Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-30-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 30 birthdays of Derek and the Dominos/Cream’s Eric Clapton, Tracy Chapman, Norah Jones, MC Hammer, Celine Dion, Lene Lovich, Frankie Laine, Duck Sauce’s A-Trak, and Justin Moore; and the March 31 birthdays of AC/DC’s Angus Young, Fleet Foxes’ Robin Pecknold, The Antlers’ Peter Silberman, Lefty Frizzell, Survivor’s Dave Bickler, Herb Alpert, Focus’s Thijs Van Leer, Bleachers’ Jack Antonoff, Ray Goodman & Brown’s Al Goodman, Richard Kiley, Mouth & MacNeal’s Willem Duyn, and Rednex’ Mary Joe.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-28-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 28 birthdays of Lady Gaga, Salt, EMF’s James Atkin, The Bad Plus’s Orrin Evans, Oran “Juice” Jones, J-Kwon, Lost Boyz’ Mr. Cheeks, and Ian Gomm; and the March 29 birthdays of Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell, Toto’s Bobby Kimball, The Guess Who’s Chad Allan, Thunderclap Newman’s Speedy Kane, Terry Jacks, Japanese Breakfast’s Michelle Zauner, The Waitresses’ Patty Donahue, Monty Python’s Eric Idle, Vangelis, The Brecker Brothers’ Michael Brecker, and Astrud Gilberto.

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3-26-22: Your (Almost) Daily Playlist

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 26 birthdays of The Supremes’ Diana Ross, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes’ Teddy Pendergrass, 808 State’s Martin Price, The Pharcyde’s Fatlip, The Five Satins’ Fred Parris, Rufus Thomas, Vicki Lawrence, Communards’ Richard Coles, Leonard Nimoy, and Silver’s John Batdorf; and the March 27 birthdays of Mariah Carey, The Associates’ Billy Mackenzie, The Black Eyed Peas’ Fergie, and Skee-Lo.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-25-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 24 birthdays of Can’s Holger Czukay, Nick Lowe, Nena, Don Covay, and Billy Stewart; and the March 25 birthdays of Aretha Franklin, Elton John, Johnny Burnette, Juvenile, All Saints’ Melanie Blatt, Big Sean, Robbie Fulks, Ryan Lewis, Richard O’Brien, Finley Quaye, Jeff Healey, and Cathy Dennis.

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#87: Lou Reed – New York (1989)

Throughout 2022 I’ll be counting down my 100 favorite albums, because why not. I’m up to number eighty-seven.

It was Primary Election Day in my beloved New York City. My job as the head of licensing at Jive Records, representing artists such as Britney Spears, A Tribe Called Quest and ★NSYNC, was just eight short city blocks from my apartment in Chelsea. My plan was to stop to vote on my walk to work and, if time allowed (meaning the bustling sidewalks of New York weren’t too crowded and there were no lines at the polling center), stop by Krispy Kreme to pick up a couple of their trademark glazed donuts. It was on the way and any willpower I may have had was no match for the smell of the freshly baked goods that wafted onto the street.

After showering I turned on the television to New York 1, our local news station, to get the weather report. They had a live feed from the World Trade Center. There was a plane flying very close to one of the Twin Towers. The camera stayed on the plane, while the reporter said that nobody knows what the plane is doing there. “Stupid pilot,” I thought. “How do you not see such a high building?”

My phone rang. It was my assistant. “I’m going to be a little late for work today. Something’s going on at the World Trade Center and my mom works in one of the towers. I want to make sure she’s alright and then I’ll come in.”

“Yeah, I’m watching this on TV. Just come in whenever. No problem. I’ll see you when you get there.”

Then the plane flew into the tower.

As I’m watching, another plane appears on the right side of my TV screen. It flies into the second building. What is happening? It seems like I just saw planes fly into buildings, but that can’t be. What is going on with me?

I turned off the TV and headed to the polls in a haze. I voted. I skipped the donuts. There were only four people at my office when I got there, just before 10 AM. One was my boss’ boss, and three were assistants, huddled around a cubicle outside my office, listening to the radio report of what was happening two miles south of where we were.

I turned on my computer and started to read my email. I heard the announcement that one of the towers was crumbling down.

I went numb. I found myself incapable of working. Just before 10:30 my boss’ boss stopped by my office. He saw me working (or so it appeared) without my radio on. “The second tower is falling. You can go home if you need to.”

I nodded. I couldn’t speak. I turned off my computer and headed toward home.

The ten minute walk home felt much longer. I couldn’t look up, as my home is in the direction where the towers are – were. The streets of Chelsea were dead silent. There were people walking on the sidewalk. Nobody said a word. Small crowds gathered in front of shops that set up television sets in the window. This didn’t feel like my New York, where I was born, and where I had lived the last 13 years, moving to Manhattan a couple of years after I graduated from college.

I got home, closed the door, threw myself on the bed, and lost it. I cried for my city. I cried for my assistant’s mother. I cried for the wives and children and father of my two step-brothers, who worked on Wall Street, just steps away from the World Trade Center. I cried for everyone who worked there, for everyone living in Manhattan, for the whole world.

Phone service for land lines, the only phone I had at that time, was spotty. For several hours I kept trying to reach my mother or sister to tell them I was okay. Eventually I reached my sister’s answering machine. My message consisted of a lot of sobbing and telling her that if she can get through to mom let her know I was fine.

My brother’s call made it through to me. He told me which train to take from Penn Station to meet him with his family at his in-laws house in Pennsylvania. My former co-worker Margaret’s call made it through. She told me which train to take from Grand Central Station to get to her home outside of New York City. I appreciated their offers, though at that moment, I didn’t want to leave the cocoon that was my apartment.

Later that afternoon my mom’s call got through to me. We both cried, relieved to hear each other’s voice. She told me my stepbrothers were fine – they hadn’t made it into the city yet by the time the attacks, as we learned these were, happened.

By 8 PM I was able to stop crying long enough to find something to eat. When I opened my apartment door, I saw the hallway was filled with smoke. A neighbor happened to be in the hall at that moment. He told me “There is a fire downstairs. The fire department is on the way.” Fine. Let all these things happen today. I’m already exhausted and emotionally spent. Tomorrow we will return to life as normal.

That didn’t happen. The next day, as I walked to work, I couldn’t help but notice there were no passenger cars on the street – just emergency vehicles, sirens blaring. Police cars, fire engines, ambulances. The National Guard was posted on every corner. The streets were closed off two blocks south of me; you were not allowed below 14th Street unless you could prove you lived there.

I thought going to work would take my mind off what was happening in my city and provide some semblance of normalcy. However, my co-workers didn’t come in. And the lights in the common areas were off. And our internet access was down. And the phones were not working. Rather than distract from what happened the prior day, it accentuated it. I lasted a half hour. As I walked home I noticed fliers appeared on the bus shelters and sides of buildings – “Have You Seen This Person? He was last seen at the World Trade Center.”

The night of September 12 I had dinner with my friend Jesse. Every restaurant in Chelsea – every restaurant that was open – was packed. People were celebrating. Not celebrating the attacks, but celebrating the city all of us love – its resilience, its sense of community, the way we look out for each other and have each other’s back, the way we stick together, our defiance. If it’s going to be “us” against “them,” they will not prevail. I imagine hearing of celebration on lower Manhattan on September 12 sounds odd, and I’m sure at that moment most of us didn’t process it the way I laid it out in those last few sentences, but I think we all realized our time on this planet is limited, so cherish your friends and family and celebrate life. I don’t know if that would happen in any other city, but it felt very New York, the city I still loved and had no intention of abandoning.

I went to work Thursday and Friday but again, I didn’t last long. By this time our neighborhood reeked of the smell of burning buildings and burning bodies. Every available wall space was plastered with notices about missing people. Our internet service was back at work. I received a few emails from my overseas contacts, none asking about their Britney Spears license requests, but rather asking how I was doing, if I’m alright. I was very moved by their concern.

The following Monday everybody was back at work. My assistant was there. His mom was fine. He explained that she was working at the World Trade Center a few years earlier when a bomb went off, so this time at the first sign of something unusual, she got out of the building and went home. We had a company-wide pizza party for lunch, and while my co-workers were alright, we did lose someone connected to us.

One of the artists we represented was Backstreet Boys. They were on a tour stop in Boston. One of their crew members, Daniel Lee, left the tour early to be with his wife, who was about to give birth any day. On September 11 Daniel boarded an American Airlines flight to New York. His daughter was born two days later. He never met her.

September 11, 2002. My alarm went off at 8:30 AM, and my first thought, the second the alarm went off, was “I’m alive.” I got out of the shower and turned on New York 1. They were talking about the events of one year prior. I can’t.

I switched to VH-1. They were talking to musicians about the events of the previous year. MTV, BET, same thing. I switched to MTV2. They were showing a music video by the rapper Ludacris. “Move bitch, get out the way, get out the way, bitch, get out the way. Move bitch.” That was so inappropriate, and just what I needed. It made me laugh.

And with a smile on my face, I left my home and walked the streets of my beloved New York City to my office. Move? Not this bitch. Ludicrous!

Just two years later I did move. To Los Angeles, to take a job as the Vice President of Licensing at Warner Music. Los Angeles has its good points. There’s the weather, and a cemetery that hosts outdoor movie screenings during the summer, and, uh, the weather. However, this essay is about New York and New York.

I love New York because of its convenience. One can find virtually anything at any time without having to go too far. I love how easy it is to make plans. “I’ll take the subway to you, meet you in front of your building, and we’ll go to Mary Ann’s Restaurant on the corner for delicious inexpensive Mexican food or if that’s too crowded we’ll walk a few blocks north to Bendix Diner for delicious inexpensive Thai food or eat at the Cuban place or the Italian place or the burger place or the Chinese place that are between those two.” I love that New York’s residents are effortlessly stylish. I love New York’s energy. I love New York’s liveliness. I love that though I lived alone, I didn’t feel lonely, as the city was my lover, always there for me and giving me what I wanted. I love New York’s diversity. I love how innovative New York’s is in the arts, particularly in my main passion – music, birthing hip hop and punk rock and Broadway. I love that New Yorkers are authentic and don’t sugarcoat their opinions.

I’m not alone in my love for New York. The city has been feted many times in song (and in film and in books). Lou Reed’s New York doesn’t lionize the city the way other music inspired by it does. Reed, an English major in college who studied creative writing and film, presents us with 14 vignettes that introduce the listener to original characters and paint vivid pictures of a New York that isn’t otherwise sung about. It’s a city where an abused Hispanic boy living in deplorable conditions is ignored by the city’s moneyed residents. Where Black citizens are killed by white policemen and vigilantes. Where politicians and religious leaders are taken to task for being hypocrites and bigots. Where the celebration of the West Village Halloween parade is tempered by the loss of so many of its usual celebrants to AIDS. Where abuse begets abuse. Where it’s too late to save the environment.

This isn’t Reed saying New York is a terrible place to live. To me, he wants this wonderful place to be better and more fair and feel wonderful to all of its denizens. Yes, New York had its share of problems when this album came out in 1989. It’s now 2022, and we’re still grappling with poverty, income disparity, the unjust killing of Black citizens, hypocritical bigoted politicians and religious leaders, and environment in need of saving, and a deadly virus. The cycle continues. The problems exist, no matter the city.

I love New York for all it offers. While that doesn’t make up for its troubles, it does create a balance. I love New York because it’s moving, it’s thought-provoking, it’s melodic, the musicianship is tight and on point, and Lou Reed’s singing combines anger and sincerity and passion and hope. Mostly I love New York because like the city’s residents, it’s authentic and doesn’t sugarcoat anything.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-22-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 22 birthdays of The Human League’s Susan Ann Sulley, The Yardbirds’ Keith Relf, George Benson, Angelo Badalamenti, Stephanie Mills, William Shatner, composer Stephen Sondheim, composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Mims; and the March 23 birthdays of Blur’s Damon Albarn, The Cars’ Ric Ocasek, Chaka Khan, Wet Wet Wet’s Marti Pellow, and Louisiana Red.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-21-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 20 birthdays of Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos, Lee “Scratch” Perry, Emerson Lake & Palmer’s Carl Palmer, Cold Chisel’s Ian Moss, The Elegants’ Vito Picone, The Godfathers’ Peter Coyne, Ultra Naté, Fabulous Thunderbirds’ Jimmie Vaughan, Robin Luke, and Johnnie & Joe’s Joe Rivers; and the March 21 birthdays of The Prodigy’s Maxim, Supertramp’s Roger Hodgson, Solomon Burke, Stray Cats’ Slim Jim Phantom, The Stylistics’ Russell Thompkins Jr., The House of Love’s Guy Chadwick, Son House, Mungo Jerry’s Ray Dorsett, Eddie Money, Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band’s Vivian Stanshall, Sum 41’s Deryck Whibley, Ylvis’s Bård Urheim Ylvisåker, and Richard “Dimples” Fields.

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#88: The Replacements – Pleased To Meet Me (1987)

Throughout 2022 (and at the rate I’m going, 2023) I’ll be counting down my 100 favorite albums, because why not. I’m up to number eighty-eight.

“Nightclub jitters, I take a drink before I hit the town.”

  • The Replacements, “Nightclub Jitters” from Pleased To Meet Me

I don’t understand. Why would you take a drink before you hit the town? Hitting the town implies going out drinking. Not for me, but definitely for alternative rock band The Replacements circa 1987, who ejected a member the prior year reportedly for hitting the town a bit too often. The song is called “Nightclub Jitters.” There must be alcohol at the nightclub. Why drink before you get there? To save money? That reminds me of the time shortly after I started dating Tommy H. when he wanted me to meet one of his best friends. We made plans to meet at an Italian restaurant in Greenwich Village and his friend showed up WITH A CAN OF COCA-COLA! He said he didn’t want to pay the restaurant’s prices ($1.25, for the record). Why not bring in your own store-bought pizza, too? “May I start you off with an appetizer, perhaps some bruschetta or focaccia rolls?” “No, I brought a loaf of Wonder Bread with me.” “Would you like to see a dessert menu?” “No, thank you. I have ice cream in my pocket.” “Shall I bring the check?” “Okay, but I have only $6 on me, so don’t go over that.” I was so embarrassed to be with this person. Making it worse was that he wasn’t embarrassed. Not at all. If you’re going to be such a cheapskate, in public, where you’re meeting your best friend’s new boyfriend, the very least you could do is make it clear that you hate yourself and are ashamed of your character, but nope. Not this guy, who later said to Tommy “About your boyfriend, I’m not impressed.” Not impressed with me??? Because I ordered a beverage? Because I said yes to dessert? Because I moved to a different table and told the waiter I didn’t know you? The can man and I had no more dinners together. Darn.

So, yeah. The Replacements. “I take a drink before I hit the town.” Another reason that drink bothers me is because if I have plans to hit the town, I want to hit the town. No delay. If our plan was to leave home by 10 and we’re still home at 10:01, I’m pissed, whether it’s because you’re having a drink or you misplaced your prosthetic leg. You should have looked for it earlier. That’s especially true if the plans involve going to a club – the getting there with no delay part, though I guess the looking for your prosthetic leg part, too.

Maybe it’s FOMO. That’s Fear Of Missing Out, not Friends Of My Orthodontist. It’s weird that you even thought that’s what that acronym means. I would hate to arrive at a club and learn that the deejay already played my jam.

I love to dance more than The Replacements loved to drink. I want to get to the club when the doors open and not leave the floor until closing time. First showing up at a club at peak time? I don’t understand. Come earlier and you’ll have that much more room to twist and jitterbug and loco-mote. I met Tommy (who didn’t have his tonsils out – inside reference for my fellow Replacements fans reading this) in 1989 at New York City’s LGBT Center (That’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender, not London, Great Britain Tourists. It’s weird that you even thought that’s what that acronym means.) on classic disco night, and I boogie oogie oogied till I just couldn’t boogie no more. I had gone to that party with my friend Frank, who was the head of the dance music department at Epic Records and my regular club buddy and occasional concert pal.

One Friday night in October of 1990, Frank invited me to join him to see Michel Camilo open for Michael Franks at NYC’s Beacon Theater, a venue renowned for its architecture and impeccable sound. Camilo, a jazz pianist, was signed to Epic Records and Frank got a pair of tickets from work. “We’ll watch him perform, then cut out and head to Columbia University.” Yes! On the first Friday and third Saturday of every month Columbia University hosted dances for the LGBT public. The deejays played Crystal Waters and Black Box and Deee-Lite and Madonna and all that G music. The Replacements? Nah, they never played them. We’ll get to them a bit. Like every essay that has never been written about them, you must take detours into house music and piano jazz and that thing that Michael Franks does. Speaking of…

The doors at Columbia U opened at 10 PM, so Frank and I stayed at the Beacon Theater after Michel Camilo finished his set at around 9 for some Michael Franks.

For those unfamiliar, Franks is a very mellow singer-songwriter who had a near-hit in 1976 with a song called “Popsicle Toes,” about his wife’s feet, which you may think an unusual thing to sing about, but chart hits in 1976 included “Convoy,” about trucks driving over the speed limit; “Muskrat Love,” in which a rodent named Sam proposes marriage to a rodent named Suzie while they’re doing the jitterbug; and “Disco Duck,” about a Black heavyweight prize fighter framed for a murder by a racist cop and corrupt legal system – oh, wait – that’s Bob Dylan’s 1976 hit “Hurricane.” “Disco Duck” is about a guy who goes to a club, hears disco music, and turns into a duck, so sure, write a song about your wife’s feet. It’s 1976. Anything goes. When introducing “Popsicle Toes” at his show, Franks told the story about how the ditty came into being. “It was the morning of my wife’s birthday and I had forgotten to buy a gift. The stores weren’t open yet, so I pulled out my guitar and quickly set to writing this song before she woke up. That’s why it has the lyric ‘I know today’s your birthday / And I did not buy no rose / But I wrote this song instead and I call it / “Popsicle Toes”.’” I whispered into Frank’s ear “And she said ‘I was hoping for a Longines.” For those unfamiliar, in the latter half of the 1970s the Swiss luxury watchmaker Longines launched a TV ad campaign in which one person gives another the gift of a wristwatch made by another company, to which the ingrate responds with “I was hoping for a Longines.” Say thank you! Someone just gave you a wristwatch. I don’t understand the lack of gratitude. You know what I get each year for my birthday? A book from my sister and a meal courtesy of my friend Scott, who thankfully doesn’t bring his own can of soda to the restaurant. Those are my birthday presents. Those and a couple of text messages and some greetings on my Facebook wall. A wristwatch? Ha! I’m not saying this as a complaint, though, readers, now would be a splendid time for you to bookmark my Amazon wish list. My point is to be grateful! “I was hoping for a Longines.” Yeah, and I was hoping for a twelve-bedroom mansion with a Kellan Lutz in every room. Maybe you’d get a fancy watch if you know that leaving at 10 means leaving at 10, you dickbutt. Say “thank you” and move on with your life. It’s not like this wristwatch bestower completely forgot about your birthday and tried to cover that up with some lame story about giving the gift of song. That brings us back to the Michael Franks concert and my whispering to Frank “And she said ‘I was hoping for a Longines.’” This was a well-known commercial back in the day. You may not remember it. Frank did. HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Frank’s booming laugh reverberated throughout the Beacon Theater, bouncing off the walls of the venue known for its near-perfect acoustics. Heads turned. Michael Franks stopped his story. He probably thought “I’ve been telling this story every night for the last 15 years. Finally someone appreciates it!” And with that encouragement he launched into his near hit, but Frank and I couldn’t regain our composure. When Franks got to the chorus – “Popsicle toes / Popsicle toes are always froze / Popsicle toes / You’re so brave to expose all those popsicle toes,” I knew we best get out lest we get jumped by bellicose Michael Franks fans. Two subway stops later we were at Columbia University. Goodbye “Popsicle Toes;” hello dancing feet.

So, yeah, The Replacements. I’m getting to them. I need to make one more pit stop, with a pit stop on my way to the pit stop.

While Columbia U was my venue of choice, the hot club on Saturday nights at that time was The Roxy, a huge space that served as a roller rink during the week. As the head of Dance music at a major label, Frank always got us in free.

One Saturday night, on our way to The Roxy, Frank and I made a stop to pick up a friend of his who was also going with some of their friends. We arrived at his friend’s apartment at around 10:30. We were invited in and introduced to his four friends, three of whom were sitting on the living room floor, one in the kitchen cooking. It was obvious they weren’t yet ready to head on over to The Roxy. Grrrrr. Don’t they know what time it is? Did nobody in this apartment get a wristwatch for their birthday?

Our host brought Frank and me large glasses of vodka mixed with cranberry juice. You know how I feel about taking a drink before I hit the town.

Ten minutes later our host announced “We’re going to have some Special K before we go.”

I don’t understand. Who eats cereal before going out at night? First of all, cereal is breakfast. Second of all, I want to get to the club before they play my jam!

I whispered to Frank “Must we wait for everyone to have a bowl of cereal before we leave?” HA HA HA HA HA! Frank explained to me that Special K was a drug. The K stood for ketamine, and it is frequently used as an anesthetic for horses. I was wondering why anyone would ingest a bowl of cereal before a night out dancing. A horse tranquilizer makes a lot more sense. Frank and I didn’t partake. The others did.

Finally, at a couple of minutes past midnight, it was time to go to The Roxy. It ended up being only Frank and me. The rest of the folks were too tired. We bid them adieu. The host said to me “It was a pleasure to meet you, Greg. Don’t be a stranger,” to which I mindlessly retorted “I couldn’t be any stranger.” He laughed and nodded.

So, yeah, The Replacements. In “Nightclub Jitters,” the narrator sings “They say ‘Now don’t be stranger,” soon followed by “I’d be willing to wager that it don’t matter much if we keep in touch.” I would wager the same. I don’t think the guy subdued by the horse tranquilizer actually wanted me to keep in touch, though that could just be my low self-esteem talking. He may actually like you, Greg! I relate to this narrator, his pre-town-hitting-drinking notwithstanding.

“Nightclub Jitters” is a quiet song from a band who, despite having quite a few excellent quiet songs in their catalogue, are best known for their rockin’ tracks. Pleased To Meet Me has a couple of the band’s best uptempo numbers.

There’s “Alex Chilton,” wherein The Replacements lead singer/chief songwriter Paul Westerberg pays homage to Alex Chilton, he of the bands The Box Tops and Big Star. How much does Westerberg love Chilton? Like Big Star’s album Third and Alex Chilton’s solo album Like Flies On Sherbert, Pleased To Meet Me was produced by Jim Dickinson. How much does Westerberg love Chilton? In this song, he writes/sings “I never travel too far without a little Big Star.” Every time I work on a Big Star release, and I’ve worked on a few Big Star releases, that line echoes through my head the way laughter echoes at the Beacon Theater during a Michael Franks concert. The only way Westerberg could profess his admiration more strongly would be if in the song he compared Chilton’s body parts to frozen treats.

Chilton himself plays guitar on “Can’t Hardly Wait,” the album’s closer, which became the title song for a movie I never saw that starred Jennifer Love Hewitt, who once sent me an oversize fortune cookie that I thought was anthrax. I’ll save that story for another time, as this piece is about The Replacements and their great album Pleased To Meet Me, and I like to stay focused and not stray from the main topic at hand. Alex Chilton’s biggest hit, as a member of The Box Tops, went “My baby just wrote me a letter.” The first line of “Can’t Hardly Wait” is “I’ll write you a letter tomorrow.” ARE YOU KIDDING ME? “I’ll write you a letter tomorrow.” I love that! I double love that! I muskrat love that! And the song has horns. Horns! On a track by The Replacements! LMAO! (That’s Love My Alt-rock Orchestras! I’m afraid to ask what you thought it meant.)

The other peak moment for me is another quieter song, “Skyway,” a tale of missed connections, where the narrator is walking on the street, pining for his equivalent of Kellan Lutz, who uses Minneapolis’s above-ground building-connecting system. Then one day the narrator sees Kellan on the street…from the skyway! Dammit! I hate when that happens! It makes me all agitated and anxious and worked up and wired. Someone get me a horse tranquilizer.

On Pleased To Meet Me, The Replacements’ quieter, melodic, affecting ballads were just as good as the rock numbers we already knew them capable of, and in some cases better (which is not to say that they didn’t have stellar ballads on previous releases). That I already loved this band more than I loved dancing at The Roxy and yet they were able to delightfully surprise on their fifth studio album is a testament to their greatness and the reason every article that has never been written about them refers to them as the Longines of alt-rock bands.

So, yeah, The Replacements. There’s more from them coming up on this list.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-18-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 18 birthdays of Wilson Pickett, Alice in Chains’ Jerry Cantrell, Lykke Li, Queen Latifah, Irene Cara, Black Sheep’s Dres, The Alan Parsons Project’s Eric Woolfson, Maroon 5’s Adam Levine, Vanessa Williams, and Sutton Foster; and the March 19 birthdays of The Specials’ Terry Hall, Mastodon’s Brann Dailor, UGK’s Bun B, Clarence “Frogman” Henry, The Pointer Sisters’ Ruth Pointer, People’s Choice’s Frank Brunson, and Patricia Morison.

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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 3-16-22

Today’s playlist celebrates the March 16 birthdays of Public Enemy’s Flavor Flav, Fred Neil, Heart’s Nancy Wilson, Tracy Bonham, Blu Cantrell, and Murs; and the March 17 birthdays of The Lovin’ Spoonful’s John Sebastian, Smashing Pumpkins’ Billy Corgan, Grimes, Jefferson Airplane’s Paul Kantner, Nat King Cole, The Darkness’s Justin Hawkins, Lorraine Ellison, Gene Ween, Hozier, Altered Images’ Clare Grogan, Vivian Girls’ Cassie Ramone, Nicky Jam, and Miles Kane.

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