Death Valley Girls really killed it tonight in Philly. Such a weird intersection of 60s girl group sounds, reverb-drenched surf rock, and horror punk organ. Totally on point — And my wife practically bought out the merch stand!🤘
Remote
Circuits
@mlupica@c.im
mastodon 4.7.2Restless GenX-er and community radio lifer. Executive Director for WPRB. Former event director and intermittent host at WFMU. Former engineer at WNYC. WRSU and East Village Radio alum.
Presently arrayed on WPRB (NJ/Philly) Tuesdays, 7-10 AM.
Obsessed with cooking, zines, bushcraft, boring art movies, being a husband and dad, hunting for cheap vinyl, biking, wine (I'm an ex-cellar rat at NYC's City Winery), and thinking about the Fermi Paradox.
——> TAX THE RICH <——
392 Followers
279 Following
50 Posts
Joined December 03, 2022
Occupation:
WPRB Playlists:
WFMU Playlists:
My NFCB Profile:
Departing WPRB DJ just showed me this and I said “Looks more like Organ Disappointment.”
I doubt I'm the first person to make that joke.
I think of myself as a generally capable person in most social situations, but I'm sometimes reminded that my predilection for odd humor isn't always consistent with mainstream aesthetics.
Example: I had to go to the bank yesterday to deposit a few checks, and while at the service counter, the teller asked where I'd gone to high school because my name and face were familiar to him. As it turned out, we hadn't gone to school together but had played on the same little league baseball team more than (checks watch) 45 years ago.
This realization was followed by the kind of friendly smalltalk you'd expect. He asked if I still lived in town, and I told him yes but added that I'd been away in the city for 30 years, to which he beamed "but now you're back".
"Just like a rash", I quipped.
He chuckled politely, but my remark caused a look of **absolute horror** to spread across the face of his co-worker, who had been observing this mini-reunion with amusement.
The baseball acquaintance and I shook hands regardless, and I made my way to the exit. Glancing back on my way out the door, his colleague's face was still contorted, and she was shaking her head with residual disgust as though I had just insulted her family.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I don’t see anywhere near as much live music as I did when I was younger, but I was taken aback by how completely dreadful the between-band music was at last night‘s Death Valley Girls show. As in, 80s power ballads by Chicago and Heart. I’m old enough to remember when shows actually had a decent DJ spinning records between bands. In the 90s, that seemed to fade out in favor of whatever CDs the soundman had handy in the booth (soon to be replaced by iPods.)
So is total dreck between bands the new normal? Has science proven that bland, 80s pop music somehow boosts alcohol sales? Why aren’t the DJs at the local college radio station asking if they can spin records in between bands?
I know, I know… I’m yelling at clouds again.😕
HE IS RISEN. And by that, I mean I dragged my ass out of bed before the chickens were awake to spin up three hours of freeform radio on WPRB. Philly and the middle/southern bits of Jersey at 103.3 FM. Everywhere else at wprb.com
7 - 10 AM.
Listen online or follow along and chat with other rarely-do-wells here: https://playlists.wprb.com/WPRB/pl/22739565/Circuits?layout=1
Not-so-guilty-pleasure vinyl conquest: newly-pressed edition of Monster Magnet's "Superjudge" LP, which seriously fried my brain when it first dropped in 1993. If you believe that Mudhoney merged the chaos of Black Flag with Stooges and Blue Cheer influences, it's not much of a stretch to see how Monster Magnet paired Sabbathoid riffing with Hawkwind, Budgie, and Jersey hesher vibes.
Singer/guitarist Dave Wyndorf was at his cosmic soothsaying best on this record, which earned mostly tepid praise for seeming too metal for the ascending grunge phenomenon. Nevertheless, a cassette promo copy (the label sent a box of them to WPRB) was a constant presence in the dash-mounted tapedeck of my car that summer, providing endless soundtracking to the kind of determined aimlessness that defined my early 20s.
“Spine of God” (their debut album) was cool, but harder to immediately lock in with. 1995’s “Dopes to Infinity” broke them into the mainstream with the dirtbag boogiefuck single “Negasonic Teenage Warhead”, but I’d moved on to other things by then. Still hailed as a big influence on the modern stoner rock scene, “Superjudge” is where they got it all perfect.
Took The Teenager to see Finn Wolfhard at Union Transfer last night (her request.) Despite the immediate skepticism I have for any band with a TV celebrity at its core, the kid has chops and merges worthy beta male influences (Chris Bell, Paul Westerberg) with “Damn the Torpedoes”-era Tom Petty and a Faces-like smirk. (A point driven home by the on-point cover of “Ooh La La.”)
The largely Gen-Z crowd was extremely earnest, which was to be expected, but I think my wife and I liked it more than the many confused-looking parents we joined in the balcony for the back half of the set.
The show was sold out, but there was **no** line at the bar all night.
My wife and I went out the other night, sat at the bar of a semi-bougie diner, had a couple of drinks, and split two appetizers. Nice, quick date night while our daughter was out with friends.
Then this morning, I answer the phone and it’s some company the restaurant has hired to follow up with patrons and seek comment upon their “dining experience”.
What bullshit. I should’ve said: “Mah dude, I had two IPAs, my wife had two Cosmos, and we shared a flatbread with a side of wings. Everything was great until you called and bothered me about it.”
Louder for the people in the back: NOT EVERYTHING IS AN EXPERIENCE. ALL TRANSACTIONS ARE NOT DATA POINTS. YOU CAN AND SHOULD TELL THESE PEOPLE TO FUCK RIGHT OFF.
Overheard an idiot in Home Depot this morning talking about nanobots the government puts into the water supply, how microwaves are mind control weapons, and how vaccines have killed more people than any disease.
In better news, my tub faucet is still broken.
Heard a song by Joy Division this morning and was reminded of this 8 year old video. A+ internet humor. https://youtu.be/8-KvyKNSV7U
30ish years ago, I used to get my hair cut at a place in Hoboken. It was primarily staffed by gum-snapping Puerto Rican girls who seemed amused by me. Or at least, they were observant of the difference between me and the usual Hoboken yuppie-types.
The girl who often cut my hair was named after a well known line of beauty products, had ornately painted fingernails, and frequently complained about her boyfriend to me. I had a small crush on her.
On several occasions, a particular Hoboken cop would make a big show of coming into the shop, greeting all the girls by name, and striding past the waiting customers to take one of the vacant barber chairs. Whenever this happened, there was a noticeable change in the room. Typically lively with bilingual banter, conversation would become stifled, with the sound of the local dance music radio station being the only thing breaking the silence. Backs would stiffen. Knowing gazes were exchanged amongst the staff. It was weird.
I eventually figured out this cop made it his business to enter the shop several times a week, sit in a chair, and demand that one of the girls BRUSH HIS HAIR, which he kept in a style similar to David Hasselhoff.
He never said thank you. He never paid. I don’t think he even tipped. He just sat there, having his hair brushed, smiling at his reflection in the mirror.
What a creep.
50 bucks says you're up early and could use some freeform radio to kick the day into motion. Meet me over here:
https://playlists.wprb.com/WPRB/pl/22809897/Circuits?layout=1
from 7-10 AM, or at 103.3 FM if you're in the Philly/Central Jerz zone.
Rolling up to a red light with the car windows down while blasting "I Know What Boys Like" by the Waitresses is the best way to meet new people in your neighborhood.
Imagine if every job had the once-a year freedom afforded by the Simpsons’ “Treehouses of Horror”.
Whenever people ask me why I started working in community radio, I always say: "The money, drugs, and sex".
Replying to
@shotgunseamstress@counterforce.social @imp3tuz@mastodon.gamedev.place Oh my god, this song was THE JAM the summer I started skating. Haven't heard it in a zillion years. Thanks!
Did quite a bit of outside work today, including raking out the chicken yard, digging up a dead rose bush, laying a few bags of mulch, and gathering up about twelve zillion of those spiky Sweetgum pods that gather on the bedroom side of the house. (Making it a perilous and extremely painful place to walk around barefoot in the summer.)
I also reoriented the patio stones surrounding the Japanese Maple tree, which had become kind of a mess from years of ground freezing and thawing. Doing so revealed quite a few earthworms, which I either fed to the chickens or handed to my daughter, who was (rather reluctantly) helping. Glad to see that even in the throes of late teenage preciousness, the kid can still handle worms like a champ. As she wandered off across the yard looking down at the squirming population in her hand, I believe I overheard her naming them.
Today I learned there is a color called ZOMP.
I just narrated an FTP upload in the style of an overexcited horseracing announcer because the two files were the same size and were uploading at approximately the same speed.
I am alone in my office right now. This was done for no one's amusement other than my own. I think I need to take a day off.
(But for anyone who was placing bets, it was neck-and-neck between gr260412.mp3 and nv260413.mp3 until the last twenty seconds, when nv260413.mp3 broke into the lead and crossed the finish line a full 4 seconds ahead of gr260412.mp3. What a race.)
Replying to
Funny aside: Many years ago, a friend told me how her boyfriend would consistently mix up the names Rick Steves with Rick James, leading to hilarious comments from him when making travel plans. ("Let's see what Rick James has to say about Amsterdam", etc.)
A trio of some favorite records from the last year picked up this week: Prolapse, Mark Stewart, and the New Eves. Anglophile? Who you callin' Anglophile??!
https://prolapse2.bandcamp.com/album/i-wonder-when-they-re-going-to-destroy-your-face
https://markstewartmusic.bandcamp.com/album/the-fateful-symmetry
RE: @openculture@toot.community
One of my favorite things to do at any screening of Un Chien Andalou is to look back at the audience during THE scene which that film is most famous for. There's just no better way to witness an entire room full of people recoil in total horror at the exact same moment.
I stopped at a local record shop while on my lunch break today, and while flipping through the bins, a guy in another aisle was speaking VERY LOUDLY into his cellphone.
I tried tuning him out, but he had one of those voices that cuts through sheet metal, so I gave up after a few minutes and just started listening to him.
This guy was a walking caricature of the Jim Morrison superfan famously lampooned by Bruce McCulloch in "Kids in the Hall". The conversation he was having was with someone whom I quickly gathered was a fellow member of his Doors tribute band. But he spoke not like he was addressing a bandmate, but rather like a timeshare salesman who was armed only with details from the Doors' Wikipedia page.
He spoke loudly and authoritatively of Doors-related trivia, of unofficial bootleg recordings which he was gifted and worthy enough to have in his collection, and of how the subtleties and nuances of said recordings could influence and inform their cover band's upcoming gigs. He mentioned several venues I'd never heard of, and which I made mental notes to never visit.
He maligned other Doors tribute acts as "jokers" and "lightweights". He mused upon possible improvements they might make to their band's liquid light show. And he studded these pronouncements with periodic lines that seem lifted from motivational speaker presentations.
It was utterly dreadful -- like having Vogon poetry spat at you -- and yet it was somehow fascinating. Interestingly, there's no way this guy was old enough to have seen the Doors perform live -- I suspect he was a few years younger than me, but appeared older due to a variety of poor health and personal hygiene choices.
He also bellowed the entirety of this mobile phone soliloquy while mindlessly flipping through the K-Pop CD section.
https://youtu.be/ZAvYUbtB3ro
DJ on WPRB played DI, Angry Samoans, and JFA all in one set and I can only assume she is subtooting me a request to rob a liquor store and go skateboarding this weekend.
I just scrolled past a photo of someone’s Pop Tart and at first thought it was another Angine de Poitrine post.
Pollen apocalypse is definitely here because I’m pretty sure my powder-snot-green car was blue when I bought it.
This is definitely not the record I anticipated finding on a random lunch break wander through my local Vinyl Hut. Jimmy Scott's "Falling in Love is Wonderful" (originally from 1962 and with Ray Charles on piano) is one of the most arresting vocal jazz records ever made. Out of print since forever ago, my immediate association with it is actually the 2001 CD reissue on Rhino, which was gifted to WFMU's Stork at the time of its release as part of a going-away care package for him when he moved overseas. (In and of itself, an extremely memorable night at an old school Chinese banquet hall in Jersey City, the highlight of which was a mildly sozzled Pseu Braun drawing a giant dick on an overhead projected map of Europe while roasting the guest of honor.)
The album cover is definitely kinda weird, and that font looks like it would be more at home on a James Bond movie title screen, but whatever. Delighted to find this new vinyl re-up for five bucks less than what most new records cost these days.
Finally listening to this wild record by Canadian experimental band New Age Doom, with guest vocals from the certifiably unhinged HR. It's pretty unsettling -- musically a bit like Oxbow at times, but driven in an even more headspinning direction with the erstwhile Bad Brains vocalist at the wheel. Orchestral dub elements and free jazz sax skronk fill in around the edges, but the core of the record is built around the utterly thundering rhythm section (complimented by members of Quicksand, Pussy Riot, and the keyboard player from David Bowie's BLACKSTAR record.) You bet I ordered a copy, though their Bandcamp page claims there are only a few dozen left, so move fast if you want one.
As is the annual Easter tradition in this house, my wife and I spent last night searching online for weird/obscure versions of songs from the Andrew Lloyd Webber / Tim Rice musical "Jesus Christ Superstar". This Russian version of "King Herrod's Song" from 1976 has it all: crossdressing, folk dancing, chickens, dogs, and a risqué scene in which a guy vaguely resembling Ray Liotta (had he been kicked in the head by a horse) buries his face in a young woman's cleveage. As my wife remarked, it's sort of like watching Russian Benny Hill set to a mutilated version of one of the best songs from JCS.
Probably only for the lionhearted, but... ummm, he is risen, I guess.
I’m eating breakfast at a Jersey diner before going to work, and after ordering my omelette (egg whites, veggies, rye toast), the waitress said: “You got it, dude”.
This feels like an unfortunate departure from the usual Jersey diner waitress reply: “Comin’ right up, hon”.
Replying to
@qburns At an industry conference years ago, a Music Director I used to work with was asked what she liked best about her job. Her (five star) response was: "The tyranny".
A microwaved sweet potato with chili crisp is the best cheap/healthy lunch I’ve ever come up with.
The eternal reflection of string lights on my TV screen.
I'm now fully convinced the New Eves are one of the best bands going. As tired as early 80s post-punk influences feel today, the New Eves clear admiration for the Raincoats doesn't stop them from sounding totally revelatory and perfect for our present moment. Crossing jagged rhythms with a rural English folk sensibility, this live studio session argues the point pretty efficiently. I hope they tour the States. (But wouldn't be at all shocked if they don't because why would anyone come here now.)
Replying to
Just observing that 21 years later, I still have the same haircut. Also pretty sure that shirt is still in rotation. #cheap
I’m a big fan of London’s John Soane Museum and bought these signs in the gift shop on my last visit.
And they say journalism is dying!
Tell me an article is about Rutt's Hut without telling me the article is about Rutt's Hut.
Replying to
Aaaaaand.... he was great! Brown's act (almost two hours, no intermission) was equal parts comedy, history, and science, delivered with the showmanship of an experienced magician. The set was well-rehearsed, but he's also skillful enough to switch gears quickly with hilarious clapbacks for boisterous audience members. For the cooking portion of the night, he usurped what I imagine were everyone's expectations by making ant, scorpion, and grasshopper stir fry, and... trout ice cream. Glad I didn't get picked as the audience volunteer for either of those.
His tour lumbers up and down the east coast for the rest of April, with more dates expected in the fall. Highly recommended if you're a fan. https://www.altonbrownlive.com/
#cooking #altonbrown
Angels, two different flavors. Bucks County, PA.
Question for academic / professorial types: I work with college age folks, and at least a few times a year, give lectures on radio history, FCC indecency rules, programming philosophy, and related topics. As volunteers at a community radio station, these are matters they should all (presumably) be interested in.
I've been doing this for almost 15 years and I think I'm a reasonably engaging speaker. But in the last year or so, I've noticed a different energy in the room when I give these talks. Instead of feeling like I'm talking to folks who are hungry for information, the lion's share of students look absolutely **miserable** as I glance around the room from my podium. Some are staring at their phones, some are gazing off into space, and some just look like they simply can't wait to be excused.
If you work in an educational setting with 18-21 year olds, is this something you've also noticed ramping up dramatically in just the last year or so? I'm no social psychologist, but could this be indicative of a societal switch flipping, perhaps connected to the fact that present day college-age students were all in middle or high school during lockdown?
I've never doubted there could be a broad cultural impact due to lockdown, but I accept that it was a necessary step on the road to beating back the pandemic at its outset. But I also wonder if those impacts are manifesting differently as young people of diverse ages enter early adulthood. For example, Covid forced my daughter to do 4th grade online and physically isolated from her classmates. It's not hard to imagine how that might stir up consequences distinct from those of an older student who did the same for sophomore year of high school.
Ultimately, this is all just armchair conjecture coming from me. Perhaps I just need to incorporate some prop comedy into my routine to maintain their interest. 🤷♂️
I heard this song for the first time in eons last week, and this morning wanted to hear it again. Totally forgot what a cinematic triumph its accompanying video is.
Replying to
@laze I know, imagine a government actually investing in its culture. Totally alien concept in the States!
Good night for a Manhattan.
In another dimensional reality, Luther still shoots Cyrus, but the Warriors just catch a cab back to Coney.