KCRW Broadcast 16

Fanatics! I was driving back into Los Angeles, post show the other night, listening to The K (89.9 KCRW), checking out Liza’s show and I started working on tonight’s show while on the 10 East. I knew I was going to work on it all night long and braced myself for a long spell of work. I don’t know what exit it was that I was flying past where it hit me what song we HAD to start with. When I climbed into my saddle and got to work, the show came together very easily. When it happens too easily, I always figure I am not trying hard enough. So, I reconfigured, added stuff, tossed stuff, etc. and a couple of hours later, I had the first draft. I played it a couple of times on Sunday and then over the last few days, made a few adjustments and here we are. I made one late addition. A band I met at an art gallery gave me their record, they are here from Ireland, they are called We Should Be Dead. I listened to their record and thought it was pretty cool so I threw in a track. I was told by their manager that they are doing a lot of shows in LA. Sounds like they would be a good live band, really like that guitar. http://www.myspace.com/wsbd. I think this is a great mix tape! The Rolling Stones are re-mastering their catalog so I went to the record store and got Some Girls and Tattoo You to see how they sounded and they are rockin’ so I thought I would throw in some Stones into the mix and I think they sit in rather well. I can’t stand how much I like Television’s Marquee Moon album and was unable to resist throwing in the title track. I couldn’t stay away from the new Dinosaur album and had to play you some more of it, so that’s in there as well. I am forgetting how I got to Dan Deacon’s album but I got it and it’s very interesting. I am still listening to it and getting my head around what he’s doing but I figured I better report to you with it. I had been wanting to play something from Getz/Gilberto for a long time but kept forgetting. Also, I had been meaning to dig into a DVD-R of rare Sun Ra vinyl that Road Manager Ward gave me months ago and I put in one of the more interesting tracks from that. I have been thinking the song Bad America by Gun Club for some time and wanted to get that one in there as well. I have been thinking about the Gun Club a lot lately as I was asked to do some liner notes for a Gun Club release coming out in Europe later this year. I wrote the thing and sent it into the record company. They wrote back and said it was good enough to use. I will put in here so you can check it out if you like:

When Jeffrey Lee Pierce died in 1996, he disappeared back into the mists from which he came. Jeffrey is the first and only American mythological figure I have ever met. It really doesn’t matter where he was born—he wasn’t from there. Jeffrey was from the badlands, the bayous, the swamps, steaming jungles and endless deserts of his imagination. He cloaked himself in Blues imagery and lived his life as a tragic hero on a death trip, a visionary who knew that his time would soon be up. I know this sounds to be an exercise in hyperbole but Jeffrey was that far out there.

Mother Juno album, a beautiful piece of work, he asked me for advice. I gave Jeffrey pep talks about taking better care of himself. I listed all the things he had going for him. His new album was great, his band was powerful, attendance was up, it was everything a musician could want, why threaten something that he had worked so hard for? I knew he heard me but I also knew that whatever destructive forces dominated his life were ultimately the spoke to him most clearly.

Hide & Seek album in its entirety to a less than full audience. I was at the front of the stage and when they finished the song Flowing, I was barely able to clap I was so awed by what I had just heard. It was a moment I can’t forget because I remember realizing that somehow this thing that he had would slip away, underappreciated and that eventually, it would turn into that which would do him harm.