various artists - Monitor This! Oct/Nov 2010

I like to play this little game when I come across this, a sampler that came from the missus' collection. It's "which record did she buy to get this free with purchase?"

Was it Superchunk, whose "Majesty Shredding" was a heavy spin for the two of us in our first year dating each other? She's always been a big Ben Folds fan, with loads of CD-R filled with live sets. I bought her a copy of his 2010 collaboration with author Nick Hornby, "Lonely Avenue", during a record-buying binge before she went home for Christmas that year. It seems unlikely it would have been the recent releases by Robert Plant (not a Zep fan, as far as I know) or Jerry Lee Lewis (she's a Sun Records purist). Maybe it was KT Tunstall; she's the right age to have blasted "Suddenly I See" while bombing down I-97 to her job in Annapolis. Or perhaps Anberlin, as she listened to a fair amount of emo-adjacent alt rock for years before meeting me. A Stone Sour purchase would confuse me. A late-catalog Ice Cube CD would be very out of character for her. And Maroon 5? Well, in this house, that's grounds for a serious conversation.

With any luck, it was a Mark Ronson record that I've yet to turn up in our shared collection. Or maybe somebody just tossed it in her bag to be nice, one fall day in 2010.

Discogs

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The Exotic Sounds Of Martin Denny - Forbidden Island & Primitiva

The third Scamp reissue of Martin Denny's Liberty output was this, a two-fer of his third and fourth 1958 releases, "Forbidden Island" and "Primitiva". Everything you might love about a Martin Denny record is present. Julius Wechter plays the vibes, Sandy Warner is on both covers, and the air is heavy with the "exotic".

Fun trivia for ya: "Primitiva" the song appears on "Forbidden Island", NOT "Primitiva" the album. What do I know about sequencing?

Discogs

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various - Zetrospective

This is a late post. I blame the missus, who distracted me with her feminine wiles while I was in the middle of writing this up. Mea culpa: I am quite susceptible to feminine wiles.

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you might think that I came to ZE Records via no wave. I've written about James Chance multiple times over the years, and the tag has a number of entries associated with it (I should probably remove it from the Screamers' live set). And that's not a terrible assumption. However, it was David & Don Was's Was (Not Was) that poisoned my brain with their mutant disco and led me to the venerable downtown label. I wasn't aware of it at the time, but every time I heard the Waitresses during the holidays, or the DJ spinning "Mr. Softee" as part of a Friday, 5pm closing shift, I was getting introduced to the downtown sounds of ZE.

And this is why I like both types of music: hardcore and disco.

This two-CD set came out back in 1989, an early digital collection of ZE's five-year heyday. I'm not entirely certain where I found it, but I'm sure I plotzed when I found it on the shelf. The combined set was only available in Europe; each disc got its own release here in the States. The artwork on said 2CD set is a horrible merge of the American releases' covers; I've subbed in the vinyl cover below.

All this is to say, I got a good deal when I turned this up for a few bucks.

Discogs

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various artists - Afterglow: Rare! Live! Unreleased! (Steve Marriott/Small Faces/Humble Pie)

It seems like the great Blogger blogroll blackout of 2026 has yet to resolve itself. I haven't seen Primitive Offerings pop up in anyone's lists (or The List) in a couple weeks. So if you're stopping by: thanks for making me not feel alone in visiting the same 30 blogs every day to what new stuff they posted.

This aluminum slab came over as part of a major Mojo buy a few weeks back, and it's fair to say that it's one I won't be regularly listening to until my end of days. Steve Marriott played with some cool people, but, truth be told, I'm only really familiar with Small Faces. Humble Pie is defined for me by a reference from "Almost Famous" and by Peter Frampton's involvement. Everything else shared here is beyond the scope of what I'd typically seek out. So maybe one of you, my kind visitors, can point me in a good direction what I might dig.

Discogs

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The Exciting Sounds Of Martin Denny - Exotica I & II

We're going to skip Scamp 9711 for now, choosing instead to focus on the next number in the catalog and the record I acquired minty and new when it came out in 1996. Martin Denny's first two LPs on Liberty, "Exotica" and "Exotica Volume II", came out in 1957, and it seems like every house with a hi-fi had a copy. There's a good reason for that: these are outstanding examples of mood music, foundational exotica records. I'd argue that, in spite of their nebulous origins, these are as crucial to a record collection as James Brown's "Live At The Apollo", Nina Simone's "Pastel Blues", and Fugazi's "In On The Kill Taker". When I listen to these, I get transported through both space and time to an idealised 1960 where I'm a few inches taller, a hundred pounds lighter, with a Lucky in one hand and a Zombie in the other. Martin Denny remains incredibly cool, nearly 70 years on. There aren't a ton of records that can claim that.

Discogs

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various artists - How Many Cats Can You Fit In A Bucket?

I've never really given much thought to A&M Records as a particularly interesting label. They were the world's biggest indie label for decades, which is a weird thing to call the home of the Carpenters, Burt Bacharach, and Captain and Tennille. But they also hosted Billy Preston, Quincy Jones, Phil Ochs, the Human League, OMD, and (for a day) the Sex Pistols. There's intrigue to be found in any entity that's been around since the early 60s.

This 1994 sampler is headlined by a pair of cuts from the then-new "If I Were A Carpenter" tribute...arguably my favorite two on the initial release, and the two most enjoyable here. It also has two songs from "Superunknown", soon to be Soundgarden's biggest, most inescapable release. Meat Puppets, Love Battery, Monster Magnet, and Paw all made up recent alternative signings, while Fretblanket and Kitchens Of Distinctions were English indie bands soon to be sacrificed to a mostly-uninterested American public. Blues Traveler's contribution, "Run-Around", is tucked away in the last third of this sampler, and would break out in a big way when its video hit MTV the next year. Rounding out the roster review were songs from the Neville Brothers, L.A. Guns, and Jackopierce (JACKOPIERCE?).

I held onto this one mainly because I enjoyed the cover, which gave me real Frank Kozik feelings.

Discogs

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Primitive Offerings Official Mixtape #3 - 49 Years Later...

I'm a big believer in a birthday boy giving gifts on his big day. And thus we present the third official mixtape from Primitive Offerings LLC, selecting one song from each year I've been on the planet that means something to me. 50 tracks, 141 minutes. I also just noticed I've also been at this blog for eighteen years. 18 YEARS! Inconceivable!

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to all of us. Stay alive, friends.

Click here to download.

Tracklist

1977 - Buzzcocks, "Boredom"

1978 - The Slits, "Typical Girls"

1979 - Gang Of Four, "At Home He's A Tourist"

1980 - Bad Brains, "Pay To Cum"

1981 - Blitz, "Someone's Gonna Die"

1982 - Cock Sparrer, "Take 'Em All"

1983 - Minor Threat, "Little Friend"

1984 - Iron Maiden, "2 Minutes To Midnight"

1985 - Hüsker Dü, "Makes No Sense At All"

1986 - Shop Assistants, "I Don't Wanna Be Friends With You"

1987 - Naked Raygun, "Vanilla Blue"

1988 - Operation Ivy, "Yellin' In My Ear"

1989 - Swiz, "Sunstroke"

1990 - Neanderthal, "Brain Tourniquet"

1991 - Leatherface, "Springtime"

1992 - Screeching Weasel, "I Wanna Be A Homosexual"

1993 - Bikini Kill, "Rebel Girl"

1994 - Jawbreaker, "Outpatient"

1995 - Huggy Bear, "Erotic Bleeding"

1996 - Aus-Rotten, "The System Works For Them"

1997 - The Get Up Kids, "Burned Bridges"

1998 - The Monorchid, "A Was For Anarchy"

1999 - Vaz, "Blocked By Satellite"

2000 - Dillinger Four, "Music Is None Of My Business"

2001 - American Nightmare, "Protest Song #00"

2002 - Majority Rule, "Not In My Name"

2003 - Wrangler Brutes, "Male Fraud"

2004 - Flowers In The Attic, "The Mouth The Salt And The Open Wound"

2005 - Mission Of Burma, "Youth Of America [Live]"

2006 - The Vicious, "Alienated"

2007 - Double Dagger, "Luxury Condos For The Poor"

2008 - Jay Reatard, "Night of Broken Glass"

2009 - Daniel Striped Tiger, "The Great Bust On Antarctica"

2010 - Giuda, "Number 10"

2011 - Terrible Feelings, "Tied Up"

2012 - Ceremony, "Hysteria"

2013 - Self Defense Family, "Not Considered A Flight Risk"

2014 - Sunny Day Real Estate, "Lipton Witch"

2015 - G.L.O.S.S., "G.L.O.S.S. (We're From The Future)"

2016 - KRIMEWATCH, "New York Nightmare"

2017 - The Chats, "Smoko"

2018 - closer, "Gift Shop"

2019 - Electric Chair, "House Of Abuse"

2020 - Zulu, "Do Tha Right Thing (And Stop Frontin')"

2021 - Posy, "BUY BUY BUY"

2022 - Judy And The Jerks, "California"

2023 - Adulkt Life, "Future Cops"

2024 - Uranium Club, "Small Grey Man"

2025 - Black Eyes, "Break a Leg"

2026 - Painist, "The Implicit Coda"

various artists - CMJ Presents Certain Damage! - Volume 3

Here's a look back to when people still thought the Red Hot Chili Peppers were edgy, when college rock meant you could loop Fields of the Nephilim, Robbie Robertson, and Kool Moe Dee together, and funk metal was the next big thing. Truth be told: I kept this because I found the cover art so goddamned charming. The Cabaret Voltaire song is pretty solid, Lion was on the "The Transformers: The Movie" soundtrack, and I'm not sure I'll ever get Bryan Ferry solo. 1987 was weird for music, man.

Discogs

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various artists - Jon Savage's 50 Pre-Punk Missing Links

I'm writing this blog about 35 minutes before it's scheduled to post. It's less than an hour to Labor Day, so I don't feel particularly obliged to do much more than post something up.

One of the homies over at Twilight Zone originally posted this up last year. Apparently, very early on in Mojo's history, Jon Savage made a list of 50 songs predating punk that led to its explosion. It's a list that runs from 1969 (Gong) to 1977 (Richard Hell & Devo). And it is an incredible playlist. For every "T.V. Eye" or "Final Solution", there are songs like Lucifer's "Fuck You" or George Brigman's "Jungle Rot"; total outsider rock that never made it to the cut-out bin.

My contribution was properly dating each song, attaching the original release it appears on, and adding a genre. Put this on today and tell the boss you ain't coming in.

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John Barry - The EMI Years Volume 3 (1962-1964)

We know why we're all here. And this third volume of Scamp's John Barry collection hands it to us right off the jump. It also bookends with Barry's collaboration with Duran Duran from 1985's "A View To A Kill". In between, it's a cavalcade of Barry's film score work, with a smattering of light music/pop/easy listening/however you care to label it. If you have the first two volumes, then what are you waiting for? You know what you want.

Discogs

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various artists - No Idea & Fueled By Ramen: You Can Taste That Something "Special"

2001 was a very good year for music to come out of Gainesville. No Idea put out all-timers from Planes Mistaken for Stars, Ruination, Gunmoll, and celebrated their 100th release with a tri-colored slab of wax that I still love to pieces. Fueled By Ramen released Frodus's final full-length, EPs from Cadillac Blindside, the Impossibles, and Jersey, along with records from the Stereo and Blueline Medic. Trust me when I say these records were EVERYWHERE. And we were happy for it.

But I hadn't seen this sampler until I added a copy for less than a buck on a recent Discogs order. That blows my mind, considering how many goddamned copies of "Back To Donut!" I ended up owning over the years. The samplers I'd get with my No Idea orders were crucial not only for guiding my listening, but helping me decide what I wanted to book and travel to see over the next five years. So it seems really weird that I wouldn't have had a copy of this until 2026.

Discogs

Click here to download.