various artists - No Alternative

If the blog count is to be believed, this is post #750. Pretty good for an amateur writer with a stuttering memory and shit taste in music. It's a real testament to my "never-say-die, never-think-things-through, never-consider-irrelevance" attitude towards life.

"No Alternative" came out shortly after my 16th birthday and is one of the few Columbia House acquisitions I've managed to hold onto. And why not? It was the first Red Hot benefit I picked up, initially for the Beastie Boys and Nirvana tracks. It was my introduction to Pavement, Uncle Tupelo, and Patti Smith. Who could ever part with such a momentous, influential release?

Now that it's been 30+ years that I've owned this, it's a lot easier to look back and pick up on things I missed as a teenager. I didn't know that Urge Overkill were covering Marvin Gaye or that the Goo Goo Dolls were covering the Stones. I definitely didn't know that Bob Mould was the guy from Sugar back then (I did know that Sugar were good). I hadn't yet put together that the leader of the Breeders used to be married to John Murphy. And could I have imagined that the guy from Buffalo Tom would eventually become a troubadour in Stars Hollow, or that I'd eventually associate the singer of Smashing Pumpkins more with pro wrestling than alt.rock? I know all these things and more now, the benefit of age and a greatly expanded record collection. To think: maybe if I hadn't snagged this one all that time ago, I might not have taken this path to the music and the misery.  And you wouldn't have gotten two hundred ninety-two words about it all.

(Postscript: the Sarah McLachlan and Matthew Sweet tracks still swing.)

Discogs

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various artists - Revolver Reloaded: Mojo Presents Their 1966 Masterpiece In Full

I'm no one's idea of a Beatles fan. As I've stated before, I've always chosen the Stones over the Beatles, and I prefer other artist's performances of any Harrison, Lennon, McCartney, and/or Starkey penned songs. But "Revolver" is the only Beatles record I've ever held onto, so when I got a chance to pick this up 20-year-old freebie at a reasonable cost, I figured, "Eh, I've written about worse." The things one does to continue a theme...

This particular Mojo collection pulls together covers of all fourteen songs from the Beatles' 1966 transitional record, along with a version of "Rain", which appeared as the B-side of "Paperback Writer". The highlights for me are Jim Reid's cover of "And Your Bird Can Sing", Lampshade covering "Good Day Sunshine", and Seattle's own Green Pajamas' version of "Got To Get You Into My Life". The rest is just fine; I cannot beat the drum on behalf of a body of work that, even now, I can at best tolerate. If nothing else, it just makes me want to listen to Pol Inate's Kinks kompilation he posted up last month. Now THAT's a body of work you could set your clock to.

Discogs

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Jackie Gleason – And Awaaay We Go!

I'm going to skip over SCP-9705 for now, due in great part to not knowing where the hell the actual CD is. Instead, let's proceed with a survey of Sheriff Buford T. Justice's character work. "And Awaaay We Go!" is an expanded edition of Jackie Gleason's 1954 10" release on Capitol. In addition to the eight tracks on that original release, the Scamp reissue adds theme music from both "The Jackie Gleason Show" and "The Honeymooners", a pair of recitations as Reginald Van Gleason III, and a few other incidental tracks. It adds up to an interesting artifact from the early days of television, as well as one of the few ways to experience Gleason's character work aurally. It is very, very cool.

Discogs

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various artists - San Diego Is Burning

The timing of this posting is apt, because for 10 years of my life, I would spend this specific week in San Diego, working Nerd Prom. They may call it San Diego ComicCon, the official name might be ComicCon International, but, for a decade, I would fly in from the East Coast to meet with vendors and licensors, talk toys, and dream of sneaking out to the Casbah for a few hours while the rest of the city focused on superheroes. They were heady days, full of far too much drinking, far too little sleep, occasional brushes with A-listers and D-listers, and very mild weather. I always thought it would be a nice place to live if I weren't already embedded in Baltimore, then Atlanta, then Seattle.

I snagged this one as part of a larger Discogs order last year, a dollar CD featuring the Black Heart Procession, the Dropscience, and Kill Me Tomorrow. Like so many other scene surveys, the results can be hit or miss. I'm always going to give No Knife a spin, and the Champagne Kiss track was a very pleasant surprise upon first listen. This mostly reminds me of my years of an upperclassman in college, booking shows in between student films and term papers. I see a name like Goodbye Blue Monday and it immediately triggers a memory of an email from a booking agent, looking for a mid-week opening on a bill. The memory, like this comp, is not unpleasant.

Discogs

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various artists - Mojo Presents: Move On Up (A Modernist Compendium)

It's a lovely mod revival giveaway, bookended by a pair of Jam cuts and named after a Curtis Mayfield song. The cover evokes "Sound Affects", and all this is missing is a Geno Washington contribution and a set of keys to your own Vespa. Spinning this one makes me miss the late night dance parties at Lithuanian Hall in West Baltimore, the homebrew hooch we'd do shots of, smoking cigarettes, dressing sharp, and greasy eggs the next morning. Move on up, indeed.

Discogs

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Walter Wanderly - Samba Swing!

The Brazilian pianist/organist Walter Wanderley had already released something like 15 full-lengths by the time he moved to the United States and signed to Verve Records in 1965. Verve would release another six records by Wanderley between 1966 and 1968, including a co-headlining slot with Astrid Gilberto, a collaboration with guitarist Luiz Henrique, and a small group LP as the Walter Wanderley Trio. The other three records were produced by Creed Taylor, engineered by Rudy Van Gelder, and make up catalog number SCP 9704-2, third in the list of Scamp releases.

And it's fan-freakin'-tastic. I've always had a soft spot for any bossa nova, MPB, or samba music, all of which still turn up reliably in thrift store bins. But I've never come across any of these Wanderley Verve releases, so it's nice to have some of it compiled here. It's not quite on the level of "Getz/Gilberto", but its material deserves to be reissued more than once every 30 years. Bonus notes: this reissue was digitally mastered by Alan Douches, who's engineered an MFT of hardcore, metal, emo, and punk over the years.

Discogs

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various artists - Let Them Eat Jellybeans!

This is the rare instance on this blog where what I'm sharing isn't a first generation copy from my personal archive. In this case, this is a rip of the CD-R that came complimentary with a copy of the 1981 Italian cassette I bought five years ago. A good dude, that anonymous punk who sold me one of the finest punk/HC comps of all time.

Everything about this has a timeless quality. The Fallout Productions cover. The Ed Colver photography. The fold-out poster. The roster of first wave North American punk, hardcore, and outsider music. More so than "Flex Your Head" or "Chunks" or "Charred Remains" or "Meathouse", this is representative of the true width of the scene in 1981. It served as a calling card for the bands contained within as they had reached a point to escape the New World and bring American sounds to Europe and beyond.

This record is 45 years old. It's been out of print nearly 40 years. And yet it's a still a pretty incredible listen, whether you're blasting Flipper, the Subhumans, Half Japanese, or the Offs. The variety present along with the artwork make it a stone cold classic.

Discogs

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various artists - Dylan's Scene: The Sound Of Greenwich Village

This is one of those good "liner notes"-type compilations where you're guaranteed to learn about your favorite artist's favorite artists. In this case, the boundary is the coffeehouses of early 60s New York City. And only a fool would try to deny the greatness of the artists contained herein. John Lee Hooker and Allen Ginsberg bookend this 15-track CD. In between, there's a range of primal music, from various blues artists to English traditional music to folk music of the day. I'll always co-sign Karen Dalton and Pete Seeger, and encourage you to look into Bukka White's catalog if you've not done so before.

It's hot outside. Slap this on and find yourself a shady spot to just listen this week.

Discogs

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The Exotic Sounds Of Martin Denny – Afro-Desia

Scamp's second release (catalog number, that is) in the fall of 1995 was a reissue of Martin Denny's 1959 exotica classic "Afro-Desia". It was his sixth record for Liberty Records, and his third of four releases in 1959. It was also the first time Denny had moved away from Polynesian/tiki sounds and into something more...primal?

Is this authentic African music? Hell no. Can you reconcile that this, in spite of a cultural insensitivity that really slaps you in the face in 2026, is an incredible record? Gee, I hope so. If you're unable to find a vinyl copy in your local thrift store, I recommend snagging a copy from Portland's Jackpot Records. They reissued this a few years back, and it comes on a lovely shade of orange wax.

Discogs

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various artists - Swami Sound System Vol. 1: 2003 Sales Conference

There are certain labels that I can always count on to deliver the goods. Dischord, 625 Thrashcore, 12XU; if their logo is on the record, it's probably going to be a good one. Swami also makes that list for me. This 2003 sampler isn't a sampler so much as a gathering of unreleased (at that time) tracks from a range of the San Diego label's groups. You get three servings of John Reis, with songs from RFTC, Hot Snakes, and the Sultans. Dan Sartain, who I've written about before here, makes his Swami debut. The Loincloth track is a big ol' ball-swingin' metal instrumental that'll scare your mama. And Sonny Vincent, whether with Testors or by himself, was a revelation in 2003, and a must-listen in 2026. Discogs sez there's a vinyl version of this, but I don't recall ever seeing it stocked. I've been tooling around with the windows down, blasting this one, and even the kids with the wrapped Geo Metros agree; this is a good'un.

Discogs

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various artists - Experienced! Mojo Presents 15 Tracks Inspired By The Jimi Hendrix Experience

Jimi Hendrix was my first musical obsession. Sure, there was the "Top Gun" soundtrack, populated with Giorgio Moroder and Harold Faltermeyer production, which came along with my first boombox on my 10th birthday. But the purple cover of "The Essential Jimi Hendrix" became burned into my mind when I first found it in my parents' record collection. I remember taking my grass cutting money to buy blank tapes so I could dub a copy to listen to while mowing more grass. I started finding Hendrix's posthumous Reprise releases, produced with overdubbing by Alan Douglas, in cutout bins. So I snapped them up. In 1993, MCA gained the catalog in the States, bringing a fresh remastering to the three Jimi Hendrix Experience releases and adding a compilation of remastered "Blues" tracks. I gobbled them all up. By then, my musical pallet had grown. But by the time I moved to Baltimore in 1994, I was still a sucker for any out of print Hendrix record I could lay paws on.

We all move on, right? Every piece of vinyl, every tape on Reprise, they've all gone to other collections over the years. I just didn't care as much any more, and there were hardcore shows to go to and girls to impress and Impulse reissues to track down. But Jimi, the god who made magic with a guitar, who said he hailed from Seattle but more like came from Neptune; he still had a place in my heart. So that's why this Mojo Monday is for "Experienced!" You get Hendrix-penned songs, his contemporaries (the John McLaughlin track is a favorite), and his descendents, all in one package.

Discogs

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