pheloniusfriar | Upbeat alt. rock and a spotlight on The Echoing Green

Here's the playlist for my fifth show (Jan. 31st, 2011)... which, predictably, also turned into a spontaneous back-to-back (2 hour long) show because the next host didn't show up yet again. This time the station manager knew he wasn't coming and was scrambling to throw on some vinyl to pass the hour, but I offered to take the show (hey, airtime, duh!). This time around, it was a very special show in a very special way: I was joined by my younger daughter Laura for her radio debut!!! She had exams the previous week and the new term didn't start until Tuesday, so she was available to come with me. She was nervous to start, but by the end was ad-libbing with ease and even had a few moments of proper "radio voice". It certainly put my rather faltering first steps onto the radio (on Dean's "Monday Morning Special Blend" info/music show) to shame — she took to it pretty much instantly, and I was incredibly impressed and proud! I guess those drama lessons and parts in plays were worth all the effort (on both our parts... I sometimes felt I had to work harder than she did when she was participating... but I was building and painting sets and she was just learning scripts, songs, dance numbers, and stage directions, heh).

As a reminder, my show is broadcast live and prone to mind-altering chaos every second Monday from 2PM to 3PM (Eastern Time) on 93.1FM in Ottawa or streaming audio on http://www.ckcufm.com/. You can always go here to find out when the next show will be (or read my playlists). Of this show, I wrote:

A little literature never hurt anyone... and so The Dollar Bin brought you poetry by the the thousand dollar William Blake. Songs, for the most part, chosen by Laura (with the exception of Fat Day and Snagglepuss, which she assumes no responsibility for).

Without further adieu, here is the playlist for The Dollar Bin:

Science Park, Disinformation, "U-Boats"
Transister, Transister, "Day #1"
The Echoing Green, Supernova, "Thief"
The Echoing Green, Supernova, "December"
The Echoing Green, Supernova, "Yesterday’s Taking Over"
Fat Day, IV, "Brown Bunny"
Snagglepuss, The Country Club Sessions, "Action Figure"
Left Front Tire, 42 Ways To Lose A Friend, "This Glass I Raise"
Llama Farmers, Dead Letter Chorus, "Jessica"
Letters To Cleo, Wholesale Meats And Fish, "Pizza Cutter"
Shampoo, We Are Shampoo, "Glimmer Globe"
Llama Farmers, El Toppo, "You Bore Me"
Sister Soleil, Soularium, "Red"
Flight 16, Flight 16, "It’s A Shame"

And then, the spontaneous playlist for Mid-Day Mind Control... We recycled a couple of "dollar bin" CDs to get the show going and then I sent Laura to the "new Canadian content" drawers to randomly pull some albums (CDs) to throw on (sometimes with seconds to spare before pressing play, it was pretty chaotic, but she rose to the challenge with humour and style). Well, things were going pretty well, until... Paddy Ryan... omfg... go to the CBC Radio 3 artist page for Paddy Ryan and play the song "Knock Me Down"... nsfw (you have been warned, heh). Needless to say, I didn't make it all the way through that song before fading and announcing that "it was a bit much". Yes, the dangers of very live radio! The next bunch of songs, randomly chosen, were absolutely awesome... I was particularly thrilled with Quartered's "Life And Light In The Form Of You", which Laura informed me (and the listeners) was a form of music called "Screemo". Awesome stuff!

Sister Soleil, Soularium, "Hit Me"
Science Park, Disinformation, "MBTA"
A Minute Away, '84, "From The Truth"
Left Front Tire, 42 To Lose A Friend, "Mental Vacation"
Paddy Ryan, Chain Link Fence, "Knock Me Down"
The Vital Side, Doppelganger, "Sink The Sky"
Le Husky, La Fuite, "La Maison Hantée"
Quartered, Walks Like A Ghost, "Life And Light In The Form Of You"
Ghostkeeper, Ghostkeeper, "Tea and Cree Talking"
High Watt Electrocutions, Desert Opuses, "Light At The Speed Of Sound"
Flight 16, Flight 16, "If All The World Hated Me"

Now, after all that, I need to go back and defend Paddy Ryan somewhat and actually highly recommend his album. I went looking for the lyrics to "the song" so I could share them with a friend and lol, but found the whole album on the CBC's web site for indie Canadian artists. It turns out that the song Laura randomly chose off a random album was the exception on the entire thing (just our luck, eh? hahaha). The rest of the album is actually some of the best new "prog rock" I've heard! The stuff sounds like early Genesis, Styx, and Max Webster. His vocals are his weak suit, but the compositions are mind-blowingly awesome! Oh, he recorded the album in his home studio and he performed all vocals, electric and acoustic guitars, bass, piano, organ, synths, flute, and tenor sax. Brilliant stuff!!! If you'd like to have a good intro, just click on the link above and play the song "Rise". Wow!

Hmmmm... guess I'll leave you with a video from this show's spotlight artist, The Echoing Green. The video is a fan "AMV" featuring clips from Final Fantasy movies, games, and ... The Passion of Christ? ... but it is mostly pretty animation/eye candy. P.S. If you have never seen the movie Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, you have missed some of the most stunning animation ever done. Even if the story makes no sense whatsoever, it's done with such style and beauty that it's a "must see"!