I got my degree today! I am now officially done with college (for the second time)! I graduated Magna Cum Laude too! And if I had any respect at all for the shitty educational institution that I escaped from then I would be proud of that.

Next week I am finally getting a new computer, which means I can hook up my turntable again and start recording with ease. Can’t wait, I got a lot of shit backed up (ew, that sounded wrong) that I really want to put up here. Expect massive posts of stupid 80s shit very soon. Until then here is some not-so-stupid 80s shit to hold you over.

Jean Michel Jarre
Revolutions (Remix)
B-side to “London Kid.” Sadly lacking in laser harp.

Japan
All Tomorrow’s Parties (1983 Remix)
Deviation (Live)
Obscure Alternatives (Live)
European Son (Remix)
What a stupid band name. Even stupider, they somehow became very popular in the actual country of Japan. Berlin isn’t huge in Berlin and Kansas aren’t huge in Kansas, the Japanese must fall to pandering pretty damn easy. Anyways, these remixes and live cuts came from a 2 LP 12” single for “All Tomorrow’s Parties.”

Thomas Dolby
Hyper-Active! (Heavy Breather Subversion)
Get Out Of My Mix (Special Dance Version)
Speaking of stupid names, “Heavy Breather Subversion?” Hey man, Erasure has the market cornered on stupid remix names, don’t cramp their style. “Get Out Of My Mix” is a “megamix” that combines a shitload of Dolby songs into one giant dance mix. Sadly lacking in exclamations of “SCIENCE!” but otherwise quite good. Both of these are on the “Hyper-Active!” 12” single.

Ultravox
Dancing With Tears In My Eyes (Special Re-Mix)
One Small Day (Special Re-Mix)
According to Wikipedia “Dancing WIth Tears In My Eyes” is about Midge Ure’s fears that of nuclear plant meltdown. I’ll take their word for that. A lot of New Wave/New Romantic artists were obsessed with nuclear anhillation, maybe that’s why so many of them vanished in the 90s, without the Cold War they had nothing. These are both from the 12” single to “Dancing With Tears In My Eyes.”

No new reviews yet this week. Although keep tuned since I just listend to the best album of the year. Find out what it is next week on Soap…I mean later this week on this blog.

Oasis
(As Long As They’ve Got) Cigarettes In Hell
Let’s All Make Believe
(I Got) The Fever
Idler’s Dream
Full On
I’ve never been a huge Oasis fan but I thought Don’t Believe The Truth was a spectacular record, and I’m really looking forward to Dig Out Your Soul and plan on buying it this week. However, I got a friend who loves Oasis. Scractht that, that’s an understatement. To say she loves Oasis is like saying that I love collecting records and that I like saying “fuck.” Every band should be as lucky to have a fan as good as her. She has all of the band’s singles, collects every magazine they appear in, and has DVDs that she can’t even play since they’re region 2 and she lives in Ohio. Hardcore. Right now life is shitting on her, so this post is for her. I wanted to post some Oasis songs she didn’t have, but then I realized that I got all my Oasis songs from her, so that would be a bit impossible. Anyways, these are my favorite Oasis B-sides that didn’t appear on The Masterplan (the group’s B-side collection). The brilliant “(As Long As They Got) Cigarettes In Hell” is from the “Go Let It Out” single, as is the equally amazing “Let’s All Make Believe”; “(I Got) The Fever” is from “Stand By Me” single; Idler’s Dream is the B-side to “The Hindu Times; and “Full On” was snatched from the single for “Sunday Morning Call.”

The Smashing Pumpkins
You’re All I’ve Got Tonight
Clones (We’re All)
A Night Like This
Destination Unknown
Dreaming
In the 90s I was a huge Smashing Pumpkins fan and only a moderate Oasis fan. Funny how things change. While I’m looking forward to hearing Oasis’ new album, every time I hear that The Smashing Pumpkins have something new coming out I cringe in anticipated dread. Of course, that group that Billy is whoring out right now is nothing more than a cover band so calling them “The Smashing Pumpkins” is a bit of a joke. Still, It’s sad…I miss D’Arcy. Sigh. Remember better days with these covers that originally appeared on the “Bullet With Butterfly Wings” single on The Aeroplane Flys High box set.

All my Big Country puns are too dirty even for me.

Big Country
In A Big Country (Pure Mix)
All Of Us
I’ve been looking for this single for years and I finally got it yesterday. Much rejoicing.

P.M. Dawn
Set Adrift On Memory Bliss (Extended Version)
A Watcher’s Point Of View (Don’t ‘Cha Think) (Youth Extended Mix)
I was really into “Set Adrift…” when it first came out. That was in 1991, so I was 12 at the time, meaning that I was one really weird white kid. Listening to it now I can’t figure out why I dug it so much at the time. Maybe it was all misplaced and I really just liked Spandeu Ballet’s “True” which is what this song is based off of. These are both off of a 12” single that had cover art so horrid that it gave me a headache.

David Bowie
Stay (Live)
Word On A Wing (Live)
First thing to do whenever you go to a used CD store; make your way to the “Bs” and scope for Rykodisc re-releases of David Bowie albums. They’re easy to spot, they have a greenish tinge to them. Ryko had the Bowie catalog for about five minutes in the 90s and when they re-released his albums they did it with style, adding rare bonus tracks to all of them. They aren’t worth a fortune now, but they are a little pricey on eBay and such, however most record stores don’t know that and they mark them as if they are the regular versions. These two tracks are from the the reissue of Station To Station. I have the Rykodisc version of Scary Monsters, but for some reason the version I have on my computer is in a goofy format. I shall fix that soon.

I got shit to say tonight, but first some shameless self-promotion of my great critical analysis.

Sunfold: Toy Tugboats – This CD pissed me the fuck off. I had a hard enough time explaining why in a quick blurb review, so I’m not going to do it again here. You want to find out why I hated it so much? Read the review.

Chapters: Wife – Ian Curtis is alive and living in St. Louis?

Lykke Li: Youth Novels – My new obsessive crush of the week.

Moving on now, despite my previous rant against how much I hate it, I went to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame this weekend. It was mostly because my mom wanted to, and I’m such an awesome son that I’ll put my rock snobbery aside for her. Besides, I went there once before and had a good enough time. However, that was a while ago, sometime in the late 90s, and I expected a lot of changes at the museum end of the hall some 10 years later. I as actually looking forward to the trip. Once again high expectations let me down.

The main part of the museum barely changed at all since my last visit over a decade ago. I understand that this is all history we’re talking about, but they have to update themselves, find a new way to talk about it. They have the same movies and videos playing now that they had in 1995. The one about punk rock really got me. So much has changed in the punk world since the mid ’90s, but not there. Nothing about straight edge, emo (for good or bad), anarcho, or even riot grrl! In fact, the museum pretty much stops at 1995. Now while there hasn’t really been a paradigm-shifting movement since grunge, a lot has happened. How about some love for The White Stripes, The Strokes or the entire indie-rock movement?

You might argue that it’s too soon for those bands to be featured, but there is a section dedicated to “what’s happening now.”What’s in that section you may ask? Linkin Park’s turntable, the mask from The Offpring’s “You Wanna Hit That” video and some Paramore shit. And I almost forgot, they just added outfits worn by The Jonas Brothers! Yay! This entire section really shows just how out of touch the Hall is when it comes to new music.

The major change to the Hall from the last time that I was there was the Hall of Fame itself. Before it was a boring little room with nothing but backlit signatures of the inductees. Now, it’s a massive multimedia presentation, with three giant screens projecting interviews and footage of every single inductee. It’s a cool idea, but the execution blows. It’s a 66 minute presentation with a short six-minute intermission between showings. My mom and I came it late and planned on sticking around to catch what we missed. Well, shits to that plan, because the second the thing ended we were rudely told that everyone had to get out for the next crowd of people waiting to get in. What the fuck? You can’t enforce something like that halfway. If you don’t want people to come in late then DON’T LET THEM COME IN LATE. Actually, I was shocked that an employee came in to the theater when the show was over. Employees of any kind seem to be a commodity at the Rock Hall. Have a question? Good luck finding someone to help you.

That’s not entirely true, there are plenty of employees in the store, because that’s where they can suck the most money out of you. I don’t expect fair prices at a gift shop, but give me a fucking break. New CDs cost 18 bucks, older ones can cost even more, especially “imports.” Why the superfluous quotations? Because most of the imports were just domestically available items slapped with an import sticker and an inflated price.

And their vinyl section was ass.

But wait, there’s more. My mom has some leg issues right now, so she’s using a wheelchair to get around. Let me tell you, if you are handicapped and want to visit the Rock Hall then good luck, because apparently the Americans with Disabilities Act isn’t very rock and roll. The wheelchair curbs outside the place are a wreck and the ramp going in isn’t much better. If you can make it past those obstacles you still aren’t in the clear though, since the doors going in don’t have an automatic button (required by law). I to hold the door open while pushing my mom in. The employee watching us from a distance was a nice tough too.

Once we were in there navigating the place was a nightmare. There are two sets of elevators in hall, and neither of them go to go to all the floors. Outside each of them is a sign saying which floors the other elevator goes to, with a tiny little arrow indicating that you’re at the wrong one. That’s some good design, it’s like they’re daring you to enjoy yourself with shit like that.

Remember how I was so upset about great bands that weren’t in the hall of fame? Forget it. Those artists are too good for that place.

Bloc Party – Luno (Polysics Harajuku Mix)
Kaiser Chiefs – Na Na Na Na Naa (Polysics Remix)
Both of these remixes are by a Japanese group called Polysics. I’m reviewing their new album and I think I can say that they are my new favorite band in the world. They are like Devo on acid (and Japanese). Expect a gleaming review in a few weeks. The Kaiser Chiefs remix is from a Japanese exclusive EP, I don’t know where the Bloc Party one is from though.

Peter Gabriel
Big Time (Dance Mix)
Not in the hall of fame…just saying. This is a 12” mix.

Pop Will Eat Itself
Games Without Frontiers
And now a Peter Gabriel cover. I plan all this shit. I have no idea where this is from.

Quick business/self-promotion to take care of. New reviews (by me) time:

Monkey – Gorillaz do Chinese opera! Better writers than me have told me this is the best review I’ve ever written. I don’t know how that’s possible, since I don’t threaten to assault a record executive or compare emo to the holocaust, but whatever.

Hybrid: Soundsystem 01 – Great trance mix. Reviewing trance is a bitch though, since it’s nearly impossible to describe what makes “good trance” good and “bad trance” bad.

Moving on, I found something so amazing today that I had to bare with the USB recording software and Audacity’s shit editing to record it and share it with all you fine people. This will be the last post for the week, so enjoy.

Exotic Birds – L’oiseau (1986 EP)
Exotic Birds were a Cleveland-based synthpop band that are of little note, except for the fact that one of their keyboardists was Trent Reznor. Don’t download this expecting some early, pre-Pretty Hate Machine, NIN-sounding shit though. This is VERY synthpoppy, and Reznor had nothing to do with any of it. He has no songwriting credit and although he’s credited as a backup singer his recognizable howling voice is nowhere to be found. Much like how NIN is Trent Reznor, Exotic Birds were Andrew Kubiszewski, the lead singer/guitarist/percussionist/programmer/xylophone player. They’re not a bad band, but they are very much a product of their time. If you like The Thompson Twins or Flock Of Seagulls you’ll probably dig on this. L’oiseau was the group’s second release, but the only one that Trent Reznor is on. I’m sure the fact that they continued on without him is what sent him into a rage-filled depression that we all hear so clearly on classic NIN tracks like “Burn” and “Head Like A Hole.”

The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame announced this year’s nominees yesterday. There are some noteworthy bands up for it this year, and hopefully the ones that really deserve it (Run DMC, IGGY FUCKING POP) will get in. But even if they do the Rock Hall has a lot of ground to make up in order to become remotely respectable again. Don’t forget, these asshole let The Bee Gees and The Eagles in. Those two bands probably did more to destroy rock and roll than any other band in recent memory. Sure, there are plenty of great bands in the rock hall that deserve to be there, but there are dozens of bands that are not, and even more great acts deserving of the recognition have been snubbed.

Here are some of the more notable exclusions, in alphabetical order:

ABBA
B-52s
Bad Brains
Beastie Boys
Buzzcocks
The Cars
The Cure
Dead Kennedys
Depeche Mode
Devo
Journey
Joy Division
Kraftwerk
Ministry
Motorhead
New Order
New York Dolls
The Replacements
Roxy Music
Rush
Stevie Ray Vaughn
Slayer
Sonic Youth
The Smiths
XTC

Okay, if you can prove to me that The Bee Gees did more for rock music than any these bands then congratulations, you are the greatest debater of all time.

David Bowie
Real Cool World (Radio Remix)
Real Cool World (Cool Dub Thing #1)
Real Cool World (12″ Club Mix)
Real Cool World (Cool Dub Overture)
Real Cool World (Cool Dub Thing #2)
I think I’ve made it abundantly clear that I enjoy stupid shit, especially when it comes to movies. I mean, I own Tank Girl (on LaserDisc!) so my film critic validity is pretty strained. That being said, even I think Cool World is a shit movie. It definitely Ralph Bashki’s worst movie (and that’s saying something) although it’s not his fault. Rumor has it that the script was changed without his permission and that he didn’t know about it until shooting began. I’m willing to believe him since it’s far less fucked up than his other films, even with the cartoon/human boning scene. However, the soundtrack is actually totally bitching. It has Moby (way before it was cool to have Moby in a soundtrack) Ministry, Brian Eno, Electronic and even a mix of Sex On Wheelz by My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult. It also has this surprisingly good song by David Bowie, who was just finally starting to dig himself out of his 80s creative nadir. These versions of that track came from a CD single I bought from a video store that no longer exists.

Love Chid Orchestra
Whole Lotta Love
Experiment 4
Bump And Grind
Anyone know anything about these guys? I bought this 12” single because of the sublimely odd cover of “Whole Lotta Love” and while the other two tracks aren’t great – I’ve heard far worse. According the back cover this was produced by “P. Gabriel” but I really doubt it’s Peter. This came out in 1989 and that year he was too busy being totally awesome and playing with stop-motion chickens. How do I know these guys are obscure? As of this writing they have nine plays on Last.fm, and they’re all by me.

Black Sabbath (Heaven And Hell)
The Devil Cried
Shadow Of The Wind
Ear In The Wall
That’s right bitches. I AM fucking metal. Last month I saw Heaven And Hell live and was struck awe by the power of the Dio. Since then I’ve given their back cataloge a second chance and I have to say that I’ve been pleasantly surprised. As a kid I didn’t like post-Ozzy Sabbath because of the lack of Ozzyness, but listening to them now I have to admit that they are all pretty damn good records (even Dehumanizer). A few weeks ago Rhino released The Rules Of Hell, a box set claiming to have all of Heaven And Hell’s released material. Great in theory, but they are lying to you. The Rules Of Hell does not have these three new tracks that were included on The Dio Years compilation. Download these, buy the box set and Dio your brains out.

Hurray for my commentors making my job much easier! Almost all of tonight selections were given to me by you very awesome people who have graced my very awesome blog with your very awesome presence. If any of you want to get hooked up with something, email me. This only applies to anyone who has sent me something, and you have to prove that you’re you. I ain’t hooking up everyone. I don’t want to tear down my carefully constructed prick persona.

Billy Idol
Heroin (A Drug Called Horse Mix)
Heroin (Ionizer mix)
Not a single one of you rat bastards commented on the remixes I posted. Not even the two of you who asked so politely for them. You all are on my shitlist. That being said, here are even more remixes of the perpetually underrated cover of the Velvet Underground classic thanks to my Dutch friend Fred. I don’t know where they came from originally though.

DJ Z-Trip and Murs
Fat Bottom Remix
Rock You/Hard Work
Kiss Remix (Prince And The Revolution Will Not Be Televised)
Okay these are really stupid, even compared to other mash-ups, they’re totally retarded. However, they also totally rock. Mad props to Dave The Ox. These are all from the same bootleg promo single.

Toadies
Cars
The Toadies are one of my favorite bands from the 90s. Gary Numan is one of my favorite artists from the 80s. Combine them for massive amounts of win. Thomas is my new hero. However, he didn’t tell me where this track originally came from, anyone got info?

But, wait I have more Toadies covers! And this is shit from my own collection. I’m done living off the scraps of others.

Auf Wiedersehen
Ghoulies Get Together
Auf Wiedersehen is a cover of an awesomely intense, almost punk rock, Cheap Trick song. It’s one of my favorite songs by the group. Source: Unknown. I do know where Ghoulies Get Together is from though. It’s the track that the Toadies contributed to the most excellent Saturday Morning Cartoons’ Greatest Hits, which also included The Ramones version of the Spider-man theme and The Butthole Surfers rocking Underdog. Pick that baby up if you can, it’s amazing.

I bought Rock Band 2 over the weekend. Get it. It’s awesome. If you haven’t checked out the setlist for it, let me tell you, it’s amazing. I expected to see classics like “Anyway You Want It” and “Aqualung” but there are some inclusions that are just totally awesome. “Painkiller” bitches! Heaviest song ever and a blast to play, even if I can’t sing it for shit. I was also stoked to see “Rebel Girl” in there. Hopefully some 12 year old girl will hear it when trying to unlock Paramore and it’ll blow her fucking mind.

Some artists surprised me too. I usually hate hate hate hate Panic At The Disco, but “Five In The Afternoon” is actually a great pop song. I’ve been comparing them to Tokio Hotel – I owe them an apology. I also was shocked to find that I kind of like “Gave It All” by Rise Against.

However, there is one caveat. One thing that holds back the game from being absolutely perfect.

“Visions” by Abnormality.

What the fuck is this bullshit? Seriously, Harmonix, I’m literally talking to you. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS BULLSHIT. This is not music, it’s a bunch of retarded twats screaming and poudning on their instruments. I would skip it if I could, but if I want to beat the “Guitar Legend” setlist I have to play it. It’s fucking impossible, and the only reason it is impossible is because it just randon notes spewed out like puke across the screen. Putting it next to “Painkiller” and Dream Theatre’s “Panic Attack” is an insult to heavy metal fans the world over. Yeah, so it’s hard, so what, that doesn’t make it worthy to be next to those classic songs, let alone ABOVE them.

The only thing harder than playing it on guitar is playing it on drums, and that’s only because the drums are complete and total shit. Seriously. Is that supposed to be a snare? Really? Fuck that. That’s not a fucking snare, it sounds like a pencil hitting a tin can. Why should I play this on drums, their fucking drummer sure as hell can’t? Of course their singer can’t sing either (and their singer is a woman by the way…wow).

So in conclusion: Fuck “Visions” and fuck Abnormality. Fuck them hard. Repeatedly. And if you want to hear good death metal with a female lead singer check out Arch Enemy.

Note: I’m not really THAT mad about this song, but after failing it for half an hour I had to vent to someone and you guys lost. Although I do honestly think that Abnormality is a god awful band that has no reason to exist on this damn planet.

Billy Idol
Heroin (Needle Park Mix)
Heroin (Nosebleed Mix)
Heroin (Overlords Mix)
Heroin (V.R. Heroin Mix)
I’m breaking my “no reposts” rule for these. I hope you’re all happy. Actually, I only posted two of these before and that was two years ago (almost to the day, eerie) and since no one read my blog then I guess it’s only fair. I have yet to meet anyone else who actually likes these tracks, so if you do enjoy them please let me know. I think they are vastly underrated.

Blondie
Rapture (K-Klassic Mix)
Rapture (Original Disco Mix)
Rapture (Guru’s Fly Party Mix)
Now why isn’t this song in Rock Band? That game needs more Blondie. These remixes are taken from a 12” single that was released in 1994. I don’t know anything else about it. The “Original Disco Mix” is not the original mix of the song, however.

Man, just when I was putting forth a concentrated effort to cheer myself up fucking Richard Wright dies. Pink Floyd got me through a musical dark patch in my life years ago. After grunge died out but before I discovered indie rock I was pretty much a classic rock/heavy metal fan exclusively (although I was oddly into Big Beat Techno as well) and Pink Floyd was my favorite band for a good five years. I own every Pink Floyd album (except The Final Cut – I hate that one) a few of their box sets/compilations and more bootlegs and rarities than you can shake a giant inflatable pig at. Wish You Were Here helped get me through my sophomore year in college, and without Animals I would have killed one of my bosses multiple times over. So, yeah, I’m bummed.

I implore everyone to check out Richard Wright’s Wet Dreams (…wait that sounds wrong), it’s a great album that has gone unnoticed for years and if there’s any good that may come from this unfortunate event it’s that this album might finally get re-released on CD. Until then I have a good-but-not-great vinyl rip here.

David Gilmour
On An Island (Live)
Take A Breath (Live)
This Heaven (Live)
In the epic Waters/Gilmour battle I’ve always been on the side of David Gilmour. Sure, he may not be as talented a lyricist as Waters, but he’s 20 times the musician that Waters could ever hope to be on his best day. I’d rather listen to About Face 50 times than Amused To Death once. On An Island was his best solo album to date, and if you haven’t picked up the live DVD of it I highly suggest doing so. He’s also releasing a live album in a few weeks, which I’ll probably be picking up (I’ll probably be getting the ultra-neato-nifty-keen limited vinyl edition which includes an entire LP of bonus tracks that won’t be on CD). These live tracks are from a sampler that I grabbed at a record convention months ago. Although I don’t have the physical copy with me to check, I’m fairly certain that Wright is performing on these tracks with Gilmour, since he was on the tour with Gilmour.

Oh, and I interviewed Gilmour over the phone once, you can read it here. Highlight of my writing career, even if the school paper never published it (but that’s an entirely different rant).

Pink Floyd
Interstellar Overdrive (Tonight Let’s All Make Love In London version)
The end all be all of psychedelic jams. I have about 80 bagillion versions of this tune and this one is the best. It’s taken from the “London 66′ 67′” single (actually mine is from a bootleg compilation, but it’s the same veresion) and this version originally appeared in the movie Tonight Lets All Make Love In London. Anyone ever actually seen that movie?

I actually was able to hook up my turntable to my laptop without it sounding like complete ass, so I might actually record some shit this week. Does anyone know how good Audacity is when it comes to recording/audio clean-up?

With my computer dying and other crap I’ve had a really shit week and while that usually means industrial music for all of you I’m going to mix it up a bit and try to stay positive (I know! I’m shocked too!) with some songs that cheer my hate-filled ass up. Incidentally, The song that actually cheers me up the most is “Fat Bottomed Girls” by Queen, but that’s neither here nor there since that’s not exactly a “lost” track. If anyone has an obscure live version of that tune or a cover of it by a band that actually matters let me know.

Carbon/Silicon
The News
Late News
This is one of the few songs/things that actually makes me hopeful for the future. Big surprise to everyone reading this blog, I’m kind of a negative fellow and I don’t have much hope for this whole “human race” thing. But if Mick Jones, the guitar player for one of the angriest punk bands of all time, and Tony James, the frontman to one of the most outrageously cynical groups of all time (Sigue Sigue Sputnik) can even joke about the human race one day getting its shit together then maybe there’s hope even for a nihilist prick like me. This version of “The News” is over six minutes long is different than the album version. “Late News” is a dub remix. I found both online somewhere I believe. I know they didn’t come from a 12”.

Feist
Mushaboom (Red Demo Version)
Feist or Regina Spektor? (Or Imogen Heap?) The immortal debate. This demo version was taken from a CD that came with The Believer.

Ron Grainer (Composer)
Doctor Who Theme (1986 Version)
Original Doctor Who Theme
Doctor Who (Cosmic Remix)
I’m not the world’s biggest Doctor Who fan, although I did occasionally watch the show when I was a kid. However, I love the theme song. It’s one of the first electronic recordings of note, and definitely the first electronic theme song to any TV show. It’s gone through a shitload of revisions over the years and two of them are included above. The one from 86 is great, but it can’t hold a candle to the original, which is still one of the greatest electronic compositions of all-time. The “Cosmic Remix” is alright, but it goes on for far too long and has too many random effects thrown in for no real reason. Don’t muck with the classics. I grabbed these from a 12” single that had a holographic cover! It’s nifty.