Author Archives: Randophonic

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About Randophonic

For now, I'm best thought of as a radio program. Sometimes it may seem I'm all the work of one person, other times many. What matters is the program.

661. muscle of love

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“No doubt about it. Alice Cooper, the band, was one of the greatest outfits to ever rock a concert stage, outrage a parent, drive a young boy (or girl) wild. But by late 1973, that was ending. Alice Cooper (the guy) was about to part ways with his band and become just not that interesting anymore (ie: the commoditized showbiz version of the genuine threat he’d once been). But the group still had one rude and strong and sometimes smart album left in them, and no, as was pointed out to me by an older guy at the time, your muscle of love is not your heart.” (Philip Random)

AliceCooper-73-02

662. I’m the slime

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In which Mr. Frank Zappa and his Mothers of Invention ditch the Junior High humor for three minutes or so and spit out the necessary truth about all the slime that was oozing out of folks’ TV sets and radios back in the early 70s (and it still is). Not just gross, perverted, vile, pernicious, obsessed and deranged, but a tool of government (and industry too) destined to rule and regulate. So why do we keep watching?

663. well (baby please don’t go)

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As already noted, John and Yoko’s Some Time in New York City has to rate as mostly disastrous, there being far too much Yoko Ono in the mix, and the sort of one-note politicking that feels like a repeated kick to the head. And yet there are a few moments such as the live take on Well (Baby Please Don’t Go) which happens to include Frank Zappa (and at least some of the Mothers) tearing things up with all due savagery and respect. Even Yoko’s saxophonic wailing kind of works, at least for a while.

664. kill surf city

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“I have no clear memory of when I first heard this ragged Jesus And Mary Chain gem.  One of those songs that just sort of percolated into my consciousness in that aforementioned noisy year of 1988, not unlike a terrorist bomb in reverse. All dangerous up front and around the edges but get to the heart of it and you realize there’s a nice little surf tune humming along, deftly undermining the foundations of civilization in the nicest possible way.” (Philip Random)

JAMC-1988

665. escape from noise

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“No doubt about it, Negativland‘s fourth album Escape From Noise was album of the year 1988, assuming you’d pretty much had it with music by that point, which I had. Not that there weren’t cool songs, essential melodies continuing to percolate. Noise just seemed a more relevant response to the prevailing cultural sewage of the time, which there was no escaping, except by diving full-on into it, which is what Escape From Noise (song and album) is really all about. And it’s hilarious, from beginning to end.” (Philip Random)

Negativland-NOISE

666. Love Missile F1-11

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Before they were mixing it up with big beats and samples and otherwise bringing the millennial noise, Pop Will Eat Itself were psyche-garage punk malcontents (aka Grebos), and way smarter than they were letting on as their torn up take on Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s annoying 1986 hit made rather clear. And no, there’s no intended Satanic significance in this being the 666 selection on the list – just how things worked out.

PWEI-F1-11