Unknown's avatar

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.

933. Melancholy Man

In which the Moody Blues go deep and wide and high, and remind us why they were once considered pretty darned cool. Philip Random recalls listening to Melancholy Man a lot while reading Lord of the Rings for the first time “… as a mostly uncool, pre-driver’s license teen with absolutely nothing better to do one long hot summer, stuck in somebody else’s cottage, there being only one even remotely decent album in the vicinity – This Is The Moody Blues (who knows how it got there?). I still think of Bilbo Baggins finally getting old whenever I hear Melancholy Man and I didn’t even know what melancholy meant at the time, just felt it anyway, all that deep sorrow and regret, particularly once the mellotron sweeps in for the kill.”

934. I pity inanimate objects

Godley and Crème started out with 10cc and ended up as cutting edge rock video artists, but in the middle somewhere found time for a few albums of overtly strange and accomplished pop experimentation. And it never got stranger than I Pity Inanimate Objects (from 1979’s Freeze Frame) which employs all manner of studio trickery to accomplish a genuinely unexpected end – you actually feel pity for things that are not alive, except they are, of course, they’re comprised of atoms and neutrons and other insanely small actions and reactions, which are the fundament of all life, all matter, all everything. It’s true. Do some research. And be kind to your toaster.

godleycreme

935. Finland

Monty Python present a bit of promotional tourist pap from their Contractual Obligation Album, which was precisely that. And speaking of lawyers, Finland was preceded on the original pressings of the album by Farewell to John Denver, which eventually had to be removed.

montypythonsings

17. The Solid Time Of Change

Part seventeen of the Solid Time of Change aired Saturday October-1-2016 c/o CiTR.FM.101.9.

Podcast (Solid Time begins a few minutes in). Youtube playlist (not entirely accurate).

This continues to be Randophonic’s main focus, our overlong yet incomplete history of the so-called Prog Rock era (presented in countdown form) – 661 records from 1965 through 1979 with which we hope to do justice to a strange and ambitious time indeed, musically speaking.

solid-crop-17

Part seventeen of the journey went as follows:

  1. Sensational Alex Harvey Band – the man in the jar
  2. Strawbs -heavy disguise
  3. Strawbs – round and round
  4. Billy Cobham – stratus
  5. Harmonium – un musicien parmi tant d’autres
  6. Simon + Garfunkel – the boxer
  7. Electric Light Orchestra – Mister Kingdom
  8. Peter Hammill – Imperial Zeppelin
  9. Yes – we have heaven
  10. Yes – southside of the sky
  11. Queen – procession
  12. Queen – father to son
  13. Queen – white queen
  14. Camel – Snow Goose [the big edit]

Fresh episodes air pretty much every Saturday night, starting 11 pm (Pacific time) c/o CiTR.FM.101.9, with streaming and download options available within twenty-four hours via our Facebook.

936. here there + everywhere

In which Emmylou Harris, who never found a song she couldn’t somehow make her own, takes one of the very few sweet, poignant, utterly beautiful Beatles songs that we’re not all allergic to and, if anything, improves it. “If I ever actually get married, I can imagine it will be prominent in the day’s proceedings.” (Philip Random)

emmylouharris

937. disruption in world communication

Synergy was one man, a guy named Larry Fast who, when he wasn’t working with the likes of Rick Wakeman, Peter Gabriel, Nektar, FM, was inventing the future via his devotion to synthesizer technologies. 1978’s Cords is one of those albums that still manages to sound rather ahead of things. Peter Gabriel gets credit for helping with some of the titles, and none better than Disruption in World Communication. Because yes, this is exactly what it ends up sounding like when we humans cease communicating with each other. Genuinely scary stuff.

synergy-cords