The February CD takes its name from the final line of Guided By Voices' "A Salty Salute," which seemed to be a suitable way to introduce the playlist.
I started out with a tracks consisting exclusively of performers I've seen live. Where I had no live recordings in my collection, I set myself out to find some, leading me on an unlikely treasure hunt. As a last resort I even converted a YouTube video or two to MP3 files. Culling the playlist was especially daunting. In some cases I had to sacrifice a song due to its length: Roy Buchanan's rendition of “Roy's Bluz” is gripping, but at 8:10 it took up valuable real estate. Other recordings were of a quality too poor to share: The Cobra Skull's “Hasta Los Cobra Skulls Siempre” is great bilingual punk, but was practically inaudible. Lastly, some performers simply didn't capture sufficient intensity in a live setting to merit inclusion. It was disappointing to say the least to hear The Ramones phone in classics like “Rockaway Beach” as if they were performing Community Service. On the plus side, what I've committed to CD is nearly 77 minutes of the best live music I've heard over the years. Please enjoy at maximum volume!
1) “All My Rowdy Friends Have Settled Down”: Anyone who doesn't think Elliott Smith had a lighter side would be delighted to hear this Hank Williams Jr. cover, recorded at Largo in 1998. Mary and I saw him at Waterloo Records in Austin that same year. Sadly it would be the last time.
2) “Hawaiian Baby”: Mary and I saw Rebecca Gates of The Spinanes at the Middle East a dozen or so years ago. My two most striking memories of her were how tall she was, and how she insisted upon paying for her drinks at the bar. This rendition of an early Spinanes song was recorded live in the studio with Lois Maffeo helping out on background vocals.
3) “Shunned + Falsified”: Former Soul Coughing frontman Mike Doughty was still going by “M. Doughty” when we first saw him at Lily's in Somerville. We've since seen him many times, including during the 2009 “Question Jar” tour from which this song is taken.
4) “This Year”: This song is so popular among the Mountain Goats' rabid fans that it was tough to find a recording that didn't include a large crowd singing along. This was taken from a YouTube video of a concert at Pitzer College in CA. We've seen the Mountain Goats as least as often as we've seen Mike Doughty.
5) “Dirty Dishes”: Deer Tick are a fairly recent find for us and represent an emerging reality – musicians who are younger than my children. This recording was also a converted YouTube video, this one recorded at Waterloo Records in Austin a few years back. Can't beat the four-part harmonies.
6) “Portland”: One of my life's great regrets is never having seen The Replacements live. Imagine my excitement to hear John McCauley and Ian O'Neil do not one but two 'Mats covers! We were only a few feet away from the stage at the Middle East in January 2011 when this song was recorded.
7) “Tom's ?”: I had never heard of R.E.M. When I saw them open up for Gang of Four at the Ritz in '81. I found them utterly captivating, but the NYC crowd nearly booed them off the stage. By '91 they were so popular that they could only perform at small clubs under a pseudonym. Here they are joined on stage in London by Billy Bragg doing an “improvised” cover of the classic Suzanne Vega song.
8) “Shocker in Gloomtown”: Mary and I have different takes on Guided By Voices, and while I readily admit that the Drunk Uncle Bob routine wears thin, they remain my favorite band of all time. This classic one-minute wonder was recorded in Melbourne, Australia in 2000, downloaded from the GBV website.
9) “Sparks”: I saw The Who in '79, a year after Keith Moon died and ten years after Woodstock. Suffice to say, they were a very different band. This is an electrifying take on the instrumental from “Tommy” as performed at that epic concert.
10) “Ugly Nora”: Mary and I saw the Soft Boys in 2000, when they reunited to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their classic album “Underwater Moonlight.” This live track is taken from their 1979 album “A Can of Bees”, and features both four-part harmonies and some incendiary guitar work from Kimberly Rew.
11) “Uncorrected Personality Traits”: We've always been amazed to hear this amusing a capella track performed live, most recently when Robyn Hitchcock toured to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the release of “I Often Dream of Trains” at the Somerville Theater.
12) “Jambalaya”: As promised, this is a second Hank Williams cover, a punkabilly take on an old chestnut. We first saw Dash Rip Rock at Howlin' Wolf in New Orleans, where they opened up for Southern Culture on the Skids. They were so good that we ended up walking out on the headliners just to preserve the euphoria.
13) “They Called it Rock”: Rockpile were the backing band for both Dave Edmunds and Nick Lowe. They were also a great live band, as evidenced by this '79 concert at the Ritz that was recorded for radio. I'm pretty sure my brother Mike and I were at this very gig.
14) “Entertain”: Sleater-Kinney were a ferocious live band when I saw them supporting their “Dig Me Out” album in '97. This track, recorded live at Lollapalooza in 2006, proves that they hadn't mellowed out one bit.
15) “Sideshow by the Seashore”: No band sounded quite like Luna, who fused Velvet Underground fuzziness with whimsical lyrics and exceptional musicianship. We saw them several times live. During one performance at the Middle East, Dean Wareham kept responding to shouted requests by deadpanning “we can't do that song.”
16) “Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo”: We managed to see Harvey Danger both in Boston and Austin, and found them to be so much more than the one-hit wonder that brought you “Flagpole Sitta.” Sadly, much of the live recordings I found were made during their farewell tour and were marred by loud sing-alongs. This live studio track came with the “Cream and Bastards Rise” EP.
17) “All Wrong”: Another unique band we loved so much, Morphine were always true to their Boston roots. We last saw them at an outdoor concert in Central Square in '99, just months before bandleader Mark Sandman died. This track was recorded live in Germany and was included with the “Honey White” single.
18) “Stairway to Heaven”: Me First and the Gimme Gimmes perform sloppy, irreverent punkified covers of classic songs, including this travesty from “Me First and the Gimme Gimmes Ruin Johnny's Bar Mitzvah.” The band typically wears matching outfits on stage, and were all wearing kitschy Hawaiian shirts when we saw them in 2011.
19) “Anthrax”: Gang of Four were positively electrifying when I saw them at the Ritz in '81. I tried hard to scavenge a recorded version of this feedback-drenched diatribe from that era, and managed to find this gem recorded at Mothers in NYC circa 1979.
20) “Barrier Reef”: I had always heard that the Old 97s were a great band to see live, and finally had an opportunity to put this to the test last April at the Royale in Boston.
21) “Recent Title”: I saw Pylon at a tiny club in West Hempstead, NY back in '79, and they put on a great show. I was fortunate enough to find this track as a YouTube video recorded at Hurrah that same year. My brother Mike and I have some great Hurrah memories dating back over 30 years ago.
22) “Killer McHann”: I'm not much of a fan of hardcore punk, but The Jesus Lizard's musicianship and the wild antics of frontman David Yow made them a must-see. I still remember the lead singer crowd surfing and just barely clearing the low ceiling at the Middle East Downstairs back in '97.
23) “All That Jazz”: Echo and the Bunnymen were another band I saw in West Hempstead circa 1979. They were so new that they played their opening song a second time as an encore because they didn't know any other songs. This was taken from the “Shine So Hard” EP in glorious vinyl.
24) “That's How I Escaped My Certain Fate”: I saw Boston's Mission of Burma at NYC's Peppermint Lounge with my brother Mike. I remember that the band refused to play any of their more popular songs, and that bassist Clint Conley sweat more than any other human being I had ever seen.
