WZBC 90.3 FM Newton

The second week of Carl’s living room. We are listening to vinyl LP tracks in no particular order or plan, just playing tracks as if we were sitting together listening to records. Two bands I have know about for ages but never really checked out are back-to-back: Sharks and Love Spit Love. The former is Chris Spedding and Andy Fraser, and the later is Richard Butler post The Furs. A few weeks ago in the alphabetical 7″ series we hear 4 Skins and Golden Starlet. Here they appear from non-7″: 4 Skins from a 12″ (their only other release) and Golden Starlet from the anthology LP. We have 3 instances of famous folks outside of their normal orbits. Big Star’s Alex Chilton in a New Orleans cover band, Mark Sandman playing outside of Morphine in Hypnosonics, and Duff McKagan in pre-G’n’R band The Living. Robert Gordon has Tish & Snooky doing background vocals on The Catman (an ode to Gene Vincent), and a couple of unknowns (Mother Trucker and Noah) pull their weight with the company they sit in. Good stuff.

Carl’s living room is the latest Gulls Window Circus series, and the loosest – join me as I just plain listen to records with the recorder on. This week is all vinyl, all LP tracks. It starts with a track from Raybeat’s unappreciated ‘The Lost Philip Glass Sessions’. NYC band Sorrows’ ‘Love Too Late’ LP, which THEY didn’t appreciate, gets re-recorded 40 years later and redeemed as ‘Love Too Late... The Real Album’. Mark Wirtz in his 1970 band The Matchmakers bring goodness, as do Crazy Horse, with the humbly titled but incredible sounding ‘Your Song.’ That track gets followed by a Somerville MA contemporary artist that nails the Crazy Horse spirit – Doug Tuttle. Other Boston area treasures [Turbines, Richie Parsons] bring joy. 80’s NYC bands Steel Tips, Glorious Strangers and Details At Eleven bring me back to my childhood, as does the live Cure track from their first NYC appearance ‘Live At Hurrah, NYC, 15 April 1980’. Also bringing me back, though not as far, is the Versus ‘Let’s Electrify!’ reissue which we hear a track from.

Part 31 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus. This week we travel from Hanterhir to Heroin. There are 2 covers this week: Hanterhir with Bowie’s Dancing Out In Space and Herbal Flesh Tea with Hawaii 5-0. Boston SSD vocalist Spring breaks the expected mold in his Chicago band The Hedonists. Corin Tucker’s first band Heavens To Betsy sounds great. Walter Lure’s first post-Heartbreakers project The Heroes get air. Absolute song of the week belongs to The Heat. All tracks could be expanded upon here, best plan is to listen and discover.

Part 30 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus. This week we travel from Green Seagull to Martin Hannett & Steve Hopkins. I enjoy the tracks I had never paid attention to before: Grout, Graham, Gravity Wx, Greenhorn, Gutterball, Grover, and The Hangmen. The flip side of The Gremies 7″ is a treat I never explored either. The RSD 7″ different version of Fire Of Love is real nice, and it is always a joy to hear Guv’ner, Gretschen Hofner, and Paul Haig.

Part 29 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus. This week we travel from Girls With Credit Cards to Grace Budd. Nice to hear The Gits again. Always a joy to hear The Go-Betweens and Vic Godard. The Godheadsilo track resonated with me more than it used to. Go-Kart cover the same track that Fun Boy Three did a few shows ago (Summertime). The second hour starts with one song out of order, but I love this track and only just got it. It is Avocadoclub, on the label Firestation Tower that we have been experiencing other bands on as well. The Glidshees are also on that label. Alphabetized 7″s are fun!

Part 28 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus. Dots and Bilal & Nikki Jean start us off out of order with a Squeeze cover. Gerty Farish and The Dots do Kraftwerk covers. Fuchsia does a Pink Floyd cover, which is funny, as last week The Dots did one too. A band Gulls Window Circus loves the heck out of (Gilded Lil) have a great track, also luvin the Droogs, Unnatural Axe, Gaunt, Generics, and Gerbils tracks as well as the Girls At Our Best one, which has the harshest cold stop ending I can recall.

Part 23 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus runs from Fabric to Furtips, with (as usual it seems) a slight side-trip into bygone letters to catch up with new finds. One such side-trip is the final Ed Gein’s Car single, which sees them expand their sound palette, and predicts later Scott Weiss bands such as Iron Prostate and Oscar And The Pidgin Sisters. A joy to hear the fist Flying Nuns – the Boston band, not the NZ label – single. All 6 singles in the For The Love Of Jesus series are played and sounds pretty darned fine. NYC babd 4 Skins – no relation to the UK Oi band, are here. New French music from Fotomatik, Gulls Window Circus favorites Further, and the inimitable Free Design.

Part 21 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus starts with Liverpool band and onetime Zoo Records artists Expelaires and runs through NYC pre-Babytooth band Fluffy. In between EZTV & Nic Hessler do Milk ‘N Cookies and Bryan Ferry do Beatles covers, Fantastic! Give us the awesome Starfield, we hear the first Fashiön 7″, the first Steve Wynn (Dream Syndicate) release as 15 Minutes, Fish Turned Human with Dolly Mixture on backing vocals, Karel Fialka with the memorable The Eyes Have It, debut 7″ by Boston band Field Day with Thalia Zedek’s brother – every song has a story and you will hear them today.

Part 20 in the 7" played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus finds us starting with the elusive East Village and running through the absolute institution The Ex. As usual, plenty of bands that only released one 7" in their career, though selection cares not for that, it only favors the best tracks. E. Coli has been a fave of mine for a long time, but I only recently discovered that the three 7"s they released all have different versions than the tracks on their lone LP. The Ecstatics is the Long Island band that introduced the world to Spike (D.R.I) and John Ceparano (Stargazer Lillies). I love the track by Eighth Route Army, had forgotten how jazzy and different The Elevators were, continue to draw blanks when attempting to discover information about the band Emma, delight in hearing my college friend Jim Fletcher in Erratic Sculpture, love the Essential Bop track and like both covers in this show (The Elevator Drops and Even As We Speak do Buggles and New Order respectively)

Part 19 in the 7″ played alphabetically series on Gulls Window Circus continues catch-up on the letters A-E, which started in 2018. I had so much fun with this one – I think there is a certain rhythm when you play nothing but 7″ singles – same as a 12″-only show or LP tracks show, each have their identity. There are many one-single wonders in this show, which I point out as I introduce each. Special attention to: The Blackouts, Broadcast (not the UK Broadcast, this one is from Kansas), The Desert Wolves, DIAMONDS (almost Echo & the Bunnymen epic in reach), Domino Rally With Magnus Lawrie (Urusei Yatsura is the backing band), fond Boston history with Dub 7, and sublime closer East River Pipe.

Part 18 in the 7″ played alphabetically series. This week we continue the catch up started in #487 (continuing next week as well), where we play all the singles in A-E that were obtained since the series first started several years ago. I love Edwin Collins cover of the Vic Goddard track Won’t Turn Back. One of the bands from #485 ‘book a show in 1995′ series returns with an earlier 7″ (Citizens’ Utilities) that sounds real good. Scottish band The Commercials spun a bit like Scars on their lone 7″ 16 Again And Again. The Clouds sound great on their 1987 single, as does Billy Childish on the CTMF 7″. Tom Croose give a singular re-edit of a Fleetwood Mac song, and Dave Davies almost sounds like Mott the Hoople. Felt’s Lawrence closes the show with the awesome It Fell Off The Back Of A Lorry – EVERY song has its story – listen and love.

fundraiser

Part 17 in the 7″ played alphabetically series which started February 2018 and has sporadically run since. The next few episodes play catch-up on A-E, which have already been covered in earlier shows, but which now have many more candidates than were available when those early shows were recorded. The songs that keep coming back to me from today’s show are by Action Suits, Alternate Learning, The Anemic Boyfriends, Benett, The Blue Stars, Tracy Bryant, and Capri (who to my surprise sound a whole lot like a band I like lots, The Farmer’s Boys). Love the Ash cover of Helen Love track Punk Boy. ALL the tracks could be singled out as faves.

Part 2 of the Book a show in 1995 special, continued from last week. Gulls Window Circus brings you to 1995 as a booking agent evaluating singles in order to book a show. This week covers 1 hour of national bands and 1 hour of local (Boston-area) bands. All tracks are 7″ vinyl, spun in real time on a turntable. The Toothpaste 2000 track deserves the cover star status is has been given, but many other teats lie waiting for your discovery (Tractor Hips, Überhund, The Accidents, Jumprope, Sextiles). Amazing cartoonist Rob Rege’s Trollin Withdrawal is here, as well as projects by folks mostly known from other bands, such as Sydra = Mel from Sugarbitch and Vistory At Sea, Ambulance Driver = Marc from Spore and Sunburned Hand Of The Man, and Lee Fisher, subject of Spore song of the same name, Punchcutter = Ayal from Spore.

With a nod to time-traveling author Paul Levinson (The Plot To Save Socrates) Gulls Window Circus brings you to 1995 as a booking agent looking to book a show in 1995. This is a 2 week spacial, with 3 hours of national bands and 1 hour of local (Boston-area) bands. All tracks are 7″ vinyl, spun in real time on a turntable. Programming this show was a fun surprise – there are many tracks that sound great today, even if they barely found their audience when they were made.

Fifth and final week in the Music From Memory series closes with the subsidiary label Second Circle, running from Dazion (SC006) to DJ Sofa, Houschyar, Okay Temiz (SC019), with a bonus four songs at the end of artists from other labels that are heavily suggested by Music From Memory’s sound. Those are Trance, Wilson Tanner, Joan Bibiloni, and Andrew Wasylyk.

Week 4 of the 5-week feature on the Amsterdam label Music From Memory wraps up that label and enters MFM's subsidiary Second Circle. This week we go from MFM046 to Second Circle's SC005. You will notice the change in the air as we start Second Circle. The label introduces itself with the drum heavy Montezumas Rache. The artists that follow keep a consistent sound before the label starts to incorporate house elements into its sound.

Week 3 of the 5-week feature on the Amsterdam label Music From Memory and subsidiary Second Circle, on Gulls Window Circus. This week we go from MFM031 to MFM046. Many highlights, probably the ones that will stick most will be the unknowns, but the well-known artists make quality appearances too, such as the Mule Musiq artist Kuniyuki, Dam-Funk recording as Garrett, and Jonny Nash, who runs the retrospective-worthy Melody As Truth label. As I write this, the track Amerikan Dread is running through my head...

Part two of the 5-week Gulls Window Circus Music From Memory special, playing a track from every release, including the subsidiary label, Second Circle. All tracks (except one CD-only comp from the label MFMJPCD001) spun on a turntable in real time from vinyl. This week covers MFM018 – MFM029.

First in a 5 week series covering the Netherlands label Music From Memory and its subsidiary, Second Circle. We will hear a track from every release on both labels, played by catalog number, starting with Music From Memory and its 54 releases. The label is usually pigeonholed as ambient or new age, but as you will hear, many flavors are represented as we travel the waters. Today we start with MFM001 (Leon Lowman) and make it up to MFM017 (Richenel).