Thursday Morning Music Shuffle – Flights of Fancy Mix

Thanks for visiting and reading Ear to the Ground. We know you have a wide choice of music blogs to read, and we are glad you chose to spend some time with us.

There is this moment (at least for me) in blogging when you realize that people other than your immediate circle of friends and acquaintances are reading your posts. This is the moment (at least for me) where everything can come off the rails and an inflated ego can cause me to think I need to say something profound and important. As when people say, that they enjoy my blog or call it “cool” or offer praise of my writing, and I think I better hit a home run with every post or I will lose this admiration.  The truth (at least for me) is that I began writing just what was on my mind – just narrating the stream of thoughts going through my brain. Fortunately, should be ego get out of whack, I have a teen-aged daughter to bring me back to earth.  “Dad, stop talking, my friends are here.”


I try and fail not to get to caught up in the Blog Stats so readily available, but it is interesting to see the search streams which get people to my site.  Of course, I can’t always tell if they stick around.  These search streams range from the insightful to the strange.  More than one recent visitor got here from the search string “Sad Easter”. To my knowledge I did not write about a sad Easter.  Also, there have been (over time) a number of visits via a search for Zombie Apocalypse Music Shuffle (or some variation).  Now, I did have a post which was subtitled Zombie Apocalypse Mix but like many of my posts, the song shuffle associated with that title did not have tangible connection to the subtitle, and so I think maybe those who came here from that search might have been disappointed????


Enough – to today’s song shuffle:


San Francisco’s The Fresh and Onlys are up first with a newish track called, Do What I Came to Do which is right now available on a free Mexican Summer sampler at Amazon.  The picture above links to that sampler.  Did I mention it’s free!

Keith Morris (Black Flag/Circle Jerks) has a new band called Off! We featured the song Upside Down earlier.  That song is on the first 4 EPs release which you can find above (the album with the Raymond Pettibone cover art.  Today’s track, King Kong Brigade is from the forthcoming self-titled first studio album.  You can grab the MP3 of the song over here. Off! will be touring with the reunited Refused this summer.

The music of Always The Light by Band of the Week alums ELIKA continues to amaze and delight me.  We Had it All is the luscious offering in today’s shuffle.  Always the Light is on Amazon using the picture above (little girl with the balloon).

And finally, continuing yesterday’s cover theme.  We have English Rose a lovely Paul Weller penned ballad originally on the Jam’s seminal release All Mod Cons.  We have the classic Jam compilation Snap! linked above.  The cover is by Hull band Everything but the Girl and if off of Ambition Volumes I & II: The History of Cherry Red Records which is linked above also. 

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The Fresh & Onlys The Fresh & Onlys

The Best of Flipside Video, Vol. 1: Bad Religion, Circle Jerks, Dickies, Weirdos Two of the best-known and longest-running bands on the Southern California punk scene, the Circle Jerks and Bad Religion, skank up a storm in this video, which combines footage from two live concerts. Bad Religion performs 11 songs, including “Damned to B

The Best of Everything But the Girl The Best of Everything but the Girl is divided between selections from their early records and remixes of ’90s hits such as “Missing.” Consequently, the album draws a slightly misleading portrait of their career, yet it still functions as an excellent introduction to the band, since it features many of their best songs, including “Apron Strings.” ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

English Rose (Import) For reasons that no one seems to recall in detail — but for which we can be grateful — when it was time to release a second Fleetwood Mac LP in America, producer Mike Vernon and the band didn’t just send the existing Mr. Wonderful album across the Atlan

Thursday Morning Music Shuffle – Cheer Up Sleepy Jean Mix

I wish I had some Monkees’ music in my MP3 player. I may have to remedy that soon.  As we remember Davy Jones, we remember the cultural phenomenon and cool music of this made for TV band of days gone by.  There have been some amazing tributes written by a wide variety of musical artists.  Say hey!

Late – so let’s get onto the list.

I created a spur-of-the-moment randomish playlist from which to shuffle and I’m pleased with the results:

First up, Rocks Off is off the uber-classic Rolling Stones album, Exile on Main Street. It captures the loose, filthy rock and roll music the band was making at that time. 

“I’m zipping through the days at lightning speed.
Plug in, flush out and fire the f**kin’ feed.
Heading for the overload,
Splattered on the dirty road,
Kick me like you’ve kicked before,
I can’t even feel the pain no more.” – Jagger/Richards

<—-Holy crap – you can download the 2010 Remastered version of Exile for just $2.99 at Amazon.com!!!

 Me and a friend once drove 80 or so miles in a convertible with the top down in a drizzle to see the next  band in the daily shuffle.  Will and the Bushmen were from Mobile, Alabama before settling in Nashville. Later Will’s and my life would intersect in a most unexpected way.  Can’t Turn Back the Clock was on the band’s 1991 album Blunderbuss (not to be confused with the new Jack White album of the same name – unless in your confusion you check out Will and the Bushmen, in which case be confused).

 <—–Blunderbuss by Will and the Bushmen – buy the CD at Amazon.com

Off! makes classic West Coast punk rock for the 21st Century.  Not surprising since the lead singer is ex-Black Flag/Circle Jerk Keith Morris.  I

<—download First Four EPs by Off! at Amazon.com

Finally, we bring you some classic Jamaican sounds from 1968. It’s Toots and the Maytals with title track from their album Sweet and Dandy. Go ahead and prepare to feel the movin’ and the groovin’.

  <—-Download Sweet and Dandy by Toots and the Maytals at Amazon.com

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Black Flag: Live Although Black Flag was unquestionably one of the greatest and most explosive live rock bands of all time, few of the band’s shows were documented on video before its breakup in 1987. Although the band only managed two British tours during its existence,

20th Century Masters – The Millennium Collection: The Best of Toots & The Maytals Toots & the Maytals’ edition of 20th Century Masters is a very good summation of the group’s greatest songs and therefore, their very importance. This doesn’t have every great song they’ve ever done, and is not as comprehensive as other overviews assemble

Rolling Stones – Exile on Main Street 18-song matching folio to the classic Stones album features transcriptions of: Rocks Off * Tumbling Dice * Let It Loose * All Down The Line * Stop Breaking Down * Casino Boogie * Torn and Frayed * Black Angel * Loving Cup * Happy * Soul Survivor * Shake Your Hips * Rip This Joint * and more. Also includes photos.