Timedoor's June mp3 blowout (part 1) · Oct 3, 06:36 AM by Don
Introducing Part 1 of Timedoor’s June mp3 review. This post is your last chance to see these songs on Timedoor. They’ve been collecting cobwebs and we need to make room for future music. Chaka and I will leave the songs up for a few days, then take ‘em down and post Part 2.
We want to learn a little bit more about what’s going on in our readers’ minds. Believe it or not, you are more than just hits to us. So to juice up the Comments aspect of our site, we’re asking this question:
What’s the best opening band you ever saw?
Our favorite response will get some kind of prize. We’re not sure what yet, but it’ll be something cool. I’ll start:
In 1989, I saw 10,000 Maniacs at Milwaukee’s Riverside Theatre. The opening act was Tim Finn. The name didn’t click for me at first. After he danced on stage barefoot wearing what appeared to be white pajamas and did a song or two, I realized it was Tim Finn, as in “Tim Finn of Split Enz.” The lively set was comprised mostly of songs from his eponymous 1989 album, but late in the set (or maybe during the encore), he did what may be my favorite song of the early Eighties, the jaunty Splitz Enz sea song, “Six Months in a Leaky Boat.” 10,000 Maniacs were stellar, as they were when I saw them in 1992, but it was fun to be bowled over by the unexpected power of the opening act. I bought Tim Finn the next day and it was a major part of my summer soundtrack.
One standout from Tim Finn is “Parihaka,” a ballad with light reggae accents about Te Whiti, leader of a passive resistance against an 1881 imperialist annexation of Maori land in New Zealand. My favorite line in the song is, “He watched the dog piss on the cannon’s wheel.” I like that Finn, gifted songwriter that he is, is able to pay homage to Te Whiti and inject a bit of humor without diluting the seriousness of the song’s subject matter. Plus, the line reads like stage direction from a screenplay: a seemingly throwaway moment that actually sums up everything you need to know about the situation.
mp3: Tim Finn – Parihaka
mp3: Split Enz – Six Months in a Leaky Boat
I posted Ted Leo’s cover of “Six Months” back on August 1. Here it is again:
mp3: Ted Leo/Pharmacists – Six Months in a Leaky Boat [Split Enz cover]
Here’s Chaka’s answer:
This is a topic near to my heart, since I’ve spent my live performance ‘career’ as a member of a protypical Opening Band. Over the years, I’ve seen many killer openers that I knew going into the show I preferred to the headliners (Alex Chilton opening for Kilkenny Cats(!); My Bloody Valentine opening for Dinosaur Jr; Sonic Youth opening for Neil Young, to name a few notables) and have also seen my share of opening bands who went on to bigger and better things (Nirvana opening for Tad; Black Crowes opening for Drivin’ & Cryin’ – I remember almost nothing from either show). But I’d have to say my all-time favorite set from an opening band would be a set from the late greats from the Buckeye state, Scrawl. I first saw Scrawl circa 1990 opening for fIREHOSE at the Cotton Club in Atlanta. I knew next to nothing about the band going into the gig but was blown away by their balls-out performance in front of an empty audience space, with most of the crowd having fled to the bar area. Scrawl won me over for good that night, and I learned something about the virtues of really going for it in the face of a hostile crowd.
All of Scrawl’s pre-Elektra output is worth hearing, especially the Bloodsucker EP, Velvet Hammer, and my personal favorite, He’s Drunk, their first full-length. Picking a single Scrawl track is a fool’s errand, but this number, from He’s Drunk, is as representative as any of Marcy Mays’ working-class, highly (sometimes uncomfortably so) personal songwriting. Scrawl’s best stuff went out of print with the demise of Rough Trade and Simple Machines, but I noticed a while back that most of their catalog was made available through iTunes.
mp3: Scrawl – I’m Ready
Timedoor’s June mp3 blowout (part 1)
Note: The mp3s listed below are defunct.
mp3: Little Richard – The Girl Can’t Help It
mp3: Link Wray – Rumble
mp3: The Bel-Aires – Mr. Moto
mp3: Del Close – Vocabulary Building
mp3: Prince – Sign o’ the Times
mp3: Prince – La, La, La, He, He, Hee
mp3: James Brown – Cold Sweat
mp3: Rick James – Give It To Me, Baby
mp3: Lou Christie – Lightnin’ Strikes
mp3: Prince and the Revolution – Kiss
mp3: Tom Jones with the Art of Noise – Kiss
mp3: New Order – The Perfect Kiss [live video version]
mp3: Sonic Youth – Cinderella’s Big Score [live]
mp3: The Go! Team – Bottle Rocket [live @ KEXP]
mp3: Chaka Khan – I Feel For You
mp3: Vanity 6 – Nasty Girl
mp3: Apollonia 6 – Sex Shooter
mp3: The Time – Jungle Love
mp3: Sheila E. – A Love Bizarre
mp3: The Family – The Screams of Passion
mp3: The Family – Nothing Compares 2 U
mp3: Asha Bhosle – Dum Maro Dum
mp3: Vijaya Anand – Neeve Nanna [Only You Were Mine]
mp3: Mohammed Rafi – Jaan Pehechaan Ho
mp3: Nellie McKay – I Wanna Get Married [live at the Aldrich Museum]
mp3: Ozzy Osbourne – Crazy Train
mp3: Ozzy Osbourne – Take Me Out to the Ballgame
mp3: Rick Springfield – Love Is Alright Tonight
mp3: Fear – New York’s Alright If You Like Saxophones
mp3: The Who – A Quick One, While He’s Away
Commenting is closed for this article.
In 2000, I won (?) tickets to see Chris Isaak at the Santa Barbara Bowl. I should be clear at the outset when I say I do not like Chris Isaak. I do not care to hear him warble for 90 minutes about how he don’t want to fall in love. With me. It’s just not my idea of great music.
Still, a free concert is a free concert, so I went. I was then presented with what philosophers and theologians everywhere would have to agree is incontrovertible proof of a Supreme Being. The opening acts (acts, mind you) were Hank Williams III and the Reverend Horton Heat. I had never seen Hank III before and he kicked six colors of poop out of that set. And the Reverend, whom I have seen many times, was incredible. Almost better than the acts themselves was watching the faces of the people who had come to hear the headline as their collective eardrums ruptured from the rockabilly.
By the time whatshisname came on, I was too blissfully deafened to care who was headlining. I think I left after the 3rd song.
— Jason Oct 3, 10:29 AM #
What an eclectic bunch of tunes. Nice!
— Sean Oct 3, 11:15 AM #
Yes! It’s so nice to hear someone giving Scrawl their “props”. I have been a fan of theirs since “He’s Drunk”. The lead singer is now part owner of a rockin’ place in Columbus Ohio called Surly Girl Saloon. Check it out!
— christine Oct 3, 12:06 PM #
Oh so many warm up band stories, but this one was the most unexpected. Went to see The Pretenders in 1984, I believe, and on the bill was The Alarm. Pretenders first tour without Honeyman-Scott, and the Alarm was one of the “in” bands at that time. The alarm finished their set, short but memorable, so the audience was getting a bit restless waiting for Chrissy et al. Well out came a three piece band with some dude in a cowboy hat covering most of his face. Walks up to the mike and say “hi, we’re double trouble” and rips into a blues riff that I swear turned a pretty hostile crowd (‘who the f#ck is this?’ or ‘shit a country band’) that expected the pretenders into an audience who almost all were picking their chins off the ground. Stevie Ray Vaughn jammed and I mean jammed for another hour or so before he left the stage. What an amazing experience that was. Unexpected and amazing. This kid who was into only punk or new wave certainly had his mind opened to listening to other music.
— Greg Oct 3, 07:39 PM #
The Doctor say – KISS!!!!
— drbopperthp Oct 3, 08:16 PM #
1992: A recent (since ”...and the horse they rode in on” album) fan of soul asylum, and having heard that they were a superior live act, i went to see them at ithaca, new york’s the haunt. to my surprise, they were blown off the stage by opening act thelonious monster. i’d never heard of thelonious monster, and when their lead singer (bob forrest) announced he was that very night “falling off the wagon,” i didn’t know whether or not it was a joke. (i don’t think it was; the rest of the band looked pretty worried.) i remember a tweed outfit, cane, and sunglasses, and a ferocious version of elvis costello’s “radio radio.” later, i noticed that pirner & co. had come to the gig in a huge tour bus. i think “runaway train” was a hit soon after.
— Sean Howe Oct 3, 09:55 PM #
Three favourites (well, two and a cheat) – Ted Hawkins supporting Billy Bragg – he was just wonderful, went on to see him headline a couple of times. The Cropdusters supporting The Men They Couldn’t Hang – farm-hand hoe down music. They never quite broke out of the local scene but were gods down our way. I’ll post some stuff sometime soon. And the cheat – next week I’m going to see Battle supportiing The Cooper Temple Clause. I love Battle and can’t understand why they aren’t massive already.
— crash calloway Oct 4, 01:47 AM #
Were you living in Atlanta in the early 90’s? My biggest surprise of an opening band was seeing Jane’s Addiction (when Nothing’s Shocking had just come out) opening for Iggy Pop at the Center Stage in Atlanta. I was a major Iggy fan (still am), but Jane’s blew the roof off. Even though Navarro had metal dude hair and was flicking guitar picks into the audience.
— jon Oct 5, 08:28 AM #
Giorgio Moroder – I’m Left You’re Right She’s Gone
— senol Oct 6, 07:08 PM #