This Track Is Fire!

  Listen, I don't make the rules, but what I do know is that you can't celebrate Polish-American heritage and polka music without playing "Beet Barrel Polka" at least once. Again, I don't make the rules, that's just how it is. So, for me, it's not Pulaski Days until I've heard not only this song, but also the one I'm going to highlight on Friday. Besides, unless you're Polish or Polish American, you probably don't know all that many polkas, but if you do, there's a good chance that you know this one because it's a classic. Also, fun fact: this was originally written as an instrumental and lyrics weren't added until seven years later. It's midway through the week and there are only two more days until Pulaski Days, so turn this up and get your ass ready to dance. Enjoy!

What is Bandcamp Friday, you may ask? All you need to know is right  here . It's always good to support independent artists and independent music, especially when Bandcamp is foregoing their cut for 24 hours. Buy something cool!

In celebration of Pulaski Days this week in Grand Rapids I am higlighting my favorite Polka songs. I admit, I own only a couple of Polka CDs, but I've been going to Pulaski Days to celebrate my Polish heritage for as long as I can remember, so though I did not intend to pick only Frank Yankovic songs (I know there are pleny of Polka artists out there), these are the versions that I know the best. Why do I love this song? Because it reminds me of sitting in a Polish hall with friends and family having a great time. Also, I'm not going to lie, I love to sing along loudly with this whenever I hear it. The fact that I have probably had a few beers while feeling compelled to belt out a tune may have some affect. But hey, in Heaven, there is no beer, that's why we drink it here! Happy Monday! Enjoy!

As I said when I posted about Front 242 , after just over a year of starting this blog I can't believe that it took me this long to post about one of my all-time favorite bands, Curve. Like, seriously, what is wrong with me? Again, I am rectifying it now. There are times in your life as a music lover that you hear a band, a song, that first time, and your immediate thought is,"WOW! What is this? Why haven't I heard this before?" This has happened to me many times, whether it be Nirvana, Atari Teenage Riot, Front 242, or, in this case, Curve. For me, the best way to describe this music is LUSH (ironic, considering that such is the name of one of their shoegaze peers), but for me this song, with Toni Halliday's melodic chanting/harmonizing and Dean Garcia's thick, syrupy bass line, covers me like a thick, velvet blanket on a cold winter's day. If Heaven was a song, I think it would "Horror Head," which, again, ironic considering the title and lyric...

I am old enough to remember Grimes before she dated, and later had children with, Elon Musk, back when she was a 20-something Canadian woman making "weird" electronic music. And while this isn't me being a hipster saying, "I knew her before she was cool," I do remember back before most people knew who she was and a coworker of Shalee's, who was DJing a wedding, played Grimes during pre-dinner music for said recepetion and I went up to him because I did not think anyone else knew who she was. (We became friends thereafter, even starting a nerd podcast together). That was 14 years ago, and though Grimes has become far more popular in the years since, there's still nothing quite like this odd synthpop piece that first caught my attention with that opening synthline and her gentle moans. I don't think anyone knew the success that would come to her following this and subsequent releases, but in my opinion this is still as good as it was when I first heard...

While I was on PTO last week my friend Jeff, the same guy that suggested the band Chalk to me back in February , asked me if I had ever heard of the ground Paranoid London. I hadn't, and told him I would check them out. Last Thursday and Friday were busy with vacationing, so I finally had a chance to check them out this weekend, starting with track one of their album Arseholes, Liars, and Electronic Pioneers . My first impression was that this was some chill, electronic music that might be a slow burn for me. Mind you, that was after playing the first track. Then the second track, "Love One Self," came on and I was immediately blown away. Is this acid house? It is Nitzer Ebb? Front 242? No, it was none of these, but also, kind of all of these things, and my audio heart swooned. This is what I sent to Jeff: First song, ok, this is chill, I can throw it on in the background. Second song: FUCK YES. I had pretty much the same reaction to all of the following tracks. Me being ...

Closing out the "Welcome Back to Old School" theme this week is another classic, but also sadly, a one-hit wonder, in the form of When In Rome, a band that most-assuredly released a full album of other music of which I have to admit that I am completely ignorant. And yet, they gave this highly-singable and wonderful synthpop song called "The Promise." Whatever happened to When In Rome? No idea, but any time this song comes on I have to turn it up a bit louder because I am compelled to sing along with it, but I am a tone-deaf man with no ability to carry a tune. The increase in volume is for your benefit, not mine, because honestly, no one wants to hear me sing. But this song? No notes, this song is perfect . It's Friday and I am most likely in Florida right now, hopefully near a pool, already enjoying my weekend. Throw this on, kick back, and start your weekend as well. Enjoy!

Continuing with the "Welcome Back to Old School" this week, I give you Kon Kan, a group who for many is probably considered a musical footnote, and yet, they created such a catchy and fantastic song that I searched for years trying to figure out what it was.  Sure, I heard it back in 80s like everyone else and liked it then, but it faded into obscurity shortly thereafter and I don't think I heard it again until sometime in the early 2000s when I was having lunch with a friend at Mongolian Barbeque (is that chain even around, still?) when I heard it playing in the restaurant. I asked my friend who it was, but she didn't know, and neither did the people working in there. It stuck in my mind for weeks before after some searches online feeding in the few lyrics I could remember before I rediscovered not only the name of the band, but the song itself. Do they have other songs? Wiki says yes, and maybe I should check them out, but ever since I was able to figure out who put...

As I was driving around this weekend I was thinking about how the summer is coming to a close, fall is on its way, and the kids are back in school. Perhaps I should have done this a couple/few weeks ago, but the idea to do a "welcome back to old school"-themed week sounded like a fun idea, and honestly, I didn't want to wait until next year to do it, so here we go. Welcome back to old school! Honestly, I am a little bit embarrassed that it's been over a year since I launched this blog and I have yhet to post a single track by Front 242, let alone this one, an absolute classic of Gen-X alternative music and culture. You see, back in the late 80s/early 90s, a somewhat new genre of music (though it was already about 15 years old at that point) really started to gain in popular, called "industrial," mostly on the success of bands like Nine Inch Nails and Ministry. A lot of those early industrial bands were on the Wax Trax! label out of Chicago, so though groups ...

My anxiety has been giving me insomnia as of late, so to combat it I throw on some earbuds and listen to ambient music to distract myself enough to sleep. This means that I have been listening to a lot of ambient music lately. A silver lining of this is that I have discovered some music that for one reason or another I simply missed over the past 25-30 years, like the Scottish duo Boards of Canada. Over the last few weeks I have been exploring their back catalog, specifically their 1998 release Music Has The Right To Children , which I admit, is fantastic. How did this not show up on my rader 28 years ago? I'm not sure, but I am rectifiying that oversight now. There are times when I am anxious and I want to let out all of that contained energy. This is when I listen to punk, metal, industrial, etc. But if it's 5:30 in the morning and I want the aural equivalent of a warm blanket, you can't do much worse than Boards of Canada. Throw this on, preferably with some good headpho...

Keeping with the synth and post-punk mood I have been in lately, this is a recent rediscovery. It has to be, the track is 20 years old, but despite coming out decades later this song just feels  so 80s in the best possible way.  It's slightly lecherous, like good pop can be, because after all, even the term rock'n roll was just slang for intercourse back in the day, so shouldn't gothy music like this be dripping (pun intended?) with desire, even if it's a little sinister? I want to hold you close soft breasts, beating heart, as I whisper in your ear I want to fucking tear you apart Damn, I think so. The slowly throbbing bassline works perfectly with this song about forbidden, dirty, maybe even controversial, lust, leaving the listener with only one real option: Succumb. Welcome to midweek! Enjoy!

Though not an offical theme, I have been in a synth mood the last few posts, so far be it for me to deviate from that. Today, I give Empathy Test "Doubts," which just speaks to everything I like about good synthpop: it's catchy, it's singable, and yeah, it's dark. there is no substitute for love no feeling tell me when you've had enough It's because of songs like this that I had to put a disclaimer on my Facebook page so that when I posted lyrics/music people wouldn't think I was in the middle of a deep depression. Quite the opposite, actually. Music like this makes me feel happy and alive. And that's how Monday should be. If you're celebrating Labor Day today, I hope you're having a good time! Enjoy! Monsters by Empathy Test

While I often try to write these posts up ahead of time, there are some mornings I wake up and think, "what am I going to post today?" despite the fact that I easily have a 10-12 drafts of artists/songs in my queue but for whatever reason they don't fit my vibe check today. I'm weird, I know. The funny thing is that I woke up with song a repeating in my head, so as I came to post today again I thought to myself, "what am I going to post today?" and initially did not consider the track playing on repeat in my brain. Sometimes I am not a smart man. But isn't an earworm a track that is fire, one that you can't stop listening to, or more to the point, thinking about? That's "Spiders" by Sweden's Ashbury Heights. Again, this is not a new song, it's nearby 20 years old, but it's infectious and I can't stop chair dancing. (Also, what is it with me suddenly falling in love with Swedish synthpop lately?) Welcome to the end of the...

What is Bandcamp Friday, you may ask? All you need to know is right  here . It's always good to support independent artists and independent music, especially when Bandcamp is foregoing their cut for 24 hours. Here's what I bought back in February ! Buy something cool!

I've noted previously that I have a lot of music, perhaps too much, and that yeah, sometimes when I think I have discovered a band, oops, I already bought something from them months, or years, earlier. This isn't quite that case, but rather, I have so much music that I sometimes I lose track of an artist that I truly love ( like Missio ) because, well, life happens, work happens, and I get behind. That's what happened here with Purity Ring. For me, their 2015 album another eternity  is perfection, an album I had on repeat for what seemed like forever. They got popular, Katy Perry asked her to work with her on one of her albums, and then asked them to tour with her (I went thanks to a $25 Groupon), and then, sometime after 2017, nine years ago now, well, I think I just kind of lost track of them. I remember WOMB  and watching them perform on a late night talkshow, but again, this is on me and does not reflect on the quality of the band or their music, I just kind of lost tou...

What is Bandcamp Friday, you may ask? All you need to know is right  here . It's always good to support independent artists and independent music, especially when Bandcamp is foregoing their cut for 24 hours. Buy something cool!