When something happens for the first time in more than a half century, you take note. Joe Biden walking away from his re-election bid for President was one of those. So it prompted a full show of songs that echoed the event. Songs about various Joes from Golden Smog to Liz Phair; songs about quitting,
It seemed like a particularly busy day for birthdays to note today, including Johnny Thunders (in 1952), post-punk’s Ian Curtis (1956), reggae’s Gregory Isaacs (1951), country’s Cowboy Copas (1913) and the British pop singer Twinkle (1948). Dorothy Fields, lyricist to “The Way You Look Tonight,” and hundreds of other songs, was born this day in
Doesn’t seem that the babyfaced performer known as Beck could possibly be turning 54 today, but there you go. Other birthdays celebrated today: Louis Jordan, Jimmie Johnson, Crickets bassist Joe B. Mauldin and Jaimoe (turning 80!). But age and aging dominated the show, just as it seems to have the national conversation. So: songs about
We celebrated that big North American holiday of independence today — Canada Day, with a number of its leading lights — Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Ian Tyson and The Band (we also save a little time for the Fourth of July later). Plus we got around to the David Sanborn salute planned in
Back with a new show for the first time in a month, we begin with a slight survey of where we’ve been, mostly concentrating on Ireland. Then it was time to salute the influential French chanteuse, model and sometime actress Françiose Hardy, who died last week at 80, pausing to pay tribute to Arthur “Gaps”
Cutting into the annual 24 Hours of Christmas programming for my own holiday edition of Capital Radio, I tried to concentrate on somber, more solemn numbers appropriate for the day rather than dazzle dazzle of jingle bells. Themes of “Christmas Day is Here” were much favored over “Christmas time is coming.” Nice to have Coltrane
The last show before Christmas warrants the annual avalanche of holiday songs, starting with the Bosstones, Aimee Mann and Nick Lowe, shifting to ’60s oddities from Bobby Goldsboro and Brian Hyland, and enduring rokcers from the Kinks and the Ramones. There was so much Yuletide, there wasn’t time for the usual birthday salutes, except for
Things don’t always go right when you pre-record a show. Sometimes, last week’s show repeats by mistake, which it did today. And as happy as I was with that show, I’m sadder that the today’s Shane MacGowan-dominated show didn’t go live. But here it is, a few hours later, in archived form. Besides our full-bodied
Taping my show last week means the Shane MacGowan tribute will have to wait a week. Instead, today’s Capital Radio had a couple songs about December, and 25 musical numbers in a sort of opposite of a countdown. There were a lot of birthdays to count up as well — including Southside Johnny, turning 75
The end of November brings the darkest days of the year, with sunset hereabouts approaching 4:45 p.m. Our show nearly stretched to that mark, starting with 13 tracks about the 11th month, from Tom Waits to The Avett Brothers. That gave way to songs about darkness — and there were a lot from Simon &
