This morning, 100.3 (The Sound, L.A.) finished their A to Z song countdown nearly ten days after its start, with U2's "Zooropa." I've been listening fairly obsessively (or as L puts it, "I'm tired of classic rock") and was surprisingly relieved to have the radio playing when the last track was spun -- I thought I might miss the moment.
The Sound's catalog swings from harder groups like AC/DC and Judas Priest to softer rock, e.g. Chicago, with plenty of the usual Stones/Beatles '60s and Eagles/Fleetwood Mac '70s to started-out-New-Wave early '80s bands like U2 and the Police. In the "take or leave" department, there were quite a few tracks I could have left, but many of them were made at least interesting simply by juxtaposition. (This morning, for instance, James Taylor's treacly "You've Got a Friend" was immediately rebutted by Priest's "You've Got Another Thing Coming.") The Howard Jones I could have done without ("Things Can Only Get Better") and I had no idea INXS had become classic rock canon.
Some songs I'd never heard, like the Knack's "Good Girls" or Deep Purple's "Space Truckin'," and was happy to become acquainted. Some songs I would have said I knew, but had never really given full attention; I didn't realize "You're So Vain" was such a great song. Mostly it was fun to guess what was coming next: "'White Rabbit'...'White Room'...'White Summer/Black Mountain Side'...'White Wedding'...what else?!" (Can you name the two X tracks?)
True story: The only other track I've listened to this past 10 days was two mornings ago, a new one from Detroit MC Quelle Chris -- partly because I liked the last thing I heard from him, but mostly because it uses a Fleetwood Mac sample. When those couple of minutes were over and I flipped back to 100.3 on my Internet dial, what was playing in the Rs? "Rhiannon," of course.
"The Chain" isn't itself great, with barely a verse from Chris. I do love what he does with the Mac, though -- they're my one '70s soft spot that's more musical than nostalgic -- and the lacerating sample from Amiri Baraka's late-'70s poem "Dope" is more evidence for my contention that new underground rap music is the only musical genre currently engaging with the class issues under discussion by the rest of society. (Or have all those directionless Occupiers finally gone home?)
Quelle Chris, "The Chain," single
