Hey! I did it! 365 songs for 365 days, babies! Each one lovingly plucked from the Interwebs for you to enjoy. What you don’t hear is all of the songs I listened to and did NOT post! You see, that’s the time consuming part, and why I am a filter, a subjective valuer of content, a deejay, call it what you will, I am SuperFan, hear me roar. I love music so much, and the mainstream music biz is still in the toilet, reduced to karaoke talent shows. So my little contribution this year was to feature the best undiscovered or under-discovered tracks I could find, from rock to hip-hop and anything else I fancied. There’s even a classic from Chuck Berry in the mix.

And ya know what? It’s been so much fun, I’ve decided l do it again in 2010.

Closing 2009 with a ferocious track with a worthy message from España’s hardcore worshipers of rock, Tokyo Sex Destruction. Happy new year, music lovers!

Tokyo Sex Destruction
“Power to the People” (mp3)
from “The Big Red Box For the Syndicate of Emotions”
(BCore Disc)

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The Marvelous Darlings‘ single “I Dont Wanna Go To The Party” rocks for two minutes and thirty seconds in a rush of pure and I mean PURE punk pop abandon. Very favorable comparison to Ramones, Clash, Cheap Trick and The Knack. Full on power pop angst-bliss! I love it I love it.

The Marvelous Darlings
“I dont wanna go to the party” (mp3)
from “I Don’t Wanna Go To The Party”
(Deranged Records)

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Ah, sweet power pop. Here we have some well crafted guitar chord bashing and vocal hooks that owe as much to Nirvana as to Cheap Trick. Ultimate Fakebook made a lot of noise for a three piece band from Manhattan, Kansas operating during the darkest days of the music industry. Here’s another neglected gem. In 2009 I have found and posted a bunch of ‘em here. Have a surf around, it beats the heck outta the your local corporate poo radio station, I guarantee you that much. But wait, Dorothy, there’s a Manhattan in Kansas? Now we know.

Ultimate Fakebook
“Wrestling Leap Year” (mp3)
from “Open Up and Say Awesome”
(Initial Records)

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On the subject of “Fools Want Noise” by Oh My God, I have to start by simply saying, they’re right. These lyrics are brilliant – kind of a “Satisfaction” updated for the Idiocracy. Celebrate the downward spiral into high decibel mindlessness? Or rage against it? Can we do both? This song is loud, fast and brash, but unlike the cultural Twinkie-filler it confronts in horror, this is actually very smart. And it rocks, too. Damn fine work.

Oh My God
“Fools Want Noise” (mp3)
from “Fools Want Noise”
(Split Red)

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Rock is not dead. It is brain dead. The Sons Of Hercules understand the power of not understanding. The subtle genius of retardation. The mastery which flows from lobotomous guitars, beer soaked vocals, and swaggering drum beats. As The Stooges demonstrated in the late 60′s, for a certain kind of rock, dumb is smart. From their “A Different Kind of Ugly” album, I give you, The Sons Of Hercules from San Antonio, Texas, performing “Brain Dead”. Gr8 stupid fun.

The Sons Of Hercules
“Brain Dead” (mp3)
from “A Different Kind of Ugly”
(Saustex Media)

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Southern California’s beloved surf punker pioneers Agent Orange have rocked for over three decades, and they continue to tour and deliver a gr8 live show. This song from their brilliant 1981 album “Living in Darkness”- recently re-released digitally by Posh Boy Music – is a good taste of their innovative guitar work and unique collision of power pop, surf and punk. The lyrics to “Everything Turns to Grey” are brilliant, at once idealistic and resigned. A classic song from a classic LP. Surfs up!

Agent Orange
“Everything Turns to Grey” (mp3)
from “Living in Darkness”
(Posh Boy Music)

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“Like boots or hearts, when they start, they really fall apart,” sings Grady. Excellent lyric. Add grit-swallowing, gut-churning, soul-vomiting guitar work, and some damned to sh!t wicked sexadelic southern rawk vocals, and, well, I’m diggin’ it. I think you will too. Tha’s wha’m here fer! Enjoy with Jack and Coke or similar. As eclectic Texas music vet Gordie ‘Grady’ Johnson Gordie Johnson puts it, “This record really is the byproduct of the musical environment we live in. Cowboys, metalheads, rednecks and punk rockers all congregate around us. Someone actually described us as ‘shredneck’ which of course brought gales of laughter.” Makes sense when you hear it. This track is killer. That’s all.

Grady
“Boots Or Hearts” (mp3)
from “Good As Dead”
(C12 Records)

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The Tits? Why yes, Dorothy. Raw rock n’ roll from a garage of grease and sweat in Nashville? But yes again! Though Nashville does have a lesser known  history of gr8 rock and roll, it is certainly not the music the city is most famous for. The Tits sound more like a motor city post-MC5 muscle car fueled teenage outburst than anything from the Grand Ole Opry of old or new.  This rocks balls. And it needs to be said, forgive me.. MORE COWBELL!!

The Tits
“Get Up!” (mp3)
from “Jesus Says Relax”
(SPAT! Records)

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October. Hottest month of the year in Cali. Appropriate then that Fun Fun Fun Recordings would release the digital debut of the long rumored but seldom heard Sex 4 Moderns album, in fall of ’09. The single “I’m Frying” sizzles and bursts, as singer-songwriter John Hanes intones in his sexy bass voice, like “an underground nuclear blast.” Hanes, you see, is like Lou Reed meets Barry White on an overdose of Love Potion Number Nine. Nearly every song on this record is a poetic ode to sex. I bought the album from the iTunes store and can’t get enough. “Swallow,” “Candy Dish” and “Penetrating Love Ray” are highlights, plus the highly original “Mr. Ed” – a personal identity revelation built around the 1950′s television talking horse – is a stunner.  Lead guitarist Steve Kirk’s angular, explosive riffing lends an urgency to the solid rhythm section work on every track. Add producer Matthew King Kaufman’s power pop sensibilities and Michael Rosen’s thunderous engineering work, and the sum is this Gr8 undiscovered rock album. I’m proud to share it with you here.

Sex 4 Moderns
“I’m Frying” (mp3)
from “Sex 4 Moderns”
(Fun Fun Fun Recordings)

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With a vocal yowl favorably reminiscent of Streetwalkin’ Cheetahs and Robert Plant, and music in a neighborhood stalked by the likes of T-Rex, Hot Snakes, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and even Turbonegro, The Cassettes love their hard rock and love it well. Soaring guitar work, solid rawk drumming, and an ornery, sincere ferocity all add up to a brilliant sonic outburst. Cool lyrics, GR8 sound.

The Cassettes
“Countach” (mp3)
from “Countach”
(Carcrash Records)

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