Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for June 10, 2017

Take two.

A kind of chaotic morning. Then when I get to the studio, instead of a film crew blocking the studio door, there was a large gathering of preteen girls filling the Somerville Media Center for some sort of event put on by the Nepali Women's Global Network.

As for the show, it's okay I guess. Mostly jazz, with a few curveballs, I didn't have a lot of time this week to work on the show, and what I had left in my "holding pen" playlist didn't really hang together. Hopefully this show hangs together well enough.

image source

See the playlist after the break...

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for June 3, 2017

Kind of a jazz heavy program, featuring some new(ish) acquisitions to the Unpopular Music library. However, we also visit Bach and Björk. There are some sotto voce mic breaks as a crew from the 48 film project had taken over the Somerville Media Center lobby.

image source

And of course, just because I had three weeks to prepare doesn't mean I didn't throw it together at the last minute. I also ended up giving myself he last minute challenge of finding something 3:10 - 3:20 that could bridge Coltrane and Björk.

See the playlist after the break...

Webcast info for May 27, 2017

Seeing as the Somerville Media Center is closed for the holiday weekend, today we are rebroadcasting the program from April 16, 2016. You may also be interested in the Memorial Day/potty-mouthed Sun Ra centennial episode from May 24, 2014.

Webcast info for May 20, 2017

I'm out of town this weekend, so in place of a live show, we will rebroadcast the episode from February 4, 2017.

Take a trip back to the early days of the Trump administration. I spent the first part of the morning at Somerville's sanctuary city rally. Listening back earlier this week, my little spiel about the event possibly makes it sound like I, myself, am an immigrant, which is not the case, although my grandfather was. I just think the vast majority of these folks are just trying to make a life for themselves, and mostly don't cause any real trouble, and should be given a chance, and the  average American, even the above or below average American as well, have nothing to fear..

As for the music, it's one of the better of my recent episodes, some folks on Mixcloud think so, too. Like America, it draws on a far flung variety of sources, somewhat influenced by the issues of the day.

We'll be back next week with a new program.

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for May 13, 2017

Having heard the Neil Young song "Hey Hey, My My" earlier this week (in the version presented in the program) I decided to start describing the program as "the more of the picture that doesn't meet the eye." Clever, no? Well, we'll see.

image source

As for the program itself, it starts out jazzy and the winds down other paths, culminating an FM classic rock radio staple played on toy instruments.


Peruse the playlist after the break....

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for May 6, 2017

Here we are once again. I actually felt worse after last week's show, not better, but ended up listening to a lot of music in that low energy time and came up with an easy list of things to play. It's a mostly (but not exclusively) jazz show, but within the wide range of sounds that word provides.

image source

See the playlist after the break....

Down the memory hole with Dave's Record Collection

Having named the webcast "Unpopular Music", several people have assumed this is the sort of thing I play. (Look right for the true explanation. I mean, I have played one of the records in the first segment, and there some things I would play (like Lawrence Welk playing "Don't think twice, it's alright", Sam the Drummer, or those generic radio commercials) if I had them, but it's not what the program's about.

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for April 29, 2017

In which your host is not quite as over the flu as he thought when he left the house, but I think not a bad show for being thrown together at the last minute, mostly things I heard in the past week. A mix of jazz, classical (old and new), blues, pop, and other.

image source

Oh, and remember, just because the music is being played by an orchestra, it doesn't mean you can't crank it up.

There are also a couple of my all-time favorites in here, which I'm surprised I hadn't played before (the Zorn and Putnam's Camp)

See the playlist after the break...

Music appreciation from Jonathan Demme

For some reason, I've never seen Philadelphia, and I also worked in the classical department of a record store in the years following its release (and therefore always needing to be able to hook up a customer with Maria Callas singing La Mamma Morta at any given time), so I was not expecting to be so blown away by this scene as I came across it in the Onion AV Club's appreciation piece for the late Jonathan Demme.

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for April 22, 2017

As I was assembling the program this morning, I came to realize that the challenge of this webcast, and I imagine any radio show, is in making the arbitrary sequence of musical selections seem inevitable. Perhaps this weeks selections are a bit too arbitrary to pull that off, perhaps not.

image source

See the playlist after the break...

Webcast info for April 15, 2017

 image source

 

As we are out of town for the holidays (this year is Easter and Patriot's day rather than Patriot's Day and Record Store Day), we will rebroadcast the Unpopular Music episode from July 16, 2016. This program features a bit more pop music than is standard along with many references to the hot sweaty day on which it was recorded.

Random You Tube find of the day - Dusty Springfield and Burt Bacharach

I was doing some random research on a song and came across this.

If you've been to a concert with me, you know I'm stingy with standing ovations. This is the first time I've given a standing ovation to something on You Tube.

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for April 8, 2017

Today's program offers the typical jazzy first hour and grab bag second. A few long things as I'm having some time management issues. (Including having time to write this.)

image source

See the playlist after the break...

Webcast info for April 8, 2017

Due to the fact that that the Somerville Media Center hosted a 24 fundraiser for the Boston Hassle, the building ended up being closed at noon. I got a chance to load my show and let it run without commentary (which is likely an improvement.)

The playlist and archive will show up at their regular times.

I'm out of town for the holiday next week, so there will be a classic episode in my place.

See you in two weeks!!

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for April 1, 2017

I had toyed with the idea of doing an April Fool's program, playing a bunch of overplayed classic rock songs. A "songs you know by people you've heard of" kind if show as that ad, was it for Mix 98, used to go, albeit with songs I actually like, of which there are plenty.

image source

Instead, I decided to plow ahead with what passes for a usual show - a bunch of white-guy jazz, a trans-century, multi-genre freeform set. It does end with Fleetwood Mac, so there's that.

See for yourself after the break...

Chuck Berry talks about genre on Soul Train

Laquinta asks "Do you find blues more soothing than today's sounds?"¹ to which Chuck Berry replies "Well, to me, each type of music is a feeling, and blues, there's nothing that can replace it when you're blue. And there's nothing that can replace rock when you're reeling, and so on..."

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for March 25, 2017

Here we are once again,

We're a bit light on jazz this week, a bit more Afro-pop. Additionally, while looking for something to fill a gap, I came across a bunch of tracks that didn't fit, but seemed to kind of go well together, so they now make up most of the second hour. And it being the first weekend of spring, we have our traditional Stravinsky offering (no pun intended).

image source

See the playlist after the break...

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for March 18, 2017

A mixed bag today, we start with some hard bop and then jump around a bit. Maybe too many downers in the second hour, but it perks up towards the end.

image source

 

See the playlist after the break...

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for March 11, 2017

This week, Unpopular Music celebrates its third anniversary. I had planned to do something special, but instead put off assembling the program until about four hours ahead of time. We have a typically jazzy first hour, with a somewhat pretentious freeform second hour. It was also freezing cold (almost literally) in the studio, and the headphone amplifier had a short circuit. Nonetheless, it's a show I think you'll like (if you like this sort of thing, that is)!!

image source

See the playlist after the break...

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for March 4, 2017

A last minute creation which got off to a terrible start, but turned out OK. A pretty wide variety of music this week - some different flavors of jazz, music from Algeria and Ethiopia, French baroque, poetry readings, and a couple of pop songs. I was hesitant at first about the opera selection, but I heard a program on another station that played both Maria Callas and Patsy Cline and figured "why can't I?"

image source

See the playlist after the break...