El Burro Volador

It has been a little while since I threw another hour or so onto to the “underplayed rock” playlist, so I thought I would give it a shot.  It is probably past time for the disclaimer that I am well aware that dipping into funk, punk, blues, reggae and metal, as well as digging into more obscure rock albums and artists, is probably not a commercially viable strategy for a radio station.  Who cares?  I’m doing this for fun at this point.

Anyhow, with Ezekiel’s help, here are 14 more songs that a classic rock radio station could play instead of an Elton John ballad (hey, I like “Candle in the Wind” as much as anybody, but there are “easy listening” stations for that kind of thing):

“Take the Highway” – Marshall Tucker Band  play the cool live jammin’ version from Where We All Belong.

“Clampdown” – The Clash  The Clash are my favorite punk band, and this bouncy, politically-conscious song makes a great contrast to “Take the Highway”.

“Mississippi Queen” – Mountain  I can’t believe I forgot this song ’til now!  Kind of like CCR with more guitar heroism and most importantly – more cowbell!

“Doesn’t Remind Me” – Audioslave  A cool pick from Ezekiel.  Nifty lyrics.

“How Many More Times” – Led Zeppelin  Early Zeppelin track is underplayed, probably because it rambles a bit and is over eight minutes.  Still rocks though.

“Killing Floor” – Jimi Hendrix  I’m kind of enjoying following long jams with high energy blasts like this.

“Killing in the Name” – Rage Against the Machine   Fierce, fierce track.

“Gimme Dat Ding” – The Pipkins  In case RATM got you down, this light-hearted little piano swing will cheer you up.  Ezekiel gets credit for finding this obscure gem.

“Sin City” – AC/DC  The opening guitar riffs – so heavy, so AC/DC – will serve notice that serious rocking has resumed.

“Enter Sandman” – Metallica  I’ve always thought that this was one of those metal songs which could easily cross over – it’s slow, building vamp at the beginning and its catchy refrain (by metal standards) make it more accessible to non-headbangers, and how ’bout that guitar solo in the middle?

“Bad ‘n’ Ruin” – Faces  An easygoing rocker from a great 70′s band.

“Tell Me” – Stevie Ray Vaughan  I just can’t stay away from blues-rock for too long, and Stevie does it so well…

“I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” – Bon Jovi  A catchy party-down rock song from Jersey’s second best rocker.  Who’s first, I wonder…

“Ramrod” – Bruce Springsteen  The album version is good, but please play the Live in NYC version!  The E-Street Band just burns the house down with it.

There are two things I would like to accomplish with this post.  First, I’d like to preview what’s coming up in the next few days, post-wise, and then I’d like to throw a couple more hours onto the “underplayed songs that rock” playlist.

First things first: tomorrow is Rebekah’s birthday, so she will be the subject of a special birthday post here at El Burro Volador.  Saturday we will explore an exciting new theory concerning some of Clementine’s more bizarre behavior, and Sunday, well, Sunday will either be a recap of Saturday’s marathon gaming session or a resumption of the “A Day in the Life” narrative, which left off with Clemmy and I speeding to Doggie Arena.

Now, let’s get down to rock ‘n’ roll.  The five songs I posted as a comment to the earlier post are included here.  Also, credit for a couple of these songs goes to the prophet Ezekiel, but I’m beginning to wonder if he’s my entire audience for this thing.  Ah, well, no matter; I’m having fun doing it, and I might even be capable of cranking out an entire 24-hour playlist by myself eventually.  Here comes hours 4 and 5, once again in no particular order:

“Rock Me Right” – Susan Tedeschi  Could be the anthem of this playlist.

“Nutbush City Limits” – Ike & Tina Turner Hard-rockin’ soul tune.

“Lady in Black” – Uriah Heep   Is this unusually hard prog rock or just really melodic metal?  Only Charles Dickens knows for sure.

“Hoochie Coochie Man” – Steppenwolf   Growlin’ blues-rock

“The Road to Hell” – Chris Rea   I swear this guy is a clone of Mark Knopfler, one of my all-time rock heroes.

“Are You Ready?” – Pacific Gas & Electric   These folks make gospel rock in a way that most christian artists would sell their souls to be able to copy.

“Cover of the Rolling Stone” – Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show   You can have a lot of fun with rock and roll.

“Night” – Bruce Springsteen   You know what we need on this list?  Some Bruce Springsteen!

“Because the Night” – Patti Smith Group  This does not count against my Springsteen cap.

“Let the Good Times Roll” – Shirley and Lee   Another oldie from the days when the sax ruled rock and roll.

“I’m Waiting for the Man” – Velvet Underground I just noticed we don’t have that many songs about drug use on the list.

“Personality Crisis” – New York Dolls   In New York even dolls know how to rock hard…

“Far, Far Away” – Slade   Tuneful, but it still rocks a bit.

“Hammer to Fall” – Queen   I often think Queen is overrated, but this one is awfully good.

“Blitzkrieg Bop” – Ramones   Another punk mainstay that is left on the shelf by most classic rock stations.

“Roadrunner” – Modern Lovers   This song just motors along.

“Bullet the Blue Sky” – U2   I’ve always loved this one, if for no other reason than the lyrics get stranger and yet more compelling as it goes along.

“I Wanna Be Sedated” – Ramones   And you need to be sedated, Ramones, because you are just barreling along so fast...

“I Love You Much Too Much” – Santana   Nothing like a long guitar odyssey to slow things back down.

“Big Love” – Fleetwood Mac   Sometimes I forget that Lindsey Buckingham had such chops as a guitarist.

“Stop” – Jane’s Addiction   This is another one of those frenetic songs that just feel like they have to crash any minute.

“Smokestack Lightning” – The Yardbirds   I’m kind of stuck on blues rock lately, and this is one of the best.

“Had to Cry Today” – Blind Faith   What can I say, I’m a Clapton groupie.

“Kitty’s Back” – Bruce Springsteen   Long and jazzy,  but with some bluesy, wailing guitar parts and a superb rock band in full swing – this is probably what Steely Dan would be like if they could rock.

“I Ain’t Superstitious” – Jeff Beck Group   This track is the coolest Rod Stewart ever was in his whole life.

“Heartbreaker” – Led Zeppelin   Digging a little deeper into Zeppelin.  Hell, did these guys do any bad songs?

“Serious Juju” – Sammy Hagar   Cut this one a little slack, it’s not easy to rock hard when singing about the environment.

“Hellbound Train” – Savoy Brown   And let’s go out on a doom-laden 9-minute blues rock epic, just in case any casual listeners are left.

Note: I cut my estimate to 14 songs an hour, because I realize my average track length has to be above 4 minutes, even with a couple Ramones songs on there

But I like it.  It turns out that it is hard to concentrate on putting together a perfect rock playlist when the overseer keeps whipping you all the time.  Nevertheless, I’ve managed to come up with 45 songs that more-or-less satisfy our two criteria.  Let’s review:

1) The song must rock.  No offense to Steely Dan (who are very good), but I once knew someone who listened to them to go to sleep at night, so they don’t get to be on this list.  I discovered, however, that not all the songs I thought of rock super hard.  Some of them are a bit slower, grinding blues thingies, but at least they tend to have gutsy soul vocals and/or bitchin’ guitar parts.

2) The song can’t be overexposed on typical classic rock radio.  This got very tricky, as plenty of the hardest rockin’ songs get played all the time (“Jack and Diane”).  Also, some artists are played so much that five or ten of their songs are probably off-limits for this list (ahem, The Doors, Zeppelin, Hendrix), but I still wanted to include them, so I tried to pick songs that are played less frequently.  Finally, I picked greatest hits from some artists that are outside the reach of typical classic rock stations.  These songs might get played plenty on soul or funk or metal stations, for example, but not on classic rock, although I think they fit.

Originally I was going to meticulously arrange these songs in the perfect order, but in the interest of getting this post up before I return to the sulfur mines I’m just going to throw them at you in no particular order.  Here we go:

“Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) – Jimi Hendrix  You may play along on air guitar.

“Think” – Aretha Franklin  You remember the scene in Blues Brothers?

“Boom Boom” -Big Head Todd & The Monsters W/ John Lee Hooker  May be the best version ever.

“I Drink Alone” -George Thorogood & The Destroyers The Blues never rock as hard as when Thorogood plays them…

“Milk Cow Blues” – Eric Clapton  …Except maybe for this smokin’ Robert Johnson cover.

“Lost in the Flood” (Live in NYC) – Bruce Springsteen  Live version adds rumble and menace to an old fave.

“Green Manalishi” – Fleetwood Mac  From back when crazy guitar hero Peter Green ran the band.

“Death or Glory” – The Clash  Punk anthem is often overlooked by classic rock stations.

“Little Wing” -Stevie Ray Vaughan   Hendrix wrote it, Clapton and Duane Allman covered it too, but this is my favorite version.

“Come to Papa” – Bob Seger   Play this more!  It makes a good change from “Night Moves” or “Turn the Page”.

“Invincible” – Pat Benatar   I get so amped listening to this!  Who says chicks can’t rock hard? (okay, sometimes I say that, but I should really know better)

“Girls Rock Your Boys” – Quiet Riot  Quiet Riot is not quiet enough to get played on The Mountain, apparently.

“Immigrant Song” – Led Zeppelin   Hammer of the Gods!  There are at least eight Zep songs that get more airplay than this one.

“Tribute” – Tenacious D   You don’t have to be serious to rock hard.

“Jungleland” – Bruce Springsteen   Epic from my favorite rocker.  Would get more play if it wasn’t seven minutes long.

“Hot Rod Lincoln” – Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen   I may just have wanted to write the band’s name…

“Jack the Ripper” – Link Wray  Dirty boogie from a true guitar hero.

“You Give Love A Bad Name” – Bon Jovi   Bon Jovi seems underplayed on The Mountain at least.

“Rollin’ and Tumblin’” – Cream   ‘Cause you gotta have Clapton, and this one keeps a lower profile than some of his other stuff.

“Green Onions” – Roy Buchanan   The original is great, but I only listen to this version now.  Here’s to you, Roy.

“Superstition” – Stevie Ray Vaughan   Another great song made greater by a master axeman.

“Back Door Man” – The Doors   Tough to find a Doors song that hasn’t been played to death, but this great blues cover has life left in it.

“Whipping Post” – Allman Brothers   Southern rock classic.

“Frankenstein” – The Edgar Winter Group  Yeah, how about a 9 minute jam to change things up.

“Lawyers, Guns, and Money” – Warren Zevon   This does get played, but not as much as “Werewolves of London“.  Terrific lyrics from one of rock’s best songwriters.

“Will It Go Round in Circles” – Martin Sexton   Martin knocks this one out of the park.  Hearing him do it live may have been the best moment of my concert-going career, and I’ve been to dozens of shows.

“Pressure Drop” – Toots and the Maytals  Oh, the pressure’s gonna drop on you…

“Tear the Roof Off the Sucker/ Give Up the Funk” – Parliament  Funk classic will in fact tear the roof off.

“Revolution” – The Beatles  I think we all know which version of this song I’m talking about.

“New Orleans” – Gary U.S. Bonds  Before the electric guitar took over, the saxophone ruled rock’n'roll

“Black Betty” – Ramjam  Aw, what the hell.  It’s my list.

“Walk of Life” – Dire Straits  The boy can play.

“Out in the Street” – Bruce Springsteen Best Friday song ever.

“Bad Reputation” – Joan Jett & the Blackhearts  One of the hardest rockin’ ladies of all time.

“Bring Me Some Water” – Melissa Etheridge  This does get played a bit, but talk about passion and intensity!

“Tom Sawyer” – Rush  Why the hell not?

“Pump It Up” – Elvis Costello  Because organ players can rock out too.

“Baba O’Riley” – The Who   My favorite Who song tends to get skipped in favor of stuff from Tommy.

“Godzilla” – Blue Oyster Cult  Great song, but it coulda used more cowbell.

“Rainbow in the Dark” – Dio  Gets played more on metal stations.

“Ace of Spades” – Motorhead  Ditto.  Frenetic high energy stuff.

“Thunderstruck” – AC/DC  The Mountain doesn’t usually dig this deep into AC/DC because they just rock so hard.

“Adam Raised A Cain” – Bruce Springsteen  I imposed a strict Springsteen cap on myself, believe it or not.

“Boom Boom (Out Go the Lights)” – Pat Travers  And we’re back to blues rock.

“I Ain’t Done Wrong” – Yardbirds   Yardbirds w/ Jeff Beck on lead guitar.

And thus ends my playlist.  Now it’s time for you guys to throw in all the great stuff I missed!

I would like to tell you about the first time I fell in love with a radio station.  It was the spring  of 1996, and I’d heard somehow about this new radio station that was starting up on 99.5 FM.  I don’t know if that frequency had been empty previously, or if some other station was going under, but now it was going to be “ninety-nine five, The Hawk” and play classic rock.  Another thing the ads were very specific about was the time that the new station would begin broadcasting.  I thought it would be cool to hear a radio station being born, so I sat down in front of my radio a couple minutes before the appointed hour and tuned it to 99.5 FM.  At exactly the appointed time, the beginning of Springsteen’s “Born to Run” rumbled out of the radio, and I was smitten.

I listened to The Hawk for the next five years, whenever I was in Colorado.  It became my standard for what a classic rock station should be.  One time when I returned from “back east”, however, my radio station was gone.  It had been replaced by something called “The Mountain”.  Since this new station promised to play classic rock, and to break away from conventional classic rock radio by playing “deeper tracks” and album sides,  focusing on more music and less talk, and by eschewing tired gimmicks like giveaways and shock jocks, I decided to give it a try.  I was soon turned off by how seriously they seemed to take their mission, however.  I remember one station ID spot where they quoted Mahatma Gandhi, and I just said “that’s it!” and turned the dial to 107.9 The Bear.  I mean, c’mon guys, it’s frickin’ radio.

I never really got comfy with The Bear, however, and after a period of drifting and playing nothing but cds I eventually came crawling back to 99.5, the station where I had been happy in simpler times.  Luckily, The Mountain had toned down the self-righteousness a notch, and I’ve been able to listen to them for the last four or five years.  They’ve grown a lot as a station in that time, and have endeared themselves to me by doing some genuinely cool stuff.  Their 3-hour block of no commercials, minimal talk (song IDs and such), maximum music every weekday from nine to noon is how radio should be.  I love the daily “barrel of monkeys” request segment, and the integration of their station with their website is a model for other stations.

Lately, though, it seems like The Mountain has forgotten how to rock.  I mean, they are still playing “classic rock” but a lot of it is mellower, less intense and passionate stuff.  Their station slogan could be: “The Mountain, where you can go to hear the softer side of Billy Joel and The Moody Blues”,  or how about “The Mountain: where Crosby, Stills, and Nash never played with Neil Young”, or maybe “Do you remember Yes or Emerson, Lake, and Palmer?  Have you forgotten about ELO or Gary Wright?  Well, The Mountain didn’t forget about them.  The Mountain plays them all the mother-loving time.”

Well, I say that it’s not hard to come up with songs that aren’t over-exposed on classic rock radio but that still rock hard, and to prove that I’m not just a filthy prevaricator, I’m going to put together a three hour rock-block myself.  I figure that a 4-minute per song average is acceptable, so I’ll post a 45-song playlist here later today or possibly tomorrow.  I invite other classic rock aficionados to chip in via comment, and we’ll see if we can’t get at least a nine-to-five no-repeat, no-talk playlist together.  And remember, “What’s Going On” by Marvin Gaye is a terrific song, but it does not rock.

P.S. One more slogan: “99.5 The Mountain asks ‘Are you ready to Rock?’  If so, we hear that 103.5 is playing Bob Seger right now.  Or you can stay here and listen to James Taylor.”