I heard a great story about TV’s Cougar Town creator Bill Lawrence (also creator of Scrubs and Spin City) on Howard Stern yesterday. He wants to change the name of his 3-year-old show because he thinks that name turns so many people off (both men and women) and has kept it from being as successful as it could/should be.
He has a Twitter campaign to create a new name for this show and added a questionnaire asking, “Are you embarrassed to admit you like Cougar Town because of the name?” He plans to go to his network with this data and request that they change the name of his show for the 2011-2012 TV season.
Sucky rock band names are all over rock radio (esp. College Rock radio) but you never see a band dump their name once they get to the big leagues.
Is there a band that you can not admit to liking because of their name?
Is there a band that you never gave a chance due to their name? (and that later you ended up liking?)
Feel free to come up with a new name for said band and we may just campaign for a name change on their behalf.
Another Mystery Date…so soon? Yes, it ties into tomorrow night’s pre-sausagefest episode of Saturday Night Shut-In.
Let’s review the ground rules here. The Mystery Date song is not necessarily something I believe to be good. So feel free to rip it or praise it. Rather the song is something of interest due to the artist, influences, time period… Your job is to decipher as much as you can about the artist without research. Who do you think it is? Or, Who do you think it sounds like? When do you think it was recorded? Etc…
If you know who it is, don’t spoil it for the rest. Anyone who knows it can play the “mockcarr option.” (And I’ve got a hunch at least one of you know this one.) This option is for those of you who just can’t hold your tongue and must let everyone know just how in-the-know you are by calling it. So if you know who it is and want everyone else to know that you know, email Mr. Moderator at mrmoderator [at] rocktownhall [dot] com. If correct we will post how brilliant you are in the Comments section.
The real test of strength though is to guess as close as possible without knowing. Ready, steady, go!
[audio:https://www.rocktownhall.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/MysteryDate060311.mp3|titles=Mystery Date 060311]
Artists who followed in the stylish, world-weary tradition of British art rockers David Bowie and Bryan Ferry painted, or hair-gelled, themselves into a corner, including the leading lights of this style of music. Early ’80s New Romantics and the extended Bauhaus scene of musicians also come to mind. Once you’ve seen and done it all, rocking European-cut suits to boot, what’s left to reveal? Who buys modern-day Bowie in 100% unbleached cotton shirts and jeans? Bowie, who strikes me as a mature man who is as comfortable as he’s ever been in such garb, is forced to carry on a public persona that taps into his Thin White Duke elegance. What is the sound of an all-cotton Bowie, Ferry, or Adam Ant, for that matter?
Weird Hot, the latest band led by our very own Townsman Shawn Kilroy, may help to answer that question on their new album, Casimir. Kilroy and his mates deliver nine elegantly crafted, European-tailored art-pop songs that are unburdened by living up to some Kilroy legacy of jet-setting, high-life proportions. Without going “country” or resorting to any other deliberate stylistic device the band manages to strip down a sound rooted in UK art rock and deliver their goods in as straightforward and “grown up” a way as an artist working in a more “traditional” vein, like Nick Lowe, has manages to do. It as if the gently poppy undertones of a band like Love & Rockets figured out how to on with the times. On a song like “Mimeograph” it’s as if Spoon finally drops the self-aware pervasive smarm that annoys me and delivers the straight-up take on Bowie’s whiteboy-alien funk-pop that they have in them, complete with an appropriately ’80s-style guitar solo (a phrase I never thought I’d say). Then there’s “Jealous,” which drops the attention-grabbing, self-absorbed histrionics that marred even the best of Elegant UK Art Rock for hopelessly gimme-some-truth me.
I dig Kilroy and Weird Hot. It’s music that looks you square in the eye.
Do you ever listen to Classic Rock radio and find yourself predicting the next artist or song? Here’s your chance to turn that habit into a charitable contribution, a barrel of rock-nerd fun, and more!
By now our founding and regularly participating Townspeople should have been reached with an invitation to our upcoming Sausages for Sammy fundraiser event to benefit Rock Town Hall’s producer and blog designer—and my trusted partner in crime—Townsman sammymaudlin and his family. Many of you have followed posts on our friend’s condition and already contributed to his remarkable road to recovery.
I look forward to seeing a number of you at our event and especially thank those of you from all corners of the Hall who have donated despite not being able to down sausages with us. If you would like to learn more about the Sausages for Sammy event, hit me offlist: mrmoderator [at] rocktownhall [dot] com.
Online predictions for tonight’s Classic Rock Psychic Rock Event are now closed. Thank you for your healthy contributions to our friend’s health!
So our ’90s-era Mystery Date was California-born and -based singer-guitarist Barbara Manning, who’s released records as a solo artist and a member of various bands, including SF Seals (ie, the “local baseball team” ladymisskirroyale referred to) and the World of Pooh. These songs are from a collaboration called Barbara Manning Sings With the Original Artists she did Stuart Moxham of Young Marble Giants (who accompanies her on the first track, “When I Dream”) and Jon Langford of The Mekons (on the second Mystery Date track, “Gold Brick”), among others. You probably know the varying sounds of The Mekons. Young Marble Giants is one of those bands that you may have heard of but never actually heard. Here’s a Young Marble Giants track that showcases Moxham’s guitar style:
Remember BigSteve‘s Listen But Don’t Look Principle? It’s an official Rock Town Hall Glossary term, if you ever need to cite it in your own works of rock criticism, but I was reminded of it tonight, when I went searching for some vintage Leo Sayer videos—solely for the purpose, or so I thought, of laughing at how the guy looked!
I found the following clip and expected a hearty belly laugh:
