TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, April 9, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Dudley by The Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Gloria by Patti Smith
What's Mine is Yours by Sleater-Kinney
Breaking the Rules by The Fall
Sometimes the Devil Sneaks in My Head by The Immortal Lee County Killers
Where's Your Boyfriend At by The Yayhoos
Honeychain by Throwing Muses

The Barren Fields by Hundred Year Flood
This Life by The Grabs
Black JuJu by Alice Cooper
Home by Iggy Pop
Hometeam Crowd by Loudon Wainwright III
Come Out and Play by Richard Cheese

Troubled Friends by Gogol Bordello
Pretty Thing by Nightlosers
On Wings of Love by The Red Elvises
Pain by Kazik
Kamarage by Kultur Shock with Carla Kihlstedt
Ya Habibi, Ya Ghaybine by 3 Mustaphas 3

The Wand by The Flaming Lips
Thursday Night Crowd by Mbconn
Babe, I Got You Bad by Nick Cave
Shame by P.J. Harvey
Junk is Still King by Gary Heffern
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

HUNDRED YEAR FLOOD!

The Blue Angel CD release party for Hundred Year Flood was just a blast from start to finish.

I'd just seen them last month for their short set at South by Southwest at the New Mexico Music Showcase, and that was a good one.

But it was nothing like playing a decent-length set for a hometown crowd ("Seventh is a heaven, nine is a cloud/It's great to be part of the home team crowd ..." -- Loudon Wainwright III)


The Blue Angel album is really growing on me and the songs from it -- many of which the band has been playing in their live shows for awhile now, were strong, especially the title song, "Don't Go," and the show-stopping "The Barren Fields."

I also heard some tunes I'd never heard before.

There's the freshly written "Ain't Gonna Fight in a Rich Man's War" (the title's similar to a Steve Earle song, but this one's funkier), one called "If I Were the President of the U.S.A." (Bill Palmer spells out a platform I could endorse) and a really cool Mexican- style polka with Felecia on accordian and Bill singing praises to Mexican food. (Hey, Palmer, you think you're the only one to write a song about enchiladas?)


I've also got to mention the venue -- The Santa Fe Brewing Company. I haven't been to this location since it was Wolf Canyon (is that the right name) years ago. I was impressed. The atmosphere is informal and friendly. The food was good (I had the Ruben sandwich, Helen had athe Greek wrap and Anton ate a hamburger bigger than his head) and reasonably priced. The stage and the dance floor work well as did the sound system.

The management is very music friendly. There are photos of local musicians -- Bonnie Hearne, Alex Maryol, George Adello to name some -- on the walls. I hope this place will be successful.

Bill gave a plug for Frogfest in mid August, which I'm assuming will be at the Brewing Company. Besides the Frogville acts (HYF, Goshen, Joe West, Boris McCutcheon, ThaMuseMeant, etc.) there might be some extremely worthwhile national acts. I was out of town last year for Frogfest. I can't let that happen again this year.

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, April 7, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
What Am I Living For? by Van Morison
Gravity's Gone by The Drive-By Truckers
There Are Strange Things Happening Everday by Cornell Hurd
I Keep Thinking of You by Sir Douglas Quintet
Cowboy Boots by The Backsliders
Dirty Knife by Neko Case
Shake the Chandelier by The Gourds

Champion Dog by Hundred Year Flood
Beautiful Weapon by Curt Kirkwood
The Coach's Wife by The Dashboard Saviors
Align Yourself by The Bottle Rockets
Cheap Motels by Southern Culture on the Skids
Starman by Jessi Colter
Gettin' Drunk by The Yayhoos
Honeychild by Susan Cowsill
I can't Help It If I'm Still in Love With You by Mark Weber

Arizona by Alejandro Escovedo
En Esta Momento by Cordero
Next Time a Diamond Won't Cut it by Andy Hersey
Oh No Hank by Jon Langford
Country Bumpkin by Cal Smith
The Only Trouble With Me by Merle Haggard
Who At My Door is Standing by Johnny Cash
Traveling Song by A. Paul Ortega

Iowa City by Eleni Mandell
That's the Way Love Goes by The Harmony Sisters
Wild Life Out West by Raising Cane
I've Always Been a Rambler by Ralph Stanley
Meant to Be That Way by Danny Santos
Butcher Boy by ThaMuseMeant
Epitath (Black and Blue) by Kris Kristofferson
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

TERRELL'S TUNE-UP: YAHOO FOR THE YAYHOOS!

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
April 7, 2006

The Yayhoos are loud, irreverent, a little crazy, and a lot of fun. And in case anyone’s forgotten, those qualities are the basic building blocks of rock ’n’ roll. Their new album, Put the Hammer Down, is a boozy, sometimes bluesy, guitar-crazed testament to the gospel of good timing.

“Gettin’ drunk, gettin’ naked, gettin’ laid, and gettin’ out,” is the refrain of one of the songs here. That pretty much sums up the spirit of Put the Hammer Down.

The band has an impressive résumé. It consists of singer Dan Baird (formerly of the Georgia Satellites); guitarist Eric “Roscoe” Ambel (who has played with Joan Jett, The Del-Lords, and for the past several years, Steve Earle); drummer Terry Anderson (The Olympic Ass Kickin’ Team); and bassist Keith Christopher (another ex-Georgia Satellite, who’s also played with Billy Joe Shaver, Paul Westerberg, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, and others.)

As in their first effort, Fear Not the Obvious, The Yayhoos sing of a world where it’s always Saturday night, the girls are all pretty, and the beer is cheap and plentiful. It starts off with “Where’s Your Boyfriend At,” a celebration of adulterous potential. I’m not sure why the instrumental bridge alludes to the “Batman” theme.

“Would It Kill You” has some fun with domestic discord. “Would it kill you to take that noose off my neck/Would it kill you to stop acting like a wreck?”

There’s even a song here (“Everything/Anything”) that introduces the boys in the band: “My name is Roscoe, and I am the boss/Without me the Minnow would be lost ... My name is Dan, I talk loud and a lot/Without me this band wouldn’t rock.” This track would be the obvious choice for a theme if The Yayhoos got their own weekly sitcom.

While most of the songs are original, The Yayhoos do a couple of inspired covers — The O’Jays’ “Love Train,” which features various Yayhoos trading vocals, and an especially exhilarating version of the B-52s’ “Roam.”

Also noted

*Sex, Fashion and Money by The Grabs. Eleni Mandell has a voice that can make men melt. Her heartbreaking, sultry alto, as heard on her solo albums (I have Afternoon and Country for True Lovers, produced by ex-Santa Fe guitarman Tony Gilkyson), will give you good dreams. And her version of “Muriel” on a Tom Waits tribute album a few years ago is stunningly gorgeous.


The Grabs is an Eleni side project. It’s a garage-y little rock quartet featuring guitar, bass, drums, and keyboards — with Mandell’s voice out front.

One could almost compare her voice to that of Neko Case, who breaks out of her country restraints and rocks as a member of The New Pornographers.

Except, while I probably like Eleni’s voice more than I do Neko’s (is that a gasp I hear out there in Reader Land?), the Grabs ain’t no New Pornographers.

It’s not a bad effort. Mandell says it was a lot of fun to record, and I believe her. Still, I don’t think this musical backdrop is the best forum for Mandell’s voice. But there are a couple of high points worth mentioning.

“Movie Star” is a put-down of some slick third-rate Steve McQueen who tries to put the moves on the singer at a party, (“Then you asked for my number, or you ordered me to give it.”) It’s got a guitar hook right out of “Then He Kissed Me” and a refrain with ba-ba-ba-ba-ba background vocals that take me back to the late ’60s, when bands like The Association roamed the earth. And the faux doo-wop of “Hope Is for the Hopeful” is a little hokey but ultimately irresistible.

As for the best-written song, that’s got to be Mandell’s “This Life,” where a forbidden crush has the singer fantasizing about reincarnation. “Last life you were my teacher/Next life you’ll be my double feature.”

So check out The Grabs. But not until you hear Mandell’s other albums mentioned above.

*The Sunny Side of the Moon: The Best of Richard Cheese. Remember Bill Murray as Nick the Lounge Singer, who belted out happy-hour versions of songs like the Star Wars theme and “You Gotta Serve Somebody” on Saturday Night Live back in the ’70s?

Remember Pat Boone’s In a Metal Mood (I liked Tiny Tim’s version of “Stairway to Heaven” better) or Paul Anka’s Rock Swings (should have been called “Smells Like Middle-Aged Spirit”)? Then you’ve got the basic idea of Richard Cheese.

Cheese does lounge and big-band versions of songs like “Rape Me” (OK, he does Nirvana better than Anka), “Baby Got Back,” (it’s a big-butt bossa nova!) “Gin and Juice” (give me The Gourds!) and Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer.”

It’s fun for awhile. In fact, hearing Mr. Cheese croon profanity after profanity in Slipknot’s “People Equals S**t” is nothing short of hilarious.

But the concept gets old quickly. You wouldn’t really want to sit down and listen from start to finish.


Down in The Flood: Hundred Year Flood returns to Santa Fe on Saturday, April 8, with a CD-release party for their excellent new album, Blue Angel, which I’ve been playing a lot lately on my radio shows and which Rob DeWalt reviews in this week’s Pasa Tempos.

The show opens with the Texas Sapphires, a country group that last month was named “Best New Austin Band” at the annual Austin Chronicle Music Awards.

The party starts at 9 p.m. at the Santa Fe Brewing Company Pub & Grill (27 Fire Place, on Frontage Road off I-25 south of the city).

$10 gets you in the door. For another $5, they’ll throw in a copy of Blue Angel.For more information, check out the Brewing Company's Web site or call Santa Fe Brewing Company at 424-3333.

ROUNDHOUSE ROUND-UP: POLLS, INFORMED AND UNINFORMED

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
April 7, 2006

Poll results released by Geno Zamora’s campaign for New Mexico attorney general show that 44 percent of 400 likely Democratic primary-election voters contacted during the last week of February preferred candidate Gary King. Zamora was the choice of 9 percent, while 8 percent liked Lem Martinez, and a whopping 39 percent were undecided.

But wait. That’s only the first round.

Zamora’s next set of poll numbers — obtained “after comprehensive information on all three candidates is presented” to the same 400 Democrats — has Zamora pulling ahead significantly, leading King 33 percent to 24 percent, with Martinez lagging behind with 19 percent.

As Gomer Pyle used to say, “Surprise, surprise, surprise!”

So what is this “comprehensive information” that so boosts Zamora (and Martinez) and so deflates King? What could the pollsters have said to cause poll participants to give Zamora an extra 24 points and cause nearly half of King supporters to flee?

Did they claim that Gary King shot a man in Reno just to watch him die?

Nothing like that, the Zamora camp says.

But they won’t say exactly what mysterious “information” was used in the poll conducted by the Washington, D.C.-based Bennett, Petts & Blumenthal firm, which is described as having a statistical margin of error of 4.9 percent.

Although Zamora himself told me early Wednesday afternoon that he had no problem with releasing the information used in conducting the poll, later in the day campaign spokesman Allan Oliver refused to hand it over.

“I hope you understand that the poll is a part of our strategy,” Oliver said.
I understand.

In general, Oliver said, the “information” consisted of the pollsters “progressively going through each of the candidates’ experience.”

There also was “information on each of the issues.”

Oliver said the information was “even handed.”

But when asked if he could categorically say that there was no negative information given about King or Martinez, Oliver wouldn’t answer with a simple yes or no.

“We talked about all their experience,” he said. “I wouldn’t characterize it as positive or negative. I don’t want to characterize it either way.”

I understand.

Pushing too hard? Oliver insisted that this was not a “push poll.”

And maybe that’s right.

While that term is bandied about a lot, according to the Wikipedia, “True push polls tend to be very short, with only a handful of questions, so as to make as many calls as possible. The data obtained is discarded rather than analyzed.”

The example they cite is the 2000 South Carolina Republican primary where a telephone pollster asked GOP voters, “Would you be more likely or less likely to vote for John McCain for president if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?” McCain lost that primary to George W. Bush.

However, the Wikipedia article says, “The term is also sometimes used incorrectly to refer to legitimate polls which test political messages, some of which may be negative.”

Sounds like “strategy.”

King responds: Contacted Wednesday, King shrugged off Zamora’s poll results.

“I’ve had a pollster tell me that they can get me any answer they want if they just ask the right questions,” he said.

The “uninformed” poll results obtained by Bennett, Petts & Blumenthal are consistent with his own poll numbers, King said.

But King said the “informed” poll results “probably indicate that if I sat on my hands and didn’t do anything, it would be possible for an opponent to close in. I’m not going to let that happen.”

See the Zamora poll results on Joe Monahan’s blog.

UPDATE: Due to some kind of human snafu at The New Mexican, this column did not appear in Thursday's paper as it usually does. It should be in Friday's paper. (Keep your fingers crossed.)

I changed the date of publication at the top of the post.

On Thursday, I spoke with Albuquerque pollster Brian Sanderoff, who told me that Zamora’s poll doesn’t sound like push polling.

“It sounds like aggressive message testing,” he said.

Of the “information” the poll-takers gave, Sanderoff said, “If it was equally balanced between negative and positive information about the candidates, there’s no reason for (the numbers) to have changed that much.”