Completely Conspicuous 548: Like a Punch In the Face

It's part 2 of my Zoomtastic conversation with guest Jay Breitling as we discuss our favorite music of 2020. Listen to the episode below or download directly (right click and "save as").

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- On to our top 10

- Kumar's #10: Dan Bejar with another great cinematic Destroyer album

- Breitling's #9: A hooky rock record from Bully

- Kumar's #9: METZ with an accessible yet pummeling record

- Breitling's #8: Spectres with a disconcerting release

- Kumar's #8: Jeff Rosenstock has become a reliably excellent indie rock stalwart

- Breitling's #7: Hop Along's Frances Quinlan goes solo

- Reppin' for the new movie Sound of Metal

- Kumar's #7: Boston act Eldridge Rodriguez with a sweeping, epic album

- Dog walkin' time

- Breitling's #6: The Psychedelic Furs with the superb comeback album nobody expected

- Kumar's #6 and Breitling's #4: Sadie Dupuis (aka Sad13) branches out with a pop-driven release

- Breitling's #5: A true banger from IDLES

- Kumar's #5: The Coriky album is as close to a Fugazi reunion as we're gonna get

- Kumar's #4: Greg Dulli delivers a compelling solo release

- Breitling's #3: Fiona Apple unleashes a bold and uncompromising record

- Kumar's #3: A pissed-off Bob Mould with a timely blast of angry anthems

- Breitling's #2: Happyness with a quirky collection that echoes an Elliott Smith-Teenage Fanclub mashup

- Kumar's #2: Protomartyr predicts everything and continues to get better

- Breitling's #1: Phoebe Bridgers hits the big time with a masterpiece

- Kumar's #1 and Breitling's #10: Run the Jewels with a vicious, vital hip-hop record that captures the desperate vibe of 2020 

Completely Conspicuous is available through the Apple Podcasts directory. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 547: 2020 Hindsight

It's part 1 of my Zoomified conversation with guest Jay Breitling as we discuss our favorite music of 2020. Listen to the episode below or download directly (right click and "save as").

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- This podcast is not affiliated in any with MovieFone.

- The first time in nine years that we're not talking the year in rock in the same room

- No live shows after early March

- Breitling last saw Hallelujah the Hills at Great Scott last November, Kumar saw Drive-By Truckers at Somerville Theater in March

- Devastating economic impact on all the non-musicians who work to put concerts together

- If approved, Save Our Stages act would aid live venues

- Many independent Boston-area venues have already closed

- Great Scott may reopen in a new location

- No touring means no income for many smaller artists

- Streaming royalties need to be updated and increased

- The Breitlings enjoyed Strange Brew recently

- Plenty of livestreams, free, for charity and for profit

- Bandcamp Friday has been a good way to help out artists

- Online radio has been fun

- Breitling is doing a show with a couple of fellow Wesleyan DJs called Parcheesi Redux

- Parcheesi Redux Thursday (along with the other shows) is on Mixcloud

- Kumar's show, Stuck In Thee Garage, is in its 7th year on BFF.fm

- Great way to discover new music

- Our favorite music

- Breitling's picks from the midyear that didn't make his top 10: Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, Soft Pink Truth, Gigi Masin, Peel Dream Magazine, Mandarina Duck, Destroyer

- Kumar's midyear picks that didn't make final top 10: Flat Worms, Dogleg, Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, Drakulas, Car Seat Headrest

- More Breitling on-the-bubble picks: Susie Derkins, Hum, Coriky, Mountain Goats, Milky Wimpshake, Somerset Thrower, Nothing, METZ, Bob Mould, The Brother Kite, Paper Birch

- More Kumar honorable mention picks: Psychedelic Furs, Kestrels, Fontaines D.C., Pearl Jam, Lo Tom, Disheveled Cuss, Emerald Comets/Ex-Hyena

- Next week: We count down our top 10 albums

Completely Conspicuous is available through the Apple Podcasts directory. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 546: Watching the Detectives

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss our favorite albums of 1977. Listen to the episode below or download directly (right click and "save as").

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- A startling number of great releases in '77; a lot of terrific debuts

- Singles chart was topped by disco and pop: Rod Stewart, Andy Gibb, Streisand, KC and the Sunshine Band, Engelbert Humperdinck

- Jay's non-top 5 faves: Ramones had two albums, Sex Pistols, Johnny Thunders, the Damned, Richard Hell, Iggy Pop, Cheap Trick had two, Bowie had two, Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, Rush, Neil Young, The Clash, Wire, Max Webster 

- Jay: My dad had disco mixtapes,

- This was recorded before Johnny Lydon said he had flea bites on his dong

- Phil's non-top 5 favorites: Grateful Dead, Television, Jackson Browne, Billy Joel, Elvis Costello, the Kinks, AC/DC, Dead Boys, Queen, Linda Ronstadt, Wire, Clapton

- The cover of Queen's News of the World scared young Phil; Kmart had a cleaned-up alternate cover

- Jay's #5: Peter Gabriel's solo debut went in new directions, combining art rock and new wave

- Phil's #5: A fiery, concise debut from the Clash (UK only)

- Jay's  #4: Guitar rock meets post punk from Television

- Phil's #4: Bob Marley breaks through in the U.S.

- Jay's and Phil's #3: Talking Heads' debut didn't sound like anything else

- Jay's #2: Iggy Pop worked with Bowie in Berlin to produce an electronic-influenced sound

- Phil's #2: The ubiquitous Fleetwood Mac album is getting popular again

- Remains vital despite massive overplaying of certain songs

- Jay's #1: Elvis Costello burst on the scene with biting lyrics, catchy classics

- Phil's #1: The controversial Steely Dan with a jazzy, meticulous opus

- Favorite songs: "Watching the Detectives" (Jay), "Josie" (Phil)

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 545: Beat on the Brat

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss our favorite albums of 1976. Listen to the episode below or download directly.

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- America was all about the Bicentennial in 1976

- Disco was picking up steam

- Arena rock and MOR was huge

- Phil's non-top 5 favorites: Eagles, Zeppelin, Steely Dan, Bowie, Zevon, J. Geils Band, Rolling Stones, Boz Scaggs, Joni Mitchell, Bob Marley, Burning Spear, Peter Tosh, Wings, AC/DC, Aerosmith, Seger, Modern Lovers  

- Like a lot of '76 records, don't love a lot of them

- AC/DC re-released Dirty Deeds five years later in the U.S.

- Bob Seger liked the double entendres

- Jay's non-top 5 faves: Max Webster, Blondie, Judas Priest, Thin Lizzy, Blue Oyster Cult, Queen, Stevie Wonder, Tom Petty

- Phil's #5: Jerry Garcia solo release spawned some Dead staples

- Jay's #5: Aerosmith continues their strong mid-70s run

- Phil's  #4: Petty's stellar debut

- Jay's #4: Zeppelin releases a sprawling, epic album

- Phil's #3: Dylan's last great album for a while

- Jay's #3: Bowie releases yet another masterpiece

- Jay's #2: Rush doubles down with a sci-fi classic

- Phil's #2 and Jay's #1: The Ramones burst on the scene with an influential debut

- Phil's #1: Stevie Wonder with an epic double LP

- Favorite songs: "Beat on the Brat" (Jay), "Sir Duke" (Phil)

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 544: In the Light

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss our favorite albums of 1975. Listen to the episode below or download directly (right click and "save as").

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- RIP to EVH

- We both saw VH in 1986

- In '75, Phil turned 6, Jay turned 8

- "Love Will Keep Us Together" was the #1 song of the year

- Disco was starting to emerge

- The S.N.A.C.K. concert

- Phil's non-top 5: Parliament, Burning Spear, Patti Smith, Aerosmith, Pink Floyd, Grateful Dead, Joni Mitchell, Steely Dan, Fleetwood Mac, Neil Young, Dylan and the Band

- Jay's non-top 5: AC/DC, Rush, The Who, Supertramp, Springsteen, McCartney/Wings

- Phil's #5: The Who tries some different sounds

- Jay's #5: Pink Floyd follows up a classic with another classic

- Phil's #4 and Jay's #3: Bowie moves into another phase

- Jay's #4: Queen breaks through with "Bohemian Rhapsody"

- Phil's #3 and Jay's #2: A gut-wrenching release from Neil Young

- Phil's 2: Dylan's 15th album is one of his best

- Phil and Jay's #1: A double album that highlights all the different facets of Zeppelin's sound

- Favorite songs: "Tonight's the Night" (Jay), "In the Light" (Phil)

- Things were happening

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 543: You Really Got Me

I'm joined by guest Brian Salvatore as we remember the greatness of Eddie Van Halen. Listen to the episode below or download directly.

Show notes:

- Recorded via Skype

- Last spoke in late March but feels a lot longer ago

- We've been fascinated by Van Halen's career, the good and the bad

- Eddie had dealt with cancer before

- Death still came as a shock

- Plenty of musician deaths this year: Neil Peart, Andy Gill, David Roback, Kenny Rogers, Bill Rieflin, Bill Withers, Adam Schlesinger, John Prine, Florian Schneider, Pete Way, Peter Green

- Eddie was iconic and eternally youthful

- Brian: First video I remember seeing was "Jump"

- Played on Letterman a few times

- Jay: Stopped listening to VH in '91 and didn't again for almost a decade

- The "Right Now" video was surprising

- Dropoff in quality after Roth left

- 2012's A Different Kind of Truth was a decent way to go out

- Hopefully there will finally be some archival VH releases

- Who buys greatest hits albums?

- Eddie's guest appearances

- Jay: First became aware of VH in 1980 when Women and Children First came out

- Eddie had been quiet for several years

- Roth was doing a Vegas residency and opening for KISS just before the pandemic shutdown

- Missing live music

- Plenty of livestreams to check out

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

Completely Conspicuous 542: Raised on Robbery

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss our favorite albums of 1974. Listen to the episode below or download directly.

Show notes:

- Recorded via Zoom

- Phil finally got a haircut

- In '74, Phil turned 5, I turned 7

- Capt. and Tennille got married, Sonny and Cher got divorced

- "The Streak" was a big hit

- Phil: Looking back, liked more songs than albums in '74

- Not a long list of albums we liked

- Radio was the main source of how people discovered music at that time

- Phil's likes: Linda Ronstadt, Little Feat, Bob Marley, Lou Reed, Gram Parsons, Big Star, Van Morrison, Clapton

- Jay's likes: Rush's debut album, Genesis, The Who, Queen, Steely Dan, Aerosmith, Zappa

- The various, very different, phases of Genesis' sound

- Queen is more popular than ever

- Jay's #5: Supertramp's breakthrough

- Phil's #5: Another great Stevie Wonder album

- Jay's and Phil's #4: Neil Young with a mellow classic, powered by "honey slides"

- Jay's #3: Big Star with an underrated power pop gem

- Phil's #3 and Jay's #1: Bowie closing out his glam period with a bang

- Phil's #2: Steely Dan featured a ton of guest musicians

- Jay's #2: Lou Reed releases a killer live show

- Phil's #1: Joni Mitchell hits it big with a jazzier sound, with help from Cheech & Chong

- Backed by Tom Scott, who later was bandleader on both the Pat Sajak and Chevy Chase late night shows

- Favorite songs: "Raised on Robbery" (Phil), "Diamond Dogs" (Jay)

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.