Five Songs I Miss Playing (VIDEOS)
This is the beginning of a series of all the awesome songs that crossed my path, and then disappeared.
One of the greatest things about this job is the huge variety of music I've encountered. And some songs...well, they're just fun to play. You look forward to playing 'em, talking over them, singing along, and talking after 'em. Like Walk the Moon's "Shut Up and Dance." I LOVE playing that song.
One of the worst things about this job is that songs you love fall out of favor with listeners, and they go away. Sometimes forever. Today I'm starting a series that'll highlight some of those great songs. If, along the way, there's a song you miss hearing, drop me a line here and maybe it'll end up on a future list.
Bourgeois Tagg - I Don't Mind At All
It was 1987 and this song hit #38 on the Billboard Hot 100. I was a part-timer down the hall here in Rochester, and only working weekends, I didn't get a chance to play this much...but Holy Mother of Pearl did I love it. I put it on a cassette, and, when that cassette died, I went without for a long long time. The sweet harmonies, the stringed instruments. It just scratches me where I itch.
Colin James - Just Came Back
After doing part time in Rochester, I moved to Petoskey, MI and worked at a cool AM/FM combo (the FM was EZ Listening and the AM was Classic Rock). It was on that classic rock station that I first played "Just Came Back", by Canadian Colin James. He's from Regina Sasktachewan (which is fun to say...go ahead, try it). It hit #7 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. And then disappeared from my life.
Dream Academy - Life in A Northern Town
This moody bit of awesomeness was a pretty darn big hit (#7 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100). Sugarland covered it in 2007, but, for my money, it didn't even come close to the power of the Dream Academy's Heynanananaaaas).
This song was such a huge hit, they started a worldwide tour, and appeared on the television programmes Saturday Night Live, The Tonight Show, MTV, and American Bandstand with Dick Clark. And then, as so often happens...the band disappeared from our world.
The Cranberries - Zombie
Their first US hit, "Linger" did nothing for me. Zombie, tho, hit me hard and it moved me every time I played it. I had no idea it was a protest song at the time (written in 1993 in memory of Jonathan Ball and Tim Parry, two boys killed in an IRA bombing). It's raw, it's angry, and lead singer Dolores O'Riordan knocked it out of the park when she wrote it.
Usher - Yeah! ft. Lil Jon, Ludacris
"Yeah!" topped the US Billboard Hot 100 for twelve consecutive weeks in 2004. If it was on the air during the Early Morning Show, Cori and I were sure to be dancing, with MABEL! the intern, bendin' over to touch her toes!
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