A Little Bit of This, A Little Bit of That (December 1990)

 

The strain on my relationship with Kelley grew even more, and this is the point when I started cheating on her. I’m not proud of this, and I won’t try to defend it, but it happened. Jill and I fooled around a little, and Jill also introduced me to a friend of hers name Denise that I slept with. In addition there was a girl in my English class named Cherie who was also in a long-distance relationship. She and I spent an evening rolling around on my floor, but we both chickened out before we got too far. I don’t know what it was that all of a sudden I had all these women around me.

I knew that sooner or later I was going to have to break up with Kelley, but for a lot of reasons, it didn’t seem that easy. We had gotten somewhat serious before all this, so stepping back would be tough. And there were issues that it’s not my place to talk about here that also made things difficult. But it would have to be done.

On a more positive note, there was a woman that I met who I wasn’t cheating on Kelley with named Anna. We met in my Astronomy class and later had a Creative Writing class together. Her boyfriend Kurt came to LSU not long afterwards and we all became really good friends. In fact, Jill was working at the snack bar in the LSU Student Union and when Kurt first came in, she remarked to him that he looked a lot like someone else she knew. She didn’t know we had already met. People felt Kurt and I looked alike, like brothers or something, but if that was ever true, I think it’s less true now. Anna and Kurt are the first two people in this history that I’ve consistently stayed in touch with since meeting them.

By this time Baton Rouge was becoming a home to me, not just the place I went to school. I had real friends there, a job (I was driving for Domino’s Pizza, which was actually a lot of fun), and an apartment. I was going back to New Orleans less often, since there wasn’t much left for me in that city. In fact, I hardly spoke to anyone there. I also started getting into the BBS scene in Baton Rouge, which wasn’t nearly as fun as it had been in New Orleans, but still introduced me to a few cool people.

The Lightning Seeds – All I Want The Cure – Like Cockatoos Ultra Vivid Scene – Special One The Sundays – Hideous Towns Bob Mould – It’s Too Late The Lilac Time – The Girl Who Waves At Trains Sinéad O’Connor – Black Boys On Mopeds Indigo Girls – Hammer and a Nail World Party – Way Down Now Syd Straw – Future 40′s (String Of Pearls) Everything But The Girl – Driving James McMurtry – Shining Eyes Steve Wynn – Carolyn

The Jesus and Mary Chain – Her Way of Praying The Stone Roses – Bye Bye Badman Uncle Green – Time To Make Demands The Replacements – Nobody R.E.M. – The Flowers Of Guatemala They Might Be Giants – Birdhouse In Your Soul Michelle Shocked – Silent Ways House of Love – Beatles and the Stones The Smiths – This Night Has Opened My Eyes Shriekback – Underwaterboys Depeche Mode – Halo Nine Inch Nails – Sin Spacemen 3 – Lord Can You Hear Me

• The Lightning Seeds – All I Want
• The Sundays – Hideous Towns
• The Lilac Time – The Girl Who Waves At Trains
• Sinéad O’Connor – Black Boys On Mopeds
• Indigo Girls – Hammer and a Nail
• Everything But The Girl – Driving
• James McMurtry – Shining Eyes
• The Jesus and Mary Chain – Her Way of Praying
• The Stone Roses – Bye Bye Badman
• The Replacements – Nobody
• R.E.M. – The Flowers Of Guatemala
• Michelle Shocked – Silent Ways
• House of Love – Beatles and the Stones
• The Smiths – This Night Has Opened My Eyes
• Shriekback – Underwaterboys
• Depeche Mode – Halo
• Nine Inch Nails – Sin
• Spacemen 3 – Lord Can You Hear Me

That’s a LOT of retreads there, and it’s pretty indicative that this is a fairly dull mix. There’s nothing particularly bad here (except maybe that House of Love track; fortunately, we’re saying goodbye to them) but nothing that would be a first choice for anyone. Not a whole lot of thought went into this. (This is the end of the road for The Smiths, by the way. And Shriekback is going to take a little break after this.)

• The Cure – Like Cockatoos

Another retread, but this one has a story behind it. Before I got my job at Domino’s, I briefly tried out for a political action group. This involved going door-to-door looking for donations and petition signatures. It was miserable, and not only because I was terrible at it. To keep myself in any kind of positive spirits, I would sing this song to myself over and over. I don’t know why it worked (it’s not a particularly happy song), but it did.

• Ultra Vivid Scene – Special One

This is the brightest spot here. Sound Woohoo briefly had a free magazine they distributed, which would spotlight new music. Their description of this band sounded interesting, so I tried out the album (Joy: 1969-1990). I loved it and to this day I love it. It’s one of my all-time favorite albums, and I love this song as well.

• Bob Mould – It’s Too Late

I know this is heresy, but I never got into Husker Du. I tried, I really did, but it just didn’t grab me. This solo album of Bob Mould’s did, however, even if it is a bit bombastic and obvious in places (This is Black Sheets of Rain. His previous solo album, Workbook, is much more subtle.)

• World Party – Way Down Now

This was one I got into through Kelley. She heard this song on the radio or something and liked it, so I ended up buying the CD.

• Syd Straw – Future 40′s (String Of Pearls)

No idea how I first heard this Syd Straw album, but it’s a lot of fun. And yeah, that’s Michael Stipe doing guest vocals.

• Steve Wynn – Carolyn

Another one from the Sound Woohoo preview kiosk. I like this song a fair amount, but the rest of the album didn’t grab me. In fact, for the longest time it was hard to find this track as an mp3 — I guess I wasn’t the only one who didn’t dig on this album too hard. I have an impression that this version is different from the original CD track I had, but I can’t tell you why that might be.

• Uncle Green – Time To Make Demands

This is a track that would be someone’s first choice. Much as I like “Vulnerability” from the previous tape, this song is just so much rockin’ fun.

• They Might Be Giants – Birdhouse In Your Soul

Hard to say who introduced me to these guys. There’s a term among TMBG fans: “Floodite”. It is a (derisive, naturally) word for fans who came on board with the release of Flood. I would be one of those fans. Jill, Kurt, and Kyle all were listening to Flood as well, so I don’t know where I heard it first. I had heard the band previously (I had the “Don’t Let’s Start” single) but hadn’t really “gotten” them until this point. (And even then it took me a while to really warm to some of their more oddball tracks.) Flood for me is such a double-edged sword, though. It’s a great album, no doubt, but because it has some humor on it and was so popular, it pigeonholed them as a “funny” band, as though they’re in the same league as Weird Al Yankovic or something. And the fact that they’re so popular among geeks, who can’t help but quote lyrics from them a la Monty Python doesn’t help either.

I got into a discussion on a forum one time about the band and said, “It’s strange to me that a band whose lyrics are constantly about paranoia and dread would get tagged so much as a joke band.” Someone said, “Which songs of theirs mention paranoia or dread?” and all I could reply with was, “Well, just for a start, ALL OF THEM.” Which is only a slight exaggeration.

They just don’t come much blander than this title, do they? Maybe the title prejudices me against thinking this tape is interesting. I’ve no idea what prompted such a dull title, though I do recall my friend Ben from Lafayette using this phrase when asked what he’d been doing lately. I do like what I came up with for the cover, however.

Click on the player below to listen to this mix!

(xspf player courtesy Lacy Morrow and Fabricio Zuardi.)

That’s About the Size of It (June, 1990)

 

My second semester in the Pentagon dorms was a drag, with the guy directly below me and the guy directly above me having a contest to see who could be the most annoying. The one below me was also the RA, so I wasn’t going to get any help there. As a result, in January of 1990 I returned to LSU but was now residing in my very first own apartment. It was an efficiency in the Library Apartments in Tigerland, on a street named after some football player. There’s not a street, building, or water fountain in Baton Rouge named for Robert Penn Warren, but there’s a whole subdivision devoted to football players.

It was very cool having my own apartment, small as it was. Among my neighbors were Ingolf (a/k/a “Wolf”), who was a really nice guy, and Corey, who was in a lot of my writing classes. I was now an English major and was doing a lot of writing, though ultimately very little of it proved to be remotely worthwhile.

Kelley and I were still together, despite the long-distance relationship. It was a strain — she was pretty much the only person I knew in Natchitoches, and she lived in a dorm, so when I went there to visit her, there was nothing to do and nowhere for me to stay, but in a Motel 6. Eventually I ended up driving up there on Friday, picking her up, driving back that evening, and then returning her on Sunday (when she didn’t just drive down herself). That’s 16 hours of the weekend in a car. Also around this time I began driving for Domino’s Pizza, so I was working as well. It was getting harder and harder to maintain the relationship.

The Mighty Lemon Drops – At Midnight R.E.M. – Get Up The Pursuit Of Happiness – She’s So Young The Feelies – Away James McMurtry – I’m Not From Here Uncle Green – Vulnerability The Replacements – Achin’ To Be Deacon Blue – Real Gone Kid Michelle Shocked – On the Greener Side The Sundays – Here’s Where The Story Ends Sinéad O’Connor – Jump In The River Kate Bush – Love and Anger	The Cure – Pictures Of You The Beloved – Hello The Smiths – Stretch Out And Wait The Lilac Time – American Eyes The Stone Roses – Elephant Stone The Lightning Seeds – Pure The House of Love – Shine On The Jesus and Mary Chain – Blues from a Gun Depeche Mode – Policy Of Truth Shriekback – Shark Walk Nine Inch Nails – Head Like a Hole Spacemen 3 – So Hot (Wash Away All Of My Tears)

With this tape I broke the 90-minute barrier. Originally it was a 90 minute tape, but almost immediately afterwards I bought two albums that demanded to have representative songs on it. I decided to give the newish 100-minute tapes a try, inserting a new song onto each side. Despite horror stories from well-meaning friends, I never had a single tape break on me.

Although a lot of my usual type of stuff can be found here, you can definitely see Kelley’s influence in the “crunchier” music that is also seeping in.

• The Mighty Lemon Drops – At Midnight
• R.E.M. – Get Up
• The Pursuit Of Happiness – She’s So Young
• The Feelies – Away
• The Replacements – Achin’ To Be
• Deacon Blue – Real Gone Kid
• The Smiths – Stretch Out And Wait
• The Stone Roses – Elephant Stone
• The House of Love – Shine On
• The Jesus and Mary Chain – Blues from a Gun
• Depeche Mode – Policy Of Truth
• Shriekback – Shark Walk
• Spacemen 3 – So Hot (Wash Away All Of My Tears)

These are just more of the same from before. The sheer number of them shows that I’m going into a rut here that will continue a bit on the next mix. That Shriekback song is really scraping the bottom of the Go Bang! barrel. “Shine On” only sounds like the most pretentious song ever because you haven’t yet heard the one on the next mix. I really gave those guys far too much credit. On the flip side, that Spacemen 3 track is a lovely, lovely song.

• James McMurtry – I’m Not From Here

Son of Larry, the writer. Sound Woohoo (Warehouse) had little listening kiosks now where you could slip on some headphones and try out some new stuff, and it usually featured lesser-known artists. I sampled this album, Too Long in the Wasteland and even though it was a lot more country/folksy/not-having-synthesizers than I usually went for, something about it grabbed me. Probably the fact that it’s a really well-done album with some great songs on it.

• Uncle Green – Vulnerability

Back when I worked at KRVS, Ben and I had a policy that any albums which came in and were on clear vinyl got played. Thus, “Chemical Way” by Uncle Green got played on the show, but that was the last I heard of these guys until I stumbled across their You CD and recognized the name. This is another great album that remains a favorite. I like this song, but the track that is far and away my favorite got saved for the next mix, and I’m not sure why.

• Michelle Shocked – On the Greener Side

Michelle’s new album, Captain Swing, took a while to grow on me, but eventually it did. I remember cleaning my apartment one day and listening to both Michelle Shocked and the Indigo Girls. “It’s lesbians with guitars day over here!” I told someone who called. I later found out that Michelle Shocked is not, in fact, a lesbian, but I don’t think she’d mind the error.

• The Sundays – Here’s Where The Story Ends
• The Lightning Seeds – Pure

These are the two tracks that forced me to go to 100 minutes. The Sundays’ first album is a thing of beauty and “Pure” is just a dazzling, gorgeous song.

• Sinéad O’Connor – Jump In The River

Sinead’s back! It’s a shame that now she’s only known for being a kook because she tore up a photo of the Pope on Saturday Night Live to protest sexual abuse in the Catholic church. It’s a shame both because it took attention away from the fact that she is tremendously talented and because you know what? She was right.

• Kate Bush – Love and Anger

This is a strange one because I don’t own this album and never did. I don’t really know where I heard it or who I borrowed it from to put it on the tape. It is a Kate Bush mystery! But I do like the song!

• The Cure – Pictures Of You

This song clocks in at seven and a half minutes and almost didn’t make the cut. I was wary of putting anything that long on a tape, since I only had so much room to work with. But it stayed on and became the longest song at the time to get featured on one of these tapes.

• The Beloved – Hello

This was a band that the British mags were liking. I bought the album and liked this track okay, but the rest of it was a bit too disco for me and I didn’t keep it for long.

• The Lilac Time – American Eyes

I can’t tell you much about this album, apart from the two songs that made it onto my tapes. I don’t have it anymore, so it must not have had much of an effect on me. Still, this is a great little song. The bit around the break, “…and never quite goes,” gets me every time.

• Nine Inch Nails – Head Like a Hole

And then there’s this. Back on Gene Pool of the Damned I mentioned seeing the Jesus and Mary Chain at Tipitina’s in New Orleans, with another band opening. This was that other band, which none of us had ever heard of before. And I have to say, they blew the crowd away. I don’t know how many people were at that show, but I’m pretty sure every one of them bought a copy of Pretty Hate Machine the next day.

Honestly, I have no idea where this title came from. I know it was something I’d say from time to time, but I’ve no idea what was so memorable about the phrase that became the title of one of the tapes. It’s such a lame title that when I was working on making covers, it gave me almost nothing to go on, so I just went with a sort of 50s retro theme.

Click on the player below to listen to this mix!

(xspf player courtesy Lacy Morrow and Fabricio Zuardi.)

Gene Pool of the Damned (December, 1988)

 

I returned to New Orleans and began to stagnate. I had a job working for Orleans Sea Food Company, dating nobody, and falling back on previous habits, such as hanging out on computer BBS systems again. I orbited the same circle of friends before (even attempting to become friends with Merlin again, which ultimately didn’t take) and although many of them had now moved on to somewhat different things, not a whole lot had changed for everyone. It was a strange part of my life, actually, very aimless, and I’m not sure what I was trying to accomplish. I still didn’t know what I wanted to do with myself, so I just kind of floated around.

For some reason there was a lot of high sexual strangeness going on (none of it affecting me). There’s no need to name names here, but a lot of the people I knew now seemed to be involved in various intricate and unsettling permutations with one another. (And let’s be frank here, it’s not like I was missing a lot of this by choice…not my choice, at least.) I was constantly getting second- and third-hand reports of the latest doings and trysts. The whole thing was very odd and soap-opera-ish because in addition to all the screwing, there were all these weird petty jealousies and such going on.

The only issue of my own I had during all this was a brief fling with a girl named Beth who I met through Christine (now living near St. Louis). They visited New Orleans and I hooked up with Beth during that time. Eventually I flew out there to spend a week with her and wasn’t off the plane fifteen minutes before getting to meet Beth’s new boyfriend.

To back up a little, though, when I was going to USL, my trips back and forth to New Orleans often included a pit stop to give Liz a ride to/from home. Liz was one of the gang with Katie and Charlyn, and was now going to LSU. I ended up palling with her and her friends there, including Michelle, who I got kind of sweet on. During this time I started to head up to LSU on weekends to hang out there, and started to consider staying up there for good.

Rob told me that such plans were futile, that a change in location would not help me, but by December I didn’t care. I had to get out of New Orleans, away from these people. I had had enough of all of it and I headed for Baton Rouge and Louisiana State University and I never looked back (much).

Colourbox – Hot Doggie The The – Slow Train To Dawn R.E.M. – Exhuming McCarthy Deacon Blue – Raintown The Jesus and Mary Chain – Sidewalking The Cure – Catch Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights Morrissey – Hairdresser On Fire Guadalcanal Diary – Litany (Life Goes On) 10,000 Maniacs – Don’t Talk The Mighty Lemon Drops – Inside Out Shriekback – Go Bang	Love And Rockets – Yin And Yang And The Flower Pot Man (Remix) Depeche Mode – Shake the Disease Sinéad O’Connor – Mandinka The Bolshoi – Modern Man The Sugarcubes – Motorcrash Siouxsie and the Banshees – Peek-A-Boo Michelle Shocked – Anchorage The Smiths – There Is A Light That Never Goes Out Voice of the Beehive – I Say Nothing Jerry Harrison – Cherokee Chief The Replacements – The Ledge

In keeping with how the story has gone, this one also represents a bit of stagnation. It’s not a bad mix, but there are a lot of wells I’m going back to here, and one especially egregious example of such. There is something notable, nevertheless: around this time I bought my first CD player. Since I was living at home, working, and had few expenses, I was buying a LOT of CDs (including a lot of things I already owned on vinyl.) Not only was this tape constructed pretty much entirely from CDs I owned, it’s one where I believe I still have every song on it on CD.

• Colourbox – Hot Doggie

This is from the 4AD compilation, Lonely is an Eyesore, and it’s by far my favorite track on there. I also liked the Cocteau Twins and Clan of Xymox tracks on there and dug both bands, though neither one of them ever made it onto a mix for some reason. As much as I love this song, I never really sought out any of Colourbox’s other stuff.

• The The – Slow Train To Dawn
• Guadalcanal Diary – Litany (Life Goes On)
• The Mighty Lemon Drops – Inside Out
• Love And Rockets – Yin And Yang And The Flower Pot Man (Remix)
• Sinéad O’Connor – Mandinka
• The Bolshoi – Modern Man
• The Smiths – There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
• Voice of the Beehive – I Say Nothing

Nothing notable here, really, just some more of the same. That Bolshoi track seems kind of out of place here for some reason. And just as trivia, I believe “Slow Train to Dawn” was the first song I ever played on KRVS.

• R.E.M. – Exhuming McCarthy

You can’t tell by this track, but this is the point where I fell for R.E.M. hard. I like Document well enough, but I now went back and really started devouring the previous stuff like never before.

• Deacon Blue – Raintown

Here’s how much I was buying music: I’m in Tower Records one night and I see this album by a band called Deacon Blue, called Raintown. I like the cover. The band is named after a Steely Dan song I like. I like the album title. Something about the entire package (except the music, which I haven’t heard) “clicks” for me, so I buy it. Fortunately, I turn out to really like the album. (I tried this same thing with other CDs and didn’t encounter success.)

• The Jesus and Mary Chain – Sidewalking

Barbed Wire Kisses came out after Darklands, even though a lot of it was recorded before that album, and it shows the JAMC progressing from the fuzzy sound of their first album to the more melodic second. On the one hand it gives a bit of context to the progression, but at the cost of taking away the surprising about-face they did.

I’m jumping ahead a bit here, but I eventually saw the band play at Tipitina’s (with an opening act to be named later). My friend Jody accompanied me and I warned him that everything I had read about the JAMC in concert assured me that they were AWFUL live. Sure enough, they were halfway through this song — one of my favorites — before I recognized what they were playing. (In fairness, I saw them two more times after that and they were much better.)

• The Cure – Catch

Also jumping ahead here…at LSU I ended up auditioning for a play, and the audition required “performing” a song as though the lyrics were dialogue. This is the song I picked for that. (I got called back but didn’t get the part.)

• Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights

Not sure why I suddenly get into Kate Bush here, with a song that wasn’t new to anyone except me.

• Morrissey – Hairdresser On Fire

Right as I’m getting into The Smiths, they break up and Morrissey goes solo. Is it cheating to have both on the same tape? At least I put them on different sides.

• 10,000 Maniacs – Don’t Talk

R.E.M.’s newfound mainstream success had a lot of similar acts being pushed hard. These were the darlings of the indie rock scene at the time both because of their affable sound and because let’s face it, Natalie Merchant was way cute.

• Shriekback – Go Bang

Shriekback put out a new album for which this is the title track. And Stephen and I wanted to love love love it like we did the others but lord, it was not that good. It did have some moments on it, but for the most part it was something of a mess (and the inclusion of an ill-conceived cover of “Get Down Tonight” by K.C. and the Sunshine Band, featuring a rap, was pretty much a test for even the most devoted fans.) Nevertheless, the fact that they didn’t follow it up with anything for some time means that four tracks from this album will get mined from it, when maybe two would have been enough.

• Depeche Mode – Shake the Disease

This is the WTF-est track on here. Yes, you are remembering correctly. It’s not a remix or live or anything, it’s the exact same song that was already on The Cool New Music Tape II. I have no idea why it’s back.

And it’s not like Depeche Mode wasn’t putting out new music, either! Music For The Masses had come out and was wowing everyone (except me, I guess — I never loved it as much as everyone else seemed to, but it eventually grew on me more.) I will say that the album works best as a whole, with few tracks that sound as good in isolation (I had already used “Strangelove” on Paradise Misplaced.) The track that probably should have gone here is “Little 15″. But even without the new album, there was so much else I could have put if I wanted an older tune. Hell, I hadn’t ever used “People Are People”!

• The Sugarcubes – Motorcrash

Looka little Bjork! The British music press adored the Sugarcubes and I liked their first album as well, even the songs where whatshisname would come in and start talking all over the place. We also saw them play at Tipitina’s and ended up leaving after only a few songs because, honestly, they weren’t that good. (I think I won the tickets by calling into WTUL, which I listened to a lot at work.)

• Siouxsie and the Banshees – Peek-A-Boo
• Jerry Harrison – Cherokee Chief

I’m sure Siouxsie fans regard Peepshow as the absolute nadir of the band, but it was great for a faux-goth like myself. And did you know Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads (and yes, the Modern Lovers, but I didn’t know that yet) put out a solo album (two, actually)? Unfortunately for him, most people didn’t know this. It’s not bad, if a bit more by-the-numbers than you’d expect.

• Michelle Shocked – Anchorage

If this seems unusual for me, you’re not wrong. But again, the British music mags went gaga for Michelle-Shocked’s Texas Campfire Tapes, so when I saw her new album, Short Sharp Shocked at Sound Woohoo (our name for Sound Warehouse), I gave it a try, and ended up liking it a bunch, to my own surprise.

• The Replacements – The Ledge

I mentioned it in a comment on the last mix, but it deserves proper mention, and this is a worthwhile place to do so. While I was at USL, Michael Dodd, my former friend who became a hated enemy, took his own life. Afterwards I played this song during my radio show as a “tribute” to him.

“Gene Pool of the Damned” was one of the nicer terms I had come up with to describe the circle of friends I had grown up with who were now in these weird, angry, incestuous relationships with each other. The Barrel of Monkeys from the cover was another metaphor I used, since there didn’t seem to be any way to have just one of them without getting the whole bunch along for the ride. (and see if you can find me in the diagram on the back cover!)

Click on the player below to listen to this mix!

(xspf player courtesy Lacy Morrow and Fabricio Zuardi.)

Paradise Misplaced (January, 1988)

 

Towards the end of the summer of 1987 I was thinking about going back to school. My record at UNO had been purged and I considered trying it again (as a commuter this time), but two things prevented that. First, I set foot on the campus to talk to some administrator about returning. Immediately I was filled to bursting with anxiety and disgust. Second, I talked to the administrator, who ended our talk with “It’s like the Prodigal Son returning!” and at that point I knew that I wasn’t going to go back to UNO.

Instead I went to the University of Southwestern Louisiana (as it was called then) in Lafayette. This is where Gene and Julie went, and I spent a lot of time with them and their friends, Felix, Duane, and Allen. In my first semester there I lived in Roy Hall, in a wonderful huge private dorm room, but then I moved to an apartment with two other guys, Ben and Hai, both of whom were great guys.

More importantly for purposes of this discussion, however, I had gotten a job as one of the DJs for the weekend late-night alternative music show on KRVS, the campus radio station (I believe strings were somehow pulled, but I don’t remember by whom.) The show was on Fridays and Saturday nights (or, more accurately, Saturday and Sunday mornings) from midnight to 6 am, and I had a blast doing it. Ben would often join me in the studio and we just had a great time. I got a lot of good feedback during my shows from people calling in, and would visit the station almost daily to see what new records had arrived, planning for the upcoming weekend. Despite the fact that I’d be starving right now, I’m not sure why I didn’t pursue this as a possible career path.

All this forward movement aside, though, I was still strongly tethered to New Orleans. Katie and I were still together, and on Friday or Saturday nights, I would do my show, eat some Vivarin, and then drive the hour and a half to New Orleans to see her or do laundry. Katie was going to school at the University of Southern Mississippi and I visited her there once. As a result I still spent a good deal of time with the same old people as before (in fact, I had even forgiven and re-befriended Merlin, so I was not quite making good choices yet.)

In my second semester at USL, Katie was no longer at USM and was instead back with the old New Orleans crowd, so this tie just increased. In addition, I never got a phone in my second semester at USL – we just never got around to getting one put in the apartment, so I had to do a lot of the work in communicating with Katie. She never wrote me letters or came to visit me, and by the end of the semester, we had broken up for the final time. I was feeling my depression coming back, so when I went home to New Orleans for the summer, I did not return.

Ultimately I didn’t put down any lasting roots in Lafayette and wound up back at home, running with the same crowd as before, doing the same things. It all turned out to be a complete wash.

Shriekback – Achtung The Jesus and Mary Chain – Happy When it Rains The Smithereens – Behind The Wall Of Sleep Tirez Tirez – Somebody Tell Me Love And Rockets – No New Tale To Tell That Petrol Emotion – Big Decision The Replacements – Alex Chilton Depeche Mode – Strangelove New Order – True Faith The The – Perfect The Mighty Lemon Drops – Turn Me Round

Screaming Blue Messiahs – I Wanna Be A Flintstone Boom Crash Opera – Great Wall The Cure – Hot Hot Hot!!! Sinéad O’Connor – Troy The Smiths – Cemetry Gates Bauhaus – She’s in Parties (edit) Guadalcanal Diary – Where Angels Fear To Tread Voice of the Beehive – Just a City The Bolshoi – Happy Boy The Proclaimers – (I’m Gonna) Burn Your Playhouse Down R.E.M. – It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

This is a huge departure from the previous track listing. The radio station is the main reason for the huge explosion in new stuff, and Ben is too. In addition, I was now regularly buying the British music tabloids Melody Maker and NME and was often grabbing stuff they talked about simply because they talked about it. For once I was actually somewhat ahead of the music geek curve!

• Shriekback – Achtung
• New Order – True Faith
• Love And Rockets – No New Tale To Tell
• The The – Perfect
• Depeche Mode – Strangelove
• The Bolshoi – Happy Boy
• The Cure – Hot Hot Hot!!!

These seven bands are the only holdouts from previously. And they’re fine choices, all said. When I had my last radio show I threatened to put “Achtung” on turntable one and “Sidewalking” by The Jesus and Mary Chain (featured on a tape yet to come) on turntable two and just go back and forth between them all night.

Incidentally, this version of “True Faith” is not the version on the original tape, which was a 7″ mix. Being New Order, however, there are approximately forty-twelve different versions out there to sift through, and this one is good enough.

• The Jesus and Mary Chain – Happy When it Rains

They’re back! The JAMC’s second album, Darklands, was much more accessible than their first (when asked why it sounded so different they replied, “We already did Psychocandy“, which I thought was brilliant.) and my love for it made me dive back into their first album and finally truly appreciate it. They’ll now be a mainstay for quite some time.

• The Smithereens – Behind The Wall Of Sleep

This is a great song, and I like a whole bunch of their others, but for some reason this is the only appearance of this band in the series. Ben really dug them, which is how I got started on them.

• Tirez Tirez – Somebody Tell Me

This remains one of two bits of music from this time that, to this day, I have been unable to find as an mp3. (The other being “Love Dog” by Norman Nardini, which has a bit of a story behind it.) Ergo, this is a tape dub. It’s actually a dub of a dub, as I played the song on one of my radio shows and sometimes taped the shows. Honestly, it’s not that great of a song, and I’m not sure why it made the cut. I can think of ten songs off the top of my head that should have been here instead.

• That Petrol Emotion – Big Decision

Another one I can’t find the original version of. I had this album on vinyl and used the version on that record. When they released it on CD, they replaced it with an extended mix. This version claims to be the original version but it’s not. (The original version ends on the last note, it doesn’t have the “Whatcha gotta do in this day and age” fade out.)

• The Replacements – Alex Chilton

Ben made me a tape of Pleased to Meet Me and I wore the hell out of it. And yes, thanks to this song, I then got into Alex Chilton himself, but that’s for a later tape. When I eventually got a CD player of my own, I bought the disk and discovered that he had taped side two before side one. The album I thought I knew was completely wrong. And what’s worse, the Ben way is a much better album and makes more sense! Try it yourself! Start at “Never Mind” and end with “The Ledge”. It flows so much better!

• The Mighty Lemon Drops – Turn Me Round
• Screaming Blue Messiahs – I Wanna Be A Flintstone
• Boom Crash Opera – Great Wall
• Guadalcanal Diary – Where Angels Fear To Tread
• The Proclaimers – (I’m Gonna) Burn Your Playhouse Down

These are all from working at KRVS. (Though I probably read about the Mighty Lemon Drops in the British music mags.) “I Wanna Be a Flintstone” is a bit too novelty for me now; I probably should have gone with “Big Brother Muscle” instead. No one is more surprised than me that I was able to find “Great Wall” as an mp3. Guadalcanal Diary already had a place in college radio, and this album 2 x 4 would have cemented it for all time if the followup hadn’t been so mediocre. And finally, years before they’d walk 500 miles for a haver, the other Scottish Reid brothers were getting coverage in the British mags, inspiring me to give their first album a try when it came into the station.

• Sinéad O’Connor – Troy

Slow, long, and all over the place musically, I probably could have picked a better track. I still laugh when I remember Rob hearing this song, getting to the point where she screams, “I’d kill a dragon for you and die!!” and saying, “She’s not taking the breakup well, is she?”

• The Smiths – Cemetry Gates

I hated The Smiths for a long time. Ben would play them just to irritate me. This was one of the only songs of theirs I enjoyed. And then one day, pow, I just suddenly flicked on the “Enjoy The Smiths” switch in my brain.

• Bauhaus – She’s in Parties (edit)

I don’t know how or why but a joke developed between Ben and I that was turning into a great big goth. This wasn’t remotely true, but Bauhaus is here largely to represent that. This is my own edit, because of course the song is quite long, as it’s not so much a song as an adolescent phase.

• Voice of the Beehive – Just a City

This is the album version of the song, which was slightly different from the version on the tape, which came from a compilation put out by Melody Maker called Indie Top 20, vol II (I also had volume one.) Honestly, I don’t remember what the difference even is. Those compilations were handy at the station because if I needed to go to the bathroom or pull records I could just slap one of those on and have five different songs worth of time. (To this day I still have recurring nightmares about being in the station, having the record be about to end, and having nothing to cue up afterwards.) This series of compilations will return with a vengeance later on.

Voice of the Beehive and That Petrol Emotion are also both notable because Ben, Katie, and I saw tem in concert at Tipitina’s. After That Petrol Emotion did a great sped-up version of “Belly Bugs” I yelled “That was great!” and the lead singer said, “He liked it! That one’s for him!” And when Voice of the Beehive sang “What You Have is Enough”, the singer sang a bit of it to Katie, who was dancing right towards the front. That was a great show.

• R.E.M. – It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

And they’re back, though we still aren’t quite at the point yet where I really dive into R.E.M. appreciation and end up having to do a lot of catching up.

This was the first tape to get its own name. It was originally The Cool New Music Tape VI, but I got tired of that and decided I would rename them. At first I was going to pick a single name and rename each one volume one, two, three, etc., but eventually I decided each would have its own name, a decision most people would have made in 20 seconds but took me a long time. I went back and retroactively gave earlier tapes names up to number three. For some reason the original two Cool New Music Tapes seemed to deserve to keep their names.

I don’t know where the phrase “Paradise Misplaced” came from, but I liked it as, of course, a play on “Paradise Lost” but also a slight pun. After I named the tape this, there was an interview with The Jesus and Mary Chain in a British music magazine and the title of the piece was “Paradise Misplaced” which I saw as some kind of synchronicity.

For the cover I wanted something abstract and ended up ripping off this piece of art from who knows who while doing a Google image search. If you know what this piece is and who did it, please let me know so I can credit them.

Click on the player below to listen to this mix!

(xspf player courtesy Lacy Morrow and Fabricio Zuardi.)