Catch The FM Showcase (e.g. All The New Music) Thursday, 9PM ET!

It's Thursday Night, and that means something a little special...

Tune in at 9:00pm Eastern US Time for the Altrok Radio FM Showcase, our collection of what makes sense this week in Altrok Radio's world of music. There's always unreleased tracks and demos featuring edge-skating sounds that made us sit up and listen, along with a few of the classic tracks that inform today's new releases (and tomorrow's.) Sean Carolan is your host, and he's been doing this a while (since 1982, in fact) so, y'know, be gentle.

Beyond that, there's another whole new selection of songs - eight hours worth starting right this moment (whenever this moment happens to be) over and above the tracks in the FM Showcase - pulsing from our servers in CD Quality MP3 Pro, at Altrok Radio.

Got a slow connection? We've put it up for you in glorious mono as well - check the "slower connections" link on the right of the page.

The bands for today (5/31/2007) are:

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120 Days

Alphabet Girls, The Arcade Fire, Art Brut

The B-52's, Babyshambles, Be Your Own PET, Bjork, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Frank Black, Blesk, Bockman, Kate Bush

The Chiara L's, The Cinematics, The Clash, Jarvis Cocker, The Concretes, Crazy 8s, CSS

The Decemberists, Devo, Dinosaur Jr., Dramarama

Mitch Easter, The Enemy

Marianne Faithful, The Fall, Feist, Forward Russia!, The Fountains Of Wayne

The Go Find, Good Shoes, The Grates

Hilary, The Hold Steady, Hoodoo Gurus

I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness, The Ides Of Space

The Jam

Kaiser Chiefs, Klaxons

Ladytron, LCD Soundsystem, Le Tigre, Leaving Isaac's Shop, Ted Leo + Pharmacists, Let's Active, Letters & Colours, The Long Blondes, Love Ends Disaster, Nick Lowe

Madness, Maximo Park, Malcom Middleton, Ministry, Modest Mouse, Mosquitos, Mouthful Of Bees

The National, The Network, The New York Dolls, New Young Pony Club, Nine Black Alps, Nine Inch Nails, Gary Numan

Oasis, Of Montreal

P, Parts & Labor, Jack Penate, The Pernice Brothers, Persephone's Bees, Persil, The Pipettes, Pop Levi, The Producers, Protokoll, The Psychedelic Furs, The Psychic Ills

The Rifles, Mark Ronson

The Sammies, Saturna, The Shins, Shiny Toy Guns, Silversun Pickups, Sir Salvatore, The Smiths, Soul Coughing, Soup Dragons, Strawberry Switchblade, The Style Council

Talking Heads, Teddybears, Tilly & The Wall, Trembling Blue Stars

Ulysses, The Uncertains

Vatican DC, VHS Or Beta, VietNam, The View, Violent Femmes, Voltage Union

Weapons, Paul Westerberg, Wicked Automatic, Amy Winehouse, Patrick Wolf

X, Xerox Teens, XTC

Yazoo

Fetus in a Bottle

My Saturday night...

Underneath the bocce ball courts in Brooklyn's Union Hall is a peculiar little basement with purple walls, black and white antique photographs, and a little elephant prancing on top of a wet bar. But behind the heating pipes and bookcases lied a modest stage set for a modest man. Unsure in his step, Chris Garneau crept behind a small keyboard nestled in the right corner of the stage and began to play. Looking like a timid boy sneaking around his grandparent's stately home, he played softly to avoid trouble. Accompanied by a cello and stand-up bass, Chris's almost inaudible voice lulled everyone into a contemplative silence. And we just stood and watched. No one talked; no one moved. All ears and eyes were captured by this little man's quavering whisper.

Chris's innocence and childlike persona makes him a more sensitive Elliott Smith. Both equally comfortable in their sadness, Chris lacks Elliott's maturity by residing in a state of drunken childhood memories. Playing a mix of songs from his current album, Music for Tourists, along with others, Chris delivered a solid, albeit quiet, performance. But his silence was heard, and that made all the difference. Although a few members of the crowd snickered about the exceptionally somber tone of the songs, Chris never seemed embarrassed about his overt display of sensitivity, even inviting the crowd to "cry about it." As if in response, Chris smartly ended his set with his song "Not Nice." Declaring "when you're not nice, I'd rather leave you alone," Chris quietly left the stage to take his place at the bar.

Okay, Yeah, I Have To Own Up To This...

A few months back, my eldest daughter and I were watching the American Idol auditions - she's genuinely a fan, and far be it from me to pass up a good trainwreck.

Don't know what did it, but when one of the hopefuls walked into the audition room, smiled and said hello to the judges, with a whole lot of confidence and not much in the way of self-aggrandizement, I turned to my daughter and said, "She's going to win this competition."

And then Jordin Sparks opened her mouth to sing. Yep, I picked her to win before she had a chance to audition.

Now I need to find someone who's willing to pay me a lot of money based on my being able to tell that story.

RIAA Takes Satire In "The Onion" As A Suggestion!

(Crossposted at DailyKos)

Back in 2002, The Onion suggested that the RIAA (the trade organization for the music recording industry) might take their money-grubbing ways to the extreme, and try to hit up radio stations for royalties they've never legally been able to collect.

(Why is it such an outrageous idea that the Onion ran with it as satire? Because it's the logical equivalent of Volkswagen charging ABC to air its commercials. Airplay generates sales, which is why so many RIAA members and radio stations got their hands caught in the cookie jar in the most recent round of payola scandals.)

Oddly, Fark.com ran a link to The Onion's article earlier today, and I suspected they had a reason...and indeed they did.

The followup showed up later in the day...

The RIAA actually wants to do what The Onion said they'd do: charge radio stations to play their music. Remember, this isn't the songwriting royalty that compensates songwriters for the use of their work, which radio and webcasters pay today; this is the one for the recording, and it's a royalty that goes straight to the owner of the recorded work - that is, the record companies. Who already make money from the sales of said work....sales that are driven by airplay.

Unfortunately, it's one of our own wrapped up in this: Rep. Howard Berman, who seems utterly beholden to media companies' interests in the areas of copyright and intellectual property law; the Peer-To-Peer Piracy prevention Act is his baby, and though his summary calls it benign, Wired.com appears to have some problems with it.

My bias here is that I'm a webcaster already smarting under the fees the RIAA's trying to ram through (even to the point of collecting these royalties for artists they have no association with.) While I get the sneaking suspicion that over-the-air radio will somehow have to "pay" fees such that they wind up paying far less than I do, and might even be a willing victim here because the fees they'll have to pay will be minor for a commercial cooperation (as opposed to the death sentence they represent for most Internet radio stations) I still have common cause with them here. I would suggest that the way things work today is the way they should work going forward - no fees for what is essentially free advertising.

So, a few things: firstly, I'm tired of any politician who puts the interests of any industry over the interests of the general populace. I suspect Berman feels that what's good for Big Media is good for his district (since it is, of course, L.A.) But Big Media's record in terms of the general public's rights is not good, and I wish Berman could come to terms with that. He might be driven by pure altruism here, but I suspect we here at DKos know we can't trust big media, so I'm honestly interested in hearing what any primary challenger that comes up against him has to say on this subject.

Secondly, someone, somewhere, soon, needs to make the RIAA and their cronies in Big Media stop now. While I don't think it'll get quite to the point where you'll have to toss a nickel in a convenient receptacle every time you hum a tune, I don't for a second believe someone at the RIAA hasn't though up a business case for such a thing.

Altrok's Eighties Friday...Plus DJ Shred, 11:30a/9p EDT

Today and every Friday, you'll hear a big pile of the music we had available in the 80's, all day and through the night, in CD Quality MP3 Pro, on Altrok's Eighties Friday at Altrok Radio.

Got a slow connection? We've put it up for you in glorious mono as well - check the "slower connections" link on the right of the page.

We do it every Friday, and we do it with a lot of tracks you won't necessarily hear on your average "Eighties Rewind" special...and that's 'cause we were there, and the stuff that sold well wasn't necessarily the stuff that we keep going back to. "I Ran" and "I Melt With You" have been shoved out of the way to make room for some really good stuff (often including the good stuff A Flock Of Seagulls and Modern English made that got completely overshadowed by their "one hit wonders".)

As if that weren't enough, DJ Shred shares her fantastic collection with you today for two hours, starting at 11:30am Eastern today, repeating at 9PM tonight...so if you're familar with La Shred's estimable preferences for things Joy Divisiony, Depecheish, and Siouxsian, you should be all set.

You can see DJ Shred live on Saturday, May 19 at Disorder, a post punk extravaganza she's ringleading in lower Manhattan at the Double Down Saloon. Head on over to 14 Avenue A at Houston St. at about 10pm that night, and stay as long as you're able; she'll have you covered (musically, at any rate.) Check her MySpace for details. Ready...set...

The bands for today (5/4/2007) are:

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A Flock Of Seagulls, ABC, Alphaville, APB The B-52's, B-Movie, Bad Brains, Bauhaus, The Beastie Boys, Big Audio Dynamite, Big Black, Big Country, Blancmange, Blondie, Bronski Beat, Buzzcocks China Crisis, The Church, The Clash, The Comsat Angels, Elvis Costello, Crazy 8s, The Creatures, The Cult, The Cure The Danse Society, Depeche Mode, Devo, Dolby's Cube, Thomas Dolby, Dramarama Easterhouse, Eat, Echo & The Bunnymen, The English Beat The Fabulous Poodles, Fad Gadget, The Fall, Fiction Factory, John Foxx, Freur Gang Of Four, Peter Godwin Heaven 17, Hilary, The Hoodoo Gurus, The Human League The Icicle Works Joe Jackson, The Jam, Joy Division Killing Joke Let's Active, Liquid Liquid, Lords Of The New Church, Love & Rockets, Love And Rockets, Lene Lovich, The Lyres M, Madness, Magazine, Midnight Oil, The Mighty Lemon Drops, Ministry, Mission Of Burma, Morrissey, Peter Murphy New Musik, New Order, Nine Inch Nails, Gary Numan Oingo Boingo, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark Robert Palmer, Polyrock, Pop Will Eat Itself, Iggy Pop, The Pretenders, The Primitives, The Producers, The Psychedelic Furs, Ltd. Public Image R.E.M., The Ramones, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Replacements Peter Schilling, The Screaming Blue Messiahs, Secession, Seona Dancing, Pete Shelley, Simple Minds, Siouxsie And The Banshees, Sisters Of Mercy, The Smiths, The Sound, Spandau Ballet, Split Enz, Squeeze, The Stone Roses, The Stranglers, The Style Council, The Suburbs, Sugarcubes Talking Heads, Troy Tate, The Teardrop Explodes, Tears For Fears, The The, They Might Be Giants, Time Zone, Frank Tovey U2, Ultravox, Ultravox! The Vapors, Violent Femmes Wall of Voodoo, Whizz For Atoms, Wire, The Wonder Stuff, Wreckless Eric X, XTC Yello