John Richards

It didn't go "the dull and wicked ordinary way." John Richards welcomed The National to the KEXP studio for an extraordinary live performance in 2017. Watch!: www.youtube.com

Lester Keith Piggott (born 5 November 1935) is a retired English professional jockey. With 4,493 career wins, including nine Epsom Derby victories, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest flat racing jockeys of all time and the originator of a much imitated style.: www.theguardian.com

"We’re setting sail to a place on the map from which no one has ever returned....” In 2018, Karl Wallinger (World Party) released a new video to update this apocalyptic 1986 tune: americansongwriter.com

In 2014, Film School reunited for one performance to celebrate drummer Donny Newenhouse's 40th birthday. They performed "P.S." then.: www.youtube.com

"It has that rumbling bassline courtesy of Simon Jones, the notes seemingly sequenced in a 'this precedes a song that strives to be massive,' kind of way....." This article considers "Slide Away" one of The Verve's 10 best.: www.stereogum.com

Like this? Deserta will be LIVE on KEXP on Thursday, February 20th at 12:00 PM. That performance is open to the public. They will be at Seattle's Central Saloon that night.

Remember when they played "Something to Remember Me By" live in the KEXP studio?: www.youtube.com

Happy birthday, LCD Soundsystem! "Too Much Love" is the second song on LCD Soundsystem's self-titled debut album, released on this date in 2005.

"Teenage Hive" is a single from Chicago noise-rock band FACS' third album, "Void Moments," out on March 27th. According to the band’s Brian Case, the song “is about not defining yourself so that other people can understand you. The evolved consciousness I’ve seen with my son and his generation/peer group regarding gender, identity, and human rights is the only hope for the future....": www.stereogum.com

Broken Up is an Italian band for which we have limited bits of information. Their label writes that they are "born thanks to an idea by Dedo Panzera in which participates immediately Max Caselli, respectively bass player and guitar player of two legendary bands in the Italian wave scene (Intelligence Dept. and Go Flamingo!). The two musicians are joined by the singer Chiara Boldrini.

Missing Persons was founded in 1980 in Los Angeles by guitarist Warren Cuccurullo, vocalist Dale Bozzio, and drummer Terry Bozzio. Dale and Terry Bozzio met while working with Frank Zappa, and they married in 1979. Cuccurullo encountered the pair while contributing to the Zappa album "Joe's Garage" (1979)

Bonny Light Horseman is playing a sold-out show at The Tractor Tavern on Saturday, January 25th, 2020.: www.ticketweb.com

Happy birthday, Neil Diamond, born on this date in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn in 1941. His father, Akeeba "Kieve" Diamond, was a dry-goods merchant. Both he and wife Rose were Jewish immigrants from Poland. : www.biography.com

Read a biography of English singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Damon Gough here: www.allmusic.com

"I Wanna Be Your Lover" was written after Warner Bros. requested a follow-up to Prince's debut album For You, which had underperformed commercially. Musically, it is a funk song sung exclusively in falsetto, detailing Prince's love for a woman and how he would treat her better than the men she is with, and frustration that she thinks of him as "a child". It was later revealed that the song concerned a crush Prince had at the time on pianist and singer Patrice Rushen.

The vocals in "The Test" are performed by The Verve's Richard Ashcroft. Incidentally, there's a whale of a video for this song: www.youtube.com

Noel Gallagher sings at the end the chorus to Gary Glitter's 1973 hit "Hello (Its Good To Be Back)." (Glitter was an influence on Britpop). He explained: "I started singing, 'Hello, hello, it's good to be back,' and everyone just fell about laughing. As the track progressed, we found we couldn't get rid of it, so we stuck it in."

Goodness was formed and fronted by Carrie Akre, who had formerly been in the band Hammerbox. Hammerbox and Goodness varied from the other grunge related bands at that time due to the fact that they were led by a female. After hardships with a major labels with both Hammerbox and Goodness, Carrie was inspired to form her own label, Good-Ink Records. Goodness lasted until 1998 before calling it quits. Carrie Akre is playing The Crocodile on Saturday, February 1st, 2020.

Perhaps you are seeking a translation for the lyrics of "Vamos": www.alivelyrics.com

This was heavily influenced by Bob Dylan, especially the way Dylan sang "Subterranean Homesick Blues." Stipe had once imitated Dylan in a low-budget film called "Just Like a Movie," which was a play on the Dylan song "Just Like A Woman."

Watch the video for this famous anti-war song: www.youtube.com

When they came to KEXP for a live session in 2013, BRMC performed "Let the Day Begin": www.youtube.com

Go ahead and get your tickets now. Hoodoo Gurus will be at The Tractor Tavern on Friday, October 23rd, 2020.

In 2013, The Quietus revisited The House of Love's debut album: thequietus.com

Formed in Wolverhampton, England, in 1985, The Mighty Lemon Drops were originally called the Sherbert Monsters. Read a biography of this band that "played psychedelic, pop-flavored post-punk reminiscent of Echo and the Bunnymen.": www.allmusic.com

This critic argues that "Johnny Come Home" is the single that illustrates just how fine Fine Young Cannibals were.: www.axs.com

This vocalist, Nick Marsh, died of cancer in 2015 at the age of 53.: news.avclub.com

In a 1987 interview, songwriter Robert Smith said that the title "is not to be taken generally, on the contrary it comes from a particular situation; I was in the middle of a tense discussion and these people around the table were looking at me as if I was going to make some ground breaking revelations, and I thought to myself "good God, why can't I be elsewhere? Why isn't someone else in my place?" I would've traded with anyone; I would've preferred to be that guy leaning at the bar than myself."

Neil Finn described in an interview how this song started off with just the title: "Tim [Finn, Neil's brother]and I were having sessions where he'd throw me a title and I'd throw him a title and we'd go off to our respective rooms and write a song. And he gave me the title 'I Got You,' and I went in and I wrote it, and I thought the verse was pretty good but I thought the chorus was only a bit average and I should change it at some point, but in fact it was never changed and it became... it just goes to show I don't know a hit when I hear one really."

"Shot right through with a bolt of blue"..." Think of 10 reasons why "Bizarre Love Triangle" is "one of the greatest songs of all time": www.billboard.com

You can hear Smokey Brights at the Treefort Music Fest in Boise, Idaho on Wednesday, March 25th, 2020.

Ahhh....the Friday song. John, Cheryl, and Kevin picked their favorite songs of the decade in this new Music That Matters podcast: www.kexp.org

Neil Tennant started to write the song while staying at his cousin's house in Nottingham and watching a gangster film starring James Cagney. Just when he was about to head to sleep, he came up with the lines: "Sometimes you're better off dead, there's a gun in your hand and it's pointing at your head". The lyrics were inspired by TS Eliot's poem 'The Waste Land', particularly its different narrative voices and mysterious references. There's lots more to know about this classic song: www.smoothradio.com

The Housemartins were compared by many to The Smiths. However the Smith's guitarist Johnny Marr was not impressed. He complained that "'Happy Hour' was a complete rip-off of 'I Want The One I Can't Have', and they've nicked others too."

Did you know that Charlie Sexton's babysitter was Stevie Ray Vaughn?: www.premierguitar.com

Speaking of Stevie Ray Vaughn, that's him playing guitar on this song. : www.youtube.com

Besides being a commercial success, this track also earned critical acclaim from several publications. "Word Up!" won Cameo the Soul Train Music Award for Best R&B/Soul Single as well as the NME Award for Best Dance Record.

"Oh we oh we oh!" Morris Day can really dance!: www.youtube.com

Speaking of dancing, watch Prince, Michael Jackson, and James Brown (with a little Fred Astaire and Cab Calloway thrown in): www.youtube.com

To throw censors off the scent, when "Relax" first came out, the band claimed publicly that it was written about "motivation." Later, they confessed it was actually about "shagging." The record company's ad campaign for this song started with a quarter-page ad in the British music press featuring an image of backup singer/dancer Paul Rutherford in a sailor cap, accompanied by the phrase "ALL THE NICE BOYS LOVE SEA MEN" and declaring "Frankie Goes to Hollywood are coming ... making Duran Duran lick the s--t off their shoes."

The lyrics, "Looking good, hanging with the Wild Bunch" are a reference to a collective of DJs and engineers in Bristol, England in the 1980s out of which came Massive Attack and other contributors to the Trip-Hop sound. Cherry recruited Mushroom of Massive Attack to appear in the video for this song. : www.youtube.com

This song is made up of about 250 samples. The line, "Pump Up The Volume" came from "I Know You Got Soul" by Eric B. & Rakim, which was released earlier in 1987. Other samples include Coldcut's 1987 song "Say, Kids What Time Is This" and James Brown's "Funky Drummer."

"Wearing a black Kangol, sweatsuit, gold chain, and sneakers....." The bulk of the sample is from Rhythm Heritage’s theme from the TV show "S.W.A.T.": www.youtube.com

Although they bum-rushed the Rock Hall of Fame in the 1985 video, "King of Rock," they were actually inducted in 2009.: www.rockhall.com

"The ladies will kick it, the rhyme that is wicked..." Here are the lyrics: genius.com

"Posse up!!" Watch Sir Mix-A-Lot perform this one with The Seattle Symphony: www.youtube.com

Frontman Speech talked about he sampled Prince's "Alphabet City" as the impetus for this song.: stillcrew.com

This new wave band formede in Beckenham, Kent, England in 1980, but had disbanded by 1984.: www.allmusic.com

The Bangles covered "Jet Fighter" for a compilation about L.A.'s "Paisley Underground": www.stereogum.com

This song was inspired by the high-wattage, unregulated AM border-blaster Mexican radio stations with signals that traveled well into America, and the occasional interjections in Spanish in the song were recorded off a real Mexican radio station.