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Tales From The Drop Box Episode 181 (2020-29) The Pandemic/BLM/Vote Trump Out/ Episodes

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If you have been reading these notes for the last couple of episodes of Tales From The Drop Box while listening (or even before listening!!!) to the podcast for the music, then you likely know how I actually feel and think about the two candidates for President of the United States. You are also aware that if Satan was running as a candidate against Trump, that I’d take a hard look at Satan. So, rather than continue to pile on that discourse, as most Americans have long ago made up their mind on whom they are going to cast their ballot (don’t get me started on the whole electors fiction) in this most important of elections, I can only say, once again, vote. If you have already cast your ballot, then thank you. If your ballot was cast for anyone other than Trump, then hopefully democracy will get a chance to say thank you after November 3.

As a reward for participating in the democratic process, I’ve expanded the show this week. Tales From the Drop Box Episode 181 is 5 songs longer but not lighter on quality! This episode has a pop feel to it, and I’ve included some artists who you may actually have heard of in this week’s episode. A surprise entry is Nick Lowe who has an amazing new track with Los Straitjackets, as well as some new goodies from Toronto’s Metz, Painted Doll, Don’t Kill The Octopus, the Arkells, Tropical Fuck Storm – you know the usual mix of music you need to hear.

So, kick back, put the headphones on tight, close your eyes and PLAY LOUD. The rocket ship is leaving now…

Here is what you will find in Episode 181:

  1. Sweeping Promises – “Hunger For A Way out” (Hunger For A Way Out)
  2. Night Birds – “Oblivious” (Fresh Kills Vol. II)
  3. Hangtime – “My Only One” (Destroy!)
  4. Metz – “The Mirror” (Atlas Vending)
  5. Rational Anthem – “Unimaginary Girlfriend” (It’s Only Permanent)
  6. Nick Lowe & Los Straitjackets – “Crying Inside” (Walkabout)
  7. Arkells – “My Heart’s Always Yours (Acoustic) (Campfire Chords)
  8. Bee Bee Sea – “Drag Me Down” (Day Ripper)
  9. The Go Set – “A Letter To My Government” (Of Bright Futures EP)
  10. Billy Nomates – “Modern Hart” (Billy Nomates)
  11. Don’t Kill The Octopus – “Accident” (Stick Together)
  12. Painted Doll – “On The Ropes” (How To Draw Fire)
  13. Idle Hands – “A Single Solemn Rose” (Mana)
  14. The La’s – “There She Goes” (The La’s)
  15. Gladie – “Thank You Card” (Thank You Card EP)
  16. The Jaded Hearts Club – “Long And Lonesome Road” (You’ve Always Been Here)
  17. Into It. Over It. – “Brushstrokes” (Figure)
  18. Tropical Fuck Storm – “Legal Ghost” (Legal Ghost 7′)
  19. The Primitives – “Crash” (Lovely)
  20. Liar, Flower – “My Brain Is Lit Like An Airport” (Geiger Counter)
Tales From The Drop Box Episode 181 (2020-29)

I heard you singing in the shower the alarm went off again and now you’re putting on your makeup I’m still laying in the bed . . . Here you go way too fast don’t slow down, you gonna crash you should watch, watch your step don’t lookout, gonna break your neck . . .

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 172 (2020-20) The Pandemic/BLM Episodes

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Blah Blah Blah was a pretty good album by Iggy Pop and the theme for this week – Blah Blah Blah. As we get closer to the only election that matters and a turning point in our country’s future, the real question is whether good will triumph over evil. That an election should decide the battle of good and evil is a truly sad thought. Why you might ask? Did you ever consider that the result of that battle is still a toss up after almost four years of misery both political and personal, and that we still are nation gripped by a pandemic and racial unrest. Good will triumph over Trump … eventually.

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 172 is just the antidote for an oppressive real world. There is hope and here is about an hour of it.

Here Is what you’ll find in Episode 172:

  1. Alexa Melo – “Digital” (Demoitis)
  2. The Thank Yous – “The Indie Pop Demon” (Good Times Killing Us)
  3. The Warlocks – “Sucking Out Your Soul Like A Son Of A Bitch” (The Chain)
  4. The Angry Agenda – “We Shall Prevail” (War EP)
  5. Catholic Action – “People Don’t Protest Enough” (Celebrated by Strangers)
  6. F.O.D. – “Wrong” (Sleepville)
  7. Left Hand Black – “Children Of The Night” (Left Hand Black)
  8. The Cowboy – “Mr. Lamppost” (The Cowboy 7”)
  9. Angel Du$t – “Lil House” (Lil House EP)
  10. Selfish Things – “Flood (Alternate Version)” (Logos (Alternate Versions))
  11. Nite Sobs – “Back On The Ride” (Do The Sob)
  12. Transit Method – “Cannibals” (The Madness)
  13. The Cavemen – “Death Row” (Various Artists – AA/VV In The Shit Records Collection N. 1)
  14. Unwritten Law – “Fight” (Here’s To The Mourning)
  15. The Dead End kids – “Hey Du” (Kommando Glitzer)

I heard you were concerned with my life I heard you had a lot to say motherfuckin’, thanks for nothin’ . . . I think I have answers the world is a cancer our blasphemous mantras of bullets and blood . . .

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 170 (2020-18) The Pandemic/BLM Episodes

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A bit of a throwback episode this week. As the number of days under pandemic increase, so does the length of the list of tracks that are – drop box worthy! America is struggling in getting the Sars-Cov-2 virus under control, and it doesn’t look like there is going to be any coordinated national response until there is new leadership in the White House. Not unsurprising, the President continues to spread lies, misinformation, and misdirection to attempt to deflect from a horrific and catastrophic loss of American lives (154,449 acknowledged deaths as of this date) and from his own failures. (See John Hopkins Coronavirus Center.) As a lesson for our future, should we have one and if American’s are still voting for elected offices, don’t elect morally corrupt lying sacks of crap who are willing to kill you for their own gain. There is hope and it is 93 days away.

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 170 is a musical smack down of diversity, with a new Osees track, a track from the former dBs vocalists Chris Stamey & Peter Holsapple, new Soul Asylum, and X. There is some new-old music from earlier in the year and late last year before the world shut down in response to the pandemic. I’ve thrown in a couple of live tracks in the hope that live shows will someday return. We will survive the pandemic and when we get to the other side, the lessons we are learning each and every day will help form a new world order, hopefully one that is safer, kinder, and forward thinking. This podcast is merely your soundtrack to the light at the end of the tunnel.

Here is what you will find in Episode 170:

  1. Violet Soda – “Don’t Like This Song” (Violet Soda)
  2. Arson Daily – “Bring It All Back Home” (Late Reflections)
  3. Osees – “Blood On Your Boots” (Be Gay, Do Crime!)
  4. Surf Rock Is Dead – “Diabolik” (Existential Playboy)
  5. The Academic – “I Feel It Too (Live at the Iveagh Gardens April 24, 2020)” (Live at the Iveagh Gardens)
  6. The Bar Stool Preachers – “When This World Ends” (Soundtrack To Your Apocalypse)
  7. Chastity – “Flames (Live At The Whitby Courthouse Theater)” (Home Made Satan: Live Addition)
  8. Standup Stacy – “Mirrors” (The Magnificent You)
  9. Aviva – “GRRRLs” (Volume 1)
  10. X – “Alphabetland” (Alphabetland)
  11. The Movement – “Revolt” (Future Freedom Time)
  12. Peter Holsapple & Chris Stamey – “Black and White” (Our Back Pages)
  13. Soul Asylum – “Hopped Up Feelin’ (Hurry Up and Wait)
  14. Plain White T’s – “Big Bad World” (Big Bad World)
  15. Riverby – “Smart Mouth” (Smart Mouth)
Tales From The Drop Box Episode 170 (2020-18)

It’s a big bad world we’re doing what we can sometimes we fall on our face before we even learn to stand . . . I, I never would hurt you but even if I did you you never would tell me . . life is simple, life is plain fuck the future, stay the same lust for lashes your country’s in ashes.

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 169 (2020-17) The Pandemic/BLM Episodes

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I was almost emotional watching the moms and dads in Portland intercede between the criminal government agents and the demonstrators in the on-going public discussion about race in America. I never thought I would ever see the day that the federal government would use a secretive unmarked paramilitary force to kidnap citizens off city streets and use an unlawful level of violence against demonstrators all to, arguably, protect against vandalism of federal monuments erected as a reminder, in some instances, of our country’s oppressive and racist past and the ongoing struggle for equality by the disenfranchised because of race, gender, disability, and privilege. Wow, that was a long sentence. Here is the short version – the Trump administration’s actions violate the constitutional rights of peaceful and lawful protestors. No one is condoning vandalism, violence or anarchy. I am not an anarchist. Anarchy only exists in my mind. What is being missed in the Fox masquerading as “news” opinion network’s daily screed is that the government represents the majority of the people i.e. we apparently elected our representatives. When the majority represented by government agents interferes with the peaceful minority’s right to disagree with the majority, this interference is the first step towards the majority repressing minority viewpoints. That action, is tyranny.

José Ortega y Gasset in “The Revolt of the Masses” (1930) recognized the issue of the mass mind:

As they say in the United States: “to be different is to be indecent.” The mass crushes beneath it everything that is different, everything that is excellent, individual, qualified and select. Anybody who is not like everybody, who does not think like everybody, runs the risk of being eliminated. And it is clear, of course, that this “everybody” is not “everybody.” “Everybody” was normally the complex unity of the mass and the divergent, specialized minorities. Nowadays, “everybody” is the mass alone. Here we have the formidable fact of our times, described without any concealment of the brutality of its features.— Chapter 1, “The Coming of the Masses”

The Fascist and Syndicalist species were characterized by the first appearance of a type of man who “did not care to give reasons or even to be right”, but who was simply resolved to impose his opinions. That was the novelty: the right not to be right, not to be reasonable: “the reason of unreason.”— Chapter 8, “Why the Masses Intervene in Everything and Why They Always Intervene Violently”

Sound familiar?

Finally, in case you haven’t heard, Burger Records is no longer a record label and Lollipop records is also in the middle of a reckoning. Both labels are accused of participation in rape culture and support of artists who have engaged in abhorrent behavior with and towards young female fans and scene followers. Please support those brave individuals who were have come forward and expose the truly dark side of Los Angeles’s garage rock/indie scene.

I should also shout out Globelamp aka Elizabeth LeFey, who has tried for several years to have her voice heard regarding her time with Foxygen and now seems to be finding support in the indie community.

For details on what is transpiring in the Los Angles indie rock scene and so you can form your opinion as to what has happened, what is currently transpiring, the bands, record labels, and music festivals involved and, more importantly, the young women and their treatment, follow these IG accounts:

  1. @globelamp
  2. @lured_by_burger_records
  3. @lured_by_lolipop_records

Here is what you will find in Episode 169:

  1. Whispertown – “Born To Ride” (I’m A Man)
  2. Affidavit – “The Truth” (Abducted)
  3. The Tissues – “Blind Beast” (Blue Film)
  4. Space Age Playboys – “Rocket Girl” (New Rock Underground)
  5. Viagra Boys – “Lick The Bag” (Common Sense EP)
  6. Varsity – “Heaven Sent” (Fine Forever)
  7. Starflyer 59 – “Miami” (Miami)
  8. The Head & The Heart – “Sun Is Rising” (Living Mirage: The Complete Recordings)
  9. SiM – “Black & White” ( Thank God, There Are Hundreds Of Ways To Kill Enemies)
  10. The Destructos – “The Sight” (Blast!)
  11. The Detectors – “The Decline” (Ideology)
  12. Swampmeat Family Band – “Friends In The Floor” (Muck)
  13. Hanni El Khatib – “Alive” (Flight)
  14. The Outcasts – “Sex And Glory” (BBC Radio 1 John Peel Session, 29 September 1982 (1982-85)
  15. Blushh – “Make It Better” (RIP Apathy)

We’re sittin’ ’round on the couch we were makin’ words with our mouths we had a pile of junk that’s already runnin’ out . . . I can’t believe I survived! It’s all around and upside down. I’m alive! How can this be true?

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 168 (2020-16) The Pandemic/BLM Episodes

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Another week, another 4300 deaths in America. Perhaps we should take a long hard look at what we are doing to prevent the spread of COVID-19. You already have much confirmation that your government will not save you, your family or anyone else from this deadly virus. Honestly, the only effective weapons in the fight seem to be wear a mask and stay the f__ away from each other. Seems simple and practical to me. It is also readily apparent that not everyone is on board with simple and effective.

As evidenced by my first trip to a beach yesterday, Mr. Belding, not a notorious sun worshipper, attempted a foray into the wild only to observe that, for many, COVID-19 does not exist and physical distancing is a mere suggestion. Amidst all the 1st Amendment debate over the claimed right to not wear a mask in a pandemic (Freedom of Expression) and the stupid outrage over having to wear a mask as somehow a violation of this right (Karens and Kens – you know who you are), what is apparently missed by a markedly large number of covidiots is that society depends on personal accountability and wearing a mask is an expression of that personal accountability choice. That is, in order for society to function we can not reach a critical threshold of people who are just ass hats.

Mask mandates for public health reasons should not be necessary. No government wants to order people to do what should be obvious. The big picture is that we need to actually care about each other and be personally responsible and accountable for our own actions and not let our desire to be “different”, part of the “silent majority” or any other lame excuse to be a moron and actually interfere with the right of others persons to be free from stupid. Don’t be an idiot, wear a mask and as noted above, stay the f___ away from me.

As for Episode 168 of Tales From The Drop Box, I am solely responsible for the content. Yup, and in my humble and very biased opinion, I believe this episode, much like the 167 preceding this one, is it worth about an hour of your time. 15 songs by bands that you likely don’t know much about, in a variety of genres that are carefully mixed to touch your soul. I am personally responsible for making sure you enjoy your time. Give it a try.

Here is what you’ll find in Episode 168:

  1. Portland – “Lady Moon” (Your Colours Will Stain)
  2. The Rhymes – “Viral” (The Rhymes)
  3. Spacey Jane – “Wasted on Me” (Sunlight)
  4. Honest Men – “Lose My Head” (I’m Okay)
  5. The Airborne Toxic Event – “All The Children” (Hollywood Park)
  6. Custard – “Take The Skinheads Bowling” (Respect All Lifeforms)
  7. America’s Favorite Punk – “Mr. Citizen” (Life After Quarantine)
  8. Flashfires – “Circus Boy” (Flashfires)
  9. Gaffa Tape Sandy – “Meat Head” (Family Mammal EP)
  10. The Growlers – “Dream World” (Dream World)
  11. The Winter Passing – “Ghost Thing” (New Ways of Living)
  12. Loyalty To Me – “Rewrites” (Clash//Co-Exist)
  13. Matthew Sweet – “I’ve Been Waiting” (Blue Sky on Mars Tour – Live At Pleasure Island, Florida June 17, 1997)
  14. Manic Street Preachers – “Roses In The Hospital” (Filet O Gang Remix Remastered)” (Manic Street Preachers)
  15. Dream Wife – “Homesick” ( So When You Gonna …)

Lady Moon may I ask you why you comfort me? When autumn comes you’re always near . . This is the part where I lose my head breaking my fingers to make amends . . .

KFR