Setlist from last night (02 September)

An all-vinyl show!

"Tightrope" – Electric Light Orchestra (for violinist Mik Kaminski's birthday)
"She Knows It" – The Pontiac Brothers
"Chasing the Wild Goose" – Bad Religion
"Fizz Pop! Modern Rock" – The Continentals

"I Don't/She Don't Mind" – The Heats
"Way Out of Shape" – Howard Devoto
"When I Was Tealby Abbey" – Elton John
"Something About You I Don't Like" – Propaganda

"Dissidents" – Thomas Dolby
"Between the Eyes" – Angel City
"Blitzkrieg" – The Meteors
"Bates Motel" – The Hitmen

"Dying to Believe" – The Beths
"Binary Fiction" – Doll By Doll
"Silly Girl" – Bleached
"Heritage" – Tellers

"Fandango" – Mo-Dettes
"Unexpected" – Dude York
"Wishing Well" – Maggie Bell
"Saccharine Rejection" – The Fluid

"On the Phone" – Man Sized Action
"Memories" – The Coathangers
"Saw You at the Eastern Beach" – Rolling Blackouts C.F.
"The Fox" – A Certain Ratio
"Can't Stand This Love, Goodbye" – Plan 9

"Every Tradition" – Bully
"It Was Beautiful" – TV Priest
"Match" – The Moondoggies
"Split Myself in Two" – Meat Puppets

"Jumpin' Jack Flash" – The Moog Machine
"Raeline" – The Brains
"John, I'm Only Dancing" – David Bowie
"Rock Against Romance" – Holly & the Italians

REALLY happy to know I’m not the only one who still has and plays their 10” Epic NuDiscs!

Oh yeah, Bip! I have two copies each of the ones from Propaganda, The Continentals, Cheap Trick (love that one), New Muzik (love that one), The Clash (absolutely love that one) ... quite a few other big ten-inch records as well, including Tav Falco's Panther Burns, Wreckless Eric, U2, Garbage, Insect Surfers, etc.

Playing that all-vinyl set gave me a lot of respect for DJs who worked in those pre-digital days. Sheesh, how did jocks handle in in the days when AM radio was king ... and all singles were three minutes or less? I talked to my mom about it the next day -- how I had to be on point, cue'ing up the next song right after the current song was beginning, and how a potty break was next to impossible. She laughed and said, "I guess that's why 'MacArthur Park' became so popular."

Some DJ's had technicians working with them. The DJ's took care of the on-air chatter, and the technicians cued up the songs, ads, and so on. But I agree that those who worked it by themselves were seriously skilled.

> I agree that those who worked it by themselves were seriously skilled.

From what I experienced Friday night, it was less a matter of advanced skills than diligence and focus ... although those are skills in themselves. (As my wife said, "You mean, like, the way I did it when I was a DJ?")

My mom asked if I'll ever do another all-vinyl show. I told her I'll be glad to, but I'll have to pay extra attention to the song length. Three minutes or more is optimum; two and a half minutes is pushing it. (How did college DJs handle shows in the halcyon days of punk? An entire set of songs from groups like Bad Brains, Minor Threat, Black Flag and the like would be a severe challenge.)

Any DJ who was playing Bad Brains or Black Flag on the radio in the vinyl era was a 20-year-old college student. They could swap out a record every two minutes for hours at a time and still have plenty of energy left for panty raids and stuffing themselves into phone booths and all the other madcap hijinks college kids get up to.

Makes you appreciate the Rodney on the ROQ’s of the world….!

Imagine the despair of FM dj’s who were used to sneaking out during long tracks by yes, genesis, Pink Floyd and led zep….. having to deal with the shorter cuts of the early new wave 80s! “Dang, man”

> Imagine the despair of FM dj’s who were used to sneaking out during long tracks
> by yes, genesis, Pink Floyd and led zep….. having to deal with the shorter cuts
> of the early new wave 80s! “Dang, man”

Maybe that's another reason why the original punk rock bands never broke big.