As the more cunning of you might have noticed last week, Song, by Toad’s Friday Fives is now a radio show on Fresh Air, as well as just a means for you to waste your time on the internet on a Friday afternoon.

This means that from 3:30pm Brian Pokora and myself will be live on the radio, with some sort of attempt made to avoid the dreary old pish I would usually pick, out of respect for the fact that this is officially pre-pub radio and you probably want cheering up rather than bringing down.

Live on air from 3:30pm – listen here.

Also, there are a couple of live gigs to remind you about this weekend, including some late news which will hopefully be rather interesting for you.

Firstly, we have The Last Battle, Dad Rocks and Shoes & Socks Off at Henry’s tomorrow night.  It is only a fiver in, and those who come along will also be able to get into the second show of the night, which is as follows:

Secondly, Lach is opening for Viv Albertine (of The Slits) at Henry’s after our gig there on Saturday, and anyone who is there for the Ides of Toad night will get in for £4.

Thirdly, on Sunday in Anstruther we’ll be hosting a Song, by Toad all-dayer called Flamin’ Hott Toadzzz! at the Hew Scott Hall.  The lineup will be Avital Raz, Dan Mutch, Yusuf Azak, Jesus H. Foxx, Jonnie Common and Meursault, and tickets will be available on the door.

And on Monday I will sleep.

Today’s pointless questions for the internets.  Remember, fives first, pish-talking later.

1. Most shameful album you’ve seen your parents buy.
2. Coolest album you’ve seen your parents buy.
3. Most embarrassing gig you’ve been to.
4. Favourite type of weather.
5. If you had a parrot, what would teach it to say?

Playlist for Song, by Toad’s Friday Fives will appear below as we play stuff:
1. The Piranhas – Getting Beaten Up
2. Dad Rocks! - Aroused By Hair
3. Youth Lagoon – Posters
4. Tom Waits – Goin’ Out West
5. Easter – Somethin’ American
6. Dolfinz – Hot Pants
7. The Twilight Sad – Kill it in the Morning
8. Dead Kennedys – Holiday in Cambodia
9. John Cooper Clarke – Gimmix
10. Yuck – Holing Out
11. Lil Daggers – Dada Brown
12. Horsecollar – Christopher
13. Other Lives – For 12
14. Blur – To the End (with Francoise Hardy)

I happened across that fascinating little video this week sometime, and it’s a really odd mixture of hypnotic, fascinating and really quite unsettling.

The video is simply a plot of nuclear explosions over time, and despite being ten minutes in length, is nevertheless really difficult to turn away from.  What’s particularly disturbing is watching how a flurry of test detonations in any one country seems to trigger a retaliatory fit of posturing in another.

It’s also kind of chilling to watch the increases in activity triggered by events like the Cuban Missile Crisis.  It’s easy to think now that they’d never have really done it, but human beings are not particularly good at measuring self-interest when they decide that someone needs to be taught a lesson.  In fact being willing to inflict harm on yourself just to punish someone else with sufficient force is a notable quirk of how collective morality is maintained by social animals. So umm… yes, it was probably closer than we allow ourselves to think from the safe distance of 2011.

Human beings seem to have particularly laughable memories when it comes to this sort of thing actually.  I was spectacularly annoyed by all the financial analysts proclaiming the worst recession since the Great Depression, when the housing and credit markets collapsed a few years back.  Fuck, were none of these cunts alive during the eighties?

I know we remember the eighties as being full of comical haircuts, synth pop and twats from ‘The City’* making shitloads of money, but it was also the decade which spawned the Miners’ Strikes, the Poll Tax Riots (just) and Boys From the Black Stuff.

And even as a kid I remember the threat of nuclear annihilation feeling very, very real.  All this chat about the world not being a safe place now because of the ever-present terrorist threat is total bollocks.  The IRA were extremely active during the eighties, and they’ve killed more people than fucking Al Qaeda (thanks America, sucks when people harbour terrorists, doesn’t it), but beyond that we all lived with that constant feeling of low-level dread that at some point the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. might actual just melt humanity clean off the face of the fucking planet.

So umm, how about some fun, after that little rant then.

1. Can you think of a decent song about nuclear armageddon?
2. Name someone nowadays you would least trust with the Big Red Button.
3. Was there anything good about the Cold War?
4. Where were you when the Wall came down?
5. Who seems most likely to go fucking mental and nuke someone in the current political landscape?

M.J. Hibbett and the Validators – The Fight for History

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Phil Ochs – Talking Cuban Crisis

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Tom Lehrer – We Will All Go Together When We Go

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Billy Bragg – Think Again (Dick Gaughan Cover)

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The Piranhas – Tom Hark

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*The City?  That’s lovely, which one?

Okay, not so much a podcast this week, more my effort to recreate a mix tape sent to me by my Mum’s cousin when I was far too young to appreciate its brilliance.  On the plus side though, despite my failure to really understand how lucky I was, they leaked more indelibly into my consciousness because I was so young that it all went beyond ‘music I remember’ and became something more fundamental than that.

I played this tape quite literally to death.  I think it finally gave up the ghost some time when I was about thirteen or fourteen – about 1988 or 1989.  I forgot about it for some time after that, and it was only some ten years later, about the time of Napster, that it occurred to me to finally try and reassemble all these brilliant songs together again.

Well, I tried but I failed.  The biggest problem was remembering what was on the thing.  I mean, a tape I last listened to ten years ago, what are the chances?  Still, aided by perseverance and some good fortune I prety much managed to as best I could.  Some I remembered immediately, others took a while, and still others took the discovery of songs on the tape itself to trigger the memory.  Easily the best playlist of any Toadcast to date, I’m only ashamed that it’s me talking about this music instead of someone more knowledgeable.

Toadcast #45 – The Stevecast

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01. The Piranhas – Tom Hark (02.06)
02. The Clash – Bankrobber (03.57)
03. John Cooper Clarke – Gimmix (Live) (10.42)
04. The Specials – Why? (18.00)
05. The Piranhas – Boyfriend (21.54)
06. Madness – Baggy Trousers (25.35)
07. The Piranhas – Getting Beaten Up (29.00)
08. The Specials – Ghost Town (32.16)
09. The Dead Kennedys – Holiday in Cambodia (37.57)
10. The Beat – Stand Down Margaret/Whine & Grine (46.37)
11. Adam & the Ants – Antmusic (52.39)

We all have a musical mentor. Our parents always play a big role I think, and I’ve already given my pal James Strath quite enough praise on these pages already, so it’s time to mention someone else: my cousin Steve.

Steve is quite a bit older than me – about twelve years or so, I think – and when I was a toddler I couldn’t really pronounce Steve very well so I called him Beebie, which rather stuck. He was my hero when I was very young and when we moved away from England when I was five he would send out tapes to us in Vienna and Singapore to aid my folks in my embryonic musical education. Steve introduced me to The Smiths, Billy Bragg, The Clash, The Specials, The Dead Kennedys and all sort of other legends, so you can imagine why I am so grateful for his early influence.

Anyhow, before I hit my teens I remember he sent me one legendary mix tape that stands out above all others and was on an old, grey TDK cassette almost identical to the one pictured. This tape had all sorts on it – Bankrobber by The Clash, Ghost Town by The Specials, Antmusic by Adam & the Ants, and then some lesser known stuff like Stand Down Margaret by The Beat and Getting Beaten Up by The Piranhas.

It was such a brilliant tape that we inevitably wore it out completely and until the dawn of the digital age I never really thought about tracking down all the songs and resurrecting this legendary compilation. Well I have done now and, although it’s not quite the same as a playlist rather than a lovingly crafted cassette, it’s amazing to hear how incredibly well all the music has aged. So, Beebie, I salute you, and here are a couple of songs from that mythical mix.

The Beat – Stand Down Margaret
Adam & the Ants – Antmusic
The Piranhas – Boyfriend
The Specials – Why?