Well you should’ve.  It was a splendid show featuring a handful of Toad favourites, and a four song section introduced by my good self.  I thought I’d throw up a quick post of a song DC played, which I think you deserve to hear.

I was emailed this ages ago and, even though I always intended to either use it either in a post or a podcast, it somehow drifted to the back of my mind.  Anyway, DC played it yesterday which reminded me of the thing, so here you go.  It’s by a German group called Mikrofisch and pretty much lays into every XFM hero whose fame could ever fill you with dismay.  Honestly, it’s a tinny little tune but the lyrics are a masterpiece of misanthropy, which you can imagine I would appreciate.

Secondly, the show closes with a cover of Guns ‘n’ Roses’ Sweet Child o’ Mine recorded by Taken by Trees, who are what has become of The Concretes.  When DC introduced it I thought for a moment he was building up to the rather less lush and rather more spectral Luna version of the same song which is also brilliant.  So here it is, because I love this version.  I actually like the original too.  In fact, I like most of Appetite For Destruction.  As DC says, no matter how much of a prat Axl Rose is, he still wrote some good songs, and that album was a bit of a high point.

Mikrofisch – The Kids Are All Shite
Luna – Sweet Child o’ Mine

And here’s the entirety of The Waiting Room podcast in full (assuming it allows me to hotlink):
The Waiting Room – The Toadcast  27/02/08

Well folks, tonight I get my revenge. You all know DC -One Half of Drunk Country – the foul-mouthed miscreant who is forever coming on this site and ruining my thoughtful and sophisticated analysis with vulgar outbursts and showers of obscenity and invective? And the one who did THAT!!–> to my lovely drawings? Well tonight it’s my turn to chuck a spanner into his works for a change.

DC, as well as being an International Man of Mystery, presents the splendid radio show that is The Waiting Room. He’s done it with Hope, he’s done it with Mr. Fisk, he’s done it with The Mouse, and now he’s doing it with, erm, no… perhaps this sentence isn’t quite going where I’d intended. Well, tonight I am making the first of what will hopefully become regular appearances on his show with a little segment called Song, by Toad Presents… where I pick four tracks and tell DC’s horrified listeners about what I’ve chosen to oil their eardrums with and why. Given the distinctly cool reception that Fisk character has given my selections when DC has presented them himself, my little slot may be met with a chorus of boos, but we’ll see.

In any case, those of you of an internet radio bent can catch the show tonight from 10pm to midnight GMT on Error FM, and those of you who prefer to your music cast in pods can download the show from here as of some time tomorrow. This is pencilled in to be a weekly feature and, although this week I’ve mostly used Song, by Toad tracks, I will try not to duplicate songs I have posted here or used on my own podcasts in future, so please do stop by and have a listen.

In other news, the Contrast Podcast turned 100 this week. Tim has a celebratory episode up, to which I have contributed Carlton Rees’s version of 99½ Won’t Do. It’s an amazing job that Tim does, pulling all that together so please pop over and have a listen. People giving their time to other folk in that sort of way is one of the best things about the internet, and Tim’s project is one of the best and most well-loved going, so swing by and give it a go.

Here’s another version of 99½ Won’t Do, this time by Detroit’s throatiest warblers, The Detroit Cobras:
The Detroit Cobras – 99½ Won’t Do
The Detroit Cobras – Insane Asylum Seemed appropriate for The Waiting Room
The Detroit Cobras – He Did It

…and don’t spare the horses.

Yes, we are back. What an enormous relief, I hear you all cry. How did you ever get by without me. Well before I get back to my usual crisp, clear and perfectly formed blog posting* I have some bits and bobs to round up, so this will be a bit of an all-over-the-place post.

Christmas lists:
Yeah, I’ll probably be making at least one. Top 20 albums perhaps, but not much more than that because I just can’t quite be arsed. A lot of people are making Festive 50 lists in honour of the great John Peel, but I am not sure I could face it. The avalanche of new songs in 2007 reduced to fifty? I doubt I could whittle them down, but I may yet have a go.

The Contrast Podcast is doing one, and listeners and participants are invited to take part. It’s a great project, so if you don’t know what I’m talking about then bugger off and have a listen. Just email Tim your top five songs of the year, in order, by November 27th and you’ll be counted. The whole lot will come out as a series of podcasts over the Christmas period, which sounds rather jolly. Details on participating can be found at the bottom of this post.

Johnny Flynn & the Sussex Wit – Leftovers

The Waiting Room will also be doing a big old Christmas Special, with special listener requests. It doesn’t have to be at all related to Christmas, so if there’s something in particular you’d like to hear then leave a comment on the site or email DC direct and let him know. My vote was for No Christmas in Kentucky by Phil Ochs which, if you know it, is a relentlessly depressing song about poor people not being able to afford the sort of stuff everyone else takes for granted at Christmas time, and just how bleak Christmas must be if you are living in poverty and abandoned by your nation. I couldn’t find an mp3 though, so the festive spirit has been given a temporary reprieve.

Decoration – Only a Plague Can Stop Us Now

Other Shit:
Mike at Manic Pop Thrills reckons we should try and engineer a Christmas #1 for Malcolm Middleton in the UK charts. Given that the song in question is entitled We Are All Going to Die, I think you’ll agree that there could be no better choice. Given that the likely winner is some ratty old transvestite from The X-Factor, I think we owe it to ourselves as a community to get Malky in there if at all possible. Help save Christmas for the misanthropes! ‘We’re All Going To Die’ gets a digital only release on 17^th December and I’m not sure where to buy it just now, so I’ll try and remind you all closer to the time.

Blogfresh Radio has been scraping the bottom of the barrel once more and invited me to talk about Found, one of last week’s reviews. Click here for the appropriate episode.

The Sequins – Treehouses

The Daily Growl – or Tim, as he’s known to his mates – took me on a pilgrimage to the new Rough Trade record shop when I was down in London, where I spent almost a hundred quid on vinyl. What a moron. And before you ask, no I can’t afford it – not anything like. Still, I have accumulated enough singles recently that record companies have sent me as promos that I figured I might as well give in and buy a record player. Some fifteen years after they became obsolete. Genius.

Phil Ochs – Talking Cuban Crisis
*Anyone sniggering at this is barred.

This is a bit of a mutual back-scratching exercise, so I thought I’d better confess my motives up front, but I think you all know me well enough to know I’d never plug something I didn’t genuinely like. The Waiting Room is a two-hour weekly podcast by a couple of muppets who actually give the shambolic disorganisation of the Toadcasts a run for their money in terms of sheer haphazard bumbling. [Edit: Sorry, they are a radio show that is also a podcast.  Broadcasts from Error FM, Wednesdays from 10pm. I think it's 10pm - I just listen to the podcasts myself.] One half of Drunk Country and Ms. Hope Eternal chatter on about not very much in particular and present some truly excellent song choices.

In the three episodes I’ve heard they’ve played the likes of Noah & the Whale, Man Man, The Magnetic Fields, Alaska in Winter, King Creosote and The Czars who are Toad favourites and also led me to buy albums by Rats With Wings, Jesca Hoop and Amy LaVere. So well worth checking out. Also, they said I was ace in their last podcast and with my colossal vanity, flattery of that sort was bound to be rewarded.

Rats With Wings – Hungry Like the Wolf Yes, that Hungry Like the Wolf.
The Czars – Lullaby 6000 This songs ends with one of the most gorgeous building choruses ever.
Amy LaVere – Killing Him