And welcome back to 35,000 Watts, the podcast. My name is Michael Mode. I am here with Scott Mobley and Keith Porterfield, and we are all ex college radio DJs talking about college radio music. And today, we are gonna talk about surprising albums. And by that, we mean albums from a band maybe that you didn’t see coming or a band that the first time you heard about them, it just they left you cold.
You never really followed up, and then their next album or a future album came out of nowhere and just totally blew you away. So an album from a band that just you just didn’t see it coming and it surprised you. I think we all had a couple excellent choices, and we’re gonna kick off today’s episode with Keith. Okay. Well, the thing what I picked for this, this episode is probably, at first, maybe not one you would think about.
I went with Radiohead’s Okay Computer, and Radiohead had some hits before Okay Computer, and, you know, Benz was a pretty big album for them. So so I’ll explain why I’m I’m going with them here in just a second. But first, let me start, just kind of laying a little groundwork here. I very obviously, you know, if you’ve listened to this this podcast, you know that I kind of have a sweet spot for my music, you know, the things that I like have over the years been known as new wave or modern rock or alternative or a lot of stuff that I buy now comes up as indie rock. Just kind of that left to center rock and roll.
But I like a lot of stuff, you know, I I, you know, when I was in college radio at that time, I was very much a music snob. But, over the years, I’ve tried to broaden my horizons and and, you know, treat other genres of music, you know fairly and and give everything their its fair shake and all that and I’ve found a lot of great music that way a lot of stuff that I wouldn’t have listened to normally so, you know, I am NOT a harsh music critic is where I’m going with this I’m pretty easy to please when it comes to music that said there are some songs out there that I just do not like that in my opinion just suck And one of those songs is creep by radiohead pretty much everyone’s introduction to radiohead That song is to my mind utterly and completely awful one of the worst rock songs ever recorded I just do not like it. There is nothing about it that I like. It is, for me, on the same level with We Built This City by Starship. Just a tragic moment in music that just should never have happened.
And and so Wow. As a result, I never actually listened to Pablo Honey. I’d never checked that album out. I was so turned off by Creep that I didn’t care about it, wasn’t gonna listen to it, had wanted nothing to do with it. When the bins came out, I know that I heard fake plastic trees, and and generally liked it.
I think I still think that’s a pretty good song. I was the music director at the time that the, the just for college, little EP came out with just was a, song off of the bins as well. And they put out, an EP that went just to college that had that song and a couple of other, songs on there. And so I was around. I added those songs.
So I was you know, I knew that they were at least okay or whatever, but they were still the band that recorded Creep. And so I just was not ever gonna get into them. So, you know, 1997 rolls around and they released an album called Okay Computer. And I did not care. I didn’t wanna listen to it.
It didn’t matter to me. It was still the same band that recorded Creep. So I had no interest in it whatsoever. But as I’m sure you guys remember, that’s that album got all kinds of buzz even when it came out. I mean, it was getting fantastic reviews.
Everybody seemed to like it. It was just kind of the next big thing. And so at a certain point, eventually, I figured, okay, I need to check this out. I need to listen to it just to see what all the buzz is about. Even though it’s Radiohead, I’ll give it a try.
And so I specifically remember the day I bought that album. I brought it home to the apartment I was living in, put the disc in the player, sat back in the easy chair I had at the time, kick back, hit play, and just let it wash over me. And I was dobsmacked, man. I mean, I could not believe that I was hearing this just incredible fantastic album coming from a band that I had utterly and completely dismissed. I mean, that album, you know, you the the songs on it that you know are great.
There’s, you know, the big ones, Paranoid Android, which is kind of a a prog rock odyssey, but really a great one. There’s Karma Police, which was probably the biggest song on on the album. And to my mind, it’s maybe the best song on the album and and kind of the linchpin right in the center of the album that the whole thing really kind of revolves around and turns on. It’s a beautiful song. Fantastic.
We got no surprises, which is probably the most straightforward song on the album, you know, just, kind of the one kind of plug and play, just, straight rock song on the album, but also really great, a pretty song. And, and who doesn’t want a day that features no no alarms and no surprises? That would be great. I would like to have at least one of those at some point. I think there are some of the other songs, even the the deep album tracks, you know, you’ve got, airbag, which has got the the great loop drum part on it, which really drives that song.
And it’s called it’s kind of the gear. They’re kind of stabbing, bass part that just kind of, you know, shoots in and out throughout the song, which is really great. It’s got a song probably one of my all time favorite Radiohead songs on it called Let Down, which I just love the way the guitars work together in that song. There’s kind of the discordant main guitar part and then the higher arpeggios going on over the top of it. It all just kind of blends together in, like, this beautiful spider’s web of guitar, noise that just carries that song through.
I really, really love that one. We’ve got, others like Climbing Up the Walls, which kinda starts off a little slower and then builds up to just this racket cacophonous ending, which is just fantastic. I mean, there are, like I said, just great great songs on that album from the beginning to the end. And and when I heard it, I was, like I said, just bowled over. I cannot believe how good this album from a band that I completely dismissed was.
And it wasn’t just me. You know, like I said critics loved this album. It got to number 21 on the billboard 200, which is, you know, a pretty big accomplishment for a band that was as, you know, niche, I guess you would say as Radiohead was at the time, sold almost 8,000,000 copies, has stood the test of time. Like, over the years, you know, you look at, lists of the top 100 albums of all time, the top 500 albums of all time from various publications. They always all have this album on it and sometimes even it’s got toward the top 10.
And so I think, you know, this album’s undeniable. It is just great, and very to me at the time surprising, you know, because like I said, I I was just not at all into Radiohead and had no interest in being at all into Radiohead based solely on that one song. Now after I got this album, you know, I went back and I bought the bins after the fact and I really liked that and I’ve been you know bought every album they’ve come out with since then and I have become a big radiohead fan You know, I have to admit the last couple of albums haven’t done a whole lot for me but the sixth album run that starts with the bins and then runs through Okay Computer, kid a, amnesiac, hilt of the thief, and in rainbows is as good a run of albums as you’re gonna find from anybody anywhere in my opinion. Just great, great stuff. And I think if you look at the over, you know, the kind of overarching, you know, arc of Radiohead’s career, Okay Computer fits in in any way because the bins as good as it is, it’s still pretty much a straight rock album.
And it’s got a little bit of the kind of, you know, experimental tendencies on it, but nothing like what would come after that. And then the album after Okay Computer, Kid A, is wildly experimental. I mean, to the point where it makes, Okay Computer, which is itself a very experimental record, look pretty tame by comparison. So I think Okay Computer hits the really sweet spot where they’ve started into the heavily experimental phase of their career, but at the same time they’re writing what are more or less straight up rock songs. And so I think it’s a really good blend of kind of where they were and where they’re going, in their career.
And yeah, you know, it’s one of those albums that, like I said, it’s got a big reputation. It deserves its big reputation. And and I’m a you know, it turned me a no person that was not going to give radio at any credit at all, into a big fan. And so, you know, I’d love this album. It’s one of my all time favorites.
I still at times can’t believe that the same band that produced creep produced this album and the ones that came after it, but I have to admit that somehow they did. And I will also say that as big a radio fan as I’ve become, like I said, I own all the albums. I’ve seen them live at least three times that I can think of maybe maybe four I had still to this day never listened to Pablo, honey And I will not ever listen to Pablo, honey because that album’s got creep on it And I don’t care what the rest of their career looks like I don’t care what else is on that album. I am not going to listen to an album that has the song creep on it. Period.
End of story. And so to this day, as big of a fan as I’ve become, that’s just not one that I have any interested in visiting at all. So, so that’s my pick for the surprise album, and maybe it wasn’t a surprise to a lot of people, but it certainly was a surprise to me. I don’t know. I had this thought the other day that as as generic and boring as creep is, if they don’t put out creep, do we ever hear okay computer?
I I don’t know that they, you know, like, for example, if Radiohead is an up and coming new band and their first album is okay computer, Do we are we talking about them right now? Have we heard of them? I I think sometimes these bands, you know, maybe do something like creep, you know, something a little more straightforward, a little more to get their name out there, and then they can unleash the the concept album or the experimental album or whatever. Not necessarily saying that’s right, but it’s it works, I guess. It worked for them.
And I I think maybe, you know, an album like Okay Computer would have found an audience at some point. I don’t know if it would have found the one that it did. Without the strength of Radiohead’s name and reputation, though, kid a does not exist. I mean, that album is so off the rails and so out there that you have to know you have to go into that album knowing what it’s gonna be. You have to trust this band to take you through that album.
And so, you know, it takes a while to get there, I think, for a lot of bands. And maybe that’s what maybe that’s why they did creep. Maybe they they needed to to get themselves into the spotlight, and then they could do what they really wanted to do. You may be right. You know, I don’t know that that Okay Computer would have gotten as big as it did without the things that came before it.
Because when they turned it into the record company, apparently, the record company had been penciling in the next Radiohead album for sales in the 2,000,000 mark. And when the record company heard it, they revised that figure down to half a million. So the record company was not terribly impressed by it, and so would it have gotten any kind of push at all if that had been the first thing Radiohead had tried to turn into a record company? I don’t know. But I think the point with with kid a is also well made in that after Okay Computer and as big as it got and with the critical acclaim that it got, those guys could do anything they wanted to.
And it was going to not only be well received unless it would just, you know, was total trash, but it was gonna sell well because of of the strength of what they did. So I think, you know, Okay Computer, maybe it did need creep to be there before it to so that it could open some doors. But once it did open those doors, it they were able to do pretty much anything they wanted to after that just on the strength of the new radio head. Yeah. And and they did do whatever they wanted to do.
I mean, Kid a is that album. And I don’t know how many millions of copies Kid A sold, but I know it was a monster hit. It has to be the strangest album that sold that many copies. I mean, it’s it it it is a I I love it. I’m not saying anything bad about Kid A, but it is it is a wildly eclectic and and, you know, strange album.
Yeah. It grows on you big time, and and and it and it it gets there. But it on a first listen, that it sounds like people sitting in a room tinkering with sounds trying to figure out what to do. You know? It doesn’t come together until you get it about three times in your ears.
And I the thought of that being like, okay. Here’s our album, you know, and and it’s selling probably I’m gonna guess if Okay Computer sold 8,000,000 copies and kid a probably sold at least four. And that that’s pretty impressive for an album that that’s that that is that experimental. I think Radiohead must have had at least one champion at the record label. It is possible for a band to to have success and everything and still have a record label be like, no.
That’s too which is kinda funny because, I mean, compared to kid a, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is like a a pop album, but it is very Compared to Ghost is Born, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is a is a pop album. You know? Yeah. And and, you know, at that point, they were in a place where, again, they had a champion. And and so I it’s very situational, but I do think you’re right in general about that conversation.
I think it’s hilarious that we have three music experts, shall we say. None of whom have listened to Pablo Honey apparently because I also have not listened to Pablo Honey. I think all three of us were really, really put off by Creep for for reasons that maybe don’t even go directly to the actual music, but just something about that song. I don’t even know how to how to put it, but it’s a very polarizing song. I’ll put it that way.
I I also think that part of the only reason that song got popular is that one crunchy guitar part that part in the in the Great. You take that out of tree, I’m not sure that song gets popular at all. You’re you’re a % correct. That that little crunchy guitar riff is the hook of that song. And and it is a nice touch.
It really it really is, but it’s the song that’s around it that’s really not that great. It’s like I said, I I don’t think I hate it as much as you did. I I I remember kind of I I wouldn’t say liking it. Tolerating it’s probably a better word. But but it is sort of catchy and whatever.
But it just seems very generic to me. It’s just like, you know, crank out, you know, early nineties rock song and, you know, spit that into AI and that’s the song that’s gonna come out. You know? I really dislike it. I mean, I I really it never really moved me at all.
And I’m always upset that that seems to still be their legacy in a certain circle. Like if you go on YouTube, for example, people do reaction videos to music these days. And if they’re reacting to Radiohead nine times out of 10, they’re reacting to creep, which of course is is not at all what Radiohead is or, you know, became or is capable of. But it’s good to see what it is. I’d love to see a reaction video of, like, a young kid now listening to something like everything in its right place.
You know, that’d be more interesting to me. Yeah. And there are a few out there and it’s fascinating to watch people discover radio head and really see how great they are. And and when when it really connects with someone, it’s pretty. I would love to see the statistics of how many people went to see them live when they were actively touring in the late nineties and early two thousands that were so mad they didn’t play creep when they walked out of the arena.
I just That that guy had to be there. You know? There had to be that guy. They’re like, oh, yeah. I love this band.
They had that song creep. I mean, they they probably saved it till the end, though. He’s yelling the whole time. Play creep. Yeah.
Yeah. Creep. Oh, man. I guarantee it happened. I guarantee it happened.
Oh, it had to. It had to. You know, my story is very similar, so I I don’t even wanna I don’t need to get into super details. I was a little more aware of the bins because I I really liked fake plastic trees and high and dry, but I didn’t put Radiohead on any kind of pest pedestal or I wasn’t really on the lookout for a computer. I actually got, either a sneak peek or I got it the the week it came out because I was working at the Virgin Megastore in Vegas at the time.
And, a friend of mine who was working in the CD department was like, hey, I got some free CDs. Do you wanna check these out? And they he hand me a stack of CDs, and in it were Dereophonics album that came out around that time, Word Gets Around, that that was excellent, and Radiohead was in that stack. And I I distinctly remember I don’t know about you guys, but there’s there’s a lot of albums that I love that I really couldn’t tell you the first time I listened to it or, you know, when it first came to me. And then there’s a couple that I have very distinct, like, core memories of.
And Okay Computer just happens to be one where I remember my roommate was gone for I actually had the place to myself, which is pretty rare, and I was like, I’m gonna really, like, just dig into these these albums, and I got really stoned and put on the headphones and put on Okay Computer and just I mean, as you can imagine, that perfect moment of just being extremely receptive to music and that, you know, that was what I wanted to do that night. I wanted to listen to music. I wanted to to hear a great album. I got you know, had the headphones, so it was just the perfect everything about it was just, you know, exactly how you would want to hear that album for the first time. And, obviously, I was hooked and and totally on board from from then on.
But did I see it coming from from Pablo Honey? Absolutely not. It’s a perfect example of this this episode’s theme because it is exactly, exactly that. And, yeah, one thing I did wanna mention, you know, this is kind of a personal thing. Like, your surprise album may not be my surprise album, may not be someone else.
Someone else may have been on the radio head train train the whole time, and the band that I’m gonna choose has certainly had decent music out before the album I discovered. But but it’s so this is kind of about your personal journey, but it does sound like I think a lot of people had this particular journey. Like, I think a lot of people, either maybe they caught on to the bins, you know, depending on on, if you heard a couple of those singles or maybe happen to have that album come across your path. You you may have locked into it, but I still don’t know that you would have seen Okay Computer coming because like Keith pointed out, The Bins is still a pretty straightforward album, instrumentation wise, arrangement wise. You know, it’s it’s it’s a rock band that is clearly, willing to reach a little bit and be a little more unique than than just the generic rock band, but you you don’t have any inkling of what’s about to happen with Okay Computer and kid a and and moving forward.
So, yeah, great example of the topic. And, man, if for some reason you’re out there and you have not listened to Radiohead Okay Computer, I mean, I I’m almost tempted to tell you to stop the podcast and go listen to it right now. That’s that’s how important it is to go just knock, like, sixty minutes out of your day, grab a pair of headphones. That’s the way to listen to it and and go make that happen. And if if you love it, and you should, keep going because they they there is a little bit of diminishing returns of just a just a touch of diminishing returns after Okay Computer.
But like Keith said, the the three albums after four albums after are all fantastic as well. So as someone that did not want to like Radiohead, it worked on me. It will work on you. It will. Absolutely.
Scott, what album surprised you, man? So for mine, I’ve chosen one that is maybe not quite as extreme in difference as as what Keith did. But for me, this was definitely a surprise. I’ve chosen Stone Temple Pilots. Their first album, Core, comes out in 1992.
This is right in the heat of me being on KTXT in right in the middle of the grunge revolution. All that stuff is happening at the same time. And to me, Stone Temple Pilots were just another band that got thrown out there because of grunge. Maybe they had the right look or maybe they got a producer to give them the right sound. But to me, they were, for lack of a better word, almost like posers.
They just didn’t fit to me what what grunge was supposed to be. They kinda seemed like they were kinda corporate shoved out there. You know, here’s your next grunge band, like it or not. I wasn’t a particularly big fan of sex type thing. I think I believe that was the first single.
Michael, you would know better than than me. I think that was the first single. It was sex type thing. At least it was the first one I heard, and I wasn’t really blown away by that song. I really didn’t care for much of what they did.
I thought it was all okay. I I won’t say that I hated anything that Stone Temple Pilots did. I just found it all very cookie cutter sort of generic, you want grunge, here it is, kind of sound. Now core was wildly popular. I was in a minority not enjoying that album and kind of maybe calling them out a little bit for what I thought was sort of a a fake glaze of grunge over this this Southern California rock band.
In reading them up on this a little bit and doing a little research, you know, into a band I’ve never done any research on, the critics all pretty much agreed with me at the time. Like, this was kind of dismissed as a grunge light. You know, here’s here’s what people wanna hear right now, so here it is. I probably really only heard the singles on the album. In doing this, I went back and listened to the whole thing.
It’s not terrible at all. It’s just not great either. I mean, there are good moments on it. Wicked Garden is a jam. Dead and Bloated is pretty good song.
I never really cared for any of the slower songs. I like Plush or Creep. I know they were big hits. I just did nothing for me. So I was in no way, shape, or form anticipating their second album, Purple, which came out in 1994.
I was still at KTXT at that time, probably getting close to wrapping up my tenure there. And I heard interstate love song and went, okay. I don’t like these guys, but I like this. I don’t know what this is. I don’t know what’s different about it.
I don’t I haven’t even thought about it enough yet to figure out why it’s better, but it is. And so if they’re about to put out an album that sounds like this, then I’m cool with it. So cut to purple coming out. It turns out that when they were trying or not trying so hard to sound like what people wanted them to sound like, they actually made a wonderfully more diverse album than core. And as someone who really prefers rockers to slower stuff, there this is a case where the slightly more mellow album is the far superior one.
And I don’t mean that purple is a mellow album. It’s not. But when it is mellow, it’s mellower than core. By that same token, when it rocks, it rocks way harder than core. It’s almost like core is stuck in this middle ground of slow paced, grungy, that sort of driving beat of what people thought was the grunge sound.
Here, they open it up to much more rocking songs and much less rocking songs, but to much greater effect. There are some great rockers on this one, including what is my personal favorite STP song, Unglued. And I have to thank Michael for this one. He turned me on to it. So like I said, I didn’t rush out and buy this album.
I wasn’t desperate to hear it. You played Unglued for me, and that’s when I went, okay. I gotta hear this. You were in tune enough with me to know when you heard that song. Well, if Scott Mobley likes nothing else by Stone Temple Pilots, he’s gonna like this.
And you serve 100% correct. But even talking about the ballads here, you know, you on core, you have Creep and Plush. Those are the the ballads there. Here, you have the interstate love song, still remains, big empty. You know, same kind of slower tempo songs, but so much more lush in production, so much better written, so much better executed.
Just everything about this album is better than what came before it. And I think all it is is that, you know, we talked about Radiohead sort of radically changing their sound or at least letting it evolve to an extreme level over a few albums. This is the same band doing the same basic kind of music. There’s nothing radically different here. It’s just a little turn of the knob to the left or a little turn of the knob to the right or let’s do this song a little more bluesy.
There’s stuff on here that sounds almost country. There’s a great acoustic song on here called Pretty Penny. It sounds like nothing else Stone Double Pilots did. It actually really reminds me of something that I have not been able to put the nail in yet as to what it is. It sounds like somebody else.
But But that’s a great song that, you know, would have never been on encore. So I think by letting these guys sort of find their voice, they they made a far superior album to the one that they’re really sort of known for. I think when you go back now and you look at, you know, like pull up their top 10 on Spotify or whatever, most of the songs are from core. And it’s really a shame. People that consider themselves fans of the Stone Devil pilot should really go back and give purple another listen because it’s it’s so much more pleasing to the ears than listening to a band try to sound like Soundgarden for forty five minutes.
You know, it’s it’s a it’s a band that is finding a voice, experimenting with some new things, trying some new sounds, trying some different styles, and and making just a a wildly successful album on the heels of one that I could have never heard again and been just fine with. I think Stone Temple Pilots and Core, have something in common with Pablo Honey by Radiohead two, which is fans that either had or or or would have the ability to do much, much more with their music being put in a box either by their record label, maybe by themselves, maybe thinking we need to do this or maybe they hadn’t discovered that, hey, we can kind of branch out because to me, you know, Creep by Radiohead and and and Creep by Stone Temple Pilots, which those those two songs are particularly similar similar, but they do share that that grungy thing that was happening. No. I like Core. I certainly enjoyed it when it came out.
I think it suffered from that, from from having to be a grunge album. And and I don’t again, I don’t know if if someone took the shine off of some of the songs and kinda tried to put them in that box or if if they just were in that box and they broke out of it later, but that’s the impression you get when you hear that album. I think it suffered terribly from Plush being the breakout hit for two reasons. One, he sounds like Eddie Vedder, and two, in the video, he looks like Eddie Vedder. It’s it’s the most uncanny thing you’ve ever seen to watch, say, a ’91 era, ’92 era Pearl Jam video, so, you know, Evenflo or one of those videos.
And then watch Plush and look at the the face the facial expressions, everything about it looks like someone trying to pretend to be someone else. You know, he looks like he’s trying to pretend to be Eddie Vedder. And the song, the inflection in his voice has the same problem. It’s it’s rampant in the whole album to but Plush really brings that out. And I think that was the thing that turned off a lot of people like you and and other people who were in the music world at the time or in college radio at the time and kind of were used to digging deeper for music to to see a band come along and just almost blatantly rip off another band is is always gonna turn you off in that situation.
I don’t know that that’s what they were trying to do. I am in the camp that feels like Plus just happened to be. That’s just how it kinda came out. I don’t I don’t think it was an intentional thing, although it’s hard to listen to it and think that it wasn’t. I really genuinely don’t think it was, but I do think that that hurt Core a lot in terms of, you know, people thinking of them as being an original band.
And then when Purple comes out, it’s clear that they are much better songwriters than we realize, much better musicians than we realize, and just more creative than we realized. I think, you know, those like you said, it’s not a radically different band the way that, like, Okay Computer is is a radically different band from Pablo Honey. It’s yeah. A tweak of the knob here, a tweak of the knob there. They they let themselves go just a little further in different directions, and it totally pays off.
The album’s much more listenable, much more enjoyable, much more diverse, and, still something I I still listen to it to this day and enjoy it. I I agree with you that that it’s really hard to tell who is to blame for, like, why all that went down the way it did, but I would probably blame a marketing department because the songs are there on chord. They’re they’re fine. It’s the way they’re produced. And I don’t believe that they wanted to make a video where they looked and sounded like Pearl Jam.
I believe some guy in a suit at their record label wanted them to do that. I mean, that’s what I wanna believe in my heart of hearts. You know? These are the same people that, you know, they they package things up and they put them out there and they try to convince you it’s one thing when maybe it isn’t. You know?
And I think that’s what happened to them. You know? These people tried to convince us that Avril Lavigne was a punk. So, you know, it’s it’s not beyond the realm of thinking that they looked at Stone Temple Pilots and went, okay. We have a rock band here.
Pearl Jam is red hot right now. Let’s kinda make them look like Pearl Jam. You know? And that I’m much more willing to blame it on that than I am on the band itself because you can tell from both albums, but really on Purple, how good they are at songwriting, how good they are at playing. You know?
And they just needed the right the right push, to let them be who they really were rather than what some marketing person wanted them to be. Yeah. I think I have a similar thought about core. When it came out, I I thought the song was fine. You know, we played them at KTXT, and gave them all good runs, and they were all good songs.
They were fine. I never really listened to the entire album because I didn’t really care to. I really thought of Stone Temple Pilots, you know, in the same breath with, a lot of other bands that were just seem to be kinda aping the grunge thing just to try to get ahead at the time when that was really big. And I can’t remember now if it was, the two first two songs I heard off Purple were Big Empty and Interstate Love Song. And I can’t remember which one I heard first.
I think I may have heard Big Empty first because it was on the soundtrack to the movie, The Crow. And then Interstate Love Song came after that. And I liked both of those songs a lot more than I would have expected to like them because I, like I said, it was not a huge Stone Temple Pilots fan at the time. So when Purple came out, I, you know, I put it on to to listen to it. And the first song on that album is Meat Plow, which is about the grungiest grunger that ever grunged.
And my thought at the time was, well, okay. Here we go again. But then immediately after that, you get Vaseline, which is a fantastic song. My complaint about this album is that it stumbles out of the gate a little bit because like I said, I’m not a big fan of Meat Plow. I’m also not a big fan of Loungefly.
So if Vaseline wasn’t sandwiched between those two songs, I don’t know that I would have finished the album. If it had been another song that sounded like Meat Plow, I might have shut it off right then. And I’m glad you mentioned Pretty Penny because not only is that my favorite song on this album, it’s actually my favorite Stone Temple Pilots song. I really, really love that song. Another thing I think is interesting is, you mentioned a minute ago, like, this is not a radical a terribly radical departure from Core just kinda, like, you say turn the knob a little left or a little right or whatever.
From my money, as much as I like Purple, I actually think Tiny Music, the album that comes after it is my favorite Stone Tip of Pilots album. I think it’s the better album. And to me, Purple kind of sits in a spot a lot like, The Bins does with Radiohead in that it’s still a pretty straightforward album with a little bit of changing and kind of changing of styles and changing what they’re doing. But it’s really not until they get to tiny music that they actually start to get really experimental and kinda flesh out the things they do with a little more psychedelic rock and and pop and that kinda thing. A transitional album, that actually got them even to a a kind of a weirder spot than they were before.
And then I have to admit, I actually fell out of the Stone Temple Pilots after Tony’s Tiny Music, so I couldn’t really speak to their career after that. But but, yeah, this is a good choice. And for me as well, I think was a surprise coming after KORE that this album was as varied, and was as strong as it was. The like you said, the the track listing is such that if you listen to the album first, you definitely are you’re right off the bat, you’re kinda like, oh, man. Here we go, you know, here we go again.
And then you kinda quickly if you if you can stick with it, you realize that’s not the case. And I would actually say, so I also heard the Big MT first because it did come out on the Crow soundtrack before the album did. And I love I love the song, but I I didn’t I didn’t see it as, like, foretelling of a a radical departure from core. It seemed like it could very much be of a piece with Core and that the next album could have been, you know, Core two with a big empty on it. And I think it still would have made sense in that context because it is kind of I guess it kinda makes sense as as to what you were saying.
It’s kind of a transitional song because it’s not straight ahead grunge, but it wasn’t a radical departure. Whereas, to me, like, you know, the interstate love song or Vaseline and and Pretty Penny and then almost everything on tiny music is is is not grunge at all. It’s it’s almost I mean, glam rock isn’t exactly right either, but it’s more glam rock than it is grunge in a lot of ways, some of those songs are. You know, they’re they’re definitely they have a poppier edge in some in some ways. They have more of a garage rock edge in some ways, but they certainly don’t have that just kind of 10 songs of dredging, you know, along at at slightly different paces that Core has.
And and, I mean, sometimes that works. Again, Core is not a bad album, you know. When it rocks, it rocks. The slow songs are decent, but it is if you don’t like grunge, you’re not gonna like Core. That’s that’s for sure.
Whereas if you don’t like grunge, I think you absolutely would like purple and and certainly could like, you know, tiny music as well. And in some cases, if you like grunge, you’re not gonna like core. Also true. Right. Well, I do think glam rock is a is a pretty good way to describe tiny music.
It’s it’s much closer to what I would think of as being a glam rock, record than than a grunge record for sure. I think that’s the direction they they kinda were going or that they kinda went. I’m like you. I think I I think I had a copy of number four, which ironically enough is their fourth album, after tiny music. And then I think that was about where that was kinda the end of road for me was with Stones of Violence.
But, Me as well. I I I I remember hearing Tiny Music. I don’t remember much about it. I know I didn’t hear anything after that. Let’s quickly give our flowers to the, the Super Lounge Lizard song at the very end of that album, where he’s crooning about this is the second album.
And that’s Oh, oh, yeah. The hidden it’s a hidden track. Yeah. That’s a there. Yeah.
What’s it called? Not really, you know, of a piece with the rest of that album, but just hilarious. It is. Let’s give them their props for tacking that on the end. It is called Kitchenware and Candy Bars, my second album hidden track.
That’s the way that’s what a hidden track should be, in my opinion. Have some fun with it. It’s like, don’t just don’t put a really great song as a hidden track. Like, I need that to to be on the album, but, like, yeah, if you’re gonna do a hidden track, have fun with it. So if you if, you’re going back and checking out some of these albums that we’re talking about and you and you hit on purple, make sure you find and finish off with a hidden track.
It is definitely worth a listen. I totally forgot about that, by the way. Thanks for reminding me. So speaking of bands that I couldn’t tell you much about their current career, but but then had a great album once upon a time. I’m gonna talk about a band called Not a Surf.
The the surprise album is Let Go, but we’ll go back in time a little bit. My knowledge of Not a Surf up until 02/2002 revolved solely around one song. I think that’s probably the case for 99% of the public. A song called Popular, which was in fact quite popular in ’96. It, in my opinion, is a novelty song.
It’s I guess it’s not technically a a novelty song, but it’s basically one where the verses are are the lead singer literally reading from, like, it’s like an old fifties handbook about how how you should act as a teenager, I think. You know, something like that. You know, how you should groom yourself, how you should behave on dates. And so he’s reading this kind of anachronistic stuff in just a deadpan voice, and and then it’s got, you know, the big hooky chorus. My dislike for this song might rival Keith’s dislike for Creep.
It’s it’s just a terrible, terrible, pandering, crappy, throwaway song, of which there were many in 1996. You know, I think ’96 and ’97 were like this time where the grunge was essentially dead. College rock had kind of bifurcated into like modern rock and alternative rock, which was now a pretty commercial, and then and then actual college rock, which is what college stations were still playing, which were still stuff you wouldn’t necessarily hear. And this is one of those that, like, wanted to be college rock, but was really playing to the seats in the back and trying to be a a big hit and and had got the big push from the record label. And and it totally worked.
I mean, the song was everywhere for a while. It it was pretty well known. And I did listen to the album. I think at the time, I I went back and listened to it again today. It’s not a great album.
It doesn’t pretend to anything that’s that’s gonna come after it. And and quite frankly, their second album doesn’t either. So they were coming off having a big hit, and if you have a big hit, the record label’s gonna gonna certainly allow you to go record another album, and they did. And when they turned it into the record label, the record label Elektra was like, oh, no. Thank you.
No. Thanks. You know, the the the classic, we didn’t hear a single, we don’t hear a single, forced them to go back and record two cover songs just to have something that they could release as singles. Not a Surf was not super happy about that, and they were even less happy about the idea of those being released as singles. And so they went to, promote the album in Europe.
And while they were gone, Electra dropped them from the label and refused to release the album in The US at all. So the second album, Proximity Effect, didn’t come out in The US until February. It was released on their own label. It also, to me, is not great. I think you can start to hear hints of what they’re capable of, but I think everything that’s about to come together on the on Let Go in 02/2002 is is just floating around on on the proximity effect where the the songwriting isn’t really as straightforward, which can be a good thing, but in this case, sometimes isn’t.
Lyrically, he’s probably trying to be a little too clever by half and it just doesn’t quite hit. That considered and the fact that it wasn’t released in The US until later and then on a very, very small label, it wasn’t on my radar at all, so I don’t really remember that album coming out. So, again, by the time we got to 02/2002, I knew one song by Not a Surf, and I did not like it. So for whatever reason, Let Go came across, I’ll I’ll say our our ears because, the time I listened to it, I think Keith and I were running an Internet radio station and and auditioned Let Go as and why we, you know, why we had it and why we bought it and why we thought it would be good. Maybe we had heard some good buzz about it or whatever.
And we listened to it and it is in fact fantastic. It is a excellent album front to back. It’s got very little filler on it. It’s got a couple great ballads. It starts off with Blizzard of 77, which is just a beautiful song.
It’s got Killian Dread, which is a nice ballad. It’s got, Neither Heaven nor Space, which it’s right up to that song is right up there with Smog Moon by Matthew Sweet as just like this out of the blue, late in the track listing, just gorgeous song. Like, never saw it coming, but it it’s on there. And then there’s four or five really great up tempo poppy rockers on it as well. High Speed Soul, The Way You Wear Your Head, all really, really good.
You could I guess you could go back and try to piece together, you know, from their earlier albums that they were capable of putting this together, but I I I tried to again today, and I just I don’t think there’s anything on those first two albums that would have made me think that everything that I kinda didn’t like about the other albums came together on this one to work. Like, lyrically, it’s still a little weird, but it works for me. The songwriting can still be a little off kilter and and take you kind of in weird directions, and there’s some hard left turns, and some of the stuff that just wasn’t working on Proximity Effect works gangbusters on Let Go. And like I said, I I can’t really tell you much about what they did after that. I think I followed them for an album or two, and it kinda drifted back into that, like, good but not great category.
But Let Go to me is just one of those albums where for whatever reason those weeks they spent in the studio, like, everything just fell into place and they produced something that, you know, I didn’t see coming and and I don’t think many people did and luckily they got they got their flowers, they definitely got a a nice critical response on that. I don’t know that it sold millions of copies, but they got some good buzz and some and some good returns from that because they definitely deserve it. You’re right that it was during the the time that we were running that Internet radio station, when we, you know, picked up that album. I I had re remembered popular. I hadn’t listened to it a long time.
I went back when I was doing my prep for this and and listened to it. I don’t hate it quite as much as you do, although I do think the lyrics are terrible. The song itself, I don’t think it’s terribly bad. But I hadn’t listened to this album in a long time either since those days back then. And I remembered you being a big fan of it, and I also remembered liking it myself.
The really the only songs I that I remembered specifically were Blizzard of ’77 and, Happy Kid, which is is a fantastic song. I’m just a happy kid stuck with the heart on a sad So I when I listened to it during my prep for this, this was the first time I’ve heard this album, you know, since back then, those days. I was blown away, man. This is a almost perfect power pop album. I don’t know how I didn’t latch onto it even more than I did at the time.
There’s not a bad song on it. They’re all really, really good, actually. It fades a little bit toward the end, in my opinion. The last two songs, Paper Boats and and Treading Water, are not, my favorites on the album. But, gosh, for the most part, every song on this album is really, really fantastic.
Just a brilliant choice for this because, yeah, I don’t think at the time, you know, anyone would have seen something quite like this coming from these guys. And I was, again, just as surprised listening to it now as I was back then. I I really had forgotten just how great a power pop album this thing is. I highly recommend it. It’s probably one, you know it’s entirely possible that everyone listening to this, podcast has heard Okay Computer or Purple.
Probably, they haven’t heard this one. Go out and listen to it. This is a brilliant record. It is really, really good. I was gonna say that I know that Keith, you said you didn’t hate popular as much as as maybe Michael did, but I know you hate the song that inspired it, which is the Sweater Song by Weezer.
I do. You know, another song that I hate as well. Yeah. Well and I think that, you know, we’re we’re back to the same thing sort of that, you know, this band put out this song popular. I don’t know if they were trying to sound like Weezer, but there were a lot of bands that were trying to sound like Weezer around that time, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they were one of them.
I remember hearing this album around the time it came out, and it was probably because of your Internet radio station if you wanna know the truth. I found a lot of music from you guys at that time, and I remember hearing this album about that time and really, really liking it. I wanted to give it another dive kinda like you did, Keith. I didn’t really get a chance to do that, but I did listen to a few tracks. But, yeah, you used the absolute perfect description of this album.
This is brilliant power pop. And if you like stuff like the fountain of Wayne or even further back than that, you know, like the lemon heads and stuff like that, like true power pop music. This is almost as good as it gets. I mean, this is a fantastic record that, like you said, I think is off a lot of people’s radar. This band is certainly off a lot of people’s radar.
And, it yeah. So if you haven’t heard, this album, Let Go by Not a Surf, absolutely give it a listen. It’s fantastic. Yeah. I can’t I can’t recommend it enough.
Well, I mean, there’s a reason I chose it for this. I I could not have been more surprised that their the songwriting, the musicianship, his singing, his voice. I mean, everything that just doesn’t really exist on popular. You know, popular is just such a straightforward, anybody could have recorded it kind of song, and I absolutely think it was meant to evoke if to to be charitable. Let’s say it was meant to evoke the sweater song, which what a what a terrible song.
Like, if you’re gonna evoke any Weezer song, why would you choose the sweater song? Don’t know. But That one should be near the bottom of the list. That’s That one should be at the bottom. Yeah.
Why not Buddy Holly or My Name is Jonas or any of the other fantastic songs on that album? It Let Go does they do that. They you know, I I wouldn’t say it sounds like Weezer necessarily, but poppy, accessible, but uptempo, but also with some very delicate moments too. Like I said, neither heaven nor space to me is one of the most just beautifully delicate, gorgeous songs that that came out of that era as well. So there’s a little bit of of everything on there.
A good one to go back and if you if for some reason you missed it and and like you guys said, there’s a good chance you did on this one, Go back and and find it. It’s it’s certainly available on streaming. There are there are two versions of it. There’s a US version. There’s a European version.
The European version does not have nor heaven nor space for some reason. Don’t know why they traded that out for quick fix, which is a much more generic and not nearly as good of song. So if for some reason you get the album, it doesn’t have neither heaven nor space, make sure you look that one up on YouTube or whatever. You can find it. The version currently on Apple Music has that song on it.
Yeah. I can’t imagine wanting to hear that album without that song on it. Yeah. And weird that Europe took it away, and we have it. Usually, that would go the other way.
Like, the like, Europe we usually get the safe generic, you know, whatever versions Really? Europe gets the the it’s the wildly original ones. But It makes no sense. And I was I was trying to figure out, like, was it was it a song that they didn’t write, or did they cowrite it with someone that didn’t want to and there’s nothing like that. I have been annoyed because I that one is one that I do listen to a lot on Apple Music.
And, as you guys know, I I do live in Europe, and that song is not on the listing. There is only one listing for that album over here. That song is not on it. I did not know why, and I could not figure out why. And I didn’t realize it until today that there’s two versions of it.
And, I mean, it’s not like they have both versions available. It’s not like that song is available on, like, Apple essentials or on a playlist. You cannot listen to that song on Apple Music if you live in Europe. I it’s amazing to me that that it’s not so, like, I had to go to YouTube to find it. It’s almost gotta be a licensing thing, but I you I mean, you said said you looked into it.
I don’t know. But it it’s almost has to be that. Right? But I mean I mean, I guess it is at the at the point of the label when they demarcated it that way, like, that kind of is that’s the rule from then on until they, you know, till they change their mind. So I I I don’t think it was a songwriting thing.
I don’t think the band maybe necessarily knew or even cared, you know, that it wasn’t here. But the record label, for whatever reason, once they did that, it was it was done and it is it has not been undone since because I cannot listen to that song without going to YouTube and listen to it. So, yeah, if you live in Europe, go find that song separately, listen to the rest of the album. If you’re apparently, if you live in The US, you’ll be fine. But I do think that song is kinda a lot of times I’d be like, oh, well, that’s okay.
Like, you wouldn’t you won’t really notice that this one I feel like that song is pretty essential to this album. I mean, it’s there’s so, you know, seven or eight great other tracks on there, but to me, it’s one it’s a standout. So, you know, I do wanna kinda I just wanna kinda call that out as a as something to to be aware of. Glad you guys agree as well because I I love that album, so it’s good to know that you guys like it as well. Three excellent surprise albums.
I think, like you said, you’ve probably listened to some of them, but but maybe not, and and maybe not some of the albums around it. Or or maybe we’ll all three go back and listen to Pablo Honey after this podcast. Who knows? Maybe maybe today will be the day we all listen to it. You guys can’t see the video, but I can tell you right now, Keith is about to say nope.
Yeah. That’s a big no for me too. But, yeah, if you haven’t for some reason heard these, go listen to I mean, for sure, go listen to Okay Computer. Well, I mean, all of them. They’re all three great albums.
Okay Computer is is probably the most classic of all of them. I mean, that one’s always gonna be in in a lot of people’s top 10 of all time. But, Purple is a very, very enjoyable album, and and like we just talked about, Let Go is as well. So go check them out and tell us what you think on, our social media. Go to Instagram.
Go to Facebook. Go to our website. We’re on Blue Sky now. So you can go to Blue Sky as well. Yeah.
And tell us, what you think. What was your surprise album? What was an album that you just never saw coming that really blew you away? This is another fun topic that we’ll probably do again, so it’d be fun to hear what you guys think. While you’re on the Internet, while you’re typing stuff, why not type 35000watts.com and go to the website, and you can check out more episodes of the podcast.
You can see a film called 35,000 watts, the story of college radio is available right there as well for download, and you can watch a documentary about college radio. Once again, thank you to Keith Porterfield, Scott Mobley. My name is Michael Millard, and we’ll see you next time on 35,000 watts, the podcast.