Monday Brings Us ‘More Cowbell, Please’, Stephen Stills & Manassas Live in Amsterdam and ‘The Soul Men’, August 21, 2023

Good morning, musicologists! Hope you’re holding up under the threat of Monday! But we’ll make it better with this great music we’ve got waiting for you. Read on for details!

Here’s your Monday, Monday lineup:

10:00 a.m. More Cowbell, Please: Various Artists

Who knew there were so many great songs with cowbell? This is nearly an EP it’s so good. You’ll hear The Beatles, Argent, The Alan Parsons Project, Blind Faith, Bob Dylan, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Dolly Parton, Edgar Winter, The Eagles, Grateful Dead, Harry Nilsson, The James Gang, Journey, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Linda Ronstadt, The Move, The Pretenders, Steely Dan, Sam & Dave, The Turtles, Warren Zevon, Little Feat and more!

3:00 p.m. Stephen Stills & Manassas Live at The Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, March 22, 1972

Stephen Stills is truly a musical genius and his lengthy career has shown it. We’ve heard all of his detractors. Yes, he’s a bit of a control freak. Today we give you Stills with his band Manassas.

9:00 a.m. The Soul Men, Volume 1: Various Artists

The soul men are in to close out the evening tonight with Ray Charles, Ben E. King, Marvin Gaye, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Bill Withers, Fats Domino, Slim Harpo, The Temptations, Al Green, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett and more!

What better way to start a Monday than with great music? There isn’t one. Join your friends from Portugal, Greece, Spain, Japan, Russian Federation, The Netherlands, Finland, the UK, France, Italy, Switzerland, Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, California and points beyond.

Monday, Monday

It’s Friday and We’ve Got ‘More Cowbell, Please’ Along With Karla Bonoff and Some ‘Live’ Peter Tosh Later, April 21, 2023

Good morning, gang! It is finally Friday and we’ve got some great stuff for you today starting with our ‘More Cowbell, Please’ playlist, Karla Bonoff’s final turn as our singer-songwriter in the middle, and Peter Tosh Live in Amsterdam to close out the programming.

Here’s today’s musical landscape:

11:00 a.m. More Cowbell, Please: Various Artists

It’s amazing how many songs employ the cowbell. In fact, some you’ve never imagined until you actually listen. You’ll hear music from The Beatles, The Alan Parsons Project, Aretha Franklin, Argent, Blind Faith, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Bob Dylan, Carly Simon, Linda Ronstadt, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Paul McCartney, The Eagles, Edgar Winter, Electric Light Orchestra, Jethro Tull, The J. Geils Band, Journey, Supertramp, Talking Heads, The Turtles, Warren Zevon, Stephen Stills and more!

4:00 p.m. Singer-Songwriter Series: The Music of Karla Bonoff FINAL AIRING!

Brilliant songwriter and great singer Karla Bonoff takes her final turn as our featured singer-songwriter for this week.

8:00 p.m. Peter Tosh Live at The Apartheid Festival, Jaap Eden Hall, Amsterdam, Netherlands, June 13, 1981 NEW!

The late, great Peter Tosh brings his considerable talent to The Apartheid Festival held in Amsterdam back in 1981. This is the first live Tosh performance in The Mermaid Lounge, but it will not be the last!

We’ve made it all the way to the end of the week. Why not get through the final day with some great music? We’re on 24/7 free of charge with no commercial interruption. Just do it.

We’ve Made It To Friday!

It’s Saturday in The College of Rock n’ Roll Knowledge: 1/23/2021

Good Morning, fellow music trivia buffs, and welcome to The Mermaid Lounge! We have today’s lesson all prepared for you. We guarantee you’ll impress your friends and family with your knowledge if you apply yourselves.

The Winter Dance Party Tour begins. But before it’s over, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper will die in a plane crash. Don McLean called it “the day the music died” in his hit American Pie.

Here’s today’s lesson:

January 23, 1959: The Winter Dance Party Tour began at the Million Dollar Ballroom in Milwaukee. Before the 24-city tour is over, the headliners, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper will die in a plane crash.

January 23, 1964: The Temptations released The Way You Do The Things You Do, one of the best R & B songs ever, in my opinion.

January 23, 1965: Herman’s Hermits released Can’t You Hear My Heartbeat.

Also on this day, Downtown made Petula Clark the first woman to have a #1 in the US since Vera Lynn in 1952. Of course, she’ll have many more here, but she is an old hand at this in the UK where she has been charting since 1954.

Beatles ’65 spent a third week at #1 on the Album charts.

January 23, 1966: Stevie Wonder played The Cavern Club in Liverpool.

January 23, 1967: Johnny Rivers, one of our favorites here, released Baby I Need Your Lovin’.

January 23, 1969: Alan Parsons (later of The Alan Parsons Project) engineered his first session at Apple Studios (as 2nd engineer to Glyn Johns) as The Beatles record one of their best ever, Get Back.

Elvis Presley records Suspicious Minds at American Sound, a small studio in Memphis. It is a huge comeback hit for The King, and it is also his final #1 hit in America.

January 23, 1970: Judy Collins is denied the opportunity to sing her testimony at the infamous Chicago 7 trial.

January 23, 1971: George Harrison is the first ex-Beatle to hit #1 on the UK charts with My Sweet Lord.

Also on this day, Gladys Knight & The Pips recached #1 on the R & B charts with If I Were Your Woman. This band never got the recognition it deserved, in my opinion, and Gladys Knight was a powerhouse of a singer.

January 23, 1973: While singing to a sell-out crowd at Madison Square Garden in New York, Neil Young is handed a message. He then announces that a peace accord had been reached in Vietnam. The crowd goes wild for 10 minutes. Here we are in 2020, and American imperialism continues on unabated and forgotten as we fucking argue over masks.

January 23, 1978: Terry Kath of Cbicago accidentally shoots himself in the head with a gun he believed was empty. He dies instantly, just eight days shy of his 32nd birthday. It also marks the death of Chicago, as far as I am concerned, as Peter Cetera leads them down the path of elevator music and renders them irrelevant.

Born On This Day

January 23, 1950: Danny Federici, keyboardist for the E Street Band, was born in Farmington, New Jersey.

January 23, 1950: Bill Cunningham, bassist for The Box Tops, was born in Memphis, Tennessee.

And that is all because we do not give a flying fuck about Mariah Carey or Justin Bieber. We will be back with our line-up soon!

It’s a Day of Rest, But Not Here in The College of Rock n’ Roll Knowledge: 12/20/2020

Good Morning, Students! It’s Sunday here in the College of Rock n’ Roll Knowledge, and we’ve got a great day lined up. But first, your lesson.

***Jethro Tull was formed on this day in 1967.***

Here’s all the news that’s fit to print:

December 20, 1956: Elvis Presley was making musical chart history with ten songs on Billboard’s Top 100.

December 20, 1958: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison appear as The Quarrymen at the wedding reception of George’s older brother, Harry.

December 20, 1965: Wicked Wilson Pickett records the fucking great song, 634-5789, with Booker T & The MG’s. Booker was missing on that day, but his keyboards were handled nicely for him by none other than Isaac Hayes.

Also on this day in 1965, The Beach Boys released the single Barbara Ann.

December 20, 1966: The Big O, Otis Redding, played the Fillmore West in San Francisco.

December 20, 1967: Vocalist and master flute player Ian Anderson and bassist Glenn Cornick leave The John Evans Blues Band to form Jethro Tull, naming the band after an inventor of farm implements. John Evans would later join Tull himself as the keyboardist.

December 20, 1969: The Beatles’ masterpiece, Abbey Road, remained at the top of the charts for an eighth week on this day.

December 20, 1971: The album from George Harrison’s Concert For Bangladesh (the very first musical event of its kind in history) was released. It would win the Grammy Award for Best Album.

December 20, 1972: The O’Jays recorded the great song Love Train.

December 20, 1975: Joe Walsh officially replaced Bernie Leadon in The Eagles, moving them into a harder rock frame. He had previously been with The James Gang, a great band, by the way. However, on this day, my love affair with The Eagles ended, as much as I love Joe Walsh. I continued to listen, and their catalogue is in our rotation, but I prefer their earlier feel.

December 20, 1980: Twelve days after being shot dead by a fucking psychopath who just wanted his time in the spotlight, John Lennon had his first #1 solo hit with Just Like Starting Over.

Born On This Day

December 20, 1939: R & B singer Kim Weston was born in Detroit, Michigan.

December 20, 1944: Bobby Columby, drummer for Blood, Sweat & Tears, was born in New York.

December 20, 1947: Little Stevie Wright, lead singer of The Easybeats (Friday On My Mind) was born in Leeds, England. He would, however, be raised in Australia. During their six-year career, The Easybeats had 15 Top 10 hits in Australia, no slight feat regardless of where you were raised. The Easybeats are in our daily standard rotation.

December 20, 1948: Alan Parsons of The Alan Parson’s Project (Games People Play, I Wouldn’t Want To Be Like You), was born in London. He began his musical career as an engineer at Abbey Road Studios, working on Abbey Road and Let It Be for The Beatles, Dark Side of The Moon for Pink Floyd, and Wild Life by Paul McCartney & Wings (their actual first album as a band). The Alan Parsons Project is in our daily standard rotation.

And that is it from The College for this morning. Our line-up will be posted soon!