The Hustle

Colin Moulding's contributions to the great XTC were crucial to making that band what they were. Andy Partridge's leadership, personality and songwriting was the main driver, but Colin had a bigger pop sensibility and is responsible for some of the band's most enduring radio songs like "Making Plans for Nigel," "King for a Day," and "General and Majors". Colin has stayed largely out of the spotlig...

Musician David Gamson was just a guy who really liked r&b. His love for the genre compelled him to write songs, produce artists, and make music that pushed the boundaries of what it could be. Nowhere is this more obvious than when he worked with Green Gartside on Scritti Politti's second album, Cupid & Psyche 85, one of the greatest albums of the decade. Their partnership carried over to t...

When you're given the chance to talk with Joey Tempest for a few minutes you take it! Europe just released another strong album last week called Come This Madness and are about to hit the road (mainly in Europe at first) so he chats with us briefly about it all. Then, we settle in with Kevin Martin of Candlebox who are also on tour right now and hitting the states with some of their fellow 90s fri...

The Clash were labeled "the only band that mattered," but why? Yes, Joe, Mick, Paul and Topper represented an anti-authoritarian stance, but what was at the core of their rebelion? Author and insider Pat Gilbert joins us to discuss his book Passion is a Fashion that is probably the most detailed Clash book you'll ever read. Each member comes to life - for better or worse - and their progress from...

The inimitable Mick Wall returns to shoot the shit with us this week. Topics include: Motley, GnR, Jimi, Kalodner, Duran Duran, Simple Minds, Billy Squier, never-ending farewell tours, concerts in general, books, podcasts and anything else we (he mostly) could think of. We had a blast! 

This week it's the legendary Gary Numan! Spenwood Books is at it again with the recent publication of Gary Numan - A People's History. The hook for the book is that it tells Gary's story through the words and memories of "Numanoids" who bought the albums, saw him in concert, met him, and have stayed loyal over almost 50 years. Gary joins us this week to talk about his incredible journey. His evolu...

Whether he goes by his long running stage name, John Wesley Harding, or his often used real one, Wesley Stace has built an unexpected career over 40+ years. He starts out like a storyteller in song form, politically minded and with a busker's spirit, but that has evolved over the years to include different styles and expressions that have always remained a level of quality. He just put out a new a...

This week we welcome Dennis Drew and Steven Gustafson of 10,000 Maniacs. It hasn't been easy for this excellent band. They got off to a slow start, but broke through on their magical third album In My Tribe with enduring singles like "What's the Matter Here" and "Like the Weather". But after a couple more studio albums that kept the success growing and a hugely successful Unplugged album, lead sin...

For our latest Book Club we're welcoming authors Brad Tolinski and Chris Gill of the fantastic new book, Blow By Blow: The Jeff Beck Story. Admittedly, I've always respected Jeff more than enjoyed him, so to help with this conversation I invited the biggest Beck fan I know, Brad Page, host of the I'm In Love With That Song podcast. Together we hear all sides on Jeff, the good and not-so-good, and...

Lou Gramm has been one of rock's greatest voices for 54 years. Foreigner's finally in the Hall of Fame and he's celebrating an amazing legacy with a deserved farewell tour happening now and a new solo album called Released. The album is made up of stray songs from his heyday that were unfinished until now and a few new songs done in the style of AOR's 80s peak. Lou joins us this week to discuss th...

John Kalodner, famous for his long beard, white suit and magic ears, is one of the most famous and influential non-musicians in music history. He's the famous A&R man that brought us groups like Foreigner, Asia and Survivor and guided the rebirth of legends like Aerosmith, Whitesnake, Journey and Cher (which he has some salty feelings about). Maybe only Clive Davis has brought bigger songs and...

You may not know the name Barry Eastmond, but chances are good if you were paying attention to r&b hits in the 80s that you know a bunch of his songs. He started out as a session keyboardist playing with greats like Change and Starpoint, but his big breakthrough was when he penned "You Are My Lady" for Freddie Jackson and watched it climb the pop and r&b charts. He went on to have a long a...

Gary Daly of China Crisis joins us this week to discuss the band's wild history. They began as an artier synthpop band - not quite as hooky as Human League, but not as adventurous as Japan. On their third album they began working with off-and-on collaborator Walter Becker of Steely Dan and they morphed into something entirely different. This pairing, odd as it sounds, worked wonders and separated...

This week is a punk rock legend. As Bad Brains bassist Darryl Jenifer says in here, their band was a "revolutionary act". Having four black men perform hardcore punk mixed with reggae at that time in America's musical history was completely unheard of. Their impact was felt deeply by bands that went on to make their own impact, changing the face of punk, what it could be, and who could do it, in t...

For most of us, singer/songwriter Donna Lewis appeared out of nowhere in 1996 when her smash hit "I Love You Always Forever" got to #2 on the charts and seemed to never go away. What was strange is she kind of disappeared almost as fast, with further singles and albums not making the same impact. You may be surprised to find out Donna's never stopped working and even has a new album, Wanderlust, h...

There is a new series of books released the last couple years that tell the story of a band we all love from the perspective of the fans. Hundreds of stories have been crowdsourced from true obsessives to tell a biography you don't hear as often. This time we welcome Richard Houghton and Iain Key to discuss their new book telling the story of the Smiths. Anecdotes from personal interactions with t...

Robin Beck could have been one of the top AOR singers of her era. She had the looks, the voice, the songs - the whole package. But, she was so successful in the jingle world she never really wanted it that much. She did have success anyway, including a massive global hit with "First Time" which, coincidentally, was used in a popular Coca-Cola ad at the time. With this came Top of the Pops, working...

You won't find a list of "bands that should have been huge" that doesn't include The Producers. Their debut album from 1981 stood perfectly at the crossroads of power pop and new wave and should have birthed multiple hits. They even performed at the very first MTV's Rockin' Eve. Unfortunately, it just didn't happen and neither did the excellent follow up, You Make the Heat with "She Sheila". Event...

We love talking about Simple Minds around here. Their road has been diverse, rocky, drama-filled, and also wonderful. One of the key members was founding keyboardist Mick MacNeil. His revolutionary playing was a huge part of the fabric of those game-changing early albums. After 1989's Street Fighting Years, Mick decided to leave and has never really looked back. He recently released the gorgeous s...

In his nearly 84 years on earth, Swamp Dogg has seen some stuff. He was born Jerry Williams and recorded under that name before taking on the Swamp Dogg persona in 1970 as a way to better express himself and his unique view of the world. He's been a legend ever since. Over his long career he's tried on almost every genre of music (including a couple recent albums heavy on the Auto-tune. His latest...

Breathe were one of the leaders of that sophistopop movement in the late 80s and scored five big hits over two albums for their work, including the enduring ballads "Hands to Heaven" and "How Can I Fall". Unfortunately, after those two albums they disappeared and have never been heard from again, especially the uber-talented front man David Glasper. That leaves guitarist Marcus Lillington as the o...

Dirty Vegas were shot out of a cannon in 2002 when their song "Days Go By" was selected by Mitsubishi to soundtrack their new ad campaign. The song was everywhere and suddenly there was a culture shift with artists and their music as it relates to advertising. This gave Steve Smith from the band a career that's taken some unexpected turns, but has never let up. Dirty Vegas released a couple albums...

When "Sleeping Satellite" hit the airwaves in 1992, it announced a new unique talent in Tasmin Archer that seemed to be going far. Little did we know that we'd only hear from her sporadically over the next 34 years. The usual label politics slowed the follow up album and after that she found it more to her liking to go independent and be her own boss, amounting to only four full length albums, inc...

It's difficult to summarize Robert Margouleff's career in a nutshell. He's a musical innovator thanks to him and his musical partner Malcolm Cecil's invention of a sort of synthesizer they dubbed Tonto's Expanding Headband. Tonto caught the ear of Stevie Wonder, who brought the guy's onboard to engineer/produce him during that peak 70s period (Innervisions, Talking Book, etc). This lead to further...

In this fantastic Bonus episode, Phil Collen and Simon Laffey of Manraze join us to discuss their brand new career-spanning box set, Lock, Stock & Barrel. Phil and Simon's friendship goes back over 40 years to the glam rock band Girl. Then Def Leppard recruited Phil and you know how that went. About 20 years ago, Phil and Simon decided to make some music together and recruited Sex Pistols drum...