The Ledge (mp3)

It may be a new year, but it’s the same great formula for the first Friday of the month. Yes, it’s nothing but new releases for the first show of 2025, and it’s highlighted again by what we like to call “friends of the show”. White Rose Motor Oil have yet another great cover. The wonderful two-piece The Ex-Bombers have a magnificent new seven-inch single. Numb Surpris...

It’s that time of year once again. I’ve spent weeks going through all of the new releases of the past 12 months, and tonight I unveil what I have decided are the 40 best albums of 2024. What a great year! Just like the last few years, my initial list was right around 100 different albums. But I was also more organised than usual. I actually kept a spreadsheet this year of the releases...

It has become an annual tradition for The Ledge to put together at least two hours of (mainly) brand new holiday music that does NOT suck. That’s the key word here. While most commercial Christmas music is banal, saccharine nonsense designed to annoy mall and fast food shoppers, every year sees a plethora of new rock and roll-based songs to get us through this pressurized time of the year. S...

Part two of the December new release series also is noteworthy for being the final new release episode of the year! What a fantastic 12 months of tunes we’ve enjoyed, and this episode is a perfect exmple. There’s a ton of new tracks from our friends at Rum Bar Records, including the fabulous new album by Dirty Truckers’ leader Tom Baker. Justine & Me is inspire...

It’s a testament to the quality of 2024 new music that even in December The Ledge’s monthly new release series is again a two-part extravaganza. Tonight’s part one features the usual new tunes by “friends” of the show, along with great punk, garage, indie, and Americana from artists both new and old.   For more info, including setlists, head to http://scotth...

Given that it’s Thanksgiving weekend, I thought it was high time to have a show consisiting of nothing but tracks from albums that I’ve been playing around the house. Yeah, not exactly a novel idea, but it’s a great soundtrack for a weekend of record shopping, partying, or even putting up the dreaded holiday decorations. (Ok, probably best for the partying category.) Sure, it&#82...

The special folder on my hard drive was full, so it was once again time to have a show devoted to cover songs. This time around there are fantastic remakes of songs by the likes of the Stones, Pink Floyd, Small Face, Pretty Things, The Cure, Joy Division, and tons of others. Most importantly, there’s a generous helping of Jesse Malin covers from the new triple album benefit album, Silver Pat...

Fall is the time for the record industry to unleash a torrent of reissues, box sets, live albums, and all kinds of other sorts of vault releases. Yes, it’s admittedly a bit of a chase for easy cash, but as a collector I love it. Give me that compilation of pre-Velvet Underground songs Lou Reed wrote as a songwriter for Pickwick Records. Give me those box sets versons of my favorite records f...

So here we go with the second half of this month’s set of new tunes. This time around we have the usual set of fabulous releses from our friends at Rum Bar Records, along with the returns of old faves such as The Lemonheads, Julian Cope, Chesterfield Kings, and Japandroids. Plus some new (to me at least) bands such as The Deflators, Tuxedo Cats,  and The Zack Static Sect. And there’s a...

Once again, the monthly new release episode is expanded to a two part extravaganza! This week’s show is split between “friends of the show” and long time veterans of the business. The “friends” sections include hometown heroes (Off Contact), a fellow Real Punk Radio personality (Intrusive Thoughts vocalist Greg “Rock ‘n’ Roll Manifesto” Lonesom...

The annual Halloween show is yet another Ledge tradition. Every year I gather up whatever new scary tunes have been released, and fill up whatever time is left with tracks I call “new to me”. Thanks to a plethora of subissions this year, I didn’t have to do a lot of searching. It’s great that so many artists, labels, and/or PR companies think that this show is a worthwhile...

If you follow me on the various social media platforms (paulisded) you’ve probably seen a variety of pictures with the tagline “The Hudson Basement Excavaton Project”. A little explanation is needed. Decades ago, my son needed a rack to store his records as he had followed in the old man’s footsteps and put together his own sizable library. As I did not at that point even o...

By now, most of you know the routine. The first episode of every month features nothing but new releases, and this month is no different. Wait, there is one major difference. Due to a scheduling conflict, there will not be a show next week so for the first time this year there is not a two part new release series.  So this month there is one super action-packed episode, full of the usual gara...

The end of September also means it’s the end of the third quarter of the year, so tonight’s show celebrates the great music that has come out these last three months. There’s a little something for everyone tonight, from the melodic goth tones of Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds to savage garage punk from The Putz and Stiff Richards. There are veteran bands that have been around for...

Part two of this month’s new release series is highlighted by long-awaited returns by legendary veteran bands. The Dictators celebrate their 50th anniversary with their first album in 25 years. The Fastbacks are back after a 23 year hiatus. Peter Noone of 60’s pop idiols Herman’s Hermits is back with vocal contributions to a Buffalo Springfield-Rolling Stones hybrid cover created...

As we have all year long, this month’s new release eisode is once again a two part series. This week’s first part features a ton of “friends of the show”. There’s the monthly tracks by White Rose Motor Oil, Rob Moss and Skin-Tight Skin, and Numb Surprise. There’s new material byperennial Ledge favorites Dave Strong, The Beatersband, and The Trouble Seekers. And...

1984 was a magical year for your favorite podcast host. It was my senior year of college, and I had worked my way up the ranks to be the music director of KAUR. This was the perfect gig for me, along with the record store job I had in my spare time. Of course, gigs like this would mean little if the music business was in a bad way. But it wasn’t. It was one of the greatest years ever for the...

Last week’s look at my personal home plays was so much that I carried it on this week. Once again, there were almost 60 years of rock and roll represented, from The Troggs and Small Faces to my favorite record of 2023, Scratch ‘N’ Sniff by The Whiffs. Full sets showcased the musical and personal relationship between married songwriters Amy Rigby and Wreckless Eric and t...

If you follow me on the ol’ Instagram, you may have noticed that every Saturday night I post a collage of my Last. FM stats that, for the most part, highlights the vinyl I’ve played in my home over the past week.  So I figured why not put together a broadcast featuring songs from those very albums I’ve enjoyed over the past couple of months? Soon enough I had enough tra...

The second part of the August new release series carries on right where last week’s part one left off. There’s still plenty of great rock, punk, power pop, postpunk, and many other genres of fantastic brand new tunes. There’s some fun stuff from our friends at Rum Bar Records. There’s the return of Hot Snakes/Rocket From the Crypt/Drive Like Jehu leader Swami John Reis. The...

We may be heading to the end of summer but it’s not the end of great music. Once again, the new release episode for this month has been expanded into a two part extravaganza. Tonight’s first part features a number of “friends of the show”, including monthly singles by White Rose Motor Oil and Rob Moss & Skin-Tight Skin. There Realpunkradio’s Greg Lonesome with his...

It’s that time again. The “Covers” folder on my laptop is full, so it’s time to turn those into a Ledge episode. But it’s not just new releases this time around. Oh sure, we’ve got new remakes by The Half-Cubes (Phil Seymour), Wyldlife (Tom Petty), The Loons (Pretty Things), and so much more. There are also sets devoted to new tribute records devoted to Jagger/R...

The second episode of this month’s new release series focuses heavily on single releases. I’m talking the traditional sort of single, with an a-side and b-side. Not the modern streaming-era lone song that doesn’t even necessarily promote an upcoming album. Nope, this week we have quite a few two (or more) track singles, and the majority of them are available on traditional 7&#824...

Earlier this week, fans of Minneapolis rock and roll were stunned by the news that former Zuzu’s Petals leader Laurie Lindeen had passed away on July 1 due to a brain aneurysm. Besdies that wonderful 90s band, Lindeen later published her memoirs, Petal Pusher: A Rock and Roll Cinderella Story, in 2008. Of course, we had to memoralize her passing with a few tracks from her band. Since it&#821...

Besides the monthly new release episodes, another regular feature of this show is the “quarterly recap”, where I play tracks from the best albums released over the last three months. This month features a wide variety of rock, punk, power pop, Americana, and a few other sub-genres. Everybody should be able to find a new favorite record in this expanded episode. Before we get to the hig...