The Christmas Club With Johnny & Andy (2011)

Here is my third upload to Mixcloud. This is "The Christmas Club with Johnny & Andy" show that aired in 2011. This is a very good show with many unique songs. The only item of note regarding this show is that every other song was played on a deck that made them sound horribly thin and tinny. Whomever was manning that deck did a poor job in verifying that the sound it produced had a full range. Just see for yourself. It's a shame really as some of the best songs were played on that deck, and if I don't have any additional copies of these songs on some of the other shows I will most likely not use them for my own compilations and mixes. Otherwise, a very good show. Here it is:

The Christmas Club with Johnny & Andy (2011) by 16trackmind on Mixcloud

The Christmas Club with Johnny & Andy (2013)

Here is the show that aired in 2013. This one is a bit abbreviated and ends rather abruptly as I edited out exact same segments which were also in the 2014 show. The broadcasts are historically 2 or 3 hours long. This edit is just about and hour-and-a-quarter.

The Christmas Club with Johnny & Andy (2013) by 16trackmind on Mixcloud

Editing The Christmas Club Shows

I've been examining The Christmas Club shows with Johnny & Andy from 2013 and 2014 and it seems that there has been some cutting and pasting involved in these shows. Some of the shows' segments--both the music and the banter between them--are exactly the same which means some of these programs have been significantly edited most likely by the station. Another observation is that on the show that was aired in 2014 which I uploaded to Mixcloud, they start off by saying it's their 7th year doing the show. Obviously since my earliest recording of their show dates back to 2002, the numbers do not add up. It cannot be a new show from 2014 if they've been doing the show since the early 2000's and it's their seventh year doing it.

What I will end up doing is some editing of my own. I will remove the repeated segments and create some unique programs. Besides, I need all the extra space I can get on my iPod. As I compared the 2014 show to the 2013, there were 17 common songs between them. I don't mind if there are repeats from year to year but as I mentioned they're not just scattered about. It is entire segments of the shows. There was a 6 song segment that was repeated and the final 11 song segment of both shows were exactly the same. I can combine those 2 shows and come up with a single 66 song show. I'll be doing some more listening the next few days.

2014 Christmas Club with Johnny Soss & Andy Cirzan on MixCloud

I learned that uploading a huge file to YouTube is a bad idea. Luckily I discovered MixCloud which allows unlimited uploads of any length. And it took a lot less time uploading there. So here is my very first upload to MixCloud:

The 2014 Christmas Club with Johnny & Andy by Exitworld on Mixcloud

Enjoy!

Johnny & Andy's Christmas Club

I'm a huge fan of Christmas music and I was notably frustrated when my Real Player crashed this morning after I had recorded the annual Johnny & Andy's Christmas Club show on WDCB. Of course it crashed before saving the file. I've been recording this show every year since about 2003 and to miss a year is terribly disappointing. Not only that but for whatever reason WDCB decided to broadcast the show only once this year and at 7AM on Christmas Day. I also learned that another local area station, WXRT, had just last week their show on the air. I don't really listen to XRT so I had no way of knowing they were doing their show there. Double disappointment. To compound the problem even further, these shows are not available ANYWHERE. Thus, I have decided to play a small part in making these shows available.

I considered making them available as downloads from a hosting website such as 4shared. But I like the idea of streaming the audio instead. I would love to upload them to soundcloud but I already have an account there with a limited amount of upload time remaining. And these Christmas Club shows are all 2-3 hours long. So I'm going to try uploading them to YouTube. Hopefully there will not be any copyright issues by uploading them there. Most of the songs these guys play on their show are obscure and would pose no problems. However, they do throw in a few commercially available tracks that may or may not be problematic. Well, that will be for YouTube to decide. If I have any problems with my first upload then I will consider other options. I just want to get these out there for everyone to enjoy!

I will start with their show from 2014. As soon as it's live on YouTube I will link to it here.

Coldplay "Ghost Stories"

I'm going to do a review of Coldplay's new 'Ghost Stories' album which was released about 2 weeks ago and I just picked up yesterday.

Let me just first share my mentality leading up to this new album. Coldplay is probably my favorite modern rock band. When a friend first introduced me to one of their earliest albums I didn't listen to it for a very long time because I didn't know exactly what kind of music it was and for some reason I actually thought it was metal or something of that sort. I'm not sure how I actually first heard Coldplay but when I did it was one of those instant love type moments. So I started listening to their first two albums--Parachutes and A Rush of Blood to the Head--quite regularly and there were so many great songs on both of those. It definitely wasn't metal. It was unique. Kinda low-key, a bit sad. Plenty of acoustic guitar and piano. Nice layers of electric guitar. Unique vocal. It was great. I thought they were an awesome band and they quickly became my favorite. 

So their third album, X & Y, was highly anticipated by me. And I was not disappointed in the least bit. The music sounded a bit more electronic due to the vintage sounding keyboards on there. But it was great! There was a number of uptempo yet dark songs on there that I play to this day regularly. There were a few I didn't care for either but that's to be expected, right? Anyway the good heavily overshadowed the not-so-good. 

Three years later I was anticipating the Viva La Vida album. As a side note, it seems every three years has become the norm for Coldplay albums to be released. That being said, this new album failed to impress me. There were only two songs that stood out for me. And no, one of them was not "Viva La Vida." In fact, that was the song that made me realize that a change was taking place. Coldplay was moving away from their unique original sound to something more along the lines of Pop. There were still traces of their original sound on this album. But they were headed more towards Viva La Vida and less towards X&Y and anything before that. The bonus in this album was that the cd came with heavy-duty vinyl LP version as well. But I just never really got into the music other than "Cemeteries of London" and "Chinese Sleep Chant," the latter being an unlabeled song on the album. 

Another three years later and Mylo Xyloto came out. Funny thing about this album is that I don't ever remember listening to it. I have heard "Hurts Like Heaven" playing at stores. I probably recognize a few others but I don't know them by name. I think that by 2011 my love affair with Coldplay had ended. I really should go back and listen to both this album and Viva. 

So again another three years later and Ghost Stories is out. I bought the deluxe edition with bonus tracks. I caught the band playing a few of their new songs on Saturday Night Live. Couldn't tell you which ones. The songs really didn't do anything for me. I read that this album was an introspective one in particular due to the breaking up of lead singer Chris Martin and his celebrity bride.

I'm listening to the album once more as I write this. Coming into this new album my expectations weren't all that high. My first impression upon hearing it was that I was correct in keeping my expectations tempered. One of the first thoughts that came into mind was that this band no longer needs a drummer! There is barely a song on here that has any real acoustic drum sounds. The majority of songs feature electronic percussion of one sort or another. So Will Champion, you might want to start looking for another project to work on. I don't think the other guys will be needing your services much longer unless you can settle for being a roadie.

At the moment, "A Sky Full of Skies" is playing and I'm reminded that this was one of the songs they performed on SNL. This song is the most animated of the bunch on the album and obviously the one for radio. It's a catchy song and it sounds all right. But it has a Euro dance/pop beat and it's not the Coldplay of yore. 

Nothing really stands out on this album. The music is very mellow and reflective. It is well made and crafted and produced. Many of the lyrics are obviously referring to Chris Martin's ex-wife. You can hear the sorrow and pain in the lyrics. Those who thought Coldplay's music was too sad before will only confirm their convictions with Ghost Stories. The bonus tracks on this edition did nothing to redeem the rest of the album. Were this their first album I would not be seeking out a sophomore effort. But it isn't so I'll keep anticipating and hoping for even the slightest of a return to the days of X&Y, Parachutes and A Rush of Blood to the Head.

I'm sure that even my friend who introduced me to Coldplay would not be excited over this new album. I give it a C/C-.

YouTube Channel: MusicMasters

I created a YouTube channel that I titled "MusicMasters" and I will be publishing obscure and/or forgotten music on there from my personal collection. My intent is to cover 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and 2000's music that is not already on YouTube. There is so much music that is readily available on there. I started going through lists of songs I wanted to upload but most of the ones I checked are already there. This might make things a bit difficult as I wanted to do a song a day. I could easily accomplish this by uploading any song that is not already there but I only want to add my favorites and share music that I consider must-be-heard.

I uploaded my first one today and here it is: