Left Of The Dial

     In my last post about The White Stripes, I mentioned that my co-workers kept trying to get me to go downtown to see them. I really did work with a great bunch of people at my suburban Detroit store. Many of us shared a love of music, books and British comedy. I even married one of them:) When I had to transfer to Akron, I dreaded having to get to know a whole new staff. My fears turned out to be unfounded, as most people in my line of retail share a love of music, books and British comedy. It was sad to leave the store a had spent ten years at though. I did have a great moment of karma involving one of my former co-workers. He went to see Rush with me once,even though he wasn't a huge fan. He enjoyed the experience and it became a bond between us. He liked the song "Working Man", so right before I left for Akron I framed my copy of Rush's debut album and gave it to him. This was the US version of the album. Shortly after I moved I went to a record store, which I won't name (although it wasn't Record Den or Square Records), and I found the Canadian version of Rush's debut album of which they only made 3500 copies. It's worth around $800, but I got it for $6. That's what I call karma. You may be wondering what any of this has to do with Left Of The Dial. When I left my old store several co-workers gave me gifts. I received 2 copies of David Bowie's Reality Tour DVD, the first season of Little Britain and my friend who I gave the Rush album to gave me the CD box set Left of The Dial: Dispatches From The 80s Underground. He had previously recommended that I read the book Our Band Could Be Your Life by Michael Azeraad. Many of the bands in that book were on this box set. I couldn't wait to dive into it.
     It has many classic songs that I already knew and loved. Among them are:

* Radio Free Europe- REM
* I Will Dare- The Replacements
* Just Like Honey- The Jesus And Mary Chain
* Behind The Wall of Sleep- The Smithereens
* Senses Working Overtime- XTC
* Ana Ng- They Might be Giants
* Under The Milky Way- The Church
* Take The Skinheads Bowling- CVB
* Punk Rock Girl- The Dead Milkmen
* Love Will Tear Us Apart- Joy Division
* She Bangs The Drum- Stone Roses

     It also introduced me to many bands that I would come to love:

* That's When I Reach For My Revolver- Mission of Burma
* Freak Scene- Dinosaur Jr
* Goo Goo Muck- The Cramps
* Teenage Riot- Sonic Youth
* I Look Around- The Rain Parade
* Monkey Gone To Heaven- The Pixies

     I strongly recommend this box set to my kids. They can each take a disc and then swap. As far as the blog goes, I plan on returning to my series on Pavement with my next post on Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. Once I started the Pavement series, I felt like a jerk for not doing this with R.E.M.'s first five albums, so I may do that in the future as well. I know I already did a R.E.M. post, but it didn't really do justice to those albums. Peace.