Notify, Volume III

Here goes with Volume III of Notify, aka not on Spotify. (See Volume I and Volume II.)

A two-fer from a covers album from the 1990's. It was called Kiss My Ass: Classic KISS Regrooved, and it had plenty of filler. (Extreme's soiling of my favorite KISS song "Strutter" should be burned at the stake.) But Toad the Wet Sprocket, of all bands, had a terrifically deconstructive take on the band's most popular song.

Garth Brooks is a well-publicized Spotify holdout, and while there are great original songs in his catalogue that I could include here, I'll go with his Evan Lloyd-approved cover of "Hard Luck Woman." Here's Garth and KISS playing the song live -- crappy quality video, but you get the gist of two great tastes that go great together. Pretty cool.

Speaking of Evan, he sure did love his KIϟϟ. He would tell a story circa '91 about when he bedded a W&M co-ed we knew but had a few seconds of coitus interruptus when he had to get up to flip the KISS Destroyer LP on the turntable. Did so, and apparently didn't miss a beat. Alas, she was not named Beth.

Back to the songs... this spring rob and I exchanged our top picks for one of our favorite bands from our youth, The Police. Here's my list, in order. (I can't find his.)

Most of The Police catalogue has been Spotified... but there are some fun outliers worth Notifying. First, before there was The Police there was some low-level act called Strontium 90. They had an LP's worth of material, one track of which you'll recognize.

Before Sting and Stewart Copeland added Andy Summers to the mix, they recorded a single and B-side. "Fall Out" was the lead track and featured Copeland on drums and guitars, save a solo by some dude named Henry Padovani. Most preferred it to the more menacing B-side.  I did not. Here's a link to "Fall Out," and below is "Nothing Achieving." This is far more punk rock.

After The Police got big, Copeland would mess about and play most or all of the instruments on some songs, usually with inanely silly content. He operated under the moniker Klark Kent.  "Away from Home" was a fun tune, but below is my favorite track, "Don't Care," with a video featuring Sting, Andy Summers, and Stewart's brother Miles Copeland (founder of I.R.S Records) masked and pretending to play instruments.

Stewart Copeland comes off like a super talented and cool dude.

Enjoy, and post more random stuff you can't find on the major music sites.