Avenue A is Mark Pember (a.k.a. Meat Katie) and Jason O'Brien (Dub Pistols), with Holly Golightly singing. There are 3 versions of the song on the disc. The first (the original version) sounds like Fuzz Townshend with the easy to recognize Holly Golightly vocals. There are 2 club type mixes too. A guy called Dylan Rhymes does one mix (my least fave of the 3 tracks) and Champagne Charlie (Merv Pepler from Eat Static and Will White of the Propellerheads) do the second mix. The single is packaged with a strong brand identity to Holly Golightly, so I don't know what the upcoming Avenue A full length 'Never The Less' will do when Holly's many fans find out that she is only a guest vocalist in this project, like Lauren Laverne was on Mint Royales excellent "Don't Falter" single. Probably this single will be Avenue A's biggest release unless they've got something really strong up their sleeves. It is really a great song in it's original version. Any fan of Holly Golightly is strongly advised by me to buy this single. Even though the original mix will be on the LP, the other 2 mixes will remain exclusive to this, and the 'Champagne Charlie' mix is really worth owning. In fact, due to that mix and the original mix this single is my fave of this weeks adds.

The Brood are a 4 woman garage band out of Portland Maine. They have been around for a long time and have a sound somewhere between The Chesterfield Kings and The Pandoras. Half of the 16 songs are covers. My fave song on the disc is one of those, the song "Seven Days Of Cryin". The Brood are a great band live. This CD doesn't try to spice up their sound with any studio embellishments, it just captures them with all the levels set right and a lively spirit in their playing. Their sound is not really for me, but I respect the heck out of them, and honor WZBC DJ's Pip and Peter Ledebur by adding this for them.

DJ is the drummer of Sportique and Marine Research http://listen.to/marineresearch/, and the fellow who runs the Where You Are Is Where It's At Record label. As DJ Downfall he has released several singles and appeared on a few compilations doing music that is closer to Flowchart than the bands he drums for. This single is on the label Rex Records, a label I have come to really admire through the releases I've heard from it. My fave Rex Records 7" is definetely The Avalanches "Electricity" single. The Avalanches are a band from Australia that I am convinced will become very well known in 2001. They have been around for a long time, but have never had success outside of Australia until now. Their new record comes out in Australia on November 27, and I expect it to have a UK relese soon after. Word is that they may sign to Madonna's Maverick Records, with the bait of her offering do a remix for them as the carrot. She heard about them when they asked her for clearance on a sample they used. They are the first band ever to get clearance to use a Madonna sample in their song. Rex Records put out The Avalanches "Information" 7". That single did very very well during it's time on WZBCs playlist after it was added through the gullbuy. This 12" is nothing up to the level of The Avalanches, but the A-side is pretty good. I do not care for the B-side though, with it's somewhat cliche sounding scrathing and piano (an instrument i've never quite really cared for). The A sounds like J-pop or the kind of electronic song Flowchart did on their "Flutter By Butterfly" 7" (Flowcharts finest moment in my opinion) on Wurlitzer Jukebox some time ago.

Flowchart are a NJ duo made up of Sean O'Neal and Erin Anderson. Several years ago when they released their first CD on Carrot Top records they sounded exactly like a Stereolab clone. By their very next release they had redefined their sound into an electronic boppy/spacy/house hybrid that they have been further refining for may releases since. For a while they were putting out an awful lot of releases, though this CD is the first release they've had in quite some time. It is out on the UK Enraptured Records dance offshoot Endorphin Records. "Gee Bee" is 10:27, Manderine is 11:47 and "Manderine (tleilaxu mix)" is 5:22. There is a 12" version of the single that does not have the third song on it. I would advise you to pick up the CD version, because that third song is my favorite of the three. The other version of Manderine is my second fave. The 2 versions are completely different, by the way. Flowchart have a good sound. The first 2 songs are more background that concentrate listening songs, but all three are pretty nice, and none of the songs are generic or boring for an instant.

The third single from Kicker, the band fronted by the drummer from Comet Gain and Velocette. All three 7"s are at WZBC, added as they came out in the gullbuy. This third single has a female vocal A-side that almost reminds me of Noonday Underground with the soulful vocal and organ, and Spearmint with the northern soul sound of the bass and drum. The B-side is an instrumental; an upbeat song that has strummed guitar like Unrest used to do. The label Bad Jazz is a pretty much 'Can't lose' proposition. It is run by the brother of the guy who runs the Liquifaction Empire label. Every Bad Jazz release is interesting, well done, and contains exclusive songs.

The latest single from NJ based band Lenola is a one sided yellow vinyl single on the UK label Earworm. The song is really good, and shows a new sense of melody for them. It sounds like they have added the Elephant Six type sound to their palette, which formerly had a very Swirlies-ish sound filled with loud dissonant guitar breaks. I hate using the 'Elephant Six' comparison, but it works because all of you know exactly what I'm talking about when I mention that label - 60's lite psyche pop based on a Brian Wilson/Syd Barrett hybrid sound. The Elephant Six sound is the latest rewriting of a sound that last was popular in the early 80's in the "Paisley Underground" movement in Los Angeles, when bands like The Three O'Clock, The Rain Parade, Green On Red, True West, Naked Prey, and (early) The Dream Syndicate were happening. To be fair, a current band like LA's Beachwood Sparks sounds much more like Paisley Underground than the Elephant Six bands, but I know that all these bands ARE sharing a common view. Lenola have a really distinctive song that sounds too good to be hidden as an exclusive track on a hard to find single. Listen to this track if you have the chance. Adding this single I think of Frank Saragnese, my friend living in Ocean Grove NJ who loved Lenola when their last record came out. Frank is the one who inspired me to put the search engine on the gullbuy site. Thanks Frank!

Wondermints are an LA band that are most famous for being the band who have backed up Brian Wilson for his last several tours, including the most recent Pet Sounds tour that stopped here in Boston. This CD is an English release of a disc they put out in Japan, where they have a sizeable following amongst the Beikoku Ongaku (the great quarterly Japanese fanzine that comes with a spectacular compilation CD each issue) set. The disc is all cover versions, with the final song being Wondermints covering one of their own originals. Many of the 14 songs are familiar, though the selections are very good ones. They cover The Monkees "Porpoise Song" (as Lollipop Train did on the Siesta Records 'Simultaneous Ice Cream' compilation), "Barbarella" (covered in volume one of the Siesta 'Songs for the Jet Set' compilations), Brian Wilson's rare song "Guess I'm Dumb" (which only appeared as a 7" by Glen Campbell), The Smoke's "My Friend Jack" (covered by Death By Chocolate on the 'Songs for the Jet Set 2000' compilation), early Pink Floyd single "Arnold Layne", the Burt Bacharach song "Don't Go Breaking My Heart", and a few others you will know. It is a record I can't really listen to all at once, but there are versions on it that are very good. My faves are "Barbarella" and "Skyman", a song I don't know the origin of. It is written by a G. Goddard. My guilty fave on the disc is the version of "Ooh Child". I don't know who did this one either. It was written by S. Vincent, and you may know it from office style popular radio shows.