Tried to sort all my albums by the key the first song is in.

The Topshelf label has just issued a sampler LP that would be a true shelf-toppler if it were on disks and not conveniently digital-only. Sixty-eight tracks! From not only Topshelf signees but, quoth a press release, “friends and bands the label thinks you ought to check out.” The variety, and the volume, can be overwhelming, from indie wisps to hardcore onslaughts. Among the stand-outs for my discriminating ears: Duck, Little Brother’s jangly emo “Steve Jobs (All is Fun Until Someone Gets Stabbed), Everyone Everywhere’s unabashedly poppy “I Feel Fine,” The Guru’s strikingly clean and well-played funk “Reel It In,” Bozmo’s propulsive new-wavery “Milksnakes” (with its terrifying blasé declaration that “You’re in middle school for life”)—and literally dozens of others.

Here in New Haven, Connecticut, the Peabody, Mass.-based Topshelf is revered for distributing Fuck Off All Nerds, the benefit album (available here http://topshelfrecords.bigcartel.com/product/fuck-off-all-nerds-single-lp) put together in the wake of the home-invasion murder of New Haven scenester Mitch Dubey.

Only two bands—Into It. Over It. and My Heart to Joy—appear on both Fuck Off All Nerds and the new Topshelf comp, making the sampler a real introductory feast even for those already acquainted with the label.

The sampler’s free from http://tpshlf.co/tsr2011, as long as you deign to “friend” the comp or tweet its importance.

When George Baker arrived in New Haven in the mid-1990s, his reputation preceded him. He’d been Marvin Gaye’s music director, had toured with everyone from overnight sensations to nostalgic acts, had even backed Sammy Davis Jr. Baker provided some of the best bar conversation in town. You couldn’t drop a name without him humbly mentioning some gig he’d done with that very act.

His magical affinity for the guitar needed no advance promo. It remains instantly apparent whenever he plays.

It didn’t take long for Baker to find a comfortable perch as one of The Convertibles, the old Thursday night houseband at Café Nine when it was still Mike Reichbart’s joint. It wasn’t long after that they he formed his own local combo, a versatile outfit which could headline a weekend night of multiple sets and also gracefully lead an afternoon blues or jazz jam.

There’ve been many line-up changes over the years, while Baker has also found fame on the BET Jazz channel and with his album Mojo Lady.

It’s been said that serving in the George Baker band is an apprenticeship, an education, a master class. The first class to graduate—saxophonist Lou Ianello, drummer Chris Lyons, bassist Kyle Esposito and keyboardist Nick Lloyd—is convening Friday, July 8 at (where else?) Café Nine, for a reunion gig beginning at 10 p.m.

These are all accomplished, multi-faceted musicians in their own right—Lloyd, for instance, produced The National’s first album and founded the Firehouse 12 studio/club on Crown Street—but the Baker band gives them a special bond. It’ll also likely be an old-home night for “musician’s living room” regulars of a decade or so ago.

Our beloved Millie of the model marvels got the call to open for Copperfield at Dollaire’s a couple weeks back. The MMs are on a kind of hiatus (Creative differences? Never! Summer camp counseling!), and Millie had a quiver full of new songs, so why not?
Copperfield is one of those bands that likes to fill the stage with all their gear before they go out to dinner, so they insist on a low- maintenance opening act, preferably female.
That’s Millie to a T, which in thus case could stand for “tough gig.” she couldn’t have been treated worse by the crowd if she’d been a radio DJ.
Her name was mispronounced. The monitor didn’t work. A short-term drink special was announced at the same time she was, causing a mass rush to the corners of the room just as she started playing. A middle-aged man whooped about her physical attributes for the whole set. The set was cut short by three songs. Copperfield apparently forgot the customary courtesy of thanking the opening act during their own set.
Business as usual, we were told by D’ollaire’s regulars when we bitched about it. But we’re Bullfinch folks and this was unacceptable.

The Itchy Thornys at the Bullfinch tonight, with a (lengthy) opening set by NIo Calamite… Fight-o-Saurs and Uintatheres at Hamilton’s, an unusually bold bout of original headbanging for the covers-friendly club… Who cares at D’ollaire’s? That’s not a band. We really mean who cares?…

Sorted all my books, by geographical region rather than alphabetically.

Pop Evil, War of Angels
Bombastic, ‘80s-style hard rock, like metal used to be before hardcore and industrial got ahold of it. Scorpions surviving the apocalypse. The order of the tracks makes for for some amusing juxtapositions: the rhyming “Broken & Broken,” “Monster You Made”; the colorscape of “Purple” followed by “Black & Blue.” The band’s name, Pop Evil, does this chugging guitar rock a disservice, but song titles like “Black & Blue” and “Monster You Made” are at least reminiscent of stuff like the Black Sabbath/Blue Oyster Cult tours of the early ‘80s.

I just got around to writing about the Archers spin-off Ambridge Extra, and suddenly the BBC also-ran is on hiatus.

An announcement at the end of the 26th semi-weekly episode says it’s the last… for a while” and that it would return sometime “in the autumn.”
Ultimately, the show dealt with its disagreeable, unformed supporting characters by putting them all in the hospital. The fact that it was so easy to corral them shows how unconscionably uncluttered this show has been all along.

Study Blues McGee’s face and you see the scars of battle. The Rosicrucian nose. The bloodshot eyes. The sunken cheeks, the drooping eyelids, the furrowed brow. Even his ears are worn.
His neck has been arched out, then relaxed, so often that it’s formed into a thick ropey vine of veins.
Some rockers get leathery as they age. Some look like they’ve been pickled and curried in a vat or sour liquid. Others just wither.
Is Blues McGee going to beat us up for writing this? (He’s weak, but he can still whack with that axe.) We’re banking on no, because he’s written a song about his own decline: “Saggy Man Blues.”
Sample lyric:
I still hold my head up proud
Smoke and shoot and get right plowed
I lost an inch
I did not flinch
I’ve always been a raggy, craggy, saggy man.

We salute you.

For those who prefer their rock young and erect, Crowned Madonnas and Majestic Mosaics are at the Bullfinch, which kind of render Hamilton’s, D’ollaire’s and everywhere else irrelevant…

The potion works. I didn’t leave my bed all CBC day, sleeping it off.

Ted Leo has done a mesmerizing rendition of his song “The Sword in the Stone” for the online original rock video program Room 205. The show has its own production crew and has corralled such noteworthy acts as Soft Moon, Daedalus and Abe Vigoda to tape sessions. The Leo one has me pining for the casual appearances he used to make at such small rooms as Rudy’s or T>A>Z on his once-frequent tours through Connecticut over a decade ago. Besides “Sword,” the newspaper-lined Room 205 features Ted Leo ripping through “One Polaroid a Day” and “The Little Smug Supper Club,” in a a solo imposing-but-not-intimidating Buddy Holly stance.