I play my iPod at work, I've set up an "office" playlist of about 1300 tunes that randomly play through. Takes a little over a week to get through all of them, and gives us a decent amount of variety. I keep adding to it, so it stays relatively fresh, though I'm going to have to take out some of the stuff on that iPod that I don't want playing at the office in favor of some newer additions (not necessarily newer music) that I do want to play there, because I've got the thing just about full.

Anyway, today for some reason a bunch of songs by bands from Chicago came up. I don't mean bigger, mainstream acts like Smashing Pumpkins or Styx or Chicago...I mean stuff I've collected by bands that played the club scene and who I saw quite a lot back in my "clubbin'" days in the late '80's and early '90's. Bands like the Elvis Brothers, The Bad Examples, Off Broadway, Nicholas Tremulis, Mike Jordan and the Rockamatics, and a few others. Tunes I heard today:


RUTHY ANN, Elvis Brothers
MORE THAN THE TRUTH, Nicholas Tremulis
ONE PERFECT MOMENT, Bad Examples
BAD INDICATION, Off Broadway
SLITHER AWHILE, Paul Cebar and the Milwaukeeans
CAN'T HAVE YOU, Mike Jordan and the Rockamatics
SOMEWHERE IN AMERICA, Survivor
THE MARKET, ExitSpecialists

Those are the ones that come to mind immediately. A bit about some of the bands:

The Elvis Brothers were a power pop trio originally (I think) from Champaign, Illinois (University of Illinois). They made a couple of very good albums back in the 1980's, called MOVIN' UP and ADVENTURE TIME. The second was produced by guitar virtuoso Adrian Belew, and was a little smoother but not as good top to bottom as their first, which was billed as sort of a rockabilly album to capitalize on their (appearance only) similarity to the Stray Cats. The songs were not, for the most part, rockabilly tunes - they were power pop songs, much like the second album. In the 1990's, after a lot of changes, they returned to their original lineup of Rob, Graham and Brad (all went by the last name of "Elvis") and recorded a CD called NOW DIG THIS, which featured the tune that played today, RUTHY ANN.

Nicholas Tremulis was a funkier type of act, an excellent musician with strong songwriting skills. He made two records back then, NT and MORE THAN THE TRUTH. He had sort of a minor hit with a tune called RIVER OF LOVE, but what played today was the title tune from that second album. The first I've never been able to find on disc.


The Bad Examples were a terrific club band with higher aspirations, also playing a genre of music that sort of was between power pop and folk. Ralph Covert, now doing the acclaimed childrens' act Ralph's World, was the driving force behind the band. The tune that played was from their second CD, BAD IS BEAUTIFUL. They had some great tunes from that album, as well as some other good stuff from future CD's like POPSCAPE and BIRTHDAY (a Covert "solo" effort that featured the whole band on many tracks). I just thought of another that played today: RASPBERRY JAM from that BIRTHDAY CD.

OFF BROADWAY goes back a little further into the 1970's. I never really saw them in a club, but I think they came as close as anyone back then to breaking out of the Chicago club scene and into the national scene with tunes like STAY IN TIME, of their first album, called ON. They released a second LP called QUICK TURNS, but then faded away. Their lead singer had been doing voice work for commercials, then started another band which I can't come up with the name of...

Paul Cebar and the Milwaukeeans are not really a Chicago band, they are from north of the border of Illinois as their name suggests. But they play in the area a lot, and this song was off their first CD, which I can't recall the name of, offhand. They are a funky outfit, a relatively large bar band, also a lot of fun to see live.

Mike Jordan and the Rockamatics was my favorite club band back in the day. I probably saw them 40 or 50 times in the years following graduation from school and their eventual breakup because of an illness to Jordan. He obviously shared the name with another famous (though not native either) Chicagoan, some guy who played NBA basketball. They released a single on a vinyl 45, and a five song tape which I finally digitized. This some was from the tape, which was called ASK HER TO DANCE. It isn't my favorite from the tape but I like it. It's slower than their usual rockin' roots music. (They definitely owed a debt to guys like Dave Edmunds and the band Rockpile, and grew out of a band called the Famous Potatoes, who were John Prine's backing band when he was based in Chicago before moving to Nashville.)

Survivor - everyone knows them from their EYE OF THE TIGER, but I was listening to them when they released their first record SOMEWHERE IN AMERICA, which I finally found on CD. The title song from that disc played today. They were led by Jim Peterik, famous from his Ides Of March band which recorded the 1960's hit VEHICLE. Peterik also is responsible for co-writing a good number of 38 Special's bigger hits like HOLD ON LOOSELY and CAUGHT UP IN YOU.

Last but not least is the ExitSpecialists. I put them in because they're a bunch of friends of mine who made two or three CD's, and I played on 6 or so songs on a couple of them. THE MARKET was written and sung by Pete Govert, and features a cheesy Farfisa organ sound from yours truly. They were totally a studio project, and they used to distribute their works through MP3.com, but they're not to be found there (or anywhere, really) anymore. But I liked this punchy pop song and I have several of their songs in rotation on my iPod office playlist. This one happened to come up today.

More blogging about Chicago rock bands to come. Have a great day...