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10/9/2006

In praise of Wall of Voodoo

Wall of Voodoo were one of the most insteresting bands to come out of the Los Angeles punk scene in the 1980s: Enrico Morricone guitar lines, avant-garde percussion, and post-punk synths, backing up one of the most distinctive vocal stylists of recent memory, Stan Ridgeway.

Here they are performing their brilliant version of ‘Ring of Fire’ on a Los Angeles TV station. Not sure of the date. The late Mark Moreland plays a brilliant guitar solo here, shorter than the one on the record, but brilliant nonetheless. If someone can name the song that he’s quoting, please let me know. Moreland and his bandmates had a knack for cramming a remarkable amount of dissonance into their music without completely breaking the conventions of contemporary pop music.

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March of the S.O.D.

As a Minnesota Twins fan and a resident of the North Side of the city of Chicago, it is my moral duty to be a White Sox hater. That said, I attended a game at the Park Formerly Known as Comiskey, and Sox first baseman Paul Konerko used this as his theme music: The Stormtroopers of Death’s ‘March of the SOD’. Quite possibly the coolest thing I’ve ever heard played at a ballpark.

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