Talking Heads – Life During Wartime:  Talking Heads appear on the Random Eight at a much ratio than they are represented on the iPod, but the songs always make me happy of their success on the Thursday playback.

Marillion – Forgotten Sons:  Proggy anti-war ranting.

Afghan Whigs – Superstition / Going to Town:  Fun live track from one of the band’s early EPs.

Merzbow – Variation For P.D. 1 (1995):  Noisy noisy.

Tom Waits – The Return of Jacking and Judy:  A blues-rooted tune from Orphans.

R.E.M. – Laughing:  Very early, friendly track that would lead to so much for the band.

Robyn Hitchcock – Lady Waters & The Hooded One:  With a few exceptions, this has been a very “indie-rock” focused Random Eight.

Afghan Whigs – When We Two Parted:  A great song that was stunning live on their tour late last year.

Afghan Whigs – Step Into the Light:  Slow, mournful tune from the band.  

Boris – Luna:  Speedy, loud, and touched with Boris’ creative flair.  

Talking Heads – Thank You For Sending Me An Angel:  Fun, bouncy tune that fits well on the great live Stop Making Sense album.

Motorhead – Metropolis:  Back to speedy and loud.

Bob Mould – Poison Years:  From back in the day, one of my favorite solo Mould songs.

Dreadnots – The Leech That Bled Us Dry:  Trippy, mellow tune.

Most – ?:  Another live track from the wacky, partially Boredoms-populated band.

Rachmaninoff – Liebesleid, TN Ill/5:  And a quiet piano closes us out today.

Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Den Sista Veckan:  An uncharacteristically long, somewhat ballad-ish song from the wacky duo…still wacky, but a different type of wacky.

The Fiery Furnaces – Waiting To Know You:  From the energetic live album, this is a bit more wacky.

Beanfield – Elektro-Kraut (Ian Pooley’s Moody Remix) Edit:  Huh, no real wackiness at all.

Mike Watt – The Glory of Man:  From a nifty live show where Watt and the Missingmen covered a series of Clash songs.

Sadahara – It’s Not Paranoia If They Are Shooting Live Bullets:  Title pretty much says it all.

The Fiery Furnaces – Birdie Brain:  I really like the iPod’s mood today.

Kronos Quartet – Part: Fratres:   More calm and quiet now.

Hawkwind – Time We Left:  Showing the proggy gray hairs to close out the Random Eight.

Sebadoh – Mean Distance:  A tricky slow song until Lou Barlow begins his loud screaming that was typical from the Smash Your Head On The Punk Rock release.

Talking Heads – Puzzlin’ Evidence:  One of those songs that always makes me chuckle when it brings images of the True Stories movie to my mind.

The dB’s – Amplifier:  Very alt-rock Random Eight so far today.

Richard Pinhas – Depression (Loukoum):  As if in response to the last note, this is much more noisy and much less rocky (not to mention long).

Dalek – Los Macheteros / Spear of a Nation:  Loud trip-hop.

Philemon Arthur & The Dung – Djurvisa For Barn:  Possibly the saddest sounding ballad Arthur could ever perform, including the laughter near the end of the tune.

Robyn Hitchcock – Egyptian Cream:  Come see me tomorrow in DC, Robyn seems to be saying…

Xiu Xiu – Dr. Troll:  That’s kinda hippy dippy trippy.

Cursive – Excerpts from Various Notes Strewn Around the Bedroom of April Connolly, Feb 24.:  Opening the day with miserable screaming.

The Clash – London Calling:  Following a day when I woke up with “The Card Cheat” in my head and listened to The Clash all afternoon.  

Amon Tobin – Wires & Snakes:  Always bouncy fun.

Nova Mob – If I Was Afraid / Coda:  Grant Hart at a calm state with his ever compelling riffs, chord progressions, and intense voice.

Murray Gold / BBC National Orchestra of Wales – I Am the Doctor:  From the 2010 BBC “Doctor Who” Prom, the exciting music that was the theme to the latest Doctor’s arrival (yes, geek alert…geek alert).

Pigface – Think:  Louder, angrier, and less geeky as we proceed through the Random Eight.

John Cale – Turn The Lights On:  The former Velvet still cranking out great tunes.

Rush – Trees: Back to geeky…

Diamanda Galas – Abel Et Cain:  Not so quiet into that not so gentle morning.

Laiback – Nippon:  A quiet version of Japan’s national anthem.

Merzbow – Colored Rain:  Back to noisy.

Philip Glass – Ouverture:  From the La Belle Et La Bete opera, this is hitting only two weeks after we saw the NYC Ballet perform to Glass tunes that have put his repetitive rhythms buried well into my head. 

Yo La Tengo – I Heard You Looking:  And another band still well in my head from the relatively recent show we saw.

Marillion – Sugar Mice:  Quiet corny poppy prog.

Genesis – The Battle of Epping Forest: More prog, less pop, and perhaps a little less corny.

Stereolab – Stomach Worm:  From my favorite lab album, Peng!, with a title that makes me a little happy I can’t understand the lyrics.

Cursive – Escape Artist:  Another older Cursive song I’m not too familiar with, but it has the manic sound I really like from the band.

Alvarius B – Seeing-Eye Latte:  Whiny solo singing / acoustic guitar…did I mention the songs are short?

Butthole Surfers – Cherub:                                  AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (the cat stepped on the keyboard before I could type a note, but it is a fairly accurate description of the song).

The Fiery Furnaces – Ray Bouvier:  Consistent fun sound from the Furnaces.

The Clash – Armagideon Time:  Oddly, this is the first song on the Random Eight that I am very familiar with.  

Akimbo – Jersey Shores:  Lengthy title track of instrumental self-indulgence.

Sonic Youth – Lee is Free:  Perhaps in anticipation of the pending Chelsea Light Moving show.

Lucienne Boyer – Parlez Moi d’Amour:  Gentle song I first heard on the City of Ghosts soundtrack. 

Steve Reich – Music for 18 Musicians:  An hour long interesting composition that promises a lengthy Random Eight today.

The Paper Chase – This is a Rape (The Flood):  Always happy songs from the band that seems to be channeling Roger Waters for this one.

Speedy West – I Love You So Much It Hurts:  So says the slide guitar.

Tom Waits – Baby Gonna Leave Me:  My favorite Tom songs are these crazy ones.

The Paper Chase – Neat; Manageable; Piles:  Moody iPod day.

Genesis – Please Don’t Ask:  Moldy iPod day, too.

Love Spit Love – Please:  Albeit short lived, I really liked this project from Richard Butler; I thought it transitioned nicely from the very 80′s-sounding Furs. 

Atari Teenage Riot – Fuck All!:  Ending this lengthy Random Eight loud and angry.

Alloy Orchestra – Hands, Men’s Hands (From “The Unknown”):  From an album that provides alternate soundtracks to silent movies, this sounds like an alternate soundtrack to a silent movie.

Sonic Youth – Justice is Might:  Old enough to be brash and fun, but not too old to just be a horrid (albeit enjoyable, at least to my ears) collection of noise.

Talking Heads – Electricity (Drugs):  From that wonderful live album, The Name of this Band is Talking Heads that I spent hours digitizing from LP before it was finally released on CD.

The Locust – Who Wants a Dose of the Clap?:  Such a polite band.

Pigface – Psalm Springs Eternal:  A brief transitional tune.

Mike Watt – Bell-Rung-Man: The last three songs have barely eclipsed three minutes in length.  

Pigalle – Le Chaland:  Nagy, from the movie Cemetery Man, French-folking away.

Gang of Four – Do As I Say:  The recent GoF album that I like whenever I hear it, but I have to admit, I have had a hard time getting into.

Rush – Anthem:  Can only get younger as we proceed.

Photek – Smoke Rings:  All drummy and bouncy.

Nakatani Gong Orchestra – Live show from 2011:  Taken from an online source of Tatsuya Nakatani’s composition, this is close to the remarkably interesting show we saw at the Kennedy Center last year (which is also available from the Kennedy Center website for viewing).

Paul Westerberg – Smokey:  One of his classic live covers.

The Clash – Version City:  Recently added to the iPod to get myself reacquainted with Sandinista.

John Zorn – Contempt:  Fun song, but as always with Zorn, I’m not quite sure about that screaming sax…

Tom Waits – New Year’s Eve:  Still making great tunes.

Klaus Schulze – Inside the Harlequin: Pulcinella:  I bought a big collection of his electronic compositions a while back but never really listened to them yet…perhaps this will be the genesis of my interest.