Political Beats

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Brad Birzer. Brad is the Russell Amos Kirk Chair in American Studies and Professor of History at Hillsdale College. He is also the co-founder of and senior contributor at The Imaginative Conservative, and the author of a number of books, including Neil Peart: Cultural (Re)Percussions. Find him online at bradbirzer.com or @bradleybirzer on Twitter.Brad’s Music Pick: YesWell, the buses outside don't add much weight to the story in our heads we began in our last episode of Political Beats, so we're thinking we should go and write a punchline; thus, welcome to part two of our discussion of the great progressive rock band Yes, wherein we discuss their career from 1974's Relayer onward to the present day. (Be forewarned -- we pick and choose after the debacle of Union (1991). Fondly remembered: Talk, Keys To Ascension, Magnification and Fly From Here. Not so fondly remembered: erm, Open Your Eyes.)I could offer more prelude than that, but this is one episode where the music will do vastly more explaining than any written exegesis; Yes bounced back after Tales from Topographic Oceans with an album even more abstruse and outwardly difficult, yet light years more compelling. From that point onward and despite countless personnel changes -- up to and including swapping the "Video Killed the Radio Star" guys straight into their band -- the group maintained its unique sound and creative voice throughout the second half of the Seventies in a series of albums that age like casked scotch. (Check out the vigorous defenses of Tormato and Drama ye shall find herein!) Then the group collapsed after a disastrous 1980 tour and seemed to be over . . . until a South African guitarist/vocalist/songwriter named Trevor Rabin entered the picture.All this and much, much more is covered on an episode of Political Beats that spans from the mid Seventies all the way to the late Eighties without once pausing for breath. Afterwards, we take a breather here and there, but for now? Tempus fugit, my friends, so you should click, because we're off to the races, going for the one. 

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Brad Birzer. Brad is the Russell Amos Kirk Chair in American Studies and Professor of History at Hillsdale College. He is also the co-founder of and Senior Contributor at The Imaginative Conservative, and the author of a number of books, including Neil Peart: Cultural (Re)Percussions. Find him online at bradbirzer.com or @bradleybirzer on Twitter.Brad’s Music Pick: YesTell the moon dog, tell the march hare! We take you close to the edge of the south side of the sky this week as we discuss the early adventures of Britain's answer to all the questions raised by hippies during the Seventies, the New Age of Atlantic: Yes. Yes were one of the pillars of British progressive rock music, but also (perhaps surprisingly) a major commercial success in America long before their peers. They were also a truly singular band during their lengthy heyday; the band underwent endless lineup changes as personalities clashed and artistic visions ran amok, and yet they have always sounded like themselves and nobody else successfully has.Starting with local janitor Jon Anderson on countertenor vocals, Pete Banks on Hendrixian guitar, Tony Kaye on groovy late-Sixties B3 organ, fussily precise jazz drummer Bill Bruford keeping time, and Chris Squire playing a bass so aggressive it intimidates people into crossing to the other side of the street, Yes exploded out of London's club-gigging scene after drawing inspiration from watching a newly born King Crimson play the circuit. Their early style mixed originals -- first halting, then increasingly assured -- with spectacularly imaginative covers of everything from West Side Story to Buffalo Springfield and Simon & Garfunkel. But as Banks was jettisoned for Steve Howe, and then Tony Kaye traded in for Rick Wakeman, Yes ascended from a series of records beginning with The Yes Album and Fragile (1971) to superstardom, with all that entailed: sidelong songs, triple live albums, and extended soaks in the topographic oceans. All set to some of the most inscrutable lyrics but gorgeous music written during the decade.So turn on your lava lamp and get ready to call over valleys of endless seas as you and I climb crossing the shape of the morning -- it's time to sink into a elevated musical fantasy world created by Yes during this, the first part of their career. We take the story up through Tales from Topographic Oceans (1973); next time around, we'll get a relayer to go for the one without too much drama, but for now click play and enjoy the sound of perpetual change. 

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Guy Denton. Guy is the co-host of The Wrong Stuff with Matt Lewis, contributor to The Dispatch and National Review, and until recently took Jonah Goldberg's guff over at The Remnant. Find him on Twitter/X . . . nowhere, because he is saner than the rest of us.Guy’s Music Pick: Echo & the BunnymenThere's really not much to say about this episode other than that it is the greatest and most important edition of Political Beats ever recorded. That's what singer/rhythm guitarist/world-class ego Ian McCulloch would no doubt say about this discussion of legendary U.K. postpunk greats Echo & the Bunnymen, and this time he might have a point, because this actually is one of the show's white whales: The Bunnymen may not have invented, but truly perfected, the platonic sonic ideal of "postpunk" over a series of four stunning records in the first half of the Eighties and if Jeff's use of descriptive superlatives were clipped and collected on their own, it would probably add up to at least a half-hour of raw time.The Bunnymen were originally a drumless three-piece bedsit-room band from Liverpool -- vocalist McCulloch, lead guitarist Will Sergeant, and bassist Les Pattinson; it was the drum machine that was nicknamed "Echo" by fans. The addition of Londoner Pete de Freitas on actual drums in early 1980 immediately catalyzed the band: They launched out of the gates with their debut album Crocodiles (1980) and never looked back. From that point onward, they would play not just a major role, but arguably the defining role, in carving out the sonic world we now think of as "postpunk": fiercely arty, fiercely aggressive, and also fiercely beautiful. McCulloch sounded uncannily like one of his most well-known competitors in the postpunk arena -- U2's Bono -- and the run of work they put out between 1980 and 1987 tracks theirs blow-for-blow and is frankly superior in all respects right up until the end.  And yet from our American perspective (and nearly 40 years after their heyday) Echo & the Bunnymen are often treated as a curious footnote from the world of Eighties music, obscure Brits who recorded That Song You Know From That Movie Soundtrack. They were the furthest thing imaginable from it: one of the most endlessly compelling and rewarding groups of a decade positively exploding with great music. We weren't kidding when we said there isn't really much to say about this episode, because the music will speak more eloquently than any words can. Bring on the dancing horses, and seal your pact with the Dark Mistress of Fortune underneath the killing moon. Perhaps it was your fate -- up against a will -- all along. Click play and never stop.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Joshua Treviño. Joshua works and writes at the Texas Public Policy Foundation and spent the entire 1990s listening a lot to Matthew Sweet. Joshua’s Music Pick: Matthew SweetFor listeners of a certain age, just the name Matthew Sweet will evoke a particular memory, and it’s likely one that involves heartbreak. Breaking through with the power-pop masterpiece, Girlfriend, Sweet channeled the inner thoughts and emotions of Gen-Xers everywhere and married them to killer hooks and melodies. Of course, his career is more than just that.Matthew Sweet bridges the gap between sweet, melodic power pop and the edgy alternative rock sound of the 1990s, leveraging the guitar work of Robert Quine and Richard Lloyd on his best music. His influences are clear -- you hear some Beatles, sure, but also influences of Big Star, the Byrds, and even Neil Young in the guitar tones.  His run of albums from Girlfriend to In Reverse (or roughly 1990–2000) is what we focus on in this show, though additional time is spent on his first two solo efforts and some of his later-career output, particularly the trio of Under the Covers albums recorded with ex-Bangle Susanna Hoffs.It’s great music and for many, including one co-host, it’s essentially brand-new music for the ears. They say nothing is certain in life, but we can guarantee you 100 percent fun when you tune in for this Matthew Sweet edition of Political Beats.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Tom Nichols. Tom is a staff writer at The Atlantic and author ofThe Death of Expertise: The Campaign against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters, with a new second edition out soon. Find him on X/Twitter at@RadioFreeTom. Tom’s Music Pick: BostonThis could be our first episode that is longer simply by listening to the entirety of the band's actual discography. Even if true, we still think you should choose Political Beats!Boston is an unusual band, sui generis in many ways. To begin with, Boston is really one guy: Tom Scholz. Okay, Okay, he probably couldn’t pull this off without the voice of Brad Delp. And our guest is quick to point out Sib Hashian has some nice moments on drums on the Boston debut album. But Scholz wrote nearly all the songs, he developed the guitar sound, he spent years in his basement perfecting that debut album. And what a debut it was. You know every song here and all but one remain in heavy rotation on classic rock radio stations across the country. It was the biggest-selling debut in history for about a decade after its release. “More Than a Feeling,” “Peace of Mind,” “Foreplay/Long Time,” and “Hitch a Ride” continue to soundtrack summers annually.But what do you do for an encore? And how do you evolve that sound, if at all? These are some of the questions we kick around throughout the show. It's always a blast to be joined by a guest who actually lived through the release of some of the music we are discussing. Tom gives a needed and appreciated perspective on Boston and the impact the music had on the rock world.We’ll talk until you’re feelin’ satisfied and are prepared to walk on to another episode. Grab your Rockman amp and plug in to Political Beats.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Jay Cost. Jay is the Gerald R. Ford senior non-resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of, most recently, James Madison: America’s First Politician. Find him on Twitter/X at @Jay__Cost.Jay’s Music Pick: The KinksHaven’t we done these guys already? We sure did! But this is the part of the Kinks' career we didn't do any real justice to back six or seven years ago when Jay first joined us for our comically brief discussion of the Kinks' Seventies career.We remedy that here, for the second part of our grand Kinks retrospective (covering everything from 1969's Arthur, or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire onwards) sheds light on an era of their career that has been largely forgotten, but which contains much of their greatest music. From the conceptual ambitions of Arthur, Lola, and an entire passel of early-to-mid '70s concept albums that are usually more mocked than listened to (wrongfully so, we argue), the Kinks reclaimed stardom, promptly kicked it right back to the curb in order to do concert/stage production hybrids for a few years, and then with superb 1976 Sleepwalker went right back to climbing the album and singles charts. And all throughout it Ray Davies's lyrical vision -- singular in both its profundity and also its occasional cheerful mundaneness -- guided the group through a series of records that, while no longer discussed as much as their classic Sixties era, were extremely popular in their time and justifiably so. We pretty much wrap up our discussion with Give The People What They Want (1981), so if you have to be a big Think Visual! fan, then this episode may disappoint you. But we doubt it. Because Political Beats is proud to have finally given the latter era of the Kinks their proper due, and in a way that we hope will make several new fans. Click play, sit back in your old rocking chair in your Shangri-La, and enjoy.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are with guest Jay Cost. Jay is the Gerald R. Ford senior non-resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of, most recently, James Madison: America's First Politician. Find him on Twitter/X at @Jay__Cost.Jay's Music Pick: The KinksHaven't we done these guys already? We sure did! For the first (and possibly last) time, Political Beats has done something unprecedented and gone back to cover an artist for the second time. Why? Because frankly, our original Kinks take was Episode #7 (we're up to #130 now, seven years later), and we didn't know what we were doing with the format yet, didn't do the discussion justice, and frankly this should have been a two-part episode.So now it is! Jay was great with us back in the day -- except for the part where we had to cut short the discussion because he had to pick up his kids from school -- so we've invited him back to do proper justice to Ray and Dave Davies, eternally warring brothers who fronted a band that started as the most mindlessly brutish of all the British Invasion '60s hitmakers ("You Really Got Me," "All Day And All Of The Night," "Tired Of Waiting For You," "Till The End Of The Day" -- all rockheaded classics) and then rapidly transformed into one of the most curiously intellectual bedsit-room British bands in history, as quintessentially "English" in the late Sixties and Seventies as The Band was effortlessly "American." The music during their early phase (discussed this week -- part two coming soon!) transforms from hitmaking international singles to insular, intensely well-written melodic and lyrical miniatures about English eccentrics and English life -- the sort of music that was destined to fail commercially in its moment but which later became (and remains) the subject of endless musical, emotional, and intellectual fascination. Join us then, as we take a second, far juicier bite at the apple and chronicle these glorious early years of growth for the Kinks, culminating in The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society (1968), an album all about the seductions, perils, and aches of nostalgia. Later on, after this point, the Kinks would reemerge into the world at large, cultivating a massive international (and specifically American) fanbase during the Seventies and Eighties with a very different kind of music. But for now, get ready for stories of session men, insufferably perfect schoolboys, ugly urban tube stations at dusk, and utterly phenomenal cats as we take you back to the mysterious era known as "decline-phase late Sixties Britain" and discuss the last of the good old-fashioned steam-powered bands.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) with guest Mike Long. Mike is a (very) occasional writer for National Review and was one of the originals back in the early 2000s as NRO was launched. He’s the author of the non-fiction bestseller The Molecule of More and its sequel coming in fall of 2024.Mike’s Music Pick: Joe JacksonAfter running through Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe/Rockpile, it was only a matter of time before we got to covering Joe Jackson. As an artist, Jackson frequently is grouped into the "angry young man"/Pub Rock category with the aforementioned artists. However, as we discuss on the show, there's an incredible depth to his songwriting and arrangements that quickly busted him out of whatever box critics might put him in.Jackson came out of the gate hot, with two releases in the magical year of 1979, Look Sharp! and I'm the Man. They could be parts one and two of the same album. These are the ones that lump him into the Costello/Parker/Lowe movement but it's a sound he rarely returns to again. Every single song is a winner. From here would come some of his best known songs – “I’m the Man,” “It’s Different For Girls, and “Is She Really Going Out With Him?” By 1981, he took a massive detour from the rock/pop world with Jumpin' Jive, a collection of covers of 1940s swing and big band songs originally performed by Louis Jordan and Cab Calloway. Night and Day was released the same year as Elvis Costello’s Imperial Bedroom and it, too, is a bid to be taken very seriously as a songwriter. Like Elvis's effort, it's a complete success artistically and even moreso commercially. "Steppin' Out" earned Grammy Award nominations and reached number six on the charts. "Breaking Us in Two" reached number 18. It's a cosmopolitan, big-city record. The rest of the 1980s would find Jackson stretching his wings and dabbling in jazz, Latin rhythms, classical – if you name a genre, he probably has a song in it (OK, perhaps not metal). Albums like Body and Soul, Big World, Blaze of Glory, and Laughter and Lust didn’t sell nearly as well as previous efforts but kept fans happy. After 1991, however, he wouldn’trelease another non-classical studio album until 2000's Night and Day II. Why? Take it from the artist himself: "After the Laughter & Lust world tour … I had real bad writer's block. I couldn't even listen to music. I just lost it, totally. It was awful."But it wouldn’t stay that way! Beginning in 2003 with Vol. 4, Jackson would release a string of records that showed he still know how to write a song. By the way, all of us have musical blind spots, and Joe Jackson was one for Jeff. Come along for the ride as he discovers the many layers of this talented performer and writer.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are joined by guest Hannah Rowan. Hannah is the managing editor of Modern Age. You can find her on X at @Hannah_Cristine and read her review of Debbie Harry's memoir here.Hannah’s Music Pick: BlondieHere's another artist we get to cross off the list of long-awaited episodes. Both Jeff and Scot have been hot to do Blondie for years and it has nothing (okay, relatively little) to do with the attractive woman fronting the band. It’s the music that means so much, even after all these years.Blondie, as Jeff argues, is perhaps the quintessential new wave band, but they started by paying tribute to girl-group sounds and garage rock of the '60s on the band’s first record. From there, singer Debbie Harry and guitarist Chris Stein, the two leaders of the group, led Blondie through a wide variety of styles and genres. The band was as comfortable playing power pop and new wave as they later would be incorporating disco, reggae, and even rap into their sound. Blondie recorded four number one songs -- "Heart of Glass," "Call Me," "The Tide Is High," and "Rapture" -- and you couldn’t quite stick any of them inside the same box.And we can’t escape the visual aspect. It’s impossible to separate what you see from what you hear. Debbie Harry was a striking figure to lead the group. And Blondie was a band that was deliberate in how it presented itself -- from album covers to stage apparel to making videos for every song on a record, which predated the MTV-era by a good half-decade or so.The timeframe for the band's brilliance is relatively short and we spend very little time on the post-reunion work (apologies to fans of Pollinator). But what was created at the end of the 1970s truly stands the test of time. The music, in many ways, pointed forward toward what we would hear throughout the decade of the 1980s.

Introducing the Band:Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are joined by guest Eric Kohn. Eric is the Director of Marketing & Communications at the Acton Institute. Check him out on Twitter at @iEricKohn.Eric’s Music Pick: Huey Lewis & the NewsDo you believe in miracles? Yes! After years of lobbying, Jeff has proven that anyone will fold, given enough time and pressure. Here is the Huey Lewis & the News episode of Political Beats.Those of you with us for a while will know that the band is a favorite of Scot's while Jeff previously has taken any opportunity to vow never to cover Huey and the boys on the show. Well, recently he had a change of heart (Track One, Picture This) and we wasted no time in finding a guest. Did we end up talking for three hours about Huey Lewis & the News? Of course we did. Did we change Jeff's mind? Listen and find out.Scot’s love of the band started at a young age, and much of his knowledge of the early story of the band’s history comes from a mass-market paperback that he still has to this day. Huey Lewis & the News: A Biography is a 142-page chronicle of the rise of the band and its origins on the San Francisco music scene. It’s out of print, obviously, but check your local used bookstore for a copy.Huey Lewis & the News essentially was the merger of two big local Bay area bands -- Clover and Soundhole. Huey and keyboardist Sean Hopper played in the former, while drummer Bill Gibson, saxophonist/guitarist Johnny Colla, and bassist Mario Cipollina in the latter. Clover (sans Huey) were perhaps best known for being Elvis Costello's back-up band on My Aim Is True. The band then picked up a 21-year-old kid in 1979, Chris Hayes, to play lead guitar and were off. The next year, 1980, brought the little-noticed self-titled debut. Here's the thing: It's quite good! This album, and the early sound of the band, is the commercial follow-through on the wonderful music made by the pub rock artists of the U.K. This record is heavier on Mario's bass than later entries, but those trademark backing vocals are there from the start. It didn't sell. At all. The next album would be make or break. Huey's face alone is on the cover. Harmonies are tighter. Little did they know they had an ace in the hole: a song written by Mutt Lange. "Do You Believe in Love" would explode to #7 on the charts. The band had a hit. A follow-up would be tougher. Three other singles from Picture This failed to break #36, though one, “Workin’ for a Livin’,” has endured as a blue-collar anthem.The band went back to work with a taste of success and a thirst for more. The mission for the next album was simple: every song a hit. Easy, right? With Sports, they pretty much pulled it off. You know virtually every song on this album, including “I Want a New Drug,” “The Heart of Rock and Roll,” “If This Is It,” and more. There was no thematic goal other than producing hits. Synths, drum machines, massive hooks -- whatever it took. Outside writers? Sure! A strength of the band was taking other's material and making it sound like their own, as they did on “Heart and Soul” and “Walking On a Thin Line.”Sports was a monster. Massive headlining tours followed. Two major projects before the next album would drop. First, Huey would take a lead vocal spot in "We Are the World,” filling in for Prince. Second, some work on a little film called Back to the Future and the band’s first #1 hit in “The Power of Love.”Huey Lewis & the News is on top of the world. But 1986 is approaching and a new album is due soon. One problem: No one hears a single. One of the engineers calls up Chris Hayes at home and says, "Chris, we need a hit.""Stuck With You" was what he came up with, and it was the lead single for Fore!, which would also hit #1 & sell 3 million+ copies. That said, Fore! is a bit of an odd duck. Fully half the songs were from outside writers, including the album's other #1 single, “Jacob’s Ladder” (written by the Hornsby brothers)Next? Well, whatever the band wanted. And what they wanted was not necessarily commercial in nature. A socially conscious effort full of eclectic musical themes, Small World. As far as I've read, the band loves this album. They got to stretch their legs as musicians. They had earned the right to make a project of their choosing. The record-buying public was not impressed. Small World barely scraped 1 million units in sales.  The band did have one last bullet to fire at the charts. “Perfect World,” a song written by Alex Call, a former Clover bandmate of Huey and Sean, hit #3 and clearly sits aside their best.Afterward, the band had some well-earned time off. In the time span, though, the rock world was changing quickly. Huey & company dropped the weirdness of the last album and returned to the blueprint -- rock, R&B, a love song, and a tune by Mutt Lange. All on Hard At Play. There would not be another album of new material for ten years. Four Chords and Several Years Ago, an album of 50s-era covers, came in 1994.Plan B, an album of new material, arrived in 2001, followed by Soulsville, a Stax covers album, and finally 2020’s Weather. The last record was released following Huey’s diagnosis of Ménière's disease, an inner-ear disorder, which means he can no longer hear music frequencies or hold vocal pitches. The result is no touring and no more new music from the band. It's sometimes hard to hear Huey Lewis & the News on the radio. Living on that weird line between rock and pop in the 1980s means there's not a great format for those songs now. It's a catalog well worth further inspection, though. You won't regret spending three hours with us and the band.