What's that sound?

Alex Chilton passed away this week. I knew the name better than I knew his work, although I certainly heard him sing "The Letter" as lead singer of The Box Tops, way back when.

Way back when he was just 16 years old, apparently.

What I heard more, though, especially in the 1980s, were all the bands and musicians that considered him an inspiration--the dB's, Let's Active, Marti Jones, Don Dixon, Paul Westerberg and The Replacements, among others.

I didn't know it then, but I do know it now. And while my musical tastes sometimes (OK, OK, often) favor the silly, superfluous, and the non-guitar-based, I do have my moments where I listen to other styles and other sounds.

The 1980s were definitely one of those times, especially when I lived in Washington, D.C., and listened to the late, lamented WHFS from Annapolis. The early/mid-'80s 'HFS, the one that carried the tradition of college radio into adulthood, but which nonetheless got taken over by corporate hacks and made more "commercially viable," i.e., viable for playing commercials, not necessarily music.

(Thank goodness for public radio, especially here in Pennsylvania, with stations like WXPN in Philadelphia and WYEP here in Pittsburgh, where, at least if we support it, we get good, alternative music without all the talk, advertising, and pandering. If you don't believe government has a role in protecting the people from the market, then by all means, tune into your favorite Clear Channel Communications station--which got its start as a billboard advertising company--and sign off from this blog now.)

Before I end up in a grumpy-old-man dialog with myself, the kind that seems to be raging across our fair-to-middlin' land these days (passionate, yes, but devoid of self-editing or fact-checking, too), let me get back to celebrating a brief period in the '80s, the Golden Age of Jangly Pop, Post-Punk Edition, which was in heavy rotation on WHFS.

When I used to listen to the North Carolina's own dB's and Let's Active, and their Ohio friend Marti Jones and their Minnesota friend Paul Westerberg, and feel nostalgic for my home state and proud of its musical heritage . . .

Washington was truly one of the most hateful places I've ever had the experience of enduring (sorry, D.C. friends!), although I suspect it had as much to do with me and who I was then, as it did with Washington. But Mitch Easter, Don Dixon, Marti Jones, Chris Stamey, Peter Holsapple, and company kept me happy and humming during those years, as did Alex Chilton.

Even if I didn't know it then.

But I do now.

Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=03DFD30F460E22C4

Caveats, I've had a few: Sorry, but I couldn't find on YouTube The dB's' "Spy in the House of Love" or "Lonely Is (As Lonely Does)" (or the Marti Jones cover of the latter), so this is an incomplete, sorely lacking playlist. But it's a start. iTunes and a good, old-fashioned vinyl or CD store, can help you further along.