Chuck Eddy
@chuckeddytor.bsky.social
I write about stuff (books = Stairway to Hell, Accidental Evolution of R&R, R&R Always Forgets, Terminated for Reasons of Taste.) Here's where I mostly write now:
https://chuckeddy.substack.com/
https://accidentalevolution.wordpress.com/author/edcchucky
https://chuckeddy.substack.com/
https://accidentalevolution.wordpress.com/author/edcchucky
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
2000 or so words on my 150 favorite albums from 1986 + questionable claims I made in a famous Creem profile I wrote about the Beastie Boys back then, such as whether metal or rap had a better year & were major labels as bad as I thought, & how come I left out that Prince album everybody loves now.
150 Best Albums of 1986
I know it’s the equivalent of rock bands whining about how tired they are of always playing their biggest hit (“No way will I do that bloody wedding song!,” a solo-tour-prepping Robert Plant once prom...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 11, 2025 at 4:30 PM
2000 or so words on my 150 favorite albums from 1986 + questionable claims I made in a famous Creem profile I wrote about the Beastie Boys back then, such as whether metal or rap had a better year & were major labels as bad as I thought, & how come I left out that Prince album everybody loves now.
2000 or so words on my 150 favorite albums from 1986 + questionable claims I made in a famous Creem profile I wrote about the Beastie Boys back then, such as whether metal or rap had a better year & were major labels as bad as I thought, & how come I left out that Prince album everybody loves now.
150 Best Albums of 1986
I know it’s the equivalent of rock bands whining about how tired they are of always playing their biggest hit (“No way will I do that bloody wedding song!,” a solo-tour-prepping Robert Plant once prom...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 11, 2025 at 4:30 PM
2000 or so words on my 150 favorite albums from 1986 + questionable claims I made in a famous Creem profile I wrote about the Beastie Boys back then, such as whether metal or rap had a better year & were major labels as bad as I thought, & how come I left out that Prince album everybody loves now.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
An early blueprint for my 1991 metal book Stairway to Hell, where much of this still-glam-skeptical piece wound up — though not as much as I long assumed. Only 3 albums overlap both book & article, plus 1 more band represented by different LPs in each. And an introductory snippet here and there.
Underground Metal Roundup, 1987
A sort of early blueprint for Stairway to Hell (note the headline), where much of this piece wound up — though not nearly as much as I’ve long assumed.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 10, 2025 at 5:05 PM
An early blueprint for my 1991 metal book Stairway to Hell, where much of this still-glam-skeptical piece wound up — though not as much as I long assumed. Only 3 albums overlap both book & article, plus 1 more band represented by different LPs in each. And an introductory snippet here and there.
An early blueprint for my 1991 metal book Stairway to Hell, where much of this still-glam-skeptical piece wound up — though not as much as I long assumed. Only 3 albums overlap both book & article, plus 1 more band represented by different LPs in each. And an introductory snippet here and there.
Underground Metal Roundup, 1987
A sort of early blueprint for Stairway to Hell (note the headline), where much of this piece wound up — though not nearly as much as I’ve long assumed.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 10, 2025 at 5:05 PM
An early blueprint for my 1991 metal book Stairway to Hell, where much of this still-glam-skeptical piece wound up — though not as much as I long assumed. Only 3 albums overlap both book & article, plus 1 more band represented by different LPs in each. And an introductory snippet here and there.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
25 songs, 1966-'87: Dennis Alcapone, Cockney Rebel, Dave & Ansel Collins, Dunkelziffer, Fresh Face, Harpo, Hotlegs, Kano, Maximum Joy (x2!), National Health, Annette Peacock, Pointer Sisters, Rich Kids, Billy Joe Royal, Savage Rose, Shockabilly, Slip, Frank Soda & Imps, Unclaimed, Vogues, more!
Living in Greenland
Blindfold Test #9
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 9, 2025 at 6:33 PM
25 songs, 1966-'87: Dennis Alcapone, Cockney Rebel, Dave & Ansel Collins, Dunkelziffer, Fresh Face, Harpo, Hotlegs, Kano, Maximum Joy (x2!), National Health, Annette Peacock, Pointer Sisters, Rich Kids, Billy Joe Royal, Savage Rose, Shockabilly, Slip, Frank Soda & Imps, Unclaimed, Vogues, more!
25 songs, 1966-'87: Dennis Alcapone, Cockney Rebel, Dave & Ansel Collins, Dunkelziffer, Fresh Face, Harpo, Hotlegs, Kano, Maximum Joy (x2!), National Health, Annette Peacock, Pointer Sisters, Rich Kids, Billy Joe Royal, Savage Rose, Shockabilly, Slip, Frank Soda & Imps, Unclaimed, Vogues, more!
Living in Greenland
Blindfold Test #9
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 9, 2025 at 6:33 PM
25 songs, 1966-'87: Dennis Alcapone, Cockney Rebel, Dave & Ansel Collins, Dunkelziffer, Fresh Face, Harpo, Hotlegs, Kano, Maximum Joy (x2!), National Health, Annette Peacock, Pointer Sisters, Rich Kids, Billy Joe Royal, Savage Rose, Shockabilly, Slip, Frank Soda & Imps, Unclaimed, Vogues, more!
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece from 1981, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or funk? why can’t I make up my mind?) and tossing in a questionable anti-disco subtext to make things even more disingenuous. ("DOR" was "Dance-Oriented Rock," btw.)
DOR! The Wave of the Future!
Posted more for socio-historical interest, than because it’s any good: A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or tal...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 8, 2025 at 1:58 PM
A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece from 1981, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or funk? why can’t I make up my mind?) and tossing in a questionable anti-disco subtext to make things even more disingenuous. ("DOR" was "Dance-Oriented Rock," btw.)
A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece from 1981, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or funk? why can’t I make up my mind?) and tossing in a questionable anti-disco subtext to make things even more disingenuous. ("DOR" was "Dance-Oriented Rock," btw.)
DOR! The Wave of the Future!
Posted more for socio-historical interest, than because it’s any good: A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or tal...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 8, 2025 at 1:58 PM
A confusing college-daily-paper trend piece from 1981, conflating at least two different kinds of music (am I talking about new wave or funk? why can’t I make up my mind?) and tossing in a questionable anti-disco subtext to make things even more disingenuous. ("DOR" was "Dance-Oriented Rock," btw.)
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
Sandra Jacqueline Denton aka Pepa turns either 56 or 61 Sunday, depending who you ask. So in celebration I thought I'd revive this Boston Phoenix review I wrote 37 years ago of two early Salt-N-Pepa singles -- one you almost definitely know (their best hit ever!), one you almost definitely don't.
2 Salt-N-Pepa singles
.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Sandra Jacqueline Denton aka Pepa turns either 56 or 61 Sunday, depending who you ask. So in celebration I thought I'd revive this Boston Phoenix review I wrote 37 years ago of two early Salt-N-Pepa singles -- one you almost definitely know (their best hit ever!), one you almost definitely don't.
Sandra Jacqueline Denton aka Pepa turns either 56 or 61 Sunday, depending who you ask. So in celebration I thought I'd revive this Boston Phoenix review I wrote 37 years ago of two early Salt-N-Pepa singles -- one you almost definitely know (their best hit ever!), one you almost definitely don't.
2 Salt-N-Pepa singles
.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Sandra Jacqueline Denton aka Pepa turns either 56 or 61 Sunday, depending who you ask. So in celebration I thought I'd revive this Boston Phoenix review I wrote 37 years ago of two early Salt-N-Pepa singles -- one you almost definitely know (their best hit ever!), one you almost definitely don't.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
2022 was supposedly the year neo-traditionalism returned to country radio while everybody showed how much they missed to the ’90s. But what mostly caught my ear were dance songs - flat-out disco, at times - by women, as often as not w/o big label recording contracts, or recording contracts at all.
40+ Best Country Singles of 2022
From what I’ve read, 2022 is supposed to be the year that neo-traditionalism (i.e., singers trying to sound like Travis and Strait and McEntire trying to sound like Haggard and Jones and Wynette) retu...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 6, 2025 at 4:34 PM
2022 was supposedly the year neo-traditionalism returned to country radio while everybody showed how much they missed to the ’90s. But what mostly caught my ear were dance songs - flat-out disco, at times - by women, as often as not w/o big label recording contracts, or recording contracts at all.
2022 was supposedly the year neo-traditionalism returned to country radio while everybody showed how much they missed to the ’90s. But what mostly caught my ear were dance songs - flat-out disco, at times - by women, as often as not w/o big label recording contracts, or recording contracts at all.
40+ Best Country Singles of 2022
From what I’ve read, 2022 is supposed to be the year that neo-traditionalism (i.e., singers trying to sound like Travis and Strait and McEntire trying to sound like Haggard and Jones and Wynette) retu...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 6, 2025 at 4:34 PM
2022 was supposedly the year neo-traditionalism returned to country radio while everybody showed how much they missed to the ’90s. But what mostly caught my ear were dance songs - flat-out disco, at times - by women, as often as not w/o big label recording contracts, or recording contracts at all.
Between when I was a kid and now, the order I’d long enjoyed as Marsupiala was upgraded to an “infra-class,” itself split between Australidelphia and Ameridelphia, and now containing seven discreet orders. Non-extinct mammal orders now total 29 — up more than 50% from the quantity I grew up with.
On Classifying Marsupials
When I was a kid, pretty much every zoology book I signed out of the library divided mammals (aka the class Mammalia) into 19 or so orders — 17 placental (giving birth to fully developed and gestated ...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 5, 2025 at 1:00 PM
Between when I was a kid and now, the order I’d long enjoyed as Marsupiala was upgraded to an “infra-class,” itself split between Australidelphia and Ameridelphia, and now containing seven discreet orders. Non-extinct mammal orders now total 29 — up more than 50% from the quantity I grew up with.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
Wroted, quoted, or reincarnated 4200+ words on one-hit alt-rockers, geniuses & sceniuses, hootenannies & the blowfish, jagged little pills, P&J Harvey, trip-hop, hip-trop, trance-hop, doo-hop, songcraft vs soundcraft, blurriness vs shagginess, AOL chats, and my 150 favorite albums of 30 years ago.
150 Best Albums of 1995
I can imagine somebody — probably somebody just then turning obsessive about music like I myself had 16 years before — fondly remembering 1995 as a long-lost glory age of adorably disposable pop-rock ...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 4, 2025 at 1:24 PM
Wroted, quoted, or reincarnated 4200+ words on one-hit alt-rockers, geniuses & sceniuses, hootenannies & the blowfish, jagged little pills, P&J Harvey, trip-hop, hip-trop, trance-hop, doo-hop, songcraft vs soundcraft, blurriness vs shagginess, AOL chats, and my 150 favorite albums of 30 years ago.
Wroted, quoted, or reincarnated 4200+ words on one-hit alt-rockers, geniuses & sceniuses, hootenannies & the blowfish, jagged little pills, P&J Harvey, trip-hop, hip-trop, trance-hop, doo-hop, songcraft vs soundcraft, blurriness vs shagginess, AOL chats, and my 150 favorite albums of 30 years ago.
150 Best Albums of 1995
I can imagine somebody — probably somebody just then turning obsessive about music like I myself had 16 years before — fondly remembering 1995 as a long-lost glory age of adorably disposable pop-rock ...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 4, 2025 at 1:24 PM
Wroted, quoted, or reincarnated 4200+ words on one-hit alt-rockers, geniuses & sceniuses, hootenannies & the blowfish, jagged little pills, P&J Harvey, trip-hop, hip-trop, trance-hop, doo-hop, songcraft vs soundcraft, blurriness vs shagginess, AOL chats, and my 150 favorite albums of 30 years ago.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
1970-1987 teenpop, Osmonds to Bay City Rollers to Knack to Lisa Lisa. Often excerpted by me since, maybe. But this is how the original version looked in Creem. A year or more later — after Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, Spice Girls, Radio Disney, Aqua, K-Pop — no way could I have kept the list so concise.
A Bubblegum Top 40
Reprinted in the 2001 Kim Cooper and David Smay-edited anthology Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth; possibly excerpted and/or cannibalized in scores of things I’ve written since.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 3, 2025 at 1:45 PM
1970-1987 teenpop, Osmonds to Bay City Rollers to Knack to Lisa Lisa. Often excerpted by me since, maybe. But this is how the original version looked in Creem. A year or more later — after Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, Spice Girls, Radio Disney, Aqua, K-Pop — no way could I have kept the list so concise.
1970-1987 teenpop, Osmonds to Bay City Rollers to Knack to Lisa Lisa. Often excerpted by me since, maybe. But this is how the original version looked in Creem. A year or more later — after Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, Spice Girls, Radio Disney, Aqua, K-Pop — no way could I have kept the list so concise.
A Bubblegum Top 40
Reprinted in the 2001 Kim Cooper and David Smay-edited anthology Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth; possibly excerpted and/or cannibalized in scores of things I’ve written since.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 3, 2025 at 1:45 PM
1970-1987 teenpop, Osmonds to Bay City Rollers to Knack to Lisa Lisa. Often excerpted by me since, maybe. But this is how the original version looked in Creem. A year or more later — after Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, Spice Girls, Radio Disney, Aqua, K-Pop — no way could I have kept the list so concise.
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
That Golden Time of the Day when sunbeams shine through your window at just the perfect angle to let you know you really, really, really need to vacuum up all that dust and dog hair. (An hour later now, thanks to Daylight Savings Time ending.)
November 2, 2025 at 10:32 PM
That Golden Time of the Day when sunbeams shine through your window at just the perfect angle to let you know you really, really, really need to vacuum up all that dust and dog hair. (An hour later now, thanks to Daylight Savings Time ending.)
That Golden Time of the Day when sunbeams shine through your window at just the perfect angle to let you know you really, really, really need to vacuum up all that dust and dog hair. (An hour later now, thanks to Daylight Savings Time ending.)
November 2, 2025 at 10:32 PM
That Golden Time of the Day when sunbeams shine through your window at just the perfect angle to let you know you really, really, really need to vacuum up all that dust and dog hair. (An hour later now, thanks to Daylight Savings Time ending.)
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
25 songs, 1931-1999: American Dream, Borghesia, Carpettes, Curved Air, 809, Sonny Fisher, Joyce Harris, Lyres, Maximum Joy, Oz, David Peel, Ritual, Luis Russell, Martine St. Clair, Stylle Band, Sugarloaf, Trillion, Tristan Tzara, Vee VV, Charles Wright & Watts 103rd Street Band, Yeah Yeah No, more!
Guilty of Noise Pollution
Blindfold Test #8
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 2, 2025 at 2:50 PM
25 songs, 1931-1999: American Dream, Borghesia, Carpettes, Curved Air, 809, Sonny Fisher, Joyce Harris, Lyres, Maximum Joy, Oz, David Peel, Ritual, Luis Russell, Martine St. Clair, Stylle Band, Sugarloaf, Trillion, Tristan Tzara, Vee VV, Charles Wright & Watts 103rd Street Band, Yeah Yeah No, more!
25 songs, 1931-1999: American Dream, Borghesia, Carpettes, Curved Air, 809, Sonny Fisher, Joyce Harris, Lyres, Maximum Joy, Oz, David Peel, Ritual, Luis Russell, Martine St. Clair, Stylle Band, Sugarloaf, Trillion, Tristan Tzara, Vee VV, Charles Wright & Watts 103rd Street Band, Yeah Yeah No, more!
Guilty of Noise Pollution
Blindfold Test #8
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 2, 2025 at 2:50 PM
25 songs, 1931-1999: American Dream, Borghesia, Carpettes, Curved Air, 809, Sonny Fisher, Joyce Harris, Lyres, Maximum Joy, Oz, David Peel, Ritual, Luis Russell, Martine St. Clair, Stylle Band, Sugarloaf, Trillion, Tristan Tzara, Vee VV, Charles Wright & Watts 103rd Street Band, Yeah Yeah No, more!
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
PAZZ & JOP PRODUCT REPORT - early November 2025
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
Pazz & Jop Product Reports, 2025
This post is a tool; it’s how I keep track of new music I hear — thus enabling me, for one thing, to put together long lists of albums I like when the year comes to an end.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 1, 2025 at 2:18 PM
PAZZ & JOP PRODUCT REPORT - early November 2025
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
Reposted by Chuck Eddy
Reading that Kirk Gibson's Parkinson's center just opened in Farmington Hills, MI reminded me I wrote about him when he was still in the minors (and I was 18). But mostly I wrote about his fellow Waterford high school grad Mike Grace, who played 5 Reds games in 1978. He was having a better summer.
A Tale of Two Ballplayers
My first journalistic focus was sports, which I got the opportunity to cover during two college summer breaks for an upper Oakland County, Michigan suburban weekly inexplicably known as the Spinal Col...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 1, 2025 at 2:09 PM
Reading that Kirk Gibson's Parkinson's center just opened in Farmington Hills, MI reminded me I wrote about him when he was still in the minors (and I was 18). But mostly I wrote about his fellow Waterford high school grad Mike Grace, who played 5 Reds games in 1978. He was having a better summer.
PAZZ & JOP PRODUCT REPORT - early November 2025
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
Pazz & Jop Product Reports, 2025
This post is a tool; it’s how I keep track of new music I hear — thus enabling me, for one thing, to put together long lists of albums I like when the year comes to an end.
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 1, 2025 at 2:18 PM
PAZZ & JOP PRODUCT REPORT - early November 2025
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
YEAH: Kindred the Family Soul: Grand Life (We’re Not a Label) 5; Mike Clark Jr.: Keep On Steppin’ (ColliPark/Atlantic EP) 5; Kang 803: New School Blues (KG Music Group EP) 5; Fatdaddy: Perfect EP (Music Access EP) 5...
[continued]:
Reading that Kirk Gibson's Parkinson's center just opened in Farmington Hills, MI reminded me I wrote about him when he was still in the minors (and I was 18). But mostly I wrote about his fellow Waterford high school grad Mike Grace, who played 5 Reds games in 1978. He was having a better summer.
A Tale of Two Ballplayers
My first journalistic focus was sports, which I got the opportunity to cover during two college summer breaks for an upper Oakland County, Michigan suburban weekly inexplicably known as the Spinal Col...
chuckeddy.substack.com
November 1, 2025 at 2:09 PM
Reading that Kirk Gibson's Parkinson's center just opened in Farmington Hills, MI reminded me I wrote about him when he was still in the minors (and I was 18). But mostly I wrote about his fellow Waterford high school grad Mike Grace, who played 5 Reds games in 1978. He was having a better summer.