Obscure Singles Heard at CVS

...and now The Band: "Ophelia"

Heard a dope Latin house remix of Santana's "smooth" in a Tex-mex place the other day. Sounded like basement jaxx back when they were good

The English Beat: "Save It For Later" in a huge supermarket in upstate New York yesterday. None of their songs were remotely hits in the US.

^^Not denying the obscurity, but "SIFL" was a pretty big MTV track back in the day.

It was a semi-regular on San Francisco's "alternative"
station in the 90s... especially the dope "80s lunch" megamix thing they did. That was an exceptional window of programming, though

That station was 105.3. "Live 105"

XTC — Generals and Majors

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/k1Rlq6m0Aob8LRffG7nvlQscLK78WoY5AHffLT7y0VU=w640-h320-no

at Carl's Jr. today.

by Spoon in case you don't know.

^^^^

Love Live 105! I do miss the flashback lunch (and basically all of their programming before they got bought by cbs or whoever in 1998). Back when I first started listening to the radio, depeche, cure, new order, etc were played almost as much there as nirvana, pumpkins, nin, radiohead

Depeche Mode: "Behind The Wheel/Route 66" at Fuddrucker's

Blues Traveler: "But Anyway" at Jason's Deli

Neil Young — Walk On

Arcade Fire's "Rebellion (Lies)" at Jack in the Box today.

James Blunt: "1973" at El polio loco (Seems like this one and "Stay The Night" are both major candidates for 'Songs That Live On Exclusively On Muzak Playlists')

El POLLO Loco

Not obscure, but noteworthy:

The last two times I've filled up at my local Shell station, they've been playing "Carry On" by fun.

I heard Taylor Swift's 2010 single Story of Us in Bed, Bath, and Beyond. The song finished and another one started while I was in the checkout line. As I left the store and walked out to the parking lot, the shopping center's outdoor stereo system started playing Story of Us.

The Police: "When The World Is Running Down" at Which Wich

lol @ El polio loco

AC/DC: "Big Gun" & Kiss: "Strutter" (the original version) at HEB.

Smithereens: "A Girl Like You" at Five Guys

Thunderclap Newman "Something in the Air" at Foodtown

Pavement, I think "Gold Soundz?" - at Trader Joe's

Talking Heads: "Warning Sign" at this mom'n'pop pizza joint I ate at last night (noteworthy mainly because it was surrounded by really played-out Classic Rock stuff--think "Carry On Wayward Son" & such--and Johnny Cash for some reason)

John Mellencamp: "Key West Intermezzo" at the FedEx Store.

Marshall Crenshaw: "Someday Someway" actually at CVS (and interrupted at least twice for ads)

― Don A Henley And Get Over It (C. Grisso/McCain), Thursday, November 13, 2014 7:19 PM (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I too have heard "Someday, Someway" at CVS. Also heard "IGY" by Donald Fagen.

― ablaeser, Friday, November 14, 2014 9:45 PM (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Crenshaw - Whenever You're on My Mind. Hear it all the time now in the grocery...

― Jimmy_Chop, Sunday, May 1, 2016 8:59 AM (seven months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

My friend is interviewing Crenshaw on the radio rn, and they just had a little sidestep wherein they discussed hearing his music (particularly "Whenever You're On My Mind") in stores and restaurants.

"Recover" by Chvrches at Cane's.

Carl Perkins: "Matchbox" at Whataburger.

White Stripes: "Conquest" and Black Crowds: "Go Faster" at Freebirds

Black CROWES

Thanks to Spotify/Pandora it's easy nowadays for obscure stuff to slip into background music.

live version of Life During Wartime from Stop Making Sense

Heard a version of The Cramps' "TV Set" in a restaurant yesterday. Turns out it's a cover by Spoon, from the Poltergeist OST, I had no idea.

The Cure — Cut Here

Singing along at the top of my lungs whilst driving the forklift.

Howard Jones "Life in One Day" at the bank.

Delaney & Bonnie: "Only You & I Know" at Fuzzy's Taco Shop

Saint Etienne: "I Was Born On Christmas Day" (on Deep Cut Xmas Muzak) at Denny's

"Hong Kong Garden" at a Vons grocery store in San Diego.

lol

Moby Grape "8:05" in a McDonalds, how did that happen?

Ray Kroc was a head

Edwin Starr: "Agent Double-O-Soul" at McDonald's

Polly Brown "Up In A Puff Of Smoke" at a restaurant in Kissimmee, FL. I'm certain I have not heard this since it was new in 1975.

http://i.imgur.com/2oZoffa.jpg

I have literally never heard Sugarloaf before in my life. Song was decent.

Oh, that's a big one! Love that kinda lumpy, good-natured but insistent riff.... I guess there's not much else to it as a song. You'd hear it - the single edit anyway - infrequently on classic rock radio when I was a teen. Not a total out-of-the-blue thing but not in regular rotation. I can remember a point in tenth grade or so when I specifically registered it as a song that existed and got excited figuring out that riff in keyboard class (it didn't take long). Their other hit, "Don't Call Us, We'll Call You" is pretty different in style/vibe, honestly not too great but interesting if you're into "rock stars bitching about the rock business" things.

The touch-tone phone dialing you hear in "Don't Call Us, We'll Call You" was the real (and unlisted) phone number of their previous record company that had just dumped them, the band likely hoping they'd get lots of prank calls

Ha! Wow.

not exactly fitting for this thread, given its status as an underground classic, but i was surprised to hear "Vitamin C" by Can at a Chipotle in south Phoenix last month

IMHO that counts! Although it crystallizes something about this thread to me, which is that there's at least two versions of this. One is where retail playlist designers design or lease some algorithm meant to add "hippitude" (I'm guessing) - hence the Can and Television and Buzzcocks and so on. The other is where an algorithm meant to capture popular, well-liked music omnivorously consumes anything that's ever charted or been semi-popular or was released as a single by a top-40 act.

Version two is sorta more interesting in that it gives the uncanny sense that you are dealing with a live human DJ pulling out unjustly overlooked faves, even though everything they play can still be found in a reasonably well-stocked karaoke binder. AFAICT the people who make professional licensed karaoke CDs are similarly wont to include anything that was ever a 'hit.' A shame there is no way to measure the actual performance rate of these things - I have a strong suspicion nobody has ever once actively chosen to sing Van Halen's "Feels So Good" or Swing Out Sister's "La La," but there they are in the listings...

Actually there is a sort of way to track karaoke performance rates--albeit a very localized one. For my friend's birthday last summer, his wife rented out a private room at one of the big (although imho not the best) places in town. Alongside the binders (which were a bit out of date), they had a computer terminal where you would actually pull up and queue the track you wanted to sing. Each entry had a play count for the venue alongside it. There were several obvious Pop and Country things that were in the thousands. As for me, I gave (iirc) "Dead Flowers" and maybe a couple other things a debut.