Obscure Singles Heard at CVS

I like Afterburner but yeah outside of "why am I hearing Sleeping Bag at CVS?" insanity I don't know why anything from it would make regular rotation on rock radio now

― da croupier, Thursday, October 11, 2012 2:32 PM

I tweeted this a few days ago. Recently:

Duran Duran - Do You Believe in Shame
Michael Penn - This and That

Semisonic: All About Chemistry

Grocery store, not CVS, but "Echo Beach" by Martha and the Muffins.

Not a CVS but I recently heard "I Am The Slime" by Zappa when I was getting my hair cut

once heard the entirety of they might be giants' flood on the walmart radio station.

jesus buddy were you waiting for an oil change or something?

ie it wasn't some worker blasting flood thru the store pa, it was the corporate radio station piped into walmarts coast to coast for some reason doing a 'showcase' on flood.

haha i think (dear god i hope) it started soon after i arrived and i may have indeed lingered to take it in, hear 'twisting' for the first time in however many years, take half an hour to decide whether or not i want poptarts, etc. something very fucked about hearing this blasting at walmart though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zNoxjUUyec

hahaha that's better than what I was guessing, which was "Your Racist Friend"

I heard Cracker's cover of "Shake Some Action" in CVS just two nights ago.

Others:

Boz Scaggs - Miss Sun
a-ha - The Sun Always Shines on TV
Tyler Collins - Girls Night Out
Toni Childs - Don't Walk Away

Huh I heard echo beach at Barnes & noble last week.

weirdest one i remember was "change your mind" by neil young while i was standing in line to get painkillers a few years ago. must've been a radio edit. felt appropriate.

Michael Penn - This and That
also, this song is so classic

Heard "Let's Hang On" which was a minor Top 40 for Barry Manilow at a Rite Aid once.

Sunrise by Duran Duran at Papa Ginos a month or so ago.
Why would THAT happen?

lite rock cover of Catch the Sun by Doves @ my bank

"Heaven's on Fire" by KISS was playing on at least two separate occasions at the CVS by my college

not an obscure single really but jarring in the soft-rock context, heard "More Bounce to the Ounce" at the local grocery store a few months ago

REM - "All The Way To Reno"

ie it wasn't some worker blasting flood thru the store pa, it was the corporate radio station piped into walmarts coast to coast for some reason doing a 'showcase' on flood.

― balls, Thursday, October 11, 2012 5:25 PM (6 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That is exceptionally weird and now I want to listen to that album which I haven't done in years.

It's not obscure but I was euphoric when I heard Amy Grant's "I Will Remember You" yesterday.

was picking up prescription for antidepressant at walgreens and they were playing "i wanna be sedated." no lie.

heard velvet underground - oh! sweet nuthin' at walgreens last week

Sugar Ray's "Chasin You Around" at Met Foods. The second single off In Pursuit Of Leisure, the album after the last one anyone cared about

not obscure but heard like a 10-minute Tool deep cut in a 24 hour kroger once. it was weird because there was usually just soft rock & r&b playing there

a couple visits to shop rite ago i heard the 12-inch edit of "she's always in my hair"

I'm just gonna use this thread for obscure songs heard in any retail setting:

Roxy Music - 2HB in Noodles and Company yesterday.

The other week in Morrisons they were playing 'If I Could Talk I'd Tell You' by the Lemonheads (a #39 smash in 1996).

Heard the Kinks' "Juke Box Music" in a grocery store a couple of years ago. Barely a hit in the US in 1977, never played on "classic rock" radio.

lol i heard donna lewis's flop second single "without love" in a cvs once

Heard "For What It's Worth" by The Cardigans in the grocery store the other day.

not that obscure really but heard dennis deyoung's "desert moon" followed by madonna's "this used to be my playground" on KRGR kroger radio last night, the algorithm was feeling some super intense nostalgia apparently

Thought this was a revival of this thread: albert hammond, "it never rains in southern california"

Not obscure, but I really enjoyed hearing Scritti Politti at CVS yesterday.

I heard the song 'On the Beach' by Neil Young at the grocery store once.

Heard "Couple Days Off" by Huey Lewis & The News last night at Whataburger.

Heard "Emerge" Fischerspooner at a Florida water-park

https://soundcloud.com/hennessyyoungman/cvsbangers

haha thank you, a classic

Jack In The Box is good for these. Today it was "Wild Wild Life" by Talking Heads, and last time a couple weeks ago I heard "Canary In A Coalmine" by The Police.

It's not obscure but I was euphoric when I heard Amy Grant's "I Will Remember You" yesterday.

alfred i'd start straight up bawling

I heard that really sterile, generic, terrible ballad by "Sergio Mendes" from the 80s...."Never Gonna Let You Go"...in a Zaxby's.

whenever i'm in cvs i hear "shattered dreams"

I heard Jack Wagner's "All I Need" and Richard Marx's "Hazard" once in an Albertsons during a 4 hour shift. I remain convinced that they had not changed their Muzak since my childhood.

and whenever I hit the "from this empty heart" falsetto several mothers in the cold medicine section scowl

hahaha. I can't help not singing along to that tune either. that or "All I Need is a Miracle".

haha otm

Shopping for pencils and invisible tape at CVS this morning I heard "Soul Drifter" by Lindsey Buckingham!

^^^^ I've heard it at CVS too

Manu Dibango - "Soul Makossa," in H.E.B. yesterday (though for some reason, in that store, the only place you can usually hear the music without straining your ears is in the restroom)

for what, making them upset in a Walgreens?

I still don't know how/why Badfinger (or whoever controls their copyrights) didn't sue Joe Jackson.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Monday, December 7, 2020 9:26 AM bookmarkflaglink

Ha, I was just about to add "Same with 'Day After Day'!" to IML's post.

It feels borderline for this thread, but it was definitely weird to hear Elton John’s “Can’t Stay Alone Tonight” in a grocery store during the lead up to Christmas.

It counts...a definite subset of this whole thing is "Album Cuts Off Recent-ish Releases From Legacy Artists".

Out of all the Blondie tracks, this is the ONLY one I knew before hand would be a hit. The original is amazing and we were in a position wherein I knew if we released a decent version it would succeed.
I had no idea I'd be hearing it in CVS forty years later https://t.co/cCqhrpT8b1

— Chris Stein (@chrissteinplays) January 31, 2021

"Flying High Again" by Ozzy Osbourne

"Midnight Blue" by Lou Gramm

"She's A Lot Like You" by The Cars

In that order.

i been a baaaad baaaad boy

Billy Joel "Leave a Tender Moment Alone" at the dentists office.

more like "leave a tender molar alone" amirite

Playing just now at the Home Depot - Charlotte Sometimes (?!)

that is amazing, i don't think i have ever heard that song out in the wild before.

Not at all obscure, but as I stepped on the stair machine at a local gym where the majority of my gym mates are black women, "Brown Sugar" by the Stones was playing.

gay people love to tell you what song from 2002 was playing at CVS

— Jill Gutowitz (@jillboard) April 20, 2021

god "brown sugar" reeeeeally needs to disappear

might beat my all time worst gym playlist experience with "Tears in Heaven"

I would be tempted to use weights as a discus to throw at someone's head if I heard that Clapton while working out

The first three lines from Modern Love hit pretty hard when heard in a Lowe‘s

— Holy Mountain (@Holy_Mountain) April 22, 2021

Playing just now at the Home Depot - Charlotte Sometimes (?!)

Us3: "Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)" at Fuddruckers

wait

why are you at Fuddruckers

Because it was there.

(FWIW, it wasn't my pick, and based on today I probably won't be back soon.)

probably have not eaten at a Fuddruckers since 1999 or so, but i have fond memories of the steak fries and especially the shakes. bear in mind i was a teenager at the time so my palate was not super sophisticated even when it came to evaluating fries and shakes.

I spent just about every Saturday night with my folks b/w 1984 and 1990 at Fuddruckers.

the Fuddruckers near me now is basically you walk up to a kiosk and put in your order electronically, you can see some of the people making your burger but it wasn't like that big clear glass window most Fuddruckers had in the 80s. and you can order like Bison burger and shit now

It def feels like a heavy piece of 1980s culture that somehow has persisted as an actual place instead of a meme.

their milkshakes were legit good!

Oh, I loved it as a kid. I can still smell that smell

Their hot dog bread was the most...generous I'd ever seen. I'm sure it had more calories by itself than the side o' beef on display behind the glass.

I have a Berenstein Bears moment any time someone brings up Fuddruckers, since my family's eating establishment of choice on vacations was Fudpucker's.

Such a ridiculous question. I’m vaccinated and when I walk into a grocery store or CVS, I still wear a mask out of respect to my fellow citizen. I also walk into both mostly to hear my songs but that’s another topic. https://t.co/SVKnalkk1q

— Richard Marx (@richardmarx) May 7, 2021

Funny guy (and not just “for a musician”)

I like Marx

Walk of Life is, at minimum, a top three grocery store song. https://t.co/mkpQkaAj5H

— Kaleb Horton (@kalebhorton) May 11, 2021

Dire Straits are fine, but this is a hard disagree for me

Just because BOSE salesmen used CDs of both bands to showcase their speakers doesn't mean that the two bands are in any way equal to each other.

One unique way they are related is that I was first exposed to a ton of their album tracks on store and restaurant Muzaks.

i heard a good one just yesterday in the grocery store but i've already forgotten what it was

i remember now! it was "shine" by years & years... which i know was a big hit in the uk, but i live in the states so i was v surprised to hear it in the wild like that

how can someone even enjoy music if they think “walk of life” is a top 3 anything

dedication, devotion

Us3: "Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)" at Fuddruckers

I dunno, hearing "Walk of Life" in a really bleak Costco in rural Indiana while scanning the bread might just make my day.

“Walk of Life” was playing in the grocery store earlier, and I was enjoying it so much I felt a flash of annoyance when someone cut through on the PA to make an announcement.

I wish it were obscure!

XP "Super Special Two-For-One Sale On Headbands! Boppa Lula Only Today!"

we got to move these
digiorno's pizzas
we got to move these chef boyardeeeeeees

“Walk of Life” was playing in the grocery store earlier, and I was enjoying it so much I felt a flash of annoyance when someone cut through on the PA to make an announcement.

I feel like Byrne would appreciate that.

True story.

While pumping gas at a Holiday station in rural upper Michigan today I heard Alphabet Street and Electric Avenue back to back which felt very out of place and amazing simultaneously

Relevant...

Huge riffs in unexpected places: When I was walking into @LiveCasinoPHL around noon today, "Rock Bottom" by @UFO_rockband came over the sound system! A few hours later they played "Gypsy" by @uriah_heep!

Almost made losing that huge pot with top two against middle set worth it.

— Brian O'Neill (@NYC__Native) June 10, 2021