Brent Johnson

brent johnson digs up a semi-lost treasure from OK Go, one of the stars of this year’s batch of Super Bowl commercials … Technically, OK Go’s ‘Needing/Getting’ isn’t a lost song anymore. Not after the millions of people tuning into the Super Bowl on Sunday saw the alt-poppers play it during a Chevy commercial. Well, at least a version of it. The clip features the Chicago band driving a Chevy Sonic through a desert lined with 288 guitars, 55 pianos and more than 1,100 homemade...Read Full Story

brent johnson digs up a lost Oscar-nominated treasure in an open letter to the Academy’s music branch … Dear Music Branch of The Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences: What happened? You know the Oscar for Best Original Song? The one you give each year to the best tune written specifically for a movie? It used to be great. Over the years, you’ve awarded pop stars, recognized underrated tracks and treated us to lovely surprises. You’ve given trophies to Irving Berlin, Rodgers...Read Full Story

brent johnson digs up another lost treasure, this week from The Beach Boys … It could be the greatest lost song on the greatest lost album of all-time. Legendary as it may be, the story of The Beach Boys’ SMiLE is too good not to re-tell. From May 1966 until May 1967, Brian Wilson spent hours and hours and hours tinkering at what he intended to be the group’s boldest statement. Their last album, Pet Sounds , was a lush, heartbreaking classic that pushed America’s most popular band far...Read Full Story

brent johnson welcomes 2012 with a lost cut from the most important band to call it quits in 2011 … When R.E.M. broke up last year, the music world lost something rare: a cult band that was also a household name. The Athens, Ga., alt-rockers often sounded little like a mainstream act — a group with murky vocals, mysterious background voices, tangled-wire guitars, indecipherable lyrics and hooks played by mandolins. They were a band made for college radio, even when Top 40 stations started...Read Full Story

brent johnson digs up a lost treasure from The B-52′s just in time for your New Year’s party … The B-52′s have long been hailed as the world’s greatest party band. Well, get ready for one strange party. Most of the world knows their pair of smash 1989 hits: the kooky ‘Love Shack’ and the sublime ‘Roam.’ But a decade before that, The B-52′s emerged from the same fertile Athens, Ga., music scene that also produced R.E.M. Only, they weren’t as much alt-rock as art-rock — sporting...Read Full Story

brent johnson has an early gift for everyone: ‘Father Christmas’ by The Kinks … Leave it to Ray Davies to write a Christmas song that’s also social commentary. In 1977, Davies and his band The Kinks unleashed piece of hard-edged holiday rock about a department-store Santa … who gets mugged by a gang of children. They don’t want toys, they tell him. They want his money instead. You won’t find ‘Father Christmas’ playing on many mainstream radio stations this time of year. It might sound...Read Full Story

brent johnson digs up a lost song from The Cure, one of the bands that was not included in another otherwise stellar Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame class today … Today, the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame welcomed one of its strongest classes in a while: the Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Guns ‘N Roses, The Faces, Donovan and Laura Nyro. A good mix of critical favorites, modern legends, innovators and artists that represent a wide array of genres — rap, funk, alt-rock, hard rock, blues rock, the...Read Full Story

brent johnson digs up a lost treasure from The Fab Four on the 10-year anniversary of George Harrison’s death … What if George Harrison wasn’t a member of The Beatles? What if he was the leader of his own British Invasion band? Would songs like ‘If I Needed Someone,’ ‘Taxman’ and ‘Within You Without You’ — mere album tracks on Fab Four records — have been hit singles instead? It’s hard to believe they wouldn’t have. Ten years have passed since the world lost Harrison to cancer. And to...Read Full Story

brent johnson is thankful for the following Heatmiser song as we prepare for Thanksgiving … You may not know Heatmiser. They’re one of the lost bands from alt-rock’s 1990s heyday — a quartet from Portland, Ore., that made three fantastic albums amid little fanfare before breaking up 15 years ago. You may know their members, though. Singer/guitarist Neil Gust went on to form late-’90s rock band No. 2. Drummer Tony Lash later produced The Dandy Warhols. Bassist Sam Coomes is the frontman...Read Full Story

The Canes come close in the final minute on a 5 on 3 but can’t beat Brent Johnson as he saves the game with an amazing skate save. http://www.youtube.com/v/O9LZ45kuBDs?version=3&f=user_uploads&app=youtube_gdata See the rest here: Brent Johnson makes game-saving toe save 12/3/11Read Full Story