Listening To “The Best Show”: 1/13/09 Episode

A weekly recap of The Best Show On WFMU, Tom Scharpling’s call-in/comedy/music show broadcast every Tuesday night from Jersey City. The three-hour program is available for free download at iTunes.

Tom fields a call from a local proprietor of a chain of hot-dog carts; the entrepreneurial fellow has to be talked down from inking a distribution deal with Merge Records to sell a Scruffy The Cat five-CD boxed set at all his carts. Already in the works, however, is the hot dog vendor’s cassette release from a supergroup called MickNickPickMickNick:

Mick Mars from Mötley Crüe
Nick Rhodes from Duran Duran
Pick Withers, former drummer in Dire Straits
Mick Box from Uriah Heep
Nick Hogan, Hulk Hogan’s son

The band is described as “a total democracy” in which each guy sings and plays at the same time. It reportedly sounds “like a herd of goats eating a rubber raft.”

Spike = Seymour Stein?
Came across this interesting theory on fotpedia; is caller Spike actually legendary Sire Records president and WFMU listener Seymour Stein? We met Stein, briefly, during Sire’s late-‘90s courtship of the Apples In Stereo but can’t recall anything about the man other than his certifiably Cosby sweater. Music-biz friends, unmask this man: tips@magnetmagazine.com

Tom welcomes Paul F. Tompkins, comedian and host of VH-1’s Best Week Ever, as his studio guest. Tompkins is always a welcome addition to the show: He’s got a great laugh, and he somehow makes Tom leaner and meaner toward meandering callers.

Speaking of meandering callers, here is the Fredericks from New Port Ritchey soundboard Tom has been using. Careful, friends: It’s a slippery slope from this to morning-zoo “Yeah, baby!” soundbites from Austin Powers.

Have not previously mentioned Fuel Dump, the novel Tom is writing, 140 characters at a time, on his Twitter page. Mostly because I don’t know what to make of it. Seems like a lot of effort.