Summer of Ham

It's the summer concert season, which only makes it painfully clear that we live in the dead-ass middle of the country. Madonna, Pearl Jam, Radiohead — all of those hot-ticket tours are flying right over our heads while local marquees display only throwback bands.

In contemplating the idea of hot-weather communion with pop dinosaurs, we logged on to iTunes and cooked up an iMix of the most jammin' hits by many of the bands coming through Kansas City this summer.

What we realized is that just about all of these songs, even the ones by sucky bands, are actually really damn good. Who knew? Here are the liner notes to some of our favorite tunes from the mix. (If you want a copy to remind you of the great summer concert season of '06, go to the Music Store at iTunes, click on iMix, and look for the mix titled "Summertime in KC. " It'll set you back about $40.) TimesDave Matthews Band with G. Love & Special Sauce "What Would You Say" (Dave), "Cold Beverage" (G. Love) Dave Matthews has become a punch line, but when the cuddly, nasal-voiced, South African palooka came on the scene in '96 with this bullshit ditty about being there when the bear ate its head, thinking it was a candy, you know you ate it up. Meanwhile, Philly homeboy G. Love's best album remains his band's self-titled debut, a slopping stew of hip-hoppy blues that features "Cold Beverage," the finest ode to the quenching of summer thirst since the Sons of the Pioneers' warbly "Cool Water." Bet those old cowboys never rapped Go, girl, work the cold one. And they probably didn't get as much pussy as G. Love, either.

Dave Matthews Band with G. Love & Special Sauce. Wednesday, May 31, at Starlight Theatre.

The Gin Blossoms TimesTimes"Hey Jealousy" When, in 1992, the Gin Blossoms asked, Do you think it'll be all right/If I can just crash here tonight? who knew they'd be staying around so damn long? What most people don't know is that the writer of that song (and all the good ones on the band's full-length debut, The New Miserable Experience) was the band's original guitarist, Doug Hopkins. Around the time of the album's release, he left the band (or was fired) because of his alcoholism and depression. He committed suicide soon after that. More hits followed, but it's Hopkins' tale of driving around town, leading the cops on a merry chase, that really takes us home.

The Gin Blossoms. Thursday, June 8, at Harrah's VooDoo Lounge.

Al Green TimesTimes"Let's Stay Together" The whole of Al Green's Greatest Hits (the one boasting a slim, shirtless Rev. Al on the cover), with its slow-burning grooves, would make the perfect soundtrack to any mid-July barbecue. But in the context of a summer fling, "Let's Stay Together" takes on a new twist of irony. Summer romances never last, but when it's midnight and you're making out on the slide at a secluded playground under the stars, it seems impossible that the relationship will ever end.

Al Green. Friday, June 16, at Rhythm and Ribs at the American Jazz Museum.

Sonic Youth TimesTimes"Sugar Kane" Who says Glenn Branca's experimental noise disciples ain't got a few sweet jams up their sleeves? "Sugar Kane," from Sonic Youth's '92 album, Dirty, is as fine a feel-good hit as any produced in the last decade, with the added benefit of guitar hooks that come on like that moment the weed smoke gently lifts you up by the edges of your face and drops you in the land of fuzzed-out groovage and spontaneous dry humping.

Sonic Youth. Monday, June 26, at Liberty Hall.

Lynyrd Skynyrd and 3 Doors Down TimesTimes"Gimme Three Steps" (Skynyrd) and "Be Like That" (3 Doors) Because Led Zeppelin and Creed can't tour together, the fates have sent us the pairing Lynyrd Skynyrd and 3 Doors Down. It's puzzling how Skynyrd manages to go on, considering that half the band, including original singer Ronnie Van Zant, the one you still hear on the radio, died in 1977. Well, if they can still sing about cuttin' a rug in a place called the Jug with a girl named Linda Lou, why stop 'em? As for 3 Dorks Down, if they drink enough whiskey, die in enough plane crashes and become the most beloved band of an entire U.S. region (the Corn Belt loves you, 3DD!), maybe they'll be sorta "like that" someday.

Lynyrd Skynyrd, with 3 Doors Down and Shooter Jennings. Wednesday, June 28, at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater. Lynyrd Skynyrd, with Trace Adkins and others. Friday, August 11, at the Missouri State Fair in Sedalia, Missouri.

Creedence Clearwater Revisted, John Fogerty "Lodi" (Creedence Clearwater Revival), "Centerfield" (Fogerty) No members of a broken-up band have spent more of their lives in legal drama than John Fogerty and his Creedence Clearwater Revival bandmates. Now that more than 20 years of smoke has cleared, Fogerty has gone his way and Stu Cook and Doug "Cosmo" Clifford, the only original members in the subtly renamed Creedence Clearwater Revisited, have gone theirs. Both play CCR hits, and of those, the original "Lodi" is our choice summer jam. It's a song about an everyman-nobody musician stuck in a small California town, playing for a bunch of unappreciative drunks. But the tune is so good and the lyrics so succinct in capturing that feeling of I-may-get-out-of-here-and-I-may-not that the song resonates universally — from the girl stuck behind a counter at Walgreens in Olathe to the U.S. infantryman on his third deployment in Iraq. It's not a happy song, but it's hopeful. (We also included Fogerty's "Centerfield" just so you can practice that tricky clapping rhythm at home before hitting the ballpark and looking like a retarded seal.)