We all have things that scare us.

C’mon — you know as well as I do that that “thing” underneath the fridge is definitely scary. Or maybe somebody like Glen Beck or Dennis Kucinich makes you tremble in fear. Or maybe it’s just green tea that makes you faint.

Whatever the case, the Uncles have you covered! We’re peeling back out own inner protective layers to reveal some of our own neuroses and fears, as realized in songs written and performed by other people (who obviously eavesdropped on our deepest, darkest thoughts to pen the lyrics — scary!).

Enjoy?

• Onkel Rudi’s “That which scares me… scares me!”
• Uncle Sam’s “Nachtmares!”
• U.N.K.L.E. Matt’s list coming soon!
• The Man(del) from UNKLE’s list coming soon!

This month, Selective Service has done a bit of downsizing. To help those of you with ADD, we’ve each put together a list of short songs — songs that are less than 2 1/2 minutes long (songs from The Beatles’ “Abbey Road” side two suite could NOT be used).

Uncle Sam asked me to do the writeup of this and at first I was offended thinking it was a knock on my smaller stature, but I got over that and thought, “who better to write up about this list than me?”

I mean, one of my favorite kinds of foods are mini-foods. White Castles, Mini-pizzas, KFC snackers… these songs are like the equivalent of those. They’re hors d’oeuvres of music… melodic sliders… tapas tunes… mini-morsels that are packed with big taste!

So, get your mouse and aural appetite ready, but there are a lot of songs to download this month…behold this month’s lists that prove that great things can come in small packages!

• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “Bite-Sized Bliss”
• UNKLE Matt’s “The Snippettes”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Brevity in Song”
• Uncle Sam’s “Short Cuts”

I can’t remember exactly under what circumstances I had this thought, but when I was a kid I remember thinking, “Do you think they’ll ever run out of song titles? There are only so many combinations of words in the English language.” My youthful fear has been alleviated thanks to the continual invention of new words like “shizzle,” but I’m pretty sure my initial question was brought upon by hearing lots of songs with the same or deeply similar names.

Upon further review — and a good, deep exploration in this month’s playlists — that’s a very good thing. Enjoy our playlists featuring songs with the same name that aren’t the same song. Sorry, Digital Underground.

• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “We’ve Got Magic To Do”
• UNKLE Matt’s “Some X 8″
• Uncle Sam’s “‘I Want You’ to Want Me”
• Onkel Rudi’s “The Song Remains The Same… Sort Of (”It’s Only Love”)”

P.S. - Before anyone gets all Merriam-Webster on me for misunderstanding the definition of homonym, I’m reinterpreting the term to apply to song. Word?

We’re wrapping up our tribute to music’s holy trinity of excess this month by cranking the amps to eleven. “Rock and roll!”

Maybe these playlists will help them find Cleveland:

• Uncle Sam’s “Gunter glieben glauchen globen”
• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “Ka-ROCK-oke”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Too Old to Rock & Roll”
• UNKLE Matt’s list is coming soon!

For June, we continue exploring music’s holy trinity of excess. Once again, Mister Mackey sets the stage — he’s such an illustrative speaker:

Let’s consult a bunch of knowledgeable musicians to help him out:

• Uncle Sam’s “Mr. and Mrs. Erotic American”
• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “The Sex Factor”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Ooooooh!”
• UNKLE Matt’s “Pleasure Delayer”

This month we begin to tackle music’s holy trinity of excess. I’ll let Mister Mackey set things up:

Duly noted.

• The Mandel From UNKLE’s “Rated Rx”
• Uncle Sam’s “I don’t like the drugs, but the songs about drugs like me”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Chemically Enhanced”
• U.N.K.L.E. Matt’s “Bad Things, Man”

Bonus playlist!

• Uncle Sam’s “More Songs About Amphetamines and Ecstacy”

This month’s theme comes courtesy loyal reader Bob Shortell, and it’s pretty direct:

“Punching”

For more fun, we decided to open our playlists to physical violence of any kind, really, so you’ll also find kicking, slapping, and even a little kung-fu fighting, too. Have fun and watch your back!

• UNKLE Matt’s “Your Songs Too Short To Box With iPod”
• Uncle Sam’s “Feeling Punchy, Tweety”
• Onkel Rudi’s “A bit punchy, are we? Or punch drunk?”
• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s Hit Me Baby, Seven More Times!

Last year when we were compiling our storytelling playlists, Matt & I realized that our nets were cast too wide — the sheer volume of outstanding story/songs deserved more focused attention, so we decided to break things up into bookstore-like sections: fiction and non-fiction. We’ve already delivered our fictional tales, so now we seek the truth: Our lists this month are storytelling songs devoted to real people or events. Enjoy the history lessons!

• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “Vox Reality”
• Uncle Sam’s “You Couldn’t Make This Stuff Up”
• UNKLE Matt’s “Phonography”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Real People”

Ever felt listless?

In need of a boost? A pick-me-up?

Ever felt like your “get up and go” just got up and went?

Do we need to get all Matt Foley on ‘ya? Because, y’know, we uncles don’t want to see y’all end up in a van down by the river…

I thought so.

Anyhow, music can be a motivator, helping move a day along, make a task easier, inspire, kick some ass and otherwise move mountains (granted, music is more likely to set off an avalanche than actually move the solid rock of a mountain, but I seem to exist on the same temporal plane as “Loony Tunes”).

Everybody, it seems, has a song (or two, or three, or six) that can act as the catalyst to daily life. With that, dive in to these selections:

• Onkel Rudi’s “Racer Ready… GO!”
• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “Motivational Stereo Speakers”
• U.N.K.L.E. Matt’s “Up And Atom!”
• Uncle Sam’s “We like Roy! We like Roy!”

(Sorry for the lateness of this intro post. Living in DC, we had, y’know, this big event here that took away energy for almost everything else.)

For the first time, in the history of Selective Service, we’re featuring an all-Huey Lewis and the News set of playlists!

OK, maybe not… but there is a bit of history involved as this month’s playlists are time machines. As we close out the year and face a barrage of “Best of 2008″ lists (something you’ll see later this month here), we’ll kick off the month highlighting the “Best of” for a memorable year in music for us.

A lot of times when hearing a song from a certain year, it will act as that Delorean reflecting what was going on in society. Songs like “Revolution” and “Street Fighting Man” characterized the volatility of 1968, while “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy” and “Y.M.C.A.” epitomized the sexual, cocaine-filled haze of 1978. But then, a song can just simply make us nostalgic for a period in our lives as often happens with people our age whenever something from the 80s pops up on the shuffle.

So, come with us by downloading these tracks and gearing up to 88 MPH with this December set of Selective Service playlists!

• The Man(del) from UNCLE’s “E.P.: The Extraordinary Playlist”
• U.N.K.L.E. Matt’s “It’s The 20080’s!”
• Uncle Sam’s “When I Was 21, It Was A Very Good Year”
• Onkel Rudi’s “Road Tripping 1991″