PRESS TO PAUSE - June 2008

The Great Unknown is taking a break.

For all you "viewers" out there, I'm taking some time off for a variety of reasons.

Firstly, response of late has been lukewarm to say the least but most importantly I am currently in the process of working on another blog that is a little closer to home and which is taking up a lot of my time and enthusiasm. (see http://toptwentyclub.blogspot.com/)

I'm not sure when I will return, maybe I'll knock "The Great Unknown" on the head for good who knows? However, for the small amount of people who have been looking in from time to time, keep doing so and something just might happen.

PRESS TO PLAY - May 08

BELLE & SEBASTIAN - Mayfly (1996)



From "If You're Feeling Sinister" - MATADOR Records. A toast to the wonderful world of Belle & Sebastian and all of it's inhabitants. Included partially becuase it includes a solo on that rarest of instruments, the Stylophone.

GENE VINCENT - Those Wedding Bells (Are Breaking Up That Old Gang Of Mine) (1956)



From Vincent's debut album "Bluejean Bop!" This song has been mentioned in despatches by Paul McCartney when trying to explain the slow disintegration of The Beatles leading to their eventual break-up.

GRAHAM PARKER - White Honey (1976)



From Parker's debut album "Howlin' Wind", an album described by the bashful Parker himself as "the best record released during 1976".

ELVIS COSTELLO & THE IMPOSTERS - Go Away (2008)



A new track from a guy who was, incorrectly, considered a Graham Parker clone back in 1976/1977. I have to admit that I have resisted the temptation to put any Costello material on here up until now. The man's music means so much to me that I've avoided him for fear of being terribly biased. Couldn't resist this little belter though. From his fine new album "Momofuku"

GARNET MIMMS - Looking For You



BETTYE LAVETTE - Only Your Love Can Save Me



JOHNNY JONES & THE CASUALS - Purple Haze



3 "floor fillers" from that curious genre known as "Northern Soul" - a term penned by the late great Dave Godin, journalist and music enthusiast. It was used to describe the obscure soul music that was being played in the northern clubs and discos of Great Britain during the late 1970's but is not really a category in it's own right despite the hundreds of compilations bearing the genre's title that have been released over the years. Nevertheless, these three items would probably have been played during an all-nighter in places like The Twisted Wheel in Manchester, The Golden Torch in Stoke-on-Trent and the Wigan Casino back in Northern's Soul's heyday. It's what Talcum Powder was invented for.

THE ORLONS - Don't Throw Your Love Away (1963)



ANITA CARTER - Ring Of Fire (1963)



LEE DORSEY - The Greatest Love (1966)



And talking of Mr Costello, three original version of songs that EC has covered fairly recently. Costello, apart from having exemplary taste usually gives a pretty good account of himself when choosing to record other people's stuff but in most cases you can never beat the first time a song has been committed to record. Here we have the rather obscure Orlons and their original take of a song that was popularised in the UK by The Searchers, Anita Carter's autoharp version of "Ring Of Fire" - written by sister June and later "mariache'd" by husband Johnny Cash and finally a song recorded by Lee "Working In A Coalmine" Dorsey that was written by Costello collaborator and all-round great dude Allen Toussaint.

THE TING TINGS - Great DJ (2008)



A track from the current darlings of the UK charts with both album and single recently placed at No.1. The band consists of the photogenic Katie White (one time member of all-girl group TKO) and percussionist Jules De Martino. Originally from Salford, they provide energetic indie-pop that's both disposable and yet catchy. Remains to be seen whether everyone's idea of "the next big thing" turn out to be front page news or yesterday's fish n'chip paper.

A change of direction

A change of direction.

I have have been thinking about changing the way this blog is presented for quite some time now. Downloading material is a doddle - the problem is thinking of some pithy comments to go with the music and being acutely aware of either boring people to death or repeating myself endlessly. So.....I have decided to change things slightly.

More Music less chat.

I will attempt to download more music but will not spend countless minutes talking about it. Maybe some comments about where to find it and in the case of the more obscure items a brief description of who the artist is, but no more personal opinions. The music included will simply reflect what I am listening to at the moment and hopefully will be more varied than before, and certainly more frequent.

There have been several occasions when I have almost given up this blog for good. The response is OK hit-wise, but I am not getting a great deal of feedback and consequently do not know who my audience is - or indeed if I have got one at all. There are one or two of you out there who have been kind enough to provide me with some much needed encouragement and for that reason I shall persevere. Besides if just one individual decides to check out some of this music having not heard any of it previously, then I guess I have achieved my aim.

Anyway, be prepared for an onslaught of sounds during May as I am going to fill this blog with a lot of good stuff!

DaveE

PRESS TO PLAY - April 08

BILLY BRAGG - Which Side Are You On? (1985)

The artist warmly known as William Bloke has lost his way a little with his last few releases with the suggestion that he may be treading more than a little water. Even though his latest album has been warmly received in some circles, Bragg's best musical achievements could well be behind him. With his first book "The Progressive Patriot" published last year there is a suggestion that his future success could be away from the music world though he still remains an engaging and thoroughly entertaining live performer. However, this blast from Bragg's past captures young Bill in his pomp and shows what a force he was during that most barren of rock decades, the 1980's. This is "The Big-Nosed Bastard from Barking" at his best - Bragg in "one-man-band Clash" mode, armed with an electric guitar, an echo chamber and with his heart firmly placed on his sleeve. Whether you agree or not with Bragg's socialist rant or not is almost secondary as it's the passion of this performance that drew my attention to it in the first place. A performance incidentally that captures brilliantly a certain moment not only in political history but in the artist's career.

THE BREEDERS - Saints (1993)



The Breeders were initially formed so that Kim Deal of The Pixies and Tanya Donelly of Throwing Muses could take time off playing second fiddle in their respective bands to let their creative hair down elsewhere. Emerging, hardly surprisingly, as a musical mixture of the two bands the chief protaganists had temporarily vacated, their debut album "Pod" released in 1990 is still regarded as their finest work. However, the demographic within the band was altered completely when Donelly decided to leave to form Belly in 1992. Follow-up "Last Splash" therefore is, if you excuse the pun, the real Deal as apart from the fact that Kim was moved to center stage, sister Kelley Deal arrived to take Donelly's place. "Last Splash" was a commercial success largely due to the hit single "Cannonball" but the general consensus is that it remains a frustrating listen as too many songs sound unfinished and half-baked, a criticism that could be labelled at the band's career as a whole. "Saints" however is an example of the band getting things right on the money. Quirky and melodic, it features the band's trademark guitars to the fore and the added bonus of one of the sexiest female voices in rock music, Ms Kim Deal herself.

BOB WILLS & HIS TEXAS PLAYBOYS - Big Beaver



BOB WILLS & HIS TEXAS PLAYBOYS - It's The Bottle Talkin



2 tracks from the undisputed "King Of Western Swing" - Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys. Western Swing was the name given to one of the most eccentric musical genres ever invented, an outrageous attempt to combine what appear to be completely unconnected styles into something new. Wills - and other artists - merged Jazz, Blues, and Country Fiddle music to create something that somehow found room for all three. In retrospect however, for most of the time Wills' music sounds less like a curious and impossible hybrid and more like a band who simply had the flexibility to play whatever they wanted whenever the mood took them. Consequently, Wills found room in his ever-changing Texas Playboys line-up for fiddle, steel guitar and a horn section though as the latter were not frequently employed Wills is generally regarded as a "country" artist. Nevertheless, when this mixture of styles worked, Wills attempts at merging black and white music paved the way for a similar idea that eventually gave us Rock N'Roll. Even though it is dubious as to whether Wills can be classed as a direct influence on Rock music, it's worth noting that Bill Haley played Western Swing before "Rock Around The Clock" and that his backing band had the distinctly cowboy-country name of The Saddlemen.

JACK BRUCE - Theme From An Imaginary Western (1970)
JACK BRUCE - Weird Of Hermiston (1970)





Soon after the demise of the supergroup Cream, Jack Bruce launched into a solo career that was as far removed musically from the occasional over-indulgence of the aforementioned trio as was possible. Freed from the shackles that Cream had held him under, Bruce kicked off by recording a jazz album with like-minded friends like John McLaughlin (the record remained unreleased for a couple of years) and directly afterwards, despite howls of protests from his short-sighted record company who thought that a Cream MkII would be a great career move, Bruce recorded and released "Songs For A Tailor" in 1970. Mixing some new material with songs that had been demo'd and/or rejected by Messrs Clapton & Baker, Songs From A Tailor has always been a record that has received a tremendous amount of critical acclaim over the years but stubbornly is an album that I've never really taken much interest in......until now. It's always difficult listening to a record for the first time when it's almost 35 years old, my pre-conceptions told me that it would probably belong very much in the period in which it was originally released. However, to my surprise it appears to have aged exceptionally well. Armed with this new-found musical freedom, Bruce's debut record is a lot more eclectic than one would have expected but is thankfully never self-indulgent, as a lot of 1970's albums tended to be and which could have been the case considering that Bruce had just stepped out of a band for whom 26-minute live drum solo's were par for the course. Regarding the two tracks included here, "Weird Of Hermiston" is one of the songs rejected by Cream whilst "Theme...." could very well be Jack's finest musical moment.

NEIL DIAMOND - I'm On To You (2005)



A track from a songwriter whose output needs to be re-valued. My first experience of the man's music was the early 70's when Diamond really sparkled (excuse awful pun) at least commercially. Hits like "I Am I Said" and "Cracklin Rosie" flooded the airwaves and were unescapable back then but at the time I was probably listening to and declaring my undying devotion for the latest prog-rock catastrophe and consequently confess to finding his music much too close to the Middle Of The Road for my liking. Meanwhile Diamond's image of a virile, hairy-chested, denim-clad male was a distinct turn-off too, the sort of artist that your musically dyslexic girlfriend liked becuase she fancied him, good god even the man's voice had muscles! In later years however, when his star receded a little and he didn't seem to be as much of a threat to the rest of the male species, I started to re-discover all those 1960's songs that he had written like "I'm A Believer" and "The Boat That I Row" and probably a few others that I didn't know about and apart from their general poptasticness, one suddenly and reluctantly had to admit that here in fact was a talented tunesmith. And then, for quite some time Neil Diamond seemed to disappear entirely off the radar. He was still making records, and touring of course, but the suggestion is that he seemed to lose interest in the art of songwriting and consequently his career stagnated for a period. But then Rick Rubin, erstwhile heavy metal producer and the man who deserves a standing ovation for having the insight to put Johnny Cash back into our world, declares undying devotion for Diamond's music and don't you just know it........Neil returns with his best album for 25 years. It seems to me that when you are as gifted as Diamond obviously is, and Cash was, the talent never really goes away. It just gets de-railed ocassionally, a bad choice of producer here, a little bit of bandwagon-jumping, the odd misguided attempt to "modernise", being pressured by a record company who know jack shit about making music. It takes a man like Rubin and others like him to get to the core of what makes an artist tick, someone who understands their strengths, who has sympathy for that individual's talent. Rubin sprinkled gold dust on a Johnny Cash career that was suffering from acute mediocrity and it would seem that Diamond is now benefitting from the same loving care and attention. "12 Songs", Rubin & Diamond's first collaboration came out in 2005 and strips away all of the 70's posturing, presenting Neil Diamond in an acoustic setting which shows him for what he is - a great song-writer and a fine performer. Of course it is also no coincidence that the album features the strongest set of songs that Diamond has penned for some time though Rubin apparently once again deserves credit for pushing the singer farther than he had been for quite some time. With the new album "Home Before Dark" already receiving critical acclaim, it would appear that Diamond has been given a much welcomed new lease of life at the tender age of 67 and another established artist is restored to musical health and saved from the doldrums.

PRESS TO PLAY - March 08

THE HINDU LOVE GODS - I'm A One Woman Man (1990)



Following on from last month's Johnny Horton cut is this cover version of his "One Woman Man". The Hindus were the name given to what was initially a 7" project involving the intriguing combination of Warren Zevon & R.E.M. (minus Michael Stipe). Some time later, after Buck, Mills and Berry had helped Zevon out on his "Sentimental Hygiene" album, the foursome booked themselves some spare studio time, consumed a belly full of booze and cut a full album's worth of material "recorded as quickly as we could listen to the material" according to Bill Berry. The record was largely ignored upon release partially becuase it was such a low-key offering from a high profile selection of musicians. Unsurpisingly the album sounds exactly what it is. A selection of pretty decent but ultimately slightly uninspiring cover versions, "knocked off" by 4 alcohol-fuelled musicians having a ball. Hidden among the covers of old blues material however, is a raucous take on Prince's "Raspberry Beret" and this warm, humorous and hugely enjoyable acoustic version of Horton's song.

PANDA BEAR - Comfy In Nautica (2007)



One of those records issued in 2007 that polarised a lot of people. Is it new, fresh & exciting or just over-indulgent re-treads of Beach Boys melodies?. Panda Bear is the brainchild of Noah Lennox, a member of a NYC-based band called Animal Collective. The various members of this group record both under the "Animal" umbrella and as individual artists and Lennox has now released three albums under his "nom-de-plume" but it's this latest release that seems to have made the biggest impression. Lennox creates his music by producing layers and layers of sampled loops and then adding a thick fog of dense vocal overdubs over the top of them. The Beach Boys certainly never recorded their albums this way but the comparisons are understandable as apart from having the knack of writing some memorable melody lines, Lennox' voice shares certain similarities with the chief Beach Boy especially when it is drenched in reverb, as it is throughout the entire album. Not of all the record works as some of the songs sound a little half-baked, but when it does - on both this track and the centerpiece of the record, the glorious 12-minute "Bros", Lennox' curious sound-scapes suck you in with repeated listenings. Strangely strange yet oddly normal.

JIMMY TARBUCK - Wasting Time (1966)



NICKY SCOTT - Backstreet Girl (1967)



A couple of curiosities from the pen of "The Glimmer Twins" Mick Jagger & Keith Richard. I am aware of the fact that "all round entertainers" Bruce Forsyth and more impressively Kenny Lynch recorded songs in the 1960's, indeed the latter was a staff writer @ the Brill Building for a spell, but Jimmy Tarbuck? Do me a favour! Yet here he is, doing a passable impersonation of a pop singer on a discarded and somewhat forgettable Mick & Keef tune. Needless to say, his career as a would-be Englebert Humperdinck never quite took off. Far more successful is Nicky Scott's excellent version of Jagger & Richards tale of a "bit on the side", a song that was originally recorded by The Stones on their "Between The Buttons" album. Scott recorded for the Immediate label for a while and in fact this track was produced by Messrs Jagger and Loog-Oldham so undoubtedly big things were expected of the young man, but unfortunately this only managed a lowly chart position and Scott faded into obscurity. Dig that accordian.

THE DRIFTERS - Another Night With The Boys (1962)



RAMONA KING - Hey Everybody (1965)



JILL JACKSON - I'll Love You For Awhile (1965)



BEN E.KING - So Much Love (1968)



DUSTY SPRINGFIELD - Wasn't Born To Follow (1970)



A bumper 5 tracks from the excellent Ace compilation "Goffin & King - A Gerry Goffin & Carole King Song Collection 1961-1967". I have waxed lyrical in the past about the talents of Ms.King so consequently do not need to go down that road again. However..... being a sucker for a good tune there can be no doubt that King is one of the very best tunesmiths that the USA has ever produced. It would be easy to write off this material as mere 60's nostalgia, but like Bacharach & David's best songs, what appears on the surface as effortless hides an extraordinary amount of songwriting craftsmanship. And there are so many of them!!!! Needless to say this 26-track compilation only scratches the surface but hopefully it will be the first of several CD's detailing the couple's history. Of the songs included here, neither "Another Night With The Boys" by The Drifters or Ramona King's "Hey! Everybody" succeeded in making much of an impression on the record buying public of America. The former, like a lot of songs that Carole King wrote during this period, was originally modelled on The Everly Bros and may well have been intended for them. The final three tracks are all either directly or indirectly connected to an artist who championed the songwriting duo by recording more than a dozen Goffin/King songs throughout her career. Dusty Springfield (for it is she) is the most well-known exponent of "I'll Love You For Awhile" here performed by Jill Jackson aka "Paula" of "Paul & Paula" fame. Ben E.King's original version of "So Much Love" was recorded by Ms Springfield on her exceptional and must-have "Dusty In Memphis" album whilst the final track features Dusty herself on a track also recorded by The Byrds for their "Ballad Of Easy Rider" album.

PRESS TO PLAY - February 08

Two tracks from a couple of "old-timers" that have been issued over the past couple of years that thankfully finds both guys in extremely rude health. The respective profiles of both Roger McGuinn and Levon Helm may have dimmed since their heyday but these releases prove that talent lasts for as long as you allow it to. Both records incidentally have one thing in common in that the source material has largely been chosen from the songs of the respected artist's youth which suggests that either sticking to what you do best is a particularly good idea or that sometimes the only way forward is to go back.

ROGER McGUINN - Silver Dagger (2006)



Taken from a project called "Folk Den" that McGuinn has been working on for several years and which is available from his web site. "Folk Den" finds McGuinn returning to his roots by taking traditional folk songs and performing them in his own inimitable Rickenbacker-drenched style. The voice may have taken a bit of a battering from the ravages of time but close your eyes, think back to 1965 and it could be "Turn Turn Turn" all over again.

LEVON HELM - The Girl I Left Behind (2007)



When Helm released "Dirt Farmer" last year most people seemed surprised that it sounded so good. This was partially becuase Helm had been out of the public eye for some time but the real shock was that Helm had recorded anything at all. Levon had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998 but had slowly regained the use of his vocal chords and after a series of intimate concerts called "Midnight Rambles" had been held at his home in Woodstock, at 67 years of age Levon decided to record his first solo album for 25 years. Aided and abetted by daughter Amy and produced by Larry Campbell from Dylan's current band, this rootsy album features songs by contemporary songwriters but also draws heavily from Levon's knowledge of traditional folk material. Apart from being a rock solid drummer, Helm is the only surviving vocalist of three that sang with The Band, all of which were blessed with distinctive voices. As with the McGuinn track, even though this item evokes memories of that superb group's early music, there ain't much wrong with that when it sounds as good as this.

RONNIE HAWKINS & THE HAWKS - Baby Jean (1959)



A track from Helm's distant past. Levon gets a co-writing credit for this track, recorded with his old boss Rockin Ronnie Hawkins. Hawkins was a native of Arkansas but moved to Canada in 1958 and long after rock n'roll got taken over by 100 teenager singers called Bobby, Hawkins stuck to his roots and continued to make rocking rockabilly into the 60's. Helm was with him practically from the start but Hawkins gradually got rid of the rest of his group and replaced them all with 4 young Canadian musicians named Hudson, Manuel, Robertson & Danko and The Band were born. This track was recorded before all of the upheaval and features some fine guitar playing by Robbie Robertson's predecessor, Fred Carter Jnr.

JOHNNY HORTON - I'm A One Woman Man (1956)



GEORGE JONES - Just One More (1956)



RAY PRICE - I've Got A New Heartache (1956)



Three tracks taken from a compilation album that does just what it says on the tin. "The Greatest Country Hits Of 1956" was released as part of a series of discs issued by Acrobat Records last year. 56 as we know was a pivotal year for Rock N'Roll so it's interesting to check out what was happening in the country music charts during the same 12 month period. This 2 CD set is notable as it includes a selection of artists like Webb Pierce, Hank Snow, & Ray Price who, between them, dominated country music during that year. What is particularly interesting however is that another artist who features heavily on this disc is Elvis Presley. Presley of course was not strictly a country artist at all but at a time when the Billboard charts were divided between "Pop" "Country" & "R&B" his dominance shows just how unclassifiable he was and how Rock N'Roll was beginning to influence other forms of music. The three tracks included do not feature "The King" however but concentrate on artists who like Presley, had a pretty good year but unlike him are strictly country.

Of the three tracks included most of the stuff that I've heard from Johnny Horton is pretty darn good. He was a regular at the Louisiana Hayride who ended up marrying Hank Williams' widow Billie Jean Jones. His most well-known hits were his so-called "saga songs" like "Battle Of New Orleans" and "North To Alaska" but back in 56, Horton could honky-tonk with the best of em. Tee-total Horton died in a Cadillac, just like Hank, in a head-on collision with a drunk driver.
"I'm A One Woman Man" was also recorded by George Jones and "Just One More" was one of numerous hits that "Thumper" enjoyed that year. A tale of hitting the bottle, Jones own battle with alcoholism has been well documented over the years. One such tippler's tale was when his then wife, Tammy Wynette, got so concerned about George's drinking habits that she confiscated the keys from Jones' car so that he couldn't drive off to the nearest watering hole for a swift half. Jones, unperturbed, drove to his local on the family's electric mower instead. All of the material from Ray Price included on this 1956 disc is worth checking out and includes his original version of "Crazy Arms", a Sun hit for Jerry Lee Lewis. "I've Got A New Heartache" was the first big song written by ex-vacuum cleaner salesman Wayne Walker who also penned Eddie Cochran's "Cut Across Shorty".

PRESS TO PLAY - January 08

MAVIS STAPLES - Down In Mississippi (2007)

Taken from Mavis' latest album "We'll Never Turn Back"and the 2nd record in 3 years that has seen her not only return to making worthwhile music again after a decidedly patchy and ultimately disappointing solo career, but it's a return also to making music that whilst being spiritual is also armed with a strong social conscience. Following on from her critically acclaimed 2004 release "Have A Little Faith", this effort was produced by Ry Cooder and his aural footprint is all over this record. That is not to say that it's a collaboration - far from it - but Cooder's exemplary musicianship and production values are in abundance and nowhere more so on this wonderfully swampy opening track. Featuring Ladysmith Black Mambazo on backing vocals, it's a song that was originally recorded by the Louisiana musician J.B.Lenoir, an artist who was as flamboyant as he was outspoken. Elsewhere, the album sometimes suffers from being a little one-paced but the performances and arrangements are striking and even though Mavis' voice sounds a little ravaged at times, overall she's as soulful as ever. The really sad thing is that the message that this material conveys is still as poignant in 2008 as it was when the songs were first written. Some things never change

ARETHA FRANKLIN - Wholy Holy (1972)



Live albums can be a hit or miss affair. A friend of mine suggests that they are worthless unless you were actually there when the album was recorded, like a snapshot of an individual's personal memory. I don't agree with this idea but I DO agree that too many live albums smack of the "contract obligation" record, released to plug the gap in the absence of any decent new studio material. However, when a live album DOES work it can almost take you from where you are and transport you back to the very night and the very concert hall in which it was originally performed. Albums like "It's Too Late To Stop Now" by Van Morrison, "Live At The Lyceum" by Bob Marley & The Wailers and "Live At The Apollo" by James Brown work partially becuase they capture an artist at the height of their powers, but there's a little more to it than that. The latter is generally regarded as possibly the greatest live album ever becuase it concentrates on the enthusiastic audience as much as it does the performance and consequently captures the spirit of the moment a little better than most albums do. An album that falls into this category is "Amazing Grace" by Aretha Franklin. It was recorded over a 2 day period at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles in 1972 with the Reverend James Cleveland, The Southern California Community Choir and a red hot selection of session musicians. It's not too surprising that as a listening experience it's got everything that a good concert album SHOULD have. Aretha is in stunning form, and not only is she singing her beloved gospel music but the intimacy of the setting and the audience's participation is such that you sometimes feel from listening to this record that you've managed to blag a ticket and are sat there amongst the congregation. When "Amazing Grace" was originally issued it featured performances "hand-picked" from the so-called best recordings that the 2-day concerts had produced but now it's available in it's entirety and it's all there - the songs, the introductions, the false starts, a bum note or two, even an impassioned and good-natured speech by Aretha's father during the 2nd evening's concert. "Wholy Holy" by Marvin Gaye is performed twice, but the best version is from the first evening as it's the opening song of the set. After the musical introduction, listen to the impact on the audience as Aretha's stunning vocal unfolds. I must confess that I ain't a religious person, but if this is how you feel when you get it, I want some. Stunning.

ROBERT WYATT - Yesterday Man (1974)
ROBERT WYATT - Just As You Are (2007)





A couple of tracks from that cuddly curmudgeon, Robert Wyatt – an artist who occupies a unique position within British music. Wyatt is a true original who thankfully has been left to his own devices by whichever record company he has been associated with and who consequently has produced some stunning music over the last 30-odd years. In these days of un-originality, Wyatt continues to plow his own proverbial and regularly produces records of a high quality that only he could make. The 1st track shows Wyatt’s powers as an interpreter of other people’s music. Wyatt covering the poptastic Chris Andrews hit seems like an almost improbable combination yet the song belongs to him from the moment the needle hits the groove and is proof that sometimes you can find a decent tune in the most strangest of places if you can be bothered to look hard enough. Of course Wyatt does have a track record of covering unlikely material having secured a hit with his version of The Monkees “I’m A Believer”, recorded just 2 months before this superior "follow up". Since then, Wyatt has graced us with a regular supply of well-crafted and imaginative albums of which 2007's "Comicopera" is probably one of the best that he has issued for some time. The latter track comes from this record and apart from featuring some tasty guitar licks from Paul Weller and a shimmering vocal from Monica Vasconcelos it also bears a strong resemblance to both Kevin Ayres "Whatevershebringswesing", a track that Wyatt provided backing vocals for, and the majestic "Shipbuilding” probably the one item from his back catalogue that most people would be familiar with. It would be a shame however if the Malvinas War lament were the only thing that he is remembered for as there is far far more to this man than that one track. A British treasure.

PRESS TO PLAY - December 07

LULU - I Don't Care Anymore (1970)



I have already included Doris Duke's version of this song on a previous post, here it is again as performed by that great white soul diva Lulu. Yes, THAT Lulu. Lulu has always possessed an impressively raspy set of vocal chords but the UK's desire to turn her into another "all-round entertainer" meant that instead of recording material that suited her talents, she ended up as Cliff Richard in a mini skirt. Occasionally, Lulu had the suss to make music that was a cut above the rest of the pop pap - "The Boat That I Row" - "To Sir With Love" and a little later, Bowie's "The Man Who Sold The World" - so perhaps it's not surprising that during the early 70's she did a Dusty and recorded an album's worth of material for the mighty Atlantic empire. The results may not be as good as Ms. Springfield's efforts but they prove conclusively that given the right material, the right band, and the right direction, this girl could sing!!!

BABY WASHINGTON - Breakfast In Bed (1969)



Having mentioned the sublime "Dusty In Memphis" album, it gives me the opportunity to include this track, an original version of a song Dusty recorded for her Atlantic Records debut back in the 70's. The AllMusic Guide does not offer a great deal of info about Babs (real name Justine) and it's equally as hard to obtain any worthwhile information about her elsewhere on the net. But she achieved occasional success in the American charts during the 50's, 60's & 70's and seems to have survived the changing face of soul music by adapting her style accordingly. Perhaps if she had been given more songs like this one, she would have made a bigger impression. It was written by Eddie Hinton & Donnie Fritts, two more white dudes in the Penn & Oldham mould that, like Dan & Spooner, operated out of the Muscle Shoals studios. It's a song that has received a number of, if not memorable, then certainly notable cover versions having been recorded by Shirley Bassey, UB40 & The Pretenders but even Dusty's version pales slightly when compared to Baby's impassioned original.

JACKIE BRENSTON & HIS DELTA CATS - Rocket 88 (1951)



Yet another recent rock n'roll death of significance was that of Ike Turner who passed away last week at the age of 76. Most people will recognise Ike as the "other half" of soul diva Tina - the duo enjoying a string of hits in the 60's and 70's, initially as part of Phil Spector's recording empire. Ike Turner never really enjoyed what could be called a positive image during his period with his missus. Musically, I dare say he was regarded by most as the guy who played rudimentary guitar whilst the obviously more talented Tina shook her significant ass out front whilst privately he will always be regarded as a dirty old man who also happened to be a wife beater. However......way before Tina was "discovered" by Ike, Turner just may have been responsible for the first ever rock n'roll record ever made. Recorded at Sam Phillips' studio by Turner's band, "Rocket 88" featured saxophonist Jackie Brenston on lead vocals but instead of bearing Turner's name upon it's release it was controversially issued under Brenston's name instead. You could argue that Ike Turner has been appearing in the margins of musical history ever since but at least just prior to his death he was being rightfully honoured as the pioneer that he had always been. So....is "Rocket 88" the first ever rock n'roll record ever made? "Perhaps" is the only satisfactory answer as rock n'roll was born out of evolution not revolution. At the very least it was a significant step forward and that is good enough.

ROY HARPER - Little Lady (1973)



ROY HARPER - I Hate The White Man (1970)



Another artist who may be in the process of receiving his just desserts a little belatedly is Roy Harper, even if, at the moment, it only appears to be the music magazine Mojo that is championing his cause (Harper won their "Lifetime Achievement Award" in 2006). His albums, particularly those released from 1971 to 1977, are of an exceptionally high quality and should have endeared him to a large section of the music buying public. But despite being name-checked by two of the biggest bands in the world (Led Zeppelin's homage "Hats Off To Roy" appeared on their "III" album whilst Pink Floyd gave Harper lead singing duties on "Have A Cigar" from "Wish You Were Here"), Harper has only achieved cult status. One of the reasons for his lack of success is that he is very much his own worst enemy, a cantankerous bugger who has been frustratingly unpredictable and who has steadfastly refused to play the music biz "game". Whilst his music is not necessarily un-commercial, it is most certainly uncompromising. Most of his albums contain pieces of epic proportions, many of which take up an entire side of what used to be an old-fashioned LP - song suites featuring multi-layered acoustic guitar and densely poetic lyrics that are both beautiful and blisteringly honest in equal measure. Despite being hailed by some of the most influential artists of his generation, I would guess that during Harper's peak period the record buying public found his stuff a little hard going, consequently Roy remained very much an outsider who never achieved the notoriety he deserved. Let's hope we discover him before he disappears altogether.

THE SONS OF THE PIONEERS - Old Man Atom (19??)



I first heard this on a Buzzola Records disc called "Like An Atom Bomb", an entertaining selection of material about the Big Mushroom mostly recorded during that period of great uncertainty when the world seemed to be just a button-push away from oblivion. Immediately smitten, I was a little surprised to discover that this clever piece of word-punnery should be recorded by The Sons Of The Pioneers, a cowboy group that I had immediately associated with campfire songs about tumbleweeds and who had been responsible for bringing Roy Rogers into this world. The truth of the matter is The Pioneers career spanned some 60 years and that even though Rogers (real name Leonard Slye) formed the group, just as soon as Hollywood came calling, he and his horse set off into the sunset and the Pioneers carried on without him. It is extremely doubtful therefore that Roy & Trigger are on this recording though the Pioneers trademark vocals remain intact. This song was just one of many songs adopted as an anthem by the 60's folk movement in the USA.

Like Roy Harper's snarling "I Hate The White Man", this is another track taken from an entertaining CD compilation called "Give Peace A Chance", supplied by those splendid people at Uncut Magazine.

PRESS TO PLAY - November 07

With the Plant/Krauss album "Raising Sand" still reverberating from the stereo system installed within Edney Towers - my humble but comfortable abode - it was inevitable that I would eventually check out some of the original versions of the songs that were covered on that album so here are two of them.

DILLARD & CLARK - Through The Morning, Through The Night (1969)

Gene Clark has always been held in high regard as a songwriter but seems to be another prime example of a talent who never reached his full potential. Most remembered for his early work with The Byrds, in 1967 he independently arrived at the same musical crossroads that Gram Parsons was occupying by releasing an album with The Godsin Brothers that must be regarded as one of the first country rock records ever made. Further releases by both Dillard & Clark and then finally as a solo artist cemented his reputation but his personal traumas always seemed to overshadow the music that he made. Attempts at Byrd reunions floundered, one of which resulted in an ugly court case, at least a couple of albums were rejected by record companies and he struggled with alcoholism and depression for a lengthy period. After an erratic career that nevertheless provided many highlights, Clark died from the inevitable liver complications in 1991 but thankfully his music has been re-discovered since. 2 songs from the rather patchy Dillard & Clark album "Through The Morning, Through The Night" appear on "Raising Sand" and the original version of the title track is included here. Gram Parsons is quite rightly revered as one of country music's finest songwriters - at his best Clark cannot be too far behind.



THE EVERLY BROTHERS - Stick With Me Baby (1960)

Chuck Berry once said "I didn't think Elvis Presley was as good as the Everly boys, .... and I don't think The Beatles were as good as The Everly Bros." which is something coming from a wily old cynic like Berry. The Everly's are undoubtedly the most famous of all sibling singers - that curious family gene that provides us with two (or more) fine vocalists that sound so alike that it's hard to tell them apart. Country music of course has always been responsible for providing us with such artists which is just as well as two-part harmony has been a staple diet of the music almost since day one. Probably the best country harmony group of all has to be The Louvin Brothers (more about them later) though a special mention needs to be given to The Bolic Brothers if only becuase of there unfortunate name. The Everly's may have been influenced by both but they became the most successful and certainly the most commercial of harmony singers though pigeon-holing them as "country" seems a little unfair as there was certainly more to them than that. This track comes from their early career with the mighty Warner Bros after they had left the small Cadence label for a considerable sum of money. Whilst Warners added some professional sheen to their recordings, by moving, The Everly's lost the opportunity to continue recording songs that had been written for them by the husband and wife team Felice & Boudleaux Bryant and it could be argued their career faltered somewhat despite a hugely promising start that resulted in their first 6 singles with Warners producing three No.1 hits. But after 1961's "Crying In The Rain" subsequent releases failed to make the same impact.



THE BYRDS - She Don't Care About Time (1965)

A superb piece of Rickenbackered Pop from the pen of Gene Clark. Clark wrote some fantastic songs for the Fab 5 back in the early 60's and it's for this period in his career that he is best known. Though this song was buried away on the B-side of one of their singles, it's my favourite Clark composition from a band that I've always felt should have been championed as one of THE pioneers of the 1960's. Apart from including within their ever changing line-up an impressive selection of influential musicians, their ability to constantly re-invent themselves whilst pioneering new types of innovative music places them 2nd only to The Beatles. This track finds them firmly in jingly-jangly mode and features their customary effortless harmony vocals whilst Roger McGuinn is blatantly guilty of borrowing his guitar solo from "Jesu Joy Of Man's Desiring".



THE LOUVIN BROS - Katie Dear (1956)
THE LOUVIN BROS - In The Pines (1956)

Andy Kershaw once said that if you were to hear Charlie & Ira Louvin sing seperately you wouldn't necessarily hear anything remarkable but when they sang together it was a whole different ball game. The best country harmony vocalists by a mile and a huge influence on fellow country singers and rock artists alike. Their songs largely fell into three different categories. They were a Gospel duo originally but discovered secular music out of necessity. A tobacco firm that were sponsoring their radio show threatened to kick them off the air as "you can't sell tobacco with religion". After discovering the happy knack of writing heart-breaking ballads that soon became country standards, Charlie & Ira turned their hand to both Folk & Hillbilly music with equal success, returning to their gospel roots from time to time. Like many brother bands since, their final split was not amicable and Ira in particular, despite being devoutly religious, not only had an ego the size of Texas but was an alcoholic whose condition grew steadily worse as the years progressed. After their split, both went solo but Ira died in 1965 in a car accident. Charlie on the other hand is still going strong and released a star-studded album only last year. These tracks date from 1956, a good year for The Louvins. Taken from arguably their best album, "Tragic Songs Of Life" is a concept album of sorts featuring a selection of folk ballads of the "doom and gloom" variety.





BIG JOE TURNER - Flip Flop & Fly (1955)

Having discussed the great man on my previous post, I couldn't resist putting a little of him on here. This is Big Joe recording for Atlantic Records not that long after his seminal version of "Shake Rattle & Roll" was recorded and released. To all intents, "Flip Flop & Fly" IS "Shake Rattle & Roll" but with a different set of lyrics. It's the proverbial example of finding a winning formula and sticking to it. Atlantic was a great place for Joe to be as they understood more about what to record and how to record it than any other label operating in the R&B field at that time. They were not only responsible for introducing us to some great new artists, but were second to none at spotting the hidden potential in people whose careers at that point had stubbornly refused to take off. Ray Charles was signed from a small label, told to drop his Charles Brown/Nat King Cole mannerisms and was then persevered with before he finally discovered that gospel was the missing link in his music whilst Aretha Franklin became "The Queen Of Soul" at the label after she had spent several uncertain and erratic years with Columbia who, it seems, weren't sure what to do with her. Big Joe was nearing the end of his career by 1955 but Atlantic knew better than anybody the debt that R&B owed to this man. Consequently they were responsible for providing him with one last hurrah before he was finally overtaken by some of the young kids on the block. Back in 55 though, Big Joe was the big cheese and this track, alongside many of the others he recorded at the time, was Rock & Roll in all but name. Play loud.

Over The Hill and Way Down Underneath

For this edition of TGU, I have decide to follow on from an original post that appeared way back in January and which tackled the thorny subject of sex in music. It was always my intention to include a second selection of music that continued where the first post left off but I never got around to it and it has remained saved on my computer ever since. So here is a belated opportunity to complete unfinished business. This time around I've chosen 4 salacious items from the Rhythm & Blues genre plus one song that purposely does not fit that category. Incidentally that's original R&B and not the modern version that, for some inexplicable reason, shares the same name. Some of these recordings date specifically from 1946-1956 - not only a golden period for R&B but an extremely important one for popular music as a whole as within those 8 years or so, the evolution of Rock N'Roll was set in motion.

During the late 40's/early 50's, the music of the establishment still belonged to the world of the crooner with the charts being dominated by singers such as Bing Crosby, Tony Bennett and Perry Como. The 6 major record labels that controlled the music industry in those days were happy to promote what was, by comparison to what came later, a bland and uncontroversial product. However, in direct competition with what was popular at the time was an alternative form of music that had been slowly evolving and which was a fusion of two different distinct styles. The first of those styles was Country & Western, the music of the poor white population and rural by nature whilst the second genre was Rhythm & Blues - the music of the poor blacks and largely city-based though it took on different sub-styles depending on it's location. A number of artists started experimenting with a combination of these two with varying degrees of success but it wasn't until Bill Haley got to No.1 in 1956 with "Rock Around The Clock" that Rock N'Roll really took off.

Prior to that Rhythm N'Blues had been successfully plowing it's own furrow despite the fact that the major record labels wouldn't touch it with the proverbial bargepole. There were two reasons for this. Firstly, it was viewed as the music of a minority as it was being purchased almost exclusively by black record buyers. It was left instead to a large selection of enterprising independent labels to market it. Secondly, when placed in the right hands it was DANGEROUS music. Uptempo R&B with it's pulsing rhythms and loud amplified instruments could be very exciting whilst lyrically, the music refelected the daily concerns of the people that were purchasing it in the first place. So, plenty of songs about drinking and generally having a ball and plenty more about infidelity and the enjoyment of carnal delights. Under the circumstances , it's hardly surprising that RCA chose Perry Como as their role model.

We start with "One Night Of Sin". Covered by Elvis with great success, Elvis' version however provides a perfect example of an R&B song being "sweetened" for the white music industry. As with "Shake Rattle & Roll" when covered by Bill Haley, lyrics were either changed or in this case were subtly altered so that the song's original meaning was hidden from all of those sensitive souls who may actually find out what it was really about. In Presley's case, "Sin" was dropped from the title - as if that made any difference. As for the original artist, Lewis comes from that long line of musicians who originated from New Orleans, a venerable hotbed of musical excellence. He was responsible for the original version of "I Hear You Knocking", a No.1 hit for Dave Edmunds in 1972. Edmunds pays his respects by name-checking Lewis (amongst others) during the song's instrumental break.

SMILEY LEWIS - One Night Of Sin (1956)



I always thought that the sexual double entendre was a curiously English habit that reached it's creative peak in the "Carry On" series of films (well 1 or 2 of them anyway) This of course is not the case as the following two songs and probably hundreds of others help to demonstrate.

Tampa Red (left - born Hudson Whittaker) was primarily a slide blues guitarist who influenced a number of artists and who was also a red hot kazoo player, as the song included here suggests. He recorded in a variety of styles and apparently co-wrote a selection of material during his career of a slightly naughty nature of which the track below is but one. Bullmoose (right) on the other hand (so called becuase of his pugnacious facial features) was a one-time member of the Lucky Millinder Orchestra who eventually left to form his own band. Perhaps not the greatest of vocalists but a fine saxophone player, Bullmoose recorded ballads as well as jump blues with the odd risque number thrown in for good measure. Included in the latter is the suggestive number below and a song written by the fledgling Leiber/Stoller partnership called "Nosey Joe" that is apparently even smuttier than the track included here. As for the "hidden meaning" behind these songs? Well, it doesn't take a genius to understand that in Tampa's case I don't think he's talking about rolling on the carpet with the protaganist's pooch and as for Bullmoose - well he is apparently discussing with a female counterpart his latest vinyl purchase. Hmmm.....Yes.

TAMPA RED - Let Me Play With Your Poodle (1942)
BULLMOOSE JACKSON - Big Ten Inch Record (1952)




Wynonie Harris life story was so colourful that it's surprising that it hasn't been transferred to the big screen. Like Bullmoose Jackson, Harris first sprung to prominence as the lead vocalist for the Lucky Millinder Orchestra but soon outgrew the band and left to go solo, signing for Cincinatti's King Records again just as Bullmoose had done. After scoring a couple of early hits, Harris sprung to prominence in 1948 with his version of "Good Rockin Tonight" - another song that ended up in Presley's repertoire. From that point on, Harris chalked up a selection of hits, most of which were fairly raucous and all of which were about living it up. In Harris' case he really WAS talking from experience as he was apparently an early purveyor of the Sex Drugs & Rock N'Roll syndrome.....with extra sex. One typical story has King Records owner Syd Nathan paying Harris a visit at a sleazy Harlem apartment in order to obtain the singer's signature on his record contract. "When we knocked on the door there were three gals in with him. One of them opened her mouth and he threw her out into the hall without any clothes on. Wynonie was in bed wearing only a pair of pink satin underpants" Wynonie finally succumbed from throat cancer but along the way made some superb records. This song details the precise reason for a mature female's lack of sexual activity and features Harris' trademark raspy vocal and a backing band of the ass kicking variety.

WYNONIE HARRIS - Sittin On It All The Time (1949)



And finally, proof that the subject matter in question was being highlighted in song WAY before Big Joe Turner got a hold of it but in a slightly more refined manner. (My post's title incidentally is taken directly from the original "Shake Rattle & Roll" lyrics as sung by Big Joe. The couplet "Over the hill and way down underneath, you make me roll my eyes and then you make me grit my teeth" was apparently a little too graphic for Haley's fans, consequently it was omitted from Bill's recording.) Cole Porter, arguably the greatest American songwriter of all, not only got away with mentioning cocaine in a song ("I Get A Kick Out Of You") but famously and quite brilliantly wrote about prostitution too in this standard. A song as good as this can only be fully appreciated by someone brilliant enough to interpret it. Not only do we no longer have a chanteuse as good as Ella anymore but if this were released today it would probably have some difficulty getting airplay.

A frightened vocalist, Miss Kathryn Crawford, sings a threnody entitled “Love for Sale” in which she impersonated a lily of the gutters …When and if we ever get a censorship, I will give odds it will frown upon such an honest thing.

From 1930 New York Herald Tribune review of "The New Yorkers"

ELLA FITZGERALD - Love For Sale (1956)

PRESS TO PLAY - October 07

ROBERT PLANT & ALISON KRAUSS - Please Read The Letter (2007)



A glorious track from an unlikely combination that on paper cannot possibly work yet sounds so natural on record. I was never a big Led Zeppelin fan - they were a little too bombastic for my liking - but I've always held a sneaking regard for what they did. Now that "Percy" Plant is taking a few risks with his music he seems to be getting better with old age. His last album "Mighty Rearranger" was a fine record and this collaboration with Alison Krauss - owner of one of the sweetest voices in country music - has to be the album of the year. Credit should be given to T-Bone Burnett who, as always, has done an exemplary job in the producer's chair and who has successfully prevented Plant from dominating the album with those testosterone vocal mannerisms of his. As a matter of fact I've never heard Plant sing as well as this and even though there are a quite a few tracks that are not collaborative, when Plant & Krauss harmonise the results are never less than stunning. With a wonderful selection of music and a tremendous cast of musicians that includes guitarist Marc Ribot I'd include the whole album on here if I could. This is a remake of a song originally written & recorded by Plant & Page for their "Walking Into Clarksdale" album and features some of those great harmony vocals and some tasty Krauss fiddle playing. Magnificent.

THE BEE GEES - Please Read Me (1967)



A track from the first album recorded by those toothy Mancunian/Australian hybrids the Gibb Brothers. The Bee Gees are probably regarded in some circles as a prime example of un-cool but along with Abba's Benny & Bjorn you cannot deny that they have been responsible for some great songs during their lengthy careers whilst also having the courage to re-invent themselves just when they were in danger of stagnating. From their Pre-Falsetto Years - 1967's "The Bee Gees 1st" is an underrated album and even though it features the odd misguided attempt at psychedelia and leans a little too heavily towards the Fab4's influence it contains the excellent singles "New York Mining Disaster 1941" and "To Love Somebody" and also this pleasant little ditty which is apparently about psychoanalysis - a rather heavy subject for the Gibb's to tackle.

JONI MITCHELL - If (2007)



A welcome return from one of music’s greatest. Period. It’s reassuring to know that some musicians will never let you down and Joni, by and large, always delivers. Gone are the days when the latest release by a favourite artist brought on that curious mixture of anticipation and concern. I spent a fair amount of my youth worrying that the latest vinyl offering by such and such would turn out to be such a great disappointment that I might not like them anymore. I’m not quite so precious about such things these days. In most cases, if you don’t like this album then at least another will be along fairly soon, though as this is Joni’s first record of new material for 9 years after a period of self-imposed exile, one began to wonder whether she would ever return. The fact that she has done so with one of the best albums from her latter day career is a testimony to her astonishing talent.

At first, “Shine” appears to disappoint but then Joni’s music always needs to be nurtured before the music finally begins to make sense and even my initial criticism that the sentiment of the lyrics are, for the most part, too preachy is dissipated by the wonderful music in which they are held. Having previously bemoaned on this very blog the lack of contemporary artists who have something to say about this mess of a world that we live in, at least Joni speaks her mind – though that might be part of the problem. At her peak, Joni was beautifully poetical to the point that her lyrics were always open to a little interpretation. It was possible to understand what she was getting at but you weren’t always 100% sure. Now, lyrics like “Men love war, that's what history's for, History, A mass murder mystery" leave no-one in doubt. It’s arguable that she believes that such a topic of conversation needs to be screamed rather than suggested but I must confess I prefer my Joni to be a little more mysterious.

The inclusion of a "2007" version of "Big Yellow Taxi" seems a bit pointless, no matter how poignant the lyrics remain, but the rest of the album is spot on and is interesting in the way that Mitchell uses keyboard textures and samples on most of the songs in very much the same way that an arranger would conduct an orchestra. There are extra musicians (6 of 'em) but they are only used as a splash of colour on a canvas that is entirely of Mitchell's making. Though overall, this album may not compare to what I would call “peak period” Joni, that golden age between 1970 and 1976 when she was responsible for 5 albums of such stunning quality that it would be hard to leave at least 4 of them - “Blue” “Court And Spark” Hissing Of Summer Lawns” and “Hejira” - out of one of those proverbial “all time best ever” lists, she remains at 64 a vibrant artist who is still capable of giving her contemporaries and followers alike a bloody good run for their money.


5 tracks from Jack Nitzsche - a man who has been called a “genius” by a number of people who seem to be perfectly qualified to know best – his fellow musicians. Nitzsche is something of an anomaly. Musicians and producers by and large receive all the critical acclaim for their musical abilities but arrangers such as Jack never seem to get the attention they deserve. Nitzsche is different. He wasn’t JUST an arranger of course but a producer, a musician and a songwriter, but it’s his talent as a “fixer” of other people’s music for which he is best known. 2 rather excellent Ace compilations set out to show us exactly how good he was. I may be an avid music listener, but I am no musician – consequently even though there has always been a curiosity for how a piece of music is welded together from the various nuts and bolts of the studio, it’s usually the song and the performance that I listen to first. The great thing about these discs is that because the compilations celebrate something that you would normally take for granted (of the material chosen here, only one features Nitzsche’s name as an artist), you are forced to listen to what’s going on BEHIND the music and then you begin to realise how good he was. This is particularly so when you understand that most of the music on these compilations come from that period in the 1960’s when an artist, if he or she were lucky, could get the full works – a great song, a producer who understood your muse and an arranger who would make your music sound dazzling. And the latter is what Jack did....very well

JACK NITZSCHE - The Lonely Surfer (1963)



The story doesn't necessarily start here but it might as well. A Top 40 hit in the US for Jack on it's release, you can tell from that opening chord and the droning orchestral textures that play behind the melody at the beginning that there's something going on here. Though it may be true that Jack is jumping firmly onto the surfing craze and riding the proverbial wave, The Beach Boys never sounded like this.

JACKIE DE SHANNON - Needles And Pins (1963)



Probably Jack's most well-known composition, co-written with Sonny Bono and featuring the criminally under-rated DeShannon who worked extensively with Nitzsche in the 60's. Andrew "Loog" Oldham, The Rolling Stones svengali at the time was instantly smitten when hearing this record. Consequently, as soon as the Stones hit America, Nitzsche was one of the first people they checked out. He must have made a good impression, as by 1966 he was on their payroll.

LOU CHRISTIE - Wild Life's In Season (1966)



Lou "Lightning Strikes" Christie with a bizarre but compelling self-penned original that starts out being heavily influenced by "Good Vibrations" but ends up sounding like nothing you have ever heard before. This track features Christie's trademark "1-0 year old inhaling a helium balloon" falsetto. Spectorims abound, which is hardly surprising as Jack was Spector's chief arranger on most of the crazed ones great 1960's productions.

TAMMY GRIMES - Nobody Needs Your Love Like I Do (1966)



Whilst "Hearing Is Believing" - Volume 1 of Ace's Nitzsche retrospective concentrates on the more well-known items from Jack's career, Volume 2's "Hard Working Man" features the odd obscurity, like this one. Tammy Grimes was a singer-actress who was given her own television series in 66. But when the series was shelved after just one season, Grimes recordings with Nitzsche were left in the vaults and Tammy disappeared slowly without trace. She sounds like Shirley Bassey after a night on the piss on this gorgeous Randy Newman tune, her only single release.

C.C.ADCOCK - Stealin' All Day (2004)



The last thing that Jack ever produced - recorded in 1999, the year before he died. Who is C.C.Adcock? No idea, apart from what the sleeve notes tell us about him which is that Adcock was a young man from Lafayette that Nitzsche was sufficiently moved by to take an interest in. Coming from the south this song has a distinctly swampy feel to it with plenty of guitar reverb but to my ears it's T.Rex and John Kongos sung by Mink DeVille, featuring "Pipeline"'s The Chantays with a sample of Johnny Kidd & the Pirates "Shakin All Over" thrown in for good measure. Got that?

THE ANDREW OLDHAM ORCHESTRA - The Last Time (1964)



Another consequence of Andrew Oldham's interest in Jack Nitzsche, a track from Oldham's "The Rolling Stones Songbook" - an instrumental record featuring orchestral "versions" of Stones recordings. Oldham had taken note of Nitzsche's "The Lonely Surfer" album as the following comments confirm. "There's Jack in his suit and specs - looking out at you. Not the lead singer, mind you, or the surf-guitar wizard, but the arranger. Back in England, we were saying to ourselves, "Wait a minute, arrangers get their own albums?" That was a revelation" The outcome was an album that was largely ignored upon release, but this track sprung to prominence in 1997 when The Verve sampled it for their No.1 hit single"Bittersweet Symphony".

PRESS TO PLAY - August 07

RUBY JOHNSON - If Ever I Needed Love (I Sure Do Need It Now)



One of a seemingly endless supply of Stax recordings that fell off of the production line only to be buried underneath "higher profile" material . Ruby recorded a number of items for the great Memphis label but only 3 were ever issued as singles, one of which was this fantastic song. Her eventual departure from the label suggests that either Stax's embarrassment of riches "roster" wise marked Ruby as excess baggage or that someone in the A&R department didn't know what they were doing. Hardly surprising to discover that this was penned by those "cats who won't cop out" the indomitable Isaac Hayes & David Porter.

CHRISTINE KITTRELL - I'm A Woman



And so, we return via the somewhat obscure Christine Kittrell to Lieber & Stoller and in a roundabout way, Peggy Lee. Lee famously recorded this smokey song but I do believe that Kittrell was responsible for the mostly ignored and in my opinion superior, original. Not a lot is known about Ms.Kittrell but she used to sing with bandleaders Paul Williams (famous for the hit "Hucklebuck") and Johnny Otis before returning, like so many others before and since, to gospel music. "I'm A Woman" nevertheless appeared in the early 60's whilst she was still peddling her wares as a gospel singer but after it's release she promptly disappeared altogether. Taken from the excellent 3 volume series "The Lieber & Stoller Story" this song carries a strong feminist message despite having been written by two guys.

MOSE ALLISON - Ever Since The World Ended (1997)



A track from one of the coolest dudes ever to set foot inside a recording studio. Mose John Allison Jnr is an American treasure - a hugely influential artist whose material has been both recorded and lauded by musicians in equal measure. A white artist, his influences are entirely black, consequently he has always operated within the jazz/blues idiom. Though a fine piano player, his nasal vocal delivery make take a little getting used to, consequently it's his strength as a songwriter that he is best remembered for. Songs of sardonic humour delivered in that deadpan wavering voice of his have made their way into the catalogues of Elvis Costello, Bonnie Raitt, The Who, The Rolling Stones, The Yardbirds, Diana Krall, Leon Russell and JJ Cale amongst others whilst Van Morrison released an entire album's worth of his material in 1996. His influence on another under-rated artist, Britain’s Georgie Fame, becomes fairly obvious when you listen to Allison’s back catalogue, of which this track is something of a forgotten gem. Allison was arguably at his most influential from the late 50's through to the 60's but even though this item is from one of the man’s latter-day releases it still sounds like vintage Mose to me. From the man who offered the lines "Your mind is on vacation while your mouth is working overtime" he begins this song with the immortal “Ever since the world ended, I don’t go out as much”

RILO KILEY - Silver Lining (2007)



Rilo Kiley are a perfect example of the band who succeed in building an impressive reputation for themselves with the release of their first 3 albums, only to inevitably sign for a major label and in doing so lose the spark that brought them to recognition in the first place. This title track from their big league debut album is particularly good but it promises much that the rest of the record fails to deliver. "Under The Backlight" marks a change of direction for the band but it's not necessarily a change for the better. They were always a band with a sense of melody but Jenny Lewis' lyrics gave their songs a sharp and inventive focus that lifted them above the norm. But the songs here are too radio-friendly and the lyrics have either been simplified or "dumbed-down" depending on your point of view. Lewis, however, is a bona-fide star in the making. She seems to have it all. Ridiculously pretty, she's a talented songwriter and sings like an angel to boot. Interesting to note therefore that most of this album was written entirely by her despite previous albums featuring a fairly hefty slice of co-written material with band mate Blake Sennett. If I didn't know better, this record sounds as if it's intention is to promote Lewis as the "next big thing" but in doing so, an awful lot has been lost along the way.

THE AUTEURS - Future Generation (1999)



The Auteurs were the brainchild of a smart-alec songwriter called Luke Haines, and after their superb debut album "New Wave" had been released in 1993 they were initially lumped in with Suede as being part of a so-called UK glam-rock revival that never actually happened. The Auteurs may have occasionally shared Suede's willingness to "crank up the volume" from time to time but that's about all they had in common and Haines was certainly no Brett Anderson. Apart from being somewhat un-photogenic, Haines was also born with a curious nasal whisper of a voice that gave most of his songs a sinister air and which at times was completely out of kilter with the racket going on behind him. Not that The Auteurs "rocked out" all the time as instrumentation was just as likely to include a cello and a glockenspiel as well as a Stratocaster and a drum kit. Blessed with a flair for pop melody, Haines was also a sharp observational lyricist and was probably too clever and cynical to play the "pop stardom" game anyway. After 4 albums, at least 2 of which are referenced in this lyric, Haines moved on and The Auteurs were sadly no more. This excellent track, the final cut on their final album seems to spotlight the end of a career that is certainly worth further attention.

PRESS TO PLAY - July 07

THE BEAT - Stand Down Margaret (1980)



A long forgotten but much loved band from the "2-Tone" period though the multi-racial Beat (or English Beat if you are from the States) were not actually on that record label. They were also a little more than just another devotee of the ska/rock steady style as a dip into their back catalogue suggests. The Jamaican influences are there most certainly but their style mixed ska and reggae riddums with punk sensibilities and with a fair amount of pop craftsmanship thrown in for good measure, they were more adaptable than some of the other bands of a similar ilk. They sadly only lasted for 3 albums but chalked up a number of hit singles during that period, most of which it has to be said, were ska re-workings of classics such as "Tears Of A Clown" and "Can't Get Used To Losing You". If those hits suggest a lack of decent original material, think again. They also wrote some good stuff of their own and this is a prime example. Though not an overtly political band this track, despite it's happy soca-like rhythm spells out in no uncertain terms where The Beat stood in regard to one Mrs.Thatcher. It may no longer be relevant of course but it's still worth repeating here - just substitute the name of the politician you love to hate.

U-ROY & THE CONGOS - Fisherman Style (1977???)



A "collaboration" but only of sorts. This combination of band performance and vocal overdub is actually called "toasting" and was extremely popular in Jamaica in the very late 60's to mid 1970's. U-Roy (real name Ewan Beckford) was not only one of the finest exponents of this style - but apparently was one of the first. Primarily a DJ, he was given acetates of many of the Dub experiments that were being produced in the local studios at the time and when previewing them in front of a live audience would invent narratives or rhymes to occupy the instrumental tracks. When John Holt caught U-Roy "toasting" one of his own recordings he was sufficiently impressed to suggest that the DJ should be recorded in a local studio. It would be tempting to suggest that these "toasts" are an early version of what is now regarded as rapping. It's probably not as simple as that but as no-one else was doing anything remotely similar back then it has to be an influence. As for the track being "toasted" - it's "Fisherman" by The Congos (whose lead singer incidentally sang on one of The Beat's singles) The album from which it was taken - "Heart Of The Congos" is apparently regarded as one of THE reggae albums of all time.

CANDI STATON - His Hands (2006)



Candi is an artist who like many other black soul singers before her, began her career in gospel music only to "cross over" into the secular field. The only difference is that Candi has chosen to do this not once - but twice - turning to "the devil's music" both in 1968 after an early career with the Jewell Gospel Trio and then after making a further 8 gospel albums, again in 1992. She is most well known for her 1976 disco classic "Young Hearts Run Free" but these days alternates easily between religious and non-religious music. This superb item taken from her last album not only betrays those gospel roots but also hints at Candi's late 60's/early 70's output as a Southern soul singer with the notorious Fame Studios that earned her the nickname "The First Lady Of Southern Soul". Written, most surprisingly by Will Oldham, a tunesmith more attuned to dark, brooding country-flavoured death ballads than this gutsy tour de force.

NICK LOWE - Hope For Us All (2007)



Nick Lowe is someone who has been plying his trade for 40 years but who has never received the critical acclaim that his talent deserves. Having followed the man's career from his early days with Brinsley Schwarz, it's probably true to say that during the early years, Lowe's songs were always 2 parts pastiche to 1 part originality and even though every songwriter worth his salt has stolen a lick or two from somebody, at times Lowe was a little guilty of being too close to the source from which his songs were taken. The trick, as far as I am aware, is to write a song that reminds you of something, but you're not sure what it is. With some of Lowe's material, it was fairly obvious who or what was being ripped off and that, along with a slightly cocky irreverence during the process of doing so, is possibly why people never really took him seriously believing that he was nothing more than a skilled hack, re-writing stuff that had effectively already been written. However, when one listens to Lowe's early take on The Beatles or The Everly Bros or Chuck Berry, there can be no doubting the man's craftsmanship and what's more as Lowe has mellowed in recent years, he's simply got better and better. Since 1994's "The Impossible Bird" Lowe has been responsible for issuing one classic album after another and even though his inspiration is still music from a bygone age - namely country and soul music from the 50's & 60's - Lowe seems to have improved to such an extent that he can now compete as a songwriter with some of the people he was originally trying to emulate. In 2006, America's Paste Magazine provided us with a "Top 100 Best living songwriters" list and amazingly Lowe wasn't in it. Nevertheless it is reassuring to know that at least he is being taken seriously by some of his peers as in recent years songs of his have appeared on albums by Johnny Cash and Solomon Burke, exalted company that befits a man of Lowe's melodic flair.
This track, taken from his latest album "At My Age" is standard fare for modern day Nick, a bitter-sweet tale of love gone right for a change. It sounds like Al Green is the source of inspiration here though it's noticeable that Lowe's talent for stealing other people's ideas is still enjoying rude health as a huge chunk of "Spanish Harlem" is brazenly incorporated into the song's structure.

DAN PENN & THE COUNTRY SOUL REVUE - Chicago Afterwhile (2005)



PERCY SLEDGE - Out Of Left Field (1968)



Another songwriter that Lowe sometimes reminds me of is unquestionably one of the finest of his generation and in my opinion, has been responsible for one of the greatest songs of the 20th century - the song in question is "Dark End Of The Street" and the songwriter is Dan Penn. Penn is one of those songwriters whose exceptional back catalogue is sometimes buried by the simple fact that his material was primarily recorded by other artists, though Penn himself is such an unassuming character he'd probably be reluctant to take the credit anyway. It's only when you do a little research that you begin to understand exactly what he has been responsible for. "Do Right Woman - Do Right Man" "It Tears Me Up" "Cry Like A Baby" "The Letter" "I'm Your Puppet" - each one a Southern Soul classic. Penn is of course white though most of the stuff he has written has been recorded by black artists. It's an interesting phenomenon but there have been a number of white people who were at the forefront of American Black music during the 1960's. Consequently record owners like Atlantic's Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler, and Stax's Jim Stewart & Estelle Axton along with a whole host of musicians and songwriters from Steve Cropper & Duck Dunn to the Muscle Shoals Rhythm section deserve their place in the soul hall of fame as much as Otis Redding & Sam Cooke do. Penn, who was heavily involved with Muscle Shoals should be in there as well. Not only a writer of great songs and an influential producer, but a wonderfully soulful singer himself as the first of the tracks included here shows. "Chicago Afterwhile" is one of Penn's latter day efforts and was included on an album called "Testifyin" by the Country Soul Revue, a "comeback" album featuring a loose aggregation of many of those white Muscle Shoal musicians and songwriters mentioned above. The second track "Out Of Left Field" by Percy Sledge is yet another Penn songwriting gem this time co-written, as many of Penn's songs were, with trusty cohort Spooner Oldham.


SEXSMITH & KERR - Raindrops In My Coffee (2005)



A “songwriter’s songwriter” which roughly translates as an artist blessed with unquestionable talent, who is revered by the “big boys” of modern song (Dylan, Costello, McCartney to name but three) but whose commercial standing, as far as I know, is pitifully poor. I guess for Sexsmith read Nick Lowe, a man possessed with a wonderfully natural flair for melody and melancholy but who sadly does not sell many records as there does not seem to be a sizable niche in the market for this kind of music anymore. It’s a more than well known fact that Lowe became a millionaire after Curtis Stigers covered his “Peace Love & Understanding” in the film “The Bodyguard” . Sexsmith has yet to find the song that could catapault him into such stellar company though from a fan’s point of view , I like this artist just as he is. Not exactly “undiscovered” but not “superstar” material either. A man who consistently writes great songs like this one but who remains unspoilt by the trappings of success. Maybe Ron would not agree with me on this one. This bittersweet ballad comes from "Destination Unknown" an acoustic album that Sexsmith made with percussionist Don Kerr and which showcases Kerr's harmony vocals.

PRESS TO PLAY - June 07

COLIN BLUNSTONE - Misty Roses (1971)



Taken from Blunstone's debut album "One Year". Blunstone's impossibly breathy vocals had been a trademark of The Zombies back in the 60's but after their split Blunstone, for some inexplicable reason, decided to turn his back on the music scene and sell insurance instead. A chance meeting with ex-Zombies Rod Argent and Chris White gave Blunstone the impetus to get back into the studio and this album, featuring several Argent/White compositions plus a few of Colin's own, finally appeared. After the album had yielded a couple of unsuccessful single releases, Blunstone's superlative version of Denny Laine's "Say You Don't Mind" was a UK hit and his solo career was up and running.

It would have been tempting and consequently too easy to have picked Laine's classic but this cut, a cover of Tim Hardin's "Misty Roses", has been included if only for it's innovative string arrangement courtesy of one Chris Gunning. In fact Gunning's arrangements are to be found all over "One Year" and is one of the reasons why the album is now regarded as something of a lost classic. This track is strongly reminiscent of the collaborative efforts of Elvis Costello & The Brodsky Quartet. Despite the fact that Costello was of the opinion that their "Juliet Letters" album had created something unique and new within the popular music canon, after hearing this track - a satisfying mix of solo vocal and a string quartet with strong classical overtones, one is tempted to suggest that maybe Blunstone had got their first.

Blunstone's vocal chords are apparently still in fine fettle and he can be found treading the boards either as a duo with Rod Argent or as The Zombies front man.

THE WALKER BROS. - The Electrician (1976)



In a recent BBC documentary on Scott Walker, Mr Engel allowed himself to be interviewed for the first time in many years. This was quite a scoop for the Beeb as Walker had been living a reclusive life somewhere in London and far from the gaze of the public eye. Watching the program, I expected to find a furtive, awkward, terribly reluctant individual but apart from the habit of wearing a baseball cap perched so low that all you could see was his nose and mouth, I was surprised to discover that the only thing remarkable about him was how un-remarkable he was. This persona is even more surprising when one considers the music that Walker makes, and has been making for the last 20-30 years.

Having spent the mid 1960’s as lead vocalist for those good-looking all-American boys The Walker Bros, in 1967 Engel embarked on a successful solo career releasing 4 critically acclaimed albums over a 2 year period and discovering along the way his songwriting muse. By “Scott 4”, released in 1969, an album that many still claim as his masterpiece, he was writing everything himself but as the album was not a commercial success a disilussioned Walker retreated from the limelight, pausing only occasionally to release the odd album of MOR material designed no doubt to keep his old fans happy whilst helping to pay the mortgage.

In 1978 however, The Walker Bros were coaxed out of retirement for one final album, though Scott’s reluctance to get involved meant that his contribution to this record was just 4 songs. It soon became apparent from this material that Scott, apart from listening to a lot of Berlin-period David Bowie, was an altogether different fish from the one that had been plundering the Jacques Brel catalogue on those early solo records. Synthesizer-laden tunes with curious song structures and unintelligible lyrics, they succeeded in taking the pioneering work that Bowie & Eno had produced on “Low” one step further and in the process of doing so ended up influencing the very musicians that Walker himself was trying to emulate.

Since then, despite a sporadic recording career that has yielded only 3 albums in a 20-year period, Walker’s vision has seen him move further and further into the musical void, occupying a territory that only he seems brave enough to occupy. After "Climate Of Hunter" issued in 1985, the last two releases, "Tilt" and "The Drift" may well have been critically acclaimed but are almost impossible to listen to from start to finish. They contain dark, bleak, unsettling, sometimes frightening soundscapes that have absolutely nothing to do with rock music – or any other music for that matter and which sound as if they have been made by a man on the edge of a mental abyss. At times moving, but mostly intensely disturbing, one wonders exactly what kind of mental state of mind is required to contemplate such material and this makes Engel's demeanour as witnessed in the documentary all the more bewildering.

"The Electrician" from The Walker Bros "Nite Flights" is lightweight pop music by comparison but there's still enough going on here to understand that Walker was in the process of taking a musical journey into un-mapped territory.

DAVID BOWIE - Nite Flights (1993)



Bowie’s version of “Nite Flights” was originally released in 1993 at a critical point in the man’s career. 10 years earlier, “Let’s Dance” had been a tremendous commercial success but instead of continuing to follow his own instincts, something that Bowie had always excelled at, he had decided to abandon his wandering muse in order to pander to his new public persona of “chart topper”. Over the next 5 year period he released two more albums that were very much in the same vein as "Let’s Dance" but both records suffered by lacking in musical direction and a surplus of anything remotely resembling a good tune. After the bloody awful follow-up “Tonight” in 1984 and smarting from the critical pasting that 1987’s “Never Let Me Down” had received, Bowie decided that the answer to this creative nadir was to become “just one of the lads” in a band – the band in question being the much maligned Tin Machine. Bowie spent another couple of album releases sharing the limelight (and sometimes the songwriting) with a selection of musicians who really did not deserve equal billing though in retrospect Tin Machine’s somewhat patchy albums did show signs that David’s talent was still in reasonable health despite the fact that it was buried for the most part under the cacophonous noise that Tin Machine created.

And so after Tin Machine had been knocked on the head along came “Black Tie White Noise”. It was heralded as a return to form despite the fact it too is a little erratic and Bowie was to produce much better things later on in the 90’s. On some of the tracks at least, namely the superb single “Jump They Say” and this track in particular – Bowie sounded confident and in control once again. Scott Walker has always been a major influence on DB but listening to Walker’s back catalogue it’s probably fair to say that they influenced each other at various points in their career. Our Davey has always liked recording a cover version or two but I’ve never really liked his versions of other people’s material as his choice of song is not always inspired and Bowie has such a distinctive style of his own that it always seems hard for him to get under the skin of someone else's compositions. However, this particular version of the Engel original is meatier than the Walker Bros take and is propelled by a fantastic rhythm track. The end result is quite superb and is easily one of the best things DB has done in the last 15 years.

PRESS TO PLAY - May 07

RUFUS WAINWRIGHT - Sanssouci (2007)



BJORK - Pneumonia (2007)



A lot of people may already have these tracks as they are taken from 2 of the more prominent new releases of recent weeks but as these records are constantly in circulation on the Edney Dansette they deserve to be included.

I know that in some circles my recent opinion regarding The Shins and their position within the pantheon of popular music had caused a tiny little stir. My “best band in the world” comments were taken a little out of context as I was trying to confirm the power of hype and it would seem that I succeeded without trying very hard. But let’s be quite certain about this. Rufus Wainwright is the best “song” writer in America by a mile. He is also a STAR – in the old –fashioned Judy Garland/Marlene Dietrich/Hollywood sense only this time I am not joking. Even though I admit to being boastfully biased - in the same way that I do not believe people who say that they don’t like The Beatles, I cannot understand how anyone with any semblance of interest in popular music cannot admit that Wainwright’s exceptionally talented. His latest album “Release The Stars” was a little disappointing on first play but if you persevere, it unfolds to reveal itself as yet another classic Rufus album. If there is a criticism then it is this - Wainwright is a supremely confident individual and when you mix his overt gayness with his theatrical leanings (he is a big opera fan) the final result can sometimes smack of flamboyance that threatens to overwhelm some of his material. This is probably the reason why Rufus has yet to break big in the States and why it is mostly fellow artists who champion the man’s name as they seem to understand and appreciate the Rufus muse more than the record buying public do. The arrangements on this record are ornate and imaginative but Rufus over-eggs the pudding from time to time and consequently they threaten to overwhelm what in essence are great songs. Rufus excels more often than not when it’s just him and his piano and I for one would like to hear a (pardon the phrase) stripped-back Wainwright on his next album but as his current working project is to write an opera of his own I may have to wait some time before that happens.

“Sanssouci” is my current favourite from "Release the Stars". The backing track seems to be channelling The Beach Boys “Sloop John B” somewhere along the line and according to Wikipedia it was "inspired by 18th century Prussian monarch Frederick the Great's Rococo summer palace outside Berlin"

As for Bjork, "Volta" is a welcome return to form and even though there are only a handful of tracks on this record that are anything close to "sprightly", it’s great to hear her being rhythmic once again after her brief sojourn experimenting with the human voice on the sometimes unfathomable “Medulla”. “Volta” is probably the most accessible thing she has done for quite awhile but it's still a record that needs careful attention as there is a distinct lack of "tunes" and a heavy emphasis on feel and texture. It certainly takes repeated listenings before one understands what's going on here. But that's the beauty of Bjork's music - "Accessible” is not a word that one can use easily when discussing her output as her constant search for new sounds and new ways in which to use them is what makes her such a fascinating artist. The album may not have too many "high points” like “Hidden Place” or “Joga” but there is a clever use of brass throughout (most prominent on the track included here) and some interesting collaborations with the usual array of eclectic musicians. However it is reassuring to know that some things remain constant in the Bjork camp. She still possesses a voice that can stop you dead in your tracks and her singing on this album and on this track in particular is exceptional.

"Pneumonia" is mesmerisingly beautiful and if I may use a piece of Bjork's broken english is consequently the "hugest" track on a fine album.


4 tracks from the hugely entertaining Rough Trade Records compilation "Counter Culture 1976". The Rough Trade record shop was founded during that year and was originally based in Portobello, London - home of the famous street market. Two years later the shop's founder Geoff Travis began the Rough Trade record label and it's roster included several influential artists though it's signing of The Smiths in 1983 proved a turning point. This extremely eclectic album (Candi Staton's disco-friendly "Young Hearts Run Free" is swiftly followed by The Residents bizarre rendition of the Stones "Satisfaction") is not a compilation of material by Rough Trade artists but instead highlights a particularly fervent 12 month period of musical activity in what was arguably one of the most important years in the history of popular music. Rough Trade along with their counterparts Stiff, were always one of the better independent labels and even though they both shared a healthy habit of constantly supplying high quality material, where Stiff used a mixture of hype, humour and eccentricity, Rough Trade were managed with comparative decorum and common sense. Despite going bankrupt in 1991 the label was thankfully re-launched 9 years later.

THE SAINTS - I'm Stranded (1976)



Proof that punk rock was not all CBGB's and The Roxy as this Australian long-haired combo take on The Ramones at their own game and almost succeed in out-muscling them on this seminal release. One of the finest records of the year beyond question and a healthy slice of punk rock recorded before the genre had been invented.

THE 101'ERS - Keys To Your Heart (1976)



Joe Strummer's pre-Clash band warms up with a pub-rock anthem and gives a highly promising taste of things to come. Named after the Maida Vale squat in which the band lived, Strummer may have provided some angst and a whole lot of attitood to The Clash's agenda but on this great track he sounds a lot more restrained and respectable.

DENNIS BROWN - Wolf And Leopard (1976)



Along with the inclusion of mavericks like Tom Waits and Ivor Cutler, "Counter Culture 1976" also includes a healthy dose of reggae and dub, a musical genre that quickly made friends with it's punk counterparts and found that they had a lot in common. This hit not only features Brown's usual smooth vocal delivery but the hugely influential riddums of Sly & Robbie.

THE PENGUIN CAFE ORCHESTRA - Hugebaby (1976)



An example of the compilations eclecticism and the odd one out in this selection. Taken from The Penguins debut album and released on Brian Eno's Obscure record label, the Orchestra were the brainchild of classically-trained musician Simon Jeffes. Formed when Jeffes grew tired of classical music's rigid rule structure, this fascinating band recorded several superb records before Jeffes sadly died in 1997. As relaxing as it is soulful - their music is both clinical and challenging yet is also warm and humorous - un-classifiable in other words and quite quite superb.

PRESS TO PLAY - April 07

THE BIRD & THE BEE - Fucking Boyfriend (2007)



LITTLE FEAT - Roll Um' Easy (1973)



A question that has raised it's head on more than one occasion in the past amongst friends and fellow music freaks has been; how many siblings of famous musical parents have succeeded in displaying a musical talent that is the equal of their elders? Up until about 10 years ago the answer to that question was.........not many. Julian Lennon? Ziggy Marley? Jakob Dylan? Don't think so. However, there are a selection of artists from the 1970's that are spawning an interesting selection of kids that in some cases are improving on the original bloodline. The Wainwrights are an obvious example with Martha and the outrageously talented Rufus flying the flag - Teddy Thompson, son of Richard, is an excellent vocalist and a fine songwriter and I guess you could include Jeff Buckley too even though he barely knew father Tim before daddy flew the nest. And now there's Inara George - daughter of Little Feat's Lowell and vocalist for the duo The Bird And The Bee. Initially an actress, she had already made a solo album before the formation of the Bird & Bee with multi-instrumentalist Greg Kurstin and even though it's early days for this pop combo it will be interesting to see whether Inara turns out to be a chip off the old proverbial or not.

As for father Lowell - his was an exceptional talent who sadly left this planet far too early and whose band Little Feat were one of THE finest from the early 70's. Elton John once referred to Feat as "The Muhammad Ali of Rock N'Roll" and apart from being one of the hottest live bands to ever grace the stage, on vinyl they were always at their best when George was running the show. Lowell suffered with ill health in later years, and that, coupled with his decision to make the band more democratic meant that latter day albums were a little patchy but the triumvirate "Sailin Shoes" "Dixie Chicken" and "Feats Don't Fail Me Now" from 1972-1974 are essential purchases. Linda Ronstadt said she "fell in love" with Lowell after hearing "Roll Um Easy" a track that sums up the man's genius and which showcases his astonishing talent not only as a slide guitarist "par excellence", but also as a great songwriter and fine vocalist.

Ironically, whilst Lowell sings of "eloquent profanity" on "Roll Um Easy" some 35 years later daughter Inara provides some of her own on the extremely catchy and somewhat explicit lead-off single from The B&B's debut album.

THE CITY - I Wasn't Born To Follow (1969)



Back in 1971, it seemed that most households owned a copy of Carole King's "Tapestry", an album that epitomised the "bed-sitter" singer-songwriter period of the day but which was seemingly purchased by record buyers regardless of individual taste or fashion. "Tapestry" somehow struck a chord with the general public and even though it never appears in a "Best Ever Albums" list it shifted a phenomenal amount of units and according to All Music Guide is one of the "most successful albums in rock music history". 2 years earlier an album entitled "Now That Everything's Been Said" by a trio called The City was issued to stony silence. The City were Carole King, Danny Kortchmar on guitar and Charles Larkey on bass (with a little help from Jim Gordon on drums) and this record was the only album released by the band prior to Carole finding her niche as a solo artist. "Now That Everything's Been Said" is currently hard to track down on CD yet it's an interesting item as it's fashioned from the same thread with which "Tapestry" was woven and in many ways is almost as good. The record utilised the same nucleus of musicians that Carole later used on her 70's output and even though it has the odd "rough edge", just like her best-selling album of 1971 it's as comfortable as an old pair of slippers with perhaps the odd big toe poking through. The material may be not be so familiar - mostly songs written specifically for the project - and in some cases not so good - but just as Carole had chosen to breath new life into classics like "Natural Woman" or "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" by recording her own "definitive" versions on "Tapestry", she succeeds on The City's album in re-claiming at least a couple of tunes that had already been set in stone by somebody else. "Hi-De-Ho", originally a hit for Blood Sweat & Tears is one of them and "Wasn't Born To Follow" is the other. In this case the "somebody else" is The Byrds who recorded the track for their "Notorious Byrd Brothers" album in 1968 though it's inclusion in the "Easy Rider" soundtrack 1 year later embedded the song into public consciousness. Shorn of The Byrds psychedelic overtones and stripped down to it's barest bones "Follow" emerges as one of King's most enduring "solo" recordings and like the album from which it was taken is something of a lost gem.

An overview of King's career - fashioned perhaps on the excellent 4-CD box-set of Burt Bacharach material that was issued several years ago - is long overdue as in my opinion, King is undoubtedly one of THE great pop songwriters of her generation. Rhino.....are you listening?

THE HONEYBEES - Some Of Your Lovin'



Just in case we needed proof of King's song-writing acumen, take this piece of pop perfection as recorded by the female trio The Honeybees. The Honeybees were apparently The Cookies but with an unknown lead vocalist, possibly Barbara Alston of the Crystals. Dusty Springfield recorded the definitive version of this and several other Goffin/King songs but this item is the rare original. King also recorded this one month later by using the same backing and overdubbing her own vocal track.

THE SWEDISH ARE COMING!

JENS LEKMAN - Black Cab (2005)



LONEY, DEAR - Sinister In A State Of Hope (2006)



PETER, BJORN & JOHN - Young Folks (2007)



If my somewhat excitable announcement suggests that the music world is about to be over-run by hordes of blonde Scandinavians then forgive me for being a little dramatic. It's just that I seem to recall that back in the 60's & 70's most of the "other" European countries seemed to be so far behind the U.K. when providing popular music entertainment that you were forgiven for believing that they may never catch up. The only "significant" Swedish artists that I can remember back in the late 60's were an instrumental duo called Hansson & Karlsson - a drum & organ combo that made somewhat tedious "progressive" music. Keyboard player Bo Hansson later achieved some notoriety by playing with Jimi Hendrix and turning Tolkien's "The Lord Of The Rings" into a Wakeman-like concept album but it was Abba who really put Sweden on the musical map in 1974 and they were a rather tough act to follow as the late and not so lamented Roxette and Ace Of Base discovered.

But there seems to be a new wind blowing in Sweden and not only have a number of artists - namely The Cardigans & The Hives - achieved success worldwide but there is a possibility that several more may follow suit. If the latest hype is to be believed then Peter, Bjork & John , a playful pop trio from Stockholm, could be the next "big thing" out of Scandinavia whilst Jens Lekman has been described as the Swedish Beck. Apart from re-introducing the long lost art of whistling on record, "Young Folks" by P B & J has an infectious I've-heard-that-somewhere-before melody line whilst Lekman's "Black Cab" sounds like an up-tempo version of the sort of song that Lou Reed would have written for Nico in the early days of the Velvet Underground. Emil Svanangen on the other hand goes by the peculiar name of "Loney, Dear" and like Lekman, was discovered more by chance than design. The rather haunting "Sinister In A State Of Hope" is taken from last year's Sub-Pop debut.

PRESS TO PLAY - March 07

MARTIN CARTHY - Company Policy (1988)



A man who, in my humble opinion, should be knighted for his services to English music. Surely if it's good enough for Sir Paul or Sir Mick then why not Sir Martin? The cynic in me knows the answer of course - Folk music doesn't sell, it doesn't shift enough units - consequently it's an MBE only I'm afraid. But Carthy has arguably done more for the British Folk music scene than any other artist and what's more he's still out there doing it. He was there at the very beginning, influencing both Dylan and Paul Simon during their brief sojourns to the British Isles in the 1960's, giving Simon "Scarborough Fair" and Big Bob the inspiration for "The Girl From The North Country" amongst others en route. He was in the original line-up of Steeleye Span in the days when they were a pioneering folk-rock band and not the cute commercial "Top Of The Pops" novelty group they later became and when the British folk scene enjoyed an invigorating revival in the early 90's thanks mainly to a injection of youthful talent - Carthy - who turns 67 this year - was at the forefront of this scene either indirectly through his daughter Eliza or through a selection of superb albums released with Eliza and his wife Norma Waterson.

This track from 1988 shows Carthy in fine fettle though it's probably fair to say that some of the man's power, both as a singer and guitarist, has diminished in recent years especially when compared with some of the recordings from his early days. Carthy's tour de force - 1972's "The Famous Flower Of Serving Men" - is a particular highlight and is in fact very similar in style to this song, a Carthy original about the Falklands War. Oh yes, and a nicer guy you will never meet.

RY COODER & MANUEL GALBAN - Drume Negrita (2002)



SANTO & JOHNNY - Sleepwalk (1959)



Apart from being one of THE greatest guitarists that ever walked this earth, Ry Cooder's career has never been anything less than interesting, it's just a little unfortunate that the areas that he has decided to work in (and there have been many) have not been commercially successful. This is primarily becuase Cooder has always concentrated on pioneering roots music and the preservation of America's (and latterly Cuba's) musical history and - sweeping generalisation here - Americans don't seem to care as much about it's wonderful musical legacy as much as others seem to. So....as Randy Newman has done, Cooder decided - after making a succession of superb albums that didn't sell particularly well - that soundtrack albums were where it was at financially and consequently he concentrated on making a host of them for several years. Nowadays it would seem that Ry has once again decided to do just what the hell he likes and apart from single-handedly introducing the wonders of Cuban music to the rest of the world, America's finest musicologist can be currently found making complex concept records that have a sense of the past both socially as well as musically. This is from just one of the several albums that Cooder has made with his Cuban chums and as well as featuring some exemplary musicianship, the record is a whole lot of fun too.

Hearing Ry & Manuel's wonderful record reminded me generally of guitar instrumentals of the late 50's and early 60's - a period when the British music charts was full of them with at least one Shadows hit seemingly appearing in the Top 10 every week. This track was recorded by Hank Marvin's Shads in 1961 and I seem to remember Cooder performing this live way back when but the original version by Santo & Johnny Farina has always given me the proverbial goose-bumps. Have Twang Will Travel.

KEREN ANN - In Your Back (2007)



I don't know a great deal about Miss Ann, apart from the fact that on the odd occasion that I have had the pleasure to hear her music I have been mightily impressed. It is therefore up to the powers of the internet to explain all. Real Name - Keren Ann Zeidel. A truly cosmopolitan individual - born in Israel to Dutch and Russian parents and from the age of 11, a resident of Paris, France. Consequently her first two album releases were in French and she did not release her first English-speaking record until 2003. Keren has been likened to a plethora of disparate performers as diverse as Serge Gainsbourg, Portishead, Joni Mitchell, and Astrid Gilberto and even though it would be nice to say that in the long run she simply sounds like herself, there is probably a little of all of the above in Keren's performances. Apart from being blessed with a gorgeously dreamy voice, from what I've heard her material is simple and emotional but with an interesting emphasis on musical detail either in the way that the song is arranged or in the instrumentation used. This wonderful track from her forthcoming self-titled album is lifted by some nice keyboard touches and a beautifully crafted string section in the middle. Beautiful.

BACKINI - Cream (2003)



Yet another artist who remains something of an unknown quantity to me other than this one track. Backini's real name is Rob Quickenden and he hails from sunny Brighton, Norman Cook territory. But his My Space site offers the following; "Brighton's Backini, takes samples and sonic inspiration from 1940s big bands, '50s bebop '60s easy listening, '70s pop divas (not to mention Adam & The Ants and UK TV show The Saint) and blends them with tough beats, cinematic arrangements and some choice turntable cuts." So there we are then, yet another scratch n'mix DJ no doubt influenced by the one artist who designed much of the template from which the likes of Backini still operate, the mighty DJ Shadow. One of the joys of listening to this stuff is trying to work out what or who the samples are. I can hear British jazz chanteuse Cleo Laine in there somewhere and there's a vaguely familiar Joe Turner-like blues singer thrown in for good measure but as far as the rest is concerned, it's anyone's guess. My sincere thanks to Rockin Steve Coram for this item.

M.WARD - Silverline (2001)



A peculiar little ditty from one Mr.Matthew Ward, another individual originating from the hotbed that is the Portland Oregon music scene (The Decemberists, The Shins, Everclear.) Ward wears his influences on his sleeve but uses them in a very distinctive and slightly unusual way. His self-confessed template is apparently American music of the 40's & 50's though the "train" sample on this track is from Jimmie Rodgers 1929 recording of "Waiting For A Train" whilst the song stylistically pays specific homage to John Fahey, the influential but slightly bonkers American guitar picker who also hailed from Portland. Ward is a fine guitarist but also possesses a strangely hushed and husky vocal technique. Sonically Quirky.

JONATHAN RICHMAN & THE MODERN LOVERS - Rockin' Rockin' Leprechauns (1977)



A man who began his career firmly at the forefront of American punk but whom, by 1977, was writing songs that sound like a scientific experiment to cross the pop craft of Buddy Holly with the brain of a 10 year old child. Songs about Ice Cream Men, Mosquitos, Martians and Abominable Snowmen in supermarkets peppered Richman's output during the period 1976 to 1980 and even though one could be forgiven for suggesting that Jonathan was in fact completely crackers, there are some great pop songs on these albums and a sense of humour too, albeit an extremely childish one. This song is, of course, about Rockin' Leprechauns and sounds as if the band are playing at the bottom of a dustbin. It ain't no "Roadrunner" but your kids will love it.

JACKSON BROWNE - Song For Adam (1972)



Jackson Browne is one of those artists who has apparently suffered from "great first album" syndrome as critics are generally united in their praise of "Saturate Before Using" (from which "Song For Adam" is taken) but are convinced that Browne has struggled to match the record ever since. A precocious youngster, he had been writing material since his mid-teens and was already well-known by the time his debut album appeared in 1972. Browne was 24 at the time of it’s issue and apart from the fact that he was able to call upon his impressive stockpile of songs on subsequent releases critics believe his debut to be his one and only masterpiece and that he has never bettered it (though 1974's “Late For The Sky” runs it a close second.) Certainly his career has become a little more erratic from 1976's “The Pretender” onwards and despite a brief sojourn into political brow-beating during the 80's it's his early "confessional" period that is still the most satisfying. This song appears to be about suicide.... Definitely not "knees-up" material.

THE EAGLES - Tryin To Get To You (1954)



And talking of West Coast artists, no it's not Messrs Henley, Frey & Walsh at kindergarden - this is a somewhat obscure American vocal group with the original version of a song that Presley covered during his Sun Studio days. Presley's early covers were almost, if not better than the originals, then certainly different such was the level of experimentation that Sam Phillips encouraged. But this track shows that Elvis kept his version pretty close to the source of the original which, to my knowledge, is the only thing The Eagles produced of any substance - until they broke up in 1982 of course.

BLIND WILLIE McTELL - Dyin' Crapshooter's Blues (1940)



A track from a man who holds the distinction of having had a Bob Dylan song named after him. William Samuel McTell was born blind in 1901 and his reputation as one of blues music's most innovative performers remains to this day. This astonishing performance, recorded I believe for a "Library of Congress" session, not only reveals McTell's abilities as a singer and 12-string guitar player but also highlights the man's storytelling prowess which is enhanced by the opening explanation of how the song was written and some stunning word imagery

McTell also wrote the original version of the much recorded "Statesboro Blues" whilst this song has not only been covered by a number of contemporary artists, but was also recently added to The White Stripes live repertoire. "I want 9 men going to the graveyard bubba and 8 men coming back"......Willie sings. Ralph McTell is definitely NOT a member of this family.

PRESS TO PLAY - February 07

MARTY ROBBINS - Don't Worry (1961)



My early memories of Marty Robbins are somewhat unfortunate. The Cossack hairspray advert image off record and the rather embarrassing "El Paso" on it. Of course this was during a period when practically ALL country and western existed only for me to ridicule. Eventually due to the process of backward evolution that came via, of all people, Linda Ronstadt, I eventually discovered just how good this music can be though one gets the impression that people STILL view Country as maudlin, sentimental slush about dead dogs and truck drivers. Well even though it can be both these things and more sometimes, there are a great deal of wonderful country songs out there and this is one of them. From Robbins early 60's Nashville period when he wrote a number of fine tunes, this song is lifted by the rather bizarre inclusion of the first ever fuzz-tone guitar solo in country music history. Covered in this country by the under-rated Billy Fury.

DON COVAY - You Must Believe Me (1964)



Don Covay is one of the "forgotten men" of soul music. Despite obtaining hits of his own, he is probably better known as a songwriter for other artists. He wrote "Chain Of Fools" for Aretha and also inadvertently helped the fledgling Jimi Hendrix during his early career as Jimi appears on Covay's biggest and best known hit, 1964's "Mercy Mercy". This song was recorded in the same year and shares a strong resemblance to "Mercy" which suggests that it too may boast the talents of one James Marshall on lefty geetar. Ironically, this song is not a Covay original but was penned instead by the sublime Curtis Mayfield.

DORIS DUKE - I Don't Care Anymore (1969)



A sorrowful tale of a life gone wrong as the narrator of this superb slice of deep soul is forced into prostitution in order to make ends meet. Heavy Stuff. Doris Curry began her career like so many black singers had done - in gospel music - and then became a session singer before the name change brought about the album from which this track was taken ("I'm A Loser"). Despite being called "the greatest soul record ever made" by Dave Godin - the man who coined the phrase "Deep Soul" - the album was actually rejected by a succession of labels who, on this evidence, really should have known better.

ROOGALATOR - Cincinnati Fatback (1976)



The 3rd single release from Stiff Records - Catalogue No. BUY 3 - this is something of a curiosity as it doesn't seem to fit alongside a lot of the other stuff that Stiff was pioneering at the time. Roogalator were led by a Costello-look-a-like American called Danny Adler who was apparently as strong-willed and driven as Elvis was but who sadly didn't have the talent or the staying power that his label-mate possessed. Despite being critically lauded as "the next big thing" this song is the only item for which the band will be remembered - a shuffling, funky and heartfelt paean to Adler's home town and some of it's musicians.

(Incidentally this one is for Big Joe and John C over there in Cincinnati - even if you're not listening!)

THE MEMBERS - Solitary Confinement (1978)



Another Stiff release and the one and only single for that label by The Members. Released before "The Sound Of The Suburbs" and prior to the band deciding to find fame and fortune with those corporate bigwigs Virgin. As it turned out, not a good move. One of the first bands to successfully attempt the combination of punk with reggae. Written by band members Jean-Marie Carroll and the wonderfully named Nicky Tesco the song's lyric memorably asks it's listeners to go out and buy the record! Cheeky!

THE SHINS - Turn On Me (2007)



A good excuse for introducing another track from The Shins latest opus. Apart from the fact that it steals it's opening from "And Then He Kissed Me" by The Crystals, Word magazine recently suggested that this track sounds like "Del Shannon in an ice rink". This song has the ability to invoke the one human emotion that, apart from crying, is a sure sign that I've just heard something good...it makes me smile. Pure Pop For Now People.

THE GOOD THE BAD & THE QUEEN - Northern Whale (2007)



The latest musical offering from the workaholic that is Damon Albarn and quite possibly the first of 2 albums to be released this year bearing the man's name as it is mooted that a new Blur album is also on the way. Albarn has re-invented himself once again for this one-off project that a number of critics are suggesting is a follow-up to "Parklife" primarily becuase the album deals specifically with our beloved capital city at a certain moment in it's history. Albarn has come an awful long way from those tedious Brit-Pop wars of the mid 80's and is proving to be quite the adaptable chameleon these days. Meanwhile Blur's old rivals Oasis are.....well still the same actually. This song and the album from which it was taken, is underpinned by the thunderous bass of The Clash's Paul Simonon and is the true tale of the Bottle-nose that became stranded in The Thames in Jan 2006.

TINARIWEN - Mano Dyak (2007)



Tinariwen have emerged as the most popular exponent of that increasingly dodgy musical genre called “World Music” and the suggestions are that this album, their third, will be the one to break them to a wider audience. One of the UK broadsheets even went as far as naming “Aman Iman : Water Is Life”, the “pop album of the week” upon it’s release which is perhaps taking things a little too far. If you don’t know who or more importantly what Tinariwen are check out their history as they are much much more than just another African band. If you are also lucky enough to find them playing in your home town I implore you to see them as live they are just about as good as it gets. Look up "hypnotic" in the dictionary and I swear that one of it's translation's would spell the band’s name.

Warning....this track starts slowly but persevere with it as at 1 min 20 seconds, we are transported to Tuareg country and once you are there you don't want to come home!


CLAP YOUR HANDS SAY YEAH - Mama, Won't You Keep Those Castles In The Air And Burning (2007)



Another band that are beginning to make waves, primarily becuase their self-financed self-promoted and self-distributed 2005 debut album sold exceptionally well despite receiving no backing from any corporate big-wig record company. The band remind me very much of early Talking Heads. Their music is clever and oddly experimental but it's also accessible and catchy. Alec Ounsworth's high, whiny, untrained lead vocals are strongly reminiscent of one Mr.D.Byrne which only serves to strengthen the connection still further. Taken from "Some Loud Thunder", their "difficult" 2nd album and a record that many critics were not too keen on. Maybe their best is yet to come.

Shin City

Hype. Dontcha just love it?

In 1974 Jon Landau famously quoted "I saw rock and roll's future and its name is Bruce Springsteen" and Bruce suffered the consequences for some time afterwards. There have been many other examples of journalists spouting words of such commitment that we are all expected to believe every single syllable as gospel and usually end up doing so.

Well, here's some hype of my own.

The Shins are the best band in the world.

As far as I am aware I may have been the only person to have made this rather bold statement concerning the band's current state of affairs but the difference is that as I am the owner of this tiny insignificent blog out here in cyberspace no-one is really gonna take much notice so I may as well say it anyway.

So are The Shins are the best band in the world? Well, probably not but then who else can seriously lay claim to that lofty position?

Judging from the hoopla that has surrounded the release of "Wincing The Night Away", their first album for 4 years, it would appear that whatever their current status may be, they are certainly on the verge of a major breakthrough and having noticed the fervour amongst Shin people at the prospect of hearing the new record they would appear to have a fan base that is almost maniacal in it's devotion to the group. And that's not all...the fan base is growing if their critically acclaimed appearance in London last year is anything to go by. Here in the UK we seem to be a little slow when it comes to worshipping the Shin Kingdom but then apart from 2 more London gigs later this month, to my knowledge they haven't really toured GB fully as yet, but they have been wedged permanently on The Great Unknown turntable recently and are in danger of staying there for some time to come.

The Shins are from Portland, Oregon and were born out of an indie guitar band formed in 1992 called Flake, later known as Flake Music. Flake Music featured a nucleus of musicians that are currently to be found in The Shins line-up, the most important of which is James Mercer the Shins songwriter. Flake Music were very much a collaborative effort and after releasing a handful of singles achieved some acclaim with their only album release "When You Land Here, It's Time To Return". In 1997 Mercer felt the need to form his own group as an off-shoot so that he could showcase his own material, but when interest in Flake Music crumbled (excuse the pun) they eventually disbanded, and The Shins took over.

It's just possible that most people - at least the cinemagoers amongst us - would have initially heard of The Shins in a film called "Garden State" released in 2004. In a scene that is now part of Shins folk-lore Natalie Portman's character plays the song "New Slang" to her friend and casually states that "this song will change your life". Shins fans would undoubtedly agree with that statement but isn't this just more hype? Well maybe.....but when people begin to talk about Mercer's songwriting abilities as if he were a modern day Brian Wilson, maybe it's time to sit up and take notice.

The Shins are really all about James Mercer to be honest. Mercer and his songs. Having grown up in the 1960's I was spoilt rotten by what seemed to be a weekly supply of great melodies issuing forth from the family transistor so consequently I find myself returning time and time again to modern day song-smiths that can belt out a good tune or two. Mercer fits that bill perfectly and even though he may never have a "Penny Lane" or a "God Only Knows" or a "Waterloo Sunset" in him he is a talented bugger for sure.

Mercer not only has an excellent grasp of melodic structure but his songs are extremely infectious and they take unexpected twists and turns when you are not looking. You would have thought that after all this time it would be practically impossible to take the popular music template and do something different with it but in the same way that Wilson circa "Pet Sounds" & "Smile" succeeded in offering us familiar harmonies that we had actually never heard before, so Mercer does something similar. In other words he's imaginative and inventive and in a world when most bands tend to sound the same, that is really something.

It remains to be seen whether The Shins succeed in conquering the world, and in a way I hope that they do not become part of the mainstream as doing so usually means compromising what makes them so good in the first place. But 2007 could turn out to be an interesting year for the band. How far will they go?

THE SHINS - Caring Is Creepy (2001)



The opening and possibly best track from their debut album "Oh! Inverted World". Not their finest effort in my opinion but an album that instantly made people sit up and take notice. The obvious 60's influences are there and just as Mercer's melodies provide unexpected moments - on this album we were also introduced to his train-of-thought lyrics. Like "New Slang", this song was featured in the film "Garden State"

THE SHINS - Saint Simon (2003)



From "Chutes Too Narrow" - an album that, apart from being their best record thus far, has the potential to become a bona-fide classic. I could say that it's the Shins "Pet Sounds" but that would probably be taking The Beach Boys analogy just a bit TOO far.

THE SHINS - Red Rabbits (2007)



After the brilliance of their previous album "Wincing The Night Away" was always going to be something of a disappointment. 4 years is a long time to wait for new material and even though the album offers suggestions that the band are moving forward, the best material is the stuff that wouldn't be out of place on their previous offering. Merely excellent as opposed to exceptional.

Let's Talk About Sex

My latest offering once again provides a connection with selections made previously available. The post entitled "James Brown's Funky People" finished with a track by one Mr.Hank Ballard, and so we begin my latest musings with something by the same artist. The subject matter therefore, courtesy of Ballard's band The Midnighters, is .......S E X.....a three letter word that has been part of the lexicon of popular music seemingly since Thomas Edison invented the phonogram in 1877.

You have to be careful when choosing material of a sexually charged nature and not necessarily becuase of it's shock value.... Having decided that my next post would include 4 or 5 songs with "sexy" in the title I went searching for what I thought would be an interesting selection of music only to discover that there are a lot of risque items out there that are anything but.

"Sexy" songs seem to fall into two main categories. Firstly, there's the wishy-washy MOR mediocrity of items like "Sexy Eyes" by Dr.Hook, the appalling "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy" by Rod Stewart, "You Sexy Thing" by Hot Chocolate (which actually isn't THAT bad) or "I'm Too Sexy" by Right Said Fred all, for the most part, recordings by white artists leading me to believe the possibility that caucasians aren't very good at conveying carnal knowledge on record. On the other hand one only has to listen to Barry White's walrus-on-heat mumblings or the fake-orgasmic groanings of either Donna Summer on "Love To Love You Baby" or the unknown female on the faintly embarrassing "Love Won't Let Me Wait" by Major Harris to understand that black artists can get it wrong too.

The second category is modern R&B. There are a bewildering array of "sexy" songs in the modern R&B canon - "Sexy Back" by Justin Timberlake - "Sexy Plexi" by Jack Johnson - "So Sexy" by Twista & R.Kelly - "Sexy Love" by Ne-Yo - "Grown And Sexy" by Chamillionaire - to name but a few. No doubt each of these songs were released in conjunction with a scandalously expensive and suitably raunchy video designed to boost record sales for what is essentially run-of-the-mill pop fodder. To be honest the majority of pop videos these days seem to feature a profusion of scantily-clad women in beautifully shot rubbish directed with precious little imagination so it's a little unfair to lay the blame on one particular genre of music for what is a general malaise within the pop/video industry. Sex sells after all.

Regarding sex in music as a whole, it seems to me that it's a subject that really only works when it is either taken "tongue-in-cheek" (pun intended) or when it is dealt with "no holds barred". Of course it would be impossible to hear EVERY song that deals with this specific subject, as along with the proverbial Drugs & Rock N'Roll, it has and always will be one of rock's common denominators in terms of lyrical inspiration and consequently one could devote a whole blog to it's history and development.

But enough of my brow-beating and let's get to the music. This post will specifically deal with those "sexy" songs mentioned above though to be honest there aren't an awful lot to choose from hence the inclusion of a number of fairly well-known items. This will be followed specifically by a selection of salacious pre-rock items from that golden period before the birth of rock n'roll.

THE MIDNIGHTERS - Sexy Ways (1954)



The return of Hank Ballard (real name John Kendricks), and taken from his days as front-man with The Midnighters. Previously known as The Royals, it was Ballard's arrival in the line-up that resulted in a complete change in their musical direction. Recorded 4 years before "The Twist" and from that all-important pre-rock n'roll period mentioned above when artists were providing a welcome alternative to the bland pop material gracing the record charts at the time. This is effectively a re-write of a Ballard composition called "Work With Me Annie" that included the lyrical couplet "Annie please don't cheat/give me all my meat". The instrumental middle section of this record alone would have given those Tin Pan Alley songwriters palpitations.

PRINCE & THE NEW POWER GENERATION - Sexy M.F.(1992)



Having been slightly less than complimentary when discussing the importance of James Brown on the diminutive one's career, you have to admit that no-one in black popular music's history has even come close to emulating Brown's achievements.....apart from this little guy. Taken from a period when Prince's career was beginning to sag a little, this is still a stunning track that The Godfather Of Soul himself would have been proud of. Whether James would have been this explicit is doubtful but then Sex has always been a Prince obsession. An example of the "no holds barred" kind of sexy discussed above. No-one does it better.

AIR - Sexy Boy (1998)



A minor hit in the UK for Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel AKA Air and taken from their "Moon Safari" debut album, a record that has yet to be bettered by the French duo. As I don't actually speak French, I have absolutely no idea what is being discussed in this song apart from the two words "Sexy" & "Boy". Nice tune though.

TIMMY THOMAS - Sexy Woman (sometime in the early 70's)



A one hit wonder if ever there was one. Timmy Thomas is most well-known for the 1973 track "Why Can't We Live Together?" one of those songs that you instantly recognise without having a clue as to what it is. This funky and slightly obscure little item was sampled by D.J.Shadow and Cut Chemist for their excellent "Product Placement" collaboration album.

THE BEATLES - Sexy Sadie (1968)



An anomaly. A "sexy" record that isn't directly about the act itself. Written by Lennon after The Beatles visit to Rishikesh, this song was originally entitled "Maharishi" but had to be changed for legal reasons. Penned after it was discovered that the enlightened one was seemingly more interested in jumping into bed with the female members of The Beatles entourage than teaching the Fab Four how to reach the astral plane.

Included becuase it happens to be one of those personal Beatle favourites that you don't hear nearly enough of.

PRESS TO PLAY - January 07

A new monthly feature. A smattering of items that have been in rotation on The Great Unknown "perfect gramophone." Will be added to at random during the course of the month.


BILL HALEY & THE COMETS - Crazy Man Crazy (1953)



Recorded in the year before Elvis and during a period when Haley was experimenting with his music - adding uptempo R&B rhythms to what was originally Country roots. The Comets were originally called The Saddlemen - a distinctly cowboy-related monicker and the inclusion of a steel guitar solo on this track provides a link to Haley's Western Swing beginnings. Haley became a novelty act after "Rock Around The Clock" went to No.1 in 1955 - between 1951 & 1954 he did as much as anyone to help invent Rock N'Roll.

CHUCK BERRY - Route 66 (1961)



The archetypal road song originally written by Bobby Troup and recorded by Nat King Cole in 1946. This is a surprisingly subdued performance by Chuck Berry who's own composition "Promised Land" charters similar geographical territory lyrically.

DAVID ESSEX - So-Called Loving (1967/68)



David "Cor-blimey Guvnor" Essex in his pre-stardom, pre-Evita days. This was recorded for Deram during the very early period of his career when he was contracted, along with Tom Jones, to Decca. Essex, according to All Music Guide, once played football (or soccer for all you Americans out there) for West Ham Boys as a youth which in my opinion makes him a top class geezer of the highest order irrespective of his dodgy musical career. This long lost Northern Soul floor-shaker was kindly provided for me by Martin "Jerky" Stone.

THE NEW YORK DOLLS - Trash (1973)



From The Dolls debut album, an integral part of any punk-rock back catalogue. An equal mixture of attitood and eye-liner. Rolling Stones riffs originally borrowed from the aforementioned Mr.Berry added to lyrics sometimes inspired by 60's girl groups equals.....uhh something slightly different.

RONNIE LANE & SLIM CHANCE - Anymore For Anymore (1974)



The man affectionately known as "Plonk" was not only part of that great Marriott/Lane Small Faces songwriting partnership but by all accounts was also the driving force behind The Faces too but was overshadowed by the more flamboyant Rod Stewart. Left the band when Stewart's solo efforts were threatening to undermine The Faces career. This is the title track from the rootsy debut album by Slim Chance, which also featured the UK hit "How Come" and the UK nearly-hit "The Poacher". Another "Jerky" production.

SHUGGIE OTIS - Inspiration Information (1974)



This is the title track from an album recently re-released by David Byrne's Luaka-Bop label. Otis was the son of Johnny Otis, a hugely influential R&B artist who toured and recorded with a "caravan" of artists and who was responsible for the original version of "Willie And The Hand Jive". Shuggie (christened Johnny Jnr.) was something of a child prodigy, starting his career at the tender age of 14 and appearing as a bass player on Frank Zappa's "Peaches En Regalia" just 2 years later. Apparently having turned down the opportunity to join The Rolling Stones as their lead guitarist, his solo career didn't last long - just 4 albums, of which this one appears to be the last thing of any substance that he ever did. The UK DJ Giles Peterson says in the album's sleeve notes that "Shuggie's music is some of the most innovative art I've ever had the joy to bear witness to" Ummmm....not sure about that but this track is tasty even if it sounds like Sly & The Family Stone via Todd Rundgren.

EMILY HAINES & THE SOFT SKELETON - Doctor Blind (2006)



Photogenic lead vocalist of Canadian indie-rock band Metric and daughter of jazz poet Paul Haines. Taken from her 2nd solo album "Knives Don't Have Your Back" a selection of moody, introspective piano-driven songs written over a 4 year period. Whilst the music suggests a number of influences.... Neil Young perhaps, Lennon's "Plastic Ono Band" album, Norah Jones on barbiturates, her music has been endorsed by the mighty Robert Wyatt, and it don't get much better than that.

James Brown's Funky People

Apart from releasing and performing his own material, James Brown was a very generous man - dispersing his talent amongst a select group of friends and fellow artists. From the mid 60's onwards Brown owned several record companies though most were short-lived. Dynamite (1965) New Breed (1966) and Identify (circa 1970) all released items of interest but it wasn't until People Records was formed in May 1971 that Brown finally found an outlet for all of his extra curricular activities.

Brown gave his rather large and continually changing entourage of musicians (known as "The Revue" for live purposes) an opportunity to "do their own thang" and even though there were rumblings about low rates of pay and false songwriting credits he provided a lot of artists with an opportunity to share a taste of the limelight. The best remembered are Brown's female vocalists, a selection of divas all plucked from relative obscurity who formed part of the live band but who all recorded their own material under Brown's tutelage. They included a singer called Tammi Washington who later moved to Motown and re-invented herself as Tammi Terrell but the 3 who are best known are the funky Marva Whitney, Vicki Anderson & the pick of the bunch, Lyn Collins.

LYN COLLINS - Do Your Thing (live) (1972)



Dubbed “The Female Preacher” and initially added as a "stand by" after Marva Whitney had left in 1970. Joined full time in 1971 as a replacement for Vicki Anderson. Her biggest hits were the mighty "Think (About It)" (another song that has been sampled to death) and the splendid "Rock Me Again and Again and Again and Again and Again and Again." Included here is a live rendition of an Isaac Hayes song that reveals what a fantastic singer she was and on closer inspection, that Lyn sang with a lisp. Collins sadly died in 2005.

BOBBY BYRD - I Know You Got Soul (1971)



An old friend from way back. Byrd (real name Bobby Day) bailed Brown out of a Georgia jail during the early 50’s and then gave James a spot in his vocal group The Flames. Brown re-paid Bobby’s generosity by stealing his band and then relegating Bobby to backing singer! It's not too harsh to suggest that as Byrd was a good but uninspiring vocalist, the decision was probably a good career move for all concerned. Byrd was rewarded with a spot as the warm-up man for live concerts, remained a member of Brown's entourage off and on for many years , married the aforementioned Vicki Anderson and with Brown’s musical guidance obtained several solo hits throughout the 60’s and 70’s of which this track – and the wonderfully named “Hot Pants (I’m Coming, I’m Coming, I’m Coming)” are among the very best.

DEE FELICE TRIO - There Was A Time (1969)



A relative obscurity that shows that Brown could be jazzy when the mood took him. Who was Dee Felice and his trio? Not sure exactly but Felice was the drummer of this particular combo and this Ramsey Lewis inspired ditty is an instrumental version of a Brown original.

HANK BALLARD & THE DAPPS - How You Gonna Get Respect? (When You Haven't Cut Your Process Yet) (1968)



An example of Brown giving a helping hand to one of his idols. Ballard was once a label-mate of Brown's at King Records, and at a time when The Famous Flames were struggling to make a living Ballard and his band The Midnighters were a great success on the R & B charts. Hank had cut the original (and vastly superior) version of "The Twist" only for Chubby Checker to claim it as his own but the vastly under-rated Ballard also recorded a selection of other great songs during the late 50's/early 60's. After falling on hard times, Brown signed him up and Hank enjoyed a richly deserved second chance at People Records. This curiosity discusses the possibility of the proverbial bad hair day at a time when "natural" was the necessary prerequisite for the trendy negro.

Incidentally, all of the above can be obtained from Volumes 1-3 of the "James Brown's Funky People" compilation series. Highly recommended.

James Brown R.I.P.

James Joseph Brown 3rd May 1933 - 25th December 2006

I may be a little late with this but I haven't had much opportunity to post anything since the sad news on Christmas Day.

As it seems pointless to offer a descriptive critique of the great man's career I think the only way to mourn the man's death is to celebrate his life so...... 5 choice cuts from (drum roll) "Mr Please Please" "The Godfather Of Soul" "The Hardest Working Man In Show Business" "Mr.Dynamite" "Soul Brother No.1" ................please welcome, the one and only Jameeeeeeeeeesssssssssssss Brown..................

JAMES BROWN & THE FAMOUS FLAMES - Think (1960)



An update of a track originally recorded by vocal group The Five Royales and a song that Brown was to claim as his own. This radical re-working provided a huge step forward on the road to discovering funk and is one of the most important recordings in the man's musical evolution. The sleeve writers of the must-have 4 CD "Star Time" box set call this "a turning point in the history of popular music", one of several Brown items that seem to fulfil that obligation.

THE JAMES BROWN BAND - Baby You're Right (alternate take) (1960)



Recorded in the same year as "Think" this track seems to suggest both where he'd been and where he was about to go at the same time. "Baby You're Right" is effectively a blues number that also contains shades of Brown's Doo-Wop roots but the song's curious musical pattern sounds different to anything else that he had done up to this point. In later years, Brown ditched conventional song structures altogether in order to concentrate purely on rhythm and groove and even though this moody track is nowhere near funky, the song finds James experimenting with the melodic meter of the song with some interesting results. James once said "Well it's a feelin you know? You got to have that feelin' " This track, co-written with Joe Tex, has it in abundance.

THE JAMES BROWN ORCHESTRA - Cold Sweat (Parts 1 & 2) (1967)



Arguably the finest track in the Brown repertoire. Without wanting to sound bitchy, this is Prince's entire career in 7 minutes. And it's only 1967!!!!! This song is so far advanced that Jerry Wexler, the great Atlantic Records producer suggested that the track "deeply affected the musicians I knew. It just freaked them out. For a time, no-one could get a handle on what to do next"

THE JAMES BROWN ORCHESTRA - Funky Drummer (1970)



Another milestone. Apparently the most sampled track in popular music history and all from what was effectively a studio improvisation. The feeling of something being created on the spot is strengthened by the fact that Brown names the tune as it's being recorded, Clyde Stubblefield is the "Funky Drummer" in question on this classic.

JAMES BROWN & THE JB'S - I'm A Greedy Man (Part 1) (1971)



Yet another outstanding track from 1971 - a productive year for "The Godfather". Despite finding his position as Soul Brother No.1 under threat from artists like Stevie Wonder, Al Green, The Isley Bros, Marvin Gaye and the Philly Soul empire this was one of 10 consecutive Top 10 hits in the Billboard charts. "Can I scream Bobby?" Brown asks his vocal cohort Bobby Byrd near the end of the track. Like nobody else James.

Phil Spector says "Have a Cool Yule!"

Father Christmas goes surfing.....

THE BEACH BOYS - Little Saint Nick (1964)



Elvis is in the house.....

ELVIS PRESLEY - Blue Christmas (1957)



Something a little more traditional.....

MEL TORME - The Christmas Song (1965)

Why didn't he pick one of mine?

Keeping Up With The Williams'

The latest in my series of MP3's loosely held together by the most tentative links imaginable. Following on from the immortal Hank Snr. in my previous post we have 5 more tracks from that talented musical family collective known as the Williamses. There are a few that I have left out - no Lucinda sadly - no Robbie of course - and no room either for Hank's off-spring Hank Jnr and his very own Hank the third - just the following bunch, hand picked for your aural enjoyment.

WILLI WILLIAMS - Armagideon Time (1979)



The original version of a song covered by The Clash and released as the "B" side of their "London Calling" single in 1979. The Clash were undoubtedly one of the very few white artists who succeeded in covering reggae with some dignity and by doing so they helped to cement the strong connection between that genre and punk rock. Of course understanding the music and treating it with some respect is partially why the band's efforts sounded so convincing which is more than can be said for Eric Clapton, The Police, 10CC and a host of other "whiteys" who really should have known better and left well alone.

As for this particular Williams, it would appear that he was the proverbial "one hit wonder" but his track record throws up a lot of collaborators that reads like a mini "who's who" of reggae. Went to school with Sly Dunbar, produced The Wailers & Delroy Wilson, worked extensively with Jackie Mittoo and Augustus Pablo and yet seemingly only has this one song to show for his efforts. It was recorded by Willi in the same year that The Clash got hold of it - 1979 - and it's a "version" - that is, a vocal track added by Williams to an existing reggae instrumental - a rare 1968 item called "Real Rock".

KATHRYN WILLIAMS - Fell Down Fast (2000)



Despite making consistently fine albums Kathryn's career has refused to blossom commercially since the 2000 release of her Mercury Prize nominated album "Little Black Numbers" from which this track was taken. Comparisons with Joni, Laura Nyro and Joan Baez are not only misleading but have probably not done her any favours - a more agreeable suggestion might be that she is a female Nick Drake though even this is not strictly accurate. However, whilst other stylistically similar artists like Damien Rice are being treated like the second coming Kathryn remains one of those performers whose talent seems patently obvious but who still deserves greater attention. Her songs are poetic, intimate and personal whilst her gorgeously breathy vocals and somewhat timid stage persona suggests a shy delicate creature. Nevertheless, having had the pleasure of witnessing her live performance on a couple of occasions recently I can confirm that not only does she occasionally share the distinctly rock n'roll affectation of "bowing" her guitar Jimmy Page-like but that she has a typical scousers sense of humour and swears like a trooper. Never judge a book by it's proverbial.

LIL GIZZELLE - Baby Please Don't Go (2006?)



O.K. I admit I'm cheating a little here - not a song BY a Williams but written by one - Big Joe. Immortalised by Van Morrison's Them in the mid 60's, I know little about the artist providing this updated version apart from the fact that she is only 19 years old, caucasian, hails from Mexico and has a voice somewhere between Etta James and a funnel steamer. Pretty impressive. My sincere thanks to Marty for this one.

LARRY WILLIAMS - You Bug Me Baby (1959)



LARRY WILLIAMS & JOHNNY "GUITAR" WATSON - Mercy Mercy Mercy (1967)



2 tracks from a guy whose life story seems tailor made for celluloid. Larry Williams was apparently a pimp prior to signing his first recording contract with Specialty Records and was promptly dropped by the label in 1959 after being arrested for selling drugs. I'm sure that I read somewhere that the character "Shaft" was loosely based on him and perhaps not too surprisingly considering his lifestyle he eventually met a sticky end. He was found dead in 1980 - the victim of a single shot wound to the head - and even though a verdict of suicide was reached, suggestions were that he was murdered.

Musically, his career can be divided into three sections. There was his 1957-59 period with Specialty where he was signed as a replacement for a prosletysing Little Richard and which yielded all of his Penniman inspired hit material. Lennon was a huge fan which is why the Fab Four recorded no less than 3 Williams tracks from this period. After getting out of jail he re-invented himself in the mid 60's as a funky soul brother with a band that included Johnny "Guitar" Watson - another artist with R & B roots whose music became more bootilicious in later years - and finally well... the least said about Williams disco career in the 1970's the better.

From his Specialty career, Sonny Bono's "You Bug Me Baby" marries rock n'roll to a traditional Scottish bagpipe tune a la Lord Rockingham's XI's "Hoots Mon" and Bill Haley's "Rockin Through The Rye". "Mercy Mercy Mercy" on the other hand was a hit for Williams & Watson in 1967 and is a cover of a Joe Zawinul instrumental originally recorded by the jazz artist Cannonball Adderley. Includes additional "right on" lyrics by Johnny & Larry. Can you dig it?

More Songs About Motorcycles & Shopping

Adopting the old adage “less is more”, here are 4 more songs connected simply by their Leiber & Stoller related subject matter minus my incessant chattering.

THE DEL McCOURY BAND - 1952 Vincent Black Lightning (2001)



Whilst not exactly an updated version of the Cheers record (see last post) Leiber & Stoller's tale of a leather-clad delinquent could have been an influence. Written by the irrepressible Richard Thompson and performed here by the exemplary talents of one of the best bluegrass bands in America. Thompson’s live performances of this superb song usually raise the roof of any concert arena in which it is performed (the studio take is also very good) but whilst McCoury’s version is slightly more restrained it remains equally impressive

BRIGITTE BARDOT - Harley Davidson (1968)



The Wonderful World Of Cheese Part 2. An item from 1968 that for some reason always provides me with a vivid visual picture of Miss Bardot dressed head to foot in leather. Or is it Marianne Faithfull in “Girl On A Motorbike”? However, Miss Bardot may not have been blessed with the best singing voice and it’s not a particularly good tune but this still manages to exude a certain camembert-like charm. Written and no doubt produced by Monsieur Serge Gainsbourg

MARY WELLS - Shop Around (1961)



Written and originally recorded by Smokey Robinson, this was The Miracles first hit in the States when it was released in 1961. Tamla Motown's production line process meant that this song was probably recorded by a miriad of artists before the powers that be decided who would put out the finished product. Smokey got there first naturally, but Mary's version was not too far behind. Taken from her "Bye Bye Baby, I Don't Want To Take A Chance" album. Snappy title!

HANK WILLIAMS - Window Shoppin' (1952)



Recorded by one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, the song however was not written by Hank Snr. The composer was one Marcel Joseph or Joseph Marcel depending on your information source. Whatever, I know nothing about either individual apart from the fact that they are one and the same. If anybody can provide further info please do so. I shall be exploring more Williamses in the next exciting episode but in the meantime if you don't like this particular member of that extended family clan then you should go see a doctor.

“We don’t write songs, we write records!”

Thus spoke songwriters Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller. Having completed the previous post with a Leiber/Stoller item, it's hardly surprising that I should take a closer look at one of the best double acts in Rock n'Roll history.

They were initially a song-writing duo that I must confess I took for granted, my original opinion being largely based on what I erroneously thought were “novelty” songs that had been written for The Coasters in the late 1950’s. Hits like “Charlie Brown” and “Yakety Yak” seemed formulated and childish to my sensitive young ears so it wasn’t until I dug a little deeper and realised exactly how many songs they had written that I began to understand their position within the pantheon of popular music. Returning to those Coasters classics also revealed a brilliant back catalogue that encapsulates what this duo did best. A lethal combination of Stoller’s music chops mixed with Leiber’s fiercely intelligent sense of lyrical fun.

Leiber & Stoller’s song-writing career began in the early 50's and hit the ground running. Even during their formative years they were composing songs that became rock n’roll standards. After initially writing a variety of hits for R&B artists like Jimmy Witherspoon and Charles Brown, their first heavyweight composition was “Hound Dog” recorded by Big Mama Thornton in 1953. This song eventually brought them to the attention of one Elvis Presley and apart from famously recording his own version of the song in 56, Elvis started to use Leiber & Stoller as his principle songwriters on a number of major hits and at least 2 movie scores. However, Jerry & Mike were already fairly well established prior to being on Presley’s payroll and by and large had tended to make things happen by themselves.

In 1953 they had formed their own “Spark” record label with music promoter Lester Sill, but the label was sold to Atlantic Records after one of their releases, The Robins "Smokey Joe's Cafe" became so popular that Spark had difficulty distributing the single. They were instantly installed as independent producers by their new employers and given total control over their product, a move that was not common practice at the time.

Whilst at Atlantic they were given the opportunity to work with a variety of artists but were largely synonymous with two groups in particular. The Drifters had joined Atlantic in 1953 and had undergone a number of personnel changes with varying degrees of success before being taken under Leiber & Stoller's wing three years later whilst the aforementioned Coasters came from the nucleus of "Smokey Joe's" Robins and were brought to the label when Spark was sold.

Leiber & Stoller's music during this period continued to be inspired by a love of blues & R&B, but as their career progressed they continually pushed the boundaries of the 3-minute pop song into new territory and consequently some critics believe that they were almost single-handedly responsible for merging Rhythm & Blues with popular music. In 1959 they became the first producers to use strings on a rock n'roll record. "There Goes My Baby" by The Drifters was in many ways a precursor to Phil Spector's wall of sound so it's not terribly surprising to discover that the fledgling Spector worked with the duo on other Drifters classics during the early 60's after being introduced to the pair by their ex-Spark partner Sill. (Atlantic boss Ahmet Ertegun had disliked "There Goes My Baby" so much that initially he refused to release it saying that the finished product was like "listening to 2 radio stations at the same time".)

In 1964 they formed their second record label “Red Bird”, this time placing the emphasis on the host of female vocal groups that were prevalent during this period and even though they sold the label in 1966 in just 2 years Red Bird hatched 11 Top 40 hits in the USA and helped to unleash, via The Shangri-La’s, producer George “Shadow” Morton upon the world whilst giving staff writers Ellie Greenwich and Jeff Barry their big break.

Either individually or collectively their list of songwriting hits from the mid 50's to the early 60's could fill up an entire jukebox. “Along Came Jones” ”Baby I Don’t Care” “Charlie Brown” “Dance With Me” “Don’t” “Down Home Girl” “Down In Mexico” “Drip Drop” “Fools Fall In Love” “Framed” “Hard Times” "I'm A Woman" “Jailhouse Rock” "Kansas City" “King Creole” "Love Me" "Love Potion No.9" “Loving You” “Lucky Lips” “On Broadway” “Poison Ivy” "Riot In Cell Block No.9" “Ruby Baby” “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” “Searchin” “She’s Not You” “Some Other Guy” “Smokey Joe’s Cafe” “Stand By Me” “Spanish Harlem” “Three Cool Cats” “Trouble” “Yakety Yak” "Young Blood" .....and there were others that they had either produced or played on.

Choosing a small selection of material from such a vast back catalogue seems like an act of treason but I have included three cool cuts from various parts of their career and they are as follows.

The first is an example of Lieber & Stoller’s early promise as hit-makers, the 1952 original of “Kansas City”. The definitive version is arguably Wilbert Harrison’s from 1959 but The Beatles covered this song on 1964’s “Beatles For Sale” albeit via a note-for-note version of a Little Richard medley originally recorded by the pompadoured pianist in 1959.

LITTLE WILLIE LITTLEFIELD - K.C.Loving (1952)



The Wonderful World of Cheese Part 1. The 1955 recording by white group The Cheers was a big Billboard hit and was also one of Lieber & Stoller’s first productions of one of their own compositions. It was apparently banned in Boston for several weeks after a local critic accused it of fostering delinquency, though the vocal performance on this version sounds so operatically camp that it was more likely to cause an outbreak of handbag swinging. The version in question is by American baritone Vaughan Monroe - a singer who was once called , amongst other things, "The Voice with Hairs On It's Chest" ..... I kid you not. Even more bizarrely, this song also spawned a French version by Edith Piaf called “L’Homme A La Moto”.

VAUGHAN MONROE - Black Denim Trousers & Motorcycle Boots (1955)



A hidden gem from The Coasters back catalogue. This Lieber/Stoller produced track is a re-worked cover version of Boogaloo and His Gallant Crew's 1955 record "Clothes Line".

This track is so cool it can only be heard whilst wearing shades.

THE COASTERS - Shopping For Clothes (1960)

Let's Break Out The Booze

One of the problems that I am likely to experience with this blog is “what comes next?” When do I introduce some of my favourite Michael Bolton moments? Should I expand upon my “Klaus Wunderlich influenced Megadeth” theory? In order to simplify things I have decided to link each post so that the previous track suggests what the next item might be. So…with this in mind it’s not surprising to find that my latest piece continues to focus on the work of Randy Newman with two more examples of the man’s handiwork. The first highlights his talent as a ballad writer (see previous post) whilst the second features Newman as an arranger for, of all people, Peggy Lee.

Back in 1970 a young songwriter called Harry Nilsson was achieving some considerable success in America. A struggling artist for many years, he had recorded his first album in 1967 and as an unknown had been endorsed by none other than John Lennon & Paul McCartney. At the press conference held to announce the beginning of their ill-fated Apple Corps organisation in 1968 both had labelled him as their favourite American artist. In 1969, Three Dog Night took Nilsson’s “One” into the Top 10 and finally during the same year Nilsson himself achieved a Top 10 hit with his “Midnight Cowboy” rendition of Fred Neil’s “Everybody’s Talkin”. With his star very much in the ascendancy Harry, never a man to do things the easy way, unconventionally decided that his next project would be to record an album’s worth of material composed entirely by someone else – a largely unknown song writer called Randy Newman.

Initially Nilsson’s chosen list of artists for this “covers” project contained just 2 people – Newman & Laura Nyro. But having already recorded “Simon Smith & His Amazing Dancing Bear” on his previous album - 1969’s “Harry” – and having called the bespectacled one “the most literate songwriter in America” Newman, not surprisingly, got the gig.

Newman at this point had made just one album, the rather awkwardly named “Randy Newman Creates Something New Under The Sun”, so it was something of a gamble on Nilsson’s part to make this collaborative effort with someone that most of the record buying public would not have heard of but the gamble paid off. The album broke Newman in the States introducing him to a much bigger audience and the record, ingeniously entitled “Nilsson Sings Newman”, was voted “Album of The Year” by the influential American magazine “Stereo Review”.

Newman played piano on every track but his influence on how the project was recorded was minimal . Apart from the decision to only include what Newman referred to as his "good guy" songs this was Harry’s album and Harry had his own ideas on how things should be done. In order to submerge himself as much as possible into the material, Nilsson spent a month rehearsing it, a painstaking ordeal for Randy who not only actively disliked the process but who already knew the tracks inside out (At least 6 had originally appeared on his debut release.)

Harry’s next idea was to abandon all thoughts of using conventional orchestration, such an integral part of any Newman record, replacing the sounds made by woodwinds and brass with his own voice (the album has, apparently, 122 vocal overdubs!) It’s surprising therefore to find that the record is not complicated and cluttered but sparse and simple or as Curtis Armstrong puts it in his sleeve notes to the re-released version “a work of exquisite simplicity made by the most complicated means possible”

Despite being something of a maverick Harry always had a happy knack with a melody and was an inspired interpreter of other people's songs. It’s ironic therefore that since the making of this record the fortunes of these two musicians have been reversed somewhat. Newman is quite rightly regarded as one of America’s finest whilst the under-rated Nilsson never really got the success his talent deserved and is now probably best remembered for his part in John Lennon’s drunken “lost weekend” of 1974. He only recorded sporadically during the 80's and suffered a fatal heart attack in 1993 at the age of 53.

I've chosen an alternative take of a song that Newman did not record himself until 1977. His version, swathed in a simple but effective string arrangement can be found on the album "Little Criminals" whilst Nilsson's version simply features keyboards and Harry's wonderful three and a half octave vocal chords.

HARRY NILSSON - I'll Be Home (1970)



The second Randy Newman related track is still something of a curiosity as I am not sure of it’s exact origins. “Is That All There Is?” was recorded by Peggy Lee in 1969, one year before the “Nilsson Sings” record and features an arrangement that is so Newman-esque it should have been issued with a patent. It’s surprising therefore to discover that the song itself was written by those raconteurs of Rock N’Roll, Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller. I will discuss those two in more detail on the next post but it’s something of a revelation to hear a song from the writers of such raucous classics as “Hound Dog” and “Riot In Cell Block No.9” that sounds like it could have originated from Germany in the early 1930’s.

I have a very vague recollection of having read somewhere that the item was originally taken from a musical but I don’t recall the duo ever having written one at least not during their working life together. It would appear therefore that it must have been penned specifically for the singer and what a singer she was.

Nora Deloris Egstrom to give Peggy her real name is one of those evergreen vocalists originating from the golden age of the big band era. Quite rightly regarded as one of the finest singers of her generation, a closer inspection of her career, which spanned some 50 odd years reveals a talent who not only wrote her own material (most famously on the “Lady & The Tramp” soundtrack) but whose eclectic tastes took her regularly into some very interesting places. The song featured here first appeared on an album also called “Is That All There Is?”, a successful attempt at a contemporary record that still managed to stay in touch with her musical roots. Indeed Peggy was a keen advocate of “rock” and this song sits neatly on a record that also included items written by George Harrison, Neil Diamond and the aforementioned Mr.Newman.

As for the title track, well it suggests that had they pursued the genre there was indeed a musical somewhere in Leiber & Stoller such is the strength of the descriptive narrative of the song’s lyric. Intriguingly there are suggestions that the lyric’s origins are from a story called “Disillusionment” written by Thomas Mann and having read passages of this prose the similarities are very striking. It’s still a great lyric nevertheless and despite the fact that it deals with that thorny subject of death it confronts the “D” word with some tenderness and a huge shrug of the shoulders and for me the combination of song, interpreter and arrangement is particularly potent. It won Peggy Lee an award for “Best Contemporary Vocal Performance” upon release, was covered to good effect by the wonderful P.J.Harvey in 1990 and apart from being one of my favourite records I agree with every word of it.

PEGGY LEE - Is That All There Is? (1969)

Does Humor Belong In Music 4?

A track from someone who, throughout his career, has pulled no punches. Randy Newman. It’s probably one of those sweeping generalisations that most Americans do not understand irony. Nevertheless……. Newman has been causing a fair amount of stink throughout his career by writing hugely satirical songs about every loaded subject that you can possibly think of. Politics, Racism, Bigotry, Religion – they have all fallen under the Newman microscope at some point or another and all have been treated with an equal amount of disdain and brutal honesty. No doubt his songs have all been taken at face value by some sections of the American public at one time or another. It’s still incredible that “Short People”, a track from his 1977 album “Little Criminals”, caused so many problems upon it’s release that the state of Maryland introduced legislation to make the playing of the record on the radio illegal. Newman has grown to hate the song calling it a “novelty” record but it works in very much the same way that a lot of his funny songs do. They get to the heart of the matter, whilst seemingly pissing a lot of people off in the process. Of course there is far more to Newman’s song-writing than just black humour. These days he his probably equally well-known for his soundtrack scores to such block-busting films as “Toy Story” “The Natural” and “Parenthood”. Indeed he has only released one “proper” album in 16 years, a disappointing return for one of America’s best songwriters. The soundtracks may have brought in a lot of personal revenue for Randy but apart from the odd song here and there, they deprive us of what Newman does best. At times his music resonates with a deep understanding of American musical history that provides a direct link to Stephen Foster’s 1800’s Americana, whilst incorporating just a tad of the musical gumbo of New Orleans. Oh yes and his ballads can break your heart too.

In these days of political correctness and the Dixie Chicks fiasco maybe Newman would find it difficult returning to his old song-writing format anyway. Whilst it may be true that Randy was never too concerned about what people thought about him, there’s certainly no shortage of subject matter to ridicule but none of the major artists seem to want to write about the serious stuff these days despite the dark times that we live in and the farcically frightening Bush regime. Where are today’s protest singers? Apart from Neil Young, who wants to stand up and be counted? Where’s Bob Dylan when you need him? (Don’t reply to that question – making darn good music is the answer)

"Political Science”, originally from his 1972 release “Sail Away” but taken here from "The Randy Newman Songbook Volume 1" album released in 2003, is a song that would cause a whole heap of trouble if George Dubya decided to agree with Randy's rather extreme take on the world order.



RANDY NEWMAN - Political Science (1972)

Bonzo Update

Two items of interest from the Bonzo camp. One, as yet unconfirmed, is that Bonzo percussionist Sam Spoons (real name Martin Ash) was apparently born in my home town of Bridgwater. OK, I admit that I'm the only person who is remotely enthusiastic about this piece of news but as it's my blog I can post what I like!

The second concerns my Bonzo MP3 of choice "Mr.Apollo" (one of those "shouldhavebeenhits" in my opinion) Whilst compiling my Bonzo text I was going to add my reasons for choosing this song. An Innes/Stanshall composition it is a perfect marriage of Innes' melodic tunesmithery and Stanshall's zany humour. Imagine my surprise therefore to discover that Wikipedia have suggested that the nonsense narrated by Viv at the end of the tune ("5 years ago I was a 4-stone apology, now I am 2 seperate gorillas") was penned by Michael Palin. Hmmmm.....I must admit that I am not entirely convinced but if anyone can confirm this please let me know.

Incidentally, if any of you good people tuning into this blog (and there a few) have any comments or suggestions to make about any of my entries, please get in touch but be sure to keep them clean.

Does Humor Belong In Music 3?

For anyone who has made it this far, another childhood TV memory from the late 1960’s (see previous posts) was “Braden’s Week” with Bernard Braden. Fronted by the affable Canadian, this show was a topical consumer “watchdog” programme that mixed current affairs stories with off-beat humour. Hidden amongst the tales concerning the Gas Board’s incompetence or the cat that swallowed a fridge, a slightly embarrassed but rather stern, authoritative looking individual with chiselled features and a shock of black wavy hair had a regular spot on the show. More often than not, he would appear wearing a thick polo-necked sweater and would sit in a comfy chair with a Spanish guitar cradled in his lap, singing his extremely peculiar songs in a very peculiar voice, broad Yorkshire with a hint of plum-in-the-mouth BBC, kind of a cross between Jimmy Saville and Noel Coward.

Jake Thackray was the man’s name, an ex-schoolteacher from Leeds who had given up the profession to perform as a full-time entertainer. Jake’s favourite subjects were class, sex & religion, sometimes fitting all three into the same song. His lyrics were extremely observational, frequently bawdy (some have suggested misogynistic) and extremely down to earth. Though he is regarded in some circles as a “folk singer”, (a debatable choice of genre), musically his songs remain largely un-categorisable. I didn’t know it at the time but Jake was apparently writing and performing his material in a style called Chansonnier, an age-old French tradition of story-telling. As a kid all I remember was how bloody funny he was and that was good enough for me. Jake was always a reluctant performer and sadly decided to quit the business altogether when it became apparent that his individual style did not seem to suit public tastes. He died on Christmas Eve 2002 at the age of 64 and since his death has been thankfully rediscovered by a new generation of people. For me, it’s not only his grasp of the English language that makes Thackray such a great artist but the way in which it was used. His storytelling prowess and the meter of his lyrics are quite superb. “Bantam Cock” from 1972 is a typical Thackray gem. A fictional story of a rampant hen, forget the cheesy accompaniment and concentrate on how the words unfold, complete with hilarious pay-off at the end.



JAKE THACKRAY - Bantam Cock (1972)

Does Humor Belong In Music 2?

Following on from my previous blog and with reference to Listen With Sarah in particular, checking out Sarah’s My Space site reveals a bewildering list of influences and amongst them are The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. The Bonzo’s are not only one of the most underrated groups the UK has ever produced but they also hold the distinction of containing within their line-up at least one bona-fide genius, Vivian Stanshall (below)

Now I freely admit that the word "genius" is much over-used being, in my opinion, a biased superlative that is frequently trumpeted by both critics and fans searching for that final word when attempting to describe someone’s talent - consequently it tends to be thrown at people who do not merit the tag. In Stanshall’s case, it fits a little awkwardly as he never really reached his true potential but during those moments when he did, he was one of the most inventive & inspired men on the planet. The Bonzo’s surreal sense of humour ran parallel with the Monty Python crew for a short while, though the Bonzo’s got their first. Indeed returning to that television “Twilight Zone” mentioned in the previous post, I was first introduced to the band as a slightly bewildered 10 year-old, via the “Do Not Adjust Your Set” TV programme in the late 60’s that also included the pre-Python talents of Messrs Idle, Palin & Jones. I still have somewhat dim but precious memories of The Bonzo's definitive live version of “Canyons Of Your Mind” being performed on this program. Neil Innes’ dazzlingly bad guitar solo is so hot that sparks fly from his guitar as Stanshall kneels before him in mock awe. The band’s other ace-in-the-hole was Innes, a songwriter with enough talent to have survived easily in any “conventional” group but whose ability for pastiche eventually reached it’s peak in The Rutles, another Python spin-off. The Bonzo’s are remembered best in this country for “I’m The Urban Spaceman” a typically catchy Innes tune produced by one Apollo C.Vermouth (a.k.a. Paul McCartney) which hit the Top 10 in 1968. But on record they were a little erratic particularly during the latter part of their career and were far better served by live performance primarily as they were arguably more entertaining visually than musically and vinyl was never able to capture their manic stage performances.

The Bonzos have reconvened for a 40th Anniversary UK Tour after a successful one-off concert last year and even though Stanshall is sadly no longer with us and I’m not one for trips down memory lane, I nevertheless witnessed their performance in all it's madcap glory @ The Colston Hall, Bristol on the 7th November.

Whilst no longer the dangerous young men of the swinging 60's - at times I found their humour to be stale and terribly old-fashioned, there were still enough moments of nuttiness to endear you to these crazy old codgers. Stanshall's absence unsurprisingly created a sizable hole that the likes of Ade Edmondson and Phill Jupitus found impossible to fill, but the band - augmented by a couple of young whipper-snappers - were marshalled well by Innes & Rodney Slater and considering that some of these guys have reached retirement age, you couldn't deny them an opportunity to bask in some much deserved back-dated glory.



THE BONZO DOG BAND - Mr.Apollo (1969)

Does Humor Belong In Music 1?

In 1986 Frank Zappa asked the above question without, so far as I know, coming to any conclusions. As for my opinion....depends…..in terms of entertainment value are we talking Little & Large, Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In and Bernie Winters or Eric & Ernie, Sgt.Bilko, and Norman Collier? (left) (I am concluding that the smart ones among you will know which of the above are in the "good" list and which are in the "bad")

Over the next 4 (or 5) blog posts I will include items that prove conclusively that the answer to the above is a resounding yes but, like most things, only if it’s done properly. Incidentally, I am not talking comedy albums - we are not on the Stan Freberg or Richard Pryor trail here. It's either music that is infused with a sense of fun or songwriters that by design make wry observations about the world around them, most of which happen to be funny.

One artist that fits into the former category is Listen With Sarah.

Sarah Nelson to quote the late and lamented John Peel was “A bit of a discovery I think” She was born in Portsmouth in 1965 and like a lot of artist ‘s championed by the great man, went from tape box to national radio seemingly overnight, first appearing on his program about 3 months before John went to that great gig in the sky and becoming a firm favourite thereafter.

Sarah “composes” her material on a PC and from what appears to be drum n’bass origins, she is developing an individual style that somehow manages to make modern music out of radio samples and old TV programmes.

One of her items – the delightful “Animal Hop” – posthumously appeared in Peel’s annual Festive 50 in 2004. Her sampling technique is inventive and clever and judging from recent releases, her sense of humour is now an integral part of what she does. She is unashamedly English, if only because the origins of her material tend to be U.K. based. Her propensity for kiddies programmes taken from that twilight zone of British Television that every 40 year-old kid remembers from days gone by strengthens the playfulness of her work but it has also landed her in hot water. Copies of her one and only album, a selection of EP’s trading under the collective title “Are You Sitting Comfortably?” is in danger of being banned due to litigation from Oliver Postgate, that god-like creator of such children’s classics as “Bagpuss” (below) “The Clangers” and “Noggin The Nog”. (Whatever happened to his sense of humour?)

Listeners from the U.S. (should there be any) will no doubt be somewhat perplexed by the “Trumpton” & “Watch with Mother” sound-bites whilst wondering who on earth this Postgate fellow is but check her out anyway.



LISTEN WITH SARAH - Animal Hop (2004)




P.S My thanks to Sarah for putting me right on a few factual inconsistencies and for allowing me to use her music (what a name-dropper I am!) Her album is no longer for sale but copies may still be available from www.normanrecords.com

The Proverbial Introduction

At first I thought the word "blogging" referred to some dubious outdoor sexual activity but now I know better.

This is my second attempt to "blog", the first failed miserably due to a lack of patience, a general feeling of confusion and a certain "can't be arsed-ness" on my part. Apparently this is a common problem - a large percentage of blogs are began with great enthusiasm yet never get off the ground.

So.... here I go again with a fresh title and, at long last, some idea of what I want to do with this thing. Having abandoned the original project - my photographic collection of "Electric pylons of North Somerset", I have realised that having been a music enthusiast for the best part of 40 years it's all very well owning a sizable record collection but apart from a few close friends, I never seem to have the chance to share what I personally consider to be great music with other people.

I've been looking at examples of what the internet refers to as "DJ" blogs and as I like the sound of becoming the world wide webs very own Simon Bates, here I am and hopefully, there you are.

Most DJ blogs seem to concentrate on a specific genre of music and the best ones are not only entertaining but educational. That's exactly my remit. However, I'm not an expert in any particular field as such and I'm not gonna be obscure just for the sake of it - I want this site to feature both established artists and some you may not be so familiar with. If I want to wax lyrical about Robbie Williams for a few paragraphs I will do so though apart from that brief mention of his name above it's highly unlikely that you'll find him on here.

Anyway having finally got beyond that initial "farting around" stage, I'm hoping that this turns into an enjoyable experience for all concerned.

So, welcome to The Great Unknown and thanks for listening.