THERE GOES THREE HOURS

I just ran into a riddim rabbit hole. The riddim (reggae speak for rhythm) is from "Ali Baba" a John Holt song recorded at Duke Reid's in 1969. The blog 27 Leggings posted Dr. Alimantado's "I Killed the Barber", paired with a version of "Ali Baba" by Jackie Edwards from 1973, the version of the riddim that was used. Edwards's version was recorded at Bunny Striker Lee's, and was used as a riddim on a shitload of other cuts, King Tubby's "I Trim the Barber" among them. Yeah, this is just the beginning. I was curious if Holt's version was indeed the original, so with trepidation I decided to check. These sorts of inquiries usually end in a riddim click overload and tonight was no exception. In fact this rundown was more fruitful than usual. In addition to the full rundown at Riddim Guide (yeesh!), I ran into a mix with a shitload of "Ali Baba"/"Trim the Barber" versions, all mixed one to another, sometimes two playing at once (in separate left/right channels). Roland Alphonso, U Roy, King Tubby, I Roy, Tommy McCook, .. . a lot of heavy hitters. There's other riddims in the mix too, notably "Wear You to the Ball" and "Tide Is High" by the Paragons (both also Duke Reid product) with variations by Dennis Alcapone, Lizzy, and U Roy among others. It's massive, three fucking hours of versions based on a handful of riddims.

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Listen:

John Holt - Ali Baba (streaming) at YouTube
Dr, Alimantado - I Shot the Barber mp3 at Now That's What I Call Bullshit

Jackie Edwards - Ali Baba mp3 at 27 Leggings Go there to get it.

The mix:
Algoriddim 20160118: John Holt Part 1 at Internet Archive Three hour mix (streaming and download) of songs derived from riddims of John Holt songs (including his work with the Paragons) The first version of Ali Baba at 3:58.

Visit:
Ali Baba riddim at Riddim Guide

NICE EFFORT GUYS

The fact that the Bottomfeeders' "Caligula" sounds like it could have been a '77-'78 era L.A. punk record is reason enough to test the waters. Never heard of these guys until a few minutes ago, and that's the first song I heard, so I did some clicking and found that there's some pretty good stuff floating around. As the band is new to me I have nothing to add but some links.

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Listen:
Bottomfeeders - Caligula mp3 at Still In Rock Note: If the link is disabled, go there to get it.
Bottomfeeders - Detect mp3 at Still In Rock Go there to get it.
Bottomfeeders - Full LP (streaming) at YouTube
Video: 
Bottomfeeders - Crust Fund at YouTube
Visit:
Bottomfeeders at Bandcamp

WHAT OF IT?

The Monsters put out a new one back in October and I'm just now finding out? Fuck, I guess I'm out of some loop. The Monsters are from Switzerland and have among their ranks Reverend Beat Man, a solo artist, label owner, record store owner and ex-wrestler. He does it all.

The new Monsters LP, M, has quite the song list. "Happy People Make Me Sick", "Nothing, You Coward", "You Will Die", and "Let Me Spend The Night With Your Wife", That's just four of twelve. They're anti-social rascals aren't they?

Here's a grab bag. A 2011 video of the Monsters' "Blow Um Mau Mau" with Beat Man playing a leering asshole bar patron. There's an mp3 of "Happy People Make Me Sick" from the new one, and one of Beatman, solo, doing "Come Back Lord". That sucker is old.

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Listen:
The Monsters - Happy People Make Me Sick mp3 at Voodoo Rhythm Go there for more on the album. 
Reverend Beat Man - Come Back Lord mp3 at Go Retro
Visit:
The Monsters  - M at Voodoo Rhythm

A MIGHTY LOSS

Charles Bradley died this past Saturday. Cancer. He was a soul singer in the classic mold, part James Brown, part Otis Redding. He began his career at age fourteen as a James Brown tribute, and continued off and on that tangent for decades until he auditioned at Daptone. He was signed and had his first LP released at age 62. As he put it "Now, I'm gonna do Charles Bradley." He did, and he did it well.

Check his voice on the songs below. If you need a point of reference, listen to what he does to Nirvana's "Stay Away". Damn.

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Listen:
Charles Bradley - The World (Is Going Up In Flames) mp3 at Hey Cool Kid
Charles Bradley - Stay Away (streaming) at YouTube Nirvana cover
Charles Bradley - Love Bug Blues mp3 at ATumblr (?)
Charles Bradley - How Long mp3 at ATumblr (?)
Charles Bradley - The Telephone Song mp3 at Tin Can Land
Charles Bradley - Strictly Reserved For You mp3 at Melting Pot

HOWDY FROM BELIZE

Back in 2006 there wasn't much music from Belize that was widely available, compilation or otherwise. It probably didn't occur to most people to go looking for it, and Belize was such a tiny country (current population 387,389) most people didn't even know it existed. I had only heard of it because a family friend had moved there (it's in Central America) . When I read a glowing review of a compilation of music from Belize, my predilection for international jams made it a no brainer.

The compilation Cult Cargo: Belize City Boil Up was my first foray into the catalog of reissue label the Numero Group, a label that basically rescues music more than anything else. Every record company, even reissue labels, aims to make a profit, but few do it without regard for how familiar the names will be. The Numero Group's M.O. seems to be rescuing the music of overlooked or forgotten regions or particular studios or labels, annotating the shit out of them, and releasing them before the music disappears for good. They do a good job of it. I tried to keep up with their releases and had to give up after a dozen. They were coming too fast for a wallet the size of mine.

Here's four songs from the Belize compilation, all completely different. A reggae song, a couple covers and a slow burning soul number. The rest of the collection is just as varied but it's all good stuff, and all the other releases I've sampled are as good or better. Unfortunately, after looking at their current discography, it's apparent that the wallet to release ratio is now even more lopsided.

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Listen:
Lord Rhaburn – More Love Reggae mp3 at Roots and Culture
The Professionals – The Backstabbers mp3 at Roots and Culture
Web - The Same Old Me mp3 at Roots and Culture
The Harmonettes – Shame, Shame, Shame mp3 at Roots and Culture
Visit:
The Numero Group

HEAVY SHIT MAN

You know how it is. You listen to enough music of one type or another and you slowly learn more about it, who the major players are, how the sound evolved, what the roots are, and all that type of shit. Sometimes that can be a good thing. But sometimes over analyzing music defeats the purpose.

Take stoner rock. I don't know shit about it, and I don't want to. I just want to wallow in it. Just fucking loud ass guitar. Stoner rock may be the last bastion. I don't have to be too vested to say that that is a good thing. Loud guitar? Of course. It's simple, keep that fucking torch lit.

This detour started with a click on a unfamiliar band name, Whores of Tijuana. They're exactly what I'm talking about. Imperfect, but loud and grinding. Offensive name? Answer: It's stoner rock. You're thinking too much.

When I went looking for their stuff, I came across the photo above of Sleep, another band I'd never heard. Oh, but my friend Al had. When I mentioned them to him he looked me dead in the eye and said "They're heavy." Gotta say though, I was relieved that the photo above was a gag. Now I'm laughing with them. I think.

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Listen:
Whores of Tijuana - [Self titled] Entire LP at Whores of Tijuana Eight mp3s, lyrics, streaming.
Sleep - Dopesmoker (streaming) at YouTube Entire LP

CARLEEN JEAN BUTLER, THAT'S WHO.

Time for some relatively obscure funky butt movers. All three of these bands were unknown to me until I came across some post on some long forgotten blog drooling over some new (at the time) reissue. That was a while ago. By now they're like old pals. I was kind of missing them, maybe you too if you've heard them before. It's better if you've never heard them, you can figure out where to go from here.

Carleen and the Groovers feature Carleen Jean Butler (that's her at the top of the post) on drums, and she smokes. Really. Dyke and the Blazers are a solid presence in the second tier of funk and soul recognition. In other words, out of the three they're the better known. The Kashmere Stage Band is one unbelievably tight high school stage band. Check the drummer, whoever he is, on those two cuts. Jeez. High school.

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Listen:
Carleen & the Groovers - Can We Rap mp3 at Now Again
Carleen & the Groovers - The Thing mp3 at Now Again
Carleen & the Groovers - Right On mp3 at Now Again
Carleen & the Groovers - Hot Pants mp3 at Now Again
Dyke and the Blazers - Shotgun Slim mp3 at Alejandro Borreo (?)
Dyke and the Blazers - We Got More Soul mp3 at Alejandro Borreo (?)
The Kashmere Stage Band - Thunder Soul mp3 at Now Again
The Kashmere Stage Band - Point Zero/Zero Point Reprise (live) mp3 at Now Again

THE KILLER WINS THIS ROUND

Ivan? Who the hell is that? After one listen I was convinced that it was Ricky Nelson with his nuts in a vice. It's almost comical how lightweight it is given the title, particularly if you're familiar with Jerry Lee Lewis's version. Ivan (actually the Crickets' Jerry Allison) was the first to record it (I think). Regardless, the Killer's version is the definitive in my book.

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Listen:
Ivan (Jerry Allison) - Real Wild Child mp3 at Mp3 Rockabilly
Jerry Lee Lewis - Real Wild Child (streaming) at YouTube
Iggy Pop - Real Wild Child (video) at Vimeo
Joan Jett - Real Wild Child (video) at YouTube
Status Quo - Real Wild Child (streaming) at YouTube

HELL YEAH, HE KNEW HE WAS COOL.

Quincy Jones made a lot of cool music. He also did a lot of schmaltzy stuff. I knew his name mostly from TV shows and the odd production credit, but never really paid much attention to him until his production credit for the "We Are the World" thing, a song that was written by Michael Jackson and lionel Ritche and performed by a bunch of eighties era music notables. I was not impressed. Then I heard Big Band Bossa Nova, his 1962 LP that really wasn't bossa nova all, or what you might think of as bossa nova. It was a kinda kooky take on the genre, the opening cut of which "Soul Bossa Nova" you might know from the first Austin Powers movie. The take away from that is that not all Quincy Jones shit was schmaltzy.

A few years later I heard "Hicky Burr" I recognized it straight away as a version of the theme from the first Bill Cosby show (pre-Cosby). It's a relatively funky theme, with Cosby uttering nonsensible non-words throughout. Okay, I thought, now we're getting somewhere. In the ensuing years, I've pegged my preference for Jones pre-1970s output. At any rate, I didn't rule him out, it was not all schmaltz.

He was really adept at soundtracks. The earlier stuff (that I've heard anyway) is kind of noir sounding, later stuff got funky, some cop TV show type stuff. The big lesson in all of this was that even though you don't like someone's current or later stuff, it's best not to dismiss their entire output. I mean, are you going to dismiss the Faces because Rod Stewart did "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy"?

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Listen:
Quincy Jones - Soul Bossa Nova (streaming) at YouTube
Quincy Jones - Hicky Burr mp3 at A Tumblr (?)
Quincy Jones - Hangin' Paper mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - Boogie Stop Shuffle mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - Blues In the Night mp3 at Sunrise Musics
Quincy Jones - Seduction mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - I'll Have to Kill You mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - No Witnesses mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - In Cold Blood mp3 at Internet Archive
Quincy Jones - Ironside Theme (streaming) at YouTube 
The initiation:
Quincy Jones - Big Band Bossa Nova (full LP) (streaming) at YouTube

DELLS ALBUM [DETAIL]

Taken out of context, this detail of a Dells album cover is just crazy. Notice that whatever athletic or he-man pose they are in, they all manage to hold on to their mics. What do we got going there? Looks like a strongman, a trapeze guy, a guy hanging off the trapeze guy, a guy just kind of dangling there, with some sort of leg choke hold on another guy. What the fuck is going on here? (Check the entire LP cover here.). Dig it, even the choke hold victim is holding on to his mic,

The song below isn't from that LP, but I'd put them within a few years of each other. "Windy City Soul" is a good sturdy soul record, 1972, just before soul started getting a little cluttered. This is a keeper. Visit Don't Stay Up Too Late and read the blurb too.

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Listen:
The Dells - Windy City Blues mp3 at Don't Stay Up Too Late

LET'S RAP ABOUT BEANS

I eat my share of refried beans, at least one can a week. I have a preferred brand, out of nostalgia (they've been around since my youth) and a "if it works don't fix it" level of brand loyalty (I'm too damn cheap to risk a dollar to try another brand). That brand is Rosarita. Rosarita has my business unless they fuck up, and right now they're on shaky ground. I never paid much attention to the recipes on the back of the cans, but about a year ago I happened to notice a recipe for Sopes Verde, using their refried beans as an ingredient. Not my bag, so I kept my eyes peeled for another back-o'-can recipe. I can't be the only one who noticed. It's been all Sopes Verde for the past fucking year. It's inexcusable. Not that I'm going to make any of their recipes (particularly since I'm not one for a lot of ingredients and the hassle of cleaning a million dishes), but it shows a blatant disregard for my recipe making brothers and sisters. What happened to the recipe writer for Rosarita? Someone should put out an APB. Rosarita needs to address this issue.

So, what has this got to do with the Jamaicans "Ba Ba Boom"? I'm getting to that, I'm still on beans. Okay, so when I open a can of beans, I empty the can into a food storage container. For as long as I can remember, be it container or pot, I've always tried to get the whole can of beans out of the can with one giant strategic spoonful. It hardly ever happens. It's like a green flash at sunset, it might happen just a half dozen times in your life. I've tried all sorts of methods and refinements over the years. I'm getting more consistent in coming close (a few two spoonful can emptyings in the past few months) but the single spoon de-canning has eluded me. Until tonight. It was dramatic. Just as the beans at the bottom of the can were confirmed completely out of the can, the opening vocals of "Ba Ba Boom" began playing. It was as if the heavens opened up. Another Festivus miracle (albeit out of season).  I was reminded how much I love "Ba Ba Boom". 100% pure rocksteady, from rocksteady's greatest fount, Duke Reid's Treasure Isle Records. I turned it up and forgot all about beans. Until I sat in front of the keyboard.

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Listen:
The Jamaicans - Ba Ba Boom mp3 at Smashing Magazine
The Jamaicans - Dedicate My Song to You mp3 at Music ADD
The Jamaicans - Feel the Festive Spirit mp3 at Pixie Radio

GAGA WISHES

Well I'll be dipped in shit, a Slits movie, forty years on. That calls for a good ol' fashioned Slits roundup. The trailer's below, and at the bottom a few songs and what-not. If you're unfamiliar with the Slits, start with their cover of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" for a point of reference. If you aren't familiar with any version of that song, there is no hope. You're in the wrong place.

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Listen:

The Slits - I Heard It Through Grapevine mp3 at ATumblr (?)
The Slits - Typical Girls mp3 at Popboks
The Slits - Love and Romance mp3 at ATumblr (?)
The Slits - New Town mp3 at ATumblr (?)
Live set:
Slits live at Primavera Sound 2010 (streaming) at Free Music Archive
Visit:
The Day I Joined the Slits by Simon Fellowes at 3:AM Magazine

REGIONABILLY

Okay, "Rockaphilly" might be a stretch, the pair of compilations titled that are way closer to the hillbilly side of rockabilly. Regardless they're worth a listen. It's third tier stuff, not necessary in any way, but very cool if you happen to like things a little tweaked, productions on the cheap, notes missed and miscellaneous stuff that is just a little off.

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Listen:
Bill Moss - You Look Like Something That The Cat Drug In mp3 at Tapewrecks Dig the drums.
Curly Herdman - Buck Fever Boogie mp3 at Tapewrecks The guitar solo on this, at 1:24, sounds promising for five seconds and then just falls apart.
The whole shootin' match:
Rockaphilly amd Return of Rockaphilly at Tapewrecks 36 songs

DESTINATION: GOLDEN ERA

A couple segments of a late seventies radio show from Jamaica featuring Studio One stuff? Heck yeah, I'll bite. Especially since I have nothing else. I too like to fuck around on my weekends.

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Listen:
Studio One Radio Show - Sounds of Young Jamaica (streaming) at YouTube Winston Williams DJ, June '77
Studio One Radio Show - Soul Power and Sound (streaming) at YouTube Winston Williams DJ, May '78
Visit:
More Studio One posts

THANKS YANNI!

Just a few minutes ago, out in front of the apartment complex, a half dozen hids were strolling uo the street. It was too dark to really see them, so I didn't bother to look up. (I was reading by the light of one of those clip-on book lights, otherwise known as the literate smoker's best friend.) Then I heard it. One of them had a boombox playing some new age-y chanting shit. Yanni type stuff. It kinda made my skin crawl. That was it. Tonight belonged to the Spits.

I'd never heard of the Spits when my friend Erik gave me one of their CDs. It must have been the mid-nineties. It was from his own collection and he literally forced it on me, insisting it was right up my alley. Alley or not, it was a racket, and it still reminds me of all of those Midwest bands that the Wisconsin contingent out here periodically raved about, but everyone else was totally ambivalent about. Who the fuck cared about bands like that when there were West Coast bands that were just as noisy but looked cooler? But that's pretty much what was cool about bands from the Midwest. They didn't give a shit about stuff like that. And, short of fanzines, there was no where else you were going to hear about them other than from someone who saw them back home. I mean, all these Wisconsin people (there were about a half dozen of them) that hung out in our ragtag group of friends, they were proud of their Midwest roots, and if that meant you heard about some kook that called himself Reverend Norb every fifteen minutes, so be it. It was just another part of the package, just like beer brats and Chili John's.

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Listen:

The Spits - My Mess mp3 at Nashville's Dead
The Spits - Rip Up the Streets mp3 at ATumblr (?)

A HALF CENTURY OF BANGING

If Tony Allen had a few years with Fela and then put up his sticks, that would be quite enough. But here we are roughly five decades later and the afrobeater is still putting out vital music. It blows my mind. This is good shit, for any one of any age. He is a 77 year-old drummer and he kicks ass.

Allen has recorded a lot, something like thirty LPs with Fela alone. Earlier this year he released a tribute to Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, titled, check this, A Tribute to Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers. Listen to what he does to Blakey's "Moanin". It's barely recognizable. Check his playing. Percolating right off that damn stove. 

The other two are from his second release this year, The Source. Dude doesn't stop.

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Listen:
Tony Allen - Moanin' (streaming) at Twisted Soul
Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers - Moanin' mp3 at Time Goes By
Tony Allen - Push and Pull (streaming) at Impose
Tony Allen - Wolf Eats Wolf (streaming) at Burl Veneer
Visit:
Tony Allen at Wikipedia
Tony Allen profile at Blue Note Records

MET MONSTER. DOES NOT LIKE YOU.

It's Labor Day, or the tail end of it. It's a holiday for workers, of which I am one. So, fuck it. I'm gonna lame out because I can. Go over to Aquarium Drunkard for a half dozen oddball Bo Diddley tracks, including "I Don't Like You", a crackpot throwaway that's just plain stupid, which, of course, is why I like it. There's a few unrelated cuts down there that have been posted before, just to pad things.

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Listen:
Bo Diddley - Bo Diddley mp3 at Rocky 52
Bo Diddley - Diddley Daddy mp3 at Rocky 52
Bo Diddley - Hey Bo Diddley mp3 at Rocky 52
Bo Diddley - Bo Meets the Monster mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
Bo Diddley - Road Runner mp3 at ATumblr (?)
Bo Diddley - You Can't Judge a Book By Looking at the Cover mp3 at Rocky 52

The oddballs:

The Darker Side of Diddley at Aquarium Drunkard Six songs

SAY NO TO FANCY

It's Labor Day weekend, the end of summer back to school blowout for many of you. It's back to the grindstone on Tuesday, so live it up this weekend. Personally, I'd recommend getting a grill going, but keep it modest. Don't do all that fancy shit, it's just a big pain in the ass to clean up. Just burgers and dogs, chips, sodas and beer. Though inevitably some ass will show up with some high dollar cut of meat, or some fancy hors d'oeuvres. There's always some jerk that will try to upscale the simplest concept there is. The whole fancy beer thing is completely off the rails. We saw it coming years ago when fancy beer meant Corona or Heineken. Back then we'd have a cheap beer contest. With a receipt as proof, the winner would win some sort of prize (the classic was an cheesy AC/DC coke mirror). The bonus being that there would be no cry babies whining about who drank their treasured fancy beer, since everybody brought cheap beer. If your beer happened to be the least cheap of the bunch, you deserved to have it drunk by others, to put you more in touch with what real cheap beer is.

So, now that we've had our little talk about keeping the cookout real, here's some surf music to get you started. We're all familiar with the American brand of surf music, heavy on the reverb, which is how it should be. Pity the Aussies who didn't get the reverb memo. Sorry, with all due respect to Tibbles, the yanks win this one hands down.

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Listen:
Aki Aleong & the Nobels - Panic mp3 at Probe Is Turning-On the People
The Hollywood Tornadoes - The Gremmie, Pt 1 mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban

The Torquays - Escondido mp3 at Office Naps

Dick Dale & the Deltones- Surf Beat mp3 at Beware of the Blog
The Astronauts - Hot Dogger mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
Danny and the Seniors - Banzai Pipeline mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
Johnny Barakat and the Vestells - The Wedge at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
The Lively Ones - Surf Rider mp3 at The California Girls
The Chantays - Pipeline mp3 at Rocky-52.net

The Aussie collection:

Board Boogie - Austrailian Surf Collection - 30 vintage cuts at Internet Archive Note: In the right column, under "Download options" click on "VBR MP3 Files"