NATIONAL [PREFERRED TERM] MONTH, PT 4

Here's a few oddballs that had been posted at Musica del Alma. That's past tense because the songs are still online but the blog itself is MIA. So the actual song links are good, but I left the source post links just in case it's a technical issue and Musica del Alma, the blog, reappears.

Musica del Alma specialized in Latin music in all its variations. Here's some I still had links to. The first two are covers. Sunny and the Sunliners doing the Meters' "Cissy Strut" and then a Fela cover from Phirpo y sus Caribes from Colombia. Go figure. "La Locuro de los Hippies" ("The Madness of Hippies") is an oddball fuzzfest for the ages. As if the title alone wasn't all time. Do dig the relentless tambourine bashing.

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Listen:
Sunny & the Sunliners - Cissy Strut mp3 at Musica Del Alma
Phirpo y sus Caribes - Comencemos mp3 at Musica del Alma
Porfi Jimenez y su Orquesta - Coro mp3 at Musica del Alma
Tony Hernandez and the Latin Liners - Jo Tex mp3 at Musica del Alma
Los Hermanos Cortez - La Locuro de los Hippies (The Madness of Hippies) mp3 at Musica de Alma

NATIONAL [PREFERRED TERM] MONTH, PT 3

If you're going to celebrate National Hispanic Heritage Month (or whatever you want to call it), and you're going to touch on culture or music, you're going to need a longer month. I won't be able to get to every band that merits posting, so I'll start with the ones that you might not be familiar with. Los Saicos have been here before (last posted three years ago) but they merit reposting no matter the circumstances. If you were to just see the photo above, they look like any other mid-sixties band. Now, take a look at the photo below. How'd you like to go against them in a battle of the bands? Think it's just that photo? Listen to them.

Here's what I remember about their backstory. They got a quick start thanks to lucking into a TV appearance (or was it more then one?), barely knew how to play, recorded six singles and then called it quits. No dispute, no drama. They just stopped playing. How many bands can you name that should have called it quits after their first twelve songs? How many can you name that, out of twelve songs, had one called "Camisa de Fuerza" ("Straightjacket") and another "Demolicion" ("Demolition")? Shit, listen to the first thirty seconds of "Fugitivo de Alcatraz" and tell me that isn't primordial Stooges. Even the band shot above, that prop they've got dangling over the car door (or should I say beat ass rusty old truck door) is all you need to know. For real.

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Listen:
Los Saicos - Camisa de Fuerza mp3 at Laoficinalive
Los Saicos - Fugitivo de Alcatraz mp3 at Berceuse Electrique
Los Saicos - Salvaje mp3 at Tape Wrecks
Los Saicos - Cemetenterio (streaming) at YouTube
Los Saicos - Demolicion (streaming) at YouTube
Los Saicos - Ana mp3 at Tumblr
Los Saicos - Besando A Otras mp3 at Tumblr
Los Saicos - Complete discography (streaming) at YouTube 12 songs
Video:
Was Punk Rock Born in Peru? - Los Saicos documentary at YouTube 13 minutes
Saicomania trailer at YouTube
Los Saicos - El Entierro De Los Gatos (live, Spain, 2010) at YouTube
Visit:
Where did punk begin? A cinema in Peru at The Guardian UK
Los Saicos at Wikipedia

NATIONAL [PREFERRED TERM] MONTH, PT 2

You can't really have a National Hispanic Heritage Month without mentioning Fania. It was a record label founded by Johnny Pacheco, a bandleader that was simply sick of being underpaid. So, he did what punk rockers would do roughly ten years later. He started a DIY record label that was so tiny he, the owner and founder, was selling records out of the trunk of his car. Without a real business model he slowly started building a roster of Latin talent that would eventually include Willie Colón, Celia Cruz, Ray Barretto, Rubén Blades, Héctor Lavoe, and half a million others. Big names. A little boogaloo and a lot of salsa. I've heard a great deal of Fania product, really just the tip of the iceberg in comparison to their discography but that's beside the point. Let's say I've heard a couple hundred Fania cuts. That might be generous. Let's say, conservatively, one hundred, though it's well over that. Anyway, think of any record label that you've heard a hundred songs from. There had to be a stinker in there, right? Well, I've yet to hear a stinker from Fania. There's a handful at the bottom, totally random selections, and prove my point, not a stinker in the bunch. If you're appetite is duly whetted, this documentary about Latin music in New York in the glory days of Fania is great.

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Listen:

Johnny Pacheco - Dakar, Punto Final mp3 at Internet Archive
Joe Bataan - Mambo De Bataan mp3 at Internet Archive
Ray Barretto - Indestructible mp3 at Internet Archive
Celia Cruz and Johnny Pacheco - Quimbara mp3 at Internet Archive
Willie Colón - The Hustler mp3 at Internet Archive
Charlie Palmieri - Boogaloo Mania mp3 at Passion of the Weiss

NATIONAL [PREFERRED TERM] MONTH

Ah hell, I was going to post this sometime this month. I might as well do the honest thing and just repost the complete thing from last year. You're welcome.:

I don't really pay attention to the National [fill in the blank] Month things. [Whatever] Awareness Month is usually noticed after seeing or hearing about it about ten times. So I didn't realize that National Hispanic Heritage Month is upon us. It's September 15 through October 15. I also learned that the term Hispanic is now kind of controversial. So, I will call it "National Flaco Jimenez, Ray Barretto, Tito Puente, Los Saicos, Celia Cruz, Thee Midniters, Willie Colon, Johnny Pacheco, Etc. Month"

Here's a song that was played incessantly on the radio when it came out, and for several years thereafter. There was no point in buying it because you'd heard it so often. It wasn't until years later that the song went away. Then, after a gap of not hearing it, I heard it again, with more learned ears. Loud. It was no longer wallpaper. It was a fucking cool song. El Chicano's "Viva Tirado" is up there with "Take Five" and "Green Onions" in terms of defining a sound. Theirs was a cover. The original is down there along with a another cover by Augustus Pablo (not his best but interesting to hear).

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Listen:
El Chicano - Viva Tirado mp3 at Internet Archive
Augustus Pablo - Viva Tirado (streaming) at YouTube
Gerald Wilson - Viva Tirado mp3 at Musica del Alma The original
Visit:
Yes, We're Calling It Hispanic Heritage Month And We Know It Makes Some Of You Cringe at NPR

MOM SAID WE HAVE TO TAKE TURNS

I'm not sure how many of you were hanging around here thirteen years ago, but I have to repost the Tielman Brothers because the old link to their video of "Rollin' Rock" went dead and we can't have that. It's too classic. The Tielman Brothers were Indonesians that moved to Amsterdam at a young age. The first thing you'll notice in the video is the energy of the band. From the beginning to the end, these cats don't stop moving. And the guitar player has some pretty good stuff. A guitar tone that sounds like Cliff Gallup's on the early Gene Vincent stuff (on a Les Paul?!). I mention that first because a little into the song it turns into a chaotic solo fest. We're talking guitar solos, drum solos, drumsticks on guitar solo, bass solo, behind the back guitar solo and my favorite, behind the back guitar solo while the guitarist is standing on the side of the stand up bass which is on top of the bassist who is lying on his back playing. It's quite a performance. Unfortunately the crazier they get, the more the actual solos suffer. By the end you're left wondering why the audience doesn't call them on their shit. All the action is fine and dandy, but when the music starts to suffer...oh.ever mind. I forgot about the clip of the audience at the very end. It's a pretty square looking crowd, not what you'd consider rock 'n' roll afficiandos. Their attention requires a spectacle..

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Listen:
Tielman Brothers - Record Hop mp3 at Rocky 52
Tielman Brothers - 18th Century Rock mp3 at Rocky 52
Tielman Brothers - A.A.A. mp3 at Rocky 52

GOT THE MEMO

Here's a nutty cat, Memo Rios, from Mexico City, who apparently did a fair amount of electro and rap, heavy on the covers. The one that sucked me in was "Techno Taco". It's like some cheesy Screamers Lite en Espanol. I didn't think it could be topped, or tainted, but I hadn't heard his covers of "Ice Ice Baby" and "Rappers Delight". Dude went from borderline oddball genius to ordinary oddball pretty quick. But the sparse production makes these interesting, as does the Spanish, and there are nice surprises, like the James Brown scream sample at :36 in "Memocotorreo". Whatever, I've gone this far. Do check the video, a cover of "Wild Thing".

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Listen:
Memo Rios - Techno Taco mp3 at Super Sonido
Memo Rios - Memocotorreo mp3 at Super Sonido Rappers Delight (?)
Memo Rios - Muy Delgada mp3 at Super Sonido Ice Ice Baby
Video:
Memo Rios -  Cosa Loca at YouTube Wild Thing

SAVE THE HOOPLA ABOUT CHANGING COLORS

This is the third time I've posted this thematic trio in the past five years. I guess I always get lazy at the end of the summer. Exhaling. Actually, the next month is usually the most enjoyable of the year. The weather's usually good, the water temperature cooling but not yet cold. We'll get Santa Ana conditions, hot and dry with offshore breezes. Tourists gone, kids back in school. If we could repeat the month between mid-September and mid-October for the entire year I'd be just fine.  

 

I know. You don't come here for a weather report. Here's the three end of summer songs. One from a Southern California band, one from a UK pop singer and one from an East coast vocal group, all of similar vintage (the sixties). I still don't get this seasons thing.

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Listen:
The Beach Boys - All Summer Long mp3 at The Pop History Dig
Dusty Spingfield - Summer Is Over mp3 at Tumblr
The Drifters - Sand In My Shoes mp3 at R Strathdee (?)

OH, THE PLACES YOU'LL GO

This is either cool or too cutesy for words depending on your attitude. It's three sisters from Monterey, Mexico. (There's your Hispanic Heritage Month tie-in.) The sisters start getting into music via Rock Band, the video game. They get instruments and start playing together, eventually posting some videos online. One of them, a cover of Metallica's "Enter Sandman" blew up. This was in 2015. They called themselves The Warning. The oldest sister at the time was sixteen, the youngest was thirteen. Okay, this is where it turns into cool versus cutesy. The cool part of it, coming from someone who grew up with two rock obsessed brothers, is that they are sisters. The whole time I was growing up, my brothers and I fantasized about having a band together. When we were young all three of us took guitar lessons but only my brother Tim stuck it out. (I got a bass a few years later but never got good enough.) Being in a band with siblings, especially when you're still in your teens, has got to be one of the best ways to begin a music career. Staying together as a unit for several years has got to be the absolute shit.

Here's a couple videos I ran across. One is a veiled ad for Patreon, the site that gets you sponsors. Nevertheless, it's a good place to start. The other video is clips of The Warning chronologically from when they first started up until 2022.

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Watch:
The Warning Evolution: 2009-2022 at YouTube 45 minutes

SQUEEZE BOX COOL

I completely forgot that yesterday was Mexican Independence Day. And Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica all had their Independence Days last Thursday, the 15th. Chile has their on the 18th and Belize on the 21st. But the U.S. has a grab bag way of celebrating all of them, Hispanic Heritage Month. That awkward name, as opposed to Latinx or some other more appropriate term, was picked up by the Washington eggheads from the U.S. Census (read about it here). Anyway, it gives me a opportunity to feature music from all of Latin America for the next few weeks, not exclusively but more than usual.

For whatever reason, the first person that came to mind was Flaco Jimenez. He was actually born in Texas but is Mexican and his fix was Norteño, Tex Mex and Tejano music. When I hear his music it reminds me of my first visits to Mexico. I grew up (and am still growing up) in San Diego, roughly twenty miles from Tijuana. A rite of passage when I was younger was to go to TJ and drink. The drinking age in Mexico was 18 and in San Diego the drinking age is 21. It is not hard math for a thirsty young adult. In the bars, restaurants and in shops you heard all sorts of Mexican music. A lot of it was like Flaco's. I'm thirsty.

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Listen:
Flaco Jiménez - El Pata Caliente mp3 at Let's Polka
Flaco Jiménez - Laureles mp3 at Let's Polka

RED HOT DEPOT

Like a lot of people, my first exposure to the song "Red Hot" was through Robert Gordon's 1977 LP with Link Wray. After devouring the LP, yep, the dig was on. It didn't take long to find out that the hit version of "Red Hot" was by Billy Lee Riley (above), recorded at Sun in 1957, with Jerry Lee Lewis on piano. (Gordon's LP also featured Riley's "Flying Saucers Rock 'n' Roll".) It wasn't until years later that I found an earlier version from 1955 by Billy "The Kid" Emerson, also recorded at at Sun. His version (the original?) is a fuckin' party. This would be my cue to hep you to an excellent four CD box set that is the deal of the century. It's called "Rockin' Memphis" and that's where I first heard Emerson's version. It's all stuff recorded at Sun and most of the cuts in the set were licensed to other labels. So you're essentially getting a whole bunch of cool songs that you won't find on official Sun boxed sets. Here's the kicker: Brand new this boxed set goes for about $16! Used copies at Discogs start at eight bucks! There's 114 songs and a 56 page book of liner notes. Get off you wallets tightwads!

Here's the three versions mentioned above and another one by the Beatles recorded in their pre-fame days at the Star Club in Hamburg. Their recording isn't the greatest but you can definitely hear some fine rockabilly licks. John or George? You make the call.

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Listen:
Billy Lee Riley - Red Hot mp3 at Internet Archive 1957
Billy "The Kid" Emerson - Red Hot mp3 at Internet Archive 1955
Robert Gordon w/Link Wray - Red Hot (streaming) at YouTube
The Beatles - Red Hot (Live at the Star Club) (streaming) at YouTube

AIN'T NO MONKS I KNOW

Just a quick one here. Los Monjes aren't my favorite Mexican band, garage, beat or otherwise. Not even close. I just dig them because they're instant oddballs. They're a three piece: organ, drums and bass. No guitar. Okay, it's the mid-sixties, I'll give you that as a bold move. Then there is their appearance. Despite the well trimmed face feathers, they look like chemistry students. With their robes (with hoods) they really seal the deal. (Los Monjes translates to "the Monks") I'm just posting a couple here. There's more at the bottom link. Sheeit, kids those days.

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Listen:
Los Monjes - Oh Yeah! mp3 at Internet Archive
Los Monjes - No Debes Mentir mp3 at Internet Archive
Los Monjes - Caravan mp3 at Internet Archive
Los Monjes - Seven more songs at Internet Archive

JAMMING JAZZBO DOWN YOUR EAR HOLE

I was looking for something else and ran across this, Prince Jazzbo's "Crab Walking". I'd been wanting to post it again because it's a favorite but assumed the link I had was dead (wrong!). Jazzbo DJs over the riddim from Horace Andy's "Skylarking" (also a favorite) and it's on Studio One (yet another favorite) and it's a DJ 12" with the version tacked on to the end (also a favorite format). Basically the only way the song could max out all of my favorite elements of reggae would be if U Roy was doing the toasting (sadly, U Roy never teamed up with Coxone Dodd.)

What I was actually looking for when I stumbled on "Crab Walking" was Gregory Isaacs's "Night Nurse". I heard it at the beach today after just coming out of the water and was stoked to hear it in the wild. I normally hate hearing other people's music at the beach, but today was an exception. Particularly after passing a group that was blasting nu-country. So here's those two cuts and a couple others that hit the spot while I was looking for the Isaacs's thing.

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Listen:
Prince Jazzbo - Crab Walking mp3 at Snuhthing Anything
Gregory Isaacs - Night Nurse mp3 at Feems
Burning Spear - Social Living mp3 at Internet Archive 12" version, with a couple minutes of the version on the flip.
Horace Andy - See A Man's Face mp3 at Kazo Wailers

CBGB OMFUG OGS

I've no idea what compilation or boxed set these might be from but any of you Television type folks (the band, not an actual television) might find them as interesting as I do. I'm not someone who coddles artists. If I really dig a record and then a follow up comes out that isn't quite as good, the band is going to have to convince me to go any further. Television did not. Marquee Moon was a great debut LP. Nothing that they did after that really interested me. One and done amigos, you never did convince me to go back. But, alternate versions from the same sessions? I can dig it, especially since these seem to be a bit more raw than the album versions. If you're into Television you'll dig 'em. If you're not, well, take 'em for a spin. The guitar interplay is the draw here.

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Listen:
Television - Friction (alt. version) mp3 at Internet Archive
Television - Marquee Moon (alt. version) mp3 at Internet Archive
Television - See No Evil (alt. version) mp3 at Internet Archive
Television - Untitled Instrumental mp3 at Internet Archive

FROM THE 99 CENT BIN

This one is a head scratcher. An LP by band called The Deep, Psychedelic Moods, was released in the fall of '66 and lays claim to the first album with "psychedelic" in the title (edging out the Blues Magoos and the 13th Floor Elevators). While that may be noteworthy to some, more noteworthy is the main Deep-er, Rusty Evans. Prior to The Deep he was a folkie and before that he recorded at least one rockabilly record. Some years after The Deep, he was doing a Johnny Cash tribute thing. WTF?

The LP is psych-lite, but has it's moments. The second cut, "Pink Ether" manages to mix fuzz and Martin Denny-like bird calls. Again, WTF? And there's no shortage of intriguing song titles, "When Rain Is Black", "Crystal Nite", "Turned On", "Trip #76",...you get the picture. While this may not be the finest psych you've ever heard, chances are you might not hear The Deep again. The LP was a one-off. Having formed just to record this LP, it was the only album under the name The Deep. They did record one other LP, Psychedelic Psoul, as The Freak Scene (find it on YouTube). Interesting, the guy who wrote the drab liner notes was Neil Bogart who went on to sign Donna Summer and Kiss. Fuck, sell what sells I guess.

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Listen:
The Deep - Color Dreams mp3 at Internet Archive
The Deep - Pink Ether mp3 at Internet Archive
The Deep - When Rain Is Black mp3 at Internet Archive
The Deep - Crystal Nite mp3 at Internet Archive
The Deep - Turned On mp3 at Internet Archive
The Deep - Trip #76 mp3 at Internet Archive

IS TIME

Oh hell yeah, these hit the spot. Just what I need before a three day-er. Althea and Donna 's "Uptown Top Ranking" is my all-time summer jam, and it's right on time. We're just starting to get summer-like weather (high 70s, 70° water). Like I need an excuse. The Horace Andy and Heptones cuts are favorites as well, and these all have the versions tacked on. Partake in something. Crank it fool.

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Listen:
Althea and Donna - Uptown Top Ranking b/w Calico Suit mp3 at Internet Archive Original 1977 Joe Gibbs Record Globe 7" Version
Horace Andy - Skylarking b/w Skylarking (Version)  mp3 at Internet Archive Original 1972 Bongo Man 7" Version
The Heptones - Cool Rasta b/w Rasta Dub  mp3 at Internet Archive Original 1976 Cancer 7" Single Version