REMEMBERING A TRUE SHIT STIRRER

Malcom Mclaren passed away today, in New York. The bulk of the piece below is from a bio I wrote for Woodstock.com ten years ago. Sadly, some editing was required, to change the tense of some passages.

Malcolm McLaren, best known as the former manager of the Sex Pistols, was incredibly astute at picking up on the slightest nuances of contemporary culture and lighting an invisible fuse. He was equal parts explorer, appropriator, trash picker, entrepreneur, opportunist and artist. And he knew how to stir up a fuss.

His name seems to pop up everywhere. In addition to the Sex Pistols, he has had ties to the New York Dolls, Ronnie "the Great Train Robber" Biggs, actress Lauren Hutton, Bow Wow Wow, film critic Roger Ebbert, Boy George, French actress Catherine Deneuve and artist Keith Haring. At different times, he has been band manager, entrepreneur, fashion designer and recording artist, and he was one of the earliest to sell the trends of punk rock, vouging, hip-hop and music piracy. In 1999, when it seemed as though he was starting to slow down, he ran for Mayor of London.

Born in London in 1946, he was brought up by his grandmother and began his young adult life attending several London area art schools. While in art school, he organized a happening at an art gallery (that was shut down by the police), was involved in student revolts and traveled to Paris where he began an association with an art gangster group, the Situationists. During these art school years, his predilection for disorder was instilled.
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Photos from McLaren's funeral here

In 1971, he entered the fashion world, opening his first boutique on Kings Road. Originally named "In The Back of Paradise Garage," it would become his hub, operating under several different names and featuring constantly changing clothing lines, designed with his partner, Vivien Westwood. From this store, under it's third name " Too Fast To Live Too Young To Die," he met the New York Dolls. After yet another name change, this time to "Sex," he would go on to briefly manage the New York Dolls, during their "red patent leather" period. McLaren issued a press statement "Better Red Than Dead" and dressed the Dolls in red patent leather outfits. The intent was for the Dolls to appear as having a threatening affiliation with communism. Ultimately the band sabotaged the idea when they told the press that it was joke.

By 1975, while still operating under the name of "Sex," McLaren met a young band called "QT Jones and the Sex Pistols" and, after learning that most of their equipment had been burgled from the homes of various English rock stars, was enamored enough that he began managing them. After dropping "QT Jones" from the name and recruiting a singer they would name Johnny Rotten, they went on to be signed and dropped from two record companies within months, before landing a deal with Virgin Records.

During the short life span of the Sex Pistols (they broke up in 1978), McLaren invited soft core film maker Russ Meyer to make a film about the band, and he began writing a script with Roger Ebert, titled "Who Killed Bambi?" The project was dropped by 20th Century Fox after one scene was shot, a studio spokesman saying, "We are in the business of making family entertainment".

McLaren would later salvage the idea and some footage, assembling a film that would later be released as "The Great Rock N Roll Swindle," with director Julien Temple. It was during this process that McLaren hooked up with Ronald Biggs, the infamous Londoner known as "the Great Train Robber." Biggs, who had escaped from prison and fled to South America, was enlisted to take the place of Johhny Rotten, who had left the band in 1978. Though the middle-aged and talent-less Biggs was an unlikely front man, he was enlisted by McLaren as an ideal candidate to infuriate British authorities. Flying Sex Pistols Steve Jones and Paul Jones to the exiled Biggs' home base, the sessions produced the single "No One Is Innocent".

The Sex Pistols would soon disband, and McLaren later summed up the experience saying, "The greatest technique involved in managing the Sex Pistols was always to create the right explosion and when know that it was going to happen, and as manager, run into the toilet and come out after the explosion and say, 'God, what's happened?"

In 1980, with his shop operating under the name "World's End", Malcolm McLaren discovers and produces Adam Ant, Bow Wow Wow and a young Boy George. Bow Wow Wow included Adam Ant's backing band (persuaded to leave Ant by McLaren) and featured a 13 year-old girl singer named Annabella, whose youth would prompt another McLaren ploy. By recreating Manet's painting "Dejeuner Sur l'herbe" using the members of the group and Annabella in the nude, as a record cover, he again managed to anger officials (and the girl's mother).

The concept for the new group, and accompanying line of pirate influenced clothes, was to promote music piracy, particularly the home taping of songs broadcast on the radio. The first single by Bow Wow Wow was "C30 C60 C90 Go" a name derived from the names designated by different lengths of cassette tapes. The press release was accompanied by a cassette single (said to be the very first in the format) and a statement that "Copyrighting of this sound recording is UNLAWFUL." The lyrics speak for themselves:

When I went in your shop,
And you said my records were out of stock,
So I don't buy records in your shop,
I tape 'em all, I'm top of the pops

Now I've got a new way to move,
It's shiny and black and don't need a groove,
I don't need no album rack,
I carry my collection over my back

C-30 C-60 C-90 Go
Off the radio I get a constant flow,
Hit it! Pause it! Record it and play,
Or turn it on rewind and rub it away

The record company, EMI, was not amused. As the first label to drop the Sex Pistols, they had already been bamboozled once by McLaren. The song was a hit, but they stopped production, issuing a press release that stated "We cannot promote a band who blatantly promote home taping."

By 1983 McLaren had become fascinated with the New York hip-hop scene, then still in it's infancy. He would later say, "I came to rap on a street corner near Harlem, and I noticed this young black kid wearing a T-shirt saying 'Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols' on it, and he was scratching. To me, that seemed like a miraculous kind of vision. Punk, from England, had made it all the way to New York's Harlem, and now here was this whole new music to be discovered as well."

He began an album called "Duck Rock" which combined international music, rap influenced lyrics and some of the earliest scratching to reach a mass audience. The liner notes described collaborators the World Famous Supreme Team as DJs from New York that had "developed a technique using record players like instruments, replacing the power chord of the guitar by the needle of a gramophone, moving it manually backwards and forwards across the surface of the record. We call it scratching."

The album was quietly groundbreaking. Not only had it introduced scratching, hip-hop culture and cover artist Keith Haring to a mass audience, it was one of the first to introduce a world music hybrid in an international pop music context.

McLaren was still active, with Westwood, in clothes designing. The two opened another shop called Nostalgia of Mud (in 1981). To coincide with the release of "Duck Rock," they showed a new fashion collection (featuring textile prints by Keith Haring) in Paris, using music that mixed rap with opera. Within a year, this would be another path that McLaren would wander. In 1984, he released his second album "Fans" which mixed opera with R & B and hip hop elements. The album, and featured single "Madame Butterfly" (which was a hit in Europe), predated MTV's "Hip Hopera: Carmen" (aired in May 2000) by a whopping 16 years.

After 1984, McLaren was seemingly everywhere, though not as much in the public eye. In 1985, he went to Hollywood, pitching movies such as "Heavy Metal Surf Nazis" and "Rock 'n' Roll Godfather." Now split up with Westwood, he began a relationship with actress Lauren Hutton. Though seen as an odd pairing by many who knew McLaren, the press was uninterested, presumably because they had covered enough of McLaren antics.

The next few years would be filled by a legal battle over the Sex Pistols name (which he gave up the rights to by walking out of court), an exhibition of his work (at the Museum of Contemporary Art in New York) and pitching another film project (this time to Steven Spielberg's Amblin Productions). In 1989, McLaren released a third album, this time recruiting Jeff Beck and Bootsy Collins. Titled "Waltz Darling" and credited to McLaren and the Bootzilla Orchestra, it was another odd pairing, this time with waltzes and funk. He also released a single "Deep In Vogue,' inspired by the New York semi-dance craze. Though not a big seller, the single predated and inspired Madonna's "Vogue," the song that put voguing into it's short-lived limelight.

From 1990 through 1999, McLaren was still at it, keeping up a pace that looked that by now, seemed unstoppable. He wrote and directed a TV movie, "The Ghosts Of Oxford Street," released a forth album, "Paris" (featuring Catherine Deneuve), and toured the Far East, Australia and New Zealand as a lecturer.

He was commissioned to begin writing his autobiography, created and managed a Chinese all girl group called JUNGK. An album, called "Buffalo Gals Back To Skool," consisting of "Duck Rock" remixes (by high profile hip-hop producers) was released in 1998.

McLaren's decade culminated with an unsuccessful bid for Mayor of London in 1999. His chances were slim from the outset. By design, the campaign was pure McLaren. (One of his platforms called for the legalization of cannabis.)

From all appearances, McLaren seems to have been on hiatus since the mayoral election. With the exception of a mash-up (of the Carpenters "Love Will Keep Us Together" and Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart," roughly a year ago), there had been hardly a peep from the McLaren camp in the past ten years. It's quite possible that it was only because he was involved in projects even more peripheral than those in the past (and, if the pattern continues, later someone else will receive the bulk of the credit). Well, then. Long live the shit stirrers.

If you follow this blog and read the last post, the irony may not be lost on you. This post, the first without links leading directly to mp3 files, is about the person who practically invented the term "music piracy".

NOTE TO UK MUSIC PUBLSHERS: These links lead to other sites:
Sex Pistols - Anarchy in the UK mp3 at Music is Art (5th song at bottom of post)
Bow Wow Wow - C30 C60 C90 Go mp3 at Town Full of Losers (4th song down)
Malcolm McLaren - Buffalo Gals mp3 at 8106 (Scroll down to 4th song)
Malcolm McLaren - Double Dutch mp3 at Crying All the Way to the Chip Shop
Malcolm McLaren & the World Famous Supreme Team – Hey DJ at 8106 (6th song)
Malcolm McLaren and the Bootzilla Orchestra - Deep in Vogue mp3 at Nervous Acid

Added 4/12/2010: Comments from John Lydon, Steve Jones, Annabella Lwin, David Johansen, Vivien Westwood and others at Pitchfork
Added 4/22/10: Photos of the funeral at the Telegraph web site
Added 4/24/10: Roger Ebert on McLaren, Russ Meyers and the aborted Sex Pistols film "Who Killed Bambi?"
Malcolm McLaren - A Chronology
McLaren declares Damien Hirst's $160K clothing collection fake
McLaren's Manifesto for London
McLaren's obituary in the Guardian

McLaren's obituary in the New York Times
Malcolm McLaren's run for Mayor of London

YOU'RE IN MY SEAT

I know, a whole month away from here. It wasn't exactly a vacation. The short version of what went down is this: I received a notice from my ol' pals at Blogger telling me that they received a complaint regarding one of the links that I posted. Seems a UK music publisher thinks I was posting something that infringed on their copyright or intellectual property or some other such nonsense. The truth of the matter is that I have never uploaded a single mp3, ever. Without exception, every song that's been mentioned on this blog was uploaded by someone else, on someone else's server. I though it obvious enough because I have mentioned, and linked to, the hosting blogs where the songs were found. Apparently that didn't matter. So, I took it upon myself to go digging through some legal fine print, and as far as I can determine, my offense was linking directly to the mp3 files, thus making it easier for hooligans to go raid the pantries of rich rock stars. So, from here on in, I won't give you the key to the liquor cabinet, I'll just point you in the direction of the party. In other words, I'll only link to the blogs, not the actual mp3s. It's an added step that, should you be interested in the song, you'll have to strain to make one or two more clicks with that mouse of yours.

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For the record, I'm not recommending that you download music posted on the blogs. but I'm not recommending that you don't either. You know as well as I do, that I can't go on record as condoning downloading, and the fact of the matter is you're all big boys and girls and can make your own decisions. I'm just saying that the right-click-"save as" button is a wonderful thing.
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Now, it didn't take a whole month to figure out how to proceed. One thing I haven't mentioned is that, right about the same time I got the notice from Blogger, I got a virus that chewed up my computer from the inside out. It was bad enough that I was forced to get a new computer, which, unfortunately, came pre-loaded with Windows 7. Ordinarily that wouldn't be a problem, but my mp3 software of choice is Winamp, which hates Windows 7, like I hate UK music publishers. It was a mess friends, and I was thoroughly discombobulated. I had to do a lot of MacGyvering to get the thing to work. But, after a whole lot of cussin', I'm ready to go. The big question is, are you still there?

DAMNED FROM THE START

It wasn't their fault. They weren't really given a chance. Signed by Sire Records in the U.S., the Saints' first album "(I'm) Stranded" was released in a massive flurry of "let's catch up" marketing. Unfortunately, the push included much more visible acts, the Talking Heads, the Dead Boys, Richard Hell & the Voidoids, and the Ramones, all from the states (the Saints were from Australia). To further their footnote status, one member had the audacity to have long hair and a skinny tie. When record store listening stations and airplay were unheard of at the time, and every record company was playing the same game of catch-up, someone had to fall through the cracks. And people weren't going to part with their hard earned bucks for a band that they knew nothing about, who didn't have the "right" look to boot. So, despite having a chart topping UK hit "(I'm) Stranded" in 1976, the Saints were ignored by just about everybody in the U.S. It's not surprising that later generations of music fiends were late in latching on. That said, it was refreshing to see a post on Licorice Pizza, where the guy had just discovered the Saints first LP and actually did a little homework. (And it was his post that prompted this one. Good going kid.)

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A semi-related link below lends a historical perspective to the record industy's initial panic, in an "Oh shit, what will we do now?!" issue of Billboard, they've got several articles on the mysterious punk rock/new wave beast. With headlines like "Assault on This Industry,' "You Call This Rock n' Roll," "Never Mind the Bollocks, Sell Me a Disk," and "Anarchy at the Labels, Does This Mean I'm Out?," it's a real hoot. But then again, watching fat cats squirm never gets old.

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The Saints - (I'm) Stranded mp3 at I Am Janet

The Saints - L.I.E.S. mp3 at CoopStuff

The Saints - Night In Venice mp3 at Licorice Pizza

The Saints - Kissin' Cousins mp3 at Licorice Pizza

The Saints - River Deep Mountain High mp3 at Unpiano.com

The Saints - Know Your Product mp3 at Box.net

The record idustry didn't know what to do:

"The New Wave Coming of Age" January 14, 1978 issue of Billboard

SPANISH STROLL BABY

Ca-chink, ca-chink, ca-chink....That's what I heard when I was at a stop light, on a wet St. Marks Place, on my way home one night, twenty-odd years ago. Looking down at the feet next to me, well traveled pointed toe shoes, the sort of which were common in Tijuana shoe stores, but not the sort I'd been seeing on the feet of New Yorkers in the mid-eighties. I glanced to my right, and saw the pointed shoe wearer's companion, with a Ronettes style bouffant, and make-up right out of a Diane Arbus photo. Then I looked up at her man. A stoic, timelessly pompadoured, figure gazing straight ahead, waiting for the light to change. It was Willy Deville.

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I'd been in New York for a couple months, done a few clubs, did CBGB's, had a group of friends that included a D-list of grafitti writers, artists, drunks, and the drummer on the Heartbreakers "Live at Max's" LP,...in short, I had all sorts of fringe NY moments. But here was Willy Deville, with his woman, on a wet, rainy night, in the Lower East Side. Now it really felt like New York.

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Mink Deville (the band), though loved by critics, were vastly overlooked by record buyers. They first appeared on a lame CBGB's compilation, and likely because of that association, no one was really sure what to make of them. Deville's understated reverence for music that came before him was about as "old wave" as you could get, especially considering his CBGB's stablemates were the Ramones, Patti Smith, Blondie, et al. This was a guy who had a Spector alumni producing his first three albums, wrote with Doc Pomus, hired Elvis' rhythm section for his third album, and recorded in Paris so he could use Edith Piaf's string arranger. It's telling that, while most of his contemporaries can be pegged to a certain era because of their sound, his music is just like his look was that night, timeless.

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Mink Deville - Spanish Stroll mp3 at Siblingshot

Mink Deville - Just to Walk That Little Girl Home mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu

Mink Deville - This Must Be the Night mp3 at Jipes Mood

Mink Deville - "A" Train Lady mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu

Mink Deville - Bad Boy mp3 at [Some Dutch site]

FROM WHENCE WE CAME

Just look at that picture. That's what baddass looks like. Though Howlin' Wolf should need no introduction to most ardent fiends, it seemed like high time to post a little sumpin' sumpin' to remind us what got us here.
Howlin' Wolf - Back Door Man mp3 at Snuthing Anything
Howlin' Wolf - Wang Dang Doodle mp3 at Burning Hand
Howlin' Wolf - Evil mp3 at Snuhthing Anything
Howlin' Wolf - I Ain't Superstitious at Ticket to the Blues
Howlin' Wolf & Muddy Waters - Highway 49 mp3 at Ticket to the Blues
Howlin' Wolf - Killing Floor mp3 at White Light Black Light
Howlin' Wolf - Coon on the Moon mp3 at Ticket to the Blues
The Unofficial Howlin' Wolf page at Perfect Sound Forever - A whole mess of articles, links, photos, and an extensive discography

(LAZY TITLE) STRAIGHT OUTTA TEL AVIV

Whenever I think about what I'd do if music wasn't available online, the answer is actually pretty simple. I'd be back at the record store, for several hours a week, just browsing the different sections. Right before the local Tower Records closed, I'd just become friends with a couple employees. One was a mega-pierced electro-hipster, the other a nu-hippy. They were both well versed in international music, funk, jazz, and soul. (And, like myself, both were readers of the exhaustive Wax Poetics.) Though I never really asked for recommendations, they subtly validated my purchases ('that's a good one"..."oh, you'd like..."). I miss that.

One thing that can be said, about online music sources (primarily blogs) is that I can still find the occasional surprise out of nowhere. These two cuts are an excellent example. Would the two guys at Tower ever have steered me towards some singer from Tel Aviv? Maybe, but chances are I never would have heard of Karolina if I hadn't been roaming around aimlessly online.

Karolina and Funset - Lion mp3 at Aurgasm

Kutiman featuring Karolina - Music is Ruling My World mp3 at Aurgasm

WELL, YOU TELL ME. IS IT?

A few weeks ago I posted a remix of a Billie Holiday song, that had her singing over reggae tracks, and it sounded, if not surprisingly good, at least interesting (depends on which side of the purist fence you're on). Then a few days ago, I just ran into a mash-up of Bob Marley and Soft Cell that works remarkably well. I normally hate it when someone fucks with reggae with mash-ups or remixes because I think of seventies reggae as too organic. But the Marley/Soft Cell thing caught me off guard. So here's the source material and Glories Jones' original version of Tainted Love.
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Gloria Jones - Tainted Love mp3 at Balarama Music
Soft Cell - Tainted Love mp3 at Aunt Charlie's Lounge
Bob Marley & the Wailers - Is This Love mp3 at {Some Russian site}
DJ Zebra - This Tainted Love (Bob Marley/Soft Cell Mash Up) mp3 at Popbytes
Billie Holiday - I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm (Yesking remix) mp3 at Life Signs Project

SORRY, MORE SOUNDS FROM THE FRONT ST HI-FI

A few thanks, for friends and strangers. First off, thanks to the regular visitors of this forsaken hack job (all four of you), who have been wondering what the hell was up with the last couple of posts (and this one). Without going into too much more detail, let me just say that these posts have, admittedly, been a little indulgent, but for good reason. The people who I've written about, and those who have left comments, were all part of the embyonic San Diego punk scene, and the house we've been referring to was as close to a non-venue epicenter as there was. Like I said two posts earlier, the sharing of music in the house was amazing, and I'm sure I'm not the only one whose musical interests and tastes developed at a fast clip due to the concentration of shared enthusiasm. In short, we were fucking lucky.

Thanks, too, to everybody from the house, and the friends that stopped by either here or Facebook, I'm still in a daze. I almost feel as if the last thirty years were spent running in place. It's been a fucking crazy couple weeks. As if all the people from the house being active online isn't mindblowing enough, I reconnected with a Hitmaker on Facebook, the same day I got an email from a Dil. Gary Heffern is in town (from Finland) for another few days, and Carl Rusk (now living in New York)and Ron Silva (in San Francisco) just played at a local club, with their side project, the Nashville Ramblers on Friday night. This is all coincidental, but a mindfuck nonetheless.

A few notes about the music: Besides the now head-thumpingly obvious songs mentioned in the comments (of the earlier posts), I threw in a couple that I remember, along with a couple others. One is for Gary. I remember the exact location that Gary first told me I should check out Gram Parsons (outside the "pop art" bathroom, at the top of the stairs.) I never did hear Parsons at Front Street, but, I sure did later. So, here's a very belated thanks Gary. ("I remember something you once told me, and I'll be damned if it did not come true. Twenty thousand roads, I went down, down, down, and they all led me straight back home to you.")

The last song down there is "The Trains." by the Nashville Ramblers, Carl Rusk and Ron Silva's band. You have to hear it. It's a near perfect song. Carl's album, "Blue Period" is some pretty bad ass pop too.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~.

Brian Eno - Spider and I mp3 at Pretty Goes With Pretty

Dillinger - Cocaine in my Brain mp3 at Siblingshot

Talking Heads - I Zimbra mp3 at Feel My Bicep

Wire - 12XU mp3 at Club Courtyard

David Bowie - Sound and Vision mp3 at Pretty Goes With Pretty

Sam Cooke - You Send Me mp3 at RustyKnight98

The Slits - I Heard It Through the Grapevine mp3 at Buzzgrinder

Modern Lovers - She Cracked mp3 at Recidivism
Gene Pitney - Town Without Pity mp3 at Fimoculous
Buzzcocks - Ever Fallen In Love mp3 at Pretty Goes With Pretty

Patrick Hernandez - Born to Be Alive mp3 at Ardypetit

Gram Parsons - Return of the Greivous Angel mp3 at Pretty Goes Wth Pretty

The Nashville Ramblers - The Trains mp3 at The Che Underground

Misc:

Front St. House on Google Maps

MORE SOUNDS FROM THE FRONT ST. HI-FI

Because the last post about the Front Street house led to thought (and ear) provoking comments, about certain records and their particular moments, new associations souped up already familiar songs. Not only that, all of these other songs came to mind.

Why do you remember that one music related incident, that one moment that is permanently etched? Everything seems to zero in on what is happening right when a particular song is playing. Sometimes, you don't remember it until much later. Sometimes, it stops you dead in your tracks and you give in to it.

One night I was at Margaret & Suzie's apartment on West Lewis Street, right before the move to Front Street. When I'd hang out there, we'd usually smoke cigarettes, drink jug wine (about three dollars, from the store across the street) and shoot the shit. On one certain night, I remember coming back from the store, and walking into a candle lit apartment, with a light haze of smoke, everything in a muted reddish hue. Margaret and Lisa were at the table talking, and Peter and Gordon's "World Without Love" was playing. I stopped and took it all in "I don't care, I won't live in a world without love,...". The whole scene was like something out of a movie, everything fit together, as if directed. I'd heard that song a zillion times, but that was the first time I heard it.

Jacqui mentioned Lisa possibly playing "The Letter" by the Box Tops. After listening to it again last night, it now prompts a visualization of Lisa, leaned over a (probably ramshackle) record player, putting on a scratched up 45, with all the accompanying surface noise. Whether or not the details of the imagined scene are correct, the association is not that of anyone getting a ticket for an airplane, any letter, or anything else lyrically referenced. It's of a moment.

Lisa mentioned a party, and Marc Rude listening to the Doors (even where he was listening and in what format). And thanks to her, after listening to "Respect" last night, the thoughts of punk girls singing along to it made me dig it more, and I'm thankful that that association is there. I dig it more; I didn't think it possible.

I remember that other party that she spoke of, the one that was videotaped. (Though, I remember it being Gary Vitalis who combed his hair, and staring unknowingly into the camera.) Early that night, while the camera was pointed toward the front of the living room and the tape rolling, there was Terry Marine with Traci's daughter, dancing in an empty room, to Tommy James and the Shondells' "Hanky Panky."

I dig that sorta shit. I hope these songs recall moments, whether shared or not. A few things to note: The more obvious Stones song would have been "My Obsession" (because it was played incessantly), but I couldn't find an mp3 of it. And something off of "Arrival" would have been a more appropriate choice for Abba, but that blue album cover of "Voulez Vous" seemed to be inescapable in that house.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~.

Peter and Gordon - World Without Love mp3 at Viajando[?]
Linton Kweski Johnson - Sonny's Lettah mp3 at Le Blog de la Grande Chose
Tommy James & the Shondells - I Think We're Alone Now mp3 at Pop Wreckoning
Marianne Faithful - Broken English mp3 at Disco Workout
Abba - Voulez Vous mp3 at {Some Belgium site}
The Vouges - Five O'Clock World mp3 at Rock Town Hall
The Screamers - 122 Hours of Fear (Pt 1) and (Pt 2) at Zahnarzt
The Rolling Stones - All Sold Out mp3 at the Adios Lounge
Aretha Franklin - Respect mp3 at Skyline Church (really)
The Who - Magic Bus mp3 at Systar
Kurtis Blow - The Breaks mp3 at 8106
The Doors - Break On Through mp3 at Music is Art
The Box Tops - The Letter mp3 at Fantastic Weapon
The Zeros - Wild Weekend mp3 at Last Days of Man on Earth
The Righteous Brothers - Little Latin Lupe Lu mp3 at EWU.edu
Hank Williams - Jambalaya mp3 at Tigersoft.com
U Roy - Runaway Girl mp3 at Le Blog de la Grande Chose

ABOUT A HOUSE

If you've ever lived with a roommate, you've probably been in a situation where your musical tastes tend to cross-pollinate. It's a great learning experience, turning each other on to music you wouldn't ordinarily listen to, especially when there are shared reference points. Try multiplying that by nine roommates (and often times more), and you have a hard time soaking it all in..

For roughly a year and a half, I lived in a seven bedroom house, with what started as eight roommates. That varied wildly. With rent at $135 a bedroom, there were instances of up to four people splitting one room, and there were a lot of extended stays by couch crashers. It was a mob scene. The core group were people in and around the punk scene, but it really wasn't a "punk house". We were pretty smart kids, almost all had pre-punk histories with varied musical, artistic and literary interests. So, what to most of the punk scene seemed like a party house, was actually a melting pot of culture.

There were records, literally, everywhere in that house. There was one closet, between the kitchen and the living room, that had a pile of records just thrown in it, a couple feet high (some with covers, some without). Just about every room in the house had some sort of record player in it. (One friend told me his first impression of the house was a hanging out in the kitchen, while people ate mac and cheese with knives and Johnny Cash played on a portable record player on the sink...) Because the majority of the records were freely shared there was a lot of exploring going on, and it wasn't uncommon to have a roommate's interest in one of your records prompt a reevaluation. The breadth of taste in the house was wide, and looking back, surprisingly good. And, more often than not, there would be music blasting simultaneously from different rooms. A trip through the house might bring snippets of the Clash, Eddie Cochran, U-Roy, Eno, Howlin' Wolf, Abba, Pete Seeger, the Injections, Kraftwerk, and the Stones. And it played constantly. Because there were so many roommates, with varying schedules and levels of employment (many had neither), there was always someone up and around. (In the time that I lived there there was not one minute in which everyone was asleep.) So, musically, you had the best of situations: a multi-room, 24/7 record party with thousands of titles, and an abundance of taste.

The house, without any prompting from the residents, got tagged by people in the scene as "the Mod House," despite the fact that there wasn't one mod who lived there. Thirty years later, there's still theories floating around about the source of the name (one is that it was because there was a lot of early Who, Kinks and Stones played), but, nevertheless, it stuck. Oh, did it stick. All anyone had to do was open their mouth and say "party at the Mod House" as they were exiting a show, and the house would become flooded with a hundred or so of our closest uninvited guests. This, of course, would sometimes lead to bad scenes involving fights, cops, bad raps and thoroughly pissed off neighbors (not to mention a few stragglers that would be "recovering from their hangovers" for days on end, without ever vacating the house). There were quite a few musicians and wanna be musicians among the residents and visitors and, depending on what else was going on, there might be a band playing on the back porch, or in the basement (more like a storm cellar) that had been converted haphazardly as a "practice" room (when conditions were damp, it wasn't uncommon to get shocked if you weren't standing on something off of the floor). One roommate, through his reggae connections, offered up his room, a large converted patio, for a pre-tour rehearsal studio for Leroy Smart, a reggae artist whom most of us were familiar with due the Clash name-drop in "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais." So, for roughly a week, we had a bona fide reggae icon (and/or his band) playing in our house. The same room was used for a no-bones recording studio, producing the backing tracks for two albums, one by A Doeman, and another by Mohamed I. (I have fond memories of falling asleep to the sound of thumping reggae bass lines seeping through the floor of my second floor bedroom.)

It's been thirty years since we moved into the house. My first memory is from right after we were handed the keys. Roommate Suzie, spinning around, arms outstretched, in the large empty living room exclaiming "I can't believe this is all ours!" My last memory is returning to the same living room through an unlocked and wide open front door, post eviction party. No one else was there and the house was eerily quiet. A bashed up acoustic guitar was sticking out of a hole in the wall (that it had been used to create), choice words were scrawled on walls, and shit was strewn everywhere, including, yes, many records. Suffice it to say that living there has had lasting effects on my musical tastes and interpersonal relationships. As with any big household, the bad shit was magnified, but then again, so was the good. I'm just thankful to remember the good, and even more thankful that, in hindsight, I can laugh at the bad. These songs are for Margaret, Suzie, Lisa, Kathleen, Lou, Bruce, Gary and Peter, all the later roommates, and, of course, our "guests." If someone would have told me that most of us would still be around, let alone some with families, I most assuredly would have asked for some of what they were smoking (and a generic beer or two to wash it down with).

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2/25/2010 NOTE: Due to a notice from Blogger, all links have been removed on this post. I do not yet know which was the offending link, but I know enough to play it safe until I have more details. Sorry for the inconvenience.

SORRY, WE ALREADY HAVE YMA.

Slow loading web pages are a pisser (but you knew that). A few days ago, I was on a blog that had waaaay too many posts on the first page, so it took a painfully long time to finish loading. Yet I felt compelled to go back to it to snag an mp3 of a song by The Sound of Feeling, just for you. TSOF (as us lazy typists like to call them) were twin sisters Alyce and Rhae Andrece, whose other main "claim to fame" was as bit actresses in Star Trek and Bonanza (sometimes research leads nowhere...). I thought, maybe, one or two people might find it mildly amusing. I found it hilarious. The more I listened to it, the more I found it hard to believe that it was actually released. It's a cover of Donovan's "Hurdy Gurdy Man," a song I've never been too fond of anyways. But this cover is, well, on a different planet than the original. Really, the backing vocals make the Shaggs sound like divas. And the lead vocal sounds like somebody strangling Yma Sumac. That's no easy feat, that spread.

It starts out innocently enough, a quiet intro into the lead vocal. It's at about :34 seconds in, when the background vocals start, that you realize that something is askew. Someone had to have been sleeping with the producer. These aren't backing vocals, they're, well, closer to moans. Just about the time you get used to them, and settle in, it gets quiet. (You know in the old war movies, they used to say "it's quiet out there, too quiet."? It's kind of like that.) Keep in mind, you're only into a little over a minute of it. Then the lead vocals come back in, with a little scat sorta thing, kind of annoying, but okay.... just as soon as you drop your guard, it's staccato time. Yes. Then it slowly evolves into some high pitched theremin impressions, and you're closing in at just past 2:00 minutes, when the music dies down and is replaced by the soothing sounds of ocean surf. Then, inexplicably, in fades a street organ (that's the type that usually has a monkey attached). Okay, this is just getting all WTF, up in your face. It's exhausting. I'll leave it at that. It's five minutes and 24 seconds of misguided freakness. (And, yes, the vocals do return.)

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The Sound of Feeling - Hurdy Gurdy Man mp3 at Ponytone

The Shaggs - The Philosophy of the World mp3 at the University of Lethbridge

(Re Shaggs link source: No shit. It was labeled as "atonal" so, it must have been for a music class.)

Yma Sumac -Ataypura mp3 at Cinecentro

REALLY, WE JUST LOOK CREEPY

There's a long bio of Richie Knight and the Mid-Knights on Garage Hangover, and I'm not sure I want to read it. Not because I'm not interested, I'd just like to believe that they were, deep down, as creepy as their cover of Otis Rush's "Homework" sounds. I mean, look at them; they've got a Twin Peaks-creepy thing going on. Maybe it's just because it's a typical early 60's band of faceless white guys. I don't know. But their reworking of "Homework" does nothing to dispel that feeling.

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It's a great song, "Homework," one that seems hard to screw up. Probably the best known version was on the third J. Geils album, "Full House," a live set that had the band at their sweaty, greasy peak. It, like the rest of the album, was just straight ahead rockin' blues, but the pace and spontaneity captured on that album make it hard to ignore. (Really, don't dismiss the entire J. Geils Band output because of "Centerfold." It's like the Faces compared to later Rod Stewart: a whole different band.)

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Knight & the Mid-Knight's version, done roughly ten years earlier (and just a couple years after Rush's original), is a whole different interpretation. The creep-o-vibe is a probably a sum greater than it's parts, namely the Munsters-like tempo of the organ, the extreme echo on the vocals, the weakest space filler whines ever (listen to the "awoow-ow" at :51 seconds in) and the unusual instrumentation and overall mix. It sounds like Knight must have just got a new Wurlitzer with a few more buttons, because there's several different organ sounds buried in it, ranging from aforementioned Munsters, to roller rink to Jimmy Smith. It could be just me, but the vibe is unsettling enough that I can't get enough of it. Sadly, none of their other stuff posted on Garage Hangover sounds quite the same, so historians will probably end up theorizing that recreational drug use led to this departure from their frat party sound.

Otis Rush's original, from 1962, is of course the template. It too has a pedestrian tempo and organ rather prominent in the mix, and Rush's guitar work is perfectly understated; but it's the horns that dominate. The horn arrangement, with it's intro, pulsing rhythm and it's filthy bump-n-grind burlesque sax fills, is the stuff of Daptone drool. Makes me wish I'd done my due diligence thirty years ago.

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Richie Knight & the Mid-Knights- Homework mp3 at Garage Hangover

Richie Knight & the Mid-Knights - Packin' Up mp3 at Garage Hangover

Otis Rush - Homework mp3 at Snuhthing Anything

Alternate link:

Otis Rush - Homework mp3 at Starmaker Machine

GET DOWN AND GIVE HELP

No matter how crappy things get for you, just remember, you've got it good compared to others suffering in third world countries. The good guys at Soul Strut have organized a record auction to help out the victims of the earthquake in Haiti, and they've got some gems posted. Among the dozens of titles are an original Studio One pressing of the first Burning Spear LP (with the awesome silkscreen cover), an ultra rare Jackie Mittoo private pressing, a Daptone test pressing of the Menahan Street Band, Thee Midnighters "Unlimited" on Whittier Records,...drooling yet? When was the last time you paid (probably) too much for a record and felt good about it? Really, the champs are the guys donating the records. That's another rarity: generous record collectors!

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Record auction to benefit victims in Haiti can be found here.

VELVET UNDERGROUND GRAB BAG

A few months ago, I was listening to mp3's on shuffle, going about my business, when I was jarred by an instrumental that I hadn't really heard. I mean, it was on my computer, so I had downloaded at some point. But I must not have listened to much of it, because I would have noticed it. It was raunchy, repetitive and kind of distorted (so, my kinda music). The playing was good, but it was basic enough that it didn't come off like hot shots. But the thing was, the mix; the mix was godhead-o-phonic. When I went to my computer to see who I'd been listening too, and saw that it was the Velvet Underground, I felt like Poseur of the Day.

Could it be, that my (new) favorite Velvet Underground song was an instrumental? And singled out, without a clue who it was? I should have recognized it, but it was from an outtakes album that I never got around to getting. And, sans vocal, it didn't sound like them. (Listen to it. The mix seems a little louder than most of their stuff.) And I like that there are breaks; the song has spots for verse, chorus and back again. And that it sounds like the Sonics doing the Velvets, (Gawd, would I like to hear Gary Roslie yelp over that!) A few months after putting it in the "save for later" pile, I figured I better put in up, before the link is dead. Do yourself a favor, get it now.

Ever wonder why all the photos you see of the Velvet Underground are in black and white?

This of course, gave me the excuse to post the backlog of Velvets/Lou Reed mp3s and links that I had. So here's the rundown: The first is the aforementioned instrumental version, followed by the live "gymnasium bootleg" version, with vocals. That's followed by the live gymnasium recording of "I'm Not A Young Man Anymore" (the only known recording of that song). "Pale Blue Eyes" is on here because it reminds me of my brother. "The Gift" is on here because it reminds me of a long lost friend, Doug Diaz, who transcribed the whole damn thing and turned it in as his own short story back when he was in high school. Then there's nine songs (at Beware of the Blog) from the "Ultra-Rare Acetate," unreleased studio recordings that were found in a stack of old records and sold for some ungodly sum a while back. Next is a Lou Reed interview from 1974, just because I find funny; it's right out of the Warhol interview hand book (you know: short, inconclusive answers). Then there's one of very few videos that's labeled as the Velvet Underground and Nico on YouTube (though it seems like it's just Lou Reed and Nico) doing an acoustic "Femme Fatal". I followed that with Nico, from the mid-80's doing "All Tomorrows Parties". I included that because it was about the time I saw her live in Amsterdam (and, you know what? The bitch didn't even look at me). After that is the Primitives, a demo-only pre-Velvets group of Reed and Cale's, who were working as songwriters for Pickwick at the time. Somehow "Do the Ostrich" got released and became a minor regional hit, forcing them to throw together a group to promote it. (A complete pre-Velvets discography can be found here.) I had to include "Perfect Day" not only because it's beautiful, it's also a go-to tear-jerker for anyone DJing a wedding. The promo for the BBC using the song is pretty tight too. (Don't turn it off when Bowie flashes on your screen. You'll be rewarded with snippets of Burning Spear, Shane McGown, Emmylou Harris, Dr. John, and Tom Jones as compensation.) Then there's the mildly amusing "Sister Ray" mash-up with the VU dubbed over a video of a Lawrence Welk band. Next is an interview with Reed at Kung Fu magazine, about the "Tai Chi of Rock n' Roll," which I haven't read, but still induced a nice smirk when I saw his poses (here's the cover). Last on the list is yet another mash-up by Go Home Productions, this time mashing Christina Aguilera and the Velvets.

So, I've pretty much depleted my stock of oddball Velvets/Reed links. Now a challenge: Five, count'em five, American dollars to anyone who sends me an mp3 of their own (or someone else's) vocals over the instrumental version of "Guess I'm Falling In Love". The only criteria is that it can't be Reed's vocals. You can make up lyrics, do a mash-up or whatever. If there's more than one sent, I'll post them all and let people vote on them. If you drop Gary Roslie's vocals over it, you'll be an instant winner of ten American dollars. Just throwin' it out there...

One more thing, just remember folks, per Reed, his reissued Metal Machine Music is "the perfect holiday gift for your loved one."

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The Velvet Underground - Guess I'm Falling In Love (Instrumental) mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu

The Velvet Underground - Guess I'm Falling In Love (Live) mp3 at Dead Flowers

The Velvet Underground - I'm Not a Young Man Anymore (Live) mp3 at Dead Flowers

The Velvet Underground - Pale Blue Eyes mp3 at Pinglewood.com

The Velvet Underground - The Gift mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu

The Velvet Underground - The Ultra Rare Acetates (9 mp3s) at Beware of the Blog

Lou Reed 1974 interview at YouTube

The Velvet Underground & Nico - Femme Fatale video at YouTube

Nico - All Tomorrows Parties video at YouTube

The Primitives - Do the Ostrich and Sneaky Pete mp3s at Beware of the Blog

Lou Reed - Perfect Day mp3 at The Walrus

Lou Reed and others - Perfect Day video at YouTube

Lawrence Welk meets Velvet Underground (spoof) video at YouTube
Lou Reed on the Tai Chi of Rock n' Roll at Kung Fu magazine

Go Home Productions -Girl Just Want to Say Goodbye to Rock n' Roll (VU vs Christina Aguilera mash up) mp3 at Beware of the Blog

OK, I'LL SAY IT: HE AIN'T HEAVY

The photo above is pretty telling. It's of my brother Tim, gazing lovingly at a Telecaster that had been hanging in a guitar shop. Left for dead, it's body scarred by fire, and deemed unsavable, it was a magnet for Tim, who took it home and rebuilt it, from its naked charred body up. After adding a new neck, tuning pegs, bridge and all of the electronic gizmos, it turned out to be more than playable. And, although he had about a dozen better guitars at the time, it held a much more significance for him. It was, first and foremost, oddball. But it was also something that no one would want. Discarded, overlooked, unloved, funky, challenging, weird, dirty and pretty fuckin' homemade cool.

Today is our birthday, we are twins. He passed away roughly 13 years ago. And he is the reason for this blog. Because he was my primary source for musical dialogue. And, if you knew him, you know that he was wild about music. Let me rephrase that: he was wild about wild music. And he loved to talk it. So, I had to start doing this to make up for the conversations I so missed.

Because of our impending birthday, last night I wrote a friend of Tim's, to thank her. She was one of the last really good friends Tim had made, and really special to him. So, I wrote her and didn't think much more about it. I looked at a few photos of Tim and, while doing so, the terms "big shot" and "bad ass" both came to mind. Not really in a chest-beating sort of way, but kind of self effacing, but also with a little bit of truth. Then today, I received an email back from Tim's friend. It was a long, stream of consciousness email, in which she splattered some of the best words written about my brother. She's was one of the last people to know Tim well, and she pretty much summed him in one particular spurt (of many). She described him as "one amazing freaky free rock n' roll sweet bad ass nice guy..." I give. That pretty much pegs him.

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Happy Birthday bro. I'll post some music tomorrow.

ENTRY LEVEL COUNTRY

Everyone who's really into music has done it. You find out someone you're not quite familiar with covered a song that you already know like the back of your hand. So, you buy their record, and find yourself liking it. You notice other covers, so you check out the originals, and all of a sudden you find yourself working backwards, getting closer to the source. So it is that the Rolling Stones can lead to Merle Haggard, or Commander Cody can lead to Red Sovine or Bob Wills, and so on. Pretty soon, you're looking for session players like Sneaky Pete, Don Rich and Phil Baugh. To paraphrase the Talking Heads, "You might find yourself saying, 'how did I get here?'" It seems especially true for genres left under explored in your younger years. But that's the cool thing about music.

There's a neat quote that was on some blog somewhere, that was from a sign in a record store. It was directed at music fiends, but, shit, it applies to everything, across the board. It said "You will never know everything. You will never hear everything. You will never own everything. You will never remember everything." I'd like to think that it came from a wise old sage, but more than likely it came from a snotty record store counter guy who was being a little profound completely by accident.

I can think of at least a dozen people in my past who have emphatically pointed me in the direction of a country artist of some sort. All had different starting points, and all were followed up on. But, still, I'm a country neophyte, so a rather obvious starting point was Gram Parsons and the Flying Burrito Brothers. I got as far as Buck and Merle, realized that I was opening up a can of worms and just cut to the chase, one of the aforementioned session guys, Phil Baugh. As a side note, I've got to add that Dave Dudley's "Two Six Packs Away" is a personal favorite. Not only does he sound drunk, but those perky backing vocals piping in repeatedly with "Two Six Packs Away" always manage to slay me.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Listen:
The Flying Burrito Brothers - Christine's Tune (Devil in Disguise) mp3 at Rock-52.net

The Flying Burrito Brothers - Wheels mp3 at Rocky-52.net

The Flying Burrito Brothers - Wild Horses - mp3 at bpfastball.com

The Flying Burrito Brothers - Six Days on the Road mp3 at Leaky Sparrow

Gram Parsons - Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man mp3 at bpfastball.com

Gram Parsons with Emmylou Harris - Love Hurts mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu

Commander Cody & the Lost Planet Airmen - Seeds and Stems mp3 at Cover Lay Down

Dave Dudley - Two Six Packs Away mp3 at Rocky-52 .net

Buck Owens - Close Up the Honky Tonks mp3 at Big Rock Candy Mountain
Buck Owens - Rollin' in My Sweet Baby's Arms mp3 at Rocky-52.net

Buck Owens - I Don't Care (Just As Long As You Love me) mp3 at Rocky-52.net

Merle Haggard - Sing Me Back Home mp3 at Rocky-52.net

Phil Baugh (with Vern Stovall) - Country Guitar mp3 at Beware of the Blog

POP THE COURVOISIER

That's right, it's Black Moses time. Another long, totally reinterpreted, cover by Isaac Hayes. Here he stretches the Beatles "Something" to almost 12 minutes. (Could you imagine if he did a Fela cover?!?) Some of his extended songs can be hard to appreciate, but you really do have to listen to the whole thing and not try so hard. For that reason, it makes for good driving music.

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I found it on the blog, Ear Hole, which also had about its pages tons of assorted soul and funk jams, making it yet another blog on the "must really dig in to one of these days" list. I'll limit it to two, the Diplomats of Solid Sound and Spanky Wilson, two keepers. (Remember the drill, right click on title and "save as...")

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Spanky Wilson and the Quantic Soul Orchestra - I'm Thankful mp3 at Ear Hole
Diplomats of Solid Sound - Plenty Nasty mp3 at Ear Hole
Isaac Hayes - Something mp3 at Ear Hole
Ear Hole's main page