YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT. JAZZ COWBOY.

I didn't know much about jazz when John Coltrane was recommended to me by a friend. The friend had great taste in music, and among other things that he told me about his indoctrination in jazz was that before he heard Coltrane, he had little interest in jazz himself. He told me, in great detail, about the first time he listened to his dad's copy of A Love Supreme. Knowing enough to know Coltrane was a near deity in jazz, and after his recommendation, I started listening to Coltrane. I got as far as "My Favorite Things" and thought it a weird choice for a cover. A song from the Sound of Music by a jazz god? What's up with that?

Luckily I listened, long enough to get to the point where he starts to stretch his legs, Okay, I thought, that's how a jazz god does covers. This all came back to me when I heard Sonny Rollin's cover of "I'm an Old Cow Hand (from the Rio Grand)". This one really goes off. By the time you're through the first couple minutes, you forget what song it started out as. The alternate take, released as bonus cut on a later reissue. is double the length, and really allows you to really get lost. While it doesn't sound like dub, it elicits the same feeling, as if your weaving in and out of the song, kind of floating. And it's just Rollins on sax, Ray Brown on bass, and Shelly Manne on drums; Just a trio.. This jazz shit is okay.

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Listen:
John Coltrane - My Favorite Things mp3 at LBCC (?)
Sonny Rollins - I'm an Old Cow Hand (From the Rio Grande) mp3 at Time Goes By
Sonny Rollins - I'm an Old Cow Hand (From the Rio Grande) (alternate take) (streaming) at YouTube
Visit:
A Bit of Jazz at Time Goes By Ten random jazz cuts, posted by the man Tibbles. What got me going tonight. Thanks Peter.

AS IF POLY WERE PISSED

If you haven't heard Downtown Boys, don't read about them just yet. Listen to them first, then do your Google thing. Descriptions are all over the place and most aren't all that accurate. There are more than a few knee jerk comparisons to bands that came before, most using tired genre labels, but it's better that you make of them what you will. Let's just say that we could use more bands like them in these times. Of those of you who haven't heard them, there's probably only a small percentage that will really dig them. That's who these are for.

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Listen:
Downtown Boys - Violent Complicity mp3 at Still In Rock
Downtown Boys - I'm Enough (I Want More) mp3 at Still In Rock
Downtown Boys - Wave Of History (Live) (streaming) at The Fader
Downtown Boys - Cost of Living (Full LP) (streaming) at YouTube
Video:
Downtown Boys - Wave of History (live) at YouTube

EIGHT COVERS BY THESE GUYS

It's not often that someone posts covers by these guys, and when they do, it might be one or two. It's a good look at where they came from, particularly if you're too young to remembered when the band actually mattered. Though the post at Boogaloo Time says that they were all recorded in 1964, without checking I think that at least a couple were released a year or two later. A nice reminder that all bands were green at one point.

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Listen:
Eight covers by that band up there at Boogaloo Time

WHILE WE'RE ON THE SUBJECT

I just remembered about another one man band, Lewis Floyd Henry. After Joe Hill Louis yesterday, I figured, what the hell, let's give this guy his due. Here's a guitar player, seemingly Hendrix obsessed (with considerable chops), playing a live mash up of Metallica and Wu-Tang Clan, and then breaking into the Stooges' "I Wanna Be Your Dog". As nutty as it sounds, it's pretty seamless. While he may not be "The Greatest One Man Band In the World" as the video is billed, he's definitely some hot shit street fare.

After viewing the video, you might want to head over to YouTube and see more of his stuff. If you can't get enough of the one man band thing, watch some Bob Log III, Reverend Beat Man or Hasil Adkins. 

TRASH NIGHT SUPER BONUS

I was just taking out the trash, which is, as all menial tasks are, usually accompanied by humming whatever the hell song pops in to my head. "Tiger Man" was up this time, Rufus Thomas's version. It was first recorded by Joe Hill Louis at Sun, but remained unreleased at the time. Sam Phillips had Rufus Thomas record it and that was the version that got released.

Joe Hill Louis's act was as a one man band and he was the only artist who had a record out on Phillips's pre-Sun label, Phillips Records, when Sun, the label, was born. "Boogie in the Park", recorded in 1950, is about as raw as it gets. Dig the link below and keep in mind that there were only 300 pressed. The fact that you even get the opportunity to hear it will mean something different depending on your age. If you're relatively young, you'll think "Cool. I'll check this later". You older people will think "Fuck, I guess the internet didn't ruin everything" and hop to it straight away.

Louis, or Hill Louis, was a semi-fixture at Sun, recording with other on-again off-again label-mates as well as solo. He played guitar on Rufus Thomas's "Bear Cat" (a ripoff of "Hound Dog"), I guess showing there were no sour "Tiger Man" grapes.

Dan Sartain, a totally unrelated artist, covered "Tiger Man" a few years back, so that's down there too, Just because it was laying around.

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Listen:
Joe Hill Lewis - Tiger Man mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban 1953, unreleased until the eighties
Joe Hill Lewis - Boogie In the park (streaming) at YouTube 1950
Rufus Thomas - Tiger Man mp3 at Internet Archive 1953
Rufus Thomas - Bear Cat mp3 at Internet Archive 1953
Dan Sartain - Tiger Man mp3 at Xtrmntr 1990s
Visit:
Joe Hill Louis - Long bio at The Hound Blog

EAT THE TEACHER

T'was a time that Sly and Robbie's shit did not stink. As the rhythm section of the Revolutionaries, the backing band at Channel One studio in the second half of the seventies, they were at the right place at the right time backing the right artists. There were other reggae rhythm duos doing remarkable work, but it was Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare that became reggae's drum and bass marquee names.

Alas, they may have been too good. Too tight. Maybe they got restless. Whatever the reason, though they retained their reggae sensibilities, they started fucking around with digital. They began backing non-reggae acts. It wasn't an overnight change, it happened gradually, so gradually that I never noticed that I had lost interest in their whereabouts until a couple nights ago. I heard them backing the Wailing Souls on "Old Broom", released on their Taxi label about 1980. Ah, man, it felt good to hear the old Sly and Robbie, as they had been around the first time I heard them. I went looking for more of that period and ran into a killer disco mix (extended version) cover of "Rainy Night In Georgia", with them backing Tinga Stewart from 1978. It's awesome, them at the early peak of their reggae game. Though they have stuck with reggae type music (i.e. dancehall), and used reggae rhythms in their playing with non-reggae artists (Grace Jones, Mick Jagger, Simply Red, Ian Dury, Joe Cocker, Sinéad O'Connor, etc.) it just doesn't have the same feel, it's not as earthy.

I checked their discography. By the looks of it the bottom dropped out for me around 1980 and, wouldn't you just know it, that's just about when they started fucking with syn drums and digital bass. They were fucking with the program, and they've continued fucking with the program. Fine, if that's what they wanna do, go for it. Their shit may not stink yet, but I'll be damned if I'm going to wait around until it does. If you want to see what I'm talking about, compare the Wailing Souls' "Old Broom" from around 1980, to their "Live On" from 1994, with Sly and Robbie supplying the backing on both. Rough or polished, I'm taking rough every time.

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Listen:
Wailing Souls - Old Broom mp3 at Bass Shaka (?) 1980-ish
Tinga Stewart - Rainy Night In Georgia (streaming) at Reggaeville 1978
Wailing Souls - Sweet Sugar Plum Plum mp3 at Bass Shaka (?) 1980-ish
Wailing Souls - Live On (streaming) at YouTube 1994

OUT STANDING IN THEIR FIELD

There's a number of ways to hit the reset button. You can revisit some rockabilly, soul, oddball, funk, reggae, punk rock and so on. Or you could just go for a jolt of irreverent, self indulgent so-sloppy-they're-not-even-trying, good ol' fashioned don't-give-a-single-shit poorly produced trashy piss off the neighbors rock 'n' roll. Pussy Galore were always good at that.

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Listen:
Pussy Galore - Dick Johnson mp3 at Le Twenty-Two Bar
Pussy Galore - Cunt Tease mp3 at Voice Blog (?)

LAST CALL FOR CREEPS

Okay, tomorrow things return to normal, but as you may have guessed from the last couple weeks, Halloween is high season for slack, meaning reposts were flying all over the place. Tonight though, two new mixes, so that may satiate you regulars. One is a mix of thirty Halloween instrumentals over at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban, put together by J.R. Williams, who always does a bang up job. The other is another Bloody Halloween Mix by Reverend Tom Frost just posted this year. Dude doesn't miss a beat.

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Listen:
The Cramps - I Was a Teenage Werewolf mp3 at Hey Cool Kid
The Cramps - Rockin' Bones mp3 at Johan Urban (?)
The Cramps - Confessions of a Psycho Cat mp3 at Review Stalker
The Mixes: 
More Halloween Instros at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban 30 songs
Bloody Halloween Mix, Part 23 (streaming) at Reverend Tom Frost

MORE ON TOPIC SHIT

Post-corn Halloween rock 'n' roll. Yee haw. Turn it up.

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Listen:
Rocket From the Crypt - I Drink Blood mp3 at Xtrmntr
Rocket From the Crypt - Rise From the Dead mp3 at Xtrmntr
Video:
Rocket From the Crypt - Village People Medley/I Drink Blood at YouTube Halloween 2003, dressed as the Village People
Rocket From the Crypt - I Drink Blood, Sturdy Wrists at YouTube Halloween 2013, dressed as astronauts

SOUNDS FROM SOUTH OF HELL

Okay you party planners, you've got your work cut out for you. You've got less than a week until your Halloween shindig. If you're in need of a soundtrack to all of your hijinks, that part of your to-do list is about to be taken care of. Reverend Tom Frost, the former host of Spread the Good Word, and a damn fine musician in his own rite, is keeping the tradition alive. Every year he puts together a Halloween mix or two, and this year he's posted his twentieth. I know, one mix might just get you through a an hour or two. Fear not, all twenty mixes are online, so you're covered. If you dig oddball, raunchy, creepy, swinging, reverb drenched and rockin' sounds, you needn't go further. The Reverend's Halloween mixes are the standard by which all others are judged, (The mixes are now posted at Mixcloud, and are streaming.)

Reverend Frost is no slouch, his own music is good stuff as well. Gravelly, roots type stuff, loosely drawn from surf, rockabilly, and country, with some reverb and distortion to taste. Check the links below the mixes. It's some dynamic sounds, man.

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The mixes (song lists at each link):
NOTE: The links are at the bottom of each post, under the song listings
Bloody Halloween Mix 20 (couldn't find the list on this one)
Bloody Halloween Mix 19
Bloody Halloween Mix 18
Bloody Halloween mix 17
Bloody Halloween mix 16
Bloody Halloween mix 15
Bloody Halloween mix 14
Bloody Halloween mix 13
Bloody Halloween mix 12
Bloody Halloween mix 11
Bloody Halloween mix 10
Bloody Halloween mix 9
Bloody Halloween mix 8
Bloody Halloween mix 7
Bloody Halloween mix 6
Bloody Halloween mix 5
Bloody Halloween mix 4
Bloody Halloween mix 3
Bloody Halloween mix 2
Bloody Halloween mix 1
From the Reverend:
Reverend Tom Frost - Malaguena mp3 at Spread the Good Word
Reverend Tom Frost - A Bloody Life (streaming) at YouTube
Reverend Tom Frost - More samples of his music at Rev. Tom Frost
Visit:
Reverend Tom Frost - Official site

THE N.O. O.G.

As you no doubt know by now, Fats Domino passed away yesterday at the age of 89. Fuck. One of the original rockers. He wasn't wild or crazy just steady as steady gets. Dude was New Orleans, period. His style of playing (triplets, if you know what they are), his rhythm and blues background, his home base in New Orlean's lower Ninth Ward (where he lived until Katrina destroyed it), his partnership with songwriter Dave Bartholomew, and his work at Cosimo Matassa's studio, all of that combined for a template on which a shitload of New Orleans rhythm and blues was based.

Rather than post a bunch of his hits, here's a few from 1955-56, ripped from 78s, surprisingly clean considering the medium. They go down good.

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Listen:
Fats Domino - All By Myself mp3 at Internet Archive
Fats Domino - My Blue Heaven mp3 at Internet Archive
Fats Domino - Troubles of My Own mp3 at Internet Archive
Fats Domino - When My Dreamboat Comes Home mp3 at Internet Archive

GETTIN' JIGGY WITH IT

Can it be Halloween music if the name of the song is "Halloween"? Is it too obvious? Shit, maybe the songs below are about something other than Halloween. I'll tell you after I dissect all of them. It hasn't happened yet despite decades of listening, so don't hold your breath.

Sometimes I just like to blast off without Vincent Price for a change. Turn it up. These beat the tar out of Bobby "Boris" Picket and the goofy shit. Put it this way: If you were getting evicted and Halloween was the day of your eviction party, these would definitely be on the playlist. Not so, the "Mash".

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Listen:
Misfits - Halloween mp3 at Emotion Lotion
Dead Kennedys - Halloween mp3 at Hey Cool Kid
The Dream Syndicate - Halloween mp3 at Quit Mumbling
Mudhoney - Halloween (streaming) at YouTube Sonic Youth cover
Sonic Youth - Halloween (streaming) at YouTube

FOUND: BOOGIE MAN

Back in the pre-internet days, there was no Google, no Wikipedia, and not enough music related books or magazines to fill in the gaps. Liner notes on album covers were essential. It was, with the people I knew, mandatory. You had to connect the dots. If not all the dots, as many as possible. That's how Big Joe Turner led me to Pete Johnson.

Johnson was Turner's piano player, and he all but owned Big Joe's boogie. I heard his playing, saw his name, and sought out his shit. The first was a compilation. If I would have been at all hesitant when selecting it (I wasn't), one song title alone would have sold me. "Death Ray Boogie". Is there a cooler name for a song? Really, when I was DJing I used to play it in the middle of a set of disparate music, just hoping someone would ask what the hell I was playing (they did). I just wanted to say "Death Ray Boogie".

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Listen:
Pete Johnson - Death Ray Boogie mp3 at AMRF
Pete Johnson and Big Joe Turner - Roll 'em Pete mp3 at AMRF
Pete Johnson - Foot Pedal Boogie mp3 at Internet Archive
Big Joe Turner with Pete Johnson - Honey Hush mp3 at Rockn Dog With both Lee Allen and Alvin "Red" Bryant on sax

WANTED: MORE HANDS

I'm not even going to mess around. Melting Pot has a post with four songs by Rahsaan Roland Kirk. That's him up there, loaded down per usual. You gotta hear these, it's some other worldly shit. Sun Ra type stuff. Go there to get them and listen to them in the order that they're posted. It's worth bugging out dad.

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Listen:

Rahsaan Roland Kirk – Four songs from Slightly Latin (1965) at Melting Pot

VIVA SONNY! (VERSION)

Wow. Sonny Burgess died back in July and I'm just now finding out (via the latest issue of Mojo). Considering I'm looking at music sites and blogs just about every day, I'm shocked that I hadn't heard. He was 88, but he was still active, co-hosting a radio show and, as of this past May, had live shows booked into this month. Apparently in July he took a fall and never entirely recovered. Because his death wasn't widely reported in the press, it seems apparent that his body of work has been sorely overlooked. So, even though I just posted the following blab in May, I find it necessary to push his stuff in your face again. Really, even if he had only recorded the A side of his first 45, it would still put him in the Wildman Rockers Hall of Fame. So here's the recycled text and three songs, the first two being the A and B side of his Sun debut.

Every once in a while, it occurs to me that there is someone who has slipped through the cracks, even after a couple thousand posts. That's what the bruise on my forehead tells me. Yesterday it occurred to me that there has not been one mention of Sonny Burgess, an early Sun artist who had one of the wildest rock 'n' roll records ever released. That's right. I said it. Check "We Wanna Boogie", it's just nuts. The first thing you'll note is the presence of a trumpet. Unusual for any rockabilly record, even more unusual on a Sun product. While the singing is pretty crazy, somewhere between Ray Campi and the Legendary Stardust Cowboy, there are solos that need to be heard. First the piano, then the trumpet. After one more verse, a manic guitar solo with the drummer just bashing the hell out of what sounds like a kit made out of cardboard. Then one more verse of increasingly crazed vocals and after Burgess hits the last three words sounding like he's eating the microphone, the end. Two and a half minutes of absolutely abandon.

Though the band wanted to do another take, Sam Phillips insisted the first take was a keeper, later saying "...they had a sound like I've never heard. Maybe Sonny's sound was too raw; I don't know- but I'll tell you this. They were pure rock and roll." This from the man that was the first to record some of the greatest rockers of all time.

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Listen:

Sonny Burgess - We Wanna Boogie mp3 at Mp3 Rockabilly
Sonny Burgess - Red Headed Woman mp3 at Rocky 52
Sonny Burgess - Itchy mp3 at Mp3 Rockabilly

TOO FUCKING COOL

Mid-sixties New Zealand beat?. Wow. I wasn't looking for it, didn't know it existed. But here it is.

I don't know anything about the Breakaways. I'll deal with that part later. For now, dig on these boss covers.

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Listen:
The Breakaways - Talkin' About You mp3 at Internet Archive
The Breakaways - Farmer John mp3 at Internet Archive

OCCAM'S RAZOR ROCK

"Check this shit out! This is fuckin' sick!" Tommy Lee said that, speaking on the subject of his revolving drum kit and his fuckin' sick dream. I appropriate it here on the subject of Ricky Nelson's "My Babe" with James Burton on guitar. Check this shit out. This is fuckin' sick.

Check Nelson's phrasing, the attitude that comes out on certain lines. Two note-perfect solos from Burton, the fullness of the sound with a minimum of instruments, and the wig out at the end. This is one piece of work.

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Listen:
Ricky Nelson - My Babe mp3 at Diddy Wah
Ricky Nelson - Lonesome Town mp3 at Diddy Wah Go there to get it
Little Walter - My Babe (streaming) at YouTube The original
Awesome image:
High resolution, full frame version of above photo

STAY PISSED.

You may have seen it, the Eminem freestyle anti-Trump rant from the BET Hip Hop Awards. It's all over the place. While I agree wholeheartedly with almost every thing he says, and I dig the intensity, there's another version on YouTube, with music, that seems to flow a lot better. Here's the video of the one that aired, and a link to the version with backing tracks, Eminem's no saint, be we're eye to eye on this one.

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Listen:
Eminem - The Storm Freestyle (Donald Trump Diss) (streaming) at YouTube

LADY KICK ASS IS BACK

Earlier tonight I was reading out in the alley when out of nowhere Etta James's version of "Security" popped into my head. Hearing a decent copy of the 45 version at a high volume is total heavy metal, seriously. Super powerful; the playing, the production (Rick Hall, FAME Studio) and her voice. I have the record but all I found online were a bunch of YouTube posts, and many of them were the LP version. So it's YouTube only for that song. Oh well. It did make me keep looking. In doing so I found a another FAME era goosebump inducing song at Groove Addict, "I'm Gonna Take What He's Got", on which her vocal performance just plain fucking kicks ass. She hits 'em all.

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Listen:
Etta James - Security (streaming) at YouTube
Etta James -  I'm Gonna Take What He's Got mp3 at Groove Addict
Etta James - Seven Day Fool mp3 at Soul Garage
Etta James - At Last mp3 at Carried Away

NOT FIGHTING IT

I had it all planned out. I knew what I was going to post tonight. Then I ran into these old Tell-Tale Hearts songs and everything went out the window. I'd forgotten how great this band was.

None of these songs are from the LP pictured above. I just dig the photo.

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Listen:
The Tell-Tale Hearts - It's Not Me mp3 at Mr. Suave
The Tell-Tale Hearts - I Get Up In the Morning mp3 at Che Underground
The Tell-Tale Hearts - Smokes (live) mp3 at Che Underground 
The Tell-Tale Hearts - At the River's Edge (live) mp3 at Che Underground