Saturday, February 04, 2012
Rock Shop - Mr. Lee's Swing 'N Affair Presents(1968)
Hailing from Monterey in northern California, Rock Shop became one of the most popular bands in the area, playing regularly at Mr Lee's Swingin' Affair nightclub in West Covina to packed houses. The band's one and only album, released on the Lee-Mo label, took it's name from the nightclub, and featured 12 self-penned tracks of fuzz-led blues and psych, as well as boasting a spoof cover depicting the band as the next Beatles and hairdresser-cum-rock promoter Mr Lee as God! Despite enjoying a minor level of success including supporting both the Shirelles and Big Joe Turner, the band decided to call it a day in 1969, leaving this lone recording as their epitaph. Although most of the band members departed the music scene, leader Alan Clark went on to work with the likes of Mary Wells, Bobby Day, Al Wilson and Big Joe Turner, as well as enjoying a lengthy stint in Gene Vincent's Blue Caps. This extremely rare album has a strong mix of late '60s sounds that, given the high musical standard and excellent recording quality, still stand up amazingly well today
Don Covay - See-Saw (1966)
The career of singer Don Covay spanned virtually the entirety of the R&B spectrum, from the electrifying rock & roll of his earliest records to the gritty, swaggering deep soul of his most enduring efforts -- the scope and diversity of his catalog no doubt contributed to his failure to enjoy consistent commercial success, however, and the general public is probably better acquainted with his songs than with his own renditions of them. Born Donald Randolph in Orangeburg, South Carolina on March 24, 1938, Covay was the son of a Baptist preacher who died when his son was eight. The family soon after relocated to Washington, D.C., where he and his siblings formed a gospel group dubbed the Cherry Keys; while in middle school, however, some of Covay's classmates convinced him to make the leap to secular music, and in 1953 he joined the Rainbows, a local doo wop group that previously enjoyed a national smash with "Mary Lee." By the time Covay joined the Rainbows the original lineup had long since splintered, and his recorded debut with the group, 1956's "Shirley," was not a hit. He stuck around for one more single, "Minnie," before exiting; contrary to legend, this iteration of the Rainbows did not include either a young Marvin Gaye or Billy Stewart, although both fledgling singers did occasionally fill in for absent personnel during live performances.
In the meantime Covay landed a job chauffeuring his idol, Little Richard, doing double-duty as the hitmaker's opening act; Richard soon produced Covay's 1957 solo debut "Bip Bip Bip," a blistering single credited to Pretty Boy. Issued on Atlantic, the record went nowhere and he next landed at Sue. During the remaining years of the decade Covay released four more singles for as many labels -- "Switchin' in the Kitchen" on Big, "Standing in the Doorway" on Blaze, "If You See Mary Lee" on Firefly and "'Cause I Love You" on Big Top -- none of them hits. He then signed to major label Columbia, issuing three 1961 singles -- "Shake Wid the Snake," the Ben E. King-soundalike "See About Me," and "Now That I Need You" -- that showcased the vast eclecticism of his approach, from retro-doo wop to uptown soul to smoldering R&B. As his recording career refused to catch fire, Covay increasingly focused on songwriting, partnering with fellow Rainbows alum John Berry to pen a dance tune called "Pony Time" -- recorded by Covay for the Arnold label with backing band the Goodtimers, the resulting 1961 single proved to be his first chart hit, inching to the number 60 spot on the Billboard pop countdown. Equally significant, Chubby Checker soon after recorded his own version, topping the pop and R&B charts in early 1962.
Covay resumed his solo career with 1962's "I'm Your Soldier Boy," his lone effort for Scepter; he then signed to Cameo, scoring another minor chart hit with "The Popeye Waddle," a novelty record inspired by New Orleans' "popeye" dance craze. Its 1963 follow-up "Wiggle Wobble" went nowhere, however, as did "Ain't That Silly" and "The Froog," both cut for Cameo's Parkway subsidiary. At the same time, however, Covay continued an impressive string of songwriting hits, including Jerry Butler's "You Can Run (But You Can't Hide)," Gladys Knight & the Pips' "Letter Full of Tears" and Connie Francis' "Mr. Twister." He also authored "I'm Gonna Cry," Wilson Pickett's debut single for Atlantic. Covay next landed at the tiny Rosemart label, where he entered perhaps the most creatively rewarding period of his career -- his first single for the label, 1964's "Mercy Mercy," was cut with a then-unknown Jimi Hendrix on guitar, and went on to crack the Billboard Top 40 after Atlantic picked it up for distribution. The song remains an R&B classic, and earned even greater notoriety a year later when the Rolling Stones recorded their own rendition for the Out of Our Heads LP; even upon cursory listens, it's impossible not to hear the massive impact of Covay's brash style and bluesy phrasing on Mick Jagger's own frontman persona.
In the meantime, Covay squeaked back into the Hot 100 with "Take This Hurt Off Me," graduating to Atlantic on a full-time basis with 1965's "The Boomerang." The latter didn't chart at all, but the move to Atlantic gave him access to collaborators including Memphis legends like keyboardist Booker T. Jones and guitarist Steve Cropper, and his music achieved an even more powerfully soulful edge. "Please Do Something" fell just shy of the R&B Top 20, and its follow-up "See Saw" proved Covay's biggest hit to date, reaching the R&B Top Five and coming in at number 44 on the pop charts. By now the likes of Etta James ("Watch Dog" and "I'm Gonna Take What He's Got") and Otis Redding ("Think About It" and "Demonstration") were recording his material, but he could never quite maintain the same momentum as a performer, in 1966 releasing three brilliant Atlantic singles -- "Sookie Sookie," "You Put Something on Me" and "Somebody's Got to Love You" -- that all failed to chart. The relatively minor "Shingaling '67" at least made it as far as the R&B Top 50, but both "'40 Days-40 Nights"" and "You've Got Me on Your Critical List" sank without a trace. And even though Aretha Franklin scored one of her biggest and most enduring hits in 1968 with "Chain of Fools," written by Covay some 15 years earlier, his own recording that same year went nowhere.
Covay attempted to reignite his flagging career by organizing the Soul Clan, a Murderers' Row of R&B greats that also included Solomon Burke, Joe Tex, Ben E. King and Arthur Conley. The supergroup's lone Atlantic effort "Soul Meeting" was a minor pop it, reaching the R&B Top 40 in late 1968. After two more failed solo singles, "I Stole Some Love" and "Sweet Pea," Covay teamed with former Shirelles guitarist Joe Richardson and folkie John Hammond in the Jefferson Lemon Blues Band, an odd stab at underground blues-rock that yielded a 1969 LP, The House of Blue Lights and hit number 43 on the R&B chart with the single "Black Woman." He left Atlantic for Janus in 1970, releasing a second Jefferson Lemon Blues Band LP, Different Strokes for Different Folks, before signing to Mercury in 1972 as an A&R exec. There he also began work on Superdude, the blistering 1973 album that many groove-heads regard as his masterpiece -- the album yielded a pair of hits, the pop smash "I Was Checkin' Out While She Was Checkin' In" and "Somebody's Been Enjoying My Home."
The gospel-inspired non-LP single "It's Better to Have (And Don't Need)" returned Covay to the charts in 1974, followed a year later by "Rumble in the Jungle," a novelty effort inspired by the now-legendary heavyweight bout pairing Muhammad Ali against George Foreman. He then migrated to Philadelphia International, teaming with famed producers Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff for 1976's Travelin' in Heavy Traffic -- neither "Right Time for Love" nor the title track charted, and apart from two indie records, 1977's U-Von effort "Back to the Roots" and 1980s Newman release "Badd Boy," it seemed Covay's recording career was over. He didn't resurface until 1986, contributing backing vocals to the Rolling Stones' Dirty Work -- in 1993, the Stones' Ron Wood repaid the favor, joining the likes of Iggy Pop and Todd Rundgren for the tribute LP Back to the Streets: Celebrating the Music of Don Covay. That same year, Covay was honored by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation with one of its prestigious Pioneer Awards, but he was unable to attend the awards ceremony due to the lingering effects of a stroke he suffered in 1992. He gradually regained his health, however, and in 2000 issued Ad Lib, his first new studio album in nearly a quarter century.
Don Covay rides his most creative crest as a solo artist with this hearty collection of songs. The settings are simplistic for Atlantic Records, which recorded similar artists in lusher settings. But rawness is what makes these recordings arresting. A guitarist as well as a singer, Covay's pickings aren't buried in the mix, and you don't need a Geiger counter to detect the grooves. Most impressive are "See Saw," "Mercy Mercy," "Sookie, Sookie," and "Boomerang," a call to dance with the feeling of Major Lance singing a Curtis Mayfield song. On "Fat Man," you wonder if he's singing about his old Washington, D.C., buddy Billy Stewart. The two began their careers with the Rainbows.
Deep Feeling - Pretty Colours(1968)
An interesting though barely recorded mid-'60s British band, Deep Feeling fed members into major psychedelic bands, star and cult, of the late '60s, including Traffic, Spooky Tooth, Family, and the Blossom Toes. The group evolved from an outfit called the Hellions, which featured future Traffic members Jim Capaldi and Dave Mason. After Mason left Deep Feeling, future Spooky Tooth guitarist Luther Grosvenor joined. This lineup, also including vibraphonist and flute player Poli Palmer (later in Family and the Blossom Toes), guitarist Gordon Jackson, and bassist Dave Meredith, did some unreleased recordings with influential U.K. manager/producer/impresario Giorgio Gomelsky (most famous as the manager/producer of the Yardbirds). One 1966 track, "Pretty Colours," does show up on the Luther Grosvenor CD Floodgates Anthology and is a pretty nifty early psychedelic venture, with flute, vibes, distorted vocals, and the kind of pop-friendly yet Asiatic-Middle Eastern melody that the Yardbirds often explored.
Unfortunately, nothing by Deep Feeling was released at the time, although they did record at least one other track with Gomelsky, "Poltergeist of Alice" (according to the liner notes of Floodgates Anthology). Gomelsky has recalled that they recorded an album's worth of material, and that some of the ideas -- including African percussion and vibraphone -- were incorporated by Traffic, the band Capaldi joined, signaling the end of Deep Feeling. In addition to the post-Deep Feeling projects mentioned above, there was a solo album by Gordon Jackson on Gomelsky's Marmalade label in the late '60s
Deep Feeling was a band that didn't last very long, but proved to be a way station for a number of notable British musicians, including Dave Mason and Jim Capaldi of Traffic, Luther Grosvenor of Mott the Hoople and Spooky Tooth, and Poli Palmer of Family. Deep Feeling were cutting their debut album in the fall of 1967 when, after five tracks had been completed, Capaldi got an invitation from Mason (who had already left the group, to be replaced by Grosvenor) to join Traffic, and the band soon fell apart. Pretty Colours collects those five songs along with one song from a BBC Radio taping in 1966 (when the group was still known as the Hellions), a live performance from a club date, and four demos Palmer and Gordon Jackson recorded not long after Deep Feeling's breakup. In the liner notes, Capaldi writes that "Deep Feeling was definitely the forerunner of Traffic," and it's not hard to spot the similarities; Palmer's use of flute and vibraphone in the group's arrangements gave their music a texture that was quite unusual for the day, and while the influence of the first wave of psychedelic rock is obvious in these songs, one can also hear faint echoes of what would become progressive rock along with traces of the waning days of British beat. Listening to Pretty Colours, one gets the feeling that this group was just about to hit their stride when Capaldi's departure pulled the plug on their future, and the fragments they left behind are fascinating but suggest their formula hadn't quite worked itself out when the five studio tracks were laid down. Ultimately, Deep Feeling's lineup promises something more satisfying than Pretty Colours delivers, but there are some great moments on this collection, and fans of these musicians will be grateful to finally hear this band's recorded legacy after decades in the vaults.
Friday, February 03, 2012
Van Morrison-Blowing Your Mind (1967)
В творчестве этого музыканта нашли отражение такие стили как ритм-энд-блюз, джаз, соул, кельтские мотивы, кантри, а сам он стал вдохновителем для многих рок-музыкантов, от Джима Моррисона и Брюса Спрингстина до "Thin Lizzy" и "U-2". Вэн Моррисон (настоящее имя Джордж Айвэн Моррисон) родился в Белфасте 31 августа 1945 года. Его мать была певицей, а отец владел неплохой коллекцией джазовых и блюзовых пластинок, поэтому интерес к музыке у парня проявился довольно рано. В 12 лет Вэн обзавелся гитарой, а вскоре стал лидером школьной скиффл-группы "Sputniks". В четырнадцать Моррисон освоил саксофон и в новом качестве вошел в состав "Thunderbolts". Затем Вэн сменил еще несколько команд, но первый успех пришел к нему с группой "Them", которую он основал в 1964 году. Самым лучшим достижением того периода стала его песня "Gloria", на которую впоследствии делали каверы такие артисты как "Doors", Джими Хендрикс и Патти Смит.
***
Equal parts blue-eyed soul shouter and wild-eyed poet-sorcerer, Van Morrison is among popular music's true innovators, a restless seeker whose incantatory vocals and alchemical fusion of R&B, jazz, blues, and Celtic folk produced perhaps the most spiritually transcendent body of work in the rock & roll canon. Subject only to the whims of his own muse, his recordings cover extraordinary stylistic ground yet retain a consistency and purity virtually unmatched among his contemporaries, connected by the mythic power of his singular musical vision and his incendiary vocal delivery: spiraling repetitions of wails and whispers that bypass the confines of language to articulate emotional truths far beyond the scope of literal meaning.
George Ivan Morrison was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on August 31, 1945; his mother was a singer, while his father ardently collected classic American jazz and blues recordings. At 15, he quit school to join the local R&B band the Monarchs, touring military bases throughout Europe before returning home to form his own group, Them. Boasting a fiery, gritty sound heavily influenced by Morrison heroes like Howlin' Wolf, Brownie McGhee, Sonny Boy Williamson, and Little Walter, Them quickly earned a devout local following and in late 1964 recorded their debut single, "Don't Start Crying Now." The follow-up, an electrifying reading of Big Joe Williams' "Baby Please Don't Go," cracked the U.K. Top Ten in early 1965. Though not a major hit upon its original release, Them's Morrison-penned "Gloria" endures among the true classics of the rock pantheon, covered by everyone from the Doors to Patti Smith. Lineup changes plagued the band throughout its lifespan, however, and at the insistence of producer Bert Berns, over time session musicians increasingly assumed the lion's share of recording duties. A frustrated Morrison finally left Them following a 1966 tour of the U.S., quitting the music business and returning to Belfast.
After Berns relocated to New York City to form Bang Records, he convinced Morrison to travel stateside and record as a solo artist; the sessions produced arguably his most familiar hit, the jubilant "Brown-Eyed Girl" (originally titled "Brown-Skinned Girl"), a Top Ten smash in the summer of 1967. By contrast, however, the resulting album, Blowin' Your Mind, was a bleak, bluesy effort highlighted by the harrowing "T.B. Sheets"; when Berns released the LP against Morrison's wishes, he again retreated home to Ireland. After Berns suffered a fatal heart attack in late 1967, the singer was freed of his contractual obligations and began working on new material. His first album for new label Warner Bros., 1968's Astral Weeks, remains not only Morrison's masterpiece, but one of the greatest records ever made. A haunting, deeply personal collection of impressionistic folk-styled epics recorded by an all-star jazz backing unit including bassist Richard Davis and drummer Connie Kay, its poetic complexity earned critical raves but made only a minimal commercial impact. The follow-up, 1970's Moondance, was every bit as brilliant; buoyant and optimistic where Astral Weeks had been dark and anguished, it cracked the Top 40, generating the perennials "Caravan" and "Into the Mystic."
The first half of the 1970s was the most fertile creative period of Morrison's career. From Moondance onward, his records reflected an increasingly celebratory and profoundly mystical outlook spurred on in large part by his marriage to wife Janet Planet and the couple's relocation to California. After His Band and the Street Choir yielded his biggest chart hit, "Domino," Morrison released 1971's Tupelo Honey, a lovely, pastoral meditation on wedded bliss highlighted by the single "Wild Night." In the wake of the following year's stirring Saint Dominic's Preview, he formed the Caledonia Soul Orchestra, featured both on the studio effort Hard Nose the Highway and on the excellent live set It's Too Late to Stop Now. However, in 1973 he not only dissolved the group but also divorced Planet and moved back to Belfast. The stunning 1974 LP Veedon Fleece chronicled Morrison's emotional turmoil; he then remained silent for three years, reportedly working on a number of aborted projects but releasing nothing until 1977's aptly titled A Period of Transition.
Plagued for some time by chronic stage fright, Morrison mounted his first tour in close to five years in support of 1978's Wavelength; his performances became more and more erratic, however, and during a 1979 date at New York's Palladium, he even stalked off-stage in mid-set and did not return. Into the Music, released later that year, evoked a more conventionally spiritual perspective than before, a pattern continued on successive outings for years to come. Albums like 1983's Inarticulate Speech of the Heart, 1985's A Sense of Wonder, and 1986's No Guru, No Method, No Teacher are all largely cut from the same cloth, employing serenely beautiful musical backdrops to explore themes of faith and healing. For 1988's Irish Heartbeat, however, Morrison teamed with another of his homeland's musical institutions, the famed Chieftains, for a collection of traditional folk songs.
Meanwhile, Avalon Sunset heralded a commercial rebirth of sorts in 1989. While "Whenever God Shines His Light," a duet with Cliff Richard, became Morrison's first U.K. Top 20 hit in over two decades, the gorgeous "Have I Told You Lately That I Love You" emerged as something of a contemporary standard, with a Rod Stewart cover cracking the U.S. Top Five in 1993. Further proof of Morrison's renewed popularity arrived with the 1990 release of Mercury's best-of package; far and away the best-selling album of his career, it introduced the singer to a new generation of fans. A new studio record, Enlightenment, appeared that same year, followed in 1991 by the ambitious double set Hymns to the Silence, widely hailed as his most impressive outing in years.
Following the uniformity of his 1980s work, the remainder of the decade proved impressively eclectic: 1993's Too Long in Exile returned Morrison to his musical roots with covers of blues and R&B classics, while on 1995's Days Like This he teamed with daughter Shana for a duet on "You Don't Know Me." For the Verve label, he cut 1996's How Long Has This Been Going On, a traditional jazz record co-credited to longtime pianist Georgie Fame, while for the follow-up Tell Me Something: The Songs of Mose Allison, he worked with guest of honor Allison himself. Morrison continued balancing the past and the future in the years to follow, alternating between new studio albums (1997's The Healing Game, 1999's Back on Top) and collections of rare and live material (1998's The Philosopher's Stone and 2000's The Skiffle Sessions and You Win Again). It wasn't until 2002 that an album of new material surfaced, but in May his long-anticipated Down the Road was released. Three years later, Morrison issued Magic Time. Pay the Devil, a country-tinged set, appeared in 2006 on Lost Highway Records. In 2008, Morrison released Keep It Simple, his first album of all-original material since 1999's Back on Top.
Them - Time Out Time In For Them (1969)
Them forged their hard-nosed R&B sound in Belfast, Northern Ireland, moving to England in 1964 after landing a deal with Decca Records. The band's simmering sound was dominated by boiling organ riffs, lean guitars, and the tough vocals of lead singer Van Morrison, whose recordings with Them rank among the very best performances of the British Invasion. Morrison also wrote top-notch original material for the outfit, whose lineup changed numerous times over the course of their brief existence. As a hit-making act, their résumé was brief -- "Here Comes the Night" and "Baby Please Don't Go" were Top Ten hits in England, "Mystic Eyes" and "Here Comes the Night" made the Top 40 in the U.S. -- but their influence was considerable, reaching bands like the Doors, whom Them played with during a residency in Los Angeles just before Van Morrison quit the band in 1966. Their most influential song of all, the classic three-chord stormer "Gloria," was actually a B-side, although the Shadows of Knight had a hit in the U.S. with a faithful, tamer cover version.
Morrison recalled his days with Them with some bitterness, noting that the heart of the original group was torn out by image-conscious record company politics, and that sessionmen (including Jimmy Page) often played on recordings. In addition to hits, Them released a couple of fine albums and several flop singles that mixed Morrison compositions with R&B and soul covers, as well as a few songs written for them by producers like Bert Berns (who penned "Here Comes the Night"). After Morrison left the group, Them splintered into the Belfast Gypsies, who released an album that (except for the vocals) approximated Them's early records, and a psychedelic outfit that kept the name Them, releasing four LPs with little resemblance to the tough sounds of their mid-'60s heyday.
Them's second post-Van Morrison album, even more than their first such effort (Now & Them), grew further away from their mid-'60s style, to the point where there were few audible links to how Them sounded in the British Invasion era. And like Now & Them, it was an intermittently worthwhile but somewhat characterless record, reflecting late-'60s trends in album-oriented rock without adding much to them or innovating paths of their own. It was even more Los Angeles-psychedelia-influenced than their prior LP, taking the lead of Now & Them's strongest cut ("Square Room") to explore sitar-laden raga-rock on several songs. "Time Out for Time In" adds a nice waltz overlay to the raga-rock sound, but "Black Widow Spider" and "Just on Conception" frankly live up to the stereotypes of "oh wow!" hippie-trippy word soups from the era. So does "The Moth," but at least there some Roger McGuinn-like vocals and dreamy orchestration add spice. Other songs are competently done but nonstandout heavy soul rock, with "She Put a Hex on You" sounding right off the cutting room floor of a 1968 psychedelic dance rock club movie scene; you can just see the bandana-swathed babe from central casting gyrating as the strobe lights flash. "Waltz of the Flies," the best song, is indeed a beguiling psychedelic waltz, and Jim Armstrong's guitar work throughout is far more instrumentally accomplished than what you'll hear on many similar albums. Yet the record's not in the same league as either the Van Morrison-era Them or the better psychedelic/raga-rock endeavors of the late '60s. The 2003 Rev-Ola CD reissue adds eight bonus cuts (all taken from 45s) of value to anyone interested in the post-Van Morrison Them, including the non-LP single "Corinna"/"Dark Are the Shadows," the rare original single version of the punky "Dirty Old Man" (which is superior to the one on Now and Them), and the rare original 45 version of "Square Room" (which isn't as good as, and is much shorter than, the one on Now and Them).
Ringo Starr - Goodnight Vienna (1974)
Thursday, February 02, 2012
Mary Wells - The Definitive Collection
Time and legions of other soul superstars have obscured the fact that for a brief moment, Mary Wells was Motown's biggest star. She came to the attention of Berry Gordy as a 17-year-old, hawking a song she'd written for Jackie Wilson; that song, "Bye Bye Baby," became her first Motown hit in 1961. The full-throated approach of that single was quickly toned down in favor of a pop-soul sound. Few other soul singers managed to be as shy and sexy at the same time as Wells (Barbara Lewis is the only other that springs to mind), and the soft-voiced singer found a perfect match with the emerging Motown production team, especially Smokey Robinson. Robinson wrote and produced her biggest Motown hits; "Two Lovers," "You Beat Me to the Punch," and "The One Who Really Loves You" all made the Top Ten in the early '60s, and "My Guy" hit the number one spot in mid-1964, at the very height of Beatlemania.
Mary turned 21 years old as "My Guy" was rising to the top of the charts, and left Motown almost immediately afterward for a reported advance of several hundred thousand dollars from 20th Century Fox. The circumstances remain cloudy years later, but Wells and her husband-manager felt Motown wasn't coming through with enough money for their new superstar; she was also lured by the prospect of movie roles through 20th Century Fox (which never materialized). It's been rumored that Wells was being groomed for the sort of plans that were subsequently lavished upon Diana Ross; more nefariously, it's also been rumored that Motown quietly discouraged radio stations from playing Wells' subsequent releases. What is certain is that Wells never remotely approached the success of her Motown years, entering the pop Top 40 only once (although she had some R&B hits). Motown, for their part, took care throughout the rest of the '60s not to lose their big stars to larger labels.
Wells' departure from Motown was so dramatic and unsuccessful that it has tended to overshadow the quality of her later work, which has almost always been dismissed as trivial by critics. True, it didn't match the quality of her Motown recordings -- Smokey Robinson could not be replaced. But her '60s singles for 20th Century Fox (whom she ended up leaving after only a year), Atco, and Jubilee were solid pop-soul on which her vocal talents remained undiminished. She wrote and produced a lot of her late-'60s and early-'70s sessions with her second husband, guitarist Cecil Womack (brother of Bobby), and these found her exploring a somewhat earthier groove than her more widely known pop efforts. She had trouble landing recording deals in the '70s and '80s, and succumbed to throat cancer in 1992
The Rattles - Live NDR 90,3
The Rattles ------- Live NDR 90,3 (2011)
01 - Intro
02 - Come On And Sing
03 - Sha La La La Lee
04 - Love Of My Life
05 - La La La
06 - Unchained Melody
07 - Mashed Potatoes
08 - Hippy Hippy Shake
09 - Mona
10 - Twist And Shout
11 - Dream
12 - Hotter Than Hell
13 - Hello
14 - Cauliflower
15 - After Tea
16 - Las Vegas
17 - My Bonnie
18 - Faith
19 - Hot Wheels
20 - The Witch
My Love ...and My World My Air My Friends My TIME ...
Thank you Jancy!!
The Young Idea - With A Little Help From My Friends (1968)
Originally released in 1968, WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS is the debut studio album by the British pop duo known as the Young Idea. In addition to a fine cover of the Fab Four's title track, the English act, consisting of Tony Cox and Douglas MacRea-Brown, offers up other excellent orchestral-pop numbers making it a kindred spirit to the contemporary group Chad & Jeremy.
Digitally remastered and expanded reissue of the 1968 debut album from this British Pop act. The Young Idea was a vocal duo comprising Tony Cox and Douglas MacRea-Brown. To their credit, their records were afforded the big band, major label production style of the day but closer inspection reveals distinctly esoteric elements on skewed pop gems such as 'All The Colours Of Darkness' (later to lend its name to a volume of the influential Rubble compilations), 'Room With A View' and 'Just Look At The Rain', affording them comparison to contemporary orch-pop offerings from Nirvana, World Of Oz and Paul & Barry Ryan. 17 tracks. Rev-Ola. 2009.
Young Idea: Douglas Brown, Tony Cox (vocals).
Liner Note Author: Stefan Granados.
Tracklisting :
1. WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS
2. THE GAMES MEN PLAY
3. THE WORLD'S BEEN GOOD TO ME TONIGHT
4. ON THE KING'S ROAD
5. MISTER LOVIN' LUGGAGE MAN
6. JUST LOOK AT THE RAIN
7. PECULIAR SITUATION
8. IN BOND STREET
9. JUST TO LOVE HER
10. GOTTA GET OUT THE MESS I'M IN
11. ROOM WITH A VIEW
12. TAR AND CEMENT
BONUS TRACKS
13. IT CAN'T BE (45 B-SIDE)
14. SATURDAY NIGHT PEOPLE (45 ISSUED AS "SCOTT HENDERSON")
15. COLOURS OF DARKNESS (45 B-SIDE)
16. MISTER REALLY GOOD (UNISSUED 1968 SESSION)
17. THE FRENCH HORN (UNISSUED 1968 SESSION)
Sorry,but is low quality - little distortion at low frequency
The Poor - The Poor (1967)
Randy Meisner - Bass, Vocals
Allen Kemp - Guitar, Vocals
Pat Shanahan - Drums
John Day - Keyboards (-1966)
Gene Chalk - Guitar, Vocals (-1966)
Randy Naylor - Guitar, Keyboards, Vocals(1966-1967)
Veeder van Dorn - Guitar, Banjo, Harmonic, Vocals (1967-1968)
The Poor are one of those bands that keeps coming up in passing mentions in the back channels of 1960s Los Angeles rock history, though relatively few people have heard their records. They're probably best known for the bigger bands that several members went on to after the Poor broke up, with Randy Meisner joining Poco and then the Eagles, and Allen Kemp and Pat Shanahan turning up in New Riders of the Purple Sage. In their brief time together, the Poor recorded four 1966-68 singles, none of them too exceptional or original, but all of them fairly typical Los Angeles harmony-oriented pop-rock with strong folk-rock and sunshine pop flavors.
The Poor formed from the ashes of the Soul Survivors (no relation to the more famous Philadelphia band of "Expressway to Your Heart" fame), a Colorado group who'd cut a couple of fair garage-pop singles in 1965 and 1966. Kemp and Shanahan had been in the Soul Survivors, and teamed up with Randy Meisner and Randy Naylor in Los Angeles to form the Poor. They had some big-name connections -- they were managed by Charlie Greene and Brian Stone, who also handled Sonny & Cher and the Buffalo Springfield; their first three singles were produced by Barry Friedman, who also worked with the Springfield, Kaleidoscope, Paul Butterfield, and others around that time; and while most of their singles had original material, they also covered early tunes by Tom Shipley and Michael Brewer, of Brewer & Shipley.
But none of their singles saw much action, with only Shipley's "She's Got the Time (She's Got the Changes)" (also done by Brewer & Shipley) making the charts, and then only bubbling under at #133 at that. After the Poor split, Meisner, Kemp, and Shanahan all put in time with Rick Nelson's backing group, the Stone Canyon Band, before landing in their most famous bands. All of the Poor's singles were compiled on the 2003 CD compilation The Poor, which also has the two Soul Survivors singles.
Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Tony Jackson Group - Just Like Me
In the summer of 1964, Tony Jackson was considered one of the hottest talents in Liverpool. As bassist and lead singer of the Searchers up to but not including "Needles and Pins" (when John McNally and Mike Pender took over the singing), he was the most recognizable member of the one major Liverpool group not managed by Brian Epstein. He was a genuine star at the time, in a group that was about as hot as any band could be. That all changed when Jackson either left or was forced out of the group (accounts vary) that summer and formed his own band, the Vibrations -- from then on, he led a hard-luck life and career.
He was born Anthony Paul Jackson in the Dingle, a densely populated and poor area of Liverpool (the same place whence Ringo Starr and Billy Fury came into the world) in the summer of 1940. He grew up surrounded by working-class aspirations and was planning on becoming an electrician when he was sidetracked, first by skiffle music and later by rock & roll. Skiffle king Lonnie Donegan was his first musical hero and in the mid-'50s Jackson formed his first band, the Martinis, as a skiffle group. By the time he shifted to rock & roll, he was singing lead. According to his successor in the Searchers, Frank Allen, Jackson had a great voice in those early days and commanded the stage in a manner that evoked images of Elvis Presley, and was also a highly proficient bassist. Soon after seeing him perform, John McNally and Mike Pender, who were already playing together as the Searchers, asked him to join. The group, which eventually solidified around the three of them and drummer Chris Curtis, spent a couple of years backing vocalist Johnny Sandon, who left their association to work with the Remo 4, and by 1962 the Searchers were on their own, with Jackson singing most of the lead parts.
Not all was well with Jackson even then, however. He carried a range of personal demons that manifested themselves in his demeanor -- he had acquired the nickname "Black Jake" by the time he was in his early twenties, evidently a reference to his persona -- and sometimes very heavy drinking, which occasionally was plain even during their performances. Liverpool musicologist Bill Harry cites the oft-repeated story of Brian Epstein coming to the Cavern Club to see the group perform, with an idea of signing them, only to see an obviously inebriated Jackson fall off the stage. He was the face and voice of the group, however, for that first year and a half separated from Sandon, until they began recording. Jackson sang on "Sweets for My Sweet" and "Sugar and Spice," as well as on the LP track that would later become their biggest U.S. hit, "Love Potion Number 9," but his voice had apparently cracked during preparation for the recording of their single "Needles and Pins," and the group's management and producer felt -- with good reason -- that there were four good voices in the lineup; Pender and McNally ended up sharing the lead on the song, which became the biggest hit in their history (everywhere but in the United States). Jackson never accepted the new, shared frontman role and his behavior grew more hostile and erratic, leading to his exit in the summer of 1964. At the time, most of the music press wondered if the group could carry on without him.
As it turned out, they did -- and still are working as of 2006. Jackson immediately put together a new group, the Vibrations, and perhaps to make certain that this was a clean break from his previous band, they had an organ rather than a 12-string guitar at the core of their sound, and girl singers in the background, and were a more soulful outfit than the Searchers. Tony Jackson & the Vibrations cut a series of four singles (one as the Tony Jackson Group) for Pye, only one of which, the first, "Bye Bye Baby," was a hit. Their second record, "You Beat Me to the Punch," produced by Larry Page (future manager/producer of the Troggs), failed to repeat the performance on the charts.
Leading a group took its toll on Jackson's musical identity. He'd been an excellent bassist with the Searchers, as well as the band's lead singer and initially played bass and sang lead in the new band. At one point, however, guitarist Ian Buisel (aka Ian Leighton) took over a lot of the lead singing from him. Later in the history of the Tony Jackson Group, Jackson took back the vocal spotlight and deferred on bass to Dennis Thompson. Jackson and his band were dropped by Pye in 1965, after the failure of their single "Stage Door," the B-side of which, "That's What I Want," was a surprisingly forward-looking record with some strong fuzz guitar, courtesy of Buisel, and sometimes gets cited as a prime piece of proto-punk. Their version of "Fortune Teller" is also a loud, guitar-driven jewel that doesn't quite hold together to the end but does represent two-minutes-plus of punkoid posturing.
A jump to British CBS the following year failed to enhance Jackson's sales, and a switch to a solo career didn't do any more good, although "Follow Me" (written by Warren Zevon) got picked up by pirate radio in England. Following in the footsteps of several fading British beat bands, the Tony Jackson Group played out its final days on tour in southern Europe, where mid-'60s British bands still had a decent following as late as 1967-1968, and got out one ultra-obscure EP (on which they covered songs by the Byrds and Paul Revere & the Raiders, among others).
Jackson gave up performing and for a time became a producer, and also later worked as an agent, furniture salesman, disc jockey, and manager of a golf club. Of the bandmembers, only drummer Paul Francis went on to a major career, playing sessions for the likes of Bill Wyman and Suzi Quatro as well as gigs as a member of Tucky Buzzard and Cockney Rebel -- and it was Francis who persuaded Jackson to resume his performing career and reorganize the Vibrations in 1991. It turned out that Jackson was still remembered sufficiently well in England to attract and audiences. They've played many times since, especially at oldies festivals. He reportedly also played some gigs with Mike Pender's Searchers, one of two versions of the group working in the 1990s. His comeback, however, was interrupted by a bizarre incident involving a dispute over the use of a public phone in which Jackson pulled out what turned out to be a fake gun to back up his point, which resulted in his arrest. Ironically, it was during this very time that his recorded legacy with the Searchers and his own group started getting unearthed for CD reissue around the world. His health had declined in his final years, a consequence of his drinking, and he passed away in the summer of 2003. Amazingly, despite being out of the spotlight for almost 40 years, his death was widely covered by the British press, and Frank Allen also published a very moving reminiscence about Jackson. Despite his bad luck and personal problems, as a founding member of the Searchers he and his music continue to attract interested listeners in the 21st century. 2004 saw the release of the first ever Tony Jackson CD, Watch Your Step: The Complete Recordings 1964-1966.
Skip Bifferty - The Story of Skip Bifferty (1967-1969) 2 CD
Skip Bifferty are something of a lesson in musical survival, and doubly so, since most of its members had viable and even highly successful careers in music stretching more than a decade after the group's breakup. The group was an offshoot of the latter-day Chosen Few, a Newcastle band that had been working together since 1962. They'd lost their bassist and lead guitarist in 1965, and organist Mick Gallagher kept the group going, recruiting John Turnbull on guitar and Colin Gibson on bass. With the departure of Chosen Few lead singer Rod Hood, Graham Bell joined as lead vocalist, but the time had come to close down the Chosen Few. Gallagher, Turnbull, Gibson, Bell, and drummer Tommy Jackman reorganized the band as Skip Bifferty.
Skip Bifferty was a psychedelic pop band that immediately found an enthusiastic audience at the Marquee Club, got Don Arden as manager (which led to a contract with RCA-UK), and were regular guests on John Peel's Top Gear. A series of singles followed, among them the hard-rocking "On Love" (their debut), but they redefined themselves more in the direction of flower power with their next few records, starting with "Happy Land." Although none of their singles charted, RCA allowed them to cut a full LP, which contained some notable psychedelic and experimental tracks. Their final single, "Man in Black," was taken off the album and was produced by Ronnie Lane and arranged by Steve Marriott.
A dispute with Arden caused the band to walk out en masse, and they next appeared together under the pseudonym Heavy Jelly, cutting an eight-minute single ("I Keep Singing That Same Old Song") that charted in a few European countries and ended up on the multi-artist sampler LP Nice Enough to Eat. They abandoned the name, however, when they learned of a Jackie Lomax-fronted outfit organized by John Moorhead that was already using it. Bell, Gallagher, and Turnbull worked together in Bell & Arc, and Gibson passed through Snafu, while Gallagher was a member of Frampton's Camel and subsequently played with Turnbull in Loving Awareness, which evolved into Ian Dury's Blockheads in the late '70s. Skip Bifferty's lone album was reissued on compact disc in the mid-'90s.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)