Song of the Week – Heavy Weather Traffic, Katydids & Idea, Bee Gees

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IGNORED OBSCURED RESTORED

My car still has a cassette deck in it. Really. Yeah, I’m not a car guy. I buy something reasonable and drive it into the ground. My 2006 Toyota has 120,000 miles and is still chugging along.

About a month ago I was rooting around in my music cave and found a big, old box of cassettes. I decided to plop it into my backseat and reach back to randomly grab something to listen to on my work commute. (An old school version of shuffle play.)

One day I played an album by the early ‘90s British band Katydids. They were formed by the duo of Susie Hug (vocals) and Adam Seymour (guitars). The first song on their eponymous, first album is today’s SotW – “Heavy Weather Traffic.”

Katydids, was produced by the great Nick Lowe. We all know that he only associates himself with quality projects. In this case it’s just solid guitar rock with top notch vocals and clever lyrics.

As I listened to “Heavy Weather Traffic” for the first time in about 20+ years there was something about its main riff that seemed very familiar to me. It was bugging me for hours. I finally decided that it reminded me of the Bee Gees “Idea” from their 1968 album of the same name.

I’m still not 100% sure this is the song I was trying to place, but now that I reacquainted myself to “Idea” I really liked what I heard. I didn’t intend for this post to feature more than one song but “Idea” is too cool not to share. If you only know the Bee Gees from their Saturday Night Fever incarnation, you’re in for a big surprise.

Put this one into the book as RESTORED.

Enjoy… until next week.

John Lennon is Dead.

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We know that. He died upteen years ago tonight. I was at a theatrical production called In Praise of Wine, with my friend Helen, and I praised wine too heartily. As we were leaving the theater we learned that Lennon had been killed. It was terrible, and then I went to sleep.

In the ensuing days it was hard not to troll the Lennon mourners. We thought they were sentimental, and they didn’t care about us at all. Drinks were thrown.

And I’m pretty sure that nothing constructive happened. Except maybe we all, even the most hippieish, thought that Imagine was treacle.

Which is why, on this anniversary, I land on Instant Karma. It’s an insistent song, but the words are as limp as those of Imagine or Revolution. It seems to be the tune that the rockarazzi have settled on as John’s legacy. Whatever.

But it really isn’t that good a song. It’s a slow slog through angry retribution, and while I would hope it introduced the concept of Instant Karma to the world, Google instant karma and you see no John Lennon song for pages, the world has passed it by.

Which leads me to the 45 I bought when the Beatles broke up. It’s meta to a fault, but it’s way more fun than Instant Karma or Imagine or How Do You Sleep, the songs that make me regret poor John.

Okay, a little more fun, because of the beat.

OBIT: Holly Woodlawn

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holly_1Holly Woodlawn was a movie star back when I was in high school. She was on the cover of the Rolling Stone, an amazing picture I can’t find, but one that certainly mixed up a young person’s head about the possibilities in this world.

When I was in high school we ate up Paul Morrisey’s trashy movies, Flesh and Heat, Dracula and Frankenstein 3D, some of which starred Holly Woodlawn.

When I heard that she’d passed yesterday I recalled the long and ridiculous dialogues she and Joe Dellasandro had in Trash, Holly’s nasal insistence the opposite of glamorous, but at the same time so full of its own sense of value, so real, that it also felt brave and heartening and hugely personal.

Vincent Canby got it right in his review of Trash in the New York Times:

“Holly Woodlawn, especially, is something to behold,” Vincent Canby wrote in his review for The New York Times, “a comic book Mother Courage who fancies herself as Marlene Dietrich but sounds more often like Phil Silvers.”

Which is why her place in rock ‘n’ roll history is cemented by these lines:

Holly came from Miami F-L-A,

Hitchhiked her way across the U.S.A.,

Plucked her eyebrows on the way,

Shaved her legs and then he was a she.

She says Hey babe,

Take a walk on the wild side

Said hey honey

Take a walk on the wild side.

You can read her New York Times obit here. The Rolling Stone obit is here.

 

 

There’s Great And There’s Uniquely Great

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I first heard this in the summer of 1969 but it was released in March of 1967. A few months before Sgt. Pepper. The big songs in March 1967 were Ruby Tuesday, Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields, and Happy Together. The Supremes’ Love is Here and Now You’re Gone also made it to #1 and is a better record than any of them but that’s another story.

Denise Fumo of all people introduced me to Heroin. I was 14 and madly in love with Denise but she only liked me as a friend. I was ready for some miserable music. Denise had many older boys in pursuit including the lifeguards, one of whom played it for her, and by the way that’s what I call sophisticated pickup technique. Denise was floored, bought it and played it for me, and thus I learned that there was more to this music thing than I thought.

Anyway, this song is every bit a product of 1967 as the others. And you Sgt. Pepper fans, which sounds more visionary now? Heroin by a mile.

Another thing is that Lou Reed covered the song more times than he could count, and he never came close to playing this song. That’s because of Mo Tucker and John Cale and Sterling Morrison. We used to play it in practice in Fun No Fun and did good things with it but not like this.

LINK: Casio MT-40 and sleng teng riddim

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casiomt40magshotSeems this simple Casio keyboard contained a preset rhythm track that, some claimed was derived from Eddie Cochran’s Somethin’ Else, or maybe the Sex Pistol’s Anarchy in the UK.

The writer tracks down the musician (a reggae fan) who created it, in 1981, as a rock track, and puts together a long and twisted history of how this single preset ended up being used in hundreds of reggae tunes.

And, it turns out, it was based on a rock song from the 70s, but not Anarchy in the UK. Which one?

Song of the Week – Day Tripper/We Can Work It Out, The Beatles

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IGNORED OBSCURED RESTORED

beatles

Today’s SotW is about the most popular songs I’ve ever posted about. The occasion is the 50th anniversary of one of my favorite singles releases evah! On December 8, 1965, The Beatles released the double A-sided single “Day Tripper”/”We Can Work It Out.”

The songs were recorded during the Rubber Soul sessions.

“Day Tripper” was written specifically to be released as a single. Recording for it occurred on October 16th and was completed that day. They rehearsed in the afternoon and then they recorded the rhythm track in three takes. Vocals were overdubbed in the evening.

The opening riff is a variation on Bobby Parker’s “Watch Your Step” (which was also the inspiration for “I Feel Fine”). The energy builds quickly as bass, a rhythm guitar and tambourine enter, capped off by a drum roll and cymbal crash. (The tambourine was used extensively on the Rubber Soul sessions.)

“We Can Work It Out” was recorded four days later on October 20th and nearly completed save for some final vocal overdubs recorded on October 29th. It is special in that it is one of a very few true Lennon/McCartney collaborations written after their very early days together.

Who wrote what is easy to discern as it plays right into the boy’s reputations – Paul’s positive, upbeat verse/chorus set against John’s cynical middle eight.

One of the things that we Beatlemaniacs love about their music is that almost every song is like a box of Cracker Jacks – it has a “surprise” inside. On “We Can Work It Out” it is the shift to waltz time in the section that bridges back to the verse. That was George’s contribution.

When the sessions began it was assumed “Day Tripper” would be the A-side. But everyone was so pleased with the way “We Can Work It Out” sounded that they changed their minds… except John. He wanted to lead with “Day Tripper” and lobbied hard for it. The compromise was to release the double A-side. Genius!!!

You’ve got to admit, they just don’t make them like this anymore.

Enjoy… until next week.

Scott Weiland, RIP

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I guess I gotta do this too.

At my gym I can see the TVs as I work out but can’t hear the audio. So this morning, I see Scott Weiland singing with the caption “Shocking Death” underneath. Sorry to be course, but the Packers’ Hail Mary was more shocking.

I ignored STP after their beginnings as a Pearl Jam ripoff. Reading I’ve done today tells me they got past that, but I was already gone. Once in a while, I’d sample something from a Scott Weiland supergroup, but nothing ever piqued my interest. Played “Vasoline” in a cover band a few years ago and it was kind of fun, but I can’t even remember how it goes.

The only Scott Weiland I ever listened to (and still do) is his appearance on How High The Moon, perhaps my favorite live album ever, from one of my favorite and most underrated bands of all-time, Masters of Reality. Sadly, it’s the weakest track on the album, but after not liking it at all to begin with, it grew on me after about a year or so.

The fact that Chris Goss would think enough of Scott Weiland to bring him on stage gives Scott cred in my book, but, in my world, Goss would be the superstar and Weiland would be the obscure guy.

Another slow one.

I hope my obituary is better than this one.

Jet Boy Jet Girl Update

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With Peter magazining and Gene and Lawr temporarily AWOL, I figured I’d do my part.

Since we discussed this a little a week or two ago, I did a google on “Jet Boy Jet Girl.” It led me to this Damned version (had never heard it before) and the Wiki listing, which told me:

a) this song was covered by many, including Sonic Youth,

b) its plot line about a young boy who has an affair with an older man only to get dumped for a woman, resonated with many young fellows.

The Damned version sounds kind of shitty at first, but grows on you if you let it play all the way through. Strange to say, but it’s kind of subtle compared to the original Elton Motello version. Plus Brian James looks like an exploded pineapple.

Going Soft

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Damn if this isn’t the second slow song I’m posting out of my last few posts, stretching many inactive months.

Graveyard is touring now and you folks need to check them out. I’m planning to see them in Philly on February 13th.

So refreshing to see a band (remember those?) with long stringy hair playing guitars (remember those?). Oh yeah, I forgot about all the pop punk garbage shit.

My two girls were home for Thanksgiving and, in the car – I swear – all they would play is that fucking Adele song OVER AND OVER AGAIN, interspersed with that fucking Justin Bieber song OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

God help us all.

P.S. – I particularly love the chord changes during the part where the ladies are singing background.

The Specials, Ghost Town

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I found this Bob Christgau story about seeing Elvis Costello and the Roots a couple of years ago, when their album Wake Up Ghost came out. It’s a fine record, but what made my eyes open was his description of their cover of the Specials Ghost Town.

Here it is.

Sound is crap, but it is sweet. Here’s the original version, which EC produced, and has a lot more air.