BLOG TO COMM

As you can tell from the above I never do learn. But try I must even though (as usual) I am slack in delivering these big deal type posts which I just know upset a good portion of you reg'lar reader types (who usually turn into EX-readers but eh!). You'll just have to bear with me considering the combination of advanced age, sagging energy (amongst other things) and the plain ol' fact that the stuff that I am writing about is ancient history and on the same level of duh as those fart-encrusted bedroom stranded nostalgia-drenched dorks who were championing the Big Band sounds during the seventies long after the initial furor had died down. Sheesh, with credentials like that maybe I should have my own tee-vee show even if it'll probably get stuck on a low-wattage UHF station at three in the morning.

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And now, a rare clip of the Plastic People of the Universe in '69 just before the big crackdown got them into a heap of trouble that at least accounted for a whole load of freebee publicity. Has their state-sanctioned album recorded around the same time as this film ever been released? (I know that a long-running history of the group has been issued --- I reviewed a few of these platters myself --- but not if the actual artyfact with original cover art etc. has made its way out. Hope some fan out there can help out which of course you won't!)

 

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The Plastic People aren't in the "Rock 'n Roll (hah!) Hall of Fame" and neither are these guys. Here's a later on Tielman Brothers performance which I will admit's quite show-bizzy (reminds me of something that would have been seen on a PBS Pledge Drive oldies show trying to bilk old turds outta their pensions) but wilder than any recent performance (music or otherwise) I or maybe even you can recall. Do you think that the concept of rock music has been hijacked somewhere down the line???:

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Gedda haircut ya hippie!

It has been some time since the previous biggie so there are a whole lot more writeups than usual this go 'round. And we know who just is responsible for these contributions right? None other than Paul McGarry, who has above and beyond the call of doody did a whole load for this blog which is why I am NOT giving out his home address lest you get the hankerin' to sending him an exploding parcel. Really, being associated with me in any wayshapeform is something tantamount to placing a mob hit on your very own self!

Manster-UNRELEASED ATLANTIC RECORDS SESSION CIRCA 1976 CD-r burn

Stars of the LIVE AT CBGB's album, Lydia Lunch's fave local band and more, there's been lots of talk and conjecture about Manster yet very little aural communication to go by. Finally this bit of lost history makes its way to our door, what purports to be demos for Atlantic circa '76 yet just might be the unreleased '82 album for Genya Raven's Ruby Records (which probably got a name change due to that other Ruby label) that even had the group doing a brief reunion back at their old club haunts. Lotsa stuff had been goin' 'round about Manster like how singer Warren Stahurski used to swing from the rafters of CBGB long before Stiv Bators and how they used to put drummer John Fehling and his double bass-drum set up front while Stahurski sang from behind. Stuff like that, and a lot of it not so good since I sure can remember some duff mentions of them in the pages of THE NEW YORK ROCKER and perhaps a few other outlets lost in the sump pump of my mind.

These recordings'll sure sate those who loved their CBGB entries and longed for more lo these many years (this codger included). As I would have surmised from Fred Kirby's late-'75 review of a CB's gig in the pages of VARIETY the jazz rock influence in particularly heavy what with a decidedly Zappa/McLaughlin bent to Alan and Robert Hertzberg's spidery guitar interplay and Stahurski's put-offish vocalese. I hear a whole lot of MX-80 Sound, Tony Williams Lifetime circa EMERGENCY! and the Good Rats too, not to mention other seventies fusion efforts that seemed so phonyficial at the time but just might be worthy of a re-eval. Sheesh, even a whole lotta that vocal jazzaroonie Michael Franks stuff if the guy was passing a sideways turd comes to mind.

Stahurski does have a good creep-out talk sing to him, at a whole lotta points reminding me of those snooty stuck up big kids who used to threaten me to all heck back during my growing up days. I should hate him for that alone but the years have washed a whole lotta those early feelings of cringe away somewhat and besides, intertwined with the screeching guitars and Thomas Giordano's thud bass Stahurski comes off like the ultimo as to what based jazz rock approach sans all the bowtie 'n tux attitude shoulda sounded like all along.

No repeats from the live album either. Even that s&m song that Kirby mentioned in his review shows up and it is a pretty harrowing bit of somethingorother...

It's all there for ya directly below. Pic shows the drummer playing a single-bass set and perched from the rear but wha' th' hey, maybe this was at some other stage in the group's evolution. Pretty hefty on all levels from the top-notch kinetic approach to the oft nonchalant vocals, and to think that this is just the tippy top of the reams of under-recorded/noticed/appreciated musical acts from the seventies and beyond that never got their place in the sun while a load of subpar offal affected the worst minds of my (and possibly your) generation.

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The Leather Secrets-LIVE AT CBGB 1974 CD-r burn

Lessee if I get this right---first there were the Leather Secrets with Camille O'Grady who broke up late-74 or so if CREEM can be trusted. Then O'Grady joined up with her then-boyfriend Peter Stampfel in the Unholy Modal Rounders before eventually re-forming the Secrets as the Camille O'Grady Band. Or something like that but whatever here's a piece of rock 'n roll history that has finally, after a good half-century of rotting in someone's shoebox, made its way to your ears and even mine.

From everything I could gather lo these many years later (including a Fred Kirby VARIETY writeup) I assumed these guys 'n gal were another New York Dolls reincarnate. Audio evidence suggests otherwise --- I mean sheesh but the show opens with "Whiskey River" of all things and the set romps through a series of golden oldies renditions (including the Belltones' punk classic "I've Had It") and equally sporty originals in the tradition that sound even better due to the C- sound quality. A might heavy on the covers but I will say that is sure does my ears good hearing Buddy Holly not warbled by Linda Ronstadt. 

And after all is heard and done maybe I do believe that the Secrets had the same New York pout and drive that Johansen and the rest tried to conquer the teenage mindset of the day with. Unfortunately they and many others failed miserably while lesser acts pandered to the worst aspects of teendom imaginable. Well, if I were front and center for this or any other Secrets show I know I woulda more'n just a good time hearing their straight and unadulterated performance of various pre-hippoid (ironic considering what these bozos looked like) rock moves without milking it into nada the way most "nostalgic" entities sure as shootin' did.

Like with Manster, judge for yourself directly below. Maybe you can make a dub and do some EQ fiddlin' to make this sound even gnarlier than it already does!:

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Ruby and the Rednecks-LIVE AT THE COVENTRY 1973 CD-r burn

It's amazing that back in the eighties and nineties I was just beggin' to lend ear to this legendary New York singer/songstress' warbling and like here, a good thirty/fortysome years down the road we not only have two legitimate album-length recordings to contend with but a nice selection of live sounds and even video (clips from by-now ancient CBGB and Max's shows even) to warm the cockles of our clogged aortas. 

Here's the earliest extant Ruby laid down at the legendary Coventry during the height of the very same En Why See Glam Slam that gave more'n a few rock 'n roll hoots hope that maybe someone or something out there thought was gonna drive the wimpoid AM snoozers and FM prog slogs off the face of the earth. I am somewhat but not totally surprised to hear that this '73 Rednecks gig is pretty much identical to what the lass was doing well into the 21st century, originals/covers and all! And I thought that the Fleshtones were an act that never varied from the original thrust! 

The inclusion of a banjo in a straight rock 'n roll setting (w/o any hint of rural countrifiedness, in fact utilized most of the time like a rhythm guitar) does add a particularly different twist of overall approach, making me wonder why more rock 'n roll groups performing in a more guttural post-Velvets sense acts didn't slip one of these into their act! 

Speaking of Velvets, dig the interesting re-do of "Rock 'n Roll" which is another one for that ever-growing list of VU covers that was staggering even before such things became the calling card of sophisticado college kids who tended to know the essence but not the downright gristle of it all. "Cry Me a River" ain't no slouch either...lend ear to that oscillator solo near the end which reminds me of Brian Sands' theremin howls that finished off Milk's version of "Boy Can I Dance Good". This is the seventies I remember, at least in downright spirit given just how much I was cloistered during those days of somewhat growing up.

Again I present a source for your own judgement just so's you can give the thing a listen and tell me how screwed my tastes are. A little dial twiddlin' might help this one out quite a bit:

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Various Artists-TEN PROTO PUNK CLASSICS PLUS TWO CD-r burn

This playlist comes from a pretty good Youtube mini-documentary that for some odd reason I cannot embed like I did with the above 'uns. You can watch it here if you so desire and come to think of it, what sorta human being who regularly tunes into this blog wouldn't want to experience this verifiable British NUGGETS of early punk rock artyfacts done up right before the Arbiter of Prog Musical Virtue (Chris Welch) did his best to suppress these tracks and save the youth of the nation with Jon Anderson. Or was it Ian?

Whoever it was that was being pushed on a gobble everything up public, those MELODY MAKER-approved denizens of douche wouldn't have been able to compete with these mid-sixties rompers that never hit the charts the way they shoulda but eh! This selection does cut a nice swatch into the entire concept of punk as it developed over there, and as far as beat invasion drive goes it's all here. The Who and Kinks seem to be the starting point, and as with the Seeds or Sonics the sounds are emulated but certainly not imitated. I could argue that there were way too many tracks that shoulda been here but weren't (the Zephyrs and Craig along with a few more come to mind), but only an old maid prissy pimply-skinned pudenda of a pustule would up its nose at tracks like "The Addicted Man" or Northern Ireland's Wheels, Belfast-bred badguys who do the Shadows of Knight's "Bad Little Woman" with such gusto that you woulda thought The Troubles woulda started right then and there if only due to ultra-sonic frequencies!

Ya want it? Just copy this to whatever you're s'posed to copy things to these days and search out "Crawdaddy Simone" and "Things She Says" (this 'un, not that 'un, with future Yes-man Steve Howe) yourself to stick right at the end! Make up your own liner notes while you're at it...well, they're bound to come off better'n some of that offal I've read these past fortysome years I'll tell ya!

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David Bowie-THE LODGER CD-r burn (originally on RCA Records)

I had long given up on Bowie's entire switcheroo schtick by the time this came out so this is like uh, the first go 'round for me. Some go 'round too...gimme a little credit for knowing enough to ditch this guy given just how superior the new and improved real rock 'n roll music was to all of the gunk that was being force-fed down our throats thanks to the remnants of the established rock press/AM-FM mindset of the day.  At best, a close approximation of what Ultravox was doing during their own decline and at worst a precursor to all of that eighties fashion glop that took the better moments of mid-seventies import bin rock and distorted it beyond recognition. THIS was the music us aural fanatics were supposed to look forward to at the seventies/eighties cusp? Shee...

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The Dead Boys-IGNORANCE IN ACTION (THE RARITIES) CD-r burn (originally on Cleopatra Records)

This might come to a shock to you, but I really haven't considered myself a fan of either Stiv Bators or the Dead Boys for quite some time, perhaps because I grew to find their entire socio-musical DNA to be somewhat derivative of their First Wave of Cleveland Underground forbearers and perhaps without the bared-wire intensity. The story that Paul Marotta had been spewin' 'bout how Bators saw the Electric Eels and copped Dave E's stage jerks kinda make me wish it was Dave himself up these gettin' the record deals while the Dead One was shuffling around trying to secure dates for his own headed for oblivion band. Maybe the entire publicity hound-y nature of the Boys suddenly hit me, as if Iggy, Alice and heck, even Crocus and Dave E weren't superior to Bators in all aspects of talent and force and there were many a punk band who could outdo the Dead Boys on a heavy metal nervetwist level.

So this was the first listen to the Dead Boys in a good quarter century or so and here's what I have to say...the '87 12-incher tracks are a tad poppy but palatable enough for you long-time listeners while the Kirk Yano demos detect the shape of dredge (aka WE HAVE COME FOR YOUR CHILDREN) to come. At least their take on the Laughner classic "Ain't It Fun" sounds close enough for comfort to the original.

Best tracks are the oft-dubbed ones from the Halloween '76 Max's show in which a bass guitar-less Boys (a la the Eels --- still don't believe Marotta hunh?) owe more to previous punk generations than they do the future one. Covers of Ducks Deluxe and Syndicate of Sound are played against various originals sounding fair 'nuff although at this date I'd actually prefer to hear the Third Rail and Kongress shows from that same evening.

The disque closes with a cover of "Anarchy in the UK" which seems like a fair enough homage that even sounds like the Pistols if you squint your ears a bit. Historical.

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The Tielman Brothers-TV SHOWS CD (Sam Sam Records, Holland)

The cover snap's misleading for this contains little if any of those early television appearances I sure would have liked to've lent ear to. Like in the Youtube clip above these cuts are mostly from the post-Beat Invasion era Tielmans when they were doing a rather Vegas-y series of boob tube appearances, most which don't quite reflect the early mania these Indorockers could whip up when they were crankin' on all gears. 

However, these tracks prove that even an aging Tielmans still could rock 'n roll even if the horns and backup singers more or less ruin 'stead of enhance the proceedings. The brothers could even do a li'l magic on some of them old run-into-the-ground standbys like "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" not to mention a rather potent "Oh Happy Day" if you can believe that. 

Not bad really, with the highlights of the batch being an authentic early-sixties styled ripper entitled "A-A-A" as well as a version of "Bossa Nova Baby" (in fact the same 'un I posted in the last big deal post) done in a way that I sure wish the early-seventies Flamin' Groovies or any of those mid-seventies English blues punks woulda. And if you like them Amerigan late-fifties/early-sixties garage-y punks from Johnny and the Hurricanes and the Rock-a-Teens to the Fendermen this 'un should be way up your own expansive alley.

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Seth Meicht Quartet-ILLUMINE CD (CIMP Records)

Nothing out of the ordinary as far as this '06 effort goes, what with Meicht and his partner in tenor saxophonedom Matt Bauder playing mid-seventies era new thing. 'tis cool enough especially at a time when the luster has worn off regarding any inkling of this music having any sort of mass appeal. If you (like me) enjoyed tuning into the old CBGB Lounge cybercasts during the Dee Pop Freestyle series to hear various new thing acts who would never get a fair shake elsewhere you very well might enjoy this one.

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Andrew White-LIVE IN NEW YORK PART TWO CD-r burn (originally on Andrew's Music Records)

It's that guy who thought he was John Coltrane once again putting out a platter that I gotta admit is pretty hotcha and way beyond just plain ol' "homage" or even "nostalgia" for that matter. Pretty wired new thing that surprisingly enough was once well known amongst even the less attuned during the sixties. Like White's other efforts a fine example of what obsessive compulsive behavior can lead to, and if you can come up with a better legacy you go ahead and try it!

By the way, the bassist on this sesh was none other than Steve Jovenall, a name that has popped up in these "pages" via my review of the Stanley Cowell BLUES FOR THE VIET CONG album on Arista-Freedom. As I've mentioned in that writeup Jovenall was born in Farrell Pennsylvania which is a mere stones throw from where I reside, and oddly enough I came across some locals with that very same last name and naturally asked if there was any relationship between them and this somewhat noted bassist. Each time they automatically said "no" which makes me wonder if perhaps he is somehow connected with these Jovenalls but being a jazz musician he's some sorta black sheep and well, I didn't want to PRESS things with 'em and start some sorta row! But I sure DO wonder...

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Black Artists Group-FOR PEACE AND LIBERTY IN PARIS, DEC. 1972 CD-r burn (originally on We Want Sounds Records)

More from the BAG expat band doing a wonderful job of keeping up France's reputation as the home for amerigan black new thing players back late-sixties/early-seventies cusp. Basically a Human Arts Ensemble release with everyone a current or former member of that particular aggro, these players (Oliver Lake, Joseph Bowie, Floyd LeFlore, Baikida Carroll and Charles "Bobo" Shaw) continue on with their emulation of the AACM mode of Great Black Music, perhaps with a more r/b and rockist attitude in mind. An approach that just might have given them some appeal with the more non-jazz members of this audience who only listen to avgarde jazz with a more open frame of mind that made these people almost as important in a few record collections as the Stooges. Not as "gets ya" as some of these other BAG efforts (no free-scronk guitar) but if you liked their earlier Aguirre Records release (ARIES 1973) I don't have to tell you anymore now, do I? 

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Various Artists-ALSCHE WELT NOCH UNTERGING  (GERMAN POST PUNK UNDERGROUND 1979-1984) CD-r burn (hear it here)

As you all better know, the concept of "post-punk" never did gel with me not only considering the plain unadulterated fact that punk rock proper was, is and continued to be a working proposition at the time but because this music just evolved into plain ol' chi-chi and pretentious sounds that certainly did not settle well with this particular fanabla! This release reminds me of just what a desert of duh the eighties were at a time when real under-the-underground sound and vision was downright ridiculed while controlled opposition music such as thus spoke for alla the hippies who were too embarrassed to call themselves hippies that are now runnin' things 'round here. To rehash an ancient joke, if Adolf were alive to hear this he'd just die...

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BLACK TO COMM, sad to say, is one fanzine that ya just can't GIVE away! And obviously it's one ya just can't sell either. But try and try I must and well, I get the feeling that there are some of you who wouldn't mind pouring your way through these still available issues that might either get you all joybells or have you sending untraceable poisons to my door. The choice is up to you, Petunia.