Yer gonna hafta wait a little while until my oft-promised (and still in gestation) mega-length article/post I've been telling you about for a few weeks finally appears, hopefully sometime this week or so but until then I thought I'd tip you off to these two wondrous Cee-Dee reissues flung atcha thanks for the fine folks at Norton Rekkids. And as far as fine Cee-Dees being flung atcha go you can't get any finer'n this pair of aluminum archival digs these days (or at least today), for both of these classic offering certainly do bring back fond memories. Not necessarily of the fifties which I'll assume a good portion of you BLOG TO COMM readers don't even remember, but of the eighties. The mid-eighties to be precise, when there really wasn't anything that hot going on and new wave had pretty much devolved into nothingness compared with the bright light it had been only a decade earlier and the only thing that really thrilled me outside of a faltering hardcore scene and a few worthy seventies leftovers were those energetic and enthralling look-backs into the maybe not-so-distant past which Billy and Miriam and their Norton label not to mention their long-missed KICKS fanzine sure helped deliver on. It's so funny in some ways, because in twenty years time it seems that very little has changed and even this late in the game it's these look backs that thrill me more'n seeing what's happening in the here and now!
Anyway, two classic sides from Norton superstar and one-man hunch Hasil Adkins (who I'm sure you all know about and cherish in some respects so I'll skip on any historical background) have been reished on Cee-Dee, perhaps because the man is now dead or perhaps because Billy and Miriam wanted to honor him in this fine way, but most probably because these sides are pretty hot tickets if you ask me that'll continue to find an audience as long as there are still rockism-crazed no-accounts keeping the flame alive out there. Both tea coasters are fine produce if you ask me, MOON OVER MADISON being Hasil's more c&w-oriented splatter with what you'd call the kinda music (tearful rural moans rooted in the country sounds the Haze grew up on) that'll get your girlfriend all weepy and ready for the hunch of your lifetime. I like this one for those late-night keep-the-volume-down moments of personal reflection (melodies to accompany caffeine-induced insomnia) but my own personal fave-rave of the batch just hasta be PEANUT BUTTER ROCK AND ROLL, the more high-energy gut-bucket rockin' rollin' one that's really good for getting me in the proper frame of mind when I wanna noogie the dog. 
PEANUT BUTTER's also fine for getting in the right mood for thigh-boil busting, blackhead-squeezing and other matters of personal hygiene perhaps because of its incessant drive that really didn't manifest itself into the collective rock psyche until a good decade (1966) after these manic sides were laid down. In fact, I gotta say (at the risk of being drummed out of the Friends Of Norton secret club) that there was a bit of a rockabilly-push extant on these tracks that actually remind me of none other than Marc Bolan during his Tyrannosaurus Rex days, and if that don't earn the ire of Billy and Miriam I dunno what will! If you thought the first RAMONES album was a no-holds-barred breathtaking experience, try PEANUT BUTTER...it makes da brudders sound like the Snooty Blues!Did I mention that each disque contains all-new material not found on the original elpee releases? Did I also mention the enclosed booklets not only with the obligatory rare snaps but liner notes by Nick Tosches as well as classic Adkins rejection slips? I didn't? Well, fooey on me! And fooey on this review! It sure is hard trying to keep up with the current reissue frenzy going on while trying to continue writing a gonzo-influenced blog especially at a time when hardly anyone could care less, especially when even I can tell I'm failing on all fronts especially with my lame attempts to capture the best of the hipster rockcrit style!
I don't know why Billy and Miriam would be so bothered about the Adkins/Bolan comparisons - after all, Lux and Ivy stated in "Incredibly Strange Music" that T. Rex helped fuel their interest in rockabilly, and even down to the later days Bolan in many ways came off as a sort of 70s Gene Vincent, far more than Gene did on his own last recordings.
ReplyDeleteI haven't heard Moon Over Madison in years, but I remember it as being just Jimmie Rodgers (the 20s/30s Blue Yodeler, not the 60s/70s country-pop crooner)/Roy Acuff style old timey country music. It's certainly good, but people who are into Hasil for the stuff he's better known for might not like it,as it lacks the gonzo weirdness of "She Said" or "No More Hot Dogs" - Michael Snider
"there was a bit of a rockabilly-push extant on these tracks that actually remind me of none other than Marc Bolan during his Tyrannosaurus Rex days"
ReplyDeleteI woulda liked to hear Hasil tackle "Hot Love", or Marc's take on "No More Hot Dogs".
Check out the T-REX 'BORN TO BOOGIE'dvd:Marc and Ringo in full Teddy-boy gear quoting Wanda Jackson's "Let's Have a Party"!
"there was a bit of a rockabilly-push extant on these tracks that actually remind me of none other than Marc Bolan during his Tyrannosaurus Rex days"
ReplyDeleteI woulda liked to hear Hasil tackle "Hot Love", or Marc's take on "No More Hot Dogs".
Check out the T-REX 'BORN TO BOOGIE'dvd:Marc and Ringo in full Teddy-boy gear quoting Wanda Jackson's "Let's Have a Party"!
Hasil doing "Hot Love" or "Jeepster
ReplyDeletewould have been great. I doubt Bolan was aware of Hasil, but he would've done a great "No More Hot Dogs".
BTW-happy birthday to Wanda Jackson tomorrow!
-Michael