Well yeah, another slimmie here. Chalk this week's rather anemic post up to a numbuh of thingies from real life craziness, general lethargy and (best of all) the lack of anything crucial to get my brain juices a flowin' like they should. But sheesh, sometimes I do find it hard to get through my head that its not 1977 anymore, or 1972 or 1966 for that matter back when music was a whole lot more exciting than it was when the eighties started to creep up on all of us. Sad to admit this up and front-like, but alla the predictions I made about the state of the 21st century way back inna eighties have come true, at least regarding rock 'n roll as a vital force in our lives that was supposed to be the all-important soundtrack to a higher state of lowbrow living. But then again, who couldn't predict that there just wouldn't be a rock kultur for a buncha suburban slob baldo paunches who still spin their 1981 Bomp! record orders just like they did the day they got 'em! I mean, some market there, eh??? But we're here (or at least a few of us), we're bald, old, maybe even tubboid, and at least we still got some of our hearing so blast away!
***Yezyezyez it's finally over and wounja know it but Donald Trump did come out on top of Hillary, and not the way alla you sickos are thinking (wishing??? hoping????) it would. I guess that Cher's suicide watch'll hafta go on for just a li'l bit longer than planned, and although I have nada against Canada or Canadians (well...some of them!) I heartily welcome that big rush of limousine liberals and assorted Last Angry Moose types (and hopefully Bruce Springsteen) to the Great White North even though that place is already overrun with a whole batch of dyed in the wool hats neo-Marxists (hey I should know, I read BLAZING CAT FUR). Well the good news for you normal Canadians out there is that they're all heading for NEWFOUNDLAND so maybe you can all rest just a li'l easier knowin' that they're gonna be far far away from you probably sweating it out in some rural shack with only a pot bellied stove to keep them company. A far cry from the lives these pampered individuals had been living but hey, that's the price for sticking up for what'cha believe in!
***And now for the moment we've been waiting for! Once again the offerings presented this time were gibben to me by a couple of well-worn fans (most namely Bill Shute and Paul McGarry) who really saved me a bundle burning these platters for my own personal fun and jamz...otherwise I'd have to pay mucho dinero for this junk! All kidding aside, like, uh, here it is.
When I began listening to this particular spinner I thought it was gonna be one of those "new country" type offerings kinda like the stuff they always have playing at the Dollar General Store when they ain't playing the glitzy top forty station that's sounded the same these past thirtysome years. Well, in many ways this does come off a bit like the new hip twang thang I guess is popular with the proles out there, but at times Bob and band do hearken back to the glory days of Peter Stampfel and that late-eighties urban folk style that was birthed with the Rounders and sorta grew from there. Not really bad at all, though not exactly my cup o' high energy blastout post-Velvets neo-kraut space splatter.
***
Haw! If Aunt Maud was the kinda gal to get you one of those cheapo Beatle ripoff albums she saw at the supermarket for 99-cents as a Christmas present, who would she buy FLOWER POWER SITAR for??? My guess is yer bachelor Uncle Walt, the one who liked to sit in that e-zy chair of his at night and watch MANTOVANI a whole lot. Never to miss out on a trend, Design Records take to the East with this offering that has some particularly twangy sitar playing along with the hits of the day done in that studio musician style that sounds beautifully antiseptic the way I always liked my Roxy Music albums to be. Nothing radical about these treatments of "Sweetest Little Fellow" jazzed up only in the slightest as some tasteful sitar strains play the lead. Sheesh, I'll bet that Uncle Walt liked this 'un even more'n the lava lamp and neckerchief, and you would too!
***
Well I guess if Greg Prevost could go the booze root then Rudi Protrudi could do the same thing as well! And the Fuzztoner does a pretty good job of it just like Prevost did! Of course there are differences twixt the two's output what with Protrudi playin' with an honest to goodniz band 'n all, but it sure sounds just as boffo as some of those under-the-radar blues acts that were getting their nods from the seventies onward. For some reason the Nighthawks stick in my mind which is strange since I ain't heard anything of theirs in o'er thirty years! Whatever, if you like those urban white guy blues outfits that were popping up with an alarming regularity ever since the mid-sixties (talkin' the ones that didn't suck) then you'll get a nice kick in the groin from this 'un as well!
***
Sheesh, didn't know that there were still any Ramones-influenced rock bands flowering across the map, but according to this release there was at least one back 2000 way. The Briefs do the ramalama drill sound good just as well as the Ramones used to, so if you're a big fan of Joey Johnny Dee Dee etc. you might like this one just as much as you liked the Suicide Commandos and all of those other Ramones-influenced brethren. Either that or you'll probably think that it's all a huge blasphemy against the original punk rock intent of it all and frankly I can see where you would be coming from!
***
Sheesh, is it hard to keep up with these sixties garage band samplers featuring the rarest of the rarey rare 'n all! But here's one I don't think I've heard of before, and it's a better'n I woulda expected collection. Once again the teens of the mop top era put their two cents into the new rock as aht mooment where even philosophers could prattle on about the Beatles, crankin' out more of those sad tales o' woe to a variety of minor chord melodies slyly copped from Paul Revere and the Raiders albums .As usual there's nothing that's outta the special here but hey, they can't all be BACK FROM THE GRAVE! The lack of liner notes fails to give me the low down regarding the Winkys employees and various other rapscallions who recorded these tracks, but somehow I get the feeling that maybe I just don't wanna know (after all, one of them could be your mother!).
***
The Allah Las-CALICO REVIEW CD-r burn (originally on Mexican Summer)
Another groovy goodie from this up and cummin' band. Like their previous endeavor(s) there's a great sixties-pop feeling that sounds as authentic as the real pop rock that was coming out at the time. I could be more'n OBVIOUS and bring up a whole slew of familiar names to compare this 'un to like the Flamin' Groovies for example, but I won't. I do hear some traces of what I'll admit is the cooler of the mid-sixties nerd brigade (Chad 'n Jeremy??? Yes!!!) thrown in with other mop top references yet it sounds way better'n some of the gal gaggers that were around a good fifty years back. Even some West Coast rumblings to be found therein. One that probably won't make much of a splash in the realms of rock 'n roll, but given just how wussified the entire music scene has been these past few eons what else is new?
***
Various Artists-MATALO FLAKE LOBOTOMY CD-r burn (Bill Shute)Bill really flung on the ol' rock 'n roll advertisements here (Gary Lewis and the Playboys for Kelloggs, not forgetting a slew of album and moom pitcher promos including one for VINCEBUS ERUPTUM) as well as some corny gnu wave such as the Space Lady singing both Steppenwolf and the Electric Prunes to a casiotone clunking machine (not forgetting the Metronomes, who don't sound quite as good as their namesake). Kinda wonder about some of the weirdos present---like, is Melinda Ligeti related to Gyorgy in any way and what the heck was the Randy and the Rest "Vacuum" side about anyway!!!! Winner of the batch...the Manikins who do the Flamin' Groovies ca. SHAKE SOME ACTION and late-seventies mop top revival pretty snat-like which just gets me to thinking that there must be thousands of these undiscovered groups who made records like this throughout the seventies and we'll NEVER get to discovering 'em all, let alone give 'em a listen to! Waah!
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