VINYL LISTENING ORGY UP YOUR WAZOO!

Sheesh. Sure wish that I could lead a real life like all of those competing bloggers out there in "Notice Me!"-land just so's I can ramble on about other significant subject matters that may cross the bloghairs of many a poster (politics, book/film/concert reviews...) but frankly my life is too much of a one-way street to do anything else than go to work, take care of the household and maybe listen to some old records down in the basement or perhaps a new Cee-Dee offering that passes my way, only if I feel up to it that is. Oh, it's either that or the ever-shrinking once-precious tee-vee time usually inna evening that occupies my non-sleeping hours. But even THAT'S becoming less and less as the days take their toll, and what's bad about it is that once I get hooked on a program I like and in fact can get obsessed with (just like I did when I was a kiddo and tee-vee was just BRIMMING with all sorts of mid-Amerigan slob-attuned obsessive programming) the show gets canned and I hafta go looking elsewhere for my tee-vee fun and games! Yeah it's really sad, especially since I was just getting really hooked on the YOGI BEAR reruns that Boomerang was showing on the weekends and now even that little oasis in an ocean of multi-channeled absurdities hadda've been taken off the air! Oh well, at least Huckleberry Hound is the featured "Boomeroyality" star this month so I'll be getting my fill of this Andy Griffith swipe and more o'er the next few weeks!

In the meanwhile here are a buncha discs that just happened to pop up on my turntable o'er the past week or so, not necessarily because they seemed to be harkening to me from their matted sleeves or tend to speak for my generation (or whatever's left of it), but because I thought that givin' 'em the writeup would look rather neato on this very blog and given how fashion-conscious I am what else could I do! Now how do you like that as a representation of my usually cool logic and reasoning?!?!?!?

***

The Bubble Puppy-"Hot Smoke and Sasafrass"/"Lonely" 45 rpm (International Artists)

When I first got latched onto this single back in 1979 I was excited as all get-out! Not only was the prospect of finding a record on the legendary International Artists label (and not necessarily the Radar reissues which were very desirable in themselves and just about as hard to find!) extremely tasty for this ever-budding rock & roll maniac, but finding one by this band which I had never heard of before made me feel about as important as the guy who found the Rosetta Stone or even the forbidden snaps taken at the Content Providers' Gay Liberation Felch-a-Thon with Jay Hinman providing entertainment by spinning all of the rare eighties singles he happened to dig up that week! However, by the time I took the rare booty home from the flea market and spun it on my now deceased cheapo-stereo my anticipation turned to abject woe...well, it wasn't that bad a listening experience but here I was expecting some solid hard-edged Texas garage-band punking and what did I get but (what at the time seemed like) basic heavy metal riffs with harmony vocals and a strange sense of late-sixties bred dismay overall. The flip "Lonely" wasn't that better but maybe I was just chungered by the letdown that the a-side incurred upon my battered soul and quickly found solace in...I dunno, an X-Ray Spex single or something but hey that's how I felt at the time!

Maybe time has changed me to a fault, but right now I find "Hot Smoke and Sasafrass" pretty snazzy as far as the cusp from mid-sixties garage band rock to late-sixties heavy metal goes, though I sure would've appreciated it more if the Pups had taken the late-sixties road to punkism like the Stooges and all good li'l snots did at the time. Still as a metal rec this one does succeed (as did its non-LP followup "What Do You See") not only with its smashbang guitar opening but the sprightly li'l instrumental interlude that shows the heavy influence of psychedelia upon the region, but without the mindless self-indulgence such chemical use could have inflicted upon more-impressionable minds.

Of course the biggest question I have regarding not only this single but the Bubble Puppy is...howcum hardly anybody considers this side a classic heavy metal BENCHMARK of some sorts? I mean, true FLASH magazine had a neet piece on them in their first issue and CREEM used to be on the ball mentioning them in their various heavy metal histories, but to the rank and file HM fans out there it seems as if metal began with Van Halen and everything before that was just "hard rock." Sheesh, what sorta history is that s'posed to be? Like Phast Phreddie once said, if you don't have roots, you're just a buncha leaves hanging around pretending to be a tree!

***

Hot Knives-"Hey Grandma"/"I Hear the Wind Blow" 45 rpm (KO)

Back in '77 there were a few people (not enough but at least they were there!) who were making the world a better place for our ears by performing, recording and writing about a music that was raw, exciting, refreshing, or any combination thereof, a music which a lotta people thought was totally new without any precedent that generally sprung forth from the minds of these creative geniuses like words flowed freely from the tips of Richard Meltzer's fingers. Of course those "in the know" knew that this sound was not exactlly all that "new"...it was just that most people had their heads buried firmly up the hindquarters of Jackson Browne and Joni Mitchell to hear anything outside of their rectal bleeps to notice what was happening in typical "Mr. Jones" fashion. Of course, some wise fellows who were part of this recording/performing frenzy weren't ashamed to borrow from way back into the panthenon of past rockism endeavors, even if it was treading rather close to the iffy strains of SAN FRANCISCO for any punk to dare admit, but back then it seemed as if even less noticed. I guess given that rock & roll as a major commodity was in such a sick state at the time even rockabilly came off like a new innovation next to the likes of...I dunno, Frampton???

Fortunately these Hot Knives borrowed from the RIGHT aspects of San Fran, mainly the good folk/punk cusp of the scene a la Moby Grape and a whole slew of great garage unknowns that I'm sure Alec Palao will gab your ears off about if you were locked in a room with him for twelve hours straight. Featuring two ex-Flamin' Groovies and a Sally Struthers lookalike, these Knives' hot rockin' take on the Grape's "Hey Grandma" comes so close to the original it ain't like it's a swipe, but more like pure homage without the smarm. (BTW, do I have to tell you that it was my review of the first Moby Grape platter last week that made me wanna dig this 'un outta the collection? I thought you guys were smarter'n that!) Still trying to find out the origins of flipster "I Hear the Wind Blow," a fine slice of 1966 Vejtables-styled folk rock with a lotta power and verve to it but have come up a dead end. I think I recall reading something about it somewhere, but whaddeva the origins this 'un's still a pretty hot example of what San Fransisco rock was supposed to be about...at least before that midgie fag wimp Jann Wenner began calling all the shots and the entire burgh became known for a lotta wimpass Marin County jive rather'n the promise the place once held way back in the day..

***

The Wailers-DO NOT RELEASE 10-inch EP (4-Dot)

Here's one that sorta popped up on the record buying market and vanished without a trace ten years back, a ten-incher featuring what's alleged to be mid-sixties era Wailers outtakes that, according to the INSERT included with this package, was released without former Wailer and Etiquette Records head Buck Ormsby's knowledge or blessings for that matter. Y'see, the story goes something like this: Ormsby gave a certain husband/wife team of Canadian origin (who were also involved with a fanzine of which only one issue came out) some authentic Wailers rarities on tape, most of which ended up on this bootleg while an earlier outtake and the sound portion of the Wailers' 6/59 AMERICAN BANDSTAND appearance turned up as a single without the express written whatever of the guy thus rankling the ire of this reknown band's former bass guitarist. Frankly I wouldn't be making a big to-do about it, only that I paid a good amount of change to run an ad for my own fanzine in that ne'er to be second issue, and as the case may be I haven't seen hide nor hair of that moolah since! (The same goes for the also gone but not forgotten THROAT CULTURE, a mag which I even contributed some shards of scribbled nonsense to way back in the ever-bleeding nineties!) And believe me, since people think I'm such a thin-skinned creep who shouldn't complain to the world when I get reamed over in the game of underground compadreship like that, all I gotta say is "WHAT'S WRONG WITH STANDING UP ON MY OWN SOAPBOX AND RANTING AND RAVING THE WAY I DO ANYWAY?????" Remember, the blogosphere is the closest to Hyde Park any of us'll ever get to, only I'll be lambasting that inbred queen of yours whether any of you want me to or not!

Tracks here sound more WAILERS WAILERS EVERYWHERE than OUT OF OUR TREE...restrained yet still with enough of that Northwest spark that really did a lot for the mid-sixties music scene albeit nobody outside of a few old fanzines and local commentators seems to acknowledge so but what else is new. Nice enough even though the original take of "Hang Up" lacks the official's hard drive and ya gotta admit that the Sonics had these guys beat all hollow...still, a little debbil inside me's gotta admit that I'm sorta glad those sheister's did what they did, though I share Ormsby's desire for justice all the more because like, he was the guy doin' it to being with!

***

IT'S ALL MEAT (pirate)

I'm sure a few of you remember hearing this Canadian group's pre-LP single "Feel It" on PEBBLES VOLUME 9 thinking this particular song was more or less stuck in the late-sixties punk scheme of things (and thus outta the "scope" of the rest of the tracks on that sampler), and even less of you probably recall reading the writeup the longplayer It's All Meat did for Columbia in '70 received at the hands of Jymn Parrett and DENIM DELINQUENT way back in '76. About fifteen years back somebody actually did a pirate of that disc...an OK job mind you only without the gatefold sleeve and with the inclusion of "Feel It" at the end in order to sweeten the pot a bit, but now that the item has been reissued on Cee-Dee by Hallucinations Records you won't have to rely on your decade-plus-old copy especially with the improved sound quality and outakes galore that Hallucinations decided to stick on. You may not have to rely on it, but """""I""""" sure do...y'see, I paid a whopping $15 for this from Forced Exposure, and given how that much of loot is like a FORTUNE to me let's just say I'm still getting my money's worth outta this platter and will CONTINUE to until it breaks or somethin' and then and only then will I fork over more for a new CD or whatever neat technological crapola they come up with once that time has come!

But for an occasional spinner IT'S ALL MEAT can't be beat for late-sixties rock without the boring noodling or sociorelevant twaddle that seemed like such a joke once 1972 rolled around. And it rocks so smoothly and sounds so sincere that even the "working it out from the inside" political number doesn't make you wanna gag! I will agree with Parrett's comments regarding how the band sound like 1967 West Coast rock a la Country Joe (the organ thing) with the "metal electricity of the late-sixties punk rockers," though just who these punks may be is open to question. The Stooges? Maybe Can??? But whatever, IT'S ALL MEAT has more than enough of that brazen garage trash aesthetic mixed with a neat sense of slow-burning intensity that'll keep your attention attuned even through a few misplaced Doors cops here and a blatant Steppenwolf allusion there. Nothing I'm going to go aaaaah! over, but still engaging enough to make me stand up and salute in spots!

***

John Coltrane-COLTRANOLOGY VOLUME ONE LP (Affinity, Spain)

I remember when I first played a John Coltrane album...it was MY FAVORITE THINGS which I had checked out of the local library after a few years of hearing his name and once again trying to quell that strange, morbid sense of curiousity I never was able to shake loose all my life. At the time I knew not what to expect...to me, Coltrane was a jazz guy who was inflluential on a number of rock musicians I had liked or at least had some peripheral interest in being a snot-nosed pre-driving age pimple farm and all, and being the kinda nerk who was discovering things like electronic music records that were also at the library I decided to take this 'un out and hear for myself what this guy (who, I had once suspected to be the FATHER of Chi Coltrane, the gal who had a hit with "Thunder and Lightning" in '72!) was up to and just how he much of his whatever-he-did could be discerened in the rock music I was playing at the time. (Come to think of it, I believe it was an FM-radio play of Devilcrabdip Carlos Santana and Maha-aha! John McLaughlin's LOVE DEVOTION AND SURRENDER on the local FM AOR station that got my attention perked considering how Coltrane got the cover treatment on that 'un! Talk about getting inspiration from the weirdest places!!!)

I really wasn't that impressed with Coltrane's take on the Rogers and Hammerstein "chestnut," expecting some sort of total energy music and getting something a bit "skippy" in the process. Even more skippy than Ornette (a guy I discovered later and enjoyed immensely more) and frankly I must admit that the experience turned me off to Coltrane for quite a few years because, hey I was still a kiddo, and even believed so! If I had only started with some total eruption side a la ASCENSION or even OHM which nobody except me likes...even Coltrane hated it once he heard the playback...maybe my opinions would have been a lot different than they had been. But starting with MY FAVORITE THINGS was def. a big mistake in the annals of my musical listening rationale, almost as bad as starting with Can's LIMITED EDITION 'stead of MONSTER MOVIE but (in my own humble defense)...sheesh, wuzza mid-teenage kid stuck inna middle of nadaswhere s'posed to do ANYWAY???

Funny enough, after all that I gotta admit that I still don't care that number, even the live take that appears on this Affinity issue of the Coltrane Quartet with special guest Eric Dolphy that came out sometime in the early-eighties. Naw, I like the album in general...the performances are enveloping enough and the classic white block letters on black background style that Affinity used on a whole lot of their covers (sometimes issued with white background and black block lettering on releases like the Spontaneous Music Ensemble's ONE, TWO, ALBERT AYLER) looks nice with the rest of the Affinity albums, most of them BYG Actuel reissues, hunkering around in my collection. But as for that song...it still doesn't swing with me...and maybe it's because I can't stand Julie Andrews and anything she may come in contact with that I carry over my ire towards this particular number, but even """""I""""" wouldn't go that far!

Gotta say that side two does rectify things (esp. when Dolphy's sweet flute and bass clarinet come into play) starting off with a mighty rendition of "Blue Train," "Naima" (for Coltrane's then wife) and closing out things that all-time wowzer "Impressions" ending this disc on a solidly positive note. In many ways this is Dolphy's album as much as it is Coltrane's, and it is kind of a shame that Mr. D didn't get joint billing on this issue because you know his name coulda helped double sales with relative ease!

One question some of you "serious" jazzbos might be able to answer for me, and that is which label originally issued this platter anyway? I know that Affinity was reissueing a lotta wares by the likes of BYG, Bethlehem and other deep-sixed outfits, but I can't find any reference to who might have put this one out way back in the day! I keep thinking it originally must've been a bootleg like the reams of jazz-oriented ones that were coming out in Europe at the time, but no mention of COLTRANOLOGY VOLUME ONE can be spotted anywhere on the sleeve. Hope somebody out there in the vast reaches of cyberspace with a half-of-ounce-of-jazz-intelligence can help this guy who has zilch-ounces-of-intelligence, jazz or otherwise! (See Jay, I can get "self-deprecating" too!)

***

Ten Years Afer-WATT LP (Deram)

Here's one I bought after reading Metal Mike Saunders' perhaps definitive article on heavy metal that the master did for a 1973 issue of PHONOGRAPH RECORD MAGAZINE mainly because he said that there were some downright Stoogian interludes to be found therein and that just wasn't counting the dog barks made by Alvin Lee that commenced this late-sixties blues chooze side either! Upon playing the thing I wasn't quite Stooged outta my mind like I thought I was gonna be, and in fact I was so nonplussed by it all that the record stayed in the collection ne'er to be dug out and digested...until now, that is.

If you think I've matured any since my original spin of WATT you may say I have. I gotta admit that I wasn't offended by Lee and company's obvious heavy-duty caucasifying of the blues sound...in fact a good portion of WATT sounds pleasing enough to accompany my evening fanzine reading hours. But if there is a spec of even the slightest big of high energy, I certainly can't really discern it. Even the closing live hash-out of Chuck Berry sounds about as staid as every other white guy band smashing the same chords into oblivion. Alvin Lee shoulda been made to listen to Crushed Butler until he cried for Clapton!

***

Various Artists-LIKE WOW LP (Hydra, Germany)

Here's an old fave that for some odd reason I believed to be groove-damaged, but checking it out just to make sure this very day I found out that it sounded as crystal as ever much to my heart's content! And it's a good thing too, because LIKE WOW is a pretty irreplaceable album pressed up back inna late-eighties when loads of these European-origin albums chock fulla Amerigan obscurities were coming to light. Not only does this one have all four sides of the Decca Tony Conn singles (FYI one of the wilder of the late-fifties rockabilly cats who, if the excerpts from his unpublished autobio printed in BACK DOOR MAN can be believed, was one completely off-the-wall rocker which is something easily discerned from his extensive telling of his childhood booger memories!) to some early Johnny Burnette Rock 'n' Roll Trio sides (might-T primal) and best of all two tracks from an unnamed acetate featuring some of the craziest sub-garage band sputum to ever get issued amongst some already-deranged sides! People were always wondering about the roots of punk rock back inna seventies, and if this scronker came out back then we wouldn't have to had heard loads of "experts" tracing the sound back to Frank Zappa! If you living under the delusion that mid/late-fifties rock & roll was all HAPPY DAYS-inspired fluff listen to this 'un and please re-evaluate your rather off-kilter thoughts!

***

The Human Arts Ensemble-LIVE IN TRIO PERFORMANCES VOLUME 1 (Circle, Germany)

And finally for today's record soiree comes this rarity that was recorded at the 1978 Moers Jazz Festival and released on the Circle label, a company that I believe existed only to release the music that was recorded at that fest and nothin' but! Anyhoo, this disc features half of the Human Arts Ensemble (Charles "Bobo" Shaw's Black Arts Group-backed seventies aggregate) in performance, this half featuring saxophonist Luther Thomas along with bassist John Linberg and Shaw working it out in a pretty snat fashion that really reminds me of all the fun I had watching those Sunday night free jazz performances at the CBGB Lounge that really re-opened my eyes to a lotta the avantness that still abounded even that late in the new millenium game. Thomas's style is not unlike that of Albert Ayler's only with a more seventies sense of jazz cynicism (y'know, that beyond-belief drive that pretty much replaces the myopic love vision of the previous decade) while Linberg plucks and arcos free enough for my tastes and Shaw was one of the better free play drummers to come out of the seventies if you ask me. If you can, try finding volume two which has Shaw playing a set with other half Joseph Bowie on trombone and guitarist James Emory playing equally off-tangent even when they're doing yet another version of "Concere Natashiah," perhaps thee signature song of the group!

Click here for a heavy metal spoofer that's not only funnier than the usual HM gags, but presents the form in a lot smarter fashion'n most of the SERIOUS stuff extant!

Bill Wilson-TALKING TO STARS LP (Bar-B-Q)

Oh the indignity of it all...after a few years of kicking about you're finally signed to none other than biggie Columbia and actually get that rare opportunity that few others could ever dream of, mainly to release an album on a major label and here it is 1976 and you're back in Bloomington Indiana recording for a local label that's actually a front for a drug dealing operation! (Well, that's what Mark Bingham said, and who am I to argue with a spokesman for a generation, or at least for a scene???) That's just what happened to this Bill Wilson guy, yet another one of the thousands of singer/songwriters of the early-seventies who sorta got wooshed outta existence thanks to the likes of Joni and James and the rest of those trashed-out troubadours who made millions singing about the same sorta personal angst most of us had better sense to keep in the closet while overtaking the same market that stifled the voices of thousands more who might've been even more neurotic! Well, at least Wilson didn't revel in the same sorta "Fire and Rain" self-psychotherapy that seemed to permeate the entire Taylor clan, but that doesn't mean he's exactly outta the woods w/regards to making us sick with the poetic precociousness and pseudo-rock he does dish out for the listener on this mid-seventies whomper.

Frankly the entire disc is instant douse even if the aforementioned Bingham (then local bigshot with his Screaming Gypsy Bandits and later on leader of the Hoboken NJ-based Social Climbers) does trot out his 12-string guitar for a track or three. TALKING TO STARS (as if the title wasn't a tipoff!) is nothing but your average pseudo-intellectual playing at bigtime star about one step above Jim Croce but still "down there" mind you and a pretty good reason that mags like BACK DOOR MAN sprung up to counteract alla that folkie (w/heavy country honky tonkness to sucker somebody in!) whiz o' the seventies. However, there are some things regarding this platter that would satisfy the normal peruser of this blog, one of 'em being that the drummer on five of the tracks here is none other than one Kenny Aranoff, a guy whose "talents" (for wont of a better word) on various recordings by one John Cougar Mellencamp has wowed aficionados as disparate as Chuck Eddy and Bill Shute o'er the years to the point of froth worthy of my dog Sam's snout on a particulaly hot day. I remember Shute telling me back in the late-eighties that he thought Aranoff was one of the best drummers in the biz, and I recall telling Bill he was fulla beans! It was all in fun though, but really if there's any big dif between Aranoff's style (which, as you can tell from my various remarks is nothing that impresses me in any special way) and a number of Aranoff's "competitors" I can't hear it. Not that I'm trying to pay attention though...

For us readers who couldn't stand the sight of Mellencamp and his whole mid-Amerigan jeeter pose its the rest of the credits that'll make us turn heads in a 360 a la Sherwood on the old BARNEY BEAN SHOW. Bruce Anderson from MX-80 Sound is here for "color direction" (under the heading "cover design") while none other than Andrea Ross, also known as the infamous Angel Corpus Christi helped out with the "back cover photos and cover assistance" whatever that means, but since the gal posing in the two snaps which look more like fine ink drawings than actual photos on the sleeve's reverse seems to very closely resemble one ACC I wonder if in fact she was being credited for being a flesh-and-blood MODEL for this rather plain elpee's sleevework! And I would certainly like to know if this is so, because if in fact it is the future Mrs. Stim who lent her visage to this platter's cover I swear never to sell, dump, fold, spindle or mutilate this album in any way, shape or form! Perhaps a very close and personal friend like Lindsay Hutton could find out, but until then this bizarroid fact just might be one of the bigger mysteries to clog up the minds of Bloomington Indiana moozik freaks world-wide!

***

Zuno Keisatsu-ALBUM 4 CD (Victor Entertainment, Japan)


Those of you who've read my previous reviews of Zuno Keisatsu (Brain Police to you) already know what to expect here...more Japanese-language agitprop backed by an interesting sorta folk-punk that seems to draw heavily from Marc Bolan during both his Tyrannosaurus Rex and T. Rex days. Having a knowledge of leader/cute teenage throb guy Panta's native tongue would certainly help in the enjoyment of these disques, but even if you haven't taken the Berlitz course in Japanese you might get a slight bitta pleasure outta these early-seventies romps that at times do take on a bit of the Kyu Sakamoto effect (sappy strings and slight folk introspection a la the 1970 Les Rallizes Denudes sides which reverberates in a lotta the current Japanese underground sides even to this day!). Nothing Earth-shattering especially when compared to a lotta foreign-tongue early-seventies garage/punk (Umela Hmota come to mind), but an interesting enough excursion for those of you who wanna take a break from the usual high-energy thrills and wanna cruise at mid-energy for awhile.

ANOTHER LONG-WINDED BLOG TO COMM VINYL LISTENING ORGY!

Gee, I know mentioning this will make me look like a sentimental old turd especially to all of you decadent geeks out there in real world land, but I'm so in love with my relatively new turntable to the point where I've spent a good portion of the past few months huddled in that special corner of the basement going through my not-that-humongous (but humongous enough to family and friends) stacks o' vinyl goodies listening to a lotta acquisitions both old and new just like I have been doing ever since being allowed near one of those things! Thus this latest in hopefully a long line of vinyl listening orgies that I know will continue to enthrall most of you dedicated BLOG TO COMM followers out there...now as a word of warning let me tell you off the bat that many of these items have been reviewed before in the pages of my own doomed to obscurity fanzine but like it's been so long since I've last spun 'em that it's almost like I'm givin 'em an all-new playing so don't go comparin' what I mighta written about 'em 15/20 years back with my current opinions! In fact I'm not gonna comb through teetering stacks of unsold wares to glom my original views on these things even at the risk of sounding like a critical Benedict Arnold! Lord knows we've had enough of 'em o'er the years, but as the long-forgotten Torky Koenigs once said people have the right to change their minds, and who am I to argue with another reminder of just how lame the entire late-eighties/early-nineties critical fan base was and shall remain! So, on with the blow...

ART ENSEMBLE OF CHICAGO LIVE 2-LP set (Affinity England)

When I first spun these elusive discs I was knocked out to the point where I actually believed in my brain of brains that I had at last uncovered the ultimate in Art Ensemble recordings which have (no contest!) toppled the entire backlog of AACM-related tuneage heard by my precious ears to the point where I proudly planned to say in no uncertain terms that this ART ENSEMBLE OF CHICAGO LIVE (Affinity) twofer is the ONLY Art Ensemble you'll need! The second time...well, it was merely "very good" so I don't know if it was me or the Cajun rice and beans I had for dinner. Whatever, this is one I had been waiting to hear for a very long time in classic Fatty Arbuckle-speak...a rarity that is allegedly from the BYG catalog although one online source claims that it was released only in Japan and I guess it has been reissued on one of those Italian labels handling the BYG backlog, albeit in the same block lettering Affinity sleeve in which it originally was released back inna early-eighties! Confused? Sure, but you can't be as confused as the folks at Forced Exposure who continually have this item up for sale on their website even though I've ordered it umpteen times only to find that it's "out of stock," as if it was ever "in stock" to begin with.

But whadevva, ART ENSEMBLE OF CHICAGO LIVE is yet another worthy to track down if you claim to be part and parcel to the whole early AEC sway and swerve that seemed to present the group at its best long before they became "thee" hipster measuring stick as to just how "far out" jazz could get. Disc one's nothing but one extended rave entitled "Oh Strange," a Joseph Jarman/Lester Bowie composition that reminds me a lot of "People in Sorrow" the way it slow burns a relatively soft-yet-intense underpinning to the solos of Jarman and Bowie while rec #2 "Bon Voyage" (Bowie) is a fantastic free play from the group performing over a bed of some of the best free drumming I've heard in a long time which leads me to believe what others do that this 'un doesn't originate from the same October 5, 1969 gig as the first elpee but from a later gig when Don Moye joined the group! Whaddeva, it's a wild trip through the nastier side of the even newer thing esp. when Malachi Favors starts plucking away on his zither like a kid inna toy shop and Fontella Bass contributes some fine sing/screaming that sounds like what Grace Slick thought she sounded like and Yoko Ono shoulda when she was mixing her rock and roll with the avant garde! One to keep both peepers opened for lest you settle back into the shocking complacency of Chick Corea!

***

Anthony Braxton-NEW YORK, FALL 1974 LP (Arista)

This is the one that got Anthony Braxton outta the free jazz ghetto and onto a major label, an upstart young budding major mind you but one that was more'n anxious to take chances on wild mavericks like Braxton and Patti Smith while raking in the long green with Barry Manilow and the Bay City Rollers. But then again, this was during that strange harmonic convergence'r whaddeva it was that made the mid-seventies such a fascinating place to live at the time (see previous post), an era where things were still so open and free that you could go into any record shop and pick up Amon Duul and Portsmouth Sinfonia albums with little effort, and I'm not even talking the import section either!

Oddly enough, on NEW YORK, FALL 1974 Braxton's not exactly the out-there abstractionist one might have expected from his earlier offerings, but the man does harken way back to the early-sixties avant garde of John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy for inspiration and I guess that was good enough for most of the jazz audience still reeling from some of the sounds that had been coming outta the jazz world for the past few years. Even with the sax quartet and duo with synthesizer player Richard Teitelbaum Braxton avoids the outer realms that are most associated with the likes of the AACM and hey, one can easily enough hear how (within a good six months) this rising star could have sessioned with his longtime hero Dave Brubeck on the latter's own foray into avantdom for Atlantic. But still, I can hear a slight hint of, I dunno, that very same pomposity? which made Richard Meltzer call Braxton the new Brubeck for late-seventies hipster college kids. Can you???

***

The Nephews-BEATHAVEN 10-inch LP/EP (Flapping Jet)

While thumbing through a stack of 10-inch discs looking for the spiffy Bon Vivants mini-album (well, it was either that or my copy of Ravel's BOLERO), I chanced upon this forgotten platter that I can't recall if I liked or loathed (remember, I'm not checking on past reviews just so I can cover my hindquarters!). Throwing all caution to the wind I decided to give these Nephews yet another spin not only because the record looked so tasty with its typically alterno-nineties graphics and all, but because the label that put this out was named after an Electric Eels song and since I'm "getting back into" the Eels after a good few years of hibernating could the godz be dropping any heftier hints my way???

Hey, turns out that despite all of the easily identifiable underground reference points and typically moderne updating that usually dooms such offerings to the instant sell pile these Nephews were pretty snat after all! Nothing awe-inspiring or secret-of-life revealing bere and they certainly ain't the Electric Eels let alone the entire seventies Cleveland underground scene, but (fortunately) the Nephews don't take their garage license to the utter depths of kitsch corn. Covers of Ut, Godz and Berry intermingle with the two-track-sounding original compositions of one Tim Ellison, whom I assume was the leader of this groupage if only because he wrote the original numbers here and he's a famed rock critic, the closest anyone'll come to Richard Meltzer outside of Byron Coley these days (I'm tempted to type "...the closest anyone'll come to Richard Meltzer outside of Byron Coley and ME" but I won't out of false modesty). I'm trying to pick out which one he is on the back cover, but I dunno if he will ever let on as to who's who. After all, they all look kinda skateboardy, if you know what I mean.

***

Sproton Layer-"Lost Behind Words"/"Space Red", "Jam From Outer Space" EP (New Alliance)

Speaking of Ellison, I remember he was really gung ho on this late-sixties Ann Arbor aggregate which featured not only the Miller Brothers (future Destroy All Monsters [yay!] and Mission of Burma [zzzzzzz!]) but trumpeter Harold Kirchen, who happened to be the brother of Seventh Seal/Commander Cody guitarist Bill making Sproton Layer perhaps one of the truly forgotten nth-ranking bands on the Detroit area scene at the time. Come to think of it I also was hot on Sproton Layer around the time (1991) not only their long-unreleased "concept" album WITH MAGNETIC FIELDS DISRUPTED finally came out but this li'l clear-vinyl gem was released to an unsuspecing/uncaring public. In fact, I gotta admit to you thriving blogreaders out there that I prefer this seven-inch slab to the actual album mainly because it captures the late-sixties garage band anger a lot better'n any of us might've thought, complete with a Detroit attitude and typical weirdness that could jumble and jive the Stooges and Pink Floyd influences with seeming ease and still not look stupid! I wish New Alliance would've stuck these tracks onto the CD version of the album, and come to think of it I wouldn't mind hearing all the sessions these tracks came from in their entirety which might be a possibility considering how well established the Miller Brothers are in light of their underground credo, eh? Until then, we can just spin this 'un over and over the same way I play that Amon Duul live '68 mp3 fragment that's goin' 'round trying to imagine what it's like en toto.

***

Copernicus-"Pink Lips"/"Quasimodo" single (Smalkowski)

Here's the official debut Copernicus single mentioned in my Turner and Kirwan of Wexford review a week or so back. It's a plain item, no pic sleeve or anything and the label it's on happens to also be the guy's real last name if you can beat that! Although side two turns up on his stellar NOTHING EXISTS disc you'll also want it for "Pink Lips" which has Copernicus swearin' all over the place while the rest of the Major Thinkers start riffin' the Kinks' "All Day and All of the Night." One disturbing image from this side has Our Hero threatening to kiss none other'n then prez Jimmy Carter on his big puffy lips! Now that image is enough to make me wanna toss more'n a few cookies into the poreclain confessional!

***

The Wailers-OUT OF OUR TREE (Etiquette)

Remember when Park Avenue Records (then home to the Wipers) outta Seattle was sellin' these cheapo knockoffs of classic Northwest punk rock albums in the early-eighties? Besides this notable reissue from Northwest KINGS the Wailers, Park Avenue was also selling the first two Sonics Lps (also on Etiquette) and the Paul Revere and the Raiders Sande album and for pretty hefty pennies as well! And to tell you the truth back in '80 I was lucky if I could scratch together enough copper to buy an import single let alone an entire album of this historical magnitude that was going for a whopping $10.99 per...but I managed to latch onto 'em all and relished every second of those great sixties slabs even if they did sound like they were recorded from "dubious" sources and were way overpriced t'boot. Of course within a few years alla this stuff was reissued legally (I think) and from master tapes as well making all of those early-eighties acquisitions obsolete, but I still cherished these albums to the utmost if just for the warm 'n toasty meaning behind 'em all.

This 'un's the classic mid-sixties Wailers offering that Norton wouldn't release in its entirety mainly because they thought some of the slower cuts like "Unchained Melody" and "Summertime" blew chunks royally. (They eventually released the more- pumped up portion of OUT OF OUR TREE along with tracks from the group's nationally-distributed offering OUTBURST on United Artists to make an all-new, and come to think of it all-rocking album more in tune with Norton's entire reason for being.) Well, I can see how some hot-to-rock label like Norton'd think that those slow tunes were absolute snoozers, but I like OUT OF OUR TREE in its entirety anyway, even if the slow stuff can get a bit obtrusive at times. The rest of the disc from their Sonics-sounding period (as the Bomp mailorder catalog once put it) has the Wailers sounding a lot closer to Gerry Roslie and the crew than Roslie and crew sounded like the Wailers, and besides romping into the familiar r&b territory that had been part and parcel of the Wailers sound since '58 be thankful that OUT OF OUR TREE has more of those patented Northwest wails and yelps on such screamers as the title track, "Baby Don't Do It" and of course the all-out punk yelper "Hang Up," a song I can relate to because way too many people think """""I""""" have one! Can you believe that?

The softer stuff that turned off the likes of Billy Miller is OK as well...actually I think "Hang on Sloopy" is a bit of instant douse and "Unchained Melody" sounds about as chained as it could get, but their version of "Summertime" is almost as good as Big Brother and the Holding Company's and that's getting pretty good! And of course what would this review be without a mention of their Beatles cover, "I'm Down" which is perhaps one of the better takes of the Fab Foes as anything to come outta the mid-sixties! Low-Fi or not, OUT OF OUR TREE is a cool winner no matter how you slice it!

***

BIG BROTHER AND THE HOLDING COMPANY (Mainstream)

Speaking of Big Brother, I realized that I haven't been listening to enough San Francisco rock as of late which prompted me to drag not only this 'un but the following item outta the mothballs. It's the consensus of most that this Mainstream debut really ain't the group's most "representative" outing but I like it even with the occasional flubs here and there (most notably "Easy Rider" which proved that James Gurley, although a fantastic guitarist, maybe shoulda kept his trap shut!). True this can't come close to such Big Brother highpoints as "Oh Sweet Mary" offa the much-improved CHEAP THRILLS but it sure has enough of its skewered Gurley guitar moments like the incredible "Light is Faster Than Sound," a free-screeching ode to amphetamine that sounds positively dull in comparison on all of the live bootlegs I've heard. The rest of BIG BROTHER AND THE HOLDING COMPANY is upbeat enough from the dazed proto-punk of "Intruder" to the sweet fifties throwback "Call on Me" while the relatively light, everyday sorta "clean" sound of the thing holds up well even four decades after the fact. And true, Janis always kinda irritated me with her downhome farmgirl gone acid image, but in the company of Big Brother you don't mind that these guys're tied in the dye hippies one bit because the whole thing is so rock & roll to the point where Gurley's indian headress ain't even offensive like it should be!

***

MOBY GRAPE (CBS South Africa)

Here's a disc I got a long time back from this Texas oriented record dealer by the name of Darren Mencken. Mencken was originally from South Africa and I guess he brought a lotta records from down that way up this way when he made the trek, because back when we were doin' business I not only got hold of this South African issue of the class act debut Moby Grape disc but the equally legendary MOBY GRAPE '69 which believe-it-or-not was issued on Columbia subsidiary Date down Johannesburg way! I still have yet to dig that 'un out but I found this easily enough and yeah, it's just as good as I remembered not only with the great harmonies (which retain a sort of punk arrogance unlike those of Crosby Stills and Whatever's with the Grateful Dead coming a close second) but with the stellar multa-lead guitars and high-energy Southern Californian post-folk rock which was still firmly rooted in mid-sixties fun and games unlike the processed material most of Grape's intellectual competition was beginning to work up. It's too bad that these guys hadda let their libidos get in the way of their potential successes and Skip Spence hadda flip out into oblivion because ya know Moby Grape not only had the big label push but the uncontested talent to have made San Francisco a little more'n the hackfest market it eventually turned out to be.

***

Electrified Fukuko-GAMBLE '86 12-inch EP (Tokyo Telegraph, Japan)

Finally on today's schedule's this rarity that came out of the Japanese underground back inna mid-to-late eighties (not exactly a boon time for great soundscapading) featuring yet anudder one-a them all-gal groups that seemed to be the rage back then, or at least it would seem that way considering how alla them boneheaded critics were always on the search for something superficial to write about while ignoring all of the really innovative and exciting things that were happening right under their very nostrils. Anyhoo, this group is probably best known because it had Ikue Mori on drums, she once being a member of the infamous no wave group DNA back inna eighties and after that the drumstress for the less-known yet still revered by some Thick Pigeon. Also in the group is Emiko Mogi on guitar, another remnant of the olden days of Japanese underground and confidante of none other'n Reck of Friction fame, while some gal by the name on Non, past resume unknown, takes care of the bass playing as well as some rather girly-girlish vocals. It all sounds a lot like something you would have expected from the Japanese scene at the time, and given how Reck himself is thanked on the back cover you can imagine just how deep the underground roots intertwine. Actually it's kinda like Ut only more rock & rolling, with a fashion-conscious Japanese gal swivel to it 'stead of New York artsyness that makes it all the more tastier. I dunno (or care) what you think, but I always believed that Mori was a great drummer, sort of a naturally talented amateur perhaps, but another Maureen Tucker nonetheless who needed to find a good American suburban garage band to be in 'stead of wallow in that soul-less downtown art mire. On this disc she does show her true potential as a percussionist par (inspired amateur) excellence and playing in a rock & roll setting without any of the pretension that one might find in the New York "art" (yech!) world. Too bad she hadda get into electronic improvised music that always seemed like the best substitute for Sominex around!

CREATIVE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY

Can any of you more attuned jazzbos out there explain to me just what was that strange harmonic convergence or lunar shift or whatever it was that was goin' on back in the mid-seventies that made Anthony Braxton the household name he most certainly was? (At least in jazz-attuned households, but hey, he was riding a wave so to speak!) Was it that very same sorta kultural jumble that got Patti Smith signed, or was it something a lot deeper than I or any true-blue BLOG TO COMM reader'll ever be able to comprehend??? The reason I'm askin' is that here's some guy, pretty OUT THERE esp. for a jazz world that was still staggering from the sixties new wave thing that gave us Coleman, Coltrane, Shepp and so forth who was part and parcel of the exceedingly fringe-like (and legendary even at that early stage) AACM recording relatively obscure but sought-after records at home and abroad, and by the middle portion of that oft-loathed seventies what else happens than he's up and signed to the brand-spanking new Arista label making albums that can easily be picked up in reg'lar non-specialty shops right next to all of those dinner club and bowtie jazz offerings! And what's more, even the stuff Braxton had recorded during much leaner times for small outta-the-way companies like Muse and Inner City were startin' to take up precious bin-space as well which really does (after a safe three decades later) kinda make me do a lotta head scratchin'! It got to the point where Braxton was such a Big Man on the Jazz Campus that I recall none other'n Richard Meltzer in his PHONOGRAPH RECORD MAGAZINE article on 77 things about the year 1977 sayin' that Braxton as well as Keith Jarrett were nothing more'n the late-seventies phony-intellectual kid answer to what Dave Brubeck was in the early-sixties, a comparison I'm sure would have warmed the cockles of the Brubeck-loving (even appearing on his 1975 avant garde longplayer on Atlantic!) Braxton! I mean, stuff like that just isn't supposed to happen at all, though considering this was the time more/less when the Art Ensemble of Chicago could get signed to Atlantic and somehow the avant gardes of rock, jazz and classical were beginning to intermingle to the point of incestuousness who knows, maybe the planets were shifting with the force of lunar gravity because in a few short years with all of the vinyl shortages and sagging sales giving the industry sever shocks it wasn't like any label, not even an "adventurous" one like Arista, were gonna be catering to the jazz avant garde like they would the arena rock brigades and ginchy post-disco gnu wave, if you know what I mean.

But for a time yeah, it was cool...cool enough so that a poor kid like me who spent more'n an inordinate amount of time drooling over all those unattainable discs in shopping mall bins county-wide got more'n enough kicks snooping through the jazz racks to get a look at the likes of these Braxton albums which seemed so beyond-the-ken, esp. after reading Richard Walls' various writeups in CREEM and eyeballing those weird graphic titles natch! And amongst the hoardes of free jazz that was suddenly making a surprise appearance on the racks (and even getting "featured" new release space on the walls just like all those heavy new rock platters) were these two albums by the Creative Construction Company, a working jazz co-op that somehow caught my eye way back in my stool days when I'd read DOWN BEAT at the library during study hall trying to act like some sort of hot stuff, at least in my own time frame. And after all this time I gotta admit that I dunno exactly what lit my ass re. wanting to hear this group with a passion...it might've been the list of instruments next to each player's name which seemed about as impressive as all of those Association and Frank Zappa records which displayed a wide array of exotic instruments I thought added zest to an already exciting music, or maybe it was the plain fact that this Braxton guy who had been getting mucho press was in the outfit. Most likely it was the group's name that turned me on even though it does sound like the title of some long-forgotten PBS children's show of the day.

Yeah I gotta tell ya that the mere idea of this ultra-free music even existing (and being relayed to anxious open-eared kids even via the ultra-staid DOWN BEAT) was more'n enough to get THIS not-so-dim bulb hot enough to actually dish out the $5.99 for CREATIVE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY on the ultra-miniscule Muse label. In retrospect it ain't hard to see just how much of an impact this 'un had on me, for this rec was the introduction of the entire AACM soundscapading oeuvre to this rabid teen and held such promise for those starved for new vistas to the point where, after coming home from the very same family vacation where I netted the thing (trip also rendering the likes of WIZZARD'S BREW, CHUNGA'S REVENGE, HOT RATS and A BEARD OF STARS amongst other worthies into my collection) I actually unwrapped my copy and played in full force upon my 4:00 AM arrival home even when the folks were tellin' me I should go to bed! Talk about unbridled devotion to the form!

Anyhoo, the entire concept behind these recordings was enough to keep me spellbound as much (if not more?) as the Coleman and Coltrane I had been listening to for the past year or so, as did a lotta the machinations behind what was going on in the avant garde jazz scene of the late-sixties on. And with Braxton's popularity on the upswing and his name appearing either as leader, sideman or as a member of groups such as the CCC or Circle (which also included onetime collaborator Chick Corea???) I was so glad to finally discover what the CCC was all about perhaps still thinking of out-there abstractions strictly in rock terms a la Zappa and Beefheart, but it sure was gonna be fun to find out all about it. Was this another AACM head-on attempt to create another cooperative (and attention-grabbing) group like the Art Ensemble? (As Robert Palmer's surprisingly good liners denote, the Braxton recordings of the previous few years were in fact CCC efforts released under the reedist's name because his was much more identifiable.) Whatever, when I plunked the needle down to hear what it was all about I certainly was surprised...this music was an incredible free, perhaps too cacophanous sound that at the time I found rather incomprehensible even after listening to the usual bigname attempts at creating a free music, usually getting hampered by major lable constraints in the process.

Oddly enough, after thirtysome years and many records down the crustacean tubes CREATIVE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY sounds a lot calmer and (to get hippie about it) "together" than the madness it seemed like that hot August night oh so long ago. Contrary to what a neophyte like I would have thought, this disc seemes to be led more by Leroy Jenkins' free violin (as well as his wheezing harmonica and various typically AACM-ish "small instruments") than it does Braxton's woodwind arsenal or trumpeter Leo Smith for that matter. Heck, "guest" pianist Muhal Richard Abrams, whom the LP-long track "Muhal" is obviously dedicated to, seems to play just as much a part in the direction this group is heading as star Braxton making me wonder why those other albums weren't properly credited as CCC offerings as well since the collective imput of even those seems to override Braxton as being the sole star of the series. But maybe I shouldn't complain...it ain't any worse'n some soon-to-be jazz hero getting the star treatment on an album he played as a sideman on only a few years prior.

And in case you're taking notes, the CCC, at least on these live tracks recorded at "The Peace Church" (yech!) was rounded out by drummer Steve McCall as well as guest bassist Richard Davis who way too many wonks out there will remember and remember only as the bassist on Van Morrison's MOONDANCE.

Strange as it may seem, the second volume from this live gig that got released a year later (entitled "No More White Gloves (With Sand Under Your Shoes Doing a Dance" [!], and that title is funny at least on a black consciousness level) doesn't quite zone me the same way the first volume does even with more of that fantastic Jenkins violin sawing (better'n Ornette and maybe even ex-student Billy Bang), but like some of these creative efforts I might have to let it to soak into my system a bit longer. Still, this entire live sesh (why it wasn't released as a double I'll never know, and why this as well as some of the other Muse/Inner City catalog isn't available readily in the here and now is also tantamount to somethingorother I'd care not to even think about these days lest it get my bile up!) is pretty snat in its own abstract AACM way and even this far down the line you can hear the reverberations echoing back and forth in the music of such interesting free jazz co-ops like Freedomland and many of those other long-forgotten aggregates I used to tune into via cybercast way back inna early-to-mid oh-ohs, a time I'm strangely feeling hunger pangs for considering how a lotta the verve and sway of the avant garde has been taking a back seat to...I dunno, a shallow shell of its former self? Heck, last time I looked there was this review of a show where Braxton was playing his avant scronk to some kid doing stand up comedy! And I guess progress is progress and all that, but did it all have to come down to this???

The Day Care Centre-A JUMPIN' JACKPOT OF MELODY 2-LP set (Czecher Records, Czech Republic)

J. D. King recommended this one to me, sayin' in his usual restrained way that it came off like a cross between the Velvet Underground, Syd and Sonic Youth, with maybe some krautrock thrown in there as well. And after such a recommendation as that why should I even review this thing? After all, King said everything about it that needs to be put to pixel so why should I bore you with my own opines onna thing!

Oh yeah, I guess you want me to imbue this review with a little bitta insight along with my usual long-windedness, eh? Well, I certainly am good for doin' it all, and I gotta admit that an item like this (not only a vinyl-only affair but a two-record set that comes in a gatefold sleeve!) is something that is worthy of my attention, limited span that it has. And considering that amongst the members of this Day Care Centre is none other than an honest to goshness former bandmate of King's during his Coachmen days whose name isn't Thurston Moore then maybe we're really onto something with this new release that's making pretty sure that 2007 ain't just another hum-drum ho-ho year filled with the usual blogfodder that might excite the usual pipsqueaks but not ME!!!

Extrapolating on King's description...yeah, the ever-pervasive presence of the once-sainted VELVET UNDERGROUND INFLUENCE is in full swing here, though thankfully it ain't the tiresome drone-on VU snore that way too many acts in this so-called "underground" have milked to a terminally eroded state thinner'n my own hairline (you already know the usual suspects!). Actually it's a pretty hefty sorta Velvets homage that A JUMPIN' JACKPOT OF MELODY oozes all over, and considering that a good portion of these platters evoke classic late-sixties garage band riffage a la Faust (think first LP, side two track one), Amon Duul II and a nice enough portion of the better krautrock groups during the day then may I even call this a true 2007 update on early Sonic Youth and F/i experiments in the same droneage twennysome years back? I'd also toss in the Coachmen themselves (at least the latterday variety) and hey, as far as Syd goes where would anything be without him?????

Oh yeah, the group consists of Rich Clarahan on guitar and bass, Dan Hill on bass and guitar, Laura Feathers on violin and Dave Keay on drums. I dunno who does that spoken word thingie on the only "vocal" track on side for but whoever he is, he sure sounds like a creep! Anyway, Keay is the guy who used to be in the Coachmen (hence King's initial interest in these disques) and he was also with Harry Toledo for a spell. Keay is also married to Feathers which I guess might put another li'l spin on this outing. Unfortunately, like the Coachmen this group is a studio-only affair so don't expect to see 'em playin' anywhere, that is if there's any place that would let them play this def. spaced-out repeato-rock. And if you wanna buy one for yourself, let it be known that although the usual outlets seem to be lacking New Yorkers might be able to snatch it up at Bleeker Bob's, Subterranean, Kim's Video and Mercer St. Books. Everyone else pray that the big time underground music providers get the hint and real soon.

***

The Light-TURN ON... CD (Ugly Things, click on link at left to order)


Ugly Things' recording arm continues to pop out these once-obscure six-oh garage band items like there was no tomorrow, and considering how these Southern Californian mop tops got their own humble feature in the latest ish of that very mag like what else would you expect? OK, you might think it some sorta incestuous tie up with the mag promoting the hootch its sellin' for obvious free pub reasons, but I sure find it a whole lot less offensive'n when ROLLING STONE was pumping the entire Taylor Family and in-laws as the next big hep trip while gobblin' up all that Warner Brothers money that was promotin' the saccharine likes of James, Livingston and Carly!

Anyway, for late-sixties So Cal fun and games (as opposed to the slick folkie trip that entire scene would mudslide into once 1969 rolled around) you can't beat TURN ON... which not only has a bit of the then-fading Music Machine sound and attitude (thanks to producer Brian Ross who as you may know also produced our one-gloved wonders) but a bit of the Moby Grape-derived "good timey" San Francisco feel and of course a general West Coast attitude that like I said wasn't gag inducing yet. Lotsa fun post-Byrdsian moments here, one brazen Beatles SGT. PEPPER (w/o the proto-prog hysteria) ripoff and loads of that great garage band negative energy that for some not-so-odd reason sounded so refreshing in light of the whole "kumbaya" trip of the day. Mike Stax, Alec Palao and the rest of the names involved of course need to be commended, though what should we give A&M for not stickin' by these punks while rakin' in all that Tijuana Brass moolah other'n one big RAZZ!!!

RIDING THE GNU WAVE!

Remember this strange chain of events that started somewhere in the seventies? First off there appeared this maybe not-so-new music that was getting written up in a wide variety of mags 'n papers that going under the name "underground rock" or "punk rock" or even "garage band music" if you so prefer. We're talkin' early '76 or so, back when people outside of the hard rock loop so-to-speak were starting to discover the varying array of musics that seemed to've been birthed from the loins of the ones called Ig, Lou and maybe even Sky! It all seemed to fall into place like some puzzle, first with alla that hot news detailing an upstart avant-yet-retrogarde scene coming out of New York and then with records by the likes of Debris, Pere Ubu and the Gizmos and sure, much of it was "old hat" as Cap Beefheart said to a point, but if you weren't hanging around at Max's Kansas City or listening to MC5 records for the past five years it sure seemed like a new and refreshing experience to lend your ears to! Anyway, by the end of '76 another term describing this seemingly all new/all now music was being tossed about...what else but "new wave," a description that originally was considered synonymous with the usual punk/garage verbage that was part and parcel of many a college paperboy's critical vocab, but as time went on new wave seemed to take on a life of its own. Perhaps this "new wave music" was a tad more cultured and refined than the more trashy and caustic punk rock and/or garage band sounds that the FM-bred Anastasia Pantsios-fied dolts of the day hated with a raw passion, and considering how the sounds generally were ineffectual to the point where these same idiots merely upped their noses at it must've been a big step up, eh?

Which might have suited the big city rock crits and WMMS-FM listening public fine, but for someone following the underground scene since the mid-seventies I'm sure these developments came as a humongous shock! Can you imagine a rabid Cleveland-based punk sometime in 1975 engrossing himself in the finer aspects of rockism by supporting such truly stellar acts as Rocket From the Tombs, the Electric Eels and Mirrors while reading CREEM and wondering what all of those then-elusive New York bands sounded like suddenly going into a coma only to wake up six years later and finding himself stuck at the tail end of this dying underground scene with the comparatively restrained likes of the B-52s and Waitresses replacing the hard-edged gnarl of those groups he left behind? Heck, it would be enough to make ANYBODY with their heads on frontwards wanna take another coma-induced hiatus for who knows how many years before the music scene gets itself RIGHT! And frankly if that guy were me I'd STILL be goin' the Rip Van Winkle route waitin' for a time and place when rock & roll was meaningful to you as a rabid, snarling mammal!

But as far as new wave goes, exactly when it morphed into gnu wave (as Bill Shute most aptly put it in one of his old INNER MYSTIQUE fanzines) is still anybody's guess. Personally methinks it might have been some time during the original thrust of the music attaining some notoriety outside the confines of the big cities when the mode really began changing, and back then did anybody really think that the likes of the B-52s, Blondie and all of those other seemingly-unique groups popping up all over the place were gonna evolve into the rot that eventually permeated the early-eighties? Not really...I mean, these groups and their fan base were supposed to have known better esp. after seeing the bright stars of the sixties ending up in the tinkertoy twaddle they eventually plopped into. But hey, hysteria does repeat itself, and I only hope that all of the bright stars seen on today's underground scene (all TWO of 'em!) know enough not to "evolve" into the senseless prattle that just about every band that sticks around long enough will end up mired in!

But hey, I gotta admit that even """""I""""" find myself spinning a little of this gnu wave along with the meatier portions of my collection, mostly outta curiousity if anything. Like Tim Ellison, I can enjoy a lotta this stuff on a different level than I do the records and tapes I definitely am more "attuned to" that are floating around in the abode, and hey, maybe there was a little bitta worth in some of these more giddysome platters than a guy who saw the end coming sometime a few years after everybody else did would care to admit. Anyway, here are a few discs I've only recently acquired that fit into the gnu wave scheme of things which most BLOG TO COMM readers might or might not want to know about, but even YOU have to take the bad with the good when it comes to the under-the-counter rock histories I like to spew so don't frown. Let's just say that if you still wear your Stiff Records tee shirt and have your leather-bound back issues of TROUSER PRESS proudly displayed on your bookshelf, then you'll probably really go for these more'n I ever will even though I have a slight liking for 'em all in my own perverted sorta way.

Starting off today's soiree's a disc I'm sure a whole lotta you rock lobstering new wavers remember with a passion, PAM WINDO AND THE SHADES (Bearsville). I certainly remember it if only for the presence of Pam's husband, tenor saxophonist Gary Windo in the band, and (perhaps) naturally one would remember this guy not only for the reams of jazz sessions he partook of back home in Merrie Olde such as the ones with Ray Russell I reviewed earlier this year, but for his solo on Pink Floyd's "Money" which I'm sure earned the guy a hefty royalty every time that song played onna radio ever since DARK SIDE OF THE MOON's surprisingly strong debut way back in the early-seventies. In fact, you can't argue that it was the Windo name that even got this group a recording contract with Bearsville back in the new wave hopping days of '80...I mean, I remember when this group used to play CBGB and naturally under their moniker something to the effect of "featuring Gary Windo, ex-Pink Floyd" (!) was printed perhaps in the vague hopes that more people would flock to the club in the hopes of seeing an actual Pink Floydian group that night. Naturally nothing could be further from the truth, since Pam Windo and the Shades were yet another one of those lower-case New York bands that seemed to epitomise the rut CBGB had fallen into back in the very-early eighties when they were booking a lotta lackluster new wave groups before hardcore and other underground forms helped revitalize the place, thanks in part to Max's Kansas City closing up shop and alla those New York bands hadda play somewhere.

Those of you expecting some great music epiphany will be let down as much as the dorks who might've thought the Shades were gonna be reminiscent of Floydian space rock but as the old saying goes what else is new? Whatcha get here's standard patented early-eighties rock with a halfway-decent attempt at a New York sound and style (perhaps thanks to the saxophones?). Pam Windo is about on par as far as those "I'm my own bitch" female singers of the day were, perhaps a step above the whole Pat Benetar swagger and brashness that was oh-so chic at the time, but nothing more. Vocals are more of the same strained whine o' the times as Patty Donahue's and if you think you're gonna be entitled to a little slab of avant sax thanks to Windo (better yet, thanks to James Chance since it was he who put saxes onna En Why map!) then you're in for a rude awakening! Maybe I should 'fess up to the fact that some of this seemed to be reaching for the right sorta underground ideal at times, but the lack of verve coupled with a halfhearted attempt at capturing the essence of all that was good about early-eighties underground rock makes PAM WINDO AND THE SHADES another mere reference point as far as New York City goes.

While Windo and her Shades were nurturing their act at CBGB others were busy trying to catch a gnu wave at competitor Max's Kansas City, Get Wet being amongst 'em. Judging from their colorful cover snaps Get Wet, or at least frontpieces Sherri Beachfront and Louie LePore, were aping the same waveoid cool pose that many other groups were copying at the time...I'd call it the early-sixties dago look for wont of a better term because the two kinda look like Frankie and Annette after being left in the spin cycle a little too long. A whole slew of gnu wave acts had that same sorta retro attitude in their look (and perhaps their music) at the time, even to the point where the early-eighties edition of Kongress (who certainly had the late-sixties garage band look and sound down pat well into '77) got the barbershop treatment even if their music wasn't quite in the gnu wave realm. But there's one thing I will say about Get Wet, and that is their rock & roll was pretty enveloping with a neat warpage of early and mid-sixties reference points with a fashionable gnu wave wrap that holds up well enough all these years later. Coming off sorta like a cross between the Fleshtones and early Blondie, Get Wet had the power and emotion on their Boardwalk label album (produced by Phil Ramone!) to have made some interesting inroads into the general record buying populace, but considering the whole staid trip that was going down at the time even this stuff was considered way too avant garde by the same people who were beginning to make REO Speedwagon and Foreigner the spokesmen for their generation. (Which translated means: can you imagine how a dude like I felt living amidst people who thought that Chicago and Journey were great on one hand, and the only "alternative" to that drivel was the whole Clash/B-52s/Blondie route that sold its soul for what little fame they got long after the fact on the other!?!?!? Like blasting FUNHOUSE out the window while driving down Main Street, that's how I felt!)

But GET WET is a pretty good attempt at capturing new wave transforming itself into gnu wave before the likes of Madonna began taking all of those pop reference points and rehaping them in her own vile image. They rock harder than the B-52 ever could, plus Beachfront is an energetic enough belter who might've gone places in a different time or space at least to the point where even their updated version of "Where The Boys Are" is catchy enough to listen to again and again. I only hope that Beachfront has the good sense to use all the door locks next time she goes to some motel! But anyway, I gotta admit that GET WET ain't your standard gnu wave album, and the fact that both Lou Reed and Peter Crowley of Max's are thanked in the liners is at least one tipoff that this one might be better than your standard ginch parade!

Finally on our gnu wave survey is a platter that doesn't quite fit into the category, but if you want me to be a bit more accurate in describing this perhaps I could refer to it as being proto-gnu wave. And frankly, I wasn't exactly expecting to peg Turner and Kirwan of Wexford as being a gnu wave band as much as one of those interesting eccentricities that appeared on the New York scene inna late seventies thus catering to a gnu wave audience while not exactly being one of its minions. These guys' histories are rather well known in some circles, they being two Irish expats who made a name for themselves playing Irish folk tunes (with some rock thrown in) at the Bells of Hell club in the mid-seventies garnering a fan base of sorts, amongst them being Hilly Kristal of CBGB and a Polish poet named Copernicus who eventually joined and took charge of the two. By '78 Turner and Kirwan of Wexford were performing on the CBGB/Max's circuit and, with the addition of more musicians to their rank as well as frontman Copernicus, became the Major Thinkers probably because it sounded more in tune with the times and that other name was way too long anyway. Of course the saga continued with Pierce Turner of the two eventually forming the successful Black 47 and hey even Copernicus is still making records so who says that the early-eighties are really that dead after all!

I never knew that the Turner/Kirwan duo had released an album, and when I discovered so I decided to search for this platter thinking it would at least be a nice aside as far as any New York rock histories went and at the worst an oddity along the lines of THE MOVIES or City Lights' SILENT DANCING, the first two albums to pop out outta the CBGB scene back in '75 long before the great rush of big label activity to the clubs only to sink without a trace because frankly, they weren't what anyone was expecting.

What a surprise I got when the item actually made its way to my door not so soon after...the first thing that hit my eye was that ABSOLUTELY AND COMPLETELY came out on the Peters International label, a outgrowth from the record importing company whose wares mostly consisted of US pressing of rare overseas progressive discs that the big labels passed on over here given the lack of a big European rock audience on these shores! The second thing to strike me was the pic of Turner and Kirwan on the cover...two longhairs with beards who, while dressed rock flashy enough, looked more or less like the reams of progressive rockers of the day not forgetting their fans who probably kept labels like Peters afloat not to mention the import bins emptying while on the search for some Vertigo extravaganza hopefully on the swirl label!

But as Bo Diddley once said you can't judge books by looking at the covers and even I have to say that there are many moments on ABSOLUTELY AND COMPLETELY that kept my interests up even while reading fanzines or old comic books or whatever I do while listening to records such as these. Actually you could call this proto-gnu wave progressive I guess, but only if you think of the better aspects of that dread genre like perhaps the Move or even early ELO. Nothing heady, although a good portion of side one might suffer from pomposity by association for coming a bit too close to classic rock bombast. Actually side two's the kicker with a Sparks-ish "The Girl Next Door" (funny lesbian deca-rock) and other things that seem to recall the aforementioned Move as well as perhaps some of the solo Cale outings of the day. Not really something you'd wanna listen to on a yearly basis, but I was surprised, especially since I thought this record was gonna be filled with Irish folk ballads!

After the gnu wave began to affect a lotta people who were maybe just two or three steps up from FM-bred dunces on the rock evolutionary scale (not much, but ya gotta give 'em credit) Turner and Kirwan added former Teenage Lust bassist Peter Collins and drummer Thomas Hamlin and became the Major Thinkers. Anyway the four released "Back in the 80's"/"Farewell to the Coast" on their lonesome, and although Copernicus is not to be found anywhere on this platter even though I was under the impression he was a full-fledged member don't fret, because the guy did get to put his own single out (one side being the same "Quasimodo" which appeared on his magnif NOTHING EXISTS album) and I guess the others wanted to do one by themselves and really who can blame 'em? Anyway both sides are gnu wave supremo really not that far removed from the Turner and Kirwan album, only with the new sounds affecting the still English Sparksy moves and Kirwan now appearing under the name Larry Lucifer! Actually an interesting self-produced artyfact of the times that should snuggle nice next to Nervus Rex's single on some late-seventies PEBBLES comp or even one of those Hyped To Death disques since it does have enough of a rock & roll kick to make it a lot more'n just another British copycat move. What is most interesting about this 'un is the pic sleeve showing the fashionable quartet decked out in early-eighties attire, with the once proggy-looking Kirwan now clean shaven with a late-fifties ducktail looking more like some hood in a British crime film and much younger than the Gentle Giant aspirant he used to be! Of course Brad Kohler will think that both records were vanity projects recorded with all of the deposit moolah the landlord swiped but we know better, I think...

TEE-VEE TOO-DAY! (or at least the past week or so)

I remember once mentioning in my own fabled fanzoonie a loooong time ago somethinorother to the effect that while Billy Miller's first love was the radio and he wouldn't rest until he and that once-magnif/now utter trashoid medium saw "eye to eye," my first and foremost was the television and I woudn't rest until I saw eye to eye with that now-monstrosity either! Years later, I can still find a lotta substance regarding this typically hot-headed statement especially considering how that entire industry, which used to cater to every imaginable whim and fancy of the oft-loathed mid-Amerigan family unit, seems to spew abject venom and hatred towards the same people it once uplifted in a way that would have put a smile on every dissident beatnik/hippie's not to mention Josef Stalin's, well-collectivised face. From its newscasts and "forums" (usually hosted by a Phil Donahue/Bill Moyers-clone with a panel of nine liberals trying to coax the sole conservative to come over to their side, or worse yet mercilessly berates Catholics and now even traditionalist Jews for being so against the grain of societal evolution yet begs 'em all to "vote our way") to the entertainment which usually ended up about as grim as can be which could be a douser for your average workaday fellow looking for some escapism, television sure ain't the bastion of FUN like it was back when I was a kid when although there were only three stations to choose from, at least you had more of a choice (for unrepentant suburban tubba-lard brats!) than with a whole slew of stations offering the same-old for an audience I wouldn't have thought even existed a mere twenny years back!

I sure do miss the days when I could very well click on my set and tune into a McHALE'S NAVY rerun or DEPUTY DAWG cartoon (on your fave-rave local UHF station) without much effort, and yeah, I'll admit that it's hard getting that lump downna throat 'n admitting that them days are gone forever even if that does tend to make me look like Joe Square in the face of today's unrepentant decadence! However, with the advent of a satellite dish onto the abode at least I have a few more excuses to sit in front of the boob tube these days, and although it ain't like it was back in olden times when tee-vee was made for the aforementioned every day slob out there, at least I can PRETEND to be one by merely flickin' on the box and settling back with some programming that's seemingly goin' the way of the dodo bird and various alternative ensembles led by J. Neo Marvin.

But sadly enough, a lotta the shows that were part and parcel to many a station's late-night and weekend schedules in the seventies/eighties only to make the trek to cable inna nineties can't be found anywhere as of now, a change from even a good three years back when it looked as if mucho b&w Eisenhower/JFK/Johnson-era tee-vee was pretty easy to latch onto thanks to the smart program directors at a number of these upstart cable nets. At least the choice of watching THE RIFLEMAN on the Hallmark channel or LEAVE IT TO BEAVER on TV Land (with a classic thirties snoozer on TCM) was akin to the old days when you had the same dilemma re. your local broadcast tee-vee stations, but even now it seems as if many of the classic (and not-so) fifties-through-seventies faves can't be found anywhere no matter how hard you go looking through your on-screen guide. Now, it ain't like I'm expecting a goodie like DECEMBER BRIDE let alone CHECKMATE or all-time fave NAKED CITY to pop up on the schedule any day soon, but sure-as-shootin' I gotta admit that I liked things a lot better back when HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL and GUNSMOKE were vying for my precious viewing time, and (strange as it seems) who would have ever thought that I would actually be nostalgic for 2003 anyways???

So obviously this piece ain't gonna be one of those Robot Hull in CREEM surveys of the 1975-76 tee-vee season (which was a classic on both the network/PBS and local station levels) nor will it be as good as, say, Mark Jenkins' own interesting early-seventies tee-vee observations in HYPERION, but I would consider it much better'n any of the eighties-era CREEM's lame attempts at documenting culture both past and present which only proved that "going with the flow" and keeping up with the times just doesn't work if those said times are strictly dungeonville, as Maynard G. Krebs once put it. Naw, this piece is gonna be about the very little television that I watch, and considering how I've declined from about five/six hours a day as a goofball kid to about four/six hours a week (depending on whether or not there's a good moom pitcher on) NOW, maybe this piece ain't gonna be as long as it should be but it's sure gonna be about as good a summary of tee-vee (on a modern day anti-intellectual slob refuses to die! level) as yer likely t' get from anyone whose braincells are as fine-tuned and rockism-inspired as mine!

For the old necessities it's TV Land all the way, though even they certainly have been slipping with less classic fifties/sixties wares and loads of more-recent drivel like LITTLE HOUSE, A NEW BEGINNING and M*A*S*H that certainly hasn't stood the test of time unless you're one of the millions who consider KNIGHT RIDER classic tee-vee programming (and calm down, Shute!). Now I'll admit that I find the earlier M*A*S*Hes funny at times, like when the show was trying to be SGT. BILKO with a bad case of seventies liberalism tossed in (I caught the one where the guys ran the home movies of Frank Burns' wedding a few weeks back and thought that scene was a hoot before doing a quick channel surf away from the rest of the thing!), but as the series progressed and became so self-conscious of itself it was hard to tell where the episode ended and the socially-relevant workings of its actors began. I'm sorry TV Land, but when I think of classic television I'm thinking 1957-67 with a few sidesteps before and after, not this seventies swill that seems to have set the pace for way too many snoozers that have appeared since! Still, TV Land is the place for all of those BLOG TO COMM-approved high-energy television shows still finding an audience even this late in the game like LEAVE IT TO BEAVER, THE MUNSTERS and THE ADDAMS FAMILY even thought I find that it was a lot healthier watching these programs in the post-school afternoon hours and on those same stations that now run OPRAH, DR. PHIL and marathon news broadcasts during the pre-dinner hour! Sheesh, if such local "programming" was part and parcel of my own educational process back during my growing up days I'd probably win an award for time spent in front of textbooks on school nights!


Of course TV Land does offer a few tricks up their usually staid sleeves like a few Mondays back when they ran a BOB NEWHART SHOW marathon that really brought back the memories of classic Saturday Prime Time viewing, and yeah I know I should've been out with the rest of the red-blooded kids running around drinking red-blooded wine and engaging in general red-blooded ruckus-raising, but at least credit me for staying outta trouble and settling back for some of the classier tee-vee viewing of the era before the late-seventies hadda come in and ruin just about everything tube-wise! Some of you might prefer MARY TYLER MOORE for your seventies humor yaps but frankly I gotta say that Moore's inbred perkiness does tend to annoy and (at least for me) the show only really worked when Ted Knight as the high-larious anchorman Ted Baxter was a featured character on whatever particular episode had him playing against either Moore or Ed Asner with extremely up-chuckling results. Oddly enough it's the low tone of THE BOB NEWHART SHOW that holds up especially these days, strange since it was exactly that same reservedness that practically ruined sitcoms for a good many years but back in the seventies it sure seemed like a new and refreshing idea!

Elsewhere on the dial there's Turner Classic Movies, a station I hate tuning into because of its very namesake but since said namesake owns just about every movie made before the year 1970 its like I have little choice. Naturally this net runs too much in the way of "class" MGM material I can do without, but if one looks hard enough there might be a prime-cut Warner Brothers offering to soak yerself into or perhaps a low-budget surprise you never would expect, or better yet some silent film that isn't going to be shown inna middle of the night even though ya usually hafta put up with the geeky new soundtracks that come off about as contemporary to the films bein' run as John Williams conducting the Boston Pops would, which come to think of it is what the music used for these silents usually sounds like. And if you ignore host Robert Osbourne's typically stodgy intros/outros and squint your eyes a bit, maybe YOU TOO can pretend you're some normal kinda guy watching this film onna late show sometime in 1963 and revel in all the greatness such fantasies would therein entail!

But for total tee-vee kicks here inna late oh-ohs you just can't beat Boomerang! Yes readers, I really have stepped up in this world for a guy who couldn't even snatch up these stations a good five years back, and just now have I dished out the extra beaucoups for this "premium" I guess it's called network which really is a hoot in a handbasket! This is where all of those old obscurities they used to run on Cartoon Network went, and although you do have to put up with a load of more present-day (which for me is anything after 1975!) gunk along the lines of WACKY RACES or worse yet THE SMURFS and their cheap knockoff clone THE SNORKS there still is more than a fair share of classic tee-vee watchability left on this net to sate the souls of more than a few overgrown BLOG TO COMM readers whose hearts are still firmly set in 1962! Like CN, Boomerang is Hanna-Barbara backed which means that a good 90% of the programming here comes from their studio (the other 10% consisting of old Popeye and Warner Brothers cartoons which don't get aired as much as they should), and although it seems strange enough for one to have to pay extra to glom what was once free network and/or later-on afternoon rerun television it's sure great seeing such uncontested winners as TOP CAT (reconstituted BILKO), THE JETSONS (BLONDIE in outer-space) and THE FLINTSTONES (dunno where they derived this show from, but don't YOU see a strange resemblance between "Yabba Dabba Doo!" and "And away we go!"?????) available for viewing in the here and now. Of course the original Hanna Barbara cartoons made especially for the tee-vee huddled baby boomers (back when that word had all the innocence that one would have originally thought!) are what really get my psyche drooling. Having not seen any Yogi Bear or Huckleberry Hound caroons in almost thirty years I was amazed just how much they took me back to my turdlin' kiddie days while later efforts such as Yippie, Yappie and Yahooie, while not as jam-packtus as their earlier forebearers, still had some of that great dunce-like charm that I'm sure fueled many a local kiddie show back in the latter portion of the sixties. The canned music for these is great (I discovered a few riffs also used on Howdy Doody cartoons and OZZIE AND HARRIET!) and if you can believe it the viewing of these classic late-Ike/early-JFK-era artyfacts really have the power to zoom me back to my playpen days when such tee-vee viewing was pretty much mandatory. Good thing I kept control of my bladder! (And Boomerang, how about bringing back RUFF AND REDDY!)

And for you fag readers out there, what's best about these Hanna Barbara cartoons is that they're just laden with homo overtones to the point where they come off about as camp as Jack Benny romping around in his bloomers in CHARLIE'S AUNT! Sure the presence of Cindy in the Yogi Bear cartoons might make you think that he's a 100% hetro kinda guy, but she's such a zilch-level personality in these 'toons to the point where Cindy ain't really nothing but cartoonland's answer to Lou Ann Poovey! Just enough fodder to keep the police off Yogi's back so to speak, and perhaps animated cartoondom's original fag hag! Sheesh, Yogi and Boo Boo sleep in the same bed and you know what kinda hay Wertham made outta Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson doin' the same thing! (And while I'm onna roll, guess what this all makes Ranger Smith...a downright homophobic representation of authority, that's what!) Taking the Wertham route to its logical conclusion Pixie and Dixie are the ideal fag marriage that is constantly being thwarted by "society" in the role of Mister Jinx! And worst of all, how about the seemingly innocent YAKKY DOODLE cartoons! Fibber Fox is such an outwardly (and perhaps outed) gay character who, besides wearing a turtleneck sweater (!) wants to "eat" Yakky, definitely the "kept duck" of Chopper, the typical bulldog who like Offisa Pupp in the old KRAZY KAT sorta represents the butchier aspects of gay cartoondom. Hmmmmm, maybe these Hanna Barbara cartoons aren't as innocent as I was originally led to believe, so if you want anyone out there to blame for your fag brother or the confusion that set into your sister after she joined the softball team look no further than these!

***

IT PAYS TO INCREASE YOUR WORD POWER! And that include bloggers from all points of the globe too! Today's case in point are the words "revenge" and "justice"...and while we're at it let's toss in the term "asshole"...look 'em all up!