A short break

I'll be back in a few days.

Klashing with the Clash

Here’s the whole LP of KLASHING WITH THE KLASH, it’s my favorite live album. It was recorded at the Palladium in New York City on Sept 21, 1979. The Clash on their second US tour, they were at the height of their powers in 1979. The sound quality is very good, the concert was broadcast on the radio so the show was recorded off the air.

LONDON CALLING had just been recorded so the audience is hearing some of these songs for the very first time. The cover picture of LONDON CALLING was taken at this concert.

The record does not have the complete concert. I don’t know why, two of the sides are under ten minutes so they could have fit the missing songs on the album. There are CDs of the complete show available if you look around.

I kept each side of the LP complete. Here's the songs:

Side one:
1. Safe European Home
2. I’m So Bored with the USA
3. Complete Control
4. London Calling
5. White Man In Hammersmith Palais
6. Koka Kola
7. I Fought The Law

Side two:
8. The Guns Of Brixton
9. English Civil War
10. Clash City Rockers
11. Stay Free
12. Clampdown

Side three:
13. Police and Thieves
14. Capital Radio

Side four:
15. Armagideon Time
16. Career Opportunities
17. What’s My Name
18. White Riot

This was one of the very first bootleg records I ever bought. I got it in 1982 at a really cool used record store called Play It Again Records in Chattanooga. The store was in an old shed behind a bookstore on the campus of UTC. Most of the records they had were priced under 5 bucks. I wish I had known more about music when the place was open. I remember flipping by copies of the MC5’s BACK IN THE USA and HIGH TIME and picking out a boring Thunderclap Newman record instead. That was dumb.

Heavy music

Here's the song I like today. It's funny and it's good. A perfect mix of two things I hold dear: absurdity and flute.

You might hate it but there's a reason such things exist.

The bass line is so great. How easy would it have been for the bassist (Vernon Martin) to take off and start doing something else? Gettin' funky. But nope. He stays on the job.

Here it is:

Rahsaan Roland Kirk, "One Ton"

(and do drop by my new weblog on my newly redesigned personal web site: http://www.davidrhoden.com )

Every summer

I melt away

The imposter

If Elvis Costello was the new Dylan, did that make Scott Wilk + The Walls the new Mouse & The Traps?

This is a pretty good record once you get used to the idea that you aren't listening to Elvis Costello. I thought somebody would get it right away. I guess the record is more obscure than I thought it was.

This was the Walls only LP. Next, Wilk did an LP with band called Bone Symphony. I've never heard it. Since then he's been doing film work, both acting and music. He's got an impressive resume that, errrrr, doesn't mention this album. It's not that bad of a record! It doesn't mention this one either.

Here's a couple more songs from the record and the two I used for clues if you haven't already gone to the trouble of renaming them.

Somebody always talking about me

That's all right.

R.I.P. Mike O'Neill

Crossing the Bridge
By Michael Baker

For Mike O’Neill, dead in July, 2006

I too have thought of jumping.
The cooling breezes, the lack
Of taxmen, the subtle shifts in sound.
I thought better of it when I took stock:
Three thousand in the bank, my friend
Jim Bob near Cannes, fifty Dylan
Bootlegs, the complete works
Of Milton and Dante. Alas, piety
And romance languages remain alien.

Better, I think, with a gun: the impact
That cleaves and cleaves, part hole,
Part new mass: too smart for new beginnings,
You now can concentrate on endings: mermaid fucking,
Endless tuna dinners, free kelp shampoo.

Each day the tennis ball comes back, and
Someone with slippers walks above us. Our boss
Is fired. The apartment becomes rent controlled.
Oriental babies shine in the moonlight.
Yards of unknitted yarn, however, gather dust
In our dark closets. You thirsted vainly for fame:
Pulitzer Prizes, sailing, opening for the Ramones—
But the viscosity of pain prefers rejection.

You had no one to turn to. Your wife
Switched to chardonnay and good friends asked
What your name was. The disproportionate climate
Was no help either, as the humidity of Florida
Became a steady intruder, like a newborn.
Tomorrow--we pray--will never come.

Tampa’s bridges are firm, steely, and straight.
Nearby a woman waved, a crooked finger
Beckoning you. Oh, I was wrong: it was really
The heat from the Everglades torching everything
And everyone not living underground. Thank
God, the water around you will never evaporate,
Allowing your luminosity to become re-animating
As your brown curls rise upwards,
Like snagged, sleepless godheads.



**************

Memorial Services For Mike O'Neill

Friday, July 28th @ the New World Brewery - Tampa FL.
8:00pm $5.00 suggested donation.

Slide show, live music, spoken word, etc..

Bands Include:
Flat Stanley, The 39 Steps, Diviners, Rancid Polecats, The Four Shames, and others...

The love I saw in you

was just a mirage.

Contest #2

OK, here's another mystery song. Good luck! Let's see more entries this time! Post your guesses to the comments section of this post. First correct entry is the winner! Same rules as last time!

Another clue. Same artist, same LP, different song.

Shiver & shake

Jim C. has got another great song for you guys.

Here's what he wrote:
"You gotta love the dada couplet "Come on, let's shiver and shake / Come on, I'll bake you a cake". There's something about the contrast between the poppish horn arrangement and that atavistic drum beat that would've made this a classic no matter who was singing over it, but her saucy delivery is a terrific bonus. By the way, it came out on Atlantic in 1957, and that's all I know about it."

Thanks Jim! You did want me to post that your e-mail too, didn't you?

KO? K.O.? K O?

Here’s another mystery record. All I know is what’s written on the label and there’s a lot of information there but not much useful stuff. There is not an address and only one last name (Hardaway) in a single songwriting credit.

I’m not even sure about the band’s name. It’s written as KO but is that KO or is it K.O.? The name on the label doesn’t have the periods. If it’s not K.O., what does KO mean? There is a Japanese character next to the name on the label so I thought it might be Japanese. I ran KO through Babelfish, it came back as KO. That wasn’t any help.

I looked on Collectorscum and didn’t find anything under either name. I did a Google search and found one mention of the record on a want list. No other information though, although they did have the name listed as K O which was a variation I had never thought of.

The song titles are not very distinctive. Allmusic.com has 271 entries for songs called “Out Of Control” and none of them are by our mystery band. There aren’t any entries for this song and the NSA is gonna start listening to my phone calls if I put the name on the blog.

I think the band had heard the Weirdos influence, this could be a song by that band and is KO's best moment. That is how the song ends on the record.

The label does say that there are NO Ballads – NO Lovesongs which is true, there aren’t any. The songs were published by Magical Music, Hardaway was published by Milene Music, which makes me think he was not a member of the band. The numbering of the songs is reversed on the flip side – song number two is listed as number three and vice-versa.

The record didn't have a picture sleeve. The record came in a paper sleeve with ‘For Sale ONLY NO Promotional copies’ stamped on it. The record is on Wow Records Inc. and has a 1979 copyright. The band may have been from Bowling Green, Kentucky. That’s where I found the single in a used record shop near the university in 1986. There were at least a dozen other copies in the same box. I wish I had bought all of them. They were marked 75 cents each.

If I had my way,

I'd tear building down.

Mystery song

Here's the mystery song. Post your guesses to the comments section of this post. First correct entry wins, winner to be announced Monday. More rules are posted below.

Good luck!

A contest

Tomorrow afternoon, I’m going to post a song. The first person to correctly identify that song in the comments section of the post wins a one-of-a-kind custom made CD of songs that I like delivered right to your mailbox.

Multiple posts are allowed so you can change your mind after you make your first post. Be careful though, there is only one entry allowed. If you make another guess, your previous entries are voided and somebody else can win if you were correct the first time but changed your guess. Only one answer per post, posts with multiple guesses will not win the CD. The winning entry will have the artist and the song title EXACTLY correct – no partial credit will be given. Don’t try to contact me for hints or clues, you’re on your own.

If there is a correct entry, I’m not going to announce the winner until Monday afternoon at the earliest so you’ve got all weekend to think about your answer. If there is not a correct answer by Monday, I’ll say so and you guys can start guessing again.

I’m the final judge, deal with it. If this turns into a big hassle, I’ll cancel the contest. If everything goes OK, I may have another contest later on.

It is not a terribly obscure song. I expect somebody will have a winning post very soon after I post the song.

Transcendental Medication

There is a new Royal Purple CD available. TRANSCENDENTAL MEDICATION is even better than the two previous Royal Purple discs. The music is great, the song choices are excellent and there are a bunch of talented Royal Purple friends helping out. I highly recommend the disc.

Contact the band here.

In the same ballpark, I've really been enjoying the new Plasticland CD too. Here's an old b-side by the band.

R.I.P. Syd Barrett

Syd Barrett died last Friday from diabetes complications.

The last thing I want to hear right now is "Shine On You, Crazy Diamond". This is more like it.

More here.

Did his pappy ever stop drinking?

Like most kids that grew up in the seventies, I always thought Commander Cody did the original “Hot Rod Lincoln”. Later on, I knew a guy that thought it was an All original. We were both wrong, Charlie Ryan is the kid that won the race in the Model A.

Ryan’s version is based on a true incident that took place on the Lewiston Grade in Lewiston, Idaho. There are earlier versions of what is essentially the same story.

I always wondered why the song is called “Hot Rod Lincoln” when he’s driving a Model A. Ryan had taken a Lincoln Zephyr frame and put a ’31 Model A body on it. And “Hot Rod Lincoln” sings better than “Hot Rod Model A”

Even though Charlie Ryan has been singing professionally since the early thirties and released a new CD in 2003. He’s remembered mostly for “Hot Rod Lincoln”. Ryan and his band the Timberliners recorded a few more songs along the same lines. The first rock(abilly)opera? I like the last one: “Hot Rod Hades”.

Every day

and every hour.

We're gonna rock

gonna rock this joint tonight.

Shakin' over to the rockin' spot

Another flea market find. Records like this are what keep me digging through dusty boxes in the hot sun.

This record was released twice. Once in 1959, credited to Curley Coldiron And The Circle C Boys and ten years later credited to the Sundowners. Both releases are on the Circle C label. I’ve got the 1969 release.

Apparently, the Sundowners were a Chicago institution, they were the house band on a Chicago TV show and had a 20 year (!!) residency at a place called the Bar R-R club. Everyone from Fats Domino to the Mekons played with the Sundowners at the Bar R-R. Jon Langford says that the trio gave the Mekons an education in country music at. Guess who is the subject of this picture that Langford painted.

I’ve had this 45 for years but it was just recently that I found out that Bloodshot Records included it on a compilation that they put out in 1994. I only play one side though. The flip, as good as it is, is not rockin’.

Oh!

Glory Glory