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Hank Ballard




     Tues, Nov. 18th would have been Hank Ballard’s 81st birthday. I guess it still is,

unfortunately he died. Every November in addition to remembering my Mom’s birthday and where I was when Kennedy got it, I think about Hank, because for thirteen years I’d do a tribute to him on my radio show this time of year, and even though I haven’t done the show in a decade I still pull a bunch of Federal and King 45’s off the shelves and give ’em a spin because to me Hank was one of the Kings of Rock’n’Roll, right up there with Elvis, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Fats Domino. He was a rock’n’roll star while Elvis was still popping zits in back of the classroom at Humes High and on his first comeback before Elvis got out of the Army.  Hank Ballard saw the music biz from the top and the bottom, but mostly the middle for nearly fifty years and came out of it an incredibly decent human being. Somebody I really loved and admired, he was perhaps the most unaffected lead singer I ever met.
     This is the part where we back pedal.  He was born in Bessemer, Alabama in 1927, and moved to Detroit as a tyke. Flo Ballard of the Supremes was his first cousin. His first inspiration was country music and his favorite singer was Gene Autry (he was even a California Angels fan because Autry owned the team). Hank first came to the attention of  bandleader/producer/talent scout/singer/songwriter/etc. Johnny Otis at a Detroit talent show where he was competing against Jackie Wilson (who won with his rendition of “Danny Boy”) and Little Willie John.  The official story goes when Federal Records recording act the Royals lost their lead singer to the draft, producer Ralph Bass got a line on Hank via Otis, although according to Hank he knew a member of the Royals from working on the Ford assembly line and was brought in to the group.  Both good stories, I believe Hank’s version because he was there.
No matter, Hank’s first disc with the Royals– “Get It” was a sexy, single entedre  fuck tune with a greasy bump and grind rhythm and gave the Royals their first hit, rising to #6 on Billboard’s R&B chart in the summer of ’53.  Federal, a subsidiary of King had just signed Apollo R&B stars the 5 Royales and to avoid confusion they changed their name to the Midnighters, a name more applicable to their new, greasier sound.  “Get It” pointed the direction and Hank didn’t need a road map, the next number he brought to the group ” Work With Me Annie” (originally titled “Sock It To Me Mary”) was even more blatant and it became a monster smash, hitting #1 R&B in the spring of ’54.  It would spawn dozens of sequels and answer records, including several from the Midnighters themselves (“Annie Had A Baby“, “Annie’s Aunt Fannie“, et al), not to mention Etta James’ great “The WallFlower (Roll With Me Henry)” (that’s Richard Berry, author of “Louie Louie” doing the spoken bit on the intro), Buddy Holly’s “Midnight Shift” (his best record in my opinion), Danny Taylor’s “I’m The Father Of Annie’s Baby“, and many others.  In fact, here’s a whole Annie set pulled from an old aircheck from my radio show. In addition to the Midnighters originals are Linda Hayes and the Platters’ “My Name Ain’t Annie”, Hazel McCollum and the El Dorados’ “Annie’s Answer”, along with the aforementioned Buddy Holly song and an accapella group doing a tune called “Daddy Don’t Work” who for the life of me I can’t identify.
The Midnighters, who like all vocal groups  had a bewildering amount of personnel changes were at this time in addition to Ballard, Sonny Woods  (bass vocal), Henry Booth and Charles Sutton (tenors) with guitarist Aruthur Porter and electric bass player (one of the first) Alonzo Tucker.  In late ’54 Cal Green would replace Porter on guitar and they issued a string of 45’s on the Federal label that need a better word than classics.  However, I cannot think of such a word to do justice to these fine discs which include “Sexy Ways“,  “Switchie Witchie Twitchie“, “Tore Up“, “It’s Love (24 Hours A Day)“, “Let ‘er Roll“, “What Is This Is See” and “Open Up The Back Door“.
Most prevalent on these discs are Cal Green’s distorted guitar work, he was a genius and his name is rarely mentioned today but he deserves to be credited as one of the inventors of rock’n’roll guitar. Federal would sign him to a solo deal where he cut some killer instrumentals like “The Big Push” and “Red Light”.  Green would get busted in Texas in ’56 for a small amount of marijuana and serve five years of a nine year sentence in a Texas state penitentiary. He was replaced by Billy “Spunky Onions” Davis.
     1956 was the breakthrough year for rock’n’roll, Elvis hit and all hell broke loose. You know the story. These should have been the gravy years for the Midnighters who were making their best records but Syd Nathan the owner of King/Federal was a cheap prick who refused to fork over the payola for airplay and the Midnighters were absent from radio, and in turn from the charts.  From 1955 when they scored their last Billboard top ten with “It’s Love (24 Hours A Day)” (a cover of a tune Earl Gaines cut for Excello, Ballard thought the original was better) which hit #10 R&B, the Midnighters would go hitless for four years.  They made a good living on the road, especially on the Chitlin’ Circuit (black clubs and theaters, mostly in the South) and at southern frat parties where, like Jimmy Reed, they had a huge white following, and these Animal House style gigs were often their best paying jobs.
     Hank Ballard wrote “The Twist” in 1958 but Nathan hated it and refused to release it. He took it to Chicago’s Vee Jay records where he cut this demo version, but Nathan would not release Ballard from his contract. Eventually, in 1959 “The Twist” was issued by Hank Ballard & the Midnighers as they were now called, as the b-side of a ballad– “Teardrops On Your Letter” which would go to #9. “The Twist” was based on the Drifters’ “Watcha Gonna Do”, itself based on an old gospel ring chant. The Midnighters had used the melody for “Is Your Love For Real“, an earlier recording. Here’s a genealogy of the twist from an old Hound show aircheck. It starts with the Drifters tune, followed by the two Midnighters recordings then to show how the twist covered pop culture like a fungus we have the “Muddy Waters’ Twist”, rockabilly legend Bobby Lee Trammell’s “Arkansas Twist” and the Ravens’ attempting a comeback with the bizarre “Ungowa Twist”. The entire segment is heard here.
     “The Twist” first broke on Baltimore’s answer to American Bandstand, the Buddy Dean Show  an after school time dance show which John Waters’ used as the basis for the Corny Collins Show in the movie Hairspray. The kids in Baltimore went twist crazy and Dick Clark was quick to pick up the ball and run with it, he had a two-bit singer named Chubby Checker do an exact copy of the Hank Ballard version (the first time Hank heard it on the radio he thought it was his own version) on a label which he owned shares in (Cameo-Parkway, soon to be taken over by Allen Klein). Clark knew he was being unscrupulous and must have felt guilty because he gave heavy play to Ballard’s next few  singles, pushing them up the charts. The new sound of Hank Ballard & the Midnighters was more upbeat, less sleazy, but still rockin’ and he enjoyed a string of excellent minor hits– “Finger Poppin’ Time“, “Let’s Go  Let’s Go Let’s Go”, “Hoochie Coochie Coo“, “The Float“, and others. Hank was back on top for a minute.
     Hank Ballard & the Midnighters cut dozens of fine singles and albums, churning ’em out and many of his best sides never made the charts and were issued only as b-sides or album cuts.  Here’s a few of my favorite rarities, first of dig this one, the flip side of “Do You Know How To Twist”, it’s got the most thundering bass line in R&R history— “Broadway“. “C’mon Baby Let’s Shake It” was only issued on the LP The 1963 Sound of Hank Ballard & the Midnighters but it’s a killer. “Daddy Rollin’ Stone” is another LP track, it’s not the Otis Blackwell tune but a great Ballard original. “Little Sister” didn’t chart but later became a huge money maker for Hank when Stevie Ray Vaughn recorded it. He cut this duet with Little Willie John shortly before John ended up in Walla Walla prison, it’s called “I Want To See My Baby“.  I’ve always like this one too– “I’m Young“.  Eventually the hits dried up and so did the touring money. The original Midnighters had become Black Muslims and refused to play the frat houses.  Eventually in desperation Hank took to recording junk like “How You Gonna Get Respect (When You Ain’t Cut Your Process Yet)”.  Hank went solo, putting in time in James Brown’s entourage, cutting some good Brown produced sides like this re-make of “It’s Love (24 Hours A Day)” from 1967. Hank told me that Brown was smoking angel dust as early as the mid-sixties and had never written a song in his life, all  his tunes were written by band mates like Bobby Byrd (who according to Hank wrote “Please Please Please”) and bought flat out on the cheap or else just stolen by Brown. He was not surprised when James freaked out and ended up  in jail. He stayed with the James Brown Revue on and off into the early 70’s, even scoring a minor hit with “From The Love Side” on Brown’s People label in ’73.  
     By the late 70’s Hank was back to small clubs, he had a female Midnighters and wore a headband. It was in one of these dives he met Teresa McNeil, a girl many years his junior and a big fan of old rhythm & blues and rock’n’roll.  They fell in love and she took over Hank’s career, advising him to lose the headband and female back up singers and put together a real version of the Midnighters in the same style that brought him fame in the fifties. Hank took her advice and with a great new group went back on the road, even playing England where they cut an excellent live album for Charley.
   I reckon from the above photo you’d have guessed it, here’s where I enter the picture.
In the fall of 1987 the reconstituted Midnighters hit New York, booked into the old Lone Star Cafe on the corner of 5th Ave and 13th Street.  Dressed in tuxedos and led by guitarist Billy Davis, they were truly amazing.  The last real R&B show on the road.  They did the all the old tunes throwing in some apporpiate new covers like Elmore James’ The Sky Is Crying”. It was one of the best shows I ever saw. I gave them a good review in the Village Voice and Teresa McNeil called to thank me.  Hank loved the review, he liked that I called the early Midnighters’ singles “fuck songs”. He was like that. A straight talker.  The next time they came to town I had Hank on the radio show.  Here’s an excerpt from the WFMU broadcast with songs spliced in. I got to be friends with both Hank and Teresa and spent time hanging out with them in New York and New Orleans where they played a showcase at the Fairmount Hotel ballroom and also at Jazz Fest.
     Teresa pushed hard to get Hank in the Rock’n’Roll Hall Of Fame. A dubious distinction to be sure, and it’s not like Hank gave a shit, but she correctly surmised it would raise his profile and get his price for gigs up. At that point they were losing money on the road. She also helped Hank get his publishing back, and when Charley Records issued the ’58 demo of “The Twist” on a compilation, it allowed him to recover full control of his most valuable copyright.  The only people who really make money on the old hits are the publishers and sometimes songwriters, and it can be a substantial sum, especially on a tune like “The Twist” which has been recorded by dozens of artists.  Luckily, on the Hall Of Fame front Hank had a powerful mentor in Sire Records mogul Seymour Stein who’d begun his career working for Syd Nathan at King.  Hank was inducted in ’88 (I wrote the bio for the booklet that year which unfortunately was edited by a hack Rolling Stone editor named Sid Holt who rewrote it into so much  advertising copy pablum….I know some day we’ll meet face to face, and I’ll slap the shit out of him). I have no idea why the rest of the Midnighters were shunned, mostly likely because Seymour Stein couldn’t remember their names. The night that Hank’s induction was announced, Hank and Teresa were in New York City and later that night when they were returning to their hotel she was the victim of a hit and run cab that ran her over on Lexington Ave, dragging her several blocks. She died in surgery that night.  Hank appeared at the Lone Star Roadhouse the next night, in shock, somehow he managed to get through his set.  Later that week he appeared on the Hal Wilner produced TV Show Night Music. Fellow guest Miles Davis took Hank aside for a chat and a toot to help ease the pain. Hank got through the show in good form considering what he’d just been through.
     Keeping the Midnighters (three vocalists, two guitars, two saxes, bass and drums plus a road manager all on salary) on the road was an expensive proposition. Hank knew he wasn’t going to get a hit record at that stage of the game and keeping the band together was getting problematic.  Billy Davis  had remarried and his new wife didn’t want him to tour so  he went back to his day job teaching music to disabled children.
To his credit, Seymour Stein did  his bit to help Hank, getting his tunes into many movies including River’s Edge.  With a good income from his song writing and without Teresa McNeil around for encouragement Hank eventually lost interest in the music business, especially touring which isn’t much fun even when you’re making money.
     Hank was a Buddhist and he no longer sought the fame or adulation or even riches he did when he was young, he was happy to stay home and tend his garden, smoke reefer and watch the Angels lose on TV. He played his last shows in the early 90’s and became something of a recluse in his last decade.
      We stayed in touch, calling each other every now and then to catch up, the last time we talked was around 2001, he sounded relatively happy. We talked about music, we both really liked early Fleetwood Mac and agreed Jeremy Spencer and Peter Green where an unbeatable team. I’m pretty sure that was our last conversation.  He said missed singing less and less as the years passed.  Eventually, he too passed, in March of 2003, at age 76 he went from throat cancer.  Hank Ballard, a great man, I miss him.
ABOVE PHOTOS:
Top) First Midnighters EP on Federal.
Middle) Detail from first Midnighters LP which I bought at the Thunderbird SwapShop Flea Market in Ft. Lauderdale in 1975. A life changing find. Hank’s autograph in lower right corner.
Bottom) Me and Hank Ballard, Lonestar Cafe, 1987. I look drunk. Photo by Teresa McNeil.

Is it okay to laugh?





From The Detroit News, Wednesday, November 5, 2008:
Nathaniel Mayer funeral set for Tuesday
Susan Whitall / The Detroit News

Motown singer and Detroit city councilwoman Martha Reeves will speak Tuesday at the funeral for Nathaniel Mayer, the dynamic Fortune Records singer of “Village of Love” and other hits. The funeral takes place at 1 p.m. Tuesday at the Swanson Funeral Home, 806 E. Grand Blvd. (at Mack Avenue) in Detroit. Mayer, 64, died on Saturday after a long illness. Survivors include his widow, Marie; sons Monkeith, Shron and Shmar; and daughter Terry Mayer Williams.

“He just loved show business. He loved to sing,” Marie Mayer said. She and Mayer married in 1963, when she was a 17-year-old model and he was 19, a rising star in music with his 1962 hit song.

Check out his sons names– Monkeith, Shron and Shmar Those are spelled right. None are listed on the Afro American Baby Names website.
But then again neither is Obama. I went to High School with a pair of twins named Mali and Femali, they had a little brother named Pyjamas.Now that we have a president named Obama how long before white people start naming their Kanisha or LaShonda? I’d imagine pretty soon.
Anyone out there heard any good baby names?

Since the source of this next website was a Japanese girl I guess it’s not racist, either way Engrish.com is a hoot and maybe a look into our own future.

It’s amazing that records and photos are still turning up of old blues guys. The above photo ran in this month’s Vanity Fair and was purchased on Ebay. The owner thinks it’s Robert Johnson and Johnny Shines, I think it’s probably Johnson on the left but not Shines on the right who was much darker skinned than that guy, who ever he is.
I’m sure there’s a big legal battle ensuing over the rights to said photo, so if anyone complains I’ll have to pull it, if that’s the case it’s actually worth buying the Nov. VF for, the article is interesting if you don’t know anything about the legal battle over Johnson’s estate (which is a good story). One thing not mentioned is that there’s still Robert Johnson music that’s never been heard. I believe one risque track exists on the metal stampers which has never been issued. Since Sony lost track of the stampers ages ago (which is why the box set sounds so bad, the first few notes of “Traveling Riverside Blues” are even missing!). Compare an old vinyl copy to the CD and see for yourself. I believe the metal parts (from which records are pressed) where dumped in a dumpster years ago, somebody did salvage them but he’s keeping a low profile. If you haven’t noticed that’s Johnson’s death certificate at the top of the page. You can’t even die without doing the paperwork, as I found out once (see Quine posting in Oct. for my experience with the NYC  Medical Examiner and meat wagon folks). Getting back to the blues, in the past few years we’ve seen tracks by Tommy Johnson, Son House, Blind Blake, Ben Curry and others turn up, not to mention the full color photo of Charley Patton. All the aforementioned tracks (and the photo) can be had from record dealer John Tefteller who puts out a blues calender with a bonus CD every year, the Patton photo is on the 2008 calender, the Blind Blake and Ben Curry tracks are on the 2009 CD. You can find ’em here if you follow the links to calender. The calenders are priceless with lots of original, old Paramount advertising art (and some modern reproductions) and well worth the $20 since that’s what the CD would cost anyways. I rarely buy any CD’s nowadays but I recommend this package. No matter how obscure your interests are these days, somebody’s got something to sell you.  But this guy is actually pretty cool and really does love the music and does a great job presenting it.
Speaking of shit turning up, there’s been some great Velvet Underground crap crawling out from under rocks in the past few years. I’ve been wanting to post these four alternate takes from the first Velvet Underground LP for a while now but I really have nothing new to say about the Velvets. They’ve been written about more than any American rock’n’roll band ever. These four tunes come off an acetate found at a stoop sale around the corner from my house, they’re every bit as good as the takes used (some , including Mo Tucker like this version of “Heroin” better). Here they are: “Heroin“, “Waitin’ For The Man“, “Venus In Fur” and “European Son“. Just something to liven up a Sunday. While I’m at it, here are a couple of killers from that live at the Gymnasium tape, with John Cale early ’67: “I’m Not A Young Man Anymore“, “Sister Ray“, “Run Run Run“. This is Cale’s last show with the Velvets. I think these are better than anything on the Quine box (which is all post-Cale recordings). Quine would have loved this stuff, too bad he killed himself. Why didn’t Universal issue the Gymnasium show? Who knows, too late now, it’s all over the net and easy enough to find complete. I guess I did have something to say, but that’s pretty much it.
    Another just thought I’d throw it in there is this one, a South African rock’n’roll 78 from the late 50’s. “Zulu Rock” by the King Brothers, I thought at least Brendan in S. Africa would get a kick out of it.

The Call Of The Wild




Having grown up in South Florida, wildlife in my mind was alligators and poisonous snakes. Both of which I’m terrified of.
I then lived for thirty five years in New York’s East Village where wild life consisted of rats, roaches, pigeons and the occasional feral dog (New Orleans where I spent time had packs of feral pooches roaming the streets of the Bywater at night, my late pal Kelly Keller got cornered by a pack one night that got between where she was living and where her car was parked, pretty damn scary). Now I live on the west side, in Chelsea and have a backyard with two giant black walnut trees, and in adjoining yards giant Maple trees, a tri-sected elm (one part of which grows over my yard) and tons of smaller trees and bushes. I now seem to have a personal relationship with urban wildlife, which includes a woodpecker (I’m not sure if you can see him in the top photo, it depends on how big your computer screen is, he’s on the left branch with a red tuft on his head), a pair of cardinals, a red winged hawk (who eats mice alive, quite a show), robins, blue jays, various water fowl, six thousand sparrows and a family of squirrels. Reminds me of one of record that’s evaded my grasp for years– Nat Couty’s Woodpecker Rock, one of the best black rockabilly records ever.
I like squirrels, they’re like lobotomized monkeys. Very much like the people I know. It started off with one malnourished kitten who lived off the paltry walnut output of the aforementioned pair of trees (they seem to be over a hundred years old and are covered in ivy six floors high, great for privacy, probably strangling the trees to death). I started feeding the squirrel, whom I named Peaches (after the brat in Gavin Lambert’s Running Time who gets devoured by coyotes). Soon Peaches (bottom photo) had grown to normal squirrel size and became quite friendly, parking herself on the ledge outside my office window when she got hungry. Then Peaches found a mate– Large Boy, who I once saw get attacked by a male cardinal (he now bears two talon scars down his back so I can tell him apart from other squirrels). Peaches and Large Boy, who maintain separate residences (Peaches lives on top of the carriage house behind St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, right behind my house, Large Boy over a shed in a yard of a brownstone that faces 20th Street several doors east of Peaches abode). I think this is a good spot for one of my favorite records ever, from one of two guys to record for the two of the coolest labels ever Sun and Fortune– Dr. Issiah Ross’ (Doctor of what you ask? I dunno but one of his Sun records was called “Boogie Disease“) Cat Squirrel.
I know Cream covered “Cat Squirrel” but I’m proud to say I’ve never heard it. I hate Eric Clapton. By the way, the other guy who recorded for Sun and Fortune was Johnny Powers. He also recorded for Fox (“Long Blond Hair“) the label that issued the above Nat Couty disc. Boy am I getting off the track…
Back in my yard, nature took its course soon the squirrels had little duffer– I call him Bingo. Bingo soon grew larger than his father and commandeered the entire yard as his turf. Peaches manages to hold her own when they fight over the food (I try and throw her food on one side of the ten foot stone wall that separates us from the church, and Bingo’s on the other to keep them from killing each other) but Peaches is starting to show the scars from raising a brat, one of her ears is now in shreds. Large Boy is terrified of his spawn and shyly comes around begging for nuts only when Bingo is off doing what ever the hell he does. I forgot to mention, Bingo is retarded. I know this because I can throw a nut inches from him and it will take him a half hour to find it. Sometimes he sniffs around in circles for fifteen minutes, missing the nut that is inches from his snoot, then gives up and goes back to his post in the walnut tree. When he does find the nuts he hides them in places where Large Boy can easily steal them, which is good because otherwise the older squirrel would starve to death.
Where my wife comes from in New Brunswick, Canada they have quite the wild life, mammals all over the place, some of them are gigantic. Once she was talking on the phone of the breakfast nook at her parents’ house and a brown bear jumped out of the garbage can below the window. Moose hunting is big up there and the first moose bagged during moose hunting season of 2002 pushed 9/11 off the front pages of the local newspaper. Here’s the best rock’n’roll record ever made about a moose, from the Specialty label Roddy Jackson’s “Moose On The Loose“. Above is a New Brunswick moose, I don’t know his name. I imagine somebody shot and ate him by now as he’s a pretty big target.
If I can put that Moose together with Peaches I can live in a Jay Ward cartoon (I can be Boris!).
These are the things that have occupied my mind since the election was driving me nuts and tv has been crappy lately (except the final season of The Shield which has been pretty good). Sure signs of brain damage….

Ike Turner- King of the Misanthropic Piss-Shiver Guitar

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oypAbJj-fEs&hl=en&fs=1%5D

Ike Turner was most of the most profoundly influential musicians and band leaders in the history of rock’n’roll, and one of the greatest rock’n’roll guitar players of all time.
His story goes like this (ah one, ana two…). He was born Ike Wister Turner in Clarksdale, Mississippi on Nov. 5th, 1931. His dad got lynched in front of his house, giving him a somewhat jaundiced view of life. He grew up hustling around the streets and soon took to playing piano.
He was inspired by local talent like Robert Nighthawk, whom he played piano behind on a local radio show (here’s the great Nighthawk recorded live on Maxwell St. in Chicago in the early sixties doing Dr. Clayton’s “Cheatin’ & Lyin’ Blues” aka “I’m Gonna Murder My Baby”, you can watch the footage above, thanks JD). Soon Ike was leading his own band with Willie Sims (drums), Jesse Knight (bass),Willie Kizert (guitar), Raymond Hill (baritone sax) and Jackie Breston (tenor sax). He dubbed his combo The Kings of Rhythm. The Kings Of Rhythm did not play the blues style known in Mississippi but the latest up to date jump band R&B sounds. Ike took his band to Memphis were he wound up at the fledgling Sun studio whose boss Sam Phillips was recording local talent and leasing the sides to Chess in Chicago and RPM out in L.A. Their first session produced a huge hit for Chess — “Rocket 88” (a hyper reworking of Jimmy Liggins’ “Cadillac Boogie”) which went to #1 R&B and is often called the first rock’n’roll record, as if there could be such a thing. Somewhere between Phillips studio and the Chess pressing plant however the credits were changed and the band was no longer Ike Turner’s Kings Of Rhythm but had been renamed Jackie Breston & his Delta Cats.
Breston, with a #1 hit under his own name briefly went solo (he’s return a few years later and a few dollars poorer) while Ike left Phillips and stuck up a partnership with the Bihari Brothers who ran the RPM/Modern/Meteor family of labels. Ike would record and play on sides by Howlin’ Wolf, B.B. King, Joe Hill Louis, and tons of others, driving around the south with Joe Bihari, recording musicians in juke joints and make shift studios. The U.K. Ace label has issued an incredible CD of some of the more interesting and obscure sides (and out takes) called The Travelin’ Record Man which is well worth buying. Ike also cut his own band for RPM and even had an LP issued (Ike Rocks The Blues on Crown) which culls together the best of his guitar instrumentals from this period (Ike, having switched to guitar after “Rocket 88”, figuring it would be harder to over look him if he was standing up). Here’s one of my favorites from that period: “Bayou Rock” (as it was known on the LP aka “Cubano Getaway” which is what it was called on the 78). The Bihari’s were cheap fucks who didn’t pay much so Ike returned to Sun on several occasions to record sides that Sam Phillips never bothered to release. Some of these are incredible but the world wouldn’t hear them until England’s Charley label started digging through the Sun vaults in the late 70’s. Here’s “I’m Gonna Forget About You” a tune Ike would recut several years later in Chicago for the Cobra label. One can hear his already perfected “piss shiver” (as Roscoe dubbed it) guitar style which involved pulling the whammy bar on his Stratocaster hard enough to nearly yank the bridge off the body. While we’re at it, here’s an oddball tune that was left sitting in Sun’s storage room, it’s Ike and first wife Bonnie Turner duetting on a number called “Down In The Congo“. Memphis soon proved too small for a man of Ike’s ambition and his next stop was St. Louis. In St. Louis Ike cut sides for labels small and smaller, appeared on local TV (where the above clip came from), and
built a sizable audience, especially with white women while appearing in local nightclubs. According to Jimmy Thomas (in a classic interview in Blues Unlimited mag from 1983), the cops would regularly round up Ike and the band and send the white gals back to their parents and husbands. Among the great tunes he recorded while in St. Louis are these two singles for the Stevens label issued under the name of Icey Renrut (Ike Turner spelled sideways), both rockers feature vocalist Jimmy Thomas- “Jack Rabbit” and “Hey Hey“.
By 1956 Ralph Bass signed Ike and his crew to the Federal label, a subsidiary of Cincinnati’s King Records one of the largest and best of the indies, and home to such hit makers as Wynonie Harris, the Delmore Brothers, Moon Mullican, the Midnighters, the Dominoes, Bill Doggett, and later James Brown. Here Ike cut his finest sides, some under the name of vocalist Billy Gayles, others as by Jackie Breston (who’d come home, all was forgiven) and some under Ike’s own moniker. Check out this one: “No Coming Back“, a fairly standard blues ballad until Ike’s solo which sounds like somebody is hitting the guitar with a frying pan. On “Just One More Time” Ike’s guitar intro combines the piss shiver with tremolo for a sound that we have no words to describe (shiverelo?). On Breston’s “Gonna Wait For My Chance” he displays equally brutal guitar technique. Here is “She Makes My Blood Run Cold” where the Kings of Rhythm move into Screamin’ Jay Hawkins territory to great effect. Alas, the Federal years also left Ike hitless and soon he was in Chicago where he cut one side each for the Cobra and it’s sister label Artistic,
the best being “Box Top” on Cobra, a re-make of an earlier Sun recording. The best thing Ike did
while at Cobra was his contribution to Otis Rush’s “Double Trouble“, that’s Ike playing the solo which is usually attributed to Rush. Together they create one musical foul mood (that’s a compliment).
It was in St. Louis that Anna Mae Bullock, who entered the picture as Raymond Hill’s girlfriend became the lead singer of the Kings Of Rhythm, with three Ikettes added to the band Ray-lette style, their first record on Juggy Murray’s Sue label — “A Fool In Love” shot to the top of the R&B charts and Ike re-named Anna Mae Tina Turner and took the sound to the bank.
The story of Ike and Tina Turner has been told many times, in many books. I’m sure Tina didn’t lie about the amount of abuse heaped on her, but our subject today is Ike’s music, and all through Ike and Tina’s recording career Ike kept recording great R&B, some under Jackie Breston’s name like this one on Sue- ” Much Later” from the early sixties, it has all the fire of his fifties recordings. Ike also kept recording killer guitar instrumentals, Sue even issued an LP of ’em called Ike & Tina Turner Present The Kings Of Rhythm— Dance! Here’s some of his wilder guitar workouts from the sixties starting with his theme song “Prancin’“, here’s a great two parter issued only on a Sue 45–” New Breed pt. 1” b/w “New Breed pt. 2“. And let me throw in some highlights from the aforementioned Dance LP– “The Gully“, “Twisteroo“, “Trackdown Twist“, a mind bending take on “Steel Guitar Rag“, the ultra wild “Double Mint“, and as a bonus an un-issued out-take “Twisting The Strings“. Another killer guitar solo from Ike found its way onto my favorite Ikettes’ single– “Camel Walk“, and dig that rhythm section!
Ike last truly incredible moments on wax can be found on the 1974 LP Blue Roots (UA). Recorded at Bolic Sound, the studio/fortress he built in L.A. (Andre Williams put in time at Bolic, even he thinks things had gone beyond excess at that point). Ike re-creates his 50’s style on “Broken Hearted” (a rare vocal from Ike) and leaves us with this mind boggling spoken word piece (also issued on a 45), an homage to Ike’s favorite drug and one of the most amazing sides ever waxed by anyone– “Right On” (when I turned Quine onto this one his jaw literally dropped).
I met Ike a few times. In the early 90’s somebody gave him my home phone number and he had his manager call and ask if I could make him a tape of his old tunes. He had some blues festival gigs booked in Europe that summer and they sent a list of tunes they wanted him to play and he couldn’t remember any of them. I made a nintey minute cassette of the old stuff and we met at his hotel room. Ike was nice enough, he was just out of jail and clean. He was very polite and funny, he spoke with a stutter. When we sat and listened to the tape, the first tune was “Prancin'” which had been his theme song for a good twenty years but he looked at me like he had never heard it before. “That’s pretty good” he said with a grin. I got him to sign some records (his autograph on my copy of Ike Rocks The Blues reads– “What’s love got to do with it not a dam thing” spelled just like that). Later I went to a party thrown in his honor and he made me feel really important by introducing me to everyone as his close friend.
In his last years Ike tried to return to his old blues rockin’ style and although the records weren’t very good, live he could still bend them strings. At least once a night he’d let loose on the guitar and give it the old piss shiver, and when he did I’d get a chill up my spine.
Ike died last December at age 76 from a cocaine overdose. Hell, at age 76 what’s the point of living clean? To save yourself for those really great years from age 90-100? If we had to judge our musical heroes by their personal life we’d have no musical heroes, and beating up your old lady is certainly bad form, I blame it on the coke. It really brings out the inner asshole in people. As a musician however, Ike Turner really was a helluva guy.
The above photo of Ike and me was taken by Bob Gruen, backstage at Tramps, NYC, 1997.

Nathaniel Mayer 1944-2008

Nathaniel Mayer, one of the greatest rock’n’roll singers of all time passed away on Oct. 31st, he was 64 years old and died after having a stroke, his second. Nathaniel, like yesterday’s subject Andre Williams started out on Detroit’s Fortune label where he recorded the all time classic “Village Of Love” which went top 40 in 1962 under the name of Nathaniel Mayer and the Fabulous Twilights, although I don’t think there really was a Fabulous Twilights. For Fortune he cut killer sides like — “Hurting Love” “I Had A Dream“, “My Last Dance With You“, “Well I Got News“, “Leave Me Alone“, the live garage-soul “Going Back To The Village Of Love“, “I’m Not Gonna Cry“, a Christmas record “Mr. Santa Claus“, “A Place I Know“, winding up his Fortune recording career with the super funky  “I Want Love and Affection (Not The House Of Correction)“.  In all he cut nine singles and one LP for Fotune, all great. His voice always seemed on the verge of cracking, giving  him a unique sound quite unlike any other singer I can think of.

 I didn’t know Nate but we had lots of mutual friends and he had suprised virtually everyone in Detroit by staging something of a comeback in recent years, recording an LP for Fat  Possum (I Just Wanna Be Held) with members of the Dirtbombs and Black Keys as well as touring. Norton two singles, one recorded in 1968–“I Don’t Want No Bald Headed Woman Tellin’  Me What To Do” and a live re-make of  “Mr. Santa Claus” He’s seen below performing I think in Spain. The only good story I have is from the late Cub Koda whose band the Del-Tinos were backing Nathaniel at a high school sock hop in the early sixties. At showtime Nathaniel was no where to be found, finally after checking all the bathroom stalls they found  him, Cub said it was the first time he ever saw anyone shoot up. Later, Nathaniel got into crack before cleaning up and making a comeback.  Rest in peace Nathaniel.

Andre Williams– Bacon Fat and other delights….






On Nov 1st Zephyr Andre Williams will be 72 years old. Or 74, or 76, or maybe 70.

Math isn’t Andre’s best subject. The first time I heard him was on an R&B station out of Miami when a DJ named Butterball who would come on at midnight played “Cadillac Jack” every night for a week. I bought the single, on Chess which I loved, along with it’s b-side “Girdle Up”. Later as I got caught the dreaded disease called record collecting I became familiar with his earlier sides on Detroit’s legendary Fortune label– “Bacon Fat“, “Greasy Chicken“, “Pass The Biscuits“, “Andre Is M-M-Movin‘”, “Jailbait“, “Going Down To Tia Juana” and the rest. These were life defining records, the reason why a person spends their life digging through piles of dusty old records at flea markets, junk stores, and yard sales, loses their eye sight reading auction lists. They were rock’n’roll in it’s purest, greasiest, and most unadulterated form. Everything about them was perfect from the sly lyrics to the distorted guitars, the primal slop beat, the guttural saxophones. Andre became an obsession and not a week went by when I didn’t spin one of his records on my radio show. In the late 80’s I met Andre for the first time, this was in Miami where he had holed up briefly. He was drunk and not in the best shape. I attempted to interview him for Kicks magazine, he spent most of the evening passing out in his rum and coke.  I didn’t see Andre again until the late 90’s when courtesy of the folks at Norton Records Andre staged one of the greatest comebacks in history.
     History, Andre’s got one, to say the least. Born in Bessemer, Alabama, probably in 1936 his family relocated to Chicago. His mother past away when he was six leaving the kids to live under a stairwell until they were taken in by various aunties. By age sixteen Andre was in Detroit where he joined his cousin Little Eddie Hurt’s vocal group the 5 Dollars who had cut such classics as “So Strange” and “Doctor Baby” for the incredible Fortune label, perhaps the most unique of all the “indies”. Soon Andre was leading his own group– the Don Juans and was given top billing, his first Fortune release, or more aptly escape, was called “Put A Chain On It”,
then recording the aforementioned classics records, they were too raw for the top forty, soon they were too raw for the record business in general and as the fifties became the sixties Andre was on the move.
     The sixties saw Andre hustling back and forth from Chicago where he scored big hits with the 5 Du-tones “Shake A Tail Feather” (a tune that would go on to be recorded by Ray Charles, Ike and Tina Turner and Hanson) and “Twine Time” by Alvin Cash and the Crawlers, back to Detroit where he cut some sides with the Contours for Motown (Andre would be hired and fired by Berry Gordy over twenty times), to Houston where he produced sides by Bobby Bland at Duke. He still recorded under his own name, now adapting a boog-a-loo style best exemplified by “Pearl Time” on Sport and “Sweet Little Pussycat” on Wingate. After a brief stint and some minor hits at Chess (see above) Andre hit a dry streak, broken only by Bull & the Matadors’ “Funky Judge”, a minor hit covered in the 70’s by the J. Geils Band. By the 1980’s Andre was living on the streets of Chicago, smoking crack and living the life of a derelict.
I think it was George Paulus of St. George Records who first brought Andre back into the studio to cut a CD (Norton issued a much different version of the sessions on the LP Greasy) backed by a band that featured the Pretty Things’ Dick Taylor on guitar and the Eldorados on backing vocals. Andre came to New York in 1997 to promote Greasy a trip that would do Homer’s Ulysses proud (he would return home many years later, after many adventures and many countries, circumcised). In what would become one of the most unlikely comebacks of the century, Andre would tour the world, using various back up groups and sometimes pick up bands, building an audience amongst hepsters who hadn’t been born when “Bacon Fat” was released. This is about the time me and Andre became reacquainted. It started with Andre recording a station ID for my radio show (“anything with an antenna is important”). I began booking Andre to play in New York at the Lakeside Lounge (it started as a Camel cigarette sponsored one nighter, he ended up playing a dozen shows including a New Year’s Eve blow out that was probably the only time I really had fun on a NYE). We also booked him into the Circle Bar in New Orleans (we had a great backing band for one of those shows with Mr. Quintron on organ and the Royal Pendletons’ Mike Hurt on guitar). Hanging out with Andre was always a blast. Once at the Lakeside he invited his new wife (a Jewish, New York lawyer, hence the circumcision, he never bothered to divorce the first wife in Chicago) and her old aunties. Andre decided he was going to do the whole set without cursing. It got off to an auspicious start with the opening number “Pussy Stank” when on the P in “pussy”, Andre’s dentures came flying out of his mouth, ever the pro he caught ’em on a bounce and had ’em back in his kisser in time to come back in on the “stank”.
     Once in New Orleans, at Mardis Gras time the 9th Ward Marching Band decided to make Andre it’s grand marshall. I was up on the balcony over the bar when they came marching down St. Charles Ave, Andre seated on a float like a Sultan. The entire marching band, bass drums, tubas, everything, took a right turn and marched into the bar, still playing (the Circle Bar is tiny, like a half of a subway car with a 10′ x 10′ room off to the side). When I got downstairs they whole band was inside, still playing, marching lockstep as Andre was carried in over their heads. I’ve never seen him happier.
     On the day George W. Bush was elected (or whatever that was) Andre and I flew from New Orleans to New York City. First we had to stop at a liquor store to get a bottle of rum to stop his DT’s (it was 8:30 am). When we got to the airport Andre dropped the bottle, leaving a pile of broken glass and Bacardi all over the floor. The bar was closed. Andre soon found the woman with the keys to the bar and sweet talked her into selling him a new bottle. On the flight ‘Dre soon had made friends with everyone else on the flight. It was the only time I’ve ever flown that I would describe as fun. He predicted Bush would steal the election, predicted 9/11 and the war in Iraq, and predicted the financial meltdown– eight years before it happened. This guy doesn’t miss a trick. Our fellow passengers were bemused but time has proved Andre a keen observer of things and the way they work.
     For the last twelve years Andre’s toured the world, gotten involved with countless women, many a third his age or less, recorded for a bewildering variety of labels including Norton (Bait & Switch is my favorite of all his post-comeback discs, Robert Quine plays on two tracks, it was one of his proudest moments), In The Red. Bloodshot, St. George, and others I can’t remember. He’s also seen his sixties sides re-issued by Night Train (Rib Tips and Pig Snouts is a must), and many
bootlegs of his Fortune sides (the offspring of Jack and Devora Brown, known as the “Wig Brothers” because of their ill fitting hair pieces, being too stupid to do the job themselves and unwilling to lease the stuff to those more competent than them, although before she died Devora issued an LP of Andre’s stuff– Jailbait that featured some great unreleased stuff like “Is It True” and “Tossin’ & Turnin’ and Burnin’ All Up Inside“), leaving the field wide open to bootleggers.
     The past few years have been rough for Andre. His wife (the real one) passed on and he’s been in and out of public housing and cheap flop houses. He had to quit drinking due to some serious health problems. Yet good things are happening too. Tricia Todd’s documentary– Agile, Hostile, Mobile: A Year With Andre Williams played at SXSW to great acclaim and should have a distribution deal soon. The trailer can be seen here. You can’t keep a guy like Andre Williams down for long. At 72, despite the hard miles he’s put on his body, he’s still better looking (and better dressed) than Bill Wyman. I hope he lives to be a hundred. Friendship with Andre isn’t always easy (or cheap) but I’m honored to know the guy. 
Captions for the above photos from the top:
top) Fortune Records poster that’s a bit too big for my scanner. 2nd down) Note from Andre for you handwriting analysis freaks. middle) Outside the Lakeside Lounge, summer 2000 (left to right): Hal Wilner, Anita Pallenberg, Andre Williams. 2nd from bottom) Andre steals a kiss from the late Bill Pietsch. bottom)  Andre with the 5 Dollars, 1956.

Ron Asheton- R.I.P.

It’s Tues. Morning, Jan. 6th, 10 AM NYC time. I just got word from my friend Michelle in Michigan that the great Ron Asheton passed away. Age 60. I’m in total shock. I’m reposting my Oct. Stooges posting because it’s got some rare photos and rare tunes. One thing I mixed up back in Oct.  In the bottom photo it’s Bill Cheetam on the far left, Zeke Zettner second from left.  Give a listen to the two takes of Jr. Kimbrough’s You Better Run posted below.  Pull out the Funhouse box.  He changed the world with three chords and a maltese cross.  R.I.P.



     Halloween marks the forty first anniversary of the first Stooges show. As unlikely as it would have sounded at the time of their first show, they’re still out there and despite a 29 year sabbatical, still the best rock’n’roll band on the road.

     Rock’n’roll re-unions, at best are disappointing (the Velvet Underground), and usually just plain suck (the Byrds, New York Dolls), but the Stooges are always the exception to the rule, Hell, I’ve seen ’em three times since they’ve reformed and they were no less than great each time. Who would have imagined it? Hearing them on TV commercials doesn’t bother me, I don’t begrudge ’em a cent, hell Ray Charles, Bo Diddley, Little Richard and Jimmy Reed all did commercials. Good enough for Jimmy Reed, good enough for anybody.  I even like the Stooges last LP The Weirdness which nobody likes, but nobody ever likes their albums until they’re twenty years old. There’s not much left to say about the Stooges, but here’s some rare sounds and pics for you. First off are two takes of Junior Kimbrough’s “You Better Run” recorded for a tribute to Junior Kimbrough LP (which I’ve never seen, was it even released?). First one is here and the second take is here. Iggy really sounds like he’s having fun, especially on the spoken part which he copies from Kimbrough’s original verbatim.
     If you missed the Funhouse Sessions seven CD box you really missed something great. I bought three copies but gave two of ’em away. From the first session for that classic disc here’s the very first take of “Down On The Street” and here’s the first take of” Funhouse”. There’s more than twenty takes of some tunes, even two takes of “LA Blues”. How did they decide which one was the keeper? Even the studio chatter is interesting.  The box is worth killing for in my opinion. It’s nice to have the whole mess on the hard drive so the various takes show up when I leave the box on shuffle. I’m constantly getting up to check the computer screen– “Loose take 17″, gotta remember that one”, then I forget which take it was and what was different it. The weird thing about the box is that since Ron overdubbed a second guitar part on the first three tunes, we never actually here the issued versions of “Down On The Street”, “Loose” and “TV Eye”. The issued takes are present but without the overdubs.
More Stooges tidbits– The first LP has been re-issued with the John Cale mix thrown in as bonus tracks. Iggy’s mix is better but it’s fun to hear. I’ll post some of those tunes some day. Speaking of mixes, Sundazed has re-issued the 45 version of “Search & Destroy” b/w “Penetration” which is still the best mix. I hated Iggy’s remix of Raw Power (at least one band member whom I leave nameless agrees with me), all he did was remove the effects from Williamson’s guitar and make his own voice louder (and let the fades play through to the endings). I thought the one thing Bowie got right were the vocals and guitars, all Raw Power needed was for the bass and drums to be turned up. So you still need your old vinyl copy. The bass and drums are audible on the WABX tapes but the sound quality on those bootlegs are so lousy I can’t recommend ’em.  
Paul Trynka’s bio Iggy: Open Up and Bleed (Broadway Books, 2007) is a hoot and well worth reading. Much better than Joe Ambrose’s awful bio (the first edition of which was pulled from the market due to plagiarism, he literally stole about 1/3rd of it from Please Kill Me, uncredited). Ambrose hates Funhouse, so why bother writing an Iggy bio? He’s practically illiterate, did none of his own research and has awful taste in music. It may be the lamest book ever published about a major musical figure, and that’s saying something. Trynka’s book however is extremely well researched and full of fun gossip, my favorite parts are Iggy’s crazy sabbatical in Haiti, and the entire story of the recording of New Values (Williamson producing at gunpoint!).
The video clip of course is from the tv show Midsummer’s Night Rock which aired in 1970. I saw it then, at age 11, and it was a galvanizing, life changing moment. It took a couple of years to track down their first two  LP’s (which I eventually got for .39 cents in a department store bargin bin along with the first Mc5 album) but from
that first glimpse of them on TV I knew the Stooges were what rock’n’roll was all about.
The two above photos show the Stooges in odd line ups. The top photo is the Stooges in ’71 with James Williamson (center) and Jimmy Recca (second from left) added to the band on guitar and bass respectively. Recca would later play with Ron Asheton in a band called New Order (not the English disco group). Williamson (who came into the Stooges from a band called the Chosen Few with a detour to reform school in between) would make a power play and force Asheton to bass when they reformed the band in ’72. The bottom photo shows the group in late 1970 with members of the road crew, the late Zeke Zetner and Bill Cheetam in the line up. I’m not sure which one played guitar and which one played bass but Zetner is on the far left, Cheetam second from left. Since my wife got the photo framed before I could make a copy I re-shot it through the frame. We have another photo from the same session that’s not framed that I may post some day. Since we seem to have the only copies of these photos that exist if you use them without permission I’ll know where you stole ’em from.
Back in the early 70’s in wasn’t so much that the Stooges were unknown so much as they were utterly hated. If you met another Stooges fan back then chances are you’d be friends for life. Most of my oldest friends were people I bonded with over the Stooges.

Halloween part one






Halloween, like everything else in this city used to be a lot more fun. There were always parties, like the one I saw Steven Kramer (the first artist to show at the Fun Gallery and later a member of the Contortions) fall off a window ledge while doing the old soft shoe– he landed on the roof of an abandoned building several stories below having shattered both legs and his face. There were great gigs– usually Iggy or the Cramps played (one year they did a double bill together at the old Academy Of Music, in the same building that housed Julians Pool Hall, now torn down to make way for NYU dorms that look like they were designed in post-WWII Eastern Bloc style)
Take the Halloween parade for example. When it started out it was just a bunch of crazy drag queens on acid. It had no set route, it would wind through the through the streets of the West Village, stopping at bars and bodegas for booze, going every which way until the paraders were to drunk to walk and then kind of peter out. Now it’s run by the city, a million mall refugees from the suburbs show up pushing their $2500 baby strollers violently through the crowd, yelling into their cell phones trying to find each other. The parade itself goes straight up Sixth Ave. and is full of smarmy politicians smiling their greasy smiles (there’s an election coming up!) and the streets are full of cops just waiting to bust heads. Pop open a beer can and you’re hauled off to the pokey. Not much fun at all, just another reason to stay in an watch TV. I stopped going out on Halloween in the early 90’s, usually leaving town for New Orleans where they still knew how to throw a good party– but we know what happened to New Orleans.

Having spent a good portion of my life hanging out on the stoops of New York City I still find it a thrill to own my very own stoop. And despite it all, I still love the idea of Halloween. So my wife decided to combine the two, and now for the sixth year we will spend Halloween sitting on our stoop as I watch my wife and friends give out ridiculously overstuffed bags of Halloween treats. The above photos are from last year.
Halloween past has also produced some great records. Good rock’n’roll thrives on novelty, and Halloween being an ancient pagan ceremony probably has the same roots as rock’n’roll so they go great together. Here’s a few favorite Halloween discs for your pleasure.
First some great guitar instrumentals with a Halloween theme:
the Ventures- The Bat (notice the similarity to the Frantics’ Werewolf)
on the R&B side, here’s an odd one– Bill Dogget’s Monster Bash
Now here’s Bo Diddley’s rarest single, and the only one I don’t own an original copy of (anyone got a 45 or 78 to sell or trade):
like all of Bo’s Checker sides, it’s great. On the rockabilly shelf, I’ve always loved this one by Jackie Morningstar– Rockin’ In The Graveyard
and also this here one- Rod Willis’ The Cat.
Good one, no?
Brian Walker’s Trick Or Treat is a peculiar disc, he truly sounds insane. Speaking of insane, it wouldn’t be Halloween without Hasil Adkins, here’s his version of Haunted House.
Another guy who like the Haze, I had out to my old WFMU radio show was Jack Starr who not only cut great rockabilly and garage records but made his own horror movies, now sadly lost. Here’s one that has aspects of all three–Halloween Party.
Some more great records– Freddie & the Hitchhikers– Sinners is one of that rare genre, rockabilly records with theramin on them. Another must for your Halloween bash is Gary Warren’s classic Werewolf. A good doo-wop side is the Symbols- Do The Zombie.
Must not forget Screamin’ Jay Hawkins. This one has one of the best lyrics of all time– “I long so much to be/the way I was before I was me”. It’s called I Hear Voices.
One last record, a bit corny but not without charm– Casper & the Ghosts’ Rockin’ Round The Tombstone.
I guess the above photos need some captions so I’ll put ’em here.
Top- Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, not sure who took this one. 2nd from top: Cute kids from down the block. 3rd down: Danny Fields and Legs McNeil man the treats basket. 4th down: Legs compares costumes with Space Kid. Bottom: Tyke with Slut costume and friends.

TV Movie alert!



I wanted to mention some stuff I overlooked on my Oct. 1st posting about Turner Classic Movies. Set your timers, tonight TCM is showing a Tod Browning double feature (see older posts: Oct 1st for a nice snapshot of Browning and pals). Midnight tonight (or 12 AM Monday EST) is The Blackbird (1926)with Lon Chaney, which I’ve never seen. Following that at 1:30 AM Monday is The Unknown (1927) with Chaney and Joan Crawford in one of her first roles. Like many of Browning’s best films it’s set in a carnival side show and is both twisted and beautiful. Chaney plays an armless knife thrower. It’s one of my favorites. If you’re still up at 2:30 AM you can catch Carl Theodor Dreyer’s Vampyr (1932) a beautiful, atmospheric vampire flick that’s not quite as good as Nosferatu but well worth watching. Two Boris Karloff vehicles follow that with  Roy Williams Nell’s The Black Room (1935) at 3:45 and Nick Grinde’s Before I Hang  (1940) at 5 AM.  The latter is  particularly good. That’s five in a row!   Nice work who ever is programming this trash. It’s a great way to get in the Halloween spirit. Tivo (or DVR or whatever the hell your cable company calls it) really does make life easier. 

I’ll be posting some Halloween theme rock’n’roll and R&B tunes this week so be sure and check back.

Hound’s Quiz #1


As an addendum to yesterday’s Bill Wyman birthday post, here’s the Hound Quiz #1.

First correct answer wins my home burned CD: Cocksucker Blues (The Best Of The Un-Issued Rolling Stones 1963-1983) featuring, in my opinion the best unreleased studio outtakes and live tracks that didn’t make it onto any legit discs. Tunes include the title track, “Andrew’s Blues”, “Two Trains”, “Everybody Pays Their Dues”, “Gimme Shelter (Keith lead vocal)”, etc. Question:
Name the top 40 single on which Keith is the only Rolling Stone playing on.
Answers to NervousNorvus@aol.com.
UPDATE: Congrats to Bob Pomery, the answer is Happy. Keith plays all the guitars and bass, Jimmy Miller was on drums and Jim Price on trombone and trumpet.
Everyone else had gone home that day. Mick’s backing vocal was later dubbed on in L.A.