The Originals Vol. 1

Full article with links here


Inspired by a propitious confluence of a long discussion about cover versions we didn’t know where covers and a generous correspondent whom we’ll know as RH e-mailing me a bunch of rare originals of better known covers, we are now at the cusp of what will be a longish series. Any Major Notebook now includes two pages worth of almost 100 shortlisted songs that in their original form are lesser known than later versions. In some cases that reputation is entirely subjective. There will be people who think that the version of Lady Marmalade perpetrated by Christina Aguilera and pals was the original. But people of my generation will long have been familiar with LaBelle’s 1970s recording. Until a day ago, I thought that was the original, but RH has disabused me of my error. The real original of Lady Marmalade will feature later in this series. In a very few cases, I will not present the original, but the earliest version available (I will note these instances accordingly). And we’ll kick-off with a heavy-duty dose of 10 originals. Tell me which songs you were surprised to learn are in fact covers, and let me know whether you prefer the originals or later versions.


Leon Russell - This Masquerade.mp3
Carpenters - This Masquerade.mp3
It makes sense to start this series with the Carpenters, who made it a virtue of picking up relatively obscure songs, and re-arrange and appropriate them. Think of (They Long To Be) Close To You, which despite legions of compet...







Randy & the Rainbows - Denise.mp3
Blondie - Denis.mp3
Here’s one I didn’t know until a few days ago: Blondie’s 1977 burst of pop-punk was in fact a cover of a 1963 hit. For Randy & the Rainbows, Denise represented...











Bing Crosby - Try A Little Tenderness.mp3
Otis Redding - Try A Little Tenderness.mp3
My kind friend RH, who helped inspire this series, has made me aware of many originals that have surprised me. It was not news to me, however, that Try A Little Tenderness was in fact an old 1930s standard, ...







The Arrows - I Love Rock 'n' Roll.mp3
Joan Jett - I Love Rock 'n' Roll.mp3
The Arrows were a short-lived English band on the RAK label, which also gave us the likes of Smokie, Hot Chocolate and Racey, and so were produced by the semi-genius of '70s pop, Mickey Most. After two hits – though not this song – and starring in a couple of brief TV series on British TV, they disappeared. Joan Jett also seemed to disappear after...





Everly Brothers - Crying In The Rain.mp3
Cotton, Lloyd & Christian - Crying In The Rain.mp3
A-ha - Crying In The Rain.mp3
Before she was all dreamy and barefooted hippie cat lover, Carole King was a songwriter in the legendary Brill Building. One of the many hits she churned out was Crying In The Rain, with which the Everly Brothers scored a top 10 hit on both sides of the Atlantic in 1961. It was periodically revived on the country circuit, but is best known to many as...






Liza Minnelli - New York, New York.mp3
Frank Sinatra - New York New York.mp3
The Theme from New York, New York has so much become a Sinatra cliché, it is often forgotten that it came from a rather long and boring Scoresese film with Minnelli and Robert de Niro. In the film, Minelli’s version is a source of some melancholy viewing; Sinatra’s 1979 take, recorded...






Four Seasons - Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby Goodbye).mp3
Bay City Rollers - Bye Bye Baby.mp3
The Four Seasons will be occasional visitors in this series. At least those people who grew up in the 1970s will be more familiar with cover versions than the Four Seasons originals. Bye Bye Baby was written by band member Bob Gaudio and producer Bob Crewe, making it to #12 in the US charts. A decade later...






Fleetwood Mac - Black Magic Woman.mp3
Santana - Back Magic Woman.mp3
From Fleetwood Mac's 1968 debut album, Black magic Woman is "three minutes of sustain/reverb guitar with two exquisite solos from Peter [Green]," according to Mick Fleetwood. Carlos Santana covered it on 1970's Abraxas album and retained...






Scott English - Brandy.mp3
Barry Manilow - Mandy.mp3
Although he is a talented songwriter, Barry Manilow is a bit like the Carpenters: he appropriated other people's songs by force of arrangement (and, obviously, commercial success) – including a Carpenters song, which will feature in this series. If we need proof of how much Bazza owned the songs he didn't write...






Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger - The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.mp3
Roberta Flack - The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.mp3
The first time ever you heard this song probably was by Roberta Flack, whose performance on her 1969 debut album was barely noticed until it was included in Clint Eastwood's 1971 film Play Misty For Me. Those who dig deeper will know ...
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McCain's double agent

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Pop and politics have a long tradition of mixing, but the relationship is not always a happy one. John Lennon’s hymn to hypocrisy stands as a totem for every song with a political or social message that would have been better served by banal lyrics about the whims of love found and lost. Of course, there are songs that did manage to capture the Zeitgeist: Buffalo Springfield’s For What It’s Worth springs to mind, or, more recently, Bright Eyes’ When The President Talks To God. On the other hand, musicians dabbling in politics can be embarrassing, even in the hands of the veterans. Even the poet laureate of black resistance, Gil Scott-Heron, exposed a lapse of wit when he referred to Ronald Reagan as “Ray-Gun” (do you see what he did there?).

Valid questions may be asked about the efforts by Bob Geldof and Bono to heal the world and make it a better place for you and for me and the entire human race (there are people dying!). It can be said that they conscientise people who otherwise might be indifferent to African famines or international debt, which is commendable. But what is accomplished by these self-important bozos, with their trademark wild hair and blue shades, in the corridors of power? Since when do kings beckon the counsel of their court jesters? The truth is, George W Bush enjoys being felated by Geldof in Time magazine, and he imagines that posing with Bono gives him some sort of street cred.

In general, it is preferable that pop stars just shut up about politics, unless their gig is political or they know how to steer clear from sanctimony. Which would have been good advice for the ghastly Madonna, whom I might suspect of being a double agent for John McCain if it wasn’t so apparent that she is just another narcissistic moron. At a recent live concert she treated her audience to a PowerPoint presentation depicting John McCain alongside Robert Mugabe and, but of course, Adolf Hitler. And another sequence ranked Barack Obama alongside the Mahatma Gandhi, Al Gore and (please excuse me while puke) John Lennon.

The mad prune thought she was doing Obama a favour? Did she phone Obama first? “Yo, Barack me old mucker, Madge ’ere. Listen, mate, I want to do something for you, innit? What can I do, pip pip old chum what?” Chances are that Barack would not have asked to be compared to Al Gore – who in 2000 failed to beat the pair that does warrant depiction alongside Mugabe and even Hitler – even less so to Lennon. And he would have pointed out that McCain is many things, but no Hitler.

Madonna certainly didn’t help her favoured candidate, her egomaniacal delusions notwithstanding. American voters might take their political advice from fat, sweaty bigots on the radio, but they are not going to listen to a woman who once published a book presenting herself with what I hope was fake ejaculate on her face. You don’t see Ron Jeremy campaigning for McCain, under the slogan McCain: A change is gonna cum, because that just is not helpful. Indeed, McCain has more in common with the Ron Jeremys of the world than he has with the Führer. Not in that I suppose McCain to be a prodigious sex machine who has been batting consistently above his league, but because McCain is a nasty misogynist who has publicly and loudly called his wife a “cunt” (a much worse insult in America than it is in Britain). “At least I don’t plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you cunt,” that charming man told his wife. It is here, not in hysterical references to Hitler, that Madonna might have fruitfully attacked McCain as an objectionable women-hater who’d probably call your mother “a cunt” too.

And then there is American Dream, that overextended Obama jingle by former Eurythmic Dave Stewart, a man whose proximity makes the virtue of relevance cower whimperingly in a corner. The song is awesomely bad (it might be OK if used to advertise fabric softener though), the video even more so. All that’s missing is Bono glaring with determined earnestness from behind his blue shades. Instead we have the usually likeable Forrest Whitacker over-emoting, smugmeister Denzel Washington smirking, Whoopie Goldberg gurning, and assorted pop stars and other self-congratulatory celebrities of varying legacies posing and leaping about in joy of the Second Coming, until the whole brew of cliché boils over with footage of Martin Luther King Jr making a speech (and guess which one). The deplorable irony resides in the video’s intrinsic racism. MLK because, as the eagle-eyed reader may have spotted, Obama is black. Don’t they know that Obama’s reference point is not really MLK, but JFK ’60, or perhaps RFK ’68?

If celebs want to express themselves politically, then at least their efforts should be helpful. Unlike Madonna’s slideshow and Stewart’s song, it should be intelligent and strategic, or at least witty or thoughtful. Preaching to the choir (insert your own Mama Don’t Preach joke here) can be a useful mobilising strategy. But Barack Obama needs no help there. Where Obama does need help is in swinging undecided voters his way. McCain’s policies and personality offer many points for attack; comparing him to Hitler serves only to insult and alienate those who are still thinking about voting for him.


And with all that in mind, here are a few politically-themed songs. Most bizarre of them is the effort by Linda Polley who claims that the spirit of John Lennon is channeling right-wing messages from the grave through her. Toby Keith’s reactionary kick-ass song is actually not too bad as far as the music goes, but the lyrics are, of course, gobsmackingly horrible – I was surprised to hear that our man claims to be a Democrat (please, no slideshows at his gigs!). JFK of course did not make records – this is from a record of his early presidential speeches set to music.

In the left corner:
Bright Eyes - When The President Talks To God (live).mp3
John F. Kennedy - The Ask Not Waltz.mp3
The Redskins - Keep On Keepin' On.mp3*

In the right corner:
John Lennon (via Linda Polley) - Vote Republican.mp3
Toby Keith - Courtesy of The Red, White, And Blue.mp3 .

And for Taylor Parkes' fantastic collection of Right-Wing Rock (whence I borrowed the Linda Polley thing), go HERE
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Great Moustaches in Rock: Dr Hook

Dr Hook once punned with prurient poise: "When you’re in love with a beautiful woman, it’s hard". It is difficult to imagine that said beautiful woman would find it easy to relieve that rigidity when confronted with the explosion of ill-advised whiskers which served to detract from the occasional eyepatch and a calvary of tonsorial catastrophes. I suspect that even the promise of pants that get up and dance wouldn’t do the trick (or would it? Perhaps this blog’s four female readers can enlighten us).

The gala of lip thatch that was Dr Hook and the Medicine Show had a strange way with women. On Sylvia’s Mother, the Doctor (well, there is no Dr Hook, but in that agricultural festival of labiae hirsutus it might have been anyone) sobs as he begs the polite but impervious Mrs Apricot to put Sylvia on the phone.
For full post, GO HERE





Previous moustaches:
David Crosby
Village People
James Brown
John Oates (of Hall & Oates)
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The Sound Of Africa Mix Vol. 2

This is the second volume of The Sound of Africa, a mix of relatively new music from Africa and a few classics, compiled for this blog. The first volume can be found HERE.

Some of these artists have acquired some recognition in the West: Baaba Maal, Fela Kuti, King Sunny Adé, Ali Farka Touré and Manu Dibango may not be household names, but they are join the non-featured likes of Johnny Clegg and some of the acts featured on the first volume among the celebrated representatives of African music. Others, such as Angelique Kidjo and South Africa’s Judith Sephuma have likewise found some international recognition. The keen Africa watcher will know Franco & OK Jazz, the oldest performers on either set – the song here comes from the mid-50s.

The versatile, late Brenda Fassie was so much a superstar in Africa, she had no need to look to Europe for greater fame. Her supposed rival for the crown of South Africa’s biggest female star, Yvonne Chaka Chaka, has lived a less rock ‘n roll life; she too is hugely popular throughout Africa. Brenda and Yvonne’s compatriots Bayete were quite big in their country – I saw them in concert very often (as I have Ringo Madlingozi, mostly with his fantastic ‘80s band Peto) – but just as they threatened to break big, frontman Jabu Khanyile died. Women are better represented here than on the first mix: besides Brenda, Yvonne and Angelique, Mali’s Oumou Sangare and Algeria’s Souad Massi represent.

So, which country can claim the crown of Africa’s musical capital? In my view it’s a four-way tie between Mali, Senegal, South Africa and the Democratic Republic of Congo (the former Zaire). And my favourite African artist? That would be a toss-up between Khadja Nin and Ismael Lo.


1. Baaba Maal - Mbaye (Senegal)
2. Manu Dibango - Soul Makossa (Cameroon)
3. Fela Kuti - Yellow Fever (Nigeria)
4. King Sunny Adé - Ma Jaiye Oni (Nigeria)
5. Brenda Fassie - Shikhebe Shamago (South Africa)
6. Manecas Costa - Ermons De Terra (Guinea Bissau)
7. Ali Farka Touré with Ry Cooder - Soukora (Mali)
8. Bayete - Mmaolo-We (South Africa)
9. Jean Bosco Mwenda - Tambala Moja (DR Congo)
10. Diogal - Samba Alla (Senegal)
11. Ringo Madlingozi - Sondela (South Africa)
12. Angelique Kidjo - Babalao (Benin)
13. Oumou Sangare - Ah Ndiya (Mali)
14. Souad Massi - Yawlidi (Algeria)
15. Yvonne Chaka Chaka - Makoti (South Africa)
16. Franco and OK Jazz - On Entre OK, On Sort KO (Congo)
17. Mose ‘Fan Fan’ - Lwambo (DR Congo)


FOR DOWNLOAD LINK GO HERE



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Pissing off the Taste Police with the Bay City Rollers

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It was inevitable that the Bay City Rollers would be regarded as the apogee of uncool, even in their pomp. The screaming, barely pubescent girls at their concert one might have overlooked – after all, the Beatles survived that. Even the outfits – tartan and stupid sock revealing bell bottoms – might have been forgivable. But the juncture of both was too much to accept for the self-respecting music fan. That, and the name of the bassplayer, Stuart "Woody" Wood. Woody!

FOR FULL POST GO HERE

Isaac Hayes : He's a dead mutha...

...shut your mouth.

To mark Isaac Hayes’ death on August 10 ten days short of his 66th birthday, here is a mix I’ve called Hot Buttered Symphonies, a selection of some of those epics, mostly cover versions, Hayes produced in the early parts of his career, from 1969 to 1973.

He is best known, of course, for the Theme from Shaft, a funk masterpiece which provided the pun in this post’s title. It would be an injustice if the man was to be reduced to the cartoon cool of Shaft, the kind of black grooviness which lets white people think that Samuel L Jackson is a proprietor of übercoolness (that would be white people like Quentin Tarantino). Make no mistake, Ike was as cool as an arctic refrigerator salesman waiting for winter, but that transcended the notions of blaxploitations. It was cool that the man shaved his head when the Afro was fashionable; his baritone was cool; it was cool how he introduces the live version of The Look Of Love with the words: “We're dealing with love now on a more personal basis”; it was cool that on his first recording as a session musician, he helped lift Otis Redding’s version of Try A Little Tenderness with his brilliant keyboard arrangements; it was cool that he’d take white bread songs and turned them into soul classics – while borrowing liberally from psychedelic rock. Hayes was an innovator, being to soul, at last for some time, what Miles Davis was to jazz (for a long time).

In his later years, Hayes forfeited some cool factor with his Scientology capers. But this is not how we should remember him. Nor should he be remembered as the chef with black, salty balls. He should be remembered as the Black Moses who launched a line of bona fide classics by fulfilling the promise made in the title of his second album: the creation of Hot Buttered Soul.

Hayes was a gifted songwriter (he co-wrote such soul classics as Sam & Dave’s Soul Man and Hold On I'm Coming). That talent would infuse his cover versions for which, by rights, he deserved a co-author credit. Hayes would take a Bacharach/David composition, a Beatles track or a country number on a long-haul journey. He’d strip the song of much which previous interpreters had invested in them, give them the essence of his own signature, and then bang them out of their original shape beyond recognition before returning to the original theme. On songs like Something and Walk On By, he went on psychedelic trips which could make familiar to the temperate listener the effects of a drug-induced high. On other songs, such as Jerry Butler’s sweet and sad I Stand Accused, Ike launches into a long monologue about unrequited love, by the time he hits the song with his wonderful baritone, your heart is almost bled out.

As usual, the mix should fit on a standard CD-R. I had to omit an essential track in the 18-minutes work-out By The Time I Get To Phoenix; I'm posting it separately. There are more epics worth checking out (his version of Never Can Say Goodbye especially).

1. (They Long To Be) Close To You (9:06)
2. The Look Of Love (11:11)
3. I Stand Accused (11:32)
4. Walk On By (12:04)
5. Something (11:41)
6. I’m Gonna Make It (11:11)
7. One Big Unhappy Family (5:48)
8. Hyperbolicsyllablicsesquedalymistic (7:29)


DOWNLOAD LINK HERE


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Pissing off the Taste Police with Counting Crows

The Taste Police does not seem to have a cohesive position on Counting Crows (the lack of a “the” in their name is an irritant). But the groundswell seems to suggest that “loathsome” is an adjective which would accurately capture the mood in some platoons.

The notion of Counting Crows being the subject with which I aim to piss off the Taste Police will have tipped off the attentive reader that I do not share that sentiment. In fact, I am very sorry that I missed their concert in my hometown a couple of months ago, and I am very jealous of my Kevin Pietersen-fancying friend in London, who will see her favourite band and the deifiable Ben Folds on one bill in December (at this point, you may construct your own gag involving the timing of the gig and the word “long”).

FULL POST HERE
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The Sound Of Africa Mix Vol. 1

1. Mory Kanté - Yeke Yeke (Guinea/Mali)
2. Cesária Évora - Nho Antone Escade (Cape Verde)
3. Touré Kunda - Wadini (Senegal)
4. Salif Keita - N B'I Fe (Mali)
5. Ismaël Lo - Tajabone (Senegal)
6. Fortune Xaba - Mi Fe Le Wa Kuti (South Africa)
7. Papa Wemba - Le Voyageur (DR Congo)
8. Khadja Nin - Mama Lusiya (Burundi)
9. Kampi Moto & George Phiri - Maio Maio (Zambia/Malawi/South Africa)
10. Habib Koité & Bamada - Wassiyé (Mali)
11. Hugh Masekela - Happy Mama (South Africa)
12. Thomas Mapfumo & the Blacks Unlimited - Set the People Free (Zimbabwe)
13. Remmy Ongala - Inchi Vetu (Our Country) (Tanzania)
14. Youssou N'Dour - Mame Bamba (Senegal)
15. Koffi Olomidé feat Coumba Gawlo - Si Si Si (DRCongo)
16. Khaled - Aicha (Algeria)
17. Tarika - Aretina (Madagacar)


DOWNLOAD LINK HERE

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Intros Quiz - 1998 edition

Compiling this intros quiz, the sad realisation that these songs are ten years old gave me a mighty jolt. Anyway, as always, this file contains 20 intros of 5-7 seconds in length, of hits or otherwise well-known songs, this time from 1998. I've checked that all were singles released that year; all were hits in either the US or UK or both, most of them were very big hits. There are more vocals on these intros than usual, which might give a clue here and there.

As always, if that number 17 is driving you nuts, please feel free to e-mail me for the answers (or e-mail just to say hello). I'll put up the answers in the comments section by Wednesday.


Intros Quiz - 1998 edition.mp3


More intros quizzes

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Have Song, Will Sing Vol. 2 - Songbirds

The term singer-songwriter has acquired a bad reputation, unjustly so. As I’ve said before, the genre is in its best state since the days of Joni Mitchell and her contemporaries. The critics, it seems, seem to conflate the rich diversity of artists thus categorised with a glut of performers who have found mainstream success, but who are not actually representatives of the genre. They are not representative because, as this collection (and the first one I posted earlier this week) may show. So in these collections do not expect a legion of Jack Johnson and Norah Jones clones.

Sure, some may be influenced by these, but the current crop of singer-songwriters draw their influences widely: Rosie Thomas, Kate Walsh and the Weepies’ Deb Talan from folk or “Americana”, Brandi Carlile from rock; Ingrid Michaelson, Laura Veirs, Kimya Dawson and Hello Saferide from different strands of indie; Mindy Smith and Charlotte Kendrick from (alt.)country, Missy Higgins from pop; Maria Taylor from everything. And so on.

The women on this mix may be called “Songirds” (a term I had not seen used when I called my series that last year, but which seems to have currency; it is a good and obvious description). These Songbirds come mostly from the US, but other countries are represented: England (Kate Walsh), Sweden (Hello Saferide), Belgium (Sarah Bettens; the female part of K’s Choice), South Africa (the gorgeous Josie Field), Iceland (Emiliana Torrini), Australia (Missy Higgins). Catherine Feeny was born in the US and moved to England; Michelle Featherstone (who, scandalously, has no record contract) went the other way.


TRACKLISTING
1. Laura Veirs - Pink Light (from Saltbreaker, 2007)
2. Ingrid Michaelson - Breakable (from Girls And Boys, 2006)
3. Brandi Carlile - Late Morning Lullaby (from The Story, 2007)
4. Dar Williams - Farewell To The Old Me (from The Beauty Of The Rain, 2003)
5. Catherine Feeny - Mr. Blue (from Hurricane Glass, 2006)
6. Charlotte Kendrick - Thank You (from North Of New York, 2007)
7. Mindy Smith - Falling (from One More Moment, 2004)
8. Rosie Thomas - Since You've Been Around (from If Songs Could Be Held, 2005)
9. Kim Richey - The Absence Of Your Company (from Chinese Boxes, 2007)
10. Missy Higgins - Warm Whispers (from On A Clear Night, 2007)
11. Hello Saferide - The Quiz (from Would You Let Me Play This EP 10 Times A Day?, 2006)
12. Deb Talan - Cherry Trees (from Live at WERS Studio, 2001)
13. Maria Taylor - Two of Those Two (from 11:11, 2005)
14. Kate Walsh - Don't Break My Heart (from Tim's House, 2007)
15. Michelle Featherstone - Coffee & Cigarettes (from Fallen Down, 2006)
16. A Fine Frenzy - Come On Come Out (from One Cell In The Sea, 2007)
17. Laura Gibson - Hands In Pockets (from If You Come To Greet Me, 2006)
18. Sarah Bettens - Follow Me (from Scream, 2006)
19. Josie Field - Every Now And Then (from Mercury, 2006)
20. Kathleen Edwards - Scared At Night (from Asking For Flowers, 2008)
21. Emiliana Torrini - Next Time Around (from Fisherman's Woman, 2004)
22. Gemma Hayes - Evening Sun (from 4.35 AM EP, 2001)
23. Kimya Dawson - Loose Lips (from Remember That I Love You, 2006)


DOWNLOAD LINK HERE

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