Goldfrapp - Strict Machine

ORIGINATION Black Charry CD
LAST LISTENED TO this week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty durn good
RATING

Ahh. What a nice way to end the year. This CD has featured on many of Suse and my trips into the highlands of Scotland and this week was no different. Whenever i hear it, i always picture mountains sliding by under an overcast sky. I think we listened to it on the stretch through Tyndrum towards Rannoch Moor this time.

Strict Machine is a few years old now (2003), but it's still sounds sparkly and new. It's a sleazy piece of glam-dance that runs on squelchy synths. These synths sound both very modern and yet also curiously retro, especially during the glam-rock stomp moments.

Alison Goldfrapp's lyrics could be seen to be, once again, quite rude, complimenting perfectly the sleazy feel to the song. However, her angelic delivery works as a perfect counterpoint to this. The result is a sleazy yet pretty song with stomping bits of glam rock sprinkled throughout.

Sons And Daughters - Taste The Last Girl

ORIGINATION The Repulsion Box CD
LAST LISTENED TO this week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good
RATING

The Sons And Daughters formed in 2004. They follow in the footsteps legendary Scottish band The Vaselines, featuring joint male/female vocals over sparky indie-pop.

This track is one of the stand outs from their 2005 CD and was in fact put out as a single. The lyrics are a little hard to fathom for a thickie twirp such as i, however they are very enjoyable, especially the female half which sound quite scornfull. The male half contains a nice little stuttered 'n-n-n-n-n-n-noooo' which occurs throughout the song in place of any chorus.

Like the rest of their work, this is short, to-the-point and catchy. Go look them up. It's always worth supporting new bands and i have to thank Julie for putting me onto this one.

Black Sabbath - Into The Void

ORIGINATION Master Of Reality CD
LAST LISTENED TO fairly recently
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT okish
RATING

For me this is the heaviest the Sabbath ever went. It's the closer from Master Of Reality in 1971 and is one of my top five Sabbath tracks. Maybe even top three. It's a hard choice.

The intro is typically Sabbath and is nothing special (for them). It's not until around the minute and a quarter mark that things get interesting, when the bass and drums pull out to give Tony Iommi space to play the heaviest riff ever recorded. That in itself would be enough to make the song. Happily, Ozzy's lyrics are pretty good too.

Here Ozzy has chosen to issue humanity a warning of its dire future in the form of an apocalyptic sci-fi vision. In this vision, man has ruined our planet and only a few are able to escape to seek freedom in the stars. It's doom and gloom that fits to a tee the heavist riff ever recorded.

The song starts with this verse:


Rocket engines burning fuel so fast
Up into the night sky they blast
Through the universe the engines whine
Could it be the end of man and time
Back on earth the flame of life burns low
Everywhere is misery and woe
Pollution kills the air, the land and sea
Man prepares to meet his destiny

From here things just get darker, with that riff just churning on throughout. It closes with a few minutes of soloing, which doesn't really excite anywhere near as much as that riff.

Freddie Hubbard - Keep Your Soul Together

ORIGINATION Keep Your Soul Together LP
LAST LISTENED TO in the past few months
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT not great
RATING

A fine and funky bit of soul jazz from trumpeter Freddie Hubbard in 1973. A very funky cycling bass line anchors the song, with the support of both drums and percussion. Over this both the trumpet and tenor sax solo for extended periods. A light sprinkling of electric piano runs along behind this, somewhere between the rhythm and the solos.

There is not a lot of trumpeters in soul jazz. Most of the soul jazz i am aware of mostly features sax and organ, so it is a treat to hear this track, especially as it is one of the funkiest examples of the genre.

Byrdie Green - Return Of The Prodigal Son

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO very recently
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good
RATING

Byrdie Green recorded this piece of gospel-soul in 1968. Her father was a preacher and there is something of the feeling of a sermon in this track which i believe is based on a passage from the bible.

Byrdie's vocals are strong and understated and they are backed by some equally restrained music. The music is primarily driven by uncluttered drums and a high in the mix bass. The groovy vehicle is augmented by southern soul guitar chops and some choice churchy organ. It a simple affair but, like the vocals, it's strong and it's groovy.

This edition of the song was, like several others entries here, reissued by Jazzman records about whom not enough good things can be said.

(dead air)

Nothing today at all. But you've got to expect that when you've been up for several hours and have travelled many hundreds of miles before the time you'd normally get up at.

Alan Hawkshaw - Dave Allen At Large

ORIGINATION FSUK2 CD
LAST LISTENED TO a while ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT small
RATING

I first heard this on the above compilation, Future Sound Of The UK Vol.2, which was mixed by The Freestylers. I think this was the first time that i knew i was listening to Alan Hawkshaw. I have since come to realise that i had been hearing him since i had first watched tv, but had not been aware of it. The Hawk has been a lynchpin of British library for a long time and as such his music has been placed in more (and varied) tv programmes than you can imagine. This here is one of the best and that's because it's one of the ones to feature his mighty organ most prominently. There's also a fantastic brass intro.

Hawkshaw recorded much more music like this. Some of it was even given a proper release, under the name of The Mohawks. Look out for it.

The Doors - The Soft Parade

ORIGINATION The Soft Parade
LAST LISTENED TO foolishly it was this week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT higher than it should be
RATING

Funnily enough, just the other day i was wondering who would be the first artist to appear on A Song For The Day twice for different songs. Today is that day and that artist is The Doors. Or are The Doors. Whatever. Sadly, this morning's song leaves a lot to be desired and, whilst it's not pure pish, it's certainly not pure genius either. In fact, it's not pure anything. It's much too much of a cross-breed bastard to be that.

To begin with, you need to know that The Soft Parade album is the worst ever recorded by The Doors. There are many things wrong with it, too many, in fact, to go into here. However, the problems in the title track are a good example of the problems of the whole.

For starters, there is the start of the song. It's really crap. Pretentious Jim "American Poet" Morrison twaddle at it's worst. That's followed up by two minutes of The Doors Musical Improv School as they take a bash at a number of very ill-advised music styles. At best this portion is embarrassing. At worst there is Morrison with more stupid lyrics. It's really quite hard to take and it's advisable to skip forward to 3:04, the point just after Morrison's ludicrous exclamation of "The monk bought lunch!" and the end of the nonsense. From here on it's Doors-by-numbers, fairly enjoyable, but nothing special in itself. Only Manzerak's organ is notable for being better then average.

The Soft Parade represents the end of the path The Doors had found themselves straying down: the nadir in their career, unless you want to be picky and note that as the death of Morrison (and we'll not even mention their most recent incarnation with The Cult's Ian Arsebury). This path had carried them down a vaguely hippy-ish, vaguely mystical path. It's easy to put all the blame for this on Morrison as it's his lyrics that seem to be the most guilty of leading them down this path. But that would be unfair. Well, a little unfair. All four of them got them to this point and clearly their inspiration was all but exhausted by the trip. In The Soft Parade, none of the extra instruments or money thrown at them helped alleviate this problem. It took a stripped, back-to-basics sound and less Morrison nonsense to solve that, which is where their next LP came in…

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Full Grown

ORIGINATION Orange LP
LAST LISTENED TO 22nd Nov
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT not huge
RATING

It's got a really rude intro ("Baby, baby you sure like to f**k!"). It's got a whole host of stupid lyrics. It's got a squelchy moog bit. It's got hand claps. It's got breaks a-plenty. It's got pseudo-Elvis singing. It's about shagging. It's full of silly asides ("Ah shucks, you make me feel so unnecessary"). It's got more excitement than a bag full of miniature James Bond clones on crack. It's dumb rock 'n' roll. Basically, it's classic Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

It may be not break any new ground but it doesn't need to. It's glorious nonsense and i love it.

Take a whiff of my pant-leg baby!

(mixed signals)

This morning my head is a biscuit tin, with the broken remains of an assortment rattling around inside.

The first biscuit is vodka-flavoured shortbread, a rather unusual Scottish biscuit from the 70s that was made for a time by The Sensational Alex Harvey Band. Sadly, all that remains of this biscuit is the phrase "Isobel Goudie". The rest of it seems to have vanished and i don't feel like looking for it.

The second biscuit was nasty and jarring and entirely distracted me from the first one. It was a cheap supermarket own-brand chocolately one, wrapped in foil. The foil was patterned to make it look like the mobile phone that rang in the communal hallway not a moment after my return from nod. This biscuit comes with a nasty version of something classical and if you try to eat it, the will foil squeak on your teeth.

Then there was the inevitable crumbly old digestive. This old biscuit was called Humph and had something to say about a 'Mid-Atlantic Variation'. Whether this really had anything to do with Mornington Crescent or not is anyone's guess. I'm not even sure this biscuit ever existed outside my head.

Lastly, a classic biscuit: the two-fingered chocolate wafer. This delicious treat was brought to us by more than one maker and from the bits that are left of it, it's hard to tell who made this particular one. Safe to say, however, that it was made with tainted love.

That is all.

Booker T. & The MG's - Outrage

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO a few hours ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT high
RATING

This is one of my least favourite of all the Booker T. & The MG's songs. That's not to say that i dislike it, however. Actually, listening to it is making me like it more. It's quite catchy in a slightly irritating fashion and there is something very insistent about the organ, in a way that is rather unlike other of their recordings. In fact upon close inspection, it doesn't really sound like Booker T's organ playing. This does lead me to suspect that this is one of the tracks that Booker T himself does not appear on.

'Eh?' you may exclaim. 'A Booker T track without him on it? Surely not.' Surely yes, i'm afraid.

What is not very well noted is that other people would often stand in for Booker T during recordings, including Isaac Hayes amongst others. This was because from around the time of their big hit with Green Onions, Booker T was attending university. Inspection of the label would seem to agree with this hypothesis, sporting as it does no writing credit for (Booker T) Jones. Instead there is one Mr. Allen.

And that's about as much thinking as i can be bothered with on a Sunday morning. If you want to figure out who this Mr. Allen is, go look. I feel i should know but, as noted, i'm now done with thinking.

Outrage is not a bad little piece of instrumental soul. It's just not really Booker T. & The MG's.

I'd also note that i have a version of this by Georgie Fame & The Blue Flames which manages to considerably up the irritation factor. Not that that is much of a surprise with Mr. Fame.

(interruption)

No song this morning. There might have been, but for the postman's arrival which woke me up. Doubling the chance for no morning song was the fact that i knew the postman was carrying a copy of Iron Maiden's Women In Uniform, which was catchy enough to stick in my head. Thus no morning song.

Happily, the postie also brought me a Jimmy Smith record from 1978. I'm on the third track right now and it's getting funky.

Jimmy Smith - Back At The Chicken Shack

ORIGINATION Back At The Chicken Shack LP
LAST LISTENED TO this week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT lots of them
RATING

I listen to organ player Jimmy Smith a lot (check this out, if you want proof). There is just something about his tone and playing that i don't seem to tire of. For the most part his sound was the quintessential organ sound, the one that everyone that came after copied and most did come after. He also can solo for extended periods and maintain excitement and interest, which is no small feat.

Back At The Chicken Shack is from his Blue Note period, when he played with a small band that was centred around Smith (who played the bass on his organ as well), a guitar (often Kenny Burrell) and drums. Here Stanley Turrentine is also along on tenor sax. The track is a Smith original and is a mid-tempo affair that stretches out over eight minutes, giving both Burrell and Turrentine time to solo as well as Smith. It's a breezy infectious number with a melody that is easy to catch onto. Little wonder that i woke to it.

If you want to know more about Jimmy Smith, i've been working on a discography project here.

Ray Agee - Real Real Love

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO this week probably
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty good
RATING

This obscure single appeared in a big bag of 45s that the good Professor Plastic brought round a few years ago. 'Real Real Love' was in fact the B-side of the single, the A side being a blues. For some reason many soul and funk singles where made like this, with the most exciting tracks put on the flip sides of blues and ballads. Clearly they weren't initially produced to appeal to the likes of me.

The track is a cracker. A fast and furiously-paced slice of soul with a real hard sound. In style it sits somewhere between James Brown and The Sonics. It's got the speed of the Sonics and something of their sound, whilst the structure, the horns and, in particular, the rhythm guitar show the clear influence of The Godfather Of Soul.

I know nothing about this track, other than what is on the label and there's next to nothing on that. By it's sound i would have to judge that it was recorded in the latter part of the sixites. The singer i know a fraction about and i found that here. Whether Ray recorded anything else like this is anyone's guess, but if i see anything else by him i'd certainly want to hear it to find out.

The theme from Alfred Hitchcock Presents…

ORIGINATION probably on one of my Hitchcock DVDs
LAST LISTENED TO not really ever
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT curious
RATING

Oops, i forgot to remember to write this morning. Maybe because it was such an odd one to wake with. I can only assume that the music was playing on a menu on one of several Hitchcock DVDs that we have watched recently.

You probably know the piece without knowing that you know it. It's always made me picture Hitchcock as the jovial and rotund prankster, as opposed to the master of suspense and world's greatest film director. But then since it was used for his TV series, wherein small, dark tales where told, perhaps that was the point. The contrast. A fall sense of security. Hitchcock was a master of manipulating his audience.

I have no idea who wrote the music or even who performed it. Doubtless it would have been the studio orchestra for whatever tv station that ran the programme originally. I don't have a copy of it and i have better things to do than to track down the info. If you really care, then find out yourself and let me know.

Harold Faltemeyer - Axel F

ORIGINATION a charity shop 45
LAST LISTENED TO no idea
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT small
RATING

It's not the worst song i have woken with in my head, but it may be one of the most annoying. Even still, i sorta kinda like it a bit, but only a bit and probably only for a few bars.

Stanley Turrentine - Spooky

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO in the past fortnight
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT ok
RATING

Stanley Turrentine was a sax player on Blue Note records when he recorded this with a big band in 1968. It is a cracking version of the pop hit that manages to transform the tune into something similar to a cop show tune. It's got all the correct ingredients for the genre: big, driving beats, large brass section and a hard-blown lead instrument.

This was, in fact, the first version of this song that i heard and it was many year before i realised that there were even words to it! I first knew it from a Blue Note compilation called 'Lost Grooves' but was lucky enough to spot the original 45 release on a trip to London a few years back. Up to the early 90s it was the only release the track was given.

I've tried finding other Turrentine material from the period, but none of it sounds like this, which explains why it was only ever put out on single. Most of it was, unfortunately, not very good easy listening and has never been played again.

Lee Mason & His Orchestra - Shady Blues

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO this week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty good
RATING

And yet another funky 45. My head is certainly full of them at the moment and a good thing that is too. Especially in the fight against winter gloom.

This one is a recent re-issue by the always excellent Jazzman Records. It was recorded some time probably in the early 70s for the British library music label Chappell. Due to the nature of library music, this tune was never given an actual release and only become known to collectors during the explosion of interest in library music in the 90s. Needless to say, this was one of the rarer and much sought-after recordings.

The track starts with a drum and bass figure that is quickly joined by a flute. Things soon set up a gear with a lovely drum roll, top wah-wah guitar and brass. The flute soon re-joins before another break and a futher change up, this time introduciing strings and an organ. By now what had started out as a fairly spare piece, has become quite crowded. Here it reaches a crescendo, before quickly dipping back into the original drum, bass and flute figure.

It's a very simple track and therein lies it's appeal. Nothing especially fancy happens here, but what does happen is well played and well contructed and happens at a nice, laid-back pace.

Apparently it has become a very popular sampling-ground and there's no suprise in that.

(same again)

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good
RATING

Dull, dull, dull. Just like last saturday. Bloody hammering neighbour.

New Birth - Grandaddy (Part 1)

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO in the past few days
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good
RATING

Another funk 45 that has been spinning around my head since the weekend. It's good.

Wolfsbane - Tears From A Fool

ORIGINATION Live Fast, Die Fast LP
LAST LISTENED TO a few weeks back
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT confusing
RATING

After almost a week of almost nothing but funk, it came as quite a surprise this morning to wake with this in my head. Especially considering that it is the weakest of all the tunes from this, Wolfsbane's debut release. There are far better and more catchy tracks on it that i really like, why it wasn't one of those, i don't know.

Wolfsbane, for those who are unfamiliar with them, and that's much more likely to be more than less of you, where a small, hard rockin' heavy metalish crew who first hit in '89. They went on to produce three and a half albums. Their singer, Blaze Bailey, then became singer for no less than Iron Maiden during a number of years in the mid to late 90s, before Bruce Dickinson returned.

'Tears From A Fool' is the ballad from their fast, exciting and slightly scuzzy debut. As a ballad on a metal(ish) LP chances are that it'll be crap and it is, kind of. However, it has a strange appeal that is rather hard to discern. Lyrically there are more clichés than even slightly sensible writers would have considered and the old accoustic guitar strumming up to electric guitar solo is a tired formula. Tired and clichéd. Yet, and this is the puzzler, i actually quite like this song. Maybe it's just a soft spot i have for Wolfsbane. Maybe it's nostalgia, i can't tell.

What i can tell is that the song, like most of theirs, is played surprisingly well. For all that Wolfsbane played the part of a scuzzy, half-arsed, layabout metal band, they were actually really tight. Going back to their music after a number of years, i was surprised at how well played it was. There is also humour and humanity in it, traits that most metal sadly lacked. Maybe that's the appeal.

For all this track's clichés and predictability, it's pulled off convincingly and there is something quite appealing about that conviction.

Lemuria - Hunk Of Heaven

ORIGINATION Strange Games & Things
LAST LISTENED TO 9 hours ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT most high
RATING

Laid back 70s soul/funk this morning. Really pretty perfect for waking too.

Lemuria where from Hawaii and recorded this in 1978. Like yestedays song, it was given a tiny release on a tiny label and it duly sank without trace, only to be discovered years later by the rare vinyl hounds. By coincidence, Jazzman records have recently re-issued it. I'm almost tempted to buy it again.

The track features primarily the vocal talents of Sharon ‘Terea’ Robinson who sings the refrain 'I just want a big old hunk of heaven' so many times that it can't fail to stick in your head. She's backed by a lovely combination of percussion, funky moog (think Stevie Wonder) and funky bass. In fact, there's a vibe real close to some of Wonder's best funky grooves of the early 70s here. Only with more percussion. This is really that good. I only needed to hear it once yesterday and it was running round in my head for hours and i was quite happy that it was.

Sugar Hill - Slow Down

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT fairly good
RATING

'Slow Down' is a juicy slab of rare funk. It was recorded some time in the mid seventies by a group who were all under 21 years of age. Even younger still was the singer, who was 14 when she recorded this!

For a funk tune it's taken at a pretty fast tempo (perhaps due to the youthful energy) and it's held at that speed by the kind of funky drums and bongos you'd hope for. Along with this, there are some nice organ melodies and a short but sweet guitar solo. On top the vocals are very assured, espscially considering the singer's age.

The track, like so many funk tunes of this ilk, was given a release on a tiny record label and then quickly vanished. In the late 90s, with the interest in funk 45s exploding, it became one of a vast number of sought-after rarities. Luckily, it was re-issued by another small label in 2002 to far greater exposure but this company sadly folded not long after, so it's become a bit of a rarity again. Enjoy.

DJ Kool, Biz Markie, Doug Fresh - Let Me Clear My Throat

ORIGINATION um, dunno
LAST LISTENED TO no idea
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT curiously good
RATING

A top piece of hip hop but one, sadly, that i know very little about. What i do know is that DJ Kool put together this track out of some timeless breaks, including the famous sax used by The 45 Kings. The reason for me waking to it today is that one of these breaks is from Kool & The Gang's 'Hollywood Swinging', which is the b-side of 'Funky Stuff' and that was one of a marathon run of 45s that Craig and i converted to mp3s yesterday.

Both Biz Markie and Doug E Fresh where guests on this when it was recorded live in a Philadelphia club in 1996 with a very lively crowd. It is party hip hop of the first order.

Metallica - Master Of Puppets

ORIGINATION Master Of Puppets LP
LAST LISTENED TO some time in the past few months
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT okish
RATING

Argh! I can't put up with this so early on a sunday morning. Don't get me wrong, i do like this. It's arguably one of the best songs from their best album, but i's not at all what i want to hear in my head at a quarter to ten on a sunday morning. I mean, there's not even any milk in the fridge. This morning has gone all wrong, i should just go back to bad now.

AARGHH! I have now put it on. It really is too much for this time of day.

(same again)

ORIGINATION Almost In Love LP
LAST LISTENED TO all day yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT still astronomically high
RATING

Yes, really. For two mornings in a row i have woke to the same song. Elvis' Clean Up Your Own Back Yard was again in my head this morning. Which is really rather fortunate as i have no time this morning to pontificate.

Elvis - Clean Up Your Own Back Yard

ORIGINATION Almost In Love LP
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT astronomically high
RATING

I can remember thinking before going to bed last night, that listening to this Elvis LP late at night almost guaranteed i was going to wake to it. It's nice to be proved correct on occasion.

This track was recorded in 1968, around the time of Elvis' NBC television special. This was a period of heightened musical quality for the man, after many years of languishing in Hollywood.

'Clean Up…' opens with some slide guitar before a bass refrain starts off a groove that will run through the whole song. The drummer soon kicks in, sounding like he may have been listening to a little laid-back James Brown before the recording, although doesn't quite reach that level. He's backed by some understated rhythm piano, before Elvis come in. A soufull brass section gives Elvis a little call-and-response action before things are topped off with some female choir backing. All in all it's a funky, laid-back vibe in a country-tinged Southern soul style.

Elvis was hardly ever less than great in his recordings. Even when he was recording utter dross (and, lord, there a lot of that), Elvis was always convincing. Here he plays it mean and laid back. Whether this was due to the backing music or because of it is largely irrelevant: the music and singing marry perfectly.

Lyrics were often where Elvis' output in the preceding years often fell flat. Thankfully here the lyrics are a little more robust, essentially pointing out man's foibles and suggesting that they sort themselves out before speaking out about others. To begin with a few specific men are mentioned (a preacher, a drugstore owner, an armchair quarterback), before the lyics move on to this closer:

"When you get right down to the nitty-gritty
Isn't it a pity that in this big city
Not a one a'little bitty man'll admit
He could have been a little bit wrong"

Which seems to me to be a rather broader attack on men in general. Elvis, of course, pulls it off perfectly, to the extent that the inherent irony of the whole song, and the last verse in particular, is unnoticeable. It's a great tune recorded by a man at the peak of his powers. It's just a shame that after his escape from one trashy city, another was to claim him after this.

Georgie Fame - St. James Infirmary

ORIGINATION The Third Face Of Fame LP
LAST LISTENED TO at least more than six months ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT not much
RATING

Maybe i'm just a bit cranky this morning (well more so than usual), but this track just isn't quite doing it for me. Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad song. It's a pretty good version of this everyone-gives-it-a-go blues standard. If fact musically it's a hard to fault. There is an eighteen piece band playing on this and it includes some pretty big names from the British jazz scene of the time (including Ronnie Scott and John McLaughlin).

No, what's not doing for me is Mr. Fame himself. Being that he was primarily an organ player, it comes as no surprise that his voice lacks a certain something. It is, in fact, just a little too nasal and a bit whiny. Which is a real shame, because i do quite like this track. I only wish that Georgie-boy could be a little bit more convincing. He sounds far too lounge-tastic for this kind of blues.

Sadly, the rest of this 1968 LP is similarly unconvincing. A quick scan of the liner notes reveals the problem: the whole LP was planned by others whilst Fame was on tour of the US and doesn't appear to feature him playing his organ anywhere. Wrong, wrong, wrong. This is somewhat akin to having an instrumental Elvis album. I ask you.