Category: Retro & Vintage

Saturday Matinee – Tito Puente, Mickey Hart & Todd Rundgren

Pure percussion by Tito Puente e Los TropiJazz All Stars. I could listen to this stuff all day.

Decades ago (in college) we attended an off-campus house party that seemed to have a live band. I asked the host about it and he replied, “That’s the Rhythm Section. They’re in the basement.” So I went downstairs and found people taking turns on vinyl trash cans, bottles, cans, buckets, with wooden dowels and spoons, and it all sounded great as it morphed, non-stop. No electronics, just stoners people grooving on impromptu syncopated rhythms.

Micky Hart‘s Planet Drum project got my ear as well. Hard to say what musical instrument came first, the bone flute or the drum. I’d guess the latter, because you can bang on anything to create a tempo, and everything else is secondary. (Vocals don’t count unless you’re talmbout Hollerin.)

Then of course there’s this RetroSka classic:

Have a great weekend, folks. We’ll be back here tomorrow whether you like it or not.

El Dos de Mayo y General Grouchy

By 1808, Spain had had just about enough of French Imperialism and Napoleon‘s occupation armies, and there was a bloody rebellion in Madrid that lasted for days (and led to The Peninsula War).

Francisco Goya was commissioned for paintings to commemorate the rebellion of Dos de Mayo a few years later in 1814.

Oh, and BTW, General Grouchy was a real dickhead.

Messerschmitt 1950

messerschmitt-1950

Barely five years after Germany’s unconditional surrender in WWII, and they were still in business.

[Found here.]

Saturday Matinee – Bovine Spring, Biergarten, Man In The Woods & James Cotton (1935-2017)

Vandaag was het weer groot feest bij boer Brandsma in Bolsward! Na 5 maanden mochten de koeien weer voor het eerst naar buiten!

Springtime in the Netherlands and the cows are released from their winter shelters (via) and THIS is definitely related.

Proof that German cattle know what a Biergarten für Rinder sounds like.

This creepy short animation was a student project from 2014 [via].

We lost J. Geils recently, but I completely missed the news of one of the greatest harmonica players I ever heard. James Cotton (aka “Mr. SuperHarp”) passed away at the age of 81 on 16 March 2017 in Austin Texas. Cotton recorded “The Creeper” in 1968. It predates Richard “Magic Dick” Salwitz‘ 1971 recording of “Whammer Jammer“, falsely accredited to “Juke Joint Jimmy”.

Here’s James Cotton at his finest, and having fun with it, too.

Have a great weekend folks, be back here tomorrow for something or other.

Prototype Babe Magnet

prototype-babe-magnet

What a great ride, but there’s only one problem: Where are the hot chicks going to sit?

[Found here.]

Saturday Matinee – The Growlers, Leo Bud Welch & J. Geils

Did I post this before? I still like this song by The Growlers. It’s retro rock on many levels.

Leo “Bud” Welch is now into his eighties and only recently began his recording career. Here’s his website. Classic Delta blues mixed with the Chicago sound.

RIP John Geils.

That clip is from 1972 and features the classic J. Geils Band line up. I didn’t find out about those guys until a couple of years later when I got hooked on the sound and the fun. None of the players in his band stood out as heavy hitters individually, but as a group they kicked ass, with Danny Klein, Magic Dick Salwitz, Stephen Jo Bladd, Peter Wolf and Seth Justman. They lost me in 1980 with their move to pop rock.

Have a great weekend, folks, and remember what Easter really means tomorrow.

The .GIF Friday Post No.479 – Turkeys Circling Dead Cat, Jerome Howard & Little Kim Un

[Found here, here and here.]

Syncopated Polyrhythmic Hot Links

Mark Twain’s study was designed to simulate the pilot house of a Mississippi steamboat.

Rogue Punctuation Nazi strikes after-hours in Bristol, England. He specializes in fixing apostrophe errors on business signs.

Need a Computer Science paper at the last minute? This generator is for you.

I knew that rebooting and hitting F8 gets you into safe mode for trouble shooting. Here’s what the other keyboard function keys do.

“The Frog Survey Letter” went viral a couple years ago.

Never heard of Hooverball? Now you have.

Click “play.”

Like early jazz? You’ll love this free download of 1920s recordings. It’s six hours of syncopated awesome.

[Top image found here.]

Saturday Matinee – Tool, Elvin Bishop & Lonnie Brooks

Very odd video. I like it.

Elvin Bishop goes fishin’. Guy has an amazing history, and I’m surprised he isn’t a full-fledged Rock God by now. His website www.elvinbishopmusic.com is back up and running.

We lost another great bluesman recently:
Lee Baker, Jr., aka Lonnie Brooks (1933-2017).

Lonnie Brooks was another classic bluesman with an interesting background.

Have a great weekend, folks. We’ll be back here tomorrow, whether you like it or not.

The .Gif Friday Post No.478 – Hare Transporter, Prep School Flappers & Buster Keaton

[Found here, here and here. And yeah, I made ’em flap.]