By the late 1970s, rock music was in the doldrums, the pits. Almost everything seemed to be corporate-marketing-department-formula-driven-pre-packaged-garbage, and much of it sounded the same. There was so much over-produced audio drek, I started going retro. Then this song hit me, and I liked the vibe.
Have a great weekend, folks. Be back here tomorrow for more stuff.
P.S. We filed a complaint with the WordPress peeps about auto-play advertisements and got a positive response. They asked for a screencap of the offending ad, so I sent one. Let’s see what they do with it.
Guy fitted his cat with a GoPro to find out what it does while he’s away, and no, it doesn’t sleep [via].
Ever hear of David “String Bean” Akeman? No? Here’s a documentary of the comic/iconic speed banjo player. Video starts at 06:00 for his rendition of the traditional folk song “Li’l Liza Jane. [Related post here.]
Akeman and his wife were murdered by burglars at their rural Tennessee home in 1973. The killers took only a chain saw and some firearms and were later apprehended and convicted.
The Blasters perform “Jubilee Train” at the 1985 Farm Aid concert in Champaign, Illinois. (Check out the impressive list of performers at the link.)
“Buckjump” by Trombone Shorty – a nice retro-funk groove to wrap things up.
I’m embarrassed to admit that I once confused Nena (Gabriele Kerner of Hagen, West Germany) with Nina Hagen (Catherine Hagen of East Berlin, East Germany). Never again.
How ’bout something primal? Nothing better than Scottish tribal drums and bagpipes. Clanadonia is what it is, and it’s loud. “The Last of the Glaswegians” is going to be stuck in my head for days.
Amazing speed cellist Tina Guo jams it with Joe Bonamassa on “Woke Up Dreaming” at Carnegie Hall (June 2017?). Takes them a bit to get in synch, then it soars. Guo’s take on Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir” is fun, too.
The [1976?] band consists of Muddy Waters on vocal/guitar, Bob Margolin guitar, Willie “Big Eyes” Smith drums, Jerry Portnoy, Harmonica and Luther “guitar” Johnson.
Meanwhile, I couldn’t find a live vid for this 1954 Detroit R&B classic. The ending is pure awesome.
There’s not much to say about the tragedy, both ongoing and pending, that hasn’t been said elsewhere. For those of you in the path of Irma with no means of escape, we pray for you. For you looters, please stay put, and move to lower ground.
Stay safe. You can replace your stuff, but you can’t replace your life.
I found this both oddly fascinating and mildly disturbing. It’s an a/v collage from 2013 somewhere near Lake Erie, yet it’s also kind of an appropriate soundtrack for the damage caused by Hurricane Harvey, and for those survivors who haven’t yet fully realized what they’ve lost.
What happens once the news crews are gone? What happens once the reality sets in that you survived the ordeal, but you’ve lost everything? Our prayers are with you.
Now about those looters and scammers…
For a long time, this was THE signature song of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, and in some ways his 1956 hit was a blues parody. In January of 2014, Samantha Fish picked it up and jammed it right down our throats with no apologies. Killer version.
Loved this proto-funk theme, and I love the Bo-Keys for rocking the retro soul grooves that I grew up with.
Have a great Labor Day Weekend, folks, and we’ll be back tomorrow with more stuff than your imagination can even tolerate. Or not.
Toni Tee & Liquid Wisdom on a bus. They play a cool variety of music (reggae, rock, funk, soul, hiphop, punkadelic) but it’s tough to find a vid with decent a/v on the Utoobage. [h/t Bunkessa – yeah she scored two hits this week; this one and the one above.]
Can’t fight corruption with con tricks; They use the law to commit crime. And I dread, dread to think what the future will bring, When we’re living in gangster time.
“Though Eddie Cochran was only twenty-one when he died, he left a lasting mark as a rock and roll pioneer. Cochran zeroed in on teenage angst and desire with such classics as ‘C’mon Everybody,’ ‘Something Else,’ ‘Twenty Flight Rock‘ and ‘Summertime Blues.’ A flashy stage dresser with a tough-sounding voice, Cochran epitomized the sound and the stance of the Fifties rebel rocker.”
Lotta covers of that kickass song.
1962 The Beach Boys. A 14 and a 16 year old contributed to this recording.
Ten years later, Blue Cheer broke ground in 1968 with a heavy metal version of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues,” released ten years earlier. [This guy was on the SanFran scene in 1968.]
I heard that version when I was in 6th grade, and tried to decide if I liked it or not. Took me several years before I understood what they were doing, and I decided that I liked the original better. Hell, the name of the band was a brand of LSD named after a laundry detergent.
1975 The Who – According to Wiki they’d been playing Summertime Blues since 1967 so this version is out of chronological order.
