The Johnny Cash bio-pic "Walk the Line" with Joaquim Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon was really great. Both actors take over their roles with such conviction, it's a real delight to watch. The storyline, characters and music are all superb. Anyway, as a tribute, here's two versions of a Bob Dylan classic - one by Johnny and June, and the other a gorgeous French cover version from 1965:
Two tracks from the sublime funky first Isley Brothers album on their own T-Neck label. The album is impossible to find, and there are plenty of compilations with the most famous track off it - It's Your Thing, so here are two others.
Isley Brothers - Give the women what they want
Isley Brothers - I know who you've been sockin' it to
Another bunch of psychedelic and progressive rarities. Most of these albums sold in the hundreds or single thousands and are exceedingly rare. Links to tracks to sample, and CD reissues to purchase, below:
01. Josefus - Gimme Shelter (from Dead Man, 1970)
02. The Mothers of Invention - You're probably wondering why I am here (from Freak Out!, 1966)
03. Felt - Destination (from Felt, 1971)
04. Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity - Indian Rope Man (from Streetnoise, 1969)
05. Apple - Dr Rock (from An Apple a Day, 1971)
The Josefus album has a striking cover, but the music sounds a bit dated and jaded to me. The Mothers on the other hand, brilliant cover (first ever double album, predating Blonde-on-Blonde or the White album), dated sound for sure but still full of verve. Felt are rathre obscure, and rather good - much the same as their Lawrence-led 80s namesakes. Brian Auger's track is an organ-led dazzler since covered by the UK Charlatans.
See part one here.
...Gently.
Well, what's a poor boy to do when he writes a quiet little album
of delicate pretty singer-songwriter songs, expecting to be swallowed up in the
wave of similar that thrashes the pop shore line, when to everyone's surprise
that one song "You're Bootifful, u are!" ends up being a world wide mega smash
and everyone starts to hate you.
Jealousy is an evil thing. So, well done James - u is cool. The revival starts here!
And he's gone and covered the Pixies and you can hear it as played in London on 31 January 2006 here, or get it on the new Bedlam sessions DVD/CD combo.
01. The Monks - I hate you (from Black Monk Time, 1966)
02. Analogy - Tin's Song (from Analogy, 1972)
03. Merrel Fankhauser & H.M.S. Bounty - Drivin' Sideways (On A One Way Street) (from Things, 1968)
04. American Spring - Fallin' in Love (from Spring, 1971)
05. Bröselmaschine - The Old man's Song (from Bröselmaschine, 1971)
The Monks are more garage band really, but they were the original punks - American GIs in Germany on leave, bashing out the most anarchic and dark r'n'b.
The American Spring track shouldn't be there really, but it's by the wife of Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys/Smile fame (along with her sister), produced by Brian and written by his brother Dennis Wilson. It's also a really sweet sound.
Special credit goes to ChrisGoesRock, and gold stars also to 8DaysInApril
."In the same way that a song on the radio can arouse a myriad associations, so can the covers that adorned this music."
Greg Daville's covers project is an experiment where he gets ordinary people to act out the covers of their favourite LPs, to often brilliant and hilarious effect.
The project came from a 2005 residency at Brighton's Phoenix Art Gallery and has grown into a 55 picture online art exhibition. Probably his most (in)famous re-enactment is the Sgt Pepper cover, but other pictures are in my view even more effective in combining our fascination with the iconic musical object and the personal character of each player. Below, are some examples - the Man Machine, One Step beyond, the Cut and New Boots and Panties. Visit Greg's website to see the full set.
"The online exhibition of prints you see before you is the result of an intense period of work, and a series of fantastic collaborations with all the people who offered themselves up to be photographed. As well as resulting in some great portraits, it afforded me the pleasure of sharing the creative/making process with others. I usually work on my own, and it was a refreshing change."
There's nothing like a good old bit of classic rock cover version madness, so here's some for that post-valentine day feeling.
A mexicali voodoo version of Hey Joe, a 1967 french psych oddity from an 18 year old Jacqueline Taieb and Patti Smith's classic take on the Who from her 1975 Horses LP:
I know the JT track isn't actually a cover, just a name check, but it's great. And yes folks, the PS cover is international, 'cos the Who were English and Patti American. Jeesh.
If you like this stuff, then you will appreciate the Jan Franzen list of cover versions of Hey Joe and the Ye Ye Girls page on Jacqueline Taieb, also a great source for other 60s french chic chicks.
The Big O magazine is a weird one - too much information, too hard to rifle through i guess.
But they do have a habit of finding some interesting bootleg live albums and putting them on line. Currently they have a gorgeous solo Neil Young set recorded in Toronto in 1971, and it's fantastic hearing these songs so close to when they were written with Neil's voice at its prime. Just him and a guitar, and an all-too-polite audience of hometown Canadians. Includes an unrelased song - Bad Fog of Loneliness. The sound quality is generally excellent too.
Go here or download the full set from here (rapidshare premium users only)
Those little monkeys. I have to admit, the album is brilliant. Musically, it's got all of that Libertines-Clash energy, but frankly better tunes than either of those bands ever had. Lyrically, it's extremely smart and witty:
and anyone who references Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em in song is alright..."He talks of San Francisco, he's from Hunter's Bar / I don't quite know the
distance / But I'm sure that's far" (FAKE TALES OF SAN FRANCISCO)
"And I'm so tense, never tenser / It could all go a bit Frank
Spencer?" (YOU PROBABLY COULDN'T SEE FOR THE LIGHTS BUT YOU WERE STARING
STRAIGHT AT ME)
A friend sent me issue 64 of John Porcellino's King Cat, which was dedicated to his father who has recently passed away, and contained some moving writing about his father and how JC felt about his passing, as well as the usual king-cat line-drawings, a kind of soft-centred bespectacled urban serenity.
I may have been feeling rather vulnerable but it touched me.
I've been following the trend and getting into singer-songwriters of late, and kept picking up obscure early 1970s compilations of folk-rock music with which I was invariably disappointed, except that on almost every one there tended to be a track by Keith Christmas and these simply blew me away. I was therefore delighted to find that he's still around, still playing - occasionally, in the West Country, in-between teaching - and more blues than folk nowadays. He also has his own website, where you can purchase CDs, listen to demos and generally chat, hang out etc.
His first album was recorded whilst he was still a student at Bath University studying Building technology. The next few in the early 1970s are all superb - full of strange mystical lyricism and extrordinary guitar playing. Like a manic version of Nick Drake, and every bit as good.
The best introduction is probably the recent Timeless and Strange compilation. Keith also played acoustic guitar on David Bowie's pre-Mick Ronson Space Oddity album, with Rick Wakeman and Herbie Flowers.
Download:
- Love like this (a recent demo, available like others from Keith's website)
- Waiting for the Wind (from his 2nd album Fable of the Wings)
- Fable of Wings (from Fable of the Wings, 1970)
Get these:
And this:
