Category: Gone but not forgotten

Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Most downloaded tracks, Studio master tapes, studio outtakes

Gold! (Gold!) Always Believe In Your Soul!

Craig McAllister

You’re indestructuh-buh-uhl etc etc.

The internet is full of gold. Look in the deepest, darkest corners and all sorts of fantastic stuff awaits you with a nod and a wink and a glad-you-found-me smile.  Without the internet, I wouldn’t have learned to dance like James Brown (thank you, You Tube). I’d never have seen Stevie Wonder doing Superstition on Sesame Street (Thanks again, You Tube). I’d never have heard those rip-roaring Sgt Pepper master tapes (still available here) that caused Plain Or Pan to go into some sort of meltdown for a few of days a couple of years ago.

One story goes that the record companies are all in a  panic over the state of many of the master tapes in their posession. The original tapes have over the years been rendered gossamer-light and wafer-thin through combinations of repeated reissues/remasters/remixes and plain old neglect. In an attempt to preserve these original recordings as best they can, the labels have started transferring the original master tapes onto digital files, where they can be kept box fresh for as long as they want (you’re indestructuh-buh-uhl and all that, or at least until someone discovers that digital files also have a sell-by date). Being made digital also means that as soon as they’ve been converted, some kind soul sticks one or two teasers out into the ether and stirs up a bit of a feeding frenzy amomgst yer more savvy downloaders. It would appear that none other than the good folks at Motown (yes!) have decided to preserve their archives in this way and, thank you Lord, someone has seen fit to leak some of these masters online. A year or so ago I posted the master tapes to Stevie Wonder‘s Superstition and Marvin Gaye‘s Heard It Through The Grapevine. If you liked them, you’ll love these…

A 15 year old Stevie Wonder belting out Uptight (Everything’s Alright) like his life depended on it.  Crystal clear with just a touch of reverb, this is the music-free vocal track. Comes complete with all the gaps and pauses for you to fill in the horn parts yourself. Listen out for his wee laugh when he cracks up towards the end. Gold!

Michael checks his latest royalty cheque. Older brother isn’t reading a text from Berry Gordy. It’s 1971.

What happened to Michael Jackson? I mean, what happened? When he died, the TV showed a brilliant black and white clip of The Jackson 5, young Michael at the front boppin’ and a-poppin’  in slow motion to this track. Here for you is the vocal-only track of an 11 year old (11 years old!) Michael Jackson singing I Want You Back with absolute total abandon. By the time he gets to the end, his voice has almost gone but he’s still going for it with those wee ‘uhs‘ and ‘huhs‘ that would later develop into crappy girly yelps. No wonder Jarvis Cocker kicked his arse all those years later. Gold!

I’ve posted Marvin Gaye studio stuff before, but never this. It’s only the vocal-only track of What’s Going On! Just Marvin double-tracked and duetting with himself through the slickest protest song ever written. The middle section where he scats and shoobee-do-bops is outrageous, something I’d never really noticed in the finished record, given that the middle part is packed full of sweeping strings, bongos and kitchen sinks full of Funk Brother riffs. Gold!

I’ve also posted versions of The Temptations‘ Papa Was A Rolling Stone before, but again, not this – the vocal-only track. Written by regular Motown producer Norman Whitfield, the vocal group didn’t really like his instrumentation. Vocalist Dennis Edwards didn’t like the autobiographical (he thought)/coincidental (Whitfield claimed) “...3rd of September” line, given that that was the day Edwards father had actually died. Whitfield made him sing the line time and time again until he got a take filled with the right amount of anger and frustration. I’m not sure who the dude doing the bass vocal part is, but be careful, he might just shake your fillings loose. Here too, is the vocal-only track of Ball Of Confusion. Gold x 2!!

Theres tons of this stuff out there. I probably should keep these back, there’s about a month’s worth of posts here….

The Spinners vocal take of the Stevie Wonder-penned It’s A Shame. Gold!

The Four Tops vocal take of Walk Away Renee. Gold!

The Velvelettes vocal take of Needle In a Haystack. The handclaps don’t stop from start to finish! Gold!

Smokey Robinson & the Miracles vocal take of Tears Of a Clown. Gold!

Diana Ross & the Supremes vocal take of Baby Love. Gold! (New link 15.10.10)

Cover Versions, demo, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Live!, studio outtakes

Are You Experienced?

Craig McAllister

“We’d like to stop playin’ this uh, rubbish an’ dedicate a song to The, uh, Cream…” My first brush with Jimi Hendrix was at the tail end of the 80s on one of those Sounds Of The 60s shows where they showed a clip of the Jimi Hendrix Experience playing a brief blast of Hey Joe before freeforming into Cream’s Sunshine Of Your Love. On the Lulu show, no less. “That was really nice!” deadpans the still Scottish-accented Lulu through gritted teeth. On first seeing it (the full 9 minute clip is below), 20 years after the actual event, I thought it was fantastic. The string bending! The guitar tone! The way he re-tuned his guitar while he played! The way he sang and played at the same time! The way he sneaked a wee Beatles riff (I Feel Fine) into it! The sheer outrageous flamboyancy of it all – he looked like a pirate and, uh, did he just play that bit with his teeth?!?!?

It would be a few years later until I’d find out what that Plaster Casters slogan on Noel Redding’s tee-shirt was all about (Google it!), though Jimi Hendrix made just as big an impression on me, in much the same way as I’d hope today’s guitar obsessed teenager stumbling across a Sounds Of The 80s show would feel on hearing Freak Scene or Fools Gold (YouTube ’em kids!) for the first time. Man! I. Am. Old. Certainly older than Jimi was when he made his best stuff, that’s for sure.

James Marshall Hendrix.

The only guitarist ever to be named after an amplifier.

Jimi died 40 years ago today, on the 18th September 1970. At the ripe old age of 27 he joined that heavenly choir of fellow 27 year olds who drowned, drank and drugged themselves to death before their time was up. Brian Jones. Janis Joplin. Jim Morrison. Later on Kurt Cobain. And they’re just the well known ones. Daddy of the blues, Robert Johnson danced with the devil and paid the price at the same age. You can add Big Star’s Chris Bell to the list. Echo & the Bunnymen’s Pete de Freitas too. You could even argue a case for missing Manic Richie Edwards. He disappeared aged 27 and has never been seen again. He was officially pronounced dead in 2008. Weird, eh? I thank my lucky stars that at the age of 27 I was still trying to master Wild Thing on the plank of wood I called a guitar. Unlike my 40 year old self, the members of the 27 Club never got stale, bloated, fat and comfortable with it all. Well, apart from Jim Morrison of course. But you knew that already.

I’ve got all the Jimi Hendrix I need – that’s the first three albums done with the Experience and a compilation of his pure blues stuff as well as a couple of studio outtake bootlegs and a sneakily downloaded copy of the Jimi Hendrix Experience 4 CD box set, choc full of alt versions, live stuff, unreleased takes and all manner of the sort of stuff that thrills me to this day. I couldn’t care less if I never hear Purple Haze again, but you can never have enough versions of Third Stone From the Sun, especially 9 minute versions that are more jazz than blues, with Jimi taking on the role of stoned space captain. I don’t really need to hear his version of Hey Joe again, but I never tire of hearing the “Oh Goddam! One more time…make the voices a little lower and the band a little louder” version – replete with great swooning female backing vocals.

On his recent tour, Paul McCartney told the well known story of The Beatles going to see Jimi Hendrix at the Albert Hall and Jimi serenading the 4 moustachioed mop tops in their box with his own version of the freshly-minted Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. The Sgt Pepper album had only been released a day or two before and Jimi thought he’d play his version for the writers. It sounds thrilling to me. I can only imagine how thrilling it must’ve been for them. Note too, that in those days Jimi didn’t have access to any of the gazillion tab ‘n chord sites that litter the internet with badly tabbed versions of Sweet Child O’ Mine. Get this homeboys ‘n girls –  he learned straight off the record. Just like me. But better – he even replicates the brass parts. Show off.

It’s pretty clear that, post Experience, Jimi had bought himself a one way ticket to Flaresville, Seventies Central. Along with the hemlines and bottoms on his trousers, his music had expanded even further into the cosmicness of free jazz. He was playing with Buddy Miles, his Band of Gypsies even had a bongo player ferchrissakes. This is a much maligned and misunderstood period in the Hendrix canon. Had he stopped after those 3 JHE albums then died, he’d have been immortal. Instead, he’ll be remembered, perhaps unfairly, in the same way as all those other casualties – the promising start before succumbing to ego, drugs and fame and the inevitable  law of diminishing returns. Put yer prejudices aside and listen to this – one of the sweetest tracks Hendrix recorded (in true Plain Or Pan tradition, it’s the demo, not the final mixed version), and only released after his death in 1971. Angel was so good, Rod Stewart recorded a version of it that even them Faces would’ve been proud of. Aye!

*Bonus Track!

In 1968, this track appeared. So Much In Love by McGough & McGear (produced anonymously by one P. McCartney) was never likely to trouble the hit parade, but the guitar playing, the tone, the way those notes are bent……rumours are that’s Jimi at the helm steering the group (including Mitch ‘n Noel of the Experience plus Graham Nash amongst others) straight towards the section marked ‘phazed phreakout psychedelia’. S’acracker!

FYI, McGough was Roger McGough, ex of Scaffold and these days better known as a witty Scouse poet. His son Nathan managed Happy Mondays, if indeed they were at all manageable. McGear is better known as Michael McCartney, brother of Paul. But you knew that already.

Cover Versions, demo, Gone but not forgotten

Black Sheep Boy Triple Whammy

Craig McAllister

Or Meet The Folkers (Slight Return). Coming hot on the slippery flippers of the folkie Dolphins post a week or so ago, I’m about to wax lyrical about Tim Hardin‘s Black Sheep Boy. Released in ’67 on Tim Hardin’s 2nd LP (Tim Hardin 2), Black Sheep Boy is a gentle finger-picked acoustic track, melancholic, downbeat and, thanks to the Atlantic Gulf Stream, perfect for this Indian summer we’re currently experiencing on the West Coast of Scotland.

Joe Strummer called Tim Hardin a ‘lost genius of music‘ and he was right. A songwriter’s songwriter, he penned one stone cold classic that would be oft covered by others (Reason To Believe), provided Nico with Eulogy For Lenny Bruce for her Chelsea Girls album and more recently has given Mark Lanegan the perfect track for his gargling sand ‘n gravel growl (Shiloh Town).  Black Sheep Boy is a melancholic rumination of a life gone awry. Basically it says, “I can’t do right for doing wrong, my family don’t love me and no-one understands me ‘cept for the girls who dig my golden curls of hair.”

Much like Reason To Believe, Black Sheep Boy has been covered by numerous hipsters, all eager to worship at the altar of Hardin. Front of the queue was Scott Walker who took Hardin’s introspective strumalong and turned it into a lush Spectorish wall of sound production, all sweeping strings, plucked nylon acoustics and bathed in pathos. Sitting quite happily amongst a mixture of originals, contemporary covers and the odd Jacques Brel song of decadance and decay, it is quite splendid and appears on ’68s Scott 2 (sleeve notes by ‘his friend‘ Jonathan King, fact fans).

Not as rich but no less fantastic to these ears is Paul Weller‘s frantic knee-trembler of a version, released on the now-obscure Volume series of CDs (the hip and happening of the day compiled on a CD with an accompanying fanzine-style glossy book.) At less than 2 minutes long it cuts to the chase, managing to pack in tasteful pedal steel, some subtle organ, occasional double-tracked vocals and Weller’s signature white man trying to sing like Otis on the last couple of lines. PW’s version was recorded in 1994, around the time of Wild Wood. You could suggest that Tim Hardin was something of an influence on the Wild Wood LP, given that album’s rootsy acoustic feel. You might even suggest that Weller has been a fan of Tim Hardin for a number of years. On Side 2 of Tim Hardin 2 you’ll find a song called Speak Like A Child. Now. Where have I heard that before?

Bonus Tracks!

Tim Hardin Speak Like a Child

The Style Council Speak Like A Child

(2 totally different songs, in case you were wondering)

demo, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find

Ruby, Ruby, Ruby, Ruby!!!!

Craig McAllister

Think of a classic album. Go on! Just one! In fact, name two! Two universally accepted classic albums! Don’t tell me yet! You could probably name three, eh? Go on then! In fact, make it ten! Still easy isn’t it? I bet you were thinking about Rubber Soul? Revolver? Blonde On Blonde? The Dark side of the Moon? Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars? London Calling? Pet Sounds? Born to Run? Nevermind The Bollocks? The Velvet Underground & Nico? Yeah, yeah, yeah and yeah! I knew it. Take the standard Mojo/Word/Uncut/Guardian/Times list of da greats with you down to your local record shop (remember them?) splash the cash and hey presto! Instant cred in your record collection. But outta that list, you’ve got them all anyway, eh? Or at least the ones you like. Maybe even also the ones you know you should like but never actually play. I know, I know, I’m guilty of that too.

Bet you didn’t think of Sunflower though. Sunflower. Nope, not Paul Weller’s rockin’ and rollin’ clarion call from ’93 (I’m back! I’m back! Check out me Patrick Cox’s while you listen!) I’m talking about The Beach Boys Sunflower, released one week short of 40 years ago today on August 31st 1970. You’re all people of good taste. I expect you’ll have heard of it. No doubt some of you will have actually heard it. If so, sorry for the condescending tone. If not, sorry for the condescending tone, but what exactly have you been using those ears of yours for all this time? Sunflower is the best Beach Boys album In The World….Ever. Forget any one of those cars ‘n girls ‘n surf compilations that turn up every time the sun pokes it’s stupid head from out behind a big fat rain cloud. Forget (gulp!) Pet Sounds. Honestly! Forget it! It’s good. OK, it’s great. But it’s not even up there with Surfs Up. As a proper bona fide studio album, Sunflower knocks spots off of all of them.

Demoed mainly in the summer of ’69 (howdy Bryan Adams) the songs that make up the final, released version (like gazillions of albums before and since, it went through a series of tracklist changes) really benefit from the shared songwriting talents of Brian Wilson, Dennis Wilson and Bruce Johnston. Brian’s songs make up the lion’s share of the album, but for me, it’s the Dennis songs that sparkle just that bit more.

Listen to Forever. Here’s a guy who’s a major player, a bit of a shagger as they say round here, and he’s writing love songs as tender and romantic as anything Paul McCartney’s ever came up with, with the added bonus of none of the sickly sweet gloop that McCartney can sometimes be guilty of plopping all over his best tunes. We all know guys like Dennis and if any of them wrote a line as brilliant as

If every word I said could make you laugh I’d talk forever…

if the song I sing to you could fill your heart with joy I’d sing forever

they’d get a kicking. Dennis, surf dude and man’s man must’ve had some nerve to bring those words out his brain, onto paper and ultimately onto vinyl. What a guy. What an absolute guy. (That’s a quote from the best film ever made). The words, the music, the arrangement, the na na na na na coda make Forever my favourite Beach Boys song bar none. Easy. Even Mike Love gets in on the act. Granted, not the Beach Boy most BB fans warm to the most, his vocals on All I Wanna Do are superb. On top of one of thee classic Brian Wilson chord progressions, they’re slightly far away sounding and as sunkissed as I can only imagine Malibu Beach to be. They help make this track one of the standouts on Sunflower. By proxy, this makes it one of the best Beach Boys tracks you’ve quite possibly never heard. Do yourself a favour, eh?

Elsewhere on the album you’ll hear snatches of melodies from the abandoned Smile album (Cool, Cool Water), top notch production and the best Californian session musicianship that Reprise Records’ money could buy. Belle and Sebastian would wet their beds if they could come up with an album approaching this amount of class. Misguided twonks like Richard Ashcroft think they’re making albums as good as this today (he really does hahahaha!). Most people consider the Beach Boys to be a singles band (see also Madness and Blur) but truly, Sunflower stands head and shoulders above everything the Beach Boys ever put their name too.  Buy it at your usual vendor of choice. Now!

*Bonus tracks

Everyone knows that Charles Manson became bezzy mates with Dennis Wilson for a wee while at the tail end of the 60s. He thought Dennis could get him a record deal. Instead, Dennis pissed him off by knicking one of his songs, changing some of the lyrics and sticking it on the Beach Boys 20/20 album. Silly move! Contrast and compare…

Charles Manson Cease To Exist

Beach Boys Never Learn Not To Love

Cover Versions, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find

King Curtis (part 2)

Craig McAllister

Everybody listen up! Everybody! All you laydees an’ Gen’lmen! All you foxes an’ fellas! All you fellas wishin’ they was foxes an’ all you foxes wishin’ they was fellas! Tonight’s contest sees some of the greatest soul records ever made* slug it out in this here ring for the crown of Best Version Of a Curtis Mayfield Song….Ever! In the black corner we have our tag-team challengers, the mysterious and little-heard of 16 year old wonder, Miss Patti Jo and, fresh from touring the World and beyond with The Jackson 5, the delicious Sisters Love. And in the black corner we have the Undisputed! Genius! Of Soul! Funk! R&B! Gospel! And stack-heeled boots! Thee Heavyweight Champion of the World, Mr Cuurrttiiss Maayyffiieelldd!

Seconds out, Round1!

By 1973, Curtis Mayfield had penned an astounding 44 Top 50 US R&B chart hits for other artists. His version of the sublime Make Me Believe In You appeared on 74s Sweet Exorcist album, but by then it had been recorded by Patti Jo. Little is known of Patti Jo. I do know she was only 16 when she recorded her version. No amount of GoogleWiki sheds any light on her at all. I don’t know what else she recorded, what she looked like, where she lived. I don’t know anything about her at all. But I do know that her version of Make Me Believe In You is a reliable standard in Pete Wiggs’ (St Etienne) DJ box whenever he gets the chance to spin the wheels of steel. Vinyl pops ‘n crackles ‘n all, this is the harder-to-find full length version, not the edited one that usually crops up on yer more trainspottery soul compilations. Flute solo included, it knocks Curtis’ original into submission by the first minute, if you ask me.

Seconds out, Round 2!

Curtis put his version of Give Me Your Love on the soundtrack to Superfly. Scroll down a wee bit from here and you’ll find a live YouTube video of it. It is Blaxploitation personified. Lush, sweeping strings, hypnotic 4 note bass riff, stabbing brass, the ubiquitous wah-wah, by the time the vocals come in I find myself struttin’ the room like a velvet-adorned Harlem pimp. A look that doesn’t go down particularly well in this exclusive part of Ayrshire, even at Halloween. Snoop Dogg liked it so much he knicked it for the opening track of Doggystyle. But you knew that already. Or maybe you didn’t? Hear here.

In contrast, 73’s version by Sisters Love turns the original’s man-coming-on-to-woman on it’s sweet soul head, giving it an empowering pro-feminist love ’em and leave em twist. Or something like that. Either way, it‘s a bona fide, stone-cold underground funk/disco classic. Does that genre even exist? It does now, brothers and sisters. Punch for punch and pound for pound, Curtis takes this one for me.

That’s one round each. Patti Jo takes the first. Curtis batters Sisters Love in the second. Who wins? It’ll go to points. Listen, score them and post your winners in the comments section below. Ciao, soul brothers and sisters!

*mid 70s only

demo, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, studio outtakes

King Curtis (part 1)

Craig McAllister

If such a thing as a Definitive List of Legends In Music existed you can bet your life the usual suspects of DylanLennonMcCartneyJagger’nthat would be on it. Some may argue for the inclusion of WonderBowieMarley(insertyerown) too, but I doubt that many people would immediately add Curtis Mayfield to the list.

Poor Curtis hasn’t had it easy in the ‘legend‘ stakes. You want socio-political commentary? You’ve got Stevie Wonder. You want a string-swept soul? You’ve got Marvin Gaye. You want the funk? You’ve got James Brown. Curtis Mayfield did all this and more. With The Impressions he was there at the birth of soul music. He’s written for others. He’s produced others. He had his own publishing compnay. He had his own record companies. Yeah, that’s companies, plural. He was the complete package, yet in the grand scheme of things he rarely gets spoken about in the same reverential tones as those contemporaries mentioned above. Plain and simply, the genius of Curtis Mayfield has been too often overlooked.

Genius is a word banded about willy-nilly these days. If you must, listen to Fearne Cotton or Dermot O’ Leary or any of those radio presenters and I can guarantee that within 5 minutes you’ll hear them attribute the word ‘genius‘ to whatever is currently the pick of the pops. Go on, I dare you. The dictionary defines genius as, “A person of extraordinary intellect and talent.” So, Fearne ‘n Dermot, you’re wrong about Plan B and Kasabian and Beyonce (although, Kasabian excepted surely, they might have their moments.) Use the word wisely, or not at all, that’s all I’m saying. 

“One is not born a genius, one becomes a genius.” Simone de Beauvoir said that. But you knew that already. Over time, Curtis most certainly did become genius. From doo-wop, gospel inflected beginnings, via straight ahead soul, he arrived at this, 8 minutes of bona fide soul genius (yes!) It’s called (Don’t Worry) If There’s Hell Below We’re all Gonna Go, it is extraordinary and it is the first track on the album pictured above. Seek it out, you’ll like it. With Curtis, you’re never too far from a wocka-wocka-wocka wah-wah guitar and he’s seen no reason to change that winning formula here. Taking his cue from the Book Of Revelations and underpinned by the sleaziest, meanest fuzz bass you’ll ever hear, strings sweep and brass blows as Curtis adds his heavily echoed sweet falsetto to the mix. It’s a fantastic arrangement. Brian Wilson always gets the ‘Legend‘ status when it comes to arranging, but (Don’t Worry)… proves that Mayfield is right up there with him. He must’ve known too when he was recording it that he was making such a monumental track. Listen to this, takes 1 and 2 of the backing tracks. No vocals, just the music in all it’s glory. You can imagine everyone gathered round the speakers in the control room as it plays, Curtis nodding his head in quiet satisfaction. Dig it, Brothers and Sisters!

Bonus Track

As you well know, Curtis Mayfield did the soundtrack to Superfly. Here‘s the demo of opening track, Little Child Runnin’ Wild, known as Ghetto Child at the demo stage.

…and here’s Curtis doing the Snoop Dogg-sampling Give me Your Love, live somewhere, sometime in ’72.

(Listen to the Bathtub intro section on Doggystyle)

Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Live!

The Tie’s The Limit

Craig McAllister

Listening to the radio whilst driving up combinations of the M5, M6 and M74 yesterday on a gruelling 9 hour trip from the sunny South of England I was reminded hourly of the sad death of Alex ‘Hurricane’ Higgins. As I drove home I wrote in my head the words here that fire forth from my fingers.

The Hurricane

Like many people in the 80s, I was gripped by the TV spectacle that was the snooker. Not snooker. That was something else. No, ‘the’ snooker. That’s how we referred to it. A game brought back from the dead-end of the working man’s club and the seedier side of life was arguably as big then as the English Premiership is nowadays. Instead of your Rooneys and John Terrrys, it was your Reardons and Terry Griffiths that were the household names in those days. Alex Higgins was different to his contemporaries in every way. Rough, ready and rakish, he brought punk attitude to the tables. He refused to wear a bow tie (de rigeur in those days) as he claimed it itched his neck. He  head butted a judge when asked to provide a urine sample. He took drugs. He smoked at the side of the tables. He drank like the ubiquitous fish and he played fast. Very fast. Hence the ‘Hurricane’ nickname.

The Hurricane came out the traps like a bolt of electricity. You know those short, short gaps between the songs in a Ramones live set?  He could muster up a double figure break in roughly the same time. Remember too, that this was the era of table bores like Steve Davis. A Rick Wakeman keyboard solo could’ve passed in the time it took Davis to consider all possibilities and all angles before lining up one of his defensive shots. Higgins was all about death or glory. If he was a rock star, he’d have been like Keith Richards or The Clash or Them the New York Dolls or any of those bands who meant it 100%. His life was snooker and snooker was his life. He earned and spent an estimated £4 million in his liftetime. Spent the lot. Drugs, drink, gambling, you name it. This time last week he was living in sheltered housing, penniless, toothless and 6 stones in weight, snooker cue-thin. A tragic waste of a life. Look at the picture above and remember him like that, eh?

The Music Bit

Here‘s Neil Young doing a live verson of Like A Hurricane. Taken from the excellent Rock ‘n Roll Cowboy 4 Cd bootleg, I’m not sure where it was recorded, but it’s a cracker. Neil Young, Crazy Horse and a million amps turned up to 11.

Cover Versions, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Live!

Shhh! It’s So Quiet You Could Hear A Name Drop

Craig McAllister

Last week I was contacted out of the blue by an editor asking if I would write him some stuff for the forthcoming Vintage At Goodwood festival – the one where the Faces with Mick Hucknall-as-Rod are playing. To cut a long story short, I interviewed both Martyn Ware (Human Leage/Heaven 17) and Sandie Shaw. Sandie (as I can now call her) phoned me at home and we spoke about her role curating an event at the Vintage Festival.  Amongst the many things we talked about, it transpired that she was unaware that Elvis‘ version of Hound Dog was not the original version, merely a watered-down, revved-up pop version of Big Mama Thornton’s old blues original. 

After Elvis appeared from outta nowhere and hit the music world like a comet from Mars, songwriters from every corner bombarded him with their compositions in the hope that Elvis Himselvis could do what they couldn’t – turn the song into a nationwide hit. This usually came at a price, as Colonel Tom Parker would demand Elvis’ name be added as songwriter and that the song be published by Elvis’ own publishing company. Look in the brackets under the song titles. All those songs – Heartbreak Hotel, Don’t Be Cruel, Love Me Tender, (and there’s more) weren’t actually written or even co-written by Elvis, but that was the pay-off if you wanted him to sing your song. Heavyweights like Leiber and Stoller were established enough not to have to buckle under the force of the Colonel’s muscle, but most others did.

Without insulting your intelligence, you will know that there have been a gazillion versions of Elvis songs over the years.  Off the beaten track and slightly left of centre, here’s another two that you may not be aware of.

Firstly, Dean Carter‘s screamin’ and a hollerin’ garage rockabilly surf version of Jailhouse Rock. Welding together what sounds like primitive morse code, the drums from Wipeout, the piano riff from Let’s Dance (the Hey baby won’t you take a chance version, not the Bowie track of the same name) and the sound of a 7 year old being let loose on an electric guitar with a spanner-as-plectrum, it comes at you at 100 mph breathless, breakneck speed and sounds quite insane. Richard Hawley probably loves this record. You’ll like it too.

Secondly, no less intense is Buddy Love‘s take on Heartbtreak Hotel. More structured perhaps, than Dean Carter’s record above, Love sounds like an amphetamine-crazed matinee idol, barking over the top of skronking sax, freakbeat drum breaks and handclaps. Man! I love handclaps on records! Tarantino could do worse than consider this version for the soundtrack to a pivotal scene in his next movie.   

Bonus Track!

Recorded live a mere 54 years ago at the birth of rock ‘n roll in the New Frontier Hotel, Vegas on May 6th 1956, “He’s a fine young lad and a fine young talent,” it’s young Elvis Himselvis’ version of Heartbreak Hotel.  Of course, Elvis would be back in Vegas 20  years later; bloated, burnt out and bereft of decent ideas, but this is the classic version played by the classic line-up – DJ Fontana on drums, Bill Black on bass and Scotty Moore on guitar. Listen out for the ‘Heartburn Motel’ line he sneaks in near the end.

 

Cover Versions, Gone but not forgotten

I Am The Cosmos double whammy

Craig McAllister

A couple of weeks ago I was window shopping in Glasgow when I chanced upon a wee stall selling replica football tops and assorted football related t-shirts – Scotland Argentina ’78 -inspired designs and the likes. Unfortunately, the Celtic-inspired tops seemed to be the best – the Ramones logo re-done with the names of the Lisbon Lions, the Dylan ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ video where Bob discards 3 cards saying “It’s A “, “Grand Old Team“, “To Play For“. Umpteen Larsson tops. That sort of thing. Amongst all the Archie Gemmell and Old Firm crap I found a brilliant New York Cosmos t-shirt. I had to buy it.

I remember the Topical Times ’79 football annual having a big piece about them and I was something of a nine year old trans-Atlantic fan. They attracted all the best players, just as they entered the final stages of their playing career. In some cases, players came out of retirement, lured by the big bucks of the club’s financial backers. Pele, Beckenbaur, Neeskens, to name 3, all played in the team’s colours. The badge was even designed with Pele in mind – incorporating the Brazilian football team colours of yellow, green and blue, the owners believed this would appeal to Pele. And it did, not just to Pele, but also to Carlos Alberto, captain of the famous Brazil ’70 World Cup winning team. This was a masterstroke by the owners – when Pele signed in ’75, average attendances rose from 3500 to over 10,000. Anyway, here’s the music part…

The Cosmos were founded by Atlantic Records’ Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun, so in turn they were funded in no small part due to the success of a mid-70s global shagging Led Zeppelin. You could say that for every copy of Led Zep IV sold, some of the profits would go into funding terrible acts like Bad Company and some of the profits would line the pockets of footballers on the wrong side of 35.

Not on Atlantic Records, and therefore nothing to do with any of the above useless trivia was Chris Bell, Alex Chilton’s foil in Big Star. Since Chilton died the other week, it’s been said that one of the reasons he underplayed the recordings he made with Big Star is because he knew how much of the Big Star sound had been created by Chris Bell and not by himself. If you listen to Chris Bell’s solo album I Am The Cosmos (d’you see what I did there?), there may be some clout in this opinion. The title track itself is a fantastic slice of mid 70s rock – easily on a par with The Stones Exile On Main St or much of The Faces back catalogue. It’s loose, it’s sloppy, it’s full of soaring vocals, there’s a fabulous twin guitar break in the middle; all the ingredients required to make the hairs on this particular neck to stand to attention. In fact, while I’ve got your attention, I’d like to offer up the opinion that it’s this record (link updated again!) more than anything from #1 Record or Radio City that gave Teenage Fanclub the blueprint for everything they recorded at the sessions that produced Bandwagonesque. Not a bad point of reference at all.

In total contrast to the original above, there’s another version of I Am The Cosmos currently released and charming the pants off me. Pete Yorn and Scarlett Johansson recorded the songs that would form the ‘Break Up’ album in 2006 but  they only saw the light of day at the end of last year. I’m not normally a fan of actors making records (or vice versa) and this album is just OK. It’s nothing spectacular and had Yorn made it with N. E. Singer, I doubt I’d even have gone out of my way to find it, let alone listen to it. But for Miss Johansson I can make exceptions. Her voice is decent enough and her duet with Yorn on their version (link updated) of I Am The Cosmos is indie/lo-fi at its best. They claim to have been influenced by Serge Gainsbourg’s recordings with Brigitte Bardot, but I can’t really hear it. I could, however, quite happily listen to it/her all day long. Indeed, if she gets in the queue behind Zooey Deschanel and plays her cards right, Scarlett Johansson could yet be the next Mrs Plain Or Pan. Mind you, I’d need to make sure I’m not wearing that new Cosmos t-shirt. I’m not nine years old anymore. I bought a medium, but I really should’ve gone for a large. I knew at the time, but who was I tryin’ to kid?

demo, entire show, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, studio outtakes

You Need A Mess Of Help To Stand Alone

Craig McAllister

Poor Brian Wilson. Deaf in his right ear after his dad Murry had uncharitably clouted him, he suffered more than his siblings at the hands of this hard-to-please man. A somewhat failed song writer (doo-wop songs his ‘speciality’) Murry Wilson was the Beach Boys manager/co-producer/arranger in those heady surf-filled, drag-racing days.

Much like those dads of today who coach frantically from the side of the pitch while their 13 year old chases a ball around, he lived the dream through his sons. He constantly obsessed over every facet of the Beach Boys, from their appearance and stage presentation to the lyrics and songs themselves. A traditionalist, he undoubtedly gave Brian an ear (only one, mind) for a melody, by playing him Gershwin non-stop from an early age. He had him take accordion lessons. He forced him to sing solo in the church. He certainly pushed him in the right direction, as Brian became as obsessive about the power of music as Murry.

Brian was prodigious. He studied vocal group The Four Freshmen, replicated their individual vocal parts on the piano and worked out how to make a group of voices sing in 4 part harmony. From this, The Beach Boys were born and the rest, as you already know, is history. Have a listen to this, but be prepared to sit down and listen closely. You won’t regret it. It’s a complete reel (40 mins) of The Beach Boys recording Help Me, Rhonda. Hot on the heels of I Get Around it would go on to become the group’s second US Number 1, but not before three painstaking recording sessions. The Help Me, Rhonda session available here was recorded probably on the 8th or 19th January 1965, depending on the sources you read, and is famous in Beach Boys circles because the session is constantly interrupted by a menacing Murry, breaking in on the studio microphone and berating the individual members of the group for their sub-standard performances. For the most part he’s right too!

“Brian. Fellas. I have 3000 words to say. Quit screamin’, start singin’ from your hearts, huh? You’re doing fine now, watch your ‘ooohs’, come in on the low notes Mike. Carl -‘oooh’ – you’re ‘eugh!’ Come on! Dennis – you’re flatting. OK Mike. You’re flatting on your high notes. Let’s go. Let’s roll. So you’re big stars. Let’s fight, huh? Let’s fight for success. OK. Let’s go. Now loosen up. Be happy. Forget the people in here……..turn the lights out in this room. Turn the lights out in this room… they see so many people…OK fellas. You got any guts? Let’s hear ’em!”

Brian (from across the room) “Dad. only 82 words.”

Murry “I said 3000. Come on Brian. Knock it off! You guys think you’re good? Let’s go! Let’s go! Fellas. As a team we’re unbeatable. You’re doing wonderful Al. I’ll leave, Brian, if you’re gonna give me a bad time…..”

Brian “I got one ear left and your big mouthed voice is killin’ me!”

Murry “I’m sorry I’m yelling. Loosen up Al, watch your flatting…….”

And on and on and on it goes, between a zillion perfect and not-so perfect short burts of Help Me, Rhonda. Mike is flatting those high notes. Al is flatting those low notes.

“Al. Al! Come in to it. About an inch and three quarters. Or two inches closer. Either sing out louder or come in closer. And e-nun-ci-ate! When you sing ‘Rhonda’ make it sexy and soft. “Rhonda you look so fiiiine!” OK?” At this point you hear an unconvinced  “hmmmm” from someone at the microphone.

And still it goes on.

“Brian. Your voice is shrilling through everybody. Carl. We can’t hear Carl. We can hear Dennis but we can’t hear Mike. And we can hardly hear Al.”

At one point Murry points out that “I’m a genius too, Brian!” Incredible! This is history in the making and we’re party to it. Incredible! Something recorded 45 years ago exists in the quality it does. What strikes me most about listening to the tape is that although Murry clearly likes the sound of his own voice and isn’t shy of pointing out the group’s failures, the group themselves know when a take has been a bad take. They don’t need Murry to tell them. You can hear them berate one another for being flat, quiet, missing their intro, whatever.

Brian actually appears in control of everything, despite his Dad’s close attentions. The session ends with Brian and Murry having a quiet arguement, Brian asking for an atmosphere of calmness, “are you going now?”, Murry commenting that “just because you’ve had a big hit…”. Brian puts up with his dad pretty well. This time. But no wonder it was only a few short months until he’d be watching TV and playing piano in a sandpit in his living room……..

Murry died in 1973. They say the devil has all the best tunes. I believe Murry is rearranging them as you read this.

TRIVIA FACT

Glen Campbell plays on this session. You’ll hear a wee bit of noodling and strumming throughout. That’s him!