Robert Ward: Another Dead Guy....

Posted by rockindomp3



Another great one gone, Robert Ward died Christmas day, he had been sick for years, been through two strokes and finally his kidneys rotted out. He left his family, including 68 grand children destitute. If you'd like to help them you can bundle up some money, gold or diamonds and send them to his wife at:
Roberta Ward
P.O. Box 217
Dry Branch, GA, 31020
US of A
Ward, who never really had a hit record under his own name was one of the greatest unheralded R&B/soul guitarist and singers of the sixties. He issued many fine sides
on the LuPine, Thelma (run by Berry Gordy's sister) and Groove City labels both under his own name and as leader of the Ohio Untouchables who, after Ward's departure would later morph into the 70's funk superstars/superstuds the Ohio Players. He also worked with the great Detroit vocal group the Falcons, an early super group of sorts led by a young Wilson Pickett along with at various times Sir Mack Rice (who wrote "Mustang Sally"), Eddie "Knock On Wood" Floyd, and Joe Stubbs (brother of the Four Tops' Levi Stubbs) who sang lead on their biggest hit You're So Fine).
Ward was best known for the "watery", tremolo laden guitar sound produced by his Magnatone amp, Lonnie Mack was his most famous disciple, adapting Ward's sound on his early hits on the Fraternity label-- Wham, Memphis, Omaha, et al.
Robert Ward popped out of the womb on October 15 of 1938 in the country side near Luthersville, Georgia to sharecropping parents. He sang in the church, learned guitar from his mother and listened to Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the Dixie Hummingbirds
and post war blues singers like John Lee Hooker and Jimmy Reed. He was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1957 and upon discharge formed the Brassettes in LaGrange, Georgia eventually finding steady work as albino rocker Piano Red's backing band. In 1960 he relocated to Dayton, Ohio in search of work where he put together the Ohio Untouchables. They were discovered by Detroit record producer Robert West who signed them to LuPine and also used them to back up the Falcons on some incredible 45's including their timeless and heart wrenching hit I Found A Love (perhaps the closest Wilson Pickett ever came to matching the shouts of his idol
Julius Cheeks of the Sensational Nightingales) and other sides including this one: Let's Kiss And Make Up on which Ward solos prominently.
Amongst the Ohio Untouchables' best sides are some monster guitar instrumentals like Uptown, Workout, and Hot Stuff as well as Robert Ward's gospel tinged vocal efforts like Your Love Is Amazing, Fear No Evil, I'm Tired, and The Swim. Finer sides you shall not hear, not in this world, not in this life. His complete 1961-67 discography can be had on the Relic CD Robert Ward- Hot Stuff.
The aforementioned sides failed to sell and Ward ended up playing on many sessions for Motown including hits like the Undisputed Truth's paranoid classic Smiling Faces (Tell Lies) and the Temptations uber-smash Papa Was A Rolling Stone. In 1977 Ward's first wife died of a cerebral hemorrhage leaving him with six children. He moved back to Georgia working outside of music in a lumber mill and in small time crime, eventually landing in the poky (where he played in a prison band with Major Lance). He was rediscovered in the early 1990's by New Orleans' Black Top records owner Hammond Scott who had been searching for him for several years. Scott recorded Ward on the 1990 LP Fear No Evil. I had several friends working at Black Top at the time and I remember hearing the original undubbed tapes of that LP and they were fantastic, Ward playing and singing magnificently. Unfortunately, Scott took the tapes and added all sorts of awful 90's touches like ugly digital reverb and lame horn charts. Ward's talent overcomes Scott's shortcomings as a producer on Fear No Evil but his next Black Top record Rhythm of the People (1993) wasn't very good (although if you want it, try here), although the Black Top discs did help him to find work and a small amount of money gigging including a European tour, the discs however do not do his talent justice. I find Black Top one of the most offensive labels of the 90's blues revival in that they could make lame records with some of the finest artists of all time (Snooks Eaglin being another who comes to mind) by attempting to make their discs 90's radio friendly, as if Robert Ward's record was going to get airplay next to Madonna. Had Scott issued the undubbed session tapes in their raw form he would probably have sold a lot more records, as the non-production success of Fat Possum records later in that decade would prove, the audience for old blues and R&B likes it because it is raw, and attempting to market the old masters in competition with the MTV made celeb-u-tards was simply foolish both artistically and commercially. This of course is one of the reasons Black Top no longer exists, and nobody misses it. It doesn't matter now, least of all to Mr. Ward who led a hard life, and left some beautiful sounds. He must be in a better place now. And, hey, dig that leopard print pick guard on his Jazz Master! Hot stuff indeed.


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Is It Still Your Birthday If You Are Dead? Bo Diddley

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Bo Diddley didn't live to see his birthday this year (which he shared with Bob Quine who is still dead). I had three brief but amusing run ins with Bo, which I posted on Boogie Woogie Flu
blog back in June when he died. If you didn't see it I'll reprint 'em here:
1) I was bike messengering in the early 80's and had some time to kill so I stopped into Show World @ 8th Ave and 42nd St (a three story peep-show porn emporium, now gone) to take in the quarter movies and get out of the cold. Who should be checking out at the counter but Bo Diddley in a long leather overcoat and cowboy hat. He had a big bag of videos so I say: "Bo Diddley!, whatcha buyin' Bo"? He pulls the top video out of the bag and shows me Maximum Perversion Vol. 23. Pix of midgets, women w/snakes, etc. all over it. He had a huge grin on his face.
2) Backstage at Madison Square Garden for some oldies show and there's Bo at the catering table. He gets a huge piece of apple pie and sits down, but before he eats it he butters both top and bottom with about a quarter inch of butter, then picks it up and swallows it in two bites.
3) In 1985 we went down to Camden, N.J. to see Bo w/the Ben Vaughn Combo backing him up (they were perfect, right down to the plaid jackets, Bo hated them) so I brought my copy of Go Bo Diddley to get signed. While I was getting it autographed, Ben asked Bo about the verse in
"Who Do You Love" about the ice wagon and what it meant. Bo replied that Leonard Chess
made him change the lyrics from the original verse he brought in which was:
"the night was black/the sky was blue
around the corner/the shitwagon flew
a bump was hit/a scream was heard
someone got hit with a flying turd"!
By the way, Bo signed the record upside down, so I scanned it upside down in case anyone out there wants to analyze his handwriting.
The point being: I know of no artist, not the Stones, not Dylan, not even Jimmy Reed, who made as many fine records as Bo Diddley. In the early 90's Charley Records of England issued an twelve CD set of his Chess recordings including many un-issued sides (you can find it here). There's almost no crap on it at all. Amazing. I wanted to post some of his more obscure tunes here to give you an idea of the depth and scope of his catalogue. He is unfairly remembered as a one-hit, one beat, one riff artist, and that is just utter bullshit. The people who write the history of rock'n'roll are often the most idiotic, misinformed, and laziest writers in the world.
Here is a small attempt to change the "conventional wisdom" on the subject of Bo Diddley. Take a listen.
Background To A Music
Africa Speaks
Bo's Dog (live)
Billy Stewart- Billy's Heartache (produced/written by Bo, Bo's also playing guitar and singing back-up)
Billy Stewart- Billy's Blues Part one
Billy Stewart- Billy's Blues Part two (produced/written by Bo, Bo can also be heard on guitar, "Love Is Strange" was based on this record)
Marquees (w/Marvin Gaye)- Hey Little School Girl (produced/written by Bo)
Congo
Cookie Headed Diddley
Mr Khrushchev
(cold war Bo!)
Detour
Mama Keep Your Big Mouth Shut
Mess Around
Moon Baby
Pretty Baby
(the above was recorded in Bo's basement during a rehearsal)
with Chuck Berry- Bo's Beat
Two Flies
Shank
Watusi Bounce
Sad Sack
Met You On A Saturday
Surfer's Love Call
Bo's A Lumber Jack
Mickey & Sylvia- Dearest (written by Bo, who is also playing rhythm guitar behind Mickey Baker, Bob Quine's favorite guitar solo).
and here's one by Bo Diddley's cousin, Bo Dudley (I shit you not): Shotgun Rider
Now if we can only find the homemade R&B star porno movies Bo filmed on tour in the 50's and 60's (as described by Etta James in her book Rage To Live (Villard, 1995) see the September posting Etta James Rocks The House for more on Bo's home movies. Should anybody out there see a Yard Sale sign out in front of Bo Diddley's place please let me know.
In an old underground comic book called Bop! there was a great story about a teenage garage band circa 1962 who invite Bo Diddley to their house to jam with them. Bo (and maraca shakin' Jerome!) showed up at the kid's house the next day and jammed out with the little twerps.
A tape exists of this garage jam and hopefully it will be released in our lifetime (Bo's manager nixed the release of it when Bo was still alive, preferring to attempt to market some sort of hip hop Bo disc). Ellas Otha Bates McDaniel aka Bo Diddley: great guy, great glasses, great rock'n'roll star...maybe the greatest ever.
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The Hound's Mystery Disc #1 Blowin' Through Yokahoma

Posted by rockindomp3



I got an e-mail from Eddie Gordetsky the other day. He said something that really struck me.
He wrote-- "having everything available at your fingertips is the same as having nothing", of course he was talking about music and record collecting and the sense that we've lost the mystery of it all. There are very few mysteries left out there. I have met and broke bread with Hasil Adkins, picked Andre Williams up off the floor, snorted dope with Esquerita, bar-b-q'd with Ronnie Dawson, carried Cordell Jackson's amp, shook the hand of T. Valentine, and so many others whose very existence seemed so unlikely a few short decades ago.
When I started record collecting you literally had to dig through garbage dumpsters to find an Elmore James 45 (as I did once on Broadway at Waverly Place, a whole dumpster full of Fire/Fury/Enjoy 45's....those were the days). Now you can hit a button and have three box sets containing every second of music he ever recorded delivered to your door in 48 hours. I'm not sure that's a good thing, and I can't explain why. Actually I could, but it doesn't really matter.
There are a few real mystery discs left out there, and one of them is this one, one of my very favorites-- Blowin' Through Yokahama Part I b/w Blowin Through Yokahama Part II
on the Munro label, of Saginaw, Michigan. Year unknown, but I'd say around '62-3.
The song itself, a version of Bo Diddley's Hush Your Mouth which was part of so many bands repertoire around that time (I always loved Dick Dale's version which he called Surfin' Drums)
revved up and given a quasi-exotica treatment, along the lines of another favorite (and mysterious) disc-- Ward Darby & the Raves-- Safari (Petite) mixed with the sort of high energy guitar workouts that Ronnie Hawkins & the Hawks' where adding to their Bo Diddley covers around the same time (here's their version of Who Do You Love with a young Robbie Robertson
shrieking out the blues, he'd go on to learn the value of publishing copyrights at Albert Goldman's elbow and virtually steal the Band's entire catalog from the guys he describes in the Last Waltz as his "brothers", for more on this check out Levon Helm's hysterical book This Wheel's On Fire, William Morrow & Co. 1993).
The Medallions you say? Anyone with the slightest interest in Rhythm and Blues or early Rock'n'Roll has heard of the Medallions. They even had a hit, the greaseball classic-- The Letter
with it's incredible spoken part ("with sweet words of pismotology and the pupituits of love....").
Released on Dootsie Williams L.A. based Dootone in '58 in never charted but was a strong seller and can still be heard on L.A. radio stations that cater to Low Riders. They made other great records too-- like the flip of the Letter-- Buick '59, Behind The Door, Edna, My Pretty Baby (with Johnny "Two Voice" Morrisette taking over the lead vocal from Vernon Greene), Rocket Ship, and Speedin' amongst them. For the easily confused here's one of Vernon Greene's pre-Medallions records, another of my all time favorites, recorded with the Phantoms on Specialty in '55-- Sweet Breeze, man that one is unearthly. Well, to my ears there's no way the group that recorded Blowin' Through Yokahama is the same as the one that recorded The Letter.
In fact, I think the Medallions on Munro where white. Maybe they still are. When I helped compile an early black rock'n'roll compilation for the Atomic Passion label (called oddly enough Blowin' Through Yokahma, issued only on shiny black vinyl, you can buy it from the good folks at Norton Records) it was reviewed in several magazines, including Blues & Rhythm: The Gospel Truth (maybe the best music mag left, of course it has no longer has a U.S. distributor) who all identified the group as being the west coast Medallions, but one careful listen will easily refute such mis-information.
I know of no other discs on the Murno label, it's not even listed in Bob McGrath's incredible four volume discography The R&B Indies (Eyeball Productions, 2006), one of the greatest works of musical scholarship in the known world. If anyone out there is in the Saginaw, Michigan area drive by 608 N. Oakley and tell me what's there now. Maybe there's a pile of Munro 45's somewhere on the premises. I'm not sure I've even seen another copy of this disc, which I picked up at a used record store in Pittsburgh in the late 80's. Anyone out there ever seen one?
Anyone know anything about a Medallions from Saginaw? Did they make any other records?
Start digging....
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Johnny Otis

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Johnny Otis, born John Alexander Veliotes on Dec. 28, 1921 in Vallejo, California is one of the most influential and profoundly important figures in the history of American music, and one of the last survivors of the golden age of rhythm and blues
and the birth of rock'n'roll. He's also one of the most interesting characters in American popular culture.  Johnny Otis was and is an incomparable musician (drums/piano/vibes), producer, band leader, songwriter, talent scout, painter, sculptor (Dylan's Malibu digs sports one of Johnny Otis' oversize sculptures on its grounds), disc jockey, congressional aide, author, apple juice entrepreneur,preacher and more. The life of Johnny Otis should be the subject of a major biography and I cannot hope to cover more than a small portion of it here (in fact Otis has published two autobiographies, both excellent-- Listen To The Lambs (W.W. Norton, 1968) and Upside our Head! Rhythm and Blues on Central Avenue (Wesleyan University Press, 1993) so I'll just focus on my favorite recordings here.
Johnny, born of Greek immigrant parents in a largely black neighborhood of Vellejo, grew up in Berkeley where his father owned a small grocery store. At some point in his youth, taken by music and the vitality of the Afro-American ghetto life around him, Johnny decided that he would become black. With dark, swarthy Mediterranean features he could pass for something like an octaroon, but remember these were the days of Jim Crow, when being black brought more grief than benefits. (For an interesting look at the opposite side of "passing", I suggest Phillip Roth's The Human Stain, Houghton Mifflen, 2000). Music became the most important thing in young Johnny's life, and soon, having taken on the surname Otis, he was pounding drums in a small, proto-rhythm and blues combo called Count Otis Mathews and House Rockers. Johnny remembered most of the set he played the beat that would later be identified with Bo Diddley (also known as "shave and a haircut/two bits"). Unfortunately Mathews never recorded.
     The 1940's was the era of the big band and caught up in the excitement caused by Count Basie and Jimmy Luncford's outfits, Otis headed east working his way through various "territory bands" (big bands whose geographic territory ranged through the mid to south western states), playing with George Morrison's band in Denver, Lloyd Hunter's band in Omaha (where he'd meet life long friend and sax player extraordinaire Preston Love, and run with wild man Wynonie "Mr Blues" Harris), and Harlan Leonard and the Kansas City Rockets in Missouri. It was with the latter outfit he hit L.A. where they became the house band at the Club Alabam on Central Avenue in Watts. Soon Otis joined up with Bardu Ali's band headlining at the Lincoln Theater, also on Central Ave. This was his last job working in somebody else's band.
In 1945 Otis formed his own big band, eighteen pieces, and they soon recorded for Leon Rene's Excelsior label where they had a hit with their sublime arrangement of Harlem Nocturne.
They made quite a few good records before Excelsior went under including this one, a personal favorite featuring female singer Marylin Scott-- Beer Bottle Boogie, but the days of the big bands were numbered, and by 1947 jobs were getting scarce.
   In 1947 along with now business partner, the aforementioned Bardu Ali, Otis opened his own nightclub, the Barrelhouse, located in L.A.'s Watts district at 106th St and Wilmington, spitting distance from Central Ave.  Here Otis come in to his own as one of the all time great talent scouts, he would discover Little Esther Phillips, the Robins (who morphed into the Coasters under the tutelage of Leiber and Stoller), Etta James,
Hank Ballard & the Midnighters, Jackie Wilson, Little Willie John (the latter three all on the same night in Detroit), as well as two of the greatest unheralded guitarists in R&B history-- Pete "Guitar" Lewis and Jimmy Nolan.  It's also around this time that Otis' discography gets a bit confusing, he would record for Modern, Savoy and its Regent subsidiary, Mercury, Peacock/Duke, Capitol, Okeh, King, as well as producing sessions for Ralph Bass at Federal (itself a subsidiary of Cincinnati's King Records), Philo, United Artists, Kent, as well as his own labels-- Dig, Eldo, Blues Spectrum, Hawk Sound. He also moonlighted producing sessions for various members of his band now dubbed The Johnny Otis Show and artists as diverse as Big Mama Thorton, Johnny Ace, Don 'Sugarcane' Harris, and Johnny "Guitar" Watson.
       It was also around this time that Otis, who had switched from playing drums (a bad seat to drive from as Iggy Pop once said) to piano, accidentally chopped off several finger tips working in his wood shop.  This cost him some of  his manual dexterity and he would take up the vibes as his main instrument which gave his band a direct link to the sound of the great Lionel Hampton Band, who along with Louis Jordan's Tympani Five where the most important precursors to the coming small band rhythm and blues  sound of the late 40's and early 50's.
    Shall we now delve into said discography and see what sort of incredible nuggets
Johnny Otis left us?
    Among my personal favorites, on the Regal label where he had a string of minor R&B hits we find:
These records, featuring Little Esther, male vocalist Mel Walker, and guitarist Pete "Guitar" Lewis were all good sellers on the R&B charts, especially in L.A. where Otis was packing them in nightly at the Barrelhouse.  Check out Lewis' phrasing and sensitive touch on "Hangover Blues", you can almost hear his headache.
 Pete Lewis, who was discovered at Amateur Night at the Barrel House had only been playing guitar for six  months when he joined Otis' band.  He'd go on to cut solo sides for Federal including the incredible "Ooh, It's Midnight" (that's Little Esther cooing),"Louisiana Hop", and a few vocal blues like "Chocolate Pork Chop Man". On this 1953  Mercury session issued under Johnny Otis' name, Lewis trades licks with former Duke Ellington tenor sax star Ben Webster, the sound of Lewis' distorted blues licks against Websters warm, foggy, sax tone is pure genius, and I'd say "One Nighter Blues" is one of the greatest sides ever waxed. Lewis would eventually drink his way into the gutter, the last time Otis saw him was during the Watts riots, summer of '66, he was living on the street as a wino. 
     Esther Phillips, another Otis discovery also began her solo career, as Little Esther,
on Federal with Otis moonlighting as uncredited producer on a handful of R&B sides including this one with the Dominoes, my favorite--- "The Deacon Moves In".
Another Otis discovery was fifteen year old Etta James who Otis took to the Modern label, producing her first hit "The Wallflower" an answer song to the Midnighters' "Work With  Me Annie", as well as such such classics as "Nobody Loves You Like  Me" (have you ever heard a bad record with the word Sputnik in it?), and "Tough Lover".*
     By 1958 Pete Lewis had left the band and was replaced by the great Jimmy Nolen.
Here's one of Jimmy Nolen's best solo sides, also recorded for Federal, his version of Erkstine Hawkins' "After Hours" (this was Roy Buchanan's favorite record, and as you can hear, the one he based his entire guitar style on).  Nolen would stay with Otis into the early sixties before joining James Brown's band where he would change his style, loosely choking the guitar's neck and playing rhythm patterns with his right hand, rarely changing chords to create that "chank" style first heard on Brown's "Out Of Sight" and "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag".  Nolen played on Otis' biggest hits, including "Willie and the Hand Jive", "Castin' My Spell" and "Crazy Country Hop", all done in the Bo Diddley style that Otis had been playing since his days with Count Mathews' House Rockers.
   Around 1957 Otis started the first of several labels he would found-- Dig.
Dig and it's Eldo subsidiary issued around fifty singles and one LP (the LP, covers of current rock'n'roll hits circa 1957 can be found here) including some real gems like Preston Love's "Wango Blues", Otis' own "Groove Juice" and "Midnight Creeper" (the U.K. Ace label has four CD's of issued and un-issued Dig material under the name Dapper Cats, Groovy Tunes & Hot Guitars: The Legendary Dig Masters well worth acquiring, even buying).
    From 1952-55 Otis was signed to the Houston based Peacock label (which had just acquired the Memphis based Duke label) run by black/Jewish gangster Don Robey.
Here he cut some excellent rock'n'roll sides, the best being this one-- "Shake It".
At Peacock he had more success as a producer/arranger, working with Big Mama Thorton whose "Hound Dog" he produced and co-wrote  (although he was later screwed out of his writer's share by Leiber & Stoller), and other killer sides like "I Smell A Rat". His biggest hit for Robey, and one of R&B's most enduring and ghostly tunes was Johnny Ace's "Pledging My Love" which hit #1 on the R&B charts in the months after Ace's  1954 death from either Russian roulette or shot by the aforementioned Ms. Thorton, depending on whose story you believe. Sorry I can't seem to keep to a chronological order here.
Otis was still going strong into the 1960's,  he had a minor hit with the LP Cold Shot (Kentand his son, guitarist Shuggie Otis would join the band, replacing Jimmy Nolen.  Shuggie, who Information LP (on Columbia) has become a major cult item among the disco/sampler/funk collector crowd, you can find it here.
     Of his sixties work, perhaps his finest moment came in 1969 when Johnny, Shuggie and singer Mighty Mouth Evans recorded under the nome' du disque Snatch & the Poontangs (Kent) an LP of the filthiest, nastiest, most x-rated rock'n'roll of all time.  It was Otis' successful attempt to preserve the part of Afro-American folk culture sometimes called toasting or the dozens, in which traditional oral history is handed down in the most profane manner possible.  Hip hop grew out of this and field recordings made in prisons in the 1940's and 50's uncovered a rich oral tradition of hilarious boasts and insults.  My favorite track is "Hey Shine" which tells the tale of the black ship mate Shine, the best part of the Titanic story (of course it was left out of the movie). The story of the "Signifyin' Monkey" is told in two parts (part one, part  two), I especially like the "true whore's oath" section of the second part. And cuz I'm a nice guy here's an un-issued outtake from that brilliant disc-- a version of the "Dirty Dozens" which features Johnny's barrel house piano and vibes as well as  lyrics that could make Redd Foxx blush. Otis had quite a backround in stuff like this, the Johnny Otis Show having provided the music for dozens of black comedy  LP's by Skillet & Leroy, LaWanda Page (Aunt Ester from Sanford & Son), and others on the Laff label throughout the sixties.  
    Otis also hosted many radio shows both in the L.A. area and the Bay Area where he returned in the 1990's, settling in Sebastopal, north of Frisco. Here's his theme song. Somewhere I have a funny tape of Frank Zappa as guest DJ, spinning classic R&B discs while Johnny tells personal antidotes about each artist.  Unfortunately I don't think I have  a working cassette deck in the house, but if I get one I'll try and post it.  For a short time he had his own TV show (clips above), he was also an aide to Congressman Mervyn M. Dymally in the 1980's (his younger brother Nick Veliotes was the U.S. ambassador to Jordan and Egypt). 
Otis kept going through the 70's and 80's, touring occassionaly (the last time the Johnny Otis Show appeared in New York City was at Carnegie Hall in the late 80's, I ended up meeting Johnny and Mighty Mouth Evans in the bathroom, they both laughed when I requested tunes from the Snatch & the Poontangs record). He ministered at a church he founded in Santa Rosa-- the Landmark Community Baptist Church, marketed  his own brand of apple juice, spend a lot of time painting (that's one of his paintings on the cover of Upside Your Head pictured above) and doing giant sculptures of African-American images (his artwork can be seen here), and kept himself quite busy. A visit to Johnny Otis World Website is well worth your time.
These days Johnny is in poor health and it's unlikely he'll ever perform again.
Airchecks of his final radio shows can be found here.  I know it's drag to get old and sick, but I sure hope Johnny Otis has a happy birthday, he deserves that and much, much more.  If anybody alive has left the world a better place it's been Johnny Otis.

* I noticed there's a movie out there with Beyonce playing Etta James, that would be like Whitney Houston playing Bessie Smith.  I read the non-fiction book (so bad I refuse to mention its title  or author here) the flick was based on and counted 24 factual errors in the first chapter. Amazing how Hollywood always gets it wrong.



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Rockets Redglare: User's Manual (An Autobiography)

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Jane Birkin

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I completely spaced off Jane Birkin's birthday, Dec. 14. (1946). Well, a belated happy birthday to one of my favorite females. I posted a bit about her back in September so I won' t repeat myself. This is more of an excuse to run more photos of her. While I'm at it I might as well post her only U.S. hit record, recorded with her ex-husband Serge Gainsborough. Je t'aime moi non plus.
They also made a movie of the same name together, the above photo of her with Warhol superstar Little Joe Dallesandro is from that very peculiar flick. That's Serge himself directing the action. I can just imagine it. "Plus profond! Harder! Jusqu'à l'arrière"!
Speaking of Serge those bottom pix are of his grave, somebody leaves a fresh pack of Gitanes on it every day. I've witnessed it. Serge's music is an acquired taste if you're not French but I do remember being a bit shocked by hearing this on the radio constantly on my first trip to France in the early 80's-- SS In Uruguay features reggae rhythm section Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare among other top notch Kingston session men. He also cut a duet with his daughter, the actress Charlotte Gainsborough called Lemon Incest. I think you can find the video for that one on Youtube. Anyway, if you're too lazy to look up the September posting, Jane Birkin's entire filmography can be found here.
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Michelle Phillips

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Everybody's got their guilty pleasures, no need to apologize. The older I get the more it occurs to me what a racket the idea of "taste" is. Anyway, one of my guilty pleasures is the Mamas & the Papas. They made some great records, unfortunately I can't post any of their music here without getting the blog pulled but you've heard 'em, at least the hits.* If not, your local used record store has 'em cheap, and if you hate to pay try the Chewbone link on the right.
I mean, can you imagine a hit record today with a bone head mistake left in purpose like on the second verse of "I Saw Her Again" when Denny Doherty comes in an entire four bars too early? There's some great album tracks you probably never heard like "Mansions" and "Safe In My Garden". Which is my was of bringing us to today's subject: Michelle Phillips , one of the all time great 60's sex symbols, the ultimate hippy love kitten.
She had the perfect bell shaped pout. She looked great in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. I can't think of a modern entertainer even remotely as sexy.
Michelle began as a sixteen year old runaway beatnik from L.A. who met John Phillips in the Bay Area, hooked up with him and ended up first in the last remnants of his folk group the Journeyman then with former Mugwumps Denny Doherty and Cass Elliot formed the Mamas and the Papas in L.A. in 1966 (after an acid fueled season of woodshedding in the Caribbean). The group only lasted eighteen months but their career was a wild ride, they were hippie royalty and rode the current for all it was worth. Their last performance was at the Monterey Pop Fest. where their caftans and mu-mu's were already looking dated compared to Hendrix, the Who and Big Brother & the Holding Company. They knew when to quit.
Michelle was not only the visual focus (at least to my eight year old eyes), but was also the coolest member of the group, by far. When the group asked her for an idea for a cover song she suggested the Coasters' "I'm A Hog For You Baby" (which the rest of the group never heard of, and when they heard it they thought she was nuts, maybe she should've teamed up with Screamin' Lord Sutch). Eventually they settled on the 5 Royales/Shirelles number "This Is Dedicated To The One I Love", one of Michelle's rare lead vocals and damned if her cracking, reedy, little voice doesn't pull it off. She's sounds fragile enough to break your heart in between cigarettes. She may not have had Cass Elliott's pipes but she had something that couldn't be replaced in the group. When they fired her after the first LP (for having an affair with Byrd Gene Clark and a one night stand with Denny Doherty, she was married to John Phillips at the time) a fan revolt forced them to bring her back into the fold within weeks. When they were inducted into the Rock'n'Roll Hall Of Fame who was that escorting her to the stage? None other than Danny Fields, the same guy who brought us the the MC5, the Stooges, the Ramones, etc. Producer Lou Adler described Michelle as "wanting to be one of the Shangri-Las". I guess that oughta fills anyone's quota for cool credentials.
Even her book-- California Dreamin (The True Story Of The Mamas & The Papas) (Warners, 1986) is highly readable, fun, and trashy On paper at least, she's pretty fair minded considering what she could have said about John Phillips (i.e. the truth, the guy was demon), she even makes it a point to say the when she first met him he was a decent human being. But any history of the Mamas & the Papas is bound to have enough sex, drugs and decadence to satiate even the most jaded reader, and she doesn't hold too much back.
Speaking of John Phillips (self proclaimed "Wolf King Of Los Angeles" and one of the first people the cops questioned after Sharon Tate was snuffed) and rock literature, his book Papa John (Dell, 1986) is a masterpiece of drug fueled debauchery and right up there with Art Pepper's Straight Life (Schirmer Books, 1979) and Dr. John's Under A Hoodoo Moon (St. Martins, 1994) in the must read great junkie memoirs department. Funny, how of all drugs, heroin has produced the most interesting literature, especially when it comes to musicians. But that's way off of today's subject.
After the break up of the Mamas and the Papas, Michelle kicked off an acting career in style with a role in Dennis Hopper's The Last Movie (1971) although she ended up mostly working in TV and b movies (her film credits can be found here). Despite a string of high profile affairs including Warren Beatty, Jack Nicholson, Harry Dean Stanton, etc. she was never able to make the jump to full fledged movie star. Still, she's quite good in John Millius' Dillinger (1972) where she plays opposite Warren Oates and is naked for much of the otherwise unwatchable Ken Russell film Valentino (1977). Besides, she's the only member of the Mamas and the Papas to survive, and with the same liver she was born with. No mean feat.
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Photos From The Hound Archives pt. 1 (ie filler day)

Posted by rockindomp3





Not inspired to write much today but I did want to post these pix.
The top photo of course is Brigitte Bardot, it's just there to grab your attention and because I like the photo.
The second from the top is another photo of Vince Taylor (see entry below), what's interesting is that the guy with the bass on the right is Stanislas "Stosh" Klossowski, son of the artist Balthus and evidently some sort of Prince, or Count, or something, as well as Keith Richards' best pal. He's just one of those people that always seemed to be at the right place at the right time, and I guess if you were in Paris in 1965 the place to be would have been in Vince Taylor's backing band.
The middle photo is the dancing bear shot I promised months ago in my discussion of Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian. Yes, that's the same bear that appears in the bar scene in the last pages of the book, would I lie?
The bottom photo? You tell me? Eleven ugly drag queens, six guys in black face and a Victor Bockris look alike out front. Try outs for the New York Dolls reunion is my guess....
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