Bongo-lined surf music from 1963

Released on the Original Sound label in 1963, the 12 tracks combined a trio of bongo-heavy tunes by Preston Epps, including his one true hit “Bongo Rock,” together with nine tracks recorded by Dave Aerni on guitar and Paul Buff on everything else as the Bongo Teens. Epps’ freak hit (which rivals Sandy Nelson’s “Let There Be Drums” for most famous Billboard top twenty hit with a drum lead) begat a few more singles, including the low-charting “Bongo Bongo Bongo” included here. The Bongo Teens’ tracks lean to guitar, organ and sax-led covers of then-popular surf and non-surf songs, with Epps’ bongo rhythms running underneath and taking a few solos. What make this pair of reissues so interesting are the bonus tracks, and the release of separate mono and stereo versions. Watch out for Essential Media’s 12-track version of this set – the Crossfire reissues have 23 tracks. The bonuses include rare singles by the Rotations and Brian Lord & The Midnighters, along with Bongo Teens sides (with and without Preston Epps) that were only released abroad. Despite its cash-in origins, this is some pretty groovy go-go music, and the remastered sound is excellent. [©2013 Hyperbolium]   (Mono)   (Stereo)

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1968 sitar-pop cash-in

The discovery and popularization of the Indian sitar in Western music, most famously through the recordings of George Harrison with the Beatles, and bolstered by the introduction of Danelectro’s electric sitar, led to numerous hit singles and album tracks sporting sitars. A small subgenre of sitar pop and jazz sprung up and led to full albums that included Vincent Bell’s Pop Goes the Electric Sitar, the Folkswingers’ Raga Rock, Big Jim Sullivan’s Sitar Beat, Gabor Szabo’s Jazz Raga, and this relatively uninspiring entry for EMI/Capitol. Produced by John Hawkins, and with Sullivan manning the sitar, the arrangements aren’t particularly sympathetic to the resonant drone, sounding instead as if they were lifted from one of the instrumental covers albums that clogged job-racked shelves in the late 60s. Unsurprisingly, Harrison’s “Blue Jay Way” works reasonably well, as does the Beatles’ “I am the Walrus.” A horn-heavy arrangement of the Who’s “I Can See for Miles,” with the sitar singing the lead, is schlocky fun, and the closing cover of Los Bravos’ “Black is Black” manages to really take flight mid-song. There are far greater ‘60s cover albums to be found, but if you’re a devotee of pop sitar, this is something you’ll need to add to your collection. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Sonny freaks without Cher

Sonny Bono’s one and only solo album was released in 1967, just as Sonny & Cher’s hits and Cher’s solo success were winding entering a three-year drought. The obvious touchstone for this 5-track, 33-minute experimental outing is the Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which Sonny quotes in the album’s title track. But the acid-tinged lyrics (including quotes from both “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” and “A Day in the Life”) and pseudo-psych musical freakouts have neither the expanded consciousness nor musical inventiveness of the Beatles. The anti-drug Bono might have heard Sgt. Pepper’s, but he didn’t really seem to understand it. The drums, likely played by Wrecking Crew ace Hal Blaine, sound as if they were lifted from a Phil Spector session, and the sitar noodling and tuneless harmonica blasts are indulgent and irritating, especially at the jam-session length (12’45) of the opening track.

The social commentary of “I Told My Girl to Go Away” might have drawn more attention had Bono been a more commercially compelling vocalist, or perhaps if Janis Ian’s scathing “Society’s Child” hadn’t exploded earlier in the year. The 32-year-old Bono sang with an air of defeat that couldn’t compare to Ian’s searing defiance. “I Would Marry You Today” might have made a nice light-pop folk-rock production for Sonny & Cher, and would have greatly benefitted from the latter’s ability to carry a tune. A few years earlier, and with a gender switch and some editing, “My Best Friend’s Girl is Out of Sight,” might have made a good tune for one of the New York girl groups, but sung as light-pop and stretched to over four minutes, it hasn’t the focus of Bono’s hits. The closing “Pammie’s on a Bummer” is more successful with its instrumental experimentation, though its message (prostitution leads to pot leads to LSD) isn’t particularly knowing.

The initial reissue of this album was produced by Rhino Handmade in 1999. That limited edition CD added eleven bonus tracks, including all of Bono’s singles for Atco: his 1965 releases “Laugh at Me” (in three versions) and “The Revolution Kind” along with their instrumental B-sides, and single edits of Inner Views album tracks that still couldn’t make these productions consumable by radio. A subsequent CD edition by Collectors’ Choice dropped the bonuses, and Rhino’s digital reissue restored everything but the shortened album tracks and session backing for “Laugh at Me.” This is by no means a masterpiece; Bono wrote much better songs for Sonny & Cher, and produced more compelling records when he stuck to the classic techniques he’d learned at the feet of Phil Spector. His vocals were never his strong card, and without a catchy angle, his record falls flat. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

1960s hard rock innovators rock hard live in 2008

Few knew what to make of Blue Cheer when they released Vincebus Eruptum in 1968 and their outrageously electric cover of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” climbed into the Top 20. Amidst a music scene that had grown louder and harder in the aftermath of the Summer of Love, Blue Cheer was harder and louder than anything around them. They took rock music to 12, pasting together the hardest, loudest bits you might have heard from The Who or Jimi Hendrix into a sustained scrum of growling, feedback-heavy guitar, thumping bass, pounding drums and howling vocals. Many listeners simply didn’t know what to make of this new sound, but by album’s end, which included a weighty cover of Mose Allison’s “Parchman Farm,” it was clear that this power trio was launching something completely new.

The group waxed and waned for the next forty years, sustaining innumerable lineup changes, but mostly retaining its thunderous rhythm section of founding bassist-vocalist Dickie Peterson and early drummer Paul Whaley. Peterson provided the group’s foundation through thick and thin, dropping out only very briefly in 1975, and it was Peterson and Whaley, along with guitarist Andrew “Duck” Peterson, who recorded this 2008 live set for the German television show Rockpalast. This lineup had been together off and on since MacDonald joined the band in 1988, and had been playing together steadily since 1999. Peterson passed away the year after this set was recorded, but as this recording shows, the band retained their pummeling sound to the end, and the rasp in Peterson’s voice added patina to their heavy psych-blues.

The eighty-three minute concert features many of Blue Cheer’s touchstones, including “Summertime Blues,” its flipside “Out of Focus,” Allison’s “Parchman Farm,” and a rendition of “Doctor Please” that stretches the eight-minute original into a twenty-five minute odyssey. The set list also includes three titles (“Babylon,” “Just a Little Bit” and a cover of Albert King’s “The Hunter”) from the band’s second album, Outsideinside, and two (“Rollin’ Dem Bones” and “I’m Gonna Get to You”) from the trio’s 2007 release, What Doesn’t Kill You. Rainman’s 2013 CD issue of this concert replicates the soundtrack of the 2009 DVD, and includes the DVD’s bonus studio track “Alligator Boots” along with the previously unreleased “She’s Something Else.” [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Wide-ranging set of CSN&Y covers

This double-album tribute to the music of CSN&Y was released in 2012 as a fundraiser for the Equestrian Therapy Co-Op in Simi Valley, CA. The twenty-seven artists range from high-profile names (Judy Collins, Elliott Murphy) to cult favorites (Steve Wynn, The Coal Porters, Willie Nile, Cindy Lee Berryhill) and a number of newer and less globally-famous acts, including Stephen Stills’ daughter, Jennifer. Each takes a personal approach to a song from the various catalogs associated with CSN&Y, together, solo, and in earlier group incarnations, such as Sugarcane Jane’s banjo-centered revamp of Buffalo Springfield’s “Bluebird.” The interpretations range widely, including blues, country, alt-rock, folk, bluegrass, soul and more. A few, such as Sonny Mone’s cover of Neil Young’s “Down by the River” actually incarnate the vocal mix of CSN&Y, and Venice’s lush harmonies on “After the Gold Rush” are quite fetching. As well-known as are CSN&Y’s recordings, their songs have held up to reinterpretation over the years, and provide a deep well from which these artists draw. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

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Austin swing trio pays tribute to their gypsy-jazz roots

Austin’s Hot Club of Cowtown has been mixing Western Swing and Gypsy Jazz since their inception in 1997. This lineup solidified in 2000, and though they split briefly in 2005, their careers continued to intertwine even as they explored separate pursuits. Reuniting in 2008, the band picked up where they left off, mixing covers and originals, and continuing to grow more adept at both writing their own material and interpreting that of others. In 2011 they paid tribute to half their roots with the Bob Wills tribute, What Makes Bob Holler, and their latest follows up with a salute to the other half, Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli’s Quintette du Hot Club de France.

The fourteen tracks focus on popular songs, show tunes and folk melodies that became jazz standards in 1930s Paris. The selections include the evergreens “I’m in the Mood for Love,” “Crazy Rhythm,” and “If I Had You” (accidentally attributed as Irving Berlin’s like-titled composition), as well as a driving take on Reinhardt and Grappelli’s “Minor Swing” and several lesser-known tunes. The group displays their virtuosity both individually and as a trio, breaking out for solos and effortlessly weaving back together into tight improvisations. Elana James and Whit Smith each sing charmingly, Smith with more of a period style, but they also step into the spotlight with their fiddle and guitar to voice instrumental versions of “Dark Eyes,” “I’m Confessin’” and “Sunshine of Your Smile.”

The set focuses primarily on songs written in the 1920 and 30s, but reaches back to the early twentieth century for “Melancholy Baby” (reportedly first sung in public by William Frawley, later of I Love Lucy fame) and the British “Sunshine of Your Smile.” The song list also pulls in Reinhardt’s 1947 instrumental “Douce Ambiance” and Frank Loesser’s even more recent, 1948 that is, “Slow Boat to China.” It’s nice to hear the band indulge their jazz roots, particularly in this live acoustic setting; but the earthier spark of their western repertoire has always given their standards a kick, and is missed, even as their continental sounds enchant. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

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Small Faces first U.S. release transitions from R&B to Freakbeat

This 1967 album was Small Faces’ U.S. debut, combining tracks from their self-titled third album (and first for the Immediate label) with three hit singles and two B-sides. Though the group had already established themselves in the UK, topping the British chart in 1966 with “All or Nothing,” it was the single that is this album’s first track, “ItchycooPark,” that broke them in the U.S., charting at #16. This was also to be their biggest stateside hit, as the follow-on single, “Tin Soldier,” fell short of the Top 40. The third single collected here, “Here Come the Nice,” was the group’s first for Immediate, and though it charted in the UK and Germany, it wasn’t released as a single in the U.S.

The band’s earlier releases on Decca were the epitome of mod R&B, but with their move to Immediate their music helped usher psychedelic influences into what’s retroactively been labeled Freakbeat. The lyrics are more impressionistic and fantastic than their earlier material, and production touches include flanging on “ItchycooPark,” a false fadeout on “I Feel Much Better,” and a variable tape-speed descent to end “Here Come the Nice.” The latter also slipped an overt drug reference by the day’s censors, complimenting the suspected (but denied) reference to getting high in “ItchycooPark.” The band’s more straightforward R&B sound can still be heard on several tracks, including the romantically frustrated “Talk to You” and the hopeful “Get Yourself Together.”

Small Faces proved themselves just as adept at flowing psych as they’d been at beat rock, with Ian McLagan’s keyboard providing multiple textures. McLagan and Ronnie Lane each provided a lead vocal, but it was Steve Marriott who showed himself to be the truly riveting front man. The album peaked just shy of the UK Top 10, and though the following year’s psychedelic concept album, Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake, is more often cited as the group’s creative high point, this self-titled release (not to be confused with their like-titled 1965 Decca debut) was the more musically influential – both at the time, and on subsequent generation of British musicians. Varese’s reissue includes the original 12-track U.S. lineup in stereo; completists should check out the mono-stereo-UK-US 2-disc edition. 

Space pop, early electronica, rockabilly and outside jazz

Cherry Red’s Righteous label offers up this stellar collection of twenty-seven kitschy, space-themed tunes. Space age bachelor pad collectors may be familiar with the selections drawn from Jimmie Haskell’s 1959 space-twang orchestral-pop classic Count Down!, as well as the orchestra, oscillator and Theremin “Out of This World” from Frank Comstock’s Project: Comstock – Music from Outer Space, but this set stretches much more broadly. In celebration of the moon landing’s fortieth anniversary, the collection reaches back to the late ‘50s and early ‘60s fascination with all things space. The lion’s share of these tracks are early rock, rockabilly and hillbilly boogie, but there’s also early electronic music from Thomas Dissevelt and Theremin virtuoso Samuel J. Hoffman, orchestral scores from Ron Goodwin and Bobby Chistian, and outré jazz from Sun Ra and His Solar Arkestra. Tying it together are snippets of spoken word and dialog, including a short piece from NICUFO founder Frank Stranges. The breadth may be too eclectic for some, but the range demonstrates how widely the space race infiltrated the popular imagination, and the rock ‘n’ roll rarities will set any party on a collision course with fun. [©2013 hyperbolium dot com]

Dick Schory was a classically trained percussionist who worked for the Ludwig drum company. He recorded a highly regarded string of panoramic stereo space-age bachelor pad LPs, based on his original concepts for percussion ensembles. Though he started with a base of traditional drums, cymbals, gongs and xylophones, he also employed world percussion, repurposed everyday objects, and large orchestras. This 1957 release, originally on the Concert Disc label, is focused on percussion, along with piano, bass and guitar, and should really be heard in full CD (or analog LP) fidelity for maximum impact; though it’s unclear if Essential’s CDR-on-demand is produced from full-fidelity transfers (which themselves may or may not have been made from original master tapes) or from the parallel MP3 digital downloads. This will still be enjoyable at lower bit rates, but may not stand up to the audiophile quality amplification it deserves. [©2013 hyperbolium dot com]

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The Percussive Arts Society
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Space Age Pop

Whether or not you’re a viewer of the History Channel’s Swamp People, this collection of bayou-inspired tunes is sure to please Louisiana music fans. Though subtitled “music inspired by the television series,” the album’s best known titles (“Amos Moses,” “Polk Salad Annie,” “Fire on the Bayou,” and “Jambalaya (on the Bayou)”) predate the program by decades. Only the collection’s title track is newly written, and the set is filled out with finely selected Zydeco, country, bayou funk and soul from the Rounder vault. The set closes with Bobby Charles’ original recording of “See You Later, Alligator,” showing off the song’s New Orleans roots with some fine second-line drumming. All in all, a good disc to accompany a gator hunt, or just a bowl of gumbo. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

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