On this date in 1995, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame opened up in Cleveland...
It was celebrity soup of course, with stars paraded in front of the cameras, and a huge all star multi artist concert to celebrate the event... Bruce Springsteen, Al Green , Jerry Lee Lewis, George Clinton, Iggy Pop, Kinks, Allman Bros., Sheryl Crow and numerous others were up onstage. One special interest group that was lobbying hard for inclusion in that palace of the pantheon of pop was Lou Reed. He wasn't voted in right away, but they did let him play the party...
Here's Lou Reed backed by Soul Asylum on Sweet Jane from Aug 31st 1995, dedicated by Lou to the then just passed Velvet's bassist Sterling Morrison
Lou Reed w/ Soul Asylum - Sweet Jane
It's still available on Dbl CD with other highlights from the historic show including stuff from Johnny Cash, James Brown, Pretenders & many more.
p.s for more Soul Asylum, hit up the profile I posted a week ago on em and download some key early tracks while ya still can... it's stuff recorded in their scrappier days, well before they would ever be invited to Rock any Halls of Fame...
Speaking of worthy nominees...
One of the most colorful characters to surface in the muddy bywater holes of Rock n Roll , but who seems unlikely to ever be acknowledged by the hallowed hall, is James Luther Dickinson ...
His presence can first be traced to the early 60's Memphis scene, and many teenagers can say they had a contract with Sun Records?
Jim did, in fact his band The Jesters has the dubious distinction of being the last single released by ol' Sam Phillips when he still ran the label.
He has since had flings, fights & full fledged affiliations with many disreputable acts ranging from The Rolling Stones during their most scrappy hedonistic heroin infused era, to playing with Bob Dylan on the Grammy award winning Time Out of Mind album.
Jim has spent some of his idle hours producing Big Star, The Replacements, Mudhoney, Greeen On Red to his lesser known stints spent playing with Flash & The Memphis Casuals as well as Mudboy & The Neutrons.
Jim gained his notoriety basically by being one outstanding fella amidst a posse of top numerous Memphis studio musicians who played on many classic records backing artists like Aretha Franklin, Sam and Dave and so many others that it gets a little blurry.
Now who do ya think was down in Muscle Shoals & played the Piano on "Wild Horses" ?
Rolling Stones w/ Jim Dickinson - Wild Horses
In the early 70's, Atlantic honcho Jerry Wexler was convinced that Dickinson and his talented pals, a bunch of studio backing musicians by then known as The Dixie Flyers should record their own LPs and go on tour to become big stars in their own right. Comprised of Charley Freeman, Tommy McClure, Sammy Creason and Jim, they were considered a top notch rhythm section, and had relocated to Miami where they were already in demand for many sessions.
Apparently living out suitcases and impressing fickle teenagers & Yankees in suits in NY was not a priority for these already comfortable Memphis cats. Instead of slick radio ready tunes, they recorded an LP back home that was more a series of downhome muddy southern boogie blues rock jams that included guests like Dr. John and Charlie Freeman.
Jim Dickinson - O How She Dances
Dickinson's interpretation on that LP of Wild Bill Jones, a song written by Bob Frank,
"stands as one of the great testaments not only of rock 'n' roll but also of its ancient and unfathomable roots,"
Jim Dickinson - Wild Bill Jones
The 1972 album those two tracks are culled from was called "Dixie Fried" and any original vinyl still goes for a good penny in collectors circles, but a CD reissue is also out now on the indie Sepia Tone.
In the 70's Jim toured as part of Arlo Guthrie's band when Woody's son was riding high after City of New Orleans hit. Later he worked a lot with Ry Cooder scoring soundtracks including Paris Texas. Dickinson had won Producer of the Year seven times before retiring his name from competition.
Apparently his taste for fine swampy rock has been down to his children, Luther & Cody who now comprise the core of the North Missipppi All Stars...
North Mississippi All Stars - Eyes
Daddy Dickinson, despite his relatively important status amongst rock & rollers in the know, remains somewhat of an outsider in the music industry to this day. He is likely feeling no real pressure to please any bean counters or radio programmers, and now in his 60s, continues to record & release material ocasionally as he sees fit. In fact, he's put out about three studio solo albums in just about 34 years. Two in the last 5 ...
Some recent Jim Dickison material:
Jim Dickinson - Red Neck, Blue Collar
another Bob Frank tune , this one from the 2006 album Jungle Jim & The Voodoo Tiger
This next one is from Free Beer Tomorrow a 2002 release on Artemis, where he interprets a tune written by SF based singer/guitarist & occasional Dickinson collaborator Chuck Prophet...Jim Dickinson - Hungry Town
Recently David Katz Nelson's Badman Recordings found fit to put out a spoken word album of Dickinson's distinctive delta dixie fried dialectics, featuring his grizzled voodoo invoking baritone. Each tale is a rambling poetic yarn, delivered with in a charming slow & simple southern drawl.
Said the eloquent former Austin writer Bill Bentley of Dickinson in 2004
"As a performer, Dickinson has notched plenty of prime-time hours on sessions and stages everywhere. He's been in bands capable of setting listeners' ears on fire, and recorded songs that have permanent positions on radio playlists across the planet. But underneath it all, like the true Southern gentleman, he is a storyteller. Because no matter what form of emotional reality Dickinson is working in, he is above all else telling a tale, with his hands on a keyboard, his voice at the microphone or his body behind a recording console. He will use whatever it takes to sell that story to the listener. In that way, he is almost like an auctioneer, spinning out music as he takes the performance to its highest bid in an attempt to be better and smarter and more alive, plugged into the huge beating heart at the center of all true art forms. Now, Dickinson is stripping his talent down to its essence on Fishing with Charlie, using only words to paint the pictures he is so good at. And what potent portraits they are....
Jim Dickinson - Congo
Download "Fishing With Charlie" (MP3, 192kbps)
a touching spoken word piece about Dickinson's late fishing buddy, Charlie Jacobs of the Mississippi band the Tangents.
Read more about Jim's old pal Charlie who passed away back in 1997 at this link
from : Fishing With Charlie, And Other Selected Readings
available via: Birdman Records
Download at iTunes Music Store
Download at Napster
Buy at 
Buy at 
This next tawdry tune was brought to my attention by the site Mashuptown...
. I can just imagine some old guy on his wrecked front porch in Pass Christian MS, singing this out as the water rises up over his ankles...
Ironically, decades later WAR's drummer Harold Brown ended up living in New Orleans and became an official licensed tour guide. He is still playing with the core group of original WAR members as the Lowrider band, since they lost the rights to their own name some years ago in a court case. After being in touch, I lost Harold Brown's email address and have no idea how he fared in the Katrina aftermath, but the 
It's Maybe The Craziest Golden Bull Gala Dive Bar Sunday Night Show Biz Extravaganza Awards Cup Of All Time...a musical event perhaps on par with a live performance of Ziggy Stardust battling Conan The Barbarian whilst Capt. Kirk seeks nubile space ho's on one of his " tang" seeking benders...
Where I spent hours just bumber banging, flippering, bleeping, dinging, tilting and whatnot at the Lucky Ju Ju Pinball Gallery...
Do not go to The Lucky Ju Ju Pinball Gallery, or eat across the street at the sushi joint for that matter. I need my space... not MySpace. You can have MySpace, I am claiming west Alameda for my Tribe...
As a teenager Brian Hyland had a huge novelty hit in the summer of 1960 with "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka dot Bikini". Hyland's haunting 1962 followup song "Sealed With A Kiss" sunk so deep it was a hit out the gate, and had a sappy second life, mysteriously reappearing on the top 40 charts again in 1975. His 1962 single release of "Warmed Over Kisses (Left Over Love)," was yet another top 40 success. By 1970, he had switched labels & gears several times, but Hyland was not through developing as an artist and had Del Shannon produce his third gold record "Gypsy Woman". The song is a Curtis Mayfield composistion that went up the charts to #3, some 17 positions higher than the Impressions original version. All in all he placed 22 songs on the charts in 11 years between 1960-1971. 
Here's that vinyl sourced version of Gypsy Woman, , a song that is available on a CD only through a special order via Hip-O Select, Universal Music's more or less semi-lame ass copycat version of a Rhino style reissue label.
. Amazed that doo-wop & R&B was merging with Latin grooves, Joe started making records within 6 months of getting seriously involved in the boogaloo scene. His first LP for Fania was actually entitled "Gypsy Woman" in '67, and like Brian Hyland, (whose mentioned in this post), he too had success covering the great 1961 Curtis Mayfield composistion with a new flair. After leaving Fania, Joe actually headed the influential but obscure Ghetto Records label, and founded the well known Salsoul label in NY which was later sold to CBS. He was a pioneer in sound & soul, and being street savvy, in 1980 he became one of the first to rap on a record, "Rap-O Clap-O".
I just loves me some old snappin & cracklin vinyl on my new fangled toy, and boy ... you whipper snappers will be getting lots more oldies from around here...
His career is filled with footnotes that make him ever interesting to muscologists, what with almost 4000 songs published by BMI under his name. Some are huge million seller 
The song here was a big hit for The Kingston Trio, and Hoyt actually reaped little from the song's success due to a bad contract. The tune eventually appeared on 3 Billboard charting albums but Hoyt made a mere $800.00 from the song
The British group Fine Young Cannibals, had a hit with Suspicious Minds again in the late 80's, and here's weirdo geeky tripped out version by Little Punktronica
Buy at 
From Jon Langford's latest release, his first solo project on ROIR, Neil Cooper's once cassette only label. Langford unleashes his usual quality songwriting, with a few choice covers. An unlikely Welsh hero of the so-called "Americana" movement, Langford who started the Mekons a couple decades ago should need no introduction to fans of real indie rock. His latest release is called Gold Brick and is subtitled "Lies of The Great Explorers, or Colombus at Gunatanamo Bay". I know I've heard this song before, likely on one of The Waco Bros releases on Bloodshot, but here it is presented in a more muted, but equally dramatic and well done version.
Michael Franti - 
John played with his lil bro Mario in a group called Copperhead for awhile, but John died of 
In September 1996, he was arrested when Novato police stopped his car and found 4.5 grams of heroin, 2.5 grams of meth, a knife and a .44-caliber revolver in his car.
a $22 hunk of chicken with some taro root puree. It's got the same sort of oceanic sorta proximity as Gladstones, but with a less rustic, more passionfruit cocktails & hipper than thou attitude.
