If you stop by this website, or others found through the Hype Machine, Elbo.ws and other search engines, then you regularly get samples of great music for free all the time.
As we enter the season of giving, consider downloading this new collection, or better yet , gifting it to a friend...
It's called making a sacrifice...
It's a little amount to you, but collectively will go a long way to helping others on the other side of the planet, people in far worse economic trouble than you.
Hell... those despicable cretins in Flipper were in town recently and jacking $25 to get into their gig...
a set list that hasn't changed or improved with time...
Here's a way to actually improve some lives...
While you debate which $25 gig to got to, or which I-phone or I-pod model to get, consider that most of the population alive today has yet to make a single phone call, much less download a song off the internet.
Various Artists Natalie Portman compiled the tracks for the new compilation called Big Change: Songs for FINCA.
The 16-song benefit compilation is available for digital download exclusively at the iTunes Store since October 30th for just $7.99. Buy at iTunes Music Store
Net proceeds collected will benefit FINCA, a leading international microfinance organization that provides financial services to the world's lowest-income entrepreneurs, helping them to create jobs, build assets and improve their standard of living. Portman, who is an Ambassador of Hope for FINCA and serves as a co-chair of its Village Banking Campaign, is a noted music fan and is credited as an executive producer on Big Change: Songs for FINCA.
With a distinct sense of how she wanted the collection to sound, the actress chose nine tracks from the Internet Online Distribution Alliance's extensive independent music catalog. She also asked some of her faves Norah Jones, the Shins and other musician friends to contribute tracks to the compilation.
"I am honored that so many of my favorite artists have so generously lent these beautiful songs in the name of ending poverty," said Portman. "FINCA helps the poor realize their own potential through extending small loans to start small businesses. I'm so excited that two of my passions, great new music and microfinance, can collide in such an inspiring and world-bettering fashion. I hope you enjoy my favorite bands while supporting a truly meaningful cause."
Today in the Random Revelations we'll discuss Rum , Sodomy &
Too Much Pork For Just One Fork...
Well sorta... The Rum & Sodomy is from an old Winston Churchill quote regarding the British Nav, that later became a Pogues album title and the
Too Much Pork For Just One Fork...
well, it's simply one of my favorite songs by "Southern Culture On The Skids" who were in town last Sunday...But the free pork was courtesy, their locally based labelmate Chuck Prophet.
Rooty rawk maestro Chuck Prophet, hired a taco truck to the Makeout Room to dole out free tacos out front in celebration of Prophet's new album "Soap & Water" on North Carolina based Yep Roc records.
Check said of his chosen catering firm:
Chuck claimed his taco purveyors:
"do a killer "al pastor" which is sort of like a Mexican doner kebab; a slow cooked pork thinly sliced off the spit with a machete-like knife."
.
Since I don't eat the pigmeat myself, I just sorta breezed past the meat pack & into the club to hear the mighty Mission Express run through their retinue of rocking new material they'd lab tested over the past few weeks on the European continent. I thought It'd be my only chance for awhile, as the band has already split to head out across the great divide on a North American campaign until December. But I was fortunate enough to catch a couple tunes at Amoeba records earlier that afternoon... and the next day, a radio station showcase before a small audience at KFOG's studios.
Then head over to The Great American Music Hall later that night to catch Chuck's Yep Roc labelmates "Southern Culture On The Skids" who are known to fling bulging buckets of Fried Chicken and down home danceable sounds around in copious quantities...
Here's the title track from Chuck Prophet's new release...Soap & Water
Not sure if they played that at the free set I caught only a few minutes of at Amoeba Records on Haight St.
The highlight of that set, at least the part I saw is the track I'm dropping for y'all down below:
It's from an album that's getting the 4 out of 5 star salute from all the relevant mag-o-zines like Mojo. Q etc. The Village Voice just referred to him as "sounding like a man who wears clean underwear but is scared to change his dirty socks." Whatever that means...
Find out fer yerself, he's on tour and here are the dates below...
The celtic minstrels of the Pogues whose biggest hit was entitled Fairytale of New York, certainly have left their hearts in San Francisco, a city receptive to their wicked ways. Last Sunday night began a four night stand at the Fillmore, where general admission for two set attendees back approx $160 after all the ticketbastard nastiness and fees are accounted for.
Despite the high tabs at the box office and of course the bar, no doubt the old wooden dance floor was be packed and straining under the weight of audiences excitedly clamoring to catch the band some 20 years after their first sold out west coast shows in the same venerable venue.
Indeed that cold November night in 1987 they had Joe Strummer of The Clash along with them on guitar, and it was a very foot stompingly wild & whiskey soaked occasion. It was so uh, magically momentous actually to see the wily assemblage holding court back in the day that I'm not sure I'll join in the fray at the Fillmore this year. I wouldn't want to taint the foggy veils of my already perfect memories ya know?
The band came through last year as well, and they heartily held the fort down for several nights, and I heard few complaints, despite the progressively debilitated condition of lead singer Shane MacGowan. It's just amazing to me that the fragile freak o' habit known as Shane's still alive, while the seemingly invincible Joe Strummer is dead...
Click to head below the fold, and download a couple mp3 tracks of rare live material. One is a celtic folk infused version of Bobby Fuller's classic tune "I Fought The Law" ripped from some rare vinyl with Joe Strummer & Shane MacGowan trading off on raspy lead vocals...
The Pogues well earned reputation as drunken pub louts ignores their impressive balladry, stirring poetic lyrics and at times erstwhile musicianship. Their 2nd album, and real breakthrough to critical acclaim was "Rum Sodomy & the Lash" which was produced by Elvis Costello and released in 1986. The record was different from nearly anything churning out of speakers in the sterile & synthetic hair farming 80's music scene. The subject matter of songs like "The Old Main Drag" about a wasted street hustler plying his trade in alleys amongst the "she males", beaten by coppers, "shat on & spat on and raped & abused' weren't likely radio ready. The album also featured songs like "A Pair of Brown Eyes" and "The Band Played Waltzing Matilda", both tunes that depicted poignant poetic moments of reminiscence by bitter veterans of useless bloody battles, lamenting their roles as long forgotten heroes of wicked wars. These songs remain vital today, if for subject matter alone, and are just two of many epics in the band's remarkable catalog of tearjerkers & crowd pleasing singalongs.
By 1987's "If I Should Fall from Grace with God", the band had hit it's peak as songwriters & live performers, and made their first foray to the west coast. I got to open for the Pogues debut at The Fillmore back in 1987, and it twas indeed a thrill, especially discovering that they had large roadcases filed with ice for their own onstage bartender... Strummer was on the tequila train, while MacGowan was already under doctors orders not to drink hard liquor, so his solution was to consume several bottles of port onstage instead. Here's the robust list of standard items in their standard contract rider:
Liquids
24 bottles of Beer 2 bottles of gin 2 bottles of vodka 2 bottles of dry white wine (Soave or Frascati) 1 bottle of Martini 1 bottle of brandy 1 bottle of champagne 1 bottle of ginger beer 2 bottles of Coke 2 bottles of sparkling water 2 bottles of still water 1 bottle of iced tea 1 bottle of Rock shandy 2 bottles of non-alcoholic Beck's
Solid's
A selection of fish, vegetarian and pasta dishes Chocolate Packets of Marlboros, Marlboro Lights and Benson & Hedges (Carrols in Dublin)
Miscellaneous 48 large, clean towels ( I believe the 4 dozen towels are to clean up the gob & puke...)
The band had a good time, and a good run, and this town, full of Irish ex-pats, always heartily embraced them. While they did make an appearance once at Berkeley's Greek Theater, opening for Bob Dylan while supporting their Peace & Love album, most of their regional shows were at The Fillmore, including there return in 1988 and several solo MacGowan shows when he was still estranged from his former bandmates.
It was sad in the early 90's when an ecstasy & dope addled Shane left the band...or was kicked out or whatever the hell happened... and even sadder still they are trying to do it all over again...
But like any family reunion, sure there'll be camaraderie, as well as ugliness & drunken recriminations, and nothings ever what it was, but that's not without it's benefits as well...
I guess it's sorta like that final Rat Pack Tour... the one where everyone knew it was the last one, and ya sorta just gotta go... Who doesn't want to see a senile Sinatra spill that last drink on the teleprompter, or this time around, Shane for that matter?
I never got around to drop a C-Note to get in the door and then spend some more dough I didn't really have. I'm sure it was fun no matter what condition anyone onstage was in. Folks collectively celebrating our triumphs & tragedies, and living & laughing like there's no tomorrow...
Heck, the last time I saw Shane play , with his "other" band the Popes, I think I was handed a ticket in a bar, quickly slammed some shots of whiskey, jumped into the swirling pit and lost my salmon dinner in a sloppy mess on the middle of the ballroom floor... The band played on.. and the crowd sang along on every song... ah...Good Times...
Here's a cell phone vid excerpt from one of their Fillmore shows last October...
Here's those mp3 tunes I promised ye:
First up a feisty take on Bobby Fuller's classic signature tune I Fought The Law, later interpreted by Joe Strummer with The Clash, and here finally filtered through the Pogues blustery banjo & pennywhistle circus...
By the time this next track was recorded in 1991, Shane MacGowan had really slipped into a cartoonishly grotesque caricature of himself. Somehow, he's kept this debauched act up for another 15 years or so as a solo act,
So in the interests of fairly charting the decline, we'll also hear a barely coherent MacGowan attempt to drunkenly pronounce the title of his not so poetic single "Yeah Yeah Yeah" from his last tour with the band in 1991
I was having a near perfect day, wasting an afternoon watching a friend and his band rip through a set of great tunes for a small audience at a local radio station studio showcase gig. Outside the sky was crystal clear, and the sun was shining over the bay. An hour later, I made the mistake of opening my email to discover word filtering in of a distressing development for the The Coalition of Aging Rockers.
Indeed we had lost another comrade, and this was no OD or drunken misfit debacle, in fact he likely was the cleanest liver of a bitter bunch, the least alcoholic and most studious, but still it was gone too soon at the age of 40.
Billy Joel & later Me First & The Gimme Gimmes have reminded me musically that "only the good die young", and indeed that seems true, as we have sadly lost another one of the good guys.
Longtime local SF musician Lance Hahn, who lovingly named his punk rock band after his favorite Muni streetcar line has died after long battles with kidney ailments in an Austin Texas hospital this past weekend. Best known for fronting his band J Church, Hahn operated out of San Francisco from the early 90's for almost a decade until he relocated from a flat near 16th on Valencia St to Austin in 2000.
pic courtesy Fat Wreck Chords
He had originally come from Hawaii circa 1990 with a scrappy trio known as Cringer, which played shows at venues like The Women's Building, Komotion & Berkeley's Gilman St Project. Eventually he formed J-Church which released literally hundreds of recordings on tiny indie record labels all over the world including his own Honey Bear imprint. While not a technically gifted singer, he parlayed a vast array of musical influences including everything from Crass, Radiohead, Adam & The Ants to ELO, into a blend of pop infused punk that became uniquely identifiable & influential, remaining well regarded in the underground music scene. He had no shortage of themes & subjects, composing improbable rock titles like "Leni Riefenstahl's Tinder Box", "The Dramatic History Of A Boring Town" , or "Socialist Newspaper", all the while delivering each song with an overall emotional sincerity rarely heard in a jaded age. One memorable release to check out would have to be his Mission District opus "Camels, Spilled Coronas & The Sound of Mariachi Bands". For those who'd like a broader overview, perhaps the compilation of rare 7" tracks called "Nostalgic for Nothing".
From 1993's "Camels, Spilled coronas & Mariachi Bands"
In addition to fronting Cringer & J-Church, he toured as a guitarist in Beck's band in 1994-95. He is survived by his longtime girlfriend Liberty, they had no children.
A man with friends, fans & admirers literally all over the world, there's a chance Hahn left behind much more here on earth than a prolific discography of obscure vinyl 7" singles. For a spell in the latter 1990's, he was known to be supplementing his meager income with visits to a certain Berkeley sperm bank...
Watch out world... who knows for sure, perhaps lil' Lance's may indeed be sprouting everywhere...
If there are no biological heirs, there are at least many "logical" heirs. Tons of kids too young to have ever seen J-Church or Cringer at their peaks, but who've been influenced & touched ever so remotely by this guy's music, writing & inspirational D.I.Y influence abound.
Aside from his handy presence at the local sperm bank, Lance worked just as hard behind the scenes helping others as he ever did at the mic, and was known for his writing in Maximum Rock & Roll & Giant Robot magazine, as well as working at indie record distributors like Revolver, Blacklist Mailorder and Epicenter Records. His overall "situationist "viewpoints didn't preclude a little capitalist wage slavery and you might've seen him behind the counter at Lost Weekend video in SF or later on at Sound Exchange in Austin. His final job was working at Austin's Vulcan Video store, before he went in for dialysis one day earlier this month, and fell tragically into a coma. I believe the next time I play that damn J-Church "Kittums In A Coma" single, It'll have a whole different resonance for me.
J-Church had a rotating line-up, with Hahn being the sole consistent member & songwriter. They had some good tunes, and their share of weak ones and were never my favorite band, but Lance was a dmaned good guy really, who wore the heart on the sleeve and you really can't fault a guy for being himself...
His presence was worth so much more than a hundred better bands, and that's because his heart was iin his music & his music not the plastic kind of syrupy crap you see in the tunes used advertisements and on TV...
A tribute album had recently been organized amongst 5 labels to help raise dough to pay some of his mounting medical bills, as the uninsured musician fell into declining health. There were operations, bleeding sockets left in him, and numerous agonizing dialysis sessions that made bleak his final year. The Vulcan Video website still has a link to help pay his medical bills, which remain a huge burden.
The Lance I remember meeting in the dawn of the 90's had a swift wit and great sense of humor, and we could trade barbs at empty venues during soundchecks and in dusty record filled warehouses for hours. He had a great spirit, took music & politics seriously and was always indefatigably willing to play a benefit show for a lost cause. Over the years, I sensed him getting more solemn, distant, deeper & more internally driven, and perhaps he instinctively knew he would not be long on this spinning orb. He pushed himself on tours across continents in a real race against time, left a creative trail of entertaining intellectual crumbs, gave it his all, and truly delivered. And ...he is gone...
One of a kind...
R.I.P Lance Hahn 1967 - 2007
Here's a track from the 2004 release Society Is A Carnivorous Flower
I'll be busy all week tending to various event jobs I have about town ranging from bartending to dressing up as a mailman for a bunch of ladies...
In the meantime y'all can get down with my Halloween themed mega mix...
Here's a special seasonal barrage of creepy, scary, spooky & murder themed tunes and even a few movie promos for y'all...
I may add a few more in the next couple of days if I have time, but here's what I have ready today...
First up, a scary "stereo" record of "scary sounds" put out by Winchell's Donuts in the 1970's, with a creepy guest named Mr. Jack O' Lantern, who likes to remind kids to trick or treat safely but seems kinda like a spoil sport. I found this mp3 in a search engine fed off the fabulous Oddio Overplay servers...but have no idea on what page of their fabulous site you might find this out of print puppy...
Winchell's Donut House Halloween Record - Hear The Monsters Well if that didn't scare ya enuf, what could be scarier than Metallica... Unplugged?
Well, it happened one day in 1997 on KSJO radio, with special guest Pepper Keenan from C.O.C in the studio with them. If only the stupid DJ didn't need to shut up & get bitch slapped by Hetfield so bad during the intro...
What would halloween be without werewolves...and sure I could put up the obvious Warren Zevon werewolf song, but his ghost might come and kick my azz...
So instead, here's some different werewolf related material, but stay tuned as I might add a certain British werewolf track in the coming days, just not the version you expect...
This version of Dead Joe by Nick Cave's early 80's combo The Birthday Party surfaced on their out of print Drunk On The Pope's Blood LP. The sonics are slightly altered and more spooky overall than the version found on their Junkyard release.
The vocals jump out more, the guitars growl louder and the mood is simply more frantic & freaked out than the other one and so we give this Halloween approved version.
I don't know much if anything about this next track, other than some clown named Hugh Romney included it in a bootleg collection called four Hairy Policemen, and it includes an old movie promo as well...
This next track is a rework of the song "The Crusher" originally by the Novas, but this version is by an on old Mexican 60's era garage/surf rock band. Somehwat obscure, they actually have lots more material available on their Anthology CD which seems to be hard to find, but oddly enough is easily available at I Tunes of all places.
What would Halloween season be without a an appearance by the original rock n roll fright king... Screamin' Jay Hawkins. Long before Alice Cooper or Marilyn Manson, Screamin Jay was out there scaring the kids (and inseminating the females)...
Available on the great comprehensive collection: Spellbound...
There are of course hundreds of Screamin' Jay tracks out there since he debuted in the 1950's, and in his last years he recorded for the re-resurrected Bizarre imprint in the early 1990's. If you'd like to grab all 18 of these classick tracks from those years, there's an MP3 collection on Amazon's download store for just about $8 that includes raunchy classic like "Shut Your Mouth and Shit", "You Make Me Sick" and a song Screamin' Jay might understand better than most of us "Fourteen Wives"...
One of San Francisco's great late 70's era punk groups, The Mutants were SF art Institute scene refugees who had a lively twisted theatrical show biz sensibility. Here's a rare track recorded live in 1979 at the Deaf Club above Valencia St from this much loved entertainment diversion that still occasionally do reunion shows with the now scattered remaining members.
Another obscure California indie rocker, put of more recent vintage is Haunted George. This desert rawker based out of the Mojave desert outpost of Llano Del Rio has put together a couple releases for the Oakland based Hook or Crook Record Company in the last few years. It's hard to say what I'd make of this crazed cowboy, if he's snorted too much sand or eaten too many of the wrong type of cactus. Anyhow without further adieu, here's Haunted George and his song Howlin' from the Cd Panther Howl... Haunted George - Howlin
Howlin' Wolf should need no introduction to fans of the blues, and his gravel voiced delivery became of a favorite of the British kids who would go on to form bands like the Rolling Stones, Beatles, Cream and others. In 1970 many of these kids returned the favor to their hero by recording a record with Howlin Wolf in London for Chess. This song here was a big hit for him on Chess back in the day, and this recut version of the track wasn't the one released on the initial album, and it's likely because the Wolf sounds a lil' sluggish. Here is a studio outtake that finally saw the light of day in 2003, a cut that sounds like the ill ol' man had maybe had a few drinks by this take. But even if it's not as vocally ripping as the other versions I've heard, it's still got a serious rock n roll pedigree pumping it out. Joining Wolf's regular guitarist Hubie Sumlin is Eric Clapton and on this track Ringo Starr was apparently on drums, with Klaus Voorman on bass.
Another musician influenced by Howlin' Wolf, and no stranger to a few drinks, or being appropriately creepy to make it into this mix was Jim Morrison...
This a recently released track recorded in 1970 from a newish collection called The Doors: Essential Rarities, that I suppose provides essential royalties to the band members.
Not sure if the ghost of Jim Morrison is as scary as Ray Manzarek & Robbie Kreiger suing John Densmore for his refusal to sell the Doors musical legacy out to advertisers...
Anyhow, Densmore says he's fat & happy enough from the past without trading his dignity for a TV commericial or a lame reunion tour with the guy from the Cult pretending to be The Lizard King.
Imogen Heap is a moderne chanteuse of sorts who I first took notice of when she did a Cure cover. She resurfaced on my radar not long after with a reworking of another oldie but goodie for a soundtrack album for some Reese Witherspoon vehicle called Just Like Heaven. It's a great old song she's reworking, one that has many great versions, my faves probably being by The Zombies and I also am fond of the Dusty Springfield version. While I can't vouch for the film it appeared in, or the rest of the soundtrack it's on, I dig Imogen Heap's version of Spooky...
Here the illbient maestro from a soundtrack excerpt to one of the scariest fright flicks ever made...
no, I speak not of the Friday The 13th or Halloween slasher genre, but one done in the silent era.
This track is from the soundtrack he did for his reworked version of the old silent film Birth of A Nation. D.W Griffith premiered his epic film Birth of a Nation in 1915 under the title The Clansman, based on a book by the same name by Thomas Dixon.
The technically groundbreaking film has remained controversial for it's Civil War themed plot which embodies racist stereotypes and features the KKK portayed as noble heroes and Southern blacks who are played as dumb cariactures prone to savage villany and as sexual predators against white females.
Here's spooky's own essay on the reasons behind the ressurection of this film...
Griffith's film has been a historical object of fascination for me for a long while - it's been one of the defining images of America in the 20th century. As we enter the 21st Century it sometimes helps to know like the philosopher Santayana said so long ago, that "those who do not understand the past are doomed to repeat it." "Birth of a Nation" focuses on how America needed to create a fiction of African American culture in tune with the fabrication of "whiteness" that undergirded American thought throughout most of the last several centuries: it floats out in the world of cinema as an enduring albeit totally racist - epic tale of an America that, in essence, never existed. The Ku Klux Klan still uses this film as a recruiting device and it's considered to be an American "cinema classic" despite the racist content. By remixing the film along the lines of dj culture, I hoped to create a counter-narrative, one where the story implodes on itself, one where new stories arise out the ashes of that explosion.
Anyhow...that sorta concludes part one of my Halloweirdo mix...
but stop by in a few daze and see if the pool hasn't been added to...
I have lots more scary tunes to add , i just don't have lots more time tonight to add 'em
and the "they" in this particular instance being the particularly peculiar yet bland blue collar-esque Ohio based rock band known as The Michael Stanley Band...
Twas a band who just as easily could have been the Ernie Kreplucezk band, other than the fact the leader's name just happened to be a guy named Michael Stanley, and thus the deal was sealed...
They were an Ohio based AOR type rock band that spewed out numerous LPs of average quality 70's rock...
Anyhow... this track from their last major label slab in 1983 seemed appropriate for this post, since the topic today gets rolling around the concept of a fire in the hole at the base of a mountain...
and the song is called Fire in The Hole, produced by Bob Clearmountain ...and I just returned from LA during it's fall Fashion Week...
Anyhow, while back in my SF work neighborhood, local Tenderloin dining legend Original Joe's suffered it's own fire on Friday, a scary big rig fire in a tunnel near Santa Clarita has severed the main commercial road artery through Northern & Southern California.
[ yikes! map of alternate routes around the I-5 south during closure further down]
The Governator, possibly eager to please the Republican voting base of Santa Clarita Chumscrubbers that helped get him into office, Arnie made sure to immediately declare the situation a "State of Emergency".
One wonders if certain inevitable "Emergency" situations like this can't be seen coming, and with the obvious transportation risks better managed or mitigated... Baba Israel - State of Emergency
P.S Speaking of "State of Emergencies", seriously, has the governor or any of his minions tried eating out here on the 5? Where the hell am I supposed to find a decent dining location with small plates, that has a trained staff capable of suitable bio-dynamic wine pairings, and perhaps proper vegetarian options out here that go with the smell of the horrendous cow sh*t...
Read my road rage addled rant of a Frisco Foodie Fraught With Fears For Us All after hours spent inching along the I-5 yesterday out of Southern California, literally many miles from a decent warm organic frisee & Treviso radicchio salad topped with thinly sliced pear, sundried heirloom tomatoes, herbed chevre and bottarga in a Barolo-tangerine vinaigrette ...
Is this California or Oklahoma for gawd sakes? I just came from Fashion Week, and starving like an anorexic model out here...
With maintenance and construction deferred, and more vehicles arriving daily, our statewide roads are aging dangerously. There are many many more trucks careening at high speeds through windy dark holes like the one in the rugged mountains south of the grapevine, than when these roads were planned. 225,000 vehicles a day apparently use the I-5 where the accident occurred. A similar stretch of I-5 just a mile away had been shut for almost 12 hours by a different big rig accident just 10 days earlier involving a truck carrying 50,000 pounds of melons in early October ...
In the last 50 years commercial freight traffic has moved off rails and onto California's already over crowded roadways. Dozens of big rig accidents a week occur in the state, most occur in areas where truck traffic is mixed in with general passenger traffic. The Bay Area is prone to it's own trouble along the 80 corridor, but the most dangerous stretch is the 710 North coming from the busy Port of Long Beach which averages at least one big rig accident a day, and in addition LA almost always has at least one big rig accident occurring somewhere in it's 4000 sq mile county...
The tunnel the trucks collided in on Friday wasn't all that much different in concept than this one pictured below that was dug in the 1870's by some 1000 or so Chinese railroad workers in the same area. The single lane tunnel pictured here was along Southern Pacific's San Joaquin Line, linking the Santa Clarita Valley (in Railroad Canyon) with the rest of Southern California.
People yesterday claimed the traffic was horrendous and expect it to remain so, and I was indeed among those who spent hours inching along the I-5 yesterday in Southern California, and can testify to the chaos...
But now that I finally am back up here, and free to think about it ... hey, the harrowing 2 hour crawl to get 14 miles is about how long it takes to get across town and back in San Francisco anyway. I mean seriously, try to circumnavigate the length and breadth of San Francisco's 7 miles across and back sometime in less than 2 hours...
Especially if one is prone to use MUNI, or stop for the numerous & delicious gourmet tapas joints popping up everywhere... I loves me any place that calls Mayo by it's fancy name Aioli, then puts lime in it. I don't think you can go 15 minutes in SF without being offered seared Ahi. I think Spicy Pineapple Saffron Coulis is a regular side dish on the lunch menu at Marina Middle school ...
Am I digressing?
I wonder if it would be any better if a proposed billion dollar bullet train derailed at the same junction on the 5?
Do you think the Tapas on a bullet train would be any good?
Anyhow... After some radical rerouting & dusty detouring, I got to see sleepy little Newhall California, which has a few more taco stands, trailer parks & brake repair joints since the pic below was taken, but it captures the essential spirit of the place. The semi-bucolic backroad outpost was surprised by the traffic influx, and the local gas station had run out of gasoline by about noon.
All I know is that there was no place serving "Small Plates"...but things could be easily "SuperSized"...
Bay Area Foodie Fraught with Fear on The Five
I think the worst part being trapped on the wrong side of the fire was knowing that even after escaping the grid lock delays of the southland, I was being faced with the bleak and unexpected prospects of spending Saturday Night on Highway 5. I had just passed up the last 210 exit to Pasadena a town in the midst of a free fall arts festival headlined by Viet-retro-rockers Dengue Fever when I learned of the impending doom and traffic blockage I was facing on the Highway 5. The only thing to do was sit and bear it...
Alas, with my LA escape route blocked, and chance of dining within range of a San Francisco bay breeze fading, even imagining hope that there was a suitable Northern California style meal in the near future was futile. I resigned myself that I would not be enjoying any sort of award winning fusion cafe on the horizon or even fresh baked whole grain bread.
Indeed, a man in a box named Jack confirmed his fish sandwhich contained no wild caught Pacific Salmon smoked on a cedar plank. the so-called King of Burgers did not offer anything resembling a fresh organic green mesclun salad topped with apricot pistachio goat cheese from Pescadero, which would've possibly made the long journey home more palatable.
I ended up avoiding the "animal style" drive thru line at In-n-Out, and ate food from something locals referred to as a "strip mall", finding a quaint place called Chili's. Apparently they are well known purveyors within the "baby back rib community". Not sure if anything there was "free range", except the soft drink refills...
The traffic was slow...and the food was decidedly faster...
The traumatic traffic stalling accident on the 5 outside LA, brings to the fore not only dramatic public safety issues but also of how foolish foodies can attempt to cope with the highway's seriously un "haute" cuisine scene.
The author attempts to enjoy a tiny but oh, so delicious $15 baby beet salad at Water Grill before devouring some grilled Colorado River sturgeon with the lil' green cumin spatzles and epezote Chimichurri on the evening of the tragic I-5 tunnel crash & traffic jam which would create a dietary crisis...
Meanwhile, behind me the smoke was still visible, and the southland shuddered with fears that it may be quite awhile before the southward part of the 5 is able to open...
News media reports & a map below:
SF's Channel 5 adds info on the slow moving cleanup process on Saturday ...
At the end of the Ch 5 report you briefly see the very worried family of missing trucker Ricardo Cibrian, whose family was holding a roadside vigil in hopes of hearing some positive news.
I'm sorta pressed fer time...headed out the door...
Tonight I'm turning down my free passes to some shindig at the local disco hosted by some company that's attempting to lure me into their nefarious networking & PR mess and gonna go catch some toasted wacky east coast noise from Sound of Urchin...
sadly it's one of those bands I set up with a show for years ago, but being a busy event monkey means I never got a chance to see em then...
and time marched on...
but they have ditty's saved up for every occasion...
Maybe I'd go for Lewbowski Fest at the Knitting Factory...
who cares
In other news...
yer welcome to read my rants at Sf Metroblogs, which is occasionally where I thrust opinions that are more SF Bay Area localized than sort of random spew I spit here...
If not read on to more nationally significant issues below:
"ethically challenged" former U.S Attorney Alberto Gonzalez has hired an attorney to represent himself during upcoming hearings. Maybe the lil' weasel has finally realized asking himself for advice wasn't working out so great...
Was busy all last week as usual...but when not dodging the loud strafing fighter jets of The Blue Angels who annually buzz our city, I did manage to catch a more peaceful teensy slice of Freedom.
That bit of blissed out Americana was from the opening day of the 7th annual Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in Golden Gate Park on Friday afternoon...
Before the bitter Jeff Tweedy could attempt to put me to sleep, who to my wondering eyes should appear much to my surprise but Little Johnny Cougar...
It was cool to catch him play just a handful of songs, but he strutted onto that stage and immediately lifted the spirits of thousands, and got the place rocking for the first time all day.
Backed by a beyond capable musical crew including T-Bone Burnett, and Doyle Bramhall II, and even Neko Case on backing vocals as well as two drummers including one Jim Keltner on one of the kits, they played a new song about the troubles in Jena Arkansas.
lyrics:
An all white jury hides the executioner’s face See how we are, me and you?
Everyone here needs to know their place Let’s keep this blackbird hidden in the flue Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, take your nooses down
So what becomes of boys that cannot think straight. Particularly those with paper bag skin. Yes sir, no sir we’ll wipe that smile right off your face.
We’ve got our rules here and you must fit in. Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, take your nooses down. Some day some way sanity will prevail. But who knows when that day might come.
A shot in the dark, well it just might find its way to the hearts of those that hold the keys to kingdom come.
Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, Oh oh oh Jena, take those nooses down.
Oh oh hey Jena, Oh oh Jena, Oh oh Jena, take your nooses down.
Take those nooses all down.
Please click here to view more from John, including the video on Mellencamp.com
The most well received song of the three he performed last Friday afternoon though was a song dating back to the 80's, when Cougar first hit the American radio mainstream, a song that tapped a fertile reservoir of sentimental solace, Pink Houses.
"Ain't That America... For You and Me"
I'm sure yer all familiar with that AOR rock staple, or at least should be. So in the interest of keeping it lively, here's the song in a slightly more revved up context. It's a version by Richmond Virginia's Avail. I used to live down the cul de sac from singer Tim Barry when we were in high school. In fact when this song was rulin' the airwaves, Tim lived on a diet of Iron Maiden & Ozzy, while I would more likely be sneakin' out late at night and skateboarding over to neighborhood girls' houses with a cassette of Scarecrow cranking in my headphones. Anyhow, this came out via the reissue of the Avail Dixie CD awhile back, released via Jade Tree/Touch and Go.
I guess Cougar, well he's been back to Mellencamp officially for many years since ...but I still love that bitchin' Cougar moniker thrust on him by the old Mainman management team. No doubt calling MainMan a "team" would even be a stretch... The main MainMan guys' name was Tony DeFries. He had lackeys, lotsa gay cracked actors and hot chicks on the payroll of course, but he was their cigar chomping shot caller in the 1970's for shizzle. By the mid 1970's, John Mellencamp was a struggling guy in his mid 20's with a wife and young daughter back in Seymour Indiana when he went to New York with a demo tape of his former glam band "Trash" and a dream. He came across the operation of one Tony DeFries, a rock manager with a reputation for excesses.
Here's Bowie , Iggy Pop & Lou Reed at a press conference with DeFries lurking in the background...
DeFries had previously taken former Warhol Factory hanger ons like Wayne County to Broadway stages and even London. He had also most infamously hit the jackpot when he built up David Bowie into superstardom. The way DeFries operated was certainly shrewd, if not all together ethical. He created the illusion of Bowie as "Rock Royalty", but as Bowie would later claim the management company called MainMan, simply existed for Bowie to be "fucked royally".
The agreement the broke and drug addled Bowie had entered into was one that basically swallowed all his incomes and held them for DeFries to dispense as he saw fit. Court records show that of the intital $56,000 advance RCA gave Bowie, he only received less than $10,000, with DeFries holding the rest. While Bowie himself was kept on a 100 pound a week stipend, and housed in a modest flat in Haddon Hall in London's Beckenham district, the rest of Bowie's dough ended up paying for any and everything DeFries saw fit. The numerous expenses included Iggy Pop's methodone, even Bowie's occasional bi-sexual dalliance Wayne County's "upkeep", and of course MainMan's offices in London, Tokyo and of course the 14 room suite off Park Avenue in New York, as well as DeFries 20 room estate in Connecticut. Bowie even paid off a $500,000 settlement to a disgruntled former DeFries business partner.
By the time Mellencamp signed on, DeFries was also embroiled in numerous business activities, including having established a conflict of interest laden P&D deal with MCA, not too mention some lawsuits and injunctions from his former clients Bowie and T-Rex. DeFries ever flashy and yet reclusively sneaky at the same time, took a shot at reinventing the Indiana lad. Former MainMan VP, the late Jaime Andrews, whose previous conquests included producing Fame for Broadway in 1974, explained the stage name MainMan gave the diminutive Mellencamp in a Seventeen article,
"We wanted something uniquely American, something hot and wild. Johnny Indiana was one of our choices, Puma, Mustang--but nothing was as hot as Cougar!"
Apparently MainMan saw something they could market in Mellencamp, With DeFries himself making statements like, "He's so American, the most American artist I've seen since Bob Dylan, and I think he will capture the same kind of thing Dylan did."
DeFries was definitely a starmaker, a money whore galore, a guy who boosted David Bowie out of the hippy dippy UK folk rock milieu and into the superstar stratosphere. Supposedly DeFries loathed drugs, but one cannot say the the same for his charges & their entourages. DeFries fueled the illusion of rock royalty by using bodyguards, entourages, limos, press conferences and copious amounts of cocaine to bullshit the press and public into believing the guy was a somebody. DeFries controlled the artists & the press and made his acts exclusive interview subjects by declaring them unavailable unless they were getting big spreads in influential rags.
Leee Black Childers discussed DeFries tour style circa 1974 in a Hit Parader article, describing the simultaneously lavish spending of all the money DeFries had taken in from his main cash source David Bowie. He would put the crew in one mid rate hotel, the Star & MainMan "execs" in extravagant suites in another, and the press would be scuttled off to a smaller property.
There are many people both in and out of the industry who are very curious about Mr. DeFries. He is, of course, the other mind (besides Bowie’s) responsible for the staggering success Bowie has realized in these past two years. He is also the creator of MainMan complete with all its policies and eccentric demands. To say he has revolutionized the music industry (which has more revolutions than any Latin American country) would be just playing with words. But, there are a lot of other management and record companies who have taken second looks at their own policies after having a gander at his.
Anyway, there isn’t much I can tell you about him beyond this. He is not a public person and never, never leaves himself open to scrutiny. I can however, describe to you the scene upon entering his suite at the Hotel Windsor Arms since I find it typical of all times I have entered his suite, in all the grand hotels in cities all over the world. First of all, unless something unforeseen arises, it is always the largest suite in the hotel and in this hotel nothing unforeseen had arisen...
Here's Mr. Iggy Pop on Tony DeFries, when Iggy was made one of the firm's babysitting projects for a spell in the early 70's:
"I thought, People will go for this guy. He had a big cigar and a big pointed nose and a great big Afro and a smug look on his face and an English accent and a big fur coat and a belly. And to the people who were running the American industry it just spelled 'Hot Manager'!"
(Quote lifted from Barney Hoskyn's Book "Glam!")
Another couple quotes from the MainMan organization from an Iggy interview by Arthur Levy:
"DeFries had received, for my services, one hundred thousand dollars from CBS Records, payable to MainMan as a production company. I had an employee contract so I had no right to touch a penny of it, and that was huge money in 1972, big, serious money. DeFries would play each of us against the other. Bowie would ask him, 'Well, where's my money?' and DeFries would say, 'Well, Iggy needed some dental work.' And Bowie'd get flipped out. Meanwhile, I'd wonder, 'Where's my money?' and I'd see Bowie on-tour and Mott The Hoople on-tour and I'd know they couldn't be making money on these tours, and I'd see five or six employees at the MainMan office and I'd think, 'There's my money.' (laughter)"
With all the employees on the road with them, and at the venues, DeFries liked to give off a certain impression of impending frenzy, and thusly, extra security would be employed to set a certain mood. Said Childers in an old Hit Parader magazine from December 1974:
From the looks of the place with its many, uniformed guards, and buzzers that let you move slowly through a series of doors as you prove your validity with various bits of identification, , it looked like we were preparing for an appearance by a highly unpopular political figure rather than a pop star.
Childers, a rock photographer who was drinking the kool-aid (or at least snorting it), was eventually given a position as VP of MainMan's NY office. The President was Tony Zanetta.
Zanetta has done a book on the Bowie era, and was there the night these managers decided to take on Iggy Pop as a client at Max's Kansas City in late 1971. MainMan would hole up clients like Iggy and Bowie in the Warwick Hotel and take 'em shopping for expensive clothes. Iggy was able to spend $400 on two pairs of pants for his first MainMan spending spree in late '71.
Here's Zanetta's description of DeFries style to former Mojo magazine editor Paul Trynka :
“He was very very detail-oriented. Very thorough. As I said, he was courageous: he could get anyone on the phone, he had that kind of dreamer thing but he wasn't afraid to take action. And he had a real hard-ass side to him: he could be very cold. He had a killer instinct that you need in business: we were all la dee dah and he wasn't afraid to do what was necessary. Tony gave us tremendous confidence - if he asked you to do something you wouldn't doubt him. He did create this family, he and Bowie had a very close relationship and discussed everything to death.. they were mutually dependent. Defries made you feel so special. And he did more than that, he put his money where his mouth was.
Well it didn't work out so great for Johnny Cougar, and apparently Mellencamp was disgusted that he was given the teen idol name Johnny Cougar, and was pissed off to find out his album was released under that title. In fact he claims the first he knew of his new name was when he saw the album cover.
Johnny was quickly dropped by MCA after one LP release sank without a trace. The debut disc, "Chestnut Street Incident" was a collection of mostly weak cover songs chosen by DeFries and his increasingly out of touch staff in 1976. Still Johnny Cougar eventually made it, and better yet, it was on his own.
He signed to Riva, a Polygram subsidiary out of London, where he had a new album out by 1978, and one John Cougar track was gaining traction in Japan of all places. The song was "I Need A Lover", and while John Cougar never hit any stateside radio play with it, a long island based female hard rocker named Pat Benatar took into the US charts.
Interestingly enough, after being dropped by MainMan and MCA he eventually found a kindred spirit in another former MainMan management client, that being Mick Ronson, Bowie's former guitarist who appeared on John's big 1982 hit track Jack & Diane from the album American Fool.
Once he dropped the Cougar moniker, he went officially on with his career as John Mellencamp, and was finally taken seriously as an artist and songwriter after more than a decade in the biz.
Mellencamp's career hasn't been without it's controversies, which have generally resulted from his political stances, including his Farm Aid charity and unabashed outspoken statements against the hypocrites he sees preying on the people from their powerful outposts in Washington D.C.
In May of this year, Mellencamp got himself in more trouble by saying in an interview that he had smoked weed in the 80's with his childhood friend and basketball superstar Larry Bird, as well as teammate Kevin McHale backstage after a concert at Boston Garden...
The sports figures then promptly issued denials...
Although, while the former Boston Celtic's players were in denial... Bostonians didn't seem to mind, turning out in droves for the massive free outdoor concert over July 4th this year on the Boston Commons with the city's famed Boston Pops orchestra, where Mellencamp was the special "patriotic" guest.
This version of his song Love and Happiness, is taken from his quasi-acoustic Rough Harvest CD, with material recorded at Belmont Mall studios in Indiana, and was originally released in 1999. By 2005, the label formerly known as Mercury had been swallowed up by the regrouped Island / Def Jam empire and the disc was reissued after a Bob Clearmountain remastering job which you can perhaps hear in this sample track.
My pal Chuck Prophet, prolly coulda used a power mongering rip off manager at some point in his career, at least to add to the collection of stories.
Chuck has a new record out, but as far as I know he's just flogging it himself, sans overpaid PR firms & managerial bloodsuckers. For over a decade now, Chuck, generally only has had his own self, or at least fate to blame for most of his career fortunes. That's not to say he hasn't had his share of ups & downs, and downers & uppers at one time or another. However there hasn't been too many Machivellian power plays, lawsuits, and whatnot. Sure there are a handful of folks who could talk some sorta shit bout him, but any guy in any bar band in America could probably find himself a scapegoat in some stupid story. If not, they should probably hang up their hat and call it day.
Drama.. it sells more records than being well liked by your Mama.
Chuck Prophet's relatively drama free backing band is The Mission Express, and they are on tour throughout this month. There is no separate dressing rooms or hotels, no nose powdering entourages, no extravagant costume budget. Everyone is packed in the same rented van and happily playing the oldies but goodies and of course cuts off their new release.
They blitzed through the UK last week, opening up an American Music Festival with two nights in London amongst other gigs, and made it into Belgium by Friday after a Thursday night in Leicester. They'll be back in San Francisco by the end of Rocktober...but they gotta win the hearts and minds over there first...
Chuck wrote me that last night he was Amsterdam, but I suspect avoided all the red lights, hashish & heroin...
WE did a webcast last night from the world famous Paradiso in Amster-Damn... Yeah, I don't know about all that web cast junk. I mean, like where's the mystique? I don't know if that's how I'd want to see Leonard Cohen, ya know?
Those old vaudevillian act's were wiped out by TV. They used to do the same basic act, but once you expose the world to it on the boob tube, they've seen it, got the DVD, the t shirt and they've moved on... fuggit.
I found a Belgian blogger who'd caught the band in front of an intimate audience in Eeklo. Leave it to the Belgians to have a town called Eeklo...
Here's a portion of the tour tale from that blogging Belgian reviewer and a track from Chuck Prophet's latest release, "Soap & Water" his first for the mighty lil' Yep Roc label, it's an album that's getting the 4 out of 5 star salute from all the relevant mag-o-zines like Mojo. Q etc.
Here's the word on the show from the Belgian blogger at the Villa in Eeklo...
Certainly the best rock performance I've witnessed since the Drive-by Truckers at the same venue back in 2004 and quite astounding considering they had traveled down from playing in Leicester in the UK the night before...It rocked big time! There were a couple of more mellow moments such as "Would You Love Me?" (see video clip below) and "Solid Gold" (Age of Miracles") played solo and acoustic as opener for the encore. Bit of a shame that only about 50 wise ones turned up to see one of the best contemporary exponents of the Telecaster play but it was one of the gigs of the year. I might get to the Brussels gig with any luck.
Been going to a lot of outdoor concerts while the weather has been decent...
Last week got a great big dose of blues with a view of the Golden Gate Bridge...
It was the 35th Anniversary of the SF Blues Festival on the Greens at Fort Mason...
Of course I was thrilled to catch some Allen Toussaint, including his delightful performance of this song ( Play Something Sweet aka Brickyard Blues) that was a hit he produced in the 1970's for Scotsman Frankie Miller and also Three Dog Night...
I found Toussaint's version at eMusic, on a compilation called Bluesiana Hot Sauce
One of the highlights of the SF Blues Fest was finally seeing the tiny lil septuagenarian lady known as Sugar Pie DeSanto up onstage in action. She participated in an open ended jam with the ancient Jimmy McCracklin, and Joe Louis Walker with occasional Nick Lowe/Commander Cody/Elvis Costello sideman Austin DeLone on piano.
Sugar Pie ( born Umpeylia Marsema Balinton in 1935) was lively and risque, hiking her dress up and she is best known for recording lotsa stuff for Chess/Checker back in the day. Etta James is in fact Sugar Pie's younger cousin, and Sugar Pie wrote many tunes recorded by etta and other artists for Chess. She also did some funky stuff in the 70's for Bay area indie labels, including her manager's Jasman records, who have a video clip of her rocking on the site. Here's Sugar Pie from a 1972 Jasman single, now included on an awesome Luv' N Haight / Ubiquity compilation called "Bay Area Funk 2"
Her history stretches back a ways, her first record came out in 1955, and she indeed was the only female who appeared at the American Folk Blues Festival Euro tour of 1964. It was a concert tour concert that hit Germany and featured performers such as: Howlin' Wolf, Hubert Sumlin, Sonny Boy Williamson, Clifton James, Sugar Pie DeSanto, Lightnin' Hopkins, Sleepy John Estes, Sunnyland Slim, John Henry Barbee...
Here is Sugar Pie DeSanto from that amazing 1964 tour in a jam with Sunnyland Slim, Hubert Sumlin, Willie Dixon, and Clifton James singing her then single about wearing her "slip-in mules", as opposed to some then in vogue "high heel sneakers"...
Sugar Pie DeSanto w/ Willie Dixon etc - Slip-In Mules
A few week sback i was privy to a semi private intimate concert by Michael Franti for a tent full of Yoga Jammers on the Sunday following the monumental 10th anniversary of his Power to The Peaceful concert in Golden Gate Park. The first Power to The Peaceful was set for 9-11 ten years in Dolores Park, and was to draw attention to the pending execution of Pennsylvania convict Mumia Abu Jamal. I remeber a few hundred folks in the sunshine, well this year organizers claimed some 50,000 attendees.
here's Franti from a record that came out in 2006...
The track featured below has appeared in different forms on both the stay Human album, and even the acoustic collection, Songs from The Front Porch, but here it is again. This time this poetic jam is featured here as heard on a new compilation. This is the 8 minute Bass Nectar Mix of Skin On The Drum from the 'Caravan of Light' collection that was just released this week by Lua productions...
Friday, I hear da legendary pirate rawker Jon Langford is in town with The Mekons and also performing with The Sadies....
Here's Langford, solo, from his Gold Brick collection releasedd via Ryko in 2005
Jon Langford - Anything Can Happen Also on Friday night I might just sneak in a visit to see perennial jamsters Mother Hips are at the Bay Meadows race track
I'll perhaps beef up this entry later, and provide some highlights of the stuff i'll be checking out this weekend at not so strictly bluegrass if I have time, likely including Nick Lowe, Blasters, Knitters etc...
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some o my recently played tracks
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" which was produced by Elvis Costello and released in 1986. The record was different from nearly anything churning out of speakers in the sterile & synthetic hair farming 80's music scene. The subject matter of songs like "The Old Main Drag" about a wasted street hustler plying his trade in alleys amongst the "she males", beaten by coppers, "shat on & spat on and raped & abused' weren't likely radio ready. The album also featured songs like "A Pair of Brown Eyes" and "The Band Played Waltzing Matilda", both tunes that depicted poignant poetic moments of reminiscence by bitter veterans of useless bloody battles, lamenting their roles as long forgotten heroes of wicked wars. These songs remain vital today, if for subject matter alone, and are just two of many epics in the band's remarkable catalog of tearjerkers & crowd pleasing singalongs. 
If only the stupid DJ didn't need to shut up & get bitch slapped by Hetfield so bad during the intro...
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"Illegal Business"
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lyrics:
I Need A Lover
The track featured below has appeared in different forms on both the stay Human album, and even the acoustic collection, Songs from The Front Porch, but here it is again. This time this poetic jam is featured here as heard on a new compilation. This is the 8 minute Bass Nectar Mix of Skin On The Drum from the 'Caravan of Light' collection that was just released this week by Lua productions...
