Innholdsfortegnelse for Jul/Aug 2019 i Vintage Rock

When Stray Cats first made their indelible mark, they had it all. That magic number of three achingly cool, rakish twenty-somethings, heavily armed with an arsenal of rockabilly, as raw as it was accessible. What’s more, niftily side-stepping the retro clichés, they recast the sound for a new generation of hungry adolescents. When the hard-slapping incendiary snarl of debut 45 Runaway Boys clawed its way into the Top 10, it was the sorest of thumbs, amidst a mainstream landscape of Abba, Spandau Ballet… and school kids singing There’s No One Quite Like Grandma. In short, with the punk insurgency now watered-down for the high street, Stray Cats were a much-needed pocket of rebellion. Of course, like all proper bands, they rose, they fell – and then they fell out. But…

TURN ME LOOSE C/W I’M A MAN (DECCA 45-F 11184) MORT SCHUMAN As well as his unprecedented archive of songs penned for other artists, Mort Schuman’s debut 45 was released on Decca in 1959. MINT VALUE: £150 THE CATALINA PUSH (CATALINA RECORDS C-115) THE CATALINAS This scorchin’ cut from The Catalinas was released in tiny numbers on their own label back in 1964, though has now found its way onto essential comps such as Keb Darge & Little Edith’s Legendary Wild Rockers. MINT VALUE: £1500 DOWN TOWN (CROSS THAT BRIDGE) (JAPANESE 7” ‘CELICA’ SLEEVE, ARTISTA 7RS-22) BLANKENSHIP BROTHERS This famed Stray Cats rarity was used as background music on a Japanese advert of the time promoting the Toyota Celica, with a highly limited amount of promotional copies with this sleeve…

Marty Wdde turned 80 in April but the British rock'n'roD pioneer remains busier than many artists at the beginning of their career. A new compilation, Dreamboats And Petticoats Presents The Very Best Of Marty Wilde rounds up leis 50s and 60s hits such as A Teenager In Love and Rubber Ball, while 4-CD boxset A Lifetime In Music 1957-2019 mixes the smashes with rare live performances and demos from a career that saw him go on to write hits for artists from Lulu to daughter Kim Wilde. We met him ahead of his latest UK tour. Were you involved in picking the obscure tracks on A Lifetime In Music? No, I left it to Cherry Red because I'm too close to my stuff. I was a bit concerned, if I'm…

Much has been written regarding the heinous and sadly frequent mid-1950s practice of bland white pop artists (Pat Boone, Georgia Gibbs, the McGuire Sisters, et al) covering the vastly superior original versions of early rock’n’roll classics by black artists – Tutti Frutti, Ain’t It A Shame, Hearts Of Stone etc. But sometimes a great rhythm and blues song slipped through the cracks and was revived more successfully by another R&B artist. The same thing happened within the rockabilly and doo-wop genres. And every once in a while, a cover was simply better. Here are 20 R&B covers that are definitely worth seeking out… HOUND DOG ORIGINAL WILLIE MAE “BIG MAMA” THORNTON COVER ELVIS PRESLEY Elvis Presley was an avid R&B and blues aficionado. Half of his first 10 released sides on…

With his distinct look, it was no surprise that Gordon would sideline onto celluloid. In ’76, while performing with Tuff Darts, he briefly appeared in the punk/New Wave style film Unmade Beds by niche Israeli filmmaker Amos Poe, an arty homage to Jean Luc Godard that also featured Blondie’s Deborah Harry. In ’82, Gordon and co-star Willem Dafoe both appeared in the future Oscar winner Kathryn Bigelow’s first film The Loveless, a 50s-style nod to Brando’s The Wild One. Gordon was notable as the romantic biker Vance; he looked the part and relished the bike riding, refusing any stunt stand-ins and resisting wearing a helmet during motorcycle practice so as not to spoil his four-inch quiff! According to actor JD King, he was averse to Dafoe’s “full of himself baloney”,…

American popular music has a proud history of collaborative compositions. At the dawn of the rock era, upholders of the tradition included Burt Bacharach and Hal David, Gerry Goffin and Carole King, Ellie Greenwich and Jeff Barry, and Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield. However, only a few white wordsmith/composer teams successfully crafted songs drenched in the black blues idiom, emphasising soulful lyric images and jazzy rhythm patterns. These rare partnerships included Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller – and Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman, who were particularly noteworthy for crafting hit tunes for artists representing doo-wop, jazz, pop, R&B, and rock’n’roll. Their period of songwriting prominence ran from 1956 through to 1967, after which they drifted apart to collaborate with others. Together they composed in a…

DID YOU TELL ME (YOU DIDN’T CARE) How Sam Phillips didn’t green-light this brooding blazer for immediate Sun release remains a mystery for the ages. Its unusual chord progression, Leon Barnett’s fluid lead guitar and a testosterone-laced Felts vocal showed Narvel was ready for stardom at his very first session. KISS-A-ME BABY The zesty Latin-tempoed beat of Kiss-A-Me Baby apparently convinced Mercury to choose this as his all-important debut platter. “I met Gene Vincent in St Louis while that record was out,” says Felts. “When I introduced myself to him, he said, ‘I heard your record Kiss-A-Me Baby in Des Moines, Iowa!’ That really surprised me, that he had heard my record and knew who I was.” CUTIE BABY Although he couldn’t quite match the original Canadian demo of Three…

Johnny Moore’s Three Blazers THE SINGLES COLLECTION 1945-55 ACROBAT Chuck Berry consistently referenced Charles Brown as a vocal influence. But it wasn’t the Chuck Berry of Johnny B Goode and Sweet Little Sixteen, but the ballad side of Berry as instanced by Havana Moon and Drifting Blues. Brown was lead singer for much of the 10 hit-making years of Johnny Moore’s Three Blazers despite getting sparse credit for it, and wrote and first recorded Drifting Blues, as revived by Chuck. This whopping three-CD collection gives you nearly all the early Charles Brown recordings, and, fair warning, don’t expect much in the way of out-and-out rocking. Instead, think Nat King Cole, cocktail jazz, fine piano and warm, understated vocals. Brown was fated to have not one, but two Christmas hits, notably…

I was surprised at the amount of offers that came in once I’d left Larry Parnes. I was expecting a famine but it became a feast. George Cooper and Don Arden were two of the agents and management who began offering me work without signing sole representation agreements. The George Cooper Agency already had Johnny Kidd, Michael Cox, Joe Brown, Danny Rivers, Jess Conrad, The Flee-Rekkers, Bert Weedon and Mike Preston. One of my first theatre dates post-Larry was a Sunday night concert at the Dudley Hippodrome in the West Midlands. It was for George Cooper and for some reason George asked me if I would be company manager and compère as well as doing my act. I was delighted at the opportunity, but little did I realise that in…

We were spoilt for choice at Viva Las Vegas, we rocked our socks off at Hemsby, and the Nashville Boogie was cooking as always – but it need not stop there. Those with a penchant for rock’n’roll in the sun (isn’t that everyone?) can fill their boots this summer with a many-splendoured menu to keep us strolling, bopping and swinging throughout. The summer season kicks off in fine fettle with Wildest Cats Summer Car Cruise, lighting up Lowestoft with a fine array of classic cars, hot-rods, bikes and trikes (7 July), before the 12th Shakedown Rock’n’Roll Weekender arrives in Dursley with acts including Germany’s Smoke Stack Lightnin’, Paul Ansell’s Number Nine, Michael Roach’s Mississippi Blues Band and all the usual accoutrements (18-21 July, shakedownrocknroll.co.uk). This is followed by more Wildest…

1959 • CHESSRE CORDS Side 1 Almost Grown 2:21 Carol 2:48 Maybellene 2:23 Sweet Little Rock & Roller 2:22 Anthony Boy 1:54 Johnny B. Goode 2:41 Side 2 Little Queenie 2:43 Jo Jo Gunne 2:47 Roll Over Beethoven 2:24 Around And Around 2:42 Hey Pedro 1:57 Blues For Hawaiians 3:23 (All tracks written by Chuck Berry) CHUCK BERRY VOCALS, LEAD GUITAR, RHYTHM GUITAR AND SLIDE GUITAR JOHNNIE JOHNSON, PAUL GAYTEN, LAFAYETTE LEAKE AND OTIS SPANN PIANO WILLIE DIXON DOUBLE BASS BOB BUSHNELL BASS MELVIN BILLUPS, EBBIE HARDY, ODIE PAYNE AND JASPAR THOMAS DRUMS JEROME GREEN MARACAS HARVEY AND THE MOONGLOWS (HARVEY FUQUA, CHUCK BARKSDALE, MARVIN GAYE, JAMES NOLAN, REESE PALMER AND CHESTER SIMMONS) BACKING VOCALS ETTA JAMES BACKING VOCALS…

Had Robert Gordon been active in rock’n’roll’s golden years, this striking song stylist could easily have been up there, sharing a pedestal with the original greats. All the same, in the 1970s, he still managed to make his mark by kickstarting the second rockabilly surge. Coming up in New York’s New Wave amongst such bands as Blondie and the Ramones as vocalist in Tuff Darts, Gordon met producer Richard Gottehrer and went on to enjoy a scintillating collaboration with Link Wray. Their two albums, Robert Gordon With Link Wray and Fresh Fish Special, dynamite-blasted the disco era with rockabilly-plus-punk-edge attitude. The untimely death of Elvis Presley in 1977 pivotally coincided with airplay for their first single Red Hot, ahead of an electrifying nationwide tour. By the time of Fresh Fish…

The cover of John Lewis & His Rock’n’Roll Trio’s new album Where Would Rock’n’Roll Be? depicts the denim-clad singer standing on top of a globe with his guitar, gazing into the far beyond. On first look, the retro design suggests a 1950s-style love of the curve and its obsession with Outer Space. “Actually, there’s a funny story behind the artwork,” says the affable performer, superficially dubbed a rockabilly, but whose back catalogue defies easy pigeon-holing. “My in-laws live in Ireland. I’ve been going there for 20 years and have become friends with a former war photographer, Richard Wayman, who switched to taking pictures of the locals. He said he’d take some photos for the album and got me up at five in the morning to catch the dramatic sunrise, making…

Precious few 1950s rockabillies possessed pipes as powerful as those of Narvel Felts. That became apparent during the 70s, when Felts crashed the US country hit parade again and again (he just missed topping the charts in 1975 with his soaring revival of Johnny Adams’ soul ballad Reconsider Me). That same vocal confidence was also there during his early career, as confirmed by Narvel Felts Rocks, Bear Family’s new CD overview of the singer’s rockabilly exploits. Felts has never disguised his rock and roll roots. “I do the occasional rockabilly festival,” he says. “I did Viva Las Vegas last year, and I did Hemsby in 2017… and I also did that Nashville Boogie last year, too. I always thought the business would retire me, that sometime I’d look out there…

Eddie Cochran ROCKIN’ WITH RAY GOLD STAR RECORDS Singer/songwriter Ray Stanley played piano on Cochran tracks like Skinny Jim and Half Loved. He also recorded a selection of demo tracks with Eddie, and four of these appear on this release. The heaviest hitter has to be Mighty Mean (a demo that later became Mean When I’m Mad) alongside Jack Lewis’ Tood-A-Loo, Ray Stanley’s Kiss And Make Up and Danny Andrew’s Bongo Boy, all of which featured Eddie on guitar. Though aimed at Cochran aficionados this is a tasty blackvinyl reissue, with picture sleeve, and it’s limited to 400 copies. Steeler’s Trio FAT MAMA’S TAMALES O-HA RECORDS O-Ha Records’ very collectable series of limited edition, one-sided singles continues with an atmospheric instrumental from this Belgian three-piece. Stripped down and soaked in…

Elvis made only one trip to the studio during his US Army service, when he returned to RCA’s infamous Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee, to cut the tracks that would keep his fans happy while he was gone. During the two-day session he laid down several big tunes, including A Big Hunk O’Love, the frenetic, piano-driven rockabilly charge that would slowly rise to the top of the Billboard in summer 1959, 60 years ago. It was the very first Elvis session not to include his trusted buddies Scotty Moore and Bill Black on guitar and bass respectively. Instead, a select team of Nashville’s finest were enlisted to support the King, including Hank Garland on guitar, DJ Fontana and Buddy Harman on drums, Floyd Cramer on piano and Bob Moore on…

In a field boasting its share of outrageous characters, Andre Williams was in a class of his own. During the 1950s and 60s, Williams created more than his share of national R&B hits and obscure classics as a performer, songwriter, and producer, doing things his way in Chicago and Detroit. Andre trafficked in doo-wop, soul, funk, and more recently, X-rated rap. He hit rock bottom due to the ravages of drink and drugs and found himself homeless more than once, but always came back for another tour and another record, looking resplendent in a three-piece purple suit with matching chapeau and telling the occasional tall tale to worshipful interviewers. The R&B maverick’s death on 17 March at age 82 ended a career full of peaks and valleys. Born in Bessemer,…

Cat Fight (Over A Dog Like Me) “Mike [Himelstein, musician, composer and frequent Setzer co-writer] sent me some lyrics – they’re right up Stray Cats’ alley. And as soon as those lyrics came, I wrote the song, instantly” – Brian Setzer Rock It Off “I was in Lubbock, Texas on a day off. I told Mike, ‘I’m not feeling too well tonight, but we’ll just ‘rock it off tomorrow’. An hour later, he sent those lyrics to me, and I wrote the song right away” – Brian Setzer I’ve Got Love If You Want It “I wrote this one by myself. It’s 50s, but it has a little twist in there that makes it a little different” – Brian Setzer Cry Danger “This one is really different for us. Mike…

“Robert to me sounds a lot like the early Elvis back when he was at Sun Records,” praised the great Link Wray. Their incendiary first album collaboration, Robert Gordon With Link Wray (1977, Private Stock) featured highlights such as Red Hot, The Fool and Flying Saucer Rock’n’Roll – and their second project together, 1978’s Fresh Fish Special, was just as tasty. This record showcased the searing first recording of Fire by Bruce Springsteen (who also showed up to play piano). “I sent Elvis a demo of it but he died August 16, 1977, before it arrived,” Springsteen mourned. Of course, next in line was Robert Gordon. “Robert Gordon has pipes that make any stylistic qualification redundant,” pointed out guitarist Chris Spedding. Ripping it up on the dynamic Rock Billy Boogie,…

With their feel for country, The Rimshots became the go-to backing band for many of the more hillbilly-style American rockers who played the UK festivals. Lewis has warm memories of working with Eddie Fontaine, Sonny Burgess, Marvin Rainwater and, as recently as last year, Narvel Felts. Perhaps the greatest thrill for Lewis was working with Mac Curtis. “I’d met him a few times before,” he recalls. “He came over one year and Paul Barrett needed someone to pick him up from London. I’d just passed my driving test and I came up with my girlfriend in my Mini Metro to take him back to Wales. Then we backed him in at a festival in Lyon. About three in the morning after the gig, we said, sort of half-joking, ‘Mac we’re…

Politics entered the rockin’ scene this year when the organisers of several festivals including Viva Las Vegas, Atomic and Rhythm Riot asked fans not to display the Confederate flag. In America, the flag was used by the 11 Lower South states who formed an unrecognised country in the 1860s, and it was adopted as a battle flag by Robert E Lee. Many in the US say it stands for Southern heritage and tradition, yet its revival post-WW2 can partly be linked to Civil Rights opposition, and it has been adopted by white supremacists because of its association with slavery before the Civil War. The ban has angered some British fans. Many who discovered rockabilly in the late 70s and early 80s first glimpsed the flag when it was used by…

Batmobile BAIL WAS SET AT $6,000,000 MUSIC ON VINYL Nervous Records originally released this album in 1988 and it heralded something of a new direction for this psychobilly trio. It may have delivered a more mature sound but it quickly became a firm favourite of fans and songs from this album like Kiss Me Now, Shoot Shoot, Calamity Man and their excellent cover of Ace of Spades still get included in their most recent live performances. Now the album is available for your listening pleasure once again, this time on yellow vinyl nestling within a gatefold sleeve and featuring two bonus tracks from 1987. Elvis Presley ELVIS IN PARIS VPI RECORDS There appears to be no shortage of releases from the King on vinyl these days and collectors’ wallets must…