V04-T14 Love Comes In Spurts

.....Supposedly, later this year will see an official DVD release of the Sonic Youth/Nirvana tour documentary "1991:The Year Punk Broke". I was kind of shocked that it's not available already, as I can remember the impact it had on younger music fans when they were between the high of discovering NEVERMIND and the low of hearing about Cobain's death. Sonic Youth fans are still waiting (perhaps forever) for a home video version in any format of "Put Blood In The Music", the excellent documentary on the New York music scene prior to the tour, a large chunk of which is devoted to Sonic Youth.

.....Since Richard Hell doesn't do much in the way of performance anymore, the recent bit of news took me back to one of the last musical projects he did that garnered significant press outside New York. Right after "1991: The Year Punk Broke" hit theaters in 1992, Hell and Sonic Youth collaborated as Dim Stars for an album and single. He's recorded bits since then, but his musical efforts seem more like a hobby next to his writing these days. Today's selection, by contrast, was one of the first (if not the first) of his recordings.

Volume 4: "THE LITTLE BROWN ONES ARE THORAZINE, GEORGE", track 14

• 02:05 "LOVE COMES IN SPURTS" (Tom Verlaine, Richard Hell)
• performed by The Neon Boys
• original source: 7" EP Shake SHK 101 (US) 1980 (previously unreleased 1973 demo)
• and my source: VALP SHAKE TO DATE Albion SHAKE1 (UK?)1981

.....I only know Albion as a British label (hence the name), but to be honest there's no nation of origin anywhere on the jacket or label. The Neon Boys were Tom (Miller) Verlaine , Richard (Meyers) Hell and drummer Billy Ficca. They would later add guitarist Richard Lloyd and rename themselves Television, shortly after that replacing Hell with bassist Fred Smith. By 1979 Television had released two studio albums on Elektra without Hell, who had released his own LP BLANK GENERATION on Sire. The Shake label was a New York based operation. In 1980 they released a split EP with both bands being Richard Hell endeavors. One side had two of the six known recordings by The Neon Boys. The other side had two unreleased Voidoids songs. All four tracks made it onto the label sampler SHAKE TO DATE, whose liner notes alluded to a second Richard Hell album they intended to release. That must have meant the flawed DESTINY STREET, eventually released on Red Star in 1982 and which Hell years later rerecorded.

.....At the time I compiled this tape I knew Hell had rerecorded "LOVE COMES IN SPURTS" with the Heartbreakers and again with the Voidoids. Looking over my original notes, I can't see much more in the way of discrete facts such as that and what I've included in the paragraph above. There are some personal observations that might be worth your time.

....."This is one of those songs that keep showing up in rock literature, yet more people have heard of it than heard it. Odd, since there are several recordings of it..."

.....Also, "I picked this track for the compilation mostly for its historical value (it sure wasn't for sound quality) and because I never met a pun I didn't like. Also, this and Patti Smith's PISS FACTORY represent the New York scene that followed Warhol's Factory, with the New York Dolls being the link between the two." All I could add to that is that Wayne County was the most likely link between Warhol and the New York Dolls. The link between the Dolls and the rest was more direct, although if I had to wedge someone between them as an aesthetic exercise... I don't know, Genya Ravan, maybe?

.....In the next post, the puns continue. This time they're across the Atlantic.

V04-T13 Summer Single

.....If you missed track 12, it was in a draft that disappeared in the Blogger freeze a few days ago but recovered after the previous post published. You can find it by going back two posts or just checking the archive on the right.

Volume 4: "THE LITTLE BROWN ONES ARE THORAZINE, GEORGE", track 13

• 03:16 "SUMMER SINGLE" (John Wesley Harding, Steve Barton)
• performed by John Wesley Harding
• original source: CDEP PETT LEVELS Sire/Reprise 9 45331-2 (US) 1993
• and my source: the same

....."Wrong! It's not Elvis Costello. Admittedly, this reminded me of Costello's 'ANOTHER SIDE OF SUMMER', especially the line about 'a tunnel at the end of the light', but the truth is they're both tributes (sort of) to the Beach Boys. Even the EP title is a corruption of PET SOUNDS, Brian Wilson's lynch pin album."

.....When I wrote those notes in 1994, there was another level behind the EP title of which I was unaware. There's a much better story on this page of Harding's website:

wesleystace.com/album/pett-levels/

.....Four tracks left to this volume. See you Monday.

V03-T14 Why Does The Sun Shine?

.....These compilations were made with a greater degree of spontaneity than cassettes I put together for a particular artist or theme. I would usually jot down song titles and playing times on scrap paper 4-6 songs ahead of whatever I was dubbing at the moment so that I wouldn't be surprised by the tape running out. If you add up the playing times for any of these ten volumes you should get roughly 45 minutes for just that reason. Aside from that one concession to planning they were programmed on the fly mostly by instinct.

Volume 3: A KINDER, GENTLER ZERO TOLERANCE, track 14

• 02:54 "WHY DOES THE SUN SHINE?" (Hy Zarat, Lou Singer)
• performed by They Might Be Giants
• original source: CD5 Elektra 66272-2(US)1993
• and my source: the same

.....While recording the 2009 album CD/DVD HERE COMES SCIENCE Disney Sound DOOO456600(US)9/09 the band TMBG was informed that this song from their back catalog was factually incorrect, despite the fact that they covered it from a 1950's educational project. They had even performed it for about twenty years without anyone pointing out that scientific consensus about the composition of the sun has changed in the last half century. If it wasn't for the fact that HERE COMES SCIENCE was intended for children it would not have come under closer scrutiny than most of their releases, as it did. Not wanting to drop a popular song from their repertoire, they coupled it with a new original song, "WHY DOES THE SUN REALLY SHINE?", which was not only correct information but also an object lesson about the greatest strength of science: everything is subject to reexamination and truth is what can be demonstrated, not merely what we are told. The full story behind the remake is here, with links to the history of the original:

http://tmbw.net/wiki/Why_Does_The_Sun_Really_Shine%3F

.....What I wrote about it at the time was that "After listening to this tape a few times I've become painfully aware how this song sticks out like a sore thumb. I just couldn't help it. Aside from a few left over singles from the 1992 APOLLO 19 album, this EP was the band's total output last year: one original song and three covers including this, the title track." Well, that's overstating it. I have since found a two-song vinyl Christmas single from the very end of the year and have learned from their site linked above that a mini-album length cassette of demos for their JOHN HENRY album leaked out and was widely bootlegged until they made it available by podcast. There were a paucity of stray tracks as well, but all in all not much for a normally prolific band. I didn't know how many more of these compilations I would be making and I couldn't imagine not having TMBG in there somewhere. While it didn't fit as I'd expected it would ("TODDLER HIGHWAY" might have worked had I thought of it) I can take some comfort in the knowledge that I gave an implicit endorsement early on for a song that proved to have considerable durability.

V03-T10a Belt You About The Mouth

.....Wow, is it Monday already?

.....When I left off in July I mentioned that the prevalent theme of rebellion so common in the first half of Volume 3 would be shifting to a theme of little things in the latter half. What better way to introduce little things than with an interstitial?

Volume 3: A KINDER, GENTLER ZERO TOLERANCE, track 10a

• 00:31 "CUT #4 BELT IN MOUTH" [no writer credited]
• performed by Richard O'Brien [as Riff-Raff]
• original source: promo-only one-sided 7" on 20th Century Fox Music #DS211(US) ?9/75
• and my source: CD SONGS FROM THE VAULTS Rhino R2 71011B(US)1990

.....The first time I heard this was when I found this rarities disc in the boxed set 4CD THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW 15TH ANNIVERSARY COLLECTION Rhino/ODE R2 71011(US) 1990. This, and a second compilation featuring foreign language and other performances from various international cast albums, were boxed with the previously available soundtrack and Roxy (L.A.) cast albums. The track above originally came from a promotional single sent to radio stations in advance of the September 24, 1975 theatrical release of the "Rocky Horror" film adaption, hence the approximate release date I estimated. A common enough format at the time, the single was a one-sided 7" vinyl record with eight cuts. On the boxed set it's given the self-explanatory title "ROCKY HORROR RADIO COMMERCIAL (BELT YOU ABOUT THE MOUTH)", but I went with the title as it appears on the record. Of the eight promotional clips only this and one other made it onto the CD. If you like, you can check out the details at the following link:

http://www.rockymusic.org/album/radio-spots.php

.....Tomorrow I'll detail the track into which this interstitial leads.

V03-T08 Skeet Surfing

.....The reason for including this track? Honestly, I can't imagine a reason not to.

Volume 3: A KINDER, GENTLER ZERO TOLERANCE, track 8

• 02:58 "SKEET SURFING" (Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Chuck Berry)
• performed by Val Kilmer [with Flo & Eddie]
• original source: EP TOP SECRET! Passport PB 3603 (US) 1984
• and my source: the same

.....Actually, I don't believe Wilson, Love or Berry wrote those lyrics. They were probably written by the Zucker brothers, who wrote the script. Obviously the music is an amalgamation of multiple Beach Boys songs such as "SURFIN' USA", "SHUT DOWN" and "CATCH A WAVE", among others. And the Chuck Berry credit? That's from the Beach Boys' own albums. They borrowed so heavily from Berry while writing their early material that a few songs give him a co-writing credit despite him not having any direct involvement.

.....Oh, and that is actor Val Kilmer singing his own part-- a much younger Val Kilmer, long before playing Batman. In fact, I think this is before playing anything else, his first screen credit. I don't know if he got a lucky break or if he put everything he had into that movie, but it turned out fantastic. That may be hard to believe in a post-"Scream" world where genre parody movies are a dime a dozen and scrape the bottom of the humor barrel. There was a time when genre parody was only approached by people with something to say and the means to say it: "Sleeper", "High Anxiety", "Little Big Man", "Spinal Tap", etc. In "Top Secret" the target is vanity vehicles for rock musicians crossed with wartime espionage films. The result is a gleeful flood of anachronisms, like watching a dozen Hollywood-made period costume epics at once. Medieval knights with chrome armor? Hercules with a wristwatch? "Top Secret" will see you those and raise you a 50's style Elvis character using 60's style surf music to fight 40's style Nazi's who are running a 70's style East Germany.

.....Aiding and abetting on the soundtrack are Flo & Eddie (Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan), former members of the Turtles who went on to perform with Frank Zappa and T. Rex after a record executive told them they were getting fat and therefore couldn't work as musicians anymore. Somebody of their caliber would have been necessary to evoke the vocal harmonies of a Beach Boys record, since the Wilsons and company worked liked dogs rehearsing their voices. Whereas their British Invasion counterparts worshipped Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, Brian used the Four Freshman as his professional yardstick. Volman and Kaylan may have been forced to give up any hopes of being teen idols, but like every good parodist from Spike Jones to Weird Al, their technical abilities were every bit the equal of their targets.

.....Oh, and we're not done with Elvis just yet. Not by a long shot.

V02-T07b Batman

.....I expected people to recognize the tune but not necessarily the band.

Volume 2: "WE'RE ALL GOING TO JAIL FOR THIS, AREN'T WE?", track 7b

• 01:27 BATMAN (Neal Hefti)
• performed by The Who
• original source: EP READY, STEADY, WHO! Reaction 592001 (UK) Nov. 11, 1966
• and my source: CD RARITIES 1966-1972 Vols. 1 and 2 Polydor 847670-2 (UK) 1991

.....Like most bands appearing on the BBC's "Ready, Steady, Go!" television series, The Who recorded their music at the network's studios a few days in advance and then lip-synched to themselves on the show. That was mid-October, 1966. Their management intended to release an EP of the studio recordings to coincide with the airing but ran into legal hassles. It would take less time and mean fewer headaches to actually rerecord everything from scratch and rush release it, which is what they did. It's not surprising that some fans came to assume that the Reaction EP was taken from the show anyway, despite switching out some of the songs for others.

.....On the show they appeared to be playing "BATMAN", "BUCKET T", "I'M A BOY" and "DISGUISES". They also goofed around to Cliff Richard's song "SUMMER HOLIDAY". There are incomplete bits of the instrumental "COBWEBS AND STRANGE". The finale was intended to be a medley of their own "MY GENERATION" in a medley with Elgar's "LAND OF HOPE AND GLORY", but for some reason the Elgar was replaced with "RULE BRITTANIA". The medley was too much of a pain to reproduce and "I'M A BOY" had just been an A-side and was likely still in stores, so those two were dropped and replaced with "BARBARA ANN" (to indulge Keith Moon's surf music fixation) and yet another version of "CIRCLES", probably to undercut the sales of earlier versions being released under different names by an ex-producer they were fighting in court.

.....In 1977 The Jam used "BATMAN" to close side one of their first album IN THE CITY. Considering their retro Mod image in the midst of height-of-punk London, this was clearly a nod to The Who and not to the Batman TV show. When The Jam broke up (really so that Paul Weller could form the even more retro Style Council) in 1982, The Who released what would be their last studio album for the foreseeable future and gave the first of many 'farewell' tours. In 1983 their old label in England released a matching pair of 'rarities' LP's to cash in on the tour. They were actually the non-album singles prior to the ODDS & SODS album, which may all have lapsed out of print at the time but were circulated in large numbers when originally released. The CD I own that combines the two albums was manufactured in 1991 and then imported to this country, which means I probably bought it shortly before making this mix tape. That would explain it being on my mind and at hand. (NOTE: The title of the previous volume of this tape series, "The Pitchfork Approach", was only half joking.) A quick trip to Amazon suggests that finding a copy might get expensive. In 1995 most of the EP (minus "CIRCLES") showed up as bonus tracks on the mono mix CD of the album A QUICK ONE. On the plus side, it includes an unused outtake of the "MY GENERATION"/"LAND OF HOPE AND GLORY" medley. That CD was supposedly rereleased a few years later in stereo but with identical packaging. Caveat Emptor.

.....Did I mention something about "height-of-punk London" just now? Hold that thought until tomorrow.