The Complete Goldwax Singles Vol 3

The third volume of the Goldwax singles is the story of music industry decline. If not exactly riches to rags – Goldwax sales were never that good – it is the tale of an independent label slowly losing its way in an increasingly difficult environment. This was not just about a failure to sign talent, but about changes within the business, and that meant that it became more difficult for regional independents to survive and thrive.

Goldwax peak year was probably 1967. Musically James Carr and Spencer Wiggins were at the top of their game, whilst the Ovations continued to record great records. New talent such as Willie Walker entered the fray and label owners Quinton Claunch and Doc Russell were confident enough to start the country music imprint Timmy to showcase talent as good as Carmol Taylor and Jeanne Newman. However distributor Bell had no real clout in the country market and the new label’s outpit fell on deaf ears, or more likely wasn’t even played to them. Other signs of how tough it was was the licensing out of various singles by ‘Ivory’ Joe Hunter and Willie Walker to Veep and Chess respectively – which Quinton now admits was to tide the label over cash flow shortages.

James Carr - I'm A Fool

In 1968 things were not improving. Although James Carr continued to make records of amazing quality, sales began to decline and, even more worryingly, James became increasingly difficult to entice into the studio and onto the road to promote his records. Inexplicably strong 45s by Wiggins failed to make the charts and it began to look as if the struggle was never going to get easier. Of course all this wasn’t helped by the way that the industry was developing, with a more centralised, major-orientated distribution network taking hold, and the church-based southern soul sounds that had formed the core of Goldwax’s sales beginning to seem old-fashioned, even in the local market. Memphis’ big soul sellers into the 1970s would be the orchestrated masterpieces of Isaac Hayes and the smoother sound of Hi’s Al Green.

The label was effectively over by 1969 and completely over by 1970. The artists had moved on, been sold on or simply left without a label. The final side on Goldwax was James Carr’s ‘Everybody Needs Somebody’ a country soul ballad of exceptional quality, and is typical of how high the quality remains throughout volume three of “The Complete Goldwax singles.” There are errors and side-steps, but until the day the doors swung shut for the final time the sounds of the label were almost always a joy to the ears. This is southern music at its’ very best.

Dean Rudland

Has some overlap with YOU GOT MY MIND MESSED UP, but to me the only guy that ties with Carr as the greatest soul vocalist of all time is O.V. Wright. -Ian!

All 28 songs from Carr’s 1964-1970 Goldwax singles are here, which is enough to make it a fair bid for a good best-of compilation, although it doesn’t have everything he recorded. About half of the songs on this British import are not on the most well-known American CD compilation of Carr’s work, The Essential James Carr, and those tracks are consistent with the level of his other Goldwax recordings, although they don’t include anything on the level of “The Dark End of the Street” or “Pouring Water on a Drowning Man.” This disc is particularly valuable for filling in some of his earliest 1964-1966 sides, which have a very slightly poppier and more up-tempo bent than his most esteemed songs. “That’s What I Want to Know”‘s groove is pretty Motown-ish, for instance, while “I Can’t Make It” and “Only Fools Run Away” have Marvelettes-like chirping in the background. The 1970 funk update of “Row, Row Your Boat” isn’t much to cheer about, though. There are plenty who will argue the point, but this doesn’t quite live up to Carr’s billing as the greatest ’60s deep soul singer; Otis Redding (who Carr resembles in some respects) was better, and others had better and more imaginative material. It’s good, certainly, and recommended to fans of artists like Redding who are looking for similar stuff that doesn’t get played on the radio anymore.

-Richie Unterberger, allmusic.com

DOWNLOAD:
James Carr-THE COMPLETE GOLDWAX SINGLES (2001 compilation)
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320kbps

The main point of this blog was to present to you a playlist, it’s a playlist that I feel is perfect for a reflective Autumn, get this up on Spotify and head down to Wandsworth Park to kick some leaves around. It did me a world of good. Please get the playlist here , and have a listen while you read the descriptions.

1. Todd Rundgren “Can We Still Be Friends?”

I went to see Vanilla Sky years ago with my sister, and despite the rest of the world discarding that movie as one of Tom Cruise’s worst ever films, we were both drawn into it’s tale, not for the sometimes over complex reality warping story, but for the elegant portrayal of human loss and love. This song is kind of off kilter but kicks in at a really poignant part of the film, makes me feel all edgy, but I totally imagine being all wrapped up in the park to this.

2. Kevin Devine “You’re Trailing Yourself”

This goes in totally just for the reason that I’ve had so many walks in the Autumn to this track after a drunken night out when you have made a fool of yourself. It’s so visual, a constant flow of images that snap together like puzzle pieces to make a stylised movie about a guy that just can’t help but say the wrong thing all the time.

3. The Beach Boys “Tears In The Morning”

This 1970 cut from the ‘Sunflower’ album breaks my heart every time I hear it. I know it’s lame that anything with a shuffle beat and a accordion makes me think of Autumn in Paris, but this song full drags you through the Le Bois de Vincennes by your gut. Sickly sweet harmonies parade around a desperate young voice. Classic break up music.

4. Elliott Smith – Any song you like really

It’s undeniable that Elliott Smith is pretty much the master of ‘on-your-own-songs’.

5. Local Natives “Wide Eyes”

Ok, this is a wild card, being a new band and all, but this album opener is a slice of melancholic praise is I have ever heard one. Sitting somewhere within some of the flash in the pan indie heavyweights at the moment (Vampire Weekend, Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses) and something a little more classic and lasting, this track is made for the movie of your life. It won’t outlast the decade, but is a perfect testament that there is some great music being put together out there.

6. Red House Painters “Grace Cathedral Park”

The ever-so-slow-and-openly-warming sound of Red House Painters is never one that fails to make me get totally choked up. A band that has gone on to influence countless literal miserablists (Mike Kinsella anyone?), with their open guitar tunings and one droning song styles (not a bad thing!), they open up their best box of tricks with this track that provides a fantastic opportunity to reflect on the season’s beginning.

7. Gene “London Can You Wait”

Heading back to my 90’s musical discovery days. Back when I begged my mum everyday for an Adidas jacket al a Damon Alban, my sister passed me “To See The Lights”. I guess this was way before I really understood the importance of The Smiths and Moz, and it must have filled that gap for me that exists in most boys. Also the guitar tone is really something, sounds like honey. A lament for a rainy leafy London.

8. Owen “I Woke Up Today”

I’m getting old. I have got grey spots in my beard and I’m getting a great Irish widow’s peak. This track from aforementioned Mike Kinsella (AKA Owen) is a homage to feeling that bit weather worn. The cascading acoustic guitar lines fit the falling leaves just right. I listen to this song at least once a week as it reminds me that I’m not the only one feeling so old these days.

9. Van Morrison “Cold Wind In August”

I love all those stories that you hear about Van Morrison. You know those ones about him storming off stages, being rude to people in the front row, banning drinking at his shows. They make this guy seem like such a mockery of himself that it’s often easy to forget that he is responsible for so many great songs. But this B-side to “Moondance” is a sickly smooth slow stomper of a track with those ever present New York brass sections and vocal quartet so note perfect they sound like a full choir. It may be a month too early, but it sums that feeling that colder times are just right round the corner. In my opinion, I hope he keeps making a fool of himself, and keeps that voice going for many years.

10. James Carr “The Dark End Of The Street”

Weddings. They are great, especially ones where you drink too much Guinness and slouch in a chair while the slow dances kick off. This song reminds me of those kinds of weddings for some reason. The Percy Sledge version has one of the best uses of a Hammond organ you will ever hear, it evokes so many memories for me, especially that ‘They’re gonna find us!’ bit. If I ever got married in the Autumn this would be the track I’d want to have a first dance to. His almost nasal vocal quality opens up a plethora of sentimental warmth that you can’t help but get sucked into the tale of hidden yet celebrated love. Man, I’m getting all mushy. A great song, and one that you need to have in your daily playlist.

11. Percy Sledge “A Whiter Shade of Pale”

Talking of the old PS and his ever present use of Hammond organs, my final track for the playlist is his version of Procol Harum’s legally bruised classic. Almost revamped into a solemn club version, this track still manages to control your insides with what is possibly one of the best opening lines ever in a song; “We skipped the light fandango, turning cartwheels across the floor, I was feeling kinda sea sick”. Timeless, refined and instantly gratifying, this version blows away the original. Haunting and yet subtly inviting.

Ok, so that was my Autumn walk playlist, I hope you enjoyed it!

PIXIES – Planet of Sound / Build High (4AD 1008 1991)
They’re touring this autumn. £30+ a pop for tickets to see them run through all the old hits yet again. Thanks, but no thanks, especially since Kim Deal has pretty much nixed any hopes of an album of new material. Trompe Le Monde got a fairly lukewarm reception when it came out, but I thought it was much more consistent than Bossanova. It was trailed as the Pixies metal album when it came out, which may have put a lot of people off since metal was about as fashionable as Daniel O’Donnell at the time. There is definitely a metal aspect to the glorious surf-thrash of “Planet of Sound”. It certainly proved that they’d lost none of their ferocity.

AFRIKA BAMBAATAA – Planet Rock / instrumental (Tommy Boy 823 1982)
It’s probably patronising and inaccurate to say that this was the record that introduced black America to Kraftwerk, but it was definitely instrumental in kick-starting the whole electro scene where rap and hip hop cross-fed with European electronic music. The tune sounds a little dated now, but that’s due more to the rapping (which, in fairness, was an art form in its infancy) than the beats or the tune.

BJÖRK & DAVID ARNOLD – Play Dead / instrumental (Island 573 1993)
David Arnold’s kind of accepted now as the natural successor to John Barry, but I must admit I didn’t have a clue who he was when this came out. Who’s this bloke who’s uppity enough to demand a co-credit on a Björk tune? I thought. It was part of the soundtrack of a fairly ropey Brit-flick called The Young Americans, and sounds like a Bond theme.

LONNIE JOHNSON – Playing with the Strings / Stompin’ ‘em Along Slow (Okeh 8558 1928)
A lot of Lonnie Johnson’s vocal blues records of the twenties and thirties were pretty generic and unimaginative. I’ve always got the impression that he just wasn’t that interested in country blues. He was much better when he duetted with Victoria Spivey. Best of all, though, were the instrumental guitar records he made solo and with Eddie Lang. “Playing with the Strings” is one of my favourites of his – the dexterity and speed of the finger-work is astonishing.

THE MONKEES – Pleasant Valley Sunday / Words (Colgems 1007 1967)
How does a self-confessed Beatle-phobe square that up with a love of what was essentially a manufactured band put together for a TV show in a blatant attempt at recreating Beatlemania? I dunno – maybe they just had better tunes. Maybe it was Nesmith’s woolly hat. You can’t deny that “Pleasant Valley Sunday” is a top pop tune, and it’s got a satirical edge to it that the Beatles could never match. Their idea of satire was whining about how much tax they had to pay.

MARVELETTES – Please Mr Postman / So Long Baby (Tamla 54046 1961)
Quiz question. What film (90s or early 2000s) had a scene where the hero (I think) is going into a building, and a trio of neighbourhood girls break into this song? There’s no prizes, it’s just something that has been bugging me. A classic Motown pure pop song. I love the bit where Gladys Horton breaks into just about the worst Jamaican accent you’ve ever heard!

JAMES BROWN – Please Please Please / Why Do You Do Me? (Federal 12258 1956)
What a way to begin a five decade recording career. Even as a callow 23 year old making his recording debut, the melodrama and the showmanship were already there, fully formed. A soul masterpiece.

PINK FLOYD – Point Me at the Sky / Careful With That Axe Eugene (Columbia 8511 1968)
Lost in the cracks of history between the Barrett era and the cosmic space-rock Floydian era were a couple of singles that are largely forgotten. “It Would Be So Nice” perhaps deservedly so, but “Point Me at the Sky” is an awesome song. It was written by Gilmour and Waters, but is very much in the Barrett vein. Perhaps that’s why it’s been effectively disowned by both authors. As far as I know, it’s not (officially) available on any CD. It’s a psych-pop nugget with a gushing trip of a chorus that concerns (in the first part) the adventures of an aviator called Henry McLean and (in the second part) the nightmare of over-population. The lyrics may be a little self-consciously Barrett-like with a touch of trademark Waters misanthropy, but they’re quite witty “And if you survive till two thousand and five / I hope you’re exceedingly thin / For if you are stout you will have to breathe out / While the people around you breathe in“.

JUNIOR MURVIN – Police and Thieves / version (Island 6316 1976)
There were loads of tunes that used the same rhythm track as “Police and Thieves”. Jah Lion’s “Soldier and Police War” is a personal favourite, but the original is still the best. I’ve always found it curious that so many great reggae singers sang falsetto. As well as Murvin, there was also the fantastic Cedric Myton of the Congos. It’s weird how it works with reggae, but sounds ridiculous with rock.

T POWER – Police State / Prospect For Democracy / Radio Start Point (Fade at Will) / Synthesis (Sound of the Underground TPOW001 1995)
Breaking my own rules of inclusion, “Police State” was virtually an album with the four tracks running to nearly 40 minutes. The lead track (all 14 minutes of it) used samples of George Lucas’s first ever film THX 1138 to create a lush but dystopian epic of drum and bass as widescreen art. One of the things that felt so liberating about jungle in the mid nineties is that it could incorporate everything from ragga to minimalism to Kosmische Musik.

ORANGE JUICE – Poor Old Soul / part 2 (Postcard 813 1981)
Before Polydor polished them up and sucked much of the charm out of them, Orange Juice represented everything that was good about indie pop. This was music that was catchy, witty and exciting. It wasn’t loaded with angst or pretension, it was simply joyous and danceable.

SLAM – Positive Education / Intensities In-Ten-Cities (Soma 8 1993)
Orde Meikle and Stuart McMillan’s signature tune is one of those rare dance tracks that sounds as contemporary in 2009 as it did in 1993. Straddling the house / techno divide, it has an irresistible drive to it that sounds as fresh today as when it was minted.

BOB DYLAN – Positively Fourth Street / From a Buick Six (Columbia 43389 1965)
I don’t think anyone has ever been able to do spite in quite the same class as Dylan. From “Ballad of a Thin Man” to “Idiot Wind”, when he gets the hump with someone the onslaught is relentless. The pay-off verse is priceless: “I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes / Then you’d know what a drag it is to see you“

JAMES CARR – Pouring Water On a Drowning Man / Forgetting You (Goldwax 311 1966)
James Carr, in my mind the greatest southern soul singer of them all, was plagued by mental health issues throughout his life. Perhaps that’s why the hurt came through in his ballads so strongly. It seemed totally real. “Pouring Water on a Drowning Man” – never has a title so aptly summed up the mood of a song.

BERTHA ‘CHIPPIE’ HILL – Pratt City Blues / Pleadin’ for the Blues (Okeh 8420 1926)
I’m a huge fan of Dashiell Hammett – in particular his early Continental Op stories set in the dark days of prohibition era America. When I first heard “Pratt City Blues” on Paul Oliver’s groundbreaking The Story of the Blues double album, it immediately evoked the shady world of speakeasies, moonshine and corruption. Chippie Hill isn’t one of the better known blues singers of the twenties, but in my mind she was one of the best at portraying the down at heel and out of luck.

More soon

I tried to find some information about Johnny Cool And The Counts but my search came up null and void. I do know that it was released on the Custom Label but other than that I got nothing. I happened to come across Johnny Cool And The Counts from a now sadly defunct soul music blog. This song is something that is a bit different from other soul songs, it’s a lot more up tempo hence the word bounce in the songs title. I love the quickness of this song and the drums are incredible. It’s a fun listen for sure. I’ll post the other equally amazing song I have by Johnny Cool And The Counts in another post. For now just enjoy this one.
Johnny Cool And The Counts – Love Bounce(No Longer Available)

Swamp Dogg (Jerry Williams, Jr.) is one of the most eccentric characters in the Soul/R&B realm. He says whats on his mind and doesn’t care. He started out as a producer, engineer, and occasional songwriter with Atlantic in the ’60s. He cut a few songs under the name Little Jerry Williams before transforming into the Great Swamp Dogg. He released his first album under his new moniker called Total Destruction to Your Mind which featured him in his underwear on the album cover. He also has another cover that was voted worst album cover for Rat On! Needless to say that the Dogg is eccentric. I read an interview where he explained that he changed to Swamp Dogg was because “Whatever I wanted to sing about I could do it as a dog since you expect a dog to do just about anything… and you’re forgiven afterwards (laughs).” Don’t let all the eccentricities fool you though, Swamp Dogg delivers great songs. Sometimes it’s political, sometimes it’s racial, sometimes it’s about a war veteran hooked on drugs.
Swamp Dogg – Sam Stone(No Longer Available)

Fun Facts about this song. It was a song in the movie Grindhouse Presents: Death Proof directed by Quinten Tarantino. It’s a revised cover The Shirelles “Baby It’s You. The Smith didn’t really have many singles and were mostly a cover band doing rock and R&B songs in the late 60′s. The soulful female singer is Gayle McCormick, who had some little solo hits in 1971 after the Break up of the band. Baby It’s you was a Burt Bacharach composed song, what didn’t that man do? This song has been covered by The Beatles as well. Enjoy!
Smith – Baby It’s You(No Longer Available)

Via: fubiz

Architect James Clar and his installations. With design off luminous objects and development has off environments representing the passage off the 2D with the 3D. With manner for him off mixing technology to Article supplements Gallery available in the continuation.

Sorry the site is in French!

- The Aficionado

NOMEANSNO – Dad / Revenge (Alternative Tentacles 60 1988)
“Dad” was remade by the band’s alter-egos the Hanson Brothers (with different words) as “Brad” (Wrong 4 1992). Both concern monstrous family members. “Dad” is the violent, sexually abusive, domineering patriarch whilst “Brad” is the über-annoying little brother who steals and squeals and generally causes no end of trouble. Both have the same punk-rock arrangement, but the protagonist on “Dad” sounds desperate, while on “Brad” he’s merely extremely exasperated. There is a difference. Unsurprisingly, it’s the Hansons I listen to most often. The Nomeansno original is too raw and disturbing.

GANG OF FOUR – Damaged Goods / Love Like Anthrax / Armalite Rifle (Fast Product 5 1978)
A brilliant three-tracker from Leeds University’s most famous Marxist alumni. Human being as consumer object, love as disease, weapons as freely traded commodities. Everything wrong with the world is pretty much encapsulated in this trio of brilliant, spiky post-punk tunes.

SOPHIE B HAWKINS – Damn, I Wish I Was Your Lover / Don’t Stop Swaying (Columbia 657735 1992)
Unrequited love can foster many reactions. The one most usually observed in pop is the self-pitying adolescent mope (hi Mozzer). Ms Hawkins, though, is just really really frustrated. This is one of those worm-like songs that gets into your head and stays there. At least it does in my case. Great use of Bonzo Bonham’s drumming on “Kashmir” too, before the sample became as hackneyed as that James Brown one from “Funky Drummer”.

SLY & THE FAMILY STONE – Dance to the Music / Let Me Hear It From You (Epic 10256 1967)
The Family Stone’s breakthrough hit, and the first really successful melding of funk and rock. “Dance to the Music” is a great party track, but also pointed the way for many to follow from the P-Funksters to the Whitfield-era Temptations and rock groups like Blood, Sweat and Tears and Rare Earth.

MARTHA & THE VANDELLAS – Dancing in the Street / There He Is (Gordy 7033 1964)
According to Mojo Magazine, the greatest of all Motown 45s. Somehow an upbeat party record caught the mood, and became an anthem for sixties radicalism – from the Detroit Riots to the Paris uprising to the Prague Spring.

ABBA – Dancing Queen / That’s Me (Epic 4499 1976)
What wedding disco or office party would be complete without it? Essentially, any social function that mixes a disparate group of people of all generations with little in common, and needs something to give the group a little cohesion usually wheels this one on. If people are drunk enough, it’ll always work. Disco-pop about nothing other than the joy of dancing. What’s not to like?

JAMES CARR – The Dark End of the Street / Lovable Girl (Goldwax 317 1967)
If soul is the expression of inner pain, then James Carr was the finest soul singer ever. He battled with severe depression all his life, and without wishing to sound glib, you can hear it in his songs. “The Dark End of the Street” is actually about two adulterous lovers trying to keep their affair a secret, but in Carr’s hands that seems a far more heartbreaking situation than the poor sods that they are cuckolding are in. Is there a genre called soul-noir? If there isn’t, then I’ll just have to invent it and give this record pride of place.

POGUES – The Dark Streets of London / And the Band Played Waltzin’ Matilda (Stiff 207 1984)
Drunken rabble rousing of the highest order. The flip side is a spirited, but respectful reading of Eric Bogle’s epic Great War tale of an ANZAC veteran of the Gallipoli campaign. June Tabor’s spooky and solemn acapella version is probably the best known, but Shane MacGowan gives the protagonist an outraged anger as opposed to Tabor’s weary resignation.

STEELY DAN – Deacon Blues / Home at Last (ABC 12355 1978)
By the time Becker and Fagen made Aja, they’d ironed out all the rough spots leaving a glistening sheen of smooth jazz-pop. By rights, that should be truly awful, but “Deacon Blues” has a sophisticated charm that makes you fantasize about owning an opened top Beamer and your own cocktail bar. At least for five or six minutes.

LOU RAWLS – Dead End Street / Yes It Hurts Doesn’t It (Capitol 5869 1967)
Lou Rawls had a gorgeous baritone voice, but for much of his career, he was a singer of standards in the Sammy Davis Jr / Billy Eckstine mould. “Dead End Street” was an all-too rare excursion into darker, more soulful terrtory. Essentially, it’s a two part song – the opening minute and a half is a monologue about growing up on the cold and mean streets of Chicago, before the song proper gets underway. It’s a gripping tale of deprivation and escape. Hey, another for my soul-noir category!

JOY DIVISION – Dead Souls / Atmosphere (Sordide Sentimentale 2 1980)
Any other band with two songs this good would have issued them as singles or used them as showpiece album tracks. Joy Division licensed them to a French arthouse label who issued them under the title Licht und Blindheit in a limited run of 1578 copies. “Atmosphere” surfaced later in the year on a twelve inch, and “Dead Souls” in 1981 as part of the Still odds ‘n’ sods compilation. With its title taken from Gogol, “Dead Souls” is a rumination on internal conflicts where the dead seem to be summoning Curtis to join them. Seriously spooky. In its initial incarnation on a Piccadilly Radio session, “Atmosphere” had the equally spooky couplet “It may happen soon – then maybe you’d care” which was changed to “abandoned too soon – set down with due care” on the final version. Discuss.

PUBLIC IMAGE LTD – Death Disco / No Birds Do Sing (Virgin 274 1979)
Seriously brutal dub topped with Lydon’s wailing phantom. Can you imagine something this confrontational and extreme making the top ten today? It’s a pity that the Sex Pistols still get all the attention. They were a minor footnote compared to PIL if you use an artistic yardstick as opposed to a cultural one.

DAVE DAVIES – Death of a Clown / Love Me Till the Sun Shines (Pye 17356 1967)
Ray’s little brother proved he had the chops with this solo hit. The dark side of Swingin’ London.

WATERBOYS – December / Three Day Man (Ensign 506 1983)
Mike Scott had already begun to move towards self-consciously epic territory in his previous bands Another Pretty Face and Funhouse, but it was with the Waterboys he went the whole hog. Big subjects required big music, something grandly self-proclaimed on his second album. “December” is a cracking song, although I haven’t really got a clue what it’s about. But it does sound very important – Jesus gets a name check, so it must be.

PRETTY THINGS – Deflecting Grey / Mr Evasion (Columbia 8300 1967)
UK psychedelia is so polite. There’s no revolutionary calls to arms, or garage band punk in the ouevre. Or very little – most concerns itself with oddball characters, gentle satire and Edwardian children’s fiction. “Deflecting Grey” is more like the gritty US psyche punk of the likes of the Count Five or even the Red Krayola. But with far better musicianship. It rocks much harder than anything else to come out of the country before the Broughtons and the Deviants injected a bit of proto-punk zip.

HOUSE OF LOVE – Destroy the Heart / Blind / Mr Jo (Creation 57 1988)
The last of the House of Love’s four great Creation singles, “Destroy the Heart” fades in at a point where you feel you’ve just walked in and missed part of it, and precedes to zip along with no let up for two and a half minutes. Brilliant and exciting – not words that would be easily applied to UK indie these days.

SKIP JAMES – Devil Got My Woman / Cypress Grove Blues (Paramount 13088 1931)
Skip James was both an amazing guitarist and brilliant songwriter, but he had a lousy sense of timing. He arrived on the scene just as the record industry was going into meltdown, so his recorded output was small, and sold zilch. Interest was revived by a couple of albums he made for Vanguard in the sixties. Good as they were, they don’t really compare with his classic 1931 material.

CLOVERS – Devil or Angel / Hey Doll Baby (Atlantic 1083 1956)
“Devil or Angel” was one of the last classic Clovers records before Atlantic virtually destroyed the group by covering their tunes in orchestral and choral schmaltz in a misguided attempt to gain crossover appeal. None of that here, thankfully – just a pure, heartstring-yanking doowop ballad where he can’t decide whether she’s good or evil before having to admit that it makes no difference, ’cause he’s smitten anyway.

More soon

Cat Power – Dark End of the Street (James Carr)
Cat Power – Fortunate Son (Creedence Clearwater Revival)

Have a good week!  Merry Christmas.

This past semester I took a class at the University of Wisconsin called “Black Music and Modern American Culture”. We covered black American music from James Carr, Sam Cooke and the sounds of the early 60′s all the way to Wu-Tang, Outkast, Scarface, and the emergence of new-age hip-hop. Not only did the class make me feel smarter and cooler than basically everyone else, but I regained a deep appreciation for the soul, gospel, and blues roots of black music in the 1960s. Gone were three-hour Sufjan Stevens and Rogue Wave listening sessions. In came hours and hours of blues, from Bill Withers to Otis Redding to Stax Records to Curtis Mayfield. Not only was my appreciation for the basis of Rock ‘n Roll strengthened, but my musical horizons were expanded to artists I had previously found trite or uninteresting, which leads me to the purpose of this post…

I never really understood the appeal of Cat Power until my professor played me “Dark End of the Street” by James Carr. The raw emotion Carr evokes and the simplicity of it all made me fall in love with Cat Power, as I saw plenty of parallels between her work and that of the aforementioned ‘kings of blues’ of the 60′s. Now, everyone’s favorite gorgeous indie-soul crooner Chan Marshall is back with a collection of covers that just barely missed the cut on Jukebox, her cover album released in January of this year. While I unfairly paid little attention to Jukebox (for reasons I just stated), the Dark End of the Street EP, due out tomorrow, was exactly what the doctor ordered. A smoky, off-tempo, re-constructive take on a CCR classic (“Fortunate Son”)? Check. A soulful, stirring, and gravelly homage to James Carr and early 60′s soul (“Dark End of the Street”)? Check. A remake of an absolutely solid gold gospel/soul/blues hit from the king of gospel/soul/blues Otis Redding (“I’ve Been Loving You too Long (to Stop Now)”)? Check.

Pitchfork gave the new EP a 3.8, which is not only absolute and complete bullshit, but is just another example of P-Fork’s inability to take their heads out of their own asses and just reaffirms my concept that their writers share a certain “smug-ness” with inhabitants of San Francisco. For them not to be able to appreciate the beauty of “Fortunate Son” and “Dark End of the Street”, to me, is appalling. I recommend they take Afro-Am 156 at Wisconsin, then issue a letter of apology. Yes, this is how strongly i feel. Listen.

MP3: Cat Power – “Fortunate Son (Creedence Clearwater Revival)”
MP3: Cat Power – “Dark End of the Street (James Carr)”

Grab a copy of the album from Matador tomorrow.

Love,
Zack

Given that, on stage at least, she prefers to hide behind her own hair rather than expose herself to her audience, you wonder if it’s because she takes the word ‘cover’ literally; certainly she effortlessly inhabits a wide spectrum of voices in the six diverse songs here.

Cat Power

Few can match James Carr’s gut-aching version of the Dan Penn title track; wisely, Power changes direction entirely by rewiring the song in elegiac notes before swinging into a richly burnished blues-folk take on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Fortunate Son.

The Pogues’s Ye Auld Triangle is delivered as a tender sliver of bruised, smoked soul, while a cover of I’ve Been Loving You Too Long is easily as expressive as the Otis Redding original.

With a faithful version of Sandy Denny’s classic Who Knows Where The Time Goes and a strung-out bluesy soul take on Aretha Franklin’s It Ain’t Fair, this is an EP that makes the humble cover version feel quietly essential.

This mix is not a representative overview of ’60s soul. Some essential artists are not represented here: Sam Cooke, James Brown, Temptations, Four Tops, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield (well, he is very much present on Major Lance’s deceptively titled track. And the Five Stairsteps, with a song released four years before their famous Ooh Ooh Child, evidently have heard a Curtis song or two before). There are some well-known tracks on here – hopefully not too obvious, though – complementing some less famous tracks. Perhaps some songs will provide surprises. Dionne Warwick takes time out from bacharaching to provide a nearly camp girl-band type song. Johnny Adams gives Release Me, most famous in its Engelbert Humperdinck rancid cheese version, the soul treatment, showing that this is in fact a great song.

Philly soul exponent Bunny Sigler found some fame in the 1970s; the closer on this set was his isolated hit (reaching #22 in the Billboard charts) of the 1960s. DeeDee Sharp, another successful Philly singer, represented here (with a b-side track), even married the co-doyen of the city’s famous sound, Kenny Gamble. Some songs set the scene for the sound of ’70s soul, perhaps none more so than the Delfonics La La Means I Love You, which created a lush sound which would be widely copied by the likes of the Chi-Lites, Stylistics et al. And going back to the essential sound of ’60s soul, check out Peggy Scott on the cover with Jojo Benson: you’d not think that she could belt out a song as she does here. The wonderful Carla Thomas and Otis follow them: by comparison with Peggy & Jojo, those two are pictures of restraint.

There are some fascinating stories behind many of the artists represented here. The most tragic is that of the Bar-Kays, Stax session musicians, who were decimated in the plane crash that also killed Otis Redding, with whom they were touring. And who’d think that the Soul Survivors, another Philly band with a Kenny Gamble connection, were all white?

And, since you ask, my favourites of this mix? Today, it’s Tighten Up and Loveland.

TRACKLISTING
1. Archie Bell & the Drells - Tighten Up (1968)
2. Major Lance – Monkey Time (1963)
3. Soul Survivors - Expressway To Your Heart (1967)
4. Aretha Franklin - Since You’ve Been Gone (1968)
5. Peggy Scott & Jojo Benson - Lovers’ Holiday (1969)
6. Otis Redding & Carla Thomas - Bring It On Home To Me (1967)
7. James Carr – Dark End Of The Street (1967)
8. Jerry Butler - I Stand Accused (1964)
9. Johnny Adams – Release Me (1969)
10. Irma Thomas – I Wish Someone Would Care (1964)
11. Brenda Holloway – Operator (1965)
12. Dionne Warwick – Get Rid Of Him (1964)
13. The Tams - Hey Girl Don’t Bother Me (1964)
14. Stevie Wonder - Until You Come Back To Me (1964)
15. Dee Dee Sharp – There Ain’t Nothing That I Wouldn’t Do (1965)
16. Martha Reeves & The Vandellas - Jimmy Mack (1967)
17. Jr Walker & The All Stars – What Does It Take (To Win Your Love) (1969)
18. Charles Wright & The Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band - Love Land (1969)
19. David Ruffin – My Whole World Ended (The Moment You Left Me) (1969)
20. Robert Knight - Love On A Mountain Top (1968)
21. The Delfonics - La La Means I Love You (1968)
22. The Five Stairsteps – Don’t Waste Your Time (1966)
23. O.C. Smith – Son of Hickory Holler’s Tramp (1968)
24. Sonny Charles & the Checkmates - Black Pearl (1969)
25. The Marvelettes – Don’t Mess With Bill (1966)
26. Robert Parker – Barefootin’ (1966)
27. The Bar-Kays – Soul Finger (1967)
28. Bunny Sigler – Let The Good Times Roll (1967)

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Not being able to sing beyond a weak sub-Ray Davies whine wobbingly icing a layered harmony, I have an elastic fascination for those who can. Like the numbers on the bathroom scales, the magnitude of those morning shakes and the proportion of nights whose memory is squirreled away into deep storage by the kindly internal archivist who looks after my self-regard, it’s growing with age. I’ve been a while getting here through those areas of a record collection tied more to a minimally cool cover image and the right array of studio technology, but will now tolerate (gripe about, roll my eyes at, mentally strip of Nashville or rototoms) the most unsinkable studio turds if a singer I love was called in somewhere along the way to hold their nose and spray the vocal air freshener.

This obsession is specifically directed at American singers, and more particularly at those from southern states who wrap themselves in the dusty vinylwear of old country, blues and soul records. There’s something about the way the language can be wrangled into rhyme and melody in a Deep South accent that makes for repeated listening to that same 20 seconds where the voice does that, whatever that might be.

So, in a bid to pogostick away from the drab insistence of other people’s texts, this is the first in a series of somethings about some moments from some voices I sometimes love. Here seems as good a point as any to note that this is no way intended as anything like the blinding scholarship of blogs such as this one, and this (is it only soul collectors who need to gather whatever wool still clings to the barbed wire of collective memory when the wind no longer blows wherever Johnny Dynamites and Denise Keebles graze?). It’s just an excuse to wander through a tiny bit of what makes me need some of my records.

So.

Exhibit one, crying in the night, is James Carr: Memphis-born and a manic depressive, condemned to a typically downhill life by sharp business practices and a malfunctioning welfare system, but possessed of? (no, by) a voice that could break artichoke hearts on an upscale pizza. Which is as well, because the material is often thin of crust and a little heavy on the cheese. Take You Got my Mind Messed Up (clearly modelled on That’s How Strong My Love Is, a ballad best, if not best-known, in the Otis Redding version). It’s a two-line chorus, some sketchy verses and a few great horn hooks, held together by the velcro scratchiness of that extraordinary voice, and a wonderful record. For now though, it’s not my favoured James Carr fix.

Pathos is, of course, as soul as soul can be; which is perhaps why current favourite These Ain’t Raindrops does what it does. It’s not a great song, suffers from some back-of-a-Muscle-Shoals-bus lyrics and the arrangement is not much more than likably functional, but I love it for the yelping whipped-dog pleading, pleading. It’s fairly easy to slip into a frame of mind where

If you tell me you love me, everything will be ok

can taste like distilled experience. And the delivery is archetypal southern soul – highly stylised, but wringing everything out of an emotional magic sponge of a song, without the vinegary melismatic horrors we’re daily conditioned to think of as singing.

Here it is:

As a result, I’ve worked through Neil Young’s Only Love Can Break Your Heart; Ben Folds’ Landed; The Smith’s Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want, No Promise Have I Made by Husker Du (seriously cranking the red rawness of Hart and Mould’s hearts here) and so forth.

I’ve slightly fallen out of love with pop music in recent times, not really having many of these moments and not really needing cheering up or soothing very often. It’s a tragedy in many ways, and I can’t help thinking I’ve missed out on much. Not the new bands: those I’ll catch up to if I have the inclination. But those old ones, that I keep discovering and adopting as old friends. There was a time, for instance, before Kristin Hersh meant anything to me, before Cat Stevens had tugged my heartstrings with his guitar strings. Gosh, even before Nick Cave. I have much more to grasp at once I’ve exited the post New Year’s cashflow slump; I’m going to update me some Ben Folds based on Nick Hornby’s 31 Songs. Yes I’m going to investigate the blog-beloved Burial, but I’ll also probably listen finally to those Elvis Costello records I bought, and probably thief as many Tom Waits albums as I can off of various willing (or not) accomplices.

Because, while I can thing of a hundred and one things more important in life than pop music, occasionally I like to listen to a song, sometimes I don’t care what, sometimes I do, sometimes it just needs to make a change from my usual pattern of just listening as background music. Sometimes it needs to be Landed.

It’s the only Ben Folds song I know, which I didn’t know I knew, until I knew it. If you follow. It’s a big piano-based number from the little frog-looking fellow, and for me it’s strangely reminiscent of so many experiences that I’ve never had, but understand entirely. Ben Folds shows extraordinary male empathy here, the resignation and acceptance of failure sure to ring a bell with most boys of my age. Somehow I associate Folds with Dave Eggers in my mind, but I’m not sure why.

Occasionally, I brutalise myself and listen to James Carr. This man is simultaneously the most joyous and the most painful listening experience one can hope to have. Listening to the legendary To Love Somebody is like leaping with exaltation while concurrently spitting with bitterness and injured pride.

I go through phases with these things: for a while, even Mr Brightside would slay me. I wonder if it’s all to do with these mysterious vicarious experiences that popstars, film stars, cartoon characters seem to have. I seem to have some sort of cosmic balance where I get to be at least a little happy and a million teenagers are required to strop around in stripy hoodies listening to Jimmy Eat World. So I can live without your experiences, thanks, and just as I type Frankie Valli has entered stage left with Walk Like A Man, and what do you know, the journey is complete. I don’t need to be emo, my computer plays wonderous doo-wop at me.

Who says pop songs ain’t cathartic?

Ben Folds – Landed

James Carr – To Love Somebody