SOUNDS G-M SOUNDS G-M
Blam! Can't miss the beat. It starts here, with the following list and lowdown on music creatures who count. Half a dozen different schools of cool are represented in the all-purpose grooves guide called Who's Cool In Music.
G-M
TINY GRIMES * The greatest unknown amplified guitar in the world. T.G. started in the late Thirties with jive group The Three Cats And A Fiddle, laid down some heavy sides with Bird, crossed over to R&B aided by his kilted Rocking Highlanders (featured vocalist: Screamin' Jay Hawkins), and returned to jazz in his last years before a surfeit of reefer and Southern Comfort caught up with him. An American classic; Tiny Grimes & His Rocking Highlanders, various sets on Oldie Blues, Krazy Kat, Prestige, etc. D.B.
GIRL GROUPS * Wondering where
Johnny had gone consumed lots of young gals' time between '58
and '64. Back then, packs of Jelly Beans, Dixie Cups, Cookies,
and Raindrops bared their hearts over the airwaves. Today their
hairdos survive in Debbie Harry and the Go Go's, and Rita Coolidge
raids their canon for songs. Don't hang up.
Growing Up Too Fast; Best of the Ronettes; Best of the Crystals.
THE GUESS WHO * These Canadians were one of those faceless hitmaker bands like Jay & the Americans, Three Dog Night or Creedence-all of them might be sitting across from you on the bus and you'd never know it. Burton Cummings was their driving force, and his quirkiness, like his voice, was a wonder to behold during the band's Seventies heyday. He followed hostility ("American Woman") with pity for nine-to-fivers ("Bus Rider"), hippie Communism ('Share The Land"), droll gun-control ("Rain Dance"), and such innocently Out There fare as "Glamour Boy" (an anti-Bowie ballad) and "Life In The Bloodstream" (achingly beaut doowop from the POV of a contraceptive pill!). -Art Fein
BUTCH HANCOCK * Professionally, this Texan folkie writes (good) songs for Joe Ely. On off hours, he produces the most deranged Dylan plagiarism since P. F. Sloan: "Mario y Maria (Cryin' Statues/Spiffin' Images)," "Long Road to Asia Minor." Love minus zero.
WYNONIE HARRIS * How many of the Byrned-out globetrotters pushing musical multiculturalism have spent a scant five minutes in their own backyard digging Omaha's coarse boogie king? When Mr. Blues came to town (late Forties), America jumped back and got rhythm. "Everything about Wynonie was strong," recalled one theater manager of the man behind "Sittin' On It All The Time" and the torrid "Christina," "...strong language, loud clothes, potent whiskey, and a set of vocal chords seemingly made of steel. Hard stuff: WH LP's on Route 66, Charly T.H.
BUDDY HOLLY * Did not need 20-20 vision to see he was pioneering a unique version of rock cool: bow tie and horn-rims. Rave on.
HOWLIN' WOLF * There are others, but his Fifties and Sixties blues were best. "I asked for water," sings the original Back Door Man, "she gave me gasoline..."
Chester Burnett AKA Howlin' Wolf, Chess box set. Watch the Wolf on DVD: The American Folk Blues Festival, 1962-1966, Volume 2, The Howlin' Wolf Story: The Secret History Of Rock & Roll.
HYPER-SOUL * A kind of musical grand-theft auto with multiple counts of speeding. Usually, it's a Vandellas rip ('Heat Wave'), over-revved and driven to exhaustion. Prime: the Butlers' breathless "She Tried to Kiss Me," Tina Britt's 'The Real Thing' (both reissued as Lost-Nite singles). The down-tempo variety pirates ballad structure, but shoves it wondrously out of Shape with scorching vocal/instro perfs. Bonnie & Clyde's 'I Want A Boyfriend (Girlfriend)" is 2:04 of raw power (InSound 45). So sharp.
CHRIS ISAAK * Only the lonely know the way he feels tonight. A terminally lovesick rocker who makes beauty from bruises and surfs the Sea of Heartbreak in Orb's wetsuit ("Wicked Game," "Forever Young").-Tim Hathaway
Heart Shaped World, Silvertone (Reprise).
WANDA JACKSON * Her voice, a wild-fluttering thing of sexy subtleties and sudden harshnesses, feral feline purrings and raving banshee shrieking, was a vulgar wonder to hear"-Nick Tosches, Unsung Heroes of Rock n'Roll. Dig 'Let's Have A Party" and "Fujiyama Mama" from WJ: Rockin'in the Country (Rhino cd).
ETTA JAMES * The real Lady Soul takes no crap ("Tell Mama," "The Pushover"). Her ballads rattle walls ("All I Could Do Was Cry ... .. I'd Rather Go Blind"). In "The Pickup," she's accosted by a tenor sax and gives in, after a juicy sax break, with "All right, but I have to be home by two."
JAN & DEAN * Their blatant faddism beat PoMo's eclecticism by a quarter century. Bright, busy faux Beach Boys tracks that skipped effortlessly from Surf to Drag to "Folk City," from leftover Batman camp to right-wing protest ("Universal Coward"). Jap imports of original lps are dear, but where else to cop "Surfin' Hearse" or "Horace, The Swinging School Bus Driver"? Gremmy Set: Surf City (EMI Legends of Rock n Roll cd).
JESUS AND MARY CHAIN * An entire band-unit dedicated to the (fairly supportable) proposition that "Sweet Jane" is the coolest tune of all time. All four JAMC cd's burn like one sustained ultra Velvet ray, though the debute Psycho Candy and 1990's Automatic buzz best. Interpretive cool: Automatic's "Head On" recasts the Ramones' "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" as 60-cycle hum.
Psycho Candy, Darklands, Automatic.
JOAN JETT * The czarina of crunch and high priestess of the power chord, she formed the first all-girl band with any juice (Runaways) and hasn't slowed since. Her taste in covers is on the money ("Little Drummer Boy," "Starfucker," "I Wanna Be Your Dog"), she produced the Germs, and has resisted all attempts to girly up her 4/4 manifesto. First and best: Bad Reputation (Boardwalk 1981, feat. "You Don't Own Me"). Also bad: Up Your Alley (CBS Associated 1988). A.L.
BILLY JOEL * For the fashion sense to know that hearts sometimes go well with sleeves (he sent doowop a bouquet in "The Longest Time" and saluted the Seasons like a fanboy in "Uptown Girl" on '83's An Innocent Man). As a rock crit, he's no slouch. Ronnie Spector's voice on "Be My Baby," he writes, "just oozes sex. I mean, it sounds almost lubricated. It's got a smell to it, like sweat and garlic."
RAHSAAN ROLAND KIRK * Of all the Sixties jazzbo iconoclasts, the late RRK was consistently the wiggiest and the most listenable. Starting out in his teens as a honkin' R & B Sax man, he matured into a virtuoso jazz performer who, on one occasion, blew three horns simultaneously for nearly 2 1/2 hours. Eccentric on and off stage, Kirk, in an attempt to illustrate his blindness, once wrapped his record producer's head in masking tape, held a gun to the guy's mummified noodle and said, "I just want you to know how I feel all the time." R.S.
New live cd: The Man Who Cried Fire (Nite). Vintage: Volunteered Slavery Blacknuss (Atlantic). Does Your House Have Lions.
MAJOR LANCE * Following Gene Chandler's appointment to Duke ('62), this ex-boxer from Chicago promoted himself to top brass with such hip moves as "The Matador" and "Monkey Time."
IRY LeJEUNE * With Coke-bottle glasses and a penchant for howling, Fifties accordion great LeJeune is the spiritual link between the Evangeline Oak and the zydeco washboard. Pass the pepper. The Legendary lry LeJeune, Vols. I and 2 (Goldband). D.S.
JACK E. LEONARD * The comic's 1956 send-up Rock And
Roll Music For Kids Over Sixteen (Vik lp) throttles rock's
corpse so thoroughly, one listen to it could've saved Einsturzende
Neubaten and PIL years of wasted effort. And, since Fat Jack's
naturally overwrought style suited early R & R's (groovy)
excess so well (dig "Boll Weevil" and "Why Do Fools
Fall In Love"), he manages to simultaneously beat the beast
and ride it with more gusto than Don Henley, say, ever could.
JERRY LEE LEWIS * Whole lotta hellfire goin' on. The Killer
awoke at dawn. He wants a drink.
LITTLE RICHARD * He put a wild face on rock n' roll. His left hand is a five-piece rhythm section (try "Lucille"). and he admits he can 'scream like a white lady" (ask "Miss Ann"). Big Little: The Specialty Sessions box, and various Ace imports. B. M.
LITTLE WILLIE JOHN * He fronted Basie's band as a teenager, wrote pop history with "Fever" (1956), and in his day shared the Cool Soul mantle only with Sam Cooke. "His music was an expression of longing and desire beyond physical love," wrote Joe McEwen in Stranded. "Little Willie John understood."
THE LOUNGE LIZARDS * New York's arch art-rockers gave the world "fake jazz" in '81, blowing bogus blues ("Incident on South Street") and punk Monk ("Epistrophy"). In 1982 they scored two films, The Loveless and Subway Rider. Like wow.
THE LOVIN' SPOONFUL * Unique and unalloyed band whose origins (b. 1965, New York City, same as the V.U.) now seem as distant as archduke Ferdy. Warmer than the Byrds more worldly than the Beach Boys, the last hip pre-hippie act radiate morning glory ("Daydream-" bright lights-big city optimism ("Summer in The City") and so much more ("Full Measure," etc.). Slip on Anthology (26 tracks, Rhino), watch the shadows scatter.
HENRY MANCINI * Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, may look like Squaresville, and Hank may come on like Mr. Middle-of-the-Road, but he scribed the bossest themes: "Mr. Lucky" and "Peter Gunn." Titles with the latter on the same LP: "Dreamsville," "A Profound Gass." Wiggy.
Days of Wine and Roses box set.
BIG JAY MCNEELY * One screams the other doesn't. This Jay's a honker, the most unhinged R&B tenor saxist around. Since the Forties he's been hopping on tables, walking the bar, Pied Piping audiences out the door and into orbit. Bonus somewhere along the line, he found time to pen the cosmos probing "There Is Something On Your Mind (Parts 1 & II)." R.S.
Vintage honk: Live at Birdland (Big J). Recent: Jay
Walkin' (ABC Australian import, 1990).
ROGER MILLER * Anyone who thought Waylon and Willie's "outlaw Country" ever posed a threat to established Nashville law 'n' order never heard the word from this crazed Okie poet: "Kansas City Star," "My Uncle Used to Love Me but She Died."
THE MONOTONES * Lead singer Charles Patrick cribbed the riff off a toothpaste commercial ("You'll wonder where the yellow went/ When you brush your teeth with Pepsodent!") to come up with 1958's dumb rock classic "Book of Love."
VAN MORRISON * Heavy on the heaven and earth tones, Belfast's lonely bluesboy dances with melody, writes automatic valentines to G-L-O-R-I-A and Madame George, and keeps on pushin', 30 years into one of the most idiosyncratic styles ever. It's too late to stop now. Thank you, baby.
Basics: Moondance,
Astral
Weeks (Warners), Best of Van Morrison, Enlightenment
(Mercury), Them (London), It's
Too Late to Stop Now.
MOTOWN * Back in the days before Berry Gordy crossed grits off his grocery list (pre-'67), the Sound of Young America was really sayin' somethin.' Which is to say, it's Reeves over Ross any day, Contours rule, and "Little" meant a lot more before he called to say whatever.
Individual artist collections; Motown: The First Decade, etc. Martha & Vandellas: The Ultimate Collection, Stevie Wonder: The Definitive Collection, Contours: 20th Century Masters.
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