ROCK AND ROLL NEWS

ROCK AND ROLL NEWS

NASHVILLE — Cetron Records is releasing a recording of Bobby Seale's contempt citation, a word for word documentation of Judge Julius Hoffman’s nova oven indictment of Seale for daring to desire to have his own choice of counsel.

The double record set features a group of L.A. actors reading the relevant parts of the transcript and ends with a smuggled recording of Seale himself, recorded in jail in Connecticut two months ago. Ben Vereen, who played “Hud” in the L.A. cast of Hair plays Seale in the rest of the documentary.

25% of the artist’s royalties are committed to the Bobby Seale Defense Fund. Producer Dennis Shanahan commented, “I wanted to produce Gagged and Chained because I believe Bobby Seale never yet had his day in court — and God knows Fred Hampton, murdered in Chicago (during the trial) will never have his day in court.”

It should be out in early September. Break your neck to get a copy and listen to it.

John Wilcock is starting another new magazine, this one about hip travel. It’s to be called Nomad, for late Fall appearance on your newstands.

LOS ANGELES — Capitol Records is about to release an album by fave rave poet Richard Brautigan, famed author of such tasty books as Trout Fishing in America, The Pill and the Springhill Mine Disaster and countless little epics for Rolling Stone and countless other magazines and newspapers.

Brautigan was recently the subject of a feature article in Life which means, as surely as all those Peter Max buses in Motown, that he’s really hit the big-time. Listening to Richard Brautigan should cinch it; it features him reading his own works, in “so-called” audio candids including a killer toilet flushing sequence.

James Taylor is set to appear in a flick called Two Lane Blacktop. Unfortunately, lovely young Mr. Taylor will not utilize his undoubtedly polished vocal chords; he just acts, you see. The film is to be the subject of a trip from Los Angeles to Memphis; it’d probably be a hit if they had the courage to go all the way to New Orleans instead. Well, guys, I guess we blew ii.

Fleetwood Mac has added a new singer for their Amerikan tour, who is Christine Perfect, sometimes and Mrs. John McVie at others; McVie is the group’s bassist. She replaces (sort of) Peter Green, who left the group for charity.

Arlo Guthrie has announced that he plans to join the struggle to free Ireland from her 8 centuries of British control. He will be appearing at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium with Dominic Behan, brother of Irish poet Brendan Behan, and an Irish political/literary figure himself. The benefit is to raise money for political prisoners and the Defense Fund of the National Association for Irish Justice.

The Palermo Pop Festival in Palermo, Sicily didn’t quite get off on Arthur Brown’s pants-down act in August. He was thrown in the can for four days (solitary confinement, too) and then thrown out of the country. The only way he’ll get back in is to stand trial.

BBC is gonna do a documentary on the Chicago 7 which will not be shown in the U.S.

Well, just about everybody has finally caught on to Dr. John. Or, as Ice might say, everybody who’s anybody. Or somethin’.

His next record was done in Britain, with Clapton and the usual crew of fantastic musicians who tour the world at night and head for the studio during the day to see who else they can make a hit by being on their record. The only real surprise guest: MICK JAGGER. Yes, 1 know we all thought Dr. John was into white magic but then who knows maybe all those super-satanic songs are really not meant the way they’ve been taken.

At any rate, if anybody does deserve a hit, it is the good Dr. John. All power to the shaman.

Rita Cooiiuge, tue iovciy young lady who blew your mind in Mad Dogs and Englishmen, is getting set to record for A&M thanks to her manager David Anderle. David is producing, with such groovers as Steven Stills, Booker T. and Marc Benno (who was the non-Leon Russell half of the Asylum Choir and is also cutting for A&M) on the sessions.

SAN DIEGO — Steve Stills of Buffalo Springfield-Super Session-Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young fame was busted for cocaine. Police reportedly found Stills crawling on the floor in his hotel with his girl friend. Both were arrested and later freed on $2,500 bail.

Aswe noted in the Beefheart poetry section last issue, his new album is getting ready to emerge, it’s called Lick My Decals Off Baby and it’ll be on Straight.

Tunes will include “Alice In Blunderland”, “Smithstonian Institute Blues (or the Big Dig)’’, and “Peop”, all with the capable assistance of the Magic Band which now features Artie Tripp on bass marimba and the return of John (Drumbo) French as drummer.

The next album after that will put Beefheart on Reprise (he’s already been on Straight, Buddah/Kama Sutra, A&M and Blue Thumb) which will handle the material Beefheart and Grant Gibbs, his manager, produce for their company, God’s Golfball (a Beefism for the world). And don’t forget the tail on yer kite.

RCA’S new “Best of Nina Simone” features her own personal arrangement of Leonard Cohen’s “Suzanne,” which she conducted for the album.

SHARON HILL, Pa. — Finally, Bessie Smith has a headstone on her grave. The stone was paid for by, among others, John Hammond, who produced Bessie's final recording, Janis Joplin and a Philadelphia registered nurse, Juanita Green.

The absence of a headstone on her grave was brought to the public’s attention by Miss Green when she wrote a letter to the Philadelphia Inquirer asking about the unmarked site.

Robert Altshuler wrote the inscription, which reads “The Greatest Blues Sinter in the World Will Never Stop Singing — Bessie Smith — 1895-1937.”

As Janis Joplin said, “She showed me the air and taught me how to fill it.”

Denny Laine, formerly lead singer of the Moody Blues and Ginger Baker’s Air Farce, former Move guitarist Trevor Burton, and Alan White, who used to drum with the now defunct Plastic Oh No! Band, have formed a band called Balls. Yep, that’s right . . . Balls. '

John Mayall has merged with the remnants of some of the former members of Canned Heat, specifically Larry Taylor (bass) and guitarist Harvey Mandel. Hunh?

Mick Abrahams, who was fired from Jethro Tull and then started Blodwyn Pig, is also going to be axed by the Pigs. Haven’t we all?

SAN FRANCISCO - Doug Weston, the man who brought the Troubadour to Los Angeles has opened his second Troubadour, this time in San Francisco. The new Troubadour, when totally finished will have a restaurant and a recording studio in addition to the nightclub. The performers who opened the club in August were Doug Kershaw and Kris Kristofferson.

The Sones new movie, tentatively titled Love In Vain, should be out in a month or two, featuring the Stones

and the Airplane, Hells Angels, Altamont and a real, honest to god murder. The proceeds, at least on the acting end, are going to charity and the distributor is being chosen at least partially on the basis of whether or not they’re willing to give up some of their expected vast proceeds for some token contributions to something as well.

The film encompasses portions of the Stones’ Amerikan tour, about half of its ninety-five minutes being devoted to Altamont. Mick Jagger described his first reaction as “just total horror”.

Meanwhile the Stones aren’t having anything to do with Allen Klein as far as their record company distribution goes. They are gonna set up their own company, Marshall Chess is probably the head of it, and they probably will set up distribution through a small label, Blue Thumb being the most frequently mentioned in the U.S., Island in the U.K. However, there’s still a good chance that the distribution rights will go to Atlantic.

LOS ANGELES - Blue Thumb Records reports that Dave Mason, the former member of Traffic has a new group which will make its first appearance in concert at the Hollywood Bowl in September with Chicago. In the new group is Mama Cass Elliot. The other members are yet to be announced but are expected to be some of the industries top names.

DETROIT — The first spate of group break-ups has suddenly emerged on the Ann Arbor/Detroit scene. All in one week, the Rationals, Catfish, and Mitch Ryder’s Wheels split up. In the shuffle, there’s a potential that two of them, Catfish and Ryder will probably end up trading members and maybe even picking up a Rat or two in the process.

The Rationals break-up was the real surprise. While the group didn’t really seem to be making much commercial progress, they did have an album out on Crewe which had drawn good notices when it had drawn any and they had been together for well over seven years, ever since the guys were fourteen.

Finally, it all got to be a bit too much, with Steve Correll, the group s lead guitarist, informing Bill Figg that he just didn’t Want to play with him anymore, sorry, -you’re still a good guy, y’know, after an Eastown gig.

Catfish’s breakup was much >ess surprising . . the split had been rumored for some time and no one seemed too upset about it. Bob Hodge is going to reform the group, probably with Harry Phillips from the old group and with his brother, Dallas, on guitar. What drummer Jimmy Optner and guitarist Mark Manko will do from here is uncertain.

Nor wus Ryder’s split with his band unlooked for; it was just a little early. Mitch will probably reform his group, again, around ex-Detroit Wheels (the originals, y’know) drummer Johnny Badanjek. But B also has offers from a couple of other places, not least of which is Bob Hodge’s newly reformed Catfish.

What with super-groups de rigeur everywhere but in the Midwest maybe it’s time that that disgusting phenomenon reared its ugly head here too.

The MC5 have returned from their first colossal European tour which got pretty fucked up due to a sudden revelation that, no, their jobs weren’t booked. They got some new ones, garnered the cover of International Times (London’s underground paper) and some press in papers like Melody Maker, the British pop weekly. And, according to road manager Steve Harnadek, ‘The responses of the crowds were better than they get over here. And the band learned a lot.”

Joshua White, mentor of the famed Joshua Light Show, the original light show at the Fillmore East, is now heading up Joshua Television, which broadcasts simultaneous large-screen color images of on-stage acts at the Fillmore at the Tanglewood series of concerts. It also records them for future TV use.

Rabbi Tony Feinberg, of Toronto Peace John and Yoko fame, has recorded an album, for Vanguard, and will donate all the proceeds from its sale to the children of North and South Vietnam. At a recent informal press conference, the rabbi looked sporty and hopeful for his seventy years, hardly needing the assistance of the hand-carved cane he received from Ho Chi Minh as a gift on his peace mission .

Curiously, Richie Havens didn’t appear at the Randall’s Island New York Pop Festival, the one chosen by several radical groups as the first festival to give over part of its profits to the revolutionary community. Apparently the reason for the no-show was less money than he had been promised. Even more curiously, Richie DID appear at the hastily-arranged alternate site of the ill-fated Mountaindale festival upstate of here. The reason? Might it be that the event there was being filmed, with the director one Mark Roth, whose other lines include partnership in a company called Stormy Forest Productions, the other partner of which is Mr. Richie Havens? Roth spent that weekend telling us how his film would prove how music can t be governed by money or laws; spent last weekend advising Havens not to go on, even though he showed up at the site, a tiny island off the shores of Spanish Harlem.

Paul Krassner, Realist editor and YIPpie! co-founder, has moved from New York City to San Francisco’s Project One. Project One is an old warehouse and is being converted into quarters for artists and media people. Meanwhile, the Tenth Anniversary issue is expected out in multi-media form, complete with un—Spectored tapes of Get Back.

Jim Morrison’s released two books of poems — one is The Lords and New Creatures (Simon and Shuster) and the other is called An American Prayer. While we haven’t seen Lords and New Creatures yet, Leon Bernard (Doors p.r. agent) sent us a copy of American Prayer. Somehow, it seems like a take-off on those super-fancy Hallmark greeting card booklets. A veneer (mahogany, I think) cover stamped with gold letters conceals some really pungent poetry. God knows where one can get a copy but it is worth the effort.

Andy Warhol is heading for Hollywood for his first California feature, “Specimen Days”. It’s the story of Walt Whitman’s experiences as a male nurse during the Civil Way. Warhol plans to use a lot of his old stalwarts, but the roie of Walt himself hasn’t yet been cast. It’s been rejected by John Lennon, Mick Jagger and Allen Ginsberg already. Shooting is scheduled to start in mid-October in New Orleans if the part is cast.

CHICAGO — Curtis Mayfield, the long-time creative springboard for the Impressions, has left that group to strike out as a solo act, as a producer and as a writer. He has one album ready to go, on Buddah, called Curtis. I’s a bitch, including a nine minute version of the old Impressions’ hit, “Move On Up”, that really succeeds.

The Impressions, who’ve been together over ten years, will continue with Leroy Hutson, formerly of the Mayfield Singers taking Curtis’ place.

In addition to all those other deals, Curtis also has his own lable Curtom, which Buddah distributes. According to Curtis’ manager, Marv Stuart, he is also contemplating purchasing a sixteen track studio in Chicago.

TORONTO — Lighthouse is presently performing here in the world’s first rock and roll ballet. They are featured in “Ballet High” with the Rovaal Winnipeg Ballet troupe. They have also taped a one-hour special for CBC for release later this year.

An added note to Ringo’s visit to the States to record his next album in Nashville; while here, negotiations were begun for him to star in an American television series consisting of 12 programs. If finalized, the series will be shown before the year is up.

Ike and Tina Turner spent the entire day at the upstate Jewish resort Grossinger's — no, not sunning and playing tennis, but shooting a sequence in Milos (“Loves of a Blonde,” “Firemen’s Bail”) Forman’s first American movie, .“S.P.F.C.” or the Society for Parents of Fugitive Children. The Turner Review will appear as the entertainment act during a segment when parents Lynn (“Faces”) Carlin and Buck (“Catch-22”) Henry stop over there. The number they rehearsed all afternoon, and performed in front of the super-straight resort audience, was “Goodbye, Baby” .

Henri Costa-Gavras, the masterful director of “Z,” will have his new film, called “The Avowal,” released here soon. It’s about Czechoslovakia. In an interview last fall, right after he finished it, and right before “Z” skyrocketed him to national attention, he remarked about how surprised he was at the lack of awareness Americans had of the situation in Greece. Even though the events on which the controversial movie is based took place years ago, he says, the conditions there are relatively unchanged .

A film is due soon on the life and travels of Ravi Shankar, which has been in production for two years.