Things are tough all over

Things are tough all over.

Last month I ventured for the first time outside my home state of California. In a trip that took me through Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, I learned quite a bit about this country of ours, and unlearned even more. Misconceptions about the threat of rednecks and Southern cops went out the window along with most of my romanticized ideas about the South, including the notion that radio there was somehow freer from the strictures of Top 40 programming, more receptive to local sounds, than in the big cities.

Did I hear strange obscure country records in Memphis, Cajun music in New Orleans, and down home blues on the black stations everywhere? Forget it. Better music of every type can be heard right here in San Francisco. There was one station in Houston that played blues after 9 PM, and another in Sweetwater, Texas where a nighttime maniac plays all heavy Led Zep/Grand Funk/TYA over a radius of about ten miles. That was okay, but still not my idea of “Texas radio and the big beat.” Jukeboxes were a better index of regional tastes, from Buddy Holly in an El Paso pizza joint to a place in a white Memphis suburban teen spot that had 6 Grand Funk songs, 3 by Black Sabbath, and 4 by Alice Cooper.

While the radio sounds were about the same all over, there were a few songs that sounded especially good away from home. I’m* thinking in particular of “Hot Rod Lincoln”, which seemed made for driving through the South. “Baby Blue” was consistently uplifting, and “Run Run Run”, a new entry by Jo Jo Gunne, (Asylum 11003) became an instant favorite. These guys aren’t great rockers yet, but they show potential. Their record would sound a lot better if we could hear it back to back with Earth Quake’s “I Get the Sweetest Feeling” (A&M 1338) and the Wackers’ “I Hardly Know Her Name” (Elektra 45783) but I guess you can’t have everything.

Driving six hours a day for two weeks you get mighty familiar with the current hit records. You also get good and sick of many of them. Michael Jackson’s continuing exploration of the Bobby Day Songbook is a case in point. “Rockin’ Robin” was novel at first, but its piping thinness soon began to grate and now I can’t stand to hear it. It lacks the substance that allows the original to still sound vital fifteen years later.'“Little Bitty Pretty One” was a worse choice yet In its day it was 4 standard of sorts, with all the greatest singers trying their hand at it. Bobby Day was covered on that one by Frankie Lymon and Clyde McPhatter, among others, but the alltime killer version belongs to Thurston Harris (Aladdin 3398). Being familiar with it, I find it impossible to get into the Jackson Five’s pathetic recreation. Of course, you can always forget history and take it all as pure sound, in which case it comes off better than most of what’s on the charts. I suppose next in line is “Over and Over”, and you can send me your nominations for other old songs you’d like to see Michael or Donny work out on after that.

The current top ten includes seven I can’t tolerate. “I Gotcha” by Joe Tex has to be one of the worst soul records ever. He was okay at one time, in fact he was great from “Hold What You Got” on back. In 1958 he recorded a song called “Little Baby Face Thing” (Ace 550) that it would take a trained dar to tell from the best work of Little Richard. I bet it could be a hit today, and it may get a chance, as Ace is currently planning to reissue all their best material, which is quite a lot.

“Horse With No Name” is another that failed the test of time. What a lame, wimpy record. I used to think people liked it because it sounded like Neil Young, now I believe it’s popular for the same reason as “American Pie”: it sounds like it means something but nobody can figure out what. Just like “Louie Louie.” The funny thing about “Pie” is that all the critics and fanatic fans hailed it as a great statement about rock culture, while the millions who bought it, it turns out, were merely intrigued by the unfathomable mystery of it. At least, that was the reason indicated by the articles and interviews concerning it that appeared in the mass media.

Some records sound better with saturation listening, among them Sonny & Cher’s “A Cowboy’s Work is Never Done” (Kapp 2163) which owes its success to Snuff Garrett’s arrangement. “Family of Man” by Three Dog Night (Dunhill 4306) sounds less like a Beatles “Too Much” ripoff and more like their best waxing since “Mama Told Me Not to Come.” “Slippin’ Into Darkness” by War (UA 50867) keeps getting better, as does Paul Simon’s “Me and Julio” (Columbia 45585) and “I Saw the Light” by Todd Rundgren (Bearsville 0003) — all records I hated at first. Songs I hate more with every hearing include “Sylvia’s Mother” by Dr. Hook (Columbia 45562) and anything by A1 Greene. Songs I keep digging more and more are “1*11 Take You There” by the Staples Singers (Stax 0125) and “Oh Girl”>by the Chi-Lites (Brunswick 55471) both great radio songs.

April 30

The lyrics of “Someday Never Comes” by Creedence (Fantasy 676) may be as profound as Greil Marcus claims, but to my ears it’s their weakest single yet. The tonal quality of the vocal is irritating, and the one good riff doesn’t last long enough to build any tension. The opening is nice but it’s right out of Moby Grape’s first album, and on the whole I don’t think this would get played if it were by any other group. The newStones single, on the other hand, keeps growing on me. At first I was strongly disappointed that it didn’t have the direct visceral impact of “Brown Sugar” or any of their other great singles, but despite all its faults, which include overdone vocal choruses and poor mixing, “Tumbling Dice” has an undercurrent of strength that keeps it flowing like the muddy Mississippi. Credit Charlie Watts for saving this one.

John and Yoko have a new platter on the market. The title of “Woman is the Nigger of the World” (Apple 1848) says it all. An important idea, but one which hardly depends on the Onos to be spread. Like most polemic music, it is forced and condescending, it has barely more melody than a speech, and the music, which is heavily overproduced, rambles on with little relation to the song’s message. Not an effective single at all. By way of contrast, Apple 1850 is a very fine effort from a new artist named Chris Hodge. “We’re On Our Way” has real drive, great guitar licks, raw edge and superb production, not to mention arcane lyrics about spaceships coming our way on some cosmic mission.

Moving from outer space to the caves, we come to “Troglodyte” by the Jimmy Castor Bunch (RCA SP-45-315). This is a great record. Harking back to the days when R&B groups weren’t afraid to be humorously tasteless, this one is guaranteed to gross you out. It’s got a fine fuzzy bass line, and lyrics that go from the amusing to the repulsive — although anybody who digs the comix of S. Clay Wilson is sure to identify with Bertha Butt of the Butt Sisters. A record like this could serve as a sort of bridge between heavy rock, which it resembles instrumentally, and reggae, which is leading the battle to restore humor and teenage stupidity to rock. Such a fusion could yield only good.

QUICK SPINS: Check the country stations for Crash Craddock’s “Ain’t Nothin’ Shakin’ ” (Cartwheel 210), one of the best reworkings of the old Carl Perkins sound in a long time. The Nashville Teens, who once backed Jerry Lee Lewis on a live album recorded in Germany, are still together and have a new single! “Ella James” (UA 50880) is a pretty close copy of the Move song, but they sound good and tight. I wonder if the Swinging Blue Jeans are around somewhere too? More good rocking singles from England include “If I Could See an End” by Savoy Brown (Parrot 362) and “Jubilee Cloud” by John Kongos (Elektra 45779), both album cuts also but fine choices for AM action. And if you missed Fleetwood Mac’s “Green Manalishi” the first time around it’s been reissued on Reprise 1079 with “Oh Well” replacing “World of Harmony” on the flip.

“Everything Good is Bad” by 100 Proof (Hot Wax 7202) is a pretty good soul record. “1984” by Sweet Rock (Merchant 1006) is a pretty good recreation of an old Spirit song. “Jubilation” by Paul Anka (Buddah 294) is a pretty good record — for Paul Anka. “Somebody’s Been Talking” by Jerry McCain (Jewel 828) is a pretty good blues record. “You’ve Got a Friend” by Roy Brown (Mobile Fidelity 2) is a pretty good waste of a great talent. “Higher and Higher” by Pat Upton (Playboy 5002) is a pretty good imitation of Jackie Wilson, if that’s what you’ve been looking for. “That’ll Be the Day” by Kenny Vernon (Capitol PRO-6503) is a pretty good rockified country version of the Buddy Holly classic, arranged by Gary “Flip” Paxton. And “On the Ride” by C.U.B. (Capitol P-3325) is pretty good bubblegum, for a Dutch group. Includes the pretty good line: “You do it once, you do it twice, you do it over cause it feels so nice.”

From the island of Jamaica come a couple of reggae discs that remind me more of old R&B groups like the Jive Bombers than of contemporary English reggae, in their bizarre primitiveness and fascinating semi-nonsense lyrics. “Flashing My Whip” by Hugh Roy (Shelter 7318), backed incidentally by “Mr. Fire Coal Man” by the Classics, a practice I was sure had died out, is infectious in its sloppy strangeness. The lyrics, printed on the sleeve, make little sense — although for all I know “I’m here the operator sold from the watts” could make perfect sense in Jamaica. The meaning of “Sweet You, Sour You” by Freddie McKay (Shelter 7319) is even more impenetrable. You gotta hear this stuff to believe records like this are still being made. The flip is called “Version” and it’s the instrumental track in case you want to sing along like you did with the Jaynetts.

For the millionth song on the subject, Carl Stewart’s “Gimme a Big Leg Woman” (Mercury 73285) ain’t bad - maybe because it was produced by Huey Meaux, which means it came out of the badlands of Texas or Louisiana. What I can’t understand is where Robert Plant ever got the idea that a big leg woman “ain’t got no soul”? And while we’re on the subject, David Camon from Birmingham, Alabama gives us “I Can’t Believe I Ate That Whole Thing” (Moonsong 9002), the best of a recent crop of TV ad-inspired songs — certainly better than any of the various “Fly Me” records around.

In case you didn’t know whether or not to vote, there’s a record to help you decide. “The Power 18” by Mustang (A&M 8101) is part of a big drive that includes a free album to all registered voters who so request, containing stuff by all of A&M’s stars, who also lend a hand on this single, though you’d hardly know it. Bobby Womack is making a strong showing with “Woman’s Got to Have It” (UA 50902) and it sure would be nice to see him get some recognition after all these years. Most interesting new group of the month is Sailcat, whose “Motorcycle Mama” (Elektra 45782) can’t make up its mind whether to be Chuck Berry or an MOR version of the Ohio Express. A catchy record.

Nowhere in the charts or the pages of Billboard can I find mention of a record by A1 Perkins that I heard widely in Louisiana. He’s the guy that did “Little Eefin Annie” (Sound Stage-7 2511) back in ’64, but this one’s no novelty but a great stone soul/blues number. I didn’t catch the title but try to find it. This is a good reminder that some local records do make it locally, while others come out but maybe don’t. I was surprised throughout my trip to find many old record companies still in business. Among these were Ace, Instant and Goldband. The latter company goes way back and was responsible for hits in both the cajun (“Sugar Bee” by Cleveland Crochet) and rockabilly (“Let’s Go Boppin’ Tonite” by A1 Ferrier) fields as well as many great R&B records in the ’50s. The label’s owner, Eddie Shuler, is still discovering local talent in the Lake Charles area and issuing records sporadically. One of his acts could’ve been huge if he’d possessed a bit more ambition. Danny James recorded “Boogie in the Mud” (Goldband 1028) before anybody ever heard of Tony Joe White, and the resemblance is startling — it’s like “Polk Salad Annie” with all traces of pop removed; solid funk. James recorded about a dozen sides for Goldband, and all are available through the mail, as are most of the label’s great R&B and cajun recordings. Write to Box 1485, Lake Charles, LA. 70601, for a free catalog.

Sam Phillips’ brother Tom has cut a new record by one of the best Elvis-type rockers of the ’50s, and it’s tremendous. “Tear It Up” by Charlie Feathers (Philwood 223) can be ordered for $1 from 1566 Lookout Dr., Memphis, Tenn. 38127. Over in Crowley, LA. old blues masters like Lightnin’ Slim are still recording for the small studio that once leased their songs to such labels as Excello and Blue Horizon. In Baton Rouge, John Fred is cutting some new sides and a local band called the War Babies is getting ready to make a big splash. All these people promised to keep me supplied with new releases, which will be covered here if they’re good enough. Readers around the country are invited to send in records by local artists from their own area — we’ll make this column comprehensive yet! The address is 64 Taylor Dr, Fairfax, CA. 94930.