ROCK • A • RAMA

ROCK A RAMA

This month’s Rock-A-Ramas were written by Richard Riegel, Mitchell Cohen, Michael Davis, Richard C. Walls, Billy Altman, Craig Zeller and Jim Feldman.

MILLIE JACKSON—Hard Times (Spring) :: Millie Jackson sure isn’t kidding when she sings “The Blues Don’t Get Tired Of Me.” In the title song, she enumerates a former lover’s “charms”: “He beat me every night...he killed the dog...he put roller skates on granny’s crutches,” and on “Blufunkes,” she limns the current situation: “Everybody’s suffering from Reaganomics/They got nuclear fright and atom bomics.” But Dear Millie tells us that to overcome adversity, all you have to do is “Put funk in your blues.” It may be simplistic advice, but sure gets Millie through, as we find put in the hilarious mini-drama “Mess On Your Hands/. Finger Rap.” Of course, you’ll have to buy the record to find out how TWO WRONGED WOMEN TAKE MATTERS INTO THEIR OWN HANDS, since the radio version is heavily bleeped—remember, Jackson has a certain, er, quotient to maintain. Even with the expletives deleted, though, Hard Times (get it?) delivers the goods, since Millie Jackson is one of the best straight ahead soul singers around. And that’s no shit. J.F.

THE NITECAPS — Go Straight To The Line (Sire):: This NYC quartet, led by whippersnapper John Xavier (a.k.a. X Sessive in his CBGB mainstay period) is in love with the idea of infusing their rock ’n’ roll with all the soul man dynamics they can beg, borrow, or appropriate. And if some of it suffers from pointlessly overextended song endings, too many italicized exclamation points from the Uptown Homs, and Xavier’s tendency to saturate his vocals with showboat maneuvers, then give them points for convincingly making their rock ’n’ soul music work on a good 50% of this debut. Especially invigorating is a full throttle remake of Wilmer & the Dukes’ “Give Me One More Chance” and the tremendously exuberant “The New Me.” Wonder if Miami Steve’s worn out his copy yet.

C.Z.

FRANK ZAPPA—Shut Up ’N’ Play Yer Guitar (Barking Pumpkin):: We’ve seen and heard so many flashy guitarists surface since Zappa’s seminal Hot Rats album that this threerecord box is bound to make less of an impact, even though it shows he’s grown considerably as an instrumentalist since ’69. Frank’s familiar nervous hornet number is expanded here to include an impressive array of rude noises as well as a few melodic moments. So if you’ve ever shaken your head as wading through another verbal putdown of somebody you never wanna meet just to hear some hot licks, this is “the Zappa album for you. M.D.

ART IN AMERICA (Pavillion):: I could be wrong, but this sounds like maybe a very crude attempt to do the ABC scene Stateside, what with the strings and the overarching angst. And the lyrics, more often than not nut-cracker musings on evil modernism; could qualify as romanticism of a sort. But let Art In America put it in their own inimitable way: they demand a “Sinatra Serenade”, as “the world out there is run by laser lights.” How come Martin Fry never thought of that? ’Cause he’s not The-Hombresof-1983 these guys are. R.R.

BILL EVANS—The Interplay” Sessions (Milestone):: Two albums, one a reissue, one previously unreleased stuff, both from ’62, both quintet dates, both with Jim Hall (guitar) and Philly Joe Jones (drums), one with Freddie Hubbai'd (trumpet) and Percy Heath (bass), one with Zoot Sims (tenor sax) and Ron Carter (bass). Great. As Orrin Keepnews says in the liners, this twofer should go some ways in dispelling the popular conception of Evans as merely “a Debussy-ridden specialist in languid mood music.” Inspirational Song Title: “Fudgesickle Built For Four.” R.C.W.

FASHION—Fabrique (Arista):: Yet another gaggle of underfed, lank-haired, angst-up-theirarses Limey hypos. Nothing new that way, of course, but Fashion lay it on a bit too thick, by liner-crediting dozens of expensive tron axes and chichi Continental recording sites that no self-respecting human would ever need to know about. Plus they divide their tunes into “Face One” and “Face Two/’ bet they’re also the kind of neurons who call their parents “pater” and “mater” at the dinner table. All of which tends to obscure some rather nifty, languidly-explosive soft-whiteboy funk. Sorta like Phil Collins doing the Ohio Players songbook. Wonder what the shoe trees in Fashion think of unashamed middleclassers (but champ white are-and-be-ers) like Hall & Oates. R.R.

WONDER WOMEN: THE HISTORY OF THE GIRL GROUP SOUND VOL. 1 1961*1964 (Rhino):: Useful as an aural companion to Betrock’s tome Girl Groups: The Story Of A Sound, valuable for the inclusion of Ellie Greenwich’s tres rare “You Don’t Know,” indispensible if your collection is missing “Party Lights,” “Sally Go ’Round The Roses,” “The Shoop Shoop Song” and “One Fine Day,” indefensible for its mysteriously edited version of “Leader Of The Pack” (to where did dad’s directive to dump the biker go?). Licensing obstacles—no Motown, no Spector—keep this Red Bird-heavy compendium from being definitive, and I’d pay a pretty nickel for a volume two with the Cookies’ “Girls Grow Up Faster Than Boys,” Earl-Jean’s ‘Tm Into Something Good” and the Charmettes’ “Please Don’t Kiss Me Again,” but Wonder Women will more than suffice for the nonce. M.C.

THE BRAINS—Dancing Under Streetlights (Landslide):: Can’t say that anything in the Brains’ past really did much for me, but the first side of this EP (done for their hometown Atlanta label) contains two of the most intensely powerful and intelligently taut songs I’ve heard all year. The title track finds main Brain Tom Gray laying down his burden of alienated reality long enough to paint a “rites of concrete” landscape that actually implies some hope, while the shoe-on-the-other-foot tragedy of “Tanya” features a perfect angry/sad balance by way of Rick Price’s riveting guitar lines and a rather touching oriental motif. Side two is considerably weaker—too heavy with the hand of ironic self-pity and loneliness—but I wouldn’t pass up this record if I were you; performances as good as “Dancing” and “Tanya” come along all too rarely of late. B.A.

EARL HINES-Boogie Woogie On St. Louis Bines (Prestige) Paris Session (Inner City):: The Prestige set, recorded in ’69 and previously unreleased, features pianist Hines leading a trio through crowd pleasing medleys of West Side Story, Showboat, and “Manhattan/ Slaughter On Tenth Ave.,” the familiar melodies trotted out in a shamelessly show-bizzy way but imbued with Hines’ fleet-fingered embellishments—corny and brilliant at the same time. The • Paris Session, solo piano from ’65, is remarkable too—Hines has been at this for over 50 years but listening to him transform old warhorses and camp ditties like “On The Sunny Side Of The Street” and “A Pretty Girl Is Like A Melody” into eloquently swinging song remains, as Paul Shaffer would say, a fresh kick. R.C.W.