eMUSIC FEBRUARY

For those counting you'll see there's more than 90 tracks here. I still had some bonus tracks left over from recruiting a new eMusic member. Also, for those of you who count the tracks -- GET A DAMNED LIFE!



* Stop Talking About Music (Let's Celebrate That Shit) by Thee Butchers' Orchestra. You can't blame this on the bosa nova. If the Girl from Ipanema was kidnapped by The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion ...

Oh Hell, I'm not going to bother with any more cheesy rock critic metaphors. This is just good bluesy garage grease music from São Paulo, Brazil. Naturally it's on Voodoo Rhythm.

The trio, which has been together for a decade or so, romp and stomp through songs like "Everybody's Got the Devil Inside," "Drama Queen" and "Coconut Heart." I don't think Sergio Mendes done it this way ... There I go again!


* The Day the Music Died by The Big Bopper (and others). I stumbled upon this while looking for stuff to play on my tribute to Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Bopper on Terrell's Sound World last week.

J.P. Richardson, aka The Big Bopper, is the only one of those musicians who never got a movie made about his life story. I don't know the cinematic quality of his life, but the man was a fine songwriter. His one big hit was "Chantilly Lace," but he's also responsible for George Jones' "White Lightning" and Johnny Preston's "Running Bear."

This album shows the Bopper had a knack with novelty songs. There's "The Big Bopper's Wedding," "Bopper's Boogie Woogie," "The Preacher and the Bear" (an old tune, later recorded by Jerry Reed, which might have roots in minstrel shows), "The Monkey Song (You Made a Monkey Out of Me)" and perhaps the ultimate '50s novelty song, "Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor."

There's also some non-Bopper tracks including a spooky little Buddy Holly song I'd never heard before called "Valley of Tears," "We Belong Together" by Valens and a maudlin little talking-song tribute to Holly, Valens and Richardson called "Three Stars" by someone named Tommy Dee.


* The Radio One Sessions by Elastica. Justine! You just don't treat me right. What the hell ever happened to this band? They are one of the major shoulda-beens of the '90s. Justine Frischmann and her band were critical darlings for about twenty minutes back then after Elastica, their first album. In retrospect they seem like a poppier, British version of Sleater-Kinney. But, due mainly to all those typical '90s rock band problems, they didn't come out with a followup for another five years. The original spark was gone.

This is a Peel Sessions album and it shows Elastica at their best. Even when they started fooling around with techno sounds (the last few songs in this collection) Justine and Elastica sound fresh. And there's even a couple of Christmas songs here. There's "I Wanna Be a King of Orient Aah" And "All For Gloria," which I've been playing on my Sound World Christmas shows for more than a decade. (It was on a Geffen sampler called Just Say Noel, under the title of simply "Gloria," along with Sonic Youth's "Santa Doesn't Cop Out on Dope" and other classics.)


* Slow Death by The Flamin' Groovies. I'm not sure how The Groovies pulled it off. One could argue that they were just a glorified bar band, covering well-ploughed ground like "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Jumpin' Jack Flash." But glorified is right. There was such spirit in their attack on these and most all of their material, they really did live up to this album's subtitle, "Amazin' High Energy Rock 'n' Roll."

This is a collection of live cuts and demos from the early '70s, the dawn of their post-Roy Loney era. The title is a lo-fi demo that's anything but slow. The slide guitar sounds is straight out of Beggar's Banquet-period Stones, mixed in with a little Velvet Underground. And there's an early version of one of the Groovies' greatest, "Shake Some Action" that should make you wonder why this group didn't make it bigger.


* You Without Sin Cast The First Stone by Isaiah Owens. I was looking for something wild for my recent gospel podcast. Somehow I stumbled upon Isaiah. Just what the mad doctor order. This Montgomery, Alabama native just might be the Hasil Adkins of gospel music. Owens wails and pounds his electric guitar, tuned to the key of H. And this isn't some field recording from some long-gone era. All these tracks were recorded, mostly from radio broadcasts, in the late 90s and early '00s.

This album gives 17 amazing testimonials for Jesus, and one fine pitch for a local auto mechanic if you're down in Montgomery and need your brake pads fixed.

* The Best of the War Years and More by Louis Prima. All too often the origins of rock is boiled down into the over-simplified story of white country boys trying to imitate blues singers and accidentally inventing rockabilly. But it's way more complex than that. You could make the argument that flamboyant jazz band leaders like Cab Calloway and Louie Prima were proto-rock stars.

Consumer alert here. The first track, "White Cliffs of Dover" begins with a weird electronic glitch. But even worse, Track 20, "That's my Desire" is so digitally damaged, the last part is unplayable -- it caused by iTunes to freeze up. eMusic made good on my complaint and gave me a free track to compensate, but as of today, they still haven't fixed it, so do not download!

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, Febuary 1, 2009
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell
Webcasting!
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell@ksfr.org

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Drop Kick Me, Jesus by Bobby Bare
Coney Island Baby by Lou Reed
Journey to the Center of the Mind by The Amboy Dukes
Baron of Love Part II by Ross Johnson with Alex Chilton
Ruins of Berlin by Dex Romweber Duo
I'm Gona Booglarize You Baby by Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band
Charlie by Gibby Haynes & His Problem

The Day the Music Died: Feb. 2, 1959
(Newscast)
Three Stars by Tommy Dee
Reminiscing by Buddy Holly
That's My Little Suzie by Ritchie Valens
Big Bopper's Wedding by The Big Bopper
Words of Love by The Beatles
Oh Boy by The Sir Douglas Quintet
Midnight Shift by Los Lobos
We Belong Together by Ritchie Valens
Walking Through My Dreams by The Big Bopper
Valley of Tears by Buddy Holly
Peggy Sue by Buddy Holly
Not Fade Away by The Rolling Stones

VOODOO RHYTHM SET
Everybody's Got the Devil Inside by Thee Butcher's Orchestra
Holy Juke Joint Beat by The Juke Joint Pimps
Demolicion by Wau y Los Arrrghs!!
Jesus Christ Christ Twist by Reverend Beat-Man
Dark Sunday Evening by Roy & The Devil's Motorcycle
Here Comes the Terror by King Automatic
Looking for a Girl by Stinky Lou & The Goon Mat with Lord Bernardo
Three Hairs and You're Mine by King Khan & His Shrines
What Do You Look Like by Hipbone Slim & The Knee Tremblers with Holly Golightly

Shape Shifter/Saguaro by Lone Monk
Palestine, Texas by T-Bone Burnette
Tearin' Up the Town by Billy Miles Brooke
Sharkey's Night by Laurie Anderson
My Night With the Prostitute from Marseille by Beirut
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

I CAN'T REMEMBER IF I CRIED WHEN I READ ABOUT HIS WIDOWED BRIDE

"But February made me shiver, with every paper I'd deliver
Bad news on the doorstep, I couldn't take one more step ..."
-- Don McLean --

I'm just sitting here reminiscing ...

Monday is the 50th anniversary of the plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson, aka The Big Bopper.

Here's a link my good Lubbock buddy Paul Milosevich sent me about how they've commemorating The Day the Music Died in Lubbock. CLICK HERE .

I'll play some Buddy tunes on Sound World tonight. (The show starts at 10 p.m. Mountain Time on KSFR. )

VOODOO RHYTHM IN TROUBLE

One of my favorite reecord companies in the world, Switzerland's Voodoo Rhythm, is in a real bind.

Here's a message from Beat-Man that was posted in The GaragePunk Hideout:

APPEAL FOR FUNDS

Hello, this might be a bit of a strange E-Mail. I have treated bands very fairly since I've started Voodoo Rhythm and have given them their records for cost price so that they could make a solid profit when selling their records on tour (we all know payouts are lousy nowadays). I did approach the SUISA (Copyright Company, musicians' union) and informed them of the nature of my agreement with the bands. Unfortunately I never put it in writing.

Now that is exactly the problem: The SUISA demands payback of a total of 42.500 Swiss Franks (roughly 38.000 US $). Basically they want money for productions that had long been settled. The bitter irony is that bands of course prefer free copies of their album, yet the Suisa is oblivious to this fact and demand the money within 30 days.

If we cannot meet their demands we might have to shut down business, since it is completely impossible to for us to raise that kind of money.

Therefore we kindly ask for your support. Even if we can pay we will not be able to offer the bands the same deal as before, in spite of the fact that they would much rather get free copies from us as opposed to Suisa money (especially American bands since they don't get any Suisa money at all).

We hope you can help us. We don't want to quit, we want to resume or work and our journey. Plea se transfer funds to the following account and forward this message.

Sincerely,
Reverend Beat-Man

So there you have it.

Voodoo Rhythm in the past few years has provided some of the craziest sounds in pyschobilly, punk blues, garage music and even alt county. You've heard a lot of Voodoo Rhythm acts on my radio shows -- Hipbone Slim & The Knee-Tremblers, Stinky Lou & The Goon Mat, Wau y Los Arrrghs!!, The Dead Brothers, Zeno Tornado, Mama Rosin, John Schooley, The Monsters, King Automatic, Roy & The Devil's Motorcycle, The Watrzloves, The Juke Joint Pimps ... and of course Rev. Beat-Man, aka Lightning Beat-Man aka Jerry J. Nixon ("The Gentleman of Rock 'n' Roll" from, so the story goes, Santa Fe, N.M.)

Help them if you can. At least buy some Voodoo Rhythm CDs. You can get 'em directly from the Web site. Plus. for eMusic members, there's 25 Voodoo Rhythm albums, including King Khan & His Shrine's Three Hairs and You're Mine you can find HERE.




My review of the documentary Voodoo Rhythm: The Gospel of Primitive Rock ’n’ Roll is HERE.

The true shocking story of Jerry J. Nixon -- how I became acquainted with Voodoo Rhythm -- is HERE.

UPDATE: What the heck, here's a trailer from that documentary:

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, January 30, 2009
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell@ksfr.org

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Forbidden Love by Billy Kaundart
Blood is Thicker Than Water by Shaver
Punk Rockin' Honky Tonk Girl by The Blue Chieftains
Lonley at the Top by Dan Baird
Johnny Valentine by Andy Anderson
Lose Your Mind by Wayne Hancock
Midnight Train by Maddox Brothers & Rose
Send Me To the 'Lectric Chair by David Bromberg

How You Drink The Wine by Amber Digby
I Just Can't Be True by Webb Pierce
Hot Dog That Made Him Mad by Wanda Jackson
Walk on By by Charlie Pride
Ain't Your Memory Got No Pride at All by Ray Price & Johnny Bush
I'll Be a Bachelor Til I Die by Hank Thompson
You're the Reason by Nancy Apple
Miss Froggy by Warren Smith
To Each His Own by Butch Hancock
Funky Butt by Mississippi John Hurt

Tex Mex Mile by The Gourds
Heartaches and Grease by Ray Wylie Hubbard
Rainbow Stew by Jason Ringenberg
My Pretty Quadroon by Jerry Lee Lewis
You Asked Me To by Waylon Jennings
I'm Mad With You by Cornell Hurd
Thirty Dollar Room by Dave Alvin
That's the Smoke They're Blowin' by Dan Hicks & The Hot Licks

Going Away by The Flatlanders
Knoxville Girl by The Louvin Brothers
To Which Cross Do I Cling by Chris Darrow
Men With Broken Hearts/ I Heard That Lonesome Whistle Flow by Porter Wagoner
The Blind Child's Prayer by Hank Williams
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

TERRELL'S TUNEUP: GOURDS STILL STANDING

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
January 30, 2009

Of all the bands that rose out of the alt-country scare of the mid-to-late ’90s, the only ones that remain standing do a lot for me these days: The Waco Brothers and The Gourds.

Wilco is a whole other story. It’s still around, of course, but its music stopped resembling alt-country — much less country — years ago. Then there’s The Handsome Family, which I tend to think of more as a duo than a get-down band. And there’s the Bottle Rockets, but they haven’t had a new record in three years or so. Come to think of it, The Wacos haven’t had an album of new material in nearly four years.

But The Gourds keep cranking ’em out, and the band’s new one, Haymaker!, is its strongest in a long time. If you’re not familiar with The Gourds, who have played Santa Fe several times in recent years, this album would be as good a place as any to start.

Like the best stuff from this Austin group, it’s good, rocking country-flavored fun, with more than a hint of Cajun and Tex-Mex music, thanks largely to Claude Bernard’s accordion. The musicians worship Doug Sahm, but they never sound like they’re trying to imitate him. They are often compared to The Band, but their humor is far goofier. The Gourds’ musicianship is tight, and yet they make their records sound like loose backyard parties. You can almost smell the barbecue and beer.

There are two main singers and songwriters in the group — Kevin Russell (who, for reasons best known to him and his god, calls himself “Shineyribs” in the Haymaker! album credits) and Jimmy Smith. I’m not sure which is John and which is Paul, but the George Harrison of The Gourds is multi-instrumentalist Max Johnston, who sings lead on two songs, including the slow, soulful, and lovely “Valentine,” which is guaranteed to get him laid on Feb. 14.

Haymaker! isn’t a concept album, but it has the feeling of a crazy travelogue. Lots of songs deal with travel. “Wake up! We’re going to the country,” are the first words of the first song, “Country Love.” That tune perpetrates the country-music truism that “country lovin’ ” is somehow preferable to urban sex.

Keeping with the unstated travel theme, Russell’s “All the Way to Jericho” sounds like it’s about some cosmic pilgrimage. “All the way to Jericho in a rusted automobile,” he sings. Listeners might be reminded of that old song about pulling into Nazareth.

Shineyribs is back to this earthly plane, however, in the song “Shreveport,” in which he’s on a “midnight drive down on Jewella Road.” This little rocker has references to methamphetamine use and “heavy metal rednecks and their frizzy blond hair.” In “Bridget,” Smith tells about not-so-sweet hitchhiker wearing a Che T-shirt. When he lets her off at a rest stop, she says, “Thanks for the lift, you old geezer.”

Smith’s best contribution to this album is “Blanket Show,” a crazy hoedown injected with garage-band energy. He sings of “warthog rage” and gets away with the line “My heart was heavy but my fu was kung.”

But my favorite Haymaker! song has to be “Tex-Mex Mile,” whices a trip to South Austin sound like Homer’s Odyssey set to the tune of “Six Days on the Road.” “I lost 10 years down there smoking that Pachuca weed/I was Rip Van Winkle but I thought I was Apollo Creed/I couldn’t find my dingo boots, hell I couldn’t even find my feet/I kept a waking and a baking even though it was mostly seeds.”

The amazing thing that The Gourds pull off is that they have managed to stay true to their basic sound. They really haven’t changed much since their earliest works, and they certainly don’t try to keep up with trends. They’re just a great unsung American band. May their fu remain ever kung.

Also noted:
* Lucky 13 by the Paula Nelson Band. Paula is Willie’s daughter. She doesn’t sound much like the old man, but you can hear the DNA in her nasal voice.

She’ll never be as highly regarded as her dad. But then again, Willie can never say he’s worked as Jessica Simpson’s stunt driver. Paula can.

I caught the last part of her set at Austin’s Saxon Pub a couple of years ago (she’s got a weekly gig there, and she went on right before Hundred Year Flood), and I liked what I heard. As this album, released last year, shows, she’s got a blues-rock sound.

My favorites are her rockers, like “Standing Tall,” “Fire Below,” and “Baby You’re Mean.” But she also proves she can handle sad songs and waltzes like “Surrender.” I had to check the credits to make sure that wasn’t a Willie tune.

Most of the songs are original, but there are a few covers. Her rocking version of the Lee Hazelwood/Nancy Sinatra, Johnny Cash/June Carter hit “Jackson” is pretty decent, but much better is her take on a lost Rickie Lee Jones gem, “Easy Money.”

My biggest beef is with her selection of “Angel From Montgomery.” John Prine wrote it; Bonnie Raitt turned it to a wimp-rock classic; and Paula Nelson didn’t need to cover it.

The Paula Nelson Band plays at 8 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 30, at the Santa Fe Brewing Company (37 Fire Place, santafebrewing.com); the cover charge is $10.

PLUGS FOR PALS & RELATIONS

I've been so busy with my political blog I've been letting this one go to Hell.

But just so you don't think I've completely lost myself to Roundhouse madness, here's a couple of music links for you to chew on.

First, a little nepotism: Check out my brother's project with John Carter Cash, The Cedar Hill Refugees. There's guest spots by Ralph Stanley, Marty Stuart, The Peasall Sisters and more.

Then there's my friend and fellow KSFR DJ Dave Barsanti has archived a bunch of his Twisted Groove radio shows. Santa Fe Opry fans know this is the show that comes on right afterward on Friday night (technically early Saturday morning.) Check that out HERE. Like podcasts, you can download the shows or listen to them on Dave's site.

One of my favorites, an Afro-funk show, is HERE

Speaking of podcasts, don't forget my new gospel show.