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Sunday, October 6, 2019 KSFR, Santa Fe, NM Webcasting! 10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
Here's my playlist :
OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Agony by The Muffs
No Man's Land by Imperial Wax
Wish She's Come Back by The Mystery Lights
In Glass by Notts
Along for the Ride by Alien Space Kitchen
Brontosaurus by Hickoids
Homicyde by Kazik & Zdunek Ensemble
I Put a Spell on You by Creedence Clearwater Revival
Heart Attack and Vine by Screamin' Jay Hawkins
Low Down Monkey Blues by Tom Waits with The Replacements
Bastards of Young by The Replacements
End of My Neighborhood by The Fleshtones
Cypress Grove by Jimmy "Duck" Holmes
Bricks by Sex Hogs II
Your Justice by Los Pepes
Disbelief Suspension by Mark Lanegan Band
This Wondrous Day by Kyra
I'm Out of Control by The Milkshakes
Can't Judge a Book by Thee Headcoats
Apartment Wrestling Rock 'n' Roll by Reverend Beat Man
Cock in My Pocket by Iggy & The Stooges
The Mad Daddy by The Cramps
Dancing on My Knees by The Yawpers
Straight Hard and Long by Meet Your Death
Chinese Buffet by The Royal Hounds
Too Bad by Lonesome Shack
I Had a Dream by Dex Romweber
Since I Fell For You by The Night Beats
How Many Stars by The Mekons CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis
I've been enjoying Ken Burns' Country Music documentary series on PBS. But one thing I'm not enjoying is the never-ending bitching on social media about artist Burns didn't cover, or cover enough. (I'm about half way through it it, so if, by the end I don't see anything on The Waco Brothers or The Hickoids, I might join in the whine-fest.)
But til then, let's look at the doughnut and not the hole. There are many great country musicians to whom Burns devoted precious footage who aren't very well known to modern ears, and one such act is the band known as The Maddox Brothers and Rose.
Fred, Cal, Cliff, Don, "Friendly" Henry (the working girl's friend) and little sister Rose Maddox brought the boogie to country music, basically playing rockabilly decades before anyone ever heard of rockabilly. Mixing honky-tonk, a little bluegrass, some R&B -- and almost always irreverent humor -- they provided good times and great sounds for the Okies who had migrated to California during the Great Depression. They also were forerunners of the Bakersfield sound and inspirations to the likes of Merle Haggard and Buck Owens (who recorded several duets with Rose in the early '60s.
Though they called their style "Okie boggie," the Maddox clan was from Alabama. The whole family walked, hitchhiked and hopped trains to Modesto, Calif. in 1933.
In 1939 they drove their Model A to the Sacramento State Fair and entered a hillbilly band competition. The Maddox siblings took the stage and ripped through “Sally Let Your Bangs Hang Down,” with hard-driving rhythms and raunchy lyrics, and tore up the competition, officially winning the title “California’s best hillbilly band.” After that, the family performed at rodeos and in honky tonks up and down the West Coast. Rose, only 12 at the time, performed in bars, despite rules that no one under the age of 18 could enter. During that period, she heard Woody and Jack Guthrie perform “Reno Blues”—a song she later remade into the group’s biggest hit, “The Philadelphia Lawyer.” When Don and his brothers returned from military service in 1946, the band reformed. Dressed in gaudy, brightly colored costumes made by North Hollywood tailor Nathan Turk, the Maddox Brothers and Rose called themselves “America’s Most Colorful Hillbilly Band” and were known for their high-energy performances – with hollers, spoken asides, and brother Cal’s crazy laughter. Don became the comic of the group and developed a confident “Don Juan” persona. His screeching “mule” fiddle became an integral part of the Maddox stage show.
Here's the song that won them that contest in Sacramento:
This is the song that made me a fan after hearing it on KUNM's Home of Happy Feet years and years ago.
Mama was right ...
Most of us are familiar with this kind of blues
And here's an oddity from 1956 I just stumbled on. I'm not sure why they renamed "I Got a Woman" to "The Death of Rock and Roll." I just hope Ray Charles got some royalties.
Sunday, September 29, 2019 KSFR, Santa Fe, NM Webcasting! 10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
Here's my playlist :
OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Along Came Jones by The Coasters
Glad Rag Ball by Daddy Long Legs
Who Controls the Weather by Alien Space Kitchen
Alien Space Kitchen interview
One More Time by The Dildonts
Let it Come Down by Alien Space Kitchen
I Won't by The Replacements
Barely Getting By by Imperial Wax
60 Minute Man by Jerry Lee Lewis
This Year's Girl by Elvis Costello
Two Dollar Elvis by Left Lane Cruiser
The Coffee Song by Stan Ridgway
Hard Times by Jimmy "Duck"Holmes
Snake Farm by Ray Wylie Hubbard
Thee Olde Trip to Jerusalem by The Mekons
Child of Mercy by The Yawpers
No Blame by Sex Hogs 2
Automatic by Los Pepes
Risking My Heart by Råttanson
Schoolbus by The Toy Trucks
The Beast is You by The Electric Mess
A Lonely Song by Daniel Johnston
Facestabber by Thee Oh Sees
Thick Skin by The Mystery Lights
Love by Sleater-Kinney
Silver Spring by Fleetwood Mac CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis
A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican September 27, 2019
Faithful readers of my music screeds should certainly realize that probably 99 percent of my record reviews are favorable. Ripping into bad music by chirpy little pop stars or stinky old classic rockers years beyond their prime doesn’t bring me much joy. But more importantly, I’d much rather tell people about great music they might not be familiar with.
But there’s one big exception. That’s when some singer or band who I absolutely love releases a record that disappoints me — music that’s so unworthy of musicians who are capable of so much more. That’s when I dip my proverbial pen into the metaphorical poison ink.
You only hurt the ones you love.
So after intense deliberation and heavy sadness, I have decided to blast The Center Won’t Hold, the new album by one of my top favorite bands of the past couple of decades,Sleater-Kinney.
In case the above verbiage seems somewhat familiar to fans of this group, that’s because I was riffing on the announcement in July by longtime Sleater-Kinney drummer Janet Weiss that she was leaving the trio. “The band is heading in a new direction and it is time for me to move on,” she wrote on social media soon after S-K had finished recording The Center Won’t Hold.
A “new direction.” That’s an understatement for the ages.
Quick historical note: Sleater-Kinney first rose from the smoldering ashes of the great Riot Grrrl scare in Olympia, Washington, in the early 1990s. But there was something special about them. It didn’t take long for S-K to slip the surly bonds of the basic girl-punk sound.
Besides Weiss’ mighty drums, there was the scorching two-guitar attack of Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein (also of Portlandia fame). There was Tucker’s hopped-up banshee wail (the group’s greatest weapon). And they only seemed to get better with every new album.
One of the best shows I've ever seen ...
They took a hiatus that lasted a decade or so shortly after releasing their 2005 album The Woods. I missed them dearly in their absence but their 2015 comeback album, No Cities to Love, was nothing short of amazing. (And their concert in Albuquerque in the spring of that year was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen.)
That’s one of the main things that saddens me so about the gloopy mess that is this latest record.
For reasons best known to Corin, Carrie, and Janet (if indeed the latter was part of this decision), they called in Annie Clark, better known among indie-rock circles (whatever that means these days) as St. Vincent. A lot of people, including many whose musical tastes I respect (my own beloved children among them), like her music. But I find it overly precious and boring and much of it soaked in synthy uselessness.
That’s fine. St. Annie can do what she wants. I just wish she hadn’t brought those dubious qualities to Sleater-Kinney’s new album. (Some may call me a stodgy old dinosaur, but I don’t give a flying darn.)
The dearly departed Weiss does play on the new album, but her normal power is diluted severely by synthesized beats. Also, the wild guitars of Tucker and Brownstein take a backseat to the electronic gizmos.
Seriously, had you played me this album without telling me who it was, I would not have guessed it was Sleater-Kinney.
The title song, which starts the album, is cruelly deceptive. It starts out slowly with clanking percussion and a synthesized bass line. The vocals — I think it’s Tucker — seem detached to the rest of the musical backdrop. Then about two-thirds of the way into the song, the old Sleater-Kinney seems to come back to life for the final minute of the track.
But it’s just a tease. By the next number, “Hurry on Home,” the new, artsy, synth-pop S-K is back and, for the most part, here to stay.
I have to admit there are a couple of tunes I actually like. “Bad Dance” comes dangerously close to rock ‘n’ roll. “And if the world is ending now/then let’s dance, the bad dance/we’ve been rehearsing our whole lives,” Brownstein sings. It’s definitely the sexiest song on the album. “Come over here and show me/that you crave a little more/Let me defang you/and defile you on the floor …”
And despite the fact that it’s just as synthy as the worst songs on the album and doesn’t really sound like the Sleater-Kinney I revere, the upbeat “Love” is so catchy it’s addictive. It sounds almost faux-’80s New Wave, maybe The Go-Gos high on pep pills and hair spray. And, somewhat ironically, it’s about S-K’s early history, even dropping the names of some of their early albums.
“Heard you in my headphones/Slipped you my address/Call the doctor/Dig me out of this mess/Tuned it down to C/Turned the amp to ten/A basement of our own/A mission to begin ...”
I’m glad the brave women of Sleater-Kinney no longer have to sleep in their van, as they sing about in “Love.” But I sure hope they turn the amp back to 10 and return to the basic sound that brought us to them in the first place.
