WACKY WEDNESDAY: It's National Tater Day!

Happy National Tater Day! Here's a holiday that deserves more attention -- as well as more butter and sour cream. 

National Tater Day has been celebrated since before the civil war according to holidayscalendar.com.

This holiday was first celebrated as simple Tater Day in Benton, Kentucky in 1843. It was originally a celebration of the spring season, and participants would come together to trade sweet potato “slips.” Potato slips at the time are what farmers called the slips that were used to grow potatoes. Eventually, this holiday morphed into one of the oldest continuous trade days in the entire U.S. On this day, participants would buy and sell livestock, tobacco, livestock, and yes, even potato slips. Over the years, this holiday also featured parades, floats, clowns, marching bands, and even vintage cars. 

Oh to be a clown in a Tater Day parade!

Important note: Don't get National Tater Day confused with National Potato Day, Aug. 19. Play it safe. Celebrate both!

But to honor this noble tradition on this music blog, let's celebrate National Tater Day in song. Here's Dede Sharp with a tuberous tune from my youth. (It also can be played on National Gravy Day, if there is one.)

Around the same time in the early 60s, Joey Dee & The Starliters shared their recipe for "Hot Pastrami and Mashed Potatoes."

Here's Fats Waller with "All That Meat and No Potatoes." This culinary crime had Fats singing, "I'm steamin'. I'm really screamin'.  ..."

Devo loved their taters.

Tater Day in Kentucky originally was in honor of the sweet potato, which Kevin "Shinyribs" Russell calls "my favorite root vegetable."

The late New Mexico state Senator John Pinto used to sing a Navajo Potato song on the Senate floor at least once a year.

And I've been know to sing my own potato song

So Happy National Tater Day. Hope your party will never be a dud!

BIG ENCHILADA 153: Kooky Kantina

 

Howdy friends and neighbors, welcome to the new hillbilly episode of The Big Enchilada. We're going to down a drink or six at the Kooky Kantina, where the liquor is cheap and Wicked Felina says things like, "Vamoose! José's on his way!"

 

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Here's the playlist:

(Background Music: Stony Island Stomp by Dan Whitaker & The Shinebenders)

Dead or Alive by Titty Bingo with Willie Nelson

When I Was a Cowboy by Peter Case

Cantina Carlotta by Terry Allen

The Lovells Stockade Blues by Rachel Brooke

All Night Cowboy by The Legendary Stardust Cowboy

Julie's Sixteenth Birthday by John Bult

(Background Music: Everybody Stomp by The Hoosier Hotshots)

Cantina by Piñata Protest

Jesus Malverde by Joe "King" Carrasco

All I Wants a Honky Tonk by Sarah Gayle Meech

Give That Love to Me by Ray Campi

Sure Fire Kisses by Goldie Hill & Justin Tubb

Kiss Me Baby by Laura Lee Perkins

Swingin' by Peter Stampfel

(Background Music: Blue Bonnet Rag by Don Helms & The Drifting Cowboys)

Johnston County by Eric Hisaw

This Morning at Nine by Bill Hearne

Through the Hole by The Dad Horse Experience

We Move on by Ramblin' Deano

Neath a Cold Gray Tomb of Stone by Knoxville Girls

(Background Music: Bob Wills Two-Step by Luke Wills' Rhythm Busters)

Play it below:

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, March 28, 2021
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

Here's my playlist :

OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres

Lula Baby by The A-Bones

Dirty Robber by The Wailers

Hot Coffee by Andre Williams & The Goldstars

Black Mold by Nots

Why Can't We Be Like the Satelliters by Wild Evel & The Trashbones

Buc-Ee's Got a Problem by Quintron & Miss Pussycat

Put Me Dowen Like A Dog by Mean Motor Scooter

Bumble Bee by Peter Case

The Hurdy Gurdy Gurdy Man by Butthole Surfers

The Devil Lives in My Husband's Body by Pulsallama

Hey Gyp (Dig the Slowness) by The Raconteurs

Sex Bomb by Flipper 

Don't Look Now by The Sires

Midnight Blues by The Detroit Cobras

Teaching You the Fear by The Bellrays

You Better Pray by Hamell on Trial

Look Me in the Eye by Rick Holstrom

What I Like About Miami by Charlie Pickett

Swingin' by Peter Stampfel

Memories of El Monte by The Mothers of Invention

My True Story by The Jive Five

I'll Go Crazy by James Brown

Yankin' My Chain by Joe "King" Carrasco

White Glove Service by The Grannies

In the Garden by Homer Henderson

This Wondrous Day by The William Loveday Intention

White Dress by Honshu Wolves

Ghosts on Mars by Harvey McLaughlin

Old Kentucky Home by Loretta Lynn

Undecided Love by Rachel Brooke

Passin' Through by Gary Heffern

CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

Like the Terrell's Sound World Facebook page


Want to keep the party going after I sign off at midnight? Go to The Big Enchilada Podcast which has hours and hours of music like this. CLICK HERE

Subscribe to The Big Enchilada Podcast CLICK HERE

THROWBACK THURSDAY: Pardon My French, It's Chanson D'Amour

 

Just a couple of weeks ago in a Throwback Thursday post about Lawrence Welk, I included a video of Sandi Griffith and a bevy of Welk beauties singing an old pop hit "Chanson D'Amour," cracking wise that "My sources in the Drug Culture community warn that it's NOT SAFE to view when you're stoned!"

I'm such a card!

But in all seriousness, this is about a song that's haunted me since I was a little kid. It seemed so foreign, alluring, with an undercurrent of danger hiding behind false wholesomeness. And the recurring "ra da da da da" is just this side of sinister.

I have a very distant and very vague memory of seeing the song performed on my mom's old black and white tv. I don't know who was singing it. Maybe it was the unforgettable, but largely forgotten Art & Dotty Todd, the first to record "Chanson" in 1958. Their video below did seem to jog some memories. However, for most of my life I assumed the singers were French. 

But that's incorrect. Art & Dotty were American lounge singers. And while the title is French, the song is not from France. Songwriter Wayne Shanklin was born in Joplin, Missouri. "Chanson D'Amour" is as American as French toast.

Here's Art & Dotty's version, introduced by Dick Clark on horseback!

Though the Todds were the first to record "Chanson," a group called The Fontane Sisters, a New Jersey group,  recorded it almost immediately after Art & Dotty. Both were released in March 1958. Here's the Fontanes' version:

By the mid 1960s, the song had been passed around and recorded by many of that era's major monsters of schmaltz: The Lettermen, Sadler & Young, Ray Coniff ... Even The Mills Brothers took a stab at the "Song of Love":

Apparently "Chanson" even made it to ... France. Here's Edith Piaff:

In the mid-'70s, "Chanson" was revived by the retro popsters Manhattan Transfer. The single was big in Europe, though didn't make much of a splash in the U.S., where cynics scoffed, "They're no Art & Dotty!"

I was hoping to uncover some obscure R&B or bluegrass or polka or zydeco or speed metal versions of "Chanson D'Amour" but came up empty-handed. However I did find  this gem by The Muppets!

But hey, R&B, bluegrass, polka, zydeco and speed metal musicians, the song is still there ... hint hint!

For more deep dives into songs, check out The Stephen W. Terrell Web Log Songbook

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, March 21, 2021
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

Here's my playlist :

OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres

Justine by The Blasters

Lil Lobo by Joe "King" Carrasco with Patricia Vonne

Baby Doll by The Del Moroccos

Ain't Your Choir by Churchwood

Before the World Blows Up by The Electric Mess

Frog Went a Courtin' by Flat Duo Jets

The Model by Big Black

It's Trash by The Cavemen

My Way by The Darts

All I'm Saying by Alien Space Kitchen

Bowdlerize by Danger Cutterhead

Travelin' Riverside Blues by Hindu Love Gods

Cape by Jon Spencer

Talent Show by The Replacements

Say Goodbye to a Dream by The Woggles

I Am Gonna Unmask the Batman by Lacy Gibson with Sun Ra

Coming to Take Me Away by Tiny Tim

Sophisticated Boom Boom by The Knoxville Girls

Parts Unknown by Kid Congo Powers with Lydia Lunch & Die Haut

Down the Road by Dead Moon

Snickersnee by Thee Oh Sees

Scumbag by Frank Zappa with John Lennon & Yoko Ono

Crazy Train / Monkey Town by Degurutieni

Hot Pastrami with Mashed Potatoes by Joey Dee & The Starliters

It's a Jungle Out There by Randy Newman

Geeshie by The Mekons

I'm a Suspect by Lonnie Holley

How Great Thou Art by Homer Henderson

CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

Like the Terrell's Sound World Facebook page


     Want to keep the party going after I sign off at midnight?
Go to The Big Enchilada Podcast which has hours and hours of music like this. CLICK HERE

Subscribe to The Big Enchilada Podcast CLICK HERE