8 a.m. to 10 am Sunday Mountain Time KSFR, Santa Fe, NM Webcasting! Substitute Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org Here's the playlist
Welcome Table and Prayer by Alice Wine
Witness for My Lord by Silver Leaf Quartet
The Holy Spirit by Rev. Lonnie Farris
A Little Talk With Jesus by Ernest Phipps & His Holiness Singers
I'm a Royal Child by Reverend Kelsey
I've Got a Home by Holy Wonders
A Sinner's Plea by The Jubilee Hummingbirds
I Know I Got Religion by Andy Mosely
Don't Forget the Bridge by The Five Blind Boys of Mississippi
I'll Lead a Christian Life by Elder Golden P. Harris
Hell Bound Express Train by Reverend J.M. Gates
Do You Call That Religion? by Rev. A. Johnson
I Prayed All Night by Pressers of Christ
God is Alright by Sons of South
I'll Fly Away by Joe Lastie
Just Beyond the River / Christian Automobile by Bright Light Quartet
Get Ready, I'm Going to Move in the Room Upstairs by Rev. Louis Overstreet
It AIn't Nobody's Biz'ness What I Do by Hoosier Hot Shots
How You Want It Done by Big Bill Broonzy
I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate by Ray Miller & His Hotel Gibson Orchestra
Jimbo Jambo Land by Shorty Godwin
Low Down Rambler Blues by Peg Leg Howell
Old Rub Alcohol Blues by Dock Boggs
Canned Heat Blues by Tommy Johnson
The Devil's Great Grandson by Roy Rogers
Pussy by Harry Roy & His Bat Club Boys
Casey Bill by Earl McDonald's Original Louisville Jug Band
She's Hum Dum Dinger by Jimmie Davis
Dying Crapshooter's Blues by Blind Willie McTell
Minglewood Blues by Cannon's Jug Stompers
On the Road Again by Memphis Jug Band
That'll Never Happen No More by Howard Armstrong
Chicken Don't Roost Too High by Georgia Pot Lickers
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Friday, October 9, 2015 KSFR, Santa Fe, NM Webcasting! 10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org Here's my playlist : OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens
Jibber Jabber by The Supersuckers
Kiss and Tell Baby by Kim Lenz & Her Jaguars
Battle with the Bottle by Linda Gail Lewis
Banana Puddin' by Southern Culture on the Skids
Old Chunk of Coal by Billy Joe Shaver
Under the Jail by Mose McCormack
Heaven Buy and Buy by Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs
I Gotta Go Get My Baby by The Maddox Brothers & Rose
Rubber Hits the Road by The Legendary Stardust Cowboy
The Girl Who Danced Oklahoma / I'm Not That Kat Anymore by Terry Allen
Knoxville Girl by Brett Sparks
Big Lotsa Love by The Bottle Rockets
Hey Baby by Country Blues Review
If I Go Crazy by Peter Case
Night on the Town by Joe West
How Far Down Can I Go? by T. Tex Edwards & The Swingin' Korn Flake Killers
The Dog was Dead by Billy Bob Thornton with Legendary Shack Shakers
Down to the Bone by Legendary Shack Shakers
Sweet Singin' Daddy by Jimmy and Johnny
One Time One Night by Los Lobos
If I Had Three Wishes by Buck Owens
Half Broken Horse by Eilen Jewell
Bloodstains On The Wall by Honeyboy
On his new solo album, Crosseyed Heart, Keith Richards (he's a member of some band whose name I'm trying to remember ...) takes a stab at a true American classic, Leadbelly's "Goodnight Irene." And it's a good stab indeed, as you'll hear below:
And below, Keith talks about why he recorded "Irene." For one thing, he says the lyrics referring to morphine (as he sings it, "Well I love Irene, god knows I do. I'll love her till the seas run dry. And if Irene ever turned me down, I'll take morphine and die") were "right up my alley."
Indeed, "Irene," though a lot of people think of it almost like a sweet lullaby, is a pretty dark tune. Before the lyrics even get to the morphine, the singer, who has just been left by his young wife, has already declared, "Sometimes I get the great notion to jump in the river and drown."
Richards' cover actually is the second new release in which Irene raised her sleepy head,Just recently, Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs, on their new album Coulda Shoulda Woulda, did a song called "Jump in the River," which has obvious roots in "Goodnight Irene." In it, Lawyer Dave sings, "Sometimes I get the big idea, I'm gonna jump in the river and drown." Notice, this wasn't a "great notion," just a "big idea." (Sorry, I can't find this song on YouTube, Spotify, Soundcloud or anywhere. You can hear it on my latest Big Enchilada podcast though.)
Leadbelly recorded several versions of his song, Here is one of them:
But the song wouldn't break nationally until shortly after Leadbelly died. That was in 1950 when a folk group called The Weavers (which included Pete Seeger) did a safe, soft and sanitized version that was a major hit. You won't find any morphine here:
This big hit probably helped bring The Weavers to the attention of the Red-baiters during the McCarthy era. They were blacklisted, Seeger being found guilty of contempt of Congress when he refused to answer questions from House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1955. (His conviction was later overturned.)
But that didn't stop Irene from sweeping the country. The Weavers' hit unleashed a wave of covers by pop, folk, country, and later rock 'n' roll acts.
Country singer Hank Thompson poked fun at the phenomenon of Irene-mania in his song "Wake Up, Irene."
And here is a Spotify list that shows Thompson was right. Here you'll find covers ranging from Sinatra to Little Richard; Ernest Tubb to Brian Wilson; Gene Autry to Little Richard. Enjoy!
Well, it's a good good wine, It really make you feel so fine
Today I'm going to salute, and hopefully turn a few people on to one of my favorite lesser-known, under-rated and unsung (actually, it was sung) Frank Zappa songs of all time:
"WPLJ" -- (That's White Port and Lemon Juice for all you squares) -- which was the opening track on The Mother of Invention's 1970 album Burnt Weenie Sandwich.
I was a student at Santa Fe High School when Burnt Weenie first came out and WPLJ immediately became part of the jukebox of my mind the first time I heard it.
It's one of Zappa's over-the-top doo-wop extravaganzas. I almost wonder whether this was an outtake from Cruising with Ruben & The Jets, released just a couple of years before. Burnt Weenie Sandwich ends with another Rubenesque number called "Valerie" (originally recorded by Jackie & The Starlites.)
Let's take a listen, shall we:
Like I say, I loved "WPLJ," from the start. The sheer absurdity of going on and on in praising this low-rent drink always made me laugh. But what really made the tune was the finish, that crazy Spanish rap by Mother Roy Estrada at the end of the song:
“The modern-day pachuco refuses to die.” Ruben Sano:
Por qué no consigues tu . . . tu carnal que nos compre some wine ese, ándale, pinche bato, puto, hombre, no te hagas nalga, hombre . . . (chale!) no seas tan denso, hombre (chale!), ándale, dile, porque no merecer, ándale, pinche vino, más sua . . . más suave es, más . . . más lindo que la chingada, hombre, ándale, pinche bato, hombre, quiere tu carnal, hombre, tu carnal ese, tú, tú sabes, tú sabes esto de la movida, tú sabes la movida, ese, tú sabes cómo es, tú sabes, pinche vino, puta, ándale, pinche bato, cabrón, ándale ... (Transcription from Zappa Wiki Jawaka) To me it sounded like Santa Fe in 1970! I had tons of friends who talked just like that.
By the way, I ran this through Google Translate and came up with the English version:
Why not get your. . . your carnal buy us some wine that, go ahead, click bato, fucking, man, do not get your butt, man. . . (chale!) Do not be so dense, man (chale!), go ahead, tell, because they deserve, go ahead, click wine, more sua. . . softer, more. . . cuter than a bitch, man, go ahead, click bato man wants your carnal man your carnal that, you, you know, you know this from the move, the move you know, that, you know how it is, you you know, fucking wine, whore, go ahead, click bato, bastard, go ahead
I'm sure that's 100 percent correct.
But "WPLJ" was not a Zappa original. He was covering an obscure Salinas, California doo-wop group called The 4 Deuces, who recorded as a B-side in 1956. The song was used in an ad for for Italian Swiss Colony, a company that produced white port.
Here's how that sounded:
But notice, the Deuces don't include the magical Spanish spoken-word performance at the end. I always wondered what inspired Zappa to do that.
Then in 2002, Arhoolie Records released a bitchen compilation called Pachuco Boogie full of Mexican-American hipster jazz between 1948 and 1950, mainly in Los Angeles. A big chunk of the selections, including the title song were by one Edmundo Martínez Tostado, an El Paso native better known by his stage name: Don Tosti.
Tosti and his group also recorded under the names Don Ramone Sr. y su Orquesta and Cuarteto de Ramon Martinez.
Whatever he called his band, these two songs make me thirsty for some white port and lemon juice and hungry for a burnt weenie sandwich.
Terry Allen with my son Anton at Santa Fe Brewing Company in 2006. (Anton looks older these days. Terry doesn't)
Here's what looks like a fine show down in Albuquerque coming up this weekend. Santa Fe's own Terry Allen and his son Bukka Allen, also a musician, will be playing at the Kimo Theater Saturday, Oct. 10 for an even called "An Evening for Vietnam."
The Allens' part of the show will follow a screening of Deryle Perryman and Moises Gonzalez' documentary Same Same But Different, a story of war veterans returning to Vietnam.
The show is a benefit for a music school in Vietnam being built by TwoBricks, an Albuquerque non-profit that builds music schools in underdeveloped regions.
Tickets are $10-$100 (now there's a range!) You can buy them HERE.
Listen to The Santa Fe Opry on KSFR, 101.1 FM in Santa Fe this Friday (10 pm-midnight). I might just have another ticket or two to give away.
Below is one of my favorite Terry Allen songs, "There Ought to Be a Law Against Sunny California," performed at Santa Fe Bandstand in 2012. Unfortunately, Terry cleaned up the lyrics when performing at that "family friendly" event.
Sunday, October 4, 2015 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(at)ksfr.org Here's the playlist
OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
We're an American Band by Grand Funk Railroad
Sinner Man by Esquerita
Drug Train by Social Distortion
Teeny Bopper Teeny Bopper by The Count Five
Vendidi Fumar by Churchwood
Dancing Fool by Butthole Surfers
Girl from Al-Qaeda by The Jack & Gene Show
Is That Religion? by Cab Calloway
Reefer Man by Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Tumblin' Dice by Johnny Copeland
Ain't No Easy Way by Nancy Sinatra with Jon Spencer
Do the Get Down by Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
It's The Truth, Ruth by The Big Bopper
As You Go Down by Holly Golightly
96 Tears by Aretha Franklin
Down on Me by Big Brother & The Holding Company
Kick Hit 4 Hit Kix U (Blues for Jimi and Janis) by John Lee Hooker
Ball and Chain by Big Brother & The Holding Company
Get It While You Can by Howard Tate
Elephant Gun by Beirut
Wicked Waters by Benjamin Booker
High Noon Blues by The Night Beats
Crawl by The Cynics
Not of This World by The Plimsouls
Prayer for New Mexico by Ronnie Gene
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis
Friday, October 2, 2015 KSFR, Santa Fe, NM Webcasting! 10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
from the April 1930 edition of What’s on the Air, a publication of WHAS radio in Louisville, Ky.
Earl McDonald is the banjo man in the middle.
Click the image to make it more readable
Most people haven't heard of him, but American music owes a lot to an African American banjo player from Kentucky named Earl McDonald.
As a teenager circa 1900, (no that's not a typo), McDonald was a fan of what might have been the very first jug band in the known universe, The Cy Anderson Jug Band, which featured early jug pioneer B.D. Tite.
The Anderson band, based in Louisville, knocked around for about nine years, playing "riverboats, carnivals, parties and venues throughout the Midwest and upper South" according to Don Kent's liner notes for the wonderful Yazoo jug band collectionRuckus Juice & Chitlins.
But by 1909, a homesick Anderson decided to move back to Virginia. But McDonald was ready to fill the void. Earl McDonald's Original Louisville Jug Band got a gig playing the Kentucky Derby. According to the Jug Band Hall of Fame:
By 1914, he was travelling with his band to performances in New York and Chicago. Earl McDonald led the Ballard Chefs' weekly performances on Louisville's WHAS radio for three years (1929-1932). Public response exceeded expectations, enhancing the popularity of jug band music throughout the eastern half of the United States. Earl McDonald's voice and the rhythm of his jug blowing enlivened the recordings of more than 40 tunes with a half-dozen bands from 1924 to 1931.
McDonald played with the Original Louisville Jug Band as well as the Ballard Chefs and The Old Southern Jug Band. And in 1924 with a group that eventally became known as The Dixieland Jug Blowers -- which was a merger of McDonald's Original band and one led by his former musical partner Clifford Hayes -- he made the first known jug band recording backing singer Sara Martin on "Blue Devil Blues."
I wasn't able to find any information and what happened to McDonald. He was doing his Ballard Chefs radio gig as late as 1932. Tat's about the time the bottom was falling out of the recording industry, especially for "race" records and "hillbilly" records. I'm not even sure when McDonald died.
But he sure left some fun tunes behind. Enjoy some now.
Here's my favorite Earl McDonald song, "She's in the Graveyard Now," a variation of "In the Jailhouse Now."
And here's another classic
And here is another McDonald, Hayes and Martin collaboration from 1924
And what the heck, here are a bunch of songs from McDonald and his bands
Today, in case you didn't know, is International Blasphemy Rights Day.
And my boss still wants me to go to work.
But this is serious. This little-known holiday is a tradition that goes back all the way to 2009. It originated with the Center for Inquiry's Campaign for Free Expression. According to the group's website, the day was created "to show solidarity with those who challenge oppressive laws and social prohibitions against free expression, to support the right to challenge prevailing religious beliefs without fear of violence, arrest, or persecution."
Blasphemy Rights Day is observed every September 30, the website says, "to commemorate the publishing of the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons, which angered religious believers around the world, many of whom expressed their disapproval with violent protests, riots, and in some cases, murder."
Yes in many parts of the world you can be jailed, executed or disappeared just by expressing ideas the ruling religion deems blasphemous.
Places ruled by Islamic fundamentalists is one example. And just a few years ago, Pussy Riot showed that blasphemy can land you in prison in Russia.
So I'm proud to be an American, to live in a land where you can blaspheme til you're blue and, even though you'll probably piss off a lot of believers, and maybe even get beat up by righteously outraged, usually your life and liberty won't be threatened.
In honor of the day here are three of my favorite examples of good old American blasphemy.
And, no, John Lennon's "Imagine" isn't one of them. First of all, he technically wasn't an American. But most of all, to commit a kind of blasphemy myself, the song just sucks. So many times I've heard it sung or quoted so solemnly by self-righteous hippies, I'd rather listen to Jonathan Edwards' "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God."
Actually, I'd rather listen to these tunes.
Let's start with Cab Calloway. Back in the mid '60s, when I was in grade school in Oklahoma City, I saw Cab Calloway in person. He played with a small combo during the half time at a Harlem Globetrotters game. I had no idea who he was, but my grandmother, who took me to the game, was hep to that Hi-Di-Ho jive. I loved it, but I was stunned when Cab sang "It Ain't Necessarily So," a song from Porgy & Bess.It basically twisted my youthful Okie head off.
I didn't come from a religious family. We were not churchgoers. My grandmother used to delight in pointing out contradictions in the Bible. The extent of my grandfather's religious teachings was that Jesus loved the little children.
But in conservative Oklahoma most of my friends did go to church, and religion seemed to be everywhere. So when this crazy dude in a zoot suit sang "the things you are liable to read in the Bible, it ain't necessarily so ..." and poked fun at various Bible stories, it opened my eyes. And when Calloway went into his crazy scat singing, it sounded like wild demonic chants beckoning the listeners to follow him into an exciting and probably dangerous new world.
Here's a version of an older Calloway blaspheming away.
Sometimes I think Randy Newman in his prime was the closest thing to Mark Twain that My Generation ever had. That was because of wickedly subversive songs like this.
And here is Robbie Fulks exploring similar terrain. To me he never sounded like he was mocking any religious ideas with this song. He's always sung it with a certain sadness in his voice. And the melody is so pretty, it sounds like the Devil himself wrote it to lead good Christians to the fires.
It's a new hillbilly episode of the Big Enchilada and we're bringing it all back home (on the range) featuring backwoods moans from Rev. Peyton's Big Damn Band, Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs, The Fabulous Alvin Brothers, Legendary Shack Shakers, Audrey Auld and a special set by New Mexico musicians including Slackeye Slim, Imperial Rooster, Mose McCormack and more. Let the music moooooove you!