WACKY WEDNESDAY: TV Themes With a Twist

Here are a few twisted rock 'n' roll takes on some of your favorite television theme songs.

Let's start with  a reliable old  psychobilly group, Elvis Hitler, who brought Hendrix to Hooterville with this 1980s mash-up, "Green Haze.".



Iggy Pop paid tribute to songwriter Neil Hefti and Adam West in his glorious live cover of  "Batman."



I was too old to appreciate The Banana Splits Saturday morning  kiddie show in the '70s. But I'll never be too old for The Dickies' version of the theme song.



When I hear Husker Du's version of Sonny Curtis' "Love Is All Around," the theme to the Mary Tyler Moore Show, I truly believe I'm going to make it after all.



The Chicano punk band Manic Hispanic brought took Gilligan's Island to the barrio. (It's from a 1997 compilation called Show & Tell: A Stormy Remembrance Of TV Theme Songs  a fun collection of rock 'n' roll TV theme covers.)



And speaking of Gilligan's Island, here's a version that sparked a vicious lawsuit filed by led Zeppelin's lawyers that resulted in a court order requiring the band Little Roger & The Goosebumps to destroy all copies of the record.

Ironically, Robert Plant in a 2004 interview on NPR's Fresh Air said this was his favorite parody of "Stairway to Heaven." (He talks about that right around the 15 minute mark.)

To which "Little" Roger Clark replied in a 2007 interview, "Thanks for nothing, Bob. Well, I met him. He said, `Oh, I’ve always liked this record.' It was Jimmy Page and the manager that hated it. But that’s just like any business situation. `I love you, babe, but my partner’s got a problem.' "

Some copies of the original are still floating around. And Little Roger & The Goosebumps released a legal version 16 years ago,

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, February 14, 2016
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

Papa Satan Sang Louie by The Cramps

Trash by New York Dolls

Clouds of Dawn by Dead Moon

You Don't Love Me Yet by Roky Erickson

500 lb Bad Ass by Chief Fuzzer

War Dancers by King Mud

Licking the Frog by Manby's Head

Mixed Biz'ness by Beck

 

Valentine by Concrete Blonde

Stumbling' Man by TAD

Death Party by Gun Club

Mama Get the Hammer by Barrence Whitfield & The Savages

Sharpen Up Time by New Bomb Turks

Goons of Hazzard by Dead Kennedys

High on Drugs by The Fleshtones

Why Do You Get So High, Shorty? By The Treniers

 

Hoodie Saperticker by Barbara & The Boys

Designed to Kill by James Chance

Been to Kansas City in A Minor by Frank Zappa

Sweet Georgia Brown by Captain Beefheart

Pretty Lord Sundance Part 1 by Lord Sundance

Teenage Head by The Flamin' Groovies

Who Do You Love by Bo Diddley

 

Manny's Bones by Los Lobos

Sewer Fire by Thee Oh Sees

Don't Be Taken In by Miriam

Frogman by King Kahn & The Shrines

It's Money that Matters by Randy Newman

Some Enchanted Evening by Bob Dylan

Nothing Lasts Forever by The Kinks with Maryanne Price

CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

 

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THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, February 12, 2016
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
World's in Bad Condition by Dave & Phil Alvin
I Want to Huga Ya, Kiss Ya, Squeeze Ya by Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs
Ramblin' Man by Dick Dale
Amarillo Highway by Terry Allen
Baby He's a Wolf by Werly Fairburn
New Deal of Love by Hank Thompson
The Girl I Sawed in Half by Paul Burch
Drinkin' Bout You by Alex Culbreth & The Dead Country Stars
Ya'll Motherfuckers Need Jesus by The Goddamn Gallows

Alabama at Night by Robbie Fulks
Rollin' on Rubber Wheels by Louie Setzer
Set Up Two Glasses Joe by Ernest Tubb
Hotel San Jose by Jimmy & The Mustangs
The Love-in by Ben Colder
Every Night About This Time by Rachel Brooke
Family Tree by Wheeler Walker, Jr.
Evangeline by Emmylou Harris & The Band
The Shiek of Araby by Jim Kweskin Jug Band

Dan Hicks Memorial Set
(All songs by Dan Hicks & The Hot Licks except where noted)
I Feel Like Singing
Ragtime Cowboy Joe
O'Reilly at the Bar by Maryanne Price & Floyd Domino
That Ain't Right (with Gibby Haynes)
Hummin' to Myself (with Maria Muldaur)
The Diplomat by Maria Muldaur
Mama I'm an Outlaw by Dan Hicks
Hell I'd Go by Dan Hicks & The Accoustic Warriors
The Buzzard Was His Friend
Beedle Um Bum (with Jim Kweskin)
See You in My Dreams

Weakness in a Man by Waylon Jennings
The Bloody Bucket by Grey DeIsle
Hop Old Rabbit by Elizabeth LaPrelle
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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THROWBACK THURSDAY: Songs Kweskin Taught Us

The recent death of Dan Hicks got me thinking of one of Hicks' big influences, Jim Kweskin.

I was in junior high the first timeThe Jonathan Winters Show, which I never missed. This was about the same time I'd become a devotee of Dr. West's Medicine Show & Junk Band and the early Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, so discovering Kweskin was a huge revelation. I don't even remember the songs Kweskin played on Winters that night. I just remember their joyful noise -- and how sexy singer Maria D'Amato was.
I ever saw the Jim Kweskin Jug Band. It was on

The music of Kweskin and his band -- which included Maria's then husband Geoff Muldaur, Fritz Richmond, Bill Keith and harmonica blower/cult leader Mel Lyman --  was a personal gateway to all sorts of old blues, jazz, hillbilly, Tin Pan Alley and, yes, jug band sounds. They showed that music that even predated my grandparents could still be wild, mysterious, and a lot of fun.

I've already done entire features on some Kweskin favorites such as Beedle Um Bum and Sheik of Araby. But here are some other original, or at least earlier versions of songs from the Kweskin song bag.

Let's start off with a jug-band tune from The Dixieland Jug Blowers, with a song Kweskin would use as a title song for his 1967 album, Garden of Joy.



This 1920s favorite by a lady named Vaughn De Leath is another Kweskin classic



Here's a version of "Never Swat a Fly" recorded by Abe Lyman's California Ambassador Hotel Orchestra more than 30 years before Kweskin and crew.


Another exotic tune, "Borneo," performed by the Frank Trumbauer Orchestra with Scrappy Lambert on vocals.



I heard "Blues in the Bottle done by The Lovin' Spoonful before I heard Kweskin's version. But Prince Albert Hunt's Texas Ramblers did it before either of them. (And Hunt was from Terrell, Texas!)


Finally, here's one for Dan Hicks.

WACKY WEDNESDAY: Happy Birthday, Jimmy Durante (and the old Schnozzola too!)

One hundred twenty-three years ago today Jimmy Durante, the gravel-voiced star of Vaudeville, radio and television and movies, was born in New York City.

This son of talian immigrants was known as a comedian whose trademarks were his beat-up hat and his huge bulbous nose (which he called "the Schnozzola").

But before his career as a comic and an actor, Durante was a musician. According to his bio on the Red Hot Jazz site:

Before Jimmy Durante became one of the most famous and lovable entertainers of the Twentieth Century, he was a hot piano player and bandleader, Durante was greatly influenced by Scott Joplin and had his first success in show business as a Ragtime piano player starting around 1911. He was billed as "Ragtime Jimmy" and played in New York City and Coney Island. 

Playing ragtime piano on Coney Island n 1911. Even if I knew nothing else about him, that alone would make me love Jimmy Durante.

He died in 1980, but his ghost still haunts strange corners of YouTube, So let's honor Jimmy on this Wacky Wednesday with some of his wackier tunes.

In 1934, appearing in the movie Palooka, Durante first performed what would become his signature song, "Inka Dinka Doo"



Three decades later, Durante would perform the song on TV with a strange novelty artist of the mid '60s called Mrs. Miller.



Also in the '60s Durante weighed in on the flying saucer phenomenon



He dabbled in patriotic children's music



And he dueted with Louis Armstrong



So goodnight, Mrs. Calabash, and happy birthday, Ragtime Jimmy, wherever you are."