Ahmed Fakroun: Soleil Soleil (edit de prince language)

The triumphant return of A. Fakroun to these pages, via a ruling edit from Prince Language. Get thee to Ahmed's online store to hear more from Mr. Fakroun.

William DeVaughn: Be Thankful For What You Got (1980 version - DJ Day edit)

Big B raged the original version of this back in January '07. Now DJ Day has come through with this all-good edit of the 1980 remake, highlighting the left-right interplay of rhythm guitars. At this juncture I'd like to wish a happy ongoing birthday to longtime co-conspirator ib, who astutely and presciently noted a connection between this and the Steel An' Skin dub from last Thursday. And thanks last but not least to the sonic warriors at Two For Tennis Radio, for turning me on to both tracks.

Isolée: Pillowtalk

Quiet Village Project: Pillow Talk

Getting pumped for the new Quiet Village album which will be available in CD format on May 13. The track above is an edit of "Voyager" by the Alan Parsons Project, of course, although our friends at I Spy Diamonds have noted that it also sounds a lot like this song "Patrick", by Goblin. Truth is stranger than fiction.

Funkadelic:
Standing on the Verge of Getting It On
Good Thoughts, Bad Thoughts (pt. 1)

from the album Standing on the Verge...

"Standing on the Verge..." is a work of genius, a pocket symphony with a slightly lopsided groove that would be awfully hard to get out of a drum machine. Not that there's anything wrong with drum machines. (By the way I'm using The Captain's vinyl rip for this. Thanks, Captain.)

"Good Thoughts, Bad Thoughts": featuring Eddie Hazel on public saxophone

Echo & The Bunnymen:
Ocean Rain (alternate take)
The Killing Moon (dreamy alternate take)

Inspired by the announcement that what's left of the band (plus a full orchestra) will be playing Ocean Rain at Radio City Music Hall this fall. Ho-hum.

Steel An' Skin: Afro Punk Reggae (Dub)

from Reggae Is Here Once Again

Wim Overgaauw:
Your Song
I Think It's Going To Rain Today

Selections from the album Sagittarius by Dutch jazz guitar legend Wim Overgaauw (1929-1995).

"Your Song": Wim digs deep into this Elton J. classic.

"I Think It's Going To Rain Today": a Randy Newman composition.

Bill Withers:
Another Day To Run
Lonely Town, Lonely Street

I feel like Big B posted some Withers some time ago...regardless, what I want to know is what are YOU running from?

East Of Eden: Northern Hemisphere

from Mercator Projected

Roy Hamilton: Don't Let Go

I bought two CDs trying to find the original mono mix of this, and both times was chagrinned to hear "fake stereo". Frustration was approaching an all-time high until just a few minutes ago, when I read the following:

"(Don't Let Go) was the first stereo record to make the pop music charts. 1958 was the year for several stereo recordings, including Hang Up My Rock and Roll Shoes by Chuck Willis, Yakety Yak by the Coasters, Born Too Late by The Poni-Tails, It’s All in the Game by Tommy Edwards and What Am I Living For by Chuck Willis."

(Thanks to these guys for the info.)

So here you have it in true stereo. From the days of creamiest reverb.

Eric Clapton: All Our Past Times
Eric Clapton: Black Summer Rain

"All our past times should be forgotten, all our past times should be erased."

Discuss.

The Smiths: Still Ill

I believe The Smiths were banned last night, but they should surely pass the test for this morning.

FROM THE ARCHIVES
Original air date: 1.16.2007

Holger Czukay: Persian Love
Brian Eno & David Byrne: A Secret Life

This selection from the archives is partially inspired by this bit of news.

Television:
See No Evil
Venus
Glory
Friction
Ain't That Nothin'
Little Johnny Jewel
Careful
Foxhole
Knockin' On Heaven's Door
Marquee Moon
Satisfaction

As promised, here is Television's show performed at My Father's Place, Roslyn, NY. Recorded June 9, 1978.

Thanks to ib for the artwork.

Thelonious Monk:
These Foolish Things (Remind Me Of You)
Trinkle Tinkle
Sweet And Lovely

vinyl rip, from Monk's Moods [Prestige 7159]

This is a record that my mom had the good sense to buy, circa 1960. The piano is maybe not 100% in tune on These Foolish Things, but Thelonious exploits this for his own ends. Once again modern man triumphs over the limits of technology.

These Foolish Things and Trinkle Tinkle recorded December 18, 1952, with Max Roach on drums and Gary Mapp on bass.

Sweet And Lovely recorded October 15, 1952, with Art Blakey on drums and Gary Mapp on bass.

"These Foolish Things" was written in 1936 by Harry Link, Holt Marvell, and Jack Strachey, for the London revue "Spread It Around".

"Sweet And Lovely" was written in 1931 by Gus Arnheim, Harry Tobias, and Jules Lemare.

Les Edits Du Golem: Klout

In case you haven't been reading the papers lately, this is an edit of "Sunshine Baby", by Clout. There's also an edit of Nisyan on the same record, as it happens.

Love the strings on this.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Hot Chocolate: A Part Of Being With You

original air date: 4/3/07

This b-side nugget, originally posted by Mike, is one that I still find myself turning to over one year later. I love the colourful combination of drum machine, electric piano, wah-wah guitar, and vinyl crackle, and especially the desolate soundscape on the outro. Relatable lyrical content, too. Words & music by Errol Brown.

Tom Verlaine:
New
Candle
Rain, Sidewalk 1

Inspired by a comment in another post, these three tracks are taken from Verlaine's 2006 Around.

Ahmed Fakroun: Nisyan

According to Wikipedia, this was arranged by Nicolas Vangelis (?) and Ahmed Fakroun, and recorded in Italy. I especially love the vocals on the second verse.

Ahmed is breaking off lots more mp3s for your enjoyment over here. Also make the voyage to AhmedFakroun.com.

Sandy Bull: Triple Ballade: Sans Cuer/Amis Dolens/Dame Par Vous, composed by Guillaume de Machaut (1300-1377)

Sandy gets mediæval on your ass with this intense jam from his Inventions LP. Everything you need to know about life in the 1300s is encrypted in these tones.

From the sleeve notes:
"The Triple Ballade by the 14th century Guillaume de Machaut is transmuted by Bull into an absorbing play of sonorities as well as of lines. By multi-tracking, he plays the parts on oud, banjo and guitar. The piece is a canon on the unison in that each part comes in on the same note. 'Written long before rules of modern counterpoint had been set down,' Bull points out, 'the harmonies have that haunting sound of the Gothic age, plus what actually amounts to tone clusters in certain places.'"

For persons wishing to hear the piece in choral form, voilà.

Philip Glass (composer):
Satyagraha - Act I, Scene 1: The Kuru Field of Justice
Satyagraha - Act III, New Castle March, 1913 (final movement)

New York City Opera, 1985.

Commissioned in 1979 by the City of Rotterdam, Satyagraha premiered in Rotterdam on September 5, 1980. It made its Metropolitan Opera premier on Friday night. It's immensely beautiful. If you are in New York I would recommend seeing it before the season is over.

Sung in Sanskrit.

The Cure:
Why Can't I Be You?
A Japanese Dream

Why Can't I Be You? with its original b-side, A Japanese Dream.

Freddie King:
Messing With The Kid
Going Down

Recorded "live" at the Antibes-Juan Les Pins Jazz Festival, Antibes, France, July 24, 1974.

One of the things I love about Freddie is that he always has a great band with him. I don't know the personnel for this show, but suffice to say that the drummer is riding high on these jams. I also like that you can kind of hear that this was recorded outdoors, probably near the sea. It sounds windy.

The Iguanas: Slow Down

Early music from Iggy Pop.

Laid Back: Fly Away / Walking In The Sunshine

I gather that this is a Balearic classic of notable pedigree, but I just "discovered" it after buying a beat-up copy of the 12" of White Horse on the street because I liked the cover and the band name.

Words, music, voices & instruments by Tim Stahl & John Guldberg. Recorded at Laid Back Studio, Copenhagen.

Walking in the sunshine
Looking at the palm trees
Talking to a stranger
Waiting for a phone call
Driving in a taxi
It's show time.

Gérard Gésina: To Thwart Soul

from the album Planant, on the Musax library label

direction artistique: J.C. Pierric

Bo Diddley meets Wish You Were Here/Animals-era Pink Floyd at midnight in the gardens of Venus. You could easily put some Milli Vanilli-style drums under this and be good to go.

(The whole album is available here.)

Serge Gainsbourg (feat. Charlotte Gainsbourg): Lemon Incest

From the album Love On The Beat

Adapted by Serge from this piece by Chopin. Other pop confections based on this melody include Jo Stafford's No Other Love (1950) and Ken Dodd's So Deep Is The Night (1964)... or so I have read.

Frédéric Chopin: Étude Op. 10, No. 3 in E major ("Tristesse")

Performed by Maurizio Pollini, and available on this CD.

Television: Knockin' On Heaven's Door

Recorded live in Roslyn, NY - June 9th, 1978.

Chantal Goya:
Tu M'As Trop Menti
Laisse-Moi

Yeah, it's that song from the trailer for Masculin/Feminin, plus another one from the same CD. I heard Tu M'As... at the movies the other night and couldn't believe how huge the drums sounded for 1966. (The acoustics of the theater helped.)

Written by J.J. Debout
Orchestre: Mickey Baker (A.K.A. Mickey "Guitar" Baker)

Mahjongg: The Rrabbitt

Black Tambourine: Black Car

Rabbitt: Savage

Written by Trevor Rabin. Recorded at RPM Studios, Johannesburg. From the album Boys Will Be Boys.

This is a bumrocks re-rage. File under: shockingly good.

Variètè: Angelic Alice

Some minimal cold synth wave from Japan for this Tuesday. From an EP entitled Souvenir [Kitchen Records Co, Dance 1].

Al Stewart: Terminal Eyes

From his album "Past, Present and Future". Sleeve by Hipgnosis.

This one figures into the mix we did back in December. It's a nice inoffensive Walrusesque number, good for a mid-afternoon coffee break. Featuring copious use of analog tape delay on the vocals, sort of like Peter Green's Just For You.

The Smiths:
William, It Was Really Nothing
Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want

Please, Please, Please was the B-side on this single released on August 24, 1984. Three years later Morrissey had this to say about the track:

I think it was very close indeed [to being a perfect song], and hiding it away on a B-side was sinful. I feel sad about it now although we did include it on Hatful Of Hollow by way of semi-repentance. When we first played it to Rough Trade, they kept asking, "where's the rest of the song?" But to me, it's like a very brief punch in the face. Lengthening the song would, to my mind, have simply been explaining the blindingly obvious.

Beastie Boys: Freaky Hijiki

Don Henley: Dirty Laundry

I always dug the beat and the production on this one. David B. might owe just the tiniest fraction of the royalties for "Let's Dance" to Don & co. for this.

Steve Porcaro: keyboards, special keyboard effects
Danny Kortchmar: rhythm guitar
Joe Walsh: 1st guitar solo
Steve Lukather: 2nd guitar solo
Jeff Porcaro: drums
Roger Linn: special effects
George Gruel, Timothy B. Schmit, Danny Kortchmar and Don Henley: background vocals

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Shirley Bassey:
What I Did For Love
The Hungry Years

original air dates: 11/15/06 and 4/4/07

These are the first two songs on the Love, Life And Feelings LP and together they constitute one of my favorite one-two punches to open any album. There is enough philosophical content in these lyrics to keep you thinking for a while.

What I Did For Love written by Marvin Hamlisch and Edward Kleban
The Hungry Years written by Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield

Produced by Martin Davis
Arranged and Conducted by Arthur Greenslade
Engineer: Martin Rushent

Première Classe: La Fille Qui Rit

I did a google blog search the other day in search of anyone else who might be repping Mikado's Par Hasard. The stratagem worked like a charm as it turned up this great French wave comp, which includes the song posted above. Apparently this is the B-side of a track called Poupée Flash. If anyone has an mp3 of that one, please do get in touch.

Love when this goes to minor at 2:36.

Phil Cordell: Red Lady
Beyond The Wizards Sleeve: Red Tuesday

François de Roubaix: La Fête Des Dieux Avions

Kicking off the week with this Monday morning coffee-sipper, available on this CD.

Elkin & Nelson: Jibaro

I finally got a copy of this 12", so that I could make my own homebrewed mp3 of this. Newsflash: this works well at parties. For lagniappe, here's the Williams Fairey version, courtesy of Ugly Talented.

Grateful Dead: Scarlet Begonias>Fire On The Mountain
(recorded "live" at Barton Hall, Cornell University, May 8, 1977)

We welcome the advent of spring with this blast of orange sunshine from spring tour '77. Legend has it that Sheridan DuPre once played this for Big B, and he liked it.

I love the audience reaction when Jerry's vocals come in at 0:43.

for the faithful:
Grateful Dead: Scarlet Begonias
(recorded live at Winterland, March 20, 1977)

Antonio Adolfo: Venice

From his album Feito Em Casa.

Casino Music: Viol AF 015

Another cut from that compilation Bippp, and the triumphant return of Casino Music to these pages. I'm not sure what these guys are singing about here but they sound hormonal. Nice vaguely canine background noises at 1:02.

The Chuck Rainey Coalition: Eloise (First Love)

From their self-titled LP.

I've fallen in love with this little tune, composed by C. Rainey, since I was first introduced to the Richard Tee version last year. So I was pleasantly surprised to find this earlier version at the local shoppe the other day. Minor-nine tonalities, piano octaves, reverb, strings, congas... romance.