Posted on

P.J. Proby — 243, 242, 241, 240, 239

ALBUMS: Three Week Hero-PJP (1969); Enigma (1966): You Can’t Come Home Again (45 rpm) (1968): Somewhere (1967): What’s Wrong With My World (1968): Focus Con Proby (1977)

MVC Rating: Hero 4.0/$$$; Enigma 4.0/$$$; Home (45) 3.5/$$; Somewhere 3.5/$$; What’s Wrong with My World 2.5/$$; Focus Con Proby. (pending review)

I have written about Proby earlier when I named one of his albums one of the seven most underrated albums in My VInyl Countdown collection.

Proby’s story is certainly a wild one: he got kicked out of England; Van Morrison wrote a song about him; his sister dated Elvis; he played Elvis in a stage production; sang mostly rock and roll and ballads but at one point in the 1970s was lead singer for Focus the heavy prog band from the Netherlands in ‘Focus Con Proby.’ Focus is a group best known for their heavy metal yodeling song called Hocus Pocus.

First, a quick update on My Vinyl Countdown.com. That’s my website where I state my mission by vowing to listen to, write about and list (in alphabetical order) all of the records I have collected since, oh about age 12.

I’m 60 now. (I took about a two-decade detour into digital).

I am doing this to raise awareness of Lewy body dementia, which I have.

There is no cure for this disease, the second-leading form of degenerative dementia after Alzheimer’s. So yes, I am forgetful and I have tremors now and then. But thanks to modern science and miracles of their cost prohibitive I’m doing fine. My bank account may not be doing fine, but I am.

So anyway, I started with 678 records and have reviewed 438. Now I have about 240 records to go. (Give or take).

Thanks to everyone with the notes and kind words throughout this. It keeps me hanging on. (Got a Vanilla Fudge album to do when I get to the V’s).

Proby is one of those artists that I really didn’t know during my formative vinyl years. He’s one of several on the countdown that I have purchased more recently (past 3 years) as I started thumbing through bargain bins and thrift shops.

Coming home after a thrift store find I put on his Enigma record and immediately noticed the voice. It was an entity all to itself, Vegas, swamp rock, Elvis, Otis, Tom Jones — that voice channeled just about everything.

He was not moving the needle much in the U.S. but the UK seemed to love him. He was like Bizarro World Elvis: or Tom Jones playing Mick Jagger in a movie about the Stones; or Johnny Cash if he had grown up in Ireland during the 1950s and 60s and was heavily influenced by Van Morrison.

(These are fun, I could go on but I’ll restrain myself.)

The ‘accident’ sparked so much audience reaction that it happened again ……..and again. I couldn’t find any stories that detailed how many times it happened. But an oversight office on moral turpitude basically had Proby thrown out of the country.

PJ Proby’s albums were often a hodgepodge of styles looking for a theme. Some real gems however found within.

About the music. I would recommend Enigma which has his single ‘Niki Hoeky’ a Deep South novelty tune in the vein of Tony Joe White’s ‘Polk Salad Annie.’ Or about anything Jim Stafford would do.

Proby’s vocals jump comfortably from falsetto to hard rock/soul back down again.

The man knew he had a voice and that was possibly his downfall.

On stage he knew he could wow anyone when he opened his mouth to sing. But his ability to sing any type of song also meant that he recorded any type of songs — as if he was going for the shotgun affect and seeing which style will stick

The problem, which comes clear in the very-good-but-disjointed ‘Three Week Hero., ‘ is that he thinks it’s all too funny, like a comedian who has no sense of when to quit repeating the punch line. His exaggerated bumpkin accent on the opening title song on Hero has no reasoning behind it, context.

It’s bizarre as if he was brushing up to be on TV’s Hee Haw.

In another really good song he sounds like Johnny Cash — only better!

Then he airs out a completely gut wrenching Otis Redding like vocal on a song that made me readjust the listening device. He covered ” It’s so hard to be a N-word.’ No, I’m not going to write it).

It’s a song written by Georgia civil rights activist and African American Mable Hillery. I was brought up that white people never use the N-word so I questioned the appropriateness of a white man singing. Here’s Mable’s version.

And here is Proby’s version with the backing of a group of four men called the New Yardbirds.

Yes, the New Yardbirds were John Bonham, John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. It is believed to be the first time the future Led Zeppelin members recorded together.

NOTE: This song is part of a 3-song medley that also includes ‘George Wallace came Rolling in this Morning.’

Off the same album is this one which sounds like it could have been a single.

Posted on

Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles 247

ALBUM: At the Apollo. (1970s?)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$

Patti Labelle — like Diana Ross –first gained notice leading a ‘girl’ group.Diana Ross and the Supremes, Patti Labelle and the Bluebelles.

Both singers became stars and left their respective groups and became even more famous with long productive careers.

In fact, one of the Bluebelles became a “Supreme” — Cindy Birdsong.

But the comparisons end at the music. Diana Ross was a hit making songstress whose soft smoky voice appealed to a broader range of people than Labelle.

Labelle was a soul belter with an amazingly powerful voice, think Aretha Franklin, although higher and more piercing. This album is live and she works it out on songs like ‘I Sold my Heart to the Junkman’ and ‘Go On.’ The interesting thing on these older tracks is that Patti keeps her voice under rein. Later, with some big spots on television and concerts she would tend to let loose with her vocal acrobatics, scaling octaves like Mount Everest. A glass breaking voice that dominated and overshadowed anyone who might be on stage with her.

Perhaps her biggest recording was the multimillion seller ‘Lady Marmalade.’

Posted on

Peter, Paul and Mary — 248

ALBUMS: Reunion (1978); In Concert (1964); 1700, (1967)

MVC Ratings: Reunion 3.0/$; In Concert, 3.5/$$; 1700 3.0/$

Peter, Paul and Mary (PP&M) are the Three Dog Night of folk music. And I don’t mean that in any disparaging way, to either party.

They both were accomplished performers and recorded great music that touched millions of people. They just weren’t trailblazers, they were interpretors. PP&M’s voices blended like milk in coffee. But they were doing other people songs. It was all to a good end. When they recorded Dylan’s ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ they made people pay attention to an almost perfect song sung in harmonic synchronicity as opposed to Dylan’s version, which was heartfelt and great but urban sidewalk busker-like with Dylan blowing harp and finger picking his guitar. Some would say PPM were homogenized and they were.

In a similar but reverse way, Three Dog Night did small hits of folksy sounding songs and turned them into convincing rock and rollers: Think Laura Nyro’s ‘Eli’s Coming, Randy Newman’s ‘Mama Told Me Not to Come’ and Harry Nillson’s “One.’ (Actually the Nyro song rocks about as hard as Three Dog Night’s.)

Now there’s nothing wrong, as I’ve said, with covering other songs. Singer-songwriters, it seems to me are relatively new thing. Folks like Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Elvis didn’t write their songs. But they could deliver them in a charismatic or appealing way and had nice careers.

The singer-songwriter phase really kicked in with the Beatles and Dylan. During the British invasion led by the Beatles, many acts were just starting to write their own including the Beatles, Buddy Holly and the Rolling Stones.

I’ve got here three PP&M albums. The newest from 1978 is Reunion. The other two are old, with tape on the seams, albums played to death by mi esposa, Catherine, who grew up loving them, Carol King, Carly Simon, James Taylor and the Beach Boys. Oh, and Simon and Garfunkel.

All singer-songwriters. In fact that little group right there have written some of the best known songs in contemporary times. Meanwhile Peter Paul and Mary just made beautiful music. Beautiful like this:

Posted on

ELVIS PRESLEY — 256, 255, 254, 253, 252, 251, 250, 249

ALBUMS: Elvis: The Sun Sessions (1979); Elvis Golden Records (1958 RE); Girl Happy (1965); Elvis Pure Gold (1975); Moody Blue (1977); Elvis for Everyone (1965) Blue Hawaii ( 1961); Elvis Country (1971).

MVC Ratings (in order of above): Sun, 5.0/$$$$; Golden Records, 4.5/$$$$; Girl Happy 2.5/$$; Pure Gold, 3.0/$$$: Moody,3.0/$$$; Elvis for Everyone, 2.5/$$; Blue Hawaii 2.5/$$; Country, 2.5/$$.

People looking at my eight Elvis records may think that I’ve got a lot of money tied up in that. I mean Elvis, come on. Got to be worth lots.

Truth is most Elvis albums aren’t worth that much. Coupla reasons. They made a lot of them as, for a time, anything with Elvis’ name and picture flew off the shelves. Secondly they weren’t that good. Elvis made a lot of mediocre to bad movies. He made a lot of mediocre to bad songs that Elvis recorded for these movies.

If you look at my list of albums I have and the photo, the two albums on the far left are the most valuable. The rest you can find at a used record store in the $4-$8 range. Or in a thrift store for $2. The other two go for 5 or 10 times that. Of course there’s other Elvis music that is worth a lot. We sat next to a couple at the Alabama Record Collector’s Association a few weeks ago who had five Sun Label singles by Elvis. He turned down offers that were in the many thousands of dollars. They actually may be headed to a museum.

Elvis had his growth stunted with the movies. I’m sure he made a lot of money and helped Col. Parker make a lot but his best stuff was clearly in his early years, starting out in 1954 when he was a 19-year-old truck driver. up until the time he was drafted in the army. He served two years, came back still putting out hit after hit, but then chose a path that I believe stunted his growth as a musician. By his early 20’s he already had an everlasting discography with classics like Jailhouse Rock, Love Me Tender, That’s All Right, Mystery Train, Don’t Be Cruel and Hound Dog.

I remember when I was high school age we went to visit some cousins, relatively distant I believe and, the one my age they called Twinkle. We watched an Elvis movie marathon and I was drawn by Elvis even if he was cheesy. She seemed to have been interested as well over Elvis. (Or was it me?) I don’t know I was watching Elvis do the ‘Clam.’

He came back and did movie music, silly music like Do the Clam. He felt like an outsider on the whole British invasion with Beatles. He staged a comeback of sorts when in 1968, dressed in all black leather he went on live TV in a performance hailed as a return to form. But while he had some good songs in the later stages of his career, they were mostly Vegas production pieces written by other people (as was the case always with Elvis). In that era came out ‘In the Ghetto,’ ‘Kentucky Rain,’ ‘A Little too Much Conversation, and ‘Fever.’

In my eyes, despite the many things you can find wrong, Elvis was the King who brought R&B to a mass audience under the new name of Rock ‘n Roll. He was talented, charismatic, good looking and could sing and dance a little bt.

Posted on

Andy Pratt — 257

ALBUM: Andy Pratt (1973)

MVC Rating: 3.0/$$

After about 30 years of not listening to this record, I put it on the other day and have been through it about three times. Before I listened to it I read a description of Pratt’s music as ‘experimental.’

I bought this for his song, the original version, of “Avenging Annie.” I had Roger Daltrey’s cover of the song from his album ‘One of the Boys.’ I still can’t tell which version is better. I lean toward’s Pratt with that falsetto going. But Daltrey’s is a little more straightforward with his lead singer pipes.

But, yes, unlike the Daltry album which was had a couple of mildly interesting songs and then filler. Pratt is indeed experimental, at least when compared to Daltrey.

Pratt tends to go for esoteric dreamy mood songs, that feature a wide dynamic range. Soft singing, loud singing, soft singing, loud singing.

The problem is most have odd structures that upon this renewed hearing sounds like no structure at all. He has a fragile voice. I think it comes down to who has the best Avenging Annie and I say Pratt by a hair (In fact, Pratt and Daltrey have very similar hair.) . I gave Pratt the same grade I gave Daltrey.

Posted on

Process and the Doo Rags — 258

ALBUM: Process and the Do Rags

MVC Rating: 3.5/$$$

Long before Dave Chappelle’s hilarious I-Am-Rick-James- Dammit, Rick James was a crossover hit at my fully integrated high school in Athens, Ga. It was 55 percent white and 45 percent black in my day “Go 78.’

The back parking lot where students hung out for one more cigarette before running to class, vibrated on most mornings.

Blacks and whites jamming to Super Freak. Power boosted stereos buzzing windows and even some dancing along the way. Other crossover songs included ‘Play that Funky Music White Boy’ by Wild Cherry, and Brick House by the Commodores.

The white kids’ favorites Lynyrd Skynyrd, Marshall Tucker Band, the Outlaws and Wet Willie were Southern Rock and did not cross over as well. Foreigner, Bad Company, Heart and Journey were sort of MOR hard rock that appealed to a mostly white audience.

Pink Floyd, Yes, Led Zeppelin and to a lesser extent King Crimson were on a different plane. One of my black friends was a huge Emerson Lake and Palmer fan.

Parliament Funkadelic and George Clinton were like the heavy metal/Frank Zappa sub-genre of funk/space music. Does that make sense? No.

I got tired of the Southern rock thing and found Elvis Costello my senior year in high school, he had just come out with ‘My Aim is True.’ Had it on cassette for car playing. I pivoted again and it ultimately led me down a very expansive, if not winding, path of music appreciation.

So while there was crossover there was a lot of segregation of the music.

Super Freak was kind of dirty for the radio but it was infectious and a huge dance hit. Rick James, who took off like a lightning bolt got into some big trouble and spent time in prison. He died in 2004.

This group he helped create and produce, Process and the Do-Rags, was a throwback group to the black doo-wop and male vocal groups, like Clyde McPhatter and the Drifters or the Temptations.

They didn’t do well and disbanded after two albums. But they were rediscovered not long ago and there were some albums re-released from Japan.

They were probably ahead of their time as a retro male vocal soul and funk group. Can definitely see the Rick James influence with ‘Stomp and Shout’ and ‘The Bells.’ RIck was writer or co-writer on most songs.

Posted on

3 best vocalist performances in Rock music

My Vinyl Countdown has found its favorite rock vocal performances.

Here’s a list of the Top 3 overall, followed by a list of Top 3 male vocal performances (not including the Top 3 I previously named.) And, yes, Top 3 female vocal performances.

This is highly subjective. When I say performance I don’t mean necessarily live – it could be live or a studio version. Here we go, short and sweet.

1) Joe Cocker ‘With a Little Help from Friends.’ Live at Woodstock. This cover of the Beatles song was turned inside out and milked to an explosion of emotion. Seeing him sing it makes it all the more potent as he writhes and sways as he pulls out deep feelings and blasts them into the souls of listeners who know not what is happening

2) Janis Joplin “Me and Bobby’ McGee.’ The cover of the Kris Kristofferson song came as a surprise. No one thought the shrieking hellhound from Texas could wrench so much emotion out of what was a deceptively well-written vagabond song. She gets under and over the notes in an amazing show of restraint letting it out, cathartically, at the end with the most natural sounding ‘na na na’ chorus this side of Wilson Pickett’s Land of a 1,000 Dances.

3) Sly Stone ‘If You Want Me to Stay.’ With its thumping thunking bass line forcing you on your feet, This mid-tempo Sly song covers all the bases vocally, from yodel flip to falsetto and back to heavy chest vibrating low octaves. It has soul and it is making the soul work.

Quick hits male and female:

Top 3 (Male vocal performance other than the above)

1) Prince “The Beautiful Ones.’’ Oh my! Nothing to say when you get to the end.

2) Wilson Pickett Hey Jude Beatles version is great but Pickett with guitar session help from Duane Allman tears the cover off.

3) Elvis Presley Fever (I also considered Jailhouse Rock and Kentucky Rain.}

Top 3 (Female vocal performance other than the above)

1) Eva Cassidy“Over the Rainbow” a pop ballad, not really rock. But when you hear this live version of the classic song, sung in a DC area night club with only Eva’s voice and acoustic guitar, you instantly are told by the chills down your neck that this is singing. And Magic. Singer died too young.

2) Gayle McCormick “Baby, It’s You.” The Shirelles did it, the Beatles did it but nobody did this song better than the lead singer of A Group Called Smith.

3) Tina Turner “Better be Good to Me’ Tina was the real deal, singer, performer, and role model.

Honorable mentions Aretha Franklin ‘R-E-S-P-E-C-T and Hocus Pocus by Focus singer Thijs van Leer.

Hocus Pocus is one weird vocal.

And in signing off I’ll cheat with one more cannot be ignored vocal: Little Richard Tutti Frutti/Long Tall Sally

Suggestions, critiques – all welcome.

Also published in AL.com here.

BONUS QUESTION: Which one of these artists on the list are from Alabama. (Scroll down to see).

.

.

.

..

Wilson Pickett born in Prattville.

Posted on

Pink Floyd — 263, 262, 261, 259

ALBUMS: Ummaguma (1969) : Dark Side of the Moon (1973): Wish You Were Here (1975); The Wall (1979)

MVC Rating: Ummagumma/4.0/$$$$$; Dark Side/ 5.0/$$$$$; Wish/$$$$$ 4.5; the Wall, 4.5/$$$$$ (NOTE: All five dollar signs meaning at least $25 to get any of these in decent shape. Can pay many hundreds for certain Pink Floyd collectibles.)

By the way, which one’s Pink?

A classic line from a classic album.

The line from a meeting between the rock group and the record company executives, in a few words, captures the relationship or lack thereof between artists and the anonymous men in suits, a relationship that historically had been too often built on rip-offs and lies. Their only interest is that ‘Pink’ and his chums can sell more ‘units.’

Come on in have a cigar boys, the producer tells them.

“I’ll tell you the name of the game, boys,” the song goes. I”t’s called riding the gravy train.”

That on ‘Wish You Were Here” echoed a previous song, the ‘hit’ Money from the DSOM album: New car, caviar, four star daydream
Think I’ll buy me a football team…

Pink Floyd has become synonymous with the so-called Classic Rock genre. But back when I got it, there was not a lot like it. There was no ‘Classic’ yet.

Pink Floyd deserves their success. I thought they were out of this world when I first heard them. I think my girlfriend in Indiana in the 9th grade gave me ‘Dark Side of the Moon.’ And if I am not mistaken, i gave her David Essex who really had only one song I remember and that was Rock On. Cool song with a little rock-a-billy echo if I recollect.

Floyd was one of those bands that expanded the boundaries of rock and roll, starting with highly experimental sounds with space as a theme or touchstone. Albums like Ummagumma and Piper’s at the Gates of Dawn were long rides, with trippy special effects. It was the kind of music that your parents thought was all rock music. Ummagumma had extreme dyanamic range with soft passages you could barely hear followed by wine glass breaking shrieks. I don’t know what a banshee looks or sounds like, but I imagine it would sound like the end of the first side of Ummagumma.

And yes, there was an element of the music built to ‘freak out’ the psychedelic or stoned crowd. But as many artists have shown before and after those Ummagumma 60’s and Dark Side 70’s, you usually lose when you mess with the drugs.

Pink Floyd became one of the most successful group of musicians in rock history, or should I say music history. They reigned in their psychedelic influenced musical ramblings into something much more accessible and potent. Unfortunately along the way they lost a key band founder, Syd Barrett, whose drug use escalated and his mental health deteriorated. Eventually the band kicked Barrett out, although he remained a muse and influential inspiration for Pink Floyd’s other members.

From Wikipedia: “Pink Floyd’s most popular work drew on the power of what Barrett signified,” wrote Steven Hyden in his 2018 book Twilight of the Gods. “[E]ven after he was no longer in the band, his spirit haunted its records.”

The Floyd album and song ”Wish You were Here,’ was about Syd as was ‘Shine on You Crazy Diamond’ from the same album.

Pink Floyd’s trademark other-worldy sound and echoes, dipping in to free form jazz and touches of Classical music was Barrett’s foundation for the band led by David Gilmour and Roger Waters. A list of top selling artists of all time using data from  MTV, VH1, and Billboard shows Floyd with 121 million certified units sold. That puts them 8th on the list of all time sales leaders. The top three are the Beatles, Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson.

By practically creating a new genre, Pink Floyd will go down as one of the most pioneering groups ever. There were other experimentalists. The Soft Machine, Emerson Lake and Palmer, Hawkwind, and Kraftwork. But none ever appealed to as many people. Dark Side of the Moon was on the charts (200) for an astounding 14 years.

Posted on

John Prine — 264

Hello in there John Prine

ALBUM: John Prine 1971

MVC Rating: 4.5/$$$$ (First pressings and promo albums can be expensive.)

John Prine wrote some classic songs. Socially conscious, witty and biting, he upon further review should go down as one of America’s finest songwriters.

‘Angel from Montgomery,’ ‘Sam Stone,’ ‘Illegal Smile,’ ‘Hello in there,’ and ‘Donald and Lydia’ are major and minor classics. And that was just his first album. I believe I got this in Middle School (actually we called it Junior high school back then). I was about 9th grade. I remember hearing ‘Donald and Lydia’ and thinking I had to find this song. I had to tell my brother to turn down the Alice Cooper so I could figure out a way to find out who did that song and what was it called. It took some sleuthing. Spanish Pipedream was another favorite: “Blow up the TV, throw out your paper … go find Jesus on your own.”

Bob Dylan is reportedly a big fan.

In 2017 Rolling Stone did a profile calling Prine the Mark Twain of singer-songwriters.

Prine’s lyrics can be funny, biting and can make you cry — sometimes all within one song.

From Sam Stone he sets the tone, a family where ‘Daddy,’ a war veteran with a Purple Heart, has a drug problem:
‘There’s a hole in daddy’s arm where all the money goes,
Jesus Christ died for nothin I suppose.
Little pitchers have big ears,
Don’t stop to count the years,
Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios.‘

His much covered ‘Angel from Montgomery’ has these lyrics near the end of the song.. They always give me the chills because I think it is a strong hint that that she (the song’s protagonist killed her husband. I’ve been in debates over this, but here they are followed by a famous cover of the song by Bonnie Raitt.

There’s flies in the kitchen
I can hear ’em there buzzing
And I ain’t done nothing since I woke up today
How the hell can a person go to work in the morning
And come home in the evening and have nothing to say — John Prine “Angel from Montgomery.’

Here’s Bonnie Raitt covering the song:

In the middle of the Vietnam War — Prine was drafted and did a tour of duty — he wrote this:

But your flag decal won’t get you
Into Heaven any more
They’re already overcrowded
From your dirty little war
Now Jesus don’t like killin’
No matter what the reasons for
And your flag decal won’t get you
Into Heaven any more

Another example of his funny side.

Posted on

Papa John Creach — 265

ALBUM: Papa John Creach

MVC Rating: 4.5/$$$$$

They talk about James Brown being the hardest working many in showbiz. Well I proffer Papa John Creach.

Born in Pennsylvania, classically trained he found some rare symphony gigs open to a black man. So the began to cater to many audiences, learning the biz one nightclub venue at a time in Chicago, he once played many months on a cruise ship and then went West.

His violin playing was a slick mix of blues, jazz, bluegrass and he adapted to his audiences to keep his music gigs alive and to put food on the table. Jazz threw him for a loop at first because he had to learn a new bowing technique, according to his Wikipedia write-up.

“Because of all the nationalities [there], I had to learn to play everything. At some jobs it was strictly German music, or Polish. Now, they used to dance and knock holes in the floor,” according to an LA Times interview in the 1990s cited on his Wikipedia page.

In the psychedelic 1960s, through some connections he made, he was asked to join Hot Tuna, a San Francisco spin-off of Jefferson Airplane. He ended up playing with Airplane as well and played with everybody from the Grateful Dead to the Charlie Daniel’s band to Louis Armstrong.

From St. Louis Blues to Over the Rainow to Danny Boy, Creach help bands expand their musical horizons with his vast knowledge of music and expert playing.