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.

The Partridge Family — 266

ALBUM: Up to Date (1971)

MVC Rating: 2.5//$

This album has two fun bubblegum singles: I’ll Meet you Halfway and Doesn’t Somebody Want to be Wanted. Besides these two hits for the TV teeny bop band of the 1970s, the album contains innocuous filler, many from the professional songwriting team of Wes Ferrell and Gerry Goffin.

I went into this album hoping there’d be a surprise hidden gem but nah. It’s all pretty mediocre stuff. But I like the hits.

If you don’t already know it, David Cassidy and Shirley Jones are the only ones who had record time along with their camera time on the insipid TV show The Partridge Family. But I watched it — heck I was 11 years old and kind of liked the notion of screaming girls chasing me, um, David around.

The Cowsills, the Rhode Island family band who actually did play their own instruments, were the inspiration for the TV show. If memory serves me the TV producers wanted the family but not Mrs. Cowsill — the mom. Not because she wasn’t a good musician, but because Shirley Jones, who starred in Oklahoma, wanted this chance of being a Rock and Roll mother as she rolled into her middle age.

Oh well, I like the Cowsills better.

Daily journal Feb. 13, 2020 (Let it Loose, Lose? edition)

I forgot to publish this yesterday. So I am publishing now, Friday, Feb 14 Happy Valentine’s Day (Fake thought it is). I will add new items for the next 24 hours to this post so keep checking. It’ll be stuff I remembered that I forgot or forgot to remember.

[UPDATE 2/15: A column is forthcoming either later today or Sunday morning on AL.com — may post here as well]

UPDATE 2/16: Click here for my just published ‘Losing it’ story.

There’s lot’s of stuff going on inside my head these days and that’s good. Sure there’s bad stuff like memory loss caused by the invasion of alpha-synuclein proteins. I just say my brain is streamlining.

Keep this post at the ready and go back over the course of the next 24 hours because my memory will be jarred and a new bit of news will appear on my blog. It will be a compilation blog.

My vinyl obsession now makes me forget of a lot of the great CD’s I accumulated in the 90s. Remember I went 20 to 30 years with my vinyl stashed in boxes as I did the digital thing. Anyway, it’s a long setjj-up just to play you a song. This oneis by Sufjan Stevens riffing off of “Sound of Silence” All Delighted People contains everything people love or loathe about this artist. (I’m on the love side.”

ONWARD: Here are some ICYMI’s.

I gave Mike Love a vinyl record on Wednesday. Then I went to see them in a moderately entertaining concert at the Alabama Theatre. I’m talking about the Beach Boys — although that’s a point of contention as several of the commenters pointed out.

Ear worms are a condition we’ve all experienced and I listed a dozen or so of my most ear wormy songs.

In yet another list — and I’ve promised that I’m going to do a best-of my lists list later — I compiled a line-up of top songs about the rain.

I still stand by my argument that nothing is something.

I still dislike ‘Seasons in the Sun’ by Terry Jack, both the music and the lyrics and any and all emotion it evokes: anger, sadness, bewilderment, and huh? (That’s an emotion in most states).

This is going to be big for me: I’m going to the Alabama Record Collectors Association show at Gardendale Civic Center on March 6. That means I am going to start selling my Countdown records I’m the guy in the booth in the back with a tear in my eye

Let it Loose.

I gave Mike Love a vinyl record today (blog version)

This is not the album I gave Mike Love today.

I gave Mike Love a vinyl record album today.

This all came about just a few hours before Love and his Beach Boys were to take the stage at the Alabama Theatre.

I’m going to the show, by the way. My brother bought me tickets for Christmas. Thanks David.

OK, here’s how I came about giving Love an album, or at least I hope he got it.

Earlier today I decided to take a stroll out of my office in downtown Birmingham to get a bite. Instead, I stopped at Reed Books, a favorite haunt which sells just about everything vintage, old and collectible.

All records are $2 and since I was skipping lunch I figured I’d use my lunch money for a record. The record was ‘Almost Summer,’ the 1978 soundtrack of a movie with the same name, which I found just rummaging around. Never heard of it but I looked at the songs and who wrote them.

A good portion of the tracks were written by Mike Love and Brian Wilson, I noticed. So there seemed to be good vibrations following me or leading me.

A record with obscure Beach Boys songs. One of them was apparently a hit.

I bought the record and wandered back to my office. The Alabama Theatre is on the way to my office, however. I stopped where a small group of people were standing near at least three large buses. They eyed me warily as I approached and began talking: Are you with the Beach Boys I asked? They really didn’t say anything. A security guard, clearly labeled so on his shirt, started to make his way closer to me. I reached into my satchel — slowly — and pulled out the album.

I told him I just wanted to give this to Mike Love or Bryan WIlson (not knowing if he’d be here or not).

“Oh,” the security guard said. “You just want me to give this to him?”

I said, yes. And I did, give it to him. Hope he likes it. Hope the security guard gave it to him. Then I started thinking, Love probably has this or maybe he doesn’t like it. I was arguing with myself.

Well, you never know. God only knows I felt good doing it, even if I won’t have it for My Vinyl Countdown.

AL.com version here.

Prefab Sprout — 270, 269

ALBUMS: Two Wheels Good (1985); From Langley Park to Memphis (1988)

MVC Ratings: Two 4.0/$$$$; Langley, 4.0/$$$

This group on these two albums play great, melodic folk English Pop-Rock with very smart lyrics. It’s the kind of band I guarantee someone reading this review and listens to it will fall in love. Not for everybody, but those who fall, fall hard. Listen to first side of Wheels five times. ‘When love breaks down’ was a hit. I love ‘Bonny.’

Listen to ‘The King of Rock ‘n’ Roll’ and ‘Cars and Girls’ on Langley five times each.

Get back to me next week and tell me what you think.

If you like two or more of these following groups, you will certainly enjoy Prefab Sprout: Squeeze, Roxy Music, 10cc, the Housemartins, Thomas Dolby (who produced both of these albums.)The sound is very 80s but very good 80s.

One explanation for their name is that band members misheard the June Carter-Johnny Cash song ‘Jackson’ when Carter sings “We got married in a fever hotter than a pepper sprout’ — they had apparently been singing and hearing that as “prefab sprout.

Two Wheels Good was released with the name Steve McQueen (yes the American actor) in the UK. But the McQueen estate objected and that why mine says ‘Two Wheels Good’ at the top right corner of my album.

God, coincidence, numerology

I have 678 records. At least I did when I officially counted my records before launching MyVinylCountdown.com two or so years ago.

I have definitely picked up more since then.

Hit ABOUT ME here if you need more information about this.

I had written about this Nun study before.

A multi-decade study of Alzheimer’s Disease , is famous and has given people hope. They found examples of nuns with visible signs of dementia causing proteins in the brain. They found some brains upon autopsy appeared that the nun had Alzheimer’s Disease — but no one knew because the patient — the nun — did not show any symptoms of the disease, leading researchers to be optimistic that some people can fight this disease and workarounds by your very own brain can avoid much of the ravages of dying of dementia.

The number of nuns used in this multiyear study? 678.

See my earlier write-up

Now I have begun looking at 78’s — those hard but fragile slabs of chellac that made music at 78 RPM. I bought a couple of these and have enjoyed some very old good jazz.

So now i’m into 78s. Doubt they’ll go on the timeline like my 33s. They are 78s, like if only there were a 6 or 600 and they’d be, yes, 678.

Maybe a stretch. So I doodled while I was waiting to think. Which took me through a thousand memories and an hour of standing blank faced.

So start with 78 RPM records.

Take away 45 RPM.

Take away 33 RPM.

Equals Zero (0)

78-45-33=0

What? What does any of that mean?

Look I don’t know a thing about numerology except that I’d probably be promised Hell by a church lady if even talked about it.

One last thing while I’m still doodling. Let’s give a number to the letters RPM, a shorthand way of saying Revolutions Per Minute.

Let’s assign each letter a number based on where they are in the count.

There’s 26 letters in the alphabet.

R =18 P=16 M=13.

18+16+13= 60

That’s 60 as in SIXty.

Story is on 78 rpm records. Subtract out the 45s and 33s (from 78) and it equals 0. Zero is also the number that comes with 60, the number for RPMs added, as shown above.

Zap the zeroes as their doubling cancelled each other out.

Slide the now leftover 6 in front of 78 and it is 678.

But let’s look at one more thing:. The sum total of the RPM numbers added is 60. Double that and you have 120. In the music world 120 RPM was what Thomas Edison was playing on the original playback recording machine

I have written before about a numbers coincidence related to my battle with Lewy body dementia that almost blew what’s left of my mind.

FROM New York Times:

NOTE: I don’t want anyone to believe that I’m sitting on some magic numbers are something. I just noticed what appear to be coincidence. I’m fine with it being a coincidence, by the way. I don’t see God sitting around coming up with numeric answers to our own problems. But as I try to make my documentation of a Lewy body patient as complete as possible, I may seem to be pushing boundaries? Wasting time? Or learning that life is all about math?

Y’all keep reading. I will say this: I’m feeling much less random about the universe these days.

Peter and Gordon — 272, 271

ALBUM: Knight in Rusty Armour (1967): In London for Tea (1966)

MVC Rating: Rusty, 3.0/$$$; In London 3.5/$$

Okay this is my fence post. This is my going as far out on my likes and dislikes — in other words, the limits of my looking for the good — nay, the great — in what I listen to. Peter and Gordon just go too far in a pop, non-rock way — yet they seem to want to be in the crowd that is making this powerful rock and roll music.

I’m not sure where these Peter and Gordon albums came from, possibly my wife Catherine’s siblings or my foster sister, Cathy, a hippie who loved the Moody Blues. But Peter and Gordon I? i don’t remember her playing, although she did play Jimi Hendrix, the Byrds and of course her Moody Blues.

just no have to say at this time to Peter and Gordon. Nice pop duo; I like ‘I’m Your Puppet.’

There’s a Beatles song or two. but P&G are just just not in my sweet spot of British invasion bands and their American counterparts. They are too poppy for me and think, to be fair, they were already established in the early 1960s as just what they are: pop duo.

And I ‘m a big pop music fan. Got no issues there, except when it is insipid or, worse, sounds lame.

Now I can be sold completely on 1960s invasion bands. The Herman Hermits, much I can live without, but the album ‘Blaze’ by the Hermits is fantastic. The Dave Clark 5, the Zombies, etc. In the United States, Paul Revere and the Raiders, the Grass Roots, the Young Rascals, and the Mama’s the Papa’s, are all groovy enough for me. Peter and Gordon, not so much, although they serve as a nice stepping stone from the past late, 50’s early 60s. But as duos from that era, I’ll take Simon and Garfunkel (better songs and vocals); and the Righteous Brothers (better vocals).

Glenn Phillips — 273

ALBUM: Swim in the Wind, (1977)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$

Here is one of the best guitarists you’ve never heard of deals. I think I’ve already said that about him. Aaaargh there are so many best guitarists out there — THAT YOU’VE NEVER HEARD OF.

But this guy is the real deal.

Glenn Phillips is an Atlanta-based musician and was in the Hampton Grease Band in Atlanta, which some swear was better than the Allman Brothers. I was about a generation behind Phillips. Although I never saw him live I do have his album — listen to the one I put on video to the end, and you’ll see some blazing and tasteful guitar.

I do understand from others that Phillips taught and mentored some of the good ones around Atlanta including Bob Elsey of the Swimming Pool Q’s. I’ve said before (mostly) instrumental guitar music is good for certain situations. In other words I have to be in the mood. Joining Phillips on an instrumental guitar record, I’ve got Steve Howe, Chet Atkins, Mark Knopfler, John Fahey the Ventures, the Raybeats, and Paco DeLucia

Alabama man’s massive 78 RPM record collection: Is it valuable? (Blog version)

A version of this was published Monday night on AL.com.

A 20-something Alabama man may be sitting on a goldmine with thousands of 78 RPM records he inherited from his grandfather.

Or. he may not be.

Sitting on a goldmine, that is.

Now it’s time for the thrill of the search and research.

A 78 sold for $19,600 just last week. It was by pre-war blues singer Charley Patton, according to ValueYourMusic.com.

The young man who inherited the giant collection contacted me after reading a column I wrote recently on 78’s — those antiquated platters, 10 inches in diameter, made from shellac. The heavy but fragile discs give you one song at a time on the turntable, spinning at a blistering pace of 78 revolutions per minute.

Is there another Patton in these endless boxes? How about a Robert Johnson, another pioneering blues singer, whose music on 78s have sold for more than $10,000 at least three times.  Tommy Johnson, another now deceased bluesman, had one of his 78s sell for $37,000.

But the man with inherited records knows there may be money in those boxes but he isn’t holding his breath for something that is kind of like winning the lottery. The man who agreed to talk as long as we don’t name him for security and privacy reasons, may just have a big collection of fine music, whose value might make him wonder whether it’s worth the time and effort to store and catalog. Upon his invitation, I went to view the collection a few days ago and am still in awe of its scope and quality — most were in mint or near mint condition — that’s a big plus in the collectors world.

I warned him ahead of time I’m no expert. After looking at about 10 percent of his collection I found no Holy grails — Pattons or Johnsons. They may be in there — but it is kind of a needle in haystck search. I got the feeling there’s stuff in here that people have forgotten.

On a tight schedule, I took some pictures and poked around for two hours. He has some interesting stuff. Early Louis Armstrong, The Ink Spots, Rosetta Tharpe, King Oliver, Sy Oliver, Bud Powell, the Mad Caps, the Royal Mounties, some spoken word, and lots of promotional records (for the DJ’s).

He has more than a dozen 78s of a young Frank Sinatra. Early stuff. There was a whole box of only Gennett labels, a label started in a piano maker’s business in Indiana. Some of those Gennett’s dated back to the turn of the century.

I discovered Lincoln Chase — he’s the guy who wrote the novelty song ‘Jim Dandy’ made famous by Black Oak Arkansas.

You can see how I can go down a rabbit hole like this and never come back.

But back to the needle-and-haystack cliche’.

As the generation of people who actually bought and listened to 78 RPM records dwindle, the attics are being searched and basements explored, sending a lot of shellac to market.

The old blues music being the most sought after is a supply and demand issue. Blues at that time consisted of black musicians playing to black audiences, often in rural areas.

That’s why there are so many 78 collections out there that are flush with Big Band and Easy Listening music — Tommy Dorsey, Guy Lombardo, Lawrence Welk and Fred Waring. That was what sold to mainstream white America. Of course, blues music came to be one of the cornerstones of rock and roll. And the Brits, for the most part, beat white Americans to the discovery of this timeless music made in America.

The records most people are familiar with are 12-inch vinyl records that spin at 33 1/3 RPM, and the 7-inch 45’s that spin at, well you know.

Spinning is what my head was doing when I saw the collection. There were boxes and boxes — I counted about 45 to 50 that I could see, boxes of 40 to 50 records each. There were rows high up I couldn’t count and, he said, there were more up in the attic. To add to it, he had LP’s (33 1/3) and 45’s — boxes of them. I Iooked through a box of 45’s and LP’s and saw a real hodgepodge of older and newer records from the likes of Pink Floyd, Roy Orbison, Beastie Boys, Michael Jackson, and Johnny Cash.

I’ll follow this search and bring results when he gets them. He says he wants to sell but like everyone with a large collection he is unsure whether to sell individually, in lots, or in bulk.

No matter what method, I think he’ll do well.

My own MyVInylCountdown collection started at 678 and has grown some. But as I age and battle this disease I, too, will downsize my records. While it is fun to nab a record that gets more valuable with time, the most important thing is the music.

As the Doobie Brothers sang, “Listen to the music.”

My Vinyl Countdown still on track but it is more difficult (blog version)



Sitting here hunting and pecking my keyboard this early morning until my meds kick in.

In the morning after 10 or more hours without the meds find me with my most outsized symptoms. Tremors and slow thinking to be specific.

But morning is my best writing time simply for its peace and quiet. Only distraction: Internet.

So, it’s like catching a wave. timing the meds. Which reminds me I’m going to see the Beach Boys in Birmingham next month. I could seriously use some ‘Good Vibrations.’

For right now, I’ll pull out some tasty record reviews from the archives after I tell you what I’ve done and what I will do over this long MLK weekend. Good weekend for having a dream.

Quicky recent ICYMIs: I almost ‘bought’ a record store.

I explored the subset of record collecting — 10″ 78s.

I gave readers a tour of my brain.

Coming up this weekend: A young man contacted me about his grandfather’s record collection and I enlisted my wife, Catherine, to drive a long way so I could help at this gentlemen’s request discern what he has. News reports of 78s worth thousands of dollars has, it is safe to say, people running to their attics or basements. The collection I looked at was spectacular, easily more than 2,000 mint condition 78s. But is there a holy grail in there? See what I find out in a column this weekend.

And lastly for another column coming this weekend: MVC as simple as 1,2,3.

My Vinyl Countdown by the numbers. I am getting closer to the 678 record reviews or record reminisces as I call them to bring awareness to my disease: Lewy body dementia. I’ll give you an update on my top wat my top 10 (or 15) musical countdown posts are and my top 10 or 15 non-countdown posts.

I’m in the ‘P’s in my alphabetic listing and the P’s are taking a lot of time, might turn out to be my biggest alphabet number so far, still to come Prince and Pink Foyd and a dozen or so lesser known, but good to great music. Music like John Prine, P.J. Proby, and Bud PowelI hope you will explore if you find what I write compelling you to give something new a whirl.

Now on with some reviews from the archives.

The Flamin’ Groovies

ALBUMS: Now (1978)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$

I was graduating from high school when this came out. Talk about retro.. This group was like something out of 1966. They cover ‘Paint it Black’ on this album like it was a new song.

‘There’s a Place’ cover sounds like the 1960’s prom band checking in on the Beatles.

All this came to me in the early 1980s.

I discovered this Flamin’ Groovies in a strange way. I was at the Birmingham public library doing some research and they had vinyl records that you could check out, like a book, and return later. This would have been mid-1980s.

I picked up a Flamin’ Groovies album called Groovies Greatest Grooves. It had the song ‘Shake Some Action,’which blew me away. It’s the sense of discovery that you live for as a record collector. Again I was looking for tunes not rare artifacts and that song was one good song. Cracker later recorded it and it was featured in a movie, all much later.

I made a cassette tape out of it that I have no idea whether I have or not.

The  thing that made the Groovies groove work was that they played essentially covers or originals that sounded so close to their heroes, early Beatles, Stones, and Who. — with no irony. That’s what makes it great. Just a few guys from San Francisco playing songs they love from another era.

So, it wasn’t surprising to see that this 1978 album, a comeback of sorts, was produced by retro-man Dave Edmunds. “Yeah My Baby” written by Edmunds, and band members Cyril Jordan and Chris Wilson sounds like a long lost classic. Or long lost classic B-side.

The sound seems  like it was coming through a B&W TV set.