Comments (6)

By Larry, June 26, 2011 4:01 pm

In black and white, like the keys, dig?

Dee Felice Trio – There Was a Time (King)
Don Randi – Taxman (Reprise)
New London Rhythm and Blues Band – Soul Man (Vocalion)
Ramsey Lewis – African Boogaloo Twist (Cadet)
Roy Meriwether Trio – What’s the Buzz (Notes of Gold)
Overton Berry Trio – Guacamolean Shuffle (Jaro)
Gene Harris – Green River (Blue Note)
Johnny Watson – Hold On I’m Coming (Okeh)
Mr Jim and the Rhythm Machine – Mrs Robinson (Date)
Junior Mance – Thank You Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin (Atlantic)
Cha Cha Hogan – Grit Gitter (Soulville)
The Stokes – Crystal Ball (Alon)
Allen Toussaint – HandsChristianAnderson (Bell)
The Music Company – The Word (Mirwood)
Mary Lou Williams – The Credo (Mary)
Backyard Heavies – Expo 83 (Scepter)
Ray Bryant – Up Above the Rock (Cadet)

Listen/Download – F16C Radio v.94 – The Living Piano – 86MB/256K Mixed MP3

Listen/Download – F16C Radio v.94 – The Living Piano – 63MB ZIP File

Head on over to the Funky16Corners Radio Podcast Archive to Check This One Out

Greetings all.

As mentioned previously, this is a Funky16Corners vacation week, but I love you mugs so much that I couldn’t very well decamp without leaving something to keep your ears busy while I was away.

The mix I bring you this week is something that had been percolating in my fevered brain for a long time, and was finally spurred on to fruition by the recent passing of Mr. Ray Bryant.

Though we have covered the piano before (see Funky16Corners Radio v.81) it was recordings of the electric variety thereof.

Having been brought up in a house with a master of the acoustic piano (that would be my Pop), I have always wanted to assemble my fave funky and soulful acoustic piano tracks, and so you have it (the mix, that is…).

Most of the numbers in this mix will be familiar to longtime followers of the Funky16Corners blog, whether via appearances in previous mixes, or having appeared by themselves at some point.

There are a number of previously unheard/unposted numbers as well, so dig those too.

Though the electric piano is the version of the instrument generally associated with funk and soul (mainly due to the electrification of music in general during the era in question) there were a number of recording artists – many of them rooted in jazz – who took the old-style acoustic piano, a massive conglomeration of wood, wires and ivory, and managed to wring a little funk out of it.

Though I love electric piano, there’s something special about the way a real piano resonates, especially when it’s played by someone that really knows the instrument.

Some of the recordings in question go back to the earliest days of my crate digging and blogging, including the Mary Lou Williams and Cha Cha Hogan 45s, where others are fairly recent acquisitions.

There are a couple of unusual tracks in the mix, in particular Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson’s one-off piano instrumental 45 for the Okeh label.

You also get a couple of tracks featuring Allen Toussaint, first with his early group the Stokes (dig ‘Soda Pop’s not so subtle variation on ‘Fortune Teller’) and a rare solo 45 (Hands Christian Anderson).

Mr Jim of ‘Mr Jim and the Rhythm Machine’ (with the swinging version of ‘Mrs Robinson’) is Philly area composer/arranger/keyboardist Jimmy Wisner who recorded a couple of 45s under this name for the Date and Wizdom label.

There are also a couple of anonymous pianists working it out here, including whoever tickled the ivories for the New London Rhythm and Blues Band (likely a UK studio musician) and the pianist for the Music Company, an LA studio group that recorded an album of Beatle covers for the Mirwood label in 1966.

Of the known jazz heavies in the mix, you get to choose from the likes of Mary Lou Williams, Don Randi, Gene Harris, Ramsey Lewis, Roy Meriwether, and Overton Berry, and the man we eulogized just this past week, Ray Bryant.

Having given it a number of spins, I can attest to the fact that it’s a lot of fun to listen to and I hope you dig it.

See you next week.

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo), in regard to the April 2nd walk.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg for some very tasty UK Folk Rock.

Comments (4)

By Larry, June 5, 2011 4:59 pm

Apologies to the soulies, heh heh…

Greetings all, and welcome to the 2011, Funky16Corners Soul Club/Grogan Casino Allnighter..

This is – as it has been since 2006 – time for yours truly to once again open up the yearly Funky16Corners Pledge Drive, in which we ask that if you dig what goes on hereabouts, with the blog(s), radio show, mixes etc, that you click on the donation link and drop a little something in the basket.

Click Here To Donate

Your donations help to pay for the server space where the blog, all of the graphics and well over 100 mixes (a number that is expanding all the time) reside, as well as upkeep on the equipment used to run the whole non-profit (is there a better phrase to describe an operation that runs at a perpetual loss?) shebang.

As always, I’m aware that times are tough, and getting tougher all the time, so if you can’t swing it, that’s cool too. However, every little bit helps, so even a couple of bucks will help things along.

The readers of Funky16Corners have always been very cool over the seven year history of the blog (as well as the years preceding that at the web zine), generous with their knowledge and vocal in their appreciation and once again I’d like to thank you all.

Funky16Corners has always been an ad-free space (and that includes needless plugs for crap that none of you (or me) is going to listen to) and will always remain that way.

Now, I can’t very well come to you with hand outstretched unless I have something to offer you for your trouble. With that in mind, I bring you the second annual Allnighter, in which I gather together some of my favorite DJs and ask them to contribute mixes.

This year we have a stellar line-up, including my man Tarik Thornton (Hot Pants Crew MPLS), Tony C, DJ Prime Mundo (Asbury Park 45 Sessions), DJ Bluewater (Master Groove, Asbury Park 45 Sessions), and my mighty brother in blogging Vincent the Soul Chef (Fufu Stew), as well as two new mixes by yours truly.

Each of these cats is very, very serious about digging and spinning vinyl heat and when you get the chance to sink your ears into the mixes they’ve contributed you will (as I was when I first heard them) be very happy.

There’s a very nice stylistic breadth to this year’s Allnighter, with deep soul, Northern Soul, rock steady, funk and disco with a connoisseur’s mix of rarities and classics.

This year I’m also posting something cool over at Iron Leg, with a few hours of garage and freakbeat recorded live a few weeks back (by me, natch)  at Spindletop @ Botanica in NYC, so if those are sounds you dig too, make sure to pull down those ones and zeros as well.

That said, click the Paypal link, and then scroll down the page slowly, soaking up all the mixes as you go.

Click Here To Donate

Peace

Larry

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Funky16Corners 2011 Allnighter!

Funky16Corners – I’m Satisfied
San Remo Golden Strings – I’m Satisfied (Ric Tic)
Jr Walker and the All Stars – Come see About Me (Soul)
Parliaments – Look at What I Almost Missed (Revilot)
O’Jays – I Dig Your Act (Bell)
Lee Williams and the Cymbals – Everything About You That I Love (Carnival)
Al Kent – You Got To Pay The Price (Ric Tic)
Major Lance – Gotta Get Away (Okeh)
Shorty Long – Sing What You Wanna (Soul)
Bunny Sigler – Sunny Sunday (Cameo/Parkway)
Jackie Lee – Bring It Home (Keyman)
Gene Chandler and Barbara Acklin – From the Teacher to the Preacher (Brunswick)
Chuck Jackson – Good Things Come to Those Who Wait (Wand)
Precisions – Why Girl (Drew)
John Willams and the Tick Tocks – Do Me Like You Do Me (Sansu)
Eddie Floyd – Big Bird (Stax)
Vibrations – Pick Me (Okeh)
Buena Vistas – Hot Shot (Swan)
Performers – I Can’t Stop You (Mirwood)
Dreams – They Call me Jesse James (DC Sound)
Len Barry – I Struck It Rich (Decca)
Ambassadors – I’m So Proud Of My Baby (Atlantic)

Listen/Download – Funky16Corners – I’m Satisfied / 96MB Mixed MP3

NOTE: I’ve been digging a lot of mid-tempo Northern Soul lately, and this is a mix of my faves. – LG

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DJ Bluewater – That Steady Beat

Ken Parker – Change Is Gonna Come
Delroy Wilson – I’m The One Who Loves You
Rocky & The Heptones – Falling In Love
Carlton & His Shoes – Happy Land
Alton Ellis & The Flames – Cry Tough
Lloyd & Glen – Jezebel –
Phyllis Dillon – Don’t Stay Away
Cecille Campbell – Breaking Up
The Soul Vendors – Frozen Soul
The Soul Vendors – To Sir With Love
Prince Buster & The All Stars – The Punishment
The Maytals – Watermelon Man
Derrick Morgan – First Taste Of Love
The Untouchables – Tighten Up
The Jailbreakers – Chatty Chatty
Delano Stewart – That’s Life
Norma Fraser – The First Cut Is The Deepest
King Rocky – The King Is Back
The Ethiopians – He’s Not A Rebel
The Uniques – Watch This Sound

Listen/Download – DJ Bluewater – That Steady Beat / 120MB Mixed MP3

NOTE: DJ Bluewater has gotten deep into the rock steady sound in the last few years

and this mix is filled with goodness! – LG

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DJ Tarik Thornton – Louisiana Sun

Willie Tee – Dedication To You ( Atlantic)
The Festivals – You Got The Makings of A Lover (Smash)
The Impressions – Man Oh Man ( ABC- Paramount)
Dennis Lee & Notables – Sunday Afternoon ( Jenmark)
Bernard Drake – I’ve Been Untrue ( La Louisianne)
Ollie & The Nightingales- I Got A Sure Thing (Stax)
Jo Armstead – There’s Not Too many More (Giant)
The Passions – I Can See My Way Through (Tower)
The Moovers – One Little Dance (Brent)
The ElectroStats – Setting the Mood ( Three Oaks)
The Supreme – Stoned Love (Tamla)

Clifton White – Are You Ready (Anla)
Dell Mack – You Can’t Judge a Book by Its Cover ( Gold Band)
Eddie Giles – Soul Feeling Pt. 1- ( Murco )
Debanaires – Feel Alright – (WBS)
O.D Williams – Moving Out Of Your Life – (Bare- Bar)
New Birth – I Can Understand it (RCA)
Johnny Williams – Breaking Point – (Twinight)
Johnny Otis Show – Watts Breakaway (Epic)
Gus (The Groove) Lewis – Let The Groove Move You – (Tou- Sea)
Lee Dorsey – Funky Four Corners (Amy)
Big Daddy Rucker – Just Do Your Thing – (GME)
Reggie Sadler – Raggedy Bag – (Aquarius)
Bonus Track : Jackie Harris & The Exciters – Get Funky, Sweat A Little Bit (Black&Proud)

Listen/Download – DJ Tarik Thornton – Louisiana Sun / 85MB Mixed MP3

A Note from Tarik:

So when Larry asked me to do this mix indeed I was honored! Larry and the Soul Chef are the guys who are responsible for inspiring me to get back to digging after taking a 10 year hiatus. I’ve been on a life rollercoaster over the last few years and this has become one of my most profound ways of expressing myself. Honestly, It took me a while to figure out a concept for this one. Always trying to be diverse I created a nice blend of Sweet Soul and Funk this time around. Both are actually sets I did live at KFAI in Minneapolis last week. After listening to them I decided to take the time to tighten them up, then added a bit more soul . The outcome, a sweet selection of songs dedicated to all the people that have taken the time to check out my work over the last year, but also in particular a very special young lady. The “B “side a tight groove of some killer funk selections that will keep you moving. Enjoy ! You can find some of my other mixes at www.mixcloud.com/8KC

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DJ Prime Mundo – Kentucky Fried Prime

curtis mayfield – tripping out (rso)
one g plus three – summertime (paramount)
billy guy – if you want to get ahead, shake a leg (verve)
the soul patrol – saigon strut (shamley)
don downing – thread and needle (roadshow)
gary toms empire – drive my car (pickwick)
bo kirkland & ruth davis – we got the recipe (claridge)
stan ivory – check it out (tese)
le roy – easy livin’ (dream machine)
chick willis – stoop down baby (la val)
billy strange – jaws (gnp crescendo)
the masqueraders – brotherhood (bell)
hummingbird – trouble maker (a&m)
ernie andrews – something (phil l.a. of soul)

Listen/Download – DJ Prime Mundo – Kentucky Fried Prime / 61MB Mixed MP3

Note: One of the OG Asbury Park 45 Sessions DJs, Prime Mundo has extremely deep crates and extremely good taste. He’s one of my favorite DJs, and this mix should tell you why. – LG

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Vincent the Soul Chef – Back to the Corner

I Just Want To Celebrate-Rare Earth (Rare Earth)
Ride Sally Ride-Dennis Coffey and the Detroit Guitar Band (Sussex)
Runaway People-Dyke & The Blazers (Original Sound)
You Met Your Match-Stevie Wonder (Tamla)
Your Love Is Indescribably Delicious-Willis Wooten (Virtue)
Mister Magic-Grover Washington Jr. (Kudu)
Heaven Is There To Guide Us-The Glass House (Invictus)
I Got You Babe-Etta James (Chess)
Vista Vista-Lee Dorsey (Amy)
Funky Boo Ga Loo-Jerry O (Shout)
Do Your Thing-Watts 103rd St. Rhythm Band (Warner)
Good Times-Kool & The Gang (De Lite)
Take Me To the River-Fessor Funk (Roxbury)
Let Me Lay My Funk On You-Poison (Roulette)
Keep on Dancin’ (Vocal)-Alvin Cash (Toddlin’ Town)
The Whatchamacalit-The Burning Emotions (Bang)
Country John-Allen Toussaint (Reprise)
Paint Me-Ohio Players (Westbound)
I Turned You On-Isley Brothers (T Neck)
Soul Sister- Allen Toussaint (Reprise)
Baby I Love You-Aretha Franklin (Atlantic)
Nobody’s Fault But Mine-Otis Redding (Atco)
Cook Out-King Curtis & The Kingpins (Atco)
The Court Room-Clarence Carter (Atlantic)
Funky Drummer Pt. 2-James Brown (King)
Make It Funky Pt. 4-James Brown (Polydor)
Hey Ruby Shut Your Mouth-Ruby & The Party Gang (Law Ton)

Listen/Download – Vincent the Soul Chef – Back to the Corner / 104MB Mixed MP3

NOTE: Vincent the Soul Chef is not only a top-notch DJ, but he’s a serious digger with diverse tastes that are reflected in his mixes. After I heard this I headed out to look for a few of the cuts right away… – LG

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Tony C – Dance the Jerk!

Doc Bagby-Mr Hippy-Tifton
Merced Blue Notes-Rufus-Accent
Horace Bailey-Cool Monkey-Delene
Larry Williams-Strange-Sue
Barry’Barefoot’ Beefus-Barefoot Beefus-Loma
Tommy & The Charms-I know what you want-Hollywood
Nathaniel Kelly-Do the jerk-Jubilee
Jay Dee Bryant-Get it-Enjoy
The Pacers-You’ll never know-Razorback
The Magics-Lets Boogaloo-R.F.A
Lou Johnson-Rock me baby-Cotillion
Eddie Simpson-Stone Soul Sister-Back Beat
Vickie Anderson-I love you-Smash
Alder Ray Mathis-Take me baby-Jetstar
Jackie Thompson-Got to right the wrongs-Columbia
Lonette-Stop-M.S
Boogie Kings-Do em’ all-Pic
Charles Hodges-Charles Shingaling-Alto
Little Flint-Pain-Beast
Sammy Lee-It hurts me-Rampart
Jay Jordan-If it wasn’t for love-Verve
The Fantastic Four-Pinpoint it down-Soul
Lovemasters-Pushin and pull-Jacklyn
Timmie Williams-Competition-Bell
Big Maybelle-I can’t wait any longer-Rojac
Trudy Johnson-You’re no good-Capitol

Listen/Download – Tony C – Dance the Jerk! / 62MB Mixed MP3

NOTE: Tony C has done guest mixes for Funky16Corners in the past, and he is always turning me on to new stuff. Great taste and deep crates, once again a dynamic combination.  – LG

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Funky16Corners – Honey Trippin’
BT Express – Express (Scepter)
Louie Ramirez – Do It Any Way You Wanna (Cotique)
Cymande – Anthracite (Janus)
Virtue Orchestra – High Horse IV (Virtue)
Mystic Moods – Honey Trippin’ (Soundbird)
KC and the Sunshine Band – Let It Go (TK)
Instant Funk – Philly Jump (TSOP)
Jay Berliner – Getting the Message (Mainstream)
Love Child’s Afro Cuban Blues Band – Love and Death in G and A (Roulette)
Gene Faith – Lowdown Melody (Virtue)
Doc Severinson – Soul Makossa (RCA)
Soul Searchers – Boogie Up the Nation Pt2 (Polydor)
Philly Sound – Waitin’ For the Rain (Phil LA of Soul)
Mongo Santamaria – What You Don’t Know (Vaya)
Philadelphia Society – 100 South of Broad Street (American)
Larry Page Orchestra – Erotic Soul (London)
Roy Ayers Ubiquity – Virgo Red (Polydor)
Barrett Strong – Stand Up and Cheer For the Preacher (INST) (Epic)

Listen/Download – Funky16Corners – Honey Trippin’ / 110MB Mixed MP3

NOTE: This is one of those mixes that had its start in a single cut, and took form slowly as I stockpiled complementary cuts. I like it a lot, and I hope you dig it too. – LG

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Click Here To Donate

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo). It’s a fantastic organization that provides services to our local autism community, with education and recr events, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Comments (5)

By Larry, May 28, 2011 9:22 am

Gil Scott-Heron RIP

Listen/Download – Gil Scott-Heron – The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

Greetings all.

It was last night that rumors, and eventually confirmation of the passing of the mighty Gil Scott-Heron appeared.

In a word, Gil Scott-Heron was deep.

I first became aware of him when I was in high school and saw Scott-Heron and his band performing their funky strike against apartheid ‘Johannesburg’ on Saturday Night Live.

A few years later he was part of the M.U.S.E. No Nukes concerts at Madison Square Garden (unfortunately not on the night I attended) where he laid down ‘We Almost Lost Detroit’, which appeared in the film of the concerts.

Years later, when I was deeper in the funk and soul game, I was lucky enough to find a copy of his very first album, ‘Small Talk at 125th and Lenox’.

The Gil Scott Heron of 1970 was a much different artist than he would become. His early work was largely spoken word, more the sound of a revolutionary poet than the deeply soulful singer he would evolve into.

‘Small Talk at 125th and Lenox’, featured the track I bring you today, the original version of ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’, a landmark spoken word piece that stands as a stark, verbal blow against the America of 1970, touching on race, politics, war, popular culture and a death of the spirit brought on by television.

It is powerful stuff, in large part because of Scott-Heron’s delivering the text with his deep, sonorous voice over a backing composed only of percussion.

Scott-Heron, who was born in Chicago but raised in Tennessee got his start as an author, writing two novels before the beginning of his recording career.

He met his frequent musical partner Brian Jackson while at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania.

After ‘Small Talk at 125th and Lenox’, Scott-Heron’s record became progressively more musical, though since he was always as much a writer as a musician, they never lost their poetic edge, and as such he became a hugely important influence on the world of rap.

His later years were plagued with drug troubles (and subsequently imprisonment) and failing health. He was able to record a final album ‘I’m New Here’ in 2010, and though the many shadows of his life were present in the periphery, the old, strong Gil Scott-Heron was still there.

He passed yesterday at the age of 62.

He will be missed, deeply.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and ,
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In 4 parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Mendell Rivers to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be brought to you by the
Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie
Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia.
The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, the revolution will not be televised, Brother.

There will be no pictures of you and Willie May
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers on the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being
run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process.
There will be no slow motion or still lifes of Roy
Wilkins strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and
Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving
For just the right occasion.

Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so goddamned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally screwed
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no highlights on the eleven o’clock
news and no pictures of hairy armed women
liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose.
The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Or Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, or Englebert Humperdink.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be right back after a message
bbout a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat.

The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo). It’s a fantastic organization that provides services to our local autism community, with education and recr events, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Comments (1)

By Larry, May 15, 2011 4:39 pm

Sam Butera

Listen/Download – Sam Butera – Love Bandit

Greetings all.

I hope that your world is just as groovy as can be.

I’m coming off a very busy, yet oddly relaxing weekend.

The fam and I managed to hit up a great barbecue where we hung with some very old, end very excellent friends, and I was working on the new annex to the Funky16Corners Blogcasting Nerve Center and Record Vault family of fine interwebs products.

What am I speaking of you ask???

Well, since I’ve been having so much fun doing the weekly Funky16Corners Radio Show over at Viva Radio, and then archiving the shows here at the blog, I got the itch to expand upon the theme.

Initially the thought was to do something like a second, shorter edition of the Funky16Corners Radio Show, to be posted here.

That still may happen, but ultimately I took a different tack, and worked up a show based on the goings on at the other blog in the Funky16Corners family, that being Iron Leg.

Iron Leg – if you haven’t been there – is where I rap about music from the same general time period that I cover here (60s/70s), but the concentration is not on funk and soul, but rather pop and rock, covering garage punk, psychedelia, sunshine pop and the like.

I know that many of the folks that fall by Funky16Corners will not necessarily find those sounds to their liking, but I also know that a lot of you are like me, i.e. musically omnivorous – where all good music is worth hearing – and will dig at least some of what I post at Iron Leg.

That said, the Iron Leg Radio Show will be posted once a month (for now), and since it is not bound by the same time constraints as the Funky16Corners show, will generally in and around 90 minutes (though this inaugural episode runs over two hours).

If this sounds like a bag you might find yourself in, motor on over to Iron Leg to check out the playlist, and if that tickles your fancy, pull down the ones and zeros and give it a listen.

I think you’ll dig it.

Now, here at Funky16Corners, I figured I’d open things up this week with something interesting, so adjust your reading glasses and your earholes and get yourself some Sam Butera.

I’ve covered the late, great Mr. Butera here a number of times, mainly in his capacity as the bandleader for the equally late, also great Louis Prima.

Though Prima and Butera are mainly known for a very swinging variety of jump jazz (the very root of rock and roll), as the years wore on, and stylistic relevance outpaced their old sound, Prima and the Witnesses – the backing band usually billed as ‘Sam Butera and …’ – recorded some funky stuff, usually for Prima’s custom label.

Though billed as ‘Love Bandit’, what you’re actually hearing here is a funky reworking of Johnny Guitar Watson’s R&B classic ‘Gangster of Love’ (though the Cadets also recorded the song in 1956 with the ‘Love Bandit’ title).

Interestingly, though Butera and the Cadets before him used the same basic set of lyrics as Watson, neither one uses his tune.

Butera’s version takes the song at a funky, sock soul pace and Sam plays up the humorous aspect of the lyrics with a band that I assume has to be the Witnesses and some female backing singers.

The arranger Maxwell Davis and the producer Bill Lazerus both spent a lot of years working at Modern Records on records by folks like Lowell Fulsom and BB King.

I have no hard data on when this was released, but I have seen a discography for the Coliseum label – which features some jazz artists like Count Basie and others that look like studio orchestras covering pop hits – with material that would seem to place this in the range of 1966 or 1967. This is only an educated guess, so if any of you good folks know for sure, and I’m wrong, please let me know.

Anyhoo, I hope you dig it, and I’ll be back on Wednesday with something cool.

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo). It’s a fantastic organization that provides services to our local autism community, with education and recr events, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Comments (4)

By Larry, May 5, 2011 4:09 pm

The young doctor as intern…

Listen/Download – Mac Rebennack and the Soul Orchestra – The Point

Greetings all.

Following yet another Sisyphean (Sisyphusian?) slog the end of the week is finally upon us.

This has been another one of those weird weeks where any attempt to fall into the lockstep of routine was thwarted by the intrusion of both the necessary and the unexpected.

I had some doctor type ish to deal with as well all that brings with it, as well as the flotsam and jetsam of daily life, including still recovering from vacation.

Despite any number of valiant attempts to switch my mind to cruise control, I was given to contemplation, and came to the realization that despite all my crabbing about how busy I am and haw many things I have to do, I am in the end extraordinarily lucky.

Aside from the obvious (and sometimes not so) joys of married life and fatherhood, I also have the opportunity, via the blog, the Funky16Corners Radio Show (this and every other Friday night at 9PM on Viva Radio) and DJ gigs to share the music I love so much with you good people.

Aside from any adolescent aspiration to become a 21st century Hugh Hefner, the fantasy that preoccupied me in the past was to engage in what I just described.

Sure, it probably manifested itself in an image closer to Wolfman Jack in ‘American Graffiti’, howling in the depths of the night while transmitting musical hoodoo over the airwaves, but as I listen (in the furtherance of both quality control and ego gratification) back to the interwebs radio show I put together each week, and then get feedback from folks that actually listen to the show, I get just enough of that spark running willy nilly up my spine and stabbing me right in the old pleasure centers to make do.

The days of the great masters of the ether are long gone, but if I can rub two sticks together and whip up just a little bit of that heat each week, I’m happy.

The tune I bring you today is yet another white whale of mine that I chased like Melville’s crazed mariner for many a year.

I do not recall where Mac Rebennack’s ‘The Point’ first made its way into my earholes, but as I am a connoisseur of both the sounds of New Orleans and the mighty electric organ (Hammond or otherwise), and a devotee of the mighty Dr. John (Mr. Rebennack’s later nom de musique), I did not merely want a copy of this particular record, but rather needed it quite desperately.

While I would not say that the Crescent City is particularly well known for organ 45s, it does have some spectacular examples of the subgenre to its credit, including James Booker’s ‘Gonzo’,  Bo Jr.’s ‘Coffee Pot’, the instro flipside to Candy Phillips’ ‘Timber’ (in actuality a certain Mr. Bocage on the keys) as well as the tune I bring you today.

As the story goes, young Mac Rebennack was set on spending his career squeezing sounds out of a guitar until he got shot in the hand and found his way (thanks be to the strange ways of fate) onto a piano bench. The rest as they say is history, with the good Doctor being one of those cats to whom one might spend a happy eternity listening to as he tickled the ivories. He is part of the long line of masterful New Orleans piano masters that includes Professor Longhair, James Booker and Eddie Bo, and as such probably ought to have a retinue following him around, with someone to hold his drink, another to dust off the keys and yet another to spread rose petals in his path on account of he deserves no less.

That said, ‘The Point’ was waxed in 1962 for the storied AFO (All For One) label, an organization founded as a self-determined black musicians collective. During the label’s original 1961-1963 run they issued just over a dozen singles by artists like Barbara George (with the million selling ‘I Know’), Tammy Lynn, Ellis Marsalis, Prince La La (as in ‘Who Shot the…’) and Willie Tee.

Though ‘The Point’ was not his first 45 (the crazed guitar instro ‘Storm Warning’ came first in 1959) it was his debut as a leader on the keys, and it is a record of singular brilliance.

This is not to say that it is any kind of display of technical virtuosity, but rather a small vinyl artifact that carries in its grooves all manner of soul, menace, night-time atmosphere, up to an including the ability to place in the listener’s mind the image of a young woman in some sort of brief and suggestive (perhaps fringed) outfit shaking (upon a purpose-built, raised platform of some sort) what the gentlemen of the time would refer to as her ‘moneymaker’ (if you know what I mean and I think that you do) in a smoky bar filled with cold beer and broken dreams, and whether or not someone’s out back in the alley turned upside down so that the contents of their pockets might spill out and satisfy a debt matters not because the kid behind the organ and his band (and the young lady) have you hyp-mo-tized with the groove.

It’s that kind of record, and as far as I know Mister Rebennack, either inside or outside his duties as Dr John the Night Tripper never really stepped into something like this again.

The flipside of the record is a nice enough jam, yet it lacks the whiff of eau de roadhouse (though the horns are real nice).

The aforementioned Mr Booker, a renowned master of the 88s also recorded some very tasty organ sides, but they are every bit as elegant and fine as his piano work, which is not a bad thing at all, but compared to the jagged edge of Mac’s sound here is something else entirely.

A very tasty record indeed, and one that filled a miniscule but important hole in my crates. Also a groovy window into the soul of young Mr. Rebennack before the left coast called and he packed up his John the Conqueror Root, Mardi Gras feathers and attitude and headed out to Cali-For-Ny-Yay.

I hope you all dig it as much as I do, and I’ll see you all on Monday.

Oh, but before I go, you will most definitely want to check this out:

”

Some very groovy folks down in DC and Virginia have put together what promises to be the show of the year under the name the Chocolate City Soul Revue, with performances by Marva Whitney, Martha High, Vicki Anderson, both Clyde Stubblefield and Jabo Starks (?!?!?) legendary James Brown MC Danny Ray, original members of the JBs, the Impressions, and 21st century soul man Eli ‘Paperboy’ Reed and his band the True Loves.

I mean, honest to god people, does it get any better than that?

The shindig goes down on June the 4th at the D.A.R. Constitution Hall in Washington, DC.

You can get yourself tickets via Ticketmaster.

Peace

Larry

 
Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo). It’s a fantastic organization that provides services to our local autism community, with education and recr events, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Comments (5)

By Larry, April 26, 2011 11:22 am

Lurking in the shadows with a loaded turntable…

OV Wright – Love the Way You Love (Backbeat)
Billy Butler – Right Track (Okeh)
Lynne Randell – It’s a Hoe Down (Epic)
Thelma Jones – Stronger (Barry)
The Platters – Sweet Sweet Lovin’ (Musicor)
Christine Cooper – SOS (Heart In Distress) (Parkway)
Irma Thomas – What Are You Trying To Do (Imperial)
Henry Lumpkin – Soul Is Taking Over (Buddah)
Barbara Banks – River of Tears (Veep)
Luther Ingram – If It’s All the Same To You (Hib)
Chuck Wood – Seven Days Is Too Long (Roulette)
Maurice and the Radiants – Baby You’ve Got It (Chess)
Parliaments – Don’t Be Sore At Me (Revilot)
O’Jays – I Dig Your Act (Bell)

(Full set list at the bottom of the post)

Listen/Download – F16C Soul Club Presents – Soulshake! Funky16Corners Live at the Subway Soul Club 61MB/256K Mixed MP3

Yours truly, Luther Ingram (spinning) and Chuck Wood (cued up)

Phast Phreddie the Boogaloo Omnibus

Girlsoul selects another winner!

The mighty M-Fasis on the dance floor.

The crowd

Everyone’s records, ready to go.

Greetings all.

I have – like the prodigal son – returned from my wanderings tired, but satisfied.

The past week saw a mini-burst of DJ activity, with the Subway Soul Club (which we’ll be rapping about this fine day) last Saturday (4/16), then driving up to Massachusetts for Sweet Exorcist on Friday 4/22 in Greenfield, and Wooly Bully on Saturday 4/23 in Northampton (which we will cover next week).

I even managed to get in some unexpected 45 digging in New York, which turned up a couple of nice funk 45s, a few disco things and a couple of doubles for the old trade box.

Wrapped around all of this tomfoolery was a family vacation, with the swimming, the sightseeing, the fine dining (pho and New Haven pizza on the same trip!!) and a lot of close quarters, but much fun (if little actual relaxation) was had, and now here we all are, back in the daily groove.

As I mentioned, I spent the evening of Saturday 4/16 alongside Phast Phreddie the Boogaloo Omnibus, Girlsoul and PJ Lozito (Connie T Empress had to cancel) whipping the best in soul on the crowd at the storied Subway Soul Club, at Public Assembly in Williamsburg, BK.

Despite the fact that the area was in the midst of a near-monsoon, which made motoring to Brooklyn a real hoot, there was a nice turnout, and by midnight the floor was full of good people soaking up the sounds of soul and cutting themselves what the old folks used to refer to as a slice of rug.

I have probably said this numerous times, but it bears mentioning once again, I love nothing more than to spin soul and funk for people that like to dance. There is something magical about pulling an especially cool record out of your box, slipping it onto the turntable and watching the crowd react when the sounds make their way out of the speakers.

Subway Soul Club is really a dancers scene, with people grooving steadily for several hours (I honestly have no idea where some people get the energy), especially to Northern Soul. This was a very appreciative/receptive crowd who dug what we all were spinning, and the experience was, as you can imagine, exceptionally rewarding.

The mix you see above is the second set I spun that night, and features a number of favorites, all floor-fillers, including a bunch of things that have had a home in my crates for many years, as well as a few recent acquisitions.

I also managed to snap a couple of pictures, and while I’m no Scavullo, I think the results manage to capture the vibe fairly well.

Big thanks go out to Phreddie and our host Lady Dawn, the other DJs (who were uniformly excellent) and especially the dancers, without whom it wouldn’t have been nearly as groovy.

I hope you dig the sounds, and I’ll be back on Friday with some funk for your weekend.

If things go as planned, I’ll have some live mixes (and pics) from Massachusetts for you next week.

See you on Friday

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo). It’s a fantastic organization that provides services to our local autism community, with education and recr events, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Funky16Corners Subway Soul 4/16 Set List

Set 1
Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes – Get Out (Landa)
Bettye Lavette – Feel Good All Over (Calla)
Dean Courtney – We Have a Good Thing (RCA)
John Williams and the Tick Tocks – Do Me Like You Do Me (Sansu)
Peggy Scott and Jo Jo Benson – Soul Shake (SSS Intl)
Felice Taylor – Under the Influence of Love (Mustang)
Frankie Valli – You’re Gonna (Hurt Yourself) (Smash)
Four Larks – Grooving at the Go Go (Tower)
Broadways – You Just Don’t Know (MGM)
Volcanos – (It’s Against) The Laws of Love (Inst) (Arctic)
Bob Brady and the Conchords – Everybody’s Going to the Love In (Chariot)
Jean Wells – With My Love and What You Got (Calla)
Danny White – Natural Soul Brother (SSS Intl)
The Contours – Just a Little Misunderstanding (Gordy) (Fade out)

Set 2

OV Wright – Love the Way You Love (Backbeat)
Billy Butler – Right Track (Okeh)
Lynne Randell – It’s a Hoe Down (Epic)
Thelma Jones – Stronger (Barry)
The Platters – Sweet Sweet Lovin’ (Musicor)
Christine Cooper – SOS (Heart In Distress) (Parkway)
Irma Thomas – What Are You Trying To Do (Imperial)
Henry Lumpkin – Soul Is Taking Over (Buddah)
Barbara Banks – River of Tears (Veep)
Luther Ingram – If It’s All the Same To You (Hib)
Chuck Wood – Seven Days Is Too Long (Roulette)
Maurice and the Radiants – Baby You’ve Got It (Chess)
Parliaments – Don’t Be Sore At Me (Revilot)
O’Jays – I Dig Your Act (Bell) (fade out)

Set 3

Mickey Lee Lane – Hey Sah Lo Ney (Swan) (partial)
R Dean Taylor – There’s a Ghost In My House (VIP)
Scatman Crothers – Golly! Zonk! It’s Scatman (HBR)
Eyes of Blue – Heart Trouble (Deram)
Rodge Martin – Lovin’ Machine (Bragg)
Cooperettes – Shing-a-ling (Brunswick)
Darrell Banks – Our Love Is In the Pocket (Revilot)
Spellbinders – Help Me (Get Myself Back Together Again) (Columbia)
Olympics – Mine Exclusively (Mirwood)
Chubby Checker – (At the) Discotheque (Parkway)
Peaches and Herb – I Need Your Love So Desperately (Date)
Rex Garvin and the Mighty Cravers – I Gotta Go Now (Out On the Floor) (Like)
Dean Parrish – I’m On My Way (Laurie) (fade out)

End of Night Wrap Up

Timmy Willis – Mr Soul Satisfaction (Sidra)
Clydie King – Bout Love (Lizard)
Producers – Love Is Amazing (Huff Puff)
Pat Lewis – Look at What I Almost Missed (Solid Hit)
Poets – She Blew a Good Thing (Symbol)
Chuck Jackson – Good Things Come To Those Who Wait (Wand)
Intruders – All the Time (Excel)

Comments (3)

By Larry, April 7, 2011 9:35 am

Bo Diddley by Mat Vullo

Listen/Download – Bo Diddley – I Can Tell

Greetings all.

The end of the week is finally here, and I hope you’ve all gotten good and oiled up with this week’s mix as your soundtrack.

The track I bring you today ought to put a nice cap on the whole deal, but first some news you can use.

This Friday night – just like every Friday night – sees the return of the mighty Funky16Corners Radio Show, on the equally mighty Viva Radio. This is the thang where you get to sit down with me (or at least the dulcet tones of my voice) and some of the best in funk, soul, jazz and rare groove vinyl for an hour of sheer, unadulterated musical pleasure. If you can’t be there during the broadcast, you can always fall by over the weekend and pick yourself up an MP3 of the show, or several dozen past shows to stuff into your iPod.

Also, I will be returning to Spindletop @ Botanica (47 E Houston St, NYC) this coming Monday (4/11) to join my man Perry Lane for some more of that good, vinyl-based groove grease. This will be the first gig of an unusually busy month for yours truly, and I’ll be bringing along a pile of new arrivals/discoveries, so if you’re in the area, and feel like a frosty beverage and some hot music, join us.

You should also pop on over to Fleamarket Funk, where my man DJ Prestige has undertaken a redesign, as well as added a new feature called ‘Big Ups’, in which yours truly has been featured. Make sure you stop by to take a look.

I’ll assume that as soon as this page loaded in your browser, the first thing you noticed was the exceedingly groovy illustration of our friend Mr. McDaniels by Mat Vullo.

Mat and I have been Facebook pals for a long time, he an admirer of the Funky16Corners Blog, and I digging his groovy illustrations. We put our heads together and settled on an illo for a Bo Diddley feature, but you really need to go by his site and check out his other stuff. If you dig the sounds herein, you will most certainly dig the visuals over there.
Many thanks to Mat.

That all said, the tune I bring you today is yet another Asbury Lanes Garage Sale find. It was one of those ‘I’ve spent most of my dough and I’m on my way out the door and I think I’ll paw through one last box before I split’ things, and good thing too since I dig me some Bo Diddley and don’t have all that much of his original vinyl in the crates.

He was one of the true elemental forces of the Chess/Checker Chitown arsenal, alongside Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf and Chuck Berry (and many others, but those are the stony visages on that particular Mt Rushmore).

The cool thing is, though Bo has shared roots with some of his labelmates, in many ways he is the very definition of sui generis, straddling the worlds of the electric blues and rock’n’roll, existing on a stylistic island all his own. This is not to say that he did not at times record what might be seen as conventional blues or rock, but rather that at his best, with tunes like the eponymous ‘Bo Diddley’, he created something without equal.

One need only look at his impact on the British Invasion (and all that flowed from it) to realize that that darkness you sensed was actually his titanic shadow draped over the whole thing. London in 1963 was almost like Jackson Pollock had dipped his brushes in a huge vat of Bo Diddley and splattered it every which way. The Kinks, Pretty Things (named for a Bo song with no less than four of his tunes on their first album), Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, Rolling Stones, Yardbirds and many others, all quaking in their pointy boots from the reverberato shock wave started by Bo Diddley’s massive stomp and rightly so because even though this lot liked to pay tribute to Messrs Morganfield, Burnett, Reed et al, nobody smacked them in the gob like Bo Diddley, because where all of the others were deep and menacing, Bo Diddley was also fun in his own, oblong, horn-rimmed, wobble-legged way.

Bo was the shit, and the tune I bring you today (which I first heard by the aforementioned Pirates, who lay it down with a rockabilly twang which is also cool since Bo’s version has a little country in it) is just another bit of evidence in that case.

‘I Can Tell’ is Bo’s rough-edged lament at a love cast aside, packed end to end with his ringing guitar, Jerome’s maraccas, and someone pumping a bass guitar con brio.

The fact that he manages to namecheck no less a light than Charlie Brown – the greatest sack of sad that the world has ever known – as the guy that elbowed in on his action speaks volumes.

You can just see his eyes rolling back into his head when he finally loses his shit and shouts ‘I Can Tell You Don’t Love Me No More!!!’

Heavy, heavy stuff, and if someone doesn’t get their shit together and erect a huge statue in his image soon…well…I don’t know what I’ll do but it ain’t gonna be nice.

That said, have a lovely weekend and I’ll see you all on Monday.

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo), in regard to the April 2nd walk. The whole Funky16Corners gang will be walking in support of autism services, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.

Comments (5)

By Larry, April 3, 2011 3:18 pm

Slap those keys Mr. Reeder!

Doc Bagby – Mix It Up (Vim)
Donald Height – Soul Monkey Twist (Jubilee)
Gate Wesley and Band – Do the Thing (Atlantic)
Four Gents – Soul Sister (HBR)
Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts – Instrumental (Jubilee)
Ike & Tina Turner – Tina’s Dilemma (Sue)
Eskew Reeder – Green Door (Minit)
Baby Lloyd – the Dog (Smash)
Jon Thomas – Hot Tip (Mercury)
African Beavers – You Got Something (RCA)
Mark III Trio – Cagey (Downhill)
Bunker Hill – Hide and Go seek (Intermission)
Tempos – Monkey Doo (Fairmount)
Chet Poison Ivey – Poo Poo Man (Bee Cee)
Hollywood Persuaders – Last Night (Original Sound)
Carl Holmes and the Commanders – Mash Potatoes Pt1 (Atlantic)
The Sunglows – Happy Hippo (Sunglow)
Chuck Edwards – Chuck Roast (Roulette)
Rivingtons – Papa Oo Mow Mow (Liberty)
Turtles – Buzz Saw (White Whale)
Candy Phillips – Timber Pt1 (Atlantic)
Emperors – Tic Tac Toe (unreleased)
Ray Sharpe – Help Me (Get the Feeling) Pt1 (Atco)
Wynder K Frog – Dancing Frog (UA)
Shadows of Knight – Shake (Team)

Listen/Download – F16C Radio v.93 – Half ‘Mental’ – 116MB/256K Mixed MP3

NOTE: This mix is NSFW, in that it will inspire all manner of odd behavior, but also because the drops within are meant for mature audiences. So don’t play this in front of your kids unless you’re ready for some ‘splainin.

Greetings all.

I hope the new week finds you all well.

Me, I’m cool (maybe depends on who you ask….)

Gonna get things started this week a note of thanks and a slew of DJ gig announcements.

First, I’d like to say thank you to the Funky16Corners readers, and especially my wife’s knitting pals (who clicked through the donation link here at F16C) who helped us raise money for the POAC Autism Walk this past Saturday. It’s not too late to throw a couple of bucks into the till for a very worthy cause, so I’ll leave the link below for this post.

Now to the gigs…

Before we get things rolling I should mention that I will be returning to Spindletop @ Botanica next Monday, 4/11 for more of the good stuff. I always look forward to packing up the 45RPM heat and hanging with my man Perry Lane. I realize that Monday night isn’t everyone’s ‘get out and hang’ night, but if you are so inclined you could do a lot worse than joining me for some hot 45s and some cold drinks.

Now, Saturday, that’s a CLASSIC get out of the house and dance your ass off kind of night, and it just so happens that April 16th I will be spinning at the legendary Subway Soul Club alongside the mighty Connie T Empress (Empire State Soul Club and the early days of the Asbury Park 45 Sessions) and SSC resident Phast Phreddie the Boogaloo Omnibus. This shindig occurs at Public Assembly (70 North 6th Street, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn) and runs from 10PM until 4AM the following morning. Subway Soul Club feature 60s soul and R&B with an emphasis on Northern.

You know I’m a Northern Soul nut, and my crates run deep with the stuff. I’ll be packing only the finest midtempo and storming dancers into my 45RPM steamer trunk (as well as some gritty 60s movers) , so if slipping and sliding on the talc is the bag you’re in, or just doing the Philly Dog, the Monkey (Boston or other…), the Jerk, or any of the other classic steps, you need to bring your feet and your ears on down to Subway Soul.

Then (YES, There’s MORE!!), I’ll be motoring up to Massachusetts for what promises to be an absolute burner of a weekend.

Friday 4/22 I’ll be joining DJ Andujar and Studebaker Hawk for Sweet Excorcist @ The Peoples Pint, 24 Federal St in Greenfield Mass, and then on Saturday 4/23 I’ll be spinning alongside DJ Cashman and Snack Attack at Wooly Bully @ the Basement, 21 Center St, Northampton Mass. I’ll be packing all manner of deep funk, hard charging party soul, latin boogaloo and even some funky reggae. Both of these nights are banging, so I look forward to bringing the very busy month of April to a loud, sweaty close. Won’t you join us??

To say that I have sweated over the mix you see before you would be at the very least an understatement. Though the overall number of mixes posted here has certainly increased, the flow of the old school, non-live Funky16Corners Radio jawns has been lean.

This has everything to do with the increase in both the F16C Soul Club series (live recordings) and the weekly Funky16Corners Radio Shows.

I am – despite rumors to the contrary – but a solitary man, and one can only turn out so much product without blowing some kind of mental gasket, so I figured that I would take my time with the ‘regular’ mixes in an attempt to make them a little more special.

That said, this particular mix has been germinating for a long time, first in my fevered brain, then on the old laptop where it has seen no less than four separate ‘drafts’, the last of which is posted above.

Funky16Corners Radio v.93 – Half Mental (as in “instru” but also crazed) is my attempt to recreate the spirit of the smoky taverns, sweaty frat house basements* and other places where people gathered to dance (and or grind) in close proximity to loud, soulful music while spilling their beverages (and whatever else gets spilled on nights like this) on the floor (and each other).

This is not music to let into your ears passively.

While you may choose to close your eyes, plug in your earbuds and have a frat party of the mind, you’d be better served cranking this stuff up in an overpacked room full of funseekers, with at least a few people fired up enough to start singing along into their beer bottles while they stagger about breaking your stuff (I can’t keep anything nice in here…).

There’s all kinds of powerful stuff in here, including the soul, the greasy Hammond groovers, (African) Beavers, Monkeys, Dogs, Hippos and Frogs and enough high octane slop to get even the drowsiest bore off of his can and out on the floor.

Normally, I would reserve such a punch in the head for a Friday, but I figured that if you were to grab the ones and zeros on a Monday, you’d have all week to get your friends together to dig it with you.

I’m not going to say much more, nor am I doing a zip file on this one. Pulling this apart would be like dissecting a peanut butter and jelly sang-weech. The pieces just aren’t the same as eating the whole thing.

So, pull down the mix (and your pants if that’s how you swing), spill some beer and get with the party.

See you later in the week.

Peace

Larry

*Just to provide a frame of reference, Carl Holmes and the Commanders were a regular attraction at Chris Millers Dartmouth U frat back in the early days of the 60s, providing (alongside folks like Lonnie Youngblood) the model a decade and a half further on up the road for Otis Day and the Knights when Miller would co-write ‘Animal House’. Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts were working the same (if a lot dirtier) vibe south of the Mason-Dixon line.

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo), in regard to the April 2nd walk.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg for some very tasty UK Folk Rock.

Comments (4)

By Larry, March 24, 2011 9:31 am

Listen to him Lucy. He know’s what he’s talking about.

Listen/Download – F16C Soul Club Presents – Spindletop New Breed 76MB/256K Mixed MP3

Jimmy Hannah & the Dynamics – Leaving Here (Seafair/Bolo)
Frank Frost – My Back Scratcher (Jewel)
Bobby Powell – Why Am I Treated So Bad (Whit)
Ike Turner and the Kings of Rhythm – The New Breed Pt1 (Sue)
Richard Berry & the Pharaohs – Louie Louie (Flip)
Roy Thompson – Sookie Sookie (Okeh)
Mighty Hannibal – Jerkin’ the Dog (Shurfine)
Bobby Parker – Watch Your Step (V Tone)
Gene Waiters – Shake and Shingaling Pt1 (Fairmount)
Roger & the Gypsies – Pass the Hatchet Pt1 (Seven B)
Scatman Crothers – Golly! Zonk! It’s Scatman (HBR)
Derek Martin – Daddy Rollin’ Stone (Crackerjack)
King Coleman – Boo Boo Song Pt2 (King)
Billy Preston – Let the Music Play (Capitol)
Etta James and Sugar Pie DeSanto – In the Basement Pt1 (Chess)
Dottie Cambridge – He’s About a Mover (MGM)
Freddie Scott – Pow City! (Marlin)

Greetings all.

The end of the week is here, and I am in dire need of some form of stress relief, whether it’s extended, uninterrupted sleep, intoxication of some sort or just deep, silent meditation.

It’s not that this week has been extraordinarily rough, ‘cause it hasn’t, but rather some combination of not enough sleep (DJ-ing two hours away on a Monday night will do that), a cold (and/or the onset of seasonal allergies) and the normal slate of irritants, have all combined to do a number on my head.

That said, I’m going to take a tip from the Sims Twins and let a little soul music ‘Soothe Me’.

First, I’ll remind you that this Friday night at 9PM the Funky16Corners Radio Show returns to Viva Radio with another hour of the best in funk, soul, jazz and rare groove, all straight from my crates to your ears. As always you can either tune in on the interwebs, or come by here over the weekend to pick up the show in its easy to use MP3 form. Either way, the sounds are equally excellent.

I had a gas on Monday spinning at Spindletop, and managed once again to capture the goings on with my handheld digital recorder, so that I might share some of it with you good folks.

I went through the musical fruits (no beans…) of the evening and carved out two sets of grooves, one of which I’ll whip on you today, the second which I’ll drop at the end of next week.

This time out I dipped into the crates and whipped out the best in hard-charging, soul party action, from gritty R&B, tough dance floor soul, right on to early funk.

I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating, that one of the prime reasons I love to DJ in a bar or club is the opportunity to hear really amazing records pumping out of a great big set of speakers. You can set the Mighty Hannibal loose in your earbuds, but it’s just not as cool as hearing him unwind his turban with ‘Jerkin’ the Dog’ shaking a room full of people like a minor earthquake.

Every single one of the records in these mixes is perfect for such an environment. I’d go as far as to say that gathered together like this, they might be too powerful for a Friday or Saturday, yet pack just enough musical TNT to set things off on a Monday.

If I was you, I’d pull down the ones and zeros, hit the liquor store, invite over some friends, roll back the carpet and turn up the stereo and do like Mr. Waiters says:

Jump back honey and let the New Breed by!

See you on Monday

Peace

Larry

Also, make sure that you check out the POAC link below (click on the logo), in regard to the April 2nd walk. The whole Funky16Corners gang will be walking in support of autism services, and any contribution you could make would be greatly appreciated.

If you want one of the new Funky16Corners stickers (free, of course) click here for info.

Check out the Funky16Corners Store at Cafe Press

PS Head over to Iron Leg for some Laurel Canyon cool from Mama Cass.

Comments (14)

By Larry, February 15, 2011 3:15 pm

The Dixie Cups on TV = Groovy…

Listen/Download – Dixie Cups – Two-Way-Poc-A-Way

Greetings all.

I don’t know about you, but I unwisely spent my Sunday evening staring at the TV set while the ‘music industry’ took a hot steaming dump.

I understand that ranting about this brings with it the possibility of being branded as old and out of touch, but honest to god, what a lot of shit.

Oh, by the way, I’m talking about the Grammy Awards.

It’s not like this is a new development, because what manifested itself on the screen this week was only the latest incremental step in a decades-long slide to the bottom.

It has been years since popular music ceased worrying about sounding good and began obsessing with spectacle, i.e. how many pyrotechnics, backup dancers and how much postmodern filigree could be wrapped around a song (and I use the term loosely) to keep the saucer-eyed worker ants tossing their hard earned money into the wood chipper, but the blending of the tabloid sensibility with what passes for music these days is scraping the street like a damaged muffler, throwing up sparks and shrapnel while revealing the finely tuned engine of commerce for the loud, greasy beast that it really is.

The really revealing thing is how much of this can be laid at the feet of old-schoolers, who allow their egos to be over-inflated by essentially empty (publicist driven) idolatry from their descendants while phoning it in in the laziest possible way.

There, on the stage next to the current crop of freshly wrapped, forgettable crap (nothing new there, just the latest version of the oily film that has always floated atop the music industry) were folks like Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger (who in paying “tribute” to Brother Solomon Burke, got the first line of ‘Everybody Needs Somebody To Love’ WRONG), Aretha Franklin and Kris Kristofferson (among many others) who really ought to have known better, basically tossing dirt on top of their own caskets.

It wouldn’t be so bad if they were performing something new, of their own creation, but they allow themselves to be wrapped around all manner of contemporary awfulness, like juicy slices of bacon embracing a succession of turds (anti-Rumaki?) , while we all sit by like waterboarding subjects, gasping thankfully for that brief respite from a musical drowning like our torturers are doing us a favor.

Just awful on every conceivable level, ultimately more about the ‘red carpet’, the iconography of crass stupidity and commerce than anything that might be mistaken for art and soul.

Of course I sat there like Statler and/or Waldorf (OG Muppets represent), sneering at my TV set when the off-button was always in reach, which makes me a special brand of rube, but I was also e-commiserating with others of my ilk on the social network that will remain unnamed, so I guess it was a kind of digital anti-focus group, in which we all bonded together in hatred for those that would presume that we were stupid enough to find any of this appetizing, which is where things are in the 21st century (where’s my jet car and Martian vacation home???).

It’s the ultimate manifestation of everything bad about post-modernization (not the conceptual po-mo but what the powers of commerce have done with it).

What we need is something solid with a direct line to the soul, and what you get is Justin Beiber, dancing ninjas with fireworks shooting out of their asses and a “song of the year” (really? Bad year…) largely cribbed from a thirty year old pop song. It’s as if the recording industry, already choking to death on its own spew (and lack of foresight) decided that insulting the intelligence of its audience was a waste of time since there was no longer anything there to be insulted so why not serve up the contents of their dumpster and make believe it’s caviar and lobster?

That said, when I decided I was going to fill this space with gripe, I realized that I couldn’t very well do that without countering the suck with something especially good, representative of the kind of musical kick in the sack required to cleanse the palate in a case like this.

I have my man Dan at the Home of the Groove to thank for turning me on to today’s selection a few years back.

I – like anyone else with a radio or a seat at a wedding – was already aware of the Dixie Cups, with the ‘Chapel of Love’, and ‘People Say’ and that tip of the feathered headdress to their home in the Crescent City ‘Iko Iko’, but when I first heard ‘Two-Way-Poc-A-Way’ my hair (and my prominent ears) stood on end, as they should when presented with something so powerful.

Recorded in 1965 after they moved from Red Bird to ABC/Paramount, and produced by none other than Joe Jones, ‘Two-Way-Poc-A-Way’ is the Wild Indian chant of ‘Iko Iko’ taken to a whole ‘nother extreme, removed from the pop element and placed firmly in the Mardi Gras parade as if you were cakewalking alongside the Big Chief with a head full of spirits (liquid and deceased).

Not much more than the Dixie Cups and a grip of percussion (more than enough if you ask me) ‘Two-Way-Poc-A-Way’ was – even for 1965 when things were really starting to change – an awfully strange record to toss at AM radio – but that’s one of the many reasons (maybe the main one) why it’s so cool.

I’ve dropped this one at funk 45 fests (and in a previous mix) but I figured that in a situation like this, it deserved to be put up where it might be savored on its own.

Real stuff for an increasingly unreal world.

Peace

Larry

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Comments (6)

By Larry, February 6, 2011 3:48 pm

Eddie Silvers

Listen/Download – Eddie and the De-Havelons – Baby Dumplins

Greetings all.

It’s time to get another week rolling here at the Funky16Corners blog, and what better way to do so than with a swinging, greasy organ instrumental?

The tune I bring you today is a little something I grabbed when I was down in DC last year.

When I happened upon ‘Baby Dumplins’ by Eddie and the De-Havelons, the name(s) rang a distant bell, but I couldn’t possibly pass up a 45 with names like that on the label.

When I got the record home and gave it a spin I was happy to discover a hot, fast moving organ instro with wailing sax, i.e. a solid party record.

When I sat down to try and track down some info on the record, it was a little harder than I anticipated.
Certainly a unique name like ‘Eddie and the De-Havelons’ narrowed down the search results, but I don’t think I was prepared for the remaining info to be quite so narrow.

It was only after I started to search using the name of the song’s author, ‘Eddie Silvers’ that I had a breakthrough.

Eddie Silvers was a Chicago-based saxophonist and arranger who was the musical director at the storied One-Derful label during the mid 60s. He had previously worked with the likes of Fats Domino and Bill Doggett before being hired by the notorious Don Robey to work as an A&R man for the Duke/Peacock organization.

During the 60s, Silvers recorded with a few different groups, including the Five G’s (for UA) and the Soul Merchants (for the Stax subsidiary Weis records), and I going to take an educated guess that it’s him playing sax on ‘Baby Dumplins’ by Eddie and the Dehavelons.

The tune – which was released in 1963 – featured some burning organ, hot sax solos and something that I first thought was a fuzz guitar, but is probably a baritone sax dropping bombs all the way through the record.

‘Baby Dumplins’ is one of those organ instros that manages to have quite a bit of soul, while keeping enough of a crossover feel to appeal to the twisters feeding nickels into the jukeboxes of America.

As far as I can tell this is the only 45 recorded under this name (certainly the only one they did for Peacock).

I hope you dig it, and I’ll be back on Wednesday with something cool.

Peace

Larry

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Comments (9)

By Larry, January 30, 2011 2:33 pm

Funky16Corners Radio v.92 – Regular Funk

Playlist

Listen/Download 115MB/256kb Mixed MP3

Download 93MB Zip File

I hope you’re all ready to step into a week.

I should let you know that this coming Friday (2/4) I’ll be guesting at the After the Laughter Soul Club at Lulu’s, 113 Franklin St., Greenpoint, NY. I’ll be joining DJ Hambone and Ben Carey for a night of funk, soul and R&B, all on 45. Things get going at 10PM and go into the wee hours of the morning, so make sure you fall by for some beer, pizza and hot wax.

That said, who wants to pull down the ones and zeros for some of what we record collectors refer to as ‘the funk’?

This is not to say that Funky16Corners Radio v.92 – Regular Funk is all one kind of thing, since it was assembled and mixed under a somewhat larger umbrella than some of you might be accustomed to.

You get some funky soul, some in the regular funk 45 stylee, and some jazz funk as well. I think it all fits together nicely, and hopefully once you stuff it into your ears, you will too.

Things get started with a little taste of Memphis groove, with the Bar-Kays and ‘Don’t Do That’. The flipside of 1967’s ‘Give Everybody Some’, ‘Don’t Do That’ is positively dripping with that Stax/Volt sound, including some very twangy gitbox, which comes to the fore when the horns aren’t blazing.

Buddy Miles is one of those groovy artists who kind of dwell in a gray area between soul and rock, working ably on both sides of the line, and mixing the two together whenever he got the opportunity. ‘Easy Greasy’ is an instrumental from his 1970 ‘We Got to Live Together’ album, and it carries with it much of the horn heavy vibe of the time, with the BST’s and the Chicago’s and naturally the Electric Flag’s, and Buddy manages to whip it all into a nice swaggering groove, that when you least expect it drops in a little bit of a quote (today’s kids might think of it as a sample) from Led Zeppelin’s ‘Bring It On Home’. Things even manage to get a tiny bit psychedelic – which was the style of the time – so settle in and dig it.

The mighty Syl Johnson appeared in this very spot but a few short weeks ago. He was – as has been stated previously – 100% badass – and his take on the Temptation’s ‘Get Ready’ has a lot of grit in its groove.

Despite a bit of searching, I haven’t been able to nail down Nate Turner, but Venetta Fields (big time backup singer of the day) and the Mirettes were familiar. The tune ‘Rap, Run It On Down’ is a cut from the soundtrack to the 1969 Sidney Poitier vehicle ‘The Lost Man’. I dig the vibe on this one (co-written by Quincy Jones, Dick Cooper and Ernie Shelby*), and the flip side (on which Venetta sits out), ‘Sweet Soul Sister’ is also cool, in a more downtempo way.

I always assumed that the Toddlin’ Town Sounds were an anonymous amalgamation of Chitown sessioners, or perhaps an instro track that someone leased to the label. Either way, their funky stomper ‘The Dud’ (flip of their better known cover of the Isleys ‘It’s Your Thing’) is a killer (dig that chopping rhythm guitar).

‘Funky Tambourine’ by C and the Shells has always been a fave of mine, simply because it defies narrow categorization. It is funky, but it also has an odd, fast moving time signature, as well as some stinging fuzz guitar. There might even be a little bit of gospel flavor weaving in and out of this one as well.

The Crusaders, once a tight soul jazz outfit (as the Jazz Crusaders) evolved into the funky R&B band that hit the charts in the 70s. Led by keyboardist Joe Sample (lots of tasty electric piano here), drummer Stix Hooper and saxophonist Wilton Felder (all three of whom did a lot of work on other people’s records in the 60s and 70s) lay down a very tasty groove indeed on 1973s ‘Gotta Get It On’.

‘Sams Funck’ is blues legend Magic Sam’s entry into the blues guys get funky sweepstakes. Based loosely on the ‘It’s Your Thing’ template, recorded in the lowest of fi’s (as it were) you still get to hear some of the guitar action that made the man a legend. If you find yourself a copy of this one, flip it over, since the vocal version ‘I’ll Pay You Back’ is quite nice indeed.

The Backyard Heavies got their start as a North Carolina show band called the Tempests. ‘Expo 83’, one of the funkiest piano driven 45s in my crates was sampled by Pete Rock for ‘The Basement Intro’.

Does Bobby Byrd need and introduction to the likes of you? Since you’re one of the fine folks that falls by Funky16Corners I’d say no. Mr. Byrd was for years James Brown’s on-stage wing man, but also stepped out to make some hot as hell 45s under his own name. ‘Back From the Dead’ is from a period when Byrd had separated from the Brown organization and found his way to Henry Stone’s Florida-based TK label subsidiary International Brothers. Bobby is in fine form, and lays down a solid bit of dance floor funk.

Eddie Harris has appeared in this space many times. He was one of the true giants of soul jazz, and as 1974’s ‘Get On Down’ illustrates, he could also be quite funky. The cool thing is that you get to hear Eddie double on keys and sax (which he also did on earlier albums like ‘Mean Greens’).

The Fame Gang was the house band at the storied Alabama studio of the same name. Their cover of the Isley Brothers ‘It’s Your Thing’ is another groovy cover of that funky classic. Much like Archie Bell and the Drells ‘Tighten Up’, ‘It’s Your Thing’ is one of those records that was not only had scores of straightforward covers, but was also (see Magic Sam above) ripped off, reprocessed and renamed countless times.

From the funk 45 column comes Pt2 of the Showmen Inc.’s ’Tramp (from Funky Broadway)’, working one of my favorite vibes, that being an intertwining of two separate dance crazes in the same record. The famed break is on the other side, but I’ll make sure to get that one up onto the blog sometime soon.

Jr. Walker and the All Stars are one of those Motown groups that had a huge, omnipresent radio hit in the 60s (Shotgun) that is so much a standard on oldies radio that it tends to make you take them for granted. Well, get yourself out and grab some of their records, because they’re filled with solid, hard hitting gems like ‘Baby You Ain’t Right’.

Now Andre Williams is a dude that has yet to get his props. Williams, acting as performer, writer and producer had his hand in some incredibly good records out of Chicago and Detroit in the 60s. He was an OG badass, with that gangsta lean, lots of greasy soul and attitude for weeks. ‘It’s Gonna Be Fine in ‘69’ is another one of his masterpieces for the Chess/Checker/Cadet family of labels. It features some wild guitar, snapping drums, and of course Mr Williams on the vocal.

Wilbur Bascomb and the Zodiact recorded under their own name, as well as backing other artists. ‘Just a Groove in G’ features a classic drum break, some wailing organ, and some imspired if spasmodic guitar action.

Billy Cobham is one of the great drummers of the jazz fusion era. His 1974 ‘Crosswind’ (also covered, very nicely by Woody Herman!) is a funky killer, with tight drumming by Billy, grooving electric piano and tasty horns. Sampled by Gang Starr among others.

Another jazz hero with funky tendencies was the mighty Grant Green. A seriously talented hard bopper who contributed to countless classic Blue Note sessions as a sideman, also had quite the discography under his own name. As the 60s rolled to a close, he got progressively more funky, so much so that his albums from that period are crate digger faves and his 1971 set ‘Shades of Green’ is no exception. His ‘James Brown Medley’ is a laid back, funky, extended take on the Godfather.

This edition of Funky16Corners Radio closes out with a cool bit of Motor City funk, ‘Tick Tock Baby (It’s a Quarter To Love)’ by the Quickest Way Out. Groovy because it shares a backing track with Reggie Milner’s raging ‘Soul Machine’. The Quickest Way Out take on the tune is a little more laid back, and the break is open, so what’s not to like.

I hope you dig the mix, and I’ll be back later in the week with something cool.

Peace

Larry

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