Listen/Download X-Citers Unlimited – Soul To Billie Joe

Greetings all

Welcome to the week, this one devoted, in a completely arbitrary manner, to instrumentals.

I just happened to be wading through the digimatization/storage folders deciding what to post, and one instrumental led to another and before you know it – Bob’s yer uncle – here we are.

We begin the week with a record that fits the very definition of ‘un-Google-able’.

First and foremost, the band in question, the X-Citers Unlimited, had a name that invites all manners of misspelling and misplaced punctuation (a hyphen…really?).

Second, and this is the real killer, both sides of the disc are covers of other people’s material, meaning that you have no “in-band” songwriting credits to expand a search.

Third, it would appear that this is the only record ever released by this band, making it impossible to triangulate using other 45s.

The only available clues come courtesy of the fact that the X-Citers Unlimited recorded for a well-known label – which makes it possible to date the record to 1967 – and that it was produced by a guy that should be familiar to fans of 60s soul, Mr Wally Roker.

Using that date and name, and combining it with previous knowledge of Mr Roker’s working environment during that time, I’d be willing to venture a guess that this was a West Coast band.

And that – as they say – is that.

Dead Endsville.

That said, one can always take solace in the quality of the music in the grooves, which in this case is fine indeed.

The reworking of Bobbie Gentry’s ‘Ode To Billie Joe’ (presented here as ‘Soul To Billie Joe’) is a hard charging bit of funky soul with some tasty Latin percussion and plenty of brass.

It’s groovy because unlike the vast majority of the probably hundreds of cover versions of the tune, it does not hew to the original tempo.

The flip, a cover of ‘Hang On Sloopy’ is much more explicity boogaloo-ish.

It is a very cool 45 indeed, and I hope that you dig it (and that, if you know anything else about it, you’ll drop me a line).

Keep the faith

Larry

 

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Also, the brand new Funky16Corners ‘Keep Calm and Stay Funky’ stickers have arrived!

The stickers are 4″ x 3″ and printed on high quality, glossy stock.

They are $2.00 each, with free shipping in the US ($2.00 per order shipping outside of the US).

Click here to go to the ordering page.
Also, make sure that you check out the links below to the Be The Match Foundation and POAC (click on the logos for more info).

 

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.