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By Larry, January 19, 2014 11:47 am

Alvin Cash and the Registers

Listen/Download Alvin Cash and the Registers – No Deposit No Return

Greetings all

The new week is here, so I thought I’d dust off some of that good Chicago (via St Louis) instrumental soul to get you greased up and ready to roll.

Alvin Cash (nee Weeks) and the Crawlers/Registers had a string of hits for the Chicago labels Mar-V-Lus and Toddlin’ Town between 1965 and 1968.

Cash and his brothers – basically a dance act – emigrated to Chitown from St Louis and hit the charts early in 1965 with ‘Twin Time’.

Backed by the Registers, originally a St Louis band called the Nightlighters, Cash basically worked the same side of the “vocal” street as Jerry-O, i.e. he was more of an emcee/toaster/proto-rapper than a singer proper, spicing up several groovy instrumentals with largely spoken interjections.

The track I bring you today is – as my pockets often are – Cash-less, featuring the Registers, along with a bottle of pop, getting down.

The tune – ‘No Deposit No Return’ is credited to Joseph Delponto and Larry Nestor. I can’t find anything about Delponto, but Nestor was a Chicago-area keyboardist who had spent some time in the Buckinghams, and wrote and arranged for other Chicago artists like the Sharpees and Syl Johnson.

‘No Deposit No Return’, which opens with the sound of a bottle being uncapped (natch…) opens up into a grooving soul instro led by some soupy (Wurlitzer??) electric piano and saxophone, with enough punch for the dance floor.

Though this song didn’t chart, its flipside ‘Philly Freeze’ grazed the R&B Top 10 and the Pop Top 50 in 1966.

It is a head-nodder indeed, and I hope you dig it.

See you on Wednesday

Keep the faith

Larry

  ___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

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By Larry, January 2, 2014 1:13 pm

Young-Holt looking badass!

Listen/Download Young-Holt Unlimited – Mystical Man

Greetings all

The end of the week is near, so it is time to remind you to set the dial on your wireless set to bring in the Funky16Corners Radio Show, which airs this and every Friday night at 9PM on Viva Radio. If you are unable to join me at airtime, you can keep up with the show by subscribing to it as a podcast in iTunes.

How about something mellow to close out the week?

The Young-Holt organization, Unlimited, LTD etc has been featured in this space many times over the years.

Isaac ‘Red’ Holt and Eldee Young, from their days as two thirds of the Ramsey Lewis Trio, on to their string of outstanding soul jazz LPs in the late 60s and early 70s, have long been favorites of mine.

Though they are known to most for their 1969 hit ‘Soulful Strut’ (which, oddly enough they are rumored to have not played on), they laid down a string of great albums and 45s for the Brunswick, Cotillion and Paula labels between 1966 and 1973 (with Holt carrying on as a solo for a while afterward).

The tune I bring you taday hails from their 1973 LP ‘Young-Holt Unlimited Plays Superfly’, and is a testament to the often unsung hero of the group, pianist Ken Chaney.

Chaney, who replaced Hysear Don Walker when the group changed from the Young-Holt Trio to Young-Holt Unlimited was the driving melodic force of the trio, as well as composing some excellent tunes.

Today’s selection is the meditative, soulful ‘Mystical Man’, the final track (and one of only two originals) on the ‘Plays Superfly’ album.

It is a great piece of spiritual, late-night jazz, with some very groovy electric piano, arco and pizzicato bass by Young and some very restrained drumming by Holt.

The album is one of their best, and worth the investment if you can locate a copy.

I hope you dig the sounds, and I’ll see you on Monday.

Keep the faith

Larry

  ___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

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By Larry, November 21, 2013 1:14 pm

Listen/Download Tim – I Need Your Love

Greetings all

The weekend is rapidly approaching, which means that it’s almost Funky16Corners Radio Show time again. I com to you each and every Friday night at 9PM on Viva Radio, with the best in funk, soul, jazz and rare groove, all on original vinyl. You can also keep up with the show by subscribing to it as a podcast in iTunes.

The record I bring you today is something that has been simmering in the crates for a long time.

I got my hands on ‘I Need Your Love’ by Tim (yes, just Tim…) way back in that multi-thousand record dump, courtesy of my father-in-law.

It’s one of those records that had to grow on me for a while before I really “got” it.

‘I Need Your Love’ has kind of a slow (dare I say, awkward) intro, but things get going pretty quickly, and build up a very nice head of steam.

The piano pushes the rhythm along, and if you slap on the heaphones and listen closely, the guitar is doing some interesting things.

I can tell you absolutely nothing about Tim himself, other than his last name would appear to be Smith, his voice sounds like a smoothed out Wilson Pickett, and that this is a Chicago 45.

Celtex was a label owned by Bill Lasley, which as far as I can tell only issued a few 45s in it’s short (just 1967?) existence, two by bluesman Mighty Joe Young and this 45 by Tim.

The song’s co-writer Vernon Taplin is better known by his stage name ‘Saxie Russell’, the man behind ‘Psychedelic Soul’ on Chicago’s Thomas label.

If you have any more information about Tim, please let me know in the comments.

I hope you dig the tune, and I’ll see you all on Monday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

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By Larry, November 12, 2013 1:21 pm

Otis Clay

Listen/Download Otis Clay – Got To Find a Way

Greetings all

Welcome to the middle of the week. Today’s selection is another one of those records that the first time I heard it, I knew I had to have it.

I had the old stereola warmed up and my aerial pointed in the direction of New Zealand, where my man Kris Holmes was slinging the 45s on Radio Ponsonby, when I first heard the mind-blowingly soulful strains of Otis Clay singing ‘Got To Find a Way’.

While I certainly knew his name – Clay had a run of R&B hits between 1967 and 1972 – it wasn’t until I picked up his outstanding cover of the Sir Douglas Quintet’s ‘She’s About a Mover’ (which skirted the outside of the R&B Top 40 in 1968) that I became acquainted with his music.

That was some years ago, and no matter how cool the aforementioned 45 was (both sides, too) I was unprepared for the explosive soul power of today’s selection.

Though this song was also recorded by the great Harold Burrage two years earlier (1965)  for M-Pac , there’s just no comparison.

Man, oh man, this is a stone solid, ass-kicker of a 45. It has everything, from a spellbinding vocal by Clay, catchy melody by Jimmy Jones and a powerful arrangement.

Every instrument in the mix verily explodes through your speakers, and oddly enough it sounds like a live mix. The drums (listen to those snare hits!), piano, rhythm guitar and horns are exquisitely balanced, propelling Clay’s vocal into the stratosphere.

Here we have the fabled intersection of pure, undiluted soul shouting, pop hooks and dance floor burn, jumping from the grooves on a 45 that is neither well known, nor exceedingly rare.

If you were similarly moved, you could head on over to Ebay and slap down less than twenty bucks (a steal, you should send the guy a fifty and insist he keep the change) and walk away with two and a half minutes of soul power that’ll set your record box (and any dance floor you bring it to) on fire.

I’m serious…if this record doesn’t knock you back on your heels, I don’t know what to tell you.

I mean, KABOOM.

Honestly.

See you on Friday

Keep the faith

Larry

  ___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

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By Larry, November 10, 2013 5:31 pm

The Staple Singers

Listen/Download The Staple Singers – Why (Am I Treated So Bad)

Greetings all

The record I bring you today is an interesting one indeed.

I first heard ‘Why (Am I Treated So Bad)’ as an organ instrumental by the Wildare Express.

The first vocal versions I heard were by Brian Auger and Julie Driscoll, and the mighty Bobby Powell.

It wasn’t until later that I realized that the song had been written by Roebuck ‘Pop’ Staples, and originally waxed by the Staple Singers in 1965.

While I haven’t spent a lot of time tracking down and digging for gospel, I am a huge fan of the Staple Singers, especially their early work for VeeJay and Epic.

In the years before they broke through on Stax, the Staples were a gospel group, almost always recorded with just their voices and the accompaniment of Pop Staples remarkable guitar.

The original version of ‘Why (Am I Treated So Bad)’ opens with an introductory monologue by Pop, backed by his guitar, bass and some very spare percussion before Mavis, Cleotha and Pervis join in.

It is a remarkable testament to the group’s power as singers (and vocal arrangers) as well as the song’s simply stated message.

If you get the chance, pick up any of the Staples’ Epic-era LPs, as they are uniformly excellent.

It wasn’t but a few weeks ago, when I was posting some videos on Facebook, that I discovered – quite by accident – the version of the song you see before you today.

Though I haven’t been able to nail down the recording date for this session, I suspect it was sometime in 1967 or early 1968, before the group left Epic.

Produced by Larry Williams (with no arranging credit listed) this version of ‘Why (Am I Treated So Bad)’ is a radical reinterpretation of the song, excising the monologue, but adding in a full, funky band.

The tempo is a touch faster, and the spare accompaniment of the original is replaced with electric guitar, bass, drums and a horn section, with a very groovy electric piano leading the show.

The 45 you see before you was released in 1971 and it was included on a compilation of their Epic material (studio and live) called ‘The Staple Singers Make You Happy’, intended to cash in on their success with Stax (the title is even a shamless reference to one of their Stax hits, 1970’s ‘Heavy Makes You Happy’).

Though I’m not 100% positive, I think this version of ‘Why (Am I Treated So Bad)’ was issued (and charted briefly) in 1967. There is some confusion because both ‘Why (Am I Treated So Bad’’ and ‘For What It’s Worth’ were issued multiple times, with different B-sides. I suspect this version did in fact get issued, since the Brian Auger and Julie Driscoll version seems to mirror its arrangement (especially the horns).

If anyone knows for sure, please drop me a line.

That said, it’s a great record, and I hope you all dig it.

See you on Wednesday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

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By Larry, November 7, 2013 2:00 pm

Mr Andre Williams

Listen/Download Jomo – Uhuru (African Twist)

Greetings all

The end of the week is approaching, and that means that it will soon be Funky16Corners Radio Show time again. Each and every Friday night at 9PM on Viva Radio, I endeavor to bring you the finest in funk, soul, jazz and rare groove, all on original vinyl. If you can’t be there at airtime, you can keep up by subscribing to the show as a podcast in iTunes, or by grabbing an MP3 here at the blog.

I pulled today’s selection out of the crates a while back and I was shocked to discover that I had never posted it here at Funky16Corners.

‘Uhuru (African Twist)’ was an early funk 45 find of mine, which has appeared in many live sets over the years.

I first picked it up on the strength of the name (artist and song) but as soon as I dropped the needle into the grooves, it went straight into the keeper pile.

There was no real ‘Jomo’ to speak of, with the 45 being the pseudonymous work of the mighty Andre Williams, who co-wrote the song with the assistance of none other than Sidney Barnes.

‘Uhuru (African Twist)’ is a powerful mover, packed with hard-hitting drums, chanting and soul clapping (which gave it a minor following on the Northern Soul scene).

Recorded and released in 1968, the “group” takes its name from Kenyan president Jomo Kenyatta and (coincidentally, I think) bears the name of his son, Uhuru (also the Swahili word for ‘freedom’), who would later ascend to the same position).

As far as I can tell, despite its undeniable quality, the record failed to chart (even locally) and is the only thing released under this name.

Andre Williams, of course had a long history as an artist, producer, songwriter and A&R man and continues to perform today at the age of 77.

I hope you dig the sounds, and I’ll see you all on Monday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

Comments (4)

By Larry, October 27, 2013 10:57 am

Harvey Mandel

Listen/Download Harvey Mandel – Wade In the Water Pt1

Listen/Download Harvey Mandel – Wade In the Water Pt2

Greetings all

We’re going to start off the week with something a little special.

We return – after a little more than a year – to the old Funky16Corners/Iron Leg Twin Spin.

I’m not sure why I haven’t done one of these in a while, since my brain is always making connections like this (not sure if it was working like that before I started writing about music or if it’s something that developed concurrently).

The song featured today is one of my all-time favorites, ‘Wade In the Water’ (featured here a few months back by the John Bishop Trio). ‘Wade In the Water’ is a spiritual that goes back well over a century, and has been interpreted countless times in both gospel and secular settings.

It was about a year ago that I was tuned in to my man Kris Holmes’s radio show and he dropped the mind-bending track you see before you today.

Upon first listen, I thought I was hearing an unreleased Soulful Strings cut, or at least something that had the involvement of Richard Evans. I immediately popped open a messaging window and asked Kris who I was hearing.

The answer was, Harvey Mandel.

If you’ve spent a large part of your life reading about, and listening to music, Harvey Mandel is one of those names that pops up frequently (especially in the late 60s) enough to make itself known, but never prominently enough to explain why.

After a little digging, I discovered that Mandel was – for a hot minute at the end of the 60s – one of those free-range, guitar gunslingers who seemed to be everywhere.

He got his start in Chicago, playing with Charlie Musselwhite, before findig his way (like so many others) out to San Francisco. He recorded his first solo album, ‘Cristo Redentor’ (which included ‘Wade In the Water’) in 1968, splitting his time between Los Angeles and Nashville.

Mandel’s version of ‘Wade In the Water’ kicks the door down with a big, fat drumbreak (‘Fast’ Eddie Hoh on the kit, Armando Peraza on congas) before the piano* and bass join in (in unison), paving the way for the strings and the many voices of Harvey’s guitar.

When Mandel starts playing, he layers on the fuzz, before switching to a clearer, more ringing tone.

The string arrangement is by Nick DeCaro, who worked in a wide variety of pop settings (Randy Newman, Lorraine Ellison, Little Feat) as an arranger and producer through the 60s and 70s.

Mandel’s ‘Wade In the Water’ manages to tap into a certain soul jazz feel and still be deeply psychedelic. Presenting it as an instrumental (certainly not the first, Ramsey Lewis had a fairly significant hit with his version in 1966 (R&B #3, Pop #19, and a big Northern side) illustrates how powerful the melody is.

If it seems simple it is only a mark of the perfection of its structure, which in turn allows an improviser like Mandel to run circles around it without ever losing sight of its core.

‘Wade In the Water’ is one of those songs that sounds like something deeper/elemental. That it has been around as long (longer) as recorded music, and is the very definition of ‘spiritual’, in the broadest, Joseph Campbell sense of the word makes versions like this (and the one I have posted over at Iron Leg) cut so deep.

‘Wade In the Water’ (pulled from the 45, so you get it in two, juicy parts) is a heavy, heavy record, great for your head (in a hippie stylee) or just for your ears.

I hope you dig it, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.

Keep the faith

Larry  

*Note – Thanks to Monk1950 for letting me know that the piano player was NOT the famed guitarist but a different person entirely. ___________________________________________________________________________________________ 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.

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By Larry, October 24, 2013 9:18 am

Funky16Corners Presents:It’s Gonna Be Good!

Johnny Jones and the King Casuals – It’s Gonna Be Good (Brunswick)
Albert Collins – Cookin’ Catfish (20th Century Fox)
Chuck Berry – Club Nitty Gritty (Mercury)
Atlantics – Beaver Shot (Rampart)
Little Richard – Soul Train (Brunswick)
Bobby Hollaway – Corn Bread, Hog Maws and Chitterlins (Smash)
The Turtles – Buzz Saw (White Whale)
The Vibrations – Soul a Go Go (Okeh)
Benny Scott – Soul Beat (Brunswick)
Junior and the Classics – Mix Up a Go Go (Magic Touch)
Jon Lee Group – Pork Chops (Sparton)
Ricky Allen – Cut You a Loose (AGE)
El Dorados – The New Breed (Port)
Danny White – Cracked Up Over You (Decca)
Louis Chachere – A Soulful Bag (Forte)
Timmy Thomas – Have Some Boogaloo (Goldwax)
Toussaint McCall – Shimmy (Ronn)
Rex Garvin and the Mighty Cravers – I Gotta Go Now (Up On the Floor) (Like)

Listen/Download -Funky16Corners Presents: It’s Gonna Be Good – 75MB Mixed MP3/256K

Greetings all.

I hope all is well on your side of the universe, and that you’re all ready for the weekend.

Don’t forget that the Funky16Corners Radio Show hits the airwaves of the interwebs this and every Friday night at 9PM on Viva Radio. If you can’t be there at the time of broadcast, you can always subscribe to the show as a podcast in iTunes, or grab an MP3 (or two, or 100) out of the archive here at the blog.

A while back my man DJ Trick over in St. Petersburg, RU asked if I would be amenable to doing an interview and whipping up a mix that they could post in their ‘Grooves’ project*.

As someone who is always down with the cause of spreading the sounds of soul and funk all over the globe, I agreed and set to work.

As you will hear as soon as you pull the trigger on this one, I was in a particularly raucous mood that day, packing just about 40 minutes worth of sonic nitroglycerin into mix form and setting the fuse.

What you get here, is some of my favorite, high-octane soul shouters, organ burners, hardcore R&B and dance party starters, stitched together so that the assembled multitudes might cut themselves a slice of rug (and maybe spill a little beer, too).

If you haven’t sussed it out over the long haul, this is a pretty good approximation of the kind of set I’d throw down were I spinning in a live setting.

That said, this is perfect weekend stuff, so get your download on, and have yourself a party, Artie.

Have a great weekend, and i’ll see you all on Monday.

Keep the faith

Larry

PS They’re posting the interview over there, but it’s in Russian…
___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

Comments (4)

By Larry, September 1, 2013 10:53 am

John Bishop and his guitar, looking badass.

Listen/Download John Bishop Trio – Wade In the Water

Greetings all

I hope the new week finds you well.

The summer is finally at and end, at least the part of the summer marked by the invasion of the great horde, which tends to recede right around Labor Day, leaving the beaches to us locals for a few precious weeks.

The fam and I had the opportunity to vacate in the latter half of August, during which the wife and I had our own little getaway.

Naturally, that included a little bit of record digging (doesn’t it always) which resulted in a nice fat stack of new additions to my crates, here and over at Iron Leg.

I always enjoy stepping out of my own little vinyl ecosystem and into a new one, where the ebb and flow of wax is different, the stock is new (at least to me) and not quite as picked over as what I’m used to.

There aren’t too many opportunities of that nature where I live, so it’s a gas when I get my mitts on some stuff that I haven’t seen/heard before.

Keep your eyes peeled for the results of said excavations in these pages.

The tune I bring you today is one of those great intersections of a song I love and a particularly hot performance.

‘Wade In the Water’ is a spiritual that goes back well over a century, which is why the writing credits on this version – to Sam Cooke and JW Alexander – are odd, but that is neither here nor there, especially when you consider how often people were slapping their names on public domain compositions in order to pick up a little scratch.

It has long been one of my favorite songs and I’ve gotten into the habit of picking up records with versions of it (like I do with ’Soul Makossa’) wherever I find them.

I had been on the lookout for the record you see before you today – ‘Bishop’s Whirl’ by the John Bishop Trio – for years. While it’s not particularly scarce, it eluded me nonetheless so I was happy to score a copy at a nice price.

John Bishop (born Gregory Ceurvorst) was a Chicago-based guitarist who ended up touring with Ray Charles (thus the Tangerine label) in the late 60s. He also played with Donny Hathaway, Ramsey Lewis and the Staple Singers among others.

His version of ‘Wade In the Water’ – the full album edit is included here, there is a much shorter version on 45 – is smoking, with exceptional work by Bishop on guitar and organist Newell Burton, Jr. Bishop goes into a blazing solo around the three-minute mark that explodes around 4:15.

It is an exceptional bit of hard-charging soul jazz, generating enough heat for the dancers (the 45 has a minor following with the Northern Soul crowd).

I haven’t been able to nail down whether or not this was Bishop’s touring band, or a group put together for the date. Burton was a Sacramento-based organist, and the bassist on the record, Jerry Scheff is a renowned session player who started a long stint touring with Elvis Presley around the time that this album was recorded.

That said, the rest of the album – with the exception of the soulful ‘Way Out Back’ – is fairly straight ahead jazz.

Bishop settled in Chicago, where he played with his wife in the Georgia Frances Orchestra, until his passing in 2011 at the age of 65.

I hope you dig the tune, and I’ll see you all on Wednesday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

Comments (3)

By Larry, August 4, 2013 1:10 pm

French picture sleeve

Listen/Download Bo Diddley – Wrecking My Love Life

Greetings all

Welcome to another week here in the land of vinyl.

The disc I bring you today is something I picked up while I was out digging last year.

You all know that I hold Bo Diddley in the highest possible esteem.

He was a gunslinger, surfer, scooter owner and general badass, as well as one of the architects of the one true rock and roll.

Though there are those that will boil him down to his essence, that being the famous “beat”, there are others (like me, for instance) who know what a truckload of manure that is.

Bo made a LOT of amazing music in his career (some of it beyond amazing, like cornerstone of modern music amazing) but unfortunately, outside of collectors of vinyl (on the deep side), much of his later catalog is not well known.

The track I bring you today is (believe your ears or not) from 1967, where it appeared on the flipside of the decidedly non-boogaloo-ish, ‘Boogaloo Before You Go’.

‘Wrecking My Love Life’ packs a metric ton of swagger into its two minutes and 47 seconds, with a thick, spicy bouillabaisse of echoey, reverbed guitar, harmonica, and female backing vocals.

The first time I heard this one, I had to go back to make sure that it wasn’t an earlier side being reissued because it sounds like 1962, holed up in a bunker where 1967 keeps a knockin’ but can’t get in.

The record stomps arounds like some kind of R&B kaiju, crushing buildings, cars and tanks under its massive feet.

Solid stuff from the master, and one I think you’ll want to play over and over again.

I hope you dig it, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

Comments (0)

By Larry, July 21, 2013 12:44 pm

Billy Stewart, tickling the ivories…

Listen/Download Billy Stewart – Scramble

Greetings all

Hows about we get the week started with something surprising?

Those of you that listen to soul music on the reg (or have ever tuned into oldies radio) will certainly know of the vocal talents of the mighty Billy Stewart.

Stewart hit the R&B charts 11 times between 1962 and 1968, crossing over into the Pop top 10 with his epic reading of ‘Summertime’ in 1966.

Stewart was a big man with an even bigger voice and he had a way with both soaring ballads and fast movers as well.

Back in the day someone (I forget exactly who, so forgive me) hepped me to the fact that Billy’s discography had a bit of a hidden secret.

Stewart, who had been recording since the mid-50s, had also been a part of Bo Diddley’s band, recording with the master on both drums and piano.

Sometime in 1963, giving his pipes a rest Billy propped himself up at a Hammond organ and went to town, whipping out the tune you see before you today, ‘Scramble’.

‘Scramble’ is a fantastic organ spotlight, with some great horns (especially a wailing trombone) in the background. I shows that Stewart was no slouch on the keys, and makes me wish he’d recorded more of the same, which (as far as I can tell) he did not.

This is one for the Hammond nuts, as well as a nice bit of trivia to thrill your fellow soulies at your next get down.

I hope you dig it, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.

Keep the faith

Larry

___________________________________________________________________________________________

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.

Comments (4)

By Larry, July 14, 2013 11:01 am

It was.

Listen/Download Syl Johnson – Is It Because I’m Black

Greetings all

I had something else planned for today, but things changed last night.

This tune – Syl Johnson’s mighty ‘Is It Because I’m Black’ – has been sitting in the ‘to be blogged’ folder for over four years.

It is undeniably one of the most powerful soul records ever made, and I was never quite sure how to approach posting it.

It doesn’t get any deeper, or realer than this, and so when Trayvon Martin’s killer went free last night, this was the only record I thought of.

This record is 44 years old, but has lost none of its power or (sadly) its relevance.

Not sure how many days I’m going to leave this on the front page, but I suspect that my anger and disgust is not going to dissipate any time soon.

Listen to this song. Really listen.

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.