Lazy Week pt 4

Up until a couple of years ago I was under the impression that today's track was a Cramps original. With a title like Goo Goo Muck, I thought that it had to come from the demented minds of Lux and Ivy.

How wrong I was, not only was it not an original but it was first recorded in 1962 by Ronnie Cook and the Gaylads.

Ronnie Cook and The Gaylads - Goo Goo Muck

Lazy Week pt3

The Fall have picked some songs to cover which at first glance induce a shudder of absolute incredulity, for example Black Night by Deep Purple, sometimes they work wonderfully as in the sublime cover of Lost In Music at other times the work less well and today's choice of tune should definitely be included in the later category, suffice to say it isn't one of the group's finest moments.

I have no idea what  possessed Smith to cover Houston by Dean Martin, maybe he felt an affinity with the Hollywood star as Martin was also a bit of a jakey but I can find no details anywhere of  Dino being a gutless, robbing bastard, so that's just conjecture on my part.

Houston was released as a single in 1965 as a single and was produced by the great Lee Hazelwood.

Dean Martin - Houston

Lazy Week pt 2

Well at least the performance review is over for another 6 months. I have no idea whether I am where I should be or not and anyway it's all arbitrary as there is a curve to follow and we can't have too many people doing well as that wouldn't fit in with whoever's bullshit theory the curve was, I'm sure I could find out if I really gave a toss. That's not to say I don't give a shit about my work, it's just all the bullshit that I can't be doing with.

Anyway,  back to the important stuff, Surfin' Bird is probably the maddest song ever and one that always puts a smile on my face. The song itself, borrows heavily from Papa Oom Mow Mow by The Rivingtons. It was released in 1963 in the US and got to number two. Apparently it was re released over here in 2009 and was also used in a campaign for stopping the last cack factor winner getting to number 1 last year. Both of which I was oblivious about.

The Cramps version was produced by Alex Chilton and was released in 1978. However the first version I ever remember hearing was the Ramones version which was on their third album Rocket To Russia.

The Trashmen - Surfin' Bird

Lazy Week pt 1

Right, I have a really shit week ahead.

End of year review today and three days in the smoke to look forward to. So I have decided to do a week of original songs that were either covered by the Cramps or The Fall, two of the most plagiaristic bands in my collection, indeed a couple of this weeks track will have been covered by both. Both bands however put their own inimitable slant on anything they cover.

First up we have Strychnine by the Sonics and released on their 1965 album Here Are The Sonics, the track was also included on the seminal Nuggets compilation of 60s US Garage bands.

This was also the last track that waste of space and fuck-wit Smith sung from the stage the other Thursday in Edinburgh. The Fall's version can be found on The Complete Peel Sessions and various live things. The Cramps version appears on Songs The Lord Taught Us.

The Sonics - Strychnine

Crimson & Clover

Prince's version of this came on the mp3 player on Thursday during my long journey up the road from Nottingham when I rashly opted to drive rather than wait the three hours for my flight home.

I think that Joan Jett's versdion is my favourite,  just a baw hair in front of the original by Tommy James and The Shondells.

Joan Jett & The Blackhearts - Crimson & Clover

I Got A Letter From The Government The Other Day.

Before I heard Tricky's interpretation of Black Steel if I had read anywhere that somebody was tackling covering Public Enemy I would have thought that they were mad and would have been confident that the results would have been pretty dire.

I wouldn't say that Tricky's version is better, it is on a par with the PE version. I love the way he has dropped the piano sample and replaced it with loud thrashy guitars and poiunding drums. But it is probably Martina Topley-Bird's laid-back delivery of the lyrics which makes this a classic.

Tricky - Black Steel

Btw this was the 1001 piece of nonsense that has been posted on this blog!

Possibly My Favourite Cover Ever

One of my favourite songs covered by one of my favourite voices. A match made in heaven.

Lone Justice - Sweet Jane

"If You're Gonna Play It Out Of Tune, Play It Out Of Tune Properly" pt 8

Right, I think that Ctel has had a long enough respite from the joyous racket that is The Fall, the greatest band in the world!

Time to get back to the series that introduces you to the delights of  Mark E Smith and the gruppe's interpretations of other peoples tunes. No Mr H, not Crawfish, to my knowledge the band have never covered this, sadly.

Today's post finds the Fall covering Beatle Bones 'N' Smokin' Stones,  a Captain Beefheart song for their twentieth Peel session broadcast 0n 18/08 96. The original was included on the 1968 album Strictly Blue.

Enjoy

The Fall - Beatle Bones 'N' Broken Stones

Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Beatle Bones & Broken Stones.

Covers Week, Day 8?

I know on the last post I said that that was the covers finished but I played this last Thurday night and thought that it should be included.

I've not really kept up with REM since the early nineties, the last album I bought was Out Of Time and the only reason that I bought that was I had just won 140 quid on the Grand National after putting money on Seagram and I was in a record shop with money burning a whole in my pocket, but I digress.

At school I had a mate who really liked REM and had bought everything from their debut murmur onwards but it wasn't until Life's Rich Pageant that I really took any notice. I remember when Ben played me that album I took notice of it and went out and bought it myself, don't know what it was about it but I really liked it and still do.

Superman, the last track on the album and not even listed on the credits is my favourite REM song and a song I never tire of hearing. It was originally recorded by a band called the Clique in 1969 and was the b-side of their single Sugar On Sunday. I have no idea what the original sounds like and have never really been curious to find out either.  As well as being on Life's Rich Pagaent, Superman was also released as a single on I.R.S. in 1986.

REM - Superman

Covers Week, Day 7

Let's go full circle and finish with another cover version of a classic Springsteen song which will be equally as frowned upon as the Airborne Toxic Event's verion of I'm On Fire.

The first time I heard Frankie Goes To Hollywood's version of Born To Run was on the bus down to Barrow In Furness in 1984. It was on somebody's Saturday morning show on fabulous Radio One and whoever it was had been given a promo copy of probably the most eagerly awaited record of the year and was playing a few of the tracks from the album. I thought that it was brilliant although the hippies  and the older folk on the bus thought that it was a travesty. For me it was an original take on the track,  full of energy, played at a hundred miles an hour and the bass was great.

Why was I on a bus going to Barrow you might ask? Well at that time in the Vickers yard they were building the most destructive ships that the world has ever seen, the Vanguard class submarine which is capable of deploying 192 independently targetable warheads. This was my first CND demo outside of Scotland and my parents thought that I had gone into the town to buy a pair of denims when they eventually found out where I went I was grounded for a considerable amount of time, but it was worth it. Not only did I hear Born To Run but I also heard Redemption Song for the first time that day and met quite a few cool anarchists.

Frankie Goes To Hollywood - Born To Run

Covers Week, Day 6

The band featured today's version of another cover version  was responsible for the worst fashion crime I have ever perpetrated.  As a result of Age Of Chance's performance of Kiss on the Whistle Test in 1987 I decided that it would be cool to wander about the streets of Lanark and Aberdeen wearing a cycling top but with no bike or bicycle clips in sight.

I remember discussing the performance with Stiff at the time,  both of us thought that their cover version of the Purple One's best song was brilliant but it was the fashion which we thought was really cool and I rushed out and spent a fortune on what I thought was a cool as fuck cycling top, the actual one in the picture above. Stiff would be able to tell you whose top tit was that I shelled out for was a copy of but me I didn't have a clue.

The very top turned up a few years ago when Stiff found it during a clear out, I had given him it when I no longer thought it fashionable (which unfortunately for me was a year or maybe more after buying it and not the next day) and to make matters worse the shirt still fit the bastard whereas it would have had to be at least double the size the have fitted me and even then would have looked absolutely awful.

So, here is another song that the Age of Chance covered brilliantly/ ruined depending on your point of view on their 1986 mini album, Crush Collision.

Age Of Chance - Disco Inferno

Covers Week Day 2

I've mentioned before that when I was a teenager and a member of  CND I hung about with a group of older folk who thought that they were hippies what with the patchouli, Italian Army jackets,  taking the legs off their beds and shit but they did introduce me to some different music some good a lot up it' own arse gash. One album that Jim gave me was Janis Joplin's greatest hits which I must admit that I loved at the time and still do, that Southern Comfort, 40 Luckies a day voice still sends shivers up my spine. But all that "man" patter during Ball and Chain really does my head in.

From the first time I heard the album one track always got me and it wasn't for a few years that I realised that it was a cover version and it wouldn't be for a few more years before I heard the original, which although good, in my eyes at least isn't nearly as good as Joplin's version.

The other day while reading Just Kids which I posted about the other day I read another passage which amazed me and sort of led to me having the idea for this week of covers.

". . .  Janis was the queen of the radiating wheel, sitting in her easy chair with a bottle of Southern Comfort, even in the afternoon. Michael Pollard was usually by her side. They were like adoring twins, both with the same speech patterns, punctuating each sentence with man. I sat on the floor as Kris Kristofferson sang her " Me and Bobby McGee", Janis joining in the chorus. I was there for these moments, but so young and preoccupied with my own thoughts that I hardly recognised them as moments."

Janis Joplin - Me And Bobby McGee.

Covers Week

I know, I know lazy blogging featuring cover versions but I do like a good re-interpretation of a song, even if all it means is a different vocal and the rest of the track virtually sounds the same. As long as it is done well then it's alright by me although there are some rules, well one.

Rule number one: Do not cover classic soul tunes by the likes of Otis Redding, Sam Cooke, Martha Reeves etc. Got that Michael Fucking Bolton, Phil Twat Collins and others of your ilk. If it is perfect don't bother.

I am aware that lots of soul singers such as Otis covered the likes of Sam Cooke and nearly everybody in the Motown stable did versions of the same song but that is allowed, not some arse of a drummer from a prog rock band or a twat with a ludicrous mullet trying to do Dock Of The Bay and don't get me started about the twat who sends his hat first class on aeroplanes and his band doing People Get Ready.

I realise the hypocrisy of the previous paragraph and that I have less than no authority to decide who is allowed to cover which songs, however it is my ball, sorry blog and I'll do what I like.

First up is a cover of a Springsteen song by a band who I have seen live incorporate this song and also, Folsom Prison Blues into one of their own tunes to great effect on more than one occasion. Come to think of it, it would be probably be possible to fill a whole month of posts with covers of Springsteen songs.

At the last count I had nine versions of I'm On Fire by other bands and I think that this is up there with the Catherine Feeny version as the best. To be honest I'm not that into Springsteen's version from Born In The USA but live it is the business.

A couple of years ago a load of indie bands got together and recorded Springsteen songs for a compilation called Play Some Pool, Skip Some School to varying degrees of success, the cover of My Hometown is one of the rankest things I've ever heard. I also have a full cd of covers called Play Some Pool by The Wave Pictures which came free with their split single with Darren Hyman released in conjunction with Play Some Pool, Skip Some School.

Airborne Toxic Event - I'm On Fire

Nothing tomorrow, as I'm in Manchester overnight and didn't have time to do two posts on Sunday night.

"If You're Gonna Play It Out Of Tune, Play It Out Of Tune Properly" pt 6

Mark Smith's love of mid to late 60's American garage bands is well documented and it comes as no surprise that he choose to cover a few classic tracks from this period including Strychnine by The Sonics.

The Sonics were formed in Tacoma, Washington in late 1960. Their first single The Witch was released in November 1964 on the Etiquette label, which was owned by another local garage band the Wailers. Between 1964 and 1966 when they left the label eight singles and two albums. Strychnine was included on the first album but was never released as a single while the band was in existence.

The band left the Etiquette label in 1966 and moved to Hollywood to record for the Jerden label but the band were not happy with the new more civilised sound that was produced and the band slowly disintegrated over the next couple of years, only to reform in 1972 to perform a live show. The band like so many others reformed again in the late noughties and as far as I am aware are still touring but don't know about recording.

The Sonics - Strychnine

The Fall covered the track for their sixteenth Peel Session broadcast on 13/03/1993 and has been known to be included in their live sets over the years.

The Fall - Strychnine

"If You're Gonna Play It Out Of Tune, Play It Out Of Tune Properly" pt 5

I am not that well versed in the recording catalogue of the Move and know very little about the band except that they were the first band played on fabulous Radio One by John Peel's nemesis, Tony Blackburn and that they were from Birmingham. I Can Hear The Grass Grow was the band's second single and got to # 5 in the UK singles chart in 1967.

The Move - I Can Hear The Grass Grow

The Fall covered the song for their 2005 album Fall Heads Roll which in my opinion is one of the best things they've done in the last ten to fifteen years. On a sadder note it was also the last track they recorded for their final Peel session, shortly before he died.

The Fall - I Can Hear The Grass Grow

"If You're Gonna Play It Out Of Tune, Play It Out Of Tune Properly" pt 3

Today we go right back to the birth of the blues for a track covered by the Fall. The track  Bourgeois Blues was written by Huddie Ledbetter about when he and his wife visited Washington in the thirties and the problems that they had trying to get a hotel. This was not due to some kind of biblical census but down to the fact that they were black.

I was introduced to Lead Belly in my early teens by the hippies I've mentioned a couple of times. I liked the songs on the album that Jim lent me,  the only problem being that it sounded as if it had been  recorded from the building next door to where Lead Belly was playing and the version of Bourgeois Town here shares that "authenticity".

Lead Belly - Bourgeois Blues


MES and the gruppe recorded the track for the 2001 album,  "Are You Are Missing Winner", a belter of a long player which contains no less than 3 covers and the lovely titled "Where's The Fucking Taxi? Cunt." On the album credits the writing for Bourgeois Blues is wrongly credited to Robert Johnson.

The Fall - Bourgeois Town

"If You're Gonna Play It Out Of Tune, Play It Out Of Tune Properly" pt 2

In today's hotly awaited instalement the Fall cover a song that when I first read what it was thought "it has to be a different song, no way are the Fall covering disco" but of course they were and it was magic.

Lost In Music was originally recorded by the grand daughters of the opera singer Viola Williams,  Sister Sledge. The Sisters, as they were indeed four sisters took the Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards produced track to number 17 in the UK charts in 1979 and would be heard in discotheques the world over. On the b side is the best track the sisters recorded Thinking Of You, with one of the most identifiable intros ever.

Sister Sledge - Lost In Music

The Fall covered it and I have to say,  made the song their own in 1993 on the Infotainment Scan album. Possibly the finest cover version ever recorded.

The Fall - Lost In Music

Some Candy Talking, too

Just back from the Wigwams and had a great couple of days, no rain but plenty of wind. The Mull Of Kintyre is quite a beautiful part of the country, well worth a visit. I now know what the writer of that song with The Frog Chorus was banging on about all those years ago.

Anyway, after scouring the blogs to see what I've been missing. I noticed that Swiss Adam had posted a rather lovely version of Some Candy Talking by Richard Hawley.

I also have a cover of Some Candy Talking, however mine's features feedback from an accordian of all things. It is by The Caulfied Sisters,  from Brooklyn and was released as a split 7" single on smart blue vinyl on American Laundromat Records with Julie Peel on the other side covering Divine Hammer by the Breeders. The song was recorded for a session for the John In The Morning show on KEXP.

The Caulfied Sisters - Some Candy Talking

The Raveonettes Do The Stone Roses

I never thought that the Stone Roses would be a band that The Raveonettes would cover. But they have and the result is actually rather good.

See that you think

The Raveonettes - I Wanna Be Adored

Everybody Loves A Cover, Right?

I've always been a fan of Springsteen apart from a couple of years in my late teens when it wasn't hip to admit to being a fan but secretly would still listen to the River or Nebraska but it took me quite a few years, upwards of 15 if I'm honest to revisit Born In The USA. When I thought of the album which was not very often what came to mind was that terrible video for Dancing In The Dark or my misinterpretation of the tub thumping title track.

When I did listen to the album again, if you take away the mid 80s production there are some great tracks on there,  in fact the album has three of my favourite Springsteen songs, My Hometown, I'm On Fire and Going Down all of which have been covered to varying degrees of success.

My favourite cover of a Springsteen song, well apart from FGTH's Born To Run, is by the American singer/songwriter Catherine Feeny.

Catherine Feeny - I'm On Fire

BTW - if anybody in the Glasgow area has nothing to do tonight why not pop along to the Flying Duck where 2 nearly and one definitely middle-aged men will be playing some of their favourite records.