Zero to 180 – Three Minute Magic
Browsing Nina Simone‘s early single releases on Bethlehem Records — Gus Wildi‘s jazz label, whose control and eventual ownership would ultimately be given over to Syd Nathan of King Records — my eyes are immediately drawn to the instrumental B-side, “African Mailman,” a fairly radical and oblique song title for
Keith Emerson captivated me as a grade schooler with the deep, heavy Moog sounds he conjured for Emerson, Lake & Palmer‘s “Lucky Man,” fittingly, the final track on a 4-LP box set from 1973 that got a lot of mileage in our household growing up, Superstars of the Seventies — one
I’m a little surprised more ink has not been expended on a snappy early reggae 45 from 1970 on the Doctor Bird label that can command up to £200 [i.e., $300ish] at auction: “Rum Bum a Loo“ The Message (1970) * “Rum Bum a Loo” was produced for the UK
Do not understand why so very little has been written about Allen Toussaint‘s 1968 composition “Hands Christianderson,” an instrumental B-side released 47 years ago this very month: “Hands Christianderson“ Allen Toussaint (1968) I hear a bit of Burt Bacharach-style melodicism in the trumpets and backing vocals, though the final product
Rufus Harley‘s sole 45, “Bagpipe Blues” on Atlantic Records — an original amalgamation of Scottish highland and African-American musical traditions from 1965 — was undoubtedly the first of its kind. 45Cat‘s carey jeggs notes that Harley is “[p]robably the first jazz musician to play the bagpipes, although Albert Ayler also
Michael Stipe and his REM bandmates, it would appear, are bat fans, as evidenced by their non-LP B-side, “Winged Mammal Theme.” This abstract instrumental take on “The Batman Theme” — flip side of their 1992 hit “Drive” – but only in the US — was somehow rejected for the soundtrack to
2013’s Steven Soderbergh-directed Liberace biopic was ineligible for Oscar nominations since, as Mother Jones points out, the film was released on cable television (HBO) instead of U.S. theaters due to its “conspicuous gayness.” Along with Milton Berle, Liberace was one of TV’s earliest stars and, as pointed out in the
If you search the web for information about a 1967 album on the World Pacific label by jazz guitar great, Joe Pass – The Stones Jazz – you will generally see uniform agreement that this album was recorded on July 20, 1966. I love that: one day to record an
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