I co-host The Big Mix radio show along with Stan Or Astro-Stan (aka Stan The Man, aka Happiness Stan) on WDBX 91.1FM Carbondale, IL on Friday nights 6:30-8pm Central Time. The show features a variety of old and new rockabilly, surf, garage, and punk along with a smattering of “other” to spice things up and keep you guessing.
Stan has been doing the show for about 14 years and I joined as second banana in December 2010. There is live streaming (http://www.wdbx.org/) but no show archive or Facebook/Myspace page (at least for now) so I’ll try to document our set lists here on a regular basis.
Yeah, I think the only reason I compared them is because they both have baritone voices, also because I was drinking gin and tonics and playing "It's my Life" really loud and got caught up in the moment pondering why Eric Burdon's status as a rock icon didn't carry over into today's generation like Jim's Did. In my world it did, ha. Like Kopper said, I was never a massive Doors fan, Jim openly stole riffs from the Kinks and fancied himself some kind of post modern poet. Eric was just a salt of the earth blues singer trapped in a white kids body.
DanyHell2011 said:
They are completely different from each other. It is like compare wine and beer. Maybe you would prefer one or another, but it is a matter of taste and not who is better than the other.
I don't think Eric Burdon could have been elevated to iconic status the way Jim Morrisson was , about 10 years after his death . He would have only graced magazines like "16" OR "Tiger Beat" when they were REALLY hurting for space filler. Until he started putting on the pounds , growing out his beard and , allegedly , introducing Lil' Jim to a Miami audience , Morrisson's looks made him quite the sex symbol in his day, but , everybody knows that. Burdon might not have been such a great looker , by comparison , but , his singing voice was pure "No blobs in the bog" animal sexuality. They were both very different , it's true , but , Burdon , as an early (White) student of The Blues was just as macho in his delivery as Morrisson. Van Morrisson.
Jim Morrisson is an icon , today , partly because he represented danger to a lot of people. And , it's true , he did get himself into a lot of brushes with the law , which he seemed to shrug off. Burdon openly admired , and dated , Black women when that was regarded as extremely dangerous , except maybe in places like France. He was a street - fightin' Geordie , and did'nt take any shit. It does'nt mean they're so alike or dissimilar as singers. Morrisson was a crooner as well as a shouter. Burdon had no time for croonin'.
I'll agree with ya on this one, but that's mainly because I was never a huge Doors fan. Actually, that's not entirely true... I thought the Doors were cool *before* I discovered all of the other great '60s bands, like the Animals, Seeds, Pretty Things, Remains, Shadows of Knight, Electric Prunes, Chocolate Watchband, 13th Floor Elevators, etc. etc. etc.
Cool , I could've seen Hunter , too. But , I never got into his solo stuff that much , some of it....It was , like $40 , here. The Cynics are also playing in Chicago , next week. They can still tear the young upstarts a new one. Watch , listen , and learn. This is how it's done.
MikeL said:
For some reason, my response to this thread ended up in the costumes thread. I don't know how that happened.
Anyway, I posted before that I saw Ian Hunter last night, and he put on a really good show. He played one of my favorite Mott songs, "Roll Away The Stone," along with "All The Young Dudes" and "All The Way From Memphis." My only complaint is that he didn't play "Once Bitten, Twice Shy."
Next week, I'm going to see the Cynics at the 31st Street Pub.
Nice pic. If you scroll up , you'll see that I was there , too. I could'nt believe they did the first album , first , but I guess they wanted to get it out of the way. I've seen them 4 times since they started touring the States , again , in '97, and they've always put on a great show.
But , they also , generally have only done the two "Hits" from the 1st LP , "New Rose" and "Neat , Neat , Neat". Once , when they and The The Dickies blew the "Misfits" , Agnostic Front and Balzac from Japan (Who , at least ,were better at being The Misfits than The Misfits playing that night.) off the stage , they also did "See Her Tonight".But , I was looking forward to seeing them do the first album , live , even tho' it's not the original band (It's a real band tho' , and a very good one.). Oh , well. That's my lot. Dave looks like Lionel Atwill with that moustachue. I saw him on TV A YEAR OR TWO AGO , HE REMINDED ME OF A THINNER , UHHH , straight , version of Charles Laughton. But , I think that was more his theatrical mannerisms than his appearance.
Brian Shapiro said:
Saw The Damned for the first time last Tuesday, great show
For some reason, my response to this thread ended up in the costumes thread. I don't know how that happened.
Anyway, I posted before that I saw Ian Hunter last night, and he put on a really good show. He played one of my favorite Mott songs, "Roll Away The Stone," along with "All The Young Dudes" and "All The Way From Memphis." My only complaint is that he didn't play "Once Bitten, Twice Shy."
Next week, I'm going to see the Cynics at the 31st Street Pub.
kopper , Yeah , it says "Bloopers" on some of these , but if they're actually the real commercials , it does'nt make sense. But , I'm glad Grayzell is getting some kind of work , and maybe some notoriety , when so many of his peers are dead or unable to play out , anymore.
kopper said:
I don't think so. I think these are the actual commercials. Maybe I'm wrong, but these seem like intentional bloopers. Watch some of the others... they're all like this. Rudy starts saying something, goofs up, curses, and the dude with the hot dog & headphones on comes up laughing hysterically. Pretty unfunny, actually.
John Battles said:
It is ridiculous , but , these are the outtakes. Have'nt seen the finished commercials. This is probably the first time an obscure , Old School Rockabilly artist , such as he , has done a TV commercial since Cordell Jackson played rings around Brian Setzer in that Bud Light commercial , though Cordell was in a class of her own ,not stuck on one thing.
I don't think so. I think these are the actual commercials. Maybe I'm wrong, but these seem like intentional bloopers. Watch some of the others... they're all like this. Rudy starts saying something, goofs up, curses, and the dude with the hot dog & headphones on comes up laughing hysterically. Pretty unfunny, actually.
John Battles said:
It is ridiculous , but , these are the outtakes. Have'nt seen the finished commercials. This is probably the first time an obscure , Old School Rockabilly artist , such as he , has done a TV commercial since Cordell Jackson played rings around Brian Setzer in that Bud Light commercial , though Cordell was in a class of her own ,not stuck on one thing.
It is ridiculous , but , these are the outtakes. Have'nt seen the finished commercials. This is probably the first time an obscure , Old School Rockabilly artist , such as he , has done a TV commercial since Cordell Jackson played rings around Brian Setzer in that Bud Light commercial , though Cordell was in a class of her own ,not stuck on one thing.
That's crazy. I mean....A Rockabilly Singer should be promoting HICCUP remedies...Or hiccup starters , maybe ? Well , we have it on good authority what does THAT.....
A friend of mine was talking to Mick about guitars. Mick said he'd never take a guitar worth more than a hundred dollars on tour again. When something happens to them, it's too painful otherwise. I can see that.
An impressionable 12-year-old rode to the top of an Arizona hill one afternoon with an old Cowboy friend to check a windmill. A big storm was building and they needed to lock the blades down before the wind hit. When finished, they paused to watch the clouds darken and spread across the sky. As lightning flashed, the Cowboy told the boy to watch closely and he would see the devil’s herd, their eyes red and hooves flashing, stampede ahead of phantom horsemen. The Cowboy warned the youth that if he didn’t watch himself, he would someday be up there with them, chasing steers for all eternity.
Sixty years ago this frightening vision, now found on the Western Music Association Web site, was etched into the consciousness of America. “Ghost Riders in the Sky” is a perfect Halloween song for the West. It’s the only cowboy song in which “yippie-yi-yay” becomes a demonic taunt. The boy who heard the tall tale from the old cowpoke would grow up to be forest ranger/songwriter Stan Jones.
“Ghost Riders” became a huge hit in 1949, a year after Jones wrote it. Pop-folkie Burl Ives was the first to record it that year. Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and Peggy Lee chased the devil’s herd, too, and before the end of the year, avant jokester Spike Jones merrily mutated the saga of the demon cows and fire-snortin’ horses. But the biggest hit at that time came from pop crooner Vaughn Monroe, also in 1949.
Of course, it didn’t stop there. It’s been covered by everyone from Concrete Blonde to Dean Martin. Frankie Laine, another popster with an ear for cowboy songs (think “High Noon” and “Rawhide”) also covered “Ghost Riders.”
Artists like Bob Wills, The Sons of the Pioneers, Gene Autry, and Marty Robbins brought “Ghost Riders” back West. Dick Dale went surfing with it. Ronnie Dawson made it a rockabilly romp. The Southern-rock group called The Outlaws introduced it to the dazed and confused generation in 1980. Johnny Cash sang it with the Muppets. Tom Jones took it to Vegas, and the Legendary Stardust Cowboy took it to Mars.
The fact that “Ghost Riders” has a cinematic feel to it is no accident. Jones did a lot of soundtrack work for John Ford Westerns, including writing music for The Searchers (in which John Wayne spoke a catch phrase that inspired a Buddy Holly hit, “That’ll Be the Day”) and Rio Grande.
When Jones wrote “Ghost Riders,” he was working for the National Park Service in Death Valley.
According to the Western Music Association Web site, “The Park Service made Stan its representative to Hollywood film crews when they came to Death Valley. After a long, hot day of filming, cast and crew members often sat around and listened to Stan’s songs and stories. They encouraged him to get a publisher in L.A.” Shortly after, “Yippee-yi-yay, yippee-yi-yo,” was being heard across the land.
My two favorite versions of “Ghost Riders” are no longer in print. The one that raised goose bumps on me as a kid was on a 1964 LP called Welcome to the Ponderosa by Lorne Greene — yes, a tacky TV tie-in from Bonanza’s Ben Cartwright. This version has a full-blown orchestra, a chorus, and Greene’s distinct gravely voice. (Greene’s hit “Ringo” was also on this album.)
Then there’s the country-rock version from New Mexico’s own Last Mile Ramblers, from their 1974 album While They Last. The artist currently known as Junior Brown is playing guitar, and the vocals are by Spook James. This was always a highlight of the Ramblers’ shows at The Golden Inn and Bourbon & Blues. You can hear the song on my latest podcast at bigenchiladapodcast.com.
I’m not sure how many cowboys changed their ways because of the warning in the song. But next time you see lightning in the sky, look for those red-eyed cows and gaunt-faced cowboys.
Also recommended for Halloween:
* Rob Zombie Presents Captain Clegg and the Night Creatures. On his previous music project, Texas singer Jesse Dayton, whose résumé includes stints as a guitarist for Waylon Jennings and Ray Price, teamed up with bluegrass singer Brennen Leigh to create an album of sweet country duets with songs like “Brand New Heartache,” “Take Me,” and “Back-Street Affair.”
Since that time, Dayton was apparently kidnapped by the evil Rob Zombie and transformed into a fiend named Captain Clegg (a name lifted from a 1962 film starring Peter Cushing) to sing hillbilly horror songs like “Headless, Hip-shakin’ Honey,” “Two-Headed Teenage Transplant,” “Transylvania Terror Trail,” and “Macon County Morgue.” These and seven other tunes appear on what is easily the Halloween album of the year.
Fans of Zombie’s most recent movie, Halloween II, might recognize Clegg and band from a music/dance scene in the flick. But this isn’t the first Zombie/Dayton collaboration. In 2003, Zombie enlisted Dayton to write and record tunes — such as “I’m at Home Getting Hammered (While She’s Out Getting Nailed)” and “Lord, Don’t Let Me Die in a Cheap Motel” — for a fictional hillbilly duo called Banjo and Sullivan in conjunction with Zombie’s 2005 slasher flick, The Devil’s Rejects.
Although Dayton’s background is in country and rockabilly, there are all sorts of influences here. Take the opening track, “Zombie a Go Go.” It sounds like a Farfisa-fueled garage rocker — at least until the steel guitar solo. “Dr. Demon and the Robot Girl” is a tribute to late-’60s “country fuzz” production, an era in which fuzztone guitars, electric sitars and folk-rock elements crept into some country music.
None of these tunes is destined to become a classic like, say, “Ghost Riders in the Sky.” They’re all pretty dumb, but then again, they’re all good fun for “spooky people gettin’ Dixie fried,” as Clegg sings on “Honky Tonk Halloween.”
A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
October 28, 2011
Southern Culture on the Skids has always excelled in good tasty swamp rock. The group’s latest album, Zombified — released this month just in time for the Halloween shopping rush — goes deep into the swamp, where mossy monsters dwell.
Most of the album was released in Australia back in the last century (1998) as an eight-song EP. Guitarist/singer Rick Miller and crew added a few new songs for the American version. The band calls it a “tribute to the horror and exploitation movies that populated Southern theaters and drive-ins during the ’60s and ’70s.”
Like the best SCOTS recordings, the sound here is a seamless blend of country, surf, rockabilly, garage-rock, exotica, swamp-rock, as I mentioned, and probably some secret ingredients the group will never tell.
Miller always sounds like a hip bumpkin — whether he’s singing about funny aspects of Southern life or, as on this CD, witches and zombies. Mary Huff plays the bass and sings far too infrequently while Dave Hartman drums. There are a few guests on some tunes, the most significant being Chris “Cousin Crispy” Bess on organ and Steve Grothmann on sax.
Miller wrote most of the songs, including the title track, “Devil’s Stomping Ground,” and “Eyeball You Later.”
But there are also some fine covers — a Creedence Clearwater Revival instrumental, “Sinister Purpose”; “She’s My Witch,” a cover of a song by rockabilly Kip Tyler; John D. Loudermilk’s eerie “Torture” (sung by Huff, who sounds like she’s been, well zombified); and best of all, “Primitive,” a garage-y snarler originally done by a band called The Groupies, and probably best known by its version by The Cramps.
There are more instrumentals than usual for a SCOTS album. Besides “Sinister Purpose,” there are “The Creeper” — on which Miller’s guitar dares to go delightfully obnoxious trying to summon the ghost of Link Wray, and “Swamp Thang,” which is upbeat, funky, and, naturally swampy.
One unusual song here is “Bloodsucker,” featuring an acoustic guitar and a lilting Caribbean/New Orleans arrangement. Trom-bonist Dave Wright colors this track.
Even though Zombified is perfect for Halloween spookfoolery, virtually all the songs here stand on their own and would sound just fine at a SCOTS show any time of year.
Another monstrous treat ... or is it a trick?
* Pop Up Yours by The Monsters. No, this isn’t a Halloween-themed album, but how could I not talk about a new record by The Monsters during this special season?
This Bern, Switzerland-based band has been around since 1986, fronted by Reverend Beat-Man, the owner, founder, and resident (un)holy man of Voodoo Rhythm Records. The group plays what it calls “chainsaw massacre teenage garage trash punk.” And they have these really snazzy red jackets.
The songs deal with love, lust, revenge and rage, based on simple riffs and Beat-Man’s shredded vocal chords. One of my favorites here is “Blues for Joe.” I don’t know who Joe is, but Beat-Man seems pretty upset as he screams “What you gonna do now, Joe.” Also commendable in its sweet, crazy fury is “Crawling Back to You No More.” There’s a pumped-up Bo Diddley beat at the core of the song.
The songs are mostly original, though many of the mutated, frantic Hubert Sumlin guitar riffs sound hauntingly familiar. There is one cover tune, a trashy — and I mean that in the nicest possible way — version of “Speedy’s Coming,” originally done by German metal screamers the Scorpions.
The Monsters seem to play with psychedelia on the closing track “Into the Void.” It starts with church bells and ends up with feedback and bashing drums.
It’s great that there are still Monsters on the loose.
Horrible mention: Here are a couple of recently released albums appropriate for the season.
* Halloween Album w/Sound Effects by Thee Cormans. This California band basically plays instrumental “surf” music. Titles include “Surf Shack of Doom,” “Haunted Sea,” and “Werewolves in Heels.” The sound effects are indeed bitchen.
* What Happens in Hell Stays in Hell by Nekromantix. Here are more crazed horror-soaked psychobilly sounds from this trio led by Danish expatriate Kim Nekroman, who plays a coffin-shaped standup bass. Some songs sound closer to Slayer than to Carl Perkins. “Bela Lugosi’s Star” has a cool Johnny Cash chunka-chunka beat, and “I Kissed a Ghoul” has a weird reference to the Happy Days theme.
Celebrate the Season!
* Live spookiness: I’ll be playing some of my own monster hits like “I Lost My Baby to a Satan Cult,” “Wolfboy,” and “The Thing in the Mud” on Friday, Oct. 28, at the Aztec Café’s All Hallows Hell Performance Party, along with ex-Angry Samoan Gregg Turner and his new band The Mind Parasites. It’s 7 p.m. to midnight at the Aztec (317 Aztec St.). There’s a $3 cover (cheap.)
* Radio spookiness: The 87th Annual Steve Terrell Spooktacular starts at 10 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 30, on KSFR-FM 101.1 and screaming on the web. Tom Adler of “Folk Remedy” is substituting for me Friday night on the Santa Fe Opry.
* Podcast spookiness: The 2011 Big Enchilada Spooktacular is scaring people all over the internet. Visit . And if you want even more creepiness, check out the GaragePunk Hideout Podcast Jukebox HERE. There's several recent shows with ghastly Halloween themes over there.
* Spotify spookiness: Hey Spotify users. There are hours and hours of haunted sounds on my monster-size Halloween Spook Rock playlist on Spotify. Get Spotify for free at www.spotify.com
Next Thursday, Nov 3rd, we've got local act The Hot Roddin' Romeo's coming in for a live performance. We'll also be auctioning away a self-made Mad Mike record. Our station is non-profit/non-commercial, so it helps pay the station's bills. Here's an example of one I made previously:
My first thought was that scream at the beginning of the Wailers' Hang Up too, but I've also always dug the nutty Alan Barnicoat screaming on this song:
