DIG THIS WITH BILL MESNIK AND RICH BUCKLAND- THE SPLENDID BOHEMIANS

Last May, my son Jasper and my daughter-in-law Hannah asked me what I would like for my birthday. I said what I always say:

“Surprise me.”

But then Hannah suggested that they get me an 8 track because she knows I collect them. She wanted to know which genre or artist I like. Also, she didn’t know how, or where to buy one.

“Ebay,” I said, and jumped on there to peruse the recent auctions. 

I like them sealed, or at the very least in a less worn condition. The first delicacy to appear was this unopened gem, produced by the fine punks at Stiff Records in the year of 1978 (prime time for me). 

It was a good choice: a vivid time capsule, recorded con brio at the crest of the New Wave, with latter-day Punk attitude.  Ian Dury, disabled, misanthropic satirist, closes the show, spitting his signature “Sex and Drugs and Rock n Roll” - (did he coin that phrase?) Nick Lowe opens the tape with his patented Power Pop, and Elvis Costello is… just amazing. He croons a Bert Bacharach tribute decades before they even worked together, and detonates a searing explosion of his own “Miracle Man,” displaying the Promethean chops that would soon catapult him to stardom. 

I feel like a grateful fisherman, after Poseidon unexpectedly washes something tasty up on the boat deck. 

A note from Bill: 

Rich says I'm too modest about discussing my Acting career - could be. But, today I have a story that I felt compelled to share about my "brush with greatness" with one of the greatest American actors of the 20th century: the titanic James Earl Jones, in a Shakespearean production of the rarely produced Timon of Athens. 

It's one thing to work with an awesome talent, - and I've stood toe to toe with a bunch of Academy, Tony, and Emmy award winners -, but the heat coming off from this icon gave me one of the most fundamental and profound experiences of my early theatrical education.  

Rich and I also welcome a few other recent check-ins to the Hotel Bohemia: the magnificent Cissy Houston (mom to Whitney); Linda Ronstadt's talented songwriting protege J.D. Souther, and the one and only Kris Kristofferson. 

 "He's a poet, he's a picker, he's a prophet, he's a pusher, he's a pilgrim and a preacher, and a problem when he's stoned. He's walkin' contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction, takin' every wrong direction on his lonely way back home"

 (He claimed the song was not written about himself, but isn't every song... at least a little bit?)

Haven’t we all wanted to just get away from the complexities of modern life? Escape the city, quit our jobs, and hit the hammock on some island in the South Pacific? This has been a predominant theme of Ray Davies’ lyrical output. Life today is too stressful; the past was more orderly and harmonious. In this song Ray goes WAY BACK to an imagined eden, a primordial jungle, when there are no jobs, obligations, or need for financial security. 

Perhaps Ray’s tunes were initially instigated by a compelling feeling of angst, frustration, and resentment, but, consummate artist that he is, he transformed those cringey feelings into ironic, joyous fuck yous for our vicarious pleasure. 

Well, maybe it’s not so simple; maybe we can’t afford the time lost or the hefty cost of such a longed-for retirement. But, we can, at least, slip away for a few moments of psychic refreshment with our pals, The Kinks. 

John Fahey (1939-2001) was a singular folklore musicologist, archivist, and record label entrepreneur who played his instrument like no other person alive.
He made weird, earthy, mystical music, and lived a life to match.
Bill and Rich are pleased to offer this excerpt from a 1979 Halloween concert given by Mr. Fahey in San Francisco at the famed Great American Music Hall.

The Fahey Files
https://www.johnfahey.com/

John Fahey discography- Studio albums | 36
Live albums | 5
Compilation albums | 16
Tribute albums | 5

Written works:

• Fahey, John (1966). A Textual and Musicological Analysis of the Repertoire of Charley Patton (MA). University of California, Los Angeles. LCCN 67003863. OCLC 1137380.
• Fahey, John (2020) [1970]. Charley Patton. Dover Publications. ISBN 9780486843445. LCCN 70548903. OCLC 1122922310.
• Fahey, John (2000). How bluegrass music destroyed my life : stories. Chicago: Drag City Incorporated. ISBN 9780965618328. LCCN 99075130. OCLC 44903282.
• Fahey, John (2003) [2003]. Vampire vultures. Chicago: Drag City. ISBN 9780965618373.

https://nickgravenites.com/

This singing-songwriting, blues legend carried the standard of the Chicago masters such as Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, James Cotton, Junior Wells, and many others beyond the Midwest, to a whole new audience of flower children in  California and beyond, when he fronted Mike Bloomfield's foundational "All American" band, The Electric Flag at the Monterey Pop Festival.  

Maintaining his passionate devotion to his art right up until his passing at age 85, having released a new album shortly his departure.

Bill and Rich welcome Nick to the Hotel Bohemia, where he can continue to rip it up for all eternity.  

Directly following this episode, Captain Billyl will be posting his 4 track tape of the Electric Flag's seminal album, "A Long Time Comin' in its entirety.

I scored this green plastic 4 track cart of musical magic on Ebay, along with Bookends by Simon and Garfunkel, and The Live Adventures of Bloomfield and Kooper, Vol. 2. I needed to acquire an antiquated device through which to hear them because 4s don’t play on standard 8 track machines, so I tracked down a heavy wooden Muntz cabinet model that still works. You have to change tracks with a lever - like an old time train conductor -  (which is thrilling enough by itself) - but when I heard Nick Gravenites crooning “Groovin’ is Easy” and “Killin’ Floor” through the jerry-rigged Jensen speakers,  I was hooked.  I read that Mike Bloomfield had first approached Mitch Ryder to be lead singer, but he didn’t want to leave the Detroit Wheels.  Nick was a better fit. This writer of “Born in Chicago”, and collaborator with Janis Joplin and Quicksilver Messenger Service was the Chicago to California connection that made perfect sense at Monterrey, where the band debuted. 

I had forgotten that Bloomfield’s mission when he first assembled his cracker jack, “All American” band, was to encompass more native musical genres and to seamlessly mix  R&B, Soul, Gospel, Country, and Pop. This was more than what the Chicago blues scene from which he emerged afforded. And, horns were part of the secret sauce. This happened at exactly the same time that Al Kooper’s Blood, Sweat, and Tears were forming. Unfortunately, heroin, and other intrusions caused Bloomfield’s band to break up before it could take its rightful crown, but this document, along with the soundtrack of Peter Fonda and Jack Nicholson’s film, “The Trip” bears witness to their promised glory.  Groovin’ may be easy, but Mike Bloomfield never did anything easy. 

Sixty-five years ago, “Kind of Blue”was recorded and performed by a young group of talented musicians —before they were jazz legends — under the leadership of the visionary trumpeter Miles Davis. Initial sales were slow after the August 1959 release, but then the album caught fire, becoming the best-selling jazz album of all time.

So why has “Kind of Blue”endured as the top classic jazz album for 65 years?

“I think of 'Kind of Blue’ as a timeless piece of work,” said James Kaplan, author of “3 Shades of Blue: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, and the Lost Empire of Cool.”

“‘Timeless’ is a word that’s much overused these days, but this great album genuinely seems to exist outside of time in a way that’s hard to explain.”

Angelika Beener, an award winning journalist, DJ, producer and host, says “Kind of Blue” uniquely captures universal human emotions.

“Everyone loves this album, and it’s not because they’re forced to, or they have to, or they’re told to,” Beener said. “There is something deeply resonant. This album drills into sort of the deepest parts of sensuality and romance and contemplation and ecstasy and vulnerability. “

While Davis took the lead on the album, he was joined by several other talented musicians who helped craft his legendary work.

“He gave a great amount of latitude to the artists,” said Leon Lee Dorsey, an associate professor at Berklee College of Music. “You see interviews with people like Herbie Hancock that he trusted — the chemistry that they brought to the table, that whatever was going on, it was like a laboratory.”

I have always been drawn to fables of underdogs and the unrecognized. This affinity was engendered early on in childhood, and marinated throughout 30 years in the acting trade, where I’ve seen many of the finest talents of my generation wither on the vine of show biz obscurity. This catchy girl-group number from the Cameo catalogue is spunkily delivered by a couple of black Philadelphia teens, whose exciting vocal energy belies some of the mysterious whispers of chicanery that surround the story of the record’s creation, and, afterward, the group’s precipitous disappearance.  

Ann and Lillian Storey of The Twinkles created this ode to black rock n roll culture in 1957, (immortalized in the film Hairspray) - when Ann, or Lillian, (I’ve seen both credited) submitted their song to a contest run by local DJ Kal Williams, who put his name on it as co-writer, and then took it to Baltimore musician and record label owner Al Browne, who also put his name on it. Browne released it on his indie label, Peak Records in 1957. The following year Cameo, who had national distribution, changed the group’s name to The Storey Sisters and rereleased it nationally, where it went to #45 on the national charts. It was at this point that Ann, or Lillian’s name disappear from the credits. In short order, The Storey sister’s career was over, after having recorded only two more sides. 

Bad Motorcycle is said to be slang for “Bad Motherfucker”, and these young women may have encountered some bad motorcycles during their short ride out of fame’s parking lot. VOOM VOOM VOOM!

This goofy confection of Sunshine Pop was so at odds with the popular music of the day that it seemed doomed from the start. The Dedrick family, (Chris, Sandy, Bruce, Ellen, and Stephanie), were so unhip that the classical-jazz compositional genius of Chris Dedrick and the sublime sibling harmonies on display were incomprehensible to the rock intelligentsia. (There were The Cowsills, of course…but….) For God’s sake, The Free Design were produced by Enoch Light, of all people - ( I always loved that name) - my dad’s “Easy Listening” guru; it was the music he had on in the background when he did his weekend paperwork.

They only existed as a group from ’67-’72, after which Chris pursued an award winning, film composing and arranging career in Canada. And, here’s where the trajectory of this esoteric ditty arcs interestingly: their only charting song, Kites Are Fun barely peaked at 114 on the “bubbling under the hot 100” list, after which the group plummeted to obscurity.  But, later, much later, like an excavated Paleolithic fossil, their catalogue was uncovered in the 1990’s, and reissued by Trattoria, a Japanese record label. Since then, this tune has been lauded, covered extensively, TikTok’ed, and featured in numerous tv commercials and shows. And, now, no one can deny that kites are most assuredly fun.

What if your Amazon packages could talk? What if they had palpitating, expectant hearts as they sped to your house? And, what a let down, after you’d ripped them open, shredded them, and left them for the recycler. What ingratitude, after their selfless commitment to your happiness.

Tool-maker, turned bassist Gary Unwin brings this anthropomorphic idea to life, abetted by lead singer and Vox Continental organist Brian Bennett. Here, courtesy of the Hi Fi’s, a busy, up and coming band of wannabe British invaders plying their rock n roll trade in Germany (as the Silver Beetles had done before them) - you get all the cringy, crooning drama (along with thumping timpani) you could want - and it’s TNT.

I discovered this diamond on an obscure Star-Club singles vinyl collection that Rich sent me after I bought my new turntable, and it captivated me from the first play. Of all the possible lyrical manifestations, a monologue delivered by a cardboard box, once lovingly wrapped and sent by one ardent lover to another via “the parcel farm,” and then abandoned, was beyond unexpected… and, just what I needed.