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

AN UNFILTERED GLIMPSE INTO A GENUINE PRODIGY OF MUSICAL AND  LYRICAL IMAGINATION.
THIS DEMO CONTAINS PAUSES AS HENDRIX INVENTS THE SONG AS HE PERFORMS AND RECORDS IT ON HIS HOME TEAC REEL TO REEL RECORDER.

• A merman is a male version of a mermaid. In this song, Hendrix sings about how he wants to escape the war-torn world and all the horrible things going on (The Vietnam War for instance) and be reborn as a merman using a machine.
•  He decides to leave "the out of style" to their destructive ways and live underwater.
• This song isn't simply anti-war, 
• Hendrix shows his disgust with the whole world we have built and how all human progress has been halted by the murderous gravity of war and the politics of America we were, and continue to be, victimized by.
• He decides to evolve and escape from the others. 
• FINAL LYRICS-
• "Hurray I awake from yesterday
  Alive but the war is here to stay
  So my love catherina and me
  Decide to take our last walk thru the noise to the sea
  Not to die but to be reborn
  Away from the lands so battred and torn
  Forever forever
  Oh say can you see it's really such A mess
  Every inch of earth is A fighting nest
  Giant pencil and lipstick-Tube shaped things
  Continue to rain and cause screamin' pain
  And the arctic stains from silver blue to bloody red
  As our feet find the sand
  And the sea is straight ahad
  Straight up ahead
  Well it's too bad that our friends can't be with us today
  Well it's too bad
  The machine that we built
  Would never save us that's what they say
  That's why they ain't comin' with us today
  And they also said it's impossible
  For A man to live and breathe undrerwater
  Forever was A main complaint
  Yeah and they also threw this in my face they said
  Anyway you know good and well
  It would be beyond the will of god
  And the grace of the king
  Grace of the king
  Yeah
  Ooo
  So my darling and I make love in the sand
  To salute the last moment ever on dry land
  Our machine it has done its work played its part well
  Without A scratch on our body when we bid it farewell
  Starfish and giant foams greet us with A smile
  Before our heads go under we take our last look at the killing noise
  Of the out of style
  The out of style out of style oh yeah
  Oooo
  So down and down and down and down we go
  Hurry my darlin' we mustn't be late
  For the show
  Neptune champion games to an aqua world is so my dear
  Right this way smiles A mermaid
  I can hear atlantis full of cheer
  Atlantis full of cheer
  I can hear atlantis full of cheer
  Oh yeah"

"RUNNING FROM A SIMPLE TWIST OF FATE"
If you are unfamiliar with his 63 year body of work then you may find this statement perplexing.
A Rock and Roll Hall of Fame without Ernest “ Chubby Checker” Evans is  not a legitimate representative of the genuine Rock and Rhythm and Blues culture it claims to embrace. Period.
After "The Twist" became a worldwide phenomenon, solely due to the soulful dynamic Mr. Checker introduced, he attempted to eclipse the image that defined him.
Recordings such as 1982's "Running", the 2008 treasure "Knock Down The Walls" and the 2013 vocal majesty of "Changes" tell a decades long tale of hard, eclectic work exposing a one of a kind vocal style seemingly buried and abandoned by fans of Popular music.
At 81 years of age, this generous artist deserves a standard of recognition reserved for icons.
He's still running, twisting and turning down the backstreets of greatness.
Long Live Chubby Checker.

Squeeze was unlike any other band, though quintessentially English. They appeared in that “Post-Punk” “Power-Pop” era of the early 80s, and definitely shared some sinister lyrical themes with such contrarian contemporaries as Elvis Costello, but their tunes were always delivered in such a quirkily upbeat style that any ill intent was mitigated.  Also, the themes were just obscure enough, so that I never was really sure what I was singing along with.

Pulling Mussels is one of those infectious pop enigmas, and, even though I never knew exactly what it was saying, (William Tell? Maid Marian?) its jaunty images of a seaside holiday resort aligned so endearingly with my memories of family outings in Atlantic City, NJ: (Lobster at Hackney’s, taffy, the carnival atmosphere of the boardwalk, the brackish sparkle of the Atlantic Ocean….), that I embraced its charms immediately and wholeheartedly. 

I read on the internet that the term “Pulling Mussels” refers to sexual encounters. Another blogging pundit said it’s about masturbation. Perhaps. But to the 10 year old me in the lobster bib, getting ready to crack open a crustacean’s claw, it’s an incantation, conjuring up a world of pre-pubescent wonderment.

What is it about some songs that make them stick in your head like epoxy? This one isn’t even really a song, it’s just a riff (I guess in this it shares that distinction with an earlier SUNNY SONGS episode, Archie Bell’s “Tighten Up”),  and, it’s also got that spoken shout out: “Hey Leroy! Your mama… she callin’ you, man!” Then the cackling laughter, and the bursting into a driving, urgent Latin Soul chant “Go to your mama”, (led by a skittering, syncopated cowbell). It’s just infectious wonderfulness, which culminates in Jimmy’s signature sax, bringing us on home as the record fades out. 

As kids, we would tease each other with the “Leroy” line, and have a fine time, running across streets and yards, madly dashing after each other: “Hey, Leroy! Your mama… She MAD, man!” 56 years later, while compiling a list of songs that make me feel instantly good, this one came scampering back, unbidden, from deep down the recesses of my befuddled brain to make the roster. 

Jimmy Castor started off his career in the doo-wop group, FRANKIE LYMON AND THE TEENAGERS.  The difference was that Jimmy was not simply a harmonizer, he was a writer, a self-generating machine of catchy content, so, inevitably, he stepped up to the front of his own outfit, The Jimmy Castor Bunch, and released a raft of memorable material to the world - perhaps most notably “Troglodyte”, a national Funk hit in the 70s, making it to number 6 in the charts. You might remember its chant: “Gotta Get a Woman, Gotta Get a woman…” 

I don’t know what it is about this record, but could it be -  (and, this might be a stretch) - that there is a little bit of “Leroy” in all of us: we all have mothers, and we all go through that period when were pushing away, but still a bit tied to the apron strings? Well… no need to overthink it. It’s just a riff, after all.

THE BILLY STEWART DISCOGRAPHY

Singles:

• Chess 1625: "Billy's Blues" / "Billy's Blues"
• Argo 5256: "Billy's Blues" / "Billy's Blues"
• Okeh 4-7095: "Baby, You're My Only Love" / "Billy's Heartache" (1957 with Bo Diddley, backed by The "Marquees")
• Chess 1820: "Reap What You Sow" / "Fat Boy" (1962) – No. 18 R&B, No. 79 pop
• Chess 1835: "True Fine Lovin'" / "Wedding Bells" (1962)
• Chess 1852: "Scramble" / "Oh My, What Can the Matter Be" (1963)
• Chess 1868: "Strange Feeling" / "Sugar and Spice" (1963) – No. 25 R&B, No. 70 pop
• Chess 1888: "A Fat Boy Can Cry" / "Count Me Out" (1964)
• Chess 1905: "Tell It Like It Is" / "My Sweet Senorita" (1964)
• Chess 1922: "I Do Love You" / "Keep Loving" (1965) – No. 6 R&B, No. 26 pop
• Chess 1932: "Sitting in the Park" / "Once Again" (1965) – No. 4 R&B, No. 24 pop
• Chess 1941: "How Nice It Is" / "No Girl" (1965)
• Chess 1948: "Because I Love You" / "Mountain of Love" (1965)
• Chess 1960: "Love Me" / "Why Am I Lonely" (1966) – No. 38 R&B
• Chess 1966: "Summertime" / "To Love, to Love" (1966) – No. 7 R&B, #10 pop
• Chess 1978: "Secret Love" / "Look Back and Smile" (1967) – No. 11 R&B, No. 29 pop
• Chess 1991: "Every Day I Have the Blues" / "Ol' Man River" (1967) – No. 41 R&B, No. 79 pop
• Chess 2002: "Cross My Heart" / "Why (Do I Love You So)?" (1968) – No. 34 R&B, No. 86 pop / No. 49 R&B
• Chess 2053: "Tell Me the Truth" / "What Have I Done?" (1968) – No. 48 R&B
• Chess 2063: "I'm In Love" / "Crazy 'Bout You, Baby" (1969)
• Chess 2080: "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" / "We'll Always Be Together" (1969)

Albums:

• Chess 1496: I Do Love You (1965) (Billboard No. 97)
• Chess 1499: Unbelievable (1966) (Billboard No. 138)
• Chess 1513: Billy Stewart Teaches Old Standards New Tricks (1967)
• Chess 1540: Cross My Heart (1969)
• Chess 1547: Remembered (1970)
• Sugar Hill/Chess CH-8401: The Greatest Sides (1982)

1988 was an astounding year: Hope was in the air - I was about to get married, Reagan was departing, and a supergroup was coalescing in Malibu. In ’87 Tom Petty had backed up Bob Dylan on tour, Roy Orbison was being celebrated on national TV in “Black and White”; Jeff Lynne had produced George Harrison’s biggest comeback in a decade, and these 5 men decided to hang, jam, and release their good vibes to the world. 

The Traveling Wilburys album was a surprise to say the least. Anyone of them could’ve filled a stadium by themselves, but together? How could such a collaboration be real, and where were the egos gonna hide? Jeff Lynne has spent his life making the impossible happen, that’s how. And, the fun these men were having was palpable.

As Mo Ostin remarked, “George’s humility and good nature” suffused the whole enterprise. And, in End of the Line, when they sing “It’s alright… even if the sun don’t shine. It’s alright.. we’re going to the end of the line,” I get chills. 3 out of the 5 are gone now. Indeed, they took it to the end of the line. And, even though times are darker now, and 1988 feels like forever ago, When I hear that soothing message of camaraderie, I feel a lot better about what’s ahead.

There is something so beautifully rendered in this piece of heartbreak I have always identified with.
Written by husband and wife Dave Ellingson and Kim Carnes and released in March 1980,  it was the first single from Rogers’ album Gideon. 
It's a tough three plus minutes to travel for some because the poetry informs with an unbearable truth for those paying rapt attention.
When Kim cries "Put Out The Light" and Kenny counters with his plea of"Just Hold On", attaching their dramatic authenticity to the words, I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes.
A profound prayer from two dreamers who could never have imagined the twist of consequence dedication and attachment can bring.
I'm a sucker for songs which dispense a healthy dose of yearning and  struggle.
And when two gifted voices collide within a symphonic world of intense devotion real humans share , I'm Gone, Gone, Gone Like A Cool Breeze.
I imagine that's why "He Stopped Loving Her Today" has been named in several surveys as the greatest country song of all time. It was released in April 1980, only a month after "Don't Fall In Love With A Dreamer". 
That Bobby Braddock / Curly Putman composed opera made 1980 quite A Good Year For The Roses.


"Don’t fall in love with a dreamer
‘Cause he’ll always take you in
Just when you think you’ve really changed him
He’ll leave you again
Don’t fall in love with a dreamer
‘Cause he’ll break you every time
Oh, put out the light, just hold on
Before we say goodbye".

Damn Straight.

-Rich Buckland

SUNLIGHT by The Youngbloods (RCA, 1969)

I’m a romantic; I admit it. I believe in true love, and the moments of ecstatic togetherness that enable one to transcend all the struggles and grief of life. And, this song reanimates this awakening each time I hear it: by the rolling chords off the nylon string guitar, eliciting the feeling of a fresh breeze of possibility; Jesse Colin Young’s falsetto voice (one of nature’s finest) projecting such hopeful innocence; and, the lyrics, which tenderly describe scenes of eternal bliss.  

I loved Jesse and The Youngbloods from the first time I put down the needle on Grizzly Bear (the first cut on the debut album). It was a bonus disc from the Columbia Record Club, and since that moment, the relationship with Jesse, Banana, and the boys, during the RCA years, was a meaningful one for me. After they went to Warners, and subsequently split up, the love affair was over.

But, the remarkable Elephant Mountain, the last collection from RCA, produced by a young Charlie Daniels, delivered this song, along with Darkness, Darkness - in a collage of Sunlight and Shadow.  Jesse said that this was the first song he wrote after moving to California, and I understand it. As a New Yorker relocating to the Golden State, I too was struck by the quality of the light which casts a spell that makes one unable to sense the passage of time, and the seasons. Years flew by, the mirror mocks me, but the romantic in me remains ever innocent.

My selection for the King of an immortal Rhythm and Blues anthem and character goes to a Duke.

Mr. Eugene Dixon became known internationally as Gene Chandler.

In 1962 his hymn to Royal Hi Fidelity, "The Duke Of Earl", conquered our imagination and romantic reverie as he conceived an eternal figure sporting a signature cape, top hot and cane. His Dukedom was a "Paradise We Could Share".

In his song "Keeping The Faith", Billy Joel delivered a tribute to the persona Mr. Chandler invoked upon writing the line:

"I thought I was the Duke of Earl
When I made it with a red-haired girl In the Chevrolet."

I never imagined Chevy's or Drive In Theaters in the Dukedom, but I get where the Piano Man was coming from.

Gene's other achievements in the key of soulful blue are also melodic autographs of greatness.

"Rainbow" (released as three separate incarnations in '62, '65 and '80 suggest it's potent importance), "Just Be True" and the enduring catchy hook of 1970's "Groovy Situation" display a vocal aptitude comfortable within Doo Wop, Blues, Gospel, Soul or just good old Popular Music.

Up until last year, The Duke continued to walk on, appearing at multiple venues at the age of 83.

As one of my Top 20 singers and performers ,Gene Chandler will always remain a testament to the everlasting truth of a music that has embraced my life with a spiritual honor and an impassioned faithfulness to which I owe a great debt.

Now Let's Walk On With The Duke!

The 60s was a fun and a unique experience. You had to be there to understand. Just talk to any baby boomer who was an adolescent during the 60s and they will tell you how fun and how fortunate they were to grow up in the 1960s. School dances and the dance crazes during that period were something else. I couldn't even begin to write about or even talk about what dances are popular today. I guess I possess a generation gap. I am lost in the 60s and 70s.

The first dance craze I remember was "The Stroll." Of course it came out in the 50s but its popularity was still present in the 60s. You could stroll to almost any slow song. The Diamonds made the song famous in January 1958 and is still played today at many parties and weddings. It was close to being the first line dance. Girls on one side and boys on the other and the line moved up as each couple would meet one at a time in the center at the beginning of the line and stroll to the music down the line between the others and take their place at the end of the line.

The Twist was a rock and roll dance popular in the early 1960s named after the song that originated it, The Twist. It was the first major international rock and roll dance style in which the couples did not have to touch each other while dancing. The dance was first popularized by Chubby Checker in 1960 with a hit cover of the 1959 minor hit "The Twist" written by Hank Ballard. Checker's single became a smash hit, reaching #1 on the US charts. The song set a record, being the only single to reach #1 in two different chart runs (as it reached #1 in 1960, and then resurfaced, reaching #1 again in 1962). This has never happened again in rock history. Faced with explaining to the youthful audience how to do the dance, a member of Checker's entourage came up with the following description:"It's like putting out a cigarette with both feet, and wiping your bottom with a towel, to the beat of the music."

In 1961, at the height of the Twist craze, patrons at New York's hot Peppermint Lounge on West 45th Street were twisting to the music of the house band, a local group from Jersey, Joey Dee and The Starliters. Their house song, "Peppermint Twist (Part 1)," became the number one song in the United States for three weeks in January 1962. We even had a Peppermint Lounge in Circleville, Ohio. Of course it wasn't as famous as the one in New York. The lounge closed after a short period of time.

The Mashed Potato is a dance move which was a popular dance craze of 1962. It was danced to songs such as Dee Dee Sharp's Mashed Potato Time. Also referred to as "mash potato" or "mashed potatoes", the move vaguely resembles that of the twist, by Sharp's fellow Philadelphian, Chubby Checker.
The dance begins by stepping backward with one foot with that heel tilted inward. The foot is positioned slightly behind the other (stationary) foot. With the weight on the ball of the starting foot, the heel is then swiveled outward. The same process is repeated with the other foot: step back and behind with heel inward, pivot heel out, and so on. The pattern is continued for as many repetitions as desired. The step may be incorporated in various dances either as a separate routine or as a styling of standard steps.

James Brown had two Mashed Potato-related chart hits, "(Do the) Mashed Potatoes" (1960; released under a pseudonym and "Mashed Potatoes U.S.A." in 1962. Brown also featured the dance prominently in his live performances during the 50s and 60s. The dance was also referred to in Connie Francis' 1962 hit "V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N" ("...we'll Mashed Potato to a jukebox tune..."), "Do You Love Me" by The Contours, "Harry the Harry Ape" a 1963 Top-20 pop and R&B novelty hit by Ray Stevens, and "Land of 1000 Dances", a song made popular by Wilson Pickett.

The Monster Mash came out around the same time that the song "The mashed potatoes" was popular ... and it was a vari