Random mumblings and mundom ramblings on music (mostly), and whatever else pops into my mind . . .
[The files attached here are for review only, and should be deleted after two weeks. If you like the bands, go buy the albums . . . like I did!] . . .
And yes - EVERYTHING posted here is still available!
Another November 2nd (Day Of The Dead) - another Grateful Dead offering for you all!
In celebration of the original album's fiftieth anniversary, The Dead's vaults were thrown open to provide Wake Of The Flood: The Angel's Share, the third installment of the celebrated Angel's Share series, featuring more than two hours of previously unreleased studio chatter, outtakes and alternate versions recorded during the band's August 1973 Wake Of The Flood sessions, held at the Record Plant in Sausalito, California. Some great additions to this release include:
Takes of “Let Me
Sing Your Blues Away,” Keith Godchaux’s first and only vocal on a
Grateful Dead studio record;
Bobby Weir’s continually evolving
“Weather Report Suite”; and
The track “Phil’s Song
(Unbroken Chain)”, released on the group's later album The Mars Hotel.
Eyes Of The World (Run-through) [Not SLATED] [8/10/73]
Eyes Of The World (Take 1) [SLATED] [8/10/73]
Eyes Of The World (Take 6) [Not SLATED] [8/10/73]
Eyes Of The World (Take 15) [Not SLATED] [8/10/73]
Eyes Of The World (Take 16) [Not SLATED] [8/10/73]
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (TAKE 1) [Not SLATED][8/15/73]
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (TAKE 2) [SLATED] [8/15/73]
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (TAKE 3) [SLATED] [8/15/73]
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (TAKE 4) [SLATED] [8/15/73]
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (TAKE 13) [Not SLATED] [8/15/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 1] [Not SLATED] [8/16/73
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 2] [Not SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 3] [SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 4] [Not SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 5] [Not SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 6] [Not SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 7] [SLATED] [8/16/73]
Phil’s Song (Unbroken Chain) [Take 8] [SLATED] [8/16/73]
Weather Report Suite (Take 10) [Not Slated] [8/16/73
Weather Report Suite (Take 11) [Not Slated] [8/16/73
Weather Report Suite (Take 16) [Not Slated] [8/16/73]
Weather Report Suite (Take 8) [Slated] [8/17/73]
Sort of not much else left to say here about this album - so I'll just shut up and offer up the music. Here for your Dias De Los Muertos listening pleasure, here's Wake Of The Flood: The Angel's Share, released by Rhino Records on August 18, 2023. This one's for all the Deadheads out there!
Enjoy, and... well, you know!
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
No long-winded Halloween stories this year; I couldn't think of any that were of any import or interest. But during the year, I gathered up a few more releases related to the holiday, and wanted to get a couple of them posted here before Friday - so here you are.
The first, These Ghoulish Things - Horror Hits For Halloween, was released in 2005. It contains some superb selections of horror rock from the Golden Age of Rock 'n' Roll, between 1957 and 1964. Artists both renowned (like Screamin' Jay Hawkins and Bo Diddley) and obscure are featured here. But what makes this release unique is that it also contains several 1962 radio station plugs recorded by Mr. "Monster Mash" himself, Bobby "Boris" Pickett. In all, many of the tunes on this disc had never before been released on CD, making this an essential album for connoisseurs of this genre. Here's the lineup:
1 Radio Plug for Monster Mash on Station KFWB - Bobby 'Boris' Pickett 2 Screamin' Ball (At Dracula Hall) - the Duponts 3 Drac's Back - Billy Demarco & Count Dracula 4 Midnight Stroll - Revels 5 Ghost Train - Virgil Holmes 6 The Mummy's Ball - The Verdicts 7 Frankenstein's Den - The Hollywood Flames 8 I'm the Wolfman - Round Robin 9 Spooksville - The Nu-Trends 10 The Munster's Theme - Milton Delugg & the All-Stars 11 Coolest Little Monster - John Zacherle 12 Monster Party - Bill Dogett 13 The Creature (From Outer Space) - The Jayhawks 14 Mr. Were-Wolf - The Kac-Ties 15 Radio Station Promo for Bill Gavin - Bobby 'Boris' Pickett 16 My Son, the Vampire - Allan Sherman 17 The Monster - Bobby Please & the Pleasers 18 Theme from the Addams Family - The Fiends 19 Nightmare Mash - Billy Lee Riley 20 The Voo Doo Walk - Sonny Richard's Panics W/Cindy and Misty 21 Feast of the Mau Mau - Screamin' Jay Hawkins 22 Frankenstein's Party - The Swingin' Phillies 23 Legend of Sleepy Hollow - The Monotones 24 Bo Meets the Monster - Bo Diddley 25 Rockin' in the Graveyard - Jackie Morningstar 26 Radio Plug for Monster Mash on Station WCOP - Bobby 'Boris' Pickett 27 Monster Mash - Bobby 'Boris' Pickett 28 The Vampire - Orvin Yoes
The second one here, Mostly Ghostly: More Horror for Halloween, coming out a few years later, was a follow-up of sorts to These Ghoulish Things. All of the music on this album is from the same general time period as the earlier comp, i.e., late '50s/early '60s. Allmusic.com put together a great summation of this compilation that I really can't add much to or refute:
If you're looking for a non-run-of-the-mill soundtrack to your next Halloween party, this disc, and its predecessor, These Ghoulish Things: Horror Hits for Halloween,
should just about tide you over the first round of trick and treat. Devoted wholly to rock/horror novelties from the mid-'50s to the
mid-'60s, just a couple of these 25 tracks... were hits. And as a matter of fact, just a few of the other artists... will be familiar to the average knowledgeable rock fan. Since these
are essentially novelty songs, you might not feel much like pulling them
out on occasions other than Halloween, much like you only play
Christmas albums at a certain time of year.
The songs are longer on
novelty than musical value, but if nothing else, they're entertaining
relics of just how outrageously silly early rock & roll performers
(and labels) would get in search of a quick hit. Some of the songs, too,
are pretty strong in their own right, especially Sutch's "'Til the Following Night" (one of the best pre-Beatles rock & roll records from Britain), "Haunted House," and the Moontrekkers' instrumental "Night of the Vampire" (one of Joe Meek's best productions). It doesn't get much weirder than Gary "Spider" Webb's
"The Cave, Pt. 1," consisting mostly of a boy and a girl sporadically
calling out to each other in a cave as guitars twang and drums throb.
Beatles'
novelties, to stretch the thread more, don't get much weirder than Gene
Moss & the Monsters' "I Want to Bite Your Hand," issued in the wake
of the Fab Four's invasion of the U.S. For Cramps fans, there's the original version of "The Goo Goo Muck," as first heard on Ronnie Cook & the Gaylads' 1962 single.
Here's the track list for this one as well:
1 Dracula's Theme - The Ghouls 2 Til' The Following Night - Screaming Lord Sutch & The Savages 3 Do The Zombie - The Symbols 4 Haunted House - Jumpin' Gene Simmons 5 Dinner With Drac - John Zacherle 6 The Goo Goo Muck - Ronnie Cook & The Gaylads 7 The Mad Scientist - Zanies 8 The Cave - Chuck Holden 9 Spooky Movies - Roy Clark 10 They're Here - Boots Walker 11 Black And Hairy - Screaming Lord Sutch 12 The Hearse - Terry Teen 13 Terrible Ivan - Art Roberts 14 Night Of The Vampire - The Moontrekkers 15 The Mummy - The Naturals 16 I Was A Teenage Creature - Lord Luther 17 The Cave - Gary 'Spider' Webb 18 The Cat - Rod Willis 19 Zombi - The Monotones 20 Alligator Wine - Screamin' Jay Hawkins 21 Morgus The Magnificent - Morgus & The Three Ghouls 22 Sleepy Hollow - The Last Word 23 Rockin' Zombie - The Crewnecks 24 I Want To Bite Your Hand - Gene Moss & The Monsters
So, that's that. For your enjoyment this holiday weekend, here are two superb and lauded Halloween-themed releases put out on the Ace Records label: These Ghoulish Things - Horror Hits For Halloween in 2005, and Mostly Ghostly: More Horror for Halloween in 2012. Have a spooky, scary, fun listen, and as always, let me know what you think.
Happy Halloween!
Please use the email links below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
Various Artists - These Ghoulish Things - Horror Hits For Halloween: Send Email
Various Artists - Mostly Ghostly: More Horror for Halloween: Send Email
(Oh, and just in case you were wondering - yes, there WAS a recording of "The Cave, Pt. 2" by Gary Webb, a follow-up to the original. For the sake of completeness, here it is for your listening pleasure - however, you won't find it as being much of a variation of "Pt. 1":)
An old elementary school classmate of mine died a couple of weeks ago. I can't call him a "friend", per se, but he was an essential presence in my childhood experience.
I've mentioned in previous postings that my Navy officer dad's next duty station after the conclusion of our time in Wisconsin was serving as a professor at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. We arrived there that summer, and settled into a two-story townhouse in military housing across from one of the main academy gates, directly behind the neighborhood pool and adjacent to the neighborhood of West Annapolis.
West Annapolis is about a forty square block area, bounded by Rowe Boulevard to the south, Weems Creek to the west, the Severn River to the north, and government property along its eastern edge. The neighborhood is pretty much cut off from the rest of the city of Annapolis proper due to its proximity to said "government property" - namely, the grounds of the U.S. Naval Academy and the adjacent housing areas for officers and their families stationed there, where I lived. As such, West Annapolis has over the decades developed a somewhat insular, go-it-alone stance among the longtime residents there, not mixing much with regular Annapolitans and maintaining a cool attitude towards the "interloping" military families living just on the other side of the old wooded Baltimore & Annapolis Railroad right-of-way.
However, the young children of area officers had to go to school somewhere. And since the Naval Academy Primary School, a K-through-5 private school located across the Severn at the Naval Station, had limited enrollment, for many years the majority of kids living in Arundel Estates and Perry Circle (the military housing areas) were required to attend local facilities, the first and closest one being West Annapolis Elementary School (WAES). So in 1974, that's where the majority of my siblings and I began our latest academic year.
For the most part, relations between the local youngsters and the relatively more transient military offspring at the school were tranquil. I know that some of the West Annapolis boys and girls considered many from my area as "rich kids" and elitist snobs (believe me, we were most decidedly not!), while some of my Navy acquaintances thought many of the locals were lower-class lowlifes (again, not remotely true). But in those years, that tranquility was constantly being roiled by one boy, Frederick, the Terror of West Annapolis.
Frederick (or "Freddie" as he was more commonly known) was a short, wiry redhead with a fiery temper and rock-hard fists that he seldom hesitated to make use of, if the situation called for it. He was a year behind me in grade; however, for a few years in the early/mid '70s, WAES administration decided to experiment with a new teaching approach whereby instead of having the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th grades in four separate classrooms, each classroom would contain a combination of ALL FOUR GRADES. So each individual teacher was were forced to provide instruction to all of the learning levels simultaneously, every day - which must have been a nightmare for them. In hindsight, it was a nutty idea, and I don't recall learning very much that year. WAES finally abandoned that practice before the 1970s ended, segregating the grades into separate classrooms, like most other schools in the nation do. But I went to school there through the brunt of this experimental period... and as 'luck' would have it, Freddie was one of my classmates.
Freddie's fearsome reputation, cultivated by classroom and schoolyard incidents that landed him in the Principal's office several times that year, and nurtured by juvenile word-of-mouth, was such that he became, in many of our minds, the pre-teen 'crime boss' and 'bete noire' of West Annapolis. Outside of attending school there, most Navy kids avoided the neighborhood, especially the area close by Freddie's house, lest they run afoul of "Freddie's gang" of area kids he reportedly controlled.
There used to be a little neighborhood store directly across the street from WAES, on the corner of Melvin Avenue and Annapolis Street about a block away from his home, called Waxman's Grocery. Mr. Waxman was the sour and crotchety proprietor of this old-fashioned one-room store, and he seemed to hate kids (many years later, I learned that Mr. Waxman's son, a WAES graduate, had been killed in Vietnam in his teens shortly after arriving over there as a new enlistee in the late 1960s... so it was then I began to understand Mr. Waxman's demeanor and feel some sympathy for him). Despite his cantankerous nature, children flocked to his shop after classes ended for the day, as Mr. Waxman stocked every brand and variety of popular candy then available - Atomic Fireballs, Mike & Ikes, Lemonheads, Pop Rocks, Marathon bars, Chunky Bars, you name it. The store owner was well aware of the individuals who kept him in business. The market was Ground Zero for the local Wacky Packages craze of the mid-70s; students would buy the packs by the dozen, trading the adhesive parody renditions of popular consumer products with others in the school or otherwise sticking them to their school folders and lockers.
Bubble Yum, the first soft chunk bubble gum, was released by LifeSavers (in limited quantities) in the Western U.S. in late 1974, and the company began a gradual national rollout later that year, with the Baltimore/Washington D.C. area serving as an early East Coast test market. When it initially appeared, it was shipped to only a few stores in our area in very small quantities, and Waxman's Grocery, with its proven track record of moving vast amounts of confectionery product, was one of the stores selected. When Freddie and his boys discovered this, they staked out Waxman's for hours on end, watching for the delivery trucks and, by their presence, "discouraging" (so to speak) non-neighborhood kids from going there. Freddie's gang would buy up every pack of Bubble Yum available, at 30 cents for a pack of five pieces, then take them to school and resell them to children craving the new gum for upwards of fifty cents to a dollar for each individual chunk. Those guys ended up making a small fortune that winter and spring, until increased product distribution and availability put Bubble Yum in more local stores. But for a long while, they were the preteen Gum Mafia.
As much as I've detailed the fearsome, threatening antics and actions of Freddie and his gang here, I did have some normal interactions with him from time to time. More that once, I recall heading over to West Annapolis to hang out and play with him and his friends, and during the winter he and his crew gathered with the Navy kids sledding down Suicide Hill directly adjacent to Perry Circle, the only decent place to slide in the immediate area. In our few playtimes, a sort of detente existed between us, as it does between kids. Still, Freddie would sometimes suggest we do activities that I wasn't comfortable with, such as shoplift sweets at the local 7-11. In those situations, I would demur, then try to quickly and quietly remove myself from his presence and head back home, as the unspoken threat of drawing the ire of "Freddie's gang" was always present.
The mid-70s period was a transitional period for music. AM radio fare, consisting of lite rock, novelty songs and other lightweight fare, still ruled the airwaves, but harder-edged punk, reggae and hard rock music was bubbling just below the surface, ready to break out. Songs that were giant hits and schoolyard favorites during that time included "Up In A Puff Of Smoke" by an obscure (for the U.S.) British singer named Polly Brown:
For some reason, this song was HUGE as WAES - never did much for me, though (in a related story, Polly Brown never had another charting song in America...).
Another massive song from that time was "Billy, Don't Be A Hero" by Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods:
Although the premise was hokey and overly sentimental (a young woman begs her love not to go off to war, but stay and marry her; he goes anyway and, of course, buys the farm in his first battle), this song still went to #1 in America in the summer of 1974, selling nearly four million copies. However, it was hated as much as it was loved, voted No. 8 on Rolling Stone magazine's readers' poll of "10 Worst Songs of the 1970s".
What I didn't know at the time was that this song was a remake of a British hit from earlier that year. Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods were an obscure group of journeymen from Ohio who hadn't had much success in the prior ten years of their music career, until they glommed on to "Billy, Don't Be A Hero", originally penned by a British group, Paper Lace, who took their version to the top of the UK charts just three months prior. Understandably pissed at seeing their thunder and stateside glory stolen by Bo Donaldson et al., Paper Lace quickly released their follow-up single, which made it to US #1 six weeks later that midsummer, the group's first (and only) American hit - "The Night Chicago Died":
Children couldn't get enough of songs like this back then!
The potential menace of Freddie and his gang overall did little to affect the fun times I had living there in Annapolis. There was a great group of kids on my street and up the hill in Perry Circle, and we were a close-knit bunch. We would all hang together at the pool on warm days, playing Marco Polo and basking in the sun. The winters were marked by building huge snow forts, from which we would choose sides and have intense snowball fights. There were birthday parties, slumber parties, football games, and expeditions into the restricted areas near Shady Lake or through the old Civil Defense tunnels and shelters under the apartments. During the holiday season, we would practice Christmas carols together, then put together a chorus and go door to door singing to our neighbors. Or we would head over across the street through the Naval Academy gates, to play baseball on the diamonds there, hang out on the platforms and structures of the old Academy obstacle course on Hospital Point, or try to sneak into the "Midshipmen/Authorized Staff Only" areas throughout the Yard.
After years of requests, I was finally awarded the paper route in my neighborhood, delivering the Evening Capital each night after I got home from school (I was one of the paper's youngest newsboys). I worked that route like a dog, doubling the subscriptions on my street inside of a few months, and by Christmas that year I was making a fortune (well, a relative fortune for a preteen in the 1970s). The Evening Capital provided me with a few extra over-the-shoulder newsbags, and there were always a few extra papers in my stack each day. So with them, my friends and I devised a game called Dogfight: each of us would have a bag filled with newspapers tightly wrapped with rubber bands, then we would get on our bikes and ride circles around each other in a big field, whipping papers at other riders to see who we could knock off! Sounds kinda brutal now... but it was a very fun, looked-forward-to activity, and I never recall anyone getting seriously hurt.
Great memories.
Freddie and I weren't close friends, only casual acquaintances at best, and I didn't keep in close contact with him after I left elementary school and moved on to Bates Junior High across town the next year. I would, however, continue to hear stories about him from some of my younger friends who still attended WAES - from all reports, his attitude and demeanor didn't change an iota. And after my family left Maryland in the late 1970s, he all but completely faded off of my radar. I learned more about him in recent years through my contact via Facebook with his older brother, who I didn't know at all back during my Annapolis childhood but got to know later. Through him, I learned that after Freddie left high school, he served a short stint as an enlisted Navy man, then quickly returned to the Annapolis area, where for decades he worked as a local handyman and house painter.
My lone interaction with Freddie since the end of our school days together occurred a couple of years ago, when I repeated to his brother a funny (and probably apocryphal) story about a practical joke Freddie reputedly played on one of his West Annapolis cronies, that quickly made the schoolyard rounds. Freddie fired off a blistering response through his brother's thread, angrily denying the legend and castigating me up and down for even INSINUATING that it was true. Mind you, I was retelling the tale of a harmless and minor childhood prank that allegedly occurred... but still, almost fifty years later, it managed to set him off. Apparently, some things - and some people - never change. Freddie's brother is friendly, stable and accomplished, and managed to put together a pretty good life for himself and his family - in other words, the complete opposite of Freddie.
So, as such, I don't have any particularly deep feeling of loss regarding Freddie's demise - he was a bully, and sort of a dick, and from all reports and indications remained so up to his dying day. I wasn't the only one with this reaction; for decades, I've remained in close contact with several of my old Arundel Estates childhood friends. Their feelings on Freddie's death can be summarized in a single comment one of them made to me: "He was the 'bogeyman' for a lot of kids back then." Can't really refute that assessment.
With that being said, Freddie was an integral part of that fondly remembered time and place in my life, and his presence and actions have done little to obscure the happy times I recall living in Annapolis as a child (prior to my return there as a Naval Academy midshipmen almost a decade later). If anything, Freddie was like a grain of sand in an oyster shell - an irritant whose presence still ended up creating something lasting and cherished.
So, in honor of his passing, and in homage to that time, here are a few music compilations from that period that will give you a sense of what was being listened to in the mid-70s. These are part of a forty-volume(!) series of recordings released by Time-Life Music between 1989 and 1999, covering the entirety of the 1970s. I only picked up a few of these, since I had other compilations that covered this same general time period. But the ones provided here, covering 1974 and 1975, are an excellent summation of music from that time.
In case you're wondering, here's the lineup:
Sounds Of The Seventies: 1974:
Can't Get Enough – Bad Company
Show and Tell – Al Wilson
Come and Get Your Love – Redbone
I Shot the Sheriff – Eric Clapton
Help Me – Joni Mitchell
I Can Help – Billy Swan
Sha-La-La (Make Me Happy) – Al Green
Rock the Boat – The Hues Corporation
Bennie and the Jets – Elton John
Midnight Rider – Gregg Allman
Sweet Home Alabama – Lynyrd Skynyrd
The Loco-Motion – Grand Funk Railroad
Smokin' in the Boys' Room – Brownsville Station
Rikki Don't Lose That Number – Steely Dan
Rock On – David Essex
Midnight at the Oasis – Maria Muldaur
Kung Fu Fighting – Carl Douglas
Keep on Smilin' – Wet Willie
Then Came You – Dionne Warwick & The Spinners
The Bitch Is Back – Elton John
Sounds Of The Seventies: 1974 - Take Two:
Lookin' for a Love – Bobby Womack
You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet – Bachman-Turner Overdrive
The Joker – Steve Miller Band
Until You Come Back to Me (That's What I'm Gonna Do) – Aretha Franklin
Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe – Barry White
Mockingbird – Carly Simon with James Taylor
I've Got to Use My Imagination – Gladys Knight & The Pips
Sundown – Gordon Lightfoot
Everlasting Love – Carl Carlton
Shinin' On – Grand Funk Railroad
Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo – Rick Derringer
Takin' Care of Business – Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Rock Your Baby – George McCrae
Sideshow – Blue Magic
Haven't Got Time for the Pain – Carly Simon
Tin Man – America
Dancing Machine – Jackson Five
Jungle Boogie – Kool & the Gang
Nothing from Nothing – Billy Preston
I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song – Jim Croce
Radar Love – Golden Earring
Sounds Of The Seventies: 1975:
You're No Good – Linda Ronstadt
Jackie Blue – Ozark Mountain Daredevils
That's the Way (I Like It) – KC & the Sunshine Band
Must of Got Lost – J. Geils Band
Why Can't We Be Friends? – War
Sister Golden Hair – America
Philadelphia Freedom – Elton John
Black Water – Doobie Brothers
Love Is a Rose – Linda Ronstadt
How Long – Ace
Dance with Me – Orleans
Free Bird – Lynyrd Skynyrd
You Are So Beautiful – Joe Cocker
Feel Like Makin' Love – Bad Company
Lady Marmalade – Labelle
Pick Up the Pieces – Average White Band
Island Girl – Elton John
Some Kind of Wonderful – Grand Funk Railroad
The Hustle – Van McCoy & Soul City Symphony
Let's Do It Again – Staple Singers
Sounds Of The Seventies: 1975 - Take Two:
When Will I Be Loved – Linda Ronstadt
Bad Time – Grand Funk Railroad
Roll On Down the Highway – Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Movin' On – Bad Company
Take Me in Your Arms (Rock Me a Little While) – The Doobie Brother
They Just Can't Stop It (The Games People Play) – The Spinners
L-O-V-E (Love) – Al Green
Shining Star – Earth, Wind & Fire
Get Down Tonight – KC & the Sunshine Band
I'm on Fire – Dwight Twilley
SOS – ABBA
Shame, Shame, Shame – Shirley & Company
Cut the Cake – Average White Band
You're the First, the Last, My Everything – Barry White
Low Rider – War
Fight the Power (Part 1 & 2) – Isley Brothers
Bungle in the Jungle – Jethro Tull
Only Women Bleed – Alice Cooper
Can't Get It Out of My Head – Electric Light Orchestra
Poetry Man – Phoebe Snow
I'm Not in Love – 10CC
Enjoy these discs, released in 1990 and 1991 (for the "Take Two" versions), and as always, let me know what you think.
Please use the email links below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
Various Artists - Sounds Of The Seventies: 1974: Send Email
Various Artists - Sounds Of The Seventies: 1975: Send Email
Various Artists - Sounds Of The Seventies: 1974 - Take Two: Send Email
Various Artists - Sounds Of The Seventies: 1975 - Take Two: Send Email
Sixty years to the day since The Beatles played Shea Stadium in New York on their second American tour... hard to fathom that it's been THAT long since that watershed moment in rock history.
I was going to pen one of my extended screeds in celebration of and in relation to this day... but it appears that Rolling Stone magazine beat me to it. I don't think I can improve upon this article, which contains the following summation:
"...Shea was more than just the first high-profile stadium concert. It
showed everyone how huge, untamable, crazed pop music could be. It
destroyed the hopes of everyone who still thought the Beatles — and
their young female audience — were just a passing fad, which was still
the conventional adult wisdom in 1965. The Fabs couldn’t be dismissed
anymore, and neither could the girls. It shattered all the cliches about
how show-biz was supposed to work. Never before had that many humans
joined together in one place to celebrate music — and on a deeper level,
to celebrate each other. That’s why “Shea Stadium” is still the
two-word code for the culmination of pop dreams at their loudest,
lustiest, scariest, and most deranged."
Can't add much else to this phrase, or the overall writeup in general... so I'll just shut up and provide the music!
I was thinking about posting the venerable Purple Chick Sheaken Not Stirred two-disc set - but I think that the one offered here is better. Here's the Shea! Stadium Ultra Deluxe set, a fan-generated compilation that popped up on a Beatles bootleg site a couple of years ago. This set features the ENTIRE concert, with music from opening acts including King Curtis, Brenda Holloway, Sounds Incorporated and Cannibal & The Headhunters; 1991 stereo versions and 2003 remix/remastering of the Fab Four's set; and bonus tracks.
And speaking of bonuses...
Knowing that the Shea Stadium show was going to be a big deal, NEMS Enterprises (band manager Brian Epstein's holding company) and Sullivan Productions (television host and show presenter Ed Sullivan's firm) arranged for the concert to be intensively documented on film. More than a dozen cameras were deployed in and around the stadium and backstage to capture the frenzy of the moment. The hours of tape generated were then edited down to a fifty-minute-long documentary, The Beatles At Shea Stadium, which premiered in England in early 1966, but not shown in America until January 1967.
The Beatles At Shea Stadium should not be considered a "true documentary", however. A couple of songs played that night were not included due to concerns about the film's length. The remaining songs were heavily edited.in post-production - some being overdubbed, and a couple replaced with studio versions already existing on record or rerecorded by The Beatles at a London session in early January 1966. The Shea! Stadium Ultra Deluxe set includes the soundtrack from this movie (in mono format)... and I included the film here as well, for your review and amusement.
So, again, for this post, I'm providing:
Shea! Stadium Ultra Deluxe, a five-disc bootleg set released in 2023; and
The Beatles At Shea Stadium concert film, released to television and theaters in 1966
I hope these offerings help you to either relive or experience for the first time the revelry, euphoria and hysteria from one of the landmark shows in music history! Enjoy, and as always, let me know what you think.
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
The Beatles- Shea! Stadium Ultra Deluxe (5-disc set): Send Email
The Beatles - The Beatles At Shea Stadium: Send Email
R.I.P. to the great Brian Wilson... a true visionary, innovator and musical genius who with his group The Beach Boys, in my opinion, saved American rock - and indeed rock music as a whole - in the early sixties after the demise/sidelining of some of the genre's early stars (Buddy Holly, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Eddie Cochran, Little Richard, etc., as I mentioned here earlier). Wilson used his deep musical knowledge and melodic sense to craft, at first, seemingly simple but sonically advanced anthems to the beach life and culture of Southern California, then began to expand his musical palette and subject areas into more intense, personal areas and compositions. He put every iota of his being into his search for crafting the perfect pop song, miniature "teenage symphonies to God". It's an open debate as to whether this intensity of focus was the cause of his subsequent mental breakdowns, or if tensions and situations outside of music (such as drug abuse, or his relationship with his father and early band manager Murry Wilson) were the reason. But Brian Wilson LIVED, FELT, and SAW music... clearer than almost anyone else.
In regards to his celebrated output, many reviewers and critics reference Smile, The Beach Boys' unfinished 1967 concept album, as Wilson's peak. However, I feel that the praise regarding Smile is somewhat overblown, heavily influenced by its aura of being a "legendary" 'lost" album (true, the original album sessions were finally released in 2011 as a multi-disc box set that included an approximation of what the finished album would have sounded like... but in my opinion, it's not quite the same thing as having the thing appear in its proper time and place back in the 1960s).
For my money, however, Brian Wilson's magnum opus was and will always be Pet Sounds, released in 1966. Although ostensibly a Beach Boys album, Wilson was the sole producer and arranger, and primary composer (along with guest lyrical collaborator (and ad man/jingle writer) Tony Asher) of every song on the disc. Brian put his heart and soul into this release; he basically considered Pet Sounds to be a solo album - reportedly, somewhat to the chagrin of his bandmates, who generally weren't consulted regarding compositions and lyrics, instead being presented with completed arrangements they were expected to follow explicitly.
Although the album met with "meh" reviews and middling sales in the U.S., Pet Sounds was lauded by critics in the U.K., and was a major hit over in England, reaching #2 on the national charts and remaining in the English Top Ten for over six months. Eventually, critics around the world caught up with what was heard and felt about this album in Britain. Today, Pet Sounds is widely recognized as an innovative, groundbreaking, revolutionary rock release, and is considered one of, if not THE, greatest album of all time (currently #2 on the Rolling Stone 500).
I distinctly remember purchasing my copy of this album at a record store in Austin, Texas in the late '90s, while on a road trip to that city. Strangely, despite my voluminous music collection even back then, I had yet to add this one to my stacks. As such, that day on the road in Central Texas, for some reason I was COMPELLED to acquire this album IMMEDIATELY, and went out of my way to find a local music store that carried it. And after all these years, I still love the music it contains. I consider "God Only Knows" to be one of the greatest, most beautiful songs ever composed.
Call me crazy... but I am convinced that, should the Earth come to an end hundreds of millions of years from now, on the day it occurs at least one of our successors (whether humanoid or not) will be listening to this song on the way out.
1997 saw the release of The Pet Sounds Sessions, containing detailed excerpts of the recording sessions and remastered mono and stereo mixes of the original album. The original plan was that Sessions was to have been released in May 1996 to coincide with the 30th anniversary of Pet Sounds. But Beach Boys vocalist Mike Love took exception to the box set's planned liner notes, which he felt diminished what he claimed was his more active involvement in the making of the original album (an observation and attitude that, for all intents and purposes, existed solely in his own head...). So modifications were made to Sessions' essays to include Love's self-serving and generally nonfactual comments, which delayed the set hitting store shelves by eighteen months.
Allmusic provides this review of the set:
"Part of the fascination with Pet Sounds
lies in its detailed, multi-layered arrangements, in which all the
parts blend together into a symphonic whole. The richness of the music
is one of the reasons hardcore fans have desired a set like The Pet
Sounds Sessions, a four-disc box that presents an abundance of working
mixes, alternate takes, instrumental tracks, and rarities, as well as
the first true stereo mix of the album. Certainly, a set this exacting
is only of interest to serious fans, and even they might find the
endless succession of work tracks tedious. Nevertheless, there's
something fascinating about hearing the album broken down to its
individual parts; after hearing horn lines, vocals, and percussion
tracks out of their original context, the scope and originality of Brian Wilson's vision becomes all the more impressive."
'Nuff said.
So in memory of the late, great Brian Wilson, who passed away earlier today, I hereby provide you with The Pet Sound Sessions, a four-disc compilation of alternate mixes, instrumental track, isolated vocals, and other pieces and parts that made up the whole of one of the most influential and celebrated rock albums in history, released by Capitol Records on November 4th, 1997. Have a listen and revel once again in Brian's genius... and, as always, let me know what you think.
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
Since I did this during last year's Day Of The Dead, I suppose I'll try to make this an annual thing now, and continue posting some hard-to-find Grateful Dead here on this date.
To commemorate the day, her for your listening pleasure is American Beauty: The Angel's Share,
like all of the other "Angel's Share" discs, a digital-only release of alt mixes, outtakes and demos from The
Grateful Dead's classic album. I'm a lazy man, so for a more detailed description of this release, I'm taking the liberty of utilizing the Discogs.com write-up, rather than my own words; all credit for the following goes to them and that site:
American Beauty: The Angel's Share brings together never-before-heard studio
recordings compiled from dozens of recently discovered 16-track reels.
It includes multiple outtakes for several album tracks along with demos
for every song on the album (except “Box Of Rain”) plus one for “To Lay
Me Down,” which was later included on Jerry Garcia’s first solo album,
Garcia. All 10 demos are available today for streaming and digital
download with the full 56-track American Beauty: The Angel's Share to be
released as a digital exclusive on October 15, shortly before the 50th
anniversary of the album’s original release date: November 1, 1970.
Like
its predecessor, the latest incarnation of The Angel’s Share was made
possible by the tireless work of engineer Brian Kehew and archivist Mike
Johnson who – operating under the supervision of Grateful Dead legacy
manager David Lemieux – spent countless hours compiling and piecing the
reels together to create this revelatory experience.
American Beauty: The Angel's Share opens with 10 demos that were recorded in
August 1970 at Pacific High Recording Studio, the same place the band
recorded Workingman’s Dead just a few months earlier. While fans are
accustomed to hearing songs evolve through the band’s live recordings,
this installment of The Angel’s Share offers them a rare opportunity to
hear songs like “Ripple” (then titled “Hand Me Down”) grow from its
first demo into the final version.
The vast remainder of The
Angel’s Share features a mix of partial and complete takes from these
sessions including multiple takes of “Friend Of The Devil,” “Ripple” and
Pigpen’s “Operator,” an alternate mix of “Truckin’” and a different
version of “Candyman.” These intimate in-studio performances are
interspersed with conversations that make it feel like you’re in the
studio with the band (Jerry Garcia, Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann, Phil
Lesh, Ron “Pigpen” McKernan and Bob Weir) along with producer Stephen
Barncard and engineer Phil Sawyer.
The Angel’s Share is rounded
out with an acoustic mix of “Box Of Rain” and a version of “Attics Of My
Life” that spotlights Garcia alone on electric guitar, both newly mixed
from the band’s recording sessions for the album later that summer at
Wally Heider Recording
That's that - here you go. Enjoy the day, have a
listen, and as always, let me know what you think. Happy November 2nd!! Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
This being the Day Of The Dead, I figured why not commemorate the day by posting some Grateful Dead? I don't have any especial love for GD... but that hasn't stopped me from collecting hundreds of hours of their recordings over the years. They're an essential American band, and as such deserve honor and respect - even from an obsessive music collector like myself!
Here's Workingman's Dead: The Angel's Share, a digital-only 2020 release of studio rehearsals and outtakes from The Grateful Dead's classic and celebrated 1970 album. I don't have much else to say about it here, but Rolling Stone magazine had plenty to comment upon regarding it when this album was put out three years ago; here's their write-up, if you're interested.
This is for all the Deadheads out there, and music fans in general. Have a listen, and let me know what you think. Happy November 2nd!
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
I was saddened to learn of the death in Pittsfield, Massachusetts last week of singer and actress Julee Cruise. About four years ago, she announced that she was suffering from systemic lupus, a painful autoimmune condition that left her depressed and unable to move and walk. Reports state that she took her own life at her home, with The B-52's song "Roam" playing as she died (Cruise was a touring member of The B-52's in the early 1990s, replacing Cindy Wilson who took a few years off to raise her children; I remember seeing her on stage at a band show I attended in Washington, DC during that period).
In a post I wrote almost a dozen years ago, I detailed how I first came across Cruise's music and my impressions regarding it - the melancholy, haunting quality that both repels and attracts the listener. After the release of her debut album Floating Into The Night in 1989, Cruise issued a follow-up, The Voice Of Love, four years later. As with the first album, almost all of the songs on her sophomore release were written by director David Lynch and composer Angelo Badalamenti, so the sound and atmosphere are remarkably similar to Floating Into The Night. The Voice Of Love is more of a continuation of her debut, rather than a stand-alone entity. If you liked the first, than this one will be right up your alley as well.
Between these two albums, Cruise recorded a Lynch/Badalamenti-modified cover of an old Elvis Presley song, "Summer Kisses, Winter Tears", for the soundtrack to Wim Wenders' scifi drama Until The End Of The World, starring William Hurt. The plot of the film had something to do with in a finding and using a device that can record visual experiences and visualize dreams... but the end result was so confusing and convoluted that the few people who DID go to see the movie were left flummoxed by it. Cashing in on his success with small, cerebral films like Paris, Texas and Wings Of Desire, Wenders managed to secure a budget of $22 million for this latest film, an amount more than the cost of all of his previous films combined. And he proceeded to spend every penny of that money, spreading his production over almost half a year with setups in 11 countries.
While Graeme Revell (co-founder of the Australian industrial band SPK) was commissioned to compose the movie theme and other incidental music for the film, Wenders asked a number of his favorite recording artists (including Cruise) to contribute songs as well for inclusion. For their selections, he asked them to anticipate the kind of music they would be making a decade later, when the film was set. It was Wenders' desire to use every song he received to its fullest extent that ultimately contributed to the overall length of the film. The initial cut was reportedly TWENTY HOURS long, from which the director and producer whittled down to a more standard running time versions of 2 1/2 and 3 hours (which Wenders called the "Reader's Digest" versions). There is also reportedly a five-hour "director's" cut of this film which has been screened at various festivals over the years.
...Not that any of that mattered. The truncated versions of Until The End Of The World were released to theaters, first in Germany in September 1991, and later in the U.S. that December, and overall the flick was a commercial failure, managing to gross only about $830,000 against its $22 million budget. Critics at the time savaged it; Roger Ebert gave the film 2 stars out of 4, describing it as lacking the "narrative
urgency" required to sustain interest in the story, and wrote that it
"plays like a film that was photographed before it was written, and
edited before it was completed". He went on to say that a documentary
about the globe-trekking production would likely have been more
interesting than the film itself. Other reviewers were even less kind.
But while the film flopped, the soundtrack was, frankly, amazing, featuring great songs by some of the top alternative performers of the day. Wenders chose well. Here's the soundtrack lineup:
"Opening Title" – Graeme
Revell
"Sax and Violins" –
Talking Heads
"Summer Kisses, Winter
Tears" – Julee Cruise
"Move with Me
(Dub)" – Neneh Cherry
"The Adversary" – Crime
& the City Solution
"What's Good" – Lou
Reed
"Last Night Sleep"
– Can
"Fretless" – R.E.M.
"Days" – Elvis
Costello
"Claire's Theme" –
Graeme Revell
"(I'll Love You) Till
the End of the World" – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
"It Takes Time" – Patti
Smith (with Fred Smith)
"Death's Door" – Depeche
Mode
"Love Theme" –
Graeme Revell
"Calling All Angels"
(Remix Version) – Jane Siberry with k.d. lang
"Humans from Earth"
– T Bone Burnett
"Sleeping in the Devil's
Bed" – Daniel Lanois
"Until the End of the
World" – U2
"Finale" – Graeme
Revell
Personal favorites on this disc, in additon to the Julee Cruise song, include R.E.M.'s "Fretless", Depeche Mode's "Death's Door" and the Jane Siberry/k.d.lang collaboration "Calling All Angels". At the time, most of these songs were unavailable anywhere else, making the compilation a gold mine of rarities. All in all, the soundtrack did better than the movie, eventually reaching #114 on the U.S. Billboard Top 200 Albums chart in 1992.
So, in honor of the life and art of Julee Cruise, I proudly offer to you all Until The End Of The World (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), released on Warner Brothers Records on December 10th, 1991. Enjoy, and as always... well, you know.
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
Back in the summer of 1980 when my Navy officer dad got transferred to the Naval Postgraduate School (NPGS) in Monterey, California and we moved into La Mesa Village, the local Navy housing complex there, my brother and I quickly fell in with the other teens who lived up in that area - folks like Mike C.; Jeff and his girlfriend Kathy; sisters Jane, Jill and Leslie; loud and brash Latina siblings Rosina and Gina; brothers Pete and John; Joel; Jenny... and so many others. But foremost in the group were two middle schoolers, Mike F. and Martin.
We would all gather together on those warm evenings, usually up by the tennis courts on the grounds of La Mesa Elementary school, to talk, bust one another's balls, and goof off, away from the watchful eyes of our parents. We would also occasionally mess with "Security", the men and vehicles sent over by NPGS during the night to patrol and keep an eye on the neighborhood. Most of the time, our group and Security coexisted in a sort of sullen, "see no evil" detente - they would drive by the courts, while we would either ignore them or silently give them the 'hairy eyeball'. But on other occasions, we would hide out in some leafy, secluded spot within La Mesa and wait for the truck to go by, so we could bombard the vehicle with pine cones and ice plants and wait for the satisfying sound of those projectiles striking metal before melting deeper into the woods when the officers stopped and attempted to give chase. No, we weren't delinquents or troublemakers, per se - just bored kids looking to have some fun and gin up a little excitement in a fairly isolated corner of the city (years later, I learned that the Security officers, similarly bored with their duties, actually enjoyed and looked forward to the cat-and-mouse antics and chases from that time as much as we did).
Half of the La Mesa crew (including myself) would be attending Monterey High School in the fall; the other half would be going to Walter Colton Middle School, both schools located downtown. My junior-high aged brother would get to be closer to and better friends with that latter group than I was... although everyone was pretty familiar with one another through our summertime hangout sessions. We played football together on some weekends, made treks down the narrow (and in hindsight, extremely sketchy and secluded) forest path from La Mesa to Del Monte Mall to eat pizza and play video games at Round Table Pizza, and occasionally on weekends some of us hopped on the Monterey Peninsula Transit (MPT) bus (the region had a superb public transportation system, that stopped almost right at our front door) to places like Carmel and Cannery Row (both of which had yet to be befouled/spoiled by the tourist traps that now proliferate at those locations). Suffice to say, we were a pretty tight-knit group.
I mentioned in a previous post long ago how UNimpressed I was with California early in our stay there; I was the proverbial 'fish out of water', East Coast guy living on the West Coast for the first time and initially not quite getting into the swing and flow of things there, especially in high school. It was the presence of music that brought me around to this area, starting off with my encounter with a B-52's fan early in the school term. As the year progressed, I was exposed to a ton of great 'new' bands there, that I doubtfully would have ever come across at my old Massachusetts high school, or if I had, would have been ostracized for, for being one of the 'weird' kids. In addition to my B-52's story (linked above), I also came across The Residents for the first time while there. The year I moved to Monterey was the year Australasian bands broke big in the States, led by Split Enz with their hits "I Got You" and "I Hope I Never" (the band played both songs on the ABC network late-night show Fridays that October) and followed by Men At Work ("Who Can It Be Now" was released in the spring of 1981, then their massive hit "Down Under" coming out later that year, finally topping the US charts almost a year later).
At Monterey High in 1980-81, there were two big bands that the kids there were buzzing about. The first was The Medflys, a local Santa Cruz/Monterey ska/New Wave band They were one of the most popular draws in the early and mid-”80s at
clubs and festivals from Monterey and Santa Cruz to San Francisco, and were regularly named “Best Local Band” by area radio stations and news publications during its heyday. The band”s sound was a combination of the New Wave rock that was popular
at the time, mixed with fast-paced ska music, even a little ”80s pop.
They were known for their theatrical, energized live shows, especially
the acrobatic and charismatic front man Christ, who possessed surfer boy
good looks and boundless energy. Their early Eighties hits included "Compulsive", "Belfast" and "State Of Mind", and later in the decade, they scored notoriety with a novelty song commemorating Clint Eastwood's successful campaign for Mayor of Carmel, "Don't Mess With The Mayor":
In their time, the Medflys went on tour with some major headlining acts, including Joan Jett, fellow locals Huey Lewis & The News and Greg Kihn, but especially The Tubes, who they formed a lasting bond with.
The other band getting a lot of local attention in those years was one I first heard about from some girls who sat next to me in Mr. Clark's science class during my first weeks in school. I noticed early on that their class folders were covered with stickers for Mr. Zog's Sex Wax, a popular brand of surfwax used to aid traction and grip on surfboards. Of course, I had no idea at the time what this product was; with the innuendo-laden line "The Best For Your Stick", it seemed to me to be a fairly risque image to display. One day, I finally worked up the nerve to ask them about it, and was rewarded with a crash course on local surf culture - the lifestyle, the equipment, the best spots up and down the Central Coast, and the music, especially that provided by their latest fave band, The Surf Punks, from Malibu.
Friends Drew Steele and Dennis Dragon formed The Surf Punks in 1976. While both of them were dedicated surfers and adopted a bohemian "surf'' attitude, their backgrounds were strictly upper class and grounded in big-time show business: Steele's stepfather was Gavin MacLeod of Mary Tyler Moore Show and Love Boat fame; Dragon was the son of popular symphony conductor Carmen Dragon and the younger brother of Daryl Dragon, the "Captain" in the hugely popular pop duo The Captain & Tennille.
The pair recruited a couple of friends and fellow surfers to join the band, including lead guitarist John Heussenstamm, Tony Creed on second guitar and harmonica, and bassist John Hunt, and began practicing in Dragon's garage studio across the street from Zuma Beach in Malibu, one of Southern California's most popular surf spots. The Surf Punks weren't really "punk", per se - most of their songs were various amalgamations of New Wave, surf rock, comedy rock and pop, with lyrics centered primarily on the in-group/out-group
experiences of "locals" (surfers living on the beach in Malibu) and
"valleys" (commuters from the San Fernando Valley to the private and public beaches of the exclusive Malibu Beach community). The band has been described more than once as "The Beach Boys of the punk world", an assessment that wasn't totally inaccurate.
Their wild shows, at places like the legendary Starwood in Hollywood and
a notorious show in Ventura, were a big draw in the area in the late
1970s, and generated enough attention in the group for a local producer to finance a single, "My Beach/Go Home" b/w "My Wave", released in Australia in late 1977. The Surf Punks' first self-titled album, an independent release on their own Day-Glo Records label, came out two years later, and cuts from this disc began receiving heavy play on L.A.'s influential alternative rock station KROQ-FM. This wider exposure led to the band booking more lucrative local gigs. And it also caught the interest of industry giant Epic Records, who picked up the group on a one-off contract; their debut album (renamed My Beach) was rereleased on the label in mid-1980. The record was fairly popular in certain quarters (mainly coastal California, Hawaii, Australia and other semi-heavy surf communities), but wasn't a national breakout hit and did nothing chart-wise. I used to hear it all over the Monterey Bay area during that time, though, and although I wasn't (and still am not) much of a beach bum, I enjoyed the music immensely. It was stuff like The Surf Punks that really got me settled into life in California, and I began enjoying the area, the school and my neighborhood more and more.
Looking back, probably the nucleus of the La Mesa group, the center it all revolved around, were the two Mikes (Mike C. and Mike F.) along with Martin. The three of them lived only a couple of houses away from one another in the upper part of La Mesa Village, and as such they were the closest of buddies, with the same skewed senses of humor and penchants for mischief and danger. A once-legendary story that emerged from that time was the night in late 1980 the three took Martin's brother's car for a joy ride. His brother Carl really wasn't part of the overall group, although everyone liked him just the same; he was sort of quiet and kept to himself and his interests, which included the restoration of a vintage vehicle from the 1940s that he had acquired. This car was a thing of beauty - a huge retro body painted metallic blue with flecks of glitter in it, sporting chromium wheels and a sooped-up engine. Carl would drive that thing around town and instantly stop traffic and draw stares wherever he was. Prospective purchasers were drooling for that auto to be put on the market... but Martin was to have first dibs on it, going 50/50 on the purchase with his father. The car wasn't in Martin's possession just yet, though - so I have no idea how he got hold of the keys...
Anyway, with Martin behind the wheel and the two Mikes riding shotgun, these guys decided to go for a spin down Aguajito Road and up the winding mountain road to nearby Jacks Peak Park. On the way back down, legend has it that Martin decided that would be a good time to open the car up and see what it could REALLY do... As they picked up speed, he reportedly crowed "I'M GOING TO BREAK THE LAND SPEED RECORD!!!" - just before he missed a turn and ran the vintage car into a ditch. Fortunately, none of the three were hurt, but the car was a total wreck. When Martin's dad found out what happened, he rejoined "Well, I was going to go 'halfs' with you on this - but guess what? You just bought the WHOLE car!"
The NPGS authorities finally got tired of residents' complaints of "rowdy teens" and decided to address the issue by opening up a "Teen Center" in the middle of the neighborhood. I was one of those annoying "student leader" types back then, so I was asked to be on the planning and advisory board for the facility, in an unused building up there. In the bylaws I helped set up, it was decided that the kids themselves would run the place, with minimal adult supervision. So we elected officers (I was the first vice-president), stocked the place with vending machines, a pool table, pinball machines and video games, and threw the doors open that winter. The Teen Club was a resounding success from the get-go - every night, 40-50+ kids would pile into the place. We held parties and dances there as well (all the guys angling to dance the longest song (always "Stairway To Heaven") with Stephanie, the prettiest girl in La Mesa).
I graduated from high school and left Monterey after one year, but my family stayed on, as well as Martin, Freeman, and most of the old group. During my first few months away, I made an effort to acquire a copy of My Beach, to remind me of the place I had grown to be fond of. The Teen Club still ran strong in my absence, and apparently continued long after all of us had left the area (Years later, I returned to Monterey as a Navy officer myself. On a whim, I drove up to La Mesa to look around, and was happily surprised to find the Teen Club still in operation. When I told the administrator there who I was and how the place came to be, she reached up on a back shelf and pulled down an ancient photo album, that included photos from that first year of existence!).
As it happens in military housing communities, the old, familiar groups tend to gradually dissipate, whittled down by graduations and family transfers. By 1984, everyone who had been part of that close-knit La Mesa circle had moved away. However, I stayed in touch with many of the folks from that period, and watched as their lives progressed. Pete ended up remaining in the Monterey area and became a paramedic; Jill became a French teacher; Martin moved down to San Diego and worked as a teacher and high school football coach; Joel also attended Annapolis and became a Navy officer; Mike F. - the wildest of us all - ended up joining the U.S. Border Patrol, and to his credit has advanced within it to high levels of responsibility. I haven't laid eyes on most of them in years, but we all still regard one another as friends - that's how it is when you're a "Navy brat".
Several decades have passed since those days... yet I still think back fondly on that time and the people that I knew. While New Zealand will always be the best place I've ever lived, Monterey ranks a close second, and is the best place in the States I've resided, hands down.
In March of this year, Martin posted a message on his Facebook page, stating that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. While it was concerning, those of us who knew him weren't overly worried, as he had worked through some other serious health issues in the past, and seemed ready to lick this thing as well.
Alas, it was not to be - Martin died last week, at the age of 55.
It seems odd and strange that someone who was an integral part of that period is now no longer with us. Because in some ways, those times in Monterey seem like yesterday, and therefore I'm still in my youth. I still listen to my old Surf Punks albums from time to time (after My Beach, they released (to steadily worsening reviews and sales) Locals Only on Day-Glo Records in 1982, and their final label release Oh No! Not Them Again! on Enigma Records in 1988 - and yes, I own them all), and they still conjure up that fine teenage period of life for me. But with Martin's passing, the first of the group that I know of to die, it brings home the fact that those times WERE long ago, that I'm not as young as I'd like to think, and the clock is ticking - ticking for us all.
Gonna miss you, Martin, man - you made it to the top of the mountain and back this time.
In honor and in memory of my time in La Mesa, and for my old friend Martin, here's The Surf Punks' My Beach, released on Epic Records in June 1980. Enjoy, and as always, let me know what you think.
Please use the email link below to contact me, and I will reply with the download link(s) ASAP:
Saying "Thanks" for the music you receive from here costs you absolutely nothing, and yet is worth quite a bit to me… If you can't bother leaving a comment on this blog for the first album/set we send you, don't bother making a request For a second album…
