Dreamtime reader/listener Bill recently sent an email with a couple of closing credit questions, reaching all the way back to the Rocktober Classic Rock episode of Season 2. Bill writes:
In your recent excellent piece on frequently asked questions, I was excited to learn that the background music for most of the credits portion of the program is "Top Hat (Underscore). " I am not certain who the musicians are for this acoustic version. Any idea?
Further, the background during the credits changes for the Classic Rock show and "Pierre Mancini" near the end of the "thanks to" portion gives "super thanks to" (sounds to me like) "Val McCowan (sp?)". Do you have any knowledge about who that might be or what the name is precisely? Or info on the music itself?
To date I haven't been able to find a source crediting the musicians playing that jazzy variant of "Top Cat." According to various interviews, Hoyt Curtin (the composer of "Top Cat," as well as literally hundreds of other cartoon scores) tried to use the same session musicians as much as possible, so the pianist on "Underscore" may be Curtin's long-time pianist, Jack Cookerly. Either Alvin Stoller or Frankie Capp may be playing drums. I can't find any info on who might have been on bass.
The answer to the question may be in the booklet included with the Hanna-Barbera's Pic-a-Nic Basket of Cartoon Classics collection, another out-of-print CD compilation that also includes "Top Cat (Underscore)". While I don't own that set, I've read reviews that indicate its liner notes have details on the musicians who played the pieces.
The closing credits for Season 2's Classic Rock episode are out of the TTRH norm in at least two respects. Instead of the usual jazz piano "Top Cat," we have a thumping fuzz guitar version of that piece. And during his acknowledgments, Pierre Mancini - who sounds as if he's phoning in through Skype - notes, "super-special thanks to Val 'McCowan.' That's him you hear groovin' in the background."
I had tried researching the mysterious Mr. "McCowan" and variants of his name, guessing that he was a musician friend of Eddie G.'s, if indeed that was him groovin' in the background. I was right about that, although wrong about the spelling of his name. Listen carefully and you'll hear that what our friend Pierre is actually saying is Val McCallum. McCallum is an L.A.-based guitarist who has worked with a variety of artists including Natalie Merchant, Peter Gabriel, Seal, Sheryl Crow, Joan Osborne and Tim McGraw. That info is from The Wallflowers web site - McCallum has provided guitar work on various Wallflower tracks - which gives us our connection to Mr. D. McCallum is also a regular player in Vonda Shepard's band (whose music was regularly featured on the Ally McBeal sitcom), which gives us yet another connection to Eddie G.
In 1999, McCallum joined up with Davey Faragher and former Attraction Pete Thomas to form the publicity-killing band, "Jack Shit". Just to digress for a moment, you have to kind of admire a trio that would take that name. You're not going to get too many reviews of either gigs or albums with a name like "Jack Shit." Nevertheless, the band has released two albums, the first self-titled, with the members no doubt giggling to themselves thinking of fans walking into a store and forced to ask, "Do you have Jack Shit"?
Wanda Jackson, "an atomic fireball of a lady,” as Mr. D has noted on TTRH, is one step closer to entering the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. From The Oklahoman web site , which has one of the more detailed articles on Jackson's nomination...
"I've been there once before, a few years ago, but I think maybe this is the year. Who knows,” Jackson said in a phone interview from her Oklahoma City home...
...For the past few years, Wendell Goodman, Jackson's manager and husband of almost 47 years, has spearheaded a campaign to get her into the rock hall. She also credited her fans for supporting her and sending letters on her behalf.
"They all were in a rage about the fact that I was the first one (woman) to record rock ‘n' roll ... and they had just totally overlooked me all these years,” she said.
Elvis Costello, who was inducted in 2003, wrote a stinging letter to the rock hall a few years ago, saying that Jackson's absence "risks ridicule and having the appearance of being a little boy's club.”...
Dreamtime favorite Kimo Watanabe and his take on the Bob Marley classic. If you haven't heard it, check out Kimo's spooky version of All Along the Watchtower that we featured on Episode 22 of the Dreamtime podcast.
The internet is a weird thing, allowing you to develop friendships - sometimes very close friendships - with people you never meet in person. Sometimes all you know of them is a nickname and an avatar and what they write.
Back in 2006, when I started up Dreamtime, the blog started receiving a lot of hits from another blog where a group of Theme Time Radio Hour enthusiasts had gathered and essentially taken over a comment thread there. One of the most enthusiastic of those enthusiasts was a person going by the on-line handle of "Picasso from Belgium," whose name I later discovered was Pierre Ponette, and who was indeed from Belgium. Picasso wasn't a native English speaker or writer and sometimes his posts were a bit hard to interpret, but his love for the music played on Theme Time came through loud and clear.
As time passed, Picasso and I both settled into the Theme Time Radio Hour forum at Expecting Rain. We'd occasionally pass emails back and forth, but usually communicated through posts on that forum, sometimes answering the other's question on a piece of TTRH trivia, sometimes just saying "Hello" or acknowledging an interesting post.
Picasso spent much of his energies in the Forum cataloging the music played on TTRH, defining each piece by its year of release, and often nailing down exactly what version had been played. That's trivial I know to the average Bear, but interesting to those of us who love music. Picasso was instrumental in creating the listings used for the TTRH CD artwork that many fans have downloaded.
In 2007, Picasso had a personal loss which he felt deeply, and his postings decreased. Yet, after a several month absence, he returned to the Forum and completed a complete playlist for the second season of Theme Time. He was obviously looking forward to Season 3, his last posting on the site was in August - a placeholder topic that he was ready to fill with the Season 3 playlists. "Inch'Allah, available here as from 10SEP08..." he wrote.
But that topic will remain empty. His daughter wrote to Expecting Rain...
It is with deepest sorrow that I announce the death of my dad, Pierre Ponette. He passed away Wednesday, September 3 in his sleep, following a cerebral aneurysm. His funeral will take place this Saturday September 13, at the church Saint-Martin de Frasnes-Lez-Buissenal at 11 a.m.
Sometimes you develop friendships with people you never meet in person. Sometimes all you know of them is a nickname and an avatar, and what they write. But maybe in the end it's what they write that is the most important thing.
Picasso from Belgium - Pierre Ponette. He was a good friend who I never met, and I will miss him.
UPDATE: I've amended the countdown clock to reflect a new placeholder date of October 1st, following my original instinct as noted below. You may have to refresh the page to see the updated countdown. Right or wrong? We'll have to wait and see. ~ fhb
***
We're getting lots of email and site hits from people looking for the start date of TTRH Season 3, but the Dreamtime team is as clueless - probably more so - as any one of the hoi polloi. I'm resisting re-setting the placeholder date on our countdown clock until at least tomorrow although I suspect a start date of September 10th is now unlikely. In any case, I want to hear if anything is said on either Deep Tracks on the XMX all-day re-run tomorrow. Since a lot of people tend to take what they see on the Web as gospel, let me re-state what the copy under the timer already says: it's a placeholder date only until I know the real one. Dreamtime has no insider information (Note to Eddie G.: Insider info would be most welcome).
If you go by Season 2, XM announced the start of that Season, which began September 19th, two weeks earlier in a September 6th press release. Actually, the news was broken one day earlier than the press release in a USA Today article dated September 5, 2007. (Writer Edna Gundersen seems to have a special relationship with the Dylan camp).Going by that history, we may see an announcement later this week for September 17th. Maybe. But I'm also starting to think that my original guess that the Season might not start until October 1st - or almost six months to the day after the end of Season 2 - may have been correct, giving the TTRH team a "six-months-on-the-air six-months-off" schedule.
I'm still resisting the various theories brought up by several of my correspondents that the Sirius/XM merger or Dylan's touring schedule or his announced work on Chronicles Volume 2, may be the root cause and there may be a delayed Season 3 or even no Season 3 at all. No evidence for it, and no evidence ag'in it, I'll admit. But I'm still going by my correspondent's note about meeting Eddie G. that yes indeedy there will be a Season 3.
Late Summer is here, and that must mean it's time for last dips in the pool and snipe hunts in the pucka brush. If you're also taking a Labor Day vacay, Curly and Bear hope you have a great one, and they'll see you again real soon in September, as will Your Host and Jailbait Jones.
John Henry, Johnny Appleseed, Hiawatha, Bre'r Rabbit. Davy Crockett. Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox. Stagger Lee. King Washington. Pecos Bill and Widder-maker. Even Uncle Sam. Most of their stories have faded away, the stuff of Disney movies now if remembered at all.
But there's one American legend that's still alive and well in 2000 and 8, his story still told in bars and barracks, pool-halls and whore-houses. His song sung every day by both white boys and black.
Jody. Even if you don't know who he is, you know he's trouble. While you somehow got your sorry ass into the Army, Jody was smart enough to stay home. And now he's sniffin' around your girl.
You can't call her, because Jody's always seems to be on your damn telephone. Your telephone, racking up phone bills to God knows where-all. You get a picture from home in the mail, and that's nice, but wait a second. Who the hell is that leaning up against your Cadillac, your Cadillac, the one that's supposed to be in your garage until you get back?
That would be Jody, and you read, "oh, honey, Jody says it isn't good for a car to be sittin' that long. He says he's keeping it nice and greased up for you."
Yeah, and what the hell else is he keeping nice and greased up?
Jody. Smart-lookin', fast-talkin'. Jody's got your girl.
Jody has had many names, and I suspect that if you traced him back far enough, some of those names would be Trickster, Coyote, and Anansi. But in black oral folklore and music we first hear of him as "Joe the Grinder," grinding being a euphemism for, ah, the sexual act. As time passed, "Joe the" turned into "Joe de" or "Joe D." until the two words eventually merged into "Jody." The "Grinder" part and Jody's last name were more or less dropped from the legend, although in at least one song he's known as "Jody Ryder."
The first known recording of a "Jody song" - more appropriately labeled as a "levee holler" by Alan Lomax - was sung in 19 and 39 by one Irvin "Gar Mouth" Lowry, a prisoner at the State Farm in Arkansas. Until he moved to preying on soldier's wives and girlfriends, Joe the Grinder seemed to have spent a good portion of his time chasing after the women of jailed men. It makes sense. Both soldiers and prisoners have a lot in common - a lack of women, your life dictated by powers outside of your control, and no way to get home... at least legally.
Jodie Man
Here's a Theme Time and Dreamtime favorite, Louis Armstrong, doing a song about "Jodie Man." Jodie Man sounds like it's going to be a straight instrumental, but hang in there, and I promise you'll hear some interesting lyrics about our friend Jody.
From 19 and 45, Louis Armstrong and Jodie Man.
During World War II, Jody's legend migrated off the work farm and into the Army, where he became the title character in cadence marching songs, such as the one we heard at the beginning of the show. Jody was almost certainly first introduced into the Army by African-American soldiers, and then had his story picked up by the general service population when the military desegregated.
Woody Guthrie in "Born to Win", says, "The best of marching I saw in my eight months in the army was to the folk words of a folky chant tune that went: "Ain't no use in writin' home/Some joker got your gal an' gone." Woody - probably not the best of soldiers - may have misheard "joker" for "Jody," or the lyrics may have evolved into this variant, but it's definitely another "Jody" call.
In fact, the Jody story became so ingrained in Army lore that by the time I was drafted in the early `70s, all Army cadences were known as "Jodies," as they still are to this very day. And just like Woody, one of the few good memories I have of my time in the Service is marching to a drill Sergeant's rhythmic imperative that I might as well settle down and enjoy Army life, because there was nothing left for me at home - girl, job, and car all taken by Jody.
"Ain't no use in feelin' blue. Jody's got your sister too."
"You're Right!" "You're Right!" we all sang back to the drill instructor.
Uncle Sam Blues
You remember King Records and its eccentric owner, Syd Nathan. Mr. D. likes to play Syd Nathan's recorded rants to his salespeople in-between cuts on Theme Time Radio Hour.
Well, after Syd Nathan, the main man at King was Alphonse Thompson, better known to one and all as Sonny. If you dealt with King as a musician, you were dealing with Sonny Thompson. He was the guy who set up your recording session, booked the musicians, arranged the tunes, even occasionally wrote one, and now and then sat in on a session himself at the piano.
Sonny's recordings aren't easy to find, but well worth the search. Recorded in 19 and 51 on the King label, here's a story about a worried soldier heading for Korea asking Uncle Sam to find something for Jody to do - like dodging bullets - to keep him away from his girl. Sonny Thompson is on the piano, Jesse Edwards is doing the vocals.
Uncle Sam Blues.
3. [Uncle Sam Blues - Sonny Thompson, 1951]
Joe the Grinder
While Jody was torturing serviceman his counterpart, Joe the Grinder, was still alive and well back in the civilian world.
In 19 and 52, Dave Bartholomew was a talent scout for Imperial Records, a New Orleans label. Bartholomew was the person who had brought Fats Domino to Imperial, and he was looking for another discovery. He found Allen Matthews, who sounded like a clone of ClydeMcPhatter, and paired him up with a gospel group looking to move into R&B, The Humming Four.
After running through a variety of names for the new group, including "Fat Man" Matthews and the 4 Kittens, they settled on the much more manly name of The Hawks, which probably better suited the raunchy song they released on the Imperial label in 19 and 54, Joe the Grinder.
4. [Joe the Grinder - The Hawks, 1954]
The Hawks even have a TTRH connection. You may remember Mr. D. talking about "Morgus the Magnificent" way back in the 2006 Halloween episode. Morgus was a New Orleans TV personality who aired old horror movies, kind of a male version of Elvira. Morgus decided to do a cover of a popular novelty single called Flying Saucer and hired The Hawks to provide backing vocals. The group, which had never made much of a stir outside of New Orleans, signed on and that was their last single, as The Outer Spacemen, gamely providing back-up to a guy dressed in a monster costume.
Like their music, black and country legends are closely intertwined, and you'd be as likely to hear mention of Joe the Grinder in an Bakersfield bar as you would on a New Orleans street corner. The Old Man From the Mountain was another one of Merle Haggard's 38 #1 hits, charting in 19 and 74. In The Old Man From the Mountain Merle's warning that Joe the Grinder better be out of his bed by the time he gets back home.
5. [The Old Man From the Mountain - Merle Haggard, 1974]
Merle Haggard's story is so incredible nobody would believe it as a work of fiction. After three stints in jail, Haggard met Lefty Frizzell and decided to try his hand as a musician, eventually building a solid reputation as a local talent in Bakersfield, CA. But Haggard's devil was still riding on his shoulder, and he was arrested for robbing a Bakersfield tavern in 19 and 57 and eventually sentenced to San Quentin for 10 years.
It was in the Big Q that Merle Haggard first saw Johnny Cash and again vowed to turn his life around if he got out alive. In 19 and 60, Merle Haggard was paroled, and though he later said that there were days when he wished he was back in prison, he walked the line and had his first national hit in 19 and 64.
If you're around my age, you probably best remember Merle for the semi-tongue-in-cheek, semi-yahoo Okie from Muskogee, recorded in 1969, when all of us were choosing sides over Vietnam. Whatever your opinion of Merle's politics, it's worth noting that his music has been recorded by artists way on the other side of the political spectrum, including The Grateful Dead and Joan Baez. Good music always transcends politics.
The Jody Golden Age
We're going to be playing a lot of music from the `70s in this episode, and that's because there was something of a Jody Golden Age during that decade, including Johnnie Taylor's monster hit for Stax in 19 and 71, which takes the line from the military cadence as its title. We're going to play two songs back to back: Jody's Got Your Girl and Gone and then an answer song to the Taylor hit, the very funky Jody, Come Back and Get Your Shoes by Bobby Newsome.
6. [Jody's Got Your Girl and Gone Johnnie Taylor, 1971]
7. [Jody, Come Back and Get Your Shoes, Bobby Newsome, 1971]
Jody's Got Your Girl and Gone may hold the all-time record for spawning answer songs. Just to name a few: Jean Knight's Don't Talk About Jody, I Finally Caught Up With Jody by Big Joe Hamilton, Bobby Patterson's Right On, Jody, and Sam and Dave's Jody Ryder Got Killed, which is one of the few songs to name Jody's last name.
This next song is from 19 and 70, so it's too early to be a response to Jody's Got Your Girl and Gone, but You've Been Gone Too Long is still something of an answer song to the eternal question about how Jody got your girl.
8. [You've Been Gone Too Long, Ann Sexton, 1970]
Ann Sexton is a lady you probably haven't heard of unless you were caught up in the great Northern Soul Craze. Not to be confused with the poet, who spelled her first name with an "e," our Ann Sexton recorded a string of soul records for the Nashville-based Seventy-7 label during the `70s.
Like a lot of artists, Ann Sexton never really struck it big, and she retired from music in the late `70s. But after being encouraged by a co-worker, Ann took to the stage again in Europe after a 30-year absence, and now says she intends to keep performing as "long as she's alive." Right on, Ann.
Trackin' Down Jody
Now here's a group and a song and even a label I can't tell you much about. I couldn't even track down its release date. Obviously recorded sometime in the `70s - dig that crazy Theme from Shaft wah-wah guitar - for the tiny Austin, Texas A.C.R. soul label, Trackin' Down Jody sounds like it was meant for a blaxploitation movie that never got made.
9. [Trackin' Down Jody - Darker Shades Ltd., 197?]
As far as I can tell, it's the only cut that Darker Shades Ltd. ever recorded, and may be the only record that the A.C.R. label ever released.
You may have thought that the music cut off a little bit abruptly, and you'd be right to think so. Trackin' Down Jody was too long to fit on one side of a 45, and was released as Parts 1 and 2 on the A and B sides. Unfortunately, Part 2, which I'll betcha was one long funk groove, seems to be lost in the mists of history. But we still have Part 1 of Trackin' Down Jody, and you just heard it.
We went all the way back to 19 and 53 for Run, Jody Run, cut by Jimmy Coe and His Gay Cats of Rhythm for the States label. Jimmy wasn't quite sure who Jody was, telling an interviewer, "Jody's like an Army guy who's hanging out at the girl's house and he has to run," but he still played a mean saxophone.
Jimmy Coe liked to tell the story that the first time he ever soloed on the alto sax, Charlie Parker was in the audience. After the set, Jimmy introduced himself to Parker and asked him what he thought about his number. "Sorry," Parker said. "I fell asleep and missed it."
While Jody was busy dodging the draft in the good ol' U.S. of A., Joe the Grinder's itchy feet had him taken him down Jamaica way, where he shortened his name to "Joe Grind" and became a well-known figure in the shanty towns and dance halls. Here's a band called The Aggrolites, who have been a backing band for both reggae superstar Derrick Morgan, and for Prince Buster, and who released their debut album in 2003. From that album, Dirty Reggae, here's Joe Grind.
11. [Joe Grind - The Aggrolites]
Jody Man and Finis
If you can remember that far back, we started our Jody episode with Louis Armstrong's Jodie Man, and we're closing out tonight's show with another Jody Man that Slim Harpo recorded for the Excello label.
Slim's not all that well-remembered these days, but if you're a fan of The Rolling Stones, The Yardbirds, Pink Floyd, The Doors, or Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, the chances are you've heard of Slim Harpo. Slim passed in 1970, a few days after his 46th birthday. Jody Man was released by Excello a year after his death in 19 and 71.
12. [Jody Man - Slim Harpo]
Given the state of the world today, the chances are good - or bad, I guess, that Jody songs will still be sung far into our future.
As far as I can tell, it hasn't happened yet, but given the increasing role of women in the military, it's probably only matter of time until we'll hear the lament on some foot-track, or on some off-base juke-box...
Jodie's Got Your Guy and Gone
It kinda makes you wonder whether Jody picked that name on purpose.
Sources: Outside of the links noted above, I commend your attention to WFMU's Beware of the Blog, where you can find much of the music I played in this episode. Soul Trivia and the Soul Detroit Forum also provided valuable information.
Thanks for listening to the Dreamtime podcast. Show notes, sources, and tonight's script can be found on the Dreamtime blog, dreamtimepodcast.com.
Some house-keeping to take care of before we wind up. We wanted to pass on our congratulations to Kevin R., the Dreamtime winner of the tickets to the New American Music Festival. Kevin wrote up a great trip report for us, and you can find that on the Dreamtime blog, too.
If you haven't heard the news, Dreamtime is now airing on Wednesdays on Tangled Up in Bob, at dylanradio.com. It's a great way to catch up on our old shows. Go check out the site at dylanradio.com, all Bob Dylan, all the time. I think you'll like what you hear.
Thanks to everyone for your emails and comments on the past few shows. Much appreciated. Jailbait, Curly, Bear and I all want to pass on our thanks to everyone who's used Dreamtime as their starting point for their Amazon purchases. It's much appreciated by all of us. If you're heading back to school, or know someone who is, and are planning on buying your school books or supplies through Amazon, please start your shopping through Dreamtime.
And finally, the Dreamtime team is on its semi-annual late Summer vacay for the next couple of weeks, and I suspect when we get back Mr. D. will have announced the return of Theme Time Radio Hour too. Hope you're looking forward to Season 3 as much as we are, and we'll be back with another Dreamtime real soon.
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You've been listening to the Dreamtime podcast – occasional commentary on Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour. Dreamtime is researched and written by Fred Bals and is a Not Associated With production. As the name says, we're not associated with XM Radio, Bob Dylan, or much of anything else.
Some of the music on Dreamtime is provided via the Podsafe Music Network. Check it out at music.podshow.com.
Remember that the Dreamtime team loves to get email. You can write us at dreamtimepodcast@gmail.com
The Dreamtime top cats are Curly Lasagna and Shaggy Bear. Our announcers are the notorious honky-tonkin' sisters, Jailbait and Joyride.
The winner of our New American Music Festival giveaway, Kevin R., was kind enough to send us a trip and concert report, and even a few pix of Mr. D., who closed out the show on August 9th. Thanks, Kevin!
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Kevin here, the winner of Dreamtime's NAMU Festival tickets giveaway.
Have to say we had a spectacular weekend in Pittsburgh. The weather was gorgeous and comfortable (a rarity for August), and the Festival itself was pretty well put together. This festival was put together by American Eagle, and as they were the main sponsor, your tickets for the show also came with a supplementary ticket redeemable for a Festival t-shirt and water bottle. On the grounds of the main concert area, near the gates, there were water coolers that you could fill up your bottle at throughout the event. This sort of foresight -- aiding the concertgoer instead of gouging them for necessities -- was much appreciated by this concertgoer, and it's a practice that should be considered by any major music festival.
This was a 2-day concert with two stages chockful of bands ranging from groups we hadn't heard of (French Horn Rebellion, The Depreciation Guild) to bigger acts like Gnarls Barkley, Spoon, The Raconteurs, and Bob Dylan and His Band. The concert site was Pittsburgh's South Side Works, which happens to be where American Eagle's headquarters are located.
Late in the program on Saturday, August 9th, festival curator Anthony Kiedis spoke briefly to the crowd about getting to pick what he referred to as his dream lineup. This seemed like it was going to be a big deal in Pittsburgh - such a wide range of acts under one banner hadn't been seen here since the touring days of Lollapalooza. As an ex-Burgher myself, I was a bit dubious about this festival's ability to carry it off at said location, which really isn't a concert venue but more a public square type of place. That being said, I was wholly impressed at the Festival's organization and facilities, and would definitely attend a future version of this event.
Mr. D arrived onstage after 9pm on Saturday night, the Festival's second day, to close it all down. We knew he had to be done around 11pm, as it seemed there were curfews negotiated with the South Side's residents and businesses.
The band came, and they came to play - most of the crowd were ecstatic as they recognized the opening number, "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35". Bob stood at his keyboard the whole set, and the band were tight as always. Having seen a few dates of the Never-Ending Tour in the last decade, it once again was tremendous fun playing "name that tune" with our friends as each number started up in an unfamiliar fashion. Personal highlight for me was "Summer Days," as it was a glorious one that night, and it happened to be my birthday to boot. While this wasn't a full-length set, the band did leave the stage after closing with "Ballad of a Thin Man." The time had ticked slightly past 11 at this point, and the stage lights went down.
Stage lighting came back up as the band reassembled. Then that CRACK of the snare that the world recognizes as the start of "Like A Rolling Stone" burst forth as Bob's giant logo banner fluttered down from the rafters. The audience members hoping against hope for an encore got one of the best songs of the night. All told, the band was hot and Mr. D's voice was a little bit croaky this evening... but the entire experience made for a fantastic night.
Thanks very much to Dreamtime and the New American Music Union for making this weekend possible. For more info and Festival highlights, check out the videos at the NAMU site: http://www.ae.com/web/77e/music/festival/index.jsp
You can hear Don Helms' trademark steel guitar on Patsy Cline's Walking After Midnight, Stonewall Jackson’s Waterloo, the Louvin Brothers’ Cash on the Barrelhead, Lefty Frizzell’s Long Black Veil and Loretta Lynn’s Blue Kentucky Girl, pretty much a Theme Time Radio Hour roll call.
And of course, as one of the Driftin' Cowboys, Helms was featured on over 100 Hank Williams recordings, including 10 of the 11 Hank Williams #1 hits. Helms played with Williams on his last recording session in late 19 and 52, a session that eventually produced Kaw-Liga, Take These Chains From My Heart, and Your Cheatin’ Heart.
Helms was the last of the Driftin' Cowboys, and was working up until his death. In fact, according to his obituary in the New York Times, at the time of his death Helms was working with Vince Gill onan album of uncompleted Hank Williams songs. Emphasis mine, as I suspect that this is theso-called "Briefcase Songs" album that we discussed back in Episode 48 - That Fateful Day: The Lost Songs of Hank Williams. and adds Vince Gill to the roster of artists thought to be on that album, including Norah Jones, Jack White, Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan.
The full NY Times obituary on Helms can be found here and is well worth the read. Our title is taken from the phrase Helms used in concert to introduce a medley of Hank Williams' tunes... "Now, close your eyes and think of Hank."
I keep on meaning to do a Dreamtime on Pandora, the "internet radio station," that is much, much more than an internet radio station, but if I'm going to do a show featuring Pandora, it looks like I better move fast.
Why is a company that has a listening audience of 1 million a day, attracts an average 40,000 new listeners a day, and has one of the most popular iPhone applications available in the iTunes store on the brink of shutting its doors?
Thank SoundExchange, brought to you by those wonderful people at the RIAA, who are nominally charged with collecting royalties on behalf of the artists for all work broadcast over the internet or satellite radio. I say "nominally," as many artists say they've never seen a dime from the millions that SoundExchange has reportedly collected, and many artists don't want SoundExchange doing anything on their behalf. But SoundExchange trucks on nonetheless.
Consider this: Unlike what you might have thought, traditional over-the-airwaves radio stations pay not a dime for the music they play, although SoundExchange is trying to change that too.
Satellite radio such as the newly renamed Sirius XM Radio pays around a royalty rate of 1.6 cents per hour per listener - at that rate, XM pays around $38,000 in royalties for each TTRH aired. That's an estimate, based on published reports that TTRH has a listening audience of around 2 million. The actual royalty figure is probably lower, as I doubt whether anyone is still collecting royalties on some of the music TTRH plays. In any case, the same music played on Pandora for an hour will cost the company almost double the satellite radio rate - an estimated 2.9 cents per hour per listener. Pandora estimates that rate will cost them over $17 million a year, or about 70 percent of their annual revenues. Which is way too much to pay out for the start-up to survive.
Although not coming right out and saying it, Pandora CEO Tim Westergren is hinting that the time may be at at hand where Pandora literally pulls the plug, and shuts down. And that would be a shame. While Pandora isn't perfect by any means, I've been a fan since its launch and recently fell in love with it again thanks to its new mini-application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.
Pandora, for those of you who don't know it, allows listeners to create their own "radio stations" which you can listen to through your computer, or now through an iPhone, and if you have a docking station for your iPhone, through your stereo or media center. One of Pandora's quirks - again due to music licensing restrictions - is that you can't build a specific playlist or request a particular piece of music. You give Pandora an artist like Bob Dylan, or a song like Mississippi, and it goes out and creates a playlist based on music similar to your selections. Eventually you'll probably even get Dylan's version of Mississippi, but Pandora's strength - as well as its weakness - is through offering songs and artists that have something in common with your requests. It's a great way of discovering music you've never heard before.
As I said, Pandora is not perfect, and can be quite quirky in its music offerings. I've always had this suspicion that the algorithm occasionally tosses in something that you'll almost certainly hate, just to ensure that you're paying attention.. However, if Pandora coughs up a particular piece of music that you really dislike, you have the option - within limits - to get it off your playlists.
Over the last couple of years, I've been building various Theme Time playlists in Pandora, using the artists and music from shows stretching all the way from Weather to Cold as my templates. An example of the results can be heard by clicking on the image above.
Some of the music on my TTRH stations is pretty good, if not quite as good as what Our Host might pick. And some of the music is exceedingly strange, such as my Mother station, as one might expect from a playlist that includes stuff from LL Cool J, the Rolling Stones, Merle Haggard, and Ruth Brown. The Drinking one is pretty weird too.
As Michael Arrington notes in his TechCrunch article, what entities such as the RIAA, SoundExchange, and the record labels don't seem to get is, "Recorded music is nothing but marketing material to drive awareness of an artist" Period. The end.
Pandora and other internet radio entities, satellite radio, traditional radio all should be considered valuable marketing and advertising tools, not another revenue stream to try to shore up the music industry's failing business model. In fact, I think a strong case could be made that the various record labels should be paying Pandora, et al for promoting their music. And yes, I know what I'm talking about is payola, but you know what, that's not necessarily a bad thing. What's wrong with a, "this hour of music was presented by Sony, Arista..." NPR-like announcement at the beginning of each hour of Pandora? Good music will still rise to the top. Crappy music will sink. Play enough crap and you'll be out of business, no matter how much payola you're taking.
It's a different sort of Dreamtime this time around. I recently had the opportunity to interview one of my favorite vocalists and interpreter of Bob Dylan songs, Maria Muldaur, and our Episode 57 focuses on Maria's latest release, Yes, We Can!which showcases the work of a variety of songwriters, including Marvin Gaye, Allen Toussaint, Earl King, Garth Brooks, and Bob Dylan himself.
A couple of show notes before we get started. As one of the Moscow Rules states, "Technology will always let you down." I had an equipment melt-down about 10 minutes before I was scheduled to call Maria, and ended up jury-rigging a last-minute Rube Goldberg recording system in order to capture the interview. I was left with the option of either capturing Maria's voice clearly, or my own, and of course decided for the former. You can tell how badly the recording sounded on my end towards the close of the interview. So, in any case, Maria wasn't indulging in a monologue, but was responding to my questions, which I edited out, but which I think you can figure out from the context of her answers.
Maria also notes in the interview that there should be a free download of a song that had to be left off Yes, We Can! on the Telarc site. As of the the time of this podcast's release, which should be around August 12, 2008, the song had not yet been posted on telarc.com. I'll put a post and a link on the Dreamtime blog when the song becomes available.
So, without further ado, here's Maria Muldaur, and a few clips from her latest release, Yes, We Can!
You've been listening to the Dreamtime podcast – occasional commentary on Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour. Dreamtime is researched and written by Fred Bals and is a Not Associated With production. As the name says, we're not associated with XM Radio, Bob Dylan, or much of anything else.
Some of the music on Dreamtime is provided via the Podsafe Music Network. Check it out at music.podshow.com.
I'm getting of the age where hearing the phrase "a musical legend/icon/giant/etc. has passed away" as a network news teaser fills me with dread, wondering who it is this time.
The clip is from the great film, Wattstax, which I heartily commend to your attention. Besides Hayes and the very young Jesse Jackson, there are appearances by the Staple Singers, an equally young Richard Pryor, Rufus Thomas doing an incredible Funky Chicken, Albert King, The Bar-Kays and many more Stax artists. As a musical document you may find the many incomplete sets in Wattstax frustrating. On the other hand, it's probably the best video document of what Watts was like in the early `70s.
I know. I was there, teaching on 101st Street. I didn't make it to Woodstock. But I made it to Wattstax, and spent one of the best days in my life, 36 years ago come this August 20th, one of the few white faces in a sea of black faces, not scared, not even nervous, just boogeyin' to the music along with 10,000 other people.
"While Bob Dylan is off searching for new Dreams, Themes and Schemes – your suggestions are welcome at bobdylan@xmradio.com – XM is playing back some of our favorites from the first two seasons of Dylan's XM Exclusive show in alphabetical order.
It's Theme Time A to Y. Why 'Y'? No 'Z' theme in the catalogue. Yet."
If one is looking for, ahem, tell-tale signs on when TTRH Season 3 will begin, the list of shows may hold a clue. We're currently at "P" - for "President's Day" and "Party" which will play this Wednesday, August 6th. Shows continue to " W" and Y" - "Walking" and "Youth and Age" (one presumes this last is the "Young and Old" show from Season 2) to be broadcast on September 3rd.
So what happens on Wednesday, September 10th, hmmmmm?
As the purchase of XM Satellite Radio by larger rival Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. closed yesterday, questions remained over whether the combined company can handle its $3.4 billion in debt, including $1.1 billion due next year.
Also murky was how quickly the companies can mesh their technologies without angering consumers....
...In the past, the companies have mentioned offering a "best of both" service for $17 a month, compared to the current price for one of the services at $13 a month.
Sirius and XM haven't disclosed which programming the best-of service will include. And there's no guarantee Howard Stern will be available to XM customers or that Sirius customers will see Major League Baseball games, for instance....
The government has approved the long-delayed merger of the nation's only satellite radio companies, combining Sirius and XM into a single entity with 18 million subscribers.
The decision last night came almost a year and a half after the companies first proposed joining. Based on yesterday's closing share prices, the deal is valued at $3.3 billion, not including debt.
...The companies must cap prices for three years after joining and allow consumers to choose the channels they want and pay less for packages of channels. Radios that allow a la carte channel selections will eventually be available for car dashboards -- the largest area of growth. The companies said they would introduce radios that receive both XM and Sirius channels...
WASHINGTON - A majority of commissioners at the Federal Communications Commission have reached a deal to approve Sirius Satellite Radio Inc.'s long-pending purchase of XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc.
The final hold-out, Republican commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, agreed to vote to approve the deal after winning several concessions from the companies involving enforcement issues.
"I think it's fair to say an agreement in principle has been reached," FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said in an interview Thursday morning. "We're still trying to work out the language."
A deal was reached with the companies late Wednesday night to pave the way for Ms. Tate's vote on the merger, Mr. Martin said. Four of the commissioners had already voted on the deal, but they had split 2-2 on whether to approve it.
The two satellite radio companies agreed to enter into a consent decree to resolve complaints they violated FCC rules. Those violations include using excessive power levels on some radio units sold to consumers and erecting several unauthorized towers to boost their satellite signals.
The companies have agreed to pay almost $20 million to settle the complaints, with XM paying about $17.5 million and Sirius paying about $2.2 million.
Ms. Tate is expected to vote on the deal as soon as Thursday. The FCC isn't expected to formally release its decision for a few days, as staff attorneys draft the final paperwork for review by the five commissioners...
...The companies are expected to bring new a la carte radios on the market in the next three months that would provide consumers more choices in which stations they receive from the two services. ...
It's Summertime, the living is easy, and our July Twenty-Ought-Eight show is all about solar rays and happiness, direct from the sun and fun capital of the world, Merrimack, NH.
Summer Days, Summer Nights
Leading us off, a 19 and 67 song in praise of Trans-Love Airways, strobe lights, blue jeans, Harley-Davidsons and warm summer nights in San Francisco. Direct from the Summer of Love, Eric Burdon and the Hippie incarnation of The Animals with San Franciscan Nights.
[San Franciscan Nights - Eric Burdon and The Animals]
As anyone who has spent any time in San Francisco can tell you, "warm" would only be used to describe a San Franciscan night by someone who's never lived there. But hey, it's still a pretty song, and one that could only have been written in the summer of 1967, when all of us wanted to wear flowers in our hair.
This was the second incarnation of the Animals, much more psychedelic than the earlier blues-oriented Animals of the `early 60s, whose big hit was House of the Rising Sun. The New Animals would also have a string of hits during the late `60s, each one getting successively weirder, until culminating with 19 and 68's Sky Pilot, a seven-minute song that included gunfire, bagpipes and dive bombers, and which had to be split over two sides of a 45. Nevertheless, Sky Pilot (Parts 1 and 2) made it to #14 on the charts.
[Jingle]
Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner
There's a movie I watch every summer, on a warm night, all the lights off, just the glow of the tube lighting the room. Now - don't laugh at me - that movie is Dirty Dancing, which is one of my favorite summer movies of all time.
Some movies just get the time and place right on, and Dirty Dancing hits the summer of 19 and 63 and the Borscht Belt world of summer resorts perfectly. Maybe that's no surprise, as screenwriter Eleanor Bergstein, herself called "Baby" as a girl, used the memories of her own childhood to write Dirty Dancing.
You know the plot: Young Jewish girl goes to summer resort, falls for dancer on wrong side of tracks. Hotel workers spend nights gyrating hips. Obnoxious college kid moonlighting as waiter knocks up hired help. Doctor Father confused about who's sleeping with who. Sister sings Wiki-Wacky-Woo. Old Jewish couple revealed as master thieves. Everybody dances at the end.
And nobody puts Baby in a corner.
One of the things that make Dirty Dancing so great is the soundtrack, much of which was based on screenwriter Eleanor Bergstein's personal record collection. That soundtrack includes our next song, Mickey & Sylvia's Love is Strange, a hit from thirty years before the movie was made.
[Love is Strange - Mickey & Sylvia]
Love is Strange was written by Bo Diddley, but was credited to Ethel Smith, who was Bo Diddley's wife at the time, because he was in the middle of a legal battle with his record label over who owned what. "Who owned what?" might be the best phrase to describe Love is Strange and its history, as its distinctive riff was lifted for numerous songs - including the roller skate rink hot hit of 19 and 62, Rinky Dink and 1963's Killer Joe by The Rocky Fellers.
You can make up your own mind how closely either song resembles Love is Strange by checking out the Dreamtime podcast blog (that's right here), where I've posted YouTube videos featuring both songs. For the record, Dave "Baby" Cortez was sued over Rinky Dink's close resemblance to Love is Strange - and lost - while The Rocky Fellers weren't. On the other hand, Mickey & Sylvia might have thought a band named The Rocky Fellers was already punishment enough.
Surf's Up!
Hey! What's that I hear? I think it's time to hit the beach!
[Ho Daddy! - Bob Denver]
I have many guilty pleasures - indeed, Jailbait claims that my life is one big guilty pleasure - and one of those guilty pleasures is my love of surf movies from the `60s. One of the best from that genre that did not have Annette Funicello in it, but did have James Darren, Bob Denver, Tina Louise, Nancy Sinatra and Paul Lynde was 1964's For Those Who Think Young.
A "hodad" or "hodaddy" is surfer slang meaning someone who adopts the surfer look, even to the extent of having a surfboard that he never uses, because he's on the beach to pick up girls, themselves referred to by the surfing crowd as "Betties."
While one story has it that the term "Betty" came from The Flintstones character Betty Rubble (an obvious sexual hysteric who Barney isn't satisfying in bed, according to that great surfing mystery, The Dawn Patrol), "Betty" was being used by surfers to refer to an attractive girl long before the cartoon was a glimmer in Hanna-Barbera's eye. "Betty" is probably derived from Bettie Page, fabulous pin-up and bondage star of the `50s, whose life story is worth a Dreamtime by itself.
Jerry Fielding, who is credited with writing the music for For Those Who Think Young, must have consulted with some real surfers to come up with the authentic lyrics. Besides "hodaddy," you'll hear Denver refer to "hot doggers," "gremmies," (inexperienced surfers), "pearl diving," "the nose," and "going over the falls.
The Man Who Walked on Water
Believe it or not jazz babies, the godfather of California surfing was novelist Jack London, who, while trying to learn to surf in Hawaii saw what London later described as a "brown-skinned god" shoot past him on a surfboard.
That brown-skinned god was one George Freeth, son of an Irish sailor and a Polynesian mother, who would later become the All-Father of California surfing.
The legend goes that Freeth borrowed a surfboard from an uncle, and finding the 16-foot board too unwieldy to carry, chopped it in two. The truncated board was not only easier to carry, Freeth found he was able to surf a helluva lot more easily too, and soon earned a reputation as someone who could do about anything in or on the water.
The impressed London talked up Freeth to anyone who would listen, and Freeth was eventually recruited by Henry Huntington - he of the famous beach - to come to California. Huntington was trying to promote his new pier at Redondo Beach, and crowds started to gather when Freeth - billed as "The Man Who Can Walk on Water" - began swooping through the pier's pilings on his surfboard.
Freeth's exploits were legendary - wrestling sea lions into submission, saving seventy-eight people from drowning, rescuing a capsized Japanese fishing skiff and surfing it to the shore, saving its crew of seven. That last exploit prompted Congress to award Freeth with the Medal of Honor.
Freeth also invented the crawl stroke and the the torpedo-shape life float that lifeguards still use to this day. Freeth started the world's first water polo team and founded the San Diego lifeguard corps. His proteges won both gold and silver medals in the 1912 Olympics. Freeth himself probably would have won a slew of medals, but he lost his amateur status because he took Henry Huntington's money.
Freeth died in 1919, age 35, a victim of the Spanish influenza epidemic that was raging through the world. Today, if you take a stroll on the Redondo Beach boardwalk, you'll find a bust George Freeth, one of the few memories left of the Man Who Walked on Water.
The Case of the Missing Navel
I have this theory that all men of a certain age had the hots for Annette Funicello, as I certainly did, and as I did for another Disney girl, Hayley Mills.
The last of the original Mouseketeers to be cast, Annette also turned out to be the most popular. Even though Annette herself knew she had an unremarkable singing voice, by age 16 she was in the studio, recording 15 albums for Disney, which resulted in a string of pop hits during the `50s and `60s.
In 1963, Annette took to the beach, starring with Frankie Avalon in what was essentially the same movie repeated five times over the next two years, culminating with 19 and 65's Beach Blanket Bingo.
Here's Annette with the theme from the first of those infamous beach movies, Beach Party, from 19 and 63.
[Beach Party - Annette Funicell0]
One of the more enduring - and kind of endearing - urban legends surrounding Annette and the beach movies is that Walt Disney himself gave Annette the go-ahead to do them, but with the caveat never, ever to "show her navel." And thus that is why you never see Annette in a bikini in any of the beach movies, even though nearly every other girl on the beach is fruggin' around in the skimpiest two-pieces allowable by 1960 standards.
However close study - and believe me, I've studied those movies closely - reveals that Annette also reveals in 19 and 64's aptly named Bikini Beach, where her belly button is shown repeatedly to God and everyone else in all its glory.
Annette wrote a charming autobiography several years ago titled, A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes, which I heartily recommend if no other reason that it's one of the few autobiographies I've read where there are no stories of exploitation, abuse, or backstabbing.
If not fully a charmed life, as she now suffers from multiple sclerosis, Annette seems to have had a pretty good one, and one that she's appreciated even through illness. To us, she'll always be our favorite Disney Girl, and we offer her our best wishes from Dreamtime.
Fugue for Tinhorns
Hey, I see that Jailbait has the lobster tails and steaks on the grill, so I think it's time for the turf portion of our show. Here's a song that I can almost guarantee you'll know, but I bet you can't tell me the title.
And nope, it's neither Paul Revere or Can Do.
[Fugue for Tinhorns - from Guys and Dolls]
That was Fugue for Tinhorns - from Guys and Dolls, and like I said, you probably know the song, if not the name.
If you've been to Vegas, or even a carnival, you've probably seen a chuck-a-luck cage. It kind of resembles an hour-glass-shaped birdcage. It contains three dice, the dealer tumbles the cage, and you bet on the dice roll.
The first version of chuck-a-luck was played with a tin horn, and since chuck-a-luck players were considered small-time by their more sophisticated brethren, they acquired the name tin horn gamblers, which eventually became shortened to tinhorn, meaning any cheap gambler.
While there's no evidence that the horses named in Fugue for Tinhorns were real, Equipoise, whose name is mentioned by "Rusty Charley" as being the great-grandfather of "Epitaph", was a famous thoroughbred from 1928 to 1938. "Known as the "Chocolate Soldier," Equipoise won 29 of 51 races in six years of racing and was named Horse of the Year twice.
Here's one more song dedicated to the Sport of Kings to add to our turf portion of our show, Willie Egan and Big Boy Groves doing You Can't Beat the Horses from 19 and 56.
[You Can't Beat the Horses - Willie Egan with Big Boy Groves]
In 19 and 62 Willie Egan lost all his equipment in a nightclub fire, and broke and worn out from the music business, retired and went to work as a hospital orderly. Twenty years later a fan tracked him down after hearing his solo singles on an LP that a British label had put out. Everybody - including the label - had thought Willie Egan was dead, but when he found out that he was a hit in Europe, he went to London, revived his career, and cut a new record in 1984.
Willie Egan, a man who couldn't beat the horses, but did all right anyway.
It's a Cruel, Cruel Summer
Cruel Summer was originally cut by the British girl group, Bananarama in 1983, and then re-recorded by the Swedish group Ace of Base in the late `90s. Me, I like the hip-hop version Blestenation, using samples from Bananarama's original, did for Blue Crush, another one of my all-time summer movie faves... and that's what I'm going to play for you now to close out the show.
This is Fred Bals, your summertime theme deejay left all alone and putting in a hot day at the studio while Mr. D. takes his leisure at the beach.
Here's hoping your summer is cool rather than cruel, the back of your neck doesn't dirty and gritty, and those summertime blues stay far away.
[Cruel Summer - Blestenation]
***
With Theme Time Radio Hour on hiatus, Dreamtime is on a once-a-month podcast schedule for the duration. We'll be back in August with a new show. Thanks as always for listening, and remember to enter our Dreamtime Constant Listener Contest, underway right now. Send us an email with your guess on the date that Theme Time Radio Hour returns with Season 3, and get the opportunity to win a copy of Million Dollar Bash, as well as a CD of Poetry Readings direct from the Dreamtime studio with those nifty stewART covers.
***
You've been listening to the Dreamtime podcast – occasional commentary on Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour. Dreamtime is researched and written by Fred Bals and is a Not Associated With production. As the name says, we're not associated with XM Radio, Bob Dylan, or much of anything else.
Some of the music on Dreamtime is provided via the Podsafe Music Network. Check it out at music.podshow.com.
Many in the Dreamtime audience get their info from the blog through its feed rather than visiting, so, even though I've updated the "Dylan Tix" post from yesterday with the info, here it is again for my feed reading audience.
We received a flurry of email , almost all around the same time. Kevin from Maryland, who noted that he "lived in the Pittsburgh area for 11 years and would be happy to make the trip back..." was the first in our mailbox and our winner of the two tickets to the NAMU Music Festival on August 8 and 9.. Congratulations, Kevin! And thanks again to Christina at the Advance Guard for offering Dreamtime the tickets.
Although not a surprise, it was kind of neat to read how far people were willing to travel to catch Mr. D. Hundreds of miles, in some instances. As Jackie Gleason once said of Miami Beach, Bob Dylan fans really are "the greatest audience in the world."
The folks over at the New American Music Union, obviously cognizant of the quality of Dreamtime listener/readers, have kindly provided us with two tickets to the NAMU Music Festival being held in Pittsburgh, PA on August 8 and 9, 2008.
Bob Dylan and the Cowboy Band will be taking the main stage on Saturday, August 9th, headlining a show that includes The Raconteurs and Gnarls Barkley. More info on the concert can be found by clicking on the link above.
Dreamtime has two tickets - a $100 value - for the Festival that we're giving away !!FREE! FREE! FREE!! on a first-come, first-served basis to the first listener/reader who emails us at dreamtimepodcast@gmail.com. One ticket covers both days of the Festival, so you can bring a friend along. This giveaway only covers the tickets. You're responsible for your own travel and lodging, of course.
So, if you're in the Pittsburgh area - or decide you want to be - and want to catch Mr. D.'s show on Saturday, August 9th, here's your chance. Drop us a line at dreamtimepodcast@gmail.com - and be sure to include your name and address so the NAMU people can send you your tickets. Good luck! And, btw, Dreamtime will be expecting a full concert report from you.
All three songs, as different as they are, were written by one Chip Taylor, born James Wesley Voight, in Yonkers, New York.
If Chip's birth name or the photo to your left brings a question to mind, the answer is "yes," he also happens to be Jon Voight's brother, adding "uncle to Angelina Jolie" to his list of credits.
The New Yorker had a piece on Taylor the week of the 7th, noting the recent release of Taylor's latest CD, New Songs Of Freedom. As the article relates, Smith has had one helluva life in 64-odd years. He first tried his luck as a pro golfer, but moved into music - and the famous Brill Building - after a wrist injury. Golf, incidentally, is where Taylor picked up the "Chip" nickname, as in "chipping a shot."
Chet Atkins heard one of Taylor's country songs, and not quite believing anyone who could write country like that was really from New York, asked to hear more... and liked what he heard, launching Taylor into a successful career as a country music writer, penning hits for Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings among others.
But Taylor liked R&B just as much as country, and by the mid-60s had also written The Troggs/Jimi Hendrix classic Wild Thing, possibly one of the most suggestive songs ever composed. In contrast, Taylor also wrote the near-hymn-like (at least when compared to Wild Thing) Angel of the Morning, a #7 hit for Merrilee Rush and The Turnabouts in 1968, and an even bigger hit in 1981 for Juice Newton, hitting #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart (for four weeks) and #4 on the Hot 100, as well as #22 on the Country chart.
Apparently not satisfied with being an awesome cross-over song writer, Chip Taylor also has had an extraordinarily successful career as a pro gambler - I'm not making this up - specializing in handicapping the ponies and playing blackjack well enough to get him banned from most Atlantic City casinos. Taylor's gaming career was so successful that he quit the music business in 1981, only taking it up again 12 years ago.
And he still plays the ponies.
Here's a link to Chip Taylor's personal label label, Train Wreck Records. As Chip notes on the site:
When Chip got back into the performing business in the mid-1990s he reflected back on his prior experience with the music business. He had not been pleased with how the big labels had handled his unique music that didn't exactly fit within one of the established genres. Given the new climate in the industry that allows small labels a better chance to compete, Chip decided to start his own company.
Train Wreck also has (or had, it looks like there's been no new episodes since 2006) a podcast, Church of the Train Wreck, which you can subscribe to through an iTunes search or from here.
A 30-minute WNYC podcast on the "disaster song vogue" of the early 1900s. Includes excerpts from the magnificent box set from 2007, People Take Warning, as well as commentary from the compilation's producer, Christopher King, and from Greil Marcus.
The closing credits for Season 2's Classic Rock episode are out of the TTRH norm in at least two respects. Instead of the usual jazz piano "Top Cat," we have a thumping fuzz guitar version of that piece. And during his acknowledgments, Pierre Mancini - who sounds as if he's phoning in through Skype - notes, "super-special thanks to Val 'McCowan.' That's him you hear groovin' in the background."
In 1999, McCallum joined up with Davey Faragher and former Attraction Pete Thomas to form the publicity-killing band, "Jack Shit". Just to digress for a moment, you have to kind of admire a trio that would take that name. You're not going to get too many reviews of either gigs or albums with a name like "Jack Shit." Nevertheless, the band has released two albums, the first self-titled, with the members no doubt giggling to themselves thinking of fans walking into a store and forced to ask, "Do you have Jack Shit"?
