TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

November 14, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 2 Comments 

In May 1979 Linda Ronstadt and Phoebe Snow were the musical guests on Saturday Night Live. Here’s their cover of Betty Everett’s 1964 Number One hit  recording of Rudy Clark’s “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss).” And, yes, that is Patti Austin leading the backup singers; and a still hirsute Paul Shaffer bouncing between the keyboards; and music director Howard Shore on saxophone. Those were the days.

And since this is the Weekend Reward — here’s Betty Everett’s original:

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

November 7, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

Last weekend’s Reward was Nina Simone’s  signature song:”My Baby Just Cares For Me.”

This weekend it’s her 1965 cover of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ 1956 song “I Put a Spell On You.”    One of the song’s many fans was John Lennon, who acknowledged his indebtedness to “Spell” for the bridge of the Beatles’ song “Michelle.”

Rolling Stone ranked Hawkins’ original recording of “I Put a Spell On You” as Number 313 of its 500 Greatest Songs of All Time; and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame includes it among the 500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll:

Hawkins was, to put it mildly, a real piece of work.  A classically trained musician and singer, his aspiration was to follow in Paul Robeson’s footsteps.  He was a formidable talent and a natural performer who stumbled —literally and figuratively— into a rather bizarre show business niche.  Rolling Stone described the genesis of his over-the-top onstage persona:

Former boxer Jalacy J. Hawkins got loaded on muscatel before shrieking out the hoodoo of “I Put a Spell on You,” and it took a healthy swig of J&B for him to re-create his studio performance onstage, where he climbed out of a coffin. The stage prop was DJ Alan Freed’s brainstorm. When Hawkins resisted, Freed peeled off three hundred-dollar bills; “I said, ‘Show me the coffin,’ ” the singer quipped.

Nothing exceeds like excess, and Hawkins’ offstage life began to mirror his onstage conduct.  He had opened for Fats Domino and the Rolling Stones, but as he became more erratic he was booted off a bill as Jimi Hendrix’ opening act.   It became increasingly less clear whether he was still in on his own joke.   On David Sanborn’s 1988 show Night Music, Hawkins combined both careers in his rendition of “Old Man River” —an impressive Robeson hommage that quickly runs characteristically amok.

Screamin’ Jay Hawkins continued performing pretty much until he died, in Paris in 2000, at the age of 70.  Nina Simone was also 70 when she died at her home in the south of France in 2003.

In her 1992 autobiography I Put A Spell On You, Nina Simone described her life from North Carolina to Juilliard, from night clubs and LPs to an emigre’s life in the south of France.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

October 31, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

“My Baby Just Cares for Me” was written by composer Walter Donaldson (“My Blue Heaven,” “Carolina in the Morning,” “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby”)  and lyricist Gus Kahn (“Ill See You in My Dreams,” “It Had To Be You,” “Dream a Little Dream of Me,” “Side by Side”) for the 1928 Ziegfeld musical Whoopee! (in which Eddie Cantor introduced “Makin’ Whoopee” and Ruth Etting introduced “Love Me, Or Leave Me.”).

Spellbinder: The cover art for Nina Simone’s 1958 debut LP.  The record label wanted an uptempo song amidst the otherwise quirkly introspective material, and she chose the then relatively obscure 1928 song “My Baby Just Cares For Me.”

Among the singers and dancers in Whoopee!’s chorus was the young Buddy Ebsen.  More than four decades later in San Clemente, RN and PN enjoyed watching late afternoon reruns of Ebsen’s show Barnaby Jones.  RN was a surprise guest at the star’s 77th birthday in 1985.  As The New York Times reported:

The members of the Barnaby Jones Luncheon Club had been waiting four years to meet the man who played their silver-haired hero on television.  The other day, Buddy Ebsen finally came to lunch.

The 77-year-old actor was upstaged a bit in the beginning when one of his biggest fans and a fellow political conservative —former president Richard M. Nixon— dropped by for a glass of iced coffee.

Nixon arrived carrying a shopping bag containing a wedding present —drinking glasses with the presidential seal— for Ebsen and his third wife, the former Dorothy Knott, who were just back from a honeymoon in Hawaii.

“I don’t look at much entertainment television,” Nixon said, “but I like Barnaby Jones.  It was a good mystery where you knew the good guys from the bad guys.  I’ve known Buddy Ebsen for 35 years.  He has been a personal friend of mine and Mrs. Nixon and a personal supporter.”

Nina Simone covered “My Baby Just Cares For Me” on her first LP —1958’s Little Girl Blue— where it remained a relatively obscure track of a relatively obscure song.  In the 1980s, when Simone was living in France and immensely popular there, the song was used as the soundtrack for a Chanel No. 5 TV ad.    In the UK a single was released which reached —appropriately— No. 5 on the pop charts.

Aardman Animations (a British Oscar-winning studio widely known for its work with Wallace & Gromit) released a wittily noirish claymation video.  Director Peter Lord captured the essence of Simone’s seductive vocal and no less seductive piano playing.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

October 24, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

A recent Soundtrack Of Our Lives featured “Take It Easy” — the Eagles’ first big hit, written by Jackson Browne and Glenn Frey.

This week’s Reward offers two covers of Eagles songs — “Take It to the Limit” and “Desperado”.

“Take It to the Limit” was written in 1975 by bassist Randy Meissner, Don Henley and Glenn Frey.   The song was a track on the band’s LP One Of These Nights , which won the 1974 Grammy for Album of the Year.

In 1981, accompanied by blues guitarist Kal David, National Treasure Etta James delivered a foreshortened but searing rendition on the late night Tom Snyder Show.

All alone at the end of the of the evening
And the bright lights have faded to blue
I was thinking ’bout a woman who might have
Loved me and I never knew
You know I’ve always been a dreamer
Spent my life running round
And it’s so hard to change
Can’t seem to settle down
But the dreams I’ve seen lately
Keep on turning out and burning out
And turning out the same

So put me on a highway
And show me a sign
And take it to the limit one more time

You can spend all your time making money
You can spend all your love making time
If it all fell to pieces tomorrow
Would you still be mine?
And when you’re looking for your freedom
Nobody seems to care
And you can’t find the door
Can’t find it anywhere
When there’s nothing to believe in
Still you’re coming back, you’re running back
You’re coming back for more

So put me on a highway
And show me a sign
And take it to the limit one more time

“Desperado,” by Frey and Henley, appeared on an eponymous album in 1973. Linda Ronstadt’s poignant cover the same year gave the song an even wider audience.

Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
You been out ridin’ fences for so long now
Oh, you’re a hard one
I know that you got your reasons
These things that are pleasin’ you
Can hurt you somehow

Don’t you draw the Queen of Diamonds, boy
She’ll beat you if she’s able
You know the Queen of Hearts is always your best bet

Now it seems to me, some fine things
Have been laid upon your table
But you only want the ones that you can’t get

Desperado, you ain’t gettin’ no younger
Your pain and your hunger, they’re drivin’ you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’
Your prison is walking through this world all alone

Don’t your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky won’t snow and the sun won’t shine
It’s hard to tell the night time from the day
You’re losin’ all your highs and lows
Ain’t it funny how the feeling goes away?

Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, open the gate
It may be rainin’, but there’s a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you, before it’s too late

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

October 17, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 1 Comment 

Mercedes Sosa died on 4 October at the age of 74.  Her life was adventurous and eventful.    Her career spanned several decades and included more than forty recorded albums.   Her personality and voice were forces of nature.  The Argentinian singer and activist was known as “La Negra” because of her striking looks and jet black hair. She performed in venues ranging from underground cafes and banned rallies to Carnegie Hall, the Sistine Chapel, and the Coliseum.

As The Economist commented on 8 October:

To many Latin Americans in the later stages of middle age, to hear the voice of Mercedes Sosa…is to be instantly transported back to the turbulent times when left-wing radicals seeking justice and revolution battled and suffered at the hands of military dictatorships. It was a voice so sonorously deep, yet so delicately controlled, that it seemed to issue forth from the Pachamama herself, the earth goddess of the Quechua-speaking people of the Inca empire from whom Ms Sosa partially descended.

One of her most famous songs was Violetta Parra’s “Gracias a la Vida.” Parra was a Chilean folklorist who launched the “Nueva Cancion” New Song movement that revolutionized —literally and figuratively— Latin and South American music in the 1960s. The new singers and songwriters mined traditional musical idioms and instruments —like Sosa’s signature bombo drum— and put them in the service of the political movements that married the emerging struggle for human rights with left wing sentiments and  communist agitation.

“Gracis a la Vida,” which may be the most widely covered of all the New Songs, was written in 1966, the year before Parra’s suicide at the age of 49.  It was played on Argentine television during the broadcast of Sosa’s funeral services.  Her body lay in state in the National Congress Building, and a procession accompanied it to the cemetery.

Her repertoire included Atuhalpa Yupanqui’s  ”Duerme Negrito”:

In her last years, while physically beset, her voice and spirit remained undiminished.  Her recent duet, with Shakira, of Cuban nueva trovo composer Silvio Rodrigruez’ “La Maza” was a hit.   In the moving performance video below, from the Alas Foundation concert in Buenos Aires in May 2008, the sincerity of Shakira’s introduction needs no translation.   The song begins at 1.35; the audio of the studio version is here.   In a statement issued   Shakira said, ”She had the greatest voice, and she had the greatest heart for understanding suffering. She was the voice of her brothers on Earth who lifted up the music of suffering, and of justice.”

Mercedes Sosa’s extensive catalog is all in print and supplemented by many compilation and “best of” albums.  Her Amazon store is a good place to start.

Mourners at Mercedes Sosa’s funeral in Buenos Aires on 5 October.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

October 10, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

My Old Man: Rosanne and Johnny Cash photographed by Annie Liebovitz.

The genesis of Rosanne Cash’s superb new CD —The List— was in a conversation she had thirty-six years ago with her father, Johnny Cash.  As she described it:

I was out on the road with him, he mentioned a song while we were riding on the tour bus, and I said, ‘I don’t know that one.’  And he mentioned another, and I said, ‘I don’t know that one either, Dad,’ and he got very alarmed. I was so steeped in The Beatles and Buffalo Springfield, and he thought I was missing something essential about my own musical genealogy. So he spent the rest of the day making this list.

The list in question, which comprised one hundred basic country songs that he thought she should listen to and know,  became her master class as she began her own career as a country music singer and songwriter.

Twelve songs from that Ur-list appear on the album — now refined through her own life and career and insights.  She is joined on several tracks by such friends as Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello, Rufus Wainwright, Jeff Tweedy, and Neko Case.  Her producer and arranger is her husband John Leventhal.

Here is the official video from The List: Hank Snow’s first hit in 1950, “I’m Movin’ On.”  Some handsome boots made for walking do so through Ms. Cash’s home turf in Brooklyn.

And here’s the audio of the album’s first single — a duet with The Boss of the Hal David-Paul Hampton  hit “Sea of Hearbreak.”

Rosanne Cash has given considerable thought to her craft and lectured on it.  She is the estimable author of short stories and a children’s book.   And she is a contributing New York Times columnist and was an early and excellent blogger.

Her early hit “Seven Year Ache” (with Vince Gill and Emmylou Harris on backup vocals) remains one of my all time favorites. And I know, from personal experiences at  Late Night with David Letterman, that, in addition to being a very interesting individual, she is also one of the nicest people in show business.

Her state of the art website is comprehensive and entertaining.  And her extensive catalog is easily available — as on Amazon.

Mrs. L: Rosanne Cash and husband-producer-collaborator John Leventhal check out the New York High Line.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

October 3, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This week’s Reward is a remarkable video of the most recent winner of the Ukraine’s Got Talent TV show.

Who knew?

I don’t mean who knew that Ukraine’s got talent.  (That question can be answered with two words: Eugenia Vlasova.)

I mean who knew that Ukraine had its very own edition of the Crowellspawn Got Talent franchise.  (Maybe the answer to that question is: everybody but me — that’s the position in which I increasingly find myself these days.)

But I digress…

The 2009 winner of Ukraine’s Got Talent (the first prize was 1 million Hryvnia — about $125K) was Kseniya Simonova.  Ms. Simonova is an almost impossibly beautiful  young woman with a talent that is as exquisite as it is arcane.  She is a sand artist, or sand animator, who uses her hands to draw pictures with, in, and on sand on the top of a light table.  The striking results, which are set to specially prepared soundtracks, can be viewed from various angles and projected on a larger screen.

Kseniya Simonova during the final 2009 competition of Ukraine’s Got Talent.  The  YouTube video of her prize-winning performance has had more than three million hits.

This 24-year-old’s prizewinning turn was an all-stops-out salute to the heroism and suffering of Ukraine during the Great Patriotic War 1941-45 — during which one in four of her countrymen died..  In light of current events in the region, its unabashed Sovietprop sentiments and frames of reference may turn out to be more prophetic than ironic.

The story begins peacefully (the music is Cirque de Soleil’s “Jeux d’eaux”) with a couple meeting in a park just as war breaks out.   Their idyll is interrupted by an historic recording that is all too familiar to Ukrainian ears of a certain age (and, by repetition, to younger ears as well): iconic Moscow radio announcer Yuri Levitan’s announcement of the German invasion of Russia in June 1941.  The music briefly shifts to the stirring 1941 anthem “Sacred War” (Svyashchennaya Voyna) sung by the Red Army Chorus.

The arrival of a baby —to the accompaniment of Mark Bernes singing “Dark Night” — only briefly mitigates the horror of war.  Bernes famously sang the song in a 1943 Soviet film — expressing the thoughts of a soldier about his wife and child at home worrying about him while he is at the front listening to the whistling bullets and roaring winds.

The Monument to the Dead of the Great Patriotic War in Kiev’s VIctory Square is the central image of Kseniya Simonova’s prize-winning sand animation.

Now, to music of “Inquisition Symphony”  by the Finnish rock band Apocalyptica, the smiling young woman receives the letter that turns her into a weeping aged widow.  She dissolves into the Monument to the War Dead obelisk in Kiev’s Victory Square as the music dissolves into “Cranes” (Zuravli), another famous Mark Bernes song, about how soldiers don’t die but turn into flights of white cranes.

For the final scenes, the music is Apocalyptica’s cover of Metalica’s “Nothing Else Matters.”    A soldier sees his child through a window as he presses his hands against the glass to say goodbye.

The words “You are always with us — 1945″ close the story.

Kseniya lives in the south on the Black Sea.  She claims only to have been animating sand for a year — exploring it as a result of the worldwide credit crunch.  In this interview on RT (the Russian English language TV network) she manages to be simultaneously spacey and focused.

Happily not all of Kseniya Siminova’s art is depressing or didactic.  Here’s a slightly sunnier performance at an earlier phase of the competition at Ukraine’s Got Talent; although the lesson, as written at the end, is “Do not be late” to show love for your parents.

A tip o’the cap to Marty Etheridge — not only  for alerting me to Kseniya Siminova’s video, but for her advice to watch it to the end.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

September 26, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 1 Comment 

Bluegrass pioneer and legend Bill Monroe frequently serenaded his home state.  In 1948, inspired by hearing Monroe’s “Kentucky Waltz” on the radio one night, Pee Wee King, the leader of the Golden West Cowboys, teamed up with his vocalist Redd  Stewart, and wrote one of the greatest —and most enduring— of American popular songs: “The Tennessee Waltz.”

Pee Wee (né Julius Frank Anthony Kuczynski), had toured with Gene Autry and was a member of the Grand Ole Opry, came to country music via a polka band in his native Wisconsin.  Redd, at least, was born in Tennessee, although he grew up next door in Kentucky.  According to the legend, because they had no paper at hand, he emptied a matchbox and tore it open in order to jot down the words to the melody they crafted.

Here are the composers —Redd vocalizing and Pee Wee accordionizing— performing the “The Tennessee Waltz” and another of their major hits, 1952’s “You Belong To Me.”

Roy Acuff’s 1948 recording reached Number 8 on the country charts. But it wasn’t until two years later that the singing rage Miss Patti Page’s pop ballad cover of the song became one of the best-selling singles of the 20th Century.   Released at the end of the year, her record spent thirteen of its thirty weeks on Billboard’s pop chart at Number One.

Patti Page’s”Tennessee Waltz” was the first pop song of the wayward preadolescence that would shortly become my misspent youth.  I remember wearing out needles playing the 78-RPM record; and being taken, after some serious pestering,  to see her stage show at the New York Paramount.

The Gannons were relative rubes, and, as we arrived to see the movie that preceded the show, we couldn’t figure out why the first dozen rows —seemingly the prime real estate for the show that was to follow— were empty.  The movie ended; and, accompanied by mighty organ music, the vast stage slowly rose from the lower depths and preceded to rise to the height of at least a two story building, and we were suddenly staring at a blank wall.

An hour later we all had creaks in our necks.  But we had, occasionally, seen what we were pretty sure was the hem of Patti Page’s gown that had occasionally appeared  over the lip of the stage.

I wanted to learn the song, and I remember bringing the sheet music to a piano lesson, which was held in in the parlor of the the convent at the St. Barnabas School.  Sister Regina Florence was —as I now see, and for which I am still grateful— amazingly tolerant and, even, hip, for a Sister of Charity of Halifax in 1953.  And I wonder what the other nuns must have thought at some of the decidedly secular sounds that started emerging during my lessons.  But she still drew lines; and one of them was at the photograph that displayed Ms. Page’s bare shoulders.  I had to put a plain brown wrapper —literally made from a shopping bag— over the cover for the subsequent lessons.

Three years later, in 1953, Les Paul and Mary Ford’s cover reached the Top Ten:

“The Tennessee Waltz” was among the twenty-two “home recordings” made by Elvis Presley in Memphis, LA, and Germany during the mid-1960s. His version is alternately goofy, raunchy, and, when he puts the power of his voice behind the mojo of the music, pretty darn moving:

In 2005, Bonnie Raitt invited Norah Jones to join her on stage in Atlantic City for an excellent VH-1-produced show — Bonnie Raitt and Friends.

And Leonard Cohen, who rarely sings covers, included “The Tennessee Waltz” on his 2004 album Dear Heather.  Of course, he fitted it out with a extra verse of Cohenesque lyrics.

She goes dancin’ with the darkness
to the Tennessee Waltz
and I feel like I’m falling apart
and it’s stronger than drink
and it’s deeper than sorrow
this darkness she left in my heart

And the last words go to terrific version, from a late ’50s radio program, by a native Tennessean — Patsy Cline.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

September 19, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This weekend’s Reward is two Charlie Poole songs — “White House Blues” and “He Rambled”—  one by the master, and one by a devotee  who has mastered the oeuvre and even successfully supplemented it.

The Wainwright family, and all its various roots and branches, has been responsible for some of the best American popular and folk music of the last half century.  Now the patriarch —Loudon Wainwright III—  has produced a 2-CD retrospective-hommage masterpiece: High Wide & Handsome: The Charlie Poole Project.

“A crazier version of Jimmie Rogers”:  Charlie Poole circa 1923.

Charlie Poole (1892-1931) was born in Eden, North Carolina.  As music blogger Robert Baird nicely and accurately put it, he was “sort of a crazier version of Jimmie Rodgers. He was a drinker, raconteur, baseball player, ladies man, the works.”  Poole developed his unique three fingered banjo picking style after he said he could catch a baseball without a glove, closed his hand too soon, and ended up with a broken thumb that left his hand permanently arched.

Didn’t he ramble: A postcard picture of New York’s Bowery sent by Charlie Poole on a lonely afternoon in July 1920 in Chester, Pennsylvania.

Poole used the southern phrase high wide and handsome to describe the way he wanted to die.  But he died at 34 in 1931, after what was supposed to be a three month drinking binge.  A story survives —and sounds strangely familiar today— that it wasn’t the alcohol that killed him, but an injection by some local doctor who was, presumably, intending to counter the effects of the booze.

Charlie Poole wrote few if any of the many songs he sang and recorded.  Loudon Wainwright has chosen a terrific selection of Poole’s range — including some of the humorous songs, all of which are endearing, and some of which are actually still funny.  He has also written some original material that reflects Poole’s inspiration.  You can hear four of them here (including the goose-bumb-beautiful “Beautiful”).   There is a lot to be enjoyed —and learned— on Wainwright’s Charlie Poole Project website.

Unfortunately, at least so far, there are no really good videos from the album.  There is an interesting documentary, but it interrupts the songs with commentary; and there are a few amateur performance videos of poor quality.  But please don’t let that discourage you from getting this superb album.  Trust me now, and you can thank me later.

With his group the North Carolina Ramblers, Charlie Poole made many records for the Columbia label during the period 1925-1930 — including the first ever major country hit “Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down Blues.”

Another hit was  ”White House Blues” — a contemporary song about the assassination of President McKinley by a gunman at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo in September 1901, and the accession of his Vice President Theodore Roosevelt.

McKinley he hollered,
McKinley he squalled
The doc said
“McKinley, I can’t find that ball”
From Buffalo to Washington

Roosevelt in the White House,
he’s doin’ his best
McKinley in the graveyard,
he’s takin’ his rest
He’s gone a long old time

Hush up little children,
now don’t you fret
You’ll draw a pension
at your papa’s death
From Buffalo to Washington

Roosevelt in the White House,
drinkin’ out of a silver cup
McKinley in the graveyard,
he never wakes up
He’s gone a long, long time

Ain’t but the one thing
that grieves my mind
That is to die
and leave my poor wife behind
I’m gone a long old time

Standing at the station,
just lookin’ at the time
See by it you’re running
by half-past nine
From Buffalo to Washington

Pay in the train,
she’s just on time
She’ll run a thousand miles
from eight o’clock till nine
From Buffalo to Washington

Yonder comes the train,
she’s comin’ down the line
Throwin’ them a station message:
McKinley’s a-dyin’
It’s hard times, hard times

Look a-here, you rascal,
you see what you’ve done
You shot my husband
with that Ivor Johnson gun
Carry him back to Washington

The doc told the horse,
he tore down the rein
Said to that horse,
“You’ve got to outrun this train
From Buffalo to Washington”

Doctor came a-running,
taked off his specs
Said “Mr. McKinley,
better cash in your checks
You’re bound to die, bound to die”

Here’s Charlie Poole and the New North Carolina Ramblers’ 1925 recording of “He Rambled”:

And here’s Loudon Wainwright singing “Didn’t He Ramble” last summer in New York’s Madison Square Park last June:

In the likely event that the Wainwright CD inspires an interest in the original material, the Poole recordings are easily available.  Probably the best of the lot is the three CD collection of remastered originals titled You Ain’t Talkin’ To Me, that comes in what looks like an old cigar box and includes an interesting booklet.

R. Crumb provided the cover art for the 3-CD box set of Charlie Poole’s 1920s recordings.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

September 12, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 3 Comments 

Earlier this year a Reward featured Mali’s Amadou & Mariam. This week it’s Senegal’s Baaba Maal.

He mostly works in his own Pulaar language, but his new song —”Television”— is in French.  Infectious, charming, and ostensibly lighthearted, it also makes an important statement about the dangers of the deceptively authoritative worldwide medium (with disturbingly authoritarian potential) that is currently making deeper inroads all across Africa.  He says, “”This is an instrument we can use to make good things.  But at the same time, it’s very dangerous, because if people seem to believe that everything that passes through television is true, it falls down into the hands of bad politicians. [That's] not good for the continent.”

The song “Television” —as well as several on new eponymous CD —Baaba Maal’s first of original material in eight years— is a collaboration with the Brooklyn-based electronica group Brazilian Girls; you hear the distinctive voice of the BGs’ Sabina Sciubba throughout “Television.”   And the song’s clever and inventive video is directed by Daniel Hensher; the art direction is by Johan Koelb; the directors of photography are Richard Mitchel and Brian Strange; it is best watched (and well worth watching) on a full screen.

(Switch it on… Look. He’s here. He’s exactly the same as he was yesterday. Go ahead, ask him a question. He doesnt hear.)

The man in the TV set
He’s always there whether its warm or cold
Where he comes from, we dont know
When he’s small be  becomes big
It’s so bizarre for us

The man in the TV set
He always dresses the same every evening and morning,
How is that possible?
Does he live alone?
Where are his parents?
We can’t understand how he stands inside there.

You will find other videos on the BaabaMaal Channel on YouTube. And his extensive catalog is available on Amazon.

Baaba Maal’s 2001 CD Missing You helped establish him as one of the leading world musicians.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

September 5, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This weekend’s end of summer Reward comes courtesy of NPR’s excellent summer-long series in which various listeners and assorted celebrities fondly recalled their favorite Summer Song Favorites.

For example, John Sebastian (whose “Summer in the City” was  a Reward last month)  chose the Beach Boys’ “I Get Around.”

Tony Bennett’s choice was “It Was Me” — the English version, with lyrics by Norman Gimbel, of Gilbert Becaud’s “C’etait moi” — that was a track on one of his early Ur albums: 1963’s I Wanna Be Around.

The recent birthday boy (83 on 3 August and still gong strong), who was himself a Reward on that occasion, is one of the very few in the Rewarder’s pantheon of all time great performers.  And this song demonstrates both his exquisite taste and his impeccable phrasing.  And the octogenarian’s insights into young summer love are charming and moving in equal parts — as well as a lesson to us all (at least to all us geezers; youth continues to be wasted on the young).

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

August 29, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This week’s Reward is melancholy but glorious —because it celebrates some of the songs of Ellie Greenwich who died on Wednesday.

HANKY PANKY

This was a Number One hit in 1963 for Tommy James and the Shondells.  It’s essentially a nonsense song, involving repeated assertions that his baby does the hanky panky.  One is reminded of the elder Holmes’ apostrophe to a katydid: “Thou say’st an undisputed thing, in such a solemn way.”

DA DOO RUN RUN

This was a hit in the summer of 1963 hit for the Crystals, anchored by LaLa Brooks.  The meaningless words “Da Doo Run Run” were intended to be rehearsal filler that would be replaced by lyrics before the song was recorded.   Co-writer and producer Phil Spector —creating what he called “little symphonies for the kids”— slathered on the strings.   And although he didn’t throw in the kitchen sink he did include sleigh bells.

THEN HE KISSED ME

Another Barry-Greenwich-Spector hit for the Crystals in 1963.

CHAPEL OF LOVE

This Barry-Greenwich-Spector song by the Dixie Cups spent three weeks as Number One in 1964.

RIVER DEEP – MOUNTAIN HIGH

Although this 1966 single was less than successful in the US (it was a hit in the UK), producer and co-writer Phil Spector considered this his best Wall of Sound work. He banned Ike Turner from the recording sessions — and then proceeded to treat Tina almost as badly as Ike did, demanding take after take.  She recalled: “I must have sung that 500,000 times. I was drenched with sweat. I had to take my shirt off and stand there in my bra to sing.”

This raw video of a live Ike and Tina Turner Revue performance includes the Ikettes – Rose Smith, Ann Thomas, and, in the middle, the phenomenal Pat Arnold (of whom more anon).

CHRISTMAS (BABY PLEASE COME HOME)

This may be my favorite Greenwich song of all. Not least because it is sung by Darlene Love. It was written for Phil Spector’s 1963 Ur Xmas album A Christmas Gift to You. Leon Russell can be heard on the piano. During my time at Late Night with David Letterman, on each year’s Christmas show, Darlene Love joined Paul Shaffer and the World’s Most Dangerous Band to sing “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).”

TAKE ME HOME TONIGHT

Although Ellie Greenwich’s most important writing was done in the 1960s, she continued to write songs — and hits.  In 1986 she was part of the team that produced this hit for former NYPD officer Eddie Money.

In the official video, Ronnie Spector proved that twenty years later she could still steal a scene even in silhouette.

And on Late Night with David Letterman, she showed she could steal a scene even with her back turned.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

August 22, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This weekend’s Reward is the Detroit Cobras.

In my humble, but well-nigh infallible, opinion (and, since it’s true, it ain’t bragging; truth to tell, it’s a real burden; but I digress), the Detroit Cobras rule.

Over the years this Motor City-based garage punk ’60s cover band has comprised a movable feast of back up artists behind vocalist Rachel Nagy and guitarist Mary Ramirez. What’s not to love about  the Detroit Cobras’ impeccable taste for underappreciated and undersung oldies rendered with an attitude that makes Ronnie Spector look restrained and Courtney Love seem demure?

Here’s their cover of Brice Coefield’s 1961 “Cha Cha Twist,” from their 1998 debut album Mink Rat or Rabbit.  The relatively obscure record was a spinoff of Hank Ballard’s  1959  B-side “Let’s Do The Twist,” which Chubby Checker’s 1960 cover turned into a Number One hit and a worldwide dance craze.

Relax and enjoy; after navigating 16-21 August 2009 you deserve it.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

August 15, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 1 Comment 

Willy DeVille, the founder and mainstay of Mink Deville, died last week of pancreatic cancer.  He was 58.

He was one of the most interesting and inventive pop artists of the last several decades.  Although he emerged as part of the Ur New York punk scene in the 1970s, his eclectic tastes and musical discipline set him apart. Over the years his repertoire extended from blues to zydeco and from salsa to cabaret.

His 1987 song “Storybook Love” was used on the soundtrack of The Princess Bride and nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song.  His 1980 album Le Chat Bleu, recorded after he moved to Paris, remains a 20th Century classic.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

August 8, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 2 Comments 

Here’s a Reward for an early August weekend: the Lovin’ Spoonful’s “Summer in the City.”   Released in June, it sat at Number One on the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks in August 1966.

Written by band leader John Sebastian, his brother Mark, and Spoonful bassist Steve Boone, it begins with a VW horn and ends with a jackhammer.

“Summer in the City” is Number 393 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time:

“Summer in the City” was a stylistic turn for the Lovin’ Spoonful — tougher and less daydreamy. “We felt the only way we could stick out would be to sound completely different from one single to another,” said John Sebastian. With a barrage of car horns on the bridge, “Summer in the City” evoked its subject with urban grit and Gershwin-esque grandeur.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

August 1, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | 1 Comment 

Monday will be Tony Bennett’s 83rd birthday; he is a National Treasure, and in a better world it would be a national —indeed, an international— holiday. Three years ago, he was wished a happy 80th birthday by Stevie Wonder on the TV special based on the 2006 Grammy-winning album Tony Bennett Duets: An American Classic. The song is Ron Miller and Orlando Murden’s  1967 Motown classic “For Once in My Life,” which was, at different times and in different arrangements, a hit for both Bennett and Wonder.  This terrific (and Grammy-winning) arrangement is by Jorge Calandrelli.

The opening of a 1982 British TV special —Bennett Sings…Buddy Swings— demonstrates in under two minutes much of the greatness of Tony Bennett.  He draws on the classic American Song Book; he sings verses as well as choruses; he has impeccable taste and timing; he’s so damn musical he doesn’t even need a band; and his joy in what he does is almost palpable. All of this is at work in the Gershwins’ “Fascinating Rhythm”:

Anthony Benedetto was born in Queens in 1926. He was drafted in 1944 and fought in some of 1945’s bloodiest battles. He was among the liberators of Landsberg, one of the Kaufering concentration camps. In 1949 Pearl Bailey invited Tony Benedetto to open for her. She asked Bob Hope to a performance, and Tony Bennett’s next gig (he had changed his name at Hope’s suggestion) was traveling as the singer with the comedian’s show. His first hit was 1951’s “Because of You” — produced by Mitch Miller (who had signed him to Columbia Records) with Percy Faith’s lush arrangement.

His June 1962 Carnegie Hall Concert still sets a gold standard for live performance. In October, he sang on the first night of Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show. And 1962 was the year he recorded what became his theme song — George Cory and Douglas Cross’ “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.”  This clip is from the July 1963 taping of “The Judy Garland Show.”

I can report —from first hand experiences at Late Night with David Letterman— that Tony Bennett is every bit as nice and warm and unassuming behind the scenes as he is on stage.  Some of that comes through in his 1996 performance of his 1958 hit “Firefly” with The Muppets.

1999’s Hot & Cool — Bennett Sings Ellington is an excellent album; but it doesn’t include my favorite Ellington standard  —1934’s “In My Solitude,” with lyrics by Eddie DeLange and Irving Mills— which has been part of the Bennett repertoire since the late ’50s.  It is, happily, available on YouTube.  It’s hard to think of any way in which this song, this arrangement, and this performance isn’t amazing.

Tony Bennett’s website is comprehensive and entertaining and full of music.  He is also an accomplished artist.

Although he is, alas, sadly underrepresented on YouTube, his CD catalog is extensive and almost entirely in print.  It is available, among many other places, on Amazon.

Tony Bennett has donated his watercolor of his longtime friend Duke Ellington to the National Portrait Gallery.  Bennett explained the roses in the background: “Every time he wrote a song he thought I would like to record he sent a dozen pink roses.”

TNN Weekend Weekly Reward

July 25, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

Posting “How High the Moon”  last Thursday’s moon watch reminded me of some of Les Paul and Mary Ford’s many other hits of the early ’50s.  This is the music of my adolescence (as opposed to my extended adolescence, which is ongoing); and I hope that, like me, you will still find it interesting and infectious.

“The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise”

The LP+MF 1949 version of Gene Lockhart and Ernest Seitz’ 1919 song was one of the first recorded examples of guitar distortion.  This clip is from their 1953-55 TV show Les Paul and Mary Ford at Home, sponsored by Listerine.  Each innovative five minute show —completely created and produced by musical and electronic pioneer Paul— featured two songs.  They were syndicated and used as filler by the fledgling stations.

“Tiger Rag”

This song was jointly credited to (and first recorded by) the Original Dixieland Jass Band (which only became the Jazz band later that year). LP+MF’s freewheeling and humorous (one is tempted to say kittenish) version of the 1917 original was a 1952 hit.  This clip is from the 1954 Colgate Comedy Hour.

“Vaya Con Dios”

This timeless-sounding song was written in 1953 by Larry Russell, Inez James, and Buddy Pepper. LP+MF’s recording, released on 13 June 1953, spent thirty-one weeks on the charts, including the Number One spot for two weeks at the end of August.  It became their signature tune — for which, alas, there is no video; but the audio track conveys the clean beauty of Les Paul’s inventions and inventiveness and Mary Ford’s warm and welcoming voice.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

July 18, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

This weekend’s Reward is Patty Griffin’s “Heavenly Day.”  It’s from her superb Grammy-nominated 2007 album Children Running Through.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

July 11, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

In his “Middle Seat Terminal” airline industry travel column this week in The Wall Street Journal, Scott McCartney turned the spotlight on a disgruntled United passenger who discovered that revenge is a dish best served on YouTube.

Canadian singer-songwriter Dave Carroll, was flying with his band from home in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to a gig in Omaha.  Looking out the window during a layover in Chicago, they watched helplessly as their guitars —including Carroll’s tasty $3500 Taylor 710— were being seriously disrespected by baggagehandlers.

Carroll’s patient and reasonable requests for reimbursement for the major damage done to his guitar were met with indifference.  He informed the last person to say no —the now-notorious Ms. Irlweg— that he would give up his attempts to obtain justice and, instead, write three songs about his experience and post them on YouTube.

The first of this United Trilogy was posted on YouTube on 6 July and is fast closing in on two million hits.

After the song “United One” began to grow some web legs, the airline offered to make belated nice.  Mr. Carroll, being a man of principle, wasn’t interested.

United, in an attempt to make a virtue of adversity, lamely claims that they’re grateful to Mr. Carroll and are using his video in employee training seminars to show the dangers of careless customer service.

I’d write more about this but I don’t want to be late for my  guitar lesson.  I figure that if I can strum a few chords and then take some songwriting classes, I might make a couple of Carrollian videos that would  elicit some responsive attention from Comcast and Aetna — whose customer service, at least in my experience, makes United look downright solicitous.   Besides, you can read the whole story here.

And here is Mr. Carroll’s song which spares no detail:

For more of Dave Carroll, look here.  And for the Sons of Maxwell (Mr. Carroll and his brother Dan) here.

There is at least one moral to the story, supplied by the Wall Street Journal’s columnist McCartney, who has even written a book about the vagaries and indignities of airline baggage handling.

Many travelers can relate to Carroll’s frustration. (However, I have long advised travelers to never check anything valuable or essential, and if you have to check something breakable, make sure it’s in a protective shipping case.

TNN Weekly Weekend Reward

July 4, 2009 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Weekly Weekend Reward | Leave a Comment 

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