Marvin Gaye, “What Do You Want With Him” (1962)
Here’s an early Marvin Gaye that really wowed me this week. Sometimes I think Motown is kind of overrated by us Boomer types but then a song like this comes along that I never really knew and I can see how good they were all the way back. Does anybody know the documentary Standing in the Shadows of Motown? Great stuff about the session players, like James Jamerson, that had so much to do with creating the label’s signature sound. There’s a Joan Osborne cover of “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted” that spooks me how good it is. I always liked Osborne, even “One of Us,” and that’s kind of a hard thing to admit. But then I feel vindicated when I see something like this (video since yanked, sorry about that, documentary definitely worth seeing!).
What’s been sounding good to you?
janeform
Bruce Springsteen — Thunder Road. 1976. Brought me right back to high school.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KngiJUNdsu0
patrick II
What has been sounding good to me is attending a Rodrigo y Gabriela concert last night in Charlottesville, VA. Somehow I lucked into first row seats and to watch these two virtuoso guitarists up close was remarkable. At the endo of the latin/rock flavored concert all 3500 people were standing,dancing and yelling. Most fun I have had at a concert in many years.
JPK
@janeform: A friend saw a Springsteen show this past week and loved it.
General Stuck
. One of the first records I owned was Otis Reading, and I would spin it several times a day, just to hear “Sittin’ On the Dock of the Bay’. I don’t think there is another song that brings back the mood and vibe of those days as much as that song.
Steeplejack
Standing in the Shadows of Motown will be shown on Sundance at 6:00 a.m. and 4:25 p.m. Sunday (EDT).
Not Motown, but I was listening to the old soul and funk this week. Think I was imagining myself back in the Café du Monde in New Orleans at about 3:00 in the morning. Haven’t been there in years. Need to get back.
The Meters, “Stormy.”
Fred Wesley and the J.B.’s, “Dirty Harri.”
Maybe my Hammond B-3 jones is just itchin’ tonight.
And this: Charlie Parker and Miles Davis, “My Old Flame.”
Steeplejack
WTF?! Release me from moderation, O front-pager gods.
janeform
@JPK: I saw the show a couple of weeks ago at the Palace outside Detroit. Over 3 hours. Awesome. I’d never seen him in concert before (except for Vote for Change) even though I’m from Jersey. Joan Walsh just wrote about the tour. Captures it pretty well. Bruce sure doesn’t phone it in, even after all these years. http://www.salon.com/2012/04/26/love_and_death_on_the_springsteen_tour/
JPK
@Steeplejack: Very nice stuff!
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: I just discovered these folks last week.
lamh35
@Steeplejack: Are you gonna attend any of the Jazz Fest gigs? Bruce Springsteen will be there Sunday on one stage and Al Green will be on another stage.
HOW DO YOU CHOOSE?
Steeplejack
@Steeplejack:
Can’t hear “My Old Flame” without listening to “Embraceable You” as well.
KRK
I watched “The Stax Records Story” last night, which was great. Prompted me to revisit some fab stuff from Booker T & the MGs, Sam & Dave, and the Staples Singers.
ETA: Otis Redding was Stax, not Motown. The documentary tells a great story of how he got signed there.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Saw your (or someone else’s) previous pointer to them. They are good.
Kiwanda
I always liked Joan Osborne’s version of Brick House, here with Bob Weir.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: I put something up last night or the night before.
joeyess
As you all know, (and if you don’t I’m telling you now) this is my go-to blog. Every morning, I open BJ and read some fresh outrage or one of Cole’s misanthropic missives. I love it here.
Are we still doing Balloon Juicer live band videos?
If so, I’ll have one ready by the end of May. I enjoyed it when a front pager posted video of a band from the comments section. I would like to see more of it for obvious reasons.
With that said, I would like to invite anyone that’s interested in unsigned acts to visit my band’s ReverbNation page.
We’re called Kink Alfred. Go on over, browse around. Do it because I spent the entire day setting this damn thing up.
BTW, we’ll have an Android/iPhone app available in about a week.
I know….. stop spamming. Well it isn’t spam unless you’ve been served endless cans of it, so this is the only plea.
Of course, that doesn’t preclude me from emailing frontpagers with new songs and videos, does it?
One more thing; The Jethro Tull cover was recorded live. Pretty proud of that.
muddy
My son recently turned me on to Dessa, she’s been my soundtrack for my work this week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELsryzJ5Hpg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gF3EcrRXO50&feature=related
Steeplejack
@lamh35:
I used to live in Mobile in the ’70s and went to the jazz festival almost every year. Hell, I went to New Orleans every chance I could. I love that town. It is the best eating city in the country, or at least it was. I haven’t been there since before Katrina.
The festival was much smaller back then. I remember one night–“Blues and Roots Night”–when I saw the Meters, the Wild Magnolias, some other group (maybe the Wild Tchoupitoulas) and (I think) John Lee Hooker. Epic.
Omnes Omnibus
@joeyess: I listened a bit. It doesn’t fit my current mood, but I bookmarked it for later listening.
@muddy: Interesting stuff.
joeyess
@Omnes Omnibus: thanks.
Steeplejack
As for Marvin Gaye, I have always loved “Trouble Man.”
Dr. Lonnie Smith does a killer version of it on the B-3, but I can’t find it on YouTube. Amazon sample here.
joeyess
@Omnes Omnibus: there will be more to come. We’re recording in a unique and novel way. Digitally, all live 4 mics, a direct line and vocals cut later. I think we’re getting a really good live feel. The Mr. Lennon song was done properly in a studio, but the Tull song was done our way. It’s economical and we’re really getting the hang of it.
Omnes Omnibus
@joeyess: No prob. Stuff sounded worth the time to give a good listen.
Steeplejack
Bringing it home for this thread: Joan Osborne and a B-3 on “Why Can’t We Live Together.”
Spaghetti Lee
What’s been sounding good to you?
Still going over my Record Store Day purchases from last weekend (OK, they’re CD’s, but still). Most of them were bands I’d never really listened to before: Portishead, M83, Pere Ubu, Fastball-all love at first listen.
Omnes Omnibus
@muddy: … and there goes the rest of my night. This hits the spot.
@joeyess: Sounds cool.
muddy
@Omnes Omnibus: I just can’t get enough of her. My son knew just what would appeal to me out of his kazillion artists that I have never heard of.
“Forget the bull in the china shop, there’s a china doll in the bullpen…” and then I put down my tools and dance about.
Brachiator
If Motown is overrated, then the Beatles, the Stones and the Beach Boys are overrated.
Cool Marvin Gaye jam.
For Otis Redding, jump over to YouTube and take a listen to his cover of “That’s How Strong My Love Is.”
(having problems linking from a mobile device.
Steeplejack
Still sitting in the café at 3:00 in the morning: Jimmy Smith, “Stormy Monday.”
And Lou Rawls and Les McCann bring it uptempo.
MikeJ
Was listening to NRBQ earlier. Here’s their hit.
Steeplejack
@muddy:
Those Dessa songs are good.
PeakVT
Jack White streaming live right now. I just happened across that while searching for a little PM5K.
ETA: Okay, last song was awesome. Gotta get me that album soon.
Steeplejack
Fred Wesley and the J.B.’s do the Soul Train line dance with James Brown.
Steeplejack
@MikeJ:
Hit, singular? I always liked “Ridin’ in My Car.”
Steeplejack
Thinking about those old New Orleans street groups got me going on some afro-pop, e.g., Ofo and the Black Company, “Allah Wakbarr.”
Jewish Steel
I am awraslin’ with this song. I will have it ready to play for my show on the 18th May. I will not chicken out and play something else like I did with Wind Cries Mary on the occasion of my last show.
http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/favtunesw/005446.HTM
MikeJ
@Steeplejack: Good point. Still never as popular as they deserved, but such is life.
Omnes Omnibus
I appear to have reached the point in the evening where a need for garage band sound and go-go dancers must be fed. Sometimes things like this are necessary. I know that I am likely to spiral into a JAMC feedback loop, but what can be done?
PeakVT
@PeakVT: Jack just came back out with an all female backing band. Which is killing it better than the guys since it includes backup singers.
Omnes Omnibus
@PeakVT: Okay, I went to it. Is good.
Omnes Omnibus
@Omnes Omnibus: The violinist in me hates watching fiddlers. Get that arm up. Hold the damn violin properly.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
I am still searching for the ultimate go-go dancing clip on YouTube. There are fragmentary glimpses of the promised land here and there, but nothing definitive or satisfying.
Somehow I feel it should involve Mitch Ryder’s “C.C. Rider”, but this may be a recovered memory from my youth.
ETA. If AsiangrrlMN shows up, I will unleash the canonical Mavericks video.
burnspbesq
Listening to the new Norah Jones record, thanks to NPR First Listen. Quite a change in feel for her (produced by Danger Mouse). Not sure it’s grabbing me.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: She has been seen on threads below, so you may want to have it on deck.
PeakVT
@Omnes Omnibus: Sounds pretty good, though. Also, too: hubba hubba.
ETA: Turns out the women were the first set, so this is a rebroadcast now. Not that it makes much difference.
burnspbesq
@Steeplejack:
There’s a clip on YouTube of the Bobby Fuller Four doing “I fought the law” with go-go dancers in jail cells that might do the trick.
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
Here’s some sound technique for ya.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUQXa5xR4jQ
Steeplejack
Off topic, but I saw this earlier today and didn’t say anything: “Ernest Callenbach, Author of Ecotopia, Dies at 83.”
I read that book sometime in the ’70s. Might be interesting to go back to it.
MikeJ
@Steeplejack:boots is surely in the running.
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: See, it can be done. Thank you.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: @burnspbesq: Burnsie, is this it?
Steeplejack
@burnspbesq:
Good one, Burnsie. Almost got it here.
. . . Okay, got the caged kitty here. But she is so lonely.
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
I can’t even imagine the amount of self-confidence Duncan Wickel had to have in order to go toe-to-toe with Mark O’Connor. Kid can play. Heck, all the kids in that video can play.
burnspbesq
This is the one I was thinking of.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vw05OasXSQ&feature=related
Just Some Fuckhead
We listened to television themes tonight while we shot pool. I collected a ton of them over the years. We decided the top 5 were:
Cheers
WKRP in Cincinnati
MASH
Greatest American Hero
Monkees
We had about another 30 in the top 10.
Steeplejack
@MikeJ:
Rawr!
Omnes Omnibus
While pursuing this quest, I stumbled across this. Takes me back to my childhood. I do prefer the Great Society to the Jefferson Airplane. Unfortunately, no go-go dancers.
Steeplejack
@Just Some Fuckhead:
God, there are so many.
The theme from The Avengers has always stuck with me.
Jewish Steel
@Just Some Fuckhead: Barney Miller and Sandford & Son for me. And the Rockford Files theme.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jewish Steel: Definitely Barney Miller.
Alison
Okay totally OT but is there anyone who can explain to me how to fix a javascript problem? Trying to order baseball tickets, but on the payment page, when I try to click the button to add a new credit card to my account, nothing happens and I see the “javascript void 0” thing at the bottom of the window. Same in Firefox and IE. I updated java and still not working. Is there any way I can fix it, or is it something they have to do? HALP.
burnspbesq
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Hill Street Blues
Alison
Okay nevermind my whining, I just created a new account with a different email. All the other buttons on the dumb page worked except the “add new card” one. Morans.
Jewish Steel
@Omnes Omnibus: Co-written by Allyn Fergusson, pupil of Nadia Boulanger who basically taught everybody.
Omnes Omnibus
@Alison: Good, ’cause god knows I could have offered no help.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Pentangle did a good version of that.
Steeplejack
@Alison:
Glad you solved your problem. For future reference, JavaScript is different from Java, so updating the latter wouldn’t affect the former.
The snippet you gave wants to launch a script upon clicking the button. Also for future reference, sometimes you can’t Ctrl-click on such links to open a new tab, you can only “plain old click.”
Steeplejack
There are a lot of TV themes that are memorable without being great songs. I loved The Rockford Files, but the song was meh. But of course it’s stuck in my brain.
Most memorable? The Twilight Zone.
Welcome Back, Kotter had a good song.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Grace Slick sort of calls into question the whole existence of go-go dancers.
Yutsano
@Steeplejack: She does seem rather antithetical to the concept. But then again I’m trying to recall if she ever moved when she sang.
Steeplejack
@Yutsano:
Not even her lips.
Narcissus
Do any juicers watch Whale Wars?
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: A fair point. Except that Grace is around the same age as, and, in the time frame, looked rather like my mother, so I don’t really care to associate go-go dancers with her. I know that I first brought Grace to the table here; I am sorry.
hamletta
@Steeplejack: Dude, I got so entranced by the hot Sauza fireman commercial I closed the window without listening to the song!
Damn, he’s hot!
I was wondering if “Stormy” was that “Stormy,” and indeed it was. Would have been good to listen to after the hailstorm subsided last night.
I miss you all, but have to get up at Oh-Fuck-Thirty for DrupalCamp tomorrow. I made the stinkin’ badges, and they’re in my truck. Also the room schedules and the yard signs pointing to the venue.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Heh. We all have our issues. Who knows what will jump out when we open the doors of memory? I think Nabokov said that. Brinsley Nabokov. On his blog, Fail Pyre.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: No, that’s Peggy Lee.
Alison
@Steeplejack: Ah well – shows how little I know, on the first part.
What do you mean by “ctrl-click” vs plain old click? I was just trying to normal click a button on the page…
FlipYrWhig
@Jewish Steel: Sanford and Son has to be #1. It avoids the cheese factor of the ones with lyrics. Just beneath the surface of all TV themes is “Standing tall on the wings of our dreams” or some such shit.
Alison
@FlipYrWhig: PERFECT STRANGERS. I loved that fucking show.
/dance of joy
Steeplejack
@hamletta:
Night-night. Have a good day tomorrow.
I’m about to pack it in myself. Have stayed up past 4:00 a.m. the last two nights, need to pull in the choke chain on the night-owl syndrome. Too late, I know.
The prophet Nostradumbass
Want to see something lame? Check out Dennis Miller’s twitter feed.
Omnes Omnibus
@The prophet Nostradumbass: No, thank you.
Steeplejack
@Alison:
Ctrl-click is a shortcut to open a link in a new tab, so the current page stays open and available. Like if you’re on this page and Ctrl-click “Next Post” at the top, the page will open in a new tab. (Ctrl-click means hold down the Ctrl key and then click the mouse button. Cmd-click or Cmd-Shift-click on an Apple.)
Some people get so used to doing this that they have the problem I mentioned above–a JavaScript script won’t run because it doesn’t respond to Ctrl-click, only to a simple click.
Why, yes, I did do technical support at one time.
Alison
@Steeplejack: Oh I see. I right-click and do “open in new tab” for that. But i tried that with this button thingie and it still didn’t work.
Oh well. Maybe I will bug them about it if it’s still on my mind tomorrow, but since I was able to work around it…meh :P And now the folks’ anniversary gift is settled, 3.5 months in advance. I rule.
Steeplejack
@hamletta:
Sauza fireman on demand.
MikeJ
@Alison: I was plotting out some driving around the other day and every single time I see the Gifford Pinchot National Forest I picture Balki walking through the woods.
Steeplejack
@Alison:
No, if you did a plain click on it and it didn’t work, it’s not working. It’s not you. I went through that whole rigmarole on the off-chance that you were Ctrl-clicking. Like I said, some people get so used to that that it becomes their default click.
Steeplejack
@MikeJ:
He’s got a home renovation show on one of the shelter channels (DIY?).
Alison
@MikeJ: LOL :) I used to work with a guy named Larry who I know liked me but probably also kind of wanted to kill me eventually for calling him Cousin Larry 90% of the time. (He looked nothing like Mark Linn Baker but he was the only Larry I’d known. I couldn’t help myself)
Billy K
Completely. Not that there wasn’t good stuff, but most boomers don’t look past Motown and they run around thinking they have some kind of triumphant understanding of music. Motown was good. It wasn’t the Alpha nor Omega…
Well, yeah, this was early, before Motown became more interested in generating money than making great music.
I want to punch something when I hear a question like this. Of course we know it; it’s not a deeply held secret. It’s just common knowledge for anyone who makes themself even generally acquainted with the history of popular American music. You are not part of a secret club for watching a fucking documentary that focuses on one of the most popular styles of music in our history.
FFS…. really?
Yutsano
@The prophet Nostradumbass: I demand immediate replacement of the brain cells I just sacrificed on that dreck. And at one point he actually was funny.
The prophet Nostradumbass
@Yutsano: It’s obviously him, but fed through a humor removal machine.
Anne Laurie
@Yutsano:
Story I heard — YMMMV — was that he had writers who were funny. But when some of those writers wanted “too much” credit for the success of Dennis Miller BigShot TeeVee Host, DMBTVH cut them loose like the backstage ingrates he felt them to be, only to discover the cushy job sitting around making up funny lines was a lot harder than he remembered. Fortunately, NineElevenChangedEverything, and Miller is now selling to an audience that doesn’t want — in fact, is actively hostile to — novelty; the fReichtards don’t want new jokes, they want ritual repetition of the established canon of Acceptable Funny Topics. “Take my wife, please, but don’t let the feminazis sell her to That Man in the White House! Hahahahahaha!”
gravie
Got “Standing in the Shadows of Motown” through Netflix and loved it. So much great music and such a great insight into how all the music got made.