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"Prime the pump" -- where have I heard that metaphor before?

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This post was inspired by Dust Bunny Queen, who elsewhere expressed an interest in the mobile life style. So I was going to post the original song, but realized that I'd already done that back here. Listening again, I wished to more clearly hear bassist John Entwhistle. I found this brilliant version with the vocals and guitars factored out. It's just Moon and Entwhistle -- the two on the right in the photo.

Years ago, I remarked that The Who and The Beatles were missing complimentary pieces, meaning that Moon and Entwhistle were sort of like the remaining two Beatles, Paul and Ringo. Ron, the commenter, suggested that the remaining 4 should get together and call themselves The Whotles: Paul, Ringo, Pete, and Roger.

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Overheard at Lem's:

Sixty Grit said...
This guy did 80's music correctly. Even all these years later I find the video cannot be resisted.
March 10, 2017 at 7:25 PM

linky poo

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Overheard at Lem's:

Sixty Grit said...

Usury - commonplace, normally, generally.

We usury see a rise in interest rates this time of year.

January 2, 2017 at 12:09 PM

Now, the first thing I heard behind the words was an "Asian" accent. Other artists besides Sixty have riffed off this -- think Roman Polanski in Chinatown: "...salt water, bad for glass..."

My mind also goes back to the The Kingston Trio and their 1958 hit "Coplas" (Couplets). Give it a quick listen:

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"You are surprised I speak your language...you see, I was educated in your country at U.C.R.A."

It's all in good fun!  And isn't that self-deprecating mockery -- the way he says OK, la guitara, ¡andele! with a very American accent at the very beginning?

One last word about The Kingston Trio. Bob Shane is the last surviving original member. I see the following in his Wiki bio:

For the Kingston Trio's success took acoustic folk-based music out of the niche market it had occupied prior to the Trio's arrival and moved it into the mainstream of American popular music, opening the door for major record labels to record and market both more traditional folk musicians and singer-songwriters as well. link

In a sense, The Kingston Trio opened the door for artists like Bob Dylan. Remember that around 1960, Capitol Records had The Kingston Trio; another label had Joan Baez. Columbia Records had Pete Seeger, but they needed someone younger who could speak to a new generation. That's when Dylan stepped forth from the shadows.

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I think that is AprilApple's old boyfriend in the upper right side of that photo. He owed his later fame to Eddie Van Halen's mechanic.

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Overheard ca. 1969-70:

Jimi Hendrix: I don’t know, man. All I did was play it. I’m American, so I played it. I used to sing it in school. They made me sing it in school, so it was a flashback. 

Dick Cavett: This man was in the 101st Airborne, so when you send your nasty letters in …

Lesser known was Hendrix's call to sing the British anthem, "God Save The Queen," the following year at the Isle of Wight Music festival:

Hendrix to the British crowd: "In fact it'd sound better if you'd stand up, for your country, and your brother...and start singin'! And if you don't, fuck ya."

Of course, this all went to hell a scant seven years later.

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Earlier, on the Van Morrison post, Sixty Grit mentioned that he liked Foreigner.

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"Gallows Pole "is another ye olde folk song (like "House of the Rising Sun" considered here the other night). Coincidently, the plot of "Gallows Pole" was also originally written about a woman (called "The Maid Freed From The Gallows"), but Led Zeppelin's version left no doubt that it was about a man who didn't cheat the hangman.

Just like "House of the Rising Sun," Bob Dylan did an earlier version of the song called "Seven Curses." It tells the story of a woman desperately trying to save the life of her condemned father. She gives gold, silver, and herself to the judge who takes everything and hangs him anyway. This sad state of affairs reminded me of an episode of "Foyle's War" -- the one in which a young desperate woman gives herself to the one man who can give her a new life and he ends up taking hers instead (sorry for the spoiler).

Listen to the last lines in the Led Zeppelin version:

Oh yes, you got a fine sister, she warmed my blood from cold,
She warmed my blood to boiling hot to keep you from the Gallows Pole,
Your brother brought me silver, and your sister warmed my soul,
But now I laugh and pull so hard to see you swinging on the Gallows Pole

Cruel.

Led Zeppelin III is an underrated album, IMHO. There is a slew of great songs on that album, many of which were never overplayed. When I first heard it (on vinyl), I thought the recording quality was inferior to their other records. But Jimmy Page remastered it and re-released it this June.

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Overheard in the "Robin Williams, RIP" thread:

"We've got to walk that lonesome highway all by ourselves."

The Reverend Mr. Black said the same thing:

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Pete Seeger (1919-2014) left a musical legacy: inventor of the Seeger longneck banjo and the author of a couple of catchy tunes. But his politics were atrocious and deserve to be mocked and scorned. It was he and his pious ilk who despised The Kingston Trio -- jealousy? Oh and Pete had no kind words for Israel.

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The song is from 1958, from a highly successful group that cool people love to hate.  BTW, did you know that only one original member is still alive?  Did you know that he attended the same prestigious Honolulu high school that our president attended?

Don't ask for a translation because they do that for you.

The song ends with something "funny" about cats.

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My older brother and I loved this song as kids. We would never have thought of making my parents' albums into frisbees.

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Dino Valenti of the Quicksilver Messenger Service wrote the song, but The Youngbloods made it famous in 1967.

I like the '60's era celebrity footage equally cut with "normal" people footage. I think I spied Sixty Grit with Carol_Herman.

Speaking of hippies, did you know that this summer marks the 50th anniversary of Ken Kesey's 1964 west-to-east Merry Pranksters road trip?

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Lighten up and let the sun shine in

I Will Wait (Open Thread)

The banjo is pretty rare in British folk music. Probably for good reason. The Pogues were obvious exceptions. And so were good olde Led Zeppelin who used it to good effect in "Gallows Pole" (wait for it at around the 2 minute mark with the drums):

The banjo is an American instrument.

Sing Hosanna, Hallelujah!

This one is my mother's favorite.  I adore it too--what's not to like? The song features a banjo, that greatest of American instruments. It also has a complexity which many Christmas Carols lack.

The New Christy Minstrels spawned the likes of Barry McGuire* (Eve of Destruction), Gene Clark (The Byrds), Kim Carnes (Bette Davis Eyes), and the Kenny Rogers. The NCM belonged to that wonderful but brief period of American music between the death of Buddy Holly and the invasion of The Beatles.
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*His growling voice appears briefly at the 1 min 44 sec mark.

The Sinking Of The Reuben James

This post probably belongs below the fold in my last one about JFK-era American folk songs. This one is special for a couple reasons:

(1) The song is from 1961 and was released around the 20th anniversary of the sinking of the USS Reuben James. JFK had his own naval experience memorialized by Jimmy Dean around that time.

(2) The Reuben James sinking predated Pearl Harbor by a full 5 weeks and yet is largely forgotten. Imagine the outrage with today's news cycle.

(3) The song was written by Woody Guthrie at a time when both the political right and left could still unite against common enemies.

(4) Guthrie originally intended to include the names of every sailor lost in the sinking, but settled for "what were their names;"  The maker of this YouTube video admirably succeeds at Guthrie's original goal. I liken the effect to releasing the men's names from the blackened depths--like bubbles coming to the surface each time the song is played:

The Kingston Trio added their own flourish at the end:

Many years have passed since those brave men are gone,
Those cold icy waters they're still and they're calm,
Many years have passed and still I wonder why,
The worst of men must fight and the best of men must die.

A Brief Musical Tribute To The JFK Era

I don't remember JFK's death as I was only three. I do have memories of 1963 -- even earlier than November. My tonsillectomy occurred months before the assassination and I remember waking up in that hospital -- perhaps because it was the very first time I sensed being outside the protective cocoon of my family. But the Kennedy assassination?  Nada. What I do remember are some of the folk songs popular during the Kennedy era which I heard in subsequent years, mostly on my parents' vinyl LPs.

This Land Is Your Land, This Land Is My Land

And people complained that Bob Dylan had a poor singing voice.