Lowbrow Vol.7: Devil Dance

Reposts! By request: Pierre Bastien's marvelous mechanical musics and Snoopy's Beatles Classics on Toys. I won't be re-upping any Twink The Toy Piano Band, as he has put all of his stuff on Bandcamp, so go there.

Due to a crashed hard drive, this volume was delayed and Vol. 8 was posted first, but now our series exploring mid-20th-century kool kulture is sequentially correct. In this volume, former nightclub accordionist-turned-killjoy preacher Jack van Impe warns us of the dangers of that devils' music, thusly illustrated by riotous, ridiculous, rhythm-and-blues, rock'n'roll rekkids (ever notice that Satan is often depicted as smiling and laughing? He's apparently having much more fun than The Other Guy). Lots of ludicrous novelties this time out, by artists gleefully unconcerned with making Profound Artistic Statements. You'll have fun fun fun even after - and I want to make this perfectly clear - even after Daddy takes the T-bird away. 

But this time, let's add "style" to our usual mix of "sin," "sex" and "sleaze". Publisher V. Vale of the legendary RE/Search books has been bemoaning the state of his home city lately, e.g: "We think it’s necessary to read as much humor as possible these days to keep our morale up, as San Francisco daily becomes more inundated with a tsunami of “techies” proud of their acultural normcore barbarism (trendy new martinis, trendy new restaurants—is that all there is?!) 

 I wasn't familiar with the term "normcore," but it's apparently a fashion statement popular among urban youth that attempts to create as bland and inconspicuous a look as possible (while still prominently wearing designer labels, of course). Baseball caps, pullovers, etc. Artist-types shunning original style to look like their dad. My God-zilla! and you thought modern culture couldn't get any more boring? Perhaps that's why in recent months I've been hittin' the thrift stores looking for real flash suits and bright-colored Hawaiian-style shirts, creating outfits like the one Don Draper is sporting here. (Shirt collars OVER the jacket, doncha know.) And paisley shirts! They might go well with my Peter Fonda "Easy Rider" sunglasses. Gotta buy a new pair of Beatle boots tho, as the ones I had when I was 20 are sadly long gone. And where can I get a medallion to adorn my chest as I wear my v-neck, wide-collar David Cassidy-type paisley shirt? It's kinda like this one, only blue. There must be someplace where one can get those loud shirts Nelson Mandela used to wear. If any shirts are worth $95, these may be them. Fashion tips in comments, please. And photo links, esp. from ladies sporting leopard skin prints.

Loud clothes - clothes that go up to 11 - need loud music. So once again, we're pouring in your earholes lots of stuff taken from my mostly 45 rpm vinyl discoveries that have not only not appeared on other like-minded compilations (so far as I know), but have never been digitally available...until now! Can find no info on some of these mysterious sides. 

Dig the AbnormCore sounds here:

Lowbrow Vol.7: Devil Dance - almost 69 minutes; (69: the dirtiest number in the world!)

1 Jack van Impe - rock music is more dangerous ("From Night Clubs to Christ") 
2 Mad Man Taylor - Rumble Tumble
 3 Bruce Johnston - Soupy Shuffle Stomp [future "replacement" for Brian Wilson with a 
retarded tribute to TV funnyman Soupy Sales]
4 Bobby Peterson Quintet - Mama Get Your Hammer [sick humor + screamin' r'n'b = what all
 music should be like]
5 Jack van Impe - rock and roll music
6 Thee Midnighters - Everybody Needs Somebody To Love
7 Spike Jones - Pimples And Braces [yes, The Master novelty bandleader did live long 
enough to parody teenagers and rock'n'roll]
8 Grace Chang - I Want You To Be My Baby [famous singing actress of Chinese cinema 
swings bilingual]
9 Jack van Impe - commie plans
10 The Lancasters - Satan's Holiday
11 Georgia Gibbs - Kiss of Fire (rock version) [this was originally an early '50s tango-type
 hit for Gibbs, but this 45 is apparently a '60s remake, judging by the swiping of Roy Orbison's
"Oh Pretty Woman" riff]
12 Jack van Impe - commie rock beat
13 Morty Jay and the Coney Island Brass - Beef-Eater [one of my absolute fave (fairly) recent instro 45 rpm discoveries]
14 Vince Edwards - Squealin Parrot (Twist) [was very surprised to come across a 45 with such a 
wacky title by teen dream actor Edwards, as most of his records are mushy ballads; was even 
more surprised to find how wacked-out hilarious it was]
15 ''Handsome'' Jim Balcom - Corrido Rock (Part 1)
16 Jack van Impe - vile filthy dirty
17 Mike Minor - Satan's Waiting [from an alternate universe where Satanists favor 
finger-snappin' lounge over heavy metal]
18 Scott Engel - Devil Surfer [future avant-crooner Scott Walker once recorded a satanic 
surf instro, under his original name?!]
19 Jack van Impe - gogo pogo
20 The Allisons - Ling Ting Tong [black girl group singing Asian stereotypes, and a way-out (slide?) guitar solo]
21 Bill Lewis - Swim Beat
22 Jack van Impe - naked!
23 The Motions - Long-Hair
24 Rod McKuen - I Dig Her Wig [one would never guess that the man behind this kooky
 rocker would go on to become a hugely successful author of sappy poetry]
25 Bobby Gregg And His Friends - The Jam Part 1
26 Jack van Impe - 4 letter word
27 Lou Monte - Elvis Presley For President [Monte was the court jester of the Rat Pack
 /Italian-Amercan scene]
28 The Sparkletones - I Dig You,Baby [I'd rather not describe here what makes the 
end part of this song, and the entirety of the next song, so, er, 'unique'; you'll hear]
29 Gene Dozier & The Brotherhood - Mustang Sally
30 Bill Haley & His Comets - Straight Jacket (Live)
31 Jack van Impe - baser animal emotions
32 David Houston - One And Only [from the film 'Carnival Rock' (thanks Youtube!);
 featuring blistering guitar work by Elvis' string-slinger James Burton]
33 Steve Allen - Memphis [tv comic plays a straight-ahead ahead Chuck Berry
 instro...but I thought he hated rock n roll?]
34 Steven Garrick and his Party Twisters - Sister's a Twister 
35 The Applejacks - Rocka-Conga
36 Jack van Impe - twisted vile perverted
37 Royaltones - Wail
38 Jack Gale & The Medicine Men - The Sloppy Madison [radio dj's parody of  
incomprehensible dance instruction records]
39 Milt Rogers & His Orchestra - Lonely Road To Damascus

Album title and artwork courtesy of burlesque queen Gene Gemay. 

THE BIG RUMBLE! Uncensored Scenes of the Nightmares of a Weirdo

(Back up, by request: Roky Erickson live, Jonathan Brandmeier, Bah Humbug, and CURL ACTIVATE 2: More '80s Hip-Hop Novelties.)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Never before in the history of blogging has there been such a SHOCKING collection of '50s/'60s audio atrocities! You'll flip your wig (or your switchblade) when you...HEAR riotous rock'n'roll and rancid radio ads! HEAR bad-boy bikers blowin' rhythm-and-blues! HEAR their rockabilly "rumble" with rival gangs! These heathen hot-rodding hoodlums and harlots are on a one-way drag race to HELL!

Music For Maniacs, the blog that brought you such SIN-tillating compilations as "Voodoo Dance Doll," and the banned-in-Boston "Hubba Hubba!," are back with an all-new spine-tingling collection of virgin vinyl rips and recorded-off-YouTube sound selections, many of which have never been digitally available before! There are other similar collections of this sort of teen trash, but these songs have (so far as I know) not been previously compiled.

Starring in this festival of forgotten (forbidden?!) 45s: a teen-aged (and unrecognizable) Scott Walker, still going by the name Scott Engel; gay novelty act Sandy Beech; one Mike Minor, possible the only lounge crooner to tackle juvenile delinquency; a Frank Zappa production; both a song by the Cheers (featuring future game show host Bert Convy) and a cover of the Cheers' hit "Black Denim Trousers" (that I think I prefer to the original); Harold Lloyd Jr - yes, the son of the hanging-off-the-clock guy - who had a short, strange life; and since every psychobilly/Cramps-related comp features Link Wray's "Rumble," we're including a different Wray rumbler that might be an even better tune.

Volume 7 of our ongoing survey of mid-century sleazy-listening sounds is in limbo - on a hard-drive that has apparently crashed. A drive I bought to be a backup for my main drive!  Damn thing (a Passport) is less then a year old. Hoping it can be recovered. So we're jumping to Vol. 8.

As Oliver Reed sings:
"Black Leather, Black Leather, Smash Smash Smash!
Black Leather, Black Leather, crash crash crash!
Black Leather, Black Leather, Kill Kill Kill!"

"LOWBROW Vol. 8: The Big Rumble"

1 ad - "The Thrill Killers"
2 Link Wray - Rumble Rock
3 Jeff Daniels - Switchblade Sam [one of the more surreal, hysterical rockabilly boppers I've ever heard, describing some kind of orgy between Long Tall Sally, Stagger Lee, and, er, Charlie Brown?]
4 Oliver Reed - Black Leather Rock [from the film "(These Are) The Damned"]
5 The Shadows - The Rumble
6 ad - "High School Hellcats"/"Hot Rod Gang"
7 The Cheers - Chicken [presumably inspired by the "chickie run" scene in the James Dean film "Rebel Without a Cause"]
8 The Champs - Experiment In Terror [like Link Wray, those "Tequila" boys The Champs did in fact record more than one song]
9 The Diamonds - Daddy Cool
10 ad - "The Wild Rebels"
11 Bill Woods - Go Crazy Man
12 Alexander (Sandy) Courage - Hot Rod Rumble (Main Title)
13 Bob Peck - Sweet 16 [cool song Bob, but you're still the poor man's Tom Lehrer!]
14 Ray Smith - Rockin' Bandit
15 The Orange Groove - Street King [it's a shame we'll never know what geniuses made this brilliant quasi-Middle Eastern bad-boy oddity for a budget label]
16 Don Lonie Talks With Teenagers (excerpt)
17 Scott Walker (aka Scott Engel) - Good For Nothin' [Wow, before I came across this 45, I had no idea about the pre-Walker Brothers rockabilly past of Scott W.]
18 Homer Denison Jr - Chickie Run [hello, sound fx!]
19 Steve Karmen - 'Teenage Gang Debs' theme
20 ad - "Fiend For Flesh!"/"Road Rebels" [alas, these films, scarcely released in the first place, are considered lost]
21 Hal Blaine & the Young Cougars - Green Monster
22 Hells Angels (dialogue)
23 The Diamonds - Black Denim Trousers and Motorcycle Boots
24 The Rotations - The Cruncher [not "The Crusher"! but an early Zappa production]
25 Die Crazy Girls - Der Feuerstuhl (Leader Of The Pack) [is she saying "buzz off, buzz off" in this German Shangri-las remake?]
26 ad - "She Devils on Wheels"
27 Epitones - The Mighty Rumble
28 Sandy Beech - Leather Jacket Lovers [amazing that this outrageous s&m parody was released back in the '60s; how did they get away with it!? Er, well, maybe J. Edgar Hoover dug it, he was a pretty kinky cat...]
29 Harold Lloyd Jr w/Page Cavanaugh - Daddy Bird [from the terrible film "Frankenstein's Daughter"]
30 Mike Minor - Rumble In The Night
31 Hash Brown - The Rumble
32 ad - "Bury Me an Angel"
33 The Crickets - I Fought The Law [yep, 'twas a post-Buddy Holly Crickets that wrote and first recorded this classic; why was it not the hit that Bobby Fuller's version was? Perhaps  the reference to a "zip-gun", the homemade rubber-band-powered gun that punk kids used, was too controversial; changing it to "six gun" removed it to a safer Old Western past]
34 Vicki Young - Riot In Cell Block #9 [the Leiber and Stoller hit for The Coasters (dba The Robins) gets a female makeover]
35 Barry Green (aka Barry Blue) - Shake A Tail Suzie [a Suzuki 'cycles promo]

ATTACK OF THE KILLER FILLER

 WILD! RAW! UNINHIBITED!

These savage young rock'n'roll instrumentals live for 'kicks'! And beware the 'square' who stands in their way!


In the 1950s and 1960s, countless records were cranked out by the "budget labels," whose releases were essentially the music industry equivalent of cheapie exploitation films. Like those groovy movies, screened at drive-ins and grindhouses away from respectable cinemas, budget records were usually not found in record stores, but in the racks of places like drugstores. They were impulse buys, sold for a dollar, at a time when proper albums went for $3-4. And like z-movie producers, budget labels used all manner of deceptive, eye-grabbing visuals to lure suckers, er, I mean customers into buying their often inferior products. Case in point: an album called "Bye Bye Birdie" with an album cover (pictured right) presumably depicting a scene from the musical film of the same name. This album features a grand total of ONE (1) song from the film (and a remake at that). Also featured here are albums by popular folk/pop star Trini Lopez, and jazz-man Buddy Tate, both featured only on side one.

So who was performing on the rest of these albums? Who knows? It is safe to say that there never were any actual bands with names like the Exotic Guitars or the Rock and Rollers Orchestra. Budget labels would acquire tapes, sometimes thru rather dubious means, and release them under a variety of phony artist names and song titles. It may seem hard to believe now, but in the '50s/early '60s such now well-regarded styles as blues, r'n'b, and rock'n'roll were, for the most part, not considered mainstream. So these tapes could be had for cheap.

It's unfortunate that we'll probably never know who performed this music, since it's quite good. The Exotic Guitars sound like session cats doing their impression of surf rock, and the Rhythm Rockers might be sessioneers, too. But I would imagine that the Rock and Rollers Orchestra was a black rhythm-and-blues nightclub band - they blow like crazy, dad. Music scientifically designed to rock a party  to da break-a-dawn. The band probably never made a penny from these recordings.

Of course, there's lots of uninteresting filler out there, too. And we're lucky with today's selections so far as sound quality is concerned, since budget labels like Crown were notorious for using the worst quality vinyl, and these sides sound pretty good. Both the Bella St Clair and the R'n'R Orch records start off fairly low key before getting increasingly crazed, so perhaps there was some actual thinking going into the sequencing at least. Those albums cover, tho...oy. That Buddy Tate one's a beauty, eh?


KILLER FILLER
(All tracks sourced from 99 cent vinyl)
Exotic Guitars:
1. Walkin Around [essentially a rock rip-off of Ray Barretto's "El Watusi," which was a great song, so fine by me.]
2. Time of My Life
3. Goin Home
4. Susan
5. Beach Party

Bella St Clair and the Rhythm Rockers:
A1 Rock A Bye [continuing in the surf-y vein]
A2 Rocking Guitar
A3 Tribute To Birdie [now it's starting to get wild, w/some screamin' sax]
A4 Rolling Theme [superb rockabilly - frantic, man, frantic!]
B1 Rolling With The Punch
B2 Teen Frenzy
B3 Jamboree
B4 Final Farewell
B5 Phone Fancy

The Rock and Rollers Orchestra:
1 - Let's Rock and Roll
2 - Romp And Stomp
3 - Long N Lean
4 - The Screwdriver No 1
5 - Cool Fool [the screwdrivers must be kicking in, cuz this song is nuts]
6 - Soda Bob [a bump-n-grinder for you burlesque dancers]

When Surfing In Space, Apply MOON-TAN LOTION

46 years ago today, humans walked on the moon for the first time, as millions watched on TV (the Soviets, via their own Luna 15 craft, were no doubt angrily shaking their fists at the screen!), and some even watched with their naked eye by telescope. One British Colombian astronomer actually watched without a telescope - he knew the night sky so well that he could tell which dot was Apollo 11. The actual landing craft and American flag is still there, also visible by telescopes, and, were you to land at Tranquility Base, you could even see Neil Armstrong's footprints. Not a whole lot of weather on the moon.

Apart from the Space Race, the Sixties also gave us surf rock, and trashy rock 'n' roll in general. Two great tastes that go great together! Seems like a good time to celebrate this most holy of unions, what with the amazing Pluto mission now happening, and surf music feeling so right in this summer heat. 

These are mostly guitar instrumentals, but wacky sci-fi sound fx, keyboards, horns, and even some orchestral arrangements all add plenty of variety. And so you don't o.d. on instros, there's a few vocal numbers as well. I've always loved the Steven Garrick and His Party Twisters song (the female singer reminds me of Rusty Warren) yet for some reason I still haven't listened to much of the rest of the album. A little twisting goes a long way. There's also some rockabilly, doo-wop, some great lounge crooning ("Journey To The 7th Planet"), and one of Brian Wilson's greatest bits of lunacy (yes, it was once thought that the moon - Luna - caused madness). And then there's Sandy "King of the Surf Drummers" Nelson's "Beat From Another World," 7 bewildering minutes of studio and tape effects + drum solo that is certainly unlike anything else I've ever heard. It's more avant-garde then most stuff that thinks it's avant-garde.

I kinda cheated this time and included some modern surf bands along with the oldies, e.g.: contempo groups covering songs from the Ventures classic "In Space" album, and the "Blob" and "Dr Who" covers. They're just too good. But no Man or Astro-Man - seeing as how their entire career is surf-in-space, they would be a bit too obvious, no?
 
And once again, as we usually do when we get all mid-century lowbrow, there's some audio ephemera thrown in. This time, it's: 'B' movie ads and dialogue, a children's record, and sci-fi sound effects. And, as per usual, the collection's title and artwork (cartoonist Bill Wenzell, in this case) are courtesy of vintage men's magazines.

Lowbrow Vol.5 MoonTan Lotion - A MusicForManiacs Collection

Do I have to write out the track list? It's 30 tracks and I'm tired!
UPDATE 7/22: Thanks to a reader with a suitably sci-fi handle,
Soylentwhitetrash, the tracklist is now in Comments.

"Female Trouble": The Soundtrack

By request from multiple requesters requesting requests...now back on-line:
RIAA: "Sounds For The Swing-Set," "Radical, Intense and Awesome", and "Schizophonia Suite." And just in time for summer: "Soul Surfin'."

Following the recent post of the soundtrack to the John Waters film "Pink Flamingos," blogger extraordinaire Jonny Zchivago slipped us the OST to Waters' 1974 classic "Female Trouble." Ingredients: some splendidly sleazy early rock, inc "Underwater," one of my fave surf oddities; Nervous Norvus hippin' the squares to that jive lingo; the singing debut of Divine; some slices of corny suburban cheese; and choice bits of dialogue from the film. As the great Nervous Norvus would say, dig-a-roonee:

"Female Trouble" Soundtrack + Bonus Filth!

01 Divine - Female Trouble Theme [original lyrics sung over an existing song...but what is the song?]
02 "Christmas at the Davenports"
03 Gene Autry - Jingle Bells
04 Ruby Wright with Cliff Lash and his Orchestra and the Dick Noel Singers - Merry, Merry, Merry, Merry Xmas
05 "The World of Heterosexuality"
06 Chuck Río & The Originals - Blue Kat
07 "A Meatball Sandwich"
08 Nervous Norvus - Dig
09 Bill Black Combo - Yogi
10 101 Strings Orchestra - Bridal March
11 "Retarded Brat"
12 The Frogmen - Underwater

Order now and we'll include these free gifts! Some songs not on the soundtrack, but inspired by the film that I've added to the file Jonny sent us:

- D. Sticker Ensemble - Massey Resource [sound collage of film dialogue vs Philip Glass (?)]
- Eartha Kitt w/Bronski Beat - Cha Cha Heels [a couple of disco/house stompers]
- Rosabel w/Jeanie Tracy - Cha Cha Heels
- The Cowslingers - Cha Cha Heels [trashy garage-rock]

Thanks and praise to Jonny Zchivago!
  

TRIBUTE TO PINK FLAMINGOS

Donald Featherstone, the appropriately-named creator of those plastic reproductions of our pink feathered friends, has just passed away at the age of 79. As if being the father of the world's most notorious lawn ornament wasn't eccentric enough, Featherstone and his wife were also known for always wearing matching outfits! Now that is just the sort of weird, goofy, good ol' American trash culture that John Waters immortalized in his 1972 film. 

If you haven't seen "Pink Flamings," perhaps the ultimate cult movie, I sure as hell ain't gonna tell you about it. Let's just say that even tho I only saw it once - and this was back in the '80s, when the earths' crust was still cooling and dinosaurs walked the earth - a mere glance at the song titles of the soundtrack recall images that are permanently seared into my brain. So let's pay tribute to Mr. Featherstone with the suitably trashy soundtrack of '50s/60s rock, r'n'b, and easy-listening oldies that Waters used to underscore his characters foul (not to mention fowl) behavior. Some of these songs are as insane as any crazed early rock (e.g.: "Chicken Grabber," "Surfin Bird") while others, like the perfectly presentable "Happy Happy Birthday Baby," are used as ironically innocent counterpoints to the on-screen depravity.

Plus! At no extra cost to you! Other "Pink Flamingos"-related audio oddities thrown into the file:

- Edith Massesy's single, which featured her "singing" a cover of the Four Seasons' "Big Girls Don't Cry," and a lovely original, "Punks (Get Off The Grass)." Massey had moved to the Venice Beach neighborhood of Los Angeles, and her thrift store was a popular hangout for local punks and weirdos, who recorded this with her in 1982.

- Divine "You Think You're A Man" (7'' version); S/He recorded a surprising amount but I just have this one catchy bit of '80s disco.

- The Illuminoids "Satan Said Walrus Eggs," a mashup from 2007 that mixes Massey's "Pink Flamingo" dialogue with the Beatles, over a stomping beat from Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. The Egg Lady meets the Egg Man, with special guest: Satan. One of the members of the Illuminoids was Howie Pyro, who took the name for his super-swell internet show "Intoxica" from one of the songs on this here soundtrack:

"Pink Flamingos" + Bonus Filth

1. The Swag - Link Wray & His Ray Men

2. Intoxica - The Centurions

3. Jim Dandy - LaVern Baker

4. I'm Not A Juvenile Delinquent - Frankie Lymon And The Teenagers

5. The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard

6. Ooh! Look-A There, Ain't She Pretty - Bill Haley & His Comets

7. Chicken Grabber - Nite Hawks

8. Happy, Happy Birthday Baby - The Tune Weavers

9. Pink Champagne - The Tyrones

10. Surfin' Bird - The Trashmen

11. Riot In Cell Block #9 - The Robins

12. (How Much Is) That Doggie In The Window - Patti Page

HUBBA HUBBA!: The Big Band Beat of Bad Girls and Burlesque

Back up by request: Roky Erickson's kids party, and "Carnival in Paradise."

Seeing as how our previous collection of mid-century sleazy-listening music is, by a wide margin, the most popular post of the year so far, I guess I'd better keep feeding you cool cats and crazy kitties more rarities and vinyl obscurities from the Golden Age of Bad Taste:

In the heydey of burlesque, dancin' goils twirled their tassels and bumped their rumps to live bands, not to a dj playing Salt n Pepa or Motley Crue. MCs, specialty acts, and comedy teams were also on the bill if for no other reason than to keep up the pretense that these were "variety shows" - something for everyone! - and not just lewd displays of wanton flesh. Tho the burlesque show format may have been created to skirt (so to speak) the censors, it ended up working quite well as an all-around entertainment package, surviving to this day. There's probably a 'burly-q' revival show near you now.

But this stuff is from the original era, the 1940s - 1960s (I'm aware that burlesque preceeds the '40s, I just don't know of any earlier music). The first track is  apparently   recorded live "in the field" from an album called "Burlesque Uncensored." I was gonna post the whole album, but it's actually in print thru Smithsonian Folkways (your tax dollars at work?)

Apart from the expected bump-and-grind jazz, there's also some wild early rock n roll, exploitation movie radio ads and dialogue, low-budget lounge combos, and show-tunes (e.g. Natalie Wood in "Gypsy," the Gyspy Rose Lee biopic, and another version of the "Take it off the E-string" song that was featured on vol 1).  And then there's the one musical moment from the infamous '60s S&M sound-effects album, "Tortura!"

I also recorded some burlesque film soundtrack music off videos, performed by anonymous sleaze-meisters. This was some years ago when I recorded these, and I can't find most of those films on the YouTubes now.  Too bad, the "Snakes" one in particular was great: a campy guy shouting "Snakes!" and running off camera, followed by a girl dancing with an actual, live enormous boa constrictor-type beastie. Towards the end, she even starts to put the snakes' head unto her mouth. A search for "snakes + burlesque" didn't come up with anything, but if any of you-all know this one, send us the links, pleeze!

And for some great reading whilst listening to this music, check out our pals at  
Decadent History for a plethora of fascinating articles. Learn your history, kids! 

Lowbrow Vol.3 Hubba Hubba! - A MusicForManiacs Collection

01 "Burlesque Uncensored" - lobby talker-chorus line-strip tease
02 Natalie Wood-Let Me Entertain You [from "Gypsy," 1962]
03 "Angels Wild Women"
04 Perez Prado - Exotic Suite of the Americans (excerpt)
05 Kay Kyser His Orchestra - Strip Polka [The Andrews Sisters also recorded this popular '40s Big Band number]
06 Dick Dale & His Del-Tones - Take It Off
07 "Varietease" - Betty Page, Bobby Shields [video soundtrack]
08 "The Naughty Stewardesses"
09 Dick Contino & Eddie Layton - Blues in the Night [accordionist Contino isn't just a James Ellroy character; in fact, he's real, alive, and still performs] 
10 Barbara Stanwyck - The G-String Song [from the 1943 film "Lady of Burlesque", recorded off video]
11 Big Jay McNeely - Striptease Swing [sax wildman, veteran of LA's legendary Central Ave scene, is also still alive and blowin']
12 Eddie Wayne [actually surf/session guitarist Jerry Cole] - Dig Ye Deep
13 Jayne Mansfield - Suey [the great blond bombshell is backed here by a pre-fame Jimi Hendrix!]
14 Ricky Vale & The Surfers - Ghost Surfin'
15 "Nurses for Sale"
16 John Barry - The Stripper [nope, not the David Rose hit (see below); yep, the James Bond soundtrack guy]
17 Ernie Freeman - The Stripper [Freeman's the man who brought Sinatra into the r'n'b scene with "That's Life"]
18 "Porno Photos"
19 "Tortura" - untitled (Track 21)
20 "Snakes"
21 Snakes! [burlesque film soundtrack]
22 The Knight Beats - Going To Town
23 Hal Blaine & The Young Cougars - Gear Stripper [Blaine is possibly the most recorded drummer in history; he's certainly one of the few to record a drag-race/burlesque fusion song]
24 The Bangers - Baby Let Me Bang Your Box, Part 1 [this r'n'b shouter is, of course, referring to the lady's piano]
25 John Buzon Trio - Ill Wind
26 Voodoo Virgin - [burlesque film soundtrack]
27 Stan Kenton - Blues In Burlesque [No, that's not Tom Waits singing, it's drummer Shelly Mann, with Maynard Ferguson blowin', from 1951]

All tracks safe for work! We like wholesome sleaze around here.

Music For People Who Really, Really Really Like to Limbo Dance

Does anybody still dance the limbo? You know, you bend over backwards to shimmy under an ever-lowering pole, to the catchy strains of calypso music.  Don't know if any actual Caribbean peoples did the limbo, but plenty of post-war suburbanites who'd sipped a bit too much rum sure did. And this has to be one of the strangest artifacts of the limbo craze - a instrumental version of the hit Chubby Checker song "Limbo Rock" stretched out for the length of an entire album. Hollywood session vet Billy Strange (that's his guitar on Nancy Sinatra's "Bang Bang," among a million other credits) and his crew keep things interesting throughout, with funky percussion breaks, and exotica-like atmospheric interludes featuring grown men a-whoopin' and a-hollerin'. There's plenty of soloing, ranging from cool jazzy to almost rock 'n' roll. 

Exotica music is fine and dandy for polite cocktail sipping, but when the drinks kick in, what are you gonna dance to, eh, eh?  I'll tell you what: "Limbo Rock pt 1" and "Limbo Rock, pt 2".  For those moments when you want to, quite literally, drink someone under the table.

Billy Strange and Telstars - Limbo Rock

Now if only a band called Billy Strange and the Limbo Rock did an album-length version of "Telstar"...

VOODOO DANCE DOLL: 1950s/60s Rock'n'Roll Exotica

Bongos in the Congo!  Apes in the jungle! Tikis, cannibals, and witch doctors! Grown men making tropical bird calls! Sound familiar? But this ain't no jazzy Martin Denny-style exotica for grown-ups' cocktail parties. No, my teen-age hoodlum friends, this sampler of exotic rock (rock-xotica?) + relevant soundbites marks this blogs' return to weekend-starting sleazy-listening sounds from the Golden Age of Cool. As with the first collection that kicked off this on-again/off-again project, many of these tracks were recorded off my vinyl, songs that hopefully have not been featured on similar comps like the "Jungle Exotica" series. My records are in various states of preservation, so I did track down some digital replacements when available. But most of this is out-of-print wax whose occasional pops and cracks can be thought of as the crunching of jungle undergrowth beneath the furious feet of Watusi exotic dancers (in all senses of the phrase).

Ingredients: surf rock, doo-wop, rhythm 'n' blues, novelties, some actual ethnic peoples, movie clips, radio ads, excerpts from a record meant to accompany a slideshow or filmstrip about the Congo, Africa (unfortunately, it did not contain the visuals), and some loungey things, but with a backbeat. There are a few well-known hit-makers here like Eartha Kitt, the Dave Clark Five, and Santo & Johnny, but as these records are from the gloriously unself-conscious pre-rock critic era*, many of these artists have been lost to the mists of history. 

Voodoo Dance Doll - an M4M Collection.zip

01 congo slideshow- weekend dance
02 Mel Taylor & The Magics - Bongo Rock
03 The Vistas - Tiki Twist
04 Leni Okehu and his Surfboarders - Hawaiian People Eater
05 Eartha Kitt - Honolulu Rock And Roll
06 congo slideshow - superstition dance
07 Muvva Hubbard & the Stompers Congo Mombo
08 "Alligator Man"
09 The Dave Clark Five - Chaquita
10 The Pyramids - 
Koko Joe
11 "100 Percent Gorilla"
12 The Rocking Vickers - I Go Ape
13 Billy Mure - Tabu
14 congo slideshow - witch doctor
15 Werner Hass - Oh-ee-oh-ah-ah
16 Dick Dale & The Del-Tones - Jungle Fever
17 Jerry & Mel - Cannibal stew
18 "Zombie Island Massacre" - Zombie Attacks Honeymooners
19 congo slideshow - drumming
20 Mel Taylor & The Magics - Drums A Go-Go
21 Thurl Ravenscroft - Dr Geek From Tanganyika
22 Buddy Morrow And His Orchestra - One-Two-Three-Kick (The Original Conga) pt1.
23 Roger Craig - Song of India
24 The Fugitives - Human Jungle
25 Bela's "Jungle Hell"
26 Roy Estrada and The Rocketeers-Jungle Dreams Part 2 
27 Busby Lewis - Jerk
28 Susan King-Drum Rhythm
29 Yngve stoor - Hula Rock
30 Perez Prado - Cuban Rock
31 Leni Okehu and his Surfboarders - Hawaiian Rock
32 Freddy Cannon - Everybody Monkey
33 Johnny and Santo - Caravan
34 congo slideshow - watusi
35 Big Walter and the Thunderbirds _ Watusie Freeze part 1
36 "shrunken heads" ad
37 Buddy Morrow And His Orchestra - One-Two-Three-Kick (The Original Conga) pt2
38 Marti Barris - Ahbe Casabe
39 Sandy Nelson - Casbah 

Thanks to Count Otto for the Rockin' Vicars!

*Cartoonist/record collector Robert Crumb has described the early rock he really liked as "proletariat," and indeed, there may be some class-ism behind the critical dismissal of so much rock prior to the mid-'60s: once rock scrubbed off all of that honky-tonk/ghetto stank and adopted such middle-class, college-educated features as "poetic" lyrics and classical European influences, then it finally merited the status of High Art. But of course, the music wasn't really improved so much as it simply changed - from fun, funny, energetic, sexy, and atmospheric to...not as much. Rock didn't get better, it just moved to the suburbs.

Singing TV Horror-Show Hosts

In 1953, the late Maila Nurmi aka Vampira invented that beloved American tradition, the TV horror host. Did other countries pick up on this concept? Low budget local stations filled their late night or weekend afternoon slots with crappy old movies, usually, but not always, of the monster variety. The shows were hosted by a smart aleck in a costume traipsing about a cobwebbed castle/ laboratory/etc set, interrupting the proceedings to make jokes, perform in skits, read letters from viewers, perhaps interact with other cast members/puppets, or, in the case of Cleveland's Ghoulardi, blow things up. And many of them made records: Vampira, her bastard offspring Elvira, John "The Cool Ghoul" Zacherle, and the lass featured below, who made one of the most perfect 45s ever.

This interview with the author of a new book about Vampira makes the case that Nurmi was the ultimate hip chick, a bad-ass beatnik who was just too hot for mainstream tv audiences to handle. After listening to the podcast (not too long, even at an hour's length), I rented "Vampira And Me," a documentary from last year based on interviews with Nurmi. The late '80s/early '90s L.A. band Satans' Pilgrims are featured. I'd long known about the records they made with Vampira, but didn't realize that most of the 'lyrics' were taken from found religious tracts. "Tribute to Elvis," however, is Nurmis' own recollections of her friendship with The King, one of many celebs entranced by her proto-goth beauty.

Why did so much insane music come out of Ohio in the '70s? David Thomas of Pere Ubu cites the influence of a popular Cleveland horror host. Ubu, The Dead Boys, Devo, the Cramps (especially The Cramps), etc. were the Ghoulardi generation, kids weened on Ernie Anderson's anarchic character who played wild garage rock records, and would blow up things with firecrackers on the air, much to the dismay of the station management. Oddly enough, my first-hand memory of Anderson is after he quit Ghoulardi to be the ABC network announcer - that was his leering voice announcing "The Loooove Boat." (Filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson is his son.)

The tradition lives on. Elvira's comeback show in 2011 was great, but short-lived, even with Jack White contributing a theme song, and even a brief on-air appearance.

Quoth Ghoulardi: "Stay sick!"

Horror Hosts - A MusicForManiacs Collection

01 Ghoulardi - "Intro"
02 Vampira - Genocide Utopia (with Satan's Cheerleaders)
03 John Zacherle - Dinner With Drac (the still-living/performing New York host made quite a few records; this was his most popular)
04 Tarantula Ghoul and the Gravediggers - Graveyard Rock (Portland's answer to Vampira was originally known as Tarantula Girl)
05 Bill Cardille - Chilly Billy's vamp (1971 Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater host)
06 Dr. Sarcofiguy - My Girlfriend Is On Fire (a few years ago we wrote about this contemporary cat)
07 Elvira - Zombie Stomp (from 1995)
08 Ghoulardi - "cool it with the boom booms"
09 Vampira - I'm Damned (with Satan's Cheerleaders)
10 Tarantula Ghoul - King Kong
11 John Zacherly - Monster Monkey
12 Count Floyd - Treat Her Like A Lady (parody of a '70s disco hit; the great Joe Flaherty playing the host of the fictional SCTV network's "Monster Chiller Horror Theater")
13 Ghoulardi - "acid "
14 John Zacherly - Come With Me to Transylvania
15 Elvira - Zombie Killer (with Leslie and the Lys)
16 Vampira - Tribute to Elvis (with Satan's Cheerleaders)
17 John Zacherly - Happy Halloween

"Screaming relaxes me so..."

FILTHY FRIDAYS: Halloween Instrumentals (2 Disks: 60 Tracks)

Another request satisfied: for what is possible the strangest comedy album ever, Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan

And another weekend is upon us, presenting you-all with yet another opportunity to temporarily (or not?) cast aside your nerdly pursuits and let our continuing survey of mid-century sleazy-listening musics help turn you - yes, you! In the Spock ears - into the heppest cat or kittie on the block. This real real gone assortment of surf, garage, r'n'b, soundtrack themes, and assorted radio ads is packed with both stars (Joe Meek's Moontrekkers*, The Ventures), and forgotten regional releases. Rock'n'roll as it should be, before it went middle-class and respectable.

Need something to look at while listening? The great lowbrow artist J.R. Williams put these comps together, so eyeball his way-out artworks. (Wish so many weren't sold out - I gotta get that Uncle Fester one.)

J.R has added a few more goodies for your trick-or-treat bag at the bottom of the page.

Halloween Instrumentals (CD 1)
Halloween Instrumentals (CD 2)

But wait! There's more! Dig these short mixes, for ghouls on the go:

Cool Ghouls mix:  J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"): Cool Ghoul mp3 mix

				J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"):... Roland - Billy Duke & the Dukes Dinner With Drac - John Logan Dance Along With Dracula (Doin' the Drac) - The Monstrosities Casa A Go Go - Count Von Shukker...
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Creepy Chix mix:  J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"): Creepy Chix Mix!

				J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"):... My Girl Friend Is a Witch - October Country Draculena - Aaron McNeill The Monster Miss - Miss L.L. Louise Lewis My Baby's Got a Crush on Frankenstein - Soupy Sal...
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Grave Yard Creeps mix:  J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"): Grave Yard Creeps mix

				J.R.'s Fun House (formerly "J.R.'s Prints of Darkness"):... Happy Halloween! Boogie Man - The Higher Elevation Gravedigger's Rock - Clyde Scott with the Zanyopolis A.U. Students Grave Yard Creep - James Duhon Someon...
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FANGS a million to J.R. Williams for all this ghastly goodness.

 *The record was banned by the BBC as being "unsuitable for people of a nervous disposition"