Slim Galliard - Opera In Vout

Slim Gaillard was a fine bop musician with a good line in hep cat scattery as well as a tendency to slap a laugh out of his favourite subjects: food and language. He and bassist Bam Brown kicked up a fair bit of dust around the bop scene billing with Parker, Gillespie, Kerouac and injecting vout into a number of films from the forties onwards. His daughter, Janis, was married to Marvin Gaye.
The hipster anthem "Opera In Vout" was originally released in 1946 on the Clef lable, as four 78's, and has appeared on countless issues since. This album kicks off with those and includes most of his well known later Verve material. The cool cover has been wheeled out for a number of different releases but was originally, I think, the reverse side of the Clef set.

I've included the "Opera" performance as a single file and as 3 seperate tracks.

Co-incidentally, and I really didn't know this when did the Smiley Culture post, Slim Gaillard ALSO appeared in the film Absolute Beginners...

How Vouty is that?

Opera In Vout

Smiley Culture - Cockney Translation

Here's Smiley's first single - 1984, Fashion Records.
Lyrics/translation, if you need them, here:

Cockney Translation

Smiley Culture - Police Officer

This is the follow up to Mr Culture's first hit "Cockney Translation" and, I think, a far superior bit of chat. It came out in 1984 and was a hit in the UK despite it's references to ganja, running cops over and "The Real Sensimania". I guess the UK censors couldn't understand what he was on about since it got considerable mainstream radio and TV exposure at the time. The choon got him onto Top of The Pops and helped him get his own Channel 4 show, "Club Mix", in 1985. If you need help translating you could check his first single (which probably won't help but might raise a grin) or go here:

Despite a minor role in the film Absolute Beginners, Smiley ran out of chat ideas pretty quickly and, apparently, now works in advertising. Level vibes, seen?

Police Officer

Death Dealers

I've decided that, in order to apply some order to this blog, I'm going to put it in some kind of order. And it's going to be a monthly theme. This first month has, inadvertantly, ended up with a vaguely comic thread so I'm going to continue in that vein. Not sure what I'll do next month but I'll try to digitise a fair bit of the old vinyl. Ripping vinyl albums is a right old pain so I'll get out what I have time for and, hopefully, provide something interesting.

Meanwhile...

I found this whilst looking for the great "California Hippy Murders" By Red River Dave. Lucky for me it's also got a couple of Eddie Noack tunes, although they ain't his best.
The album is a collection of songs inspired by serial killers interspersed with interviews of the actual nutters 'explaining themselves'. The cover is a painting of Elvis by John Wayne Gacy...

Death Dealers

Jilted John - Jilted John

For some reason this is often overlooked as one of the great punk moments...

Produced by Martin Hannett - in 1978 it reached Number 4 in the UK charts and was introduced on Top Of The Pops by David Jensen as 'one of the most bizarre singles of the decade'

Written and performed by Graham fellows aka Jilted John aka John Shuttleworth.

Jilted John

John Shuttleworth - Incident On The Snake Pass

Wierd British comedy meets vintage organ "samba".

Incident On The Snake Pass is actually the 'B' side. I heard, and loved, this when it first came out in the 80's but didn't get my arse into gear quick enough. So I coveted it until I went to see him gigging in London about ten years later. He didn't play it but, during the show, he mentioned that he was hungry so I got my daughter to go and give him a biscuit. Which allowed me to easily wangle a chat with him in the interval. I mentioned that this tune is how I knew of him and how I regretted not buying it when I could. Mr Shuttleworth, who was about a foot taller than I'd imagined, said he was sure he had a few at home and would send me one. He did so and this is it.
I've included the 'A' side, Swimming With Sharon but there are a couple of spoken word tracks which, frankly, I didn't think worth the agro of grabbing. If you really think you need them I'll stick 'em up.

Incidentally, in case you didn't know, John Shuttleworth use to be Jilted John of the punk single "Jilted John" fame. It's a banger. I might post it next...

Incident On The Snakepass
Swimming With Sharon

Boy Wonder I Love you.

So I'll start with this, as much a test as anything else.

It's a 1967 recording of Robin (Burt Ward) reading out some fan mail over a Frank Zappa scribed backing and chorus. Produced by Zappa with band credits including Elliot Ingber, Jimmy Carl Black and Roy Estrada. The flipside is a cover of Orange Coloured Sky and showcases Robin's interesting vocal "talents". I wonder if he was wearing the kit when he did it...

Boy Wonder I Love You
Orange Colored Sky