David Berthy Posts

Every so often, I come across music that portrays space as a sleezy european disco where no one smiles. I find this sort of event more exciting than I should, and I thought I’d share three songs that epitomize this seldom-celebrated genre. Included is an epic, spaced-out cover of “On The Road Again,” by Tom & Jerry’s Rockets (pictured above), “Tout Petite la Planete,” by Plastic Bertrand, and “Space Woman,” by Herman’s Rocket.

Space Disco

Listening to Ween on a roadtrip with QD a while back, the band's one quasi hit, the Van Morrison-on-crack "Push The Little Daisies" came on. Heather became quickly convinced that the lead vocal was performed by Cartman from South Park. Listening again, she has a good point...it sounds EXACTLY like Cartman. Its not possible though, as Ween's Pure Guava came out in 1992, five years before South Park debuted in 1997. What is possible, and even probable according to several bloggers out there, is that the Ween track provided the inspiration for Cartman's voice.

WEEN PUSH THE LITTLE DAISIES

Here's The Video:

Special Weekend Post from Tony Bianchi:

DFK introduced me to the music of Elvis Perkins, via a friend of hers John ... who in turn grew up with Elvis in LA, and would occasionally sleep over at his parents house, the late actor Tony Perkins.

Famous and tragic family story aside, I really liked the recent Elvis Perkins in Dearland record, and caught a pretty good show of his in april, where I recorded them playing "Doomsday".

Now he's back in town, closing the Wicker Park street fest today. This is your big chance to see him while eating fried dough."

"Shampoo"

With all the great soul and bluegrass that's been occupying my ear lately,
I've been craving some good old fashioned fuzzed out guitar based indie rock. I was a big fan of Dinasour Jr.'s first two albums back in the 80's, and having heard good things about thier recent re-union albums, I thought I would give a listen. I'm really impressed with both albums, especially the guitar work and the overall organic sound which brings to mind a modern day version of Neil Young's Crazy Horse, whiny vocals and all. Great Friday afternoon music! Here's the opening track from Beyond , the first recorded output from the band's original line-up in nearly 20 years, with Lou Barlow back in the fold after his years with Sebadoh and The Folk Implosion

Almost Ready

David Berthy Posts

I had this version of the Thin Lizzy song "Dancing in the Moonlight
(It's Caught Me In Its Spotlight) for a while and then lost it when my
computer was stolen. Of all the songs I lost, it was this one I'd
missed the most. I still had the studio version from Bad Reputation,
but there's something about this recording for John Peel that I've
always thought was more than a little special. It's hard to pin down
what makes it so good. Somehow, It swings a little more, the vocals
are more convincing, and when Lynott sings "I'm walking home..." I
always fall in love with the song all over again. A few weeks ago, I
emailed Jon Meyers from the blog The Vinyl District (where I'd
originally found the song) and he graciously sent me a replacement
version. You can grab it below.

Dancing in the Moonlight

You may know him from slick Top 40 soul hits like "Give Me The Night and "On Broadway", but jazz guitarist George Benson made one of the ballsiest moves in musical history by releasing an entire album cover version of selections from The Beatles Abbey Road just three weeks after the original came out(!). After a schmaltzy start with Golden Slumbers/You Never Give Me Your Money, things really get cooking when Ron Carter and Idris Muhammed kick in on "Come Together". The rest of the album follows suit,alternating schmaltz with great solos from Benson, Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard, and Sonny Fortune. This curiosity belongs in any record collection-filed under Sunday Morning Music.

Because/Come Together

Tamborine

While working tambourine into Teen Band Trace's version of "I'll Be There", Randy mentioned that Motown House band "The Funk Brothers"actually had a tambourine guy.
Jack "Blackjack" Ashford played the tambourine on hundreds of Motown hits. His definitive performance is on "War" by Edwin Starr; but he also played on "Nowhere to Run" by Martha & the Vandellas, "You Can't Hurry Love" by The Supremes, "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" by Marvin Gaye, "Don't Leave Me This Way" by Thelma Houston, and countless others. He also played vibes, shakers, and the marimba on the label's recordings, such as The Miracles' "Ooh Baby Baby".

Today's download is"You Can't Hurry Love", plus a bonus track "Tamborine" by Prince, the best (and only) "Tambo as a metaphor for masturbation" song out there, from his very own Sgt Peppers Around The World in a Day. Funfact-Prince plays every instrument himself on the track.

Tamborine

David Berthy Posts

Cass McCombs plays next Monday (7/20) at the Hideout, and I’m
definitely looking forward to the show. The tour is in support of his
new album, Catacombs, which is the first album I've listened to end-to-
end, over-and-over, for some time. My two favorite songs are “Dreams
Come True Girl” and “Don’t Vote." Who knew that legendary scream
queen Karen Black, who sings on the former, sounds like Roy Orbison?

Cass McCombs

IMW Guitar Teacher Randy is a wealth of information when it comes to soul session men, coming up as he did on Chicago's southside during the 60's and 70's. Just the other day we were discussing Michael, and how Randy used to go see the Jackson 5 when he was young. The shows were frequent,as the band lived just over the state line in Gary, and they were always matinees due to the band's age. Just imagine wandering into a matinee at Noon on a weekday to see the Jackson 5 on stage!

We got to talking about the Jackson 5 session musicians and Randy brought up guitarist David T. Walker, who played on many of the early singles, including 'I Want You Back".
He also played on Stevie Wonder's Innervisions, Marvin Gaye's Let's Get It On and countless others. He released 12 albums under his own name, available now only on japanese import.

Here's funky jazz instrumental "doo doo" from the 1970 album Plum Happy.

Doo Doo

This was the first dance at Tim & Jane's wedding up on Grindstone Island this past weekend. "This is the First Day of my Life" is a sweet, vulnerable, and honest love song from the Bright Eyes masterpiece-I'm Wide Awake Its Morning.


Yours is the first face that I saw
I think I was blind before I met you
Now I don’t know where I am
I don’t know where I’ve been
But I know where I want to go

Bright Eyes

David Berthy Posts


I once bought six Ramsey Lewis albums from the seventies at the
Salvation Army on Grand. Buried within this stack were some great
cover songs. Here are two of my favorites: "If Loving You is Wrong I
Don't Want to Be Right" from the album Funky Serenity and "Cry Baby
Cry" from Mother Nature's Son, an album of Beatles covers.


Ramsey Lewis

DJ David Berthy got things rolling with Phoenix at the July 4th Indiana Dunes Cabin Dance Party

Fences

New Fuller Park Teen Band member Dakari waltzed into the classroom on day 1 of the Summer program, sat down at the piano, and effortlessly pounded out the openeing chords to "Saturday in the Park" by Chicago, a hit from their 1972 album Chicago V. The band fell in behind him and quite a little jam ensued.

Its the perfect 4th of July soundtrack, enjoy!

Saturday in the Park

David Berthy Posts

Every so often while I’m in a record store I’ll swallow my pride, walk up to the guy or girl working, and risk subjecting myself to a contemptuous sneer by asking, “What is this?” Such was the case in Dave’s a few years ago when I learned about krautrock stalwarts Faust,who can get pretty out there. For one record, The Faust Tapes, they took Virgin’s money, holed up in a house in the countryside, did a lot of acid, and pieced together a sound collage consisting of, among other things, the sound of rattled forks, lyrics about naked germans, and squawking horns. You sort of get this vibe from the above photo. There's the thousand yard stare of the guy on the left, two band members are sheepishly drinking tea, the guy in the middle is utterly confounded that he should be holding a lute, and the gentleman on the right is standing on a box with a sinister-looking remote control. Such eccentricity can also produce genius, as evidenced by the more melodic songs I've included here. I’ve long loved the contrast bewteen noice and melody on “It’s a Bit of a Pain,” and “Jennifer" has a meandering, psychedelic quality that reminds me of “Green is the Colour,” the Pink Floyd song I posted a little while ago. Both are from Faust IV, the record playing in Dave's that prompted my brave foray to the counter. The guy working, by the way, was gracious and eager to share--another reason Dave's is my favorite record store in Chicago.

Faust

Tony Bianchi Posts

"I really don't know too much about the indie band The White Rabbits, but I did fell for the 4 tracks on their Daytrotter session from back in 2007. Energetic, enthusiastic but still urgent and ominous (plus a Randy Newman cover thrown in!) The song "untitled" is the standout by far.

Fast forward to 2009 and they have a new album, produced by Britt Daniels from spoon - which is great, right? Except I'm not yet convinced he didn't exert too much influence on them ... even perhaps extending to the record cover.

That said, it's still a solid, sometimes excellent, record. They're headlining Wednesday night at Empty Bottle.

Here's the link to the first track off "It's Frightening."