Soul Summer

SUMMER SONGS' 09: FINIS

2009-09-20T23:45:00.001-07:00

Michael Jackson: We Got a Good Thing Goin'
From Stripped Mixes (Universal, 2009)

I wanted to pick something to end the Summer Songs series with and really, few other songs have haunted me as much as this one this summer (for obvious reasons). This is from Michael's Stripped Mixes, an album that came out just a few weeks after his death (coincidence?). It's engineered to strip down any number of classic songs, so that you're really left with a minimalist musical accompaniment - just enough for a glint - and letting Michael's soaring vocals do the rest. It's beautiful, it's sad, and that, my friends, is how summer often ends.

See you all back in 2010.

September 2009
O.W.

MORE ON THE END OF SUMMER

2009-09-16T17:42:00.000-07:00

My man David Ma bringing some choice end of summer tracks..

(end of) summer songs � NERDTORIOUS.com

MICHAEL BARNES: IT'S ALMOST OVER

2009-09-06T19:49:00.001-07:00

(Editor's Note: Michael and I have been on parallel paths for the better part of a decade or so. I first met him when we were both DJs at KALX in Berkeley and both of us shared the same musical tastes in jazz and soul. I later found out Michael was enrolled in the Sociology PhD program at Berkeley during the same time I was going through the Ethnic Studies PhD program there (and my BA is from Cal, in sociology). Then, we both moved to L.A. around the same time and Michael's become an adjunct in my department at CSULB. I think L.A.'s tremendously fortunate to have him, especially as one of the best new DJs at KCRW, new audioblogger (Melting Pot), and most recently, half the dynamic duo running the Sunday night party at La Cita, Gris-Gris. When I asked Michael to contribute a piece for this year's Summer Songs series, he asked to do something at the end of the season and since it's now the Labor Day Weekend, I decided to run it now. Enjoy. --O.W.)

Early morning…three minutes before your alarm goes off.

Love: The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This
From Forever Changes (Elektra, 1967)

Late Afternoon

Rolling Stones – Waiting on a Friend
From Tattoo You (Virgin, 1981)

Early Evening / Dinner time

People Under The Stairs: Anotha’ BBQ
From Fun DMC (Gold Dust, 2008)

Dancing downtown just ahead of midnight

Tim Maia: Nao Quero Dinhero
From S/T (Polydor, 1971)

Late-late night

Otis Redding – My Lover’s Prayer
From The Soul Album (Atlantic, 1966)

What you gonna do tonight,
When you need some lovin’ arms to hold you tight,
Tell me what you gonna do tonight,
When you need my heavy voice to tell you goodnight,
Honey but, you can’t let there be no problem,
You’ve got to come on home and help me solve ‘em,
Then I won’t be missing you,
And honey, my lover’s prayer would be all over.

JEFF WEISS: SUMMER SMOKE

2009-08-28T22:25:00.001-07:00

(Editor's note: Jeff Weiss is one the most prolific young writers still going the print route, writing for the LA Times and LA Weekly besides running the excellent Passion of Weiss blog where he and friends riff irreverently on hip-hop and pop music at large. For his summer songs post, Jeff takes a hit off the nostalgia pipe and blows smoke rings in ode to his Jamaican weed adventure. --O.W.)

Jeff Weiss: Summer Smoke--From Cali to the Caribbean

Rita Marley-“One Draw”

From Who Knows It Feels It (Shanachie, 1981)

Peter Tosh-“Legalize It” (dubby version)

From The Ultimate Peter Tosh Experience (Shanachie, 2009)

Eek a Mouse—“Ganja Smuggling”

From Wa-Do-Dem (Greensleeves, 1981)

Jackie Mittoo-“Hang Em High”

From Keep On Dancing (Coxsone, 1967)

this man

Junior Murvin-“Bad Weed”

From Police and Thieves (Island, 1976)

Black Uhuru-“Big Spliff”

From The Dub Factor (Island, 1986)

Linval Thomson—“I Love Marijuana”

Available on Don't Cut Off Your Dreadlocks.

Bob Marley--"Kaya”

From Kaya (Island, 1978)

Black Uhuru, “Sinsemilla.”

From Sinsemilla (Island, 1980)

Calypso ’70

The Isis Band with Falasha—“Faya Faya”

From The Isis Band myspace page

THERE GOES YOUR SUMMER

2009-08-22T12:28:00.001-07:00

Meaghan Smith: Here Comes Your Man
From 500 Days of Summer Soundtrack (Sire, 2009)

This is a quick addendum to the last post but I just heard this for the first time today (and I haven't even seen the movie yet). A little voice is telling me I probably should find it just a touch cloying and overly XM-Radio-The-Coffee-House-Channel-ish but I tell that voice to shut the f--- up and I'm happier for it.

Keep in mind too, I think the original is the best damn thing the Pixies ever recorded and 20+ years, I still love the original. And somehow, Smith manages to tweak the emotional vibe of the song into something altogether more bittersweet and quirky and the type of pop ditty (I mean that in a good day) that I would have put on a mixtape back when I was in love with, well, anyone in my 20s.

What I'm saying is that this song makes me feel young and old at the same time. And it also seems to fit - perfectly - with the end-of-summer theme.

EDITOR'S CHOICE

2009-08-19T21:45:00.000-07:00

Please start by reading this first.

Part of why I solicit people for their summer songs posts is because I have a hard time reinventing the wheel for my own sense of what summer means via music. This year, the one song I knew I wanted to write about was "We're Almost There" by Michael Jackson and in many ways, that song brought me back full circle to my very first summer songs post.

I had a chance to revisit that theme for a post written for NPR's Summer Songs Series:

As much as I like classic summer anthems — bright, splashy, exuberant — they rarely capture what I think of as the essence of the season. Summer wants to be immortal and endless, and that beautiful delusion has birthed countless pop songs. But for me, summer is always a tangle of conflicted emotions: hope and disappointment, desire and frustration. It's the season of promises that, at their core, are impossible to realize.

Summer is more about what we want it to be than what it actually is — what I once described as "drops of reality dissolved into a vat of fantasy." Idealism may make a potent brew, but we know the season inevitably ends. That's why my favorite summer songs are almost always tinged with fragility and marked by melancholy. This is music that admits the painful truth about summer: Even the best times won't last, as long days fade with autumn's encroaching dusk.

And here were the four songs I picked to illuminate those ideas:

Michael Jackson: We're Almost There
From Forever Michael (Motown, 1975)

Like millions, I've spent the summer of 2009 revisiting the Michael Jackson catalog. The song that continues to haunt me is "We're Almost There," from 1975's overlooked Forever, Michael. I keep getting stuck on the idea of being "almost there." The song aches with the yearning to complete, as Jackson sings, "just one more step," but it's that "almost" that lingers. "Almost" teases and tantalizes, but it's as much a threat as it is a promise. Almost means maybe we won't make it. Almost means maybe "one more step" is, as Aretha Franklin once sang, "a step too far away." That's summer in a nutshell: an ambition within reach, but also one step from being lost.

William Devaughn: Be Thankful for What You Got
From Be Thankful For What You Got (Roxbury, 1974)

Has there ever been a smoother, more sublime summer jam than this? William Devaughn's ability to paint with such vivid lyrical imagery -- "Diamond in the back / Sunroof top / Diggin' in the seam with a gangster lean" -- is perfectly matched by the slick insouciance of the song's bass lines and conga slaps. This is no high-noon groove, though; it's a low-rider sunset, a time for quiet contemplation during the slow cruise home. Be thankful for what you got, Devaughn keeps instructing. Take nothing for granted. But even in the fading light, Devaughn's ultimate message is one of hope: "You may not have / a car at all / but remember / brothers and sisters / you can still stand tall."

Ice Cube: It Was a Good Day
From The Predator (Priority, 1993)

If Devaughn opens solemnly but closes on an up note, Ice Cube goes the other way on this 1993 hit. He ostensibly celebrates a halcyon day of basketball games, lucky dice and a late-night motel romp. But it's the turnaround at the end of each verse that tells the true story: "nobody I knew got killed in South Central L.A." & "I didn't even to have to use my AK." Those sobering afterthoughts carry an unease echoed in the somber mood of the music itself. The sample source is The Isley Brothers' "Foosteps in the Dark," which has all the feel of a classic seduction jam: the slow tempo, the syrupy strings. But there's a sadness that flows through; those "footsteps," after all, are of a sneaking lover. "It Was a Good Day" wisely taps into that implicit discomfort. (For a contrast, listen to the far sunnier remix, which uses a different sample.)

I should add: "It Was A Good Day" was inescapable in 1993, and even now, 16 years later, it still resonates with the summer.

The Heath Brothers: Smilin' Billy Suite Part 2
From Marchin' On (Strata East, 1975)

If I had to score summer's end, this early Heath Brothers song from 1975 would be an easy choice. It positively drips in melancholy, especially through Stanley Cowell's use of an African mbira (thumb piano) to play the memorable "Smilin' Billy" motif. I imagine the song patiently playing out as September days drift quietly towards the fall equinox. There's one last, rousing gasp of life that unexpectedly sparks at the end, but with one dramatic thump, it’s all over. Summer's gone

ADAM DUNBAR: ECLECTIC RELAXATION

2009-08-02T21:06:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: Adam Dunbar runs one of my favorite new blogs - Musica Del Alma - dedicated to the crossroads between Latin, funk and soul. Top-notch stuff and filled with the kind of tropical sabor that I thought would be perfectly matched to the summer season. --O.W.)

Musica del Alma

Richard Ryder and the Eighth Wonder: "PHASE III"
From the PHASE III 7" EP (Y'Blood Records, 1972)

"I ain't singing no more sad songs
Gonna have to sing the whole day long"

Exit 9: "Fly"
From the Straight Up LP (BRC Records, 1975)

Ray and his Court: "De Eso Nada Monada"
From the S/T LP (Sound Triangle, 1975)

Jorge Ben: "Criola"
From the S/T LP (Philips, 1969)

The Chakachas: "Hot Hands"
From the Eso Es El Amor LP (RKM, 1977)

relax

Poor Righteous Teachers: "Word Iz Life"
From the Word Iz Life 12" (Profile, 1996)

ANDREW MASON: BK BBQ

2009-07-23T00:58:00.001-07:00

(Editor's Note: Andrew Mason, aka DJ Monk-One,is one of the hardest working DJs/journalists/label dudes you'll ever meet. I probably first got to know him through his extensive writing for Wax Poetics and it wasn't until later that I realize, "duh, he and Monk-One are the same guy," and his music-making as scarily prolific as his writing. He helps run NYC Trust which is home to, among other things, the excellent Greenwood Rhythm Coalition and Midnight Lab Band. (There's going to be a big NYC Trust Remixed album this Sep. so keep an eye out for that and meanwhile, make sure you peep E's E's "Scratch Skank single.) That, of course, is when he's not busy putting out his own compilations or hitting off the Underground Railroad with soul and funk mixes. For his summer songs post, Andrew takes us to Brooklyn for some plush, funky BBQ tunes. If these whet your appetite, you can get another heaping helping this Friday at the Lincoln Center. --O.W.)

If one activity sums up summer, it’s a barbecue. In Brooklyn, that means a secret passage from baking streets to the humble jungle confined in the corridor unseen between blocks. Step from the sidewalk through a cramped apartment out into a matchbook backyard where your host has wiggled a grill into the corner and bottles jostle in a cooler. Speakers are wedged in windows and neighbors peer from third-floor perches.

Since appropriate musical accompaniment is essential for a summer soiree, here’s a few tested suggestions.

Pieces Of A Dream: Warm Weather
From S/T (Elektra, 1981)

Waking up on the day of your backyard fiesta, you’ll need something to set the mood. This superb cut from the Philly-based Grover Washington, Jr. protégés is laid back and lyrically uplifting. As vocalist Barbara Walker notes, “I like the warm weather, it’s like a natural high.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKuH7gQ8840

Jessica Cleaves: I Really Envy The Sunshine
From Plush Funk (P-Vine, 1992)

Any discussion of Summer Songs has to include a “sunshine” selection, and though I enthusiastically recommend Nancy Wilson’s song of that name, mine comes courtesy of Jessica Cleaves. One quarter of the vocal group Friends of Distinction, Cleaves also sang on two of the early Earth Wind & Fire LPs before teaming up with the Parliament Funkadelic crew in the mid-‘70s. This track comes from a 1980 session that didn’t see daylight until it appeared on a 1993 P-Funk rarities comp. The languid bump would perfectly accompany a chilled beverage and the readying of a grill. Do you have one of those chimney charcoal starters?

Choc Quib Town: Somos Pacificos
From Somos Pacificos (Rue Bleue, 2007)

Now that the marinated morsels are sizzling and guests are easing in, this cut from Choc Quib Town goes down lovely. One part laid back marimba riff and one part popping drums, add Gloria “Goyo” Perea’s Lauryn-esque rap and you’ve got an irresistible concoction. CQT represents Colombia’s Pacific coast culture hard—like the man says, “Colombia es más que coca, marijuana y café.”

De La Soul: Thru Ya City
From Art Official Intelligence (Tommy Boy, 2000)

The chorus is a lift from the Lovin’ Spoonful’s “Summer In The City,” but what puts this firmly in the warm weather category is Jay Dee’s amicable beat, all chubby synth bass and fizzy keys, elements I suspect would come off cornball in the hands of 98% of the other chefs out there. Probably cooked up around the same time as Common’s Water For Chocolate, the drums sound ?uestlove-ish and are loose in the unquantized style Dilla perfected. Without giving away the exact ingredients, I’ll add that the sample source for this is an electro-tropical dream that could’ve made the menu just as easily.

Tabu Ley: Maze
From Rochereau Vol. 6 (Star Musique, 1982). Also on This is Africa Vol. 2 Part 2

Something about the twining chimes of soukous guitar calls out “summer.” Maybe it’s the resemblance to the Dominican Bachata omnipresent in the Brooklyn bodegas where I grab dewy Presidentes, maybe it’s an exoticized image of steamy Zaire, but regardless, there is something that makes the sweet sound perfectly apt. Tabu Ley was already a superstar when he had a big hit with this track (pronounced “mah-zay”) in 1980, and has since achieved status nothing short of legendary. This easy swinger just bubbles along, getting funky right around the 3-minute mark when band switches up the groove. When “Rochereau” (Ley’s nickname) breaks out the winning English-language chorus “I love you, baby touch me” a few minutes later it’s pure perfection, no translation required.

Willie Colon: Ah-Ah/O-No
From El Juicio (Fania, 1971)

Not far musically from Willie Colon’s earlier, more blatantly African “Ghana’e” (a neglected back-in-the-day Bambaataa banger, BTW), this lead-off cut from the magnificent El Jucio album is a simple boy-tries-to-get-girl tale that vocalist Hector Lavoe elevates to art with his cool, clear delivery and clever come-ons. The last minute or so is given up to an irresistible itinerary of all the locales he’ll take his gal: “we’ll dance Cumbia in Colombia,” and so on.

P-Funk All-Stars: Hydraulic Pump Pt. III
From 12" (Virgin, 1983)

If I ever had doubts about this one as a bonafide summer slammer (as the cover of PE’s “Brothers Gonna Work It Out” single proclaimed itself back in June of ‘89), they were obliterated one sultry afternoon a few years ago at a barbecue in Los Angeles. You might say the essence of DJing is matching songs to scenarios, and when the puzzle pieces fit perfectly it’s a truly transcendent experience for listener and selector alike. When I recall the reaction as I ran this track, there’s no doubt this was one of those times. “Jump up in the air and stay there,” the chorus commands, advice the backyard bunch in LA did their best to follow. The version that got ‘em levitating was part three on the 12-inch, a segment that sagely strips the track to the octave-leaping bass line that gave the song its name and a sassy brass riff from the Horny Horns.

Wendy Rene: Bar-B-Q
From 7" (Stax, 1964). Also on Smokin' Soul Picnic.

Now that things are well underway, let me introduce Wendy Rene who’s going to break it down for you. Hang on, first let’s get Booker T & the MG’s to lay down a snapping groove. Alright, how about some handclaps… OK Wendy, tell ‘em: “I smell something in the air/You know it smells like a barbecue/If I had some I wouldn’t care, because I like a barbecue/You like a barbecue/We like a barbecue.” Who could argue with that?

Derrick Harriott: All Day Music
From Reggae Disco Rockers (Wildflower, 1975)

Around here the backyards are right up against each other, and if you’re getting too loud, too late, your neighbors will have a few choice words for you. So in the interest of stress free living it’s best to bring things back down a little as we move into evening. War’s “All Day Music” is already a self-evident summer anthem, and taking it for a spin on the Jamaican music machine that was Derrick Harriott’s musical chariot only intensifies that vibe.

Bill Withers: Can We Pretend?
From +'Justments (Sussex 1974)

When the sun has set and the embers are glowing in the grill, it’s time to kick back with the closest of friends. “Can We Pretend,” found on Bill Withers’ oft-overlooked +Justments album, is a premier league Quiet Storm classic. It was also the final song when the Greenhouse, my nine-year old Brooklyn weekly, concluded earlier this summer: a hopeful goodnight and a promise to do it all again soon.

SASHA FRERE-JONES ON SUMMER SONGS

2009-07-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

A podcast with Sasha Frere-Jones: Online Only: The New Yorker

GAYE THERESA JOHNSON: SUNRISE TO SUNSET

2009-07-10T11:45:00.001-07:00

(Editor's Note: I met Gaye through the Experience Music Project; her and Jeff Chang were giving a phenomenal talk about music in New Orleans, post-Katrina, and I discovered that her work closely aligned with many of my own interests, namely looking at cross-ethnic relations through musical activity. She has a forthcoming book called, The Future Has a Past: Politics, Music and Memory in Afro-Chicano Los Angeles which I'm eagerly awaiting. For her post, Gaye flips through six songs that capture a variety of summer rhythms from East Harlem to Southwest Louisiana with stops between at Monterey, Strong Island and more. --O.W.)

Ray Barretto: El Hijo de Obatala
From Indestructible (Fania, 1976)

The best part of this song comes after the band announces, "Damas y caballeros, ahora con ustedes, las manos duros de Ray Barretto. Y como TOCA!" The ensuing dialogue between the Edy Martinez on piano and Barretto on congas is one of the most beautiful conversations I've ever heard.

The Jacksons: Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)
From The Jacksons Live (Sony 1981)

This song makes my husband Chuck want to rollerskate, and jump up in the air when the Jacksons sing, "Let's dance, let's shout (SHOUT!)" What always strikes me about this song is the intensity of energy next to the effortlessness of MJ's vocals. The tempo on the live recording is faster than the studio version; it makes you wish you were listening live and dancing with strangers on a hot summer night. Beautiful.

Charles Lloyd: Forest Flower (Sunrise and Sunset)
From Forest Flower (Atlantic, 1966)

This is a most powerful combination of the talents of Keith Jarrett (piano), Jack DeJohnette (drums), and Charles Lloyd. The high notes on the piano at the end are almost too much to take. Hard to get better than this on a summer evening.

Public Enemy: By The Time I Get to Arizona
From Apocalypse '91: The Enemy Strikes Black (Def Jam, 1991)

The temperature of "Two Sisters of Mystery" sample (Mandrill) changes in this context to an intimate, steely heat. Every time I hear Chuck D say "AriZONA" I see him throw a punch in my mind's eye, and hear the lyrical punch in my ears. Reminds you to get your summer protest on. "Go Go Go Go Go..." Evan Mecham must have heard this deliberate, inevitable fury and updated his NRA membership.

Brand Nubian: Wake Up (Reprise in the Sunshine)
From One for All (Elektra, 1990)

This song is a two-fer, because you really can't get through a summer without listening to Roy Ayers. This is a "word of wisdom to the groove from the wise" whose lyrical ease makes you want to sit back and enjoy the heat. Everybody loves the sunshine.

Keith Frank: What's His Name
From What's His Name (Maison De Soul, 1994)

There are few songs that make me want to two-step, waltz, or jig. But everything Keith Frank does in this song makes me want to break with my vegetarian, one-step sensibilities; eat gumbo, and take on the Louisiana heat for a live performance. There are no tricks in this song, just an easy, fun song that inspires love for what Zydeco is for the human spirit.

ERIC LUECKING: SOUNDS IN THE SUN

2009-07-06T09:43:00.001-07:00

(Editor's note: For the last year or so, Eric Luecking has become Soul Sides' most prolific contributor. It was only right that he get to drop some thoughts on the summer season. --O.W.)

What defines a summer song? Is it a regal horn arrangement? Is it a love song? Is it an ode to life? In short, it can be all these things. In the Midwest, we love barbecues, pool parties, cruising the strip, hooking up, and house parties just as much as anyone. While many of my choices are more recent selections, they fit the recipe perfectly for what makes a great summer music soundtrack.

Chicago: Street Player
From Chicago 13 (Chicago, 1979)

One of the premiere '70s bands (who also extended their run into '80s radio mainstays as well), they explored multiple sounds and textures. On “Street Player,” panned by some critics as having too much disco influence, the horns are ablaze. While it has a disco bass riff, it also has an incredible latin drum breakdown before going into a guitar solo. Personally I love the track as it makes me want to conga through downtown or ride on a parade float with a brass band marching behind with confetti shooting into the air.

People Under The Stairs: Blowin Wax
From Question In The Form Of An Answers (Om, 2000)

Few groups ooze a summer sound like the west coast's People Under The Stairs. Every album you know you're going to get a soundtrack to your barbecue. “Blowin Wax” has a Pete Rock feel to it with its snappy drums and funky sax on the chorus. All you need to do is stop by your local butcher's to pick up the ribs, and PUTS will take care of the rest. Don't have guests to your barbecue? That's okay, just blast this song on high and the neighbors will show up. Getting your annoying and so-tanned-her-skin-looks-like-leather septagenarian gossip queen to leave the barbecue once you got the party poppin' will take something more than what this post can encompass. Sorry. (Maybe you can tell her the neighbors next door are playing bingo.)

Naughty By Nature: Clap Yo Hands
From Poverty's Paradise (Tommy Boy, 1995)

The true summer hip hop kings, however, are NBN. In the '90s and early '00s, they came up with the anthems that defined your summer “Clap Yo Hands” was overshadowed by its other album counterparts in “Craziest” and “Feel Me Flow,” but easily holds its own. (Note: The b-side “Hang Out & Hustle is really nice, too.) Kay Gee laced a nice beat underneath (that bass can snap your neck) the seriously underrated Treach and Vinnie who both spit with serious flow. A Rakim sample in the hook never hurts either. The main thing that really propelled their summer anthem success was simple, but catchy hooks, something 50 Cent took note of a nearly a decade later. It also didn't hurt that Treach's cadence was/is unfucwitable. During the couple of summers where NBN didn't have a single out, in the '90s spring just went straight into fall. Mother Nature thought, “What's the use?”

Koop: Summer Sun
From Waltz For Koop (Jazzanova/Compost, 2002)

Swedish jazz never sounded so nice. Poppy enough to sound like it could be the backdrop for an Old Navy commercial but with enough chops not to sound cheesy, this song is to lay back in the hammock on a sunny day and watch the clouds by overhead while listening to the birds chirp. Yukimi Nagano's vocals have a dreamy and optimistic tone to them that marry perfectly with the arrangement. It's impossible to not be overcome with happiness while listening to this song. Go ahead and try; I dare you.

Donald Byrd: Think Twice
From Stepping Into Tomorrow (Blue Note, 1974)

I'm not going to front – I didn't pick up this album until after I heard Dilla's BBE Beat Generation CD in 2001, but it instantly became one of my favorite jazz albums. I remember reading that Dilla had hoped to remake this entire album but settled for just updating “Think Twice.” Part jazz, part funk, and even part disco, the Mizell brothers played on and produced this fine musical specimen of cross-pollinated bliss.

SUMMER COMES TO COVERVILLE

2009-06-25T11:19:00.000-07:00

Coverville 589: Summer Covers (Happened So Fast) � Coverville

The great podcast Coverville tackles songs about summer.

SCOTT SAUL: AFTERNOON IN ITAPOÃ

2009-06-13T10:33:00.001-07:00

(Editor's note: Scott Saul is, among other things, an award-winning professor of English at UC Berkeley, the author of Freedom Is, Freedom Ain't: Jazz and the Making of the Sixties, and in general, an impressive "man of letters" who has critically mused on everything from the mythologies of Los Angeles, the tragedy of Jonestown, and the Civil Rights Movement in the North; he is also currently writing a biography of Richard Pryor. All of which is to say - he's as interesting and dynamic a scholar/writer as one could aspire to (myself included). For his summer songs post, Saul riffs on the wisdom that can be learned from men in bathtubs. --O.W.)

Afternoon in Itapoã

Vinicius de Moraes: Tarde em Itapoã
From en Mar del Plata (Trova, 1971)

Days in Mar del Plata

Sex and the City

Bonus Material:

A fabulous documentary

The song “Itapua” from Caetano’s Circulado

Saudade em Itapoã

Cançoes Praieiras

Loronix

MICHAEL GONZALES: PITTSBURGH ON MY MIND

2009-06-03T22:35:00.001-07:00

Editor's note: Michael is one of the hardest working, most prolific writers on music and film out there - I first started reading his work back in the 1990s, thanks to the book he and Havelock Nelson put out: Bring the Noise. I more recent years, I caught his "On the Corner" column for Popmatters.com but he's penned for many outlets over the years, including Stop Smiling, Vibe, The Village Voice and Latina. His articles on soul music can be found at http://soulsummer.com and his own blog, http://blackadelicpop.blogspot.com.

Gonzales already wrote a great summer songs piece here and for us, he pens one about childhood summers spend in Steeltown USA. --O.W.

Foster Sylvers: Misdemeanor
From S/T (Pride, 1973)

Michael Jackson: Maria
From Got To Be There (Motown, 1971)

Graham Central Station: The Jam
From Ain't No 'Bout-A-Doubt It (Warner Bros, 1975)

PETE L'OFFICIAL: IT'S THE WIND

2009-06-03T22:34:00.000-07:00

Editor's note: Before I ever met Pete in person, I knew him from his writing 1) he's been a valuable contributor to places like The Believer, Spin, Village Voice and Salon and 2) he boasts one of the coolest looking bylines out there: "The Official Pete" (which is considerably better than being, say, Pete L'Faux). Pete's now matriculating through grad school at Harvard, wisely avoiding the imbroglio of the journalism world for the safe security of the academi...oh wait, never mind.

Anyways, Pete really took to knocking out a Summer Songs post - one that begins Uptown, ends in the Dirty South and takes detours to Jamaica and Brazil in the meanwhile. --O.W.

It's the Wind

"It feel hot at night and shit, like, the sun ain't even out."*

Camp Lo: "Luchini AKA This is It"
From Uptown Saturday Night (1997)

flying backwards through heaven with angel wings (see: about 1:17 in)

Crooklyn Dodgers: "Return of the Crooklyn Dodgers"
From Clockers Original Soundtrack (MCA, 1995)

Desmond Dekker: "Intensified '68 (Music Like Dirt)"
From Rudy Got Soul - The Early Beverley's Sessions 1963-1968 (2003)

Sister Nancy: "Transport Connection"
From One Two (Techniques, 1982)

Elis Regina: "Perdão Não Tem" | "Vexamão"
From Tabelinha - Elis & Pelé (Philips, 1969)

it's that Pelé

Juelz Santana feat. Freeway: "My Love"
From Diplomatic Immunity (Roc-a-fella, 2003)

Caetano Veloso: "Remelexo" | "Sampa"
From Muito (Dentro da estrela azulada) (Polygram, 1978) | From Domingo (with Gal Costa) (Philips, 1967)

Jorge Ben: "Rita Jeep" | "Que Pena (Ela Já Não Gosta Mais de Mim)"
From Negro e Lindo (Philips, 1971) | From Jorge Ben (Philips, 1969)

Beanie Sigel: "Feel it in the Air"
From The B. Coming (Def Jam, 2005)

Tim Maia: "I Don't Know What to Do With Myself"
From Tim Maia (Continental, 1971)

Bun B feat. Pimp C, Young Jeezy, & Z-Ro: "Get Throwed" (Promo Only)
From Trill (Rap-A-Lot/Asylum, 2005)

Raekwon, "Spot Rusherz," Only Built for Cuban Linx...," Loud/RCA/BMG, 1995

SUMMER SONGS '09: LAUNCH!

2009-06-03T22:29:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

I meant to have this up and running last week but hey, the beauty of summer is that it can start whenever - the end of school, the Memorial Day weekend, if the mercury creeps over 70, etc. And so, with today, we start yet another year in our long-running Summer Songs series here at Soul Sides. I know it's cliche to say that each year will be "bigger and better" but I've been more ambitious in the last few years, inviting more folks to contribute their take on "what does summer sound like to you?"

The first two posts are already up on our dedicated site - one from writer Michael Gonzales, thinking back on his summers in Pittsburgh. The other comes from writer-turning-scholar Pete L'Official. In the weeks to come, anticipate contributions from everyone from music historians Lauren Onkey and Scott Saul to incomparable mixmasters DJs Cosmo Baker and Monk One to political/cultural columnist Ta-Nehisi Coates to DJ-turned-soul singer Mayer Hawthorne (and many more!)

In the meantime, also check out my man Jeff Weiss' "Summer Jamz" series, rescued from Stylus Magazine. Mo' summer songs, mo' better.

END OF THE SUMMER OF 08 (O-DUB'S REWIND)

2008-09-21T22:16:00.000-07:00

Soul II Soul: Back To Life (acapella mix)
From 12" (Virgin, 1989)

Bonnie and Shelia: You Keep Me Hanging On
From 7" (King, 1971). Also on New Orleans Funk Vol. 2.

Patti Drew: Stop and Listen
From Tell Him (Capitol, 1967). Also on Workin' On a Groovy Thing.

Bobby Matos: Nadie Baila Como Yo
From My Latin Soul (Phillips, 1968)

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles: If You Can Want
From Special Occasion (Motown, 1968)

Menahan Street Band: Home Again
From Make the Road By Walking (Dunham/Daptone, forthcoming 10/14/08)

Final Solution: I Don't Care
From Brotherman soundtrack (Numero Group, 2008)

Freeway: Let the Beat Build freestyle
From ? (?, 2008)

Q-Tip: Gettin' Up
From The Renaissance (Motown, forthcoming 2008)

Black Ivory: You and I
From Don't Turn Around (Today, 1972)

It's the end of another summer, alas.

Looking back over the summer songs season, I wanted to do the last post on the songs that ended up forming my personal soundtrack the last few months. To be honest, I thought this list would be a lot longer than it ended up being but I wanted to keep it to songs that I kept returning to over and over rather than something I found merely "good."

Soul II Soul's acapella mix of "Back to Life" came at me three different ways: Murphy's Law dropped it at Boogaloo[la] and reminded me how cotdamn fresh it was, Greg Tate's Summer Songs post made me revisit the Soul II Soul catalog and I finally saw Belly which makes incredible use of the song to open the movie. Personally, I grew impatient to actually get to where the beat drops so I edited my version down to about a 30 second teaser before the "Impeach the President" drums kick in. As ML showed me, it's always a fun cut to play out.

The Bonnie and Sheila, I have to admit, I learned about first through a quirky youtube video[1] and I wondered how the hell I didn't know about this earlier. Great little slice of New Orleans funk produced by the great Wardell Quezergue and released on King (the Cincinnati label most associated with James Brown). Words are insufficient to explain to you how much I love this song.

The Patti Drew I owe to Chairman Mao. When I interviewed him for Asia Pacific Arts, he mentioned "Stop and Listen" as an example of a great soul tune that doesn't cost and arm and a leg yet sounds like a million bucks (not his exact words but you catch the meaning). I couldn't agree more. Don't sleep on the equally excellent ballad, "Tell Him" on the same album.

I had totally forgotten about the Bobby Matos and Combo Conquistadores song, "Nadie Baila Como Yo" (nobody dances like me) off the incredible My Latin Soul album until I heard the Boogaloo Assassins play it at their shows. This may very well elevate itself to my top 10 Latin soul songs given how it changes up chord progressions and tepos not once but twice - it's like getting three songs in one; one of the marks of a superior son montuno. I can't believe I slept on this track all these years.

I found the Smokey Robinson and Miracles song during my search through Motown's catalog to find tracks to play out that wasn't part of their Big Chill/Greatest Hits collection and I never failed to be amazed at the generosity of greatness that Motown provided over the years. For those who think Smokey is all droopy ballads, "If You Can Want" is a loud, proud wake-up call of funky power. How has no one ever done a 12" edit of this?

I already wrote about the Menahan Street Band and Brotherman songs already but they're so nice, I had to list 'em twice.

Freeway's freestyle over "Let the Beat Build" goes well with my official, beginning of the summer post where I nodded at Lil Wayne's original. Free, who had one of the best albums of last year that few seemed to notice, murders over Kanye's beat here. After, uh, a million subpar "A Milli" freestyles, I was happy to hear someone pick a different track to rip.

The last song is one I should have started the summer with. Late pass. Q-Tip's had a rough, um, decade so far in terms of being able to get this music to the masses but I'm hoping "Gettin' Up" does it right for him in preparation for his Renaissance album. This is, by far, the best thing I've heard from 'Tip since this and without getting all misty-eyed for my halcyon teens and 20s, listening to Tribe, this song just f---ing sounds good in the way the best Tribe songs just sounded f---ing good. (No doubt, it helps that the sample source is also f---ng good: "You and I" by Black Ivory. Read more here.).

By the way, if I had to pick my absolute favorite song of the summer...surprisingly, it'd end up being Solange Knowles' "I Decided." Don't ask me why but this has stuck with me the entire time through without ever ceasing to be pleasurable.

And with that...I bid all you adieu until next May but hope you keep the memory of summer in your mind alive until then.[2]

[1] Don't laugh - he dances better than you.

[2] Unless you live in the Southern Hemisphere.

SUMMER IN SO MANY WORDS

2008-09-05T09:37:00.000-07:00

(word cloud of Soul Summer's RSS feed made at wordle.net)

SUMMER SONGS 08: CHARLIE BETHEL

2008-09-02T22:15:00.001-07:00

(Editor's note: the penultimate summer songs post goes to Charlie Bethel, aka Captain Planet aka Chuck Wild from Captain's Crate and the host of the fantabulous Toque party in Brooklyn. Charlie and his brother Wil (aka Murphy's Law) are valued contributors to Soul Sides and I'm very happy to have him be one of the last voices for this fastly dwindling summer season. --O.W.)

The Playlist:

The Beatards : Big Bad Beat & It's So Easy
sneak peak taken from the upcoming EP "Big Bad Beat" on MixtapeRiot (2008)

Our new EP is done as of last week and will be back from the printers shortly! Don't think you know what we sound like just from hearing these two tunes, we go all over the map and back again. Check us live in LA this week & next, or back in NYC in Sept. We keep our schedule updated on the myspace page.

The Virgins : Rich Girls (Beatards Remix)
CRATE EXCLUSIVE - can't get this one anywhere else!

Atlantic records reached out to us, and then bailed cause they don't know what's good for 'em.

Erykah Badu : Cleva (Captain Planet Remix) & Honey (Captain Planet Remix)
taken from the 12" AVAILABLE HERE or HERE on BSTRD BOOTS (2008)

I posted these joints for limited time only downloads earlier on, but this summer they finally came out on wax. In case it isn't already entirely clear, I've been going a little buck wild with vocoder and autotune experimentation recently. Feel free to hate, but I'm happily picturing myself chilling alongside Roger Troutman and T-Pain in the afterlife. Someone even liked my Honey remix enough to post it on youtube!

Captain Planet ft. Ako : On Yer Feet
taken from the upcoming EP on Bastard Jazz

Ako is a young funky drummer and producer. He recorded a bunch of drum breaks and posted them online- I used one as the backbone for this beat. The rest of the EP is falling into place nicely and should definitely be out before the year is over.

Captain Planet : Lean On My Baby
just a sketch for now... we'll see what happens

One of the many lil ideas I've hurriedly thrown together this Summer. I did this in an hour and a half, no lyrics yet, but I still love it and hope that it turns into something finished- who knows what.

Bonus beat: peep this music video, made by the group of High School students that I worked with in Sunset Park this summer. It was part of a competition to express why "I LOVE NY" in one minute or less. We didn't win, but we had a bunch of fun regardless.

The Story:

Deeply embedded in my understanding of the world, is the belief that Summer is meant to be "time off". There have been few moments, if any, in my life that approach the uncontrollable surging relief and freedom that I would feel every June getting off the bus after that last day of school. Looking ahead at the summer in front of me, the days of the week ceased to matter, and the passing hours that normally divided my laborious schedule into even blocks of responsibility and focus, blurred into a continuous quest for thrills. The goal of a day might take shape in the simple hunt for an ice cream cone, a new skate spot, a cute girl or a water-balloon fight and a place to swim. Perhaps nostalgia has amplified what I truly felt at the time, but this is how I will forever remember it.

2008 was my UN-summer: I've been working more than ever before, scheduling meetings and filling up two calendar pages beneath the present one. However, the fact that I'm doing it for myself, and spending time on what I love, has also helped me feel some of that same thrill I used to get from doing Super Soaker drive-bys on my bike. Instead of any "time-off" this summer, I spent nearly every free moment in my studio working on music or putting together live shows with my group The Beatards. In general, I really try not to blow up my own spot, but to be honest, these are the songs I've been listening to the most this summer. The tracks I'm posting up today are just a small fragment of all the music I've been making, so stay tuned for a lot more to come.

Now that summer is unofficially over (Labor Day still means back to school in my book), I'm finally getting a chance to take a break. Anyone who's in the Los Angeles area should definitely come out to one of the events I'm doing in the next week & a half. Leave your preconceptions at the door and be ready to let loose.

SUMMER SONGS 08: SOULKOMBINAT

2008-08-12T12:32:00.001-07:00

The folks at Germany's Soulkombinat.org did their own Summer Songs post. Should have linked to this weeks ago but better late than never. Some great stuff there; it's a monster group post!

Soulkombinat Sommer Songs

SUMMER MADNESS

2008-08-11T23:10:00.000-07:00

(Written by Captain Planet)

Curtis Mayfield & The Staple Singers : After Sex
taken from the Soundtrack album "Let's Do It Again" on Curtom (1975)

Bill Conti : Reflections
taken from the soundtrack album "ROCKY" on Capitol (1976)

Kool & The Gang : Summer Madness
taken from the album "Light Of Worlds" on Dee-Lite (1974)

Shuggie Otis : Island Letter
taken from the album "Inspiration Information" on Epic (1974)

Ok, so this is not my official "Summer Songs" post, which is now going to be a dog days affair, but I want to let everyone know that I'm not dead and am still in love with music. I've been going through some pretty heavy stuff lately (basically a divorce, even though we weren't technically married), and working in the studio more than is probably healthy (you'll hear the fruits of labor soon enough), but I'm getting back to the blog for real now. I love this place and the chance to sit down with a lil handful of songs like these ones I picked out today feels highly therapeutic.

I heard Curtis Mayfield's "After Sex" (an old forgotten favorite of mine) yesterday at my friend's spot, and as I lay melting into the wheelchair that he uses as furniture (superior by far to any lazyboy) I realized that the song was expressing the exact the sound inside me right now. I found myself pulling the needle back at least 10 times. Bill Conti's "Reflections" came to mind next, as an extension of the same sentiment. I still remember watching Rocky for the first time (it was a hot Summer day then too) and loving the scene where he's alone in his grimey little apartment and he drops the needle on a record... "Reflections". It wasn't until I later scooped Kool & The Gang's "Light Of Worlds" that I realized Conti was doing what appears to be a pretty blatant knock-off track for the soundtrack (doesn't really take away from my appreciation of it somehow). And then, to complete the vibe, I knew a little Shuggie was necessary. So here's to a peaceful and uplifting moment of inner exploration. We all know the feeling.

ps- R.I.P. Isaac Hayes

SUMMER SONGS 08: LUC SANTE

2008-08-10T21:54:00.000-07:00

Prince Mohammed: Bubbling Love
From 12" (Job Gibbs, 197?). Also on Bubbling.

Derek Holtsma, Robbie Shakespeare, Sly Dunbar: Reggae Strings
From 12" (B-side of the Congos "Jah Is the Sweetest") (Rasta Movement, 197?)

Junior Delgado: Fort Augustus
From 12" (Taxi, 1979)

Gregory Isaacs and U-Brown: The Border
From 12" (GGs, 197?). Also on My Number One.

Derrick Laro and Trinity: Don't Stop Until You Get Enough
From 12" (Joe Gibbs, 1980). Also on Hustle! Reggae Disco.

(Editor's Note: I first became acquainted with Luc Sante through his writings on New York, namely his remarkable history of early New York, Low Life as well as his remarkable, bittersweet essay on living in the Lower East Side in the '80s, "My Lost City", which also appears in a fantastic anthology of Sante's essays, Kill Your Darlings. As a novelist and modern "man of letters," Sante covers a range of topics in his writing but music is a central interest and love (he has a Grammy from 1997 for his liner notes for the Anthology of American Folk Music). For his Summer Songs post, Sante reflects on hot New York summers and the sound of reggae sides floating atop the fog of heat. --O.W.)

Written by Luc Sante:

I grew up in various suburbs and now I live in a town on the edge of the countryside, but when I close my eyes and think of summer, the image that appears is always of summer in the city, specifically New York City, where I spent nearly every summer between the ages of 18 and 40. Summer meant poorly ventilated tenement apartments with no air-conditioning and no swimming pool. It meant an intense, slablike heat caught between brick walls in the motionless air, turning the asphalt liquid and the sidewalk reflective, settling a yellow film over the world, making everybody stupefied or murderous or both at once. But if you lived in that heat you had no choice but to surrender to it, and if you truly gave yourself up you could find a strange kind of euphoria in it. If you became one with the heat, it gave you a gift; it was as if your physical processes altered fundamentally, became more fluid, tapped secret resources of energy to remain upright and moving.

I did a lot of walking in those days, because it was better than sitting at home and because I was restless anyway all year round, and in summer the walk became like something between swimming and dancing, a sort of gliding lope I could ride like a wave through air with the consistency of blood. Naturally I had to have a soundtrack, and before the boom box and the Walkman the soundtrack would have to be provided by an internal jukebox. In the summer I especially liked to feed mine with Jamaican twelves, which provided the exact rhythm and mood for my walking purposes--they were after all products of intense urban heat themselves. And they were my principal secret reserve of energy. Whatever stamina my body couldn’t provide on its own would be supplied by the bass lines that lived on in my head.

The bass was paramount. It was fuel. I walked all day--and often danced all night--with power supplied by Robbie Shakespeare and Aston Barrett and Lloyd Parks and Boris Gardiner and Fully Fullwood and Leroy Sibbles and Flabba Holt and Ranchie McLean. The bass located a dynamo in the lower torso, about midway between the navel and the groin, which governed hips and legs and knees and feet. To contain those bass lines was to put on seven-league boots. I don’t know how anybody ever managed to make it through summers in the city without them.

SUMMER SONGS 08: KAREN TONGSON

2008-07-22T23:39:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: I met Karen Tongson through Josh Kun - she's part of an impressive set of faculty talent over at USC working on issues around race, sexuality, identity, and of course, music. Like Christine Balance, Karen's also part of the (un)holy trinity who run Oh Industry! and she's got another blog for her intriguing, forthcoming project, The Inland Emperor. Appropriately enough, for her summer songs post, Karen examines the songs of her youth, growing up Inland. --O.W.)

Written by Karen Tongson:

listening party about the suburbs

Southern California’s Inland Empire

Wham!: Club Tropicana
From Fantastic (Columbia, 1983)

Sergio Mendes and Brasil ‘66: Pais Tropical
From Foursider (A&M, 1972)

family of musicians

Queen Latifah: Weekend Love
From Black Reign (Polygram, 1993)

Relocations

Paho Mann’s work

Brighton

Electrelane: I'm On Fire
From On Parade (Too Pure, 2003)

SUMMER SONGS 08: ADAM MANSBACH

2008-07-14T22:04:00.001-07:00

(Editor's Note: I met Adam Mansbach through Jeff Chang, back when I was living in the Bay Area and Adam was moving to Berkeley. Besides mutual friends, Adam and I discovered all sorts of shared interests, from collecting funky blues LPs to arguing over race and the politics of hip-hop. We collaborated for the mix-CD for his Angry Black White Boy. Adam most recently published his latest novel, The End of the Jews. --O.W.)

Poor Righteous Teachers: Shakiyla
From Pure Poverty (Profile, 1991)

A smooth-with-the-roughness tribute to the black woman (remember when rappers did those?) from Trenton’s finest. I think it’s the hypnotic violin line – which PRT’s Jarobi/5 Foot Excellerator-esque do-little sideman (remember when rappers had those?) Culture Freedom pretends to play in the video – that makes this song so summery. It’s sort of reminiscent of the keyboard line to Kool & the Gang’s “Summer Madness,” and a perfect counterpoint to Wise Intelligent’s dense, medium-tempo chatting, almost Eek-A-Mouseian in its sing-jay stylings. This is the ideal song to play from huge speakers at an outdoor summer concert before A Tribe Called Quest comes on, as my man DJ Kebi did in 1995 at Columbia University; “Shakiyla” killed despite the fact that maybe fifteen of the ten thousand people listening knew the track. It was the highlight of the whole day, in fact – far more fulfilling that Quest’s “we’re contractually obligated to give you forty-five minutes, y’all, but we gonna show love and rock for forty-six” set.

Otis Redding: That's a Good Idea
From Love Man (ATCO, 1969)

This exemplifies a musical category I think of as “songs that sound like they’re massive, classic, Burger King-commercial-status songs, but really aren’t,” which I mean as a compliment. This is an ideal song to play at a point in your all-day barbecue when energy seems to be waning due to prodigious and prolonged food/beer/weed consumption, the sun is beating down, and your cousin’s kids are pestering everybody to play whiffle ball. From the little RZA-ready breakbeat up front to the horn arrangement to the sweet, life-affirming lyrics, this is like Memphis in a bottle, a revivifying tonic that only takes about eight bars to make everybody perk up and decide yeah, what they hell, why not have another beer and pitch to a seven-year-old?

Mixmaster Spade and the Compton Posse: Genius is Back
From 12" (LA Posse, 1988) Also available on The Ultimate Collection Vol. 1

One of my greatest regrets is that I never got to interview the dearly departed Spade, an elder statesman of LA hip hop who taught kids like King Tee and DJ Alladin how to rhyme and spin in his Compton garage. I’ve been obsessed with this dude since I heard this song on WERS in Boston in 1988, an obsession I share with such wise men as Jeff Chang and DJ Frane. Spade has one flow, a singsong baritone cadence that never varies whether he’s kicking cautionary tales (as on the equally-classic “Better Bring a Gun”) or murdering the “Genius of Love” beat. It doesn’t have to: it’s impossible to tire of. He’s loose, he’s charismatic, and if he’d been from the Bronx he would have been an old-school legend. This song works in any summer setting, but it may be best suited for pumping in the whip (top-down, if possible) while on the way to the liquor store or supermarket, pre-barbecue.

Grachan Moncur III: New Africa
From New Africa (BYG, 1969)

A long, mellow, sublime tune written by trombonist Moncur, who I wish had recorded more than he did. I forget who else is on this, and I’m 3000 miles away from my records right now, but this is a beautiful tune that might be categorized as ‘spiritual jazz,’ although I kind of hate that term (as opposed to what? Secular jazz?). It’s both propulsive and delicate, equally appropriate to listen to whether watching a purple-gold-pink sunset or basking in the first rays of a July morning.

Ahmad Jamal: Tranquility
From Tranquility (Impulse, 1968). Also on Complete Recordings.

It’s always pointed out that Jamal was highly regarded by Miles, and for good reason. He’s such a tasty composer and player that even the irascible egomaniac who never stopped insisting he bought Trane that soprano had to give up the love. You might think ten minutes is a long time to listen to a piano trio play one song, but this will change your mind. An irresistibly soulful tune that manages to be straight-ahead jazz, and yet so much more.

Faze-O: Riding High
From Riding High (She, 1977)

Super-obvious, but it might still be the joint you break your DJ rule for, and play twice in the course of that six-hour barbecue.

Smoothe The Hustler: Broken Language
From Once Upon a Time In America (Profile, 1966)

Summer in Brooklyn, when you’re grilling on a little-ass hibachi on your front steps, drinking a Heineken, and feeling simultaneously giddy and vaguely hostile. I still hold this down as perhaps the greatest hip hop song ever, as measured by pure lyrical energy and hungriness. You can’t fuck with the chemistry between Smoothe and his brother Trigga (whose Def Jam album never came out; anybody got that?), or the simple, dope, minor-key piano loop and snapneck drums provided by D/R Period. These guys invented a new diction on this song, most of their illest shit never came out, and they were so lyrically-focused that they thought this was a single! Sample line: “I run with/half a hundred/illegal funded/forty-five I gun with/five I run with.” Who’s fuckin’ with that? Special shout out to rugged-picture-poser Jon Caramanica on this one.

Melvin Van Peebles: I Remember
From As Serious as a Heart Attack (A&M, 1970)

Drunken politically-astute off-key warblings over a ridiculously dope six-minute-long drumbreak from the only guy who could get away with such things. This is one of those songs where everybody gets quiet when you throw it on, like ‘what’s that?’ And if you listen to the whole thing, you find Melvin getting truly heated about halfway through; he’s got some serious ish on his mind, and the band takes it up a notch too. This is for after the sun has gone down, on one of those days when, like Raekwon said: it feels hotter at night.”

Pharoah Sanders: Prince of Peace (a.k.a. “Hum-Allah-Hum-Allah-Hum-Allah”)
From Izipho Zam (Strata East, 1969)

Leon Thomas (RIP) is the vocalist on this gorgeous, searching excursion, one of many early-seventies recordings that show why Pharoah really was the inheritor of Coltrane’s meditative, exploratory aesthetic. Anthemic and inspiring, perfect at about eleven in the morning when you’re making coffee, thinking about showering, generally getting ready for a long say of hot fun in the summertime and feeling hopeful about the universe.

Brigadier Jerry: Three Blind Mice
From Jamaica Jamaica (RAS, 1985

I feel like I’m opening a whole new can or worms by even getting into reggae. I could happily fill a summer with nothing else – rub-a-dub deejays all day long, dancehall at the club, dub while I’m working, early-nineties hip-hop reggae mashups (Bounty Killer over the “C.R.E.A.M.” beat? What!) as aural Red Bull, and so on. It’s always summer in JA, seen? Brigadier Jerry – the great Sister Nancy’s older brother – didn’t record as much as a lot of his contemporaries (Yellowman, Welton Irie, Lone Ranger, etc) but he got massive respect, as evidenced by the fact that his name is always the final one mentioned in everybody’s requisite list-of-every-deejay-ever “connection” song (the reggae version of the ‘hip-bone’s-connected-to-the…’ joint). Here, his great voice and magnetic personality transform an old children’s song into a classic rub-a-dub workout. Great horn arrangement, too.

SUMMER SONGS 08: ROBERTO GYEMANT

2008-06-29T21:31:00.000-07:00

(Editor’s Note: Roberto “Beto” Gyemant is an old friend around here (even if I only met him about a year ago); he’s becoming one of the leading chroniclers of Latin music in Central and South America thanks to his work on the Panama and Colombia anthologies. That just scratches the surface of where he’s headed (a Panama 2 comp is due out this fall) and wherever Beto leads, you know Soul Sides will follow. —O.W.)

Written by Roberto Gyemant:

When I think of summer songs, the first thing that pops in my mind is DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince’s “Summertime”, or Mary J. Blige and Method Man’s version of “You’re All I Need to Get By”… For some reason I have this vision of driving down Monterey Blvd. in San Francisco, going toward the freeway past the liquor store where, if you turned left, you might get lost in the Sunnyside area that in my highschool years was one of a number of “rival” territories. That’s when San Francisco had ethnic and working class neighborhoods, and you had to watch where you went and who was walking down the street toward you. Not to romanticize that too much, but it had its charms.

Going back a little further, I think about my brother Towtruck George’s huge picnics in Golden Gate Park, barbecued hotdogs, cragmont drinks... Footballs whizzed through the air, caught by little puffy headed fools like me (with long curls past the collar), wearing either a Montana, Jerry Rice or Ronnie Lott jersey. Harleys were started and raucously revved. And blasting from a boombox was a Steppenwolf’s “Magic Carpet Ride”, ZZ Top’s “La Grange”, Malo’s “Suavecito”, War’s “Slippin Into Darkness” and anything by native son Carlos Santana.

Summers seemed to last forever then, but they go by so fast now (grumble grumble). Since I see many contributors have covered the R&B and Hip Hop territory, and know much more about it than I do, I’ll focus on a few songs I have been listening to lately, and am playing this summer at the Elbo room in SF (last Friday of every month: come by and enjoy).

For those interested, I played some related songs on KUSF’s Friday night session with Andrew Jervis a few weeks ago.

Catalino y su Combo: Tan Bella y Tan Presumida
From Tan Bella… y… Tan Presumida! (Orbe Colombia, 1964)

This is Catalino el Negro de Barranquilla (Colombia). Catalino is great, really raw, tons of swing and attitude. Most of his covers have him straddled by two white girls in bikinis. This song, a big hit in the region in the mid ‘60s (Venezuelans loved it) is listed as a Tamborera, a bouncy, percussive folklororic form from Panama (which used to be “Colombia’s black province” before 1903). That Catalino executed it so well in Barranquilla is no surprise: look at a map, its just up the coast, and turtle fishermen made the circuit from Colombia to Panama and Costa Rica annually.

What’s really interesting about this song, other than its’ hot hot heat, is pay attention to the beat… does it remind you of a form that’s flooding the airwaves right now, emanating from Latin America? I won’t name the form, you figure it out, but listen to this: that form, say those in the know, originated in Panama, not in Puerto Rico or the Dominican Republic. So did the Tamborera. Wait, am I saying that that form came from or was influenced by the Tamborera? You decide.

Los Curramberos de Guayabal: Guayabita Colora
From Los Curramberos de Guayabal Vol.3 (Tropical Colombia, 1965)

Los Curramberos de Guayabal (note: different than Los Corraleros de Majagual) were a little vallenato-style cumbia supergroup from the Carribean coast of Colombia that included the likes of Alberto Pacheco and Anibal Velasquez. I love this song, and hear it as a perfect fusion of accordion-led Vallenato and hot Afro percussion. The diversity of Afro-Colombian music is mind-boggling. Colombia is somewhere between 20-40% black, with that population concentrated along the coasts, which is where the Cumbia, Porro and Vallenato all come from.

Ceferino Nieto y su Conjunto Bella Luna: Zum Zum Babae
From 7” (El Estilista Panama, 1967)

Ceferino Nieto is one of the greats of Panama’s Musica Típica scene. Ceferino’s cover of Zum Zum Babae highlights the link between Panama’s and Colombia’s Mestizo/Mulato/Afro country music culture, with its raw percussion and accordion mastery. It also points out how deeply Afro-Cuban music penetrated Panama, that those from the deep countryside were moved enough by this classic Cuban guaracha to spin their own version. Panama was always a critical center for the diaspora of Afro-Cuban music. Beny Moré and Perez Prado played (and were celebrated) there before they exploded in the US and Cuba. Even through the “salsa” explosion of the late 1970s Fania test marketed many songs in Panama, because if it could pass the fans there, it stood a good chance of being a hit in the wider “salsa” world.

Los Silvertones: El Baile del Araña
From 7” (DiscoMundo Panama, 1969)

This song is listed as a “bosanova”. Leave it to the musicians of Panama in the 1960s and 70s to take a bossa nova beat, marry it to a funk bassline, and blow funky yet very Caribbean hornlines over it. It occurs to me that there was a certain openness that came from living during that period and being a talented, bilingual Afro-Panamanian whose parents were English speaking Jamaican and Bajan laborers. The combination of being liminal to Panama, not quite accepted, brilliant, bilingual, and black: and exposed to Jazz, Afro-Cuban music, Brazilian music, James Brown, The Impressions, Carlos Santana… I don’t know. But it’s the only way I can begin to explain “El Baile del Araña”, which fittingly, composer Carlos Allen told me was just them messing around in the studio. Sigh.

SUMMER SONGS 08: GREG TATE

2008-06-24T08:36:00.001-07:00

Editor's Note: It is difficult to imagine a more influential, contemporary music writer than Greg Tate. Since first emerging in the 1980s as part of the Village Voice's remarkable collection of talent, Tate has become the critical voice of a generation, especially for hip-hop and R&B obsessives, but his range is far beyond that of a "rap critic." As insightful as he is incisive, political and polemical without being a demagogue, Tate was a major force behind ushering in a new era for rock and pop criticism. His collection of essays from the mid-1990s, Flyboy in the Buttermilk had a profound effect on me as a budding writer and a decade-plus later, he continues to inspire, including with his 2003 anthology Everything But the Burden. Tate is currently working on a biography of James Brown. For his summer songs post, he takes us back to 1989 - the number, another summer, hot damn - and the sound of Soul II Soul's funky drubbing. --O.W.

Written by Greg Tate

Soul II Soul: Keep On Movin'
From Keep On Movin' (Virgin, 1989)

RETRO SOUL SUMMER?

2008-06-20T17:31:00.001-07:00

Solange Knowles: I Decided
From Sol-Angel and the Hadley St. Dreams (Geffen, 2008)

Estelle feat. Kardinal Offishall: Magnificent
From Shine (Atlantic, 2008)

Little Jackie: One Love + 28 Butts
From The Stoop (S-Curve, 2008)

Bonus: Tammi Terrell: What a Good Man He Is
From Irresistible (Motown, 1969)

Question: exactly how many "next Amy Winehouses" can there really be? So far, in the last year we've heard about: Leona Lewis (more like the new Mariah), Duffy (voice so thin, you could shave with it), Adele (Tracy Chapman meets Madeline Peryoux), Gabrielle Cilmi (didn't both Nicole Willis and Amy both do this same video already?), even Lykke Li (doesn't belong in the same conversation), et. al.

It has been a curious phenom that in the wake of last year's epic Sharon Jones + Winehouse one-two punch, everyone is rushing to jock the bandwagon, and especially with Amy, there's a desire to find another personality who could loom as large (good luck! You'll need more than a bee-hive to fill Amy's coif). From my point of view though, the upside to all this is that 2008 is shaping up to be a summer chockfull of retro-soul-esque production. I mean, sure, a lot of it is derivatives of derivatives - is there such a thing as neo-retro-soul? Hmmm...) but frankly, I'd rather listen to a bad clone of a clone of Motown/Stax than some of the new music that's the alternative.

Case in point, three more recent artists on the retro tip, all of whom I've found perfectly enjoyable even if two of them seem to be riding the bandwagon. I've installed a "Wine-O-Meter" to measure similarity (not quality).

Solange, aka that other Knowles sister, decided to go to the source and hire Mark Ronson to produce her new single, "I Decided." I admit - I was initially really skeptical about the song but it's grown for me. Here's my main beef: that little, jaunty, handclap track is very Motown-ish but it's an intro: after a bar or two, the real beat drops in and in this case, that's all there is. It's like the song is all build-up but never delivers a gorgeous melodic hammer that you'd expect. That said, once you accept that, it's a catchy tune. Snap along!

Wine-O-Meter: 7

Estelle's Shine is one of my more favorite albums of 2008 and a strong, second showing for this British artist. I actually don't think she's very much like Winehouse; her vibe is more like a throwback to the late '90s if anything else. There's that R&B-meets-classic-hip-hop flair on songs like "Wait a Minute" (shades of "Kick In the Door") and "So Much Out the Way" (Beatminerz steez) plus the ragga flavor on "Magnificent." I just really like how that whole song flows, especially with the heavy ska/dub influence and Estelle's silken vocals. Sweet stuff but hey, she should have gotten Special Ed on here instead of Kardinal. That would have been offishall.

Wine-O-Meter: 3

As for Little Jackie...ok, now THIS is definitely on some post-Winehouse tip, not just musically (Adam Pallin does a pretty good flip on Ronson's style) but also in terms of the attitude and spark in the songwriting. Here's the confusing thing: Little Jackie is not the singer; it's the group name. The vocalist is Imani Coppola, who some of you might remember from "Legend of a Cowgirl" from about ten years back. Vocally, she's also more contemporary than throwback but as noted, the kind of wit and cutting-ness in the songwriting will likely remind folks of Winehouse...even though, if you think about, her career goes back at least half a decade earlier. True as that may be, it's really hard to listen to something like "28 Butts" (which I'm pretty sure uses this song) on part of the rhythm section) or "One Love" and not make the comparison. The latter is straight up '60s girl pop (and I'm feeling it!). Their album drops later this summer: I highly recommend it.

Wine-O-Meter: 9

This all said though, you still gotta ask: why go retro when you can still listen to the originals? The bonus track is by the late Tammi Terrell, from (tragically) her only solo album, Irresistible. This song is so soulful, so funky, so ridiculously good for something that's nearly 40 years old. It's artists like Terrell who set the bar - now let's see who can pass it.

P.S. Peep when Terrell drops: "let this girl tear the world up" - loving it!

SUMMER SONGS 08: JAMES CAVICCHIA

2008-06-20T15:42:00.001-07:00

Editor's Note: James Cavicchia is not a writer...not professionally but when I first started hearing him muse on music, films and books on Soulstrut, I was struck by his remarkable command of prose that combined insight and economy. For purely selfish reasons, I wanted to read more of his stuff so I invited James to write a summer songs post for us. I was not disappointed; nor will you. --O.W.

Written by James Cavicchia:

Gerry Rafferty: Baker Street
From City to City (UA, 1977)

Al Stewart: Year of the Cat
From Year of the Cat (Janus, 1976)

Brenton Wood: Gimme Little Sign
From The Oogum Boogum Song (Double Shot, 1967)

Barbara Lewis: Hello Stranger
From Hello Stranger (Atlantic, 1963)

J-Dilla: Time: The Donut of the Heart
From Donuts (Stonesthrow, 2006)

Talk Talk: New Grass
From Laughing Stock (Verve, 1991)

Remember, that’s the way it used to be…
Seems like a mighty long time…

SUMMER SONGS 08: CHRISTINE BALANCE

2008-06-20T15:30:00.001-07:00

Editor's Note: I first met Christine Balance a few years back, when I kept hearing about another grad student doing research on Filipino DJs. She's become a valued peer and friend since that time, not to mention soon-to-be professor at UC Irvine (salut!). Christine's interests are on music, popular culture and performance, among a range of others, and she's part of the triumvirate running the Oh Industry! blog. Her summer songs post takes us on a trip from suburban L.A. to the Philippines, to the Lower East Side, with a side trip to Hawaii for some shrimp. Tasty. --O.W.

Written by Christine Balance:

I believe deeply in the relationship between space, place, feelings, and music – that certain geographical regions encourage certain listening and music-making practices, that certain social spaces (suburban garages, driving in cars, airplane rides, downtown clubs) and times (childhood, youth, young adulthood) are informed by our own internal soundtracks. In this spirit, I chose four locations and vignettes, each with their own flashpoint songs, that invoke memories of summer.

I. SoCal Suburban jamz

Growing up an only child, summers in suburban Los Angeles always meant an influx of social activity and prolonged interactions with a network larger than just my parents and classmates. Summer was special thanks to two things – weekend-long sleepovers at my cousin’s house in the Valley and out-of-town visitors from other U.S. states and beyond. We shared ghost stories and dance moves, cinematic and real-life crushes. We pined for growing older and driver’s licenses, buying make up and going to prom. Mostly, we began shaping our identities –dancer, goth, karaoke singer, swimmer--, crafting our dreams, and understanding the world’s vastness through the endless potential we saw in the stark contrasts between each other’s lives. From those days of Slip and Slides, Cross Color overall shorts, and neon-paneled bike shorts, here’s one slow jam classic for daydreaming in your room and one dance hit for choreographing dance moves in your garage.

Force MD's: Tender Love
From Chillin' (Tommy Boy, 1985). Check out the video.

Dino: Summer Girls
From 24/7 (4th and B'Way, 1989)

II. Promdi Philippine jamz

Summertime not only meant no school and oft-forgotten birthday celebrations, for some of us children of immigrant parents, it also meant a dreaded or welcomed (depending on your relationship to family) visit to the third world country of your elders' origins. Between feeling too-big and too-monolingual American, there was the proverbial opening up to the sights and sounds of a provincial landscape - the smiling faces of a country's poorest, meats grilling on the side of a road, uncles drinking San Miguel in the dark, and cousins jamming acoustically into the early morning hours. Always a love song, to fulfill the Filipino's penchant for "senti" or sentimentality. Hot off the "promdi" ("from the province") Philippine jamz mixtape, one lilting cover song from a bluegrass-country favorite about love found, another classic jam from the island's finest about love lost, and the last a raucous rallying cry from the newest darlings of a country where texting is a revolutionary act:

Alison Krauss: Baby, Now That I've Found You
From Now That I've Found You (Rounder, 1995)

Eraserheads: Ang Huling El Bimbo
From Cutterpillow (Rollyn, 1995)

Sandwich: Sugod
From Five On The Floor (EMI, 2007)

III. Good World Party Jamz

Summer in New York City sounds like the perfect indie blockbuster, cocktail drink, and mix tape title all rolled into one. Perhaps because the event evokes the best and the worst of Gotham's full sensorium - scantily clad and browned shoulders walking through seventy percent humidity only to find relief sipping on mojitos or kava preferably on a rooftop bar at sunset; the occasional descent into the depths of hell (known more familiarly as subway stations) awaiting relief in the form of an A/C blast and open seat on the train; newly-pedicured open toes traipsing in flip flops past midnight and piles of steaming trash bags littering Midtown, K-Town, and Chinatown. All this after a winter of sensory deprivation and the absence of bodily contact. From the late 1990s to early 2000s, a generation of young Asian Americans in Nueva York, brought together by mainly Filipino American DJs (such as Cam One, Un-G, and a rotation of members from the 5th Platoon crew –Roli Rho, Neil Armstrong, and Kuttin' Kandi) partied religiously at these two spots: Good World Bar (in Chinatown) and Bob Lounge (in the Lower East Side). In homage to those evenings, two songs - the first, a high-impact and height of the evening selection and the second, a simultaneous cool down and 'last call' anthem.

Justin Timberlake: Like I Love You
From Justified (Jive, 2002)

Wayne Wonder: No Letting Go
From No Holding Back (VP, 2003)

IV. Island Cruising Jamz

Last but not least, a bit of cheating on the seasonal date for playing these two final cuts. In order to survive a few Northeastern winters, my partner and I devised a mid-season "defrost" plan - trips to Hawaii so that we could be swimming in the Pacific on Christmas Day. While cruising around the windward side of the island (from North Shore and Pupukea down to Lanikai Beach), we regularly jammed along to the local sounds of Jahwaiian music. Sometimes referred to as Hawaiian reggae music or a derivative of Jamaican reggae with a Hawaiian flair, I like to think of Jahwaiian music as a broader category that includes R&B, pop, rock influences and allowed for a sort of intra-island (Jamaica, Hawaii, New York) collaboration along musical lines. In this vein, here's one official island party jam from Maui locals and one mainland slow driving jam that I'd like to gently place in the wide embrace of the Jahwaiian sound.

Ekolu: Shores of Walehu
From Shores of Waiehu (Tusnami, 2008)

Chris Brown: With You
From Exclusive (Jive, 2008)

SUMMER SONGS 08: MURPHY'S LAW

2008-06-10T11:16:00.001-07:00

(Editor's Note: This summer songs post comes from Murphy's Law, my DJ partner at Boogaloo[L.A.] and one of the Captain's Crate duo. He's been a real inspiration for me to discover new music; his post aims to take you on a journey of your own. --O.W.)

Take a Trip With Me

written by Murphy's Law

Rosinha De Valencia

Summertime

Brazilian Beats 2

Gilberto Gil

Extra

Um Banda Um

McNeal & Niles

Summertime

Thrust

Sugarhill Gang

Hot Hot Summer Day

8th Wonder

heat

The Dove Shack

Summertime In The LBC

The Show Original Soundtrack

I Funkadelic

Can You Get To That

Maggot Brain

Elkin & Nelson

Vamanos

D'Angelo

Crusin'

Brown Sugar

SUMMER SONGS 08: LAUNCH!

2008-06-06T15:56:00.000-07:00

I got this IM from a friend the other day: "every winter I think to myself "Summer songs...what a dumb concept...why should music be seasonal???" and then during the springtime I think, "I can't wait to listen to music this summer."

I could only chuckle since he's exactly right. As much as I - along with others - invest in the idea of a "summer song," it can certainly feel like a forced concept yet, as his ambivalence reveals, it's still such a seductive idea that we find ourselves buying into it despite ourselves. Such is the power of summer.

Welcome to the 4th annual Soul Sides Summer Songs Series. I began the series as a way to try to articulate a muddle of thoughts I had about the relationship between summer and music and four years later, I'm no closer to any conclusions but I have used this as a great excuse to invite some valued friends and peers to muse along with me. Here's my own contribution for this year:

Ray Barretto: Pastime Paradise (O-Dub Edit)
From La Cuna (CTI, 1981)

Quantic and Nicodemus: Mi Swing Es Tropical
From Ritmo Tropical EP (Tru Thoughts, 2005). Also on Shapes.

Gotta thank my man Rani D for these two songs - I had heard both in passing didn't really pay attention to it until he dropped it during our pairing at last month's Boogaloo[L.A.]. Now I can't get 'em out of my head.

I know it's cliche to use some Latin/Brazilian sabor as a "sound of summer" example since you might as well offer up a picture of some salt and lime to go with it but I just can't help but think of summer when that electric piano comes in at the beginning of both songs. Love. That. I don't care if you want to throw a drink umbrella on it. So be it.

The Barretto is another example of how vital that man was to Latin music throughout his entire career. I wouldn't have thought an early '80s Barretto jam would pull off a cover of Stevie Wonder's "Pastime Paradise" but the sound of this song is just so gorgeous (at least in parts). Ok, I admit, I did lose interest in the song once the vocals cut in. And then there was some cheesy sax. And then bad, Santana-wannabe rock guitar. So I just cut all that out and left you with a 1/3rd length "best of" edit from the song. Love it or hate it.

I'm more familiar with QSO than I am with Quantic proper and I realize: I need to get familiar. Great tune...I just wish I had been playing this for three years now instead of discovering it three weeks ago.

Marlena Shaw: California Soul (Diplo Remix)
From Verve Remixed 4 (Verve, 2008)

Inkfat feat. Moonrocket: California
From Surfacing (???, 2005). Also available on Asian American Hip Hop For Dummies.

Just when you thought Dockers may have ruined this song permanently, trust the folks at Verve and Diplo to pull it back. I admit - I was a little skeptical at first at the idea; Shaw's song is so much a classic that it's hard to imagine what one could do with it but I gotta credit Diplo here - instead of piling on, he pulls back, keeping the audience anticipating - but never quite delivering - the crashboombam they expect, at least until the very end where he brings back those gorgeous strings again. I don't care if you're not from Cali - feel this vibe. (By the way, make sure to also check out the fantastic Mike Mangini remix of Nina Simone's "Gimme Some").

With "California" by Vallejo's Inkfat - I have DJ Phatrick to thank for putting me up on it; it's one of the cuts featured on his new Asian American Hip Hop For Dummies mix-CD. When I first heard the song I assumed it was from the late '90s, especially given the production style and how Inkfat reminded me of Makeba Mooncycle). But I was very surprised to learn it was from just a few years ago (and moreover, obscure enough that you can't even find a mention of the album online. Looks like someone needs to step their marketing up!) I'll be straight up: as far as lyricism goes, this is not what you'd call a "masterpiece" and I'm not trying to dog on Moonrocket but "calamari" is an awkward word to work into any rhyme (though perhaps not as bad as "crouton"). But despite those critiques, I like how the song sounds - it brings back all kinds of nice memories of living in the Bay Area and the creative era that presumably influenced a song like this. Plus, Bob James-esque keys = a good look (or, er, sound).

Alton Ellis: Gonna Take a Miracle
From Sunday Coming (Coxsone, 1970)

This, along with his cover of "What Does It Take To Win Your Love To Me" have been in heavy rotation the last few weeks. I'm a late-comer to reggae soul in general and Ellis in particular but he's my new minor obsession - most of what I've heard from him so far has been sublime.

The Cool Kids: 88
From The Bake Sale EP (Chocolate Industries, 2008)

I'll have much more to say about this group later this summer. I have no doubt a lot of dudes want to hate on them and I'm even partial to some of the reasons why. But for real? I can't stop bumping "88" (or "Black Mags" for that matter). And hell, I don't even own Bapes.

Lil Wayne: Let the Beat Build
From Tha Carter III (Cash Money, 2008)

Sure, it's not as good as Carter II and arguably not even as fun as Dedication 2 or Da Drought 3 but I'm not mad at Carter III (less Auto-Tune would have been nice though). Of its songs, "Let the Beat Build" feels the best executed and it has this beautifully patient momentum that builds that feels perfect for summertime. Just wish they hadn't named it "Let the Beat Build" - let the song do the speaking, not the title.

The Impressions: They Don't Know
From This Is My Country (Curtom, 1968)

Doesn't this song seem apropos right now? Recorded in the wake of MLK's assassination, "They Don't Know" is simultaneously defiant and affirming, perhaps not quite as anthematic as something like "We're a Winner" or "Keep On Pushing" but coming after a tragedy that left so many demoralized, the song tries to find a moment of uplift in all that darkness. I did cringe at the part where they sing, "every sister's a breeder" (whereas the "brothers" get to be the leaders) but this bit of gender role anachronism aside, "They Don't Know" feels like a grand theme to charge towards November with.

By the way, I've had Impressions 45s for years but never invested in their LPs much (not compared to Curtis' solo work) and I'm now kicking myself for not being up on this since pre-natal. This album is amazing - incredibly beautiful songs and listenable end-to-end. Be sure to check "Fool For You," "My Woman's Love" and "Stay Close To Me."

--O.W.

SUMMER SONGS 07: DAVE TOMPKINS

2007-08-30T15:49:00.000-07:00

Dave swears this isn't the Polyphonic Spree

(Editor's Note: Barring some unforeseen circumstances before next week, this marks the last Summer Songs post for 2007 and we're going to end with a spectacular flourish courtesy music writer Dave Tompkins, one of my most favoritest people in the world. Look for his upcoming book on the history of the Vocoder. For those too lazy to read, Dave says "Overlord Ice Dog is going to recite the whole book in Auto-Tune." --O.W.)

CONTINUE READING...

Quick-Tail The Sky Down

by Dave Tompkins

Nora Dean: Angie-La-La
From 7” single, B-side of U-Roy's "Tom Drunk" (Duke Reid, 1970s)

“And then I started making extinct bird calls.” (The Rubbles usually answer on the third ring.) Nora also executes one of the best weees on record, with respect to Digital Underground’s pool party “weeee!” I suspect a supernatural agency at work here, more than a fat guy jumping on an inner tube. That’s the way love is. Nora also did a song called “Scorpion In His Underpants,” which must have surprised the shit out of the ants. Not that a creature who wears its ears on its legs could be surprised.

Key & Cleary: Young People
From 7” single (Amherst, 1970s)

Jesse Key and Sylvester Cleary recorded an instrumental about the tragic Buffalo blizzard of 1977. Its violins sound even more forlorn in the Spring and by June they can’t even get out of bed. Mr. Cleary himself makes a fool out of summer inertia, designing tube socks, candy bars and bicycles while bottling wine from the pear trees in his back yard. (A friend recently described Key and Cleary as “people who can’t stop doing stuff.”) There’s also the Key and Cleary pet shop promotional record, with violins “designed specifically for the enjoyment of your dog.” This is good since the average dog is pretty much screwed in August.

“Young People” would’ve done Schoolhouse Rock some good--no wonder kids always wanted to hang out at Key & Cleary’s house, where the label motto is: “The best thing that ever happened to anybody.” (Serious.)

Not old enough to drive, flicking cards at each other, trying to avoid the snappy orange guy in the top hat that lives in the fridge, whose idea of a good time is celery sticks and frozen OJ squares. These kids, looking for a brand new game. (Look no further than “I Need Wheels” by Lil Mac the Lyrical Midget of Texas.)

Funkadelic: Music for My Mother (Instrumental)
From 7” single (Westbound, 1970). Also on Funkadelic.

The last time I saw George Clinton he was in a golf cart that ploughed through a game of 3-on-3 basketball in a parking lot in Atlanta, back when the Fu-Schnickens were still together. Adrock was on that day but Money Mark spent more time in the air, probably from doing all those Moog-ups on stage. (Mike D=Almost Rambis). George was headed to the tour bus to have a speck of glitter extracted from his cornea. I remember him nictitating like Herbert Lom at the end of Pink Panther Strikes Again (when Lom’s being rubbed out by his own doom ray). For a wonderful moment all that remains is Lom’s eyeball, an ocular tic floating in front of a church organ, which is still blaring and feeling pretty Lon Chaney about things when all turns to castle manure.

This is the instrumental of an early Funkadelic record, only on the 45. That opening bit of guitar is Van Cleef facing off with the humidity—hold heat, sweat bullets. And check that misplaced split end of a twang, which, if your turntable has its pants on backwards, has a tendency to loop by accident around 1:30. It all sounded pretty 80 in a 55 this past June when I was knocking back telephone poles across South Carolina and west Georgia, near Omslum? Osmium? (Map says National Cane Forest.) A big snake was crossing and I gave it a haircut. No harm done, though you can imagine all his boys ribbing him with “Plissken! I-heard-you-were-dead!” jokes for the rest of the night.

And a George-related bonus for your patience

Compton’s Most Wanted: Late Night Hype
From It’s a Compton Thang (Capitol, 1990)

There’s no way I could speed to this song and so the popsicles had transmattered before I got home. I like how MC Eiht (the g is understood) acts surprised because Unknown once made tracks like this.*

Now it’s Anita Baker and a bassline played by Iguanodon thumbs. Then a late night exchange at a gas station, something poking out the window—what this guy from Gastonia used to refer to as “the Wavy Wavy.” Then Eiht wakes up on his floor, thanks to the ding-dong timing of Rick James’ bag of weed.

*A minute or so into it you realize this thing is kicking Rain Forest’s ass. This is back when CMW’s DJ Slip did that E.V.I.A.N. 12, the only record credited to Parisian bottled water with cover art depicting a seahorse and a starfish playing strap-on keyboards.

Rodney O & Joe Cooley: Gimme The Mic (Instr)
From Days of Way Back (Psychotic, 1993)

Among the better Eric B rumors that might get us ventilated (eg, he once drove an ice cream truck in Red Hook) is the one about him hooking up the loop of Kool & the Gang’s “Summer Madness” and bringing it to Paul C/Large Pro and Rakim. For whatever reasons, they turned it down, maybe because Rakim was too busy making math with another Kool & the Gang song called “Chocolate Buttermilk.” Then Jazzy Jeff and Fresh Prince released “Summertime.” Then Eric B pawned his gold anchor for a yacht with 75 girls, made an R&B album and started managing a guy who said, “Look out Ma, I’m in my own world.”

This is Rodney & Joe Cooley’s version of “Summer Madness” with some Michael Jackson run-off from the previous track as mixed by either Joe Cooley or Egyptian Lover, who I swear yells “Fender Rhodes” at one point.

Segment 2 : Cold Pump That Body (Dub)
From 12” single (Tandem Records, 1980s). Also on Tandem Jams the Bass

This is better at the wrong speed but I tip my gas can to whoever was programming those lawn sprinklers out in Burlingame, California.

More likely, this is what that guy upstairs was listening to in HP Lovecraft's "Cool Air"--before he turned into muckspit. Apparently refrigerated pumps weren't all that back in 1928. This called for words like "unutterably." Or "slitherful." Which was coined by Mr. Buckshot of Brooklyn, not Mr. Lovecraft of Red Hook by way of Providence, waking up with drawbridge jaw somewhere between. Bog gob it all to hell.

“The lounger, it seems, had fled screaming and mad-eyed after his second delivery of ice.”

Latin Rascals: Lisa’s Coming
From ssshhhh (Tommy Boy, 1980s). Also on The Tommy Boy Story Vol. 1.

Summer of 1986. While the Fat Boys were in their dressing room, Latin Rascals opened up Fresh Festival III in powder wigs. They were dancing to the same JS Bach organ that opened the non-LL version of Rollerball. Rollerball is worth seeing for John Houseman’s boiled owl brows and a porned-out instrumental called “Executive Lounge Party.” The scene with people in evening gowns shooting down trees at dawn always saddened me. But who wouldn’t wear rollerskates for Maud Adams? Rollerball was adapted from Rollerball Murder, a collection of William Harrison stories that includes one about a kid who spends his summer with an aunt who teaches him how to eat furniture.

“What’d you do this summer?”
“Left my teeth in my aunt’s Noguchi sun porch.”

Summer is also about talking into electric fans. An IEEE guy I spoke with calls this effect Vortical Shedding. Or Shredding, depends on which fabric of the universe is stuck to your ass that day. One girl told me she spoke into fans because she wanted to sound like an ice cream cake from outer space. Another said she could get to Mars by speaking through a used Kraft cheese wrapper. At least that’s what her mother said—and she lives in Chillicothe.

Sine: Mosquito Walk (Reedit)
From 12” single (Moonstew, 2004)

Didn’t get disco in North Carolina. Then moved up here and saw folks in summer dresses dancing to an endless version of “Atmospheric Strutt” on the Coney Island boardwalk. The mosquitoes were pretty into it too. And if these creatures must go around smuggling CDC ketchup packets through the air then we may as well get a nice blood-siphoning keyboard out of the deal, no? Produced by Patrick Adams, “Mosquito Walk” is credited to a Canadian group called Sine but this edit subtracts the cloying dweedleness of the original. Nor is there anything more summery than a late night proboscis in your ear. Slap yourself to sleep.

Extra slitherful is Lalo Schifrin’s birth of a mosquito theme from The Hellstrom Chronicle.

Creative Source: Good Lovin’ Is Good Livin’
From Consider the Source (Polydor, 1980s). Also on Bugz In the Attic.

Two summers ago at my oldest brother’s memorial throwdown on a pig farm/art gallery in West Georgia. A circle of 280 people holding hands and screaming blind metal at the sun, most of them strangers to me until that day, including a guy who’d built a mosquito the size of a Go Kart, using an old propane tank, a Dirt Devil thorax and some Bridge Out reflectors. Then someone told me a story about my brother tripping over an alligator in the dark. Then a guy from Olivia Tremor Control offered one about him playing drums inside an empty water tower (the bats must’ve loved that one) choked in kudzu’s chest wig, out near Danielsville where I’d met the Skinny Boys’ DJ’s cousin. (No fibrillator.) I tried to repay them with the retread about my brother offering the late Tammy Faye Bakker some nachos when she was ducking reporters at a Chi Chi’s in Charlotte. Then the sun got tired of getting yelled at. Sheesh! And slunk off without telling anybody. So it was up to Creative Source, in an orange poof of dirt at dusk. Sounded even better because we knew tomorrow would be out for blood.

(You think the crawdads are wondering how the fuck twilight ended up with “crepuscular?”)

Milton Wright: I Have You
From Spaced (Alston, 1970s)

This one is to reclaim July since it was less a month than tragic ordeal for most of my friends. (Can't we just swap out for an extra October?) Milton brushes real dirt off his shoulders--a wrinkled suit with an epaulet auto-swiffer.

One more for the roadcoder.

(My license has been expired for three years--dohcoder)

No wait, I first heard this 14 summers ago when I had to take one of my students to a hospital in Orange, Virginia at 2 a.m. (meningitis scare) and I passed out over three detention chairs in the waiting room with a box of Fruity Pebbles. Luckily it was a false alarm and this song took our faces out the window during the ride back.

Fall is the best time for the beach anyway.

As my puppet-making grandmother used to say, "It's been real and I certainly have seen you."

SUMMER SONGS 07: DAN CHAMBERLIN

2007-06-21T15:48:00.000-07:00

Editor's note: Today is the first official day of summer. That always makes me sad because it means that from here on out, everything begins to wind down and shorten. But hey, let's not dwell on it. Summer is here and it seemed only right to include a summer songs post to celebrate.

The latest comes from Los Angeles writer Daniel Chamberlin. I've known Dan ever since the days when both of us were at URB Magazine and he was definitely some of the editors I've enjoyed working with the most. In the time since, Dan's written for Arthur Magazine, edits for Flavorpill, and is now the Arts Editor for the new social networking site, Uber.

For his summer songs post, Dan picked out an eclectic selection that covers everything from "juicy psychedelic country vibe" to "heat-induced hallucinations" to music for deaf women. Or something like that. Most of all, he reminds you not to sleep on the Marshall Tucker Band.

CONTINUE READING...

The Grateful Dead: Morning Dew
From bootleg (Fillmore East, NY, 4/29/71)

Bonnie Dobson

On the Beach

Deadhead

my friends

Marshall Tucker Band: Fly Eagle Fly
From A New Life (Capricorn, 1974)

Meat Puppets: Swimming Ground
From Up on The Sun (SST, 1985)

On The Natural

OM: Rays of the Sun/To The Shrinebuilder
From Inerrant Rays of Infallible Sun (Durtro/Jnana, 2006)

Stars of the Lid: Sun Drugs
From The Ballasted Orchestra (Kranky, 1997)

Arthur Magazine

SUMMER SONGS 07: ROBBIE ETTELSON

2007-06-19T15:48:00.000-07:00

Editor's Note: For a writer who's not even in this hemisphere, Australia's Robbie Ettelson puts a lot of rap journalists in America to shame with his interviews. Maybe it's just that he actually transcribes and publishes what he raps with these rappers about but even that provides some much-needed candor and illumination.

He ran his interview with KRS-One last week and it actually addresses several of the conversations that came up in my recent KRS post. In particular, Robbie asks him if KRS was going at Jeff Chang with "I Was There" and KRS talks a bit about Can't Stop Won't Stop and what he sees as a failing in "doing your homework" (though notably, KRS says Jeff worked at Def Jam which is completely untrue so it looks like lack of homework isn't just limited to hip-hop scholar/writers). By the way, Jeff addresses some of this on his site.

That said though, I was very much impressed by KRS's self-reflexive comments on any number of different topics and think Robbie, in particular, is really distinguishing himself as one of the best interviewers I've seen in the game.

But since it's actually winter in Australia right now, I thought it'd be fun to have him muse on his summer songs while he's freezing his arse off. For Robbie, his post finds himself waiting on that glorious sun:

CONTINUE READING...

Special K:

Sun Is Up

From the Treacherous Three's

Old School Flava

(Wrap!, 1994)

Pete Rock & CL Smooth:

Sun Won't Come Out

From

The Main Ingredient

(Elektra, 1994)

Large Professor feat. Q-Tip:

In The Sun

From

1st Class

(Matador, 2002)

Organized Konfusion:

Walk Into The Sun

From

Organized Konfusion

(Hollywood BASIC, 1991)

SUMMER SONGS 07: DJ LITTLE DANNY

2007-06-13T15:47:00.000-07:00

From the editor: No way could we do a new summer songs series and not have DJ Little Danny down for a post. As the creator of Office Naps, Daniel Shiman has put together one of the best audioblogs we know out there - a fantastic mix of obscure music and Shiman's considerable knowledge.

For his summer songs entry, Shiman dips away from his 45-only format on Office Naps and pulls out a few LP cuts that tap into his summer idealism. --O.W.

Summer is just as much a vessel for our romantic imagination as it is baseball, cars, and youthful indiscretion. Humming within every summer song is always that ideal of our warmest months, some hazy ratio of what our imagination tells us summer should be - the breeze, the swimming hole, the sex, food, booze, and blaring music - and what our memory tells us summer was - usually with greatly exaggerated measures of the same.

TnT Boys: Musical Del Alma
From Sex Symbols / Simbolos Sexuales (Cotique, 1969).

We shook, we did the shingaling: the history books tell us that we had fun before 1968’s “Tighten Up” riff, but I’m not so sure. The unstoppable, hypnotic beat of late ‘60s Spanish Harlem is there on “Musica Del Alma,” and, I’ll be damned, so is that riff. The TnT Boys were enthusiastic and impossibly young when they handed us “Musical Del Alma,” all buoyant with piano and pride and hot-fun-in-the-summertime grit.

Or so I imagine. This is pure Nuyorican soul fantasia to me. “Musica Del Alma” is three minutes of cultural transcendence for someone who grew up in a small tourist town in Pennsylvania, someone now living in the West Texas desert. It’s music and peals of laughter and seared food smells rising from the late ‘60s New York City streets, and the added luxury of complete obliviousness to the inner city's meanness. “Musica Del Alma” is the perhaps the summer song's greatest potential realized: escapism.

The Jesus and Mary Chain: Everything’s Alright When You’re Down
From Barbed Wire Kisses (B-Sides and More) (Blanco Y Negro/Warner Brothers, 1988).

For all its droning fuzz and feedback, the song’s got the right AM radio moves. ‘60s pop hooks, surf-ish guitar solos and anthemic choruses: “Everything’s Alright When You’re Down” is a great summer song. Unlike the TnT Boys, however, I hear the song today and I hear the banal, awkward reality of adolescence.

The Jesus and Mary Chain were both a combination of everything I was between my sophomore and junior years in high school - sullen, greasy-haired, and sixties-fixated - and everything I wasn’t, but desperately wanted to be. I was gawky, with nerd glasses and bushy, uncontrollable red hair. The Jesus and Mary Chain were Scottish and unspeakably cool. Everything I could find by them, I bought and recorded dutifully to TDK 60 minute cassette. I hear “Everything’s Alright When You’re Down” today and, in other words, I’m slumped in the backseat of the family Toyota with some crappy, off-brand Walkman, willfully ignoring my parents and glaring out the window. It’s August. I think we were going to Canada. Somewhere with lakes.

Years later I still cringe at the pubescent version of myself, and slap my forehead accordingly. Setting aside our embarrassment, though, we must include the awkward, fifteen-year-old reality of the summer song, too. This is only appropriate. This is the flipside to the fantasy of “Musica Del Alma.”

The Cake: Baby That’s Me
From The Cake (Decca, 1967)

Other contributors to O-Dub’s summer songs series have noted this gap, this fantasy of summer on one hand and the actual experience of it on the other. Frequently our summer favorites float somewhere in that gulf between imagination and memory, escapism ("Musica Del Alma") and reality ("Everything’s Alright When You’re Down"). Yeah, summer is swell but, dammit, my ass is stuck to the seat again. Summer is constantly belying its own idealism.

I found the Cake’s debut album several Junes ago. With its Wall of Sound grandeur and psychedelic tinge, "Baby That's Me" was the right song at the right time for someone cultivating a taste for dreamy '60s pop. This song, too, was dutifully recorded. It went everywhere my mp3 player did: job, car, apartment, running. It was infatuation.

The poignancy and the sweet anticipation have long passed for many of us. We may now strain to remember the month. There are families now, and homes, careers and lives evolving independently of seasonal reverie. Our awareness of summer constantly dims - even as our obsession with music persists. But the shape of summer, though diffuse, still hangs in the air around us, and as long as it does, so does the possibility of the summer song. I hear the Cake’s "Baby That’s Me" today and I remember waking one golden morning in California two summers ago, perfectly content with myself for once and perfectly aware, too, that it was summer.

SUMMER SONGS 07: TRAVIS GLAVE

2007-06-08T15:47:00.000-07:00

From the editor: Travis Glave is the founder of one of my favorite hip-hop blogs, Wake Your Daughter Up, where he writes long, impassioned posts about what he's been buying/listening to/thinking about. Maybe I'm partial also to the fact that we're close to age and thus are nostalgic for the same eras and artists but I like the depth and dedication he brings to site.

For his summer songs entry, Glave plumbs into the memory lanes hitched to his younger days and just what tunes form the soundtrack to those flashbacks. --O.W.*

CONTINUE READING...

Koolade feat. Masta Ace: Survival
From 12" (ABB, 2004)

Beastie Boys: Hey Ladies
From Paul's Boutique (Def Jam, 1989)

Steve Miller: The Joker
From The Joker (Capitol, 1973)

Greatest Hits from ‘74-'78

Masta Ace Inc.: The INC Ride
From Sittin' On Chrome (Delicious Vinyl, 1995)

De La Soul: Sunshine
From Stakes Is High (Tommy Boy, 1996)

Parliament: Flashlight
From Gloryhallastoopid (Casablanca, 1979)

Greatest Hits

Exile: Summertime In LA
From Dirty Science (Sound In Color, 2006)

Dirty Science

*Glave was kind enough to supply all the files himself but he did them in the zshare format and I just didn't feel like converting them to either direct MP3s or divshare.

SUMMER SONGS 07: EDITOR'S CHOICE

2007-06-02T15:45:00.000-07:00

Being that this is the third time I've brought in this series, it's been a challenge for me to find something new to say about summer songs each time out. Personally, I still like what I had down the first year, this idea of summer songs as encapsulating the fragility and idealism and nostalgia of the season. It's not like I'm about to reinvent that.

However, I want to go back to my original question: what does a summer song mean? And for me, I've been realizing that there are at least two kinds:

CONTINUE READING...

What songs remind me of summer?

These aren't necessarily songs about summer or that even came out during summer but rather, they're songs that, for me, wiggle out the cork of a memory of summertime - a musical trigger for some time forgotten, then recovered through a song. For example, I'm almost certain that Fela Kuti's "Water No Get Enemy" will always be associated with the summer of 2006, when I moved back to Los Angeles from the Bay Area and this song was on constant repeat through the early days of August.

There are other songs I've probably forgotten, summer songs from my childhood in Massachusetts or San Diego that have long faded into amnesia but might yet resurface in the right moment. However, the one song that always invokes a sensation of summer for me has been...

R.E.M.: Stand
From Green (Warner Bros, 1988)

My birthday is in mid-August (Leos, holla) and I spent the first part of the summer of 1988, practicing driving, trying to earn my learner's permit so that when I turned 16, I could get my license ASAP and join that long parade of teenagers in Los Angeles who conflated their license with a passport to freedom. I had signed up with some random driving school out of the phonebook (no doubt "AAA Driving School" or "ABC School") and on my second lesson, my instructor - who I thought was minorly mad for doing this - told me to get on the freeway and head West. It was my first time driving on the freeway and in L.A. no less and as you can imagine, I was a little shook.

I figured it'd be a quick jaunt down the 10 for a few miles than getting off and driving back home. Nope. He told me to keep driving: past downtown, past La Brea, past the Westside area where I live now, past Santa Monica, all the way from the 10, onto PCH and north towards Malibu. It was, to be sure, an incredible drive - scenic (and harrowing) and patient and what I remember from that drive was what was playing on the radio. Well, I remember "Stand" and that, at this point, might be the only song I can remember (pity too - I'd love to be able to say, "Yeah, I made that drive playing "Route 66" by Depeche! But honestly, I just don't recall) but any time I've heard the song since, I'm taken back nearly 20 years (damn...20 years already?) to that car, to that drive, to that summer where I went from being a mere boy to...a mere boy with a driver's license. Good times, good times.

What songs sound like summer?

This is a more amorphous - though no less valid - kind of summer song. It speaks to this idea that summer itself is all about your ideal of it vs. any actual reality. So these songs are the ones that capture what you think summer should sound like whether it's a lazy Sunday afternoon lounger, a sweaty club night anthem or whatever tempos and attitudes come in between. For me, these songs are always changing, depending on the moment.

As I've written recently, I've really been into sweet soul songs and to me, there's a summer-y quality to a lot of these classic, post-Chi-Lites/Impressions soul tunes. It's not just the fragility of the voices and melodies - though that's part of it - it's also that so many of these songs are less about love and more about loss, about how fleeting infatuations and obsessions and romances are. And as I've said before, the feeling of summer is most powerful when you realize how quickly it passes; that you don't really appreciate the magic of the season until it's on the cusp of fading away.

For me then, the songs that sound like summer are the ones that either/both musically or/and lyrically capture that moment where loss is imminent and the desire to hold on never shines brighter. Lately, one of the songs that's embodied this idea has been this one:

Soul Majestics: I Done Told You Baby
From 7" (Al-Tog, 1971)

I owe a huge thanks to Joshua Alston, who is a reporter for Newsweek as well as the creator of the Joshua's Jukebox blog. At the EMP conference this year, he presented a paper that centered on this song by Chicago's Soul Majestics as an example of an older, now lost, form of Black masculinity - one that was open to embracing and expressing a vulnerability that few artists today are willing to cop to. As an example, he played this song by the Soul Majestics, which I had never heard before, but it quickly became an obsession, especially alongside the equally sublime "Together" by the Intruders. Even though Chicago is a long way from East L.A., there's something about this song that screams lowrider soul to me, a tune made to float out of cars cruising under hot July suns or warm August nights, a soundtrack for falling in (or out of) love with a crush destined to fade by winter but whose memory will haunt ever summer after. So bitter. So sweet.

SUMMER SONGS 07: ERIC WEISBARD

2007-05-26T15:45:00.000-07:00

It's Memorial Day Weekend which means that as we celebrate the informal return of summer, it also means we're relaunching our annual Summer Songs posts.

It all began here. Now, in our third year, we've gotten even more ambitious, with over 10 guests invited to muse on what their perfect summer songs are.

First up: Eric Weisbard. Enjoy.

Frank Zappa/Mothers of Invention: Plastic People
From Absolutely Free (Rykodisc, 1967)

Sid Vicious: My Way
From Sid Sings (Virgin, 1979)

Public Enemy: Rebel Without A Pause
From It Takes a Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back (Def Jam, 1988)

Neil Young: I'm the Ocean
From Mirror Ball (Reprise, 1995)

The Loser's Lounge: Islands in the Stream (no recording available)

Los Abandoned: Van Nuys Es Very Nice
From Mix Tape (Vapor Us, 2006)

Jonathan Richman: That Summer Feeling
From Jonathan, Sings (Rough Trade, 1983)

Garth Brooks: That Summer
From Chase (Liberty, 1992)

DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince: Summertime
From Home Base (Jive, 1991)

Bryan Adams: Summer of '69
From Restless (A&M, 1984)

The first guest for 2007's Summer Songs season is Eric Weisbard. I first met Eric back in the late '90s when he was the music editor at the Village Voice and not long thereafter, he joined the staff at the Experience Music Project and seeing him would become a yearly event thanks to all the work he put in assembling the annual Pop Music Conference. Since he and his wife Ann Powers ended up in Los Angeles not long before me and my family came down, I've had the pleasure of spending even more time with them and have constantly reminded myself that Eric has a scary, encyclopedic memory for all things music-related. He knows every anecdote and story you can imagine, cross-genre.

These days, apart from EMP, Eric stays busy with book writing, having already helped put the Spin Alternative Record Guide together as well as writing an entire book on Guns N' Roses' Use Your Illusion. He's currently finishing up his long-delayed PhD dissertation from UC Berkeley (Bears, holla!). With that, here's Eric Weisbard's ruminations on summer songs*:

*Given the number of songs in this post, I divshare-d them as a way to reduce bandwidth. Sorry for the inconvenience.

SUMMER SONGS 06: JIM HARRINGTON

2006-08-04T15:42:00.000-07:00

The Beach Boys: Good Vibrations
From Smiley Smile (Capitol, 1967)
(Editor's Note: This latest summer songs post comes from Jim Harrington, music editor for the Alameda Newspaper Group. For him, summer songs are like popsicles. Mmmmm...popsicles.)

I'm all about the lead graph. Credit that to my background as a concert critic. I've found that if I've got a good lead in mind, the rest of the review tends to flow rather smoothly. If I'm not confident in my lead, it usually translates to a very, VERY long evening. (And, really, what can one write at 3 a.m. about a Blink 182 concert that hasn't already been written?) So, when the topic of great summer songs recently came up in a staff meeting, I immediately turned to our theater critic and said, "a great summer song should be like a popsicle." I had no idea what I meant by that - just that I had a good lead.

Later, I would flesh that idea out and back up my lead by saying that a great summer song should be cool, sticky and sweet, leaving you with a sugary high. Bingo. And the first summer song I thought of was Good Vibrations. I didn't know what else would be on my list, but I knew that would be at the top. Taking this discussion out of season, I would go so far as to submit that Beach Boys song as a candidate for best song ever. (Mojo mag would back me on that one _ it listed Good Vib as the best single of all time. Rolling Stone had it at No. 6.) This year marks the 40th anniversary of the release of Good Vibes and, having just listened to it, I would say that song still has it _ whatever that elusive "it" is. It still sounds important and fun and, very, genius. I can only imagine what
it must have sounded like at the time. So I'm putting that song as no. 1 on my list - the very tastiest of all Popsicles. Here's some other of my top sweets:

- "Vacation," Go-Go's
- "Land of 1,000 Dances," Wilson Pickett
- "Night Moves," Bob Seger
- "Miserlou," Dick Dale
- "Blister in the Sun," Violent Femmes
- "That Summer Feeling," Jonathan Richman
- "Bouncing Around the Room," Phish
- "(Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay," Otis Redding
- "Raspberry Beret," Prince

--Jim Harrington

SUMMER SONGS 06: THE ANTHEM

2006-07-22T15:42:00.000-07:00

Eddie Kendricks:Intimate Friends
From Slick (Tamla, 1977). Also on The Ultimate Collection.

Common Sense: A Penny For Your Thoughts
From Can I Borrow a Dollar? (Relativity, 1992)

Sweet Sable: Old Times' Sake (After Hours Mix)
From 12" (Street Life, 1993)

213: Another Summer
From The Hard Way (TVT, 2004)

Rhymefest: Sister
From Blue Collar (J, 2006)

When I was listening to the new Rhymefest the other night[1], the song "Sister" came on and the first thought in my mind was, "Intimate Friends" again?

You have to understand, for three summers running, this Eddie Kendricks' song has been sampled by the likes of Rhymefest, Alicia Keys and 213. Plus, go back a decade and Common used it in 1992, then Sweet Sable the next summer. (I know I'm missing a few others too).

And the thing is, it always sounds really good because you really can't f--- up the original source. "Intimate Friends" simply sounds like summer. Breezy, laid-back and oh-so-soulful. It's definitely my favorite Kendricks song that doesn't appear on People...Hold On.

Of the lot above, 213 still did it best if only because they turned this into an official summer anthem in name even if the rest aspired to be that without announcing their intentions. The way Common flipped it way back when was interesting but the engineering on that album (in that era, of course) didn't really bring out the full beauty of the song. The Sweet Sable was closer to achieving that but it also loses points for just having inane lyrics. And as for the Rhymefast - I'm not mad at it even though it doesn't do much different from 213. I do wonder if Rhymefest was also trying to nod back at his fellow Chicago-ian, Common but it may just be a coincidence.

[1] Somewhat to my surprise, Blue Collar is actually a real good album. Not perfect but all things considered, I was very satisfied with it both aesthetically and conceptually.

SUMMER SONGS 06: ERNEST HARDY

2006-07-10T15:43:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: I love all the summer songs posts but I must say that I'm especially pleased to have convinced Ernest Hardy - one of my favorite contemporary writers - to contribute, especially given how much he was willing to write and share. I first began reading Hardy's work when I started at the LA Weekly in the late '90s and since then, I've come to appreciate how insightful and articulate his writing is about music, film, race, masculinity, sexuality, etc. I was especially happy to see that he's compiled many of his best essays and reviews into Blood Beats Vol. 1 which just came out the other month - buy it directly from him and support one of my fellow broke writers. --O.W.)

Negroes reflexively do a waltz between past, present and future, between holding on to what has been while hurling ourselves toward what might be. Sometimes we hold too tight to the past and get stuck, to our detriment. Sometimes we hurdle too quickly forward and lose any sort of anchor, again to our detriment. And that particular dance is reflected in our art and our politiHave Fun (Again)
From Diana (Motown, 1980)

I was always a huge Diana Ross fan, but Detroit itself was kinda ambivalent toward the hometown girl made good. Their pride was tempered by the charges of “oreo” and “sellout” that reflexively trailed her name. But the year that she hooked up with Chic and produced her funkiest, blackest album, Detroit claimed her fiercely. The singles “Upside Down” and “I’m Coming Out” (especially the latter) were huge, of course, seeping out of apartment windows, blasting from car windows and replayed at every party. But the album tracks “Tenderness” and the sing-along, custom-made-for-summer “Have Fun Again” were just as popular, with everyone loving the fake-out fade-out of “Have Fun.” Fun-fun-fun-fun-fun-fun FUN… Have fun… One of the things I most loved about the album was bonding over it with my much older cousin Randy. Back before stretches in prison and jail became media-hyped and industry-glorified rites of passage, most black folk still lowered their voices when speaking of a family member who was in or had been in jail/prison. There was shame around it. Randy had been in and out of juvie and then jail for as long as I could remember. But he was out that summer: cheekbones high, smile wide, ‘fro flawless and his tight, cut-off-at-the-knees jeans driving all the girls wild for flashing his almost comically bowed but still sexy legs. Randy was – and is – the biggest sweetheart on the planet, just cursed with shitty luck and incredibly bad timing. Always caught up for petty or stupid shit. But still, prison had stamped him dangerous, mysterious, in my young eyes. I was intrigued by him but a little afraid of him. One day, dusk falling, just the two of us sitting on the front porch, “Have Fun Again” playing loudly on someone’s radio, Randy turned to me with a grin and said, “Your girl is bad. That’s good shit right there.” And he sang along. And it was.

Soul II Soul: Back To Life
From Vol. 1 - Keep On Movin (Virgin, 1990)

Some call-a-number then call-another-number then call-somewhere else to get the address warehouse party in Los Angeles. Too many people, too little air. Bottled water too expensive. Caron Wheeler’s voice shimmers a cappella through the speakers and hands shoot up in the air, spines liquefy and asses figure-eight. Bodies jook to that beat and the crowd becomes a choir: However do ya want me / however do you need me. And I could swear that a cool breeze floated in from somewhere. Sensuality, a cosmopolitan vibe rooted in Motherland consciousness and a future-sound molded from stripped down beats and the loveliest of sweet, sweet voices all aswirl.

The Isley Brothers: That Lady
From 3+3 (T-Neck, 1973)

The Isley Brothers: Fight the Power
From The Heat Is On (T-Neck, 1975)

A one-two punch that bottles the brilliance and the range of the Isley clan. Long before Ron became the creepy ass uncle that no relative in possession of a vagina wants to be left alone with (Mr. Bigg… yawn), he really was that smoove luvva man… Cooing respectful yet suggestive compliments, given seductive backing vocals and a fierce guitar solo by his siblings, “Lady” was the cut that inevitably had the ladies strut their stuff on the patio, across the park, down the block… “Fight the Power” was simply the get-the-party started jam… Everybody and their mama loved/loves it but it seemed to really connect with the black men I knew. I think even two year-olds channeled some pent up frustration to spit the line “…all this bullshit going down.”

Luther Vandross: Never Too Much
From Never Too Much (Epic, 1981)

It took a minute for me to make the connection. That nerdy muthafucka on all the billboards around town was the same guy who sang the sublime, ecstatic, when-does-he-take-a-breath “Never Too Much.” For real? A thousand kisses from you… Teenage summer crushes, grown folks business and a soul-pop catchiness that snared everyone who heard it. Sitting in the backseat of one of my aunt’s or uncle’s cars with my sister and cousins, trying to match Luther note for note, seamless breath for seamless breath, and collapsing into laughter after mangling a passage.

Earth, Wind and Fire: Reasons
From That's The Way of the World (CBS, 1975)

Clustered on the stairs of the back porch, me my sister and our cousins. Young versions of ourselves. Shorts, tee-shirts, summer dresses. Cornrows to let the scalp breathe and cut down on our mothers’ summertime hair management. Popsicles in hand. I forget who kicks off our a cappella concert, but there we are, singing our hearts out: And in the morning when I rise, no longer feeling hipmatized… A performance that would repeat throughout the summer.

Honorable Mentions:

--Ernest Hardy

SUMMER SONGS 06: DOUG WOLK

2006-07-05T15:43:00.000-07:00

Godchildren of Soul (with General Johnson & Joey Ramone): Rockaway Beach
From Anyone Can Join (Rhino, 1994)

Dub Narcotic Sound System: Shake-A-Puddin'
From 7" (K, 1996). Also on Boot Party.

(Editor's Note: These summer song picks come from Doug Wolk, last seen here plugging some James Brown-related rarities. Wolk has been killing it on the music tip lately...makes you wonder why dude doesn't have an audioblog of his own...can it be too far away? --O.W.)

There's the ideal of summer, and then there's the reality of summer. When you think about the pleasures of summertime, you think of stretching out, sand in your shoes, a cold drink in your hand, cool-looking Ramones shades over your eyes, seagulls circling in the distance, a favorite Carolina beach music mix playing on your headphones. Real summer is rarely that exquisite: there's sweat and chafing, bug bites, stifling humidity, polyester clothes that don't let the breeze through. But all you need is one moment of that perfect, unreal, flawlessly relaxing summer to have it fixed in your head forever.

It's the same with this version of "Rockaway Beach," recorded by the Godchildren of Soul for their 1994 album Anyone Can Join. In my mind, it's the perfect summer single--the Ramones' 1977 punk-pop not-exactly-a-hit-but-a-standard "Rockaway Beach," re-cast as a beach-music groove (brilliant idea!), and sung by the Chairmen of the Board's General Johnson (even better!), with Joey Ramone himself chiming in (awesome!) on a bridge that's not actually in the Ramones' version but, it seems for a moment, should have been. When I call it up in my mind, it should be blasting out of somebody's radio about 40 feet away from my beach towel. When I actually listen to it, it's got some real flaws--the prefab swing of the rhythm section, the slightly plastic horns (I'm not sure they're actually all real horns), the hints of inappropriate synthesizer, Joey's hoarse rasp, the way the arrangement ditches the Ramones' cockeyed riff altogether instead of figuring out how to adapt it somehow. It has the sticky plastic feeling of a beach ball. But having listened to it is great: the idealized version is the one that I can call to mind whenever I want.

There's nothing wrong with a little beach-ball plastic in the right place, anyway. As Dub Narcotic Sound System's Calvin Johnson knows (and Kraftwerk, in a totally different way, knew too), if you go far enough into unfunk, you emerge on the other side in the middle of funk. (This is the original 7-inch version of "Shake-A-Puddin'": the album version on Boot Party is a bit longer, but I love this one better.) Johnson's only got two carb-crazed notes to sing and sings them both flat, and he's not exactly convincing when he sings about "that Southern style," and Larry Butler's drums couldn't possibly be more parched, and somehow the whole thing is just freaking amazing, the song I want to hear at rattling volume in the summer as the last bit of sun slips below the horizon and a hint of blessed chill comes into the air and the dance party starts up. Best moment: a minute before the end, when the little ascending half-step scale (on the world's third-cheapest yard-sale Casio) that Johnson's been flicking in and out of the mix swims into a fragment of backwards psychedelic guitar that's like a school of minnows, and then Brian Weber's feather-fingered organ riff swoops in and swallows everything. --Douglas Wolk

File Under: Summer

SUMMER SONGS 06: R.J. SMITH

2006-07-01T15:44:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: R.J. Smith is author of the just out The Great Black Way: LA in the 1940s and the Lost African American Renaissance, a really amazing book about Los Angeles' famed Central Ave. and the cultural scene that grew up around it. He's also a senior editor at Los Angeles Magazine. For his summer songs post, he wanted to go with a trio of instrumentals since, as he put it, "people talk so much in the summer, and listen so little. you know?")

Hank Levine and the Orchestra: Image, Part One
From 7" (ABC, 1961). Also on Teen Beat, Vol. 4.

I don’t know a thing about Mr. Levine or his band, but this piece of exotica instrumentalia solidly fits into a tradition of California music that reaches back to Ferde Grofe right on up to Brian Wilson. It’s a swoony seaside train chugging into the night. It’s a shimmery piano that gets all bitchycute at the outro. It’s a saxophone gliding above the sparkle. Just like sex on the beach, without the peach schnapps.

Johnny Guitar Watson (billed as Young John Watson): Space Guitar
From 7" (Federal, 1974). Also on Out There.

Some kids get a pen when they graduate from high school – a few get a car. Young John Watson obviously got a messed up guitar. Up to about 1954, this Texas-transplant to LA was considered a rising r&b piano player with an attitude problem. But a piece of space junk clearly hit him on the head and turned him into one of the boldest, baddest guitarists of the decade. This tricked-out effects showcase doesn’t just foreground the guitar, it pushes it into your face like Hendrix would a decade plus later.

Luther Thomas and the Human Arts Ensemble: Funky Donkey
From Funky Donkey Vol. I & II (BAG, 1973).

This isn’t eat-your-peas free jazz that sounds like a blackboard equation, this is free jazz coming from an organ south of your stomach, coming from a place where old feelings and fresh ambitions are stored up waiting to bleed. Tripe stew for the soul. Radical big band funk with politics on its mind that captures the smash-this-place-up spirit of a band of bikers dismantiling a road house.

--R.J. Smith

Monkeyfunk has a tribute to the late Johnny Jenkins.

SUMMER SONGS 06: DJ B.CAUSE

2006-06-22T15:41:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: Our latest summer songs post is from Josh Bea, aka DJ B.Cause, one of the Bay Area's finest behind the wheels o' steel. Josh is what I call a "shadow collector" - his crates run deep and his taste is exquisite but he's almost one of the most down to earth and humble dudes you'll meet. Apart from working part-time at the Groove Merchant, aka the best record store ever, he churns out some of the best mixtapes I know of, including the recently plugged-here-on-Soul-Sides, Soul Boulders (cop that!). His summer songs post includes many tracks I had never heard before...but of course, now desperately want. Seriously - the music here is fantastic. --O.W.)

It's pretty tough to define what a summer song means to me, and even more difficult is the task of choosing a small handful of songs that transcend accurately that feeling of adventure, youth, heat, nightlife, outdoors, love and the occasional deep pain of loss. Instead I've decided to pick the first few seemingly appropriate jams that pop up out of the nearest stack of worn lp piles, those of which seem to grow in the spring months of vinyl aquisition through flea markets and garage sales.

The Coasters: Love Potion # 9
From The Coasters On Broadway (King 196?)

I've loved this tune since I was a kid, so when I stumbled across this dynamic version about a decade ago I was more than thrilled. The song title reminds me (for some odd reason) of the sweet nocturnal smell of blooming jasmine, something I remember vividly from running around after dark as a teen in Los Angeles where the blossoms are abundant. About a year ago I DJed an evening wedding reception in a barn near Modesto, CA...one of those cool wedding parties that actually ends up being genuinely fun. The music was quite good rather than the usual reception jukebox flip-flop: getting riddled with endless requests for 80's pop music despite the fact that they initially hired you to play funk, jazz and soul. Here were some really good and open-minded folks having the time of their lives. At the peak moment of the celebration this tune played feverishly while everbody including myself smiled, shouted, laughed and danced...the moon was bright, the air warm, and you could just make out the faint smell of jasmine in the valley night.

Quicksilver Messenger Service: Fire Brothers
From S/T (Capitol 196?)

Recent re-discovery on the mystical mountain-man volcano worship tip. This track pretty much speaks for itself, smoldering but folky flange.

Sydney Barnes: Summer Sunshine
From Foot Stompin' Music (Parachute 1978)

This is a perfect steppers-style soul tune for the occasion, everything from the title and lyrics to the somewhat mystical & modern feel of the arrangements scream 'summer mix tape'! Love it.

Wrinkers Experience: Fuel For Love
Strangers: Love Rock
From EMI Super Hits (EMI Nigeria 197?)

Two great tunes from an excellent early 70's Nigerian EMI lp that I listened to one too many times and ended up having to purchase despite a dwindling pocketbook. It was hard to choose just two tracks from this record, if I had the time I would have posted them all.

Bonus round 45: Was about to wrap this post up when I noticed this forgotten lil' ditty poking out of one of my 45 bins, and with a a title like that it just had to be included.

The Reflections: She's My Summer Breeze
From 7" (Capitol, 1975)

Honorable mention but out of time & space:

Ray Charles: America The Beautiful
Ted Hawkins: What Do You Want From The Liquor Store?
E-40: Hope I Don't Go Back

--DJ B.Cause

SUMMER SONGS 06: HUA HSU

2006-06-15T15:41:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: This summer songs post comes from a dear friend and colleague, Hua Hsu - all-star culture writer, scholar, DJ and member of the Red Sox Nation. Given that both of us spend ungodly number of hours, idling in front of laptops (Apple, holla), we're constantly IMing songs back and forth. That's why I knew, given Hua's eclectic, expansive taste in music, his summer songs post would be off the wall for ya'll. Not to mention some funny sh-- to read. As I understand it, Hua wrote this during a bout of insomnia, in the wee hours of the morning. --O.W.)

Superchunk: Package Thief
From On the Mouth (Merge, 1993)

A personal indulgence, because this song reminds me of some summer during my mid-teens, sitting in the back of this sunned-out driving school classroom, reading magazines and deciding that “my thing” was going to be music. The next summer, I went to debate camp in Vermont and scared this girl I was cutting cards with (nothing kinky; we were compiling evidence about health care policy) by telling her the shirt actually read “SUPERCHINK.” There’s nothing quintessentially summery about this song, other than the fact that it sounds like the song itself is sweating.

High Fashion: Feelin’ Lucky Lately
From Feelin' Lucky (Capitol, 1982)

A: You should get this.
B: This is corny.
A: You need this.
B: I guess it’s not so bad. Okay, I’m going to get it. And someday, perhaps I will like it. And someday, after that, I’ll be in this really, really good, life-affirming mood, and I’ll put this song on and it will be wonderful that I have something that can adequately capture how I feel inside that perfect moment.
A: Do that.

The Fab 5 (Heltah Skeltah): Leflaur Leflah Eshoshka
From Nocturnal (Priority, 1996)

Mark Ronson feat. Ghostface: Ooh Wee
From Here Comes the Fuzz (Elektra, 2003)

It took me many months in the DJ booth at the Enormous Room to realize that nobody wanted to hear Boot Camp semi-hits, but I didn’t really care. When you’re constantly being harangued by a seemingly endless queue of sun-damaged idiots, you need some “alone time,” and this, oddly, was my sanctuary. The mirror-ball, disco fanfare and cha-ching of “Ooh Wee” are best enjoyed striking the most classical of summer poses: riding shotgun, one arm (preferably the right) out the window, stars in eyes, life ahead of you.

David Bowie: The Bewlay Brothers
From Hunky Dory (RCA, 1971)

Jesus and Mary Chain: About You
From Darklands (Warner Bros, 1987)

The Kinks: Waterloo Sunset
From Something Else By The Kinks (Pye, 1967)

Three-fourths of the year the dissolve from day to night lasts two blinks. Summertime is the exception. It drags. It is the possibility of agony. Those hours before sunset are like readymade bummers, and sometimes you need something languid, something that feels slower than the sky, to make that passage without injury.

The Zombies: Care of Cell 44
From Odessey and Oracle (CBS, 1968)

I think “She’s Not There” is such a great title for a song. Where is she not? Is she simply not where you last saw her? Is she not there—mentally? Is it on some existential shit? A similar instability cloaks “Care of Cell 44,” a much better but also much less famous song from the Zombie catalogue. Within ten seconds of harpsichord you know exactly how the rest of Odessey is going to sound: perfect. Like, so perfect that you wish life itself could be this symmetrical, this harmonious, etc. Colin Blunstone has a great affect, even when he’s not singing—sometimes you can hear him wetting his mouth between lines; oftentimes it sounds like he’s a weeper. The “summerness” of this song, for me, is in the threat of sadness (see: above)—even when CB enters the prattle with a “Morning to you, I hope you’re feeling better, baby,” you don’t really get the sense that this is going to be a very happy song. Where is she this time? Boarding school? Or perhaps a sanitarium? Again, Blunstone is purposefully vague with the details, referencing a “prison stay” before eventually fessing, “We’ll get to know each other for a second time.” Yeah, it’s definitely a sanitarium. Summertime: pretty and calm on the surface, but you never know when you might go mad.

Sister Sledge: Thinking of You
From We Are Family (Cotillion, 1979)

It is not uncommon for record collectors weaned on hip-hop (“Yo, son, Lord Finesse used this bass-line. He chopped it up, son! You need this!”) to view disco as that Maginot line you don’t cross. This is plain stupid. “Thinking of You” is a pantheon song, one I do not trifle with unless I want to “go there.” (“There” being the sanitarium.) It is a self-evidently incredible song and the British love it. And by “the British,” I'm of course talking about Paul Weller.

SUMMER SONGS 06: JOE TWIST

2006-06-06T15:40:00.001-07:00

Rare Earth: I Couldn’t Believe What Happened Last Night
From Willie Remembers (Rare Earth, 1972). Also on Earth Tones: Essential.

Burning Spear: I&I Survive
From Garvey’s Ghost (Island, 1976)

Rolling Stones: Gimme Shelter
From Let It Bleed (London, 1969)

(Editor's Note: Today's summer songs post comes to us from Joe Twist aka Joe Schloss aka one of the finest scholars on popular culture I know today (his students at Tufts and NYU know the deal). I've known Joe for almost ten years now and have found him to be one of the most thoughtful and insightful people I know when it comes to music, culture and academia. Here's his take on the sounds of summer).

From Joe Twist:

BE THANKFUL FOR THE RETURN OF SUMMER SONGS

2006-06-06T15:40:00.000-07:00

William Devaughn: Be Thankful For What You Got
From Be Thankful For What You Got (Roxbury, 1974)

I introduced the summer song series last year, inviting a series of guest posters to discuss what they thought were the ideal summer songs. With Memorial Day behind us and the summer solstice up ahead, I decided to bring it back with a whole new set of guests (beginning with Dr. Joseph Schloss aka Joe Twist) who will be bringing us their favorite summer songs all throughout the season.

I recently wrote about summer songs for my monthly Oakland Tribune column and in going back to my Soul Sides archives, realized that I had never written about Devaughn's song specifically for the site (though I had posted two covers of it over the time). It is a quintessential summer song for reasons I explain in the column:

[This is] one song that's a complete package — the feel and flow of summer, the wistful allure of nostalgia, and the fragility of those moments. Find the album version — all seven minutes of it. The languid groove builds from the opening congas into a subtly funky mix of dulcet guitars and soft vibes and it's the perfect score for a long drives, lazy afternoons and sweaty house parties alike. DeVaughn's vocals bring it all home, urging us to appreciate what life offers even if we're not able to enjoy "diggin' the scene with a gangsta lean." DeVaughn's song is all about living for the moment, advice worth remembering as our summer fast approaches and, inevitably, will end sooner than we realize.But hey, summer's not done yet. We're just getting started.

SUMMER SONGS: JOSH KUN

2005-08-15T15:39:00.000-07:00

King Elio Boom: El Tren
From Champeta Criolla Vol. 2 (Palenque, 2003)

Irving Fields: Cha Cha No. 29 (Mexican Institute of Sound Remix)
(exclusive remix for Reboot Stereophonic)

Yolanda Perez: Aqui Me Tienes
From Aqui Me Tienes (Fonovisa, 2004)

Editor's Note: The latest in the Soul Sides Summer Songs series is from a treasured mentor, Josh Kun. A professor at UC Riverside by day, Kun's wears more musical hats than even I can keep track of, including author of the new Audiotopia and co-founder of the MP3 blog, Hippocampus Music

SUMMER SONGS: BLAKE LEYH

2005-08-05T15:38:00.000-07:00

Sean Paul: Like Glue
From Dutty Rock (Atlantic, 2002)

Juan Carlos Coronel: Danza Negra
From Un Maestro Una Voz (Colombian import, year unknown)

Magic System: Premiere Gaou
From Premier Gaou 1+1 (Next Music, 2002)

Editor's Note: The latest in the Soul Sides Summer Songs series is from composer and sound designer Blake Leyh, who apart from his numerous album and film credits, also has one of the coolest jobs out there as the music supervisor for The Wire. (We'd be happy just fetching coffee on The Wire). Leyh also maintains the excellent audioblog The Ten Thousand Things where we recently heard the mash-up of Gwen + Miles = "Summatime Girl."

More summer-y links:

DJ Applesauce's excellent In the Sunshine mix-CD

The Pop View's own summer songs post

VH1 Classics' summer songs poll. "I Got You Babe"? Seriously?

The NY Times Kelefa Sanneh on this year's summer jammy jam by Mariah Careh.

SUMMER SONGS: TODD INOUE

2005-07-28T15:38:00.000-07:00

Teena Marie: Square Biz
From It Must Be Magic (Motown, 1981)

The Go Team!: Ladyflash
From Thunder, Lightning, Strike (Memphis Industries, 2004)

Journey: Don't Stop Believing
From Escape (Sony, 1981)

Editor's Note: The latest in the Soul Sides Summer Songs series is from the my mellow, my man (and fellow new dad), Todd Inoue, music editor for the SJ Metro.

New Radicals joint

SUMMER SONGS: KRIS EX

2005-07-21T15:37:00.000-07:00

Ninjaman feat. Tinga Stewart: Cover Me & Take Time To Know Her
From Anything Test Dread (VP, 2001)

Heartical Don Bonus: Shabba Ranks:Peeny Peeny
From Caan Dun - The Best of Shabba (VP, 1995)

Editor's Note: The latest in the Soul Sides Summer Songs series is from the erstwhile Warscribe, aka Kris Ex.

Sez Kris:

green bottles

the other big tune ‘pon road right now

Backwood

a self-righteous dread screamingcaveat emptor!

The One

Tinga

By the way...

~~Those copycats~~ My colleagues at NPR have their own summer anthem special.

SUMMER SONGS: JUNICHI SEMITSU

2005-07-17T15:36:00.000-07:00

Tiger Tunes: Kirsten Is a F***machine
From Forget About the Stupid Rocket Idea! - Up & Out EP (2004)

Big Punisher (feat. Joe):Still Not a Player
From Endangered Species (Loud, 2001)

The New Radicals: You Get What You Give
From Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too (MCA, 1998)

Editor's Note: The latest in the Soul Sides Summer Songs series is from my partner at Poplicks.com, Junichi Semitsu.

Q: What does a summer song sound like to you?

A: "I imagine my answer is the same as everybody's. A good summer song has the feel-good lyrics, breezy melody, and carefree beat that inspires you to get a Brazilian, head for the beach, strip down to a thong, flaunt your jewels, and act out scenes from From Here to Eternity with the next septuagenarian who walks by with a metal detector.

The hook of a good summer song uses words or phrases that everyone associates with happiness: summer, sun, love, gravy, helium, Atari, Fundies, "not guilty," "it's not your baby," etc. This explains why songs about genocide, colon cancer, or public restrooms tend to fail as summer songs. The only exception is the Beach Boys' classic ditty, "Help Me, Rhonda, Pt. 2 (It Hurts to Urinate)."

Finally, a good summer song hypnotizes you into humming it, at any time of the day or year, even in inappropriate moments such as a eulogy, a hostage crisis, or a Heaven's Gate departure.

With these criteria in mind, I offer the following three choices for my trio of great summer songs:

First is the new song "Kirsten is a F***machine" by the Danish band Tiger Tunes. Its spasmatic beats, catchy chorus, and inebriated child backup singers compel me to smile, despite the fact that the song is about a woman in a "Holocaust state of mind" who "knocked my teeth out" and "stole my shoes." The first time I heard this, I was merry as a Mardi Gras partygoer and began flashing my inoperative mammary glands to my office mates by the first "Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep! Yeeah! La la la la la!," which I later learned is not a Danish mating call.

My second cut is "Still Not A Player" by the late Big Punisher. Who can possibly resist Joe's velvet hook, the perfect piano progression, and Pun's invitation to picture him ripping through our hooters and "crushing" us a lot with all 700 pounds of his Puerto Rican self? On a warm summer night, I like bumping this song to remind me the formula to the perfect romantic date: "park the Jeep, pump Mobb Deep, and just spark the leaf." When this summer jam is on Volume 11, I get so blissed out that when my twin brother yells, "You Nasty, Twin!" -- I don't care.

My final choice would be the classic "You Get What You Give" by one-hit wonder The New Radicals. I can't help but sing along to this, starting with the memorable first line: "Wake up kids / We've got the dreamers' disease." When I first heard this song, I was unfamiliar with slang terminology and didn't know what "the dreamers' disease" is. I know the answer now: herpes, which is the only disease that "you get what you give." But despite the infected subject matter and the harsh lyrical threats against Hanson (which bumped up the band's street cred), this guarantees that fresh summer feeling when I'm feeling not-so-fresh."

SUMMER SONGS: JULIANNE SHEPHERD

2005-07-05T15:36:00.000-07:00

Soho: Hot Music
From 12" (Kool Groove, 1989). Also available on House Crusher.

Amerie: All I Need
From Touch (Sony, 2005)

The Sugarcubes: Birthday
From Life's Too Good (Elektra, 1988)

As I noted in my first Summer Songs posting, I've invited folks to contribute their own reminisces. Here's the incomparable Julianne Shepherd with her selection.

Q: What does a summer song mean to you?

A: Vaguely perspiratory, or conjuring images of such. Including but not limited to: crescendoing horns, crescendoing synth line, multiple imprints of breakbeats. Gigantic guitars and singalongable choruses. I.e., music that intensifies and creates or implies friction. Music that is airy or transcendent and sounds like the thirty seconds before the kiss. Hooks that seem to promise something. Tracks split wide with possibility. And as Rich Harrison can attest, there's just something about a brass section.

If the song possesses none of the above, it helps if it is pervasive and defines your summer whether you like it or not, i.e. Bobby Valentino's ass-appreciation anthem "Slow Down."

Despite the above criteria, it all depends on the moment. Here is a perfect example: Last night, fitful with 1 am's heat sticking on me, I decided to walk to my friend's house in Ft Greene. When I got there, he and his two roommates were deep into an impromptu dance party, to the classic house track that sounds like it was born in the air of mid-August: Soho's "Hot Music," produced by Pal Joey in '90. It's got the sweaty, echoing vocal sample, the nigh-atonal piano and sax that bump uncomfortably, and the dogpiling snare samples--that's what I mean by increase and friction.

As far as pervasive singles out right now, I would say "Pimpin all over the world" is my favorite summer song, but the above theory is best illustrated by Amerie's "All I Need" (against all odds, I like it better than "1 Thing" at this point). The bassline on the chorus IS summer.

As for songs that CONJURE summer, I would also like to add the song "BIRTHDAY" by The Sugarcubes. It is the sound of Bjork around the time her first baby was born, young and unself-conscious, singing about a five year old and the guitars are all woozy.

SUMMER SONGS: ALPHA

2005-07-01T15:35:00.000-07:00

Editor's Note: Below is the very first Summer Songs post, written by yours truly back in the summer of '05. The whole concept behind the Summer Song Series was to ask people: what does a summer song sound like to you?

It has since (slightly) evolved since the concept can run in different ways, the two most resonant being: 1) songs that sound like summer and/or 2) songs that remind you of summer. With that in mind, I began to invite other folks to join in - other music writers, other bloggers, just people who I thought would have something interesting to say. With every new year, I try to bring in new voices. Unfortunately, since we don't keep sound files up for more than two weeks, most of this is just text now - no tunes. I still hope you'll find something evocative to think about. --O.W.

UPC All-Stars: Don't Get Discouraged
From 12" (Soul Cal, 1971/2005)

Amerie: One Thing (Siik Remix)
From Siik.org (Siik, 2005)

Shuggie Otis: Inspiration Information
From Inspiration Information (Epic, 1974)

Given that the 4th of July is already upon us, I'm trying to kick off a mini-meme by asking folks the simple(?) question: What does a summer song sound like to you?

I don't mean songs that happen to become popular during summer, though I respect the institution of the summer hit. I'm talking about songs that invoke summer - the type of song where you could be neck-deep in snow, in the middle of February, with the heat broken but once you hear it, you can almost see the sunset or smell the scent of backyard BBQs or feel the hot, humid air of nights where it's 2am and no one's ready to go home yet.

My favorite memories of summer are droplets of reality dissolved into a vat of fantasy. After all, what else is summer if not a delicious swirl of nostalgia and idealism, a lemonade cup filled with what we want summer to be rather than what it is. The perfect summer songs are the ones that invoke a sensation of innocence, optimism, and beauty yet also tinged with the slightest daub of melancholy. For what else is summer if not the feeling of sadness from knowing that summer will eventually pass, consigned into the darkening days of autumn? I guess that's why my favorite summer songs are rarely brash, loud anthems. I prefer tunes with a hint of fragility in their melody, a vulnerability in their sensibility.

The three songs I picked out and not necessarily my all-time favorites but right now, they've managed to capture the anticipation of summer's onset. The first is the UPC All-Stars' "Don't Get Discouraged," a previously unreleased song from the same folks who brought you Omaha's L.A. Carnival (the song even features Leslie Smith from the Carnival). This is an incredible song...I can't believe no one put it out before. It opens with this beautiful, mellow keyboard riff and then the brass section blares in from nowhere and the song ramps up into a funkier jam that sounds perfect for a late-night outdoor party. The song is so positive, like something that should be the anthem for a scrappy Little League team.

As for Siik's remix of Amerie's "One Thing" - I know ya'll are probably sick of the original already but I swear to God/Jah/Allah that hearing this made me think it was a completely new song. Especially compared to the forceful funkiness of Rich Harrison's original, Siik takes it in the other direction with that sublime guitar melody. I can't stop listening to this remix - it is so perfect to me and most definitely on a summer vibe. Makes me want to go trade my Prius in for a drop top just so I can play it out (but alas, foggy as hell right now in S.F.).

Last but least is a song out from the archives - Shuggie Otis' "Inspiration Information." The production on this is simply gorgeous - it's full of life and joy and sparkles in a way that I never tire of. I hate to abuse an oft-used metaphor but the song really does sound like a ray of sunshine. Get lit by it.

I've invited some guests to contributed their own summer songs and I'll put them up as they become available.

Hope everyone enjoys the long weekend.