Volume 28 - Winter 2020

Welcome to the end of the world. For real this time! Let the music touch your face, your eyes, and your ears as we cross the threshold while everything perishes. Your soul will thank you for it when the clock strikes. Wash your hands, don't wash your hands. Nothing matters.

Nonetheless, I have some lovely tunes once more ripped from the interwebs and from new (old) vinyl of mine that I'm eager to share with you all. I hope you are enjoying the devastation while in isolation.

The matchbook image for this volume is a special one. It comes from Bimbo's 365 club in SF. I was fortunate to go for the first time late last year. Man, I could spend the next 365 days in that joint and think I was stuck in 1961, except a 1961 where no one smoked cigarettes. Despite nobody lighting up, they do provide packs of matches with this same image. However, for our vintage purposes I found a pleasing, original matte version for this collection. Bimbo's was also featured on one of the Las Vegas Grind CD covers and it had to be pointed out to me by a native after I had already been living in the Bay Area for some time.

Our first silver nugget to highlight is the ineffable Ballad of the Surf by Richie Allen. I've been trying to find this one out there for a while. There was a poor quality version on video, but a crisper version recently showed up. The 45 was not easy to find and any copies were beyond my means. Elegiac surf tunes are my favorite kind if you've learned anything from reading this blog, and this one serves its purpose. Allen vividly conjures the image of a tsunami slowly churning towards the land. The speck of a surfer sits atop of the aquatic mountain just moments before the destruction. Gotta love the finger cymbals and, of course, my truly heart-touching wordless vocals.

Before we go any further, maybe someone can give Bandido a drink? Bandido is not observing social distancing and thinks the bars are still open. Somebody tell Bandido to be like Clift.

Monty doing great in his self-quarantine.

Bermuda by Ray Sharpe is only one of two vocal songs in this volume. Let the lilting sounds bring you gently into the coming warm weather. Just don't mess with the coral. They're having a hard enough time as it is.

And now, ladies and gentlemen gather round for the big fight of sidemen-band-name-of-the-month! Let's get ready to Link Wraaaaay! We have a head to head this month: In the red corner we have The Illusions (with Marlow Stewart) doing their version of Earthquake which sounds nothing like the other Earthquake. And in the blue corner coming in at a cold 32 degrees we have The Sinkers (with Ronnie Rae) doing their take on the sultry vocal standard. This time, The Sinkers bring the temperature way down to freezer-burn the hell out of that fever!

Drum roll please...our winner is The Sinkers with Chills! How can I not select such a downer name for this downer of a blog? This may even be the first time a vocal song won the contest. The vocalist is irrelevant anyway since we're talking about the side band.

We have an unusual entry into our macabre omnibus of songs with a few tracks by Elmer Bernstein. They're from his score to the (until recently unknown to me) TV show, Staccato. My man Frankie Fink turned me on to these dark tales of a swinging detective played by John Cassavetes. Normally, I don't go too far into the crime jazz territory for these collections but I recently happened upon the vinyl soundtrack at a craft fair in San Francisco.

"I'll have the heart attack of the day."

The SF wax-slinger also had another 45 that I picked up called The Greasy Spoon by Hank Marr. This one was a nice discovery. It is the perfect music to picture yourself sliding into a booth, ordering a small stack a pancakes, a cup of black java, and a side of pulmonary heart disease.

Night comes: you find yourself walking after dark, along the empty asphalt. And when they see you coming they walk away, toward oncoming traffic to keep the 6 feet distance. You're lonely, your heart throbs and you wish for, long for love. Hear The Viscounts as the sax screams in aching desire: the sound of your soul crying out. Night for Love is the piece de resistance of this set. After hearing it I was compelled to find it in its truest, perfect, 7 inch form. And now I share it with you.

Finally, we close our entry with a nod to my pal Shankey, the Fink with the Farfisa. Although Wade Curtiss likes to spell it as Shankie, it was close enough to recall my former Viper. This sweet rockabilly instro comes from a Norton comp. I shelled out the 298 cents after hearing it on Little Danny's show. Throw some cold cash Norton's way. They deserve it and then some.

Thanks for listening, reading, breathing and living. This took a while to post even though we're a month into Spring, which means the next set might be close behind.

Best regards to everyone. Stay safe and stay away.

Sanitize your ears here