June 23, 2008

Blues You Can Use

A few months ago I posted criteria for a mix tape. One of the song selections was "A blues: not a necessarily a blues record but a song that is labelled (something)blues," or, to clean up that filthy disaster of a sentence, a non-blues song with "blues" suspiciously added as a suffix.

Remembering that post and my previously mentioned love for "old things," I spent a weekend looking for "vintage blues sheet music" on eBay, thinking I'd find some Skip James, Big Bill Broonzey or Howlin' Wolf. Instead, I found some these awesome examples of the treasure hunt above:

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"I'm Sorry I Ain't Got It You Could Have It If I Had It Blues"

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"Take 'Em to the Door (That's All There Is, There Ain't No More)"

"Dangerous Blues"

Fun, fun stuff currently falling off my apartment walls on a regular basis. I'm eyeing up a couple more, but these take the cake for silliness out of everything I've seen.
And this posts question: what's your favorite non-blues "blues" song? I'll make a preliminary list of my own:

"Bell Bottom Blues" -- Derek & the Dominoes
Overwrought, or overwrawesome? I have a love/hate relationship with Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs, but this tune is one its most redeeming moments.

"Come and Go Blues" -- The Allman Brothers Band
A gem of a song from a gem of a record. If I were king of the world and could decree that Chuck Leavell play piano in every band, I would.

"Elvis Presley Blues" -- Gillian Welch & David Rawlings
The melody will get stuck in your head for days on end, and the harmonies will make you wish you had someone to obsess along with.

"Strong Man Holler" -- Big Bill Morganfield w/ Taj Mahal
This one is a total cheat since it's actually a blues song with the word "blues" stripped from it, but it's an amazing tune that used to kick off the Blues Show on my campus radio station. The stabbing, unnerving guitar riff was a better way to start my day than Raisin Bran.

I'm not even touching Dylan's output of "blues" songs, because that's a list unto itself.
So everybody else pony up (but please, don't cowboy up...I've had it up to here with people cowboying up). I want at least two songs from each of you, por favor.

June 12, 2008

Hot time, Summer in the city

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This is only a half-truth. I actually can't hear you over the oven-like sounds of 99-degree plus weather in Philadelphia, which makes my life feel a lot like the following clip:

Just replace "Tommy" with "National Weather Service" and "best chance to hook up with this girl" with "best chance to not die a terrible, fiery death" and you get the picture. But this post is not about the hard of hearing or the tired of sweating, friends. It's about the fond of seeing, whether they be slightly sightly or blightly unsightly.

Someone sent me a fantastic collection of famous film scenes done using only typography (make sure to check out "Ocean's Eleven" and "Psycho" as well).

Also and additionally, check out Vampire Weekend's video for "A Punk" -- an excellent song from an excellent album, rounded out nicely with an excellent video:

I also got to see James Hunter again on Tuesday night, a treat that I missed at last summer's XPoNential Music Fest because of rain that never appeared. He was still in fine form, did a killer rendition of "Riot in My Heart" with weird key changes, and some sort of bizarre calesthetic acrobatics with his guitar. The new record isn't as immediately engaging as People Gonna Talk, but he does get a face-melting guitar moment or two, especially on "Don't Do Me No Favors."
Check out this video of "Don't Do It" from the first time I saw him at the TLA two years ago: