Delayed Gratification Dept. - The Churchill Downs

 

Artwork copyright FalseMemoryFoam© Art Department O' Art Dept.

This here album was recorded in '67/'68, shelved by the record company (I've said it before - record companies is a buncha schnooks) and eventually issued in 2011 [fercrissakes - Ed.] in a sleeve you'd scroll or flip right past, such was its undistinctiveness (I've said it before - record companies is a buncha schnooks) which is a damn shame, on account which it's swell. Great acid guitar, strong harmonies, all the perquisites of consolette time here on th' IoF. It's free, you'll dig it.

The Frantics tell the same sad story. Equally excellent, although leaning into hard rock. FoamFeatured™ antecedently, but duct-taped to the deliverable whether you want it or not!

Departmental Artwork © IoF© Department of Art Department Dept.

 

 

 

Frog-Pop Dept. - Vanessa Paradis

Plus Frenchie que ça, on meurt ...

I've been a fan since her extraordinary second album Variations, made with Serge Gainsbourg, up with who's shit she would not put, inspiring his "Paradis, c'est l'enfer" quote. I was living in France at the time, and the eye-popping video for Tandem [below, you skeevy perves - Ed.] got me rushing out for the record.

Since then, every release has been a subtle grower of a blast. She has impeccable taste, she's whip-smart, and she knows what she wants, which has given her the reputation of being a bit of a brat.

 

 

Arriving a scant seven years after her last, her latest album Le Retour Des Beaux Jours [below, Ed.] comes as a hugely welcome surprise (at least to je), and it's another partnership with the truly gifted Etienne Daho. Of all her albums, it's perhaps the most diverse, leaping effortlessly across style barriers, and because of this will be a swell introduction should youse bums be unfamiliar with her œuvre [Fr. egg - Ed.]. It's a damn shame you're too dumb to speak French, because the lyrics are as thoughtful and clever as ever, but you'll appreciate the grooves and the vibes and the sumptuous sound. And that elusive quality of Frenchie sophistication, which she has out th' ass.

My birthday present! Thanks, Nessa! Album O' Th' Year, and by some way.

Re-Post Dept. - In The Garden Of Scented Sitars

SITARSWAMI WRITES: A late-night Google search of my memory banks reveals that the sitar first entered public consciousness in early 1966, centered around a fifth-grade group art project. There were four of us huddled close to the school’s portable record player auditioning Rubber Soul. The three of us content to do the least amount of work acceptable had agreed with an idea put forth by our class’s sole long-haired boy: we make hand puppets of, and pretend to be, The Beatles performing a song off their latest record. Hazy recollection suggests we chose “Run For Your Life” for our quickly forgotten pantomime (was I Ringo or George?). I wasn’t a Beatles fan, due to my older sister’s short-term obsession, but “Norwegian Wood” tickled the tinder in my ten- year-old brain. Later that year, stoked by the release of “Paint It Black” and “Turn-Down Day,” the smoldering embers sparked into a slow, burning, infatuation.

If incense was the olfactory signpost of late-60’s flower power, then a sitar was the aural manifestation. On the strength of its 18, 19, 20, or 21 strings the sitar provided world music with its first inroad into western pop. Soon, the scent of sitars permeated society heralding a golden age. Its aromatic, yet sublime, spice spread into the far reaches of the entertainment industry -- from film soundtracks to comedy routines. Teen music magazines tried to follow the beat widening their reportage and fanciful profiles. In Hit Parader and Tiger Beat you could now devour articles on Ravi Shankar (“Ravi & Raga at Monterey Pop” or “It’s A Happening, A Sitar Sensation”) along with the Brian Goes Back To The Beach exposés and Zappa’s “Folk Rock is a Drag” Hagstrom guitar ads.

When some listeners proved allergic, science responded. Genetic experiments conducted by Dr. V. Bell at Danelectro laboratories successfully bred a sitar with an electric guitar. Creating, in retrospect, a questionable, if not-illegitimate, offspring and one who will not be heard in this article.

Smelling profit, record label executives used the whiff of a sitar to entice novice buyers. With fifty years hindsight, these cash-in attempts seem harmless, charmingly naive. Some, like Emil Richards’ Journey to Bliss, should be heard. Others (e.g., Flower Power Sitar by Rajput & the Sepoy Mutiny or Kali Bahlu’s Cosmic Remembrance on the glorious World Pacific label) aren’t listenable for more than a few minutes but manage to evoke a timeless “What were they thinking?” excitement. Proof that the western-pop-sitar craze had blanketed the globe was the album release, in India, of Balsara & His Singing Sitars’ Great International Hits, featuring “the exciting new sounds of sitars” playing classics like “Tequila,” “Edelweiss” and “These Boots Are Made For Walking.”

But it’s those few plucked or strummed moments of eternal bliss that we live for. When I hear sitar in any recording the endorphins flow and my mood elevates suddenly. Who can ask more of any instrument?

The bulk of songs found In the Garden of Scented Sitars were recorded in the 1960s. By the early 70’s the sitar had fallen increasingly out of fashion, but the seeds planted grew. Throughout the decades devoted musicians have tended to the garden and its admirers continue to record.

I’ve sprinkled a few familiar tracks along the garden path and rather than presenting the Four Or Five Guys© with well-considered and researched insight into each of the sixty-nine bouquets displayed, below you’ll find only random commentary and indiscriminate petals of thought. Let’s digress:

The Flower Power Atomizer

Brewer & Shipley wrote Noel Harrison’s (the UK’s answer to Nancy Sinatra) one toke beyond ode to her eyes and to her mind.

The ID Company lp features Inga Rumpf on one side and Dagmar Krause on the other. I&D had previously recorded together in the German folk-blues unit, the City Preachers, and it’s a bit unnerving to hear Dagmar sing a rollicking version of “An Old Shanty Town.” Inga went on to front Frumpy before going solo, while Dagmar joined Slapp Happy and Art Bears.

One side of (Farq favorite) Shawn Phillips’ non-lp single soars into Tim Buckley territory. You’ll find the flipside further along the path.

Sheb Wooley, the “Purple People Eater” perpetrator, lays waste to the counterculture.

Sopwith Camel delivers one of my sitar favorites. Who could have guessed that harmonica & sitar would blend so magically?

Ravi’s student, Warren Klein, ex-Factory and Fraternity of Man, adds age-appropriate sitar to Beck’s latter-day downer.

Ron Nasty, not Elvis Costello or Jeff Lynne, would have been the perfect replacement for John Lennon in the reformed church of The Beatles.

Every garden contains a poison bloom: Here, the A-side of The Meditations’ juicy, unbelievably bad, 45 frees the inner man with an overripe Elvis Presley-styled recitation b/w a b-side (appearing later) so creepy it reminds me of an incident related by a friend’s wife. She worked the front desk of a chain hotel in a small college town where the Beach Boys stopped for a one night stand. When Mike Love registered, he invited her up to his room after the show “to practice Transcendental Meditation.” Inspirational TM lyric: “Follow sense into infinity/When our day-to-day life flowers and blooms /and I touch reality.”

At the Shrine of the Paper Sun

Meghana Bhat introduces sitar jangle pop.
Now playing: the finest sitar pop instrumental ever waxed courtesy of Ravi’s nephew, Ananda .

Pastor John Rydgren issues a stern warning of the dangers to be found in the garden, simultaneously creating new dimensions in the middle of reality.

The Trees’ original version of Jane Delawney was ranked #1 in an informal poll taken by fellow sitar-heads of “songs that should have included sitar.” #2) “Summer Breeze” by Seals & Crofts, #3) the Bonzo’s “Kama Sutra,” followed by, at #4) either (pick one) “Iron Man” or “Planet Caravan,” with The Kinks “Fancy” rounding out the top five.

Erstwhile Bruce Brown surf instrumentalists The Sandals combine sitars & monster mash.

It’s not The Kinks, but the Smell of Incense is nothing to sniff at and will give you some idea re: #5 above.

One reviewed opined “(Hiromasa Suzuki’s) backward journey along the lights and shadows in search of the musical and cultural sources of mainland Asia, from the gates of India to the roots of China...” To me, it’s an alluring mix of electric piano & sitar, thoroughly intoxicating despite the worst abrupt fade-out encountered in years.

Clark & Marilyn Burroughs were The Joyride. Clark sang tenor with the Hi-Lo’s, a late 50’s- early 60’s vocal group and replaced Curt Boettcher as The Association’s arranger at their insistence. His work for the group commenced with “Windy.”

A Hidden Path Discovered

ILYABT, a collage of snippets from the best sitar film soundtrack. Resistance is useless in the face of Brute Force.

Presenting The Petals and the high-flying mushroom infused folk-rock that made Milwaukee famous.

I’ve not heard sitar-flavored bluegrass but Fit & Limo’s take on The Dead leads me to suspect it might play well.

A longtime Beatle impersonator and Ravi’s lesser-known daughter cover a George b-side.

Brothers released the only non-Mountain/Leslie West album on Windfall records. The album’s cover art would provide a great alternative to Farq’s superb work found on this set.

I’ve excluded a conspicuous number of rare and precious, or popular, sitar gems from this post – no Traffic, no Rolling Stones, Chocolate Watch Band, Vince Donofrio, Alison Gros, John Renbourn, Pentangle, Elmer Gantry, ISB, Donovan, Pretty Things. Boeing Duveen, not even Joe Harriott or the Zodiac Cosmic Sounds. Sorry, maybe next time!

 

REPOSTED IN ITS ENTIRETY FROM 11/9/22 - THANKS TO SITARSWAMI FOR THE RE-UP!

Kudos to Sitarswami for the swell sounds 'n screed!

Albums That Shouldn't Exist But Probably Will Dept. - Rural Free Delivery

Homesteadin' is the long-awaited first album from Rural Free Delivery, the side project of Jesse Wayne Cord (Ethyl Dream, Grits For Breakfast, Cord-Clark). Cut on a vintage TEAC cassette recorder at his Porch Records home studio in Dead Mule Flats, OR., Homesteadin' is a major-label release from the supergroup on Piehole Records.

Jesse Wayne Cord, yesterday

"It's a reaction to the times in which we're livin' in," Cord says. "I was kind of isolated from that whole pandemic thing, battling my own demons, and RFD is a way of processing the changes I was going through." How was the supergroup assembled? "I made a few calls to a bunch of friends and they were, like, when do we start?" (laughs). "Katy and Betty-Lou McAlister were on board from day one, they bring that Appalachian vibe to the table. Brett Sweeney (Fuelie Bros, Broken Plates) hung his hat on the door and set right in. And Shep Clark (Cord-Clark, Wineblossoms) laid down his signature beat. We did everything in one take. You can hear the coyotes!" (laughs). "The songs were just everyone sittin' and pickin' on the porch, and everything, like, flowed. You can't plan for that, it just happens. It's the best thing I ever done."

Tracks: Double Time Still Single/Homesteadin'/ Back On Track/Our Broken Hearts Will Heal/Oregon And Back/Winchester Carbine/Coyote Moon/Dogs, Horses, And Grits For Breakfast/O Montana/Lord You Were On My Mind

Homesteadin' is set for release as a double vinyl 10" Record Store Day Special, followed by a TinyDesk concert. "We're really hyped," says Jesse. 

 

You want this? Go ahead and record it. Somebody will eventually.

The Myra Nussbaum Interviews: Sitarswami™

 

Sitarswami Zoomcalls Mrs. Myra Nussbaum! Actual Foam-O-Graph© derived from sustainable shade-grown technologies, going forward!

Older readers will remember with some fondness elderly Bikini Tester Mrs. Myra Nussbaum. Although no longer part of the core narrative here at th' IoF©, her occasional lectures have proved as entertaining as they are educational [i.e. neither - Ed.], and garnered the prestigious Pork Bend Golden Pigs Knuckle Award for Use Of Internet. Kudos, Mrs. Myra!

In the first of what is sure to become a popular regular FoamFeature®, our iconic geriatric is pleased to present her first The Mrs. Myra Nussbaum Interviews interview, with reclusive mystic and Charter Four Or Five Guy© Sitarswami!

Mr. Swami spoke via computer technology from his lamasery high atop snow-girt Smeltville Mound, ND.

MMN Hello?

SS Is this Mister Beans? Art Beans?

MMN Hello? Am I pressing the right button, thing?

SS Mr. Beans, I'm calling about your car's extended warranty, Mr. Beans.

MMN For heaven's sakes! Why is this writing so small?

SS Hello? Art? Art Beans of 232a Crimp Street, Mingewater?

MMN Will someone get me my reading glasses? What's that buzzing sound? Oh dear.

[ERROR 404 NOT FOUND- Ed.]

Well, there we have it! To celebrate this achievement. Mr. Swami has generously donated one (1) autygraphed box set of his None More Sixties curatorial initiatives! To qualify for this once-in-a-lifetime Dream Deliverable™, simply state in a comment your favorite thing, like, literally, ever! Mr. Swami will choose the lucky winner from the entries received! Oh boy!

These swell long-playing disc record albums contain up to literally, like, dozens of sure-fire party favorites! Who will be the lucky winner?? Not you, probably! LOOOOOOSER!!!!!

 

Art Dept.

 

Real painting by real painter William Rochfort

For Girls! Dept. - Thirty Minutes Of Soft Machine For Girls! Now With Upgraded Artwork!

Inclusivity is a long and revered tradition here at th' IoF©! Our trail-blazing recognition of basic human rights for Bikini Testers has garnered plaudits worldwide, and our award-winning For Girls! series has adapted the most off-puttingly "difficult" bands to the blander tastes of the "weaker sex" (bless 'em!). Think of the series as the musical equivalent of Classics Illustrated comics [below left - Ed.] ! Those popular abridgements of otherwise unreadable literary masterpieces such as Moby Quixote and Don Dick instilled a love of Fine Literature in a whole generation!

Yes, we like to think that the For Girls! series is of equal importance! No longer shall the "little lasses" feel excluded from the fun of listening to "boys only" bands such as The Captain Beefheart, The Velvet Undergrounds, the Lead Zeppelins, Pink And The Floyds, The King Crimsons, and now, The Soft Machines!

We've smoothed out those irksome jazz-rock "rough edges", concentrating on the more hummable qualities of this oft-challenging combo! And although the purist may carp that some of the selections - blended seamlessly into a Thirty-Minute Medley O' Melody™ - are solo performances, no "dolly-bird" is going to bother her pretty little head about that!

So, if you know any chicks [you're kidding, right? - Ed.], or maybe someone you know claims to, why not give them a copy of this swell long-playing album LP record? Its feminine allure is heightened by the oh-so-sensitive cover design,  making it a swell companion for her Dory Previn albums!

TAB HUNTER SEZ!

"Say, fellers! This sure is one neat recording! Using the latest hi-fi equipment, Farq has created a disc which is sure to hit that coveted Number One spot nationwide! And let's get one thing straight - this isn't just for the gals! Why, there's plenty for us guys to dig, too! I like to play it while I relax poolside with such husky H'wood hunks as Rock Hudson, Monty Clift, Cissy Romero, Cary Grant, Morrie Gosfield, Spence Tracy, Ty Power, Mary Brando, Vince Price, Ray Burr, Randy Scott, Sal Mineo, Tony Perkins, Jimmy Dean, and Tom Cruise! They all agree this is Manly Music for the guy of today, and you will too!

Your Pal, Tab!"

 

 

 

This piece created in a fit of cabin fever during the rainy season. Please address all complaints to Babs.

Re-Up Re-Kwest Dept. - Michael Chapman