Released digitally (download wise) a month or so ago but released on CD back in July this isn't too bad a set at all.
It's organic on the whole which sounds quite refreshing after the onslaught of auto tuned Gospel bangers I keep downloading and never playing. It's also got more than one decent track on it, which is also a nice change.
In many ways the style is laid back and smooth but it has a nice warmth to it.
Ronnie McNeir has a new CD out called "Living My Life". Ronnie is pretty old, take a look at the photo, it's before Colour Film was invented, that's no Fro Revival he's got there.
There is a track on the new CD called "sweet grandmother of mine" and it begins with the words "my grandma has passed away now", frankly unless she lived in a village in China you'd kinda of expected that.
Ronnie though is a bit of a legend, in the very real sense, a vast talent and perhaps the favourite artist of many a UK based Soul Fan.
With a title that puts me in mind of "Tiger Blood", Mr Gill returns with a CD after some 17 years.
He's made some good choices production wise, and I must admit he's in fine vocal form on this track. This CD isn't going to exactly change the world but overall it isn't sounding to bad to these ears.
I heard it the first time at Prestwich (played by Bob Hinsley) and took notice, the next month he played it again and I took further notice. By the third month I'd downloaded it through fileshare and loved it. He never played it again.....
The other night on Facebook my friend Paul Sutton posted up a track by Walt Dickerson called Death and Texas. I believe it's from a 1961 LP though Paul had bought it on a 7 inch single (bless him).
It was one of those moments that brought back a few memories. I'm a fan of Walt Dickerson , I own a few of his LP's. I came to owning them for a number of reasons, firstly he made several "Direct Cut" LP's. Direct Cut remains the best way of listening to Vinyl, the process is simple enough (I quote)
" in the 1970's Direct Cut referred to the audiophile technique of recording directly to a vinyl-disc cutting lathe, without the intervention of a tape recorder. It was a notoriously difficult way to record; the musicians and all concerned had to record a complete LP side without any serious musical or technical mistakes. Otherwise, it was put another lacquer on the lathe and do it over. But the gain in sound quality was considered worth the trouble. (As typical commercial LP releases were cut from fourth-generation analog tape copies, the improvement in sound offered by eliminating all those layers of tape and electronics was not illusory.)
My love of Hi-FI meant that I was always going to be interested in Direct Cut. Moreover Walt Dickerson played the Vibraphone and it was an instrument I owned and wanted to play myself. I owned a set of Vibes because I wanted to learn a musical instrument but lacked co ordination. I couldn't master anything too complicated, I wanted something I could hit but had "notes". The Vibes seemed easy enough, one of the bars had the letter "A" engraved on it, so how hard could it be ? Another plus point was that they weren't exactly common back then, least not round my way. So back in 1976 I took my £200.00 down to Manchester and bought an old (very old) set, took them home set them up stuck on a Roy Ayres LP and made a terrible noise. If you want to play bum notes nothing is better than a set of Vibes, the purity of the sound doesn't lend itself to just tapping away. I needed help so I bought a book called "teach yourself Vibes" by Dick Hyman which I only bought because the name Dick Hyman was so funny (in a Carry On playing the Vibes way). The book didn't help much though I did master "Jingle Bells" after about 18 hours. Eventually I was able to play them (in a fashion) because I had too, I'd joined a band and it was the kick up the backside I needed, and along the way I learned a lot about music.
Walt Dickerson remains my favourite Vibes player. His Steeplechase LP's are special to me, because he creates a theme of a melody and revisits it over and over. With each revisit he explores the melody further, making changes that are both subtle and vast. In between these revisits he does ultra manic fast runs up and down the bars like Roy Ayres on meth. The sleeve notes on the Steeplechase LP's explain this by referencing Coltrane, and by using a lot of fancy words. Whereas I say that he plays a lot of music (and notes) that are uncomfortable to listen too but the odd bit is just so brilliant. Take the track "To my Queen revisited", here he takes an old song of his and stretches it out to 23 minutes. I love this track. I've taken it and reduced it to about 6 minutes (in the past) but without the difficult bits somehow it's just not the same. So here you go 23 minutes of Walt, with upright Bass and Piano solo's I've never heard bettered....
P.S I do believe Paul Sutton played the vibes (but wasn't as good as me)
Sylvia Robinson cast not a shadow but a light on the music world. She was the first Woman to own and run a record company. She founded Sugarhill and took what was a fledgling new music genre and launched it into the stratosphere of commercial success.
Now it is of course a stone cold classic, a track that has that dance sensibility stamped through it, so much so I call it prototypical of a sub genre known as "chiggy- chiggy".
I recall once at an Event about 4 years ago called "souled out" seeing people in their late 20t's not only dancing to to but mouthing the words, which was something that made my heart sink.
The best thing I can write about it is that a good mate of mine having read countless references to it admitted that he actually didn't know it (a fact almost impossible to believe). Such was his take on culture he asked me if the song was in fact dedicated to classic web site "Wifey's World" (no link provided). A real jaw drop moment.
Back in 2002 I was sat in a kitchen and was played a track by Next called "Do Your Thing". My first thought was that it sounded like "I found Love" by the Fatback band only better. So for the next few months we both asked for it at Modern Soul Events. Nobody played it despite me pointing out that it sounded a bit like "I found love". I was met with incredulity and the sort of head shake suggesting I was a few grooves short of a 12 inch single. To counter my earnest requests the DJ's played Wifey instead, which was exactly what I was trying to avoid. Soon the months turned to years and even when I asked for Next's second most "chiggy chiggy" track "Looking for Love" I got nowhere
And they wonder why sometimes I come across as bitter.........?
Note to promoters: I am currently taking bookings for DJing, I have a large collection of CDR's in a special flip type folder......
I normally wouldn't post Video on here, but I'll make an exception for Chicago 8 piece group Kids These Days. Read about themHERE. I first came across them via blindiforthekids a few months ago. They have something about them that stands out. Quality music and captivating visuals on this and previous Tracks
"For a while, Van Hunt was a well-connected industry type, writing and producing for pop singers like Dionne Farris, Joi and Nikka Costa. He’s even managed by Randy “Pitchy Dawg” Jackson. But beneath his velvet-smooth, VH1-friendly lover man persona is a bit of a superfreak. His evocative arrangements have always shown touches of Prince and Peter Gabriel; he covered Iggy Pop on his sophomore album and recorded a third album so free-wheeling and unconcerned with genre or anyone’s hopes that he become John Legend 2.0 that his previous label refused to put it out it. The punk-inflected Popularcan be found on the internet, but has yet to garner an official release, and Hunt leftEMI on bad terms.
After a few years of regrouping, he’s back with What Were You Hoping For?, which he recorded himself and is releasing through his own label, and he’s clearly thrilled to not have to answer to anyone"
................................................................................................................... http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2011/09/van-hunt-what-were-you-hoping-for.html
Having heard the CD myself I'm not as enthused as Mr Tedder- I'd go so far as to say it's bloody terrible in places, most places in fact. Yet the track Moving Targets is kinda wonderful
I downloaded this track a few years ago as a "forth coming" release from the then up and rising starlet Keri Hilson. I got the feeling this track "Come Clean" was/has never been released.
I search these days and it's around sure enough. There are lyrics to it, there are You Tube Clips (no official video). If memory serves it was due on the CD "In a Perfect World" but didn't make it.
There is no reference to it on her discography on Wiki and yet it seems well known, so maybe I'm wrong.
It is of course very good so maybe that explains it ?
I took my MP3 Editor and cut the mix into tracks most of which I'd heard or heard about. The exception though was "Dahlisha Vince - Free Your Mind".
The track has haunted me ever since. I forget about it for a few months then dig it out again. It's just awesome. I still have no idea about it though I did Tweet him and ask this very Evening.... I'll keep you posted.
One thing I'd like every visitor to take away from these pages, is the realisation that I know very little about music (the fact I have a poor grasp of written English is pretty clear). At one time I thought that I knew quite a bit about music, certainly about the genre called Soul Music. I based this on the fact I owned about 4000 long playing records and just under 1000 12 inch singles. This seemed like a lot to me and I even read all the sleeve notes. I could tell you about who produced what, the changing line ups of bands, who wrote what songs and so on.
Even after I'd got rid of over half of my Records I still felt smarter than your average Soul fan. It wasn't until I joined forums that I began to see that 4000 LP's isn't a huge amount, indeed 10,000 isn't . Even though my knowledge was specialised I was a Soul minnow in a vast sea.
These days I have around 350,000 mp3 files and I know fuck all. I'm too busy playing a tiny percentage of what I have, to have the time to be sure of much at all. This is how it ought to be IMHO. If I want to post on here a song I can use Google to tell me about it, assuming I really need to know (which I don't but I respect the fact that you do).
Which brings me to last Saturday, I was in a Car and was reminded of a song from the 90t's called Beverley. I never owned the track but had taped it from the Radio back then. I was clueless as to who it was by, furthermore I couldn't even remember the melody. I knew it was quite good. A couple of Days later I spent about a half hour trying to Google it, which was pointless. So I turned to someone who still has knowledge to help me, a UK based DJ called Steve Jackson. I dropped him a message saying "90t's song called Beverley have you got it?". In less than half an hour he came back to me with the name, title and Divshare below.
Sometimes there is no substitute for knowing stuff.
So if you listen to Steve's show on Starpoint this Evening you'll probably hear it again.... If he plays it I'll link to his show here......
