England's Newest Hitmakers

In April 1964, the Stones released their debut record in the UK, it would appear in a slightly different form in the US six weeks later. Recorded at the tiny Regent Sound studio in London, these would be their last recordings (aside from a few stray tracks) made in England until 1966's Between The Buttons. It's an amazing debut, and again is comprised almost entirely of covers. On the day of it's release in the UK, it sold 100,000 copies, and by early May had knocked With The Beatles off the top spot of the charts.

It opens with Bobby Troup's "Route 66," originally a hit for Nat King Cole, which they undoubtedly learned from Chuck Berry. Keith transposes Johnny Johnson's piano riff to the guitar, and it is one of their most searing live numbers of the early years. The song selection includes blues numbers they had been playing around London in the clubs, as well as their take on current US Soul and R&B hits. There's a version of Gene Allison's "You Can Make if you Try, which they probably learned from the Solomon Burke version, the b-side to "If You Need Me" which they would lay to wax months later at Chess Studios in Chicago. The single from the LP in the US, "Tell Me" was the first recorded Jagger-Richards composition, and went to #24 on the US Billboard charts. Keith plays a 12 string acoustic and sings harmony into the same microphone. It's also their first great pop record.

(to be continued)

Download:

"Route 66" mp3
by Chuck Berry, 1961.
available on New Juke Box Hits






"I Just Want To Make Love To You" mp3
by Muddy Waters, 1954.
available on His Best 1947-55

The boys get "roasted" by Dino:





"Honest I Do" mp3
by Jimmy Reed, 1957.
available on Best of the Vee-Jay Years



"Mona" mp3
by Bo Diddley, 1957.
available on I'm A Man: The Singles As & Bs 1955-59

I'm A Man - The Singles As & Bs 1955-59 [ORIGINAL RECORDINGS REMASTERED]


"Now I've Got A Witness" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1964.
available on England's Newest Hitmakers



"I'm A King Bee" mp3
by Slim Harpo, 1957.
available on The Excello Singles Anthology

The Rolling Stones on the Mike Douglas Show:
Soundman out to lunch, but stay tuned for interview at the end.





"Carol" mp3
by Chuck Berry, 1958.
available on The Great 28



"Tell Me" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1964.
available on England's Newest Hitmakers





"Can I Get A Witness" mp3
by Marvin Gaye, 1963.
available on Gold



"You Can Make It If You Try" mp3
by Gene Allison, 1958.
available on You Can Make It If You Try

"You Can Make It If You Try" mp3
by Solomon Burke, 1963.
available on If You Need Me



"Walking The Dog" mp3
by Rufus Thomas, 1963.
available on Walking the Dog




part 1 : here

********************

Gather No Moss

Between June of 1963 and February of 1964 The Rolling Stones released three singles, one EP, and a couple other tracks on a compilation. All in the UK, and all before the release of their first LP. All but two those songs were covers. The trajectory of their career couldn't yet have been imagined. Firstly, they wanted to be the the best blues band in London (they were), and by the time they started recording, they wanted to share their love of American Blues, Soul, and R&B with a larger audience (which they did). The Stones weren't the only band in London doing this, but they were the best. They eventually wrote songs of their own (as urged by their manager Andrew Loog Oldham) but for the most part, their early records, up until 1966's Aftermath are heavily comprised of covers of black American music.

So, as the story goes, nearly fifty years ago, in late 1961 on the outskirts of London in Dartford, Mick and Keith, old boyhood friends reunite at a train station. Mick is carrying a copy of Chuck Berry's Rockin' at the Hops and The Best of Muddy Waters. BINGO! The alliance is born. in the coming months they start playing, and find Brian Jones, who is masquerading around town as a slide-guitar playing Elmo Lewis. Later they add Stu, Bill and his Amp, and Charlie.

It's no accident that their first single would be a Chuck Berry song on one side and Muddy Waters on the flip, two artists they would re-visit frequently, and soon enough meet at Chess Studios in Chicago. Their second single "I Wanna Be Your Man" is a song they got from Lennon and McCartney, when Oldham invited them to the studio. It was a something that McCartney considered a throwaway, and the Stones took it gladly. I've never been one to choose between the Beatles and the Stones, but if you were comparing the their versions of this particular song, which the Beatles eventually recorded in their next sessions, the Rolling Stones win this one hands down. The b-side, "Stoned" was their first original 'composition,' - basically a blues jam - and was banned in the U.S. for it's suggestive lyrics. Their third single, "Fortune Teller," was shelved and eventually appeared on a UK compilation. Next, an EP of more great American R&B, and a single of a Bo Diddelyized version of Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," backed by "Little by Little," a Stones original based on a Jimmy Reed riff - both recorded for the first LP which was soon coming. At that session, were Phil Spector and Gene Pitney, who contributed some maracas and piano respectively, and Spector copped a partial songwriting credit for "Little by Little."

(to be continued)

Download:



"Come On" mp3
by Chuck Berry, 1961.
available on The Great 28



"I Want To Be Loved" mp3
by Muddy Waters, 1955.
available on Anthology: 1947-1972

***********





"I Wanna Be Your Man" mp3
by The Beatles, 1963.
available on With the Beatles (Mono)



"Stoned" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1963.
available on Singles Collection: The London Years

***********









"You Better Move On" mp3
by Arthur Alexander, 1961.
available on The Greatest






"Poison Ivy" mp3
by The Coasters, 1959.
available on Baby That Is Rock 'n' Roll



"Bye Bye Johnny" mp3
by Chuck Berry, 1960.
available on The Great 28



"Money (That's What I Want)" mp3
by Barrett Stong, 1959.
available on Collection

***********





"Fortune Teller" mp3
by Benny Spellman, 1962.
available on Fortune Teller



"Poison Ivy" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1963.
available on More Hot Rocks: Big Hits & Fazed Cookies

***********







"Not Fade Away" mp3
by The Crickets, 1957.
available on Buddy Holly Gold

"Little by Little" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1964.
available on Singles Collection: The London Years

***********



Bonus:

"Andrew's Blues" mp3
by the Rolling Stones (and others), 1964.
unreleased

"Mr. Spector and Mr. Pitney Came Too" mp3
by the Rolling Stones, 1964.
unreleased

30/40 Days

Ernest Tubb is gonna call up the gypsy woman, and she's sending out a worldwide hoodoo. Those are Chuck Berry's words of course, and it's a gift to us to hear Tubb sing them on his 1955 version of "Thirty Days" released two months after Chuck put out his second single for Chess. They both raced up the R&B and Country charts respectively, and established Chuck Berry as a first rate crossover artist/songwriter. Berry's guitar solo is chunky and rhythmic, soaring over and leading the rhythm section. Tubb calls out to his soloists: Billy Byrd, "Half-Moon" Bradley, and Tommy Jackson of the Texas Troubadours, making it sound like his own. It was, after all, Berry's version of Bob Wills' "Ida Red" (a western swing number) that finally caught Leonard Chess's ear (on the insistence of Chess star Muddy Waters) from his homemade audition tape earlier that year. It evolved into "Maybellene," his first single.

Ronnie Hawkins recorded a blistering rockabilly version as "Forty Days." Maybe he was a more patient man giving his woman an extra ten days to come back home. Or perhaps, it's a biblical reference to Noah's Ark, after living with the torrential rains and flooding back home in Arkansas, where he and his band, including teenage drummer Levon Helm, had fled for the brighter pastures of the Toronto music scene.

Chuck Berry's liaison to Chess, Muddy Waters, recorded a single (different song) "Forty Days & Forty Nights" around this time with future murderer Pat Hare on guitar. Waters, also using the biblical reference, is "like a ship out on the sea" waiting for forty days and nights, and it's "raining all the time." His lover hasn't returned and most likely won't.




"Thirty Days" mp3
by Ernest Tubb, 1955.
available on Thirty Days - Gonna Shake This Shack Tonight



"Forty Days" mp3
by Ronnie Hawkins and The Hawks, 1958.
available on Roulette Years



"Forty Days & Forty Nights" mp3
by Muddy Waters, 1956.
available on The Chess Box: Muddy Waters

*************



"Thirty Days" mp3
by Chuck Berry, 1955.
available on Johnny B Goode: His Complete 50's Chess Recordings

Johnny B Goode: His Complete 50's Chess Recordings

*************



available on King of Western Swing

Some Useless Information to Fire Your Imagination

The other day, in my current state of nagging frustration, I found myself drinking coffee pre-dawn in my kitchen listening to the ipod on shuffle and contemplating what lay ahead for another day. Just then, "No Satisfaction" by Black Mountain came up and reentered my consciousness after a lengthy absence. "Oh yeah, " I thought. "How is it that Steve Jobs always knows what I need to hear?"

No Satisfaction = Frustration.
Thanks for reminding me.

The ipod is insidious in it's ability to pull things out of the air - like a vague or general horoscope that's been programmed by you. Maybe I'm just impressionable, or find it hard to ignore coincidence. Satisfaction is the humblest and most realistic of aspirations. It is way below the spiritual quest for enlightenment, transcendence, serenity, bliss or whatever it is we try to strive for in our lives - or maybe it's all the same. In frustration, we find these states to be transitory or just out reach. Here's some songs that look at the notion of what satisfaction is or more often is not, and what that feeling is if we don't get what we want. So, with that said, "let's light up your town and get things happening"

Download:

"No Satisfaction" mp3
by Black Mountain, 2005.
available on Black Mountain

"Satisfaction" mp3
by Ken Boothe, 1968.
available on Freedom Street

"What I'll Do For Satisfaction" mp3
by Johnny Daye, 1967.
available on The Complete Stax-Volt Singles 1959-1968

"I'll Be Satisfied" mp3
by Don Covay, 1965.
available on Mercy!/See-Saw

"Just To Satisfy You" mp3
by Waylon Jennings, 1969.
available on The Essential Waylon Jennings

"Dissatisfied" mp3
by Sonny Boy Williamson, 1957.
available on Down and Out Blues

"Unsatisfied" mp3
by The Replacements, 1984.
available on Let It Be

"I Can't Be Satisfied" mp3
by Muddy Waters, 1947.
available on The Definitive Collection

"Satisfied Mind" mp3
by Jonathan Richman, 1992.
available on Jonathan Goes Country

"Uptight / Satisfaction" mp3
by Stevie Wonder with The Rolling Stones, 1972.
available on Keep Your Motor Runnin'
bootleg

**********
BONUS
**********

"You Can't Always Get What You Want" mp3
by The Rolling Stones, 1968.
available on Could You Walk On Water
bootleg - different stereo mix

The Hawks

Enough doom and gloom already.



















Download:

"Farther Up The Road" mp3
by Bobby "Blue" Bland, 1957.
available on The Anthology

"Further On Up The Road" mp3
by The Hawks, 1961.
available on A Musical History



















Download:

"She's Nineteen Years Old" mp3
by Muddy Waters, 1958.
available on The Anthology: 1947-1972

"She's Nineteen Years Old" mp3
by The Hawks, 1961.
available on A Musical History



















Download:

"I'm Gonna Play The Honky Tonks" mp3
by Marie Adams, 1952.
available on
Men Are Like Street Cars: Women Blues Singers 1928-1969

"Honky Tonk" mp3
by Levon and The Hawks, 1964.
available on A Musical History

******************************************
************ BONUS **********************
******************************************

"What A Party" mp3
by The Hawks, 1961.
available on Crossing The Great Divide

"You Don't Know Me" (live in Texas) mp3
by Levon and The Hawks, 1964.
available on Crossing The Great Divide

"The Stones That I Throw" (sketch) mp3
by Richard Manuel and Robbie Robertson, 1965.
available on A Musical History

"The Stones That I Throw" mp3
by Levon and The Hawks, Atco Single 1965.
available on A Musical History

"Tell Me, Momma" (live in Liverpool) mp3
by Bob Dylan and The Hawks, 1966.
available on A Musical History