Buddy & Cathy Rich - The Beat Goes On

I’m not really qualified to pass judgement on Buddy Rich’s drumming beyond saying it’s pretty damn good. I do however feel a little more comfortable mentioning his exceptional skills as a showman. While the now infamous tour bus tapes give insight into his often discussed off stage temper, his onstage charisma is captured in a live recording of The Beat Goes On, from the album Big Swing Face (1967).

Rich introduces his 12-year-old daughter Cathy and makes a joke about her being drunk. Not something you’d expect from your average American parent. Cathy’s performance is pretty solid when you consider she’s 12 – however, there are moments where she sounds unsure of herself. Although Rich is clearly introducing her live the vocals are (according to liner notes) an overdub, I wonder what the original performance sounded like? I couldn’t find an answer, but YouTube does have a couple of lives performances that suggest Cathy Rich is a capable vocalist. I guess the mystery goes on too.

Hot Sauce - Bring It Home (And Give It To Me)

It’s hard to ignore a band named Hot Sauce. I found Bring It Home (And Give It To Me) (1972) on a Stax compilation. The catches your ear immediately, the vocal cadence sounds like Amy Winehouse at her best. The singer is Rhonda Washington and she is in fantastic form for the rest of the song:

Hot Sauce Although it appeared on Stax compilations, Hot Sauce actually recorded on Volt, a subsidiary label based in Detroit. In reality, Hot Sauce is just Rhonda Washington, I can find little to no record of the backing band, and Washington herself disappears after Stax goes bankrupt in 1975. It seems that the record was produced by Al Perkins (not to be confused with the guitarist), a Detroit based, Memphis born, radio DJ. After a bit more digging, it turns out this is actually a cover of a Na Allen song:

As you can tell, the arrangement is almost identical. But while Allen’s recording is a straight forward soul song, Hot Sauce’s is incredible

Arctic Monkeys - Baby I'm Yours

If you haven’t spent much time at the bottom of the Arctic Monkey’s Spotify page, I recommend it. There are some very cool covers lurking in their b-sides like Right Red Hand (the theme song to Peaky Blinders) and Diamonds Are Forever (which they also performed at Glastonbury).

My personal favourite is their version of Baby I’m Yours. Something about the song just fits their sound so well. Although they recorded it in 2006 (it was released as a b-side to Leave Before The Lights Come On) the song would fit very well with the ballads on 2011’s Suck It And See. And the whole 50’s/60’s vibe fits very well with Alex Turner’s look on the AM tour.

Anyway, have a listen below and go have a look through the rest of their back catalogue.

Stone Roses - Beautiful Thing

The Stone Roses released another new track this week. Despite having been disappointed by All Join Hands, I still had hopes! One of the first reasons was the length at 7:01, I was hoping for a Second Coming style psychedelic blues rock romp. 

And it’s not far off, Beautiful Thing has the kind of infectious dance beat you would expect, along with John Squire’s fantastic guitar playing. The lyrics seem to apologise for the tepid All Join Hands pointing out ‘there’s a method to my madness.’

All things considered, I’m not in love with Beautiful Thing, it’s a good song, but unfortunately, Stone Roses have a reputation for bangers.

Kings of Leon - Milk

I’ve always been a big Kings of Leon fan, though I can’t claim I liked them before they were cool – I remember a friend telling me to go listen to Youth & Young Manhood (2003) and Aha Shake Heartbreak (2004 in the UK, 2005 in the US) shortly after I told him how much I liked On Call (2007)! A lot has been said about how far the band has or hasn’t fallen since then, I’m going to steer clear of all that.

When I was listening to Milk, the 5^th song on Aha Shake, a couple of days ago, I realised that it sits somewhere between KoL’s very early songs and their later, more ‘arena rock’ sound.

The synth intro, the groovy guitar driven break, the vocals front and centre in the mix are all far removed from Four Kicks.  Add to that, the ambiguous lyrics about ‘hourglass bodies’ and ‘spotlights’ and you could easily have a song from Only By the Night (the one with Sex on Fire, 2008). At the same time, the driving bass line during the verses drives like the shuffle on Holy Roller Novacaine, and the vocals are just that bit more ragged, and the lyrics darker, giving the song more of a KoL circa 2003 than 2008 vibe. At the end of the day, music will always defy categorisation – every song and performance will always be unique – but it is always strange the little connections that sometimes pop up.

Cory Henry at Union Chapel 17 May 2016

I saw Cory Henry a couple of Tuesday’s ago at the Union Chapel and it was hands down one of the best gigs I’ve been to in a while. The gig was part of The Revival project where Cory gets to sit down and jam through songs he considers his biggest influences.  He draws on songs he played growing up, both standards and pop, and just runs with them.

It was clear form the get go that he was in his element. With just a drummer – the superlative Taron Lockett – and his 3 keyboards (including the Hammond B3 + Leslie speaker that every review mentions) they create an atmosphere that was intimate and yet also larger than life. 

It would be wrong not to mention that a huge part of this comes from the venue itself. The Union Chapel is indeed a chapel space, complete with Victorian gothic stained glass, and is still used for services. A huge rose window sits above the stage, and a smoke machine was used to great effect. Lockett’s sticks were a blur as he played, and as the stage lights caught the smoke the whole event took on an ethereal feel.

This contrasted with the passion with which Cory sang and played, baring his soul on a version of Ray Charles’ Drowning In My Own Tears. And with the huge sound of the both Cory’s organ and Taron’s drums, there was a shifting sense of being right there with them as they made their music, and sitting back, watching two musicians in a bubble on stage loving life.

The latter sense was most apparent during their cover of Giant Steps. Taron Lockett laid down an absolutely huge backbeat - he had a pad set up along side his kit just for this kind of sound. Meanwhile the former came across during the original composition NaaNaaNaa, a song Cory describes as made to cheer you up and make you feel good.

NaaNaaNaa is also where Cory’s showmanship really comes out, throughout the song he worked the audience, getting different sections of the room to sing different parts. This was a great experience, and you could feel the whole room come together. In essence, this is what The Revival is about: sharing music with the audience and seeing the connection it creates.