History's Dumpster = GLORIOUS trash! Kitsch, music, fashion, food, history, ephemera, and other memorable and forgotten, famous and infamous pop culture junk and oddities of yesterday and today. Saved from the landfill of time...
Kentucky Fried Chicken holiday bucket and lid, circa late 1960s.
The 1960s and '70s will always be the heyday of the Christmas album loss leader. Tire companies were using Christmas records to entice customers. Department and grocery stores too. If it was round with grooves and played at 33 1/3 RPM, you were likely getting extra business with it.
Colonel Sanders was also bitten by the Christmas vinyl bug. And released his own series of Christmas compilation albums through RCA from 1967 to 1969.
1967
1968
There was even an Australian pressing of the 1968 edition!
"Nuttin' For Christmas" is clearly one of the most god-awful, Christmas spirit sucking squeal-fests ever written. It's funny when you're 5. When you get any older, it's unbearable to hear. The only version I can stand is Stan Freberg's parody version.
This is why you don't hear it much (if at all) on your local all Christmas radio station. No matter who covers it, it's just annoying to hear the year long attacks of some psychopathic kid who then wonders why no one gives him anything for Christmas.
It's the spiritual forerunner to the gangsta rap songs where the artists list out their criminal rap sheets to prove how tough they are. Yeah, sure. They did some drive-bys and pimped some ho's. But did they do a dance on Mommy's plants? That is pure thug, right there.
But Bobby Stewart's version was not the original version of this song. This is one argument that seems to be perennial every year when I discuss vintage Christmas classics with novice collectors and this song pops up. Peter Pan (and corporate parent, Synthetic Plastics Company) never released anything that wasn't a knockoff of something else. No matter what their moms might have told them.
Yes, Bobby Stewart's version also came out on a 78 RPM record. But a lot of kids records still did in the 1950s as parents who upgraded to modern 16/33/45/78 RPM speed turntables often handed down their old 78 RPM players to their kids.
This was the original version. Released in 1955 by Art Mooney and His Orchestra with six year old Barry Gordon on vocals.
I picked Bobby Stewart's particularly horrific version of this song because it was one I used to be tormented with hearing over and over every year blaring from my mom's console stereo when I was a kid. It was on this 1965 Diplomat Caroleers LP.
There was also something very off about Bobby Stewart's version of this song. Namely in that if you listen closely, it sounds like it was actually performed by a young woman rather than a little boy, like in the original Art Mooney/Barry Gordon version. But then again, such trickery was not uncommon at all in the world of budget record labels.
So who was Bobby Stewart?
Obviously, the trail goes cold.
There are literally thousands of performers named Bobby Stewart. And as mentioned,
it's also doubtful it was even the actual name of the person singing on
this recording. The boy who sang on the original 1955 MGM recording was
named Barry Gordon.
Peter Pan Records' corporate parent, SPC was notorious for using fuzzy memories and market confusion to
their advantage to fop off their cheap knockoff recordings, Peter Pan credited their recording to a random "Bobby Stewart" and shoved it out to unsuspecting buyers who thought they were getting the original Barry Gordon version (or whoever that kid's name was.)
Secondly, SPC's distribution channels (discount and drug stores), worked to their advantage as it gave their recordings greater exposure to a less music savvy clientele that MGM's original recording of this song (which could only be found in actual record stores and larger, pricier department stores serviced by the major labels at that time. The cheaper price of the Bobby Stewart record also helped.)
Which is why some people still think Bobby Stewart's was the original version of the song; Mostly because they had this version as a kid and clung religiously to that belief.
The
Bobby Stewart version was available independently as a Peter Pan single for several years before being
consolidated into SPC's Diplomat Records line under their generic house
band The Caroleers. The Diplomat albums added an atrocious artificial echo chamber and electronic fake stereo to this track.
In the sudden aftermath of the Kennedy assassination. a flurry of tribute albums to JFK were released.
Several labels participated, but it was mostly the budget labels, such as Synthetic Plastics Company (which distributed two albums on the Diplomat and Premier labels), Pickwick had a version as well as Crown Records and a few majors such as Columbia, RCA Red Seal and Decca.
They were mostly recordings of Kennedy's greatest speeches. Most sold for 99¢ and proceeds from these records went to benefit The John F. Kennedy Council on Mental Retardation.
Many people have asked me if these albums were valuable monetarily and to be honest, they're not. All of these recordings are now public domain and widely available through several download sites (including US government archive sites) or on YouTube. Sealed mint copies go for as low as $15 and copies in any condition could be easily found in most thrift stores, as millions were sold in the months following the Kennedy assassination.
Ahhh....Another peaceful Sunday morning. Time to put on some nice, relaxing easy going music. Right?
Well I'm having none of it. It's time to crank it up full blast and wake up the neighbours with some truly awesome music. The stuff you just won't hear on the radio. Anywhere.
Outsider musicians are those folks who simply make music
the only way they know how. With very little to no musical training
whatsoever. The conventional requisites of stardom are simply unheard of among
outsider musicians.
This is not American Idol. There is no competition. Or critiquing. Or even practicing and rehearsals. What you hear is what you get.
They simply don't care about commercial success. Or
any musical conventionality even amateur musicians adhere strictly to. They make their
music on their own whims and for the sheer sake of their own personal enjoyment. Even if the only one enjoying it
is themselves, they wouldn't care.
It also differs from vanity acts. Vanity acts actively look for a commercial breakthrough and exposure to the masses. Most outsider acts would never be heard at all were it not for certain friends and associates encouraging them to take a leap of faith and record their material.
Sometimes a major label finds them, but that's usually a by-product of local press buzz or through chance contacts. The labels never seek outsider musicians and outsider musicians never seek the labels. If planets align, they align. But that's very rare if they do. The major labels want something that delivers a massive return on whatever investment they make. And that's something no outsider act has ever really done.
Outsider music isn't even a conscientious rebellion against mainstream rock and pop's status quo, which usually drives most hardcore independent lo-fi punk bands. They truly believe in what they are doing in spite of what anyone thinks. They simply let their dim lights shine.
But what may sound like tone-deaf psychiatric patients (some, but not all outsider musicians suffer from some sort of severe mental illness) to
the rest of us is technically a sub-sub genre of Alternative rock. It's not even a "new" thing ("Wild Man" Fischer, whom Frank Zappa discovered in the late 1960s, is a pioneer. So is David Peel, whom John Lennon discovered and released a few albums of his on the Beatles' Apple label in the early '70s, The Shaggs and to some extent, even Charles Manson.)
Today, we're going head first into the most obscure of obscure music genres. But like most of my posts here, I don't disclose everything. I like to leave some of it out for you, the reader, to explore on your own. I just merely set up the launch pad for your own journey (it might be one-way.) So this is not a complete list. Not by far. But it's enough to give a basic
insight into this strange genre. Google "Outsider music", if you're
really curious.
Bingo Gazingo
Sweet dreams, ladies.....
Bingo Gazingo (Murray Wachs, 1924-2010) was an elderly New York City outsider musician and poet with perhaps more punk rock authenticity than any band that ever played at CBGB's. And I mean all of them. He was, perhaps literally, the grandfather of punk.
With song titles like "Oh Madonna, You Stole My Pants", "Up Your Jurassic Park" and "I Love You So Fucking Much, I Can't Shit", you pretty much get the idea this was no ordinary retired postal worker from Queens.
He released an album through WFMU Radio in 1996 and this song, "You're Out of The Computer" was a collaboration with techno artist My Robot Friend (Howard Rigberg) from My Robot Friend's 2004 CD Hot Action! It also appears on the Songs in The Key of Z compilation of outsider music.
Tragically, Bingo Gazingo was struck down by a cab on his way to a performance at the Bowery Poetry Club where he appeared weekly every Monday night in November of 2009. He died of his injuries on New Year's Day, 2010. He was 85.
Wesley Willis
Wesley Willis (1963-2003) could be the most famousof outsider musicians, even garnering some airplay on mainstream alternative rock radio in the 1990s.
His story began as one of ten children born in a dysfunctional family (having so many siblings can throw even the most stable family off - think the Duggars) in the housing projects of Chicago. He spent most of his life going from foster home to foster home with two older brothers as their parents had a violent relationship and split up when Wesley was a child.
In spite of this horrific background, Wesley seemed to be a bright and fairly normal young man. However on October 21, 1989 (there are people who remember this specific date), he began to hear voices in his head, which he called "demons" and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.
About this time, he also began making music. Mostly as an outlet to escape the turmoil inside his head. He also made artwork and was discovered by members of Chicago's alternative rock scene, who encouraged his musical pursuits. This led to a collaboration called The Wesley Willis Fiasco and he actually became a sensation in the Chicago alternative underground, gaining attention from major label American Recordings, which was distributed by Warner Bros.
His favourite greeting wasn't a handshake or a hug. It was a headbutt to the forehead. I am not making that up. This left a permanent bruise on his forehead.
His music was crude, rambling and often profane. One unique characteristic of Wesley Willis is no matter what song he's performing, they all sound identical to each other. They mostly are songs about things that he had personally identified with in his life. Such as his local McDonald's, bands and stars such as Pink Floyd, Foo Fighters, Kurt Cobain and whatever else figured.
Here's a sample of what that sounded like
He eventually recorded 50 albums from 1994 until his untimely death in 2003 from leukemia. He was 40.
Daniel Johnston
Daniel Johnston, like Wesley Willis, also suffers from schizophrenia and like Willis, also uses music as a way to cope with it. Johnston is also a visual artist as well. However Johnston is different in the sense that his music is more introspective and melodic than either Wesley Willis or Bingo Gazingo. He's been called a "fractured genius" and "the indie Brian Wilson". He quite possibly could have achieved mainstream stardom and in fact, he came quite close to it.
Daniel Johnston began recording music as a teenager on a boombox at home in the late '70s. By the early '80s, he was self releasing his own material. He moved to Austin and appeared on MTV in 1985, which gained him further exposure. He went on to make more recordings, including collaborations with Sonic Youth, Half Japanese and other indie acts, who became fans of his.
But his schizophrenia was also worsening. In 1990, on the way to West Virginia on a small, private two-seater plane piloted by his father Bill, Johnston had a manic psychotic episode believing he was Casper the Friendly Ghost
and removed the key from the plane's ignition and threw it out of the
plane. His father, a former Air Force pilot, managed to successfully
crash-land the plane, even though "there was nothing down there but
trees". Although the plane was destroyed, Johnston and his father
emerged with only minor injuries. As a result of this episode, Johnston
was involuntarily committed to a mental hospital.
In the early '90s, Kurt Cobain was often seen wearing a t-shirt with the cover image of Johnston's 1983 album Hi, How Are You? on it.
Which lead to even more interest in Daniel Johnston. Even while involuntarily committed at the mental hospital, Warner Music label Elektra Records was interested in signing him, but he refused the deal as Elektra then was also the label home of Metallica, whom Johnston thought worshipped Satan.
Eventually he signed with Warner co-owned Atlantic Records, which released his only major label LP Fun in 1995. The album flopped commercially and Atlantic ended his contract in 1996.
In 2005, a full length documentary DVD on Daniel Johnston's life The Devil and Daniel Johnston was released.
Johnston is still active in music.
Jandek
To say Jandek is merely an outsider musician just doesn't quite cut it. In fact, he's been described as "The Rock N' Roll J.D. Salinger". Because he's perhaps the most reclusive of all the outsider musicians.
Yet he has released over 70 albums on the mail order Corwood Industries label. A label that while Jandek maintains a certain distance from professionally, has only issued Jandek material. And he has a surprisingly loyal and solid worldwide fan base. With almost no radio airplay or any promotion of any kind.
Most Jandek albums feature a young man on the covers in random photo shots and when you lay them out, you realize they are the same person - Jandek himself? Possibly.
But nothing has been directly confirmed by Jandek - he's only done a few interviews. But in rare recent pictures of Jandek, you do see a very strong, even uncanny resemblance.
Jandek's actual name has never been confirmed directly either, but he's believed to be Sterling Smith and he was born in 1945. Other than that, very little else is known about him. And that's how he likes it.
His music is a sort of psychedelic country-blues. But even that description isn't quite accurate. Jandek is a genre all to himself.
Jandek is an enigma even by outsider music standards. And that's saying something. In 2003, he released Jandek on Corwood, a documentary DVD that doesn't answer even the most basic questions of his life his fans always wanted to know. But then again, that mystique is still a part of his attraction.
He's still active, releasing an album or two a year and occasionally touring.
This single was only released in Europe, where she was living at the time and she starred in the French movie Moi, fleure bleue, (that's Me, Blue Flower (???). The official English title is Stop Calling Me Baby!) She sings on the film's soundtrack, where this song comes from.
She also recorded a French version of this song with a different arrangement.
You know Carly Simon as a legendary singer/songwriter of the '70s. But not many people outside of her most devoted fans know her recording career began several years before her signing with Elektra and her massive pop hits like "You're So Vain", "Anticipation" and "That's The Way I Always Heard It Should Be". A streak what would continue well into the 1980s
The Simon Sisters were Carly Simon and her lesser known sister Lucy. They were regulars in the New England folk circuit in the early 1960s and caught the attention of Kapp Records, then one of the larger independent labels in the US.
Meet The Simon Sisters (later retitled Winkin' Blinkin' and Nod after the first single from the LP which became a minor hit.) (Kapp, 1964)
This would be the last Simon Sisters LP until 1969. But the folk scene of that time was beginning to change with more challenging, socially conscious lyrics and Kapp Records had been sold to MCA. They returned in 1969 with an LP for Columbia; The Simon Sisters Sing The Lobster Quadrille and Other Songs for Children.
But the sisters brand of traditional and kid friendly folk was being overshadowed by harder edge acts. Their 1969 Columbia LP was reissued in 1973 as Carly & Lucy Simon Sing Songs for Children shortly after Carly Simon had her breakthrough hit "You're So Vain". (it was retitled to avoid confusion with Simon's pop albums.)
These LPs would remain without a reissue for over three decades until 2006 when the Kapp LPs were reissued for the first time on a single CD. Followed in 2008 by the reissue of Carly & Lucy Simon Sing Songs for Children.
When you think of classical music, K-Tel isn't exactly the first name that comes to mind.
K-Tel, as everyone knows, was the purveyor of microgroove albums of all the pop hits that's print to fit. So what was K-Tel doing messing around with classical music?
The story begins in the UK at the height of the Stars On 45 fad. Louis Clark, former arranger of Electric Light Orchestra had an idea of making a similar medley album, using recognizable pieces of classical music linked together with a disco beat. He thought it could re-energize the classical genre the way the Stars On 45 helped re-energize the Beatles catalog for a new generation. He found an unlikely supporter and partner in K-Tel UK.
UK pressing of Hooked On Classics
However this was far from the first time someone got the idea of blending classical music with contemporary pop music. Since the dawn of pop, classical melodies were used as the framework for many pop songs. Classically styled orchestras called 'Pops' (or "Light") orchestras often made full orchestrated versions of pop music and were staples in the easy listening radio format. Arthur Fiedler and John Williams were the best known conductors of pops orchestras.. The 1960s and '70s were a huge time of classical fusion with pop and rock. Beginning with Simon & Garfunkel, The Moody Blues and various experimental albums using classically styled arrangements of pop hits led to the progressive rock era. And from there, disco was added ("A Fifth of Beethoven" Walter Murphy from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack was the '70s most famous example. Even leading an aging Arthur Fiedler into the disco age.)
While classical purists loudly condemned this practice, it's worth noting that there was a side benefit. Classical music even then was largely dying as fewer young people were exposed to the music. These albums, for all their campiness and unconventional approaches did introduce classical elements to a newer generation. It may not be your grandpa's classical music, but they illustrated what could be done with it in contemporary music. If they only got that far it was worth it as classical music, while still an increasingly obscure genre and long vanished off commercial radio, is still very much alive and it's influence still occasionally pops up now and then in contemporary pop and rock music.
Hooked On Classics was released in the UK and became a phenomenal smash hit. However in the US, K-Tel needed to get this out to real record stores, as most of K-Tel's product was sold in discount stores. And to the radio stations. RCA had all these connections. So they arranged a distribution deal through RCA Records in the US.
This is K-Tel's only originally produced US Top 40 hit single, making it to #10 in February of 1982.
Hooked On Classics spawned two sequel albums, each selling far less than the first in 1982 and 1983.
