JERRY LEE LEWIS Live & Rare with MICKEY GILLEY, CARL PERKINS & JOHNNY CASH!

JERRY LEE LEWIS Live & Rare!

Readers would be surprised how many LPs I have—and I have more by JERRY LEE LEWIS than any other solo artist.  I love the unpredictability of JLL’s live performances, so I also have a lot of radio shows & boots from which the tracks on LIVE & RARE were taken.

There are tracks recorded in locales from Los Angeles to Pasadena (Texas).  JERRY LEE manages to “play nice” in the family friendly environments of Knott’s Berry Farm, and Neil Young’s Bridge School Benefit, but he cuts loose in a big way in Nashville.  The Grand Ol’ Opry lifted his ban on the condition that Jerry play his country hits, only to have The Killer perform one of the most raucous versions of Rockin’ My Life Away I’ve encountered.  Jerry Lee was always at his best when he was giving someone the finger, breaking the rules, or burning something to the ground, & JLL’s wreckless abandon inspires longtime guitarist Kenny Lovelace to play one of the best solos I’ve heard from him.

I’m as enthralled by his stage patter & the asides directed at bandmembers as I am his music.  During Blue Suede Shoes he says on mic that: “Drummer lost a little beat, but don’t worry, he’s hip enough, he’ll catch up!”

And Jerry didn’t always restrict himself to the truth in his intros & outros.  He restarts Blue Suede Shoes, saying: “Carl Perkins wrote it, Carl Perkins sang it along with a bunch of others… Elvis did NOT have that record first, CARL PERKINS had the record… and he sold three million records on it.  Elvis Presley recorded the record when Carl was laying in the hospital nearly dead, from a wreck…  I think he tried to steal it from him... I’m just telling’ ya what Carl said, I ain’t got nothin’ to do with it!”

Along the way he made stops in Alabama, London, & Bridlington (wherever that is) and there are a few tracks that even I don't remember where they were recorded.  There’s even a rock medley of Matchbox/Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On/Blue Suede Shoes performed with his old friends CARL PERKINS & JOHNNY CASH.  Ladies & gentlemen, please welcome: The Three Quarters Of A Million Dollar Trio!

The Elvis History Blog includes this passage on the famous MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET pairing of Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, & Elvis Presley:  Jerry Lee & Elvis took turns singing. When Lewis sang a bit of “Crazy Arms,” Elvis said, “The wrong man’s been settin’ here at this piano.” Jerry Lee responded, “Well, I been wantin’ to tell you that. Scoot over!” In Robert Johnson’s newspaper article the next day, Elvis praised Jerry Lee. “That boy can go,” he said. “I think he has a great future ahead of him. He has a different style, and the way he plays piano just gets inside me.” (http://www.elvis-history-blog.com/elvis-jerry-lee-lewis.html)

If Jerry Lee can be believed, just before Elvis went into the army, a decision many felt might end his reign as The King Of Rock & Roll, Presley handed it all over to him, telling Lewis to “Take it.  Take it all.”  True or not, what is true, is that more than any other artist,  JLL was poised to do so.

I accidentally left the logo off, but it's Another Stinky Production, & I'm tellin' ya every fan of JERRY LEE LEWIS needs this compilation.  In the words of The Ferriday Fireball: “If I tell you it’s gonna rain, you'd better bring your umbrella!”

 

Grandpa's Whistling Tracks

Richard says: 

The third part of these compilation tapes from Papa ‘Cil, the bass player of Buy Off The Bar was in fact the second tape he gave me, shortened to fit on a CD.
This time, hardly any of the bands had major success. That never got in the way of having a good time, making incredible music, and becoming legends. Most music on this compilation is from the late 70s. The Sex Pistols gave everybody the message NO Future (unless you Do It Yourself), and from that a thousand bands were going into their teenage bedrooms, parents’ garages, youthclubs, squats, and whatever place they could find to practice.
Here are some that never made it beyond that one vinyl registration that saved them from total oblivion.
The Capitols, The Golinski Brothers, The Idiots, Executives, Johnnie + The Lubes, Ti-Tho (from Hamburg), Restricted Code, The Alleged, and 3-Action! Never released more than a place on a compilation album, up to a handful of singles.
Restricted Code reformed after 36 years and released an EP in 2020, I Got Lost.
Semi-well-known bands like The Great Leap Forward, Mo-Dettes, The Chesterfield Kings, Talulah Gosh, TV21, The Piranhas, or The Distractions released more, and even had a glimpse of the Top 40, though a Peel Session would sometimes be the highest claim to fame and as good as gold.
There are artists here that need a little closer inspection. The Distractions, Arthur Kadmon spend “2 minutes” with The Fall, Arash Torabi went on to play with Beat Hotel, June Brides, Granite Shore, Painted World, and continues to this day as a bass player. Multi-instrumentalist Mike Kellie has over a hundred credits to his name before he passed away in 2017, having had a career spanning from 1967.
Playing with Spooky Tooth, Joe Cocker, The Only Ones, on Johnny Halliday’s Je T’aime Je T’aime Je T’aime, and many more.
The Piranhas of course, had that wonderful saxophone player Phil Collins.

TRACKS  

Amongst today’s tracks, there are four complete ep’s/singles: The Desperate Bicycles, The Capitols, The Distractions, and the split ep The Executives/Johnnie + The Lubes.
My real cool vibes come from The Golinski Brothers, one of the best hopeless love songs ever. Executives – Shy Little Girl should have been a top ten hit.
Another worth pointing out JOSEF K Romance  and  The Chesterfields – Ask Johnny Dee
And last but not least TALULAH GOSH ...don’t you just love them ...

2024 Comeback Comeback

Here's a post to correct significant omissions from 2024’s Comeback Special compilation.  I haven’t found a reliable method to keep up with all the comebacks released in a given year.  Having only recently completed a 2025 comebacks compilation, I’ve already found four that I missed (Bill Fox, Feedbacks, Rwake, and Thee Headcoatees).  EDIT: add OK Go, The Farm, John Cafferty & The Beaver Brown Band, and a posthumous album by The Saints!  

The 2024 Comeback Special included 22 artists who released albums of new original music after an absence of a decade or more.  And yet, I missed another 28 comebacks from 2024: far too many to include on a CD-length compilation.  I had to leave out Belong, Kittie, Manu Chao, Propaganda and Stetsasonic.  (There was also a 2024 release from Plasticland called Spree, but I couldn’t find it online anywhere, and apparently the songs were completed a decade earlier.)

The award for the longest time between albums (40 years!) goes to The Heats, whose self-titled 2024 album follows their 1983 debut, The Heats Have An Idea.  It’s been almost that long for The Prisoners, who returned with Morning Star in 2024.  And over 30 years passed before the 2024 comebacks of the Jack Rubies, Propaganda, Stetsasonic, and Toadliquor.

Last year, Khayem reminded me that Beth Gibbons and Gavin Friday had released solo comeback albums in 2024.  Koen discovered that Jona Lewie also released a new record in 2024. 

The biggest name I missed among last year’s comebacks was The Black Crowes.  The Robinson brothers buried the hatchet and reunited in 2019, but it took another five years to release an album of new songs. At the ass-end of 2025, “Rats And Clowns” sounds quite topical, as does “Cross The Line” by Connecticut hardcore band The Pist (who somehow knew in 2024 that the essential question of 2025 would be, “Am I being detained?”)

I front-loaded this compilation with the grooviest songs, and put the heavy stuff at the end. Like 2024 itself, it starts out fun and ends in anger and despair, with everyone wondering how the hell to make sense of this crazy mess. Here's to better days, friends.

CLAMS, FLUBS, & SQUEAKY DRUM PEDALS Vol. 1 - Like the 16 year old father, they left it in!

CLAMS, FLUBS, & SQUEAKY DRUM PEDALS Vol. 1

Here’s another idea for a compilation that fell in my lap when I was combing the internet to verify some information about songs where the singer flubs a line.  I ran across a thread about the prevalence of SQUEAKY DRUM PEDALS in popular music.  It expanded to include CLAMS (mistakes & wrong notes played by a musician), and FLUBS (usually singing the wrong words, or singing the right words at the wrong time).  Of course a FLUB can be any number of mistakes; hitting the microphone with your instrument, knocking something over, or getting tongue-tied.

So here’s Volume 1 fresh from JOKONKY LABORATORIES, with a tip of the fedora to Jon who offered encouragement, and wise counsel. 

Here’s what you’re listening for:

THE MAMAS & THE PAPAS’ male half, Denny & John, accidentally came in early on the chorus of I Saw Her Again & it sounded great, so they left it in.  They went over to England & played the dub for Paul McCartney & he said; “Wait!  Play that again.  That’s a mistake.  No one’s that clever.”

Two things were true of Keith Moon; he couldn’t sing, & he loved to sing.  If you listen at the fade out of Happy Jack Pete Townshend says: “I Saw Ya!” to Moon The Loon who was sneaking into the studio to try to lend his vocals to the track.

I remember listening to THE BEATLES What You’re Doing with headphones on as a teenager and catching flubbed lyrics, but when you’re 16 and music is IMPORTANT to you, you figure you must be hearing things because no one would leave a mistake in, and certainly NOT THE BEATLES. (Another I caught in my teens pops up on Volume 2.  In Slow Down John Lennon sings wrong line).  That was the starting point of this compilation.

DO NOT listen to this compilation if you don’t want to have THE SEARCHERS’  Needles & Pins ruined for you!  Once you hear the squeaky bass drum pedal, you can’t NOT hear it!  “But still they begin, ah, Needles &Pins SQUEAKY-SQUEAKY-SQUEEK-SQUEEK.”

In THE BEACH BOYS Wendy, as the organ break gets underway there’s a clear cough.  And in BOB DYLAN’s Idiot Wind there’s a sneeze at the 7:21 second mark.  There’s a different type of distraction in the fade out of BUDDY HOLLY & THE CRICKETS I’m Gonna Love You Too.  An actual cricket had crept into the studio, & gives a couple of chirps.

On DAVE EDMUNDS’ I Hear You Knocking (which is a first take!) guitar whiz MICKY GEE came in early.  There’s another flub on CCR’s Lookin' Out My Back Door.  Songwriter John C. Fogerty sings; “All our troubles Illinois, lock the front door, oh boy”.  And another metallic squeaky noise is present in LEE MORGAN’s Candy.

Around the 1:46 minute mark, I’m told Tommy Bolin breaks his E-String (while bending it) during Billy Cobham’s Taurian Matador.  And providing the “clam” necessary for this series’ title, there are repeated “clams” (or bum notes) played on the organ during HARRY NILSSON’s Early In The Morning.

It’s always a good idea to have NEIL YOUNG make an appearance on a compilation, & although it isn’t too obvious, he hits the mike with his harmonica stand 2 mins into Out On The Weekend.  A squeaky drum pedal at the end of ERIC BURDON & THE ANIMALS’ When I Was Young is enough to earn it inclusion here.  Another lyrical flub gets Ain't No Sunshine included.  BILL WITHERS sings: “She's house just ain't no home” (at 1:30).

In MEGADEATH’s version of Paranoid, Dave Mustaine calls to drummer Nick Menza: “Nick!  NICK!” to get him to stop playing and he responds: “Fuck me running.”

As Chris Axe wrote in his egghead music blog about James Jamerson’s bass playing on Ain't Nothing Like The Real Thing by MARVIN GAYE & TAMMI TERRELL: “Notice how throughout this song, Jamerson uses many 'wrong' notes. In particular, he uses the open E and A strings as part of a semiquaver chromatic run up to the next chord. The speed of these passing notes means that rather than the note sticking out as being 'wrong', it forms part of a larger passage that often links the chords together. This is a very common technique that Jamerson uses and you can spot it in many of his lines.”  I couldn’t have said it better, myself.  Paul McCartney cites Jamerson as his biggest influence, btw.

Two minutes into the DINAH WASHINGTON & BROOK BENTON hit; Baby You've Got What It Takes Brook starts to sing her verse & she says he’s “in my spot”.  The chaotic break in THE B-52's Love Shack was unintentional!  It was pre-programmed & kept going, & the band simply stayed in the moment.  Jonder suggested the false start left in THE REPLACEMENTS’ I Hate Music.  The engineer says: “Tapes Rolling” & the reply is: “SO WHAT”. 

Keyboardist ROY BITTAN keeps playing during the break near the end of BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN’s Born In The USA.  Despite his gaff, when SPRINGSTEEN split from the E Street Band, BITTAN was the only member he retained.

 

Clockenflap Festival 2025 Hong Kong

Late October, the Dishonorable Edward Pastanga and I visited Wilhelmus von N's place, as we had been invited once again for a vinyl evening. 
I had prepared myself by digging up some old singles and albums from my collection, as well as buying a new platter: Go Go Crankin’ - Paint The White House Black… 
Afterwards, we sat down in his vinyl sanctuary, opened the beers, and started playing some discs, which is a kind of ancient ritual for us by now. 

Most of the brought along 45s I couldn’t play as W’s record player missed one of those plastic adapters, but we still had more than enough music to enjoy. 

Fuelled by copious amounts of beer, conversation typically went all over the place: Artificial Intelligence, politics, music, books, the mystery of the never-matching socks in our households, etc. 
Suddenly, W announced that we hadn’t been to any real concert for a while, to which both DEP and I agreed, but didn’t have any suggestions at hand to rectify this sad state of affairs. 
Not discouraged at all, W consulted his smartphone and suddenly exclaimed: “Oh, this is cool, Clockenflap Festival in Hong Kong, 5-7 December, we should go there!” 
He shared the festival’s lineup with us, of which we recognised exactly two bands: Sparks and Franz Ferdinand… 
Even so, we agreed that it really looked cool, and W immediately started booking tickets! 
Other details, such as getting there + accommodation, we would look at later… 
 
Once sobered up the next day, I texted DEP: "Did he really book tickets for that festival???" 

To make a long story short, it turned out that W had exactly done that, so we started booking flights and hotels, which was relatively easy.

We watched these bands/artists during our short stay.

Friday: Passenger, Sparks, Digitalism DJ-set

Saturday: Phum Viphurit, Chilli Beans, L’Imperatrice

Sunday: Marcin, Jeremy Zucker, TV Girl, Franz Ferdinand, Godspeed You! Black Emperor

Our overall impression was that the festival was very well organised (unlike some of the Dutch events I attended back in the day), very clean, plenty of toilets, food stands, beer taps, etc., impressive!

Unfortunately during those 3 days, it became frightfully obvious that our decrepit bodies no longer could survive standing for more than 3 hours straight, no matter how much we shuffled around: lower back aches, leg cramps, and sore feet, our litany of complaints could have come from a bunch of pensioners in a nursing home...

As a result, we missed a lot of bands/artists, but from those we did see, here are our reviews:

Name: Passenger

Date Performing: Friday, 5 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Entertaining acoustic stuff, good interaction with public.

Wilhelmus von N: If you like buskers, you like Passenger. It takes courage to be alone with a guitar on stage. Knows how to involve the crowd - but there is only so much you can do with a guitar to really get the crowd going. 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Chatty. He enjoyed sharing his new stuff, but no one in the crowd really recognized any of it. This became more obvious when he got a huge roar near the end when he played the only song everyone knew. Can imagine it gets tiring to play one song all the time, although he put on a brave face, claiming he enjoyed playing it.

Name: Sparks

Date Performing: Friday, 5 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Epic stuff! But how can Russell Mael (77!) jump around on stage like that? And Ron Mael doing his Suburban Homeboy shuffle was priceless!

Wilhelmus von N: I just want to age like Russell. They played an amazing set! 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Excellent fun from the very off when they sang "Shall we start?". Great show, good music. Embarrassing for the grumpy old men who, quite rightly, avoid jumping around like that especially in public. 

Name: Digitalism DJ set

Date Performing: Friday, 5 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: DJ shite

Wilhelmus von N: Forgettable. Which I apparently did instantly. 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Don't recall them. Must have been thinking about anything else.

Name: Phum Viphurit

Date Performing: Saturday, 6 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Funky Thai band, cool background videos too.

Wilhelmus von N: Really enjoyed this band - flute, violins, and all. Technically really good, and they clearly had a ton of fun being on stage. Great background videos too! 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Started inauspiciously with a head-wobbling love song kind of track that Thai girls love. Once they got going though, it turns out, they are well funky with excellent production management. Fun show.

Name: Chilli Beans.

Date Performing: Saturday, 6 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Cute Jpop girl band who can rock!

Wilhelmus von N: They rocked - good bass player too! 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Fun and rocking with cuteness overload from the lead singer.

Name: L'Impératrice

Date Performing: Saturday, 6 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Loud but fun, at times a bit like Level 42.

Wilhelmus von N: For me the best discovery of this Clockenflap. Funky, some Level 42 bass action, and sampling Massive Attack (Diamonds in the back, sunroof down, digging the scene... ). As it's all in French, it's hard to sing along and to remember songs, but I find myself listening to their playlist and liking their tunes more and more. 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: It had a good beat, and you can dance to it. They played a great many songs, but I cannot recall a single one and, if they played the song again, I would not recognize ever having heard it. Ultimately, the songs had no real distinguishing feature, unlike the lead singer who was extraordinarily lithe and had two very distinguishing features.....her voice and her dancing (not what Wilhelmus was thinking).

Name: Marcin

Date Performing: Sunday, 7 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Clever, but boring after a while, showoff…

Wilhelmus von N: No wonder he's a hit on TikTok

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Extraordinary guitar player, clearly sleeps with his instrument and plays it in his sleep. The guitar that is, not what Wilhelmus was thinking. Something to be seen live, not really suitable for say listening to on a long drive.

Name: Jeremy Zucker

Date Performing: Sunday, 7 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Ouch, delete!

Wilhelmus von N: Time to get another beer....

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Oh yeah. Him.

Name: TV Girl

Date Performing: Sunday, 7 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Better than expected.

Wilhelmus von N:  Enjoyable for a few numbers - West Coast American pop. 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Oddly enjoyable, I would add them to a playlist. Not something to get lost in for hours though.

Name: Franz Ferdinand

Date Performing: Sunday, 7 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Highlight of the festival, they ROCKED!

Wilhelmus von N:  I am a big fan to start with and they were my main reason to sign up for this year's Clockenflap. And boy, they rock! What is it with Glasgow and great bands? 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Proper rock band. Absolute highlight. Wanted to go back and listen to their entire back catalogue.

Name: Godspeed You! Black Emperor

Date Performing: Sunday, 7 December 2025

Grumpy Old Men Verdict:

Art58Koen: Nah, didn’t really work for me…

Wilhelmus von N: What? 

The Dishonorable Edward Pastanga: Noise.

Afterwards, we submitted our in-depth reviews to Clockenflap's organizers, who were mightily impressed and consequently released a special MP3 compilation, which is riding the Hong Kong charts right now!

Unbelievable, right?! Right! ;-)

Punks Got Soul (One More Time)

 

It's another Friday night after a long, shitty week at work.  Please forgive me if I don't have the energy to post anything more creative than another number in this series of cover songs.

Once again, only some of the performers are punks.  There's some new wave, pub rock, no wave, and post punk as well.  And in addition to soul songs, there are some girl group and funk covers in there (Sly Stone, Stevie Wonder, the Chi-Lites and Charles Wright).  

Some of the songs have been featured before (by other performers).  And some of the performers have been featured before, but they're covering different songs this time!  

Wilko Johnson appears here twice (as a solo artist and with his Solid Senders).  Clive Langer is also on here twice (with his band The Boxes, and backing his former Deaf School bandmate Bette Bright).  Pearl Harbour (the patron saint of our blog) is here as well.  And the whole thing ends with some vintage Ralph Records weirdness.

Thanks to Koen for the Bette Bright track, and to Richard for the Rhythm Pigs (the boys from El Paso, not Top Jimmy's crew).  I forgot to thank Richard last time for the Rock Against Junk album, which was the source of two songs on Volume 5.  And a tip of the hat to RYP for reposting Chris Bailey's solo albums at my request.    

THE PALADINS’ BEST VOL. 1 - Bluesy Stray Cats!

THE PALADINS’ BEST VOL. 1 

The Paladins’ two core members; guitarist Dave Gonzalez & bassist Thomas Yearsley met in high school, & worked together at a San Diego lumberyard while they got the band off the ground.  

I once described The Paladins as BLUESY Stray Cats, but bandleader Gonzalez explained their sound in the liner notes to their second album: “I really like country, Tom really likes swing and R&B, and Scott's a real blues guy… so all this stuff we try to put together. We're not a blues band, not a rockabilly band. We just like all these different sounds and we try to interpret them in our own way."

Their first three albums are my favorites.  One of the band’s strengths is choosing material that suits them as well as the wonderful songs they write.  Those first three records contain songs by: Johnny Horton, The Collins Kids, Jimmy Reed, Hayes & Porter, & Chuck Willis.

The Paladins sprung from the San Diego scene alongside The Beat Farmers & made the drive up I-5 to play alongside The Blasters & Los Lobos in Los Angeles. 

They toured with Los Lobos, & Stevie Ray Vaughan, & often backed Hollywood Fats at The Belly Up Tavern.  Alejandro Escovedo is a fan (who brought them to Austin) & The Fabulous Thunderbirds' Kim Wilson produced the band's self-titled debut. The Los Lobos connection continued on their second album Years Since Yesterday, which was produced by Lobos saxman/producer Steve Berlin and engineer Mark Linett.  (It's where I suggest the curious stick a toe in--& it's where the cover art is from.)

For more information check out this splendid article: https://sandiegotroubadour.com/the-paladins-decades-of-delivering-the-goods-from-san-diego-to-the-world/