TISH! That's French! Vol. 4

TISH! THAT”S FRENCH! Vol. 4

No expenses were expensed in coming up with the latest installment of TISH! THAT”S FRENCH!

This FOURTH volume contains a lot of suggestions from regular JONKY visitors/commenters, so merci to everyone who suggested a track or a group—especially Bucephalus who hooked me up with a ton of compilations & turned me onto a lot of new artists, AND songs including; À Celle Qui Dure by M. 

I’m currently putting the final touches on Volume 10, which seems like a good place to stop—so no more suggestions, please.

I discovered THE CHAINSAWS all by myself in the cut-out bin sometimes in the 1990’s & even someone with my limited grasp of French can get the gist of J'ai Perdu Mon Phallus.

One can always count on Nouvelle Vague & Eartha Kitt, and Louisiana native Lucinda Williams to fold a little French into their music, & it’s no surprise when jet-setters like Grace Jones, Bill Wyman, & R.E.M. use the language of love in a song.

But there are also born-and-bred French persons in the shape of Jacqueline Taieb, Les Rita Mitsouko, Jaures Stalingrad, & Yves Simon.

 

IN THE MIX Vicki Peterson Edition Vol. 3 - THE BANGLES, Action Skulls, PSYCHO SISTERS, & More!

IN THE MIX Vicki Peterson Edition Vol. 3 

IN THE MIX Vicki Peterson Edition Vol. 3 starts off with one of the first songs Vicki wrote with her Banglemate Susanna Hoffs: Hero Takes A Fall.  There are other studio & live tracks from The Bangles including Ask Me No Questions which Debbie Peterson sings lead on.  Also included are tracks from Vicki’s duo with Susan Cowsill; The Psycho Sisters, and two Giant Sand tracks for which Peterson provided background vocals.

It features cuts from her wonderful album with John Cowsill, Long After The Fire, & their previous project, ACTION SKULLS with Lost In Space’s Billy Mumy of Barnes & Barnes fame!

In the years The Bangles were apart, she recorded with Continental Drifters.  There are a couple of live performances, as well as Vicki performing with The Records’ John Wicks at a 2014 concert.  

Here's a link to check out, or buy Long After The Fire:  https://vickipetersonandjohncowsill.bandcamp.com/album/long-after-the-fire

Gnarly Guitarists: C.C. Adcock

 

Sometimes you hear a song before you're ready to really listen to it.  Such was the case for me with the music of C.C. Adcock.  Two decades ago, I received a sampler CD from Yep Roc Records which contained a song from C.C.'s album Lafayette Marquis.  At the time, it didn't resonate with me.

But last year, C.C was one of the artists recommended by Peter Lubin for our American Explorers project.  I fell in love with C.C.'s song Poke Chop.  Digging a bit further, I read about the Louisiana supergroup Lil' Band Of Gold and was even further smitten with C.C.'s song Runaway's Life.  

C.C. Adcock's first recording credit was on a 1990 compilation album called L.A. Ya Ya, where he backed Top Jimmy and King Cotton.  C.C.'s self-titled solo album was released in 1994.  The Lil' Band Of Gold (with Steve Riley, Warren Storm, David Egan, Pat Breaux, C.C. and other Louisiana swamp pop and zydeco musicians) released three albums.  The last one, 2012's Lil' Band O'Gold Plays Fats, is a set of Fats Domino songs sung by Robert Plant, Lucinda Williams, Jimmy Barnes (Cold Chisel), Tim Rogers (You Am I), and others.  

C.C. Adcock has contributed to TV and film soundtracks, and is also a producer who has worked on albums by Doyle Bramhall, James McMurtry, the 2022 comeback album from Tommy McLain, and last year's Clifton Chenier tribute album. On those last two projects, C.C. worked with Elvis Costello, Van Dyke Parks, and the Rolling Stones.  

IN THE MIX Susan Cowsill Edition Vol. 2: LUCINDA WILLIAMS, PSYCHO SISTERS, & HOBART BROTHERS!

IN THE MIX Susan Cowsill Edition Vol. 2

On this installment, our hero is joined by fellow Crescent City music legend LUCINDA WILLIAMS on the first song.  How do you follow that?  With some PSYCHO SISTERS tracks; Heather Says, & Never Never Boys.  Susan’s partner in that group, VICKI PETERSON was also her bandmate in CONTINENTAL DRIFTERS, who were captured live on NYC’s WFUV, and at NJ’s Court Tavern.

SUSAN’s solo tracks this time around are limited to her cover of Glen Campbell’s Galveston, & the absolutely adorable Itty Bitty.  Of course there are more tracks with her siblings including Hello, Hello--the song from their 1969 live album that introduced me to Susan when I was a kid.

There are more recent live tracks by THE COWSILLS taken from The New Orleans Jazz Festival, Huckabee’s, and the benefit concert for their brother Billy.  There are also studio tracks, an a cappella track, and a Non-LP cut by the band; You (In My Mind)--a song that brother JOHN COWSILL recorded with his wife VICKI PETERSON on their Long After The Fire Album.  

Jon threatened to smash my dinner plate, & saw off my corner of the table, if I didn’t include Ballad of Sis (Didn't I Love You), so it’s here.  It’s actually one of my favorite tracks, as things turn out.  It’s credited to Jon Dee Graham, Freedy Johnston, & Susan Cowsill—better known as THE HOBART BROTHERS & LIL’ SIS HOBART.  Anyone who’s washed dishes in a restaurant knows exactly where their name comes from.

Finally, there’s a song from a live performance with DWIGHT TWILLEY at Rockabilly's in Houston—a show that’s well-represented on Volume 3!

 

It's Time (Again) for Power Pop!

A recent article on Bandcamp profiles a number of recent power pop performers, and makes a few excellent points on the genre.  The author (Ben Salmon) opines that power pop "has consistently surged as a reaction to some other musical impetus. The First Wave (The Raspberries, Big Star, Todd Rundgren) pushed back against the complexity and indulgence of prog and psychedelic rock in the early 1970s. 

"A decade later, the Second Wave (The Cars, Cheap Trick, Nick Lowe) provided a less aggressive alternative to the rise of punk. And the Third Wave (Teenage Fanclub, Matthew Sweet, Fountains of Wayne) offered a reprieve from the self-seriousness of ‘90s grunge and alt-rock."

The current wave "is power pop rooted in the Beatles (it always is, really); but it’s also deeply influenced by Sugar’s distortion pedals, Buzzcocks’ propulsive pace, and Guided By Voices’ philosophy that melody wins out over fidelity every time."  

The author places the newest generation of power pop in opposition to "a landscape of music that’s been pitch-corrected and snapped to a grid, over-compressed, edited into oblivion and robbed of character" and "an industry ruled by platforms that prioritize short songs and front-loaded hooks for shrinking attention spans."  Well said!  I've only heard two of the artists mentioned in the article, but will check out the others.

This seems like as good a time as any to share a collection of some of my own favorites from the Nineties, the Noughties, and beyond; beginning with the aforementioned Third Wave's reaction against grunge and what was once memorably labeled "complaint rock".  Maybe not all of it will meet your own definition of power pop, but to me these are all examples of accomplished songcraft, ringing guitars, soaring vocal harmonies, and clever perspectives on the eternal lyrical themes of love found and love lost.

ELSEWHERE ON THE BLOG:  more music from Hypnolovewheel, New Pornographers, Oranger, P.Hux and Redd Kross.  

IN THE MIX Susan Cowsill Edition Vol. 1 - Psycho Sisters, Redd Kross, Cowsills, Continental Drifters & Solo!

IN THE MIX Susan Cowsill Edition Vol. 1

SUSAN COWSILL has had a long and incredible career, and despite the tough childhood outlined in the documentary about her family's band THE COWSILLS, she seems to have turned out to be a wonderful person—and is definitely an amazing singer.

She makes no secret of her love of Linda Ronstadt and possibly the best compliment I can pay her is that she’s every bit as good a singer/harmonizer.  Aside from covering Warren Zevon’s Mohammed's Radio, there aren’t many similarities between them, other than singing ability—and an unerring ability to choose material that’s perfect for them.  

Mohammed's Radio was on a digital single that also contains the lead off track It Might As Well Rain Until September—a GOFFIN/KING song that was written for Bobby Vee, & instead released as a Carole King single because Don Kirshner loved her demo of it.  King is an intensely personal & emotional singer, & COWSILL easily matches the original on both counts.

SUSAN’s versions are as dear to me as the originals of songs a vocalist has to be fearless (or foolish) to cover like Sandy Denny’s Who Knows Where The Time Goes, Brian Wilson’s Don’t Worry Baby, & John Lennon’s Julia.  Julia is a live recording with another artist I’ve given the IN THE MIX treatment; The Bangles’ VICKI PETERSON.  

PETERSON is Susan’s partner in PSYCHO SISTERS—and they both seem to love to collaborate.  They were both also in CONTINENTAL DRIFTERS, who are represented here by two live-in-studio tracks from an appearance on NYC’s WFUV, and two album cuts.  VICKI PETERSON is married to Susan’s brother, JOHN COWSILL and the couple recorded an album of songs by his brothers Bill & Barry.  SUSAN gets to the heart of Barry’s River Of Love—a song that they left alone--& one Susan started performing with her own band during the four months after Katrina that Barry was missing.

Naturally there are plenty of tracks with THE COWSILLS.  Readers who haven’t dug into their catalogue (which is packed with power pop) would be forgiven for mistaking Is It Any Wonder for The Plimsouls.  The hit versions of Indian Lake, & Hair, are included, as well as an incredible live version of The Rain, The Park & Other Things (on Huckabee's Jukebox). Recorded 52 years after she was added to the line-up, it proves that Susan and her brothers are the vocal counterparts of Dick Clark.

Jonder will be happy to see her duet on REDD KROSS’ Love Is Not Love—which could be a lost track by THE COWSILLS—and has become one of my favorite songs on this edition—but it has a LOT of competition.

Because of the high quality of her work, the songs on this collection could be randomly shuffled & it would still flow, but I spent much more time than usual on the track order.

 

HAZLEWOODIZM: Incurable Lee

Lee Hazlewood spent most of his adult life in a psychiatric hospital.  “Haze” (as his fellow inmates called him) couldn’t sing or play any instruments, but was convinced that he could become a pop star.  He befriended Duane Eddy, a young hospital orderly who played guitar to entertain the patients.  Hazlewood made up band names and song titles in exchange for cigarettes. 

Duane Eddy’s success in the music business made Hazlewood bitterly jealous. He began writing songs day and night, and insisted on making a record.  Duane got Hazlewood a recording contract on the advice of the staff psychiatrist, who thought it might cure Hazlewood of his monomania.

To everyone’s surprise, Hazlewood’s debut wasn’t a complete disaster.  Haze escalated his demands.  He was obsessed with the original “Brat Pack” – Sinatra’s daughter Nancy, and the sons of Dean Martin and Desi Arnaz.  He wanted them to record his songs.  His original lyrics read like a confession (or a threat):

These boots are made for stalking

And that’s just what I’ll do

One of these days, the cops 

Are gonna catch me stalking you

ARE YOU READY, NANCY?  BETTER START RUNNING!

Nancy Sinatra never met Lee Hazlewood -- their duets were recorded separately.  She had a restraining order against him, and was terrified that he would one day escape or be granted release from the psych hospital.

Hazlewood’s next demand was to make a record with Ann Margret.  Hospital administrators were improperly swayed by the possibility of meeting the popular sex symbol.  But she was almost as delusional as Hazlewood about her own singing ability, and the pairing was a flop.

Hazlewood’s treatment team decided to invent a fake duet partner for their patient. This too backfired.  The album Requiem For An Almost Lady was written after Haze discovered that “Suzi Jane Hokom” was pure hokum.   Heartbroken and betrayed, Hazlewood spiraled into a deep depression.

A series of LSD treatments finally relieved his depression, and Haze found a new obsession.  This time it wasn’t a celebrity: it was an entire country.  And now he wanted to make movies as well as albums.  Hazlewood never actually visited Sweden.  Everything was done on a soundstage, constructed by hospital staff for their famous patient.  Everyone had to wear costumes and pretend to speak Swedish.  The ruse was abandoned after the record buying public lost interest.  

Hazlewood’s later albums are rare because “Lee Hazlewood Industries” was a vanity label that existed only to press small quantities of Haze’s music during his declining years.  Lee Hazlewood was one of the first “outsider” artists in pop music. He belongs to the tradition of Wild Man Fischer, Daniel Johnston, and Wesley Willis.