Category: Music

Ray Stevens, Ahab the Arab.  Here is the original from 1962.  In the lyrics there are references to two hits from the same era, Chubby Checker's The Twist (1960) and Lonnie Donegan's British skiffle number   Does Your Chewing Gum Lose its Flavor?  On second thought, the reference is to Checker's Le't's Twist Again Like We Did…

Have you settled accounts with the Infernal Revenue 'Service'?  If yes, order up one scotch, one bourbon, and one beer, and enjoy this live version of Taxman  featuring Harrison and Clapton.  Stevie Ray Vaughan's blistering version. 

YouTube comments are among the worst of the Internet.  But this is good: "You can have your Lady Gaga, I'll take Lady Gogi."

Last night I foolishly failed to save my drafts of my Saturday Night at the Oldies post replete with a load of links to songs, and a temporary TypePad outage banished the post to cyber-oblivion.  Well, here are some of them, da capo, in celebration or bemoanment of human folly the chief instance of which…

Just now discovered this great Ralph Stanley and Melba Montgomery version of the old Hank Williams tune, You Win Again.

In three categories:  Rock, Religion, Romanticism. Cream, Strange BrewDoors, People are StrangeDoors, Strange DaysMickey and Sylvia, Love is Strange Stanley Bros., Rank StrangersEmmy Lou Harris, Wayfaring Stranger Frank Sinatra, Strangers in the Night  To be is to do (Socrates).  To do is to be (Sartre). Do be do be do (Sinatra).Barbara Lewis, Hello StrangerAcker Bilk,…

I was going to cover 'strange' songs tonight, but then I remembered it is St. Patrick's Day.  Remember The New Christy Minstrels?  Here is Barry Maguire belting out their 1963 hit, Green, Green."  It was sanitized, well-scrubbed hootenany stuff like this that caused a lot of my generation to pick up guitars and then find our…

Hank Williams, Lost Highway. "The day we met I went astray/And started rollin' down that lost highway."The Byrds, Life in PrisonBob Dylan, Take a Message to MaryJohnny Cash, Folsom Prison BluesWarren Zevon, CarmelitaNina Simone, House of the Rising SunKIngston Trio, Tom Dooley. Doc Watson's version.

Jr. Walker and the All Stars, ShotgunBeatles, Revolver (the whole album!)Hoyt Axton, Pistol Packin' Mama.  Al Dexter wrote the song and had a hit with it in '43.Lloyd Price, Stagger Lee, 1959.  "Stagger Lee went home and got his .44 . . ."  Mississippi John Hurt's version.The Leaves, Hey Joe.  "Hey Joe, where you going…

Stevie Ray Vaughan, SuperstitionHowlin' Wolf, I Ain't Superstitious.  "Well, I ain't superstitious, but a black cat just crossed my trail."Elvis Presley, Good Luck CharmLeon Redbone, When You Wish Upon a StarBlind Lemon Jefferson, Rabbit Foot Blues, 1926Screamin' Jay Hawkins, I Put a Spell on You.  Don't miss this one!Albert King, Born Under a Bad SignEagles,…

I'll reckon you haven't heard one of these in a righteous spell: Betty Everett, You're No Good, 1963.  More soulful than the 1975 Linda Ronstadt version.The Ikettes, I'm Blue, 1962. Lee Dorsey, Ya Ya, 1961.  Simplicity itself. Three chords. I-IV-V progression. No bridge.Paul Anka, A Steel Guitar and a Glass of Wine, 1962.Carole King, Crying…