Monthly Archives: January 2010

Dick Dale: King of the Surf Guitar

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Dale’s second album dilutes the guitar sting of his debut

Dick Dale’s second album was his first to be issued on the Capitol label, and though his guitar playing is solid (as is his saxophonist’s), the song selection isn’t as inspiring as his debut, Surfer’s Choice. The Blossoms, featuring Darlene Love, back Dale on the title track and the guitarist sings lead on “Kansas City,” “Dick Dale Stomp,” and several other tracks. The covers include R&B, Soul, Folk, Country and International tunes that aren’t always the best showcase for Dale’s immense instrumental talent. Or at least they’re not always arranged to leave space for his guitar. The second half of the album offers more charms, with staccato flat-picked shredding on “Hava Nagela” and “Riders in the Sky,” fancy picking on “Mexico” and a low twangy groove on “Break Time.” Sundazed’s CD reissue adds two bonus tracks, both instrumentals that offer up samplings of Dale’s six-string craft, but on balance there’s more singing and sax than belongs on an album titled “King of the Surf Guitar.” This album leaves you wanting more of Dale’s picking, which just might have been the idea at the time. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

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Various Artists: Radio Hits of the 60s

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Terrific collection of AM radio’s highly varied legacy

Rather than picking an artist or label or scene or sound, Legacy’s pulled together thirteen original hit recordings that show the range of music that AM radio brought to its listeners. Collected here is New Orleans R&B (“Ya Ya,” 1961 and “Working in the Coal Mine,” 1966), Dixieland Jazz (“Washington Square,” 1963), Easy Listening (“A Fool Never Learns,” 1964), Folk Pop and Rock (“We’ll Sing in the Sunshine,” 1964 and “In the Year 2525,” 1969), Garage Punk (“Little Girl,” 1966), Soul (“I’m Your Puppet,” 1966 and “Cherry Hill Park,” 1969), Bubblegum (“Simon Says,” 1968), Trad Jazz Vocal (“The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde,” 1968), and Vocal Pop (“Worst That Could Happen,” 1969).

Even within these individual songs you can often hear more than one genre exerting its influence, such as the steel guitar and horns that provide accents to the superb pop production of Merrilee Rush’s “Angel of the Morning.” In this day of highly balkanized music channels and individually programmed MP3 playlists, it’s hard to imagine such variety inhabiting a single mass-market playlist, but that was part of AM radio’s power to attract and keep a broad swath of listeners. Playing this collection will remind you how good record and radio people were at picking and making hits – the winnowing process disenfranchised many, but what got through the sieves, particularly what got to the top of the charts, was often highly memorable.

Legacy’s disc clocks in at a slim 35 minutes, but what’s here is a terrifically nostalgic spin whose songs stand up to repeated listening forty-plus years later. True, Andy Williams’ “A Fool Never Learns” might wear out its welcome before the other tracks, but it’s part and parcel of the ebb and flow of 1960s AM radio. This set isn’t meant to be an all-inclusive compilation of any one thing in particular, but a reminder of the breadth that once graced individual radio stations across the land. There was a unity to AM radio’s audience that’s been replace by the free choice of the empowered individual. That personalization carries with it many benefits, but the range of this set may remind you of what’s also been lost. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Various Artists: ’60s Indie Garage

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Rich collection of mostly original mid-60s garage-rock obscurities

You know you’re in for an interesting ride when a compilation begins with an obscure single, “Lady Greengrass” (and it’s flipside “Love of Mine”), by a pre-Tangerine Dream light-psych incarnation called The Ones, from a 7” single that sported the legend “Music for Hippies.” There are a few better known garage items, like the Litter’s “Action Woman,” and E-Types “Put the Clock Back on the Wall,” but most of these cuts are obscure to all but completist collectors of Nuggets, Pebbles and Boulders compilations or the original 45s from which they’re made. You’ll hear lots of fuzztone and reverbed guitars, whining Farfisa, badly recorded drums, tambourine, frat-rock dance beats, and vocals that range from snotty and bored to loud and confrontational. Tracks by the Shadows of Knight’s (“Gloria”) and the Mojo Men (“She’s My Baby”) aren’t the original single versions – though they may be period alternates, and Blue Cheer’s bombastic “Summertime Blues” doesn’t really belong here. Audio quality is good (though, of course, the original records weren’t always great to begin with) and the transcriptions seem to have been cleaned up as there’s virtually no surface noise, clicks or pops. What’s here is listenable, if not always from the best source; the E-Types “Put the Clock Back on the Wall,” for example is available in higher fidelity stereo on Introducing… The E-Types. Like many of Goldenlane’s compilations, the lack of provenance for these tracks keeps this set from achieving the collector’s nirvana of the Nuggets box sets [1 2 3] or Pebbles reissues [1 2 etc.], but 50 tracks for less than the price of a single CD is a great deal even without band bios or track notes. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]