Chicks On Speed – The Re-Releases Of The Un-Releases
“Give Me Back My Man” (Yes…a cover of the B-52s!)

Chicks on Speed is Melissa Logan (from New York), Kiki Moorse (from Munich) and Alex Murray-Leslie (from Bowral, Australia). They use the “Chicks On Speed” name for their music productions, clothing label, design work and their record label (Chicks On Speed Records). Their clothing line is as fabulous and outrageous as their music. Check some of it out here. Along with crafting deconstructed, feminist-leaning no-wave drenched synth pop, the group also runs Go Records, Stop Records, and Chicks on Speed Records; designs video and print graphics and art installations; and makes and sells avant-garde paper and leather clothing. Appropriate to their arty, Eurotrash vibe, Moorse, Logan, and Murray-Leslie met in 1997 at a bar near Munich’s Art Academy. Soon after, they were releasing limited-edition, critically-acclaimed singles such as Smash Metal, which pitted the group against Patrick Pulsinger, DMX Krew, and DJ Hell (whose album Munich Machine they also appeared on), as well as the ironic, pseudo-house anthem Glamour Girl. Their live shows ranged from appearances at 2000’s Love Parade festival to touring with Console and Super Collider to gigs at renovated mental hospitals. Mid-2000 saw the release of their debut album Chicks On Speed Will Save Us All! What’s most noteworthy about Chicks on Speed is, well, their *speed*. They hit the ground at Warp 9 and, without a second’s warning, took both the art and music worlds by storm, designing fashion shows, performing, and recording two records in under two years. And in that short time after their art-school formation, they were taken under the wings of Austrian electro-glitch producers Gerhard Potuznik and Ramon Bauer, only to become instant stars on the intelligent club circuit. Their first US record, The Re-releases of the Un-releases, shown here, is a brilliant collection of their early work as remixed by Bauer and Potuznik. The Re-releases is raw and unpolished but somehow charming and a bit more personal than their import-onlydebut. As well, The Re-releases preserves the studio chatter between the Chicks and their producers and includes strikingly innovative and screamer-worthy covers of the B-52’s “Gimme Back My Man,” the Normals’ “Warm Leatherette” (with DJ Hell), and the Delta 5’s “Mind Your Own Business.” Although Chicks on Speed was originally conceived as an art installation project, they’ve obviously found a niche within synthetic pop music and they exhibit an impressive amount of songwriting skill and social commentary. But, really, they’re just some pretty funny, fast and furious chicks.

My computers have all been down for the past couple of weeks, so my ability to keep the Jukebox Heart motor spinning has been limited. But I’ve been busy coming up with ideas and arranging some special reports for upcoming updates.

I’ve also been combing through the used bins at my favorite stores, because they’ve all been dramatically clearing out their inventories. Such bargains! Couple this with a challenge I’ve been given in another forum (one of sveral where this blog gets cross-posted) to write about a CD (among other items) that I believe no one else who reads my entries on that forum owns. Considering that I believe a rather significant portion of my personal collection falls into this category, it was hard to pick just one.

Until I sat through a listen of this recent find in a cut-out bin at Newbury Comics.

Lady and Bird “Lady and Bird”
(Yellow Tangerine Records CD, 2006)

This side project is from the duo of internationally famous singer/songwriter Keren Ann Zeidel and Bardi Johannson (lead singer of Iceland’s Bang Gang). This incredibly charming CD was first released in France in 2003, but was not picked up in the US until 2006 when the tiny US indie Yellow Tangerine released it. The US version contains an exclusive live acoustic track of “Do What I Do”. Keren Ann is Israeli born, currently living in France by way of Holland and Belgium. Bardi Johanssen is “a tall Icelandic Man” releasing music under thename Bang Gang as well as his own name, since 1996. This CD is a stylistic departure for both artists. Lady & Bird’s liner notes confirm what everyone always wants to know about their favorite rock stars, “Yes! We always have sex all the time!”. And honestly, given the beauty and tenderness of the music on this CD, there should never have been any doubt.

There are so many breathtaking moments on this CD that it is hard to know where to begin. The influences are many and certainly diverse. In the avant pop realm, if one were to draw a square with His Name Is Alive, Stereolab, The Magnetic Fields and Goldfrapp posted prominently at each corner, Lady and Bird occupy the space bound by those with a determined sensibility that might land them with a future release on Audio Dregs, Tomlab, Fat Cat or some such similarly minded imprint. The instrumentation, arrangements and especially the magical vocals and harmonies here will cast this as one of the greatest unknown independents ever.

This is not to say that this virgin effort is without its flaws. Two of the tracks, Shepard’s Song and La Ballade of Lady & Bird employ some questionable vocal stylizations and effects. Ballade is a spoken radioplay of sorts whose musical background is as impeccable as the rest of the tracks here, but their voices have been electronically raised to make them sound like they are speaking behind lungs full of helium. In Shepard’s Song, an artificially deep-voiced beast is enough to make me squint and scratch my head – and almost caused me to drop the CD back into the cut-out bin, which would have been my own tragic loss.

The band, however, more than adequately overcomes these flaws, not in the least with their selections of included cover songs, both included here. The Velvet Underground’s “Stephanie Says” is just *owned* by Lady and Bird, and their lyrically complete version of “Suicide is Painless”, aka The Theme from M*A*S*H, is simply devastating.

Here are some tracks from the album. The individual tracks are all wonderful, but their sequencing on the CD is of equal importance as well. I’ve listed them here in order of appearance on the album.

Stephanie Says
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/ladynbird/track3.mp3]

Walk Real Slow
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/ladynbird/track4.mp3]

Suicide Is Painless
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/ladynbird/track5.mp3]

Run in the Morning Sun
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/ladynbird/track7.mp3]

Blue Skies
[audio:http:////www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/ladynbird/track9.mp3]

This week, I happened to borrow the “Phil Spector: Back To Mono” 4-CD box set from my local public library. It traces his career from his earliest works in the late fifties to the rise of his legendary imprint Philles Records. I have many of the original 45s featured on the set, but I thought it would be nice to have pristine digital copies of those songs, so I began to rip away track after fabulous track. Phil Spector is one of my heroes. And there were several songs I had never heard before getting hold of this set.

The project is fairly exhaustive, but I was surprised at some of the things that were omitted. The story of his legendary business tactic is well known, and it includes the commercially unavailable record by his signature group The Crystals called “(Let’s Dance) The Screw” which is currently known to exist only has a handful of DJ copies and one stock copy. This was pressed to get out of a contractual obligation to his partner, and is highly sought after by collectors. It’s been bootlegged a gazillion times and odds are if you run across a copy of it, it is counterfeit. I don’t have a copy, but an original looks like this:

At this writing, I don’t have an mp3 of that track to include, but I would be happy to link to one if any of you can point me to a copy on line.

Another oddly omitted track is the amazing B-Side of the Ronettes Walking In The Rain hit single, called How Does it Feel?

[audio:http://www.paulcollegio.net/juke/divas/bunny01.mp3]

While I love the Ronettes – and who wouldn’t what with those fabulous towering hairdos and sweater-piercing cone-bras – Ronnie Spector’s vibrato just reminds me of Kathryn Hepburn in the latter stages of Parkinson’s disease. Finally having said that, this is one of my favorite Ronettes songs evah and perhaps their most avant garde production, given that stressed out horn section and nightmarish background vocal arrangement. It’s the flip side of another of their big hits, (I said HITS) ‘Walking in the Rain’.

Phil Spector is pretty much unanimously given credit for the invention of the “Wall of Sound”, and his signature sound has had enormous impact on the direction of pop music over the last four decades. And credit is definitely due. But he was definitely influenced by certain sounds happening in the R&B world over the previous years, and these records definitely poured the foundation for the Wall of Sound. I think astute listeners will be very able to trace his influences back to a decade before his earliest releases, to a man named Terry Johnson.

Terry began his recording career with an obscure Baltimore based vocal group called The Whispers in the early 1950s. They only recorded two singles for Philadelphia’s Gotham Records label. One of them, “Are You Sorry” is just an amazing example of group sound, and only a handful of elite collectors really know about it. The harmonies and arrangements are innovative and breathtaking…all arranged by then 16-year old Terry Johnson. Click below to hear it.

The Whispers – Are You Sorry
[audio:http://www.paulcollegio.net/juke/juke0506/doowop.mp3]

After the Whispers fell apart, Terry managed to hook up with the Flamingos and by 1958 was one of the lead duet singers in “Lovers Never Say Goodbye”. Terry did the arrangement on virtually all of the singles the Flamingos recorded for George Goldner’s End label.

Perhaps the most recognizable song from The Flamingos is their 1959 version of the classic I Only Have Eyes For You. This is the focal point, the song that I believe inspired Phil Spector and pushed him toward developing and evolving The Wall of Sound. This was a process in The Flamingos music that was developing over the years, but it was Terry Johnson who made it gel with songs like Lovers Never Say Goodbye, Mio Amore and many others. But it is in I Only Have Eyes For You is where the concept is really spot-on.

[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/spector/Flamingos_eyes.mp3]

Terry ultimately landed Motown Records as an artist and producing partners with Smokey Robinson. As an artist, he recorded several records on the Gordy Label. He wrote, arranged, and produced songs for Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, The Supremes, The Four Tops, The Temptations, Martha Reeves & The Vandellas, Edwin Starr, The Spinners, Bobby Taylor & the Vancouvers, Jimmy Ruffin, Mickey Denton, Blinky and other Motown artists.

Anna Domino is an American singer who relocated to Brussels in the eighties. She has an incredibly cool, low, sexy voice that was once described as the voice of the erotic, tense, despairing, thinking woman: Peggy Lee-meets-Nico.

She was part of the exploding Brussels music scene of the romantic antique-overcoat cold-war era that began with Joy Division and ended when the wall came down. It was this time when quite a lot of “immigrants” from the States and England contributed to an exciting, experimental musical climate in Brussels especially. Blaine L. Reininger, Tuxedomoon, the Legendary Pink Dots, Isabelle Antena, Paul Haig are among those who made the voyage over. Many of these recorded for the immortal and legendary independent record label Les Disques du Crépuscule – or Operation Twilight Records, under which alternate name some related records were issued. She also did a number of guest-appearances on album of others, such as on “Temperamental” by Kid Montana (another half Belgian/half American affair), aka Dudley Klute, now famous for his guest appearance on the Magnetic Fields Sixty-Nine Love Songs box. Crepuscule’s output is prized by most collectors, including myself, and much of it has been either reissued directly or repackaged for anthology reissue by LTM.

Though she disappeared slowly from the public eye in Belgium, Anna Domino has continued to record and publish her songs ever since. She has worked with Alan Rankine (The Associates), Marc Moulin & Dan Lacksman (Telex), Flood (Depeche Mode, Erasure), Blaine L. Reiniger (Tuxedomoon) and Anton Sanko (Suzanne Vega).

In 1999, Anna resurfaced as Snakefarm with the CD “Songs From My Funeral”, a project that has been described as “Acid-blues? Folk-funk? Troubadour trip-hop?” by the American music-press. Together with her Belgian husband Michel Delory she recorded a number of old American folk songs or “murder ballads”, and thanks to Nick Cave for bringing the term into vogue, such as “John Henry”, “Saint James Infirmary”, and “Tom Dooley”, albeit with a more modern bent.

Anna is remembered in various circles for different songs. In my own circle, the one song that is uniquely hers is “88”. It’s from her third album, “Coloring in The Edge and The Outline”, and it completely sums up that heady era in one burst of song. Anyway, I needed cheering up today, and this song always works. You can click below to hear it, and get cheered up right along with me.

Time For A Little Hero Worship at Jukebox Heart…

Arriving in the mail Friday from Netflix was the “Not A Photograph” DVD, the story of the legendary Boston band Mission of Burma. I have to say, it’s a pretty fantastic document of the band from their inception to their completely upsetting disbanding in 1983 and then to their reunion in 2002.

I arrived in Boston in 1978, shortly before Burma formed. I never had the chance to see the pre-Burma band Moving Parts perform, but, given that I lived in Kenmore Square for the better part of four years, I did get to see MoB play many times, as well as the earliest performances by the co- and post-Burma band, Birdsongs of the Mesozoic. The video omits all of the side projects and post-Burma bands, such as the Volcano Suns, Kustomized, or No Man, sort of giving the uninitiated the idea that they went off to oblivion between incarnations of MoB.

But that’s a minor issue, the DVD itself is pretty great, especially where it shows the band in its infancy performing at various locations. While Burma would have been a perfectly fab main act, the best shows were where Mission of Burma opened for other amazing bands – setting the standard for the main act to meet. Such examples: with Pere Ubu at the Main Act, and with Gang of Four at the Paradise. Of course, Sundays at the Rat… cheap beer, and walking distance from my BU dorm.

Anyway, the arrival of this DVD spurred a weekend of listening to Mission of Burma. I dug out the singles and all the vinyl I have and punched up the volume until the windows rattled like the studio at Fort Apache. One of the high points of the weekend was the discovery by my son and his girlfriend that Moby’s was not the original version of “That’s When I Reach For My Revolver.”

This was followed by a trip to Newbury Comics in search of copy of The Obliterati, which I found, used on the cheap for $5.99, and which, to my squealing delight, came completely unmarked with an accompanying DVD of moments from the 2004 show at the Tsongas arena. Their performance of Revolver, on that DVD, is embedded below.

Peter Prescott is just one of the best fucking drummers to ever have lived. If no one has said it yet, then, goddammit, let it be said now. I’ve always thought so, and Rick Harte, producer of their earliest recordings, understood that too. The drum sounds he captured and knob-twirled into eternity, only prove it.

Everyone has a favorite Burma song, and here’s mine. The band’s second single, from 1982. The drums are only a part of it…

My thoughts are reborn…

While I am on the path of providing some bizzare and unusual cover versions, I stumbled upon this one.

It’s bad. Very Bad. It’s so bad that the only redeeming value is that moment where the shock of recognition hits you. This is so much the case for this song that I’m not even going to tell you what it is. But don’t worry; you *will* figure it out.  Though I will tell you about the band and the album. Now don’t go looking it up; you’re only cheating yoruself. *wink*

Originally on Atlantic Records, this album was passed over for reissue during a huge burst of reissue activity. Years later, it was picked up by Collectibles and is available once again. It first appeared in 1972, during the height of the first doo-wop revival, and while conetmporary critics don’t seem to realize that all went on back then, it was a pretty huge thing at the time. And it spurred certain artists to create contemporary interpretations of the genre. And established artists like Frank Zappa began to kick in, and new artists such as the Manhattan Transfer appeared. Many surviving groups resurfaced trying to capitalize and reinvention. Some worked, some didn’t.

So here’s the mystery track:
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/godfreydaniel/godfrey.mp3]

Admittedly, his take on reinventing the genre was unique. Rather then re-purpose songs plucked from the defined genre, he covered contemporary songs, reinventing them as doo wop. I first heard this in the context of a doo wop anthology, so I was completely unprepared for it.

We may never know what compelled the band to take this approach — no one seems to know who the band is! I mean, as bad as this is, even the SHAGGS were proud eough of their work to own it publically. Be that as it may, Godfrey Daniel remains a mystery. The album’s cover image, of an abandoned recording studio, and its meager liner notes provide no clues whatoseover, though rumors have been flying for decades: the Amboy Dukes being the number one pick. And if *that* doesn’t take you on a journey to the center of yoru mind, I don’t know what would. But more likely it’s producer/arranger Andy Solomon. Not that many people are doing much detective work. After a deal with Atlantic records, the group put out this (their only) record in 1972. It flopped and they disappeared.

Possibly a cover version even more bizarre than IQU’s theremin based version of “Loving You” is Dion “Why Must I Be A Teenager In Love?” Di Mucci covering Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze.

While Dion is probably most famous for his solo single, “The Wanderer”, his group, Dion and the Belmonts was the most successful white doo wop group of all. And while his biggest solo hit was The Wanderer, he also scored big with other familiar songs like Ruby Baby, covering The Drifters and Donna the Primadonna, among others. Late in 1968, he scored again with a more politically motivated tune, the familiar “Abraham, Martin and John”. Purple Haze was the follow-up and was a commercial disaster, despite its current legendary cult status.

I got a copy of this 45, on Dion’s classic Laurie imprint, from my good friend RRRon Lessard, of RRRecords up in Lowell. He is The Man for experimental sounds in the US with his shop being a major presence in downtown Lowell for over 20 years. He comes through with these bonuses now and then…

Subscribe to Jukebox Heart here.
Listen here:
[audio:http://www.paulcollegio.net/juke/juke0706/cover.mp3]

What makes you scream??

Iqu – Sun Q
Sonic Boom Records CD, 2004

Honestly, I don’t even know how I came to own this CD. Last week, when I was in the midst of cleaning out my studio – the process of which itself was a horror show of Grand Guignol proportions – I uncovered this CD on my desk and noticed that I hadn’t entered it into the database where I keep tabs on *everything*. I don’t remember buying it, or getting it in the mail, or receiving a promo. Hmmm. Maybe I hated it and wanted to get ridf of it? I put it aside to listen to it some time…

Today, I took it in the truck and listened on the way to work. Very fun. Honestly, I was surprised at how much fun I was having. I was dancing behind the wheel at red lights. I never do that. Well, maybe not never… Anyway… fun being fun and all fun aside, about halfway through it, I had a Screamer-Of-The-Day, This Is Fucking Brilliant moment. I’ll explain shortly.

IQU (pronounced ee-koo) is a Seattle-based electronic duo who make the old sound new again. On Sun Q, the second full-length from Japanese-American multi-instrumentalists Kento Oiwa and Michiko Swiggs, the duo jettison the improvisational vibe (and prominent stand-up bass) of their rough-hewn 1998 K Records debut, Chotto Matte a Moment!, in favor of tighter song structures, administering juicy timbres and melodic hooks in doses generous enough to captivate even the shortest attention spans. The band is versatile enough to cover a wide array of styles transparently. The flirtatious electro-disco single “Dirty Boy”, one of the three tracks featured here, makes the catchiest use of a guitar talkbox since Frampton Comes Alive! — think Panacea covering Julie London’s “Daddy” with rapid-fire scratching by guest DJ Suspence and goofy children’s-record samples sprinkled on top. Or better, Think Pink, only it’s a much better party. The breezy, samba-cum-JPop romance of Sun Q, with its smirking tongue-in-cheek title just glide over some pretty intense lyrics. And in Owia’s hands, the theremin sounds less like a holdover from a ’50s sci-fi B-film and more like a wailing, operatic diva – the Screamer Moment I was talking about. He uses it to great effect on an instrumental interpretation of Minnie Ripperton’s 1974 R&B hit “Loving You,” replacing those sweeping glissando vocals appropriately enough with his amazing theremin performance. For those who cherished the globetrotting, cartoon club pop of Towa Tei-era Deee-Lite and enjoyed the abstractions of German electronica innovators Mouse on Mars, Sun Q offers the perfect marriage between the two.

IQU describe their music as “Bento Box Pop”, and it has been featured in the films “Everything’s Cool”, and “Another Gay Movie”. I’ve featured three tracks here on Jukebox Heart, but you can listen to the entire album on the band’s website.

Subscribe to Jukebox Heart here.
Listen here:

IQU – Dirty Boy
5.08 MB | 5:32
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/iqu/dirtyboy.mp3]

IQU – Sun Q
5.03 MB | 5:40
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/iqu/sunq.mp3]

IQU – Loving You
3.93 MB | 4:17
[audio:http://www.jukeboxheart.com/screamers/iqu/lovingyou.mp3]