Lambert, Hendricks & Ross “The Best of Lambert, Hendricks & Ross”

I feel like I had another record by them awhile back, and I feel like I wrote about it, but I can’t find it. I picked up this one fairly recently—a little against my better judgment because it’s a “best of” record—and the cover (a stylized silhouette drawing of three howling cats) made me think this was released like, yesterday. Also because it’s a very clean copy. It’s also on that most common of all labels, the red Columbia one. So I was kind of shocked to see the record came out in 1974—that’s 45 years ago! Oh, now looking at the small print… this record was previously released as their record, “The Hottest New Group in Jazz” in 1959—so it’s essentially a re-release. So, as an object, it’s brand new—that is, if 1974 was now, but, well, the music… that makes more sense to me… it sounds like 1959.

The music on this is all good, I like every song, and I can listen to this at every meal. Lambert, Hendricks & Ross are—well, you know—a vocal group consisting of Dave Lambert, Jon Hendricks, and Annie Ross. (I’m not sure if they considered calling themselves: Annie, Jon & Dave.) I first heard one of the songs from this record, Annie Ross’ song, “Twisted,” when Woody Allen used it as the title song in his movie, Deconstructing Harry (1997)—along with jump cuts of Judy Davis in a murderous rage. It’s the best opening of any of his movies (well, except for maybe Manhattan). Though the very first place I ever saw her was acting, playing a singer in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts (1993). I believe you can find some old footage of her, maybe on YouTube (I’ll look), yeah, on some kind of old TV show that is made to look like a casual party, where you know, Count Basie happens to be playing and people (Annie Ross, then Lambert and Hendricks and Joe Williams) break out into some jazz singing. I’ve already said something else is the “best thing on the internet”—but really, this may be. It’s great. And this album’s not bad, either—like I said, all the songs here are good—they’re fun, and all pretty unique while fitting together like anything. My favorites here being Cloudburst, Twisted, and, really, just all of them. And Summertime (some day I will make a mix tape of all the versions I can find, and this is a particularly killer one).

I just noticed that there are some extensive liner notes on the back cover, written by Jon Hendricks, which I failed to read before, so I will now—written for this re-release in 1974 (he mentions Watergate)—really good liner notes, kind of a poetically conveyed history of the band, ending with his poem (“the shortest jazz poem ever heard.”) “Listen.” I’m going to steal that. That’s perfection, poetry-wise. But where do you go from there? I guess imperfection, which is also beautiful, and contained in all my favorite stuff. As part of his brief history of each of them, and them getting together, he tells us that he’s from Toledo, Ohio (interesting to me since I’m from non-literally a stone’s-throw from there), home of Art Tatum, among others, and also the expression “Holy Toledo”—which he says: “derives from the fact that there are only two bad weeks in show business: Holy Week and a week in Toledo. And if you happen to be booked in Toledo during Holy Week, well—’Holy Toledo!’”

Pete Rugolo “The Sweet Ride”

You might expect that the soundtrack of my favorite movie of all time would not be my favorite record of all time. Of course it isn’t. But part of my love for this the movie, The Sweet Ride (1968), is that the score is pretty great, as is the opening title song (which is also the end credits music). The score is by Pete Rugolo, who did tons of great scores, was an arranger and composer, made lots records, was all over the place. I’ll pick up any record I see his name remotely on. Also, this record is kind of two-for-one, because the title song (which sounds nothing like the score music) is by Lee Hazlewood and sung by Dusty Springfield—it would be worth buying even if the rest of the record was unlistenable, which it’s not. It’s a great title song, with really funny lyrics, and has been running a loop in my brain for the last 50 years. I mean that in a good way. The score has, what seems like, a deliberately trashy feel, which is appropriate, since it’s an exploitation movie. It kind of sounds like the score for one of those 1960s Tony Curtis movies where he plays a major sleaze, like one of those stories where a character from the Fifties rubs up against characters from the Sixties, and kind of comments on both eras, and the changing times, while trying to simultaneously sell itself with sex. But the score also rises above that—to a great degree, too—almost sounds experimental at times and, I think, is great art. This is appropriate because, in my opinion, the movie does the same thing. I mean, it rises above the exploitation movie, the trash movie, and is great art. Did I say it was my favorite movie of all time? (It isn’t, really, but it’s definitely tied for first.) It’s impossible to listen to this record without it recalling scenes from the movie—which is fine, and maybe it makes me like it more. But I would also say, as groovy as this record is, I might like it even more if I had never seen the movie. There’s my one word review: groovy.

Tamiko Jones “Tamiko”

I had never heard of Tamiko Jones when I picked up this record for nothing—I bought solely on the cover, a full size headshot of her, equal parts odd and beautiful, with painted on eyebrows and pale lipstick—kind of a hunting photo, really, with such a limited depth of field that her dark eyes are barely in focus, while her ears are part of the background blur. The stark red letters: “Tamiko” are in a kind of “Exotica” font that led me to believe this record might be in that vein, but it’s not at all—it’s kind of pop jazz vocalist stuff—pretty straightforward, but really nice, and to me has kind of an odd edge that I can’t really place. Sometimes she sounds a little like—it almost came to me—but I lost it. If we’re to believe Internet, she was born in Kyle, West Virginia and raised in Detroit, so it’s safe to assume she must have visited the Cedar Point amusement park in Sandusky, Ohio, during it’s prime years. It also says she is part Japanese, part British, and part Cherokee. The album has virtually no credits, but some is arranged by Jimmy Wisner, and some by Pete Dino. There is some standard sounding pop orchestra, and then some that sounds pretty otherworldly, with haunting vibes, some pretty prominent flute, and… do I hear a harp? There are some bossa nova songs, probably my favorites here. And a nice version of “You Only Live Twice,” my favorite Bond song (not in part because it makes no sense). A Bacharach/David number, which I always like. Really, I’m pretty captivated by this record, to the extent that I don’t want to ruin the spell by listening to it too many times right now—I know I can come back to it and have the same kind of curious reaction to it—at least I hope so. So I might write about it again.

The Partridge Family – The Partridge Family Album

My copy of this record is trashed—I don’t think there is any chance of this being the actual copy I had when I was 10 years old—I’m pretty sure I bought this at a thrift store at some point—but my copy would probably be, if it still existed, this scratchy. This may be the first LP I ever bought—it was either this or a Tommy Roe LP. Before that, I did buy many 45s. I used to play my records on a “Show N Tell,” which was a kids’ toy record player—well, it worked—it looked like a little TV with a turntable on the top, and you played these slide shows with accompanying records. But I eventually used it as my hi-fi, and played my records on it—I don’t imagine the sound was great, and it probably had a stylus like a roofing nail. These things, and all memories of them, disappeared off the face of the Earth—but of course, I bet I could find one on either eBay or YouTube or both. It’s now nearly a week later and I’ve been doing little else but looking at Show N Tell videos on YouTube. Also, found my Niagara Falls motion lamp, vintage Hot Wheels, and a Major Matt Mason space station. I can probably find every odd and obscure thing I recall from my childhood on YouTube now, which is great, in a way, but you’ve got to limit yourself—like with angel food cake, coffee ice cream, Girl Scout cookies, potato chips, and purple drank.

This record always sounded great to me, even though you knew the band wasn’t a real band (it’s a TV show!) and it’s no doubt bubblegum, syrupy, and corny—but why is it so great? Little did I know (when I was 10) that the songs were written by some of the best pop songwriters of all time, and it was being performed by some of the best LA studio musicians of the era. “I Think I Love You” was the big hit—I think I had the 45, first. But then on this album, side two has two even better songs, “I’m On The Road” and “Somebody Wants To Love You”—both songs that give me goosebumps to this day. When I think about it now, this record, and the TV show every week, under the influence of my first heartbreaking crush, along with these songs and this music—no wonder I was scarred for life. The other odd thing—the memories that listening to this record beings back—is I remember finding out that David Cassidy was actually Shirley Jones’ step-son in real life, which confused me for some reason. I guess watching the show I got this weird feeling of an incestuous relationship between those two (or at least their characters)—which I couldn’t really put my finer on, or put into words. But when I think about it now—I guess with the variety of ages and genders of the kids in the family, much like the Brady Bunch, you were intended to maybe be infatuated with the one close to your age. But me, as a 10 year old, for some reason, had a huge crush on Shirley Jones. I wonder what that was all about.

Mountain “Flowers of Evil”

The guitars on this record just won’t quit. They may well outlast the demise of almost everything else on the Earth. In some future time, just after the cockroaches have even finally all died out, those guitars might still be going. But it’s just one guitar, right? Do I have to look this up? Sometimes I want to deal with a record just at face value, which is why I so enjoyed staying at various cabins in the “North Woods” where the internet is just a rumor, yet they have an old hi-fi and a stack of moldy LPs. This one has everything you need, pictures of the four guys in the band and simple descriptions of the instruments they play (guitar, vocals, bass, drums, keyboards), songwriting credits, some lyrics, but like a lot of older records, no date. (It’s from 1971.) Great front cover black and white band photo—the guys wearing their best stuff, but trying to look casual, and like the photographer was able to expend exactly one photo. On one guy’s shirt it says “Gerken”—but I think that was written there by the former owner of this LP—Gerken is a company that moves dirt from point A to point B. Or it could be a misspelling of gherkin, a type of pickle. Or it could be an obscure weed reference. Or the former owner’s name. At any rate, any of those things could explain the condition of this record (dirt, weed, pickle juice)—it’s close to unplayable. There are also liner notes explaining how side two—which is live—is really long (almost half an hour) which—considering that it was not really recommended making LPs that long due to diminishing sound quality— is really not all that bad sounding.

There has been nearly a half century of guitar heavy rock played, recorded, performed, and practiced by too-loud-neighbors since this record came out, which is a staggering amount, enough to sink the world and float the Titanic. So it’s kind of hard to appreciate what was likely the mind-blowing and groundbreaking nature of the hard rock this band was playing—but it’s just really difficult to put into perspective. I could probably enjoy it more if the record didn’t sound like it was being simultaneously murdered as it played. To be fair, I looked for some stuff on the internet, and there is some really great old footage of them playing live, and I very much enjoyed that. The guitar player and singer, Leslie West, is a big, sweaty guy, and really fun to watch play. I always love when a guitar player makes his guitar look like both a toy, a weapon, and an unwanted growth he’s trying to eradicate. I also really like certain guy’s names that are more often women’s names—not the unisex names, but the ones that kind of throw you off, like Leslie and Tracy. I don’t know why that’s important—and why names are important—but it is and they are.