Tavares

Artist: Tavares  

LP: Check It Out

Song: "Mama's Little Girl"

[ listen ] 

Last night I wanted to put something on the turntable to help me relax and unwind after a long and arduous day at work, so I selected this 1973 LP by the brothers Tavares that I found in the dollar bins at Fat Cat Records a few weeks back. It must have worked, since I fell asleep at the kitchen table while trying to edit the photos of Tavares from the back of the record. According to sources close to the family, the title of the record refers to the stupendously detailed and out-of-this-world needlework that adorns the outfits of Butch, Tiny, Pooch, Chubby, and Ralph in the cover photo of this, their debut LP:  

[ Check It Out ]

I'll betcha $24.80 that those dynamite duds were thrown together by Mama Tavares so her boys would make a good first impression! Lead vocals on "Mama's Little Girl" are handled by Ralph Vierra Tavares; "Check It Out" was produced by handsome musician Johnny Bristol; you can read about Tavares here.

[ Tavares ]

Gibson Brothers

Artist: Gibson Brothers

LP: 7" single

Song: "The Singer Not the Song"

[ listen ]

Just popping in to say Happy Veteran's Day and to post something randomly pulled from my collection. I found this one for just €2 on my trip to Barcelona back in the summer of 2018. My ears have loved everything they've heard by the Gibson Brothers. You can't really go wrong with a formula Wikipedia describes as a "mix of disco beats, Latin percussion, soulful vocals and a catchy tune." I'm very sad to learn that one of the three brothers, Patrick, died this past April from COVID-19.

[ Gibson Brothers ]

Carpenters

Artist: Carpenters

LP: 7" single
Song: "Superstar"

[ listen ]

I'm so proud of my 14-year-old niece! She entered a regional song performance contest, turning out a stellar rendition of this Carpenters song last weekend (it was a #2 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1971), which earned her a spot in the lineup for the next contest round. Superstar, indeed! This one's got one of the best sets of lyrics from any popular romantic love song: "Baby, baby, baby, baby, oh, baay-behh..."

[ Carpenters ]

 

[ Oops, wait. Wrong folder. ] 

[ Carpenters ]

Pat & Lolly Vegas

Artist: Pat & Lolly Vegas

LP: Pat & Lolly Vegas at the Haunted House

Song: "Here I Go (Falling In Love Again)"
[ listen ] 

Song: "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"
[ listen ]

This 1965 LP by the Vegas brothers is another one of the treasures I picked up at Daybreak Records a few weeks ago. After being persuaded by Jimi Hendrix to embrace their native roots, Pat & Lolly went on to form Redbone in 1969...and the rest, as they say, is Wikipedia entry. I've just gone and picked up a truckload of foam rubber, six gallons of red food coloring, 24 white party hats and a fog machine. I'll be spending the rest of the weekend re-creating that fantastic Haunted House bandstand in the bedroom of my apartment!

[ Pat & Lolly Vegas ]

The Breeders

Artist: The Breeders

LP: Mountain Battles

Song: "Walk It Off"

[ listen ]

Song: "Regalame Esta Noche"
[ listen ]

Happy New Year! I escaped America for a few days and zoomed up to Victoria, British Columbia on the Victoria Clipper for a bit of rest and relaxation. Plus records! The Turntable is a neat-looking little store situated in the famously quaint and narrow Fan Tan Alley, near the city's Chinatown neighborhood. Oh, did I say store? Record museum is what I actually meant, since the prices at The Turntable generally discourage purchasing by anyone who isn't a nutty collector or an unfortunate tourist who has absolutely no idea what they're doing when shopping for vinyl. Here are a few unfortunate examples: 

• Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits = $20. You can find three copies of this at just about any thrift store for $1 apiece.
• Frigid Pink LP you can see on the wall in the photo below = $45. I paid $6 for mine and have seen it around pretty regularly for a similar price. 
• Tom Waits' "Foreign Affairs" LP = 2 copies at $45 apiece. Records this expensive should be ones that you aren't likely to find available for sale ever again...especially not three seconds later right there in the very same bin.
• Berlin "Love Life" LP = $12. OMG. Take my breath away! Are you nuts? 

There were lots of good records at The Turntable, but they basically have an ongoing "buy-one-for-the-price-of-eight" sale and I just wasn't having it....well, not until I found The Breeders' "Mountain Battles" LP perched up on the wall display for $30. That, as a matter of fact, seemed reasonable.

For one thing, that's $30 Canadian, which equals about $25 US. For another thing, The Breeders are one of my favorite bands and you don't see this one around too often on vinyl. For yet one more thing, it features a song, "Regalame Esta Noche," sung entirely in Spanish! For a last and final thing, it was just about the only reasonably-priced LP in the store and I desperately wanted a souvenir from this place! You can read about "Mountain Battles" on Wikipedia here and go here to find a 2008 Pitchfork review that seems pretty spot-on to me.

[ The Breeders, circa 2008 ]

[ The Turntable — Victoria, BC, Canada ]

The Talbot Brothers of Bermuda

Artist: The Talbot Brothers of Bermuda

LP: Calypsos

Song: "You Can Go (But You'll Return)"
[ listen ]

Song: "Sager Boy"
[ listen ]

The Talbot Brothers, who were all the rage in Bermuda when this LP was released back in 1957, have asked me to wish you Happy Valentine's Day, from you to them. They would have told you themselves, but Archie, Austin, Bryan, Ross, Roy and Cousin Mandy are no longer with us. Roy Talbot, who was the last surviving member of the group, died in May of 2009. So anyway, Happy Valentine's Day!

The Talbot Brothers of Bermuda on YouTube:

[ "Bermuda Buggy-Ride" ]

[ The Talbot Brothers of Bermuda ]

Guido & Maurizio

Artist: Guido & Maurizio

LP: Welcome!

Song: "Verde"
[ listen ]

Song: "Goodbye My Friend"
[ listen ]

Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, whose film THE SALESMAN has just been nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, has decided not to attend the awards ceremony in Hollywood this year. He'd initially planned to be there, but after Friday's executive order banning travel to the USA from seven Muslim-majority countries, Farhadi regretfully announced, "I have decided to not attend the Academy Awards Ceremony alongside my fellow members of the cinematic community...the possibility of (my) presence is being accompanied by ifs and buts which are in no way acceptable to me, even if exceptions were to be made for my trip." 

He continued, "To humiliate one nation with the pretext of guarding the security of another is not a new phenomenon in history and has always laid the groundwork for the creation of future divide and enmity. I hereby express my condemnation of the unjust conditions forced upon some of my compatriots and the citizens of the other six countries trying to legally enter the United States of America and hope that the current situation will not give rise to further divide between nations."

That sucks. Asghar Farhadi's A SEPARATION won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film of 2011, and he's one of the most exciting filmmakers working today.

Speaking of films, brothers Guido & Maurizio De Angelis made music for lots of them, mostly the ones from Italy. They also made pop songs with vocals, but those were released under the name Oliver Onions.

Sum Sum & Bun Bun Sisters

Artist: Sum Sum & Bun Bun Sisters

LP: 7" single

Song: "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" 
[ listen ]

Have I ever told you about the time I was working at Scarecrow Video and a group of young Asian college students came in and asked if we had the film "Chicky Chicky Boom Boom?" I honestly thought they were looking for some rare soft-core Russ Meyer film that had never been released on video. 

Anyway, I figured my upstate New York record hunting was finished once I left Ithaca, since I'd found a notice online that the one and only vinyl shop in Jamestown, NY had closed in 2015. But I had to visit Jamestown anyhow, since that's where Lucille Ball comes from and they've got a museum, her grave, the "Scary Lucy" statue, and other things like that strewn all over town. As I was walking through downtown Jamestown to take a gander at a humongous I Love Lucy mural painted on the side of a building...
 

...my eyes were instinctively drawn to the word "RECORDS" painted on a column outside Collector's Paradise, a store with a treasure trove of odds and ends assembled inside. 

As I browsed through the bins, I heard the store owner bragging about how he'd taken over the shop from the previous owner, a woman who, according to him, "was just giving things away. She didn't know the value of anything! You have to know what you've got so people don't swindle you! Now I know what things are worth. You won't find any deals here!"

"You won't find any deals here." Not the most effective advertising slogan I've ever heard. When I came across a batch of 45s from Singapore in the 1960s that didn't have prices on them, I was prepared for the worst. The owner had left by the time I brought my few records to the counter, and the friendly gal working there wasn't allowed to do any pricing. She couldn't reach the owner by phone, so I had to leave my name and number. She was going to have him come back in to price the records, and then I could stop by again after visiting the Lucy & Desi Museum to see what sort of deal I wasn't going to get (my words, not hers). 

Of course it's hard to imagine that the good people of Jamestown have been scrambling over each other, forming lines around the block to acquire 1960s vinyl singles from Singapore, but evidently the owner posts things like this on e-Bay and they go for a pretty penny—a pretty penny, indeed. I'd found about ten singles in all, and when I returned from the museum and saw what some of them had been priced at I had to stifle a scream...not a scream of joy. Let me just say this: I'd suggest changing the name of the shop from 'Collector's Paradise' to 'Collector's Quandary.'

I picked out three of the singles that I was most excited about that didn't have six-figure prices on them and made an offer for the trio. The nice gal I was working with, who did seem to really want me to have the singles, I must say, called the owner to present my counter-offer. (I tried to sweeten the deal by also purchasing a nice vinyl copy of The Beatles' "Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band," which wasn't overpriced there any more than it is at every other record shop in America.) My offer was accepted. So I guess you really can find deals at Collector's Paradise. Well, actually, no. You can't. But things can be arranged in such a way that you feel like you got a deal at Collector's Paradise, and sometimes that will just have to do.

I know I put myself through an awful lot of trouble for three measly 7" singles. But I just couldn't imagine pulling out of Jamestown knowing that I'd left behind a copy of "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" as recorded by the Sum Sum & Bun Bun Sisters of Singapore in 1969. It was worth it. The record is more than spectacular! (Or, to use the vernacular, it's wizard; it's smashing; it's keen.) Go ahead and look for more pics of these sisters, but all you're likely to come up with is a bunch of photos of these.
 

[ Sum Sum & Bun Bun Sisters ]

[ Collector's Paradise — Jamestown, NY ]