Na Hoon-a

Artist: Na Hoon-a

LP: 2nd Collection of Hit Songs Sung Again

Song: "Love In a Dream"

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Song: "Three"

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I just returned from a fun weekend in Centralia with friends who will be moving away to Wisconsin next month. On our way back to Seattle, we stopped at the GoodWill thrift store in Olympia, where I found, amongst the myriad Ray Conniff and Engelbert Humperdinck LPs, this uncommon-in-these-parts 1977 collection of hits by South Korean "trot" singer Na Hoon-a. 

Hoon-a released his first record back in 1966, and, according to this piece in The Korea Times, the handsome and debonaire singer will be retiring after a few final concerts later this year! I'd love to find out how his record ended up in Olympia's GoodWill bins; there's only one copy available on Discogs, and it's in Germany. Some interesting Na Hoon-a trivia can be found on Wikipedia...in 2008 he threatened to expose himself on live television to end rumors once and for all that he had been castrated by Japanese gangsters!

Thanks to the miracle of Google Translate, the English-language lyrics to the songs posted above are included below. It's incredible how it seems I could have written "Love In a Dream" myself in the summer of 1986, when I was smitten by Shawn Bagley. We met at the church dance while he was visiting his cousins in Yakima for the season from Belleville, Illinois!

LOVE IN A DREAM

Because it's a sin to love someone you shouldn't love, 

should my speechless heart cry tonight too?

Because it's a sin not being able to forget someone who should be forgotten,

without you, should my heart cry tonight too?

Ah, love - my sad love - if it's a one-night dream that I will never see again, 

I'd rather close my eyes

Don't do it, because it's a sin to love someone you shouldn't love

Should my speechless heart cry tonight too?

THREE

This feeling of leaving and the feeling of letting go

We can't say everything we want to say to each other,

but the one thing I want to say is I loved only you. 

Nora, I truly loved you.

The joy of love and the sadness of separation - now you and I can't be together again.

I still want to leave behind one thing...

The words I only loved you. I truly loved you.

[ Na Hoon-a ]

B. J. Thomas [1942-2021]

Artist: B. J. Thomas

LP: Most Of All

Song: "Rainy Day Man"

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Song: "Most Of All"

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I was sad to hear today that raindrops will never again keep falling on this guy's head for the rest of time. I posted tracks from this 1970 LP back in October of 2015...but I don't have any other B. J. Thomas records, so here it is again. In "Most Of All," B. J. sings that he's at the railway station in St. Paul. I was just there! You can read the New York Times obituary for this handsome crooner here. 

B. J. Thomas

[ August 7, 1942 — May 29, 2021 ]

We will miss you, Billy Joe.

Valeri Leontiev

Artist: Valeri Leontiev

LP: I'm Only a Singer

Song: "I'm Only a Singer"

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Song: "I Don't Love"

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I've just come back from a week-long road trip all around The Land of 10,000 Lakes! In case you're not familiar, that's another name for Minnesota. Most of the state's record stores are concentrated in the Twin Cities, and that's where I visited seven of them. The first five were all in Minneapolis...

 [ Minneapolis ]

...and my very first Minnesota record store was Cheapo Records, the big store on Nicollet Avenue. There was no listening station there (and none currently available at any of the stores I visited) so on this trip I basically had to judge a book by its cover. But what a cover! I had a strong hunch Valeri wouldn't disappoint with this 1988 LP, and I was right. Valeri (sometimes "Valery") Leontiev is a very big star in Russia, but of course I am not Russian, so I had never heard of him. I wonder: Do they have a lot of leopards over in Russia?

[ Cheapo Records — Minneapolis, Minnesota ]

John Martyn

Artist: John Martyn

LP: Inside Out

Song: "Fine Lines"

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Song: "Ways To Cry"

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One of my favorite things is visiting the record store to go digging through the LP bins in hopes of discovering something amazing that I never knew about before. But recently I realized that I can now do that at home for free! This morning I dug out this lovely and amazing 1973 LP by John Martyn. I had no idea what it sounded like, so I put it on and was thrilled—again—to have discovered it! Ahh, the joys of getting older, with the memory slipping slowly away. 

 

Martyn died in January of 2009 at age 60. You can find his New York Times obituary here, in which it's stated that Martyn, "inspired in part by the slow-burning, mystical jazz of the American saxophonist Pharoah Sanders, ...devolved a keen sense of texture and atmospherics, transforming ballads into sensuous rhapsodies."

 

[ John Martyn: September 11, 1948 — January 29, 2009 ]

Debbie Cameron & Tommy Seebach

Artist: Debbie Cameron & Tommy Seebach

LP: 7" single

Song: "I See the Moon"

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Here's a happy little ditty from 1980 that I picked up on my trip to Norway with my sister back in 2017. "I See the Moon" has Eurovision Song Contest written all over it...which makes sense, because that's where Debbie and Tommy worked together to create pop music magic in 1979, representing Denmark on the show. Incidentally, Tommy and Debbie both had the same birthday, September 14th, though he was born nine years before she was. 

 

[ Debbie Cameron: born September 14, 1958 ]

[ Tommy Seebach: September 14, 1949 — March 31, 2003 ]

Dick Mine

Artist: Dick Mine

LP: Dick Mine's Favorite Song Collection

Song: "Hell Blues"

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Here's something nice and mellow from classic Japanese crooner Dick Mine for a nice and mellow Sunday afternoon in spring. I really was going to try to not make fun of Mr. Mine's unfortunate name, since that seemed a little too obvious... but then I was faced with this sort of thing, even with the 'safe search' turned on, when trying to scrounge up images of the singer on the Web. Oh well. 

 

Dick Mine had his first hit with "Dinah" in 1934, and his last big number was "Modern Age," a duet with Noriko Awaya in 1982. More on Mr. Mine can be found on Wikipedia here, and "Hell Blues" lyrics are included below in both Japanese and English, the latter thanks to my Google Translate app...though the English version reads a bit like the lyrics to a Cocteau Twins song.

 

[ Dick Mine: October 5, 1908 — June 10, 1991 ]

Prince and the Revolution

Artist: Prince and the Revolution

LP: 7" single

Song: "Mountains"

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One of the places I'm looking forward to visiting on my upcoming trip to Minnesota in May is Paisley Park, Prince's estate which is now a museum. Have I already wondered on here if I've got more Prince 45s than anyone else in the cities of Seattle, Shoreline, and Tukwila...put together? "Mountains" was released in 1986 as Prince's follow-up to his chart-topping hit "Kiss." Unfortunately, "Mountains" grew breathless from scaling the charts and, after peaking at only #23, it turned around and headed back down again. If you ask me, it's a fine song...and plus, look at those abs!

 

[ Prince Rogers Nelson: June 7, 1958 — April 21, 2016 ]

Alberto Vazquez

 Artist: Alberto Vázquez

LP: Rock y Baladas con Alberto Vázquez

Song: "16 Toneladas"

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Song: "Olvidalo"

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Song: "El Hombre Araña"

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Does everyone remember my Alberto Vázquez post from back in April of 2017? Great! Well, here's another one. I was thrilled...THRILLED, I tell you, to find another of Alberto's LPs last week, this one at Daybreak Records over in Fremont. This 1974 offering is yet another delectable mixture of cover songs, in both English and Spanish, along with (I'm fairly sure) some original tunes thrown in too for good measure. 

 

There are still tons (16 toneladas, to be exact) of Alberto Vázquez records to be on the lookout for, as you can see for yourselves at his discography listing on Wikipedia here. Alberto was 77 when I last featured him here on the blog, and now...well, next month, he'll be turning 81! Here's to many more years of good health, happiness, and music from Sñr. Vazquez in the decade to come. 

 

PS. Earlier this week was "National Women's Day," which I had every intention of celebrating here...yet so far all I've posted are records by people named Oscar and Alberto. I promise this will be rectified in the days to come.

 

Oscar Brown, Jr.

  Artist: Oscar Brown, Jr.

LP: Between Heaven and Hell

Song: "Hazel's Hips"

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Song: "Forbidden Fruit"

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Song: "World Full of Grey"

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Ugh! I've been trying to post this thing for the past three days, but always in the evening at the end of a long day at work and I literally keep falling asleep! It's not Oscar's fault though...he's fantastic! 

 

I first heard of Oscar Brown, Jr. after I moved to Seattle back in 1997 and listened to "daytime jazz" on the local NPR station, including, occasionally, one of Brown's hits called "Signifying Monkey." Since then, I've snapped up any record of his that I happen upon, and I recommend that you do too! ...Unless you're with me, and then I recommend you get out of the way or you're going to get hurt. 

 

It wasn't easy to choose just three songs from this 1962 LP to post: "Hazel's Hips" is an ode (with an arrangement by Quincy Jones) to the "concert of contours and curves" featured on a popular waitress named Hazel who works at the local diner (fortuitously, "hips" rhymes with "tips!" This was back in the old days, when a man could openly admire a sexy woman's body and offer up flirtatious banter about it in public, even in broad daylight (no pun intended), without having his life subsequently destroyed); Nina Simone later recorded and had a hit with Brown's "Forbidden Fruit," a playful retelling of what really happened between Adam and Eve in that very first garden on Earth; "World Full of Gray" seems just as strong now as it did when it was put on wax nearly 60 years ago. The "World Full of Grey" lyrics are included in the excellent liner notes by publicist Billy James, included below. The talented, versatile, and sadly under-appreciated nowadays Oscar Brown, Jr. passed away back in 2005; you can read his New York Times obituary here.

 

[ Oscar Brown, Jr.: October 10, 1926 — May 29, 2005 ]