Along with my regular F45 features (Classic Recording Studios, Great Session Players, Great Record Producers, Rock And Roll Hit & Lit), I’m going to drop in a few long-form mixes here and there. That’s what I posted on F45 exclusively for the quite awhile, dating back to my debut in December 2006 (which you can still hear here).

It’s been 6 months or so since I was last in the studio, so I’m a little rusty. The mixes aren’t so tight and the flow is a little weird. But it’s not bad. Hope you enjoy it.

For really great mixes, check out Adam Weatherhead’s Diddy Wah.

Today’s Mix

Webb Pierce – Hideaway Heart
Sergio Mendes – Bim-Bom
Isley Brothers – What It Comes Down To
John Kay – Somebody
Sly And The Family Stone – Somebody’s Watching You
Jose Feliciano – Compartments
Strawbs – Where Do You Go?
Sons of Champlin – Hello Sunlight
The Temptations – I Could Never Love Another (After Loving You)
Bert Kaempfert – Hold Me
Pretenders – Talk Of The Town
Lou Reed – Walk On The Wild Side

Photo by Spassmonkey

Truth be told, the little blue-haired lady I mentioned a few days ago in my post about Strawbs had one up on me. She may not have known about Strawbs — who, according to White Ray at Echoes In The Wind, were said to be the British version of the Band – but she knew John Hartford and I really didn’t. Oh, the shame.

The short story on Hartford is that he came from a fairly wealthy, intellectual background, was obsessed with the banjo, the fiddle and the Mississippi River and spent most of his life pursuing his knowledge of all three. He wrote one of the most famous pop songs of the 1960’s, Gentle On My Mind, a song he said “bought his freedom”.

The little old lady might have known Hartford from his appearances on the Glen Campbell and Smothers Brothers TV shows. Or, she might’ve known him from actually listening to the 1969 John Hartford album she sold me for 25 cents. Given the content of the record — bizarre and certainly left of center — the mind reels at the kind of conversation blue-hair and I could’ve had had I known what I was getting into.

John Hartford – The Poor Old Prurient Interest Blues

“I have no idea who they are,” shrugged the blue-haired little old lady as I rummaged through the box of records she’d set out at the mobile home rec room rummage sale. Mantovani, Andre Kostelanetz, Percy Faith and…Strawbs? She professed to know of John Hartford, whose first album she also owned. Having listened to it, I find that somewhat more bizarre than her possession of a Strawbs record.

I know Strawbs by chance. I inherited a handful of their records from a radio station that changed format. It’s the ultimate moment of confusion for a music junkie: “I’m sorry but we’re changing the station’s format to all Pat Robertson All The Time. As a parting gift, here’s your severance and several boxes of records”.

I can safely say that, up until that time, my upstate New York upbringing had not allowed me to cross paths with Strawbs. I can say that no tonearm has ever crossed those Strawbs records I got for free, either. But I kept them because they had a cool, Britishy air about them (kind of like the Steeleye Span record I’ve had since 1979 but don’t think I’ve listened to.

Fast forward many years and here I am: kindly Mrs. Grandma Record Collection and the Best of Strawbs for 25 cents. How could I miss?

To quote the first few paragraphs of the liner notes:

It’s something of a tribute to the slightly bizarre nature of that catchall pigeonhole known as “British Rock” that a group which originated as England’s answer to Flatt and Scruggs would go on to cite The Tibetan Book of The Dead as one of its prime influences, gives the world one of its best-respected female vocalists and classically-oriented keyboard wizards, spawn the career of a hit-song writing duo and end up classified closer to the spatially-stately progressive wing of rock than to anything remotely resembling it “world’s fastest bajo”/bluegrass beginnings.

And that’s just one sentence!

The female vocalist was Sandy Denny; the keyboard wizard was none other than Rick Wakeman of Yes and the songwriting duo was drummer Richard Hudson and bassist John Ford (who wrote Strawbs UK #1, Part of the Union).

What pulls this all together is a listen to Lay Down, their UK Top 10 in 1972. One part Jethro Tull, one part Cat Stevens, one part Emerson, Lake and Palmer, it draws together in just a few minutes the whole of the British folk and prog rock era. And little old blue-haired ladies like it too!

Strawbs – Lay Down