Category Archive

by Max Conroy:

The Go’s latest album Howl On the Haunted Beat You Ride is a fantastic record that doesn’t seem to get much credit, and I live in the land where it was made.  Shamefully, until I moved to back to Michigan this past August I’d never heard of them and the way that I heard of them was from a magazine published in the UK, Mojo.  Mojo gave the record a four star review and the write up was good; garage, overlooked band, Detroit, etc.  There was also a picture of the record’s cover accompanying the review that pretty much guaranteed that I’d look for it.  It’s perfectly psychedelic: two huge hipster faces with lifeless hipster expressions, flanking the jacket; the entire band arranged vertically in the center of it, all wearing black or stripes; their far out logo in the upper left; a brown and orange, early mid 60s to early 70s, color motif; all of this on a hazy blanket of stars.  I know being interested in a record because of its packaging might be a bit careless, but this record is so cool looking and feeling that I’d be happy to own it even if the music sucked, which it most certainly doesn’t.  It’s on Cass records (Cass is a street/area in Detroit for all you non-local readers), which I’ve never heard of, but they totally knocked the ball out of the park on this one.  It’s a gatefold with super heavy boards, it feels like it’s a record made in the 50s, and has great graphics pasted inside along with the lyrics. 

The Go formed in Detroit in 1998.  Jack White was an early member of the band and is featured on their debut Whatcha Doin’, playing lead guitar and singing back up.  I had read somewhere that they kicked Jack White out of the band, which would be one to tell the grandchildren: Yeah, I was in a band back in the day…and we kicked Jack White out of the group…We could have been rich!  I’m pretty sure that he just left the band because he didn’t want to be a sideman.  I have no idea if there is any bad blood as a result of the split, but the Go wasn’t on the White compiled fantastic comp. Sympathetic Sounds of Detroit.  There is footage the Go out there playing live during the JW era on an obscure movie called the Detroit Rock Movie, which also has footage of JW jamming Stop Breakin’ Down in his tiny Detroit apartment.  If any of you out there have a copy of this movie, I’d be happy to receive one; please respond to this post.  Anyway, Whatcha Doin’ was released on Sub Pop and is a great debut record on the noisy side of the garage.  They made a follow up for Sub Pop called Free Electricity that was never released because it was allegedly too heavy, which has to be bull shit…too heavy for Sub Pop?  I found a copy of it on Soulseek and it’s definitely worth finding.  I think there were other reasons Sub Pop shelved it though; one song starts with the lyric, “Big cock angel”.  They were ultimately dropped from Sub Pop and put out a more focused rehashing of 60s garage and 70s glam on Lizard King, called The Go.  The group then waited four years to put out another record, the brilliant Howl on the Haunted On the Haunted Beat You Ride, which AMG has listed as coming out in April of 2007, but I’m pretty sure it was more like late summer and they still haven’t reviewed it.

Howl On the Haunted Beat You Ride represents the Go fully coming into their own.  The music is derivative of 60s psych and 70s glam to be sure, but they certainly make it theirs.  The production on this record is simply amazing and it was produced by Bobby Harlow, their front man, in Detroit.  The album utilizes clean tones, trippy imagery, and classic CSN-like harmonies with great effect (and I really dislike CSN).  The bizarro-poetic title comes from the song Yer Stoned Italian Cowboy, a romp about an irresitible character that “shoots directly from the Id”.  Fucking brilliant!  In my opinion, there’s only one bum track on this record and that’s the lead off song called You Go Bangin’ On, which was released as a single, so I might be missing something.  But don’t listen to the first thirty seconds of this record and file it away.  I bought this record seven months ago and the Go haven’t played around here since to my knowledge, until this past Saturday where they played at Gold: a fund raiser for the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.

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There have been many important contributions to the world of music, mainly disco, funk, and R&B in the late 70s and early to mid 80s, whose contributing artists sported magnificant Jheri Curls.

  Michael Jackson is the first to come to mind for most people, and he may have been the most popular dance music superstar to “grease it up”.  The cover of his Thriller album shows his Jheri Curl at it’s prime. 

But what about the others?  I thought this was a topic that was deserving of an all time list.  Keeping in mind the equal importance of Jheri Curl awesomeness and the actual music, here goes the rest of the top ten (in no particular order):

Prince-Prince was perhaps the most innovative musician of the last 30 years.  He brought us the songs Kiss, Little Red Corvette, When Doves Cry, 1999, and countless immortal others.  Always the stylist hipster, Prince sported a more glammed out Jheri curl.  This When The Doves Cry picture sleeve 7″ is a good example.

James Brown-God rest his funky soul.  His was more of a variation, more straight than curly.  But still cool.  JB may have commanded the most respect of any musician ever, known as Mr. Brown to those around him.  The hair helped.  This Ain’t It Funky Now 45 shows him on the King label, not the best example, but his LPs sell as soon as we get them, and we’re out at the moment.

Kevin Rowland (& Dexy’s Midnight Runners)-Kevin had a pretty sweet Jheri Curl for a white boy.  C’mon Eileen-check it out.

Rick James-Rick James actually had a dread-Jheri hybrid.  This picture of his Throwin’ Down LP is bad, but you get the idea.

Morris Day (and The Time)-The Oak Tree 45 shows it off, but a better example is the classic Time album, What Time Is It?  His may have the most awesome of all time.

Durell Coleman-An obscure choice here, but a neccesary one.  Durell and his fantastic Jheri Curl was the first ever winner of Star Search.  He went on to record one LP and a few 7″ers around 1985; I once found a still sealed copy of his r&B love album, and it is priceless.  I recommend the song, Somebody Took My Love.  He now fronts the Durell Coleman Band, the self proclaimed America’s Premiere Party Band who played at Shaq’s wedding.  Some guy’s got it for sale for $2.99 on eBay; if I were you I’d snach it up.

Dazz Band-One of those 80s dance funk groups where the whole band sported Jheri Curls.  You gotta love that one white guy in the band-did he have Jheri Curl envy?

Lee Osler-Although I can’t confirm this due to a lack of a photo, I would bet my house that Lee had a Jheri Curl.  If he didn’t, he would still make the list due to his Back To Ypsilanti song.  We do know that his mustasche inspired the name of the label of that 45.

Little Richard-Little Richard had a Jheri Curl way back in the 50s, when he began his journey as perhaps the greatest ever contributer to rhythm and blues and rock n roll.  Coincidence?  Perhaps…

Honorable mention: Kool and the Gang, Easy E, Jermaine Jackson, Lionel Richie. 

There you have it.  I am sure I have left off some well-deserving names. 

This is what I would throw in it on my way to work:

1) Taj Mahal, Mo’ Roots

My favorite Taj Mahal album, it’s a masterful blend of reggae and southern roots music.  Clara (St. Kitts Woman) is going in my next mix tape after Akido’s Yesterday http://cousinsvinyl.com/2006/akido-self-titled-mercury-lp-1972-afro-funk/.  A great Friday morning selection.

2) Jah Bunny, Dubs International

Such a sweet dub album.  All the songs are well put together, and not as echoey and crazy as Lee Perry.  Makes for great late-night cruisin’ music.  Also good for a passenger friend who just needs to chill out.

3) Various, Electric Breakdance: The Hottest Breakdance Music On The Street

Awe yeah!  This is my pimpin’ music!  1984’s freshest breakdance joints.  Need to shop here to listen to this www.myairshoes.com Too bad I can’t put the poster that comes with it on the side of car.

4) T Rex, Electric Warrier

“Beneath the bebop moon, I want to crooooon, with you, Beneath the Mambo Sun, I got to be the one, with you…”  Impossible not to turn this up.

5) Mel Brown, Eighteen Pounds Of Unclean Chitlins and Other Greasy Blues Specialties

Yeah, it’s what you would expect.  Mmmm, mmmm!

6) Marvin Holmes and the Uptights, Ooh Ooh The Dragon and Other Monsters

Sweet happy funk.  Has one of my all time favorite songs, I’ve Never Found A Girl (To Love Me Like You Do).  The back cover describes this album as being as funky as barrrels of hot asphalt.  This is being played as loud as my speakers will let them.  I hope I don’t get a speeding ticket with this on.

UNDER THE SEAT: Wes Montgomery, Full House

OK, this is cheating a bit.  But I gotta keep this in reserve in case I feel the need for some relaxed jazz cruising.  This early Riverside is one of my favorite jazz LPs.

I think I’d put in a new rotation after about a solid two weeks.  Better not do any off-roading though.

-Cousin Geoff

Damn trying to write a review of the other junk I brought home, it was too tough to follow the Grand Funk.  So a little NY Dolls should be fun and keep me up and typing at 3:30am.  Rolling Stone gave the new Dolls record like four stars.  Has anyone heard it?   David Johansen’s show on Sirius satelite radio is a strange one.  It runs on Friday nights but it is rare to be home and ketchup.  Hot Hot Hot.  Why does Arrow’s version not have any interest.  Maybe this weekend I can convince Max Conroy to submit some more random thoughts to this page.  I think it is time to chill out now.  Here is a shameless way to get some debate, Stones or Beatles.

Cousin Justin

P.S.

In case you were wondering, it is the Stones

It started when I had to review The High Strung for Current magazine. They had a great semi-glammy sound that I loved, and the lead singer’s voice was so familiar that I thought he’d been knocking off someone that I remembered but couldn’t quite place.

So, I picked up a copy of Mott, the sixth (?!) album by Mott the Hoople, sort of at random. It was what the record store had, y’know? And much as I love Cousins, sometimes I’m impatient and want to have an album right then.

The High Strung singer didn’t sync up, so I guess it was a wasted experiment for research (I guess I won’t be able to write that off on my taxes this year), but I fell in love with the album.

First off, it’s big. It’s hard to remember (though T. Rex is a better reminder than Mott) that at one point, boogie and backing singers didn’t sound cheesy. You could have saxophones in rock and roll, and they fit instead of feeling affected. The arrangments add such a sense of power behind these pop suites that it’s a shame similar tricks from Sufjan Stevens just leave me feeling underwhelmed and tweed off.

Second off, and this is harder to quantify, Mott does an amazing job of putting out a meta-rock album. The lyrical leidmotif is rock and roll itself (a losers’ game), and that’s a hard thing to pull off. Think of the Ashlee Simpson treatises on the perils of fame or the fey complaints of Lindsay Lohan about paparazzi for examples of how not to be sympathetic while complaining about your fame. That this has become de riguer for a certain subset of pop divas has only served to make it harder to recommend Mott sincerely, even though that’s what I’m trying to do. The seperation point is that Mott makes a love of rock seem like the tragic flaw of an Oedipus or Antigone, something that pushes you forward even as you know that it will ruin you. Weariness, dissatisfaction, resignation… all right after the breakthrough success of “All the Young Dudes”? Yeah, but from the giddyup there’s that reverence for, say, the rock roots of Memphis or swamp boogie (in Honaloochie, which I assume is an invented bayou).

Even the songs that depart from the overall theme are fucking killer, totally justifying the traditional line about Mott being bastard sons of Bowie and Dylan (the amazing “I Wish I Was Your Mother” has the genius instrumentation that Dylan never mastered, and the lyrical bite that Bowie couldn’t manage). “I’m a Cadillac” has the clipped fun of Warren Zevon, again with bigger and better production than anything I’ve ever heard from him (but I think Zevon’s my next listening project).
Now, granted, I haven’t been able to convince my girlfriend or my father, who form my primary music listening community. My dad has dismissed Mott as my rehashing his hash adventuures, arguing that it’s no good without the drugs (I’ve listened both sober and stoned, and I think it’s great either way). My girlfriend hates Ian Hunter’s voice, clearly a sign of her irrational tastes, but I hope that playing the album softly around the house will weaken her resolve.

It had better, because I’ll be damned if I’m going to stop playing it.