Nothing to do with beds, this post picks up on a comment by ToffeeBoy about my travelling playlist. TB picked out Tony Joe White's Aspen Colorado for special mention and it reminded me that, where Tony Joe White is concerned, that reaction was by no means a first.
I've got to thank, for my Tony Joe devotion, the screenwriter Neville Smith, who wrote the Albert Finney film,
Gumshoe, (and who is incidentally another ToffeeBoy - he and Ken Loach made the film The Golden Vision in the '60s, about Everton fans). Neville's twin son and daughter were my best friends when I was at University in Liverpool, and into our music-obsessed group of friends, they introduced some of the sounds with which their dad had raised them. These included musicians I continue to love - Arthur Alexander, Nick Drake, Jim Croce - and there was also one song that, once heard, became something more than a favourite song. It was an intimate, a confidant, one of the gang. The song was
Polk Salad Annie. We knew every word, each jag and twinge of the guitar, each vocal grunt like Barry White gone country. We knew the spoken intro the same way me and my brother knew every inflection of Pete Wylie's spoken outro to Story of the Blues years earlier. We'd recognise the song just from the "Four" counting it in right at the beginning. We called the song "Four" as a term of affection. For ages, it was just the one song, though there was a promise of a Best Of LP in Neville's collection that would be purloined on a visit home one time. When that arrived, Tony Joe White became something like a Talmudic text.
And the thing was, it was everyone. Someone might have popped round; if Tony Joe White happened to be playing while they were there, the response would always be, "
Who is this?". These were the days of mix-tapes designed to curry favour with pot dealers, impress the pants off an object of affection or save having to spend dole money on a birthday present and, invariably, a Tony Joe White track would be seized upon by the recipient and there'd be a follow-up request for a TJW sampler. So this sampler is constructed in loving memory of
temps perdue but also in the confidence that Tony Joe White's music can still win converts.
What we have here are eight TJW numbers, kicking off with
Polk Salad Annie, which is well-known thanks to the cover version by Elvis, and rounded up with
Rainy Night In Georgia, another TJW composition (he also wrote
Steamy Windows for Tina Turner) that provided others with hits. Elsewhere, we have country rhinestone, soul fried chicken and bluesy bourbon in such a distinctly American concoction that it should come as no surprise that TJW has lived for many years among the people who most fervently embraced his music, the French.
Polk Salad AnnieSoul FranciscoWillie and Laura Mae JonesHigh Sheriff of Calhoun ParishGroupy GirlI've Got A Thing About You BabyLook Of LoveRainy Night In Georgia
... and DsD is getting fat,
some true odd skool tracks... enjoy!
Some time in the New Year we plan to have a party to officially launch the basement. It will be an Elvis party - everyone has to come dressed as Elvis or someone associated with Elvis or a contemporary of Elvis - preferably from the early years. We'll be playing Elvis on vinyl and may have a karaoke or lip sync contest as well. Should be fun! I'm already growing sideburns for the occasion!
What would i give to be there now - one of the most beautiful experiences the Familie-gremlinfc has had and boy was it hot! This is probably the easiest so far of the hunt-the-gremlinfc and no doubt you will all crack it in a nano-second(am i getting carried away with - hyphens-here?). Back to Blighty for the next one so enjoy the sunshine here.
