My Generation of Sunday 24 April: Yardbirds, Mungo Jerry, Roland, Matthew Fisher’s blues [Ed’s Show 2016-17]

Yardbirds, Mungo Jerry, Roland, Matthew Fisher’s blues **  Radio 68: All the sounds and all the voices that made the sixties ** Happy To Be Different  
SHOWTIME CET (Brussels) Sundays 12:00 noon  > 16:00 hrs ** Repeated 16:00 > 20:00 hrs, 20:00 hrs > 24:000 hrs midnight and 24:000 hrs midnight > 04:00 hrs Monday Morning.
SHOWTIME GMT (London) Sundays 11 a.m. > 3 p.m. ** Repeated 3 p.m. > 7 p.m., 7 p.m. 11 p.m. and 11 p.m. > 3 a.m. UK Monday morning.

MY GENERATION  & BLUESIDE: THE PLAYLISTS

MY GENERATION (new show)
SPECIALS: YARDBIRDS  LIVE AT THE BBC – KEITH RELF solo (incl. alternate take) and  MUNGO JERRY ** AND ALSO: DDBM&T ** THE IVY LEAGUE ** THE FLOWER POT MEN ** THE MINISTRY OF SOUND ** BONNIE DOBSON ** HUGUES AUFRAY ** ERIK VAN MALDER **

MY GENERATION BLUESIDE (new show)
SPECIALS: ROLAND “A Tune For You” re-released * SPECIAL: MATTHEW FISHER’s Blues ** AND ALSO: CHUCK BERRY **  ROBBAN:  solo album by the singer of The Wentus Blues Band ** SLIM CHANCE: two more tracks from recent album ON THE MOVE **

MY GENERATION (repeated)
SPECIAL: THE SHADOWS OF KNIGHT ** AND ALSO:  THE BLUES MAGOOS * *  ** THE MONKEES , 1966 ** WARM  SOUNDS  ** MURRAY HEAD ** JACKIE DE SHANNON ** BOUDEWIJN DE GROOT, 1966 ** ORANGE SEAWEED ** VELVETT FOGG ** THE FLOCK  ** + Voice: sluiting mijnen Zwartberg

MY GENERATION (last week’s show repeated)
SPECIAL:  WENTUS BLUES BAND: LUCKY STRIKE MAMA, 2015  ** SPECIAL: THE SHADOWS OF KNIGHT: BACK DOOR MEN,  1966. ** AND ALSO:  RONNIE BIRD ** IRMA THOMAS ** ODETTA ** LED ZEPPELIN **  ALAN GLEN & STEVE MORRISON ** THE ARTWOODS, BBC 1966 *

MY GENERATION, incl. BLUESIDE: THE SHOW 
MY GENERATION / BLUESIDE is a four-hour show. Each week, a new 60 minute episode followed by the previous show, totalling two hours of all the sounds and the voices that shaped the 60s. Each show includes a special highlighting one artist, release, topic or trend. BLUESIDE: a new 60 minute episode every week, followed by the previous show, totalling two hours of the blues that influenced and inspired the sounds of the sixties – from the originators till the present day. Each show includes a special highlighting one artist, release, topic or trend.

SPECIALS 

STILL GOING STRONG: The Yardbirds, Roland, Mungo Jerry, Bonnie Dobson

ROLAND: Starman Records has re-released Roland’s early albums “A Tune For You” and “One Step At A Time” on vinyl, with eight bonus tracks in all. Check: www.starmanrecords.com Thanks to Felix! We play four bonus tracks: three songs and the interview.
BONNIE DOBSON: the composer of “Morning Dew” has turned 75 and is performing again. She also released a new album with new songs in 2013, “Bonnie Dobson and Her Boys”. A splendid album on Hornbeam Records www.hornbeamrecordings.com . Thanks to Bonnie, Liz and Les.
MUNGO JERRY aka RAY DORSET played a wonderful gig at The Spirit of 66. Read my review here:  http://www.keysandchords.com/mungo-jerry-bull-9-april-2016-bull-the-spirit-of-66-verviers.html. He also has a new album out: Rewind.  The second cd features all new songs and we play a few in this show.
THE YARDBIRDS: only one original Yardbird is still active in the band: drummer, singer, composer Jim McCarty. Anyway, they’re still touring did a great gig at Under the Bridge (London) on 15 April.  Also, heir LP “Roger the Engineer” has been re-released as a doouble cd to coincide with its  50th anniversiary, so to speak. The new release features the mono and stereo version of the LP, some bonus tracks, plus five Keith Relf solo tracks: the A and B sides of his two singles and an alternate take of  ‘Shapes in My Minds ‘A-side of the second single).

MATTHEW FISHER’s BLUES

Our Savage Branch of this show is none other than MATTHEW FISHER, him of the mighty organ! After stints with Bill Fury and Peter Jay and the Jaywalkers, Matthew Fisher joined  Screaming Lord Sutch’s Savages in 1967. That same year, Gary Brooker asked him to join his new band, Procol Harum. Fisher played on their first three albums, then left and returned on various occasions, while developing a solo career,  AND, surprise, surprise, recording an album with R&B rockers The Downliners Sect in 1993! Fisher also on the albums by Screaming Lord Sutch. 
Now, you may think that a prog band with a classically-trained keyboard player has no connection with R&B, but they did write and record some blues tunes and would play lengthy versions of them on stage. So here’s one-time Savage Matthew Fisher
First, with The Downliners Sect on 3 songs: Glendora, Baby What’s Wrong and Strange Locomotion. Next, with Procol Harum, live in the USA in 1969, a long and heavy version of Going Down Slow, followed by tracks from their early albums “Shine On Brightly” and “Salty Dog”, plus the single track “In the Wee Small Hours”. (This is a repeat of episode of The Savage Branch, the special of my show The Savage Tree, Wednesdays at 21:00 hrs CET / 8 p.m. UK time on Radio Sutch www.radiosutch.net 

THE SHADOWS OF KNIGHT: BACK DOOR MEN

“The original LP version of this album, the second by the legendary white Chicago garage punk/blues outfit, was one of the most sought-after artifacts of mid-’60s punk rock.  BACK DOOR MEN was a loud, feedback-laden, sneering piece of rock & roll defiance, mixing raunchy anthems to teenage lust (“Gospel Zone,” “Bad Little Woman”), covers of Chicago blues classics ( Willie Dixon’s “Spoonful”, Jimmy Reed’s “Peepin’ and Hidin'”), raga rock (“The Behemoth”), folk-rock (“Hey Joe,” “Three for Love,” “I’ll Make You Sorry”), and a blues-punk grab off of commercial Top 40 (“Tomorrow’s Gonna Be Another Day”) all on one 12″ platter. What makes the record even more startling is that every one of these tracks, however far afield they go from one another, works. The band strides across the music spectrum with a reach and boldness that most listeners usually only associate with the likes of  The Beatles or The Rolling Stones,a grasp that, for a moment here, may have exceeded either of those groups, as they slide from electric guitar into extended Chess-style blues instrumentals (“New York Bullseye”)”. Source: Bruce Eder, www.allmusic.com

WENTUS BLUES BAND: LUCKY STRIKE MAMA

“While most people associate the blues with the steamy bayous of  Louisiana and the cotton fields of Mississippi, lovers of the devil´s music may be surprised to hear that there is also a thriving scene in Scandinavia. At the heart of this Nordic blues explosion are the WENTUS BLUES BAND, who hail from Kokkola in central Finland.

And while the pine-studded wilderness of their homeland is about as far as you can get from the juke-joints of the Deep South, there´s no doubting their musical credentials. Established in 1986, the band have acquired a reputation as the hardest working in Scandinavia and play around 150 gigs a year. The Wentus Blues Band has toured in 17 different countries, released 10 albums, done several TV-shows, headlined festivals and toured with many great bluesmen. Expect explosive blues and frantic rhythm and blues, played with laid back stylishness”. (Source:  http://wentusbluesband.com).

‘Lucky Strike Mama’ contains 12 songs, 12 originals written by band members Niko, Robert, Pekka and Juno. It  coincides with their 30th anniversary and it sounds like they treated themselves to a real blues party. The disc starts with a blast: ‘Baa Baa’ is based on a Muddy Waters riff, obly thrice as loud and distorted to support the lyrics: this song is not about Muddy Waters’ back door man, but about the men that go invade someone else’s country or rather the decision makers that send their soldiers and tanks to conquer someone else’s land. There’s a lot of straight blues here custom-made for Chicago ears, but there’s also a fair portion of country here, which gives the disc a gentler and rolling along feel here and there.  (Eddy Bonte)