My Generation Sunday 7 August: We The People, Alligator Records 45th Anniversary [Ed’s Show, 2016-32]

Specials We The People ** Alligator Records 45th Anniversary ** The Blues Magoos ** Shakey Vick pt. 2 ** 
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)

SPECIAL: WE THE PEOPLE / AMERICAN ZOO ** AND ALSO: BO DIDDLEY **  JAN DE WILDE **  DAVE DAVIES ** DEEP PURPLE ** THE HONEYCOMBS **** KEVIN AYERS ** THE LOVIN’ SPOONFUL  ** PAGE & PLANT live **  LONGPLAYING:  FAT MATTRESS; MP FAT MATTRESS, 1969 + IRON BUTTERFLY: METAMORPHOSIS, 1970 *

MY GENERATION BLUESIDE (new show)
SPECIAL: ALLIGATOR RECORDS 45th ANNIVERSARY  pt1  with HOUND DOG TAYLOR (1971), LIL’ ED & THE BLUES IMPERIALS (2008), KOKO TAYLOR (1975), JIMMY JOHNSON (1977), SHEMEKIA COPELAND (2015), TOMMY CASTRO & THE PAINKILLERS, DELBERT CLINTON, CAREY & LURRIE BELL, RICK ESTRIN & NIGHTCATS, JOE LOUIS WALKER (2012), SON SEALS (1973) & ANDERS OSBORNE *** Thanks to Alligator Records ** AND ALSO: OTIS REDDING ** WILLIE MABON ** JESSE COLIN YOUNG **

MY GENERATION (repeated)
SPECIALTHE BLUES MAGOOS Psychedelic Lollipop ** THREESOME:  IAN MATTHEWS ( MATTHEWS’ SOUTHERN COMFORT ** FAIRPORT CONVENTION)  ** LONGPLAYING: BLOOD,  SWEAT AND TEARS: CHILD  IS FATHER TO THE MAN, 1968 ** AND ALSO: BRYAN FERRY **

MY GENERATION BLUESIDE (repeated)
SPECIAL:  Shakey Vick pt. 2: Exclusive Radio 68 Interview Snippets  and feat. SHAKEY VICK, CHRIS YOULDEN, WAYDOWN feat. Chris Youlden,  SAVOY BROWN  with Chris Youlden,  BIG JOE LOUIS,  BILLY BOY ARNOLD,  JUNIOR WELLS CHICAGO BLUES BAND; OTIS SPAN’s SOUTH SIDE PIANO ** AND ALSO: Dr. JOHN ** THE RISING SONS: Taj Mahal and Ry Cooder

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 BACKGROUND

WE THE PEOPLE aka AMERICAN ZOO  

We the People aka American Zoo is a 60s teen band from LA (do not confuse with We the People from Orlando), that released four singles and recorded another demo. Surprisingly, these kids write their own material and produced interesting, introspective lyrics as well  (e.g. ‘Who Am I’, re-recorded as ‘What Am I’). Their music is a blend of rough beat (now called ‘garage’), folk and psychedelic elements, with vocal harmonies on top.

Says Mike Stax of Ugly Things: “The album clocks in at less than 30 minutes, but when every one of those minutes is pure magic, how could you possibly complain? We have a new contender for album of the year”
Their records didn’t go anywhere, buts some  band members (who were still attending high school when they made these recordings!) developed impressive careers: guitar player Bill Bottrell became a Grammy award producer, working with Michael Jackson, Madonna and George Harrison among others. Drummer Jason “Jasun” Martz toured with Frank Zappa and recorded with Michael Jackson. Today, he’s a well- known avant-garde artist and sculptor. Steve Zaillian, the first We The People drummer, became an Academy Award winning director, producer and screenwriter (“Schindler’s List” and “Hannibal” among others).

The band’s entire output can be found on the cd “Visions of Time” www.guerssen.com (EB)

ALLIGATOR 45th ANNIVERSARY COLLECTION (2016)

Two cds for the price of one, 37 tracks by 37 artists / bands totaling more than two and a half hours of music – celebrating Alligator’s 45th anniversary and thus Alligator’s sound. It is only normal that many a band / artist couldn’t be included, the label now possessing a catalogue of more than 300 albums. As Alligator have released anniversary albums fairly regularly, this one focuses rather heavily on albums released this century, with many released the last few years.  (Eddy Bonte)

“On May 25 and June 2, 1971, the rawest, roughest-edged, most joyful blues band in Chicago recorded their first album. With the help of two fledgling producers, Bruce Iglauer and his friend Wesley Race, they cut multiple takes of twenty-five songs in two evenings, recorded live and mixed as they were being recorded. The album, issued in August of that year, was simply named after the band: Hound Dog Taylor And The HouseRockers, the first release from a brand new label called Alligator Records. Alligator was a leap of faith, an underfinanced one-man operation run out of an efficiency apartment.  (…)
Forty-five years later, Alligator Records, now with a catalog of almost three hundred albums, continues to be bound by the same philosophy that led to that first recording—that direct, unvarnished, straight-from-the-soul blues and blues-rooted music, the music we call “Genuine Houserockin’ Music,” speaks to some primal, necessary place in people’s consciousness. We believe that our music, if delivered by charismatic, soul-stirring artists, and if publicized, promoted and marketed with unwavering energy, will find a worldwide audience, stand the test of time, and keep the label moving forward for years to come”.
Thanks, Alligator Records!
Bruce Iglauder * Entire text:  http://www.alligator.com/albums/Alligator-Records-45th-Anniversary-Collection/

THE BLUE MAGOOS PSYCHEDELIC LOLLIPOP

(…) That album was Psychedelic Lollipop — one of the first albums to use the word “psychedelic” in its title — and it took them onto the charts with the self-penned garage-punk classic single We Ain’t Got Nothin’ Yet . The album showed they had songwriters in their ranks — the Byrdsian jangle of One By One came from Ron Gilbert and Peppy Thielhelm (only 16 at the time), others from Gilbert with Ralph Scala and Mike Esposito. But it was the other material which showed them with one foot firmly in their club and dancehall past: they cover James Brown’s crowd-pleasing I’ll Go Crazy, J.D Loudermilk’s Tobacco Road and the ballad Sometimes I Think About (which they claimed writing credits on). There was some filler to: She’s Coming Home right at the end.

But it was more than merely promising debut and — as with the debut albums by Moby Grape and Country Joe and the Fish the following year — Psychedelic Lollipop covered a lot of ground from rock and soul to ballads and pop. So where was the “psychedelic” bit, the hints of trippiness that would take the world by storm within six months? Oddly enough it was in their treatment of the familiar Tobacco Road which boasts a skewing guitar part by Esposito. It crams an exciting trip into just four and a half minutes (source: not traced)

SHAKEY VICK

Born in 1937, Graham Vickery aka Shakey Vick for most of us, was among the lucky and privileged few who attended the first gigs by those famous American blues musicians who were being flown over to the UK at the end of the fifties and the beginning of the sixties. He picked up the harmonica his brother-in-law had given him for his ninth (!) birthday and formed his first group with singer-guitarist Chris Youlden in 1963. Although Shakey Vick would never equal the success of bands like The Yardbirds, he did record an entire album for Pye in 1969. Youlden eventually joined Savoy Brown and Shakey’s guitarist Rod Price found fame with Foghat. Being a bit of rebel who hates being told what to do, he stuck to his love for Chicago blues and the harmonica. In his own words: “Getting nowhere, but enjoying myself”. Or: “My blues life has been about me doing my direction and other people coming along with me, but not coerced”. It certainly did not stop him from recording and from touring the UK, Europe and the US. At the age of 78, Shakey can still be found playing Chicago blues at local venues in London. Radio 68 interviewed this modest and true British blues phenomenon in December 2015.
in Part 2, you can listen to interview snippets, tracks form the 2005 cd  Greek Street, Savoy Brown feat.  Chris Youden plus many of Shakey’s heroes.