Waterloo 45's and CD Reviews.

For the second straight week, I managed to find more 45s than actual CDs.  Something like six 45s to 2 CDs.  Basically I was bored, the temps were around 40 degrees and had a hunch that I might find something of value.  The usually reliable St Vincent De Paul didn't have much of 45s, the usual ones that have been in poor shape and probably be a permanent fixture along with all the crappy LPs and CDs that nobody wants.  I'm not going to complain about the dollar CDs that I did find.  If they suck, at least I got a jewel case in the process.

Like Davenport, the Waterloo hunt was a hit and miss. Along the way on a Saturday Night I noticed that the Lone Star Restaurant closed their doors, just like the one in Cedar Rapids last month.  And that going to Cedar Falls, they have replaced about 4 stop lights on University Ave in favor of those fucking roundabouts, which is like taking your life into your own hands when you come across them.  Thankfully I had two other cars going the same way I was going.  That pretty much got me to Blair's Farm And Fleet to pick up some jeans for my picky dad who likes a certain kind of jeans and not prewashed.   It also got me to stop at the Waterloo K Mart for their close outs and managed to get some of my own at 40 percent off.  Even while looking for music, I'm still doing my shopping and combining all my trips into one.  I still haven't located Mohair Pear, the Cedar Falls record store and basically limited my searches to the thrift stores.  But the thrift stores and pawn shops yielded nothing of value and it's a shame that the St Vince De Paul 45s were all chewed up.  However I did noticed another bargain hunter that managed to find a couple of 45s (A Ray Price For The Good Times was one of them he bought).  There was a okay copy of The Bee Gees Idea but I didn't pick it up.  The guy may have picked up the 45's I left aside but I didn't see the need to fight him over them. The shape wasn't all that great.

The Goodwill University Avenue Store was where I found all of the 45s worth saving and even had to contend with some preppy looking woman eyeballing a Jack Jones LP but what they had for LPs was total shit.  So it wasn't a wasted effort and I do think that these 45s are a lot more rock and roll than the Davenport finds of last weekend.   And no disco records masquerading as rock and roll either.  I could have probably picked up a couple more to round it off at 10 records but in all fairness they were trashed (Elvis Presley Stuck On You, The Who Magic Bus, Rick Nelson, For You and Brenda Lee I Want To Be Wanted the best known of the ones that were deemed unplayable).  So, here's the pick six singles of the batch.


1)    Next Door To An Angel-Neil Sedaka  (RCA 47-8086)  #5  1962

I know this record was part of the early years of my life but can't recall if it came from my Mom's original record collection or if Mom bought it during the formative years.  Sedaka was one of those teen idols I could take or leave although not as odious as say Paul Anka.  This came after the number 1 showing of the first version of Breaking Up Is Hard To Do (Sedaka would do a slower version of Breaking...that made it to number 8 in 1975).  Next Door To An Angel, was played a few times growing up in Lincoln in the early 60s for myself.   And while this record is sleeveless, it plays pretty good.

2)   Hail To The Conquering Hero-James Darren (Colpix CP-655)  #97  1962

Howard Greenfield, who co wrote Next Door To An Angel with Neil Sedaka, co wrote this little known single from Darren that blinked at number 97 for one week before going south.  The introduction sounds a bit like what The Vagrants would use for their version of Respect a few years later although they might think otherwise.

3)   Rock And Roll Is Here To Stay-Danny And The Juniors (ABC Paramount 45-9888) #19 1958

One of the cornerstones of my formative years of growing up and listening to 45s, was the one two punch of At The Hop and the followup, to which was used quite nicely in the Stephen King movie Christine, about a demotic car with a love of golden age rock and roll and doo wop. Motown swiped a few chestnuts on the soundtrack.  They might have started punk rock with the driving beat or least garage rock (along with I've Had It by the Bell Notes, another single from my mom's collection) but the B Side School Boy Romance is bobby soxer slow dance material.  Nevertheless this song is a cornerstone for myself and it's finally nice to find a decent copy although the label needs to be superglued back into place.  I seem to recall repairing another ABC Paramount single that the label fell off when I found it at a thrift store last year.

4)   You Belong To Me-The Duprees (Coed CO-569)  #7  1962

Latter day doo wop of the 1960s was a passing fad but once in a while there would be a cool cover of a old pop classic, such as this cover of the Jo Stafford song.  This song did fit in on one of those American Graffiti compilation albums that MCA put out in the early 70s to cash in on that movie.  It did generate a fond remembering of the golden age of rock and roll and doo wop.

5)   Till Then-The Classics (Musicnote MX-1116)  #20  1963

This Brooklyn based Doo Wop group recorded for a handful of labels and this was their first single release on the Musicnote label.  Their best known and one of the all time great doo wop numbers, even though it came in 1963 to which by then Doo Wop was a thing of the past.   Till Then still remains a timeless classic.

6)  Respectable-The Chants  (MGM K-13008)  1961

There's never a shortage of forgotten songs, or songs that only bubbled under.  Originally TRU EKO TE-3567 before MGM picked it up for distribution.  Later a faster version popped up on 20th Century Fox under the banner of Jimmy Soul And The Chants (20th Century Fox 413) but to these ears it doesn't sound like Jimmy Soul singing.  The guess is that the 20th Century Fox is an alternative version of the 1961 Tru Eko/MGM single.  You be the judge:
20th Century Fox version: http://www.45cat.com/record/nc424468us
MGM Version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3fzYkGmS1g

The 2 CDs reviewed:

Beck And Sanborn (CTI 1975)
He's Joe Beck, the fusion jazz guitar player and he's David Sanborn who has gone on to make background music for The Weather Channel.  I guess this was typical of the fusion jazz of the 1970s, adding Don Gronlick's Richard Tee like keyboards and a nice rhythm section with Will Lee and Chris Parker.  I don't mind Beck when he decides to rock it out on guitar but Sanborn is a whole bit annoying, going for a sax solo that may have ushered in the era of Kenny G. The bonus tracks Ain't It Good does have a decent Lee bass groove before Sanborn's squawks makes it hard to make it through.
Grade C

The Outside-Antibody (2001)

Among the garbage of CDs at St Vincent De Paul was about 50 CDs of this album by a now defunct Cedar Falls band and basically amounts of a free CD to go with the jewel case.  In some ways, The Outside managed to put some time and money into this cd and did their damnest to get their music heard.  On the outside they balanced between Killing Joke/Marlyn Manson type of doom dance metal (Empty) and Sabbath like riffs (Small Injection) which might have bode well for the future but their lyrics show their shortcomings which may have been influenced by Korn or Slipknot.  And like other bands trying to go for this sort of sound, it's listenable but it doesn't stand out, they usually come to their senses and go looking for a career job than trying to be the next Korn or Marilyn Manson.  Even the shelf lives of those bands are dated as well. You make better money working at Wal Mart instead.
Commendable job guys but there's a reason why there's 50 Cds of this at the St Vincent De Paul. 
Grade C+ 


Passings:  Pete Overend Watts, bass player for Mott The Hoople, dead from throat cancer.  He was 69.

From Mark Prindle.  He has a bone to pick about Derek And The Dominoes. 


Derek and the Dominos - Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs (40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) - I like The Yardbirds, Cream and Blind Faith, but this 1970 release is where Eric Clapton lost me forever. I like a few of the songs, but it's mostly just a bunch of boring Southern-fried blues and boogie-rock. The bonus disc has Johnny Cash on it though, along with some songs intended for the second album. I actually like those alright! They sound more tired and heroiny than the first album.

From Jeff Latten (on The Chants-Respectable)

I was part of this band from ~1960 - 1965, on an off. If this was the 1st version on EKO, it's Mike DeVivo on lead, John Linde on drums, me on rhythm guitar, Joe Polari sitting in on lead guitar, probably Bobby Butts on background vocals along with Mike and me and John, and I'm not sure who played bass...might have been Steve Lotto.
Actually, this version we all considered pretty tame and studio sounding. We had done a demo that really popped but was never used. The EKO guys insisted on using their primitive studio. This record won Murray The K's record of the week contest after its release and we got to play live on several of his record hops in the NYC area, including backing up the original Isley Brothers and Ruby and The Romantics. What killed the momentum was MGM bought it up after we won the contest and pulled all the disks with the EKO label out of stores so they could put their own labeled disks in there and so there were very few sales while it was being played daily on WINS in NYC. It got pulled the following week. We thereafter dabbled a bit with Bobby Darin's company, got to work with his head A/R guy Clint somebody, but nothing came of it. Feel free to ask me whatever you'd like...those were some fun days.