Come on in and meet the elusive Elvis Pummel, the primitive rock ‘n’ roller often referred to as Swedish but seemingly from Dortmund, Germany
– a place where genius and madness merge into a subtle duet.
Equipped with a '50s Hofner guitar Elvis Pummel first came
to prominence in 1998, appearing on the Voodoo Rhythm compilation The
Penetrating Sounds Of,,,, although he’d
been playing his own brand of psychobilly since at least the mid 1980s, first
in the band Barnyard Blitz before striking out on his own, weird musical
journey.
Since then he’s issued at least half a dozen EPs and 45s.
Many of his songs last for a minute or less: eight tracks appeared on his first
EP Original 50s Punk; ten were crammed
on to the 2001 EP Elvis Pummel And His Wild & Primitive Soundsystem
– On Board. The majority of his earlier
releases were complied on the 56 track collection Elvis Pummel – Recalled To Be Executed, issued in 2006. He’s still gigging – and issuing
sporadic releases - today
Reviewing his first release, Blue Suede News magazine wrote: ‘If you think Hasil Adkins
with his distinctive, raunchy one man-band music is a true stylist and genius,
you might like this effort.’ I think that
undersells him somewhat. Adkins has a similar primitive rock ‘n’ roll approach,
and there can be no doubt that both musicians have been resolutely ploughing
their own perverse furrow, but Adkins’ productions are akin to Phil Spector’s
when compared to Pummel’s – and Adkins can (or at least could) sing: no matter
how much you may like Pummel’s distinctive voice you could hardly call him a
great singer.
Anyway, have a listen to a few tracks from Elvis Pummel
And His Wild & Primitive Soundsystem – On Board and decide for yourself.
Issued in February 1969, The Good Earth is theonly
single released by the legendary Irish comedian Dave Allen. If you don’t know whom
I’m talking about get Googling now: Allen was easily one of the best and most
important comedians of the last 50-plus years. His irreverent, religion bating
monologues, jokes and sketches are priceless, and his knack of kicking against
the establishment whilst gaining a huge TV audience was unprecedented.
David Tynan O'Mahony (6 July 1936 – 10 March 2005) was –
certainly until the 1980s - Britain's most controversial comedian. His relaxed,
intimate style (on TV he would sit on a high bar stool, smoking and sipping
from a glass of what looked like whiskey, but was in fact ginger ale) charm and
besuited respectability allowed him to get away with more than any other
comedian had dared do before – especially on prime time television. A religious
sceptic, religion (and especially Roman Catholicism) was an important subject
for his humour, mocking church customs and rituals rather than beliefs.
So it’s a bit of a surprise to discover that the great man
released this piece of sentimental claptrap.
Called a ‘somewhat whimsical but certainly sincere
counter-cultural contribution timed to coincide with the moon landing’ by Allen’s biographer Graham McCann, The Good
Earth uses the image of an astronaut looking down upon our planet, a
very contemporary message at that time. Written by Ben Nisbet, The Monkees also
recorded the song during sessions for their 1969 album the Monkees Present, although their version remained unreleased until
Rhino Records reissued the album on CD in 1994.
The B-side, A Way Of Life, is worse: to the tune of Greensleeves, Allen recites a ridiculous
poem which offers up such homilies as ‘listen to others, even the dull and
the ignorant: they too have their story’. The writer credit on A
Way Of Life reads ‘Martin/Kelsey’ however
the words are actually by the American poet Max Erhman and, correctly named Desiderata, would provide an enormous international hit a
couple of years later for Les Crane. Calling it Spock Thoughts, Leonard Nimoy also performed the poem on his 1968
album Two Sides of Leonard Nimoy.
Unsurprisingly the record was not a hit. Allen went back to
comedy, leaving this sole disc an obscure footnote in an otherwise remarkable
career.
A short post today - sorry. I had written something much longer only to discover, as I checked through my previous posts, that I had already featured that particular track. Well, 301 posts down the line, surely you can excuse an old man a touch of forgetfulness? Todays brace of badness comes courtesy of the ever-brilliant Music For Maniacs, an essential blog for lovers of the obscure and perverse, and where, back in 2010, I first discovered the delights of Margaret Raven. There's very little I can tell you about the obscure Margaret Raven, apart from that they were based in New York and recorded one album - probably only issued on CD-r and passed around family and friends. A couple of the tracks on the album originally appeared on MySpace in 2009: at some point before 2011 the band split. One of the former members of Margaret Raven, posting on the (author and Shaman) Carlos Castaneda forum Sustained Reaction, had this to say: "Margaret Raven was my
band. We made really crazy music, nothing like you've ever heard before.
Anyway, the music we made was very heavily influenced by Carlos Castaneda. I
learned how to play my instrument, Rainmaker, from the devil's weed. There is
an old saying that goes "you always know when you hear a crow, but when
you hear a sound and have no idea what it is, that's a raven". Our band
consisted of Rainmaker, Theremin, and drums. Please give it a listen. These
songs are quite a few years old." I can tell you that an earlier Margaret Raven was a playwright who published the play The Alchemist in 1912, but that's about it.I wish I had more, so if you know anything else about them please do share! For now here are two tracks from Margaret Raven: Run Me Rainbow and Fire Atop The Pyramid. Enjoy!
***update: better versions of Hey Little Girl (Do You Want to Get Married) and Super Duper Man now uploaded, as well as the missing instrumental Chicken Track. Thanks Ross!***
When I started this blog way back in September 2007 I had no
idea how (or even if) it would take off, and I’m immensely grateful and humbled
that so many people seem to enjoy it. Today’s WWR entry is a bit of a milestone
– it’s my 300th blog dispatch – and for today’s landmark posting
we’re going right back to where it all started, revisiting the career of the
man who performed one of the most infamous bad records of all time, the late
Jimmie/Jimmy Cross. If you've read the book you'll already know most of this: you may want to skip to the end of the post and simply grab the tracks!
There are an alarming number of records about traffic
accidents - but the sickest has to be I Want My Baby Back by Jimmy Cross. Routinely considered the worst
record of all time – and feted as such by the first Kenny Everett Bottom 30
– I Want My Baby Back is the king of
the teenage tragedies. Written and produced by Perry Botkin Junior and Gil
Garfield, the song is a parody of records like Last Kiss and Leader of the Pack, two releases which describe the aftermath of traffic
accidents in rather graphic detail, although neither of them go into quite as
much depth (if you’ll pardon the pun) as Jimmy Cross does:
Born in Dothan, Alabama in 1938, although radio producer
Jimmy Cross had dabbled in song writing (co-writing I Still Love Him, which was produced by Garfield and Botkin for girl
group The Joys) I Want My Baby Back
was his first release as a featured performer*, and the only one of his singles
to chart. Issued on the Tollie label in December 1964, the single reached number 92 on the
Billboard Hot 100 the following February.
Knowingly referencing both the Beatles (the group that
supplied Tollie with its only major chart hits) and Leader of the Pack, I Want My Baby Back is a song which describes – in graphic detail - how
the singer’s girlfriend is fatally dismembered and how he, after several months
of torment, decides that the only way to overcome his grief is to desecrate her
grave, crawl into her coffin and join her for all eternity.
I’ve tried, believe me I have tried
But I just can’t make it without my baby
So I decided I’m gonna have her back one way or another
It’s ghastly, and thoroughly brilliant – and hearing it for
the first time in the early 1980s was a defining moment for me. This (and Fluffy
by Gloria Balsam) is entirely responsible
for kick-starting my interest in bad music. Bizarrely the song was covered (not very well, in my opinion) by British R'n'B act The Downliners Sect for their 1965 EP The Sect Sings Sick Songs.
The moderate success of I Want My Baby Back was reason enough for Tollie to order a follow up,
so Jimmy was put back to work. His second single for the company was The
Ballad of James Bong, a comedy record
(credited to Botkin, Garfield, Cross, Price and Cole) based on the James Bond
phenomenon, where Cross’s character is trying to save the world’s rock and roll
stars from being annihilated. It was released (this time credited to Jimmie
Cross) in 1965 and sank without a trace – as did Tollie Records. Red Bird
Records, the company set up by songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, then signed
Jimmie and he released a further 45: Hey Little Girl (Do You Want to
Get Married), a timely Herman’s Hermits
pastiche, backed with Super-Duper Man, a tribute to the man of steel. Both tracks were co-written by a
24-year old bank clerk who, a few years later, would go on to much greater
fame: Harry Nilsson.
Unfortunately this single also missed the mark and Jimmie
quietly returned to the day job. Hey Little Girl was re-issued, this time with an instrumental version on the B-side
(curiously renamed Chicken Track on
some copies, Hey Little Girl Part 2
on others, and credited to the Jimmie Cross Orchestra) on the
Vee-jay imprint Chicken Records: in 1967 Nilsson would offer Super-Duper Man and Hey Little Girl, along with half a dozen other songs, to The
Monkees. They turned them down but did opt to record his other compositions Cuddly
Toy and Daddy’s Song.
Yet that would not be the end for I Want My Baby Back. In 1977 British DJ Kenny Everett began featuring I
Want My Baby Back on his Capital radio
programme The World's Worst Wireless Show although initially,
probably because of the credits on his later release, Everett wrongly assumed
that Jimmy Cross was in fact a nom de plume of Harry Nilsson. Even though he
got his facts wrong, the interest in the song created by Everett inspired
Wanted Records in the UK to re-issue the single, complete with its original
B-side Play the Other Side (a short,
instrumental version of the A-side) and a new picture sleeve but without
bothering to officially licence the damned thing. They even had the cheek to
add a jokey sleeve note and credit it to Jimmy, even though the poor devil knew
very little (if anything) about the release.
Jimmy died of a heart attack that same year at the
ridiculously young age of 39 in North Hollywood. Perry Botkin Jr went on to
fame and fortune working with the likes of Barbra Streisand, Van Dyke Parks and
Carly Simon as well as writing and producing the music for many successful TV
series including Happy Days, Mork and Mindy and Laverne and Shirley.
Gil Garfield, sadly, passed away in 2011 after a long battle with cancer. Jimmy
is buried at the Forest Lawn Cemetery. I hope that he’s finally been reunited
with his baby.
Jimmie’s daughter, Kellee
Cross Raymer, is (rightly) rather proud of her father’s most famous three
minutes: “Yes, some would say that I Want My Baby Back is just a little bit out there; but never the less,
it must put smile's on people's faces!”
Here, for your enjoyment, is every track recorded by Jimmie (or Jimmy) Cross. I’ve also included the instrumental B-sides to I Want My Baby Back (Play the Other Side), The Ballad of James Bong (Play the Other Side Again) and Hey Little Girl (Chicken Track).
Enjoy!
* There’s an earlier single by Jimmie Cross, Pretty Girls
Everywhere (probably the same song which
was originally recorded by Eugene Church and was later covered by the Walker Brothers) issued in 1961 on Recordo Records. However I’ve been unable to ascertain if this is the same Jimmy/Jimmie Cross as our
hero. If anyone out there knows, do tell!
