Pedro Pistolas - Los Locos Del Ritmo

Today enjoy the long cool stride of Los Locos Del Ritmo.

They were one of the first major Mexican rock and roll bands to form in the late fifties, going on to become the first Mexican rock group imported back into the states (as seen in an appearance on the Ted Mack hosted Original Amateur Hour).

Pedro Pistolas is a deadly cool piece of surfabilly, the sound is pure convertibles cruising down the boulevard with a hot leather interior and the dead eyed killer intent of a shark. All in a tidy two minute package!

Satisfaction - Los Apsons

Los Apsons have been cited by Carlos Santana as one of the best bands of the sixties. The group were founded by Arturo and Francisco Durazo, brothers who grew up in Agua Prieta a town in far northern Sonora which stands on the border between Mexico and the United States. As a result the brothers were constantly bombarded by a mixture of American and Mexican media cultures, with a particular emphasis on the new Rock and Roll music drifting down from the States. Their embracing of the sound, alongside several contemporary bands, started what became known as the Northern Invasion.

The band travelled and picked up members, and had particular early success (as many sixties bands did) with covers of currently popular songs. This can be seen in today's Best Song Ever: Los Apsons rendition of the Stones classic Satisfaction.

The song is a fairly straight cover, though the recording has a wonderfully woozy quality to it. The drums have low slung machine echoes rippling off of each snare smack while the guitars spindle and twang through the murk. However I feel particular love should be paid to the vocals: simultaneously aping Jagger while feeling far more run down. I believe Los Apsons can't get no satifaction more than I believe Mick Jagger can't get no satisfaction.

Mary Mary - Los Ovnis

Sixties garage punks from Mexico play The Monkees. That sentence makes me way happier than it should. MARY MARY!

This will be the first of a few entries looking at underground sixties Mexican musicians, but to set the stage and get you shimmying in your seat with anticipation enjoy Mary Mary by Los Ovnis!

Tunes of Terror Vol. 4 - The Witch

'The Witch' makes me think of the Batman theme song on steroids. In fact the titular Witch would make the best super hero ever. A garage rock heroine roving the city late at night in a long black hearse fighting villains with sex, hair and a massive shotgun she calls her BroomStick. Goddamn yes. What was I talking about?

Right! The Sonics are old favorites here on That Song Blog. We've spoken about their brutally percussive brand of sixties rock before, so you know what to expect. It beats the shit out of you while forcing you to do a violent twist.

You know the drill- load it up and make it LOUD, because it's illegal to listen to The Sonics if your ears aren't beginning to bleed.

Bend Me, Shape Me - The Models

The opening thirty seconds of The Models 'Bend Me, Shape Me' (which should only ever be listened to through headphones- loudly) are the equivalent of drowning in a bath tub made of gelatin guitars while drums implode like bubbles. The song is so drenched in reverb and echo that it sounds more like a bacchanalian transmission from another dimension than a pop song.

'Bend Me, Shape Me' was initially a track by the group The Outsiders (though some claim The Models put their version out first), but only became a hit in 1967 when the so soporific-it-rivals-valium American Breed cover hit the airwaves.

There's not a great deal of information available amount The Models. They were part of the growing army of Sixties Garage girl groups and supposedly were made up of Vogue magazine models. The latter part is a little hard to verify but it's a striking image especially when placed against the sound of the song.

Unlike their contemporaries, such as The Shangri-Las, The Models didn't fully embrace pop. 'Bend Me, Shape Me,' with it's effects heavy production (courtesy of Tom Wilson) and stop'n'start rhythms is both hypnotically groovy and icily alienating. There's an edge of unease, like you're hearing music made by doppleganger Garage girls in a concrete bunker.

Clock on the Wall - Alva Snelling

You'll have to take my word for it, but the man in that video wants to blow your mind. I've looked and looked for any detailed explanation as to the identity of Alva Snelling (also known by his stage name Alva Starr). From the little I could find he appears to hail from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, didn't put out an enormous amount of material, and passed away in 1995.

His one hit (if you can call mainly known by obsessive record collectors a hit) is Clock On the Wall. The song is built on a metronomic ticking that slowly cracks away at your skull like a twitching ball peen hammer tapping an egg. Wire thin guitars begin pricking and burning away at your nerves as Alva spins his own brand of psychedelic surgery.

You've just had your mind blown by a man with an estate agent moustache.

The Electronic Insides of Dr. Krieg - The Riders of the Mark

The reason I love sixties garage so much is because it was a hotbed of experimental sounds and creativity. It's like a drip feed of one-off bands and projects pumping you full of mutant morphine to give you wonderfully weird hallucinations. Hallucinations like The Electronic Insides of Dr. Krieg:

Much like The Monocles from a few days ago, The Riders of the Mark appeared out of an LSD saturated haze and gave us one song before vanishing again. Armed with little more than a Lord of the Rings referencing name (naturally), Riders John Hill and Don Cochrane entered the studio in 1967 wanting to make a song similar to The Beatles track 'Tomorrow Never Knows.' Only, you know- with a whole lot more angry German machine men bathing in fire (naturally).

The song is a fascinating melding of reference points and genres. The lo-fi fuzz bass and thudding steam-powered drum line feels like a blue print for thrash punk. The backwards looping guitars and organs are firmly entrenched in mid-sixties psychedelia. Electronic squeals and blips slip and slide across the foundation, boring into you like an elastic power-drill. The automaton fever dream screams echo, burst and submerge beneath the waves of sound.

Wonderful. And apparently it's an anti-war song. In so far as songs about degree carrying fire robots can be an anti-war song.

The Spider and The Fly - The Monocles

I just...

Okay. It's...

It's hard to explain. Or find any explanation. As far as I can tell, The Monocles were a garage rock band from Colorado who started out making clean cut pop, then they discovered drugs, then this happened.

It walks a very fine line between being insanely kitsch (which it is) and pretty unnerving. The echo drenched bass and drums feel like rubber bands slapping against the underside of your brain. The guitar is less played than punched, crackling with electricity and bark. The organ screams and rolls, building higher and higher before crashing down in on itself.

I don't even know where to begin describing the vocals. A bit like the Justice League narrator and Vincent Price were dropped in a blender. With a mouse. And a B movie actress.

It's not like it would ever be (or ever was) successful, but it doesn't matter. The fun the musicians were having is infectious, and it's definitely unique. It makes me wish we'd see more bizarre stuff like this today. If this doesn't open the door to psychedelic auto-tuned tornadoes of robots demolishing humanity with pop songs, then there is no justice in the world.

Linus and Lucy - Vince Guaraldi Trio

Vince Guaraldi was a jazz trio band leader active from the late 50s to the early 70s. He is chiefly remembered for composing the music to the Peanuts television specials and movies; and for Linus and Lucy in particular.

It's an achingly simple piece of jazzy blues. Driving bass piano notes samba with brushes and maracas, bursts of drums thunder with chiming piano licks, all backed by that hear-it-once-and-you-never-forget-it melody.

The reason Linus and Lucy so perfectly encapsulates the spirit of Peanuts is because it hits just the right pitch of naivety and world weariness. Peanuts has remained perennially popular because of the universal chord struck by taking children and giving their concerns an adult perspective.

With this in mind, Guaraldi has composed a piece of music that wouldn't feel out of place soundtracking a bustling metropolis or a kid scraping their knee. It's the drudge of dragging a sledge up hill and the wide-eyed-ye-Gods-I'm-Alive heart pounding affirmation of the world as you thunder back down the ice.

The Other Side - Tiny Tim

Tiny Tim's reputation precedes the hell out of him: 'He's the dude who sings with that annoying voice, right?' or 'The ukulele guy?' or 'That gross guy with the face and the hair?'

Yes. Tiny Tim often sang in falsetto. Yes. Tiny Tim played the majority of his music upon the Ukulele. Yes. Tiny Tim was unusual looking to say the least. The fact that this man with grease paint on his face was for a brief period one of, if not the, biggest pop star in The United States was a truly incredible feat.

However when you listen to his first album, God Bless Tiny Tim, it all becomes a bit clearer. Tiny's consummate performance is given a grandiose psychedelic pop paint job by producer Richard Perry (who would go on to produce artists such as Harry Nilsson). Recorded in 1968 with the majority of it's numbers written between 1901-and the late 1920s, Tiny's debut still sounds piercingly fresh today largely due to how bizarre it was in the first place, and is well worth your time to seek out.

The track we are looking at today is The Other Side, one of the few numbers written contemporaneously with the album by a man named Bill Dorsey (a man who we will discuss a bit further another day).

The Other Side is a whirlwind of a song. First there's cryptic tone poetry about the Earth having drowned in a watery apocalypse accompanied by staccato bass plucks. But then! Urgent, slightly discordant pianos and synths build up the pacing as Tiny begins to tense and menace. But then! The booming orchestra-gone-drinking-song punch line of a chorus kicks in as the song joyously announces 'The Ice Caps Are Melting! Oh-ho-ho-ho! All the world is drowning!'

The whole song (and album) has an incredible sense of theatre about it. It's gripping, dramatic, and camp as hell. These are widescreen technicolor marvels for the ear.

And he barely sings in a falsetto.

Who Are Parents - The Shaggs

Any song by The Shaggs requires a bit of explanation. The Shaggs were a three piece out of Fremont, New Hampshire comprised of sisters Helen, Dorothy and Betty Wiggin. The band, hotly tipped for fame by their grandmother, were managed (in some reports rather forcefully and always eccentrically) by their father Austin. He booked them regular gigs at school halls and community theatres, and even pushed them into recording their one and only album Philosophy of the World, from which the above is taken.

Now as you may have noticed if you've begun listening to the track, The Shaggs are not a fantastically gifted band musically. Rhythms wander, guitars jangle discordantly, and the singing can't quite decide on a key. There are wonderfully serendipitous moments of harmony appearing out of the mix, but overall things lack polish to put it generously. However what The Shaggs lack in musical training they more than make up for in unselfconscious sincerity. There's an innocence and a genuine belief in the music they're putting out which cuts to the heart far quicker than lush harmonies or rich orchestration ever could.

Nowhere is this better exemplified than the song Who Are Parents. The song is a sweet n' slow piece of sixties pop reminding kids that, in the end, your parents are going to love you no matter what. Is it a little trite? Sure. Yet no other band has even tried to approach this message, and one suspects that if they did they wouldn't pull it off with anywhere near as much heart. Simple, sweet and it'll have you thinking fondly for your folks. Not something I expect to write about a rock song, but thoroughly glad that I am able to.

Little Hands - Alexander 'Skip' Spence

Alexander 'Skip' Spence. One time drummer for Jefferson Airplane. Founder of Moby Grape. In 1968, while recording Grape's second album Wow, Spence suffered a violent breakdown which ultimately ended with a six month stay at Bellevue Hospital Center where he was diagnosed with schizophrenia (likely aggravated by ingesting copious amounts of LSD).

During his time at Bellevue, Spence was writing songs. Songs which sound familiarly unrecognisable, the aural equivalent of coming home to your house to find the furniture stacked in bizarre statues.

Spence left Bellevue and, purportedly in his pajamas, rode down to Nashville on a motorcycle and recorded the album Oar. Comprised of the songs he'd written during his hospitalization and performed entirely by himself, it's the albums opening track Little Hands which we are looking at today.

Little Hands is a shambling gem of psyche-folk. One of the first things to jump out about the song is it's unusual rhythm. Stuck somewhere in between a war march and sunshine, the drums and acoustic guitar work together to create a rich punctuation to Spence's lyrics; infectious despite never entirely settling into a groove. Atop these pulsations spikes of electric guitar chime and pounce across the weave of sounds.

The real star of this show however are Spence's multi-tracked vocals. Skydiving from ethereal highs to creaking lows, his voice breaks out across the track like streaks of light, but always manages to remain intimate.

Have I The Right - The Honeycombs

Have I The Right comes courtesy of 1964 one hit wonders The Honeycombs, chiefly known for being the first successful rock group with a female drummer (they have now mutated into two groups of the same name, both containing original members and neither as good) though really the song belongs just as much to legendarily troubled producer Joe Meek.

Meek is primarily known for producing the famous hit Telstar and for employing a variety of unorthodox (for the time) methods to gain new sounds. For my money, Have I the Right takes Telstar and proceeds to stomp on its neck- over and over again.

Which is appropriate really. The reason Have I The Right's rhythm pounds so righteously is because Meek had the whole band stamp on the wooden floor of the studio recorded by five separate microphones, topped off with a sixth one being directly smashed with a tambourine. The resultant booms are organic, brutal and joyous all at once, instantly elevating the track above its similar sounding contemporaries.

The Honeycombs – Have I The Right

You're Goin' Miss Your Candyman - Terry Callier

Terry Callier has had a tough time.

Despite several critically acclaimed albums recorded throughout the late 60s and early 70s he failed to catch on commercially and finally decided to stop touring. He went back to his desk job at a local university and settled into a comfortable nine to five, his musical past for all intents and purposes a secret identity he'd left behind.

Then he was rediscovered.

Slowly he was coaxed out of hiding and back onto the road. Some moderate success followed. People were buying his albums. They were attending his shows.

Then he got fired.

When the University he'd been working at discovered his 'secret identity' they threw him out the door. The exact circumstances remain somewhat shrouded, only cryptically referred to by Callier himself in interview.

If I had to guess a reason from the sound of his music, it was for fear he'd sex the pants off of every college aged girl in a 50 mile radius. You're Goin' Miss Your Candyman is a track off of Callier's breakthrough album The Color of Love, and mother-god-damn is it a good song.

Essentially Callier's take on Midnight Rider, the track is both a musical magpie and time machine of genre and style over it's seven and a half minutes. Folk picked guitars gently caress you through the doors, shimmying bongos slap you on the back, and then one of the slinkiest and sexiest funk basslines ever put to wax spikes your drink while pushing you out to the dance floor.

Callier's voice is equal parts silk sheeted soul singer and blues wolf on the prowl. By the time the string section is duking it out with Motown horns in one of the biggest bar brawls you've ever seen, he drags you into his private back room for a quiet moment alone, before letting the whole thing roar back up again into a long hot finish.

The song can be found in two flavors: the original album mix (which is great) or a version slightly remastered by The Cinematic Orchestra for their Late Night Tales mix album. The answer to choosing between the two? Easy. Get The Cinematic Orchestra's version first, and when you realize you HAVE to hear more of this man, get The Color of Love in it's entirety. Let's give the candyman we never knew we were missing the love he deserved way back when, just a little late coming.

EDIT: If the video above has trouble loading, here's the song as trimmed by The Cinematic Orchestra.

Terry Callier – You're Goin' Miss Your Candyman