You better get straight

On a nondescript thursday afternoon, I went with my man Tone Tank to Generation Records

Hadn't been there in ages.
I know the record stores are struggling. What with the kids. And the Downloading.

I used to love record stores. Loved the whole culture.

Maybe I got burnt out.
I can still dig in my own collection. There's tons of records I've never even listened to in there. (I used to acquire records in vast abundances. And with such regularity!) . I used to rescue crates and crates of records from dumpsters, clear out basements of elderly relatives, trade for them, barter, do whatever it took.

In truth I only walked into the store because Tone had some business with them. I was just tagging along because we were wandering around Manhattan Island.

I quit smoking cigarettes more than two years ago (you can do it too!). And by now I am so well over the hump that I no longer even think of it. I can hardly even remember what it was like. Smoking. And I can say with confidence that I'll never smoke another one of those damned things in my life. But every once in a while I'll catch a whiff of some wandering puff of R.J Reynolds' money-crop cloud floating off into a cool/crisp autumn evening and I'll remember everything.

I caught a whiff of those records.

I only allowed myself to flick through one row.
I pulled out this Eric Burdon Record

(I don't know if anybody noticed) but we took a couple chances so far with Eric Burdon on the show. And Eric Burdon has been ILL for quite some time now. But I'd never heard this one. And Eric Burdon just looks like he's not playing on that cover. The dude standing behind him has a Paul Korzan thing going on (a close personal friend of mine). And the dude in the back left looks like mad people I know with that mustache.
(anyway)
Eric Burdon is a real soulful dude.
The guy at the counter goes: "the first track on here is awesome".
The first track is "White Houses"
The guy was right. It is awesome. The whole record is awesome really.
But I've been playing "White Houses" over and over the last couple of days.
That's the real chance on this record.
There are a couple other chances on here too. But if I had to pick one, this would be THE chance.

Having recently been evicted from my situation living underneath the Impact Theatre on Underhill avenue, I feel a bit unmoored. I don't know what my next move is going to be. It's all up in the air. My life. Everything. And something about this song compliments, somehow, my contemplative mood.
Thinking about what it is that I really want out of life. How I want my life to be lived.

Download:
White Houses - Eric Burdon & The Animals


-KRAY

Chances With Wolves #8: Cosmo takes a chance

Episode #8:

Special Guest Star:

Cosmo Baker

Tracklist:
Introduction
Summertime - Billy Stewart
Eleanor Rigby - Kim Weston
Indian Rope Man - Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & The Trinity
Don't Drop Out - Dolly Parton
Tired Eyes - Neil Young
I Won't Hurt You - Neo Maya
Today - Tom Scott
You Don't Love Me Anyhow - Act One
It Be's That Way Sometime - Nina Simone
Daydream - Rita Moss
Danny's Dream - Jeanne Newman
Smokey Joe The Dreamer - Bullet
The Dream Catcher - The Little Boy Blues
Hank Aaron - Smoke
Can't Help Falling in Love - Robert Zimmerman
I Sen't My Love - Billy's Band
Sea of Love - Phil Phillips & The Twilights
Save Their Souls - Bohannon
(Intermission w/ Cosmo Baker)
**Cosmo Baker's Set**
The Other Song - Spirit
War in Peace - Skip Spense
Six Day War - Colonel Bagshot
Season of The Witch - Lou Rawls
Come in out of the rain - Parliament
Tom Cat - Muddy Waters
Stone Junkie - Curtis Mayfield
Victims of the Darkness - Allen Toussaint
The Lurcher - Faust
Warning - The Ansley Dunbar Retaliation
Suburban Family Lament - Ruth Copeland
Don't You Know - Jan Hammer
Halleluwah - Can
Stoned is - Cynara
Momma Miss America - Paul McCartney
Psychedelic Portrait - Jack Arel
Gossip - Cyril Neville
Three People In Love - Mack Rice
I've Been Watching You - Southside Movement
Forever My Queen - Pentagram
Tatou Strip Tease Michel Audiard
Tales of Brave Ulysses - Rotary Connection
Tailor Man - United States of America
Odokamona - Ian Carr' Nucleus
See Emily Play - Pink Floyd
(Interlude)
What's going on (stripped down version) - Marvin Gaye


****CORRECTION: Thomas Jefferson is on the 2 Dollar Bill. Keep it real. Peace



-

Joan Baez's Rap Song

It's some kind of diss song aimed at Time Magazine.


First of all she's wearing an astronaught jacket with the "Red Baron" goggles. On some real Chuck Yeager-about-to-break-the-sound-barrier shit

Also this record was released in '77 which means it predates the Blondie tune by four years. So she got the jump on the white-woman hip-hop-homage-track craze. And her flow ain't that bad. She can fuck with Deborah Harry.
She gives no shout outs to Grandmaster Flash or Fab 5 Freddie though, which would have been a good look.

But it does remind me of a rap song in a few other ways:

1. It's all about her "industry strife". Mad rap songs are about the music industry. Rap music is the most self-referential genre of music of all time. It's because it's post-modern or whatever. She even mentions record sales.

2. She's basically talking shit & and telling off the haters. Plus she refers to herself as "the Queen"

3. Beefing with magazines in your songs is just a mad hip-hop thing to do.


check it out:
Joan Baez-Time Rag (Download)



KRAY

Episode # 7: Chances With Chin Chin

Episode #7


click here to stream




Send us Joints you think we'd like or comments and questions to discuss on the air to Chanceswithwolves@gmail.com

Special Guest Stars:

CHIN CHIN

Playlist:

Gloomy Sunday - Ricky Nelson
Someone To Fullfill My Needs - Moovers
When I Was Young - Eric Burdon
Poor Man - Lee Hazlewood
Marie - John Standberry Jr.
Who Knows - Marion Black
Pitter Patter - The Ultra Mates
Sunny - The Dreamlets
I don't Know Why - Delroy Wilson
Woman you made me - Bobby Dixon
Bloop Beep - Gary McFarland
Were-Wolf - The Kact Ties
Bang Bang - Sheila
Zorba - John Murphy & David Hughes
Strange Weather - Tom Waits
I Need Some Money - John Lee Hooker
Swinging Drums - Ronny Kae
(InterMission w/ Chin Chin)
Godfather - The Professionals
---Torbitt A/K/A DJ Lil' Shalimar's Set----
Smilin' (While You're Crying) - Poets of Rhythm
StreetWalker - The Bar Kays
Come Down Hard On Me - Jimi Hendrix
Take Me To The Pilot - Latimore
Stick 'Em Up - Archie Shepp
What Comes Around (Goes Around) -Dr. John
Lady Dubonette - The Bazaroos
She's Cracked - Modern Lovers
(Interlude W/ Chin Chin)
Love is Hurt - Art Grayson
The Boston Wrangler (from the soundtrack of The Thomas Crown Affair) - Michel Legrand
For What It's Worth - Sergio Mendes
My Lady - Wood, Brass, & Steel
Soupy - Maggie Thrett
He Will Be There - The Brothers
Lonely Sea - The Beach Boys
Blue Jean Blues - ZZ Top

Episode # 6

This was one was a real good show

Special Guest Star:

Tone Tank

We had first ever guest this week, Mr. Tone Tank who's new EP is available for free download at www.Scumlife.com

Also:

We now have a mailbag.
Send all your questions, comments, queries, playful barbs, shout-outs, vitriolic rants, song requests, hate mail, or nude photos to

Chanceswithwolves (at) GMAIL (dot) COM

We'll be reading the most interesting letters out the mailbag on the show. So don't scrimp -come wid it.


PLAYLIST:

Introductory excerpt from "Teen Wolf Too" Staring Jason Bateman
First girl I Loved - The Incredible String Band
Like Running Water - Clarence Reid
The Fuzz - Diane & Carole, & The Watchamacallits
Dumb Head - Ginny Arnell
Bury Me In My Shades - Casey Anderson
Your Beat Kicks Back Like Death - Jans Lekman
But I was Cool - Oscar Brown Jr.
Check My Machine - Paul McCartney
Ain't No Love In The Heart Of The City - Bobby Bland
Salt of The Earth - Violinaires
Black Gold of The Sun - Rotary Connection
Transmissions - The Turtles
(Intermission)
Only In America - Tone Tank
Modern Rhymes - Cool Calm Pete
Cod Liver Oil & The Orange Juice - Hamish Imlac
Stay Close To Me - Bad Brains
Now I Taste Tears - Fearns Brass Foundry
Only Black Man In South Dakota - Andre Williams
You Ain't Going Nowhere - Robert Zimmerman
Stay With Me - Sharon Tandy
Trouble, Heartache, & Sadness - Ann Peebles
Hollywood Hopefull - Louden Wainwright III
Dead Man's Stroll - The Revels
Jealous Guy - Donny Hathaway
Hey There Sunshine- The Pre-Cambrian Lightning Bolt
Six Trey- Freestyle Fellowship
Change - Shades of Brooklyn
(Intermission)
Ali Baba - Jon Holt
Strangler in The Night - Albert Desalvo
The Bottom - Duke Payne
Cry Me A River - Kevin "King" Lear
Finally Found You Out - Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger, and The Trinity
I Smell A Rat - Big Mama Thornton
Charlie Brown - Ghostface
Ave Lucifer - Os Mutantes
Satan Is Real - The Louvin Brothers
Number One - Bill Mos
(our Goodbyes)
Anythang - Devin The Dude


Peace Out


********CORRECTION: That's not Bob Dylan on that Hennesy Poster. He did do a Victoria's Secret add though so....it's on you, really. I can't call it.

Episode # 5

Episode 5





Playlist:


1. Ghost Dance - Truett & George
2. L'il Red Riding Hood - Sam Sham & The Pharoahs
3. Sleepy Hollow - The Last Word
4. Six Day War - Colonel Bagshot
5. The Cuckoo - Taj Mahal
6. I'm Standing in the Shadows - Five Royals
7. Crimson & Olive - Ken Nordine accompanied by his Rubber Eggs
8. Save the World - Southside Movement
9. Is There Any Love - Trevor Dandy
(Interlude)
11. Give It Up - Kool & the Gang
12. The First Cut is the Deepest - P.P. Arnold
13. Fuel for Love - Wrinkers Experience
14. If Love was Money - Dan Penn
15. Life Depends on Love - Bert Jansch
16. Black Ladies, Magical Nights - F. Polymeris & V. Tsitsanis
17. Crying By Myself - Wendy Rene
18. Must be Something - Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson
19. Space Walker - The Time Zone
20. Subway Joe - Joe Bataan
21. Pig Snoots Pt. 1- Natural Bridge Bunch
22. Too Much - Eric & the Chessmen
23. Butcher's Tale - The Zombies
24. I Got You (I feel Good) - Vilma Valera
25. Rainbow Power - Timmy Thomas
(Interlude)
26. Oxycontin - Central Services
27. Poppa Large in the US - 100 dBs
28. Not for Sale - Coco Rosie
29. Be Good to Me - ESG
30. Walking the Cow - Daniel Johnston
31. Fat Boy - Billie Stewart
33. Girl like You - The Troggs
34. Good Things - Charles Wright
35. I'm your Man - Richard Hell & the Voidoids
36. Trip to your Heart - Sly & the Family Stone
37. Puppet on a String - Gino Washington
38. Just Dropped In - The First Edition
39. I ain't Gonna Cry No More - Timi Yuro
40. Don't Pity Me - Joannie Summers
41. Sexy Coffee Pot - Tony Avalon & the Bel-Airs
(Interlude)
42. Lakota Dream Song - Earl Bullhead

Slept on films part 2

So it seems that Charles Burnett is one of the unsung heroes of American cinema. I was in Detroit a few months ago, up late and flipping channels, when I was struck by the gritty, early eighties feel of a film I'd never seen before. It was Burnett's "My Brother's Wedding" (1983). It had just started, so I watched the whole joint. Using a cast of amateurs and non-actors, Burnett tells the story of Pierce, an intelligent but disaffected young man working in his family's dry-cleaning business in Watts, Los Angeles. Pierce's blue collar ideology conflicts with the ambitions of his upwardly mobile brother, and he eventually becomes torn between attending his brother's wedding, and being there for an old ex-convict friend (who, strangely, is named Soldier Boy). The film is rough around the edges, but incredibly direct and earnest in it's depiction of family relationships and Pierce's struggle to figure out what he is doing with his life. It is also visually striking, and quite plainly, beautiful.
Certainly, worth a watch if you can find it.

One of Burnett's earlier films, "Killer of Sheep" (1977) was also on that night. It was also ill, but much looser in the narrative sense. Here is a clip.








I think part of the reason I like these films is that I am fascinated with the Watts towers, and hence with Watts itself. This little film tells the story of how Simon Rodia realized his vision over a period of 30 years. Simply incredible.