As I’ll detail next week in the New Year when I post my traditional rundowns of records I picked up over the past year, despite not being able to go out for much of 2020, I still did quite a lot of record therapy. With a year like this one I was especially thankful to be able to be able to close it out with a trip to one of my favorite LA spots, Avalon Vintage. Today marked only the third time I was actually in a physical record store during this year. As bonafide record nerd/addict, in usual year there might be some days that I’d go to three stores, let alone weeks or months, so as I said, being able to close out this year actually being able to dig through a collection in person was about as nice a way as 2020 could close out.
And what a person. Rodney is one of my favorite record people. His tastes are broad, he tells the most amazing stories connected to his life and music and it’s always a joy to be in his space, newly re-designed a few months ago.
Perhaps it’s fitting the final record (well, in truth, I bought a bunch of records today), is by a band called Beast, since 2020 was such a beast of a year. There’s not a whole lot that I know about this group, a seven piece outfit at this time, apparently based originally out of Denver, Colorado. I have vague memories of seeing this record, somewhere, at some point in the past, and having the cover haunt me until now. Now that I’ve actually listened to the album, with songs like “Inlook,” “Communication,” “Migration” and “Don’t You Think It’s Time?,” it’s a little hard to believe I haven’t had a copy before. In terms of their sound, there’s many elements in Beast that I love dearly, there’s a bit of hard psych (“Move Mountain,” which I’m not sharing is maybe the best example of that), with more pastoral sounds, as well as CSNY harmonies, all mixed up with a bit of jazz, and some flightly flute. After a year of so much uncertainty and (as I’ve written below) so much loss, it was nice to finish the year doing one of the things I’ve done the most in my life…digging for new and old sounds and finding a few gems of records along the way. So, looking forward to 2021 and can’t wait for my “I Survived 2020” T-shirt to arrive. Happy New Years folks!
Today we learned that Daniel Dumile, perhaps best known as the masked rapper MF Doom, passed away on Halloween in 2020. Though we’ve so many legitimate giants, this one hits especially hard, since at 49, Dumile perhaps had decades of choice material to release, but now we’ll never know what he might have created. While I’m sure I’ll spend a great deal of time with my favorite recording from the MF Doom years, Madvilliany, today I felt like going back to the beginning, and when I heard Daniel Dumile first, when he was known as Zev Love X in the group KMD. “Peachfuzz” wasn’t the first time I’d heard his unique style, as he’d first popped up on my radar, as was the case with many, due to his guest verses on 3rd Bass’ “The Gas Face.”
Returning to this early work upon hearing of his passing, it’s fascinating to note how different both the flow and the beat sound from other groups of this period. It’s not as if it’s an entirely unknown or unexpected sound, but there’s still something about it that sounds…just…different. Some of it is in the that rapid, verbally dexteritous, flow that became a hallmark of MF Doom, but it’s also in the choice of samples. Hearing this now, in an era where it’s so easy to look up on the internet and figure out the samples of records, I was surprised to learn that the song is based primarily (in addition to familiar drums from Funkadelic’s “You’ll Like It Too”) on two separate songs from soul crooner O.C. Smith. Surprise mainly because, one of the songs “Sounds of Goodbye” was on a record I used to own from my family collection, but somehow I’d never ever played on “Soul Kitchen” back in my Album 88 days. That brilliant attention to detail, a focus on samples that felt novel and wordsmithery that was beyond peer are what I’ll remember most about Mr. Dumile. I don’t often say this, but I truly mean it. Rest In Power, Daniel Dumile aka Zev Love X aka MF Doom.
Another passing that happened after I’d recorded the “Adoration” themed December “Moods,” was that of guitarist and vocalist Leslie West at 75. West was best known as the founder of Mountain, which recorded one of the most iconic licks in all of guitar god rockdowm with “Mississippi Queen,” in 1970. While that song does have some heavy drums that would find a happy home in many a Hip-Hop production if the breaks were a bit cleaner, it’s the song “Long Red,” taken from a live Mountain record that somehow became a staple sample of the golden era.
You find a part of “Long Red” in some 600+ rap songs from 1986 to 2019. I’ve always been curious about how this song became a bedrock sample. It doesn’t lend itself easily to sampling. It’s a live recording, while the drums are clean at the start, it’s most often the “Clap your hands to what he’s doing!” that gets sampled (though I originally thought, due to how it was cut up in Eric B & Rakim’s “Eric B Is President,” that they were saying, “clap your hands to what is the 1, 2.” I know it doesn’t make much sense but that’s what I heard). But a bedrock sample it has become. I don’t know what Leslie West thought of his influence on Hip-Hop culture, but in addition to all the muscular licks he laid down, I’m thankful for it. RIP
Roughly a day or two after I’d already recorded and sent of the December “Moods” focused on “Adoration” for those we lost in 2020, we learned of the passing of someone who I likely would have started or closed the show with, Stanley Cowell. For those of us who are fans of “spiritual jazz,” the label that Cowell co-foudned with Charles Tolliver, Strata East, is perhaps the gold standard. All of the albums were artist controlled and they are some of the most magnificent music that was produced in the 1970s. I first learned about Strata East from the 1997 Universal Sound/Soul Jazz collection of music from the label, “Strata 2 East.” This was around the period of time that I was really getting deeper and deeper into digging for vinyl, and the sounds really hit the sweet spot in terms of the kind of jazz music I was increasingly interested in. Music that you rarely heard on the radio in those days, growing up in Atlanta with a landscape dominated by WCLK, featuring virtually all-Jazz programming, though tendingh tended towards more of a straight ahead approach. The only time that WCLK didn’t play Jazz during those days was on Sundays in the afternoon, when they’d play multiple hours of gospel. WRAS, wisely chose that time to play Don Kennedy’s “Big Band Jump,” and a jazz show that I initially founded with James Diggs, Darryl “G-Wiz” Felker (and named by G-Wiz), “The Blue Note.” Over time James and Darryl weren’t able to keep up hosting duties and so the show was all mine for the last two years I was at the station, until 1998. In addition to focusing on jazz funk and dance floor jazz, spiritual jazz was a major component of the show, sounds which again, you so rarely heard anywhere in those largely pre-internet days. Interestingly enough, after leaving WRAS, a station that had sold off it’s jazz library before I’d ever gotten there, I found myself at WORT in Madison, Wisconsin, with maybe the best jazz record library I’ve ever seen, including at least 30 Strata East original albums. One that the station didn’t have and one that I searched high and low for many years until I finally got a copy last year around my birthday was this one from Cowell, something I’d long wanted for the version of “Travelin’ Man,” which was featured on the Strata 2 East compilation mentioned above.
Cowell recorded two versions of “Travelin’ Man,” on 1974’s “Musa-Ancestral Streams” and here. This version (which also features some lovely flute from Jimmy Heath, who passed in January of 2020) isn’t just my favorite of the two, it’s one of my all-time favorite tunes from those Strata East albums. Part of it is the sound, part of it is the sentiment, sung so lovingly, primarily by Charles Fowlkes Jr.
“I’m a travelin’ man, never stopping, but moving on, moving on…I’m a travelin’ man, trying my best to understand what’s going on, goin’ on…”
As someone who has lived in multiple states and has had 14 different residences in the 25 years since my mother passed, it’s safe to say that the song resonates deeply with me, as do “Trying To Find A Way,” and the album’s closing, “Lullaby.” It’s gorgeous, spiritual, life-affirming music. Something that could only come from artists fully and completely self-determining their own production and creating exactly what they wanted to create with each other. My life is made so much brighter by the records that Cowell had a hand in through the creation of Strata East, I’m so thankful to have been in a position for many years to share that music and spread it far and wide. RIP
Though I’ve been a bit silent on this site since October, I’d actually been purposely holding back getting a post together for the December “Moods,” because I recorded it on December 19th, and knew full well that 2020 wasn’t done with us in terms of artists passing during this year of woe. But for all the loss, it’s equally important to remember what we’ve gained through being able to bear witness to the artists who gave us so many beautiful bright moments over the years. So, in our 12th edition of Moods In Free Time, we pay tribute to artists that passed in 2020, spending more time highlighting many of those who were underappreciated, as opposed to some of the bigger names and legitimate giants we lost. Looking forward to looking forward, in grand anticipation, for what 2021 may hold in new releases and (I truly believe) a return to live music sometimes in the Summer or Fall, when we celebrate our one year anniversary on Artform Radio in January 2021. Until then, y’all take care and be proud that you survived 2020 and can live to tell the tale.
Given that I’ve only got an hour for “Moods” these days on Artform Radio, as soon as I made the decision to do a show focused on some of the artists we’d lost in 2020, I knew I had have some hard choices in terms of who and what made it in. Though I play the more well known 45 version of “Who Got De Funk?” in the show, this live version recorded in 1979, from his 1981 private press (his own label, Andrew’s Music) release “Fonk Update” is by far my favorite. The problem, at least when you only have 50 minutes to work with of music, is that all three parts together, with the chatter, is a full 15 minutes. But I do love it so. The multiple intros about the band members searching high and low for the “Fonk,” cracked me up, especially when they get to a local safeway and are asked by the manager to spell it, and then how things rhythmically shift so distinctly on the different versions, which, aside from the basic melody, sound nothing like the 1973 original (though there’s an even better open drum break, at least to my ears).
When I close my eyes, I can still see Cool Chris at Groove Merchant playing this in the store the very first time I heard it in the early 2000s. White was a fairly underrated player during his day, and I’ve passed on a fair amount of his self-released records. But this one will always have a special place in my heart. RIP
There’s no reason at all that it’s taken me so long to post the November “Moods” here. The show was cut essentially during a week long break for Thanksgiving from school that was most spent in a heavy depressive episode and had all my energy sapped up by the end of the semester. I’ve been free since Christmas Eve, but it’s still be tough to catch up with things here until now, the very last day of this year seemingly like no other 2020.
I’d chosen “Befuddlement” as the mood for November’s show for a couple reasons. One, I couldn’t figure out a mood that fully fit the gluttony that’s expressed in Big Barney’s “The Whole Thang,” and Two, given how weird that record really is when you think about it, that then led me to thinking about other records that have been sitting on one of my shelves for a long gestating (like all of my mixes apparently) mix dedicated to one of my favorite sub-genres that I focus on these days…”Weird Shit.”
So, you ended up with an hour of tunes that befuddle me to no end, in some cases the songs themselves are just confusing (like, how can it be that “The Dead Don’t Die Alive?” even if this was some kind of Zombie Apocalypse, wouldn’t the undead have to have been dead first, which means they would have had to have been alive? Nothing makes sense about the premise of that song), some are a bit bewildering, others are just strange. They all work with that idea of “befuddlement,” and a few have had me in that state for over 25 years…hope y’all dug it.
Given that this month’s show was gonna debut on the eve of Matthew Africa’s birthday in the US, while it was already MKA’s Bday elsewhere in the world, there was no way I couldn’t pay tribute to him on this month’s show. Matthew is someone I have deep reverence for, both when he was here and in the years since his passing, and so “reverence” fit perfectly as the mood for this month.
There have been a number of people who have made impacts on me and turned me onto great music, but nobody is likely ever gonna compare to Matthew’s influence because it happened at a really key moment in my life. When I discovered Jazz Dance Classics Vol. 1, which Matthew helped compile and wrote the notes for, in 1994 or thereabouts, I was still a teenager buying CDs and working at Blockbuster Music (even writing that just makes me cringe y’all). I’d been working at Album 88, WRAS Atlanta for a year and I thought I knew a thing or two about music. But hearing Gary Bartz, 24-Carat Black, & particularly Rusty Bryant’s “The Fire Eater” on that collection completely blew my mind and lit the fire that got me digging for deeper sounds on vinyl. Getting to know Matthew at KALX Berkeley years later when I moved to the Bay Area for grad school, along with that station’s emphasis on their DJs presenting a diversity of sounds in their shows, was also a major turning point in how I listen to music and how I draw connections between different genres and different time periods. The experience of either following his show or being on the air just before his at KALX, along with working on the Record Acquisition Team aka “The RAT,” getting records for the station is something I’ll never forget.
Matthew Africa’s notes to David Axelrod’s Songs Of Experience in the KALX Record Library…with additionally commentary from yours truly.
There’s just no way to fully measure the influence Matthew had on me, and so again, any chance I get to pay tribute to him and show my reverence for the man, I’m gonna take that chance. As I mention on the show, I’ve paid tribute to Matthew on multiple occasions, back in 2012 on KPFK just after his passing and also in 2016 on the online edition of the Melting Pot Radio Hour. Back in 2012 I mentioned that I could have easily done a four hour show, and with all of these tributes I’ve done more than that and could easily double it with all of the music that Matthew turned me onto. I can all but guarantee (after all, no one truly knows what the future holds, it is always unwritten) that this won’t be the last tribute I do for Matthew. There’s still so much more music to discover and to share.
I hope y’all enjoy this relatively short tribute as we’ve shifted back to doing one-hour shows on Artform Radio. If you dig this and you haven’t heard much from Matthew, I recommend that you give a listen to his exhaustive Mizell Bros. mix (99% of which I broadcast over the KPFK airwaves in 2018) and especially that you check out the Soul Boulders 2 mix that he and B.Cause mixed together. As I’ve said before, quoting the golden era classic “T.R.O.Y.” (which is another one of Matthew’s records that now is in my collection), “…never be another, he was my brother.” RIP MKA
Playlist – Moods In Free Time 010: Reverence…for Matthew Africa {opening theme} The Visitors – The Juggler – In My Youth (Muse)
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Lee Dorsey – A Lover Was Born – 7” (Amy) The Shades of Black Lightning – Any Old Way – The Shades of Black Lightning (Tower) U.S. 69 – I Hear You Talkin’ – Yesterday’s Folks (Buddah) The Jackson Sisters – I Believe In Miracles – 7” (Mums) Donald Byrd – You and Music – Places and Spaces (Blue Note) Toni Tornado – Mei Libertei – Toni Tornado (Odeon)
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Gary Bartz NTU Troop – Celestial Blues – Jazz Dance Classics Vol. 1 (Luv’n’Haight) Billy Harper Quintet – Awakening – Love On The Sudan (Denon Jazz) Faust – The Lurcher – Untitled (NOL
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DJ Matthew Africa & B Cause – Excerpt – Soul Boulders 2 (Mixcloud) David Axelrod – A Divine Image – Song Of Experience (Capitol)
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{closing theme} Dungen – C. Visar Vagen – Tio Bitar (Kemado)
Today would have been Matthew Africa’s 49th birthday. As is always the case since his passing 2012, I pay tribute to him and the legacy of music he left on this day his light first shined. This record is one of the ones that found it’s way to me from Matthew’s own collection. Before writing this post, I honestly didn’t know anything about the Shades Of Black Lightning. I heard the opening of “Yesterday’s Dream,” and that song was so blindingly good, I honestly didn’t care what the rest of the album sounded like. But the album itself is solid apparent “Blue-eyed Soul,” made novel by having a horn section that appears to only feature two trombones. I say ‘apparent’ solely because the shading on the front cover makes it impossible to see any of the members of the band, none of which are listed in the notes, aside from songwriter Billy Ford, who I’m guessing is the lead vocalist. The notes on the band from Freddie Piro didn’t lead me to much more about the band, but did confirm a few things about Piro and where it was recorded.
The ”Mama Jo’s” in the title for the instrumental “Mama Jo’s Place,” on the album was a reference to Piro’s mother, which Piro would also take as the name of recording studio, which according to Discogs was one of the first truly independent studios in the Hollywood area. That leads me to believe that Shades Of Black Lightning were likely an LA-area band. Later in 1971, Piro produced a straight soul album by a group called Body & Soul that featured a very different version of “Yesterday’s Dream,” but this one is definitely superior, something the producer Frequency flipped for Wordsworth’s 2004 song “One Day.”
It’s a shame that the powers that be chose “Soul Love In” and “Got Myself Together” as the lone single from this record. A 45 pairing “Yesterday’s Dream” with “Any Old Way” would have been the better choice to my post-Hip Hop ears, especially with that drum break on “Any Old Way.” But alas, how could they know back in 1968 that these kind of sounds would be the kind of thing that so many people would lust after in the future. One things for sure…Matthew Africa always had a knack for tracking down obscure records with deep sounds and fantastic breaks. I would have loved to have known what he thought of this record, and how it came to be in his collection, but those stories are now lost to time. All that remains is the music, and the memories of time shared, and for that, I am eternally thankful that I knew Matthew and called him a friend, and as long as we keep the music going and keep sharing the stories…Matthew Africa Lives Forever
I’ve meant to write a post on this 45 for the past two months. Perhaps, I’ve been putting it off, because I know there’s a long story, full of record nerdery, to tell about how it came into my possession. As with everyone else, whatever plans I had for 2020 were dashed back in March when the world turned. But if you’re addicted to vinyl, you find ways to feed the addiction. Without going out and digging for records, I’m reduced to periodic moments of “digital digging,” on Ebay, Discogs and the wider Internets. That’s how I came across this song, though I can’t remember exactly how the search began. At some point though I ended up on CratesLA’s youtube channel and landed on this song, the perfect anthem for the year that is 2020.
I’d never heard of Thom Macke or the Omega label from Philly, but the production and sentiment on this one just floored me. As is often the case when I hear something online that I dig, I’ll first see if there any copies for sale on Ebay & Discogs. A few other 45s from Macke showed up, but there wasn’t even a listing for this particular release. However, when I returned back to youtube for a re-listen, I was also shocked to discover that CratesLA were selling the record. That immediate rush of finding an amazing song you’d never heard before, was then being raised to new heights when you realize you might be able to own it, was unceremoniously crushed upon seeing that the auction had ended roughly a month and a half before I had stumbled upon the song.
I am, for better and worse, a stubborn fella, so I decided to place my hopes in a search on Google. Much to my complete and total amazement, venerable UK record dealer John Manship had also posted a youtube video of the exact same song, but this one was only from a few weeks prior. With bated breath, I checked the Manship website and unbelievably the 45 was there, and at the utterly affordable price (considering there’s not even a discogs listing for this one) of £50. I quickly deposited it in my cart, along with another 45 I’ve already posted here, Doris & Kelley’s “You Don’t Have To Worry,” and proceeded to do a happy dance in my apartment. That’s when things took a turn yet again.
First, I noticed that after a notice that the 45s were shipped, I then also noticed a refund. Given the amount, corresponding to the Macke 45 plus shipping, I feared the worst, that someone else had snatched up this 45 just before I had. The truth was something I hadn’t considered…the 45 was lost. As is sometimes the case with massive collections, the 45 had been misfiled somewhere and thus I thought that might be the end of my quest to get this record…Until, for whatever reason, I decided to send another e-mail a month later with my birthday approaching, and got the very good news indeed that John hadn’t given up the quest, and had found the 45 literally just the day before. All previous arrangements with cost and shipping were honored and the 45 was on it’s way to me, arriving well before my birthday which allowed me to include this gem in my 45 45s 45th birthday mix.
And what a mysterious gem this is. As I mentioned earlier, there was no listing for the record online. The songwriter, Phelma T. Washington, didn’t seem to have any other credits. The person apparently responsible for it’s sound, F. Fioravanti, didn’t raise any bells with me (I’m guessing this is Franke Fioravanti, who did some production for West End, but one can’t really be sure until you’re sure). Even if there hadn’t been a once in a century pandemic going on that had confined most of us to our homes for most of the year, I still would have thought this was a boss gem of a tune. But finding these lyrics in 2020? It’s just too perfect.
Monday through Friday is just a routine, Everything at home, Quiet and serene, No problem finding things to do, And not much time to think of you, But then comes Saturday and my work is all done, I have nothing to do but think of when we were one, And how it be the weekend, With togetherness in mind, But that was long ago when my love was blind.
My Saturdays are lonely, But Sundays just as bad, Another weekend day and I’m feeling sad, My Saturdays are lonely, But Sundays just as bad, Another weekend day which was reserved for our love made.
I awakened one Monday morning and found myself alone, You had split while I was sleeping and never returned to our home, Now all I have left is a busy routine with lonely weekends and sad dreams.
I awakened one Monday morning and found myself alone, You had split while I was sleeping and never returned home, Now all I have left is, A busy routine with, Lonely weekends and sad, sad, sad, sad dreams.
Monday through Friday is just routine, Everything at home is quiet and serene.
But then comes the weekend, My Saturday’s are bad, My weekend is all lonely and sad, And all I have left is a busy routine, With lonely weekends and sad dreams, Lonely weekends and sad dreams, Lonely weekends and sad dreams…
I might feel this even more in the present moment, months removed from when I discovered it, as I’ve gotten back into my usual weekly routine of teaching. Thankfully, weekends for me haven’t turned out quite as sad or lonely as they were for Macke, as I’ve made some amazing new connections as well as strengthened bonds with old and dear friends. I hope the same is the case for whoever is reading this and for everyone involved in the making of this 45.
Not entirely sure why it took me a few weeks to get September edition of “Moods” here but here it is. After knowing months ahead that I’d focus on “Gratitude” for August, I really had no idea what mood I was going to focus on for September’s show. Some of that was connected to an attempt to line up an interview with an artist whose album was being released around the time the show would air. I had thought that artist would have a hand in picking the mood for the month, but the interview ultimately proved to difficult to schedule. In this case, the inspiration for the show came from recently renting the fever dream of a film Ganja & Hess, and being haunted by the score created Sam Waymon. Much to my surprise I saw that someone had pressed up a soundtrack as a recent Record Store Day release. Looking at a review of the reissue caused me to notice that Numero group had dug up additional music from Dale Warren and released it in 2020. After ensuring both records were on their way to me, I mused for a bit about the kind of music these men created, how unsung they were and how I wished more people knew of them. That feeling, which I had no idea there might even be a word for what I was feeling led me to the dictionary of obscure sorrows and eventually to “Silience,” which is defined thusly:
Silience – n. the kind of unnoticed excellence that carries on around you every day…which would be renowned as masterpieces if only they’d been appraised by the cartel of popular taste, who assume that brilliance is a rare and precious quality, accidentally overlooking buried jewels that may not be flawlesss but are still somehow perfect.
That pretty much perfectly nails the feeling I had been trying to articulate. And with “Silience” as my guide, I sought out tracks from my collection that are largely from private press, unknown and unheralded artists. People who produced amazing music, but never got quite the acclaim their talents deserved. This is our last two hour show for the near future, and I think “Silience” was the perfect muse to make very good use of that extra time just once more. October’s show will be focused on “reverence,” as it will be a tribute to Matthew Africa on the eve of what would have been his 49th birthday. Peace and bright moments until then…
Playlist – Moods In Free Time 009: Silience {opening theme} The Visitors – The Juggler – In My Youth (Muse)
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24 Carat Black – Speak Low – III (Numero) Odyssey – No One Else Pt. 1 – 7” (Hi) Bruce and Vlady – Reality Pt. 1 – The Reality (Vampi Soul) The Outlaw Blues Band – Deep Gully – Breaking In (Bluesway)
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Ice Water Slim – Dream On, Dream On – 7” (Hawk Sound) Dennis Olivieri – I Cry In The Morning – Come To The Party (VMC) The Peppos And Jones Straitjacket Band – Humanity – 7” (Straitjacket) Caroline Peyton – Brister – Intuition (Bar-B-Q) David Astri – Safe and Sound – Do It Right (Award)
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McDonald & Giles – Tomorrow’s People – McDonald & Giles (Island) Mirta y Raul – El Suendo De Andria – Mirta y Raul (Arieto) Joy Unlimited – Rudiment – Butterflies (BASF) Bubba Thomas & The Lightmen Plus One – On The Way Home – Fancy Pants (Now-Again)
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Sam Waymon – Ganja & Hess Suite – Ganja & Hess: Original Soundtrack (Strange Disc) Thom Macke – Lonely Weekends – 7” (Omega) Celia – Na Boca Do Sol – Celia (Continetal) Ismael Diaz – Capricornio – Mi Graduacion (PID) Alan Hawkshaw – Moody – Themes: Je t’aime (TIM)
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Duncan Lamont – Funky Flutes – Serenity (Bruton Music) Pure Pleasure – By My Side – 7” (QC) James Black – (I Need) Altitude – (I Need) Altitude (Night Train) Phil Cohran and the Artistic Heritage Ensemble – Unity – Phil Cohran and the Artistic Heritage Ensemble (Zulu)
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Franciene Thomas – Too Beautiful To Be Good – 7” (Tragar) Symphonic Four – Who Do You Think You’re Fooling Pt. 2 – 7” (Zudan) Duster Cat – Modern Times – Boys & Girls (Q Records) Murari Band – Dreaming – Dreaming (Desire Tree) Betty & Angel – Everlasting Love – 7” (Every Day) The Magnificent 4 – You’ve Got Me – Wardell Quezergue: Strung Out – The Malaco Sessions (Grapevine)
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{closing theme} Tony Williams – Wild Life – Believe It (Columbia)
Just yesterday afternoon I was telling one of my best friends, “as much craziness has happened already, I think this next 30+ days is gonna be truly nutty, nothing will surprise me…” and in less than 24 hours, I’ve been proven true. Waking up to some of the least surprising, but still extraordinarily shocking news of the year, this song from Dr. John has been playing on repeat in my mind. And, as some one who truly believes that no human being is ever beyond redemption, as long as they consciously move towards redeeming themselves, this song really should serve as a warning and a reminder to everyone. Or, as the dearly departed Dr. John The Night Tripper sings to us all, great and small:
…Life is not getting any younger, It’s getting older and older, You keep trying to be a little bolder, Life might treat you a little colder and colder, What goes around, Comes around, What goes around, Comes around…
With only three full months left to go, something I’ve said to close friends multiple times continues to ring true, namely that 2020 continues to be a real right fucker of a year…Just over the past weekend, I was trying to bring myself to write a tribute to Toots Hibbert, an absolute legend of Jamaican music, and like so many of the losses during this insane year, I just couldn’t fully bring myself to do it. Today we got word that Supreme Court justice and Feminist icon, Ruth Bader Ginsburg has died…and after Bill Withers, Tony Allen, John Lewis and at least a dozen or so other giants, it’s tough to comprehend how much we’ve lost, and when we’ve barely even had time to grieve one loss, another arrives. It is a very tough time we are living through right now.
“Time Tough,” wasn’t written for these times, but it might as well have been. Most of the bad times it’s addressing are connected to economic and personal tragedy, but both of those are certainly felt by many over the past 7+ months and these opening lines certainly hit home in the current moment where every day runs into the next without any real relief in our seemingly unending despair.
I go to bed, But sleep won’t come, Get up in the night, I couldn’t stand my feeling, no, Early in the morning, Oh mercy, It’s just the same situation… Time tough, Time tough, Everything is out of sight and so hard…
The song is one that I first found out about because Soul Coughing sampled it on “Down To This,” all the way back in 1994. I’d known Toots & the Maytals’ Ska era hits like “Ska War,” and the early reggae all-timer “Bam Bam,” (though I heard Sister Nancy’s cover first), as well as classics such as “Pressure Drop” (first heard through the Clash version), “Monkey Man” (first heard from the Specials’ cover) and “Sweet & Dandy,” but strangely I hadn’t really considered myself a fan. “Time Tough” struck me hard upon hearing it, because that sampled intro was so overtly funky, and the song itself so great, that it lead me to track down the 1972 album “Funky Kingston,” as well as 1976’s “Reggae Got Soul” (which I highlighted in 2011 here). I’m thankful that I’ve had multiple opportunities to play “Time Tough” out and about as a DJ, particularly at Funky Sole, where the song always went over well. That gruff, soulful voice Toots had was such a perfect compliment to the soulful Reggae he helped to pioneer (including being the first artist to include the term “Reggae” or “Reggay” in their releases) and the consistent quality of his performances will ensure that he, like many of the other legends who have passed this year are never forgotten. Rest In Peace to Toots, RBG, and the long list of giants we’ve lost in 2020, those losses still yet to inevitably come and also to dreams that have been deferred because of the insanity of this year.
