Bit of a strange one to put up retrospectively for NYE. You might have expected some heaving duty raging rock or dance track but this was one of many tracks that came up on a friend’s shuffling iPod and started a conversation about Billy Bragg so that’s what you get. Four Tops lead singer, Levi Stubbs died in 2008 which led to this track picking up a few radio plays. I’ve been playing a bit of guitar again this year and this is one of the songs I re-learnt so another good reason. The alternative would have been another track that features on Rock Band or even worse something from the Singstar Abba game.
Good to see Bragg playing the Burns on this one and Dave Woodhead turning up for that trumpet bit.
Earlier today I read a rumour about New Year Honours suggesting a surprising award for a folkie.
Just been checking my Twitter stream before sleep to see Tom Watson, MP for West Brom, posting that it’s John Martyn, MBE.
As promised in my quick post last night here’s a cracking performance of I’d Rather BeThe Devil from the Old Grey Whistle Test back in 1973. Do you reckon The Edge nicked his trademark sound from here?
I was watching an episode of Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe this evening which was about children’s TV. He was talking about a kids’ TV show called Yo Gabba Gabba! and they showed a clip of this track, being used to help kids count, although without identifying it. It bugged me for a moment or two, trying to place it until I remembered it was by Cornelius from the mad ‘Fantasma’ album that I used to play over and over during ‘97. I’ve now synch’d this re-discovered album onto my iPhone for enjoyment over the next few days.
Been playing a fair bit of Rock Band today, unlocking tracks ready for everybody to have a go on New Years Eve. I love playing this track. The guitar part also seems to do the mad scratching.
It’s prompting a lot of delving through the record collection. For starters I turned up Stack O’Lee Blues, also known as Stagger Lee. I’ve chosen the Mississippi John Hurt version, although I could have gone for one of countless other options including Woody Guthrie’s Stackolee, Nick Cave and Bad Seeds’ Stagger Lee from the Murder Ballads album and Stackalee by Frank Hutchinson from Harry Smith’s wonderful Anthology of American Folk Music boxset on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.
The sleevenotes in the Smithsonian boxset gives background to the tale,
“Theft of stetson hat causes deadly dispute, victim identifies self as family man.
The murder mentioned here probably took place in Memphis in about 1900. Stack Lee seems to have been connected by birth or employment with the Lee family of that city who owned a large line of steamers on the Mississippi”
I’ve also just discovered two more versions in my collection. Wrong Em Boyo by The Clash, a cover of a Ska song on London Calling is based on the tale as is Stack Shot Billy by the Black Keys. I’ve spent a bit of time listening to the various versions of this song that I have.
I’m not planning to do any of that review of the year stuff that other bloggers and other more traditonal publications are doing but one of my highlights of 2008 was when Robert Plant joined Fairport Convention onstage at Cropredy Festival for The Battle of Evermore.
This track originally by the Everly Brothers, comes from his collaboration with Alison Krauss on the Raising Sand album. T Bone Burnett, a man with a collection of fine guitars, does a fine job on the production with the spacious reverb and slapback echo.
I intended to go see these at the Kitchen Garden Cafe in Kings Heath this evening but by the time we’d got ourselves organized it was sold out. Seems I am unlucky with this band. I tried to see them at a pub in Balsall Heath about a month ago, only to get there and find the pub was shut.
I did see them earlier in the year at Moseley Folk Festival and was mightily impressed. They are a Birmingham based bluegrass band. It’s very much a family thing with dad on banjo and national steel guitar and his two daughters on guitar and mandolin. The girls’ vocals harmonize real purty.
This is one of their slower tracks picked mainly because it name-checks Bill Monroe.
Posting this one from my phone so no links at the moment. A google should point you to their myspace where you can take a listen.
At the moment I’m reading a brilliant book I got for Christmas called 
