5 Songs Friday, July 18, 2025

Music from different times and places

Ben E. King – “Young Boy Blues,” 1962 from Don’t Play That Song. I tell you what, the record industry was a different baby in the early 1960s. King had a gigantic hit with a little song called “Stand By Me” in 1961, but it wasn’t until his second LP release of 1962 that it got slotted onto an album. “Young Boy Blues” comes two songs after the iconic number, and was good enough to be the title track of a later budget release on the Clarion subsidy of Atlantic. This track was written by Doc Pomus and Phil Spector, though my money is on Pomus doing most of the heavy lifting. It’s a dramatic number with swirling strings, bubbling piano, and King’s powerful emoting about how hard it is to move on from the woman who left him. “Each night is like a thousand years since I got these young boy blues.” Well, since he keeps thinking of her every time he kisses somebody new, it’s easy to see why the nights are so long. Anyway, I think this could have worked as a single – it’s that well executed as a record.

Andy Summers & Robert Fripp – “Seven on Seven” 1982 from I Advance Masked. Just before the Police were about to reach the top of the pop world and then implode, and around the same time King Crimson had formed once again to make three of my fave records by that group, guitarists Andy Summers and Robert Fripp put out this oft-neglected album of instrumental duets. It’s sometimes tricky to tell who is playing what, but this sounds to me like Fripp is taking the lead on this short little tune, while Summers supports him with what is effectively a bass part played on guitar. It’s got that slightly off-kilter Fripp-styled melody. But Summers could play that way, too, so I can’t be sure. At any rate, this is under two minutes of dangerous beauty.

Motörhead – “Bite the Bullet” 1980 from Ace of Spades. Motörhead played faster, louder, and harder than any other heavy metal band of the time. Because Ace of Spades contained their best ever song, the title track itself, it was the most successful of all their records – if people only owned one album by this band, this was the one. Hidden away in the middle of side 2 is this short little shot. It’s as if Lemmy was writing his version of a country song lyrically – though he mentions crying in his beer, it’s in the negative. This song is about the guy who causes the tears to jerk. He’s done, and he’s biting the bullet and leaving his lover. It’s got the classic Motörhead slam bam power, it’s got Lemmy’s mush mouth heavy growl, and it’s even got room for a brief Fast Eddie Clarke guitar solo at the end. What more do you want in well under two minutes?

AFO Executives – “Olde Wine” 1962 available on Gumbo Stew: Original AFO New Orleans R&B. AFO stood for All For One and was a short lived musician owned label in New Orleans run by Harold Battiste. The AFO Executives were the studio pros who owned the label – after another year they all moved to Los Angeles where they hooked up with Sam Cooke as his backing band until his death. This funky little number sits at the border of jazz and r&b. It never lets go of its catchy flavor, and you can definitely dance to it. In many ways, this feels like a New Orleans take on the Ramsey Lewis Trio, only with horns and well before that group started having hits. I think this may have been released on an album in 1963, but the Discogs listing for it has a song called “Olde Wine & Some.” Probably the same track, but who knows – I’ve never seen the record in question. Anyway, I can see this being a dance floor fave in the early 60s even if it never really got the chance.

Mahalia Jackson – “Just Over the Hill” 1959 from Mahalia. On the short list of greatest singers of the 20^thCentury, Mahalia Jackson sang exclusively gospel music her whole life. This W.H. Bradford composition was probably recorded a few years before this album came out – the fact that it’s in two parts on the track listing indicates it was either released or planned to be released as a single at some point. At any rate, it’s a fairly standard, workable number with traditional gospel chord changes and lyrics about looking forward to what’s on the other side of that hill, the hill being death. But the genius of the recording is in the ways Jackson sings the song. The first part, almost three minutes long, is slow and full of churchy elongated phrasings, with words stretched across even the slow beats, and slight changes in pitch as they go. My gosh, the control of her vibrato! Then, halfway through, the beat drops, and Jackson plows slightly ahead of the beat, creating a push/pull effect with her rhythm section that is exhilarating. It’s like a playful gospel march at this point. Simply magnificent.