Swedish musician and Zappa fan Hans Annéllsson and his friend John Marshall (= The Vegetarians) have released a five song download only "EP" with cover versions of some of their favourite artists: Frank Zappa, Steely Dan, Led Zeppelin, Traffic and King Crimson. This imaginary EP is titled Fred Zappelin, a name adopted from the Zappas. Fred Zappelin (or Fred Zeppelin) was the name of a band that the young Dweezil Zappa used to play with. The name is what you get when combining the two names Frank Zappa and Led Zeppelin. The songs by The Vegetarians sound quite catchy, but let's see what the purists say. You can hear the Fred Zappelin tunes on Radio Dupree:
1. In The Evening
2. Medicated Goo
3. My Old School
4. One More Red Nightmare
5. The Idiot Bastard Son
Peter Gabriel's new one is titled Scratch My Back. On it he covers a bunch of personal favourites and here's the track listing:
01 "Heroes" (David Bowie) 02 "The Boy in the Bubble" (Paul Simon) 03 "Mirrorball" (Elbow) 04 "Flume" (Bon Iver) 05 "Listening Wind" (Talking Heads) 06 "The Power of the Heart" (Lou Reed) 07 "My Body Is a Cage" (Arcade Fire) 08 "The Book of Love" (The Magnetic Fields) 09 "I Think It's Going to Rain Today" (Randy Newman) 10 "Après moi" (Regina Spektor) 11 "Philadelphia" (Neil Young) 12 "Street Spirit (Fade Out)" (Radiohead)
It is supposed to be a "song swap", so we'll see these artists covering Peter's songs in return on a follow-up album.
More on the album over at Stereogum, where you also can hear one of the songs; Arcade Fire's My Body Is A Cage.
How can you do anything but smile when you're in Finland? Here's a freshly YouTube-added 2 minutes and 47 seconds from the press interview at the 2007 Pori Jazz Festival, which was part of the Heavy Rollers Tour.
By the look of things this meet-the-press couldn't have been that much longer, but it would be nice to see the stuff that got left out in the editing.
When Frank Zappa's ex sideman Napoleon Murphy Brock did a brief visit to Sweden in December he mentioned his upcoming cd This is What Frank Zappa Heard - Just in Case You Were Wondering - Live at the Red Noodle in Waikiki, Hawaii. It is a live recording of the show that Nappy and his band played in August 1973 when Zappa was in the audience looking for a new lead vocalist.
Frank got the tip from his road manager Marty Perellis that he should come to this club and check out this singer. Frank introduced himself and said "you are my new lead vocalist". Napoleon was not too enthusiastic at first since he did not even know who Zappa was, but a couple of months later he joined Zappa's Mothers. He and stayed until early 1976 and appears on albums as Apostrophe ('), One Size Fits All and Roxy & Elsewhere. The Hawaiian live recording was taped on a TEAC 4 track reel to reel machine and includes covers of James Brown's Make It Funky and Carol King's So Far Away just to mention a few titles. For more information go to: http://www.napoleonmbrock.com/
Steve Harris, interpreter and translator, phoning from Japan to make an interview for the largest selling music magazine in Japan. He admits that he's no Steely Dan specialist, but rather the only guy able to put together the questions.
As part of the world curious of what's next as far as Elton John recordings go, Radio Dupree has seen rumours about a rap album and more as the months and years since his last one; The Captain & The Kid. That record - just like the past few he's done - got great reviews and ended up selling more han 3 million copies without bothering the top of the charts in any major way.
We wrote last May about the new album coming in 2009. It was news we got from long time lyricist Bernie Taupin's homepage. That piece of news disappeared and no record appeared. However, the final day of 2009 a new post appeared titled New album update.
In November last year Elton, Bernie and Leon Russell got together and wrote "a vast wealth of material that ranges far and wide and covers many musical genres."
And it is supposed to be recorded in mid-January with T-Bone Burnett producing.
So all we'll have to wait for now is a release date. And as we're not 100 percent happy with all of Elton's previous country influenced songs we are confident that Leon and T-Bone together with far and wide musical genres will keep the record from sounding predictable and without energy. Here's hoping they had a great time in the studio!
And we're also pondering a bit why not one sentence about this has been written on eltonjohn.com. Looks like bernietaupin.com is the place for Elton John recording news.
At any rate we're satisfied the rumoured rap album from Elton still is just that; a rumour.
You've got until February 21, 2010 to catch the 2009 documetary on the great 1970's soul singer Billy Paul titled Am I Black Enough For You. That's how long it will be online.
We wrote about in March last year, but here it is online for a month thanks to Swedish Television. As far as we understand it it should stream/be viewable outside Sweden as well. But since we're not 100% sure; please, if you live in another country and are having difficulty viewing it leave a comment.
And we also found this; Billy Paul's own podcast series! As part of billypaul.com it is as the time of writing seven episodes hosted by Billy himself and wife Blanche talking to the people involved in making that musical magic in Philadelphia.
How about some bossa nova? Here's a live set with Luciana Souza from NPR. On her 2007 album The New Bossa Nova she had a song co-written by her husband Larry Klein and Steely Dan man Walter Becker; Love Is For Strangers, as well as Where You Blind That Day = the original lyrics version of the song Third World Man from Steely Dan's Gaucho album.
The songs in this live set is: Adeus America (Haroldo/Geraldo) Down to You (Mitchell) Sorriu Pra Mim (Gilberto) You Go to My Head (Coots/Gillespie) So Danco Samba (Jobim) You and the Girl (Souza/Klein) Waters of March (Jobim) O Pato (Traditional) Corcovado (Jobim)
Time to brush up on your German as you watch these four persons talk about and play music from Popsongs, an album featuring 15 covers of ... "pop songs". The persons in question are the Fauré Quartett from Germany. Founded in 1995 playing classical/chamber music they recorded the album Popsongs in 2009. And it is of special interest to us as it features Steely Dan's Charlie Freak and Peter Gabriel's Here Comes The Flood. A group and an artists often played on Radio Dupree.
And you get to hear some of Charlie Freak as well as bits of the Pet Shop Boys song Dreaming Of The Queen plus Chop Suey! from System Of A Down watching this video.
Tracks on the album. (Original artist) 1 - (Elliot Smith) - Between The Bars 2 - (A-Ha) - And You Tell Me 3 - (Feist) - Gatekeeper 4 - (N.E.R.D.) - Wonderful Place 5 - (Peter Gabriel) - Here Comes The Flood 6 - (Pet Shop Boys) - Dreaming Of The Queen 7 - (Polarkreis 18) - River Loves The Ocean 8 - (Steely Dan) - Charlie Freak 9 - (Beach Boys) - Our Prayer 10 - (System Of A Down) - Chop Suey! 11 - (Prefab Sprout) - Andromeda Heights 12 - (Ben Folds Five) - Don´t Change Your Plans 13 - (Ryan Adams) - Amy 14 - (The Divine Comedy) - Our Mutual Friend 15 - (John Cale) - Satisfied
It all reminded us of that other German-musicians-meet-Steely Dan-music record from almost five years ago; Hessischen Rundfunk Big Band playing Steely Dan. Here's a link - in German!
Jay & The Americans final single, released in 1971 with There Goes My Baby as the A-side and Solitary Man on the B-side. Strings and horns arranged by Donald Fagen & Walter Becker.
After close to a year of tranquilty and quiescence donaldfagen.com has finally been updated. And with not one but two short texts. The first on is about the jazz radio DJ Ed Beach who passed away late last year. The second one deals with the fake Donald Fagen sites that pop up on MySpace, Facebook et al.
I think it is safe to say that any Donald Fagen page anywhere - including Twitter accounts - not officially mentioned and approved on donaldfagen.com is fake and bogus.
The same goes for Steely Dan pages and Walter Becker has already set the record straight with a previous post/page on walterbecker.com titled Is it really Walter?
He'll pop up as one of the guys in the band during tonight's Levon Helm episode of the series, and probably just for a few seconds/minutes, but still... Nothing wrong with the rest of the musicians in this or any of the programs in the series!
Here's a teaser:
Innovators In Music is "a new series of documentary profiles on six dynamic musicians from a variety of genres, backgrounds, and disciplines. The series premieres on Bravo! Canada on January 7, 2010 at 8:00PM EST with the Steve Earle episode. The rest of the programs include: Levon Helm, Mickey Hart, Dave Stewart, Billy Bragg and Sonic Youth."
About the Levon Helm espisode: January 14 - Levon HelmCome celebrate Helm's "Midnight Ramble Sessions: 69th Birthday Edition" directly from his home in Woodstock, NY, with his all-star band including Donald Fagen and Larry Campbell.
On the series official homepage you can find the quote: Innovators takes viewers behind-the-scenes into Levon's kitchen where the musicians work on the music together before the show. (Look for half of Steely Dan on the recorder!)
Donald Fagen of Steely Dan, in an interview with New York magazine said that, "Ed Beach on WRVR would do this very scholarly afternoon show, and I'd listen to that when I came home from school." Fagen cited Beach, as well as Mort Fega and Jean Shepherd, as a major influence on his Nightfly character from the successful album of that same name.
This time it's about the premiere of a robot girlfriend from the company TrueCompanion. The robot is being unveiled in Las Vegas this weekend and although there are other songs named True Companion, we'd like to think that the Donald Fagen tune from the animated sci-fi movie Heavy Metal played a small part in inspiring the creators of what, according to this article, is "a life-size robotic girlfriend complete with artificial intelligence and flesh-like synthetic skin." The female robot Roxxxy comes with five personalities including Wild Wendy, Mature Martha and Frigid Farrah.
Could a future personality update perhaps be named Pixeleen?
No actual pics of the robot girlfriend, but the price is between 7 000 and 9 000 US dollars "depending on features".
BBC reports that actor Andy Serkis plays the British post-punk singer Ian Dury in the movie Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, which is in UK cinemas on 8 January 2010. Serkis' most famous role is arguably still Gollum in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8440110.stm
Just uploaded on the Radio Dupree playlist: Stinkfoot, Dirty Love, Manx Needs Women,The Purple Lagoon and You Didn't Try To Call Me. All from the brand new Frank Zappa album, Philly '76! This is a tasty little sucker!
If you're in or close to New York you can see Donald Fagen joining Levon HelmBand on stage at Terminal 5 7.00 p.m. local time. Tickets are $31 advance / $35 day of show.
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And also a reminder that the six part series we wrote about two weeks ago; Innovators in music premieres on the Bravo! channel in Cananda the very same day; Thusrsday January 6. The time is 8.00 EST, and the first episode is all about Steve Earle.
The second episode will air January 14 and features Levon Helm:
January 14 - Levon Helm. Come celebrate Helm's "Midnight Ramble Sessions: 69th Birthday Edition" directly from his home in Woodstock, NY, with his all-star band including Donald Fagen and Larry Campbell.
(Thanks to steelydoc who posted the Terminal 5 info over on the BlueBook.)
Here's a not-so-wild guess: One of the persons involved in this house development in Thailand is a fan of Steely Dan. The whole thing is named "Aja" and look at the logo after we've qouted the opening lines from the classic Steely Dan song Aja:
Up on the hill People never stare They just don't care
The logo:
And what's for sale here? According to the website "6 villas in a gated community with a low density build orientated on site to ensure unobstructed sea views from every room.The project is embellished by an environmentally sensitive communal pavilion and finished to the highest standards to include a gym, pool, bar, massage room and sun terraces with natural rock plunge pools. "
So if you've got 19,500,000 Baht/588 237 US dollars/409 607 Euros to spare...
(As far as we know this development business has absolutely no connection to Steely Dan.)
The cover includes pics from the original 2000 DVD release.
It's a foldout with a short text on Steely Dan by one William Hogeland.
Here's a record that popped up in 2008 listed among other Steely Dan releases. There is also a DVD with an identical name and cover. Curiosity got the better of me and I finally ordered the CD. Titled Steely Dan In Concert it proved to be a bad copy of the audio from theTwo Against Nature - Steely Dan's Plush TV Jazz Party In Sensous Surround Sound DVD from 2000.
I was puzzled to find that the CD was in mono! Yes, you read that right; m-o-n-o. And edited to just feature the music and none of the talk between songs. Badly edited at that. Now, if anyone can explain why a bootleg - cause that what it must be - is released in mono please enlighten me and all who read this. At any rate it is a record to steer clear of. And without having seen the DVD in Concert companion I would expect the same thing to be true for it as well. Avoid at all costs.
The label is Immortal with additional info IMC Music Ltd. Licensed from BCD B.V. Made in The Netherlands. BCD@cddirect.nl
And they're not hard to find:
Blaricum CD Company BV Blaricum Music Company BV Compact Direct BV
Akeleibaan 60 2908 KA Capelle aan den Ijssel The Netherlands
"Blaricum CD Company BV, Blaricum Music Company BV, and Compact Direct BV are three indepent music and dvd publishing companies and part of the Blaricum Music Group.All companies are welknown all around the world for their high quality budget products."
The strange thing is that I've seen Steely Dan in Concert CD and DVD for sale not only from online retailers but in actual record stores as well. And maybe that these releases have been made possible to some weird loophole in the law, but it is sad that they're allowed to do the rounds. Any fan is shortchanged and I am pretty sure that very little - if any - of the money made from selling these make it back to the musicians.
And why, oh, why - if you're going to rip and release the soundtrack from a DVD on a CD - convert it to mono?!?
We are still waiting to get the new Zappa album in the mail. Some US fans have already received it. One of the regular visitors on the Radio Dupree blog did send us this comment: "Typography and art design/layout is weak... but the few pictures are great. This is a kick-ass band. Not disappointed so far."
Philly '76 is a live recording featuring one of the bands that Frank sort of neglected on his You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore series and otherwise too. It is hard to understand what made Frank choose the material for You Can't Do That On Stage. A lot of the songs on the six double cd sets are great, but many fans thought that Frank picked far too many recordings from the 1984 tour and the Flo & Eddie band (1970-71)....and almost nothing from much more exciting touring bands as the '73 band with Jean-Luc Ponty and the fall '76 band featuring the dynamic female vocalist Lady Bianca. Few fans got to hear Bianca since she left the band after just a few weeks on the road, so this is a long time "want". Yes, there are some high expectations here, and if anyone of you guys and gals at www.zappa.com ever read this, we would like to express thanks for the Philly discs. Thank you for the Buffalo album too, maybe a little too much compression on that one but this is a hot show.
And while we're at it let us just get the opportunity to list the other most wanted releases, as Radio Dupree sees it: 1. A 1973 live recording featuring the Jean-Luc Ponty band. How about one of them Australian shows? FZ:OZ II? This must be one of Frank's best bands ever, with keyboardist George Duke and violinist Lean-Luc Ponty. Lots of great instrumentals. Or why not release one of the 1973 shows where Frank tried out a new lead vocalist...Kin Vassy and Sal Marquez. (They did not hang in too long but would be interesting to hear.) 2. Ritz, New York City November 17, 1981. This is one of the big ones! Wouldn't it be cool to hear it just the way it sounded when it was broadcast on the radio...really fat sound. Monster suite of The Drowning Witch/What's New In Baltimore/Moggio. The 50's type song This Is My Story linked with a great grooving reggae version of Whipping Post. We recall some of this material was on a bootleg called Toxic Shock...gave us goosebumps in the early 80's. 3. A live album from the Bongo Fury tour (spring 1975). We would like to hear the funky version of Let's Make the Water Turn Black, Willie the Pimp, Debra Kadabra and some other Beefheart madness and the unreleased song Portuguese Lunar Landing.
...were the most popular artists on Radio Dupree in December. Those facts are based on the "thumbs up/thumbs down" buttons service in the Live365 player window.
Here's the entire Top 20: 1. The Beatles - The Ballad Of John And Yoko - 1967-70 2. David Bowie - Sweet Thing - David Live 3. Santana - Savor - Santana 4. Frank Zappa & The Mothers - Call Any Vegetable (Radio Dupree mix) - Absolutely Free/Just Another Band From L.A. 5. Cozy Powell - Killer - Over The Top 6. Yes - I See You - Yes 7. Steely Dan - The Caves Of Altamira - The Royal Scam 8. Frank Zappa & The Mothers - Fifty Fifty - Over-nite Sensation 9. Frank Zappa - Room Service - You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore - Vol. 2 10. Steely Dan - Throw Back The Little Ones - Katy Lied 11. Ofege - It's Not Easy - Forge Your Own Chains: Heavy Psychedelic Ballads And Dirges 12. Gentle Giant - Three Friends - Three Friends 13. The Beatles - You Really Got A Hold On Me - With The Beatles 14. Steely Dan - Monkey In Your Soul - Pretzel Logic 15. Santana - Shades Of Time - Santana 16. Michael Leonheart - Fade - The Suzy Latimore EP 17. Human Instinct - Jugg-a-Jug - Stoned Guitar 18. David Bowie - Memory Of A Free Festival - Space Oddity 19. David Bowie - Rebel Rebel - David Live 20. The Beatles - No Reply - Beatles For Sale
Frank Zappa and Steely Dan most popular during 2009 We dug up the monthly charts from 2009 to find out which artists that were the most popular. Checked the 10 most popular ones for each month. (Sorry, the numbers from August were missing, but we got the other ones). Not much of a surprise but still satisfying to find out that Frank Zappa and Steely Dan are topping the chart, followed by The Beatles, George Duke and David Bowie.
2010 is less than 10 minutes old here in the part of the world where Radio Dupree is situated. And what's there to say except thanks for tuning in our station over on live365.com as well as reading this blog. And even getting in contact from time to time. It's all good.
And hopefully 2010 will be a good year with some great music; a few good albums, a show or five we can enjoy. Not too much to ask for, right?
Keep those comments and tips coming. We'll try to keep an eye on "our" artists, mainly Frank Zappa and Steely Dan, and promise to have some news for you in the next couple of days.
