various artists - Mojo Presents: The Route To Quadrophenia

I've been exploring more of the original mod & beat sounds this year, hearing these songs through the lens of proto-punk/new wave. So I'm finding myself hearing an awful lot more from the Yardbirds, Small Faces, Kinks, and Who than I have in the past. For some of y'all, that may seem weird. But I'm prejudiced against the dinosaurs of rock, so I just slept on some of these bedrock rock records until this year.

...which ended up being a fun little discovery for me. The stripped-down, amphetimine-fueled rock records of the early 60s that soundtracked the mod movement in the UK fed into the first wave of British punk. So of course I'd feel a collection like this, coming in the issue of Mojo dated October 2011. With an equal balance between the contemporary mod tracks and the early rock, jazz, and R&B that inspired the song in the first place. I love having Slim Harpo and Mose Allison alongside the Creation and the Action. The addition of a new-in-2011 Booker T. song is a bit weird, but, hey, maybe Stax wasn't licensing any MG's songs at a reasonable rate for this project.

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various artists - Hairspray (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

It's dawned on me that I probably underrate "Hairspray" as a movie, almost certainly on account of what it became. I still can't believe that there was a successful musical adaptation of a John Waters movie, yet here we are. I think my niece auditioned for Traci Trunblad last year. It's a weird world. Thankfully.

The musical makes me mad because there isn't nearly enough Toussaint McCall or Gene Pitney or Barbara Lynn. There are a bunch of theatre kids singing about acceptance, I guess. Which is all well and good, but nothing equivalent to "The Bug".

John Waters soundtracks are the shit, is what I'm saying. I like this one so much, I own copies on vinyl, CD, and cassette. And I'd probably buy it on 8-track if it'd come out in that format.

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various artists - The Beach Boys Classics

1/13/23: UPDATED WITH NEW DL LINK

It's the early hours of December 25th as I write, and, yeah, I oughta go to bed, otherwise Santa won't come. But Santa never really comes, does he? The Amazon delivery driver is probably the closest modern version, and that poor bastard works a hell of a lot more for a lot less reward than the adoration of the world's children. Besides, I ate half a share-a-bag of M&Ms and chased 'em with a half gallon of zero calorie sweet tea, all in a quest to vibrate into the 6th dimension.

I've been reading a lot of Luke O'Neil lately. Can you tell?

There's a pretty interesting series that Tokyo's P-Vine Records did approximately 30 years ago. The "Classics" series took a famous group (in this case, the Beach Boys), and pulled together a compilation of songs either covered by the group or influencing the group. This one has a great mix of girl groups, early rock 'n' roll, a bit of surf and beach music, and a lot of late 50s/early 60s pop. I think it's a pretty rad concept, the creative sort that Rhino was also really good at coming up with around the same time period.

Old time music makes staying up late a bit easier. Sorry, Saint Nick.

Discogs

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