Posts tagged ladies

Ken Boothe - Down By The River

While it doesn’t have its own parade, its members are legion and its influence pervasive. Yep, like it or not, misogyny is an alternative lifestyle all of its own. We here at the ol’ Deadly Deaths Underwater Megaplex don’t subscribe to this worldview personally, mind you - women are to be cherished, to be thanked for their delicious sandwiches, to have their hair surreptitiously sniffed in the elevator, names written and encircled in hearts on the outside of Trapper Keepers. Women Appreciatin’ is central to our platform, as you’re likely aware if you’ve read the pamphlets we’ve been pamphleteering with.

So with that proviso, I humbly submit for your Saturday afternoon consideration, a jaunty little roots reggae number about shooting your old lady. In or around the face, possibly. With a gun. In close proximity to a tributary.

Originally performed by everybody’s favorite disheveled smelly uncle Neil Young, who apparently wrote it while feverish in bed, ‘Down By The River’ is one of many takes on the age old trope of a guy killing a girl due to infidelity. Oh, those mischievous, XX-chromosome havin’, cheatin’ wimmins!  Studio One stalwart Ken “Mr. Rocksteady” Boothe made quite a career of reggae-fying popular tracks by other musicians, and turns in a fuzzed-out version of this classic, which kinda rules if you ask me. Great music to fly into a jealous rage and make life-altering mistakes to.

Boothe pictured shortly before shooting his baby.

Gregory Isaacs - Front Door

Earlier this year, reggae legend and possessor of the best nickname ever, Gregory “The Cool Ruler” Isaacs passed away, and it’s only now that I can write about it without tearing up, and definitely not that I just didn’t get around to posting one of his many amazing songs. Throughout his multi-decade career, Gregory Isaacs dropped more gems than a jeweler with Parkinson’s. In true DD:LD fashion though, he wasn’t just a prolific and relatively unsung reggae hero, he was also a world-class badass, possessing both well-documented ‘struggles’ with cocaine and crack, and a penchant for illegal firearms, which all told netted him a toothless mouth and 27 arrests, and contributed to his early passing at 49 this October. Don’t take this the wrong way, Jamaica, but to be a notable drug user in Kingston is like being the smelliest guy in Brooklyn. It’s an award nobody wants, but is impressive nonetheless. Jamaica is often portrayed as a sort of seemingly idyllic paradise with an inescapable, menacing undercurrent of violence where illicit substances are ubiquitous. That’s because it is. It rules there, you should check it out.

‘Front Door’, from 1981’s ‘More Gregory’ is Gregory’s take on the musical monomyth of the unpleasant breakup. It’s a story close to my heart; packing everything you own into a shopping bag and moving out of your old lady’s house because your relationship sucks, and maybe settling for the next thing that crosses your path rather than being lonely. Now that’s what I call romance! So much of what made the music of Gregory Isaacs notable is here on display in this classic - almost uncomfortably lascivious moaning, a dozy, dawdling backbeat, awesome little synthy burbles, and the dulcet tones of the Lonely Lover, Mr. Gregory Isaacs.

I’m not trying to suggest that I’m more fabulous than you (I am, check out this scarf!), but I’ve been to Jamaica a few times and one thing that always strikes me is the ratio of their creative output to their size. They’re to music what Sweden is to cellphones. There are dozens of bonafide international stars that call this relatively tiny island home, and just driving down the road you’ll see sign after sign for small events featuring talent like John Holt, Marcia Griffiths, etc. It was at one of these small shows that I was lucky enough to see Gregory Isaacs in 2009. I couldn’t feel my face at the time but he really kicked my lilly-white ass. True story: I was sitting having lunch in Negril the next day and Gregory Isaacs walked in with the largest Jamaican I have ever seen and sat down. I nearly shit my pants, but that was really more a factor of my diet at the time. I was excited too, though.

Gregory Isaacs, The Amish Statesman of Reggae

The Zombies - Girl Help Me

There’s a game I like to play when I’m lying in bed with my number one girl and I call it “Dead Zombie” - that’s when I roll over on top of her, usually while she’s still sleeping, allow all my weight to fall on her as awkwardly as possible, and then basically just act dead, and zombie like. But cool dead, you know? She inevitably asks me “What the hell are you doing?” to which I reply “I’m a dead zombie. I can’t hear you.” This is usually followed by a cute little struggle and her saying “Get the fuck off me”, or something to that effect. I remind her that I’m a dead zombie and obviously she’s going to have to move me herself if she wants me off. Anyway, this game is a real hit as you might imagine and somehow reminded me of this Zombies tune that I figure I’d post for you today.

In 1968 The Zombies released what they feared may be their final album, the fuckupedly spelled Odessey and Oracle. The singles chosen from these recordings failed to chart as expected and the band had actually disbanded before the album was properly released. But then a third single was then released, “Time of the Season”, and would provide the band with a bit of a ‘dead cat bounce’ resulting in whispers of a reunion. Even though keyboardist Rod Argent and bass tickler Chris White were already steps ahead assembling a new band, which would eventually become “Argent”, it was during this time that Argent and White were persuaded to compile and release a final Zombies album “RIP” - consisting of older out-takes, demos as well as a few  newer recordings. This track “Girl Help Me” is one of those newer 1968 recordings, and as a result doesn’t include main Zombies vocalist Colin Blunstone (which can’t have bothered Blunstone a whole lot as he was busily playing his own version of the zombie game with girlfriend Caroline Munro). Hooooonk! Anyway, I don’t think this final Zombies album, “RIP”, ever saw the light of day — at least until its reissue years later — but then again neither do Zombies.

Bill Withers - Use Me

How we’ve gone this long without dropping a little Bill Withers on y’all is a bit of a mystery. I suppose his somewhat lighter, almost folksy brand of soul doesn’t appeal to he who sits down at the other end of the hall here at DDLDHQ.

Internal politics aside, this track “Use Me” is from Withers 1972 sophomore album Still Bill. Lyrically right up my alley, Withers sings of friends who try to talk him out of a relationship with a woman because they feel she’s using him. But you know what? Bill don’t care. Getting used rules. If it feels that good to be used, then why stop? I mean, I suppose I’m being used in much the same way a cow being milked is being used - but in both cases, the poison has to leave so it’s pretty win/win in my opinion. Withers, on the other hand, lets himself be so used that it feels as if he’s using her! A classic switcheroo. But let me tell you what’s not classic; artists using “Use Me”. This track has been covered by such unawesome artists as Fiona Apple (who ironically, I would use), Better Than Ezra, Liza Minelli.. and yes, Hootie & the Blowfish. If I were Bill I’d yell rape.