MP3 Truffles: Gertie Goes Bonkers

One of my all time favorite Read-Along books as a kid was the story of E.T. No, not the creepy version read by Michael Jackson, but the cute one read by young Drew Barrymore. As a kid I just thought she was cute and cool, as an adult I realized that the part where she gets shoved in the closet...well, it sounds like a stint in rehab, doesn't it?
Drew Barrymore sees goblins in rehab

Get this album and many more at Read-Along Adventures (which also features groovy interactive flash files) or at The Secret Cavern of Read-Along Treasures. Both of these were found via Blogio Oddio, who also points you to even more resources for kiddie records on the net.

Speaking of kiddie nostalgia, if you haven't already checked out the new Sesame Street Old School DVDs, they are a great trip down childhood lane, and feature the classic episodes that are about 500 times cooler than this sucky Elmo-world we live in today. Where else could you hear this:
Lou Rawls: ABCs

Good Music for Bad Times shares the first Rodney on the ROQ compilation, which not only features the best version of "Bloodstains" (with Brooke Shields intro, of course), but introduced that blogger to the glory of 80s NYC no-wave princess Cristina (doing an awesome Peggy Lee cover, though considerably changing the Leiber & Stoller lyrics).
Agent Orange: Bloodstains    
Cristina: Is That All There Is?

Feel the heat of Attila, Billy Joel's 1970 prog rock band. Yeah, they're bad...but also kind of smokin' in the badness. Hey, if Joel disavows it today, that must mean it has something good going on. (via Record Robot)
Holy Moses   
Wonder Woman
And by recommendation, here is also their aptly titled instrumental Brain Invasion

Zongamin has now officially done my favorite Brian Eno cover. (via Copy, Right?)
Third Uncle

The flexidisc display at the WFMU Record Fair is always most impressive, so in honor of the hour or so I spent staring at them, here is a flexidisc ad from France. (via A La Piscine)
Le Parfum J'Adore

And finally, promo for that new Dylan film is freaking everywhere, but if one of those actors playing him in the biopic should have totally been Mr. French. At least, I think that is clearly evidenced by Sebastion Cabot, Actor, Bob Dylan, Poet.
Like a Rolling Stone    
It Ain't Me Babe   
All I Really Want To Do

Other MP3 fun for you to explore after the jump!

This week in sad country music deaths: Hank Thompson. A lovely tribute here and Hank's greatest drinking songs here.

Holger Czukay's first post-Can solo album.

Screamin' Jay Hawkins' does an album of all Cole Porter.

A dance school recording of Sunshine of Your Love. It's cute!

MP3s from the Latter Day Saints Children's Songbook. (via the ol' Blather Box)

The aptly named Awesome Tapes From Africa recently turned me on to Boubacar Traore, and this is an official thank you.

Sputnik is not just a Russian satellite, it's one of my favorite words. Correction, "mutnicks" is even better.

YuppiePunk goes off on celebrity tirades. Some of these you've heard right here, but don't miss the Lyndon Johnson pants order that will blow you away.

A truly thorough archive filled with sounds of vintage Detroit radio. I recommend the commercials.

A classic from my more angry youth back in Denver, "My Dad's a Fuckin' Alcoholic".

And finally, here's a nice little taste of West African breakbeats.

Comments

[illlich]

You SHOULD have posted "Brain Invasion" by Billy Joel's ATTILA, although I get a kick out of his ridiculous overblown vocals on "Holy Moses"-- the instrumental "Brain Invasion" lives up to its name.

Is this the band whose breakup so depressed Billy Joel that it inspired him to drink Drain-O in a failed suicide attempt? Ouch. If you think this is weird check out his earlier band "The Hassels" their pseudo-psych-prog LP "Hour Of the Wolf" is a trip too.

[Resident Clinton]

I was debating Brain Invasion, then left it out just because it was instrumental. But you're right: though not fully representative, it is probably the "best" cut on the album. Anyway, y'all can get the whole darn album anyway by following the Record Robot link.

Attila was indeed the band he was in when he tried to commit suicide - by drinking furniture polish - but it wasn't over music. It was over a love triangle with his bandmate's wife. There's a bit about it in Billy Joel's biography "Life & Times of an Angry Young Man" which, um, I didn't read...but did flip through one time when I was really bored.

[bartleby]

I think there is another LP from this band where they perform prequels to what was to become "We Didn't Start the Fire." These were album-side jams one of which starts appropriately enough with the discovery of fire up through the fall of Rome. The flip side starts from that point up until the Treat of Westphalia. I understand they also released a limited single about the Diet of Worms which never charted. The B-side was an instrumental medition on Chaldean Astronomy. So there is a gap in the Billy Joel historico-compositional canon between the end of the 30 years war and right around the end of the second world war, where "We didn't Start the Fire" begins. It's possible there is some unreleased material or that this gap may be filled in future compositions.

Actually I'm kidding none of the above is true as pertains to Billy Joel or Attila.

[krup]

that lbj phone conversation can't be real, can it?

[illlich]

Small world: I was also recently turned onto Boubacar Trauore thanks to the Tapes Form Africa blog, you can find the cd reissue on ebay, and amazon has several of his other cds.

It's funny to me that a lot of the people who like Holger Czuckay's early solo albums also hate the later Can LPs, when I have always considered them very similar (at least when compared to the aggressive early Can albums)-- "Cool In The Pool" is just as silly as "Can-Can" from the final Can LP. I'll bet the people who hate "Can-can" also own copies of those silly Perry & Kingsley LPs, and don't have a problem with them.

[Jim]

Thank you for the exquisite Cristina track. This is why I love this blog.

[Dale Hazelton]

I heard the LBJ phone tapes a couple of years ago, on NPR of all places. They musta kept the Oval Office pretty hot for his nuts to hang like he says....

Attila! Terrible music, sorta like a high school kids version of prog with all the solos. But the cover image alone is worth it. Wasn't Joey Levines "Life is a Rock" the prequel to We Didn't Start the Fire?

[Walkathon]

Axelrod used to occasionally write for the CTW - wonder if he had anything to do w/ the Lou Rawls (R.I.P.) track. Speaking of which, more here:
http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Lou_Rawls

[Dale Hazelton]

Isn't the Rawls song actually called ABC-DEF-GHI, penned by Joe Raposo? I'm not an S.S. expert, so forgive me if I'm wrong.....

[Jakeer]

Thanks for this. I've been looking for that Cristina cover of "Is That All There Is" forever.
Now all I need to do is find a copy of Live At Raul's and I'm set.

[Pamela]

Excuse me?
'Not the creepy one read by Michael Jackson' ?!? - Care to explain yourself.
In fact my friend...I order you to explain your VICIOUS intention.
Michael is the most loving, generous, humble, compassionate soul EVER.
He is TRULY worthy of reading this story to the children of the world.
THINK before you speak.
Bless you ♥