Mining the Audio Motherlode, Volume 62 (MP3s)

Give the Drummer Some's
Favorite Downloads from the MP3 Blogosphere

You can't swing a cat and not smack into a tremendous recording among this week's bag of musical tricks. In fact, they're all hanging here like a big ol' audio piñata, just ready to burst. So go ahead and take a whack: BLAM! a mambo maestro goes modern; BOFF! a Jamaican soulster sings pure sugar; FLRBBBBB! an unsung Texan makes his first record; KERR-PLOFF! a African American freedom fighter duets with a Nobel Peace Prize winner; OOOOCH! German folkmeisters channel their inner Fairport; ZZZZZWAP! Apartheid receives an early, elegant shot across its bow. Holy freebies, Batman!

Arsenio Rodríguez  ~  "Quindembo / Afro Magic"
(Blog: Listen to Your Ears)

Growling Tigre
Widely acknowledged as the "father of the mambo," Rodríguez invented the conjunto lineup, updating the standard combo by adding piano, trumpets and congas. Quindembo was an ultra-modern statement, mixing jazz colorings—he replaced the trumpets with saxes—into a outfit delivering rootsy, folklyric material of a more overtly African derivation. Rodríguez's virtuoso playing (on the tres, a Cuban guitar with two sets of three strings) and growling vocals are worth the price of admission.

Pat Kelly  ~  "One Man Stand" and "Give Love a Try"
(Blog: Filé Reggae Downloads)
From the One Man Stand: You Are Not My Kind (mp3)

True Falsetto
Trained as an electrician, reggae crooner Pat Kelly is one of the few recordings stars with skills to pay the bills from both sides of the studio glass. (Indeed, after a long career clutching the microphone, he wound up twiddling knobs for Channel One Studios.) Kelly's sweet falsetto—and his relentlessly romantic lovers' soul songbook—has had him oft compared to Sam Cooke, but Smokey Robinson's pipes and repertoire are, to my ears, the closer resemblance.

High Mountain  ~  "High Mountain Hoedown"
(Blog: Record Fiend)
[Password = record-fiend.blogspot.com]

Southern (California) Rock
At 17, Jerry Lynn Williams cut his teeth playing rhythm guitar behind Jimi Hendrix's lead as a member of Little Richard's '65 touring band. After achieving local-legend status in Dallas/Forth Worth, Williams migrated to L.A. and became an in-demand songwriter, penning numbers for stars, including B.B. King, Bonnie Raitt and Eric Clapton (who said Williams "looked like Jack Nicholson and sang like Stevie Wonder.") Williams's own records never amounted to much, including this lone effort by his short-lived band High Mountain.

Max Roach  ~  "Chattahooche Red"
(Blog: Funland at the Beach)

Wherein Max Duets with Martin
Shamefully out of print (and never issued on disc) this vital 1981 LP presents Max Roach's longtime working quartet at the height of its brilliance. The centerpiece here is Roach's dramatic, propulsive drum duet with excerpts of MLK's "I Have a Dream Speech"—an audacious experiment no other artist could dream of pulling off. Additional thrills: Fresh reimaginings of "Giant Steps," "'Round Midnight," and "I Remember Clifford," along with the western lament "Red River Road," which sounds for all the world like a transitional passage straight out of Oklahoma. [Note 1: Files are FLAC not MP3.] [Note 2: Tracks 8 & 9 are mislabeled]

Gurnemanz  ~  "No Rays of Noise"
(Blog: Female Vocals)
From the album: Der Schwartenhals (mp3)

Volksmusik (with Uncringeworthy Kazoo)
Not nearly as grandiose as fellow German electric-folk ensemble Ougenweide, this quartet was content to deliver less ambitious pastoral fare. With Lukas W. Scheel and Manuela Schmitz singing mostly in English, Gurnemanz sounds a whole lot more Canterbury than Rhineland. Kazoos, however, know no borders.

Harry Belafonte/Miriam Makeba  ~  "An Evening With..."
(Blog: What... Cat 8 Your Tongue?)
From the album: Beware Verwoerd!

Power Couple
Miriam Makeba recorded this Grammy-Award winning "folk" album with Harry Belafonte two years after testifying on apartheid at the United Nations in 1965 (and having her South African citizenship revoked) and three years before marrying Stokely Carmichael (and having recording contracts and tour dates in the U.S. revoked). Though not credited, Hugh Masekela, Makeba's husband at the time, reportedly appears on this recording.

Listen for music from these and other incredible finds on
Give the Drummer Some, Fridays on WFMU, 9 to Noon (ET).

Check out every installment of Mining the Audio Motherlode

Comments

[Jessi]

The Arsenio Rodriguez album made my day! Thank you! And I haven't even heard the Max Roach yet, but any minute now...and I had no idea Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba recorded together, so that'll be dessert!

[aboombong]

I met Max Roach at about the time that album came out. He did a drum workshop for my HS jazz band and was amazing. Those couple of hours changed the way I thought about approaching drum kit. A true giant.