40 Year Itch: The Mysterious Alvin Stardust

It was just a brief item in the October 26th issue of Billboard Magazine:

Newly formed Magnet Records will release four singles before Christmas for distribution through CBS. The first, "My Coo Ca Choo" by mystery singer Alvin Stardust has received Powerplay plugging on Radio Luxembourg. Stardust is stated to be a familiar music business figure, but his identity is not disclosed.

Ah! The hype of those early years of Glam Rock! 

Alvin Stardust was none other than Bernie Jewry, a roadie, who in the early 60's replaced the 17 year old namesake of Shane Fenton and the Fentones when the first Fenton dies of rheumatic fever.

When the Fentons disbanded in the early 60's , Jewry vanished from the spotlight . He probably would have the spent the rest of his life playing small nite clubs had he not come up with the mock Glam Rock persona that borrows the black leather look from Elvis Presley's 1968 TV special and the surname of David Bowie's most famous persona Ziggy Stardust.

It may have started as a joke,  but Alvin Stardust recorded seven Top 10 hits from 1973 to 1984. His most famous is "My Coo Ca Choo" which hit #2 in the UK and spent seven weeks atop the charts in Australia. Stardust's follow-up single "Jealous Mind" would top the UK charts in 1974.

Still, he may best be remembered for his somewhat menacing performance in this public service announcement.

'

   At 71, Stardust is alive and well and touring Europe often in the company of Slade and Sweet.

   Here's a link to his website

40 Year Itch: Really Love Your Peaches Wanna Shake Your Tree

[Purchase]

The story of The Joker, the album that finally broke the Steve Miller Band, begins a year earlier, in 1972, when Steve Miller broke his neck in a car accident on the way to the airport, where he was heading on yet another big tour to support a moderately selling album.

 He told me: 

 I fractured a vertebrae.I'm dealing with it right now. I got like three numb little fingers right here and kind of a bad arm over here. 

 Steve spent the next year house bound in Dallas, living with his parents. He had a lot of time to himself and eventually wrote a three chord song looking back over his career. The song refers to the Brave New World track "Space Cowboy" , "Gangster of Love from Sailor and "Enter Maurice..." from Recall the Beginning...A Journey to Eden.

He called the tune "The Joker". 

 All of a sudden, finally, ...last chance: got a big huge number one hit.

The song topped the Billboard charts in early 1974. I got the feeling I wasn't the first person to ask him the meaning of "The Pompatus of Love":

"The Pompatus of Love" is just, you know. I can't tell you man. If I told you I'd ..I just can't do it.

Riding on the success of the #1 single, The Joker peaked at #2 on the charts despite mixed reviews including this one from Rolling Stone's Bud Scoppa:

The Joker, is a lazy slide back into the empty posturing that has marked the second half of Miller's career.



Here's the rest of my Steve Miller interview

40 Year Itch : Creem Magazine's Top 10 Jazz Albums of 1973

Creem Magazine readers clearly prefer jazz with rock song structure so their Top 10 reads like a Who's Who of fusion ..minus anything with funk overtones like Headhunters or Donald Byrd. At the end of the list see Downbeat Magazine's list.

10. 

Considered by many at the time as the best guitarist in the world

9.

Brazilian crossover artist hit the Top 20 Billboard album charts with Deodato 2

8.

Two John Coltrane covers on this lp by Sir Chinmoy devotees

7.

A year after Last Tango in Paris , the Argentinian sax player returns home

6.

Jarrett's first album for Impulse! is out of print

5.

Deodato's first US album featuring the #2 single, a funky take on the 2001 theme "Also Sprach Zarathustra"

4.

It was an album before it was a group.

3.

Weather Report's fourth album and the last to feature founding bassist Miroslav Vitous.

2.

Mahavishnu drummer recorded debut with Jan Hammer and future Deep Purple guitarist Tommy Bolin.

1.

Loud rocking and then delicate fusion . A road map for every other jazz fusion band out there.

DOWNBEAT'S TOP JAZZ ALBUMS OF 1973

CRITICS POLL ( tied)

Tyner plays keyboards like they are African percussion instruments

Charlie Parker disciple got more experimental as the years went by

READERS POLL

1973 in Reggae

[Purchase]

With 1972's The Harder They Come soundtrack finally entering the US charts, Johnny Nash scoring hits like "I Can See Clearly Now" and "Stir It Up" and The Wailers touring with Sly and the Family Stone, Reggae was ready to seduce black record buyers. And yet, for whatever reason, it was white audiences that bought albums like the Wailers Burnin' and Toots and the Maytals Funky Kingston.

The second of the Wailer's great albums of 1973, Burnin' is the last to feature Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer, both of whom would go on to solo careers. Highlights like "Get Up, Stand Up", "I Shot the Sheriff" ( a #1 pop hit for Eric Clapton in 1974) and "Bunin' and Lootin' " reveal Marley at his most political. And yet the music never fails to groove. One of the year's essential albums.

[Purchase]

For infectious, joyful reggae nobody beats Toot and the Maytals.  After contributing two cuts to The Harder They Come soundtrack ( " Sweet and Dandy" and "Pressure Drop") , the band released Funky Kingston with its cover of "Louie Louie" and the the classic title cut. In 1975, Island Records would release a different version of the album with the same title and cover art but featuring mostly songs from1974's In the Dark.

[Purchase]

THE first dub record. Only 300 copies were originally released in Jamaica by producer Lee "Scratch" Perry's house band which at one time included Sly Dunbar and future Wailers Aston "Family Man" Barrett and brother Carlton. 

[Purchase]

 As Burning Spear, Winston Rodney released his lo fi debut album in 1973, His lamenting of the days of slavery would make 1976's Marcus Garvey and Man in the Hills his classic albums.

[Purchase]

Deejay I Roy ( Roy Samuel Reid)is one of the world's original rappers. First class dance hall toasting.

[Out of Print]

To keep him out of trouble,  deejay Tapper Zukie's mom send him to the UK where he recorded the songs that would make up his debut album Man Ah Warrior.

[Purchase]

Jimmy Cliff's follow-up to The Harder They Come has some decent tunes ( the title cut, "Better Days Are Coming") but sounds as though he was trying too hard to go pop.

Six Degrees: The Bats to Husker Du

1. New Zealand alt rockers The Bats release their legendary debut album Daddy's Highway in 1987. All songs are written and composed by founder Robert Scott.

2. Robert Scott is already well regarded in New Zealand's music scene as the bass player for The Clean, formed 9 years earlier. The Clean's original bass player is Peter Gutteridge. He wrote "Point That Thing Somewhere Else".

3. Peter Gutteridge is a founding member of yet another legendary New Zealand band, The Chills. Their classic 1990 album Submarine Bells, featuring the ear worm "Heavenly Pop Hit", is produced by Gary Smith.

4. Gary Smith is best known as the producer who discovered The Pixies whose "Where Is My Mind?" , from the Surfer Rosa album, appeared on the 1990 A Matter Of Degrees soundtrack.

5. Never saw the movie but the soundtrack is full of classic alt bands like Uncle Tupelo, Yo La Tengo, Miracle Legion and a band called Nova Mob, led by Grant Hart.

6. Grant Hart was the troubled drummer and a terrific songwriter for Husker Du who has found new joy in recordng and touring.

Peter Hook ( New Order) : My Top 10

With the single "Confusion" wrapping up its fourth week at #1 on the UK Indie chart, New Order's Peter Hook presents the October 13th, 1983 issue of Smash Hits magazine with a list of his ten fave songs.Three Velvet Underground vets make this list -as does a then ten year old tune from Cockney Rebel's great Human Menagerie. It all comes courtesy of Brian at Like Punk Never Happened.

Three Albums Released on This Date in 1973

[Out of Print]

It was just an uncomfortable tour. I felt like a product, and I had this band of all-star musicians that couldn't even look at each other-Neil Young

True, Neil Young may have called Time Fades Away his worst album but he's only referring to the audio quality of the recordings and the vibe he gets when he thinks about the 90 day tour he spent with The Stray Gators ( which included Jack Mitzche on keyboards, Neil's buddy Ben Keith on pedal steel guitar, Tim Drummond on bass and at first Kenny Buttrey  then former Turtles/Airplane drummer John Barbata). Danny Whitten was supposed to play guitar on the tour but his drug addiction was too much for the band to handle so Neil sent him home where he died of a heroin overdose.

These songs--all previously unreleased-- are recorded just months later.

The crowd came for Harvest so they met a lot of these Crazy Horse style rockers with silence. Neil Young fans refer to Time Fades Away as the first of the Ditch Trilogy ( along with Tonight's the Night and On the Beach), Young's attempt to pull back on his super stardom. All three are dark, haunted and essential.

There is an online petition to get Young to reconsider keeping this album out of print here.

[Purchase]

The band just doesn't seem to matter much anymore.
 - Gordon Fletcher, Rolling Stone

   Fleetwood Mac continues its string of spotty albums dating back to Future Games with their second album of 1973, Mystery To Me. Bob Welch offered the best songs on the album including the single "Hypnotized". If the other members weren't so prolific they couldn't be blamed. Christine McVie and husband John were headed for a divorce while new guitarist Bob Weston was having an affair with Mick Fleetwood's wife, model Jenny Boyd. "Keep On Going" seems to anticipate the disco age ( and "Forever" could have been a tune off the Vampire Weekend debut) while a lot of the filler is straight forward, somewhat pleasant boogie.

[Purchase]

    Wake of the Flood has its devoted fans but the first album for the band's own label , Grateful Dead Records (and the first studio album in three years) , only has one classic song on it, the transcendent "Eyes of the World". The addition of Keith Godchaux and wife Donna may have helped the band fill out their sound but they can't bring life to songs like  "Stella Blue" which sounds like a George Harrison throw-away.