From their third album, Hammer On A Drum, Vacouver's Payola$ released this Holiday gem in 1983. It's a mid-tempo love song filled with longing and loss, reverb on the snare and chorused guitars. It was the 80's thank you very much. It's a fine song, Holiday-themed or not. Nice, logical chord progressions in the verses. It was released on nice clear green vinyl in the US. Not too much to say other than it's not regarded as a holiday classic and it's a damned shame that it isn't.
David Marks was the
rhythm guitarist with The Beach Boys from February of 1962 until
October of 1963. He co-signed the band's contract with Capitol
Records along with Mike Love and the Wilson brothers and was on the
bands first four albums (Surfin' Safari, Surfin' USA, Surfer Girl
and Little Deuce
Coupe). He ultimately left the
band left over a financial dispute between his parents and Murray
Wilson. He was technically a legal full-time member of the band until
late 1967.
David
Marks later rejoined The Beach Boys in 1995, first appearing on
Baywatch with the band. Then on the Beach Boys Salute
NASCAR 1998 compilation. And later appearing on the bands 2012
reunion album That's Why God Made The Radio and subsequent
50th Anniversary World Tour.
Soon
after leaving the band Marks formed The Marksmen in 1963 and released
a few singles on A&M Records and Warner Brothers before
disbanding in 1965. The complete Marksmen recordings were finally
compiled in 2008 on the Quiver Records compilation album The
Ultimate Collector's Edition 1963-1965.
Sundazed
Music released this beautiful little single in 2003 of two of the
stand-out tracks by The Marksmen (“The Sheriff Of Noddingham” b/w
“Kustom Kar Show”). “Noddingham” is a classic surf
instrumental rave-up with plenty of wet, reverby guitar ala Dick Dale, while “Kar
Show” is an endearingly goofy songwith
backing-vocals and handclaps by The Honeys (which featured Brian
Wilson's future wife Marilyn Rovell).
Highly
recommended for fans of The Beach Boys and Surf Rock. Here's The Video Review:
For the first-half of the decade The Police were the biggest, most-popular & most commercially successful new wave band of the 1980's. Basically, they were The Beatles of the new wave/punk movement. They had as many female admirers as they did male fans and they were respected by the critical community and fellow musicians alike. They began their career with faux-punk songs and reggae-infused pop songs and over the course of eight years, twenty-singles and five albums became a more worldly and experimental pop band. Then at the peak of their career they called it a day.
Then in January of 2007, Stewart Copeland, Andy Summers and Gordon Sumner (known more colloquially as "Sting") announced they would be reuniting for a world tour to celebrate their thirtieth anniversary. The tour - sponsored by Best Buy - commenced in May of 2007 and ended in August of 2008. To say it was successful would be putting it mildly; the tour earned upwards of 350 million dollars and became the third highest-grossing tour of all-time. The Police were the world's most top-earning musicians for both 2007 & 2008. The band even reunited with original Police guitarist Henry Padovani (who hadn't played with the band since 1977) joined the band for an encore when they played Paris. Thankfully, the tour was also well-documented/recorded and the band released the Best Buy exclusive Certifiable: Live In Buenos Aires (recorded live at River Plate Stadium in December of that 2007) in November of 2008. There was a home video of the performance released as well on both DVD & Blu Ray. The DVD was packaged with the CD release of the show.
A rare four-man band shot (with Henry Padovani on the far right) at the Mont de Marsan Punk Festival, Paris, France, August 5, 1977.
There was also a nice triple-vinyl release as well. The gatefold packaging itself that houses the three vinyl discs is on the thin-side and leaves a bit to be desired. It's difficult getting the records comfortably in and out of the sleeve. You'd think that considering the amount of money generated from the tour, A&M - or whoever was ultimately responsible for packaging - would have made sure that the packaging was of a higher-quality. But surprise, surprise they did not.
But beyond the shoddy packaging, the records and the recording itself is excellent and a must-have for any Police fan. The performances are great as well; the band has always taken liberties when it came to performing the songs live. For example the band has rarely, if ever, performed "Roxanne" the same exact way live as they did when they first recorded the "hit" studio version from Outlandos d'Amour. With age Sting's voice has slightly deepened and so, occasionally a hit version from 1980 that was in a one key is now in another or sung in a lower octave. A few songs ("Don't Stand So Close To Me" and "Voices Inside My Head") have appeared to live lives of their own and now have fairly different arrangements altogether.
Andy Summers is finally given plenty of room to stretch out and solo as much as he wants (in their heyday he was previously given a four-eight bar maximum) and the band sounds completely confident and relaxed. You'd never know this was a band that had not played together (regularly) since 1984. Sting is still a strong vocalist and is an incredibly nuanced and nimble bassist. And Stewart Copeland still sounds as vital a drummer as ever. The band has streamlined their sound but they basically still sound like The Police, and not like Sting and a pick-up backing band as some might have feared.
The nineteen-song release is a virtual greatest hits collection plus a few fan-favorites (i.e. "Hole In My Life", "When The World Is Running Down...", and "Next To You"). If you're a Police fan of any kind this will make for an interesting and very entertaining - and for the out and out Police fan - an historic listen.
A very special Halloween edition of Talk About Pop Music: Vinyl Views. I'll be reviewing four Halloween-themed vinyl. recordings
Mondo Zombie Boogaloo: 100 Years of Roc is a Yep Roc Records Halloween-themed various artists compilation. It contains four tracks by The Fleshtones, five by Los Straitjackets, five by Southern Culture On The Skids and one track ("Que Monstrous Son" - "Monster Mash" en Espanol) featuring all three bands. All three bands are also signed to Yep Roc records as well. The album holds-up surprisingly well with tracks by The Fleshtones ("Dracula A Go Go" & "Ghoulman Confidential) and Los Straitjackets ("Ghostbusters" & "Theme From Halloween") as the big winners here.
There's satisfying flow of consistency in surf, garage and rockabilly that has always suited Halloween or Horror-themed rock. It's a nice modern addition to this tradition. The double-vinyl is colored green and purple. The vinyl also comes with an enclosed CD copy of the album too!
Halloween Horrors: The Sounds Of Halloween (A&M 1977) is a nostalgia-placeholder for many a thirty-something. It's not a terribly good release, however it could also be a lot worse, I suppose. Side one is an ostensibly would-be scary story that doesn't add up to too much (I guess it can't be too scary). And side two is a collection of seemingly-synthesized sound-effects. Some of these are quite nice; the "Pipe Organ" track is excellent. Most of them are run-of the mill sound-effect tracks.
Recommended if it's very cheap or very free.
Monster Rap - Bobby (Boris) Pickett Featuring Bobby Paine (Easy Street Records 1984) is a cheesy stab at exploiting the Halloween market via the hip-hop genre in the mid 80's. Aside from it being Pickett's last release (famous for his 1962 novelty release "Monster Mash") there's virtually no redeeming qualities to this curiosity. The claymation artwork on the sleeve resembles the hologram figures in the chess game played in Star Wars.
Not really recommended for lovers of even the most dire kitsch.
Last but not least is "Screamin' Skull" (I.R.S. Records 1983) by The Fleshtones. The lyrics are basically about amphetamines and living fast in Los Angeles, as the band was doing at the time. It's set in a faux-horror garage rock setting, complete with honking saxophone and spooky organ intro.
It's the second single release for the band's amazing Hexbreaker album. Despite it's very "American-sound" the label made the possibly wrong-headed decision to only release this (and the first single from this album) only in the U.K.. The B-Side is a nice cover of the John Lee Hooker atheist rave-up "Burning Hell", which also nudges the single into Halloween/Horror genre. An excellent should-have-been-hit-single from Queens New York's finest purveyors of "Super Rock".
