Mongo Santamaria Band "Watermelon Man" 45

The label of this 45 caught my eye right away. Loved it. Basic but effective. Mongo Santamaria doing his Herbie Hancock cover B/W "Don't bother me know more". Almost everyone is familiar with "Watermelon Man" and Mongo plays it prety straight forward with a little shouting added in and a little messing with the tempo in the chorus.
The flipside is a latin groover with a nice bassline.
Some records you buy cause you know the artist or song title. This I bought just on the strength of the logo on the label and I got lucky.

James Brown Olympia 1966

A slightly longer clip, but damn check out the footwork!

Friday Cycling Action

SC Coppi-Bartali stage went to Robert Foster on a course that got shortened due to rain and cold. Several riders packed it in including Tyler. One more day for either Scarponi or Rogers to try and steal the top step from Luca Pierfelici.

Castilla y Leon wrapped up with the stage going to Ventoso and overall to Contador. 2 riders who are having break out seasons. Good race for Saunier Duval who got 2nd and 3rd overall as well as some stage wins with Ventoso. After these wins in shorter races the attention and pressure will probably fall onto Contador for a high placing in the Vuelta.........

Criterium International starts tomorrow and I will throw down an overall winners podium comprised of Shleck,Kloden, and Valjavec.

Same thing for the Belgian semi Classic E3... Everyone's favorite misfit VDB will be in the hunt. With Bettini and Boonen at the start this might herald the start of their competition for glory in the North. The domestics are stacked 100% Belgian and Dutch. This will be an interesting couple of weeks for Quickstep. If they overcome internal rivalries they will be tough to beat, if they don't they open the door to all the other teams. I say the podium will be Ballan,Boonen, and O'Grady(I am goint to keep betting on him. He has to win something this spring)

9 days til the Tour of Flanders and 16 til Paris Roubaix. Cancellara has ben quiet this season can he go again at PR? Boonen and Ballan have to be favorites. I still am pulling for a big win for Stuey O'Grady -if not one of the big 2 how about Ghent-Whelvegam? Bettini? Hard to say, but I don't think he will get Flander this year.
Props to Brad Huff who scored the first US medal in track racing in a longtime. Bronze in the Omnimum event.

Ruby Andrews "Gotta Breakaway" 45

A nice 45 from the prolific Ruby Andrews. "Gotta Breakaway" is a standard love song, but with an interesting arrangement. The flipside is the killer.
"You Ole Boo Boo You" is a slow burning funk monster. Slow down the "Freddie's Dead" groove and add in a harmonica and drum molasses breakdown and you've got the making of an unstoppable track. When the organ and strings kick in, it just pushes it over the top. Imagine "It's your thing" on 33.
Zodiac Records.

Skip Henderson 45 Cape Cod Country????

Found this one in the Goodwill and it was a quarter well spent. A country label from Hyannis? Skip Henderson and the Armarillo Band give you "Now is the time for leavin" B/W "Nashville Lights on Scrimshaw Records who have an excellent whale logo. Whales and country? Makes sense right? A side, is standard honky tonk heartbreak. An uptempo hit the road anthem. Vocals and harmonica overpower the music which chugs along competently. "Nashville Lights" is the story of guitar picker trying to make a living. Not terrible, but not memorable honky tonk fare. I would imagine they played a lot of covers where ever the played.
Neat record, good enough to make me stop by Bud's Country Lounge the next time I'm on the Cape and ask some old guy at the bar if Skip ever played there. If being the Cape's premier country bar isn't reason enough for you to go visit, remember they had at least one crucial hardcore show back in 85 or 86. You remember right? Crash Course/Ghoul Squad and the Freeze or was it Ganglion? You probably bought a copy of United Rights fanzine and skated the railroad track in the JiffyLube parking lot
This could trigger a whole series of Cape Cod Indy and private press releases. Well a series of at least one "live at Johnny Yees" album and maybe a "live at the lighthouse" by some other guy who played piano at a hotel bar in West Dennis.

Gettin Soulful

The cover of this reminds me of a line I just heard on the new Redman "I got chest hair that looks like taco meat". Vampisoul is bringing you 21 tracks of soul. Heavy emphasis on the Latin end of their catalog, but track after track of obscure funky soulful nuggets. This has got a ton of big names (Willie Bobo,Cal Tjader, Fania All Stars, Joe Bataan, Mongo Santamaria,etc) Willie Henderson name checks a whole lot of dances I haven't heard of on "Break your Back". Joe Bataan drops a rocking latin funk jam called "Chick-a-boom" that is real nice. Erma Franklin lays down the law on "Gotta find me a lover". Cal Tjader takes you into space for "Solar Heat" a nice rare-groover. Lenni Sesar drops a nice full orchestra "Morris Park" that swings like an Oliver Nelson Verve record. Is Johnnie Colon the man responsible for the eletric slide? I can't say, but he does drop "Line Dance" on this comp. Israel "cachoa" Lopez drops a honking salsa track "Es Diferente". Irakere drop a proggy latin jam called "38 1/2". Finishing it off is an organ driven James Brown meets the frat house classic called "Squeeze it Tight" by Coss Nostra.
Totally recommended unless you have an aversion to latin grooves
Buy this and it saves you the time and trouble of mixing a killer party tape -just don't look directly at the cover....

Les McCann Invitation to Openness

The cover art and title should help prepare you for the 3 tracks on this LP. 3 tracks give Les and friends room to stretch out. Some seriously expansive 1972 shit. Spacey more than raging. Songs based on his life stories which he shared with the musicians. Les even took the cover photo himself. Yusef on flute and 2 guitar players. 5 guys on drums and percussion including Bernard Purdie. "The Lovers" takes up side one and is an expansive and rambling journey. More soundscape than song, but it has it's moments. If you are going to take up an entire side of an album with one track, I would prefer it was a little more intense.
"Beaux J Poo Boo" opens side 2 and the title makes me think of some goof on "Beautiful Shit" Les's liner notes say it is "montage of all the pieces of my life, that have made me who I am". Starts out with a subtle groove and then kind of gels into a spacey ambient jam. "poo pye McGoochie" is up next and again reminds me of some kind of veiled fecal reference, but I guess i am just immature. This one starts out trippy and quiet with just keys and builds a nice groove with some synth noodling. Comes back to a more earth bound groove when the Sax kicks in.
I like my grooves a little more straight ahead, but I have total respect for the records Atlantic was putting out during this period that were totally driven by the artists vision -think Yusef or Roland Kirk. I doubt I will grab for this too frequently, but for a buck it is a worthwhile acquisition. Sample geeks and DJ nerds could probably harvest a lot of sounds form this one.