Bing Crosby The Hometown Hero

Just consider the numbers:
Bing Crosby scored 38 #1 hits.Even The Beatles only had 24.

He was the #1 Box Office Star from 1944 to 1949, winning the Best Actor Oscar for "Going My Way".
And his song, "White Christmas", is still the most popular record of all time.
50 million copies sold.

The musical journey of Bing Crosby began on Tacoma's J Street on May 3rd, 1903.

At the age of 4 his family moved to Spokane.
But Washington left a lifelong impression.
He said "I like to remember the Pacific Northwest as a land that can put a song in your heart.
You know when I was a kid around Spokane or Tacoma,
the song was usually carried in sort of an off key whistle."

Bing attended Gonzaga University but dropped out to pursue his musical career--first as part of a trio called The Rhythm Boys.

Pop music critic Gene Stout says thanks to amplified mics, Bing popularized a new singing style:
Crooning.

"That was there term that became popular to describe that style of slower more expressive conversational singing style," says Gene. "And he was a pioneer who influenced Frank Sintra, Deam Martin and so many other crooners that followed."

His interest in working with the very best musicians led Bing to becoming a Civil Rights pioneer. He integrated the stage...sharing the spotlight with his friend Louis Armstrong. No small feat in the 1930's.

And Bing apparently shared more than the stage with jazz musicians.
He loved marijuana which he called "Mezz". As late as the 1970's he was suggesting it should be decriminalized.

"He was a bit of a punk in his day", says Gene. "And I think it's sort of interesting that he carried that over years later and actually became an advocate for decriminalization

Even though his career took him all over the world Bing Crosby always loved the Pacific Northwest. He donated his Oscar and many other mementos to Gonzaga and offered this advice to fans:
"If you'd rather swing on a star as I just did or gather moonbeams up in a jar,you can really be better off that you are by hitting the road to the Pacific Northwest.
Oh it's a great way to discover America."

Though an entire generation believes he only sold orange juice and lacked parenting skills Bing was declared "The Most Admired Man Alive" in 1948--ahead of Jackie Robinson and Pope Pius the 12th. He died in 1977 at the age of 74.

We Are Normal And We Want Our Freedom

As I listened to the opening track of comedy-rockers The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band's second album ,The Doughnut in Granny's Greenhouse, I heard a familiar refrain.
Check it out about two minutes in when the tune finally takes off.
"We are normal and we want our freedom".
It's a line you'll hear towards the very end of Love's "The Red Telephone".( About 4:11 in)

The Bonzo album came out exactly a year after Forever Changes.
Doughnut's album cover somewhat resembling the Incredible String Band's Hangman's Beautiful Daughter

Nobody at work or home would care that I made this connection so I'm laying this turd right here. Enjoy!

#23 The Individuals "Dancing with My Eighty Wives" (1982)

From the same Hoboken NJ music scene that spawned The Feelies, The Bongos, The Cucumbers ( remember them?) and eventually Yo La Tengo comes The Individuals and this college radio one hit wonder that lit up the phones at WTUL like christmas trees.

Produced by dB Gene Holder and recorded at Mitch Easter's legendary Drive-In Studio in Winston-Salem, Fields updated the fractured sound of Richard Hell's Voidoids to great effect.


I can see how polygamy might be a good idea. Because...I'm a guy. But I consider 80 wives a tad over the top. I work in an office with nine women and there's not a moment of silence until the last one leaves.

Remembering Kent Morrill of The Fabulous Wailers

Keyboard maestro and vocalist Kent Morrill of Tacoma WA's Fabulous Wailers has passed away at the age of 70, after giving prostate cancer one hell of a fight. Morill was the only original member of The Wailers to play with the band its entire 50+ year stretch.

It is Morrill, seen here in sunglasses and a hat, whose nimble fingers on the keyboards are featured in The Wailers 1959 Top 40 hit "Tall Cool One"
At the time the boy were still in high school. They played their hit on American Bandstand and The Alan Freed Show.




The Wailers could also play garage punk. Their fuzz rocker "Out of Our Tree" was on one of the Nuggets collections and their 1961 version of "Louie Louie" with Rockin' Robin Roberts was the one the Kingsmen sloppily copied in a Portland studio and made famous. Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere and the Raiders says their band was borrowing heavily from The Wailers as well.






When it came time for The Wailers to really WAAAAIILL, they called upon Kent:





Morrill was also a masterful Roy Orbison tribute artist. But he should be remembered as one of the Godfathers of the Northwest Rock n Roll Scene.
Below is what may be his final show in 2010. Following surgery he appeared right where he belonged: at the keyboards and in fine voice as always.




The Tacoma News Tribune has some thoughts from fellow Wailer Buck Ormsby here
Thanks Kent! Soul-Long and R.I.P.

Mike Oldfield "Tubular Bells" LIVE pts 1, 2 and 3 (1973)

I've been thinking about having my children listen to this CD as they fall asleep at night all summer.
And then on Halloween night, we'll watch The Exorcist together.
Kind of an experiment of sorts.

#22 Bobby Marchan There Is Something On Your Mind (1960)

In the South, you'd say a guy like Bobby Marchan had a little sugar in his blood... cuz he was so sweet. One of Huey "Piano" Smith's clowns, Bobby cut lead vocals on the classic double A-side ( in my opinion) "High Blood Pressure"/"Don't You Just Know It". Bobby also was the first to sing "Sea Cruise", a million selling single in 1959, but his vocals were replaced by Frankie Ford. Ford would become known as "The New Orleans Dynamo". Bobby was still just a clown.
Bobby finally got around to recording this Big Jay McNeely tune, a somewhat standard ass-swaying tune that, with a big dose of Bobby's theatricality, shot up to #1 on the R&B charts.
Yes, Bobby had a bit of a history with the theatre.

Since his teen years, Bobby liked to dress up as a woman and perform on stage in drag. He even organized his own drag troupe, The Powder Box Revue.
He would perform in drag at least into the 80's when I remember seeing posters of a platinum wigged Marchan stapled to telephone poles in New Orleans. (I was a college student, too dumb to go see Marchan when I could see The Neville Brothers play for the 12th time).

So here's why this is one of my 1001 tunes: the drama queen in Bobby gives us two dramatic monologues in the middle of "There Is Something On Your Mind".
The first one suggests when love is lost, move on.


I tell ya,when somebody else is rockin your cradle better
Than you can rock your cradle yourself,there's only one
Thing left in this world for you to do
Pack your clothes,turn around,walk slowly out the door
Look over your left shoulder,hang your head and say,

(Sings)
If you ever think about me
If I ever cross your mind
...I'm yours, I I know I know your mine




Then comes the second monologue. And the first time I heard this I stopped dead in my tracks. Its like the end of Taxi Driver!


After you can't stand it no more,you go on downtown
To the pawn shop and get yourself a pistol,and then you
Make it back up on the scene,where your love one and
Your best friend are now together..You go right in and
Bust down the door and shoot him..You can't shoot her
Because you know if you shoot her,all of your love and
Your long lifetime will be gone forever..and just as you
make it in your mind to forgive her,here comes another
One of your best friends through the door...This really
Makes you blow your top and you go right ahead and
Go on purpose to your heart,and shoot her...and realizing
What you just done,you say,"Baby please forgive me,I'm
sorry", and with her last dyin breath,she looks up at you
and say,
Doo,doo,doo Whoa-o-o , doo,doo,doo Whoa-o-o

For a thorough history of the Bobby Marchan story, check out this post by The Houndblog.

Paul Simon demonstrates how he made his brilliant new album

    Such an amazing return to form for Paul Simon ! He explains how he went back to an older form of songwriting for the new album So Beautiful or So What




For a limited time you can stream the new album here


    You can also find a downloadable version of the lead track "Getting Ready for Christmas" via The Hype Machine or perhaps right here via Popdose