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News from the darkest corners of the
musical universe:
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Monday, December 25, 2006 ◦
Weirdomusic.com wishes you and your loved ones a happy holiday season and a music filled new year! We'll be back with more goodies in 2007.
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Thursday, December 21, 2006 ◦
For nearly forty years, the soul of bubblegum music has been schizophrenically split. On one side, the producers, songwriters and studio cats who pulled the strings and made most of the money. On the other, the teenage garage rock players who went out on the road bearing the name of a hit band, even if they didn't always know "their" latest tune. They got the glory, but didn't get to write the history.
Now one of those garage-turned-bubblegum bands has crawled out of the pink mists of time to tell their own story. Floyd Marcus, original drummer of the 1910 Fruitgum Company ("Simon Says," "1-2-3 Red Light") is now blogging at the Bubblegum University website in hopes of setting the record straight. In his first post, Floyd describes a triumphant fill-in gig for the Vanilla Fudge, when the initially angry crowd was won over by the raw rock power of the "bubblegum" combo. Future entries will explore the band's formation, studio and road tales and answers to fans' questions.
Floyd Marcus says, "I didn't realize how much wrong information was out there about the band. I'm back, involved again and I can't wait to finally tell the real story. We were a real band, played great, and had crazy experiences on and off the road. We're grateful to Bubblegum University for the soapbox and want our fans to know if they ask the questions, we will answer them!"
The 1910 Fruitgum Company has reformed with original members, and performs frequently in the Eastern U.S. For more about the 1910 Fruitgum Company, visit their website.
Bubblegum University (your sticky pink think tank) is a website run by Kim Cooper, co-editor of the bubblegum bible "Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth" and writer of liner notes for "The Best of the 1910 Fruitgum Co." http://www.bubblegum-music.com
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Friday, December 15, 2006 ◦
Ahmet Ertegun, the music magnate who founded Atlantic Records and shaped the careers of John Coltrane, Ray Charles, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and many others, died yesterday in Manhattan. He was 83.
A spokesman for Atlantic Records said the death was the result of a brain injury suffered when Mr. Ertegun fell backstage at the Beacon Theater in Manhattan on Oct. 29 as the Rolling Stones prepared to play a concert that marked former President Bill Clinton's 60th birthday. He had been in a coma since then.
More info on Google News.
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Thursday, December 07, 2006 ◦
Arthur Shimkin, a Grammy Award-winning producer of children's records, including Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" - sung, appropriately enough, by Jimmy Durante - died Monday at his home in Manhattan. He was 84. The cause was bladder cancer, his son Carl said.
As head of the Little Golden Records division of the Simon & Schuster publishing company in the 1950s and '60s and of Sesame Street Records in the '70s, Mr. Shimkin often said that his clientele was the kid at home from school with the sniffles, and moms and dads weary of reading "Cinderella" for the fourth straight time.
He was the executive producer of more than 3,000 records that sold more than 5 million copies — including at least 500,000 of "Sesame Street Fever," a takeoff on the 1977 Bee Gees hit "Saturday Night Fever." He was nominated for 13 Grammys, including the one he won in 1961 for "Peter and the Wolf," played by the New York Philharmonic under the baton of Leonard Bernstein.
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Tuesday, December 05, 2006 ◦
The first four in a series of eight Steve Hillage Virgin-era remasters are due on January 15th 2007. The remainder are due later in the new year. All re-issues feature re-mastered music and include a number of bonus tracks from the Hillage tape archives. They are put together with Hillage's co-operation, come packaged in jewel case with liner notes written by prog expert Mark Powell and include photos and memorabilia from the Hillage archives.
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