Like I promised the time before.
These albums don't
exist of course, but are simply referenced on the back of the booklet that came with Pussy Galore's tribute to/deconstruction of the
Historia series from 1990.
In its own way, this list is as funny as the one they provided with the originals. Hard to surpass the humor in reality, if you know what I'm saying, but this list--the entire CD package--is so faithful to the budget bin aesthetic of the Spanish archetypes that you've just got to giggle.
Somebody spent a lot of time with this, it's clear, so I know the mistakes are intentional. My favorite is "Mango Jerry," though "Otis Spawn" is also good. Also love how John Travolta and Ike & Tina both get appearances on two albums, in the same way Roger Daltrey did in the original Spanish series. And they included Aphrodite's Child! No word for that but awesome. Just plain awesome.
Now we can say, had you doubted, that Jordi Sierra i Fabra and Pussy Galore both agree: The Rolling Stones and Aphrodite's Chid are essential.
And was it inevitable that Pussy Galore--named after a Bond girl, of course--would include in their list a band that named itself after the Bond villain Hugo Largo? I really have no choice, given the evidence; I have to suppose it was.
Beyond the humor drawn from the intentional mistakes and the James Bond injokes, the humor is where it was in the originals: in the juxtapositions. I hadn't realized until I compiled the list last week that the Spanish records hadn't actually combined artists on a single platter; but I've long known that Pussy Galore's parody finds most of its humor in the way it slaps radically different artists onto the same (yes, yes, hypothetical) disc. "Nuclear Assault, Shocking Blue" might just be my favorite fusion, though fictional record # 42 is pretty great, too: "Iron Butterfly, The Crests, The Crewcuts, The Undead."
Beyond that which is funny, much of this list is amazingly obscure. After the doo-wop and the paleo-rhythm and blues, much of it is comprised of arcane New York bands from the dawn of punk, crust punk bands, and Youth Crew bands, and scum punk bands and no-wave bands, many of whom I've never heard of in any other context.
Such deep, deep obscurity begs the question as to whether some of these bands might be so unknown that they, technically, as we say in the blogger biz, didn't even fucking exist. Pussy Galore wouldn't lie to us, would they?
Would they?!?!?!?!?
Well, it seems not. I did a little internet verification on some of the ones I hadn't heard of this morning, and almost everyone mentioned appears to have, you know, been real. "Red Buckets" and "L.C.U.," I couldn't find anything on them, but 20 or so of the others that I looked at have some kind of quickly-found mention on the beercan-riddled shoulders of the information superhighway.
If you wanna get an idea of some of the stuff I found while looking,
check out this review of a rare early NY-scene compilation that namechecks five of the bands PG go to in their list.
Other than that, dive in:
| 1. | | The Rolling Stones
| | 2. | | Red Buckets, Chubby Checker
| | 3. | | Bob Marley, Squirm, Crippled Youth
| | 4. | | The Fleetwoods, Savage Clrcle, The Chiffons, The Ad Libs
| | 5. | | Even Worse
| | 6. | | Billy Preston, Solomon Burke, Rites of the Accused
| | 7. | | The Headlickers, Sam & Dave, The Association
| | 8. | | The Waldos
| | 9. | | The Platters, Ultravlolence
| | 10. | | lke & Tina Turner, Warzone, Esther Philllps, Blues Image, Jimmy McGriff & Junior Parker, Ludichrist
| | 11. | | The Bloods, Duane Eddy, The Fireballs, Jack Scott,
| | 12. | | The Beach Boys, Gladys Knight & The Pips, Rude Buddha, Disco Tex & The Sex-O-Lettes
| | 13. | | Curia Thomas, The Shlrelles, Lonnle Mack, Brook Benton, Seizure,
| | 14. | | Mango Jerry, Johnny & The Hurricanes, Danny and The JunIors, Agnostlc Front, BiII Deal & The Rhondels
| | 15. | | Token Entry
| | 16. | | Nuclear Assault, Shocking Blue, The El Dorados
| | 17. | | Cro-Mags, L. C. U.
| | 18. | | Bloodsister
| | 19. | | The Platters, Killer Instinct, King Curtis, Lee Dorsey
| | 20. | | The Diamonds, The Five Americans, Sam the Sham & The Pharaohs, Porno Dracula, The Manhattans
| | 21. | | The Misguided
| | 22. | | Rufus Thomas, Martha Reeves, The Nashville Teens, Ism
| | 23. | | Sick of It All
| | 24. | | Harlots of 42nd Street | | 25. | | Gary Lewis & The Playboys, The Eternals, Ritual Tension |
| | 51. | | The Impressions, Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry, NY Niggers, Otis Spawn
| | 52. | | Jan & Dean, Shades of Blue, Jay & The Techniques, Patti Labelle & The Blue Belles, The Solitalres
| | 53. | | Aphrodite's Child
| | 54. | | Brook Benton, White Zombie
| | 55. | | The Shlrelles, The Olympics, The Mercers, Jerry Butler
| | 56. | | Roger Manning
| | 57. | | 76% Uncertain, The Dovells, Jlmmie Rodger, T Roe
| | 58. | | Circus Mort
| | 59. | | Harry Crews, The Lunachicks, STP, Maria Excommunicata
| | 60. | | Mike Rlmbaud
| | 61. | | Jimmy Mcgriff & Junior Parker, Shirley & Lee
| | 62. | | Mike Blooomfield, Otis Spann
| | 63. | | The Skyliners, Gene Chandler Joe South
| | 64. | | Kraut
| | 65. | | Robert & Johnny, The Spaniels
| | 66. | | Peach of Immortality
| | 67. | | The Kingston Trio
| | 68. | | Icon
| | 69. | | Letch Patrol, The Flamingos
| | 70. | | Billy Bland, The Jive Five, Johnny Crawford
| | 71. | | Erasers, Cllfton Chronic, Isaac Douglas
| | 72. | | Jimmy Reed, Rat At Rat R
| | 73. | | The String-a-Longs, Sonny Till & The Orioles, Bobby Helms
| | 74. | | Jackie Wilson, J. Frank Wilson, Damage | | 75. | | Amen Corner, Egoslavia |
|
|
| 26. | | Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry, Verbal Abuse
| | 27. | | Stisism
| | 28. | | The Drifters, Chronic Disorder, The Bobettes
| | 29. | | John Travolta, Fontella Bass, Marv Johnson, The Box Tops, Lloyd Price
| | 30. | | Drunk Driving
| | 31. | | Murphy's Law
| | 32. | | The Orioles, The Dust Devils, The Moonglows, Fabian
| | 33. | | M.O.A., D.Y.S., F.O.D.
| | 34. | | S.O.D.
| | 35. | | M.O.D., Freddie & The Dreamers
| | 36. | | The Speedies
| | 37. | | Hugo Largo
| | 38. | | Virus, Black Snakes
| | 39. | | False Prophets
| | 40. | | The Jimmy Castor Bunch, The Casuals, Chris Banner
| | 41. | | Blodwyn Pig, Joe Simon, Otis Spawn
| | 42. | | Iron Butterfly, The Crests, The Crewcuts, The Undead
| | 43. | | Butch Lust & Tne Hypocrites
| | 44. | | The Capris, Heart Attack, George Freeman
| | 45. | | A. P. P. L. E.
| | 46. | | Uniform Choice
| | 47. | | John Travolta
| | 48. | | Ike & Tina Turner, Jimmy Reed, Serendipity Singers, Johnny Rivers
| | 49. | | Johnny and The Hurricanes, The Klngsmen, The Excellents
| | 50. | | Betty Everett, The Earls |
| | 76. | | The Olympics, Nausea, The Mystics
| | 77. | | B. J. Thomas, The Tokens, Mel Carter, Token Entry, Bobby Freeman
| | 78. | | Sanford Clark, The Clovers, Ludichrist
| | 79. | | The Fiestas, The Fireballs, The Coachmen
| | 80. | | Numb Sex
| | 81. | | P. M.S., Wilbert Harrison, The Leaves
| | 82. | | Telly Beans, Peter Best
| | 83. | | The Cribcrashers, Doctor Clayton
| | 84. | | Youth of Today, Reagan Youth, Wasted Youth
| | 85. | | Irma Thomas, The Cowsills, The Crow, The Dells
| | 86. | | Johnny Ray, The Rotters
| | 87. | | The Passlons, Jlmmie Rodgers, Crumbsuckers, The Shangri-Las
| | 88. | | The Mellow Kings The Qin-tones, Swingin' Blue Jeans
| | 89. | | The Skulls, The Turtles, Frankie Valli
| | 90. | | The Paragons, Joe Thomas
| | 91. | | The Capitols, Frankle Ford, The Mob
| | 92. | | Brook Benton, Gogi Grant, The Happenlngs, King Harvest
| | 93. | | The Charlots, Ronnle Dove, Jerry Wallace, Sister Rosetta Tharpe
| | 94. | | Bloodsuckers From Outer Space
| | 95. | | Robert and Johnny, The Shaved Pigs, The Chimes
| | 96. | | Artless
| | 97. | | The Capris, The Earls, Don Gardner & Dee Dee Ford
| | 98. | | Seizure, Jimmy Reed, Crippled Youth
| | 99. | | The Solitaires, Billy Bland, Dee Clark
| | 100. | | Sonny Till & The Orioles, The Spaniels, The Undead | | 007. | | Pussy Galore
|
|
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"A new page in the history of Rock has been written. ¡Bravo!"
Inspired no doubt by the new Explosions in the Sky album, the folks at Spin in their May issue produced a good little featurette about the history of instrumental rock. Though I enjoyed the thing quite a bit (and can you believe I've still never heard Link Wray's "Rumble"?), there's definitely some stuff I think they missed. No "Eruption" = No Credibility is what I say. 
Unless I can track down a copy of Soundhog's Mashup album, that is.
In addition to other rock and roll books, including biographies of The Who, Pink Floyd and Rick Wakeman (!), Sierra i Fabra had some ten years earlier also written a reference work called La Historia de la Musica Pop, so we can assume a name for the new project came fairly easily for them.
Of course, Lillian Roxon's English language Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock had outlived its original editor and gone into its second or third edition by this time, so Prado's large encyclopedia might have remained of limited interest to an Anglo like myself . . .
And for some reason they gave Roger Daltrey a record after having already given one to The Who? What was it, the McVicar soundtrack?
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