With Sal's blessing, my intention is to keep the blog on life support until he feels like returning.
This has happened before, but you never know.
"The future is uncertain and the end is always near",
said drunk Jim after he woke up and got himself a beer.
Most of the time "bonus tracks" are anything but. In reality they're just "filler".
That said, sometimes you find a good one. "Claudine" from the "Some Girls" sessions
is a cut above and probably left off the album for legal reasons.
It was a little too current an event at the time.
The lyrics fairly accurately describe the scenario of Claudine Longet, estranged wife of singer Andy Williams shooting and killing her boyfriend, Olympic skier "Spider" Sabitch in their Aspen cabin, on March 21, 1976. She later married her defense attorney.
It's a rare bit of Rockabilly from the Stones, with "Rip This Joint" being the other example I can think of.
I thought it sounded awfully familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on it until my phone randomly played Jack Scott's "Leroy" from a recently acquired compilation, "Loud Fast & Out Of Control-The Wild Sounds Of "50's Rock" .
It was the b-side of his chart topping (Billboard #3) 1958 single "My True Love".
15 comments:
I've loved "Claudine" since I heard it on the "Some Girls" reissue. It's definitely my favorite on that collection. I had no idea about the jack scott song.
And I love love love that when I clicked on this page I saw a new post.
You're a good man, BBJ.
Music keeps coming out but it's just not as much fun without someone to share it with (or praise, pan, parse, pirate or promote.)
For many of us Sal was that someone.
Thanks for keeping the fire burning until Sal can't stand it any more and has to weigh in.
Tinpot
You realize that when the lame substitute came in for our favorite teacher, we did as much shit as we could get away with? So be careful what you wish for...nah, just kidding. We'll behave (mostly). Agree with Chris C on the song, not knowing the older song, and being happy to see a new topic on the blog. Let's do our best to keep it up.
Sorry, one more thing: I generally cannot stand bonus tracks. While a few are hidden gems or interesting alternate versions, most of them are the dreaded demo versions of album songs. With a few exceptions (Macca and EC come to mind), most demos are dreary acoustic strum fests that do not add any insight into the origin of the song. IMO, they're just not much fun to listen to.
Adding my thanks for keeping the flame going! I was much more of a lurker than a commenter, but always appreciated the variety of opinions from Sal, you and all the readers.
Thanks for stepping in. The Claudine thing was a recurring bit on SNL back in the early days. Anybody know what happened to the missing pages on the website. It is back to April 2017. I was really interested in the topic a few weeks back regarding reducing double albums to single album and now it is gone.
"Some Girls" had the Horrible Country parody song on it
I was driving home early Sunday morning through Bakersfield/Listening to gospel music on the coloured radio station/And the preacher said, 'You know, you always have the Lord by your side'/Well, I was so pleased to be informed of this, that I ran 20 red lights in His honor/Thank you Jesus, thank you Lord.
only stones song I can remember with Ronnie Wood on pedal steel guitar
May Todd bless you Sal wherever you are
kh
I've always hated "Faraway Eyes". It's a bad parody and a worse homage.
Thanks BBJ! I cain't help it, I dig all the Stones outtakes, and this is a good one.
Amazing similarity between Claudine and Leroy! Both songs are fairly simplistic in structure; I think probably an unfortunate coincidence. Not much to plagiarize there in the first place.
Thanks for keeping the flame alive....and I guess this could be considered a comment
I have "Claudine" on a couple of Stones' bootleg albums but then it came out in better quality on the "Some Girls" deluxe release. Always liked the song, thought Jagger was enjoying himself with the lyrics. And as a bye the bye, somewhere I've got Ms Longet's "Love Is Blue" LP, not much played, vocals too whispery & breathless for me.
Never considered Rip This Joint as Rockabilly until reading this post. Took a listen and yep, it is!
The cause of all the commotion and her cover of ‘Let’s Spend The Night Together’:
https://youtu.be/9AWRQhGWHR4
Always loved "Claudine" since it floated up to the surface on bootlegs 25 years ago or so. But it's a lot closer to Bakersfield country then Rockabilly.
Quick thoughts:
One of their few failings of the Stones was they never have been able to play Rockabilly. Even their best Rockabilly cover "Suzie Q" had to be turned into a proto hard rock song for it to come off successfully.
Jack Scott's "Leroy" is barely Rockabilly itself and not very good, (he was a very minor talent) but the resemblance to "Claudine" to "Leroy" is sure there especially on the choruses.
In my opinion "Faraway Eyes was the only bummer track on the stellar "Some Girls" a favorite stones album of mine. "Claudine" would have slotted in beautifully in it's place to make a great album even better.
Captain Al
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