Mike Bennett writesFriday iPod/MP3 Shuffle—Happy Birthday Lionel Hampton Edition

Today, let’s pay tribute to a legend who got his start right here in Chicago. Lionel Hampton was born in Louisville 104 years ago, but moved to Chicago as a youngster, where he quickly picked up the xylophone and drums, and started playing in the Chicago Defender Newsboys’ band in his teens. As a young adult, he played vibes with Louis Armstrong in California, and a career was born. Hampton then worked with swing great Benny Goodman before forming his own orchestra, and working with many of the other great players of his time. His music sometimes crossed into R & B. Although his popularity on the charts waned after the ’50s, he kept playing until 1991, for a six decade plus career of excellence. Let’s celebrate Hamp’s birthday by grabbing your iPod or MP3 player, hitting shuffle, and sharing the first 10 songs that come up.

1. The Damned — Melody Lee (Machine Gun Etiquette): While known as the first punk band to release an actual album, The Damned quite clearly had a lot more going on then many of the more straightforward punk bands of their time. They clearly had a strong ’60s psychedelic influence, which led to songs like this one, that have more in common with early Pink Floyd and Hawkwind than 4/4 back to the basics rock. What I like about this song is it adds a healthy dose of energy to its psychedelic base.
2. The 88 — Nobody Cares (Over & Over): The 88 are a classic example of band with a sound who got a whiff of success, when one of their songs was used in a commercial, and graduated to a bigger label and budget and in trying to make their already accessible sound more mainstream, got too slick and stripped away the character that made their music so fun. This is one of the better tracks on this album, a bouncy pop tune with a strong Kinks influence.
3. Earl-Jean — I’m Into Something Good (One Kiss Can Lead To Another: Girl Group Sounds Lost And Found): Yes, this is the same song that was a major hit for Herman’s Hermits. This is a sweet, low key girl group treatment of the song, which is real fun.
4. Mose Allison — Wild Man On The Loose (Allison Wonderland: The Mose Allison Anthology): After picking up his comeback album from a couple of years ago, I became enough of a fan to get a two CD compilation of his work. Allison’s blend of blues, jazz and other American song forms is so classic while remaining utterly distinctive. Allison’s vocals are the epitome of ’50s jazz cool and he back up his song with fantastic piano playing. This is a typically fine track.
5. Outrageous Cherry — Tracy (Out There in The Dark): Some of the best Outrageous Cherry tracks sound like experiment — what if The Velvet Underground were a bubblegum band? This song is an example of that. It’s a very basic ’60s styled pop tune, played with that early Velvets sound, with the strummy guitars and Moe Tucker-esque drumming. I love it.
6. That Petrol Emotion — Spin-Cycle (Babble): This off-shoot of the Northern Ireland pop-punk band The Undertones was far darker, but still had the same ability to come up with incredibly catchy songs. Rather than songs about chocolate and girls, the songs here were about injustice and various social problems. The whole thing was very post-punky, with sturdy bass lines, and rhythm accents that often created hooks. Babble was their best album by far, and soon thereafter they lost the thread.
7. Shudder To Think — Summertime Train (Funeral At The Moves/Ten Spot): Early Shudder To Think material, with Craig Wedren showing off how high he can sing over some riffy guitar playing and a solid groove. Dischord deserves credit for signing a band that was a lot proggier than their usual stuff. The angularity fit, but they took it in a much different direction than bands like Jawbox.
8. Simon & Garfunkel — Leaves That Are Green (Old Friends): Simon & Garfunkel seem to be regarded as a singles band nowadays, which is a big mistake, as Paul Simon penned a lot of fine tunes that were album cuts. This is not a great song, but it’s a fairly typical S & G folk-rock track, with a nice melody, swell harmonies and a creative rhythm track. So Simon was interested in clever rhythms even back then.
9. Touissant McCall — Nothing Takes The Place Of You (Hairspray): The original movie version of Hairspray is just littered with great old R & B and pop tunes from the pre-Beatles era. John Waters knows his stuff, and he apparently spent a good portion of the movie’s budget licensing all the music, which is why it’s a shame that the soundtrack only features 11 of those chestnuts (plus the swell Rachel Sweet theme song). Thankfully, this gem made the cut, and why shouldn’t it? This was a regional hit that Waters remembered from his younger days in Baltimore, and Waters paid the ultimate tribute by having McCall appear as himself to lip sync the song at a Motormouth Maybelle record hop. This is a wonderfully elegant deep soul ballad, with McCall’s well-phrased vocals adding a bit of class to the proceedings.
10. No-Man — Just A Day (How The West Was Won): Roger Miller as a solo artist eventually morphed into the duo No-Man, with Miller playing with a percussionist. This is from the best of his albums, where Miller was writing some of his most accessible songs. This song is bursting with melody, while his guitar chops are as good as ever. A lot of people don’t realize what high quality music Miller made during the long hiatus of Mission Of Burma, and all of his solo and No-Man work is worth revisiting. Moreover, his live performances were always top notch.