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Sad news: Jimmy Sabater, the “velvet sound” of Latin soul, just passed away. To me, Sabater is one of the most undersung of the boogaloo giants, the literal voice to many of the style’s great hits. I had a chance to interview him a couple of years back for the liner notes to the Joe Cuba Sextet’s We Must Be Doing Something Right and am grateful to have had that opportunity.
Sabater and Cuba were, for the most part, inseparable from one another. It’s impossible to consider the accomplishments of one without crediting [...]
Continue reading REMEMBERING JIMMY SABATER
As I’m about to expand my mixes-for-purchase catalog (a new Aretha mix and Deep Covers 3!), I’d also like to offer up free mixes from the past, beginning with this trio. I’ll likely add at least 1 or 2 more mixes to this page over the next week.
 Polyrhythmatic (1998). Hip-hop, indie-heavy. Probably my favorite hip-hop mix from that era…I just had great songs to use and I spent the most time on (basic) scratching and other segue tricks.
 Double Flip (1999/2000). This was a “double album” – [...]
Continue reading FREE MIXES
RIP, Don Cornelius.
Read.
Listen.
Watch.
It’s been a minute since the last Sidebar podcast but I figured I could make things up to y’all by busting out an interview with Syl Johnson, the legendary R&B/funk musician/singer out of Chicago. Syl’s going to be playing in Los Angeles, with Breakestra no less, on February 11th and I am hella excited to see how they’ll team up.
Syl’s been riding a wave of re-discovery every since his Complete Mythology anthology dropped on Numero Group back in 2010.1 We talked about how busy he’s been, especially in working with a new [...]
Continue reading THE SIDEBAR #22: SYL JOHNSON
Etta James was a singer who I always enjoyed on the periphery…in other words, I never made a concerted effort to really get that deep into her catalog but I understand, on a very basic level, that this was a Very Important Artist and not just because she sang one of the very best ballads ever sung in the history of people singing ballads. 1
So for this appreciation, I’m not going to try to pull off some “Etta James’s most important songs” post because I simply can’t claim to know this. I [...]
Continue reading ETTA JAMES: AN APPRECIATION
On my Sidebar wishlist would be a chat with Gabe Roth of Daptone about the label’s 10 years. I suspect that may not happen, if only because they’re hella busy and they’ve already done a lot of that commemoration on their own.1
To wit, there’s a feature on them in The Atlantic (which I haven’t had a chance to read yet) and then there’s this self-produced video as well:
Congrats to Daptone on their 10 years; here’s to another 10 and beyond.
To be sure, Gabe, Neal and all those guys have been very [...]
Continue reading DAPTONE @ 10 YEARS
Sarah Vaughn: Bye Bye
From 7″ (Mercury, 1964)
James Royal: House of Jack
From 7″ (CBS Germany, 1969)
Mark Martin: In the Good Old Topless Time
From 7″ (TWR, 1968)
I previously wrote about “instrumentals-made-into-vocal” covers in 2010, and now have three more to add into the mix.
Sarah Vaughn’s “Bye Bye” obviously riffs on Mancini’s hugely famous “Peter Gunn Theme”. I’m on the fence with this one…you don’t really need to throw vocals on one of the best frickin’ t.v. themes of all time but then again: [...]
Continue reading VOCALIZED COVERS
Orchestre Du Bawobab: Kelen Ati Len + Jarraf
From Visage Du Senegaal (Disques Buur, 1974)
Amongst certain circles of Afro-funk fans, “Kelen Ati Len” is probably the best-known song by this Dakar band but this LP is hardly a one-tracker 1 No doubt, “Kelen Ati Len” is killer with its crashing drums and angular guitar work. It’s like Bawobab/Baobab members had spent a few years jamming with the Kashmere Stage Band before returning to Senegal.
However, I included “Jarraf” because you get a whole other sense of cross-cultural play with its [...]
Continue reading ORCHESTRE DU BAWOBAB: CROSS-ATLANTIC CONNECTIONS
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