Spunky Onion - Cookie Man (Parts 1 & 2)

Label: Contempo
Year of Release: 1974

"Cookie Man" is an utterly brilliant and much sought-after single which attempts to tempt all the ladies in the vicinity with the promise of "cookies".  As much as some horribly negative spins could be put upon this proposition (although it's no worse than "my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard") it's placed on top of a slick and downright irresistible funk groove.  An absolutely wonderful disc with a some marvellous horn section breaks, it was obviously too riff-based to really stand a chance in the British charts at the time, but it can still provoke action on a dancefloor to this day.

Whilst The Spunky Onion is a downright peculiar group name, this would seem to be largely the work of one Clarence Reid, aka Blowfly.  Reid wrote scores of R&B tracks for other artists throughout the 60s and 70s, and was known for sneaking out sexually explicit material of his own under the Blowfly moniker.  Some of that is argued to be the earliest examples of rapping on record - sadly, there's not any evidence of it on this example, but it's still a damn good track.

There's a brief interview trailer for the documentary "The Weird World of Blowfly" on Youtube.

Jonathan's Experience - Mixed Up Foolish Girl/ Only Sixteen

Label: MGM
Year of Release: 1968

About the only thing you can glean from any research on "Jonathan's Experience" is that they were a "little known" group from Dallas, Texas.  That's it.  We know that they also did a cover of Kenny and the Kasuals' garage classic "I'm Gonna Make It", but further data is thin on the ground.

Something of a shame, because "Mixed Up Foolish Girl" - actually the B-side of this platter - is a piece of sunshine pop brimming over with rink-a-dink rhythms and wailing violins, bouncy and cheery from beginning to end.  It's no lost classic, but it's surprisingly obscure given its quality, especially in these days where just about every good sixties pop tune has been dug up and presented to the world.

The A-side is a slow, angst-ridden cover of the classic "Only Sixteen", but it's rather inessential, adding little to the original version.  However, it's not without its fans online.

If you know anything more about Jonathan's Experience, please do step forward and give me more information, I'd be really grateful.

Austin Van Driver and The Morrismen - Salt & Vinegar

Label: Pye
Year of Release: 1979

It's a work-in-progress bedroom demo for Blur's "Parklife"!  It's Mike Skinner of The Streets with a Casiotone demo of his missing chippy "dinnertime" track from "A Grand Don't Come For Free"!  It's Eddie Argos out of Art Brut doing an ironic advert for the British Potato Council!  It's Chas and Dave getting unusually belligerent and demanding in a Leytonstone Fish and Chip shop!  It's... well, it's all of these things, but it's actually none of these things as well.  Sorry.

However, we can definitely classify this as a curio from the arse-end of the life of Pye Records which was clearly meant to be a summer novelty pop smash.  Had a particularly influential daytime Radio One DJ taken a shine to this it probably would have been a hit, but we can only assume that they failed to see the potential - or rather, that Pye at this stage in their corporate lives were utterly incapable of getting anyone's attention at the Beeb.  As it stands, I've never seen an actual officially released version of this record for sale, only promo copies, which makes me wonder if it did ever get an official release.

There's something very cheesy and cheap about the record, and it's received thorough drubbings elsewhere on the Interweb, but I genuinely like it - it's unpretentious, snappy and decidedly silly, siphoning off the influences of Madness and Ian Dury that were credible at the time and squeezing them into a novelty blender.  The lyrics focussed entirely upon the act of putting salt and vinegar on chips are utterly facile and ridiculous, but sometimes pop music needs such idiocy.  Had it been even a minor hit, there's a strong probability it would have become awfully irritating very quickly, but as a flop it's harmless, cheerful and sprightly.

It's not clear who Austin Van Driver and the Morrismen were, but certainly the involvement of Phil Hampson on the songwriting credit is something of a giveaway to the fact that they were a one-off project.  Hampson has produced numerous pieces of soundtrack work and one-off novelty singles over the years, including "The Sparrow" by The Ramblers,  "Matchstalk Men and Matchstalk Cats and Dogs" by Brian and Michael, and (perhaps more credibly) the "Spiral Scratch" EP for The Buzzcocks.  This particular single is probably halfway between Brian & Michael and The Buzzcocks, and as bizarre as you'd expect given that.

Injun Jo - Feel The Rhythm Inside/ Jawbone

Label: York Records

Year of Release: 1973

We've already (briefly) explored the career of Miki Anthony on this blog back when I uncovered a Mark Wirtz produced acetate of "Knight In White Armour", and this particular disc stems from a later part of his career when he found himself working for York Records, a subsidiary of Yorkshire Television.  

The A-side offers nothing unusual in the slightest, and is in fact a particularly sprightly piece of pop which was unlucky not to have been a hit.  "Feel The Rhythm Inside" has clattering drums, bass piano notes, an euphoric chorus and a general sense that all is well on the suburban dancefloor.  There's nothing radical or original about it, but it's a serviceable example of a particular strain of non-glam pop music that was faring reasonably well in Britain at the time.

Far more absurd is the B-side which can only be described as a country/ trucking song sung by daleks, or at the very least Miki Anthony doing a very good impersonation of a dalek.  The story behind this, so far as I can ascertain, is also a bit odd.  Earlier in 1973 York Records had slated a record for release by a group called The Daleks entitled "Feel It Inside" with "Jawbone" listed as the flip.  Copies of this have never actually been seen, and the qualified guess of most record collectors (and Doctor Who collectors) is that somebody at the Yorkshire media company got jittery about copyright violation and getting into trouble with the BBC.  This would have applied even if the single were issued on a standard record label, but one with close affiliations to their rival station ITV would surely have come in for a giant whacking from the legal beagles.  Whether "Feel It Inside" was a different version of this A-side sung in the voice of a dalek, the same track or another track entirely is impossible to say, and chances are only Miki Anthony or an ex-employee of York Records would be likely to know.  

Whatever the facts, the B-side is a right old racket, and the humorous novelty factor of daleks trucking across the country exterminating quickly loses its appeal.  It's bizarre, make no mistake, but has all the hallmarks of an off-the-cuff flip side, which is a shame given the potential of the idea.  

The Denims - The Adler Sock

Label: The Adler Company/ Columbia
Year of Release: 1965

Rock and pop groups have always had an uneasy relationship with corporate sponsorship, to the extent that even in the present day (where the majority of musicians will allow their work to soundtrack adverts without shame) it puts a cringe on the face of many.  I myself have an ambivalent and perhaps hypocritical stance to the use of music on adverts - if it's The Fall, Clinic or Vashti Bunyan, my reflex reaction is to think "Well, I'm glad they're finally getting paid some money". If it's The White Stripes soundtracking an 'iconic global brand', I rub my face in my hands and sigh (even if the tune is rather good).

However, much as it may be logical to assume that The White Stripes were the first American garage band (we'll call them that for the sake of arguments, OK?) to take corporate dough, obscure New York racketeers The Denims were probably the first out of the gate in 1965, unless anyone knows better.  They were hardly household names in the USA, but that didn't stop The Adler Company from borrowing them for a promotional 45 about the benefit of Adler Socks, which were essentially cheap wool socks which tended to disintegrate or discolour after only a few washes.  "YEEEEEEAHHHH! DO THE SOCK!" the lead singer screeches as if his life depends on it, while the band kick up a fierce row in the background.  It's utterly unclear why The Adler Corporation thought such an act could flog feetwarmers, but I for one am thrilled they did - this is one of the most bizarre corporate spin-off singles I've ever encountered, a garage nugget with a commercial message attached.  It's likely to sound odder to British ears as this kind of harsh, abrasive punk noise never really made much headway in the UK charts, so the notion of using such an act to advertise clothing would have been unthinkable here.

The B-side is essentially an abbreviated version of the A-side and is included here for curiosity value only.  I can only assume it may have been used as a segment on the radio.