Honeysuckle Rose

‘Honeysuckle Rose’ is one of my absolute favourite songs. It shouldn’t surprise you that it was composed by Fats Waller, with lyrics by Andy Razaf. Waller was super talented. Duh.
There are sixty billion different versions of Honeysuckle Rose. Sixty billion.

This is one of Waller’s:

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But I want to look at this one, by Basie’s band in 1937:

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I love love love love it. There’s something about that bigger band, and Basie’s different piano style that adds to the song.

I was just listening to this version by Jonathon Stout and Glen Crytzer’s bands battling together with this song as the framework:

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I’m not an expert, but this sounds like an adaption of the Basie arrangement. And then they add a bunch more layers to the song. The dixie ‘joke’ in the middle is gold, and a really good example of the difference between swing era swing and that earlier moment in jazz, before swing stormed the world. I’ve written about this performance a bunch of times, and you can follow up some links to the musicians’ own ideas about the song via links in my post bands for dancing.

hot as fuck: bands

It’s 45*C in Sydney.

Things that dancers just need to get over wrt live bands:

  • Long songs. Just deal, yo. You don’t have to dance the whole thing. And you don’t have to dance two songs with each partner.
  • Songs that start slow, then get faster after the intro. It’s not that big a deal.
  • Fast songs. You don’t have to dance the whole thing, and you don’t have to dance every song. Get some fitness, get some small dancing happening, get over yourselves.
  • A band’s songs all ‘sounding the same’. Geezus. They’re a BAND not a DJ. They got a thing going on: get used to it.

Things that bands need to figure out if they want to play gigs organised by and for dancers:

  • Dancers like songs that are about 3 minutes long. This is because they’re usually used to dancing to CDs. Technology enforced this 3 minute rule. Suck it up. You can play your long songs, yo, but if you play lots of really long, really fast songs, the dancers will eventually all sit down. SCIENCE, BRO.
  • Not everyone in the band needs a solo. Unless your band is made up of the Esquire All Stars, you’re probably not that good. Sorry, mates, but that’s how it is. This isn’t a democracy: it’s jazz. Even if you are that good, I’m not convinced you’ve always got something to say.
  • Dancers aren’t seated audiences. They’re not listening to the music the way seated audiences are. They’re riding their adrenaline, and their appreciation for your art is going to be tempered by their physical abilities. This means:
    • If you play all super fast songs, and all super long songs, your dancing crowd is going to die. Work the tempo wave, yo.
    • Dancers are jocks, pretty much. They’re not going to appreciate that complicated, noodly bit of low-energy, finger-fiddling bit of solo that goes on for four phrases. Stop that. It’s wankery. Get your head up, look at the room and not at your fingers. Work the crowd.
    • Engage the crowd. Yeah, you’re an artist. But right now you’re playing for dancers. Make some eye contact. Pay attention to what you see, and learn to understand what you see. The communication between dancers and audiences isn’t verbal. It’s non-verbal. Dancers learn to dig what you’re doing, so you learn to dig what they’re doing. Then we can all be a TEAM.
    • Long bass solos are boring. Sorry, Ray Brown, but four phrases of subsonic twiddling = dull dancing. Stop it.
    • Dancers are unlikely to clap your solo. Sorry mates. But they’ll let you know they’re listening with the way they move.

Just reminding myself…

Feminism for me, can often be a profound discomfort with the way things are. The sort of niggling irritation that eventually just pours out as rage. Because shit is WRONGTOWN. I’m a white, middle class woman living in a developed city that’s wonderfully resourced, in a country that has free health care. Sure, it’s a bit shit being a woman in a patriarchal culture that keeps trying to convince me I should starve myself for approval, or lock myself away in my house so I won’t force men to rape me. But mostly I think I have some good things going for me.

So when I discover one of those niggling irritations, I like to use all that privilege and do something about it. Because, fuck, I can. And I tend to think that if you’re in a position to do something, you should. Partly because, you know – responsibility – but also because doing stuff undoes that crippling disempowerment that comes from being told you’re too fat, too old, too skinny, too boring, too smart, too dumb, too loud, too ridiculous, too hairy, too opinionated, too female every single day. Just doing a little thing reminds you that you’re not a complete failure as a human being. You’re actually pretty damn awesome. So you can do awesome things.

Generally, speaking up about shitty things that you see happening in your community, particularly if you’re a woman, means you get some pretty bad reactions. I get the odd bit of hate mail. Stupid comments on my blog. Nasty interactions on Faceplant. But you know what? I get far worse every day yelled at me from passing cars when I’m waiting for a bus. So fuck that lamearse nastiness. I can tolerate persistent sexual harassment and fight down the fear that I’ll be beaten and raped on the street, so those stupid little comments sure as shit aren’t going to stop me.

I strongly believe that stewing on your rage makes you feel worse. A key part of patriarchy involves convincing women (and men) that there’s nothing they can do. That they just have to suck it up and tolerate being told what to wear and how to behave and how to think and what to do with their bodies and lives and minds. That if you do question the way things are and then do do something about it, you’re a bitch.

I’m totally ok with that.

Bring me all your partners, and make them bounce really high in their bodies



(image from here)

I’m mad keen on partner charleston atm. I go in and out of love with it, but now I’m the best at lindy hop*, I can concentrate on other dances.

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*I feel I need to signpost that this is a joke, because I quite regularly get dumbarse readers rolling through who’re just a bit too literal. While I’m at it, I do actually hate all men**.

**That was a joke, too. But I get accusations of man-hating every couple of months. I mean, obviously.

Goats: THROWN!

Imperial Swing from dogpossum on 8tracks Radio.

Last weekend I DJed my first proper lindy hop set since November, and it was super fine. It was the first set of the night at Imperial Swing, a social gig put on by Swing Out Sydney. TOTAL FUN. It’s a great venue, and the sound system is pretty damn special. The DJ after me – Kat – is now my new favourite DJ. She was ON FIRE. Here’s the set list, because a friend asked for it. I aim to please.

Anyways, this set is pretty much what I think of as a ‘potato chip’ set: these are the sorts of songs you can just eat down by the handful. Nothing too crazy or confronting, lots of familiar stuff (C Jam Blues!), lots of energy. I was aiming for a high-energy party feel, and wanted to keep the tempos kind of reasonable as the crowd included some very new dancers. I figured familiar was also good, as many of the regular dancers who’d arrived were feeling a bit unsure of themselves in a queer space, so I wanted to help them find their feet. And, you know, we overplay C Jam Blues because IT’S A GREAT SONG.

title year artist album name song length (links -> where you can buy the album direct from the artist)

Blue Monday 1957 Jay McShann and his Band (Jimmy Witherspoon) 125 Goin’ To Kansas City Blues 3:40

Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop 1945 Lionel Hampton and his Orchestra 135 Hamp: The Legendary Decca Recordings 3:21

C-Jam Blues 1999 Lincoln Centre Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis 143 Live In Swing City: Swingin’ With Duke 3:34

Blues In Hoss’s Flat 1958 Count Basie and his Orchestra 144 Chairman Of The Board [Bonus Tracks] 3:13

The Spinach Song 2004 Terra Hazelton (feat. Jeff Healey’s Jazz Wizards) 165 Anybody’s Baby 4:57

Percolatin’ Blues 2011 Smoking Time Jazz Club 135 Lina’s Blues 4:14

I Like Pie 2012 Gordon Webster (with Aurora Nealand, Jesse Selengut, Gordon Au, Dan Levinson, Matt Musselman, Cassidy Holden, Rob Adkins, Jeremy Noller, Steven Mitchell) 162 Live In Rochester 5:38

Sales Tax 2012 Leigh Barker and the New Sheiks (Matt Boden, Don Stewart, Alastair McGrath-Kerr, Eamon McNelis, Heather Stewart) 132 The Sales Tax 3:43

Good Rockin’ Tonight 1959 Jimmy Witherspoon with Roy Eldridge, Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Woody Herman, Earl Hines, Vernon Alley, Mel Lewis 160 The ‘Spoon Concerts 2:27

Don’t You Miss Your Baby 1980 Jimmy Witherspoon and Panama Francis’ Savoy Sutans 145 Jimmy Witherspoon and Panama Francis’ Savoy Sultans 3:56

Milenberg Joys 2010 Gordon Webster (with Jesse Selengut, Matt Musselman, Cassidy Holden, Rob Adkins, Jeremy Noller, Adrian Cunningham) 194 Live In Philadelphia 3:45

It’s Your Last Chance To Dance 2007 Preservation Hall 179 The Hurricane Sessions 4:31

Mr Gentle and Mr Cool 2005 John Hallam and Jeff Barnhart 173 Mr. Gentle and Mr. Hot 3:23

Tempo de Luxe 1940 Harry James 130 New York World’s Fair, 1940 – The Blue Room, Hotel Lincoln, 3:19
Savoy 1942 Lucky Millinder and his Orchestra (Trevor Bacon) 166 Anthology Of Big Band Swing (Disc 2) 3:05

St. Louis Blues 1939 Ella Fitzgerald and her Famous Orchestra 183 Ella Fitzgerald In The Groove 4:46

Keep On Churnin’ 1952 Wynonie Harris 146 Wynonie Harris: Complete Jazz Series 1950 – 1952 2:56

I Ain’t Mad At You 1960 Mildred Anderson 158 No More In Life 3:04

Here’s what I was thinking as I was DJing:

‘Blue Monday’ is a song I often start sets with. It’s an easy tempo, has lots of energy, and a very simple structure. It worked well for me here as the music in the free lesson before the dance was mostly neo, and I needed a good transition to my more old-schooly music. Also: shouting.

‘Hey! Ba-ba-re-bop’. You know why I played this.

‘C Jam Blues’. By this point I had a lot of energy happening, and the room had settled into proper social dancing after the class. I decided I wanted to come in pretty hard with the energy (rather than easing into things), as I only had an hour. There were enough people in the room who could dance comfortably, so I figured I’d ring Pavlov’s Bell and get the kids jumping about a bit.

‘Blues In Hoss’ Flat’. I love following C Jam Blues with this. It’s the perfect Ellington-Basie one-two punch. BAM! Things were cooking at this point. A mass of people arrived in a big flow, so I needed to get really serious.

‘The Spinach Song’. Enough of that big band wall of sound! I wanted to get to some NOLA action eventually, so I needed a good transition. This song is a brilliant transition from that Kansas city blues shouter sort of vibe that ‘Blues in Hoss’s Flat’ sets up. It also echoed the Witherspoon song. But the instrumentation leans a bit more towards old school.

‘Percolatin’ Blues’. I felt as though the previous song was the crest of the first energy hill, so I needed a chillout song. Those previous songs had kind of battered people emotionally with their big, intense feelings, and I needed to give people an in to the dance floor if they’d not gotten up yet. So I dropped the tempos and the intensity so peeps could dip their toes in if they’d just arrived or finally recovered from the class and felt ready to try again. This was about twenty minutes into the set, which is the end of the first third, where I’m usually thinking we’re cresting.

Ok, enough with the molly coddling. Time to pump the energy up again. I’d said I’d play this in talk on FB, and it’s still massively popular. Personally, I’m totally over this version of ‘I Like Pie’. I’m tired of the mugging lyrics, and I’m tired of the fairly boring chorus. But each time I listen to it, I fall in love with Gordon’s piano. That shit is hot. Anyways, this was a crowd-pleaser.

But things were kind of loud and intense, and I saw quite a few tired people looking for a break after two longer songs. So I did ‘Sales Tax’. I think I made a slight misjudgement with this one. I needed to keep the energy up, but with a slightly different sound. Anyways, it wasn’t quite right. It was around this point that I realised there was some serious problem happening with the sound system. The sound was too loud at the front and not loud enough at the back. The sound guy had disappeared, so I couldn’t ask him.

‘Good Rockin’ Tonight’ – a live version. I went with more Witherspoon because I wanted to kick things up with some higher tempo shouting live fun. But I was quite distracted by the technical problem, so I’m not sure it was the perfect choice (though as the song progressed it turned out to be the perfect choice). But about 30 seconds in, a seriously loud alarm started beeping in the DJ booth. The dancers couldn’t hear it, but it was LOUD. The sound guy came running down and tried to fix things. Apparently someone had turned off all the music in the pub. On Saturday night in an inner city queer pub. Nice one. It WASN’T ME.

Anyways, I was kind of shaken by that, so I just lined up the next song I had in mind, and had to physically move myself out of the way, away from my laptop and the sound gear. So the next Witherspoon – another Witherspoon – was a random choice. I’d almost played it instead of ‘Good Rockin’ Tonight’, but didn’t. It turned out to be a really good choice, but I felt as though I’d lost control of things for a second there. Anyways, by the end of the song, the alarm was off, I was back at the laptop and it was time to get into things again.

By the end of that song, it was time to hit that crest again. The energy really chugs along in that Panama Francis band’s version of a standard, but Witherspoon adds a really interesting alternative to the Jimmy Rushing version we hear all the time. And I was feeling a bit smarty pants, referring back to that Basie song with Witherspoon again.

‘Milenberg Joys’. I much prefer this to the Pie and Cake song. It rocks. It pulled the energy (and tempos) up. I’d have gone faster again, but the crowd wasn’t quite up to it. There were still a lot of new dancers, and the dancers who’d been around for a while didn’t really have the skills to tackle the massively higher tempos. The room felt hot, though, and people were kind of going crazy. There were quite a few glazed crazy-eyes in the room, which was pleasing.

So I did the obvious thing after this with Preservation Hall. I’m kind of over this song. I think it’s overplayed, and unlike C Jam Blues, I don’t think it’s quite versatile enough to warrant the overplaying. But it provided a nice climax to the energy in the room. And, long song. is long.

‘Mr Gentle and Mr Cool’ is a lovely, lovely song that an Adelaidean DJ, Jarryd, put me onto. I’m obsessed with it. It actually reminds me of the Preservation Hall Hot 4 album in the piano, so in my mind it was a lovely match to the song before. I’m not sure peeps who don’t know that Pres Hall small group album would have caught the connection, but, who cares! Anyways, it’s a chillaxed, more complex song, but it still has some tempo on it, so it doesn’t let things die.

By this point I was done with that modern NOLA sound. I needed something older and funner. I’m a bit nuts about this Harry James song. It was recorded live at the World’s Fair in 1940. It starts really mellow and kind of sweet. But mid-way it picks up with a bang! and becomes a fucking brilliant dance song.
I’m interested in the World Fair from that year for a few reasons. Firstly, there’s footage of people dancing together at the Fair. And they’re all women. WIN!

The Fair did, of course, feature lindy hoppers from the Savoy doing performances, but apparently this was a pretty shitty gig. Reading through my copy of The Man Who Recorded the World, a book about Alan Lomax, I discovered that he’d designed the music bits of that World Fair as a series of ‘everyday’ music spaces – jook joints featuring blues music, town halls playing bluegrass, etc etc etc. He’d wanted to recreate the contexts he’d recorded music in during his ethnographic work. But the Fair organisers reneged on his plans and forced the ‘mock Savoy’ into the plan, and abandoned Lomax’s much more interesting ideas. I suspect this shift was partly to blame for the shitty time the Savoy dancers had at the Fair (I have, incidentally, written a bit about this stuff in the post a snot-addled, animated wander through san francisco).

More usefully to dancers on the night, ‘Tempo deLuxe’ is what I think of as a ‘builder’ – it starts mellow and gets crazy. A good transition from the mellower song before to the fun I wanted to do next.

‘Savoy’ is, of course, a song about the Savoy Ballroom. See what I did there? It’s also a stock standard. And a jolly good song with lots of fun in it.

I’ve been playing that version of ‘St Louis Blues’ for years and years and years. It’s truly fabulous, AND it was recorded live at the Savoy ballroom. See?

Ok, so things feel exciting in the room. I was building energy for the dancers, but also because we were about to have a performance by Pretty Strong Woman, who does weight-lifting burlesque stuff. And I like to set up the energy for performers.

After all that Savoy stuff I went with Wyonie Harris because the crowd had quite a few rock n rollers, and I wanted to at least throw them part of a bone. Not much of a bone, though. Mildred Anderson was a similar token effort. Both of these are great songs, but they lean towards jump blues, and I find them great cross-over songs when I’m playing a mixed lindy hop/rock n roll crowd. These two are a bit slower, too, so they’re more accessible.

And then I was done!

Fun times! And as I said, Kat played a cracker of a set after me. She really did brilliant work. And I danced like a fool til the rock n roll/neo DJs came on at midnight, and then I went home. After I saw Kira Hu-la-la do a brilliant motorhead type burlesque show. Oh, how I LOLed at her clever jokes. GOATS: THROWN!

Dry Throat Fellows

aka ‘Dry Throat Five’.


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I’m chasing their CDs because #want

Listening to them, I’d give you a dollar if they didn’t feature musicians from Les Red Hot Reedwarmers, most probably the clarinet player.

NB You can buy their CD through Stomp Off Records, or get downloads through itunes. You know I recommend buying direct from the band or label when you can. Especially because downloads can be such shitty quality these days.

Swing Session from Switzerland Belgium Europe

I bought Leapfrog by the band ‘Swing Session’ a little while ago, and it’s great. No, not this Swing Session, though that’s fun too. The Swing Session I’m talking about is Swiss, and I found them via the Red Hot Reedwarmers‘ site…. actually, I’m not sure where I found them. Looking at their site, I can’t make the French translate (because FRAMES! ARGH!), but the .ch suffix makes me think Switzerland. I recognise some of the band names in the musicians’ bios, but that’s not enough. In fact, if you scour the internet for the bands listed in these guys’ bios, you’ll find some really nice stuff.

It was a bit tricky getting hold of this CD. I had to send an email to someone or I had to use paypal on a French language site or something. It was all a bit complicated. But If you want a copy, you should send an email to Manu Hagman, who is a top bloke, and was very helpful. His details: Emmanuel Hagmann ehagmann at manusound dot net Or you can go to his site and buy directly from him.

So, anyway, this is a good band. I like this CD a lot.

What does it sound like? Well, firstly, you can tell some of the blokes in the band are Benny Goodman fans. There’s some spanking vibraphone in there. You’ll recognise songs like ‘Flying Home’, but the treatment is quite different. If you pushed me, I’d call this chamber jazz meets power groove. But that’s not a very helpful description. It doesn’t really explain the way the piano works in this album. You can listen to audio clips from the band on their site.
If I was to DJ from this CD, I’d play the really good version of ‘Bag’s Groove’, which is definitely powergroove, and has some really neat nonsense-mumbly scatting, a la ‘Incoherent Blues’ and ‘Mumbles’ by the Oscar Peterson small group. In fact, listening to it now, I don’t know why I don’t play it more often. It’s really, really good. Sometimes you just want to get down into your hips and pretend you’re Virginie Jensen.

The nice version of ‘Leap Frog’ on there is slower, and again it’s getting towards power groove. But I don’t think ‘power groove’ is actually a very useful or accurate description – there’s enough get-up-and-go in that track to make it a bit more exciting than your average power groove.
They do a version of ‘Yacht Club Swing’ which is really nice. These doods are super talented. But this treatment is a little more in the pocket than Fats’. In fact, the whole album tends to ease off the beat a bit. But it still has a really driving beat that makes you want to get up and dance. And I really like the vibes in this version of the song. It’s a really nice approach to what we tend to think of as a ‘piano song’. It’s as though Benny Goodman’s small group decided to do some Fats Waller.

So, if you like the sound of this, and can handle the convoluted ordering process, get ordering.

Need more learns.


I do quite a bit of sewing. I didn’t do sewing at school, because I was determined to do what the boys were doing (metalwork, woodwork, technical drawing). That was a big mistake. Being the only girl in a massively bogan school doing manual arts? A recipe for sexual harassment, bullying, and frustration. I was pretty good at technical drawing, and I still refer to the principles, but manual arts was a complete waste of time. I regretted not learning to sew, but then perhaps not learning to sew then was what motivated me to learn when I was about 22.
I did a TAFE course. Goddess bless TAFE. More people attend TAFE in Australia than university, and the courses are far more useful. That eight week course taught me how to sew. I was addicted. I’ve been sewing ever since, I’m on my second sewing machine, I own an overlocker, and I have a nasty (deliciously nasty) fabric habit. And I really need to do a course in fitting and altering patterns, so that I can finally – after sixteen years – make clothes that fit me properly.

I’m putting it off. But I shouldn’t.

I think being able to sew well is a lot like being able to dance well – you have to spend a lot of time doing it. You’ve got to make millions of skirts and trousers and shirts. Over and over. You’ve got to push yourself and make things like jackets and hats. You’ve got to know where to find fabric, and you’ve got to be prepared to try new things.

I love sewing. When I started, it was because clothes in the shops were rubbish. I was a hardcore second hand shopper, and I was always looking for something unusual. I had a shaved head and liked little floral dresses to wear with my cherry 8-hole Docs. Yes, I know. But in the early 90s, when I was first at uni, mainstream fashion was very, very ordinary.

I’m still sewing now. It used to be cheaper to make my own clothes instead of buying them, but these days with sweat shops and the increasing scarcity of decent fabric and notions (buttons, zips, etc), buying clothes is far cheaper. You can buy a reasonable pair of jeans for $15 at Kmart these days. It’d cost far, far more to make them myself, and they’d never fit as well. But I keep sewing, because I’d rather be the one sweating over those bullshit seams than a child in a warehouse working her fingers to the bone.

I would, though, really like to be able to make clothes that fit me well. So this year I’m thinking about another TAFE course. Well, if TAFE is still running the sort of course I need, with enough places for us all. There’ve been some pretty dire changes in Australian public education over the years, and the TAFEs have been gutted. That makes me furious. Just like sewing lightweight rayon with a blunt needle. That enrages me too.