Teenbeat: the Mamas and the Papa's

It's almost a cliché to say the nineteen-sixties produced some of the most memorable popular music of the modern era and growing in the era afterward I was very much in that shadow cast by it cos if your folks and relations didn't have it, then often it was played on the radio.
One trend  amongst many was the fusion between folk music and the emergent rock in the middle of that decade which you see with the Byrds, Bob Dylan and naturally Simon and Garfunkel.

 

A popular sound often leads to others getting on on the genre and the other essential act you really need to listen to was the Mama's and Papa's who through a career that only spanned from nineteen sixty-five through nineteen sixty-eight, releasing seventeen 45's and five albums.

They comprised of John and Michelle Phillips, Denny Doherty  and Cass Elliot and were signed to Dunhill records in 1965 .

The combination of close harmony singing and relatively sparse instrumentation coupled with the dreamy quality of the songs lyrics is a core reason these productions stand out among many others.

Imagine not hearing such songs as Monday Monday, California Dreamin' that summarized that era, Dedicated To The One I Love, Creeque Alley and Dream A Little Dream Of Me before they made their separate ways? To anyone around it would be unthinkable and even when I was growing up, their records were always played on oldies but goldies shows on the radio which trust me I heard a lot of being ill during my childhood and reliant on the radio to cheer me up, it was was left for me to listen to.

Their have been a number of compilation albums of their music issued over the years as while there's a bit of me that loves the original studio lp jackets, in truth their always was a bit of filler on those albums and like many sixties albums seldom run much beyond a half hour or so making a well compiled compilation a sensible option.

The strength of two thousand and five's Mama's and Papa's Gold  is it offers many of the songs from the individual albums in addition to the hit 45's on two well filled compact discs avoiding the mistake of including solo recordings that featured on the nineteen ninety-one Creeque Alley package so there's a clear focus and it can act as good alternative to a full set of albums.

Best of all, this is an inexpensive double in Universal Musics Chronicles series negating any need to consider single cd sets completely.

Recommended

Winter is almost in the air

After last week's more observational ow-ish post we're back into the wild this week although you'll need your thick tights on as it's bloomin' cold at the minute as I can feel it in me bones.

 These creatures have been keeping my company  on the smallholdings I pass while out walking, trying to keep myself fit as the go "Baa" making me feel my stomach and leaving me feeling hungry

 The leaves are beginning to grow and if you look carefully there are Dandelions stillout by the base of the tree trunk.

The signs are for the Farmers Market and Unprocessed milk you can buy from the farmers gate as some people prefer it to treated milk. Personally I prefer sterilized!

The leaves be a turning colour here all crisp which makes walks in the wood so enjoyable if you don't get a dozy wasp flying out of a hedge at you which is what happened to me the other week.

You should of seen me run the other way!!!

I haven't know too many village centres were between the shops, you can see and hear that much wildlife which makes even a trip to get a bottle of milk and Allied Bakeries finest can be most pleasant.

Game over

 Everything seemed perfect.

A new life, a new school and even some new subjects to learn.

The facilities were excellent, you'd never had your own locker before

But then you realized you were in this little game

a game for littles like you

and you'd scored a six out of a hundred

and a hard spanking.

A loss

 I'm not at my best this week and in a way it goes back to the day before I went away for a few days where unbeknown to me or for that matter to all of us, a person we've known for a good number of years after a period of infection and covid had died.

Personally, I had encountered them in January of 2011 after a period of been an active member of one web site, falling out of favour with both content and especially accompanying ads, upon looking for a better site for "littles" I filled out an online application to join one they ran.

By 2013 as I became more established with that site and its members I first encountered them face to face at a party get together one person had laid on and in time I learned about their knowledge of astronomy and things connected with running websites such as coding.

Of course the big thing was the Littlest which was their love of being a little, dressing in pretty dresses not dissimilar to younger girls, their love of just playing and dolls and they often brought swings to extended get togethers that we all played on.

If you can picture a "girl" in a gingham dress not uncommon in British schools in summer just smiling as you're swaying back and forth on that swing then you'll get an idea of what the sorts of things they did meant to me.

The last time I saw them would of been this time last year at a get together as they and their partner had missed this summers.

R.I.P Debbie 

Dept of strange affairs!

It's not uncommon for me to get new records and recently I have got a few classical records after a good twenty five or so years of just getting cds that I have played.

Schroeder's sentiments in this classic Peanuts frame below do rather match my own to be honest.

Yesterday had it's own moments too. Like as some of you know I have much of my music stored on micro sd cards for my music player for use out and about or  I'm poorly which isn't exactly uncommon with me, to play via it to a small stereo in my rest room.

It saves faffing about finding the recording and putting it on a cd or turntable when I'm feeling seriously yukky.

Anyway I like the awesome Canadian group Rush, always did and had been getting the new better than regular cd High Definition downloads  my player plays extremely well and I keep a spare card with back ups of them on.

Imagine then my reaction when while changing a card and it flies through mid air and I can't see it landed!

I was tearing my hair out trying to find it last night and have only just spotted it at the very end of the room in a dark corner just visible by it's gold plated contacts where it had landed contact side up!

I can see I'm gonna have to get a changing bag to put the player in while I'm doing this so it can't travel as far!

Now just listening to Stravinsky's The Firebird Suite as I type this!