Honky Tonk

[davidt]

A page or 2 ago Will Vine mentioned Fifties Flash amongst others and asked where are they now.

I found out last week Flash is spinning his records once a month in Woody's in Northwood Hills. I'll try and get some dates to post. I think the next one is this coming Thursday evening.

David

[Rob Hall]

Having finally got my hands on a copy of this album, let me just say that it fully justifies the build up in this thread: it's glorious. I'll be playing this a lot, and (I predict) so will the people who will be getting copies from me this coming christmas. Well done Charlie (and Ace). I hope it sells by the truckload.

[Charlie]

Having finally got my hands on a copy of this album,

Thanks for the kind words, Con (*), but how did you get your hands on it already? I'm looking forward to getting my copy on Monday.

Incidentally, or maybe not so incidentally, the timing of the DJ Relay this Thursday makes it possible to treat the event as an unofficial launch party for the album, which will certainly be the source of some of the selections in my DJ slot. details of the event are posted by Jamie under the gig section of the forum.

(*) Freudian error - Con Murphy wrote a very kind of review of Otro Mundo in fRoots that I kept meaning to thank him for. Seems I allowed the presence of an 'o' in the middle of Rob's three-letter name to confuse me.

[Rob Hall]

Having finally got my hands on a copy of this album,

Thanks for the kind words, Con (*), but how did you get your hands on it already? I'm looking forward to getting my copy on Monday.

Ah... maybe I should keep quiet about my source. I thought it had been released already - maybe he let me have it early by mistake. Suffice it to say, it's a legit copy and I paid the going rate for it, and it's worth every penny.

(CG edit): (*) see note above

[NormanD]

Incidentally, or maybe not so incidentally, the timing of the DJ Relay this Thursday makes it possible to treat the event as an unofficial launch party for the album..

Perhaps even a prize-giving ceremony? No speeches though.

[Neil Foxlee]

On Mac Gayden and slide-wah, see his own site:

http://www.macgayden.com/MacBio.swf

[jackdaw version]

I notice that on the AmazonUK site, at http://www.amazon.co.uk/Charlie-Gilletts-Radio-Picks-Honky/dp/tracks/B002KWLUW8/ref=dp_tracks_all_1#disc_1, the last track is listed as Tabou Combo's "New York City," but that got switched to "Soul Makossa," didn't it?

[paul Mc]

Charlie,The CD has arrived & is resident on my CD player; is it really from 30 years ago??We were all much younger then Being from the "sticks",Colchester is rather a long way from the BBC Radio London transmitter so listening to an unclear & in bad weather a constantly fading signal was all part of the experience;not unlike listening to AFN in my earlier years.As you may realise I was into quite a few of the tracks Charlie played in the early days but what a learning experience it was !!
As a small insight I had over half of the tracks on the CD before I heard them on Honky Tonk.This was mainly due to sharing records with my colleagues at Boarding School,particularly Dave H who managed to get great records from Romford Market At first it had to be black & American but I quickly realised that Jerry Lee Lewis & many others were white & still making great music..
I was surprised to find Honkin at Midnight by Frank Motley on the now defunct Acrobat CD.
How likely is a second volume ? several good suggestions have already been put foward on the Forum

[will vine]

Hard not to put yourself in the way of an OBN (Old Brown Nose) award in congratulating Charlie on this compilation but it is great; in fact it ain't nothin' but a houseparty. I put it on for the first time this (sunday) morning and got on with painting the kitchen. If you're familiar with the famous wallpaper scraping scene in The Royle Family you'll have a pretty good idea of how things went. Fortunately I think it'll need another coat.

[kevin]

If you're familiar with the famous wallpaper scraping scene in The Royle Family you'll have a pretty good idea of how things went.

And if you're not familiar with the scene then lookee here!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuCkT9Ha5hU[/youtube]

[Jamie Renton]

Honky Tonk was the featured album on Mark Lamarr's God's Jukebox last Friday. It's on the BBC i-Player until Friday.

[Charlie]

Honky Tonk was the featured album on Mark Lamarr's God's Jukebox last Friday. It's on the BBC i-Player until Friday.

Now you know why I like the boy so much. Does he ever play a bad record? Not on this show.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b00nmz6k

[Charlie]

message from long lost listener Dave Parker

Charlie Gillett’s Radio Picks: HONKY TONK

Ace Records CDCHD1242

And about time! I used to write to you quite often in the past when I listened to Radio London and followed you over to Capital for the Punk (not for me) then regularly again on Radio London (GLR) for the Saturday world music programme and also your visits to Radio 2.

I have read and re read ‘Sound of the City’ and still enjoy listening to ‘The Honky Tonk Demos’ and ‘Another Saturday Night’, both in good condition on vinyl. I even bought some of your Oval singles (including a Barbara Lynn) for my Juke Box (which I still own).

You see I am a bit of a fan but try as I did then I couldn’t follow you so whole heartedly down the African music scene although I like Breton music very much with their Baghdad and Celtic styles. (I have a house there)

So, I was thrilled to see this Ace CD (and bought it immediately) even though I have most on it.

It is true to say nobody influenced me more that you did. In your early broadcasting days I even went up to the Audio Show at Olympia (I think) to watch you work

I took a pub in 1977 and bought a fm radio-cassette player and many C120’s and refused to serve customers at 1pm Sundays while I went up to the flat to turn the tape over. The pub, my first, was a great success so I could start buying LP’s that you had caused me to put on my wants list.

They included J.J.Cale, Ry Cooder, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Graham Parker, (The track you chose ‘Back to Schooldays’ was so murderously close following the track before that it was almost impossible to record it separately) Delbert McClinton, (My Wife and I went in 2008 on one of his ’Sandy Beaches Rhythm & Blues Cruises down the West Mexico Coast with some terrific bands. Bruce Channel was supposed to be on it but had had a death in the family) Bobby Charles, Mickey Jupp, The Wild Tchoupitoulas, [I have long deleted double LP and your interest in other New Orleans artists saw us spending a fortnight there at the Jazz and Heritage festival seeing John Fogerty, (who I also saw in CCR at the Albert Hall with Tony Joe White), Irma Thomas, Bonnie Raitt, Dr.John, and too many others to mention] and The Band.

I could go on. My 1000 LP’s, 1000 CD’s and my 4000 singles bear witness to what you have done to an old rock ‘n’ roller.

Since you finished I was able to buy and complete collections by most of those above and the many others (and am still doing it!) but otherwise I sometimes seem to have lost direction. I’m still looking to replace my worn Anglos ‘Incense’ single and ‘It’s All Over Now’ by the Valentinos. (Put them on volume two).

Newer sounds I’ve discovered are the Subdudes, the Gourds and James Hunter. Old names I still collect are Taj Mahal, Little Feat (even a bad CD by them is better than most else), Tommy Castro and Tab Benoit to say nothing about the wealth of Blues I buy after listening to Paul Jones.

Finally when you had Chas ‘n’ Dave in the studio, I straight away booked them for a party in my pub and they came and played twice which led on to appearances by Juice on the Loose, Diz and the Doormen and the fabulous ‘Balham Alligators’ who were all raging successes.

I hold you entirely responsible.

Regards

Dave Parker

PS: Does this Ace CD mean you might return to this type of music?
Hope so.

[davidt]

I went down to that Audio show at Olympia too!
I think that's where I got my poster which is in slighty better condition than the one reproduced on page 2 of the booklet. I can't think where else I got it from unless they went out as prizes?

I'm enjoying the CD a lot. More, please!


David

[Charlie]

I meant to give you advance warning, Tom Robinson invited me on his 6Music show and played tracks from the Honky Tonk compilation for an hour.

Five more days on iPlayer:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0072lb ... des/player

special thanks to producer Henry Lopez-Real