Yet More Music By Caldor

I credit my brother for my occasional love of the groove.

Through the years I've gone crazy for Southern rock, New Wave, punk rock and classic rock. But all along I've had a taste for funky stuff, too.

Since college, I've gotten hooked on classic stuff ranging from James Brown and Funkadelic, to rap such as the Beastie Boys and Run-DMC and electronica by the likes of Gus Gus and Fujiya & Miyagi.

The stuff that laid down the base (and the bass) for me, though, was as follows.

My brother was into Billy Preston, who first gained fame as a session musician for the likes of Little Richard, Sam Cooke, Ray Charles and even The Beatles. In 1971 he released an album called I Wrote a Simple Song, which featured an instrumental called "Outa-Space," which won a Grammy for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.

We had the 45 that featured that song, as well as the album's title track. My brother and I played the hell out of "Outa-Space," which, with its driving beat and amped-up, groovalicious keyboards just demanded such.

Here's a fantastic live performance of that song:

My brother -- Steve -- was also really into Kool & the Gang. While the band has become known over the years for "Celebration" -- the song known to wedding and high school reunion revelers all across the U.S. of A., it was their early- to mid-'70s stuff that we jammed on.

We had the 45's (well, I still do, which of course is why I'm writing this) for "Hollywood Swinging" and "Jungle Boogie," the latter of which was my favorite.

Check it out:

The next one I pulled out of the little pink box of 45's is one I'd forgotten about (there are a lot of those) is "For the Love of Money" by The O'Jays.

Watch this for the grooves and the moves, the clothes and the 'fros.

And finally, a song that never seems to go out of style, K.C. and the Sunshine Band's "That's the Way I Like It."

Man, these guys are amped up, eh?

For more on the dusty platters that sorta matter, see "Music by Caldor" and "More Music by Caldor."

More Music by Caldor

As promised, here's the second installment in my series that looks back at 45's my brother, sister and I bought in the '70s (see January 23, 2013, "Music by Caldor.").

Today, I picked three random little discs out of the battered pink case that's held our collection of 45's since back in the day. Over the years, I've become the de facto music archivist in my family, gathering up some of my parents' old LP's, and scattered long players and singles that my siblings and I bought over the years at our local Caldor department store in Avon, CT.

The first one to come out is Elton John's "Bennie and the Jets."

This song came out in 1973, when I was 8 years old, and was incredibly popular on the radio. John didn't want to release the song as a single, thinking it was too plain and boring, according to good ol' Wikipedia. Producer Gus Dudgeon decided to punch it up a bit by adding in reverb, applause and other audience effects to make it more lively. The song became John's first Top 40 hit on the R&B charts.

For more on the song's history, read this.

Interesting side note: I had a friend growing up named Bene (pronounced "Benny"), so we used to mock him at times by singing this song. Bene, unfortunately, passed away several years ago two months shy of his 40th birthday. Driving home from his funeral, I got stuck in a traffic jam on Route 84 just south of the Mass. Pike. As I sat there, listening to a mix CD I'd made a few years ago, a version of "Bennie and the Jets" done by the Beastie Boys with Biz Markie suddenly popped up.

I don't get too mystical and spiritual, but I laughed to myself and thought my good buddy was telling me, "Hey, don't sweat the traffic."

On to the next song.

Jim Croce's "Time In a Bottle" always makes me sad.

Like "Bennie and the Jets," Croce's tale of wishing for more time to do the important things in life was released as a single in 1973. The song became popular after Croce's tragic death in a plane crash in September of that year.

I wasn't crazy about this song, instead preferring Croce's more upbeat tunes like "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" and "You Don't Mess Around With Jim."

I put Croce in the same category as Harry Chapin, who also died tragically, in a car accident in 1981. They were both singer-songwriters with loads of talent, but also guys who were a bit too, well, singer-songwriter-y for me.

Finally, Jo Jo Gunne's short, sweet boogie rocker, "Run Run Run."

Jo Jo Gunne was kinda like Foghat. Slide guitar solos, chugging rhythms and a fun sound. I didn't know anything about them, so I went to Wikipedia, of course. The band grew out of 1960's L.A. band, Spirit, who allegedly influenced Led Zeppelin. "Run Run Run" charted in the U.S. and U.K., but Jo Jo Gunne (they got the name from a Chuck Berry song) broke up after releasing four albums in two years.

Stay tuned for another installment (or two, or three)....

Music by Caldor

Other than a brief fling with anti-apartheid activism in college, I've always kept my politics mostly to myself. Sure, if you know me well, you know I'm a liberal Democrat. But I don't speak out much about my views except in close company.

So you might be surprised to learn that the first 45 (remember those?) I bought was "Give Ireland Back to the Irish," a political screed written and recorded by Paul McCartney & Wings.

OK, screed might be too strong a word, but considering the song was written by the guy who penned "Ob-la-di, ob-la-da, life goes on, brah!", "Give Ireland Back to the Irish" is a pretty strong statement.

I have no idea why I opted for this song as the first single I bought from the Avon, Connecticut, branch of Caldor, the department store chain that closed in 1999. My parents would take my brother, sister and me there once in a while, and we kids would buy 45's there, then take them home and play them on our pop-up record player.

I guess the song must have been popular on the radio when I was 7 years old. Somehow, I grew up in a household devoid of Beatles music, and I didn't buy an album by the Fab Four until I was well into adulthood.

Digging through my musty stack of 45's in the attic, I did find, however, that one of us bought McCartney & Wings's "Jet," as well as Ringo Starr's "Oh My My."

I had no idea what "Give Ireland Back to the Irish" meant at that age. As I got older I came to an understanding of just what Great Britain was doing in Northern Ireland.

The song didn't mean much to me, but perhaps I thought of it during my time at Keene State College as a member of a student group that tried to raise awareness of the appalling apartheid in South Africa.

Oh, who am I kidding -- that didn't happen.

Here's a video of the song that shows the 45. Below this clip is an interesting video of the band practicing the song in somebody's living room.

The second 45 I bought had a bit more of an impact on my life.

"Rock 'n' Roll Hoochie Koo" by Rick Derringer continues to be a song that I listen to, and one that inspired a story in my short story collection, (C)rock Stories: Million-Dollar Tales of Music, Mayhem and Immaturity.

This one was also popular on the radio when I was young, but unlike McCartney's song, it continues to get airplay on classic rock radio.

Let's watch and listen together:

Other 45's I bought that I still have in my collection (but never play) include "Hot Rod Lincoln" by Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, a song that also features in one of my (C)rock Stories; and The Knack's "My Sharona," the sleeve of which features a somewhat androgynous young woman in a tight, see-through tank top.

When I started writing this a few days ago I wasn't planning on digging through the little pink box that my siblings and I stored our 45's in, but now that I've done so, I think I'll write a few more installments in coming weeks.