Dr Buzzards Original Savannah Band

No, Disco Tex was Monti Rock III--hairdresser, cabaret performer, frequent Johnny Carson guest, the DJ (for a brief few seconds) in 'Saturday Night Fever'...nothing to do with Kid Creole/Dr. Buzzard, though.

More Monti Rock data here:

http://www.ironminds.com/ironminds/issues/010227/dreams.shtml

Nahh. Tex is from Miami and Darnell/Bowder are Native New Yorkers. Which ties "Odyssey" (who was 1 hit wonder with "Native New Yorker") & Disco Tex's "Get Dancing" together as both of those songs were Dr. Buzz rip-offs. I actually had a freind whose studio time was scheduled after Tex's in Miami so he chatted with him for a while. Corey Daye appeared briefly on the last Towa Tei alum!

btw, Do we need a seperate Kid Creole and The Coconuts thread?

I've heard "Sunshower" sampled on at least two different hip-hop songs in the last year. Anyone know what they are? I'm racking my brain here.

That's funny because I've always connected the 2 in some weird way also. I made a mixed tape when I first leaned of DB that was nothing but Steely Dan & DB.

I didn't know about Sunshower being sampled...I know 1 of the Wutes (Wu-Tang) did a "kina-cover" of Chez Chez La Famme as did Lauren Hill on the 1st Funkmaster Flex commercially available mixed tape. Japanese acid jazz group UFO sampled Mister Love in their song LOVE. I can't recall any others yet.

I can remember some funny stories about Rocky III...oh wait, no I can't. I'ma go listen to that Cornershop song again for a refresher course.

also, mad props must be given to Machine (another Darnell thang) for "There But for the Grace of God Go I"--ILM's theme song?

CC me on this whoever answers with a way to get it! If anyone missed it, I did post earlier that she was on Towa Tei's track "Finest Turntable".

I never saw the Salon thing when it came out, but this line strikes me as odd (or maybe just stupid):

"The debut album was an optimistic glimpse of a partytime society that never came to pass."

Oh, so disco and the late '70s never actually happened?

Well, maybe that line applies to the idea that they exaggerated the "art deco chic" of the retro 70's.

"Sophisticated" or not, the record's just so *touching*.

I never linked Kid Creole with the 2-Tone stuff and the other stuff you mentioned; Darnell's music seemed too much its own thing to be roped into a movement, but I can see what you're getting at.

And there's a whole other side of 2-Tone that's only tangentially related to Ska but comes out of the british post-punk funk scene, like the Higsons and the Appolonaires.

The third album, "Goes to Washington," is also great, although noticeably darker than either of the first two, and with less memorable tunes. I still like it better than the first album, though (and I like the first album plenty).

All of that does not make it "better" or "more valid" or whatever compared to types of music that are actually popular and commercially successful. What it does provide is sort of the musical equivalent of a type of science-fiction novel: What would the world look like if we just tightened (or loosened) this one screw a bit . . . ? Kid Creole, of course, came from the same place, but pretty systematically limited its ambition to making funny party music. Dr. Buzzard's was party music, often funny, with something serious to say and do.

It often seems that mainstream and conscious hip-hop are engaged in a kind of blacker-than-thou death struggle. Both are obsessed with "keeping it real", and define "real" as a very impoverished, minimalist view of the African-American community. Dr. Buzzard's seemed determined at times to "keep it unreal"; most of its songs deal with some kind of fantasy world. Also, the African-American community of Dr. Buzzard's is full of people with white and hispanic relatives, people with middle-class jobs and careers, people who dream about seeing Paris and are proud of the French they learned in school. They see themselves as the inheritors of all of Western culture, and contributors to it. The fantasies of Dr. Buzzard's are striver aspirations; I am not sure what the fantasies of conscious hip-hop are (maybe simply getting recognition).

Conscious hip-hop almost entirely lacks a sense of humor, and what humor there is tends to be self-deprecating and not terribly subversive -- which is why sometimes I long for Jay-Z, or even Ludacris' Amos-n-Andy act. Dr. Buzzard's was all about humor, and it was of a piece with their music: a miscegenationist platform.

Also, conscious hip-hop is not (or not often) dance music. Dr. Buzzard's made dance music. That's a pretty profound difference.

Using another approach: The protagonists of conscious hip-hop tend to be Bigger Thomas, or the narrator of The Invisible Man, or Amiri Baraka, or Ntzoke Shange. The characters Dr. Buzzard's made of themselves were James Baldwin and the Harlem Renaissance, or Ellison himself, refracted through Spike Lee (but before Lee even existed). And turned into dance music. (To be fair, there is a lot of Spike Lee in conscious hip-hop, too, but rarely Lee at his most expansive.)

Or more apt: Conscious hip-hop aspires to be the Marvin Gaye of What's Going On, and Bob Marley, and (of course) Grandmaster Flash. Dr. Buzzard's wanted to be Duke Ellington crossed with The Mighty Sparrow and The Trampps. Not unlike Prince, but minus the meglomania.

"Cherchez la Femme" is blowing my mind. I've known the song for a few years, but I've never sat down and tried to pick each instrument apart until now. It's not working. At all. My favorite is the bassist, though. He seems like he spends the entire intro off in his own little corner/world plucking out his busy busy part with no regard for what anyone else is doing. Then the verse starts and all of a sudden he's not just in the pocket, he's a fucking metronome.

And then there are the little reversed bass parts that pop into the other speaker occasionally. Those are awesome, too.

I swear this is the most complex pop song I've ever heard. I can imagine it would take hours on end just to notate the (I'm sure improvised) intro bass part. And that's only one of at least 13 instruments in the intro.

The chords of the first section of verse are established with clarinets that you never notice until you go looking for them.

And they manage to shoehorn that whole intro, including the crazy-ass bass part, right under the third verse.

lol @ Darnell's grandstanding

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CK-f-Hhij4

also, mad props must be given to Machine (another Darnell thang)

i had no idea about this

can the 2nd album really be that bad if it's got 'nocturnal interludes' on it? (am listening to sugar & poison.) i see it got panned, but jbr upthread and some peoples on rate your music say it's their best. sounds promising.

opinionate while i sit in this here slsk queue.

on the other hand i found the cory daye and thought it was pretty silly, barring a couple tunes. (partic 'rainy day boy')

The 2nd album is pretty awesome. There's not a dud on it. Of the three Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band records, the 3rd one, DBOSB Goes to Washington, is the spottiest, and even that one's great.

one of my greatest regrets in life was not buying <I>Goes to Washington</I> the day I saw it (and about a dozen other amazing looking things) for sale used in Minneapolis in 1995 or so. I've never seen it anywhere else, either. (not that I've searched especially hard, mind.)

awesome youtube link

totally love them. but some of it is too slickly produced. if they came out in the early 70s i think i might like it more.

August Darnell is god! And if Broadway and its minions had more than an ounce of brain, they'd praise Him as such. Can you imagine if this man enjoyed the same popularity in the theeayter as Andrew Lloyd Blubber? He just might have inspired Sondheim to get funky. (Maybe.)

And the side projects...swoon! Give or take something by Chic Inc., Machine's "There But For The Grace Of God Go I" is the greatest disco single of all-time (and totally stage-ready too...Chita Rivera still could've played Carmen Vidal in 1979...maybe even now).

I have all this stuff on vinyl (save for "Grace") else I'd YSI it to y'all. Is any of it on CD? We need a comprehensive box set with liners by Milo Miles.

Agreed. The Don Armando's 2nd Avenue Rhumba Band album is awesome too. Liked the Kid Creole & The Coconuts version of "There But For The Grace Of God" better than Machine's, though.

no way, that shit is far too goofy

and the machine version = way better for dancing. groove is locked on

How is it goofy? Shit's just fun.

I really geeked out on this thread.

Is any of it on CD?

The first two Dr. Buzzard's and at least some of the Kid Creole stuff, although the second DBOSB album is only available on some weird comp entitled The Best of Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band which is really just the first two albums on random.

"Italiano" - James Monroe HS Presents Dr.Buzzard's Original Savannah Band Goes To Washington

Wow. This is almost as good as or as good as "Sunshowers" and "Cherchez". I need to find that third DBOSB album.

Weird that both a Dr. Buzzard's thread and a Kid Creole thread got revived by different people within a matter of minutes.

I saw the creole revive, and remembered to revive this

the 3rd dr. buzzard album is just about as good as the 1st 2.

the 4th put me off so badly that i haven't revisited it since first purchase

I've never been able to quite get into the second one. It's kind of inscrutible to me. The 4th one was made without August Darnell or Andy Hernandez. I've never heard anything good about it. Looks like Hernandez has dumped all his archived Buzzard's/Creole footage onto Youtube.

Hell, I can't quite warm to Dr Buzzard, and I adore Kid Creole's Wise Guys -- I really can't do without it. The Going Places comp was pretty revelatory too, although I can't shake the suspicion that there's even more outre stuff in the vaults.

*Wise Guy, of course.

i never understood people differentiating the 1st form the 2nd album. they're interchangeable to me. their greatest hits literally was the entire 1st and 2nd albums intertwined.

the 3rd is in the same vein, just slightly weaker melodies.

i never understood the band's decline though. if august was responsible for the lyrics, why did the music go downhill after his departure?

i befriend coati mundi on myspace a couple years back and he left me a few shouts.

The first album has much better tunes than the second. I mean, there's not really anything on the second that's fucking with "I'll Play the Fool", which is the third best song on the debut, tops.

Funny, my boyfriend and I have been listening to the second album all this week over and over and over, and really loving it alot. It's so great!
We think that there is some kind of psychic triangular forcefield between Van Dyke Parks in LA and August Darnell in NYC and Haruomi Hosono in Tokyo, because if you line up VDP's "Discover America" and Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band "Meets King Pennet" and Hosono's "Tropical Dandy" in a row and play them all you get the greatest anachronistic old/new fake/serious time-warped feeling.

O
M
G

I couldn't disagree more.

My fave songs, in order:

Mister Love (2nd)
I'll Play The Fool (1st)
Sunshower (1st)
Transistor Madness/Future D.J. (2nd)
Call Me (3rd)
Cherchez La Femme (1st)
The Gigolo And I (2nd)

If I could include Gichy Dan songs, 2 more would be crammed into the center of that list.

xp, I can see your point Neotropical pygmy squirrel. In fact, I think some early YMO melodies brush up against Dr Buzzard melodies.

VDP obv was employed Esso Trinidad Steel Band/Mighty Sparrow connection on Discover America, and obv August Darnell had a fascination with the same.

i played Sunshower out last weekend in the middle of a beardy/disco set and i felt it was too weird and schmaltzy and had to take it off

solution: play weird schmaltzy stuff instead of beardo disco

From Favorite song sung by children or featuring children singing

August Darnell - Friendly Children (Todd Terje Re-Kutt)

or as it was originally known as

Gichy Dan's Beechwood #9 - On a Day Like Today

― i like to fort and i am cozy (PappaWheelie V), Tuesday, January 27, 2009 1:06 AM (0 seconds ago) Bookmark

http://66.102.1.101/translate_c?hl=en&sl=sv&u=http://www.divshare.com/download/4574119-696&prev=/search%3Fq%3D%2522friendly%2Bchildren%2522%2Btodd%2Bterje%2B%2522gichy%2Bdan%2522%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26hs%3DqeM%26sa%3DG&usg=ALkJrhinLdWjCnwHwAnl715KbOpztKAc0w

Matos and Rev, I have the third album . . .

the third album blew my mind when i first heard it. it's just so tightly packed with cool stuff.

Third album is pretty great. Here's a rip if anyone is interested.
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?ettkw3gm4wm

homie

whenuweremine, v v appreciated! I've been lazy about ripping my copy.

This is brilliant stuff. Thank u.

OMG I'm so sad I didn't see this sooner! Still haven't heard the third album, still dying to.

Third album really is good.

4th album is like watching More American Graffiti :-(

I have no hopes whatsoever for the fourth album, never did.

I got an email asking to repost the 3rd album, so here goes.

http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=7f9f061a3baab66a41446e35a78dc463e04e75f6e8ebb871

God, "Call Me" is so wonderful.

Isn't it?

thanks, been after this for a while. love the first two albums like the children i'll never have!

THANK YOU.

whenuweremine: God bless you, kind sir. I have been hoping to hear this album for years!

Damn! I seem to have missed this link again - it doesn't seem to be available, or is it just me?!

alas, i get a "the folder you have requested is empty" message, too. Ari, would you be so kind...?

^ i would appreciate this as well!

Same here. I dled it before, but my hard drive crashed since then.

Huh, strange that Mediafire deletes stuff so quickly. Tried megaupload this time; hopefully it stays up longer.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=IP1QRL95

thx!! sounds great so far

Thanks for this - got it at last!

Wow! I thought they were supposed to drop off after the 2nd album, but this 3rd album is so good. Thanks so much!

it's all good. well, all three original albums are all great. i haven't been able to get the 2nd album off of my turntable for weeks. i don't really see a need to stop listening to it.

this thread always reminds me that i DO want a copy of the 80's album. i never ever see one anywhere.

recently found mp3s of the cory daye solo stuff and it also is incredible

sort of embarrassed that i never listened to this band before but the s/t is fuckin magical

Sort of embarrassed that I didn't go to see them thirty years ago at the Greek Orthodox Church on Northern Boulevard when I had the chance, but I was still benighted by the disco sux0r mentality.

Or maybe this is a false memory infected by an outtake of Summer Of Sam.

ehh at this point you might as well just tell everyone you saw em, eventually youll convince yourself that you were there, and isnt that just as good

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n54/n271007.jpg

By which I mean to say, of course, that you are wise beyond your years.

sort of embarrassed that i never listened to this band before but the s/t is fuckin magical

― max, Sunday, November 22, 2009 5:26 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

its really the best thing ever imo

no, second album is best thing ever. oh okay first album is best thing ever too.

It never occurred to me to check out any of the other albums until I read this thread. I've just got the second album which is almost as good. I've got the third one on the way, I can't wait to hear it.

it's great!

Did you ever get the fourth album? I noticed there's a few on sale on ebay at the moment.

no, not yet. it's only a matter of time. it's on my cratedigging radar.

Yeah I think I won't be far behind in getting that. I don't know why I never thought of getting the other albums, I love the debut which I first read about on here. At the moment I'm getting all my recommendations from ILM, I've been almost working my through the Full length disco albums thread you started. Some amazing albums I can't believe I've never of on there, I keep hoping someone will revive it soon.

I just listened to the fourth album the other night. Every so often I pull it out and think (hope), "Maybe this time it will kick in for me." It never does. For completists only. And then only if you’re a total diehard.

Main problem: the sound on it is just atrocious. The whole thing is drenched in this inexplicable reverb.

I got the third album last week and I just love it. I'd say it's better than the second album but not quite as amazing as the first one but then not many albums are as perfect as that.

I really want to hear the Don Armando's Second Avenue Rhumba Band album does anyone know where it might be available online anywhere?

I probably should post this on the Kid Creole or Ze records thread but I heard the August Darnell compilation today and the track by Gichy Dan's Beachwood Band blew me away. Anyone know if the album is any good or available anywhere other than for 30 pounds on Ebay?

I'm totally obsessed with this sound at the moment I also just got the Aural Exciters album and ordered the Coati Mundi album.

The Gichy Dan album is good, but I'd say just a notch less wonderful than the best of the OSB stuff. The Don Armando album is fantastic, super white hot! It's also worth hunting down the 12"-single extended versions of "Deputy of Love" and "I'm an Indian, Too" as both improve on the album versions. Another obscure world of August Darnell album worth hunting down:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_eMdPAakixwM/Sr2gn59tIPI/AAAAAAAAAOM/4avGkM3QEsQ/s400/Coconuts+-+Don%27t+Take+My+Coconuts.jpg

I have the title track of that on a compilation somewhere, I never knew there was an full album to go a long with it. That's another one for the list then. Cheers for the recommendation I just want more and more of this stuff.

I really wish they would put some of it out on CD. They did a great job on the reissues of the first four Kid Creole albums a few years back and there's been a few good Ze compilations recently but I would like some of the actual albums. Some of them are pretty expensive and I can't find many downloads of them anywhere either.

This is a great place to start:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51c61uB4kGL._SS400_.jpg

xpost to Kitchen Person:

The entire Don Armando's 2nd Ave. Rhumba Band is available as a digital download on the Ze Records website, zerecords.com

Other than finally owning a copy of Machine's "There But For the Grace of God Go I," that Darnelle comp paled beside the first four Kid Creole records.

The Darnell comp is somewhat misleading: it's not meant to represent Dr. Buzzard or Kid Creole and the Coconuts. But it does collect together a lot of the Darnell-related ephemera that would cost you zillions to buy on eBay.

The entire Don Armando's 2nd Ave. Rhumba Band is available as a digital download on the Ze Records website, zerecords.com

― Fruitless and Pansy Free (Dr. Joseph A. Ofalt), Friday, December 4, 2009 2:10 AM (14 hours ago) Bookmark

Thanks for the tip off. The whole Ze website is pretty cool shame a lot of the stuff is out of stock. I'm looking forward to hearing that album.

I listened to that compilation, it's really good it's actually partly responsible for making me even more obsessed with this type of music. I'm so in love with that Gichy Dan song especially the last minute, it's beautiful.

I've ordered Coati Mundi's album and I downloaded the Coconuts album Mottdeterre mentioned. It's absolutely wonderful and it sounds better than Doppleganger from the same year which I'm not a massive fan of. I've also found the Cory Daye album which I'm looking forward to playing.

Ive searched for the Gichy Dan album and all I found was a broken link on a guys blog.

Are either of the Machine albums worth hearing?

Machine had one truly great moment: "There But for the Grace of God Go I," which is readily available. The rest is forgotten because it’s eminently forgettable.

Flipping through the booklet in the Hall & Oates box set, I was surprised to see Darnell compliment Daryl Hall's voice and songwriting (Hall returns the compliment by admitting that he stole the chord sequence of a Kid Creole song)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ha43A6agYZw

WHOA!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF4qdIrgG2A

you did themambothechahabolerotherhumbathetangothecongathediscothesamba

august darnell, you fucking genius

starting to think DBOSB Goes to Washington might be their best

hearing them sing

Stonio, Augustino
Corio, Andio, Mickio

so joyously in unison at the end of their last record is such a bittersweet ending. like really, is that supposed to be the sound of a band-ending rift developing?

the yankee stumblebum neonazi

Love these albums. Need to relisten to 'em.

Bored, so I decided fuck the fuck of it to create an 8 tracks account and create a playlist.

I used August Darnell to test it out. Here're 8 Dr. Buzzard related tracks, chosen by me:

http://8tracks.com/pappawheelie/august-company

haha good thing i checked your mix first, was literally just about to post 'rainy day boy' for the fun of it

solution: play weird schmaltzy stuff instead of beardo disco

― The Reverend, Tuesday, 27 January 2009 05:36 (2 years ago) Bookmark

why oh why will no one heed this sage wisdom

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_KqndcpjQSek/S0OSQBH1vmI/AAAAAAAAW8g/GlxjWaMeX4g/s400/Cory+Daye+-+Cory+%26+Me.jpg

WAU this sleeve!!

!!! amen !!!

Whoa. Am I the last to know about this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpgQRnTulqY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeGqKYHZ8X0

On Dinah Shore:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLQwvh4hDdI

http://carolcooper.org/music/kidcreole-83.php

^^^ circa 1983, about Browder & Darnell working together post Dr. Buzzard.

Also, 1994:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvFtxjJKU-4

i bought the elbow bones album just last weekend! productionwise not as dope as dr. buzzard (live drums would suit better i think), but good songs. i like it.

'cory and me' is very cool. the cover is super nice as noted - airbrush mania! and i cannot get enough of cory's voice!!

think i have played 'hard times' maybe 15 or 20 times now

something about the luxuriant spaciousness of this track, a large room without too much furniture

OH I'M SORRY DID SOMEONE SAY ALLTIME CLASSIC?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbGWBmInrvA

Man, I have a tasty beverage and a few discs I want to listen to (currently Wilson Pickett’s last, It’s Harder Now) but now I’m distracted, thinking I could be listening to Dr. Buzzard.

Forgot about this thread! Here's one we were back on last year---some overlap of course, but not too much repetition: Kid Creole & the Coconuts: C o' D, S 'n' D

Revisiting Daft Punk's last album Random Access Memory recently it struck me that the later movements of "Touch", which IIRC has a strong following on this site, has a very Dr Buzzard vibe