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Stronger Than a Cup of Coffee (LevonHelm Edition): This ain’t no regular joe – Percolatin’ with Levon

Faster than a whore house clearin’ out after a police raid.
More powerful than a fresh batch of Kentucky moonshine.
Able to leap tall prisonyard walls in a single bound.

Look up, up at the stage!
It’s absurd. It’s insane!

It’s…three songs stronger than a cup of coffee
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Call it gumption; call it gusto; call it giddyap; these here three songs contain a little something special that’ll have your toes tappin’ and hands clappin’ before you know it. Actually, you could call that little something a heapin’ healping of good ol’ Levon Helm. 

The eagle flies on Friday and when it does, everyone is in a good mood. Fridays are for striking sparks. The best way to do that is to put on a few red hot numbers and raise the temperature in the room.

I’m at a fever pitch with the road trip to the Midnight Ramble visit now just twenty-four hours away. These three barn burners might just push me over the edge (at least I hope so). 

Enjoy

Up on Cripple Creek

Don’t Do It

Ophelia

Solo Levon

This playlist is made up of a handful of my fave rave songs from Levon’s solo albums. Levon never stopped making great music after the Band broke up. His solo albums were filled with that same earnest, honest feel that he lives his life by. That’s the only way he knows how to make music…it’s who he is. His life and life’s work are synonymous with each other. We should all be so fortunate. 

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It’s Levon Helm week on The 6149. I am celebrating my first visit to Levon Helm’s Midnight Ramble this Saturday with a series of post about the man and his music. Have a read of the ones you may have missed.

“But I love to hear him talk” – The next best thing to hearing Levon Helm Sing

What’s the next best thing to listening to Levon Helm sing? Listening to him talk. When Levon sings he tells great stories. When in conversation, Levon tells stories that sing.

His voice is like a handshake or a pat on the back. It invites you in and tells you to sit a spell. Even after a tussle with throat cancer you can still feel the warmth and welcoming nature in Levon’s way of talking. 

I thought I’d pull a few choice vids off the world wide web cam of Levon telling tales and slinging the drawl. 

Enjoy

A scene from “Classic Albums” – The Band

Are you familiar with the Classic Albums series? If not, lucky you; you are in for a treat. It is a documentary series about albums considered to be the best of of their eras. In each docco, they have the musicians, producers, engineers, managers and the like, tell the stories about how the albums were made. My fave part is when they sit at the mixing board and twiddle the nobs to spotlight a bass line or a vocal. If you are a music nut and haven’t seen these, shame on you.

One of the best episodes focuses on the album “The Band” by The Band. Levon is front and center on this one. I pulled a clip from the docco off of YouTube for you to check out. It’s one of my fave rave scenes of the whole dang thing. 

Pay attention at 5:17 of this clip. John Simon makes a comment to Levon; watch / listen to Levon’s two word response. That kills me every time I see that. He is in the moment and he is loving this. He is a fan of good music and respects and appreciates the small nuances as much as the big crescendos. There is a lot of joy and honesty in his response. I love his laugh and comment at the end of this clip, too.Pure Joy.

 

A “couch” appearance on Conan O’Brien back in 1993

The interview kicks-in at 3:13, right after Levon and Max Weinberg belt out a rocking version of “Short Fat Fannie”. Levon reeks of humility in this interview conducted by a very fresh faced Conan. When I watched this my mind slipped off into it’s strange and damp places where all the gooey weird thoughts live; it conjured up ugly thoughts of dick-swinging rappers who boast and brag about how much their shit is littered with rose pedals. Who the hell are the kidding?

Thanks Levon for being a humble servant of the sound, stories and sanctity of America’s musical heritage. We owe you one…

A second scene from the “Classic Albums” episode on The Band

Half way through this one, Robbie starts talking about Levon’s drumming / singing style. Jim Keltner chimes in with a bit of awe for how Levon plays the skins. Levon gives us a bit of insight as well. Lest we forget that Levon’s drumming is as revered by musicians as much as his voice is. 

It’s Levon Helm week on The 6149. I am celebrating my first visit to Levon Helm’s Midnight Ramble this Saturday with a series of post about the man and his music. Have a read of the ones you may have missed.

The Road to the Ramble: Levon Helm, “Defining Moments” and a Road Trip Playlist

The Rock & Roll Three-Way: The Surprise Guest is the Best (Levon Helm Midnight Ramble Edition)

The Rock & Roll Three-Way: The Surprise Guest is the Best (Levon Helm Midnight Ramble Edition)

The second date my wife went on was on August 27, 1999 in Boston, MA to see the Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band reunion tour. It was my second Bruce show of the their Boston stand and my wife’s first Bruce show ever. By the end of the night, she was swooning and well on her way to my front seat … and is still there near 10 years later (we met at a Tom Petty concert a month earlier).  

She was a Rock and Roll neophyte back then; I was her Mrs. Robinson. She barely understood the significance of the Boss/E-Street reunion, let alone the local significance of that night’s on stage “surprise guest”: Peter Wolf. 

The Woofa came out to sing “Raise Your Hand” with the Boss & Co. I flipped out. This was and still is my only live taste of a live Wolf performance. The Bruce show had already popped our thermometers, but when Wolf came out, the room got a bit hotter. 

That is the thing about “surprise guests”: you can be at a gig and you can reach that “it can’t get any better than this” feeling and then, out of nowhere, you hear, “we’d like to welcome [insert your fave rave performer here] to the stage to do a song with us”. Out of nowhere, it gets better … much better. 

Great gigs turn into legendary gigs when the killer surprise guest takes the stage. As you may know by now, I am on my way to Levon Helm’s Midnight Ramble in Woodstock, NY this weekend.  In my wildest dreams, (and I do dream of this and even know what song I would sing) I dream of being asked on stage to sing with Levon and his band. Alas, I will not hold my breath nor wait in vain for the “call-up”.

Others, others who are much, MUCH more talented than I have been called to the stage to perform with our American Son.  This version of The Rock & Roll Three-Way showcases three great surprise guest call-ups that joined Levon and his band on stage.  The Rules of the Ramble say you can’t bring in cameras of any kind and you better keep your mobile phones off for all performances. It is not surprising that there are very, very few clips of actual Ramble ramblings. 

That being said, not all of the vids posted here are from actual Rambles. What you have here are three vids of Levon Helm Band gigs from 2010 where a special guest graced his stage. I think you’ll enjoy the song selections and the performances. The Jim James performance is from a Ramble (bonus points). Each of these songs are fave rave of mine as originally done by The Band.  

So there you have it, another Rock & Roll Three-Way: 1 > Jim James guesting on a band song with Levon 2 >> Ray Lamontagne guesting on a Band song with Levon 3 >>> Donald Fagen guesting on a Band song with Levon. 

Enjoy

(and if I do get called up on stage to sing, you’ll all be the first to know)

Jim James (My Morning Jacket) performing “It Makes No Difference” with Levon and his band at the Ramble on 08/13/2010

Ray Lamontagne with the Levon Helm Band performing “Tears of Rage 11/05/2010

Donald fagen & The Levon Helm Band performing ‘King Harvest” 06/01/2010

Stronger Than a Cup of Coffee: Keep on Rockin’ in Neil’s World (best live TV music performance EVER!)

Have you blown-out all your New Year’s resolutions already?! Are you still strapping on the feedbag and avoiding the gym? Are you still smoking butts like a prisoner with a life sentence? Are you still building a house of maxed out credit cards ready to crash into a debt landfill? Yes, you say…to all three? Good: fuck resolutions. 

Resolutions lead to failure. How many people actually make good on their resolutions? I don’t have an official count, but my guess is that the answer is, not many. OK, OK, that doesn’t mean making resolutions is a bad idea. Maybe I should say, fuck unrealistic resolutions.

I make resolutions, too; fortunately I tend to be one of the “not many”. Why am I a “not many”…I don’t make unrealistic resolutions. I make tough ones, but not man on the moon or break the four minute mile resolutions.  Keep it simple and doable and by December 31st, you may actually accomplish your goals.

How about if we set a simple and doable resolution for 2011 together?  You’re in? Cool. OK, here is my suggestion: In 2011, together, we will listen to more awe-inspiring, chicken-skin inducing, bow-down music.  Like I said: doable. This one is a bonafide winner. We can’t miss!  

Lately I have been trying out a new gimmick segment on The 6149 called, “Stronger Than a Cup of Coffee”.  One morning I couldn’t get my train on the tracks, even after a couple cups of coffee. When ever I am in jam, I turn to music for inspiration; thus, the “Stronger Than” segment was born

In the two “Stronger” postings, I usually highlight three songs. This post contains only one song…because it need only contain one song. This is an bow-down live performance for the ages: Neil Young & Crew tsunami Saturday Night Live  in 1989 with wipe-out “Rocking in the Free World”.

This is legend and for good reason. How does a group of guys go from standing still to whirling dervishes instantly?!  “Explosive” doesn’t come close to describing this performance. 

Immediately the rhythm grows roots and gets deep. Check out Steve Jordan on the skins. He is one of curent music’s unheralded stars. He pounds, thumps, wails and punishes the beat with those tree trunks he is wielding. Fellow X-Pensive Wino, Charley Drayton, looks like a primal scavenger stalking the stage searching for bass lines to plonk on. Crazy Horse Mach 2 member Poncho glues the song together so not to let reckless abandon take over. 

Watch at 2:50 when Neil starts out on his first guitar solo. He heads straight from the drum riser to lock horns with Jordan. All of a sudden he spins and with that crazy Neil-Face on, he leaps off the riser and stomps that Shakey-American Indian-Tribal-Dance that is seemingly controlled by his squelch-fest guitar solo. 

At 4:30, with Charley and Poncho still doing their prowling and anchoring the groove, Neil sets flight on his second guitar solo. I love this solo. I always think of it as inside-out. I can’t even tell you what the fuck that means! That solo seems to be smirking at me. I also love the way Neil marches to the front of the stage to take off. Afterwards the three fiddlers meet in the middle and cavort like wild banshees. 

OK…now go watch this. There is more footage on here as well. At 5:35 Neil does a solo “Needle” and at 7:36 the partners in crime are backing Neil on “No More”. 

What do you think? Is this a doable resolution we set? Like I said, we can’t miss…especially not with performances like this. Let me know if you have the chicken-skin after watching.

Buckle-up..

Shakey-_Free_World-SNL890930-cd.mov
Watch on Posterous

p.s. Love Neil’s Elvis t-shirt

Gigs in 2010 That Made My Head Rock, My Heart Roll and My Moneymaker Shake

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The world does not need another Top 10, 5 or 100 list from another freak with a keyboard. While I do consider myself one of those keyboard freaks, I am not going to give you a list, per se. Actually, technically, what I have here for you is a list. Unfortunately I can’t present this to you in any other form that doesn’t resemble a vertical list of info, vids and anecdotes. 

That being said, here is my non-list list of fave rave gigs I attended in 2010 (think of this more as a collection than a list).

For five years I placed myself in concert going purgatory down in Sydney, Australia. Don’t get me wrong, I saw a handful of bow-down gigs in Sydney: My Morning Jacket, The Black Keys, The Hold Steady, Derek Trucks & EC, Taj Mahal, Bo Diddley, Neil Young, John Fogerty, Lucinda Williams, Ryan Adams (3x), Kings of Leon (2x), Pearl Jam, U2, The Stones, Bob Dylan, The White Stripes, Ray Lamontagne (2x), The Black Crowes…

…wait a minute, that’s not concert going purgatory, that is shit-hot concert going joy! I take back the purgatory comment. Still, that list came over the entire five year period of living there. Back when I lived in Boston, that list would compromise a summer’s worth of concerts for me. 

Sydney…Australia…loves it’s music. The only real problem is that Sydney is a long way from anywhere (aside from New Zealand) and that prohibits a lot of acts from going there.  In September of 2009 I moved to London. I saw a few great bands right away, namely Andrew Bird and Ray Lamontagne (this was my first gig at the Royal Albert Hall as well). 

I went on a concert going tear in 2010. I saw current bands, older acts still making great live sounds and a few seriously…seriously…bow-down gigs for the (my) ages.

I wanted to share those bow-down gigs with you here. Live music is the life-blood. The internet cannot replace this environment and experience. Streaming a gig across the web…fuck that. Yeah, it is OK if you can’t travel half way around the world/country to be there in person, but really…fuck that. No ISDN line or 3G connection is ever going to replace standing shoulder to shoulder, three rows back from the stage, a shit-hot band wailing away, beer in hand, smile on face and making eye contact with a Rock & Roll legend. Hot-concert-going-fucking-a-right-Damn!

There are five gigs that made my big toe shoot up in my boot in 2010 (I love that Little Richard saying). Four of them are by bands known round the world. They are folks that are steeped in lore in Rock & Roll / music history. The fifth is a small blues outfit from The Netherlands. While they may not be known ’round the world, they play big…BIG…big enough to knock the globe of it’s axis. 

I pulled vids from the YouTube (what my old man calls it), each of which comes from the specific gigs I attended. I also provided links to the post I made about the gigs at that specific time. If you have some time off and a cold six pack of your fave rave ales on hand, have a read of, or listen to the previous posts (some of them were episodes of my homegrown, Poorman’s Podcast series). Be sure to look at some of the related videos the YouTube offers up, particularly from the Ronnie Wood and Robert Plant gigs. 

Do I have any tix for 2011 yet, you ask? Well…

…I am certainly going to be starting 2011 of on the right concert going foot: on the 29th Jan I will be attending my first Levon Helm Midnight Ramble (Yes! YES!). This is a music/live music watershed moment for me. I can tell you how much excitement, anticipation, appreciation and outright joy I have for being fortunate enough to have ticket in hand for this gig. There will be much pre, during and post commentary on The 6149 around this. Stay tuned…

Enjoy the sounds…

Top to Bottom, my Fave Rave Gigs of 2010:

Ronnie Wood

If you are new to The 6149, then you don’t know that this was a fucking monumental gig for me. Firstly, it is Ron Wood. Secondly, it was a one-off gig to promote his fantastic 2010 solo album, “I Feel Like Playin‘”. Thirdly, I met some great new friends at this show. Lastly, oh yeah, I snuck into the after-gig party, met and talked with Ronnie Wood for 20 minutes or so and then hung out with the rest of the band, celebs and hangers-on until 3:00 am. 

Like I said….monumental. Be sure to read the previous post on the gig to get the entire story. The music was insanely good. Ronnie was in excellent form. He also had the London cast of Stomp on hand to perform very cool percussion duties. 

I loved what Ronnie did in 2010 with his album, his radio program and especially this gig…what a night!

“Stay With Me” –  The Ambassador Theatre, London 09/19/10

“Jumpin’ Jack Flash” - The Ambassador Theatre, London 09/19/10

Leon Russell 

When I saw that Leon was going to be playing in London, I shit my pants. I couldn’t buy my ticket fast enough. LEON RUSSEL in London and I was going to be there. Hot damn. The Jazz Cafe is a legendary club that holds 500 people max. I got there extra early and ended up standing 3 feet from Leon. He played all of his hits, a few hits from Bob Dylan and The Stones ( a killer “Wild Horses”) and he played like man on the verge of a comeback.

Comeback…I guess so. When I saw him I was unaware these were tune up gigs for his subsequent album and tour with Elton John. This was a one-off, uber-gig for me. I didn’t get to see him in his prime, but this gig was all primetime shit. 

 Previous Post: “Poorman’s Podcast: Small Joints & Big Highs: Leon Russell at the Jazz Cafe in London

“Delta Lady” (show opener) - Jazz Cafe, London 08/03/10

“Song for You” - Jazz Cafe, London 08/03/10

Robert Plant

Oh yeah…I knew of the new Band of Joy album. I was looking forward to it. I burnt out on Led Zep a long, long time ago; I listened every day in high school. I have always followed Plant’s solo career, though. I love that he never forgot the music that turned him on when he started on his way to rock and roll legend status. I was really hot for his backing band for the Band of Joy album, which is comprised of musician’s musicians, led by the VERY talent Buddy Miller. 

This was the first gig of their tour. In fact, it was their first gig in front of a paying concert going audience ever!  I had never seen Plant in any incarnation prior. I was psyched for this…and wasn’t disappointed.  The playing was tip-top, bow-down phenomenal. They played a lot from the new album and then a few Led Zep covers which were done up in different styles and flavors. Be sure to check out the related videos for this gig. They did a cool, rockabilly version of Rock and Roll and other Zep chestnuts. 

Oh, that concert going experience where I mentioned locking glances with a Rock and Roll legend…that was me at this Plant gig. 

“All the King’s Horses” – HMV Forum, London 09/02/10
 

 

“Houses of the Holy” - HMV Forum, London 09/02/10

Bettye Lavette

Twice. In one night. Back-to-back gigs. It had to be done.

Bettye played two sets this night and I went to both. My wife left after the first one. She knows I have a thing for Bettye. She left feeling safe, but knew that if I had my chance with this soul sister…I’d take it. Now, a few months after the gig, my wife said she would have been more afraid had she read Bettye’s November New Yorker magazine article quote back then:

“I really don’t have a lot of talents.  I can cook, and I can fuck, and I can sing.  And I’m proud of all of them 

Damn straight Bettye, damn straight. 

This woman was a force that night. She didn’t let up in either show. Her 2010 album, “Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook” was on full display.  She doesn’t just sing…she emotes. I love the way she sings. I can’t imagine how good she is at her other talents.

A Woman Like Me“ - Southbank Centre, London 06/17/10

“All of My Love” (yes, a Led Zeppllin cover) - Southbank Centre, London 06/17/10

The Juke Joints - Le caveau des Oubliettes, Paris 04/18/10

Sometimes the unexpected exceeds all expectations. I walked into the basement of a very cool Paris pub hoping to hear a half-way decent band. What I got was passion, pride and a powerful, pulsing, propulsion from a quartet of Dutch blues lovers. Read my previous post on this band…it says it all. 

This video/audio is from me. I only had my iPhone on hand, but wanted to capture some of this. The sound quality sucks. Turn your volume down to appreciate the passion in this performance.

“Juke Joints Jam” – 04/18/10 – Paris 

Other stand-out 2010 gigs for me:
  • Black Keys (twice)
  • Drive-By Truckers
  • The Hold Steady
  • Jeff Tweedy
  • Wilco
  • Solomon Burke (just a couple months before he died)
  • Ray Lamontagne
  • Jackson Browne & David Lindley (first time seeing either of them. They gigged at the Royal Albert Hall)
  • Stevie Wonder
  • Alejandro Escovedo
  • Willie Nelson
  • Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings
  • Peter Parcek (x4)

—> What were some of your fave rave gigs in 2010?

The Rock & Roll Three-Way: Bo Diddley Comes First (Shave and a Haircut…Three Brits)

Rock and Roll has a few grey hairs in it’s beard. 

Chuck Berry is 84. The Killer is 75. Fats is 82. Little Richard Penniman is 78. This Thursday, December 30th would have marked the 83rd birthday for The Originator, Bo Diddley

Bo_gunslinger

Bo Diddley is a hero of mine. I dig his whole thing: style, attitude, ambition and sound. I was fortunate enough to see him twice. Though not in his prime, he did not disappoint. He told stories, played all kinds of sounds and effects from his many homegrown guitars and contraptions and, of course, he laid down his infectious and infamous Bo Diddley Beat. 

The “Beat”: “One and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and…”
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Ah, the Bo Diddley Beat. So simple, but yet so poignant. It has an instant effect on the body and the brain; primal. Maybe that is why so many people copped it. That being said, everything comes from somewhere. So where the hell did Bo get his beat from?

As the story goes, he moved to Chicago when he was a young kid and was instantly drawn to the Blues scene. One of the first gigs he attended was a John Lee Hooker show. He was inspired by The Hook enough to start his own small band to play on street corners to get their chops. I find this part of the story intriguing. 

Hooker is another one of those folks from musical lore who created his own sound: that Hooker Boogie. You know the one. You can hear it in almost all his uptempo numbers, specifically in his monsters: ”Boom Boom” and ”Boogie Chillun” (this link leads you to a shit-hot video that has a stone-boogie strut from JLH playing on The Stones Steel Wheel tour…Clapton is on it, too). You can hear The Hook’s boogie in countless songs that followed (um, did Hooker get royalties for this? ”La Grange“). 

Maybe that is what Bo heard: an original sound. Yes, these sounds are not completely original, but they were culled and crafted into a form that could be recognized easily and “owned”. Based on what history tells us, I am using “owned” in the figurative sense rather than the literal. Bo, John Lee and many others had their ownership rights and royalties issues. In the end, it was their sound that identified them and gave them a lasting identity and legend. 

Does anybody do this anymore? (That question is not as rhetorical as it may seem. Do you have any thoughts on this?)

Bo’s first studio album did not come out until 1959, but Bo’s first single came out in 1955…and it was double-sided, bow-down, bonafide, one for the ages smash hit. I guess Bo wanted to make a statement: the A-side to this single was called, “Bo Diddley” and the B-side was called “I’m a Man“. Well, Bo wanted to leave nothing to interpretation: you knew who he was, you knew how he rolled and you knew this guy was going to be a star: both the A & B sides went to #1 on the R&B singles charts. 

“Bo Diddley” - Bo Diddley

This is from the Ed Sullivan show in 1955. Bo was told to play “16 Tons”, but decided to play his namesake song, “Bo Diddley”. Ed was a bit pissed off and banned Bo from future appearances. Same old story: “don’t criticize what you can’t understand. Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command. Your old road is rapidly changing”.

(I smell a Rock & Roll Three-Way coming on)

In 1963 Bo toured Europe on a bill with the Everly Brothers and Little Richard. None other than “England’s Newest Hitmakers”, the Rolling Stones opened for them. Bo and his contemporaries had a huge impact on the young, American-music loving Brits. Aside from maybe Chuck Berry, no one may have had a bigger impact than Bo. 

Check this out…three of England’s most popular members of the British Invasion set all had at least one Bo Diddley song on their debut albums. That’s right, The Rolling Stones, The Kinks and The Pretty Things all covered Bo on their firsts. 

On The Rolling Stones’ self-titled April 1964 UK release, they covered Bo’s “Mona”. Oddly enough, the US release of this album saw the name changed to ”England’s Newest Hitmakers“. On this US version, “Mona” was replaced with “Not Fade Away”…a Buddy Holly song. Are you following? What is funny about this is that Holly’s “Not Fade Away” is a stone-cop of the Bo Diddley beat! More on Buddy Holly later in the post…

The Kink’s October 1964 UK self-titled debut had these lads covering Bo’s “Cadillac”. The US version, renamed “You Really Got Me”, retained the Bo cover. 

The Pretty Things released their self-titled debut in March of 1965, almost one year after the Stones first album came out. They decided to kick the whole damn thing off with a side A, song one version of Bo’s “Road Runner” (album title nor track listing was changed on the US version).

Well, hot-damn! There you have it, another Rock & Roll Three-Way: 1 > The Rolling Stones covering Bo Diddley’s “Mona” on their first album 2 >> The Kink’s covering Bo Diddley’s “Cadillac” on their first album  3 >>> The Pretty Things covering Bo Diddley’s “Road Runner” on their first album. A R&R Three-Way from Bo Diddley and his Brit brethren as they bang out The Beat. 

But wait! There’s more! Now, about that Buddy Holly character…

Buddy didn’t have a Bo Diddley cover on his his 1957 debut, “The ‘Chirping’ Crickets“…or did he? One of the songs on this album was, “Not Fade Away”. If there was ever a copping of Bo’s Beat for a song (at least, at the time) , this was it. Now I don’t know if Bo had anything to say about this at the time, but I doubt Buddy was trying to steal anything from Bo. Just the same, the influence is unmistakable.  Now dig this…Buddy did eventually cover a Bo tune…”Bo Diddley”…the very tune he copped the beat from for “Not Fade Away”! 

About a year ago I wrote two posts that dealt with all this influence, emulation and copping of riffs and sounds. I encourage you to have a read if interested. I remember them being some of the most fun posts that I had written to date:
From John Lee Hooker to Bo Diddley to Buddy Holly to The Rolling Stones…none of this copping and borrowing should come as a surprise to anyone…it is a time honored tradition. As Peter Seeger calls it, it is the “Folk Process“: borrowing freely from others to create something new. Borrowing and creating, indeed…

Enjoy the music…

“Mona” – The Rolling Stones (Live, on the BBC, 1964)

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“Cadillac” - The Kinks (1964)

 –
“Road Runner” - The Pretty Things (Live, 1966)

Bonus “Beat”

“Not Fade Away” – Buddy Holly

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“Bo Diddley” - Buddy Holly

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