http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot/ Comments on MetaFilter post The Moray Eels Eat The Holy Modal Rounders and Charlie Poole, to boot Mon, 30 May 2005 21:17:33 -0800 Mon, 30 May 2005 21:17:33 -0800 en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 60 http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot <small>We kept changing the name. First it was the Total Quintessence Stomach Pumpers. Then the Temporal Worth High Steppers. Then The Motherfucker Creek Babyrapers. That was just a joke name. He was Rinky-Dink Steve the Tin Horn and I was Fast Lightning Cumquat. He was Teddy Boy Forever and I was Wild Blue Yonder. It kept changing names. Then it was the Total Modal Rounders. Then when we were stoned on pot and someone else, Steve Close maybe, said Holy Modal Rounders by mistake. We kept putting out different names and wait until someone starts calling us that then. When we got to Holy Modal Rounders, everyone decided by accumulation that we were the Holy Modal Rounders. That's the practical way to get named.</small><br><a href="http://www.redhotjazz.com/hmr/index.html" title="'The Holy Modal Rounders were almost the very definition of a cult act. This isn't a case of a group that would be described by such cliches as "if they got more exposure, they would certainly reach a much wider audience. their audience was small because their music was too strange, idiosyncratic, and at times downright dissonant for mainstream listeners to abide. what makes the rounders unusual in this regard is that they owed primary allegiance to the world of acoustic folk -- not that generates many difficult, arty, and abrasive performers.' - richie unterberger>The Story Of The Holy Modal Rounders</a>. In 1965, they used the psychedelic in a lyric and channeled Charlie Poole. From 1999, Green Man reviews their <a href="http://www.greenmanreview.com/holymodal2.html" title="The Holy Modal Rounders are ... well, they nearly defy description. Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber together are a walking (sometimes with a pronounced wobble) encyclopedia of American traditional music. Stampfel is 61 but looks 20 years younger; Weber is 55 but looks and sounds 20 years older. Their treasure trove of musical knowledge runs from minstrelsy through rock 'n' roll, with everything in between. And the best of their music is a lovingly irreverent take on all those forms.">Too Much Fun!</a>--&amp; <a href="http://www.ink19.com/issues_F/99_10/wet_ink/music_hl/114_holy_modal_rounders.shtml" title="Let me start by saying that Peter Stampfel's musical yelp-and-banjo combo is an acquired taste, like feta cheese or anchovies. Add Steve Weber's manic scatting and strumming and Dave Reisch's washtub-worthy bass thumping, and it gets far more exotic. Those who find themselves enjoying these strong flavors often meet with puzzled stares, so don't be surprised at the amount of bafflement in the room when you play your friends the find of Ninety-nind, the Holy Modal Rounders.">Ink 19</a>'s take as well. From No Depression comes <a href="http://www.nodepression.net/archive/nd22/features/rounders.html" title="Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber, the constant core of the Holy Modal Rounders, have played together since 1962. From the beginning, they have drawn their instrumentation (fiddle, banjo, mandolin and acoustic guitar) and their repertoire (Charlie Poole, Stanley Brothers, Blind Willie McTell, etc.) from the rural South. And yet they have taken extensive liberties with everything they've borrowed - making up lyrics, changing tunes and tempos, looking for the joke in everything. That's the secret code: deep country roots addressed with bohemian irreverence.">Bohemian Rhapsody</a> and from Richie Unterberger here's <a href="http://www.richieunterberger.com/stampfel.html" title="The first Rolling Stone Record Guide said of the Holy Modal Rounders: 'Stampfel...has a working knowledge of almost every song ever written, and Weber...only sometimes has a working knowledge of his own compositions.' -- I actually know a lot more songs than most people. As far as knowing every song ever written, perhaps I know a tiny fraction of 1% of every song ever written. I mean, even a tiny percentage of a tiny percentage of one percent. But still, yeah, I do know way more songs than most people, 'cause, well, I remember songs pretty good, and I'm 58 years old. My memories of songs and singing commercials goes back to...well, the first song I remember, 1944. And the first singing commercial I remember is 1945. For a while, I was collecting old singing commercials. 'Cause no one has. And I was asking all kinds of people older than me if they could remember any old singing commercials, and nobody could. So there's something about my head that just remembers music that it likes. And Weber does have a very faulty memory as far as his own songs and other people's too. It's a somewhat accurate remark.">an interview with Peter Stampfel</a> and the liner notes he wrote for the CD re-issue of cult classic <a href="http://www.richieunterberger.com/moray.html" title="The late 1960s produced numerous collisions between folk music and spaced-out psychedelia that would have been absolutely unimaginable not just during the early-1960s folk boom, but even in the early days of the folk-rock boom. Skip Spence's Oar, Dino Valenti's famously misspelled Dino Valente, Jake Holmes's original version of 'Dazed and Confused'--all were done with instrumentation not much different from what might have been used in an early 1960s Greenwich folk club. Yet none of them would have been welcomed by hardcore folk listeners, featuring as they did fragmented song structures, odd dabblings in weird reverb and electric instrumentation, and a hallucinogenic aura of heightened fear and ecstasy. Often the songs reflected states of mind that were not just altered, but on the verge of disintegration. And no acid folk album mixed inspiration and lunacy in as downright deranged a fashion as The Moray Eels Eat the Holy Modal Rounders, the Holy Modal Rounders' sole LP for Elektra Records.">The Moray Eels Eat The Holy Modal Rounders</a>. In a related bonus, here you can find <a href="http://www.newsobserver.com/print/sunday/arts/v-printer/story/2408653p-8786679c.html" title="Before he died at age 39 from one alcohol binge too many, Poole was a larger-than-life character who could out-drink, out-play and out-ramble just about everybody. But tall tales are only part of Poole's legacy as a key evolutionary figure in country music's prehistory. Listen to the hillbilly string-band records that he made with the North Carolina Ramblers between 1925 and 1931, and you hear the clattering rhythms of uptempo fiddling, cascading banjo and topical songs that would come to be known as bluegrass.">Charlie Poole</a> singing <a href="http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/movingday/menu.html" title="Because it's moving day, moving day--rip the carpet up off the floor, Load your oil stove and out the door! Because it's moving day, Pack your bed quilts and get away--If you spend every cent you can live out in a tent! It's moving day!">Moving Day</a>, a great song which I first heard by the Rounders. post:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410 Mon, 30 May 2005 21:16:47 -0800 y2karl Music Folk HolyModalRounders http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944882 Also, There's a great box set of Charlie Poole out now on Columbia/Legacy--<a href="http://www.popmatters.com/music/reviews/p/poolecharlie-youaint.shtml" title="This is a three-disc, 222-minute box set that shoots for the moon. Here you will find just about everything you need to know about the life and career and music of a guy named Charlie Poole. Columbia-slash-Sony knows that you probably don't know who the hell Charlie Poole was, but they want to make sure that that changes. In fact, their intention is even bigger than that. They want to claim, without actually saying it out loud, that Poole might be the central missing link of American music. ">You Ain't Talkin' to Me: Charlie Poole and the Roots of Country Music</a>... Oh, and here's someone's labor of love: <a href="http://world.std.com/~gdallal/charlie_poole.htm" title="You're looking for the songs of Charlie Poole? Good luck! In 1982, C. Kinney Rorrer published Rambling Blues: The Life and Songs of Charlie Poole London, UK: Old Time Music, which contained Rorrer's transcriptions of Charlie Poole's recordings. As Rorrer says in his introduction to the songs, 'One problem that most fans of Charlie Poole have is understanding some of the words to his songs...[Lonnie] Austin says some people used to treat the records as puzzles, purchasing them just to find out what Poole was saying.' Rorrer reports, among other theories for Poole's being difficult to undersand, Ernest Stoneman's suspicion that Poole deliberately mumbled some words just to keep others from learning his material. One thing Poole did do, according to the documentation provided by Rorrer, is restrict himself to pre-1923 material, which places his songs in the public domain(*) and outside the reach of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act.">The Songs of Charlie Poole</a>. But enough already. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944882 Mon, 30 May 2005 21:17:33 -0800 y2karl http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944889 <em>In 1965, they used the psychedelic in a lyric</em> Er. they used the <strong>word </strong>psychedelic in a lyric--they were like the first to do so, if I am not mistaken, and the song was, if I recall correctly, Robin Remaily's <em><a href="http://www.trussel.com/lyman/taketrip.htm">Euphoria</a></em>--which can be heard here at <a href="http://www.avistic.demon.co.uk/PaulSherra/2001/49.html">#23 on this Global Radio</a> show. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944889 Mon, 30 May 2005 21:27:58 -0800 y2karl http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944908 Cool stuff. The Rounders intersect with so many unbelievably talented and interesting people: Gary Lucas, The Fugs (damn, I love The Fugs), Sam Shepard, Harry Smith, Scotty Moore, even Jeff "Skunk" Baxter! Incredible that they stayed a semi-unknown phenomenon for so long. I love American music. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944908 Mon, 30 May 2005 22:54:32 -0800 Dr. Wu http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944920 And from <a href="http://www.robotwisdom.com/home.html">here</a>, you got <a href="http://www.robotwisdom.com/jorn/hurley.html">this</a>, where you may learn how much fun it is to rob a bank. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944920 Mon, 30 May 2005 23:55:18 -0800 TimothyMason http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944923 Thanks, y2karl, I adore the HMR. Perhaps my favorite musical moment is in their '64 recording of Flop-Eared Mule. This is a song with a total of <a href="http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=875031">five distinct words</a> in the whole thing, and yet one of the guys manages to sing the wrong lyric at the beginning of the second verse. It makes me so very happy. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944923 Tue, 31 May 2005 07:16:34 -0800 infidelpants http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944930 Yes, I like Boobs a Lot! comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944930 Tue, 31 May 2005 07:31:47 -0800 jonmc http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#944968 Naturally, you've inspired me to listen to them all morning. So I can report that the word 'psychedelic' does not appear in <i>Euphoria</i>, unless I blanked on it. It is, however, in <i>Hesitation Blues</i>, from the same album: <blockquote>Got my psychedelic feet in my psychedelic shoes I believe Lord above I got the psychedelic blues tell me how long do I have to wait or can I get you now or must I hesitate?</blockquote> <small>(Pedantry demands that I note that Stampfel pronounces the word "psychodelic".)</small> comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-944968 Tue, 31 May 2005 08:21:39 -0800 infidelpants http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945031 Dang if you aren't right. I was conflating that with the belladona cloud on Euphoria: <em>Well Ma's out there, twitchin' in the kitchen Dad's in the living room, fussin' and a-bitchin' I'm out here, kicking the gong for... Euphoria! Euphoria - When your mind starts reelin' and a-rockin; Your inside voice starts squealing and squawking Floatin' around on a belladonna cloud,singin'... Euphoria!</em> Here's <a href="http://www.villagevoice.com/generic/show_print.php?id=7271&page=christgau&issue=9930&printcde=MzM1MjY2NjQ3MA==&refpage=L211c2ljL2luZGV4LnBocD9pc3N1ZT05OTMwJnBhZ2U9Y2hyaXN0Z2F1JmlkPTcyNzE=" title="Jeez, now a Donald Wollheim connection...">Parent with parrots</a>, yet another article about Stampfel, by Robert Christgau--and here's his page for the <a href="http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist2.php?id=588" title="Holy Modal Rounders[extended]">Rounders</a>. It's interesting to me at least that the Holy Modal Rounders Story linked above is archived at <a href="http://www.redhotjazz.com/index.htm">Red Hot Jazz</a>. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945031 Tue, 31 May 2005 09:18:09 -0800 y2karl http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945117 Stampfel's quite a character; not merely does he still play way-out-there stringband music, but he's also the submissions editor for a sci-fi publisher, <a href="http://www.penguinputnam.com/static/html/aboutus/DAWsubmission.html">DAW Books</a>. He's also working on a project to record a song from every year of the 20th century -- and still found time to call me to give me a free banjo lesson over the phone. Stampfel and Weber don't get on so well these days. I was going to be working with Weber on a web project, but we never quite managed to get it to happen. (if you're looking for an HMR album to buy first, get <strong>1 and 2</strong>. <em>Moray Eels</em> is a bit hard to take, even if it doe have <a href="http://imdb.com/name/nm0001731/">Sam Shepard</a> on drums.) comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945117 Tue, 31 May 2005 10:46:19 -0800 scruss http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945124 Lord, I love robbin' banks! Tell the teller thanks...<blockquote>"You probably just don't have the software to know how good I feel about the <em>Have Moicy</em> release. So many people have told me that they love it, it changed their life, it turned them on to old-time asskickin' hillbilly, it lead them to a superior love life, it brought them much wealth and still remains a favorite after 20 years or 10. Everytime I listen to it, it sounds more together; it sounds like a bunch of loonies too."</blockquote>Amen, brother. And thanks for this great post. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945124 Tue, 31 May 2005 10:51:03 -0800 languagehat http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945244 i have an OLD tape of theirs. They were wonderful. slaphappy and tight musicians. "real world, real world, reeeall reaalll reealllll world" Thanks. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945244 Tue, 31 May 2005 12:34:00 -0800 reflecked http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945276 jon, I hope you wear your jock a lot. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945276 Tue, 31 May 2005 14:03:24 -0800 RakDaddy http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945366 <em></em>I hung out with Stampfel back in the 70s. Amazingly weird, very New York character. I love that he never gave up that old time-music-meets-psychedelic aesthetic - he even did a wild Appalachian version of the theme to <em>Goldfinger </em>about ten years ago. Large amounts of free, entire Charlie Poole cuts can be <a href="http://www.commotionpr.com/charliePoole.html">downloaded from here!</a> "If I Lose" rivals anything the Ramones ever did. Poole really influenced the 1970s US old-time revival, but his name was rarely mentioned although his songs were widely sung and used as the basis for a lot of folk rock imagery. Scuse me, but I just got home to Budapest after a fifteen hour drive from Milan with Ricky Scagg's ex-guitarist. I'm dead. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945366 Tue, 31 May 2005 15:57:31 -0800 zaelic http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945407 Cool post, y2karl! I think it should be mandatory that you make a weekly musical post - they are among my all time faves, many bookmarked. Your knowledgeable commentary and well-chosen pointers have brought me more enjoyment than I can possibly thank you for. ... and speaking of a former y2karl music threads, look <a href="http://www.natickarts.org/tcan_artistdetail.php?artist_id=491&event_id=491">who's</a> in my neighborhood in two weeks. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945407 Tue, 31 May 2005 16:55:43 -0800 madamjujujive http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945423 hey zaelic, you mean <a href="http://scruss.com/music/peter_stampfel-gold_finger.mp3">Goldfinger sounding like this</a>? [MP3] I was saddened to hear today that the supposedly excellent documentary about the HMRs, <strong>Bound To Lose</strong>, may never see public release, due to legal threats from Steve Weber [according to Stampfel, in the yahoo group <a href="http://groups.yahoo.com/group/have_moicy/">have_moicy</a> today]. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945423 Tue, 31 May 2005 17:12:23 -0800 scruss http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945729 I'd give my left testicle for another copy of "Have Moicy". But, I lost it long ago in Tijuana a card game. comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945729 Tue, 31 May 2005 22:43:28 -0800 troutfishing http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#945890 *pictures a Mexican triumphantly showing his compadres the testicle he won off a gringo in a card game* scruss, thanks for that -- perked my morning right up! comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-945890 Wed, 01 Jun 2005 06:14:37 -0800 languagehat http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#948251 <blockquote>Dear Rounders Fans: It is our regret to inform everybody that <em>Bound to Lose</em> has officially been pulled from the 2005 <a href="http://www.newportfilmfestival.com/">Newport International Film Festival</a> due to a legal threat by Steve Weber. After five years of working on the film, this is truly devastating. A lot of you have expressed support for the project and we want to offer a heartfelt thanks. And as if you need us to say it, Rounders fans are the best. ... Sincerely, Paul Lovelace Sam Wainwright Douglas badbird 1713 8th Avenue Suite #5-4 Brooklyn, New York 11215 718-788-2949 Roundersfilm /at/ yahoo /dot/ com</blockquote> comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-948251 Fri, 03 Jun 2005 15:57:14 -0800 scruss http://www.metafilter.com/42410/The-Moray-Eels-Eat-The-Holy-Modal-Rounders-and-Charlie-Poole-to-boot#948495 Best acid bluegrass ever. Excellent post. Doesn't it kinda break your heart Doesn't it make you sad When the boy you love so dear Turns out to be so bad? comment:www.metafilter.com,2005:site.42410-948495 Fri, 03 Jun 2005 20:49:02 -0800 gramschmidt