Hop Sun Part Deux

Desafanido- Laurindo Almeida MP3


Satin Doll- Laurindo Almeida MP3

8/12/11

beeradvocate.com rating- beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/3818/17497

Southern Tier Hop Sun Summer Wheat Beer- Superior Market, Sunnyside, Queens, NY- 12 oz. bomber into Belgian Beer Glass- 7.0% ABV

Head- A fibger's worth of head which receded quickly; no lacing

Color- Darker in color than last years beer with more of an orange tint. (view 2010 version in post below.)

Mouthfeel- Light bodied. Medium active carbonation

Aroma- Lemon. Hops.

Tatse/ Overall- I had this beer last summer and spoke about it an earlier blog:

thursdaynightrecordsandbeer.blogspot.com/2010/09/9610-southern-tier-hop-sun-summer-wheat.html

I enjoyed it then and decided to try it again. It is very much as I remember it though with a bit more of a "wheaty" quality than last years. For a wheat beer it has a nice hop presence and a pleasant bitterness. This is a crisp refreshing beer and would be highly recommended for a summers day.

On the turntable is I Left My Heart In San Francisco- Laurindo Almeida- This LP, based on my research, was originally issued as "Acapulco 22" on Capitol Records in 1963. This version was released by Pickwick Records based out of Long Island City, NY about 5 or 6 miles west of where I live and was licensed from its original incarnation from Capitol. I got this LP earlier this summer in Philadelphia. It was reasonably priced and I had been looking for something by this guitarist for a while so I picked it up. I really like the cover art and its overall “60’s” design elements. The LP was manufactured in Hauppauge, NY out In Suffolk County. It’s funny to think of a record pressing plant out there but I guess at the time, back in the days of Grumman, it wasn’t uncommon to have a manufacturing plant out on Long Island. Pickwick Records largely did budget priced LP’s and soundalike records. This LP was probably marketed as a budget LP but the vinyl itself feels pretty high quality especially compared with a lot of the flimsy feeling “budget” lp’s in my collection or even later day records, from the mid seventies onwards, distributed by major labels like Warner Bros.

Mr. Almeida was a Brazilian born guitarist who was brought to the U.S. by Stan Kenton to play with his band. Mr. Almeida went on to have a successful recording career as a leader through much of the 60's and 70's. This is an “electronically enhanced” stereo LP which according to my friend was when they took a recording originally recorded in mono and “spruced” it up with reverb, etc. to create an artificial “stereo” effect. In this case I don’t think it really detracts from the album but this would certainly sound good in Mono. I really like the organ on these tracks and, for me, it really lends itself to what are otherwise fairly straight forward bossa-nova arrangements. Included above are the songs "Satin Doll" and "Desafinado".

Living In Darkness To Hide Our Wrong

To Love Somebody- James Carr MP3


Life Turned Her That Way- James Carr MP3


Everybody Needs Somebody- James Carr MP3

8/11/11

http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/1853/9365

Sly Fox Route 113 IPA- Key Food, Forest Hills Queens, NY- 22 oz. bomber into 12oz. Brandy Snifter- 7.0% ABV

Head- About a fingers worth of head. Heavy lacing.

Color- Rusty orange

Mouthfeel- Medium bodied, with some creamieness. Medium active carbonation

Aroma- Tangerine, lemon. Yeast...?

Taste/ Overall- This beer was brewed in Pennslyvania. Big citurs smell, grapefruit and maybe even caramel in the aroma..There is a distinct sweetness in the smell and a bit in the taste which is not quite to my liking.. But there is also a creamy texture I don't normally find in alot of IPA's which is a nice feature. I detch a hint of boozieness to this ale but just a bit. Not a bad beer, pretty good in fact, though I would like to see the sweetness drawn back but that is also what sets it apart from other IPA's I have had.

On the turntable is At The Dark End Of The Street- James Carr- Compiled by Upside Records in 1987- Mr. Carr came of age during the golden age of southern soul music and whose music was crafted by the guiding hands of musicians and producers working out of Muscle Shoals, Alabama and Memphis, Tennessee. Carr never experienced widespread success like some of his contemporaries and is now largely overlooked outside the community of fans interested in 1960’s era southern soul music. For those interested his fairly brief career is analyzed and described by Barney Hoyskns in the undervalued and overlooked book amazon.com/Say-Time-Brokenhearted-Barney-Hoskyns/dp/074754137X. This book, published in 1998, describes the incestuous relationship between American soul, blues and country music and the unique mixing of white and black cultures which helped produce these musical folk forms.

I was first introduced to the song At the Dark End of the Street on a CD compilation included with an issue of Mojo Magazine from around 2003. It was performed by the Flying Burrito Brothers and it was my first introduction to both the song and the band. I became enamored by the formers ability to incorporate soul songs into their country-rock arrangements and have them sound original and completely at home within a genre which seemed on the surface so at odds with what 60’s soul music was identified with. Little did I know the synergy between these genres can be traced back to many sources and one of the first I recognized is the collaboration between two of the masters of blues/jazz and country music on the tune Blue Yodel #9: Louis Armstrong and Jimmie Rodgers.



Session information and musicians

This is a compilation of Carr’s work in both Memphis and Muscle Shoals from the late sixties when the largest percentage of his output was recorded. The album opens with the classic At the Dark End of the Street. After I heard the FBB version of the song it was still a few years before I started to learn about the origins of what could possibly be argued as one of the Top 10 soul songs of all time and at the very least my favorite. I was surprised to learn the original version of the song was written by two white musicians/producers named Chips Moman and Dan Penn, recorded by a group of southern white musicians and preformed by an African-American singer named James Carr. This LP includes Carr’s version of To Love Somebody which was originally written by Barry and Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees and later preformed, again, by the Flying Burrito Brothers. The 2nd track I posted above is the Harlan Howard (a prolific country music writer during its unofficial golden age) penned Life Turned Her That Way. Again this track illustrates the mighty crossover appeal of the country/soul genres and the similarity of themes explored in both. Lastly I included the compilations closing track Everybody Needs Somebody which I feel is most notable for its jaunty organ/clavinet riff reminiscent of Garth Hudson’s playing style from The Band who were in their own way musically informed by the music emerging from Muscle Shoals and Memphis.