Köthener Straße 38 - The Legend of Hansa Studios

Fripp, Eno, Bowie at Hansa: "heroes" forever and ever

For my personal history of music listener, Hansa Tonstudio is essentially the temple where U2 crafted Achtung Baby. For the history of modern popular music, the Berlin studios are something more. A kind of dark sonic magic that started in the Seventies, when a notorious wall was still up (few steps from the door of the studios) and David Bowie came there - along with his friend Iggy - to start a new career (great book about those years: Thomas Jerome Seabrook's Bowie in Berlin).

This playlist tries to capture some of the Hansa's sound and vision. It features two songs each "selected recording" I found on the studios' Wikipedia page. Just one album in that list is missing from Spotify: Ossler's Ett Bruss. So, to get the symbolic 38 songs of the title/address, I added one track from Diamanda Galas' You Must Be Certain of the Devil and a bonus from U2: Stay (Faraway, So Close!). A song born from the Achtung Baby sessions, with a wenderesque video (below) that made me fall in love with Berlin fifteen years before I could finally walk through the Tiergarten.

Not a very joyful collection of music (Siouxsie, Depeche Mode, Nick Cave!), but I hope you can enjoy it. :o)

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KOTHENER STRASSE 38
The Legend of Hansa Studios
Source: Wikipedia.

David Bowie – Sound And Vision/Warszawa
(from Low, 1977)
David Bowie – "Heroes"/V-2 Schneider
(from "Heroes", 1977)
Iggy Pop – China Girl/Nightclubbing
(from The Idiot, 1977)
Iggy Pop – The Passenger/Lust For Life
(from Lust For Life, 1977)
Tangerine Dream – Force Majeure/Cloudburst Flight
(from Force Majeure, 1979)
David Bowie – Remembering Marie A./Baal's Hymn
(from Baal, 1982)
Depeche Mode – Everything Counts/Love In Itself
(from Construction Time Again, 1983)
Killing Joke – Love Like Blood/Eighties
(from Night Time, 1984)
Marillion – Kayleigh/Pseudo Silk Kimono
(from Misplaced Childhood, 1984)
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Tupelo/Say Goodbye To The Little Girl Tree
(from The Firstborn Is Dead, 1984)
Siouxsie And The Banshees – Cities In Dust/Candyman
(from Tinderbox, 1986)
Killing Joke – Adorations/Sanity
(from Brighter Than a Thousand Suns, 1986)
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Your Funeral My Trial/Sad Waters
(from Your Funeral... My Trial, 1986)
Diamanda Galas – Let My People Go
(from You Must Be Certain of the Devil, 1987)
U2 – Zoo Station/One
(from Achtung Baby, 1991)
U2 – Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
(from Zooropa, 1993)
Snow Patrol – Crack The Shutters/If There's a Rocket Tie Me To It
(from A Hundred Million Suns, 2008)
Supergrass – Diamond Hoo Ha Man/When I Needed You
(from Diamond Hoo Ha, 2008)
KT Tunstall – (Still A) Weirdo/Uummannaq Song
(from Tiger Suit, 2010)
R.E.M. – ÜBerlin/Discoverer
(from Collapse Into Now, 2011)

Listen to it on Spotify: HTTP, URI. (SR0723)

The UK Blue Stax Singles Collection 1967-1968

Just to prove you that I'm not Nick Hornby's Annie Wilkes and that I care more for taking some good musical advices from him than dissecting his books, here it comes a new playlist. Actually, Hornby suggested it, when he wrote - in the first pages of Fever Pitch - "We would be left to rot with our Arsenal programmes or our collection of original blue-label Stax records...". Blue-label Stax records? What's that? Here's the answer: a collection of old vinyl records, out in the UK in 1967 and 1968. Below, you find it almost completely (83,33%) spotified. A good soundtrack for your vintage soul parties, with Otis Redding, Carla Thomas and many other great black acts. Enjoy!

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THE UK BLUE STAX SINGLES COLLECTION 1967-1968
Source: Staxman.co.uk (whose table below I shamelessly copied and pasted, and where you can find some useful infos if you're a vinyl collector...)
Songs available on Spotify: 70 out of 84 (83,33%)

601001	Eddie Floyd	Raise Your Hand	1967	42	Stax 208A
		I've Just Been Feeling Bad			Stax 208B
601002	Carla Thomas	Something Good (Is Going To Happen To You)	1967	--	Stax 207A
		It's Starting To Grow			Stax 207B
601003	Johnnie Taylor	Ain't That Lovin' You	1967	--	Stax 209A
		Outside Love			Stax 209B
601004	Sam & Dave	Soothe Me	1967	35	(none)
		Sweet Pains (remastered 2006 version)			(none)
601005	Otis Redding	Day Tripper	1967	43	(none)
		Shake			(none)
601006	Sam & Dave	When Something Is Wrong With My Baby	1967	--	Stax 210A
		A Small Portion Of Your Love			Stax 210B
601007	Otis Redding	Let Me Come On Home	1967	48	Volt 146B
		I Love You More Than Words Can Say			Volt 146A
601008	Carla Thomas	When Tomorrow Comes	1967	--	Stax 214A
		Unchanging Love			Stax 214B
601009	Booker T. & M.G.s	Hip Hug Her	1967	--	Stax 211A
		Summertime			Stax 211B
601010	Mable John	Same Time, Same Place	1967	--	Stax 215A
		Bigger And Better			Stax 215B
601011	Otis Redding	Shake (live)	1967	28	Volt 149A
		634-5789 (studio; original single was live)			(none)
601012	Otis Redding & Carla Thomas	Tramp	1967	18	Stax 216A
		Oooh Carla, Oooh Otis			(none)
601013	Rufus Thomas	Greasy Spoon	1967	--	Stax 221B
		Sophisticated Sissy			Stax 221A
601014	Bar-Kays	Soul Finger	1967	33	Volt 148A
		Knucklehead			Volt 148B
601015	Albert King	Born Under A Bad Sign	1967	--	Stax 217A
		Personal Manager			Stax 217B
601016	Eddie Floyd	Things Get Better	1967	31	Stax 187A
		Good Love , Bad Love			Stax 187B
601017	Otis Redding	The Glory Of Love	1967	--	Volt 152A
		I'm Coming Home			Volt 152B
601018	Booker T. & M.G.s	Groovin'	1967	--	Stax 224A
		Slim Jenkin's Place			Stax 224B
601019	William Bell	Eloise (Hang On In There)	1967	--	Stax 227A
		One Plus One			Stax 227B
601020	Ruby Johnson	If I Ever Needed Love (I Sure Do Need It Now)	1967	--	Volt 147A
		Keep On Keeping On			Volt 147B
601021	Otis Redding & Carla Thomas	Knock On Wood	1967	35	Stax 228A
		Let Me Be Good To You			Stax 228B
601022	Judy Clay	You Can't Run Away From Your Heart	1967	--	Stax 230A
		It Takes A Lotta Good Love			Stax 230B
601023	Sam & Dave	Soul Man	1967	24	Stax 231A
		May I Baby			Stax 231B
601024	Eddie Floyd	On A Saturday Night	1967	--	Stax 233A
		Under My Nose			Stax 233B
601025	Bar-Kays	Give Everybody Some	1967	--	Volt 154A
		Don't Do That			Volt 154B
601026	Booker T. & M.G.s	Chinese Checkers	1967	--	Stax 137A
		Plum Nellie			Stax 137B
601027	Otis Redding	(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction	1967	--	Volt 132A
		I've Been Loving You Too Long			Volt 126A
601028	Rufus Thomas	Down Ta My House	1968	--	Stax 240A
		Steady Holding On			Stax 240B
601029	Albert King	Cold Feet	1968	--	Stax 241A
		You Sure Drive A Hard Bargain			Stax 241B
601030	Sam & Dave	I Thank You	1968	34	Stax 242A
		Wrap It Up			Stax 242B
601031	Otis Redding	(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay	1968	3	Volt 157A
		My Sweet Lorene			Volt 157B
601032	Carla Thomas	Pick Up The Pieces	1968	--	Stax 239A
		Separation			Stax 239B
601033	Otis Redding & Carla Thomas	Lovey Dovey	1968	--	Stax 244A
		New Year's Resolution			Stax 244B
601034	Mable John	Able Mable	1968	--	Stax 249A
		Don't Get Caught			Stax 249B
601035	Eddie Floyd	Big Bird	1968	--	Stax 246A
		Holding On With Both Hands			Stax 246B
601036	Bar-Kays	A Hard Day's Night	1968	--	Volt 158A
		I Want Someone			Volt 158B
601037	Rufus Thomas	The Memphis Train	1968	--	Stax 250A
		I Think I Made A Boo-Boo			Stax 250B
601038	William Bell	A Tribute To A King	1968	--	Stax 248A
		Every Man Oughta Have A Woman			Stax 248B
601039	Derek Martin	Soul Power	1968	--	Volt 160A
		Sly Girl			Volt 160B
601040	Otis Redding	The Happy Song	1968	34	Volt 163A
		Open The Door			Volt 163B
601041	Linda Lyndell	Bring Your Love Back To Me	1968	--	Volt 161A
		Here I Am			Volt 161B
601042	Albert King	(I Love) Lucy	1968	--	Stax 252A
		You're Gonna Need Me			Stax 252B

Listen to it on Spotify: HTTP, URI. (SR0722)

UK Blue Stax singles were slightly different (with some previously unissued songs) and definitely less numerous than US singles. If you think this playlist is not enough and you wanna more soul, check the 244-song boxset Stax-Volt: The Complete Singles 1959-1968.

Booktracks - Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch

Two weeks ago, I made a business trip to London. Well, not the usual & boring weekdays kind of trip; but the rare & incredibly entertaining weekend kind. I spent most of the time at the Arsenal's Emirates Stadium, attending some matches of the Emirates Cup. Even if in a playground mode, my schedule was quite tight. At the end of it, just before Arsenal and New York Red Bulls started the last match of the tournament, I had to jump in a train of the Piccadilly Line and go to Heathrow, for catching my flight back. I did it. But I took the longest and winding road. Not southwest-ward, to the closer Halloway Road tube station, but northeast-ward, to the properly called Arsenal station. Just for one reason: I wanted to dedicate at least five minutes and five pictures to the remains of the nearby old Highbury stadium.

From my Italian perspective and historical memory, Highbury is the stadium where our nazionale played a foggy and legendary 1934 game against the England team. We lost 3-2 (this YouTube title is wrong), but we showed we could compete even with the masters of football (nowadays, that Italian team is still known as "I leoni di Highbury", Highbury lions...). From my Torino-fan perspective, Highbury is the last stadium where we played an international game, in 1994 against Arsenal, obviously losing it, before being swallowed in the inferno of the second division, where we are still floating & burning. From the British point of view, naturally, the stadium is (was) something different, something more, the historical temple of Arsenal.

From my five-minutes-tourist-in-Islington perspective, instead, Highbury was essentially the main character of a book I did and do love: Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch. That's the reason behind the picture you see above (shot while a bike gang of 12-year-old boys were noisingly staring at me and at my smartphone, in a way that today has assumed a different, creepier tone, in the aftermath of recent London riots). And that's the reason of this playlist, too. On the tube to Heathrow, I started reading Fever Pitch again. I loved it, again (this guy became famous writing a book about his obsession for football?? Genius!!). I noted many musical references. And I decided to make a booktrack with all these references (booktrack = book + soundtrack, an invention of mine, but I kindly let it in public domain...).

Some things:
1st: yes, I'm really, pathologically sick.
2nd: no, really, totally sick: I started to look for YouTube videos of the matches Hornby wrote about, too. You find some of them, below: so, actually, this is a booktubetrack (public domain, again).
3rd: I noticed that during the Seventies Hornby listened to much more music than in the Eighties. Or, maybe, the music he listened to left a stronger mark in its DNA. Indeed, there are far more music references, comparisons and jokes in the first half of the book, than in the latter.

One more thing: my personal Fever Pitch revival was completed tonight with the (second) view of the 1997 movie adaptation with Colin Firth. It's a really good summer movie. You even appreciate it when you don't care a lot about Arsenal and you support another football team, locked in the italian Serie B. The movie soundtrack is good, too, starting with The La's' There She Goes and going through The Who, Lisa oh-my-god-the-end-of-the-80s Stansfield and Van Morrison. So I decided to add some of these songs to the playlist, too, as bonus tracks (booktubemoviesoundtrack?)

One very last thing: if you support ManU, City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham or whatever other English team, probably you will find all this Arsenal stuff rather annoying (except the last video, maybe). I understand it. If I saw on a website something similar about Juventus, I'd probably block the website access from my computer and likely I'd even start writing anonymous menacing emails to the site owner. Well, in that case, forget the post and its humble writer, and give a chance to the music. I think the playlist is not bad, quite varied & classic, and since there are not Gallaghers in it, it's definitely football agnostic.

Enjoy! :o)

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BOOKTRACKS - NICK HORNBY's FEVER PITCH
Source: Fever Pitch (book) + Fever Pitch (movie)

1. Eddie Floyd - Raise Your Hand*
2. Carla Thomas - Something Good (Is Going To Happen You)*
3. Johnny Taylor - Ain't That Lovin' You (For More Reasons Than One)*
4. Sam and Dave - Soothe Me*
5. Otis Redding - Day Tripper*
* first five blue-label Stax records
(page 2: "We would be left to rot with our Arsenal programmes or our collection of original blue-label Stax records...")

6. David Cassidy - Cherish
7. Black Sabbath - Paranoid
(page 21: "How could my sister not hear that David Cassidy was not in the same class as Black Sabbath?")

8. Richard Tauber - Girls Were Made To Love and Kiss
(page 31: "Constable Morgan (whose rank never changed throughout his long Highbury career) sang highlights from light operettas and Hollywood musicals: my programme for the Derby Game says that he performed Lehar's 'Girls We Made To Love and Kiss' that afternoon.")



9. Steve Morse - Heartbreaker
(page 38: "Once we went to look around the Chelsea Drugstore, where I bought the second Led Zeppelin album..."; the song is taken from Led Zeppelin II, but it's a cover version because of the Led Zeppelin embargo on Spotify; )

10. Lou Reed - I Wanna Be Black
(pag.40: "Hence the phenomenon of mock-belonging, whereby pasts and backgrounds are manufactured and massaged in order to provide some kind of acceptable cultural identity. Who was it that sang 'I Wanna Be Black'?")

11. Pogues - Whiskey in the Jar
(pag.40: "All those Pogues fans from Hertfordshire singing Irish rebel songs!")

12. Elvis Presley - In the Ghetto
13. Rolling Stones - I Wanna Be Your Man
(pag. 41: "The 1944 Education Act, the first Labour Government, Elvis, beatniks, the Beatles and the Stones, the sixties... we never stood a chance"; Beatles not available on Spotify yet, I had to mix the things a little with the Stones...).

14. Muddy Waters - Mannish Boy
(pag.41: "It's no wonder we all wanted to be Muddy Waters or Charlie George")



15. The Blues Brothers - Soul Man
(pag.72: "You like football? Then you also like soul music, beer, thumping people, grabbing ladies' breasts, and money")

16. Dire Straits - Sultans of Swing
17. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - "Notte e giorno faticar" (Don Giovanni, Act I)
(pag.72: "You're a rugby or a cricket man? You like Dire Straits or Mozart, wine, pinching ladies' bottoms and money")

18. Luther Vandross - Never Too Much
(pag. 72: "You don't fit into either camp? Macho, nein danke? In which case it must follow that you're a pacifist vegetarian, studiously oblivious to the charms of Michelle Pfeiffer, who thinks that only leering wideboys listen to Luther Vandross)

19. Rod Stewart - You Wear It Well
(pag. 74: "I developed a new hairstyle (supposed to resemble Rod Stewart's, but I never found the courage for the spikes) to go with the clobber")

20. Olivia Newton-John - Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain
(pag.75: "She was, I thought, beautiful, with the long, straight, centre-parted hair and the melting doe eyes of Olivia Newton-John).

21. Van Morrison - Caravan
(pag. 78: "... and suddenly life was all drink and soft drugs and European literature and Van Morrison).

22. Danny Kaye - I've Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts
(pag.90: "And when they won a game, the tannoy would blast out 'I've Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts'...").

23. Graham Parker & The Rumour - The New York Shuffle
24. Television - Venus
25. Patti Smith - Pissing In A River
26. Bruce Springsteen - Thunder Road
27. The Clash - White Riot
(pag.92: "... I bought and borrowed records by Graham Parker and Television and Patti Smith and Bruce Springsteen and The Clash...).

28. Ramones - Blitzkreig Bop
(pag.94: "How come I had to rely on a couple of Chandler paperbacks and the first Ramones album to provide me with some kind of identity?")

29. Mavis Staples - Chocolate City
30. Shirley Brown - Woman To Woman
(pag.95: "And I have met women who love music, and can tell their Mavis Staples from their Shirley Browns...").

31. Buzzcocks - Orgasm Addict
(pag.102: "I played a Buzzcock album instead (the Singles - Going Steady compilation album), knowing that side one would take me through to the final whistle")

32. Bay City Rollers - Bye Bye Baby
(pag.106: "There were others who did the same, and behind me a pair of teenage girls were weeping silently, not in the hammy fashion of teenage girls at Bay City Rollers concerts, but in a way that suggested a deep and personal gried")



33. Rod Stewart - Sailing
(pag.116: "Everyone knows the song that Millwall fans sing, to the tune of 'Sailing': 'No one likes us/No one likes us/No one likes us/We don't care'").

34. Sex Pistols - Anarchy in the UK
(pag.119: "There was something about it that reminded me of Bill Grundy winding up the Sex Pistols on television in 1976 and then expressing his outrage about their behaviour afterwards. Arsenal, the first of the true punk rockers: our centre-halves were fulfilling a public need for harmless pantomime deviancy long before Johnny Rotten came along".)



35. Maria Callas - Un bel dì vedremo (from Giacomo Puccini's "Madama Butterfly")
(pag.126: "In 1969 I saw George Best play, and score, for Manchester United at Highbury. The experience should have been profound, like seeing Nijinsky dance, or Maria Callas sing, and though I do talk about it in that way sometimes, to younger fans, or those who missed out Best for other reasons, my fond account is essentially phoney: I hated that afternoon".)

36. The Jam - In The City
(pag.130: "It had occurred to me - as I think it occurs to many young teachers of a similar ilk - that my interests (football and pop music in particular) would be an advantage in the classroom, that I would be able to 'identify' with 'the kids' because I understood the value of the Jam and Laurie Cunningham".)

37. Rolling Stones - Painted Black (live)
(pag.192: "Or maybe you saw the Stones at Wembley, but then even something like that is repeated for night after night nowadays, and consequently doesn't have the same one-off impact of a football match".)



BONUS TRACKS (FROM 1987 "FEVER PITCH" MOVIE SOUNDTRACK)
38. The La's – There She Goes
39. Harry J Allstars – The Liquidator
40. The Pogues – Fiesta
41. The Who – Baba O'Riley - Remixed Version
42. Tim Hardin – How Can We Hang On To A Dream
43. Fine Young Cannibals – Good Thing
44. Lisa Stansfield – All Around The World
45. Van Morrison – Bright Side Of The Road

Listen to it on Spotify: HTTP, URI.



Previously booktracked:
Nick Hornby's High Fidelity
La musica liberata (mine)

The Indie Labels Party - 5 new labels (Sub Pop, Secretly Canadian, Merge, Acuarela, Morr)

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