Word out.

Photo by MQMurphy 

There's a little article on the Cape May Times website about Cape May County's newest radio station. For those of you more than ten miles from Cape May the best I can offer for my bit is that I'm looking into how podcasts (webisodes?) are done. Last Saturday's show featured no challenge, but the theme was "Royalty". That meant we had plenty of Duke Ellington, Aretha Franklin - the Queen of Soul, songs about kings (King of the Road, King of Pain, King of Wishful Thinking), Dukes (Duke of Earl, Sir Duke), and your odd Prince. (Pun-tentional? Your call.)

A challenge was suggested yesterday - Dennis Quaid to Janis Joplin. The challenger says he already has the links worked out - we'll see what I come up with.
There'll be a Grammy themed show on the 9th of February, of course. Want to send challenges or suggest themes? Put them right here in the form of a comment, mes amis.

Details, details . . .

Been having an ongoing discussion with my interlocutor about the methodology of my linking. If anything, my reputation in general is one of consistent inconsistency.
On the one hand, Joe questions the use of a songwriter-in-common as a valid link - but he finishes with " . . . but it's your show, you make up the rules." Arrrgh!
As I look back over the Challenges there is a clear 'catch-as-catch-can' element. (Say that three times fast - you'll break your teeth!)
Let's say that I aspire to the purity of an "In the same place at the same time" quality of connection.
The last one I did - Rudy Vallee to Carly Simon - was a stumper. I got stalled on the Rudy end for a while. It's not as if he didn't have a long and broad career, I just couldn't make a link work. I ended up using (needing!) The Village People to put a breathing Rudy in the last quarter of the 20th Century. Real hand-to-hand, that - but then I completely break down into flimsy links based on who-formed-what-record-company. Granted, being able to include The Village People and Captain Beefheart in the trip makes the calisthenics worthwhile. Also, I like the idea that before yesterday, no one around here had heard "Bat Chain Puller" coming out of their radios for a few years. At least.

The Rudy-Vallee-to-Carly-Simon challenge was featured on the January 19 show, which had a secondary (lame-ass) theme of "About a Quarter to Three".

Over the transom.

David MacKenzie, a member of the Radio Committee at CCA, sent in a challenge a little ways back. It wasn't emailed or even called in - it was carried in on a slip of paper by his wife Hope Gaines. Dave wanted me to link Jim Kweskin to Peggy Lee.
Kweskin's name rang a bell (the Amazing Kweskin?) - it started a Pavlovian reel in my brain that is just six words long: "Jim Kweskin and the Jug Band".

I sort of knew what jug band music was - not really sure that I'd ever listened to much of it. Jug band music was part of the folk music revival of the late fifties and early sixties. Coffeehouse fare. (Editor's note: By definition - being part of a revival means that Jug Band music had a history before the folkies came along.)
I hit the Wikipedia with "Jim Kweskin" and the entry that came up had another name that I hadn't heard or seen in a long time - Mel Lyman.

Lyman played harmonica with the Kweskin Jug Band, and that experience apparently qualified him to move on to become a spiritual leader. A friend of ours from Philadelphia found the Lyman family in Boston and fell under the influence for a while.

Back on earth and in the music world, the Boston-based Kweskin Jug Band also featured Geoff Muldaur and Maria D'Amato. Miss D'Amato became better known to the music world as Maria Muldaur.
Ahhh, love. Before the Kweskin Jug Band, she had been a member of the Even Dozen Jug Band in New York. The EDJB was a late entry in the folk revival and when the band - uh, - disbanded many of its alums went on to other notable careers in the music industry.
Like who/what?
Like John B. Sebastian, who formed The Lovin' Spoonful.
Aside from his work with the Spoonful and his solo recordings, Sebastian was a prolific songwriter and at least one of his songs was recorded by Peggy Lee.
Her version of the John Sebastian song "Didn't Want to Have to Do It" was included in a 110-cut (whew!) box set collection of Lee's singles.

The Jim-Kweskin-to-Peggy-Lee challenge was featured on the January 12 show, which had the secondary theme of "Angels, Devils, etc".