That Stuff Rubbed Off On Me

George requested Carl Perkins following the Perkins-Craig face off on Monday. I haven't posted any rockabilly since my Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night series came to a close in March 2015. It began to feel like homework and a chore, two hundred and ten posts in, so it stopped. So this is a rockabilly reprise for a Thursday in March...

In 1956 Carl Perkins released Her Love Rubbed Off, a song that makes maximum use of Carl's southern gargle, a psyched out guitar part and slap back echo. The lyric celebrates getting it on in a pretty frank style for 1956.

'Well, I was so alone in the city park
I met my baby standing in the dark
Took my lovin' baby by the hand
I let her know that I'm her lovin' man

That love rubbed off on me
That baby wouldn't let me be
That baby took me by the hand
That love, I made her understand
That love, I hollered no, no, no
That baby wouldn't let me go, oh, oh'

Her Love Rubbed Off

In 1990 The Cramps twisted it further around, Lux and Ivy adding volume and distortion to Carl's already pretty hot under the collar song. You just can't beat The Cramps.

Her Love Rubbed Off  Correct link now.

Sandstorms

I noticed in the labels list that runs down the right hand side of this blog that Carl Craig has pulled ahead of Carl Perkins in the postings stakes, eight posts to six (nine to seven now). Carl Perkins was there at the start of popular music- he wrote Blue Suede Shoes for crying out loud- but Carl Craig has a wider back catalogue and has pursued progression and sonic experimentation more doggedly. Not that it is a competition, they just both happen to be named Carl and next to each other on this blog.

Sandstorms is a 2004 track, from the Just Another Day ep, that builds languidly over squelchy bass noise. Carl is releasing an updated 2017 symphonic version with pianist Francesco Tristano, out shortly.

Sandstorms

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Rockabilly as a genre is particularly clothes obsessed and I've posted a number of rockabilly songs celebrating pink pedal pushers, cat clothes, a black leather jacket and motorcycle boots, be-bop glasses and blue suede shoes. Carl Perkins was responsible for blue suede shoes but it's best associated with Elvis Presley. The '68 Comeback is pretty special.

Have a good evening, whatever you're wearing, wherever you are.

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My recent spurt of Cramps enthusiasm has led me back to some of the source material. On Stay Sick! there is a suitably great and sleazy cover version of this song by the great Carl Perkins, from way back in 1956 and recorded for Sun Records. Carl has that pared down sound and and tone and wants to let her know that he's 'a lovin' man'. This is risque, even lewd, stuff for the mid-1950s- he says he'll take off all his clothes for her. His lovin' is so much that she'll follow him to the grave. And I can't believe it was only Lux Interior who took her love rubbing off on him as literally and not just metaphorically.

Her Love Rubbed Off

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Johnny Cash reckoned Carl Perkins was the King of rockabilly and who are we to disagree with the Man In Black. In this song, a demo recorded for Sun Records, Carl sings of an item of clothing I do not own. And am unlikely to, despite their availability online (see below).

Pink Pedal Pushers

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Tonight's Rockabilly comes from one of the originators- Carl Perkins, who the Japanese couple in Mystery Train argued about for most of the film, may have been better than Elvis. Honey Don't was the B-side to Blue Suede Shoes, released in January 1956 and is just as groundbreaking as Joey Beltram's Energy Flash thirty four years later. But with fewer drug references.

Honey Don't

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Carl Perkins, who had a thing about clothes- Blue Suede Shoes and Pink Pedal Pushers among others- with a Friday night instruction. Put your cat clothes on.

Put Your Cat Clothes On.wma

Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night 11

It's Friday night and it's that time again, for our weekly rockabilly rave-up. Carl Perkins (he was there before Elvis music fans) invites you to a party, and for this bank holiday weekend, including our pre-40th trip to Edinburgh, I think we should all get Dixie Fried. Have a great weekend.

14 Dixie Fried.wma