The Milkshakes Sing and Play 20 Rock & Roll Hits of the 50's & 60's (1984)

A genius.

When I listen to a Billy Childish record I want to play my guitar.

When I see a Billy Childish painting I want to paint.

When I read a Billy childish poem I want to write poems.

When I see Billy Childish I want to grow a fine moustache

and ride an old bicycle. 

That's how much I like Billy Childish.

The greatest record you've never heard...

Ok, I'll admit that's a sensationalist title for a post, and that many of you will indeed have heard the record in question.
When a few months back I compiled my Desert Island Discs selection I didn't include this song for the following reasons:
1- I had only ever heard it once, fifteen years ago.
2- I wasn't 100% sure of the name of the group.
3- I wasn't sure if it had ever been released.

Rewind to 1995 (I had to look it up).
A guy I work with gives me a lift one day. In his car ( a battered car with a tape deck to match) he plays a tape, not in a 'you've got to listen to this' way, just as background noise. It was a mixtape of garage type bands, The Milkshakes, Thee Headcoats etc.
One song really stood out.
Now this is where the shards of my memory, splintered by years of abuse, fail to come together.
Was he the drummer in this band? I remember that he was a drummer, that's for sure, but did he tell me that he'd been in this band? Or did he just know them? He'd lived in their town until quite recently. I honestly can't remember.
Any way- the other day I found the record on the excellent Shotgun Solution blog.
Here it is. Don't forget to show your appreciation to the original poster.

G.L.O.R.I.A

If you drop a guitar down a flight of stairs, it'll play 'Gloria' on its way to the bottom- Dave Barry.
This is for all you people who are starting groups- Woody (The 101ers)

Curmudgeonly Belfast bluesman Van Morrison penned this song in 1964 and it appeared as the B side to his band Them's single Baby Please Don't Go.

It's eminently playable simple 3 chord structure made it a staple of the booming garage scene on both sides of the Atlantic. There are versions here by US garage bands The Gants (the first recorded cover), The Squires, and Robb London and Soul Unlimited. In 1965 Chicago's The Shadows of Knight released a slightly bowdlerized version that made the Billboard top ten.

Garage rock had a global appeal and we have here two Latin American interpretations of the song, from Columbia's Los Ampex and Mexico's Miguel Angel and Los Sharps.

Meanwhile down in Adelaide notorious hedonists The Masters Apprentices were giving Gloria their own treatment.

As the beat music of the era gained a more acid tinged, psychedelic feel, bands such as The 13th Floor Elevators emerged from the garage scene . The song's simple structure and sexual overtones made it an ideal backdrop for the meandering poetic improvisations of Jim Morrison of The Doors and a backbone for the inspired guitar noodlings of Jimi Hendrix.

Patti Smith opened her 1975 LP Horses (one of the most influential records in the history of popular music) with her take on Gloria, featuring a trademark poetic ramble.

This outing propelled Gloria into the proto punk garage scene that spawned pub rock , two versions here- The 101ers and Eddie and the Hot Rods. In that other great populist music boom of the 70's, Disco, Santa Esmeralda funked up the track for a spin under the glitterballs (to be honest it isn't as funky as you'd expect).
The first time that Melbourne's The Boys Next Door were recorded was a live set featuring Gloria in 1977 .
Van Morrison teamed up with John Lee Hooker to take the song back into the charts in 1993.

The appeal of the three chord bash that typified garage music is enduring as well as far reaching- contemporary Magnitude 3 from Japan come up with by far the most primitive take of the song here, and The Crushers from Moscow give us a massive 21 st century version .

Bear in mind:
Variable bitrate.
Some of original recordings rudimentary.
Van Morrison is known to employ 10,000 monitors in five continents working 24 hours a day to ensure that his work is not circulated via the internet.

Billy Childish- 25 years of being childish (2002)

Billy says it all in his own words there. Can't add to that.
Here is a 42 track retrospective of the first 25 years of Billy Childish's recording career, featuring The Pop Rivits, The Milkshakes, Thee Mighty Ceasars, The Delmonas, Sexton Ming, Jack Ketch + crowmen, Thee Headcoats, Thee Headcoatees, Armitage Shanks, The Blackhands, and The Buff Medways.

The 5.6.7.8's- Bomb The Rocks- Early Days Singles 1989-1996.

The 5.6.7.8's make some other so-called garage groups sound like Genesis. Plenty of vigour and urgency here. No extraneous polish.

This is a compilation of their early material.

Billy Childish -Thee Milkshakes (1984) -Thee Headcoats (1993)

What we have here are two live sets featuring the great Billy Childish.
Thee Milkshakes recorded in 1984 and Thee Headcoats from 1993.
The King of Garage Rock- Childish has produced over 100 LP’s with his various bands, in addition to writing 40 volumes of poetry and producing hundreds of paintings.
This is the sort of stuff that should make you dust down that old guitar…
The file contains sleeve notes, line ups etc.