The Marvellous Melotone

"The Marvellous Melotone" gramophone ad, Evening Post, 14 December 1925

"20 Beautiful Models to select from, priced from 8 to 100 Guineas"

Early in the morning, late at night, I want me some

Thursday music corner: Wendy Rene (1947-2014) was a Memphis-born soul singer who recorded on Volt and Stax Records in the mid-1960s. Born Mary Frierson, her stage name was suggested by label-mate Otis Redding. The novelty number Bar-B-Q, released when she was seventeen years old, was her fourth single, and her second released on Stax. The single featured Stax house band Booker T & the MGs guitarist Steve Cropper. Rene released one more single on Stax in 1965, and then retired from the music business to raise a family.

Wendy Rene - Bar-B-Q (1964)

See also:

Music: Wendy Rene & The Drapels - Wondering (1964)

Music: Wendy Rene - After Laughter (Comes Tears) (1964)

Music: Wendy Rene - Give You What I Got (1965)

Lou says you changed your pickup for a Seville

Thursday music corner: Kirsty MacColl (b.Croydon 1959, d.2000 Mexico) was a British singer-songwriter born to Scottish parents in London. Her father was notable Scottish folk singer Ewan MacColl (1915-89). She was signed to Stiff Records before her 20th birthday after impressing on backing vocals duties for punk band Drug Addix, and went on to release five albums during her lifetime, including Electric Landlady, which reached number 17 in the UK album charts in 1991, and Tropical Brainstorm, which later went gold in the year she died. 

MacColl is most famous for the 1987 UK number two single, Fairytale of New York, recorded with the Pogues; producer Steve Lillywhite was her then-husband. The single topped the Irish charts and also reached number 5 in New Zealand. MacColl was killed in a boating accident aged 41 when a powerboat moving at speed in a restricted area struck her while she was pushing her son out of harm's way.

There's A Guy Works Down The Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis was MacColl's third single release, and the first to chart. It reached number 14 in the UK singles chart in 1981, and appeared on her debut album Desperate Character.    

Kirsty MacColl - There's A Guy Works Down The Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis (1981)

See also:

Music: Kirsty MacColl - Days (Kinks cover, 1989)

Music: The Pogues & Kirsty MacColl - Fairytale of New York (1987)

Music: Ewan MacColl - Van Diemen's Land (1952)

Come on outside, let me hear those thoughts

Thursday music corner: American singer-songwriter Sharon Van Etten has released seven studio albums since 2009, including her most recent, Sharon Van Etten & the Attachment Theory, released in February 2025. She has also acted in TV series and films. She and her band are currently touring Australia and New Zealand, and performed at Wellington's Opera House on Tuesday, along with impressive support from Los Angeles folk-punk singer Shannon Lay.

Idiot Box is an album track from Van Etten's most recent album, and was written by Van Etten and the band.

Sharon Van Etten & the Attachment Theory - Idiot Box (live, 2025)

See also:

Music: Sharon Van Etten - Afterlife (2024)

Music: Sharon Van Etten & Josh Homme - (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding (2020)

Music: Shannon Lay - Mirrors (2024)

And the ground coughs up some roots, wearing denim shirts and boots

Thursday music corner: Singer, songwriter and actor Bobby Darin was born Walden Robert Cassotto in New York, in 1936. In his early twenties he attained fame co-writing the 1958 million-selling novelty single Splish Splash, and then cemented his pop stardom with Dream Lover and his covers of Weill and Brecht's Mack The Knife and French singer Charles Trenet's Beyond the Sea (originally La Mer). He released an astonishing 27 studio albums in his relatively short career, with his second and third, That's All (1959) and This Is Darin (1960) reaching the US Billboard top 10. Darin scored 22 US top 40 singles from 1958 to 1966. He also appeared in 13 feature films, including the 1962 remake of State Fair. From 1960 to 1967 he was married to popular actor, Sandra Dee. Darin died in 1973 aged 37, from a long-standing heart condition.

Long Line Rider appeared on Darin's 1968 album Bobby Darin Born Walden Robert Cassotto, which was his first album release to consist solely of self-written songs. The track concerns the discovery of unmarked graves at the brutal Cummins Prison Farm in Arkansas, where prisoners killed by the titular prison service riders were buried.

Bobby Darin - Long Line Rider (1968)   

See also:

Music: Bobby Darin - If I Were A Carpenter (live, 1973)

Music: Charles Trenet - La Mer (1946)

Music: Stockard Channing - Look At Me, I'm Sandra Dee (1978) 

Maria Bamford's workplace trajectory

Given my tendency to reject those who accept me, this is the work pattern that I fight against to this day:

1. I cry in the bathroom at the impossibility or first sign that I am not good at my job (for example, upon hearing, "Did you forget to order creamer?" [receptionist], or, "Can you pace it up?" [voice-over gig]).

2. I start to see the flawed nature of my employers and the unethical moral quandaries of the job. There's a reason the animation is done in Korea! The labor is cheaper and not well-treated! There is hypocrisy in what I thought was beautiful! Now that I'm a part of it, it is BAD!

3. I start to "speak up" passive-aggressively (via comedy). At Nickelodeon, I made a satirical short film with myself and another production assistant killing off all of the Nickelodeon executives in a Masterpiece Theatre-style mystery.

4. I am well-liked but troubling to the people who have hired me. I do a good job, but those in charge sense my lack of respect. As with everything, once I am invited to be a part of it, it is BAD.

I was at Nickelodeon for one year and I was voted Employee of the Month the same month I got fired. After being fired, I won a voice-over role on their new series, CatDog. They gave me a severance of two months pay and with that, I was able to move to a nicer neighborhood, get a dog, and begin earning more from stand-up than from temping. But I would still do anything for cash. I've answered phones for comedy development executives right after having pitch meetings with them. I worked eight hours at NBC4 reception after doing The Tonight Show the night before. The weatherman walked by and said, "You were on Leno last night!" and kept walking. The gradual change into being a full-time performer took about as long as it took me to pay off my medical debt - eight years.

- Maria Bamford, Sure, I'll Join Your Cult, New York, 2023, p.146-7.