Long Live Laika and the Cosmonauts

It was on the great show Surfwave that Laika and the Cosmonauts were heard in Los Angeles. The year was about 1990. As the radio show ended the august sounds of Fade-A-Way were heard but there was no back announcement.

By next week host, Jim Dunfrund, had been besieged with requests about this mystery melody. After some checking he told us that it was "Laika and the Cosmonauts from Finland...". Laika, as you may recall, was the name of the dog sent into space by the Russians in the 1950s.

The Warehouse on Santa Monica had one man that favored rock instrumentals, it was he that sold me my first CD of the Cosmonauts. What I next needed was a CD player. Surfwave was THE show that got me buying them before I even had a player! I listened to the show from 1979-2003 and still lament its loss. But the host found greener pastures in San Francisco.

It took me years to see them since I worked evenings. Finally seeing them in Hollywood at the Knitting Factory then again during their farewell tour at the Bordello with Big Sandy. They signed my records and allowed me to take pictures. Sorry they were not played more. They like another European act, told me that the EU has not bettered radio coverage for European bands.

I hope what followed their demise is better for them. Musically it remains worse for us.

Billy on Hollywood Hilly

Anyone that knows the history of rock-a-billy "White man's blues" according to some, know of the great respect it has long had in Canada, Europe, or Asia (Japan). This continues to this very day.

Sweden's Go-Getters are one of the premier practitioners of this form of music. With the establishment of the EU one would imagine a better programming of radio. Their drummer and leader told me this is not the case. In fact it has gotten harder for Peter and the boys to get airplay at home since the EU was established!

It remains a vitals, fun, and vigorous style of music yet country and rock radio shun it or regard it as an 'oldies' idiom. Psychobilly, rooted in the Cramps and maybe, for pace The Ramrods and their take on Ghost Riders in the Sky (by Stan Jones), cab be more topical than most commercial music other than rap or hip hop.

Jeff Beck at Nokia

Some may bristle at the thought of Jeff Beck being as skilled as Hendrix, but I am not among them. Between the Clapton and Hendrix explosions it was Jeff Beck while still in the Yardbirds and Hendrix was well enough of aware of him to ask Chas Chandler if he could meet him in 1966.

Not as overt musically as Hendrix, be as adroit, he was doing as a Yardbirds what Hendrix would later do but could not as a sideman on the Chitlin' circuit. Unfortunately Jimi is not here in the flesh.

Jeff Beck remains a musical adventurer and that seeking to break the sound barrier again led him to the instrumentals.