Various artists - London Is the Place for Me 1-8 (2011-2019)

London Is The Place For Me
1: Trinidadian Calypso In London, 1950-56
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
When the Empire Windrush, an old troop-carrier, arrived at Tilbury on June 21, 1948, and inaugurated modern Caribbean immigration to Britain, it also supplied calypso with its best-known image - on Pathe newsreel, Lord Kitchener singing his new composition London Is The Place For Me.
Kitch had boarded with Lord Beginner at Kingston docks, Jamaica, on Empire Day, May 24. In London they joined a milieu of fine band musicians familiar with Caribbean musical forms, and already represented on numerous recordings crucial to the development of British swing and jazz music.
Travelling with their own core audience, the Trinidadian calypsonians brought with them the vocal music of Carnival. Traditionally this ranges from social satire to sexual double-entendre, from voodoo to the most pressing issues of the day, from sporting events to competitive insult. The experiences of Britain's growing Caribbean population were to be fabulously rich in raw material.
'... a witty and joyous testament to the creative power of popular culture and a document of more innocent times. It constitutes one of the best starting points for that rich, unfinished history of the black British diaspora and its intricate interweaving with British life that remains to be written' (Stuart Hall, The Guardian).
'... Not only is it a momentous record of real historical significance, but it comes in a finely produced sleeve with evocative photographs, background notes and recording details that bring the performances on the disc to life even more. a unique and marvellous compilation that lays open a whole era' (Chris Searle, Morning Star).
2011 - London Is the Place for Me | Tracklist:
01. Lord Kitchener - London Is the Place for Me (2:46)
02. young tiger - I Was There (At the Coronation) (2:45)
03. Lord Beginner - Mix up Matrimony (3:19)
04. Lord Kitchener - My Landlady (2:42)
05. Lord Kitchener - Kitch's Bebop Calypso (2:45)
06. Lord Beginner - Victory Test Match (3:02)
07. Lord Kitchener - Birth of Ghana (2:52)
08. Trinidad - Lord Invader - Aguiti (2:49)
09. Lord Beginner - Jamaica Hurricane (3:06)
10. Lord Kitchener - Kitch in the Jungle (3:21)
11. Mighty Terror - No Carnival in Britain (3:07)
12. Lord Kitchener - The Underground Train (3:00)
13. Lord Beginner - Housewives (3:03)
14. The Lion - Some Girl Something (2:28)
15. Lord Kitchener - Saxophone No. 2 (2:58)
16. Lord Beginner - Fed-a-Ray (2:42)
17. Timothy - Bulldog Don't Bite Me (2:11)
18. The Lion - Spanish Calypso (2:36)
19. Lord Kitchener - If You're Not White You're Black (3:01)
20. Lord Kitchener - Sweet Jamaica (2:47)
London Is The Place For Me
2: Calypso And Kwela, Highlife And Jazz From Young Black London
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
'Vibrant and beautiful almost beyond words, the fifty year old recordings being collected on Honest Jons' London Is The Place For Me series are giant and precious treasures of early black British music. Exquisite artistic achievements in their own right, they also throw light on the early development of post bop jazz in the UK.
Volume one in the series, released in '02 and subtitled Trinidadian Calypso In London, 1950-1956, features all-but-forgotten masterpieces of reportage, social commentary and louche wit from Lord Kitchener, Lord Beginner, the Lion, and other recently arrived young calypsonians. This second volume, subtitled Calypso And Kwela, Highlife And Jazz From Young Black London, concentrates on the same period but widens the geo-stylistic net.
'Featured musicians, caught early in their careers and still working within the rich contexts of their native folk musics, include trumpeter Shake Keane from St. Vincent, later a collaborator in Joe Harriott's free jazz explorations, but in '55 on Baionga in exuberant jazz-highlife mode; clarinetist Willie Roachford and trumpeter Harry Beckett, from Barbados, soloists in Ambrose Campbell's jazz-infused West African Rhythm Brothers highlife band; and from South Africa, alto saxophonists Gwigwi Mrwebi and Dudu Pukwana, together with two of Pukwana's Blue Note colleagues, pianist Chris McGregor and trumpeter Mongezi Feza.
'Mrwebi's Nyusamkhaya, which also features Pukwana, is a Fort Knox-certified 24 carat early kwela mothernugget, the man's Africanized Earl Bostic sound fully and gloriously developed. The bass player is Coleridge Goode, from Jamaica, who later played key roles with Harriott and with John Mayer's seminal Indo-Jazz Fusions project. Pukwana, Feza and McGregor add a township-jazz dimension to Nigerian Tunji Oyelana's Omonike.
'Jazz also gets lyric and stylistic look-ins on two early-mutant calypsos: Young Tiger's Calypso Be and King Timothy's Gerrard Street. Tiger ridicules the "monstrosity" which is bop, but nonetheless includes a stirring bop-informed solo from Jamaican tenor saxophonist Sam Walker. Timothy instead celebrates the music, and London's modest then-answer to 52nd Street, Soho's Gerrard Street (but asks, "Another thing I don't realise/Why they all have dark glasses on their eyes?")
'Straightahead calypso at its finest comes on Kitchener's My Wife's Nightie - where, unembarrassed by his own infidelity, the singer demands of a one-night stand that she "Come back with mi wife's nightie/Or I charge you for larceny" - and Lion's masquerade-spooky Kalenda March, catching a similar shiver-up-the-spine vibe as Beginner's awesome "Fed-A-Ray" on volume one.
'Truth is, there are no standout tracks here. It's all wall to wall magic and beauty and loose-limbed dance rhythms. But Campbell's percussion-only Ashiko Rhythm - a mellow hand drums, thumb piano, and gong-gong workout on the basic shave-and-a-haircut/two-bits beat - and the Rhythm Brothers' delicate and lullaby-like closer Sing The Blues can't go by without mention.
'Musical value aside, London Is The Place For Me 2 is also an acutely timely reminder of the glory that is London's multicultural mix-something we cannot allow to be destroyed by the psychopathic death cult behind this month's bomb outrages in the city. One love.'
2011 - London Is the Place for Me 2 | Tracklist:
01. young tiger - Calypso Be (2:57)
02. Ambrose Campbell - Yolanda (3:15)
03. Mona Baptiste - Calypso Blues (2:58)
04. West African Rhythm Brothers - Adura (2:53)
05. Lord Kitchener - My Wife's Nightie (2:37)
06. West African Rhythm Brothers - Ominira (3:12)
07. West African Rhythm Brothers - Eroya (2:53)
08. Lord Beginner - General Election (2:48)
09. The Lion - Kalenda March (3:05)
10. Tunji Oyelana - Omonike (3:09)
11. Shake Keane - Balonga (2:11)
12. Timothy King - Gerrard Street (2:37)
13. West African Swing Stars - E.T. Mensah's Rolling Ball (2:39)
14. Ambrose Campbell - Ashiko Rhythm (4:56)
15. West African Swing Stars - Omo Africa (3:25)
16. Gwigwi Mrwebi - Nyusamkhaya (3:19)
17. Russ Henderson - West Indian Drums (3:11)
18. Lord Beginner - Nobody Wants to Grow Old (2:29)
19. Rans Boi's Ghana Highlife Band - Gbonimawo (3:06)
20. West African Rhythm Brothers - Sing the Blues (2:49)
London Is The Place For Me
3: Ambrose Adekoya Campbell
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
Television has given us a picture of the day in 1945 war ended in Europe. Nostalgic black-and-white film footage captured the celebrations as men and women danced in the Trafalgar Square fountains and embraced complete strangers. You can almost smell the Woodbines and brown ale. Caught up in that VE Day throng - although not recorded on film - was a band of Nigerians carrying drums and guitars. A little bruised and battered maybe - and far, far wiser than when they left their West African homes to go to sea - they had learnt survival ways in a war-torn Blighty and wanted to add their own voice.
As blackout curtains were torn down from windows everywhere, the Nigerians made their way to Piccadilly Circus and joined in. For Ambrose Campbell and his friends, VE Day marked the public debut of a group - to be known by many names including the West African Rhythm Brothers - that would go on to become an ubiquitous presence in London musical circles. But it was more. For these time-serving veterans of difficult times, the event was another step in a journey to becoming what they themselves called 'Englishmen'.
A newspaper reporter, remarking on their presence, called them 'West Indians'. The mistake was probably inevitable at the time, given the prevailing ignorance about 'foreigners', not to mention the presence in Britain of a visible contingent of Caribbean servicemen. But the stokers and trimmers of the merchant navy were often from Africa, and among the people who helped keep many a wartime convoy afloat.
Born in Lagos, Nigeria, in 1919, Ambrose Campbell grew up in a strict Victorian household with a preacher father who educated his children in the family compound. His Yoruba name was Oladipupo Adekoya, and as a youngster he sang in his father's church choir. When the Rev. Campbell embarked on evangelizing missions, his son's dulcet tones were employed for attracting the public. He found excitement at night by sneaking out to where palm-wine was sold: stalls under the moonlight where seamen and servants gathered to sing and play music, and drink the sweet, cloudy beverage. Coming from places as far away as Liberia, Guinee and Cameroun, these men carried with them diverse cultural traditions. They also brought Western ideas picked up on their travels. Influences were exchanged and combined as they played. When he was old enough, Campbell joined them, singing and beating a tambourine.
With a group of young friends, he entertained at Christmas events; but war was looming, and soon Campbell was himself on the high seas, below decks and headed for Britain. He spent a few days in Liverpool before returning to Lagos; on a second visit, though, he jumped ship and headed for the capital. Hardship ensued in the grim days of the war, but it wasn't all misery. Casual racism abounded but friends emerged too - English people who appreciated the vitality of the newcomers - and amidst the bombing, a small group of Africans would meet up to play guitar and drums, between pints of Guinness and bitter.
After the deprivations of war, people everywhere were hungry for novelty and change. 1946 saw the emergence of Britain's first black ballet company, Les Ballets Negres, and Nigerian musicians headed by Ambrose Campbell accompanied the dancers on the London stage. For the occasion, two newcomers arrived from Manchester: bongoes-player Ade Bashorun (from Lagos, the only professional musician in the group) and Brewster Hughes, from Ibadan in Western Nigeria, a teacher by occupation and a brilliant guitarist. A British tour and a spell in Paris followed the London debut of the Ballets.
Campbell's affable personality and the quality of his voice dictated that he should be leader. At first he sang mainly, and played percussion; though he had always dabbled on guitar, he did not start learning the instrument seriously until he took lessons from the Trinidadian Lauderic Caton. This association with a Caribbean musician was unusual, but multiplied when Campbell added two newly-arrived Barbadians to the mix (Harry Beckett on trumpet, Willy Roachford reeds) and his innovations continued when he brought in a schooled pianist, Adam Fiberesima (equally unusually an Ijo, from the East of Nigeria).
Around 1952, the West African Rhythm Brothers found a permanent showcase as residents at the Abalabi in Soho's Berwick Street market. A nightclub opened by Ola Dosunmu and run by him and his English wife, this became one of the most famous clubs of the era and a magnet for a wide cross-section of humanity. Afro-Cuban rhythms were popular at the time, and Dizzy Gillespie's experiments with Chano Pozo - a Cuban drummer from the Yoruba lucumi cult - had penetrated the London jazz consciousness. Accordingly, jazz musicians came to the Abalabi to hear the 'real thing'. Others came to dance the highlife, the new West African dance which combined traditional rhythms with Western jazz and swing voicings and harmonies. Long after the market stalls closed down for the night, Nigerian students and dignitaries joined ex-colonials to dance to the new beat, while debs and other high-flyers made themselves at home in the funky basement, rubbing shoulders with the hustlers, gamblers and hookers of Soho.
All this took place at a time when London was still riddled with bomb-sites. The winters were cold, with snow that settled, and traffic regularly ground to a standstill in the fog. Rationing was still in place and clothes were drab. In this post-war scene, the Nigerians grappled with the realities of sensory deprivation and coal fires, finding substitutes for familiar food until rare moments when seamen brought a memory of home.
Importantly, Ambrose Campbell was beloved by London's jazz community. Musicians went to the Abalabi and Club Afrique - its successor - to learn at the source. Saxophonists Tubby Hayes and Ronnie Scott studied there whilst carousing. 'Ambrose was a bit special,' Scott told me years ago, 'a bit of a musicologist.' Kenny Graham, who led his own Afro-Cubists and employed several African percussionists, was a regular. And Phil Seamen - the most African of English drummers - was Campbell's number one fan, passing on what he learnt.
Just as Ambrose knew everyone who was anyone, his own importance as a cultural figure was recognised by an astonishing range of people, from the playwright George Bernard Shaw to Prince Buster. Shaw was among the notables who sponsored Les Ballets Negres: although famously vegetarian himself, he allegedly had chicken cooked for the band. And when Buster was photographed for the sleeve of his Melodisc collection I Feel The Spirit, it was Ambrose who lent him a talking-drum and agbada.
Ambrose is part of the story of Soho in the 1950s - but, apart from his good friend Colin MacInnes (who includes him as Cranium Cuthbertson in his somewhat sensationalist City Of Spades), few chroniclers give him house-room in surveys of the Bohemian quarter. It's a shocking omission, especially given the fame of the Abalabi in its day. When Dosunmu moved his operation to the more up-market Club Afrique in Wardour Street, Campbell formed another new band to play there. He alternated with Brewster Hughes' Starlite Tempos - the pair feuded and periodically went separate ways - while the venture continued into the 1960s. Fire-eating was staged there occasionally, and a temporary switch to Caribbean bands was attempted before the Dosunmus relocated to Lagos.
Campbell and his fellow musicians established themselves against the odds. Both he and Hughes continued to work with Caribbean musicians, among them such notables as trumpeter Shake Keane and saxophonist George Tyndale. Campbell used white musicians as well: Denis Preston recorded him for Columbia in 1966 with a very mixed personnel.
What Campbell, Hughes and the West African Rhythm Brothers did was to create a new African music influenced by their experience as migrants - and in Campbell's
own case with the deliberate inclusion of elements first encountered on the beach in Lagos.
In 1972, Ambrose Campbell did a disappearing act. He moved to Los Angeles with record producer Denny Cordell - the two of them to go into business with Leon Russell, from Oklahoma. Whilst a new studio was completed, Campbell joined Russell on the road, bringing his percussion skills to 'blue-eyed soul' without missing a beat. (He says now that his ease with such American music can be traced back to his early exposure to Western ideas. Country idioms were not unknown to West Africans, amongst whom Jim Reeves was to become a perennial favourite.) He recorded as a percussionist, too - most notably on Russell's million-selling collaboration with Willie Nelson, One For The Road.
Nearly all the tracks assembled here come from recordings made for the Melodisc label and originally released as 10-inch 78rpm singles. People who bought these records at the time can still recall how it was when the percussion team - among them Ade Bashorun, Salustiano Dos Anjos, Manny Myers and 'Lati' Pedro - built their polyrhythms in Ola Dosunmu's kingdom. With the melodic guitars of Brewster and Ambrose coming together behind Campbell's soothing voice, the musicians contrived to paint an evocative, enduring picture of palmwine Lagos nights.
For English people, emerging from the shadow of wartime deprivation, this fresh 'sunshine' music was just what the doctor ordered. The atmosphere at the clubs, and the warmth of their African clientele, contrasted favourably with the restraint and stiff upper-lip which might have got the country through the war, but which - for some people - left something missing.
This music and the startling taste of hot West African food were for many white people the keys to learning about a new way of being. The Nigerians had an equivalent experience. Often the hard way, they were learning about a new society and how best to conduct themselves in it. For years the communities came together and partied, often in humble surroundings, but with a determination to fight prejudice and cross boundaries that has endured to this day. Such exchange and interaction have helped to make British society what it is now, warts and all. And music was at the heart of the process.
2011 - London Is the Place for Me 3 | Tracklist:
01. West African Rhythm Brothers - We Have It in Africa (2:20)
02. West African Rhythm Brothers - Oba Adele (3:26)
03. Nigerian Union Rhythm Group - The Wind in a Frolic (3:26)
04. West African Rhythm Brothers - Iku Koni Payin (3:44)
05. Ayinde Bakare & His Meranda Orchestra - Ibikunle Alakija (2:35)
06. West African Rhythm Brothers - Oma Laso (2:26)
07. West African Rhythm Brothers - Calabar-O (3:00)
08. West African Rhythm Brothers - Emi Wa Wa Lowo Re (2:48)
09. West African Rhythm Brothers - Iwa D'arekere (3:08)
10. West African Rhythm Brothers - Ominira (3:01)
11. Nigerian Union Rhythm Group - The Memorial of Chief J.K. Randle (2:48)
12. West African Rhythm Brothers - Mofi Ajobi Seyin (3:20)
13. Nigerian Union Rhythm Group - Unity (2:50)
14. Nigerian Union Rhythm Group - Oratido Soso (2:47)
15. West African Rhythm Brothers - Ayami (2:22)
16. West African Rhythm Brothers - Oba Ademola II (3:04)
17. West African Rhythm Stars - Late Ojo Davies (3:01)
18. West African Rhythm Stars - Geneva Conference (3:08)
19. West African Rhythm Brothers - Ele da Adara (2:44)
20. West African Rhythm Brothers - Aye Wa Adara (2:55)
21. West African Rhythm Brothers - Lagos Mambo (2:43)
22. West African Rhythm Brothers - Odudua (1:56)
23. West African Rhythm Brothers - I Am a Stranger (2:49)
London Is The Place For Me
4: African Dreams And The Piccadilly High Life
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
Calypso, kwela, highlife and bebop, a little rock n roll and an Indian mambo, a shango hymn, some Sun Ra-style cha cha cha. A lake in a Johannesburg zoo, a Chinese on the Harrow Road; astronauts and prostitutes, landlords, streetfighters and cricketers.
'As well as the appeal of this little-known music - inventive, precocious and fluent by turns - there's the pleasure of discovering the rich, frequently moving histories of the players, thanks to the exceptional sleevenotes. CD Of The Week' (The Observer).
'... matches the superlative standard of its predecessors' (Independent On Sunday).
The music and notes are presented alongside rare artist photographs by Val Wilmer.
2011 - London Is the Place for Me 4 | Tracklist:
01. Ginger Folorunso Johnson - Egyptian Bint Al Cha Cha (3:33)
02. young tiger - African Dream (3:11)
03. Dorothy Masuka - Zoo Lake (2:23)
04. Lord Kitchener - Rock n Roll Calypso (2:56)
05. Eric Hayden - Don't You Go Away (2:18)
06. Shake Keane - Mambo Indio (2:38)
07. Lord Kitchener - Alphonso in Town (3:21)
08. Eric Hayden - Give Her the No. 1 (2:41)
09. Enoch & Christy Mensah - Dakuku Dum (3:25)
10. Dorothy Masuka - Khauleza (2:25)
11. Lord Kitchener - Is Trouble (3:34)
12. Victor Coker - Ilu Oyinbo Dara (3:03)
13. Young Growler - V for Victory (3:12)
14. The African Messengers - Highlife Piccadilly (3:11)
15. Cab Kaye - Everything Is Go (3:18)
16. young tiger - Chicken & Rice (2:52)
17. Nat Atkins - Darlin Don't Say No (3:12)
18. Lord Kitchener - Piccadilly Folk (2:46)
19. Ginger Folorunso Johnson - African Jazz Cha Cha (2:53)
London Is The Place For Me
5 And 6: Afro-Cubism, Calypso, Highlife, Mento, Jazz
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
Another sack of open-hearted, bitter-sweet, mash-up postcards to the here and now, from young black London.
As then, calypso carries the swing. There are four more Lord Kitchener songs - in consideration of his wife leaving him for a GI, cricket umpires, a fling onboard an ocean-liner and West Indian poultry - besides a hot mambo cash-in, cross-bred under his supervision, and an uproarious, teasing Ghanaian tribute to him in Fanti by London visitors The Quavers.
Other calypsos range compellingly from the devaluation of the pound through jiu jitsu, big rubbery instruments, football fans, heavyweight champ Joe Louis and the sexual allure of English women police. The Mighty Terror contributes the woe-begotten, cautionary tale of his beloved Patricia's change of heart: 'I cannot believe, not for one moment / She gone with Millicent. / You may think I am jocular / But this really happened in Manchester / I felt so ashamed, my friends laughed at me / I had to take a train for London city.'
Ambrose Campbell is back, with six more shots of prodigal, limber, melancholic, visionary West African highlife. Also the Rolling Stones' favourite Ginger Johnson, with a percussive Latin scorcher; and Mona Baptiste, with some wonderful, soulful exotica.
Jamaican mento makes its first entry in the series, with a brace by Tony Johnson: a drily witty drinking-song, and a love-letter to Marilyn Monroe. Also finally getting some dues, the path-breaking Latin-African-jazz experiments of Ghanaian drummer and percussionist Buddy Pipp, with spine-tingling playing by the great Jamaican saxophonist Joe Harriott.
Expert jazz idioms course sophisticatedly through all the selections, which include a straight-up, South London version of Duke Jordan's Jordhu, something from Dizzy Reece's soundtrack - brokered by Kenneth Tynan - to the British crime film Nowhere To Go, and a trio of magnificently hybrid, hard-swinging instrumentals led in turn by master-guitarist Fitzroy Coleman, Kitch's innovative arranger Rupert Nurse, and trumpeter Shake Keane - named after Shakespeare because of his love of poetry - from St. Vincent.
The CDs are beautifully presented as miniature books, saddle-stitched, with forty pages of rare, precious photos of the musicians and their social milieu, and in-depth commentary; the LPs in gatefold sleeves with full-size booklets.
Proper Brit Pop.
2013 - London Is the Place for Me 5: Latin, Jazz, Calypso and Highlife from Young Black London | Tracklist:
01. Buddy Pipp's Highlifers - Cuban Nightingale (2:26)
02. George Browne - Calypso Mambo (2:23)
03. Lord Beginner - The Dollar and the Pound (3:00)
04. Trinidad - Lord Invader - Goodwood Park (2:55)
05. Shake Keane - Trumpet Highlife (2:11)
06. West African Rhythm Brothers - Ominira (3:08)
07. Caribbean Swing Band - Jordhu (3:50)
08. Buddy Pipp's Highlifers - Ghana Special (2:12)
09. Lord Kitchener - Cricket Umpires (3:01)
10. Lord Kitchener - Kitch's Mambo Calypso (2:55)
11. West African Rhythm Brothers - Jekafo Ju Agbawo (3:30)
12. Mighty Terror - Patricia Gone with Millicent (2:53)
13. Lord Kitchener - My Wife Went Away with Yankee (3:05)
14. The Quavers - Kitch (2:38)
15. Mona Baptiste - Tabu (2:50)
16. Lord Kitchener - Jamaica Turkey (3:19)
17. Mighty Terror - Women Police in England (2:43)
18. Tejan-Sie - King Jimmy Foo Foo (2:58)
19. West African Swing Stars - My Sorrow (2:58)
2013 - London Is the Place for Me 6: Mento, Calypso, Jazz and Highlife from Young Black London | Tracklist:
01. Dizzy Reece - The Escape (1:21)
02. Mighty Terror - Life in Britain (2:53)
03. Lord Kitchener - Romance on the Queen Mary (2:53)
04. Timothy King - Jiu Jitsu Calypso (2:45)
05. Buddy Pipp's Highlifers - Sway (2:56)
06. Fitzroy Coleman Quintet - Uncle Joe (3:01)
07. Lord Beginner - The Joe Louis Calypso (2:34)
08. Tony Johnson - Marilyn Monroe Calypso (2:51)
09. Lili Verona - Big Instrument (2:45)
10. Ginger Johnson - Mambo Contempo (2:21)
11. Timothy King - Football Calypso (2:57)
12. West African Rhythm Brothers - Asikoloto (3:01)
13. Rupert Nurse's Calypso Band - Song of Joy (2:56)
14. Buddy Pipp's Highlifers - Positive Action (2:16)
15. Tony Johnson - Me Donkey Want Water (3:02)
16. Eric Hayden - Belly Lick (2:26)
17. Rupert Nurse's Calypso Band - Calypso Rhythm Dance (2:29)
18. Buddy Pipp's Highlifers - Prospero (2:37)
19. Mighty Terror - The Queen Is In (2:46)
20. West African Rhythm Brothers - Nigeria Odowoyin (3:31)
London Is The Place For Me
7: Calypso, Mento, Joropo, Steel & String Band
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
Still deeper forays into the musical landscape of the Windrush generation.
A dazzling range of calypso, mento, joropo, steelband, palm-wine and r'n'b. Expert revivals of stringband music, from way back, alongside proto-Afro-funk.
An uproarious selection of songs about the H-Bomb and modern phones, prostitution and Haile Selassie, mid-life crisis and the London Underground, racism and solidarity, the Highway Code and a 100% West Indian Royal Wedding.
For example some frantic British-Guianan joropo music-hall about Eatwell Brown from Clapham, who starts out biting off a piece of his mother-in-law's face at a party, then devours everything in his path. a chunk of Brixton Prison, a Union Jack, a policeman's uniform. Or Marie Bryant - collaborator of Lester Young and Duke Ellington - taking time off from skewering the South African PM Daniel Malan at her West End revue, to contribute some arch, swinging filth about uber-genitalia.
Superior sound, courtesy of Abbey Road, D&M and Pallas; lovely gatefold sleeve; full-size booklet, with full notes, and fabulous previously-unseen photographs, including a set from the family archive of Russ Henderson (who led the first, impromptu Notting Hill Carnival march, in 1966).
2019 - London Is the Place for Me 7: Mento, Calypso, Jazz and Highlife from Young Black London | Tracklist:
01. Lord Beginner - Sons and Daughters of Africa (3:00)
02. The Lion - Royal Wedding (2:59)
03. The Mighty Terror - Hydrogen Bomb (3:10)
04. Dai Dai Simba - Modern Telephone (2:31)
05. Willie Payne & The Starlite Tempos - Wa Sise (2:40)
06. The Mighty Terror - Emperor of Africa (2:38)
07. Louise Bennett - Bongo Man (2:26)
08. Marie Bryant - My Handy Man (2:40)
09. Nigerian Union Rhythm Group - Tortoise Mambo (2:32)
10. Calypso Rhythm Kings - Boule Vese (2:19)
11. The Mighty Terror - Life is Like a Puzzle (2:51)
12. The Mighty Terror - Chinese Children (2:40)
13. Bill Rogers - Hungry Man from Clapham (2:18)
14. Lili Verona - Underground Train (3:11)
15. The Lion - Highway Code (3:10)
16. Billy Sholanke - Kana Kana (3:12)
17. Calypso Rhythm Kings - L'année Passée (3:16)
18. Lord & Lady Beginner - One Morning (3:08)
19. West African Rhythm Brothers - D4. West African Rhythm Brothers, Ema Foju (2:36)
20. Trinidad Steel Band - Caroline (2:11)
London Is The Place For Me
8: Lord Kitchener in England, 1948-1962
HONEST JON'S RECORDS
The genius of Lord Kitchener has been the mainstay of our series.
In this volume devoted to his post-war London recordings, Kitch plays his many roles with signature aplomb and poised subtlety.
First there is the hooligan chantwell, up for anything in the hurly-burly of carnival proper; and then the casual reporter, firing off postcards to Trinidad about taxis, flashy booze, fast women and football in Manchester, with homesickness and grievance nestled just behind the optimism, pride and tentative senses of belonging.
There is the bearer of news from home, in detailed accounts of murders, tales of stupid local coppers, and reminiscences about food and particular mango trees; the political thinker, considering racism and Africa; and the diarist, with his vivid tales of infidelity, and disclosure of the break-up of his marriage, and his desire to get away.
One foot in the UK, the other in Trinidad; but the man himself somewhere in-between. Kitch In The Jungle, nobody around. A 'diasporic explorer'; a key twentieth-century witness, alongside such hallowed figures as Samuel Selvon and Edward Kamau Braithwaite.
Though in frustration Kitch would sometimes take over double-bass duties himself, the musicianship of Rupert Nurse, Fitzroy Coleman and co is top-notch. The original glorious sound is down to Denys Preston, recording for Melodisc, often at Abbey Road Studios (where we transferred and restored the 78s compiled here).
Presented in a lovely gatefold sleeve, with a full-size booklet containing superb, specially-commissioned sleevenotes by Kitch biographer Anthony Joseph, and fabulous, previously-unseen photographs.
2019 - London Is The Place For Me 8 - Lord Kitchener In England 1948-1962 | Tracklist:
01. Lord Kitchener - Carnival Road March (2:57)
02. Lord Kitchener - No More Taxi (2:36)
03. Lord Kitchener - Mango Tree (2:48)
04. Lord Kitchener - Food from the West Indies (2:45)
05. Lord Kitchener - Alphonso in Town (3:21)
06. Lord Kitchener - Come Back in the Morning (2:39)
07. Lord Kitchener - Too Late Kitch (3:05)
08. Lord Kitchener - Drink a Rum (2:45)
09. Lord Kitchener - Constable Joe (3:08)
10. Lord Kitchener - Pirates of Paria (2:39)
11. Lord Kitchener - Carnival in Town (2:51)
12. Lord Kitchener - Is Trouble (3:34)
13. Lord Kitchener - If You Brown (3:12)
14. Lord Kitchener - Life Begins at 40 (3:10)
15. Lord Kitchener - Manchester Football Double (3:16)
16. Lord Kitchener - The Denis Compton Calypso (3:07)
17. Lord Kitchener - Mistress Jacob (2:55)
18. Lord Kitchener - London is the Place for Me (2:48)
19. Lord Kitchener - Tie Tongue (3:06)
20. Lord Kitchener - Dora (Meet Me at the Pawnshop) (2:47)
21. Lord Kitchener - If You're Not White You're Black (2:54)
22. Lord Kitchener - Africa My Home (2:44)
23. Lord Kitchener - Nora (2:58)
24. Lord Kitchener - Kitch in the Jungle (3:23)
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