Hey, y’all! Hope you’re doing your best. It’s Tuesday again, and you know what that means–it’s once again time for Talkie Time and The Jazz Program on datafruits.fm! Read on below to find out what we’ll be playin’ this evening!
Talkie Time : That Hammer Guy - 14 Saddle Shoes / The Laura Fenton Case
(This program was originally aired May 7, 2024.)
♬ pizza party '90s Hammer, ultra-violent-noir-dick! whisky power ♬
As you could probably guess from waves hands at half of the shit we play on Talkie Time my entire schtick, I love me some good ol’ fashioned noir bullshit. Very few things in this world are as up my alley as gritty, gruff, maladjusted manly men solving the world’s problems with violence, one-liners, and unreasonable amounts of gratuitous sex.
With that stated, it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that I have consumed damn near everything by the undisputed master of hard-boiled detective fiction – that would be Mickey Spillane, for anyone who didn’t know, and anywone who says otherwise is wrong – and have enjoyed nearly every incarnation of his ‘45-toting, lady-bedding, murder-murderin’ antihero Mike Hammer.
And yes, that includes his stupidly goofy straight-to-TV reboot in the ’90s, with the man who once blew up an entire mansion through a gas leak in The Body Lovers reduced to such fantastic plotlines as cable news, Internet porn, and b-ball. (I’m not just pulling those tropes from a hat with the words “things the 90s had lying around” written on it, by the way–those are literally the Big Bads of episodes 2-4 of Season 1 of The New Mike Hammer, respectively.)
What is not nearly as well known, however (probably because only a select few of the shows survive to this day, none of which were in good enough quality for OTRR to take a swing at ’em) is that Spillane’s PTSD-riddled alcoholic lunatic with a gun had his own radio show for a decently lengthy period in the early ’50s, penned not by Spillane but by Ed Adamson.
Sadly, we aren’t going to be graced by the absolutely phenomenal (and pizza-loving) Stacy Keach incarnation of the hero tonight, but we’ve got two episodes of the original broadcast featuring both Larry Haines and Ted de Corsia as the titular Hammer guy.
Our Larry Haines spot this evening is “Saddle Shoes”, which originally aired on April 7, 1953. Right after that, we’ve got Ted de Corsia stepping into the big man’s shoes in “The Jim Gordon Case” (or “Mike’s Friend Murdered”, if Old Time Radio Downloads is to be believed), which originally aired May 5, 1953.
The Jazz Program : Joey DeFrancesco - Live At The Green Mill, May 6, 2011
RIP to one of the best to ever do it.
We all know how much I love the B3 Hammond organ. There’s no instrument on earth quite like it; its soulful sound and the sheer variety of ways you can play the thing make it stand out among the instruments in the great choir of jazz. I grew up listening to the now-defunct (rest in peace) KDHX and spent many a weekday happily waiting for the segment on The Rhythm Section where Andy Coco would, in his own words, “let the B3 be free”, and bands like the Deep Blue Organ Trio and Emerson, Lake And Palmer would go on to cement that beautiful, woodgrain-tinged tamber and tone deep in my subconscious as I got older.
There are many fantastic musicians who’ve put the Hammond through its paces in their careers, but the late, great Joey Defrancesco was one of the greatest to ever pilot the instrument. Joey released over thirty records with his name on the cover during his lifetime, and toured with the likes of Houston Person, David Sandborn, John McLaughlin, Miles Davis, and countless others.
Tonight, we’ve got a set ripped right off the boards by a local head at Chicago’s own Green Mill, recorded on May 6, 2011. Featuring Fareed Haque on guitar and George Fludas on drums (as well as a surprise appearance by the aforementioned Deep Blue Organ Trio’s own Chris Foreman in the third set), this set’s a hidden gem in the great history of both bootlegged recordings and the Hammond organ.
And hey–if there’s two things we love here on the program, it’s board-rippin’ bootleggers and the Hammond B3. We’re lettin’ the music be free tonight; come join us.
That about covers this week’s show! If you’re reading this the day of, and you can make it in tonight, you should come hang out in the chat with us on Datafruits! We’ve got a good crowd of folks in the chat every week, and whether you have a suggestion for a future show or just want to hang out and chat with fellow jazz enjoyers, you’re welcome here with us.
You’re all amazing and don’t let anyone tell you that you’re not. Stay safe out there, and I’ll see you back again next week. Same time, same station: on datafruits dot fm..