Roadrunner Once 1975
Roadrunner Twice 1972
Featuring Jonathan Richman, two versions of his ‘tribute’ to Velvet Underground’s ‘Sister Ray’ released on a 7″ single after the original band had split up, on California’s Berserkley Records.
Jonathan Richman went to New York as a youngster to soak up the vibes at Warhol’s Factory Club and to witness the house band the Velvet Underground. He stayed in New York for a couple of years. Sufficiently inspired he went back home near Boston, and formed a band that did very little until 1972 when they did some demo’s for John Cale from the Velvet Underground. During these sessions the track ‘Roadrunner’ was recorded.
It must have been quite a compliment for John Cale to work on this track amongst the others produced that session, sounding so much like ‘Sister Ray’ but in so many ways different…not just a cover version, a completely new composition with the respectful influence of Cale’s old band.
This version and the other tracks from the Cale sessions were released on one side of the debut LP during the punk boom in the U.S. in 1976, a while since the band had actually split up. This single uploaded here from 1977 has that one Cale produced ‘Roadrunner’ track on the B side from 1972, and a more recent recording from 1975, with a different band, on the A side, produced by Kaufman and Koloktin.
This is great stuff.
Jah Pork Pie
June 3, 2008 at 1:52 amI’m sure I remember this from a punk compilation I bought in ’77 with New York Dolls, Heartbreakers, Little Bob Story, Flamin Groovies, Richard Hell and The Voidoids etc on.
And until you mentioned it above, it simply hadn’t ever occurred to me that this was a tribute to Sister Ray. Now, of course, it’s bleedin’ obvious. Nice one!
Nic
June 3, 2008 at 8:45 amYeah, yeah, yeah!
Jonathan Richman’s music is probably the longest and most dedicated tribute to the VU that has existed…
😉
Does anyone like ‘Dynamo’ by The Method? I always thought that was a carbon of ‘Roadrunner’ (and it’s great)…
(The band were based around Hackney, had links to Bazooka Joe, released this single on Do It – who released some of the early Ants material – which was produced by Robin Scott of M – ‘Pop Muzik’ fame, and featured a member who had been on the Desperate Bicycles ‘Smokescreen’ 7″)…
A ‘bedroom band’ that I’m in (we just get together and play for the pleasure of it) do a cover of ‘Roadrunner’ filtered through an opiated haze: very slow, heavy on the wah and delay…
🙂
Jah Pork Pie
June 3, 2008 at 12:03 pmEr, no, I was being serious.
Nic
June 3, 2008 at 12:38 pmI know you were being serious, jah (although you must be mad to have never noticed it before), as was I when I noted that he had a complete hard-on for the VU (which he never tried to hide)…
Jah Pork Pie
June 3, 2008 at 4:41 pm2 small points Nic:
1) It’s “Pork”. The “Jah” is silent.
2) Nice spot on the mad thing. I’m manic depressive.
😉
He always seemed like far too much of a geeky-looking sod to me to be into the Velvets – I’d always envisioned the average Velvets obsessive to be well into the smack and not someone who looked like Bill Gates’ tidier brother really. I’d kind of thought that it was a uni scratch band made up of a few surfie types or something.
I used to play rhythm guitar in Bob Short’s band pre-Blood and Roses (Alex on drums, Ruthless on bass, Bob on lead guitar and vocals. No name, just a symbol which was half hammer-and-sickle and half-swastika, with “Words are not enough” underneath. Pretentious? Moi?). We used to do a cover of Roadrunner and one of Louie Louie as well, if my memory serves me right.
It’d be interesting if somebody came up with a “Rock Family Tree” for tunes, rather than bands, one of these days: I like the idea that “Dynamo” is “Roadrunner” is “Sister Ray”. Another punk band I was in, “The Plague Dogs” had a song about speckled blues called “3 for a quid” which come to think about it was quite reminiscent of Roadrunner too.
Tony Puppy
June 7, 2008 at 2:28 am“Does anyone like ‘Dynamo’ by The Method? I always thought that was a carbon of ‘Roadrunner’ (and it’s great)…
(The band were based around Hackney, had links to Bazooka Joe, released this single on Do It – who released some of the early Ants material – which was produced by Robin Scott of M – ‘Pop Muzik’ fame, and featured a member who had been on the Desperate Bicycles ‘Smokescreen’ 7″)…”
Bazooka Joe’s vocalist was Adam Ant.
?
Nic
June 7, 2008 at 9:36 amYes, Tony – that’s why I mentioned the Bazooka Joe connection: to create a little synergy with the previous Ants post…
🙂
chris
June 9, 2008 at 5:22 pmHmmm, I think ‘tribute’ or not the fact remains ‘Roadrunner’ was an infinitely better known song than Sister Ray. I distinctly remember being very surprised when I heard the Pistols cover of it on the ‘Swindle’ soundtrack as the J.Richmond version was one of the songs i’d hear being played in the disco beside our old house. I can only conclude Roadrunner simply must have been a massively popular – “crossover” – record, much like “Ca Plane Pour Moi”. Sister Ray never was.
And, also, I don’t mid admitting that I never searched out any VU stuff until I heard Joy Division’s cover of ‘Sister Ray’ on ‘Still’ 🙂
Nic
June 10, 2008 at 12:05 pmI searched them out because of ‘Waiting for the Man’ by Slaughter and the Dogs…
🙂
(and that was mainly because of the monotony of the riff and Wayne Barrett’s grunting at the start)
Anything good on in the smoke on Thursday, Chris?
I’ve got an interview…