I’ve been digging in my vaults and discovered enough gold down there among the set lists and ticket stubs to announce two serious (IMHO) releases in the ever-expanding Vintage Series which began in 2003 with the demo recordings of Aquashow & Just A Story From America (and that’s thirty years after the release of my debut album!).
Car Songs (Vintage Series # 12 available now) is a gas combustion engine fueled three-song EP recorded in the 1990’s containing a fully produced version of my lyrical life’s journey encapsulated in the epic “Road Movie” as well as two fine (I think) acoustic recordings of Long Island/New Jersey cousin songs “Drive All Night” and “Stolen Car” (which is of course by Bruce Springsteen.) The vintage photo on the cover of Car Songs is a story in itself with deep meaning to yours truly.
A rare 1960’s shot of downtown Garden City, Long Island (where I grew up) showing the corner of 7th Street and Franklin Avenue, the epicenter of my teenage “hangin’ out” days. The photo highlights the curved white façade of the Garden City Music Center, my hometown record shop which was responsible for so much of my formative musical education and where I bought Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” as a 45rpm 7” single. I also took guitar lessons there, mostly with jazz and classical teachers who although highly competent were not too helpful when it came to teaching me rock ‘n roll riffs such as Link Wray’s Rumble. But more importantly, it was at the GCMC where I purchased my first guitar strap and that was a game changer! For with that strap I could stand up in front of a microphone with my guitar hanging low at Garden City Junior High School dances and strum my Harmony acoustic while singing “This Little Light” the great Kingston Trio hit of the day.
Next to the GCMC is the Mid-Way Bar which locals called Leo’s in reference to the name of it’s always welcoming, often grumpy owner and where I spent too many late nights wondering if there was a world waiting for me outside of suburbia. And if so how would I get there? You see I graduated high school in 1967 and embarked on my first cross-Atlantic journey in 1971 and during those sad years my family was still in freefall since my father’s death in 1965 and I was holding on to a musical lifeboat for dear life. Some of my bands were The King James Version (I only sang one song: “Like a Rolling Stone”), Bullfrog (my teen dream girlfriend Mustang Laura would almost come to tears when I sang the Bee Gees’ “Words”), Stud (with my brother Matthew on bass and me with my tries at songwriting with “House With No Answer” and “Die Baby”…my titles have improved since then;) and most importantly Bang Zoom where I was a genuine guitar hero with the first Marshall Stack on Long Island. Hopefully all of that and more will be documented in future Vintage Series.
Vintage Series #12: Car Songs is available now in the Official Elliott Murphy Store.