Sunny Friday morning, after 3 hours of emails on all sorts of biz matters (sigh!), Ray Charles came on, doing “Come Back Baby.” The day was lookin better!

  Got me thinking about Ray and his recording of “Am I Blue,” live in Japan (in ’76 I think). Dialed it up on Grooveshark (here) and once again got chills (running from my ears down arms). A rare performance, with John Coles killing it on the trumpet, the crowd obviously tuned in.

  The second time Ray sings “blue,” he makes it into a 6-note word. He starts bending all the held notes. At the very end, he makes “Am I gay…,” go “Am I gay-ay-ay…” Just a stunning vocal.

https://grooveshark.com/#!/album/A+Sense+Of+Place/6694433

When I was 12, I was crazy about the Mills Brothers. (I didn’t discover Fats Domino until 6 years later.) I loved their vocal harmonies, their cupping hands to mouths making trumpets and trombones. Plus John’s vocal bass. That was in the late ’40s and I didn’t know about all their earlier work with Count Basie, Louie Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Cab Calloway, Bing Crosby — on and on, until I discovered this 5-CD set (“1930s Recordings.”)

   In “My Walking Stick” with Louie Armstrong, the Mills Brothers “band” plays behind Louie’s vocal, then there’s a duet with Louie’s trumpet along with Herbert’s mouth trumpet. With Cab Calloway, Cab’s band does a solo, then the MBs come in with their vocal trumpets and trombones, like a little band. Wonderful music.”Flat Foot Floogie With A Floy Floy.” Check out the vocal bass with “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love Baby” here.

   Note, I know I repeat stuff from time to time. Goes with the getting older territory. Well hey, your memory is not infinite, right? As new stuff comes in, other stuff gets jettisoned. Right? Right?

Back in the ’80s I knew a guy working in a D.C. reggae record store who’d clue me in on good records. Vinyl. When I first got this I thought Toots was channeling Otis. Plus some Memphis Horns.

Here’s an Amazon review:

Hibbert is widely revered as a reggae pioneer, but he’s also a Caribbean cousin of Otis Redding and Al Green, which he proves on this collection of ’60s and ’70s soul covers. Sly and Robbie anchor the rhythm section of a crack band that also includes guitarist Teenie Hodges and Andrew Love of the Memphis Horns. Together with Hibbert, they reinvent Redding’s “I’ve Got Dreams to Remember,” Green’s “Love and Happiness,” and eight other classics (among them “Hard to Handle,” “It’s a Shame,” and “Freedom Train.”) The result isn’t pure reggae or unadulterated soul, but a hybrid as appealing as both at their best.–Keith Moerer

Here.

   Last week I heard Toots doing “It’s You,” such a good song, I love the Itals’ vocal harmonies. Who’s doing vocal harmonies of this quality these days? Here (play the one on the album Pressure Drop).

Got up at 6, just as dawn was breaking. Wish I could say I do this often, but I don’t. When I do I get 3 times as much done, everything is so quiet, exquisite, as the day unfolds.

  As I write this, right now on BBKing’s Bluesville, “I’m Tore Down” by Freddie King. “I’m tore down, I’m almost level with the ground.” Next: “Temptation” by Kelly Hunt. Shit, what great music!

 Change in the weather last night. Feels good. Been unseasonably warm. Fog now in, storm coming. Rain, rain (+ neg ions), come our way…

   I gotta say, the election was a huge relief to me. For the future of Supreme Court, for just one thing. In fact I’m pretty fucking overjoyed to think that the Koch brothers and Carl Rove and the Tea Party and Fox and the Money Guys and Trump/Limbaugh/other mean-spirited, controlling people couldn’t buy (and lie their way to) the election. This just happened in America and it reminds me that there are things that I love about this country.

Now on radio, Buddy Guy with “I’ve Got Dreams to Remember,” done live in the Sirius blues studio. Great vocal harmonies.

Tiny Homes On the Move: Water & Wheels We’re in full gear. I’m corresponding with dozens of contributors. Material is coming in daily. Much from the UK — lot of nomads there. I’ve got about 50 pages roughed out. The book has come to life, as our books do once underway. Mojo workin.

   It changes from day to day. About 25% so far are “Water” (houseboats,sailboats, tugboat); 75% “Wheels” (house busses, house trucks, RVs, trailers, vardo, vans). I sort of schizophrenically juggle this blog, all the necessary pub biz necessities, and working on the book (and getting out to the beach). Both Lew and Evan are starting to work on the book. Lew on various vehicular homes, Evan on snowboarder Mike Basich’s truck/camper and 39′ sailboat, and some bike guys.

Tiny Homes at San Francisco Green Festival this Weekend We’ll have a booth, be selling Tiny Homes (plus other building books) for 20 bucks, giving away the mini (2″x 2-1/2′) books. Lew, Evan and me. It’s at a great venue, the SF Concourse Exhibition Center, which is like a big steel and timber barn. Sat-Sun, November 10-11, details here.

Stretching, the eBook Rick Gordon is putting the finishing touches on the iPad version of Bob and Jean Anderson’s book Stretching (which has sold over 3 million copies and is in 23 languages). When Rick started putting together our 1st eBooks, none of us realized that he was going to do such a masterful job. Jeff Galloway’s Marathon is head and shoulders (in design and ease-of-use) above any other running eBook in Apple’s library. Then he did Tiny Homes and it’s spectacular — even on an iPhone. The electronic Stretching looks really good. It’ll work on an iPad, also on an iPhone (dial up “Airplane Stretches” during your flight, or “Hotel Stretches” when you travel…).

Green Smoothies We just got a Blendtec super-powered (3 hp) blender. I’m making drinks with fresh fruit and greens (parsley, kale, spinach, dandelion roots, or carrot tops). A lot of times I get going in the office and skip lunch and this is a great solution. Interesting comparison between a juicer and a blender. With the latter, you get all the fiber. When I realized that, it was, like, duh…Not just carrot juice, but the whole carrot.

   Yesterday I made pancakes by adding 1 cup of oat groats, eggs, buttermilk, and baking powder (+ a little baking soda) —  blending, and voila — batter. This is a wonderful tool (better late than never). I got it with two books by the Boutenkos which are exceedingly relevant in explaining the principles and providing recipes. Here it is on Amazon.

Elegant Mini Reading Glasses You can put these on your keychain; I keep a pair in my fanny pack. They fold up tiny. For whenever I don’t have my backpack (with regular reading glasses). Discovered here on CoolTools (my favorite blog in the world). NOT available from Amazon; let’s hear it for the manufacturers!

As I sign off, it’s Slim Harpo doing “I Got Love If You Want It.”