Shimmy in Strangeland

 

In the midst of this Kramer Shimmy Disc nonsense, mastermind of Wall of Sound Phil Spector died. Spector was one of the most influential figures in pop music history & one of the first figures in the music industry to wield unprecedented control over every phase of the recording process. His parallel to Kramer immediately popped into my head.

At the age of one, Stephen Michael Bonner was adopted by Gary & Rosalyn Kramer in 1959 & moved to Long Island. We have come to know him as Mark Kramer or more commonly Kramer (long before Seinfeld's friend). New dad Gary would always put a small AM Radio tuned to the local top 40 music station next to his son's pillow each night to help him sleep. This left an indelible mark on Kramer with the sounds of Phil Spector, Motown, Stax & eventually The Beatles, as the 60s raged on. 

 

 

This Spector connection came full circle with 2012s The Brill Building, a surreal yet solidly grounded tribute to the building itself & the songwriters who began their long careers there in the early 1960s. It contains 10 songs by Neil Diamond, Carole King, Gerry Goffin, Harry Nilsson, Doc Pomus, Lieber & Stoller, & Phil Spector himself.

 

This here Shimmy Disc project has been a gargantuan undertaking for a deranged...er..I mean disarranged mind like mine, considering the sheer number of releases & band involved. Besides the ones I have already posted, there are thousands of recordings & hundreds of bands: White Zombie, Pussy Galore, Royal Trux, Alice Donut, & Galazie 500 among them.

 

Kramer has remarked that some of his own personal favorites are: all three Galaxie 500 LP's; the first 2 Low LP's; Will Oldham's Palace; the first 2 LP's for Danielson Famalie; the first two Damon & Naomi LP's; PussyGalore; Jon Spencer Blues Explosion; Rope,Inc.; two extraordinary Jad Fair & Kramer LP's; & the first two "studio recordings" by Daniel Johnston. Kramer considers the amazing Dot Allison's Exaltation of Larks (see comment seven there) his finest work as a producer.

 

In light of all this & current occurrences, I have decided to shift gears & concentrated on the music of the man himself. (if anyone has any other Shimmy Disc they’d like to check out, you gotta let me know...I’ll try to oblige.)

 

In 1976 Kramer left his Long Island home the day after his high school graduation. He moved to Woodstock, NY to study music at The Creative Music Studio under Dr. Karl Hans Berger, where he met future collaborators John Zorn & Eugene Chadbourne. He also began working with the co-founder of The Fugs, Ed Sanders, with whom he co-composed the musical drama "The Karen Silkwood Cantata" in 1978.

 

 

Following a chance meeting with ex-Soft Machine guitarist Daevid Allen at Giorgio Gomelsky's NYC loft in 1979, Kramer's first professional gig was as keyboardist/trombonist with Allen's NY GONG on a 6-month long tour of the USA alongside Bill Laswell, Fred Maher, & Michael Beinhorn. After criss-crossing the country twice on a psychedelic school bus, the tour came to a chaotic end at the Rock & Roll Supermarket in NYC early in 1980. Kramer soon immersed himself in the Downtown music scene with Zorn, Chadbourne, Fred Frith, Christian Marclay & others, culminating in a one-off trio performance at NYC's legendary Mudd Club with Zorn & guitarist Derek Bailey, founder of 20th Century Improvisation.

 

 

 Joining Eugene Chadbourne in The Chadbournes in 1981, Ktamer played bass & "cheap organ" alongside percussionist David Licht, saxophonist Zorn, & the late cellist Tom Cora. That group became SHOCKABILLY upon the departure of Zorn and Cora in 1981.

 

 

In 1984 Ed Sanders & Tuli Kupferberg re-formed The Fugs (sometimes billed as "The 1984 Fugs") with Kramer as musical director & bassist.

 

 

Following the demise of Shockabilly, Kramer purchased a Hofner "Beatle Bass" & played his first gig with the Butthole Surfers two days later. It was around this time that Kramer purchased his first recording studio, NOISE NEW YORK; a 16-track facility on 34th Street in NYC, with a 3rd floor, bird's-eye view of Madison Square Garden. It was here that he recorded classic Butthole Surfers tracks for some of their finest mid-80s releases (Cream Corn from the Socket of Davis & the Butthole's first college radio hit, "American Woman" from Rembrant Pussyhorse).

 

 

In 1985 he met magicians Penn & Teller. He subsequently worked for them as sound designer & consultant for Penn & Teller On Broadway in 1987. Later Kramer & Jillette (the larger/louder half of Penn & Teller) collaborated on two LP's. They called themselves The Captain Howdy, with friends Deborah Harry, Billy West, Bill Bacon, & others adding vocals, guitars, percussion, etc. The collaboration ended when Jillette moved permanently to Las Vegas in 1998, where Penn & Teller have been the hottest show in town ever since. I will post up The Captain Howdy releases before getting into Kramer's solo work.


Here The Captain Howdy is: Kramer - most all instruments; Penn Jillette - vocals. With very special thanks to: Deborah Harry (who sang "Rosabelle" & played drums & sang on "Tattoo of Blood"); Billy West (who played guitar on the same two songs); Soma Allpass Hammarlund (who played cello all over); & Lou Reed (who wrote "Tattoo of Blood").

The Captain Howdy - Tattoo of Blood, Shimmy Disc Shimmy 084, 1994.
decryption code in comments

We Want Our Vietnam
The Juliet E-mail
China Needs Women
The Hero that Feels Sorry for Himself
Rosabelle
The Wreck of the Captain Howdy
Dino's Head
Tattoo of Blood
The Best Song Ever Written

Next - Money Feeds My Music Machine.

Enjoy,
NØ