Thursday, May 03, 2007

Little Feat


I've had this white label LP since the late 70's which I found in a junk shop in Stepney. I was a Little Feat fan at the time so amazed it turned out to be a concert by them. I assumed it to be taken from a radio show as the audience sounded quite small and intimate. Today I found out where it was from. It was recorded in New York at Ultrasonic Studios ( WLIR) in Septemeber 1974. I know this because the whole thing , and hundreds of other concerts are kept at the Internet Archive.

Wikipedia says-

"The band was formed by songwriter, singer and guitarist Lowell George and keyboard player Bill Payne, whom George had met when George was a member of Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention. Payne had auditioned for the Mothers, but had not joined. They were backed by former Mothers' bassist Roy Estrada and drummer Richie Hayward from George's previous band, The Factory. The name of the band came from a comment made by Mothers' drummer Jimmy Carl Black about Lowell's literally "little feet." The spelling of "feat" was a nod to The Beatles.
There are three legends about the genesis of Little Feat. One has it that George showed Frank Zappa his song Willin, and that Zappa fired him from The Mothers, because he felt that George was too talented to merely be a member of his band, and told him he ought to go away and form his own band. The second version has Zappa firing him for playing a 15 minute guitar solo - with his amplifier off! The third version says that Zappa fired him because Willin contains drug references ("weed, whites and wine"). Ironically, when Willin was recorded for the first, eponymous Little Feat album, George had hurt his hand and could not play the song's slide part, so Ry Cooder sat in and played the part. This was one reason why Willin' was re-recorded and included on their second album Sailin' Shoes. Sailin' Shoes was also the first Little Feat album to include cover art by Neon Park, who had painted the cover for Zappa's Weasels Ripped My Flesh."

Discover more about Little Feat HERE.


Little Feat - Rock 'N' Roll Doctor

Little Feat - Two Trains

Little Feat - Oh, Atlanta


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2 comments:

ally. said...

lowell george has such a voice.
20 million things is right up there.
x

Wastedpapiers said...

Didn't he though. Shame he died so young. Thanks for dropping by ally.