Lee Hazlewood -- Search and Destroy

nancy & lee is obviously classic. cowboy in sweden carries on this tradition.

"Trouble is a Lonesome Town" is a great storybook album similar to nilsson's "the point". in between all the songs is dialogue setting you up for the next song. the album tell a story about the people in the town of Trouble and they use such witty wordplay. there's a great song called "Ugly Brown" that describes Emery Zickafuce Brown, the ugliest boy for miles. it says that if he was the only one who entered one of those Mister America contests, the luckiest he could hope for was fourth place.

and then lee's album "13" is his soul/funk album. complete with heavy drums (breaks) and a horn arrangement that could easily be on a stax album.

Destroy: most of those reissues on Smells Like, including Trouble Is a Lonesome Town. Unwarranted hipster enthusiasm.

?: The MGM stuff is OK, from what I've heard of it. Nancy & Lee is spotty and not for all tastes, but the best stuff is pretty good.

Scroll down here for some stuff on the man himself.

So. If I were to dip a tentative toe into Lake Hazlewood, where would I start? I'm fascinated to hear the originals of "Won't You Come Home To Me", "SVM", "A Cheat" etc; is there a decent compilation or is Nancy & Lee a good jumping-off point?

Thoughts...

Yes, "Cowboy in Sweden" is very good, but "Love and other crimes" is even better. I don't think it's been reissued but it does turn up in second-hand shops and you should be able to get it cheapish. Mine was a tenner, I think.

Also got two Lee films when I was in Sockholm - Lee & Nancy in Las Vegas, which should be brilliant but doesn't quite live up to what it should be, mainly because Nacny is too nervous to give a good performance and the crowd are SHIT. But it's good for the backstage stuff alone, great to see the interaction between the two of them. Also got a weird swedish language film with loads of Lee stuff I've not heard before, but the sound quality is pretty dire and the film is plain odd, no real story to speak of, just Lee and friends out in the swedish wilderness.

Might be the tiem of the year to take out 13

i still think this dude is really hit or miss. i hate his voice (it's like a cartoon version of johnny cash) and the kitsch factor is sometimes a wee bit too high for me. he's a good songwriter and a damn fine producer, though.

Love & Other Crimes (Bugles In The Afternoon, After Six, For One Moment, etc)

-and-

The Many Sides Of Lee Hazlewood (Long Black Train, The Railroad, Whe A Fool Loves A Fool, and so many more)

Cowboy in Sweden [Smells Like, 1999]
Hazlewood is an "interesting" figure, always was. A natural hipster, in the biz but not of it, pop and rock and country and just plain weird--Duane Eddy, Nancy Sinatra, and Gram Parsons is quite a trifecta. Problem is he'snever been all that good. There's a nice best-of hiding in his collected works, including the new standards collection. But his vogue transcends crass track-by-track quality controls, combining the usual convolutional one-upsmanship, a visceral distaste for roots-rock's sonic canon, and a generation of aging slackers' discovery that doing bizness needn't deaden your mind or rot your soul. If slick blues licks make you sick, Hazlewood's studio hacks and string-section dreck will be some kind of change. If you like Nancy Sinatra almost as much as Karen Carpenter, thin-piped Nina Lizell will clean away enough Janis-and-Bonnie grit. If you doubt all shows of soul, the flaccid sentimentality of "Easy and Me" will be one more trope as far as you're concerned. But without opening a book I can recall half a dozen unreissued singer-songwriter albums that do more with their varied conventions than this Europe-only 1970 rarity--by Thomas Jefferson Kaye, Nolan Porter, Marc Benno, Hirth Martinez, Alice Stuart, Mississippi Charles Bevel. And I shudder to think of the unreasonable claims to be made when their time comes around again. B-

One Last Walk for the Man Behind ‘These Boots’
an excerpt:
By SIA MICHEL
Published: January 28, 2007
HENDERSON, Nev.

"LEE HAZLEWOOD is ready to die. Suffering excruciating pain from renal cancer, Mr. Hazlewood, the reclusive singer, songwriter and producer doesn’t have much time left, maybe a year if he’s lucky. So he has been preparing for what he calls his impending “dirt nap.”

He has decided he wants to be cremated, and to have his ashes strewn on a Swedish island where he composed some of his favorite songs. He has chosen his epitaph: “Didn’t he ramble,” referring to his loner-drifter nature. He has already given away most of his gold and platinum records, which he earned making hits for Duane Eddy, Dean Martin and Nancy Sinatra, including “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” one of the most famous pop songs of all time. He has released his swan song, the quirky album “Cake or Death,” which hit stores last week. And he married his longtime girlfriend, Jeane Kelley, in a drive-through ceremony in Las Vegas."

True, he is one of the more iconoclastic figures of 20th-century pop, a cantankerous, hard-living innovator who walked away from fame and fortune whenever he felt like it. One of the major hitmakers of the ’50s and ’60s, he helped Duane Eddy shape twang-rock, transformed Nancy Sinatra into a megastar and, on his LHI label, released what is widely considered the first country-rock record, by Gram Parsons’s International Submarine Band. And he made a series of beautifully oddball solo albums that were mostly unheard in America, until a member of Sonic Youth reissued them in the ’90s.

Today Mr. Hazlewood is sadly unsung, which is partly his own fault. He spent decades trying to disappear, flitting between Europe and the United States — particularly those states with no personal income tax. “I’m kind of a bum,” he said.

If you're a fan you absolutely have to hear the Einsturzende Neubauten cover of "Sand".

back to Lee: would that we all could display such casual bravado in the face of our own mortality...a true maverick...(Warren Zevon, too)..

"He had a knack for mainstream pop too. Dean Martin interpreted his jaunty wandering-man lark “Houston,” a huge hit in the mid-’60s. They bonded over a love of scotch: Mr. Martin was a J&B man, Mr. Hazlewood drank Chivas Regal. “Here’s Dean Martin drinking J&B and I’m drinking something which is twice as much money and twice as good,” he said, shaking his head with mild disgust. “I didn’t drink to get drunk. I drank as a reward, and I only drank the good stuff.”

Soon Frank Sinatra wanted him to fix the floundering career of his daughter Nancy. Despite a decade-plus age difference, Mr. Hazlewood and Ms. Sinatra hit it off; they remain close friends. He thought that she was too cutesy, that she needed to seem more like truck-driver-dating jailbait. “He was part Henry Higgins and part Sigmund Freud,” Ms. Sinatra said by telephone. “He was far from the country bumpkin people considered him at the time. I had a horrible crush on him, but he was married then.”

Romance rumors swirled, but they never had an affair, Mr. Hazlewood said, “and now we’re old enough to tell you if we did.”

wow did this guy ever make a bad record?

I don't know about bad, but some of them are definitely better than others (most of the Anne Margaret record is not good, but it's saved by the awesome singles tacked on at the end.)

i never got into "poet, fool, or bum" personally. but the hit:miss ratio is remarkable.

ann margret record is great if you can get beyond her abrasive way of singing, but i agree the singles are more interesting

I've never heard 40 either. That one's not supposed to be great either.

also, the final few records, including the last nancy & lee one, were not good

"ann margret record is great if you can get beyond her abrasive way of singing"

Yeah see I can't do that. Cover is awesome too btw.

I just heard the Ann Margaret for the first time yesterday and totally dug it, don't mind her hamminess at all. Agree about the extra singles though - You Turn My Head Around is amazing

i never got into "poet, fool, or bum" personally. but the hit:miss ratio is remarkable.

"Poet, Fool or Bum" is good, as is "Back on the Streets".

I've never heard 40 either. That one's not supposed to be great either.

I love "Paris Bells" on that one!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bggeCwBR6Y

The Lee Hazlewood bug bit me pretty severely a couple months back, haven't been able to stop listening since.

recently i've been listening to "guitar on my mind" that LH wrote and produced for duane & miriam eddy - really oddball song that is a proto-some velvet morning

I love Lee's 1970's hungover Marlboro man look

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCLJIi6SSZ0&feature=related

I think these last two youtubes are from Swedish telivision?

this is from a Nancy TV special in the late 60's I believe:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnkuRQ8tjIE&feature=related

I would imagine the viewing public were like,
who the hell is that mustachioed man with Frank's daughter?

"your thunder and your lightning" is like johnny cash stealing the mic from ian curtis for a song

heeeeey cowboy.

http://torbjornaxelman.com/

This is a damn good song.

"My Autumn's Done Come" is such a great song.

No more slinky Vogue dolls for me.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Anyone see BBC 4's current batch of "Singer-Songwriters at the BBC"? Lee Hazlewood on the Rolf Harris Show from 1971 (I think), not duetting unfortunately! "Cold Hard Times" is the song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2k4Z12VHZk

Light in the Attic is about to put out some very rare Hazlewood stuff:

http://lightintheattic.net/releases/739-a-house-safe-for-tigers

A House Safe For Tigers is the soundtrack to one of the seven TV movies Lee Hazlewood made with the director Torbjörn Axelman during his period living in Sweden in the early 1970s. Hazlewood had moved there to lay low and to help his son avoid the draft, but wound up finding happiness and creative freedom. Many of the albums recorded in Sweden made their way no further than Scandinavia, but of them all, A House Safe For Tigers is the holy grail for collectors, often changing hands for hundreds of dollars.

saw a couple of killer-looking comps that appear sorta similar, design-wise, to the above, recently - two vinyl reissues compiling bunches of lee's stuff seemingly by mood; there was a syrupy one with wait and see on & another with no train to stockholm, the nights, &c, iirc. they were stickered with fan-club-only or something, i don't really know much about them. they had ridiculous sleeves, one with a photoshopped remake of the trouble sleeve but with a cut-out futuristic & moustachioed head of lee taking the place of a train on the tracks in the distance. mainly stuff from the records but they looked pretty good.

Oh man, that Tigers reissue is great news!

Yea this is awesome.

So prolific, insane how often I thought I had exhausted the catalog and then more comes up

Light In The Attic seem to imply that some remastered, better quality reissues are coming. Any confirmation on that?

Just this:

For the past 7 years we’ve been begging, pleading, and praying to re-release some of Lee’s greatest solo recordings and production work, including material from LHI, Lee’s own label from ‘66 to ’71. We are ecstatic to announce that we will launch a detailed Lee Hazlewood Series this spring all gloriously re-mastered from the original analog master tapes. The series will include scores of unreleased sides and unseen photos. As I write this, we’re digging through hundreds of tapes that have been untouched for over forty years, meticulously transferring the reels, and drooling in anticipation for the months ahead.

...but no specifics yet...

Please, please let them do the Honey Ltd. album.

House Safe For Tigers is NUTS. Got the LHI comp too - wish these came with MP3s

One of his best, for sure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E99wO8fluXg

I just splurged on this Light in the Attic 7" box set in a fit of ridiculous financial irresponsibility and I have no regrets at all. It's so, so, so good. I didn't know so many of these songs, and there's not a dud on this thing.

http://blog.lightintheattic.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/honeyltd_invite-675x928.jpg

Press release says 4 young women but there are 5 on the cover?

I was gonna post about this like an hour ago

this reissue has been suuuuuper overdue

Had no idea the sisters were still going: http://likehoneymusic.com

What kind of crummy photographer gets a flower right in the face of one of the subjects?

A botanical photographer. Actually I think that's just a superimposition of the middle girl.

this reissue has been suuuuuper overdue

Hell yes. Such a great record, too.

Great article by DL in the Guardian today, and that
box set looks very exciting.

I hate trying to put links in.

Okay so I'm a bit bummed that in order to get the complete LHI catalog as mp3s you basically have to spend $180. I have most of the Lee and I guess the Honey Ltd. Is there really enough out there to make this even remotely worthwhile?

I'm totally strung out on Honey Ltd.'s Complete Recordings, and their reincarnation as Eve---minus one member, I think, but the two Eve tracks in the label boxset play in my head alll the time. The box also has well-chosen Complete Recording tracks.
A fair amount, maybe most of Hazlewood's own music included in the box can be found elsewhere, but would cost more, in some cases a lot more, if bought sep. Great to hear him (solo and with duet partners, mercurial Ann-Margret and pioneering youg *female* rock producer/on-point singer-songwriter Suzi Jane Hokum) in same place as misc. LHI singles, sporting psych-punk, folk-rock (incl. Ann-Margret and Suzi Jane's solo efforts, respectively---A-M's a badass!). Also excellent Deetroit-meets-Stax from Babara Randolph and the brilliantly re-named Billie Dearborn.
Lots of deep cuts and one-shots, but why weren't Buffalo Spingfield etc. show openers Hamilton Streetcar better known outside of late 60s Hollywood? Being on this fractious label didn't help any of these artists, except Hazlewood, I guess.
Can't say if it would be worth $180 to you, since I got it and Honey Ltd. as promos. Maybe they'll be on Spotify, does Light In The Attic do that? Spotify already has a number of Hazlewood albums, maybe a bit of these other artists' stuff too, on prev. comps. Found a bunch of other boxes, like VU, Dylan ( they still just have the 15-track Another Self Portrait sampler on there, though).

Members of the Wrecking Crew and other A-list session cats keep the quality consistent, too.

Emusic has the MP3 version of the LHI box for cheap (the contents of the discs though, not the complete LHI thumb drive thingy).

Oh yeah, I don't have any of the bonus deals, just the mp3s and .pdfs of the Honey Ltd. booklet and box book, both excellent. CDs would be better; I get tired of backing up my back-ups etc.

I think I need to check what the 305 tracks are. It's a lot of money but I could see it being worth it I guess. Just seems like a crazy amount of money for basically a DVD stuffed with WAV/mp3s that I have elsewhere. I could care less about the rest of the stuff that is doubling the price.

The 107 track version is on Spotify, and it's incredible enough on its own, without further context.

Yes, listening to that right now after don's recommendation and first listening to the Honey Ltd, which is also on spotify.

Can't say if it would be worth $180 to you, since I got it and Honey Ltd. as promos. Maybe they'll be on Spotify, does Light In The Attic do that? Spotify already has a number of Hazlewood albums, maybe a bit of these other artists' stuff too, on prev. comps. Found a bunch of other boxes, like VU, Dylan ( they still just have the 15-track Another Self Portrait sampler on there, though).

― dow, Sunday, 8 December 2013 16:12 (2 hours ago) Permalink

sorta hidden in the compilations category but spotify pulls through big

http://open.spotify.com/album/30Nzeoqzc9baLBz3ZPyPaf

Hamilton Streetcar's Invisible People and The Aggregation's Flying High are both psychsploitation gold.

Just found it under Lee Hazlewood, didn't seem to be hiding anymore, at least from the Spotify search function. So far seems to be a whole pocket universe of undiscovered countrified psych-pop in which Serge Gainsbourg meets Kris Kristofferson.

Although no doubt certain crate diggers done dug it before me

Should have put the prefix "Euro" in there somewhere

Sometimes it's difficult to remember the good times but I know there were some.

streaming the box now, man it sounds good. hope that it is under the xmas tree this year!

Yup. I like how "Dark End of the Street" threatens to turn into "River Deep, Mountain High."

I think I need to check what the 305 tracks are. Me too! But yeah, the Spotify version is what I have, and enough for now (maybe...) Best way to find it: put the main part of the title, There's A Dream I've Been Saving.

"Dark End": yeah, was thinking he and A-M were getting all turned on by the danger, and then he bleats, "Aw, let 'em find us"---the jaded cowpoke, mebbe fixing to mosey on, or just country-fatalistic about the available thrills and spills (reminds me of Lou Reed at times).

The CD version also includes the first legit DVD of his movie, Cowboy In Sweden; haven't seen that. LITA site doesn't seem to specify what the other tracks (incl 17 LPs and many 45s) are, on the deluxe ed.'s data discs. Oh well. They do provide a trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgQ1tdmn-Jo

How is the book? I already have most of the previous reissues, but the book is the one thing that could get me to plunge into the LITA box.

I can't pay $89 for a book no matter how awesome it looks. It's a sign of my mental illness that I'm like maybe I should pay double that for a DVD stuffed with songs basically plus a book lol. :-\

The book is beautiful and elegantly written but maybe not worth $89. THe boxset is the biggest one I own - it's a beast.

Afraid to see the video of Cowboy in Sweden, because I've already made such a video for it in my head. It's solidly in the the form of a corny variety show sketches, a la Sonny & Cher and Donnie & Marie, providing maximum contrast with the high craft of the songs.

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/mar/29/lee-hazlewood-rocks-great-recluse-wyndham-wallace-meltdown?CMP=share_btn_tw

Thanks! Wonder if this show was recorded...?

Dying to know what some of those "Movie Facts" were.

And now Wyndham Wallace's book, rec by author of recent Robert Wyatt bio:

Marcus O'Dair
‏@marcusodair

.@WyndhamWallace is on @BBCGidCoeShow next week, talking about his brilliant Lee Hazlewood book, Lee, Myself and I. Recommended.

Rock's Backpages has a free Lee section at the moment (dunno for how long)

http://www.rocksbackpages.com/public/img/home/129-free.jpg

A COWBOY IN NEW YORK — Wyndham Wallace recalls his first encounter with the legendary Lee Hazlewood in 1999 and NME's Tony Stewart talks Nancy Sinatra and more with Lee in 1971. PLUS exclusive audio of "the ol' sonofabitch" talking about his early years in Oklahoma…
That last is an epic mp3 talk with/to/at Barney Hoskyns. You gotta go here and scroll down through this vast trove of freebies, also register, but it worked pretty well for me:
http://www.rocksbackpages.com/Library/Free

Nad here's the Lee concert, with comments by facilitator Wyndham Wallace, whose dream come true:
(mp3s, get 'em while you can)
http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=2436

"movie facts" still such an incredible clothing slogan

Lee and Suzi Jane Hokom

http://41.media.tumblr.com/6bb756c6c9b2e70a8151dd9452dc3142/tumblr_nf1en7A1DK1soodkfo1_1280.jpg

New album of 1955-1956 material out today!
https://leehazlewood.bandcamp.com/album/400-miles-from-l-a-1955-56

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnAlNilp48E

Nice overview:

https://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/lee-hazlewood-musician-texas/

Holy Shit at him going to high school with revisionist Western stalwart L.Q. Jones.

(... one for the 'the last famous person you were surprised to discover was actually still alive' thread)

Really enjoyed that article. His push 'n' pull affection for the landscape of petroleum refineries and Methodists adds a bit of new understanding to his eccentricities.

this clip was new to me, nicely done

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbtKHrI-OAs

We are so very excited to announce the next release in our Lee Hazlewood archival series, The Sweet Ride: Lost Recordings 1965-68, a new compilation of demos, outtakes, and home recordings from Lee’s most prolific and successful era. https://t.co/276FrR2dIb pic.twitter.com/ITZwoh44g6

— Light In The Attic (@lightintheattic) July 29, 2022

For a long time I thought that the Belly song “Sweet Ride” was a Lee Hazlewood composition bc I’m absolutely certain I saw it erroneously credited as such somewhere. As is clear from this new comp, Lee’s “Sweet Ride” is an entirely different song. Funnily enough though, Belly’s song sounds very much like it could be a Hazlewood tune.

My pick for underrated Hazlewood composition is “In Our Time,” recorded by him and later, with bowdlerized lyrics, by Nancy Sinatra.

"For A Day Like Today" was my top Spotify song a couple of years ago.

You probably already knew this, but the Sweet Ride film had another perspective theme song written & recorded by Moby Grape which they mime to in the film.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Glo-RJ4go-I

I did not already know this.

Nor I.

I do know that a very interesting upcoming book will feature a detailed analysis of the recording of “Omaha.”

Brane is breaking just looking at the ToC: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/10.4324/9781003093206/one-track-mind-asif-siddiqi

i know this was posted before by me and maybe others but don't see it, broken link perhaps
great song but prime wrecking crew footage is what makes it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54x78pcWIgc

INA youtube channel has some gems in there among the rote tv promotional stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFNDY9ocrhE

his best song, maybe. always puts me in a space.

TIL that Reprise thought they could make lightning strike twice by having Lee produce another Rat Pack daughter...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7DI__tn7fw

Streaming for one week on lecinemaclub.com, Cowboy in Sweden: https://www.lecinemaclub.com/now-showing/cowboy-in-sweden/

I found it on Vimeo proper, apparently from the same source, for anyone who comes by after the Le Cinema Club feature expires.

https://vimeo.com/374624228

Filed under “things I explicitly purchased a box set for and then never got around to it”

so disappointed lita didn't include the dvd as a bonus on the recent 2 lp reissue (still, sounds amazing!) as they did on one of the previous releases.

I’ve spent the last month listening to nothing but lee and related and have been preparing playlists on Apple Music, Spotify and YouTube to share soon but will also be doing a write up. Basically 1955-1975. I keep discovering stuff and am just blown away.

There's going to be 3 playlists. a 7+ hour version for completists, a 2 hour version for purists and a 4-ish hour version, which tells the story I'm learning and I'm working the most on.

The youtube version of that playlist is here:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-_DBT13UQzCXQOtKk7dZ01vgPtQ6iVcS&si=7ALFZKt0NDlluD3Z

Because youtube has random uploads from people, this version of the playlist has a handful of tracks not available on Apple Music or Spotify.

I think it's a good range, mostly chronological, stuff he wrote, produced, performed, some stuff he only performed. It's a mix of my personal preferences and a vague idea about what makes a Lee Hazlewood song.

There's a few stretches...I just really wanted to get a track from the Waylon Jennings album Lee produced but the only Lee song on that album is one that Lee had already recorded himself a few years before and that version is already there, but then I noticed Lee sings on Waylon's version of Utah Philips' Rock, Salt and Nails, so I was able to include that.

I'm not going to share these playlists until I write it all up in a way I see fit, but figure some people may find this interesting in the meantime.

I am looking forward to this!

Happy Birthday Lee Hazlewood! Coincidence?

Cowboy in Sweden streaming for a few more days?

https://www.lecinemaclub.com/now-showing/cowboy-in-sweden/?utm_source=pocket_shared

Playlist of Lee on youtube, including Requiem...

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-_DBT13UQzDVsiSQMFfLtX-z0Ja3D21S&si=DzizZq7pGBppn-I-

"The President is popping pills
And paying all the old folks' bills
And wearing a silver spoon around his neck"

Those were the days, also daze.

From my round-up of 2022's country and related reissues, prev. unreleases etc.:

"Give up, you won’t survive, you’ll never get out alive, this world won’t letcha I betcha, and if it did, what’s it gonna getcha, what counts is, how you feel inside—cause life’s a, sweeeeet riiiiiiide---"
Thus Dusty Springfield blissfully calls over the crest of The Sweet Ride. which wiki sez is a 1968 American drama film with a few surfer/biker exploitation film elements. It stars Tony Franciosa, Michael Sarrazin and Jacqueline Bisset in an early starring role. The film also features Bob Denver in the role of Choo-Choo, a Beatnik piano-playing draft dodger. Sarrazin and Bisset were nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer, Male and Female respectively.
Seems promising, but right now I must focus on the contrast between Dusty and Lee (there’s a duo!)’s delivery of this key and opener to Lee Hazelwood's The Sweet Ride: Lost Recordings 1965-68, in which Light In The Attic does right by LH yet again, with a cohesive round-up of spare change, all about keeping your highest and lowest on point, on the fence of your sense, so for instance he here hunkers down and squeezes the end of the line over a rinky-tink piano. Just sit back and relax it, some day they’ve got to tax it—and when you can’t do that no more, nor shrug it off with a Roger Miller-worthy quirk over your acoustic guitar, just bug out toward Lou Reed Hazlewood cabin creak and even creekside tour guide to self-aware fantasy memories: whatever it takes to be taken etc. Relistenable beyond completism, with no need for signature layers of finished product atmospherics.

I'm still editing my Lee Hazlewood essay but his relationship to Roger Miller is fascinating. Miller lived in an apartment over Lee's garage, some of his handwritten lyrics were sold at auction by Lee's ex-wife. They were definitely sympatico. Miller's "One Dyin' and a Buryin'" sounds like a Lonesome Town outtake. Later Miller covered the Fool and sounds like he's paying more tribute to Lee than to Sanford Clark.

Finally WFMU's John Allen sent me the link to his interview with Lee during the Smells Like Records period where Lee offered a fascinating bit of trivia. The violin playing ape on the cover of Lee's The N.S.V.I.P.'s album? Roger Miller.

Intriguing, thanks! Speaking of Roger Miller (and 2022), here's a round-up I did of Roger's '22 digital debuts (albums), plus a revelatory collection of his early work---turns out he was a bit of a honky-tonkin' sport of the 50s:
https://mydeprodation.blogspot.com/2025/09/roger-miller-2022-digital-debuts-also.html

Thx for the tip to that WFMU interview. It's streaming here: https://www.wfmu.org/playlists/shows/24163

the cover of Lee's The N.S.V.I.P.'s album

it's amazing how Lee's mustache seems to add around 70 pounds, he looks so tiny here

Happy Birthday Jack Nitzsche...performing Lee's Baja here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oz_oJjQt7NQ

Nitzsche did a few sessions with me. I couldn't catch a hit with him at all. I introduced him to Phil Spector. They had hit after hit. I used to tease Phil…’you took my arranger.’ He said ‘you didn't do anything for him, I turned him into something.’ I said ‘you're right.'

-Lee