Dr. John: Hot or Not?

i guess what I'm curious about is ... how the hell did this record (Gris Gris) get made? Seriously, it sounds like one of the stranger albums of the 60s. And Wikipedia sez it was made in LA at Gold Star Studios! Sounds like it was made in a swamp somewhere. Maybe I just need to get used to it ... Loved it, but was also baffled!

iirc Dr. John had moved out to LA to do session work along with his sidekick percussionist Diddimus and they ended up at Gold Star. Obviously he had jazz chops so that would get him in the door for various things, but I don't remember exactly what he worked on. I know some solo stuff he recorded ended up on lots of crappy reissue packages for which he didn't see a dime.

the clothes he is wearing on the cover of Babylon were all acuired from the Diggers' Free Store on Haight - that album is like his SF psych scene record

I thought I read somewhere that the record got made while sonny and cher took some breaks during their recording time

linked thru the wiki

LINER NOTES FOR DR. JOHN'S GRIS-GRIS

By Richie Unterberger

When Dr. John's Gris-Gris hit the rock underground in 1968, it wasn't certain whether its master of ceremonies had landed from outer space, or just been dredged out of hibernation from the Louisiana swamps. The blend of druggy deep blues, incantational background vocals, exotic mandolin and banjo trills, ritualistic percussion, interjections of free jazz, and Dr. John's own seductive-yet-menacing growl was like a psychedelic voodoo ceremony invading your living room. You could be forgiven for suspecting it of having been surreptitiously recorded in some afterhours den of black magic, the perpetuators of this misdeed risking life-threatening curses for having exposed these secret soundtracks to the public at large.

In fact Gris-Gris was recorded surreptitiously, but not in some New Orleans house of sin. It was laid down in the famed Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles, where Phil Spector had cut many of his classics. It might have never come to pass at all had Dr. John and his co-conspirators not managed to wrangle some free studio time that had been originally earmarked for Sonny & Cher sessions. The resulting album nonetheless sounded as authentically New Orleans as a midnight Mardi Gras stroll though the French Quarter. Given the circumstances, that achievement was just as magical as anything the most powerful voodoo ritual could have wrought.

cher also covered walk on gilded splinters I think

Sonny & Cher thing just makes this album all the weirder.

thanx to whoever sold their copy of the sun, moon & herbs to my local record store. i bought it solely on THE NIGHT TRIPPER name and album art

what a strange and awesome guy!

pretty wild record! What the hell!?

otm

great record

other recent Dr. John postings on this thread:

Dr. John S/D

Hadn't heard that Sonny & Cher story before. Gris Gris is one of my alltime fav lps. Psychedelia without the influence of The Beatles or the Stones though he went on to guest with both bands.

Have been meaning to get hold of the autobio for years.

Aren't several of these Night Tripper lps due a remaster?

Sorry, when did Dr. John guest with The Beatles?

never afaik

The new box set is pretty great.
Takes him up to Desitively Bonnaroo.

Sound i spretty great. But there are no liner notes beyond what's on the shrunken lp sleeves they've represented as Digipacks.

Maybe I just need to get around to reading Under A hoodoo Moon which I've meant to do for the last 25 years or something.
But would have been nice if they included a booklet with background on each lp.

Sorry, when did Dr. John guest with The Beatles?

― Number None,

http://www.meetthebeatlesforreal.com/2019/06/remembering-dr-john.html?m=1

Not really with the full Beatles but with Lennon and Ringo.