uh this is my book... i have sent it to you...
yes it's been forever, and you probably thought i had thrown in the towel for good... but i have a half dozen things i'd love to share, so here goes...
***Satan and the Deciples***
this record rules!!! deep supernatural organ-rock kitsch from Louisiana. i could see how this might suck if Satan wasn't such a turned on NUT. imagine a David Allen Coe style vocalist rambling at length on all kinds of spooky ancient mystery cult esoterica. it IS campy, but it is also fantastically weird and right-on if you are into this kind of thing. the "Book of Alpha" is my favorite cut, a sort-of underground Bible-belt journey into inner space and beyond, as he explains in a sort of bayou hallucination the evolution of man from reptiles! "Satan on Universe" is also remarkably out-there, as Satan proclaims the existence of the United Staes and the year 1968 before the Big Bang! i flash Dr. John, and a bit of Sam the Sham, but this is truly a local and personably freaky odyssey. the band is like a toned down version of the Sir Douglas Quintet or the Pharoahs, southern accordion rock with some wah and wacky homemade sound effects, but really suprisingly mellow and sensitive to Satan's eccentricities. i can imagine about a dozen people truly enjoying this one. good luck.
posted by J.D.F. | 11:36 AM
9 Comments:
This looks cool!! Thanks
You may have the great PALMER ROCKEY lp. If so, please post it!
Thanx.
Any chance of re-upping "Grass" by Jackie & Roy? I need some swingin' sounds! Or anything else by them you've got.
Thanks!
How about a re-up of Cincy Joe & Mad Lydia? I might have some stuff you are looking for. I have the Rockey LP, for e.g.
Guau.
http://jreva.blogspot.com/
Bye.
Hot damn!
THANK YOU THANK YOU!! Hot damn, these guys are what The Ponderosa Stomp are all about.
A -little- bit of information for you about Satan and the Deciples. I enjoy digging up information on the most obsure 60's garage bands but Satan has proved the most elusive. What I know came from a few sources and seems to be all of the information about Satan and the Deciples available. Which would make me the world's leading authority on Satan and the Deciples! Woo-hoo! I'm finally a world's leading authority on a band. Admittedly my info is not much, and I'm no investigative reporter. Still, what you are about to read is the most information about this band available together in one location (not counting LP numbers and minutiae that I could reprint here for no reason but number of characters typed...). First, and by far the most interesting fact about Satan and the Deciples, is that Freddy Fender was the guitar player! That's right, listed on the record as Baldemar Huerta, Freddy rocked with Satan down in the swamp for a couple of years. Freddy left us not too long ago, RIP Freddy; I had contacted him before he passed though, not knowing that he was terminally ill. He replied graciously through his wife, Vangie. He did his best - I can only imagine the memories that he must have from a fifty+ year career in rock! He put together a list of the musicians in the band, which basically corresponded with the Borderline book ("Fuzz, Acid, and Flowers" recognized authority on 60's garage). his names were more informal but they matched. They were all Mexican and apparently Freddy was the last survivor so the entire band is gone now. Freddy of course was no "deciple" of Satan - I'm sure he's in rock and roll heaven. But unfortunately the relatively short period of time in Freddy's long career that the band occupied did not leave much of an imprint. I was not able to figure out who Satan was, and what the dude's trip was. Satan was not Mexican! Only his band was! Satan's name, though clouded in history and subject to conflicting accounts, is most likely Raymond O. Bates. And that's all you get, sorry! I wish that I had more to give you - such as why R.O. decided to do what must be the first real devil rock album, Screaming Jay Hawkins et al. notwithstanding. Satan and the Deciples was the first one that was really devilish and talked about the devil a lot, and of course there's that album cover. It's awesome! I'm no deciple of the devil either, but I know a classic album cover when I see one! Now, Freddy was not sure what happened to Ray (he referred to him as Ray). He did not know if he still roamed the Earth. The ending of the album speaks of more to come, but to the best of my knowledge the world is still waiting. Perhaps Ray is still working on a much-improved record. Because unfortunately the music here is sub-par. Don't get me wrong - I enjoy it in it's way -but it's not the super fuzzed up, brain-frying bad trip meltdown that the album cover gave pause to hope for (I saw that cover for YEARS before I finally heard the record though, by that time nothing could). But this also makes it even weirder. The music is strangley placid, even when the band is chugging. Satan's voiced is detached. It's not scary but it is certainly creepy. He does not seem to change his voice for effect, certainly nothing like that guy who is the lead singer for ever death metal band in the world, except for some very odd laughs. Some of the songs are not about Satan, or even ghoulish at all. In fact they are...pleasant. My personal favorites are "Satan's First theme" and "Book of Alpha" where that next wotk was mentioned. Then "Why The Seas Are Salty" is the exact opposite, the complete 180 degree polar opposite, of what the album cover looks like. And "Black Sheep" is one of the single worst songs that I've ever heard. Poor Freddy! But to me, this stuff just makes the big story that much more interesting. I wish that I knew what Ray's trip was indeed. For not only did Satan and the Deciples release this album, they were also the house band for some bar down in the French Quarter (I don't know which one). What could that possibly have been like? I mean - here's some fat, middle aged white guy on vacation in New Orleans going into a bar for some drinks - it's the late 1960's and he's with his fat white wife, in his Bermuda shorts and sandals with socks; and onstage are six Mexican guys (including then unkown Freddy Fender) jamming out with some looney white man claiming to be Satan and singing about how misunderstood he is. Wow. That's one memory that you can't give yourself. to make things even worse, the last bit of juicy Satan and the Deciples gossip that I have for you is that they lost the house band gig to a then-unknown Black Oak Arkansas. That's enough to drive anyone to the dark side.
Geez why did I just write all that? I only came to the computer to leave feedback for an eBay transaction!
I'm not responsible for any gross inaccuracies, half truths, or outright lies printed here.
R.I.P. Freddy Frender. Sorry that I could not find you a copy of "Mummie's Curse." Thank you, Vangie Fender. And my condolences.
Oh yeah I almost forgot! Do you guys want to hear it for yourself?
http://heinouberspace.blogspot.com/2007/10/satan-and-deciples-underground-1969.html
Wow, a friend of mine gave me a tape of a tape of this album almost 20 years ago. I've never been able to find any info on them.
It didn't help that the tape was labeled Satan's Disiples.
Thanks for all the info. I really dig this album a shame that Satan (or Ray) didn't do any other music that I know of.
Post a Comment
<< Home