Kendra Smith - Alle Morgens Parties

I'm still here.

I recently got a request to re-up Kendra Smith's German language version of "All Tomorrow's Parties," which I originally posted long ago. It's worth hearing again, but I thought I would also take the opportunity to re-record the track, and apply some of what I've learned about digitizing vinyl in between time. This was taken from a flexi disc given away with The BOB Magazine. It's never going to sound like the kind of recording audiophiles use to demo interconnect cables, but I think it sounds a lot better than the first time I did it. (Long time readers who downloaded this back in 2006, let me know what you think).

I don't have a lot to add to what I said originally, which wasn't much to begin with. It's uncanny how fully Kendra Smith and Steve Wynn were channeling The Velvet Underground when they recorded this track back in 1981. If I didn't already know better and someone told me this was an alternate take from the Velvets' session that produced the Norman Dolph acetate, I would believe it. Slavish imitation? Sure, but also great.

I'd like to apologize to my regular readers for not posting in a while. I've been suffering from a case of what might charitably be called writer's block. But I'm going to keep posting, if not necessarily at the rapid pace I once did.

Alle Morgens Parties (click to download)

All Tomorrow's Parties (In German)

German language appreciation week concludes with this version of "All Tomorrow's Parties" recorded by Kendra Smith with Steve Wynn back in 1981. German is such a natural choice for this song it makes you wonder why Lou Reed didn't think to have Nico sing an alternate version in German. German also comes naturally to Smith because she spent part of her childhood in Germany. This was recorded around the same time as the sessions for the first Dream Syndicate EP. It was probably a good idea not to release it at the time as the band was being obvious enough about its primary influence without actually covering them.

The Dream Syndicate

I vividly remember the first time I heard the Dream Syndicate. It was junior year in High School and a buddy and I had driven 45 minutes to visit a mall where Bert and Ernie were appearing (yeah, don't ask). My buddy bought a cassette tape of The Days of Wine and Roses and we played it on the ride back. The music blew me away. Sure it was obviously derivative, but here was a band making the kind of music I really liked in the here and now instead of in some far off time before I was born. And it beat the heck out of Starship or whatever was getting played on the radio at that point in time.

Rhino released an expanded edition of the The Days of Wine and Roses with their first EP included as a bonus. This is a live version of a song that originally appeared on the EP. It's taken from a Rough Trade 12" of "Tell Me When It's Over." It's a quieter, but no less intense, version of "Some Kinda Itch."