The Bossmen - Hey Congratulations/Bad Girl

Saturday obscurity at its finest. And yes, I’m cheating a little. Back in 2012 I posted the Dick Wagner & The Frost 45 “Bad Girl” on Date — complete with the elusive picture sleeve. Today’s mail‑order treasure? A “Bossmen” single pairing “Hey Congratulations” with (surprise!) “Bad Girl.”

I dropped the needle and immediately thought, Wow, this sounds exactly like Wagner’s version. Well, kiddies, peeps, children of the revolution — that’s because the Bossmen were basically Dick Wagner with a band name attached. (No, I didn’t research whether they were the same lineup as The Frost. There are only so many hours in a day and I need at least two of them for coffee.)

My quick dive into Wagner’s résumé turned up things I had absolutely no clue about. Apparently he was recruited to play on Lou Reed’s Berlin, then became musical director for the Rock ’n’ Roll Animal tour, rearranging Velvet Underground songs for both the shows and the record.

And then it gets better — absurdly, cosmically better. How, you ask? Well, you — my followers with rock‑and‑roll IQs so high they need their own air‑traffic control — probably already knew that Wagner was one of the dueling guitar sorcerers on Rock ’n’ Roll Animal. Yes, that “Sweet Jane” intro, the one that sounds like the gates of heaven opening for a leather‑jacketed angel.

How did I not know this, considering that album has been welded to my soul since forever?Now the fact is lodged in my brain like a glittering shard of trivia, and I can only wonder which perfectly useful piece of knowledge it shoved aside to make room. My PIN number? My anniversary? The location of my car keys? Hard to say. The mind is a chaotic jukebox.

Lou Reed has only made one appearance here so far, which is frankly negligent on my part. I’ll fix that. Eventually.

The Elgins-You Found Yourself Another Fool/Street Scene

The weekend — no, let’s give it its proper title, the glorious Three‑Day Weekend — is creeping up, so allow me to seduce your senses with some sweet, swooning, soul‑soaked goodness. — the kind of record that the buying public completely ignored at the time, proving once again that history has terrible taste. What was once a bargain‑bin wallflower has now become a hard‑to‑find luxury — like stumbling across its brilliance at a yard sale, a flash of treasure so startling and luminous it makes you wonder who on earth let such a marvel slip away in the first place.

We’re dealing with one of those “who had the name first?” situations. Unfortunately for this particular group of Elgins, they had zero chart action, so they politely step aside for Motown’s V.I.P. Elgins — the more famous vocal group who actually got invited to the party. But this final 45 of theirs? It outshines the “other” Elgins so thoroughly it should come with sunglasses.

Released in the overcrowded musical jungle of 1965 on the Valiant label — a label so obscure it practically came pre‑filed under “forgotten” — the record eventually found salvation thanks to the northern soul crowd, who have a talent for rescuing neglected masterpieces.

“Street Scene,” with its slow‑burn In‑Crowd vibe, was apparently the intended A‑side. Cute. But it’s the B‑side, “You Found Yourself Another Fool,” that does the real seducing. This copy someone doodled on the label, which I choose to interpret as physical evidence of the moment the song hijacked their brain. Fair enough — it grabbed mine too.

Ria And The Revellons -She Fell In Love/He's Not There

Crackly Ria and The Revellons crash‑landed onto my Thursday Girl Soundz like they’d been smuggled in by a time‑traveling jukebox. They started with that Shangri‑Las swagger, but then—bam!—my brain did a cartwheel and suddenly I’m hearing David Johansen from the New York Dolls yelling from the corner of the room. Wild how your mind just grabs two unrelated records and insists they’re cousins.

Anyway, this was another one of those flea‑market miracles, the kind where you find treasure only if you’ve got a few crumpled bills and a reckless spirit. I took the plunge (because you know I’m powerless against those girl‑group harmonies), even though the vinyl looks like it spent fourteen summers as a dog’s favorite frisbee. And the marker scribbles? Absolutely the work of a DJ who had given up on life and possibly gravity.

Sonny Curtis- Talk About My Baby/Red Headed Stranger

We lost Sonny Curtis last September, and his passing drifted by like a quiet chord change — subtle, almost unnoticed, but leaving the air different once it was gone. His songs traveled farther than most people realize, landing in the hands of artists as wildly different as the Everly Brothers, Bobby Vee and the Clash, Hüsker Dü and the Dead Kennedy's. And of course, before all that, he was a Cricket, standing right there in the glow of Buddy Holly’s early brilliance.

He never scored a blockbuster hit under his own name, but his recording career ran deep, wide, and wonderfully strange — proof enough in this 1960 45. Red Headed Stranger may have worn the A‑side crown, but it’s Talk About My Baby that hits me square in the sweet spot, the way only a perfectly cut, slightly forgotten gem can.

The Jags- Here Comes My Baby

Powerpop Heaven — the kind of bliss that hits like a sugar rush straight to the soul. The Jags don’t just cover this Cat Stevens classic; they kidnap it, give it an energy drink, and launch it into orbit. The second it starts, you’re bopping down the road like you’ve been personally chosen as Earth’s Ambassador of Cool.

This song takes over your entire nervous system. If I’m blasting it in the car, my head starts shaking so wildly that nearby drivers probably start rehearsing their “I witnessed everything” statements for the police. And honestly? I’ve never heard a version of this song that doesn’t absolutely melt my brain in the best possible way.

The Shadows - Apache

Honestly, as cheeky as I can get, let’s talk about the Shadows and the absolute circus of them never cracking the U.S. charts, because at this point it feels like the universe misplaced a memo, spilled tea on it, and then blamed the dog. In Britain they were a proper big deal — striding about with that crisp, twangy instrumental sound that should have slid right into the American surf scene like a greased‑up beach ball (oops, it did, later courtesy of the Ventures, who basically said, “Move aside lads, we’ll handle the American bit”). And no, they weren’t some plucky little outfit recording in a shed behind a fish‑and‑chips shop; they were on proper labels with what should have been proper distribution, doing everything short of strapping the records to a flock of carrier pigeons and hoping for the best.

They did have to ditch their original name, the Drifters, after the other Drifters in the States said, “Absolutely not,” which is fair enough. But honestly, “the Shadows” sounds far more dangerous — like a band that might steal your girl, your amplifier, and possibly your lunch if you leave it unattended. Cliff Richard (born Harry Webb, because of course he was) started out with them, and together they racked up a deliciously naughty total of 69 charting singles — 35 with Cliff, 34 on their own. Yes, yes, nudge, nudge, wink, wink, you cheeky devil.

And then — oh, buckle up — there’s “Apache.” The Shadows crafted this moody, cinematic, desert‑mirage fever dream of a masterpiece… and who gets the U.S. hit? Jørgen Ingmann. Lovely chap, I’m sure, but let’s be honest: his version is the store‑brand cereal next to the Shadows’ full‑sugar, name‑brand original — the kind that comes with a free toy and a mild sense of superiority.

There is no comparison. There is only the Shadows, glowing like a radioactive jukebox in the night, and America, tragically wearing noise‑canceling headphones.

And just when you think the “Apache” drama couldn’t get any spicier, in march the Ventures — not tiptoeing, not politely knocking, but barging in like, “Hello, yes, we’ll be taking this now.” They didn’t just cover it on their highest charting album “Plays Telstar”; they covered it as masters, the musical equivalent of walking into a room wearing sunglasses indoors and announcing, “We’re professionals, darling.”

So now you’ve got the Shadows with the OG, Jørgen Ingmann politely collecting the U.S. hit like he’s picking up a parcel at the post office, and the Ventures strutting in with full “we own this surf‑rock kingdom” energy. It’s chaos. It’s drama. It’s a love triangle, but with guitars and questionable haircuts.

Meanwhile, the Shadows’ version is still sitting there, legs crossed, eyebrow raised, quietly judging everyone because it knows — it knows — it’s the superior one.

Sister Josephine James- Look Down Upon Me/Lord I Believe

Yesterday unraveled the way my cats unravel a ball of string — with enthusiasm, zero strategy, and a trail of chaos that somehow feels personal. I slipped out to the yard sales — a covert little treasure hunt — only to find that every driveway had transformed into a graveyard of forgotten objects. The old saying “my junk could be your junk” didn’t stand a chance. I’ve already got enough of my own junk auditioning for space in my house.

I did manage to mow the lawn, but the idea of digging through the shed to find the shears felt like an archaeological expedition I wasn’t emotionally prepared for. And the bush trimmer? The thought of plugging it in felt like too much commitment for a Saturday.

The real chaos started with the new router. I had this whole plan: install it, bask in the glow of improved Wi‑Fi, then hang new curtains like a domestic champion. Instead, the router decided to audition for the role of “Most Useless Piece of Technology.” The company swore their app would handle everything “effortlessly,” which was true only if “effortlessly” means “not at all.”

Meanwhile, Wifey was growing increasingly irritated because no internet meant no Roku, which meant no TV, which meant the household mood was deteriorating fast. After two hours of digital purgatory, I finally called the company. A technician swooped in — not through their precious app, but through an old‑fashioned browser window. She was fantastic. The app, however, remains a mystery wrapped in incompetence. Why direct customers to a tool that works about as well as a screen door on a submarine?

Anyway — back to the real heart of the day: another Peacock 45 arrived in the mail. Funny thing, I almost never stumble across the R&B Peacock 45s in the wild, and the spiritual Peacock 78s only surface once in a blue moon. I’ve got a battered copy of Big Mama Thornton’s Hound Dog on both 45 and 78, but I’ve never held an original Peacock sleeve in my hands.

I do have a few Sister Josephine James 45s, though. A little digging suggests she passed in 2019 — and she was the sister of Reverend Cleophus Robinson, whose voice I adore. Funny how a single record can open a door into a whole family’s history.