OLD SCHOOL #6 Petite Adrenaline

For fifty years, I’ve been bewildered. Why wasn’t “Feel Older Now” by The Phlorescent Leech and Eddie (Flo and Eddie y’all) a huge hit of 1972, like Neil Young’s “Heart of Gold” or Roberta Flacks’s “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.”

It is joyous, it is mad, it is weird. Maybe that affected the record sales. Also there was the blossoming of the Watergate scandal. Who had time for two refugees from the power pop giants The Turtles, Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan? Clearly they had moved on from lollipops and roses hits like “Happy Together.”

Clearly, Mark and Howard had taken the LSD Frank Zappa had offered them, grown their beards out sloppy, and adopted the scuzzy hippie look of their new band, The Mothers of Invention.

What happened in those time is told well by Howard Kaylan in Shell Shocked: My Life with the Turtles, Flo and Eddie, and Frank Zappa, etc.

Yes they smoked pot in the Lincoln bedroom. They may have imbibed a bit during the sessions for this blasting ballad that features the whimsy of growing old backed by bitterness, regret, and amplifiers stacked to the moon.

FEEL OLDER NOW Phlorescent Leech and Eddie

Just under 130 million in album sales. Horror actor Vincent Price on Michael Jackson’s Thriller: 70 million. Alice Cooper: 58 million. Turtles: 1/2 million.

I talk about seeing Jackie Wilson in person on a golden oldie tour in the podcast. What a presence. Wilson was an incredible performer who brought such passion and joy to his music. The video is him doing one of gymnasium nation’s greatest hits. In the show is his professional debut from 1956. Jackie wails. As Van Morrison said, “Jackie Wilson Said (I’m in Heaven When You Smile)”.

REET PETITE Jackie Wilson

Wrapping OS#6 we have a great tune from the industrial pioneers led by Genesis P-Orridge and Casey Fanni Tutti. They began life as COUM Transmission, and performed as Death Factory before hitting on the name we remember them for.

ADRENALINE Throbbing Gristle

All this energy destroys me Killing my security Sitting here you make me shiver Sitting here I lose all fear Making love in different places Jealousy brings you So near

It still helps me be happy It still helps make me free Yet it still helps me be happyA And it still helps made me free

Adrenalin, adrenalin paper-thin adrenalin paper-thin adrenalin

Sitting here you make me shiver Sitting here you see my fear I am split in different places I am split from everything Longing for security

Paper-thin adrenalin Paper-thin adrenalin Waiting for the life you give

Here we are just sitting prettyHere we are just sitting pretty

Paper-thin adrenalinPaper-thin adrenalinPaper-thin adrenalin

Longing for security

I am split in different placesI am split from everythingYet it still helps make me happySitting with adrenalinAnd it still helps make me happySitting with adrenalin

Can I be alive once more?Sitting with adrenalinSitting with adrenalinSitting with adrenalinSitting with adrenalin

“The past is a blast.”

Thanks for listening to Old School. Remember it is easy to load these in with your podcasts and things update there every time I click go on this end.