Mose Allison Sets It All Down For You!

Allison Wonderland, Mose Allison Anthology ^ | 1968 | Allison, Mose

[tsomer]

title: Monsters of the ID

here:

https://youtu.be/Cdkf5tJ2yb4

[tsomer]

So far back he saw all this coming. May as well laugh as cry.

[fhayek]

Mose Allison ping.

[Born in 1950]

Nice, thanks.

[Michael.SF.]

Mose Allison was one of those guys who was more popular with those inside the business than he was with the general public.

[krogers58]

Mose Allison’s work was introduced to me, via “The Who”. Here’s Mose’s version of “Young Man”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prviQu0rcDw

and the Who’s version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWRmsoBXAUw

[deks]

Thanks for posting, I hadn’t heard this one before. The arrangement reminds me of some that Marty Paich did for Mel Tormé. Looks like I need to dig down more into the Mose Allison catalog :)

YouTube is on autoplay so keeps playing Mose songs...great!

[tsomer]

I think I heard somewhere that while in primary school, a young Mose Allison proposed—as his entry into the upcoming science fair— to map each of the twelve tones of the chromatic scale to its complement among the 12 pairs of cranial nerves emanating directly from the floor of the human brain. He believed there was a direct correspondence between these entities, and that this was the basis of our comprehension of music.

They said that several notebooks, including a fully developed theory supporting his hypothesis were discovered by his teacher shortly before the precocious Mose could collect subjects and put his experiment into motion. Most agree that despite it being a setback to scientific progress, this timely intervention was on the whole of benefit to humanity.

I’ve been unable to confirm this story despite hours searching for evidence, including once reviewing every single entry returned from a Google query. I nevertheless remain unconvinced that it is total bullshit.

I suppose that Mose was most popular inside the business because he provided so much they could steal from. The general public derived much enjoyment from him as well, only, second hand.

[tsomer]

I passed those videos along to my son.

Thanks!

[Born in 1950]

Spent several hours getting acquainted with Mose Allison. Thanks to you! Monsters of the Id has interesting lyrics, who do you think the song refers to?

[tsomer]

Thanks for that.
I guess I stumbled over him while looking around on Youtube. I’d forgotten about him — hadn’t listened to him since about the late 70’s. The first song I picked was Parchman Farm— I was familiar with Johnny Winter’s version and liked it and read somewhere that Mose’s rendition influenced Johhny’s. It was a revelation. I hadn’t appreciated the clear narrative and complex, broad-grounded chords he delivered with such rhythmic precision and humor in my earlier hearings. After that I scrolled down the cue and noticed “Monsters..” I had to listen, and having listened I had to pass it along.

I think he did this in the late 50’s or early ‘60’s, when Freudian Analysis was a popular topic of discussion on campuses and around the cocktail circuit. That would have been the beatnik period and I think there’s a touch of it’s influence as well. I think he was based on the west-coast and I associate that music with musical sophistication, restrained expression and light undercurrent of satire.

I could be wrong about his back-ground; I’m going to look into it. I also want to see if Tom Lehrer (New Math) might have been another influence, or vice versa— both were remarkably talented.

I’m glad you heard what I heard.

Thanks again.

[dfwgator]

I consider their Isle of Wight version the greatest single live rock and roll performance ever.

[Lurker]

Thanks!

L

[tsomer]

Okay:
Wiki says he grew up in Mississippi attended college and did two years in the service. He moved to New York, then out on Long Island, married and raised four kids. Imagine, a great artist who also lived an exemplary life.

So much for my theories.