Deviny James was an alias for Jim Pewter, who became better known by his given name as a DJ on KMET-LA and later Armed Forces Radio. “Blue, Blue Denim” – a title that likely aided in endearing him to Gene Vincent, with whom he later collaborated – came out on the Beta label as the flipside to “Little Girl” in 1959. Check out the scorching guitar solo by session ace Larry Hulley and the disembodied backup voices on loan from the house on haunted hill. Thanks to Jerry Richards for this one.

Deviny James – “Blue, Blue Denim”

The old Adams Extract building on I-35, which I waxed nostalgic for back in ’07, also caught the fancy of Mike Judge, who attributes the building as a key inspiration for Extract, his new movie. The location is still nothing but a heap of dirt, but the original neon sign now adds class to the considerably less attractive building in Gonzalez, Texas (above). At least we still have Benji’s photo of the building. And thanks to commenter Sterling Crim of Adams Extract & Spice, LLC, who tells us that the Austin History Center “has the original architectural files” and that they are “loaded with photos inside and out of the plant.”

Riley Walker circa 1994 (Photo by Peter Vogel)

This photograph of Riley Walker, taken at his Arizona home 40 years after the release of “Uranium Miner’s Boogie,” comes to us courtesy of Peter Vogel, who’d also written the 1989 article about Walker in New Mexico magazine. I love the picture – it captures a man who clearly never gave up music even though he’d long since kicked the music biz out of his life. (Click photo to enlarge.)

Although this record comes from the early seventies heyday of the California-centric Jesus Movement, band leader Jim Palosaari – a first generation Finn from the Northern US – apparently had a large scale evangelistic agenda which had him rockin’ all over the world. Jeesus-Rock! came out on the Finnlevy label, which was kind of like the Finnish Warner Bros. until the real life Warner Bros. swallowed it up in ’93. The whole thing’s in English except for two tracks sung in exuberant, American-accented Finnish, including this one – which translates lyrically to “Jesus loves” and musically to “dig my big bass riff, Baby.”

The Sheep – “Jeesus Rakastaa” (1972)

posted by Kim Simpson