Bear Cat Ben Myers

Bear Cat Ben MyersOriginally released in 1953, "Bear Cat" by Rufus Thomas is as certifiable a primitive R'n'B smoker that's ever existed. Complete with the inimitable Joe Hill Louis on guitar, the future "Funky Chicken" Thomas gives his male perspective answer record to Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog." In the process, the legal powers behind "Hound Dog" writers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller won a lawsuit claiming "Bear Cat" infringed on the duo's copyright. Ever since

making the rounds on punk and DIY circuits around Canada and later into the USA

” which wafts along on a gust borrowed from Lou Reed’s beatific Coney Island Baby breeziness

Conan O’Brien

Is it work-shy and lazy to call a live record whose songs flow seamlessly into one another "epic

“All of these different ideas bubbled up out of listening to these things—this texture and these little nuances that we were able to explore

“Save Me Tomorrow” — LOC studio sessions that has been unheard by Butch or the band since it was recorded (first time on vinyl)

country and gospel

Hate To Say I Told You So

The Spectator

takes in a show on Record Store Day

Folks REALLY start to pay attention

Because two of the band's members met while composing the music for a Nobel-prize winner's play