VOTD 11/26/2025

Shirley & Company: Shame Shame Shame (Vibration)

Purchased at Jerry's Records

When I was briefly doing my Nurse With Wound deep dive, I read Steven Stapleton's comments about being a young, obsessive collector of weird records. Among the criteria: the cover art. In his case he sought out psychedelic and surrealist imagery.

There was a time, in my young adulthood, I could look at the cover art or recognize an artist name, and I knew if the record was likely going to be for me. That's not that case any longer. There are a number of reasons. These would include my inability and disinterest in keeping close tabs on current indie and underground trends and artists, and the absolutely glut of product available in a current record store. I'm still willing to drop a few dollars on a gamble if it looks, for lack of a better term "experimental" enough, but I have my limits if I don't know the names involved. Which is most of what I find currently.

It's by happenstance that this record was sitting on the racks of Jerry's Records with the front cover on full display. The image is posted below. It's not the weirdness favored by Steven Stapleton, nor the grimness of early industrial noise LPs I might have sought in my early 20s. But I ask you, how was I to turn up an album with a primitive image drawn in magic marker, depicting (presumably) Shirley next to Richard Nixon, with the title Shame Shame Shame? And for $5? Sold!

The back cover proudly announces "disco dynamite!". Mmmm, maybe, maybe not. This dates to 1975, and disco broke out into mainstream mania in 1977 with the release of Saturday Night Fever. That's not to say disco didn't exist before that year, but this doesn't strike me as a down-the-line disco album. More poppy, funky r-n-b verging on a disco feel. When I think of disco, it's all very close to the same tempo with consistent (or incessant) hits on the snare on two and four. 

Do I recognize the opening title track? I'm not certain. Possibly. As a program I wouldn't have followed the vocal version directly with the instrumental; I would have put them on different sides. Likewise "Cry Cry Cry". Once again, have I heard this before? I remain unsure.

While not as flat and low-quality as the vinyl release of Sex World from my previous blog post, this lacks the high end lush production and arrangements of better known disco albums. It doesn't sound bad, if anything I prefer it less polished.

There are occasional contribution of people playing trombone and soprano saxophone, rather sharp. I'm just as guilty, it's a struggle in my own playing to this day.

The program is pretty good in general. I doubt anyone will claim this is a stone cold classic, but it's a fun listen and end with a strong funky closer in "Keep On Rolling On" with the largest horn section of the album. Shirley, whoever she is or was, has a light but well defined voice. It's been an entertaining listen, and that's not so bad.

$5 well spent, all based on a cover image.

VOTD 11/22/2025

 Barry Lipman: Sex World OST (Vinegar Syndrome)

Purchased at Vinegar Syndrome Pittsburgh

Hello, back to typing my thoughts, for the time being.

There's a new store in Pittsburgh, Vinegar Syndrome. VS is a thriving (I assume) blu ray/DVD label dedicated to reissues of horror and exploitation films. Recently they've taken to 4K hi def restorations. Much of it, if not all, isn't readily available for streaming. I'd love to watch some of them without having to spend, say, $47 just to view the ridiculous Mac and Me. (A cheapo ET ripoff blended with one big McDonald's endorsement.) Plus I don't own a 4K player.

Vinegar Syndrome has opened four brick and mortar stores, the other locations being Toronto, Bridgeport, and Denver. Pittsburgh seems more logical than Bridgeport CT, but then I can't say I've ever been there. The label isn't just for mail order or conventions any longer.

The store is dedicated to physical media: used and new DVDs and blu rays, records, CDs, comics, books, t-shirts. It's mostly horror and exploitation-oriented, though I did find a reasonably priced used double DVD set on Criterion of Stan Brakhage's films. 

Among the new vinyl soundtracks was this, on VS's own imprint. If you haven't already guessed, it's a 70s porn take on Westworld. Maybe even taking the idea to its more logical conclusion.

I can say honestly I haven't seen the movie. The very existence of a soundtrack album from a 1970s hardcore feature is enough to pique my interest. The industry, the stories, the sort of care that was put into some of the movies, the adult industry's own star system and theater circuit, all of that is far, far more interesting than the movies themselves.

Each track is accompanied with a still for the associated scene. (The images don't get any more hardcore than a pair of bare breasts.) The Sex World theme itself is a pretty straight forward disco number. It was 1977 after all. Other cues sound a bit like bachelor pad music. Some lighter, some heavier, but generally trying to evoke that "sexy" mood.

The sound is flat, possibly mono(?), and sometimes choppily edited. Did the label have access to the original master tapes? It's well played, definitely professional musicians involved. I don't find it difficult to believe they skimped on recording fidelity, but I really wonder if this was of better quality out of the studio. 

But it's the fact of its very existence that caught my attention. It's so curious that this much effort was put into a movie for the raincoat crowd. Though, it was the age of "porno chic" I suppose, with an industry vying for more reputability in this most disreputable category. Nonetheless, it's a mark of quality. A real studio band playing well-developed charts. Today, for a cheap direct to streaming film, it would probably all be done on a laptop in Ableton Live. Or worse still, GarageBand. (I swear I've recognized GarageBand loops in Syfy Channel movies.) Even the images on the back make it look as though the movie was well filmed, probably on 35mm. 

Is this any less embarrassing or (I'll use the word again) disreputable than Cannibal Holocaust with its original score by Riz Ortolani? I've commented on it in this forum a few months ago. I've seen its trailer which tells me that I really don't need to watch that movie. I don't necessarily object to movies that are bloody or of questionable themes, but I have a big issue with cruelty and sadism, even if they're fictional. With that in mind, I don't need to see Pasolini's Salo either.

With that in mind, yeah I'd watch Sex World before I'd ever watch Cannibal Holocaust.