22/50
It would be hard to overstate the impact it had on me
Tale
The life and work of the most original American singer-songwriter of the past 50 years. I vividly remember hearing Mink Deville’s song “Mixed Up Shook Up Girl” on the radio when it came out in the late 70s.
I had no luck finding it or anything else by this mysterious artist
And yet, when I went looking for the record in the stores where I lived, it was like searching for the Holy Grail. Finally, many years later, I was overjoyed to find a compilation record of his called “Savoir Faire” that included not only the song I had been obsessed with for so long, but many other incredibly great tunes.
He later recorded in Europe and lived for a time in New Orleans
The documentary Heaven Stood Still delves deeper into the mystique that has surrounded Mink Deville frontman Willy Deville for all these years. His first three albums were released by Capitol, but due to disappointing sales, he was summarily discarded.
There are some enlightening interviews with people like Ben E
I was very impressed by the archival footage of the band’s incredible early years, but found the flaws and the whole excavation of Willy’s slow, drawn-out decline to be emotionally crushing. I suspected that drug use had contributed to the deterioration he suffered in his later years, but I had no idea how pervasive it became.
King (Stand By Me) and Peter Wolf, the singer of the J
Geils Band. There’s also a live performance of “Mixed Up Shook Up Girl” that I’d never seen before and that literally gave me chills.
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