Today I'll be looking at side 1 of The Temptations' 1972 record "All Directions." I don't know why I particularly care for this record, but I do, especially the third song on side 1. But more on that in a minute.

1. Funky Music Sho Nuff Turns Me On

When I converted this record to MP3s, this track stood out due to lack of quality, I mean, the music on it is fine, it's just the sound wasn't quite right. It sounds like it was recorded live. I couldn't even try to interpret the lyrics on this one. The beat was good though.

2. Run Charlie Run

One thing that bothers me to this day: Why is it that Black people can say the "N" word all they want, but when we (honkies) try to use it, we always get in trouble? If I were to sing this in a concert in Detroit (not that I'll ever get a chance to!) they'd rush the stage and beat me up, mostly for the line (which is repeated a lot in this track) "the n--- is comin'". I guess it's just me ranting on "words are just words, they shouldn't hurt anyone." If some Black guy came up to me and started callin' me a white trash honky, I wouldn't care. Anyway, back to the music. I have no idea what the lyrics are supposed to be, the sound quality on the rest of the record was a lot better, though.

3. Papa Was A Rollin' Stone

This is the reason why I bought the record. The standout track is a little over 11 minutes long, and the single (although it had to be broken up into two parts to fit on a 45 RPM record!) I have heard this referenced in MST3K (the episode where they riffed on "Boggy Creek II: The Legend Continues" at the very beginning of the movie) as well as I heard it on the Weather Channels' "Local on the 8s" segment (not the part where they sing, though.) Although for weather info, I usually now go to Weatherscan (channel 127 if you have Comcast), but they play the same 4 or so songs over and over again ever since I started getting it a few years ago. My favorite line from this one is "and talk's goin round town that papa had three-eyed children and another wife." I doubt that's what he's actually saying but it's funny so I'm sticking to it like that. I mean, how many three-eyed human children are there out there?

So why am I telling you all this? My favorite musician Beck on his webpage has this deal called "Record Club" where he and a bunch of other musicians get together and play a whole album in one day. Since I have been playing the piano/keyboard for years now, I thought I would try my hand at doing something like this (although it will be just me on the keyboard.) I started getting Papa Was a Rollin' Stone stuck in my head for some reason, and suddenly I thought of doing this. So right now I have turned the whole record onto MP3s, and right now I'm in the process of gathering lyrics, and after that arranging the music. I have done a bit of arranging on Papa Was a Rollin' Stone, but this little project of mine is in its infancy. It's grandoise ideas like this I think up when I'm super bored.