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Come together: Electrifying footage of Ike and Tina Turner


 
As 1968 rolled around, Ike and Tina had been performing as the “Ike & Tina Turner Revue” since the early 60s, doing tons of television appearances but they were only treading water, especially in America. Their luck had started to change in England in 1966 when they had a big hit on their hands in the UK thanks to producer Phil Spector and the song “River Deep – Mountain High” (written by Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich—the prolific husband and wife songwriting team who gave us, among other earwigs, “Da Doo Ron Ron.”). Though Ike is credited on “River Deep – Mountain High,” he was allegedly paid $20,000 by Spector to fuck off during the session which according to Tina was about as much fun as “carving furniture.” Spector considers the song to be his single greatest achievement, but when the single didn’t do that much in the U.S. this is what seemed to prompt his withdrawal from the music industry. That didn’t stop the Rolling Stones from tapping the Revue to open a dozen shows for them during their British tour that same year. (Where do you think Mick got his moves from? Tina Turner and Inez Foxx!)

Still, the Revue was still technically without a hit in the U.S. Undaunted, Ike, Tina and the band would take up a residency in Las Vegas. They also recorded a few albums that year and in 1969 including, The Hunter, which would yield a Grammy nomination for Tina for her vocal work on the title track. Ike would also get a Grammy nod in the Best Rhythm & Blues Instrumental Performance category for his record A Black Man’s Soul while leading his other funky outfit, Ike Turner & The Kings of Rhythm. At the end of 1969, the busy Revue was touring yet again with The Rolling Stones.

Here’s a clip of Tina’s absolutely incendiary performance of Otis Redding’s “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long” taken from Gimme Shelter documentary.
 

 
Much more Ike & Tina after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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08.09.2017
11:02 am
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Did Marc Bolan play guitar on the Ike & Tina Turner classic ‘Nutbush City Limits’?


 
It’s a topic that needs to be tackled definitively by the cybersleuths of Snopes.com: DID Marc Bolan, in fact, play guitar on Ike & Tina Turner’s classic “Nutbush City Limits” in 1973? Or was it Ike? Or neither of them?

Although many have tried to get to the bottom of it in recent years, no one seems to really know. Allegedly Tina Turner herself confirmed, in a BBC radio interview that it was indeed Marc Bolan playing guitar on the song. But where is that elusive radio interview? Someone has a memory of it. That memory then gets repeated and “quoted” and ultimately once something comes up enough times in a Google search it becomes a “fact.” True. Or at least true enough.

From the “Nutbush City Limits” entry on Wikipedia:

Typical of the period, none of the session musicians who contributed to “Nutbush City Limits” were given specific mention in the song credits. It has been rumored for years that Marc Bolan, frontman for the glam rock band T. Rex, played guitar on the track. Gloria Jones, his girlfriend at the time—who herself provided backing vocals for Ike & Tina Turner during the 1960s—asserted that this was the case in the 2007 BBC4 documentary Marc Bolan: The Final Word. This claim is bolstered by the fact that Bolan toured the U.S. extensively and resided in the Los Angeles area during the mid-1970s, and is also acknowledged to have played on the Ike & Tina Turner singles “Sexy Ida (Part 2)” and “Baby—Get It On.” However, a 2008 Ebony magazine article about Ike Turner’s death identified James “Bino” Lewis, then a member of Ike & Tina’s backing band Kings of Rhythm, as the guitarist. It has also been suggested that James Lewis is the guitarist on “Baby—Get It On.”

 

 
In a 2010 interview with record collectors magazine Goldmine, Gloria Jones stated again that it was Bolan on the track:

He played on “City Limits” with Ike and Tina Turner. I’ll never forget. I called Ike and said we’re in town and he said, ‘We’re in the studio; you guys come down.’ Marc took his guitar; Tina and I were listening to the song while Marc and Ike were working out their guitar part. Ike said to Marc, “Play what you feel.” That’s when Marc put that “chink, chink” you hear on there. Ike and Tina also really admired him, and they appreciated a lot of the rock acts.

Gloria Jones ought to know. After all, she was there.
 
Continues after the jump…

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Posted by Richard Metzger
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01.06.2016
09:19 am
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‘Superstars In Concert’: Jimi, Cream, Rolling Stones, Ike & Tina Turner & more in obscure classic


 
When the question of “What’s the best/great rockumentary of all?” is asked, the answers can range quite widely obviously, from something like Don’t Look Back or Let It Be to The Last Waltz or Stop Making Sense (which both seem to make almost everyone’s lists) to something totally out of left field and life-affirming like Half Japanese: The Band That Would Be King. I really loved the new Pulp: a Film about Life, Death and Supermarkets... and wouldn’t “Heavy Metal Parking Lot” be in the running for all-time best rockumentary? Of course it would be!

It’s an impossible question to answer, but sidestepping it somewhat, if I had to pick the best overall “time capsule” of the rock era to preserve for future generations, it would probably be Peter Clifton’s Superstars In Concert.  Also known as Rock City in a different edit, the film was directed and produced by Clifton (The Song Remains the Same, Popcorn, The London Rock and Roll Show) and is a hodge-podge compiling (mostly) his promotional short films and snippets of concert performances shot between 1964 and 1973 by the likes of Peter Whitehead (Wholly Communion, Charlie Is My Darling, Tonite Let’s All Make Love in London), Michael Cooper (who shot Kenneth Anger’s Lucifer Rising), Ernest Vincze (the cinematographer responsible for the 2005 Doctor Who reboot) and Ivan Strasburg (Treme).
 

 
Featured in the film are The Rolling Stones (several times), Eric Burdon and The Animals, a typically demure appearance of The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Otis Redding bringing the house down, Cream, Steve Winwood, Blind Faith, Cat Stevens (a stark Kubrickian promo film for his “Father and Son” single) , The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Donovan, Joe Cocker, a segment with The Ike and Tina Turner Revue that will bring a smile to your face, Pink Floyd and Rod Stewart and the Faces. Pete Townshend is seen getting in his digs at the Stones for promoting pot use, managing to make himself look like a blue-nosed twat in the process, while Mick and the boys are seen doing “Jumpin Jack Flash” in the (decidedly more evil) warpaint version of that promo film (there were two, this is the one that was NOT shown on The Ed Sullivan Show for obvious reasons) and in their promo film for “We Love You” which features Keef in a judge’s wig, Marianne Faithfull as a barrister and Mick nude wrapped up in a fur rug (a sly joke that if you don’t get, then google “Rolling Stones,” “Redlands,” drug bust, her name and “Hershey Bar.”)

Superstars In Concert came out in Japan on the laserdisc format and that’s how I first saw it, in the late 80s. Since then, other than the various clips showing up cut from the film on YouTube, it’s remained an obscurity. Apparently there was a Malaysian bootleg and then in 2003 a Brazilian magazine called DVD Total gave away the film for free with one of their issues. So far fewer than 200 people have viewed the video.

DO NOT miss what’s perhaps the most intense version of Pink Floyd’s “Careful with That Axe Eugene” ever captured on film. This entire film is absolutely amazing from start to finish, but it jumps off the scale during that part (Otis Redding is no slouch, either!) I highly recommend letting it load first before you hit play, otherwise it’s kind of flickery. If you wait a while, it doesn’t hang up and looks and sounds great.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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08.29.2014
03:01 pm
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Ike and Tina Turner do whiteface, ‘subtly’ allude to cunnilingus during performance
04.19.2013
02:35 am
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Tina in whiteface
  
In spite of Ike Turner… well, being a bastard, Ike and Tina are one of my favorite duos of all time (Fool in Love, anyone?). It’s a pity amazing albums like this (and their super-subversive artwork) are overshadowed by… you know… him being such a piece of shit human being. This biting little piece of minstrelsy satire is from the 1968 album Outta Season. It’s rumored that the album art was created as a response to the ongoing capitalization on black artists by white music industry honchos (That’s probably more than a rumor!)
  
Ike Turner whiteface
 
Their skill at using startling images was only surpassed by their startling performances. My favorite track is Tina’s version of “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long,” and while the album version is fantastic, what they did with it live was absolutely insane. Here’s a 1971 live version with some of the most explicit (and in hindsight, very disturbing) dirty talk I have ever heard in a song—or at least a good song.

Just forget that he’s a wife-beater for a brief moment and enjoy the subversive imagery and pornographic bridge!
   

Posted by Amber Frost
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04.19.2013
02:35 am
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Come Together: The Ike & Tina Turner Review
09.29.2009
11:44 am
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image

 

This post is dedicated to all the “care trolls” who fired up their email devices to tell me how “disappointed” they were in me that I seem to think Ike Turner is such a great musician and blah, blah, blah, and how this must mean that I am all a misogynist, too.  Huh? Y’all need to get a life life—there are WAY more serious things in the world to be concerned about if you ask me—but the thing that really got my goat was the insinuation that I disrespect TINA TURNER, the Queen of rock and roll?

You don’t know me! How dare you?!? No no no. Just because I like Ike, does not mean I’m dissing Tina. Not by a long shot, she’s considered a goddess in this household!

I listened to an Ike & Tina Turner greatest hits collection full blast yesterday as I worked, and I searched YouTube for a performance clip of their amazing cover of the Beatles “Come Together” to share here:

 


Here’s the amazing Acid Queen sequence from Tommy:


Previously on Dangerous Minds: