Thursday, April 9, 2009

Martin Denny

I've been listening to this 2 CD set called The Exotic Sounds of Martin Denny the past week off and on after not putting it on for a few years.A WOMR public radio from Cape Cod DJ named Squid Jigger who has a bi-weekly sunday night gig called Squid Jiggers Ball got me going on it again.The funny thing about the CD which has been out for a number of years was originally suggested by a friend of mine when he was at Capitol and they laughed at him.After he moved on to EMI and then EMI moved to New York A Capitol sub label at the time it came out.Anyhoo it's a sound you'll either love or hate.Martin Denny was the master of Tiki Music that came about after WW2 and it's hard to describe.It has a lot of background sounds especially strange yelps,moans and animal noises.A bit of surf guitar before there really was surf guitar and a lot of other instruments.My favorite is a number called The Enchanted Sea though there are a lot of gems on the CD'S.I recall several of the albums residing at my Aunt and Uncles house the ones that had no children and I got to sleep over on weekends on occasion falling off to sleep after ten! while they played cards with friends in the nearby kitchen something that was exotic enough compared to my parents house.In LA I do beleive there is still a Trader Vics in Beverly Hills though I haven't been in years.When I lived in Brookline during college years there was a small Chinese place the other side of Beacon past Coolidge Corner that we called Old Man's that was a mini version just because they served drinks like The Scorpion,Fog Cutter,Blue Hawaii etc.Out of all the Tiki bars I saw though the oddest and thus my favorite was the Kon-Tiki room at the Sheraton Mount Royal in Montreal.My brothers and I for several years would meet at my brothers college digs in Winooski,Vermont when he was at Saint Mikes and drive up to Montreal for a Habs game at the old Montreal Forum.We always stayed at the Sheraton and spent the first night in the Kon-Tiki room.I went twice with Frat brothers from Boston twice also in late fall and winter and there was just something about drinking in a tiki bar in Montreal during the cold months.It's been gone for years but there are still web sites praising it.

6 comments:

Colburn said...

Did you ever go to the Tonga Room at the Fairmont Hotel in SF? It's another of the old tiki bars. They took an old swimming pool and turned it into a tiki bar in the 40's, but they left the pool in the middle and every so often there is a fake rainstorm that pours from the ceiling down into the pool. Fun place, but it may close when they rebuild that part of the hotel for condos or something.

JAbel said...

I saw that this week and never knew it was there.Boston had a Trader Vic's in the Statler now Park Plaza.Trader Vic's,Don the Beachcomber and other tiki reastuarants were scattered all around the country.There were a few in the Midwest,Portland Oregon etc.I'm pretty sure the Trader Vic's in Beverly Hills is still in operation in the Beverly Hilton I think.In fact my brother and sister in law had their rehersal dinner there in the spring of 1980.

JAbel said...

I stand corrected.According to a Travel&Leisure link from 2007 the 1955 Trader Vic's at the Beverly Hilton was demolished to make way for condos and a much smaller Trader Vic's was moved next to a pool area in another part of the Hotel where it serves mostly drinks but then one never really went for the food but it's sad to see another grand piece of Americana wrecked in the name of progress.

Colburn said...

Trader Vic's was founded here in Oakland, although it's been closed forever and I'm not even sure the building where it was located even exists anymore. Somewhere down near Emeryville on San Pablo Avenue.

Carol said...

I had Martin Denny's Exotica LP for years. It was good for putting babies to sleep, for one thing. A great example of mood music, at least one kind of mood music.

JAbel said...

Carol,My Aunt and Uncle had that one.I was fascinated by the cover as a lad especially in the middle of a Rochester winter.This 2CD set is a collection of 40 songs from all the different albums.