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LOVERLY MUSIC: THE SINGLES (1997 - 1999)

(Loverly)

Since the early '90s, Memphis music fanatic Ed Porter has made his Loverly Music imprint home to music that grows wild, woolly, and weird in the fertile soil of his own backyard. He embarked on his mission in 1993 by releasing 45 rpm singles -- and only 45 rpm singles -- of Memphis's fringe dwellers because he liked the idea of embracing something (and somebody) that had been left behind. Eventually, though, he broke down and issued a pair of double-length albums that collected Loverly's singles output on CD. Listening to those volumes was like accidentally tuning in to some outlaw radio station haunted by the grinning ghosts of wildman disc jockey Dewey Phillips and dozens of half-forgotten one-hit wonders, scam artists, freak-show extroverts, and professional crackpots.

The Singles (1997-1999) is the third and final peek into Porter's alternate aural universe, and it's a worthy ending to the Loverly story. Lorette Velvette, whose previous covers of the Stooges and T. Rex were Loverly highlights, turns the Bowie/Eno glam keepsake "Boys Keep Swinging" into a velvet goldmine (the flip, Roxy Music's "In Every Dreamhome a Heartache," is also a glitter-crusted keeper); Lamar Sorrento's "Lawnmower Song" is a nifty slice of ersatz Dylan-fronting-the-Byrds; the Satyrs' "Dying Away" brings a little gloomy goth elegance to the proceedings; Lucynell Crater weeps like a willow on "Blackhearted"; and, in "Daddy Likes," New Car Smell offer this pearl of earthy wisdom: "Daddy likes pot, mama likes wine/Get together, have a real good time/Where do you think you came from kid?" The only missteps are the Christmas-tune covers, which may be seasonally appropriate but feel a tad too trad to fit the Loverly mold.

-- Jonathan Perry