1001 Songs

40 Years Ago This Week : "Son Of My Father" Tops the UK Charts

2012-02-23T02:52:00.115-08:00

Chicory Tip - Son Of My Father

[Buy The Best of Chicory Tip]

This week, 40 years ago, British poppers Chicory Tip pushed T. Rex's "Telegram Sam" out of the top spot on the UK charts with one of the first hits to feature a synthesizer.
For three weeks "Son Of My Father" stayed atop the charts until Nilsson's "Without You", the biggest song of 1972, knocked it off.

"Son Of My Father" is a cri de couer from a schoolkid who decides to break away from the "molded, folded, pre-packed" rules so he can make up his own life. But it wasn't the lyrics that got everybody's attention. It was the ear wormy hook played on a Moog Synthesizer two years before Kraftwerk's historic synthesizer album Autobahn.

Credit Giorgio Moroder, who wrote both the song ( with Pete Bellotte in Italian as "Tu Sei Mio Padre") and recorded the original version with the same Moog Synthesiser hook.

It would be hard to find anyone who had a bigger effect on 70's music. Moroder helped Donna Summer become the queen of disco with the salacious "Love to Love You Baby" and the other-worldly "I Feel Love" which became a blueprint for some of the experimentation David Bowie and Brian Eno would do with the Berlin Trilogy.

According to Bowie:

One day in Berlin ... Eno came running in and said, 'I have heard the sound of the future.' ... he puts on 'I Feel Love', by Donna Summer ... He said, 'This is it, look no further. This single is going to change the sound of club music for the next fifteen years.' Which was more or less right.

Moroder also did a lot of film soundtracks. Blondie hit number one in 1980 with "Call Me" from Moroder's American Gigilo soundtrack. Berlin scored a #1 U.S. in 1986 with "Take My Breath Away from Top Gun and in 1978 Moroder won an Academy Award for Best Film Score for Midnight Express.

40 Years Ago This Month: Jimmy Smith records Root Down

2012-02-21T02:50:00.000-08:00

Jimmy Smith : Root Down (And Get It)

[Get Your Root Down]

You can credit Hammond B3 master Jimmy Smith with transporting the nerdy organ from the back of churches and skating rinks to the front of the soul jazz stage. His 1963 album Back At The Chicken Shack is a Blue Note label classic.

On a single February night in 1972, Smith recorded his funkiest album, Root Down, at a Los Angeles club. The funk came-- in large part-- from his young supporting crew, inspired by the sounds playing on the radio. Witness guitarist Arthur Adams's wah-wah guitar. Other musicians included drummer Paul Humphrey, percussionist Buck Clarke and , most surprisingly, bass player Wilton Felder of The Crusaders. "Most surprisingly" because Jimmy Smith preferred to play the bass lines himself...on the B3's 25 foot pedals. Most of Smith's jazz albums are more laid back affairs, closer to Root Down's cover of Al Green's then chart climbing hit "Let's Stay Together". But on this night the godfather of the modern soul-jazz organ and his bandmembers brought the funk to the house. (Verve's newly remastered album presents the full unedited versions ... sometimes doubling the length of the tracks.)

The Beastie Boys sampled multiple parts of the title cut on their 1995 single "Root Down" which appeared on Ill Communication.

40 Years Ago: Esso's "Rock Star" Commercial

2012-02-20T05:36:00.000-08:00

Elvis Presley: Hey Jude

[Buy Elvis Now]

Elvis Now , a collection of studio tracks recorded over a two year period, is released February 20, 1972. The album includes songs by Gordon Lightfoot, Kris Kristofferson and Buffy Sainte-Marie.

40 Years Ago Today: "Joy" Brightens The US Pop Charts

2012-02-19T04:35:00.000-08:00

Apollo 100: Joy

[Get Some Joy ]

Behold the genius that is Tom Parker. The chap who told Johann Sebastian Bach "No! No! No! You've written it too slow!" Well, maybe his genius is realizing that Jigsaw's 1971 version of "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" needed a harpsichord and a lighter attitude to really impress the Yanks. (Jigsaw would finally see some chart action in 1975 with their Top Ten hit "Sky High") After making its debut on February 19, 1972, the instrumental rose to #6 on the US pop charts. You can almost hear producer Miki Dallon yelling "More harpsichord!"

The 1971 Jigsaw version :

40 Years Ago Today : Manfred Mann's Earth Band debut

2012-02-18T02:29:00.000-08:00

Manfred Mann's Earth Band : Living Without You

[Buy It]

In 1972, the dean of all rock critics, Robert Christgau, gave just three albums his A+ rating: Paul Simon's eponymous album , The Rolling Stones 's Exile On Main Street and this multifarious album by Manfred Mann's Earth Band.
From the beginning Manfred Mann always had a way with choosing covers. Their 1964 #1 hit "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" was originally a minor hit for The Exciters. "If You Gotta Go, Go Now" (UK#2,1965) "Just Like A Woman" (UK#10, 1966) and "Mighty Quinn" (UK#1 and US #10,1968) were all Dylan compositions. "Pretty Flamingo" (UK#1,1966 ) was written by the same guy who wrote The Banana Splits Theme. But all along Mann and his bandmates could knock out some pretty good stuff on their own.
My current obsession is the Beach Boys inspired "Up The Junction", a follow up single to "Mighty Quinn" that went absolutely nowhere.

Manfred Mann: Up The Junction

[Buy The Essential Manfred Mann]

When the band Manfred Mann dissolved, Mann himself began fusing jazz with hard rock.
That's a recipe for progressive self indulgence of the worst kind. There's some of that ( "Sloth", "Tribute") but in Mann's hands, the album works wonders for the most part. Gospel meets Deep Purple riffing on "Captain Bobby Scout". Watch as Mann responds to a band mate's "Let's boogie!" with a passionate three minute long Moog synthesiser solo below.

So the album rocks hard in places. But there are also some quiet originals that will break your heart."I'm Up And I'm Leaving" and "Part Time Man" both sound like something Ray Davies probably wishes he wrote.

Finally there are the covers. Dylan's "Please Mrs Henry", Dr John's "Jump Sturdy and Randy Newman's "Living Without You", the highest charting single from the album at #69. As most of us know, Manfred Mann's Earth Band wouldn't make a huge splash on the charts until they discovered Bruce Springsteen. "Blinded By The Light" went #1 in the US in 1976 and "Spirits in the Night" cracked the Top 40 in both the US and UK. But that was years after the Earth Band recorded their best album, a debut Christgau called "the perfect corrective to the willful brightness of boogie optimism."

40 Years Ago This Month: Say You Don't Mind

2012-02-17T01:15:00.000-08:00

Colin Blunstone: Say You Don't Mind

[Buy The Album]

Former Zombies vocalist Colin Blunstone returned from a few years of selling insurance to hit UK #15 in mid February of 1972 with this gorgeous string laden cover of Denny Laine's 1967 single. Yes, that Denny Laine. Former Moodys. Future Wings. ( see Denny's version below). The string quartet was arranged by Chris Gunning who would go on to win awards for composing film and TV soundtracks. "Say You Don't Mind" comes from the 1971 album One Year, which also features "She Loves The Way They Love Her" and "Caroline Goodbye", both recorded with his old Zombies bandmates.

40 Years ago: Smyle If You Thought It Was A Beatles Reunion

2012-02-16T03:13:00.000-08:00

Smyle: It's Gonna Be Alright

I can't add a whole lot more about the Dutch band ( who hit their native country's Top 10 in 1972 with "It's Gonna Be Alright") that hasn't been said by anyone who's ever heard Smyle: their lead singer ( "zanger" in Dutch) sounds just like John Lennon. So much so that Bas Muijs went on to sing the Lennon parts on the Stars On 45 Beatles medley. A Dutch music fan caught up with guitarist Mark Boon to get a sense of what Smyle was like it is heyday.

"It's Gonna Be Alright" came out in a plain white sleeve with just our logo on it. That was done on purpose, as Polydor wanted to keep things mysterious, hoping people would suspect it was a Beatles bootleg. That was the sentiment back then you know, people desperately hoping the Beatles would reform and bands like Klaatu cashing in on it.
Here's a good story: At that point early in our career our manager got angry letters and phonecalls from the UK, urging us to change our name because there was another Smile active in the UK. We didn't budge an inch, so eventually that UK band changed their name to....Queen! It's true, I swear!
We also did some TV-shows back then and I remember sharing a dressing room with early ABBA, or rather Agnetha, Björn, Benny, Anni-Frid as they were known back then. We got along fine with them, and their guitarist Björn, having lost his own guitar at Amsterdam Airport, borrowed my Les Paul to mime their song Ring, Ring. He gratefully returned it to me, but when I got home, I found he'd given it a serious case of buckle rash, dents and scratches caused by that big diamond-studded belt of his...Mark Boon from Nederglam.nl

A few more choice cuts from Smyle including a video for the single Tandem.

40 Years Ago This Week: John and Yoko Co-Host Mike Douglas Show

2012-02-15T02:47:00.000-08:00

"They're not just Super Stars. They're Super People".

And with that Mike Douglas -- still basking in the glow from a tepid performance of The Beatles's "Michelle"-(see below) -introduced his co-hosts for the week of February 14-18, 1972, John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

For John and Yoko, it was a week to indoctrinate people with some hope for peace ( if you want it), equality and natural balance. Among the guests that week: activist Ralph Nader, comedian Louis Nye, Chuck Berry and The Chambers Brothers.

Lennon and Yoko were joined by the Elephants Memory Band for a performance of “It’s So Hard” from Imagine.Later that week Yoko took it upon herself to howl through Chuck Berry's "Memphis". When it came time for Berry and Lennon to play "Johnny B Goode" you can see Yoko pick up the mic again only to discover that it had been shut off.

Later that year Elephant's Memory, John and Yoko released the god awful Some Time In New York City. and Lennon performed at Madison Square Garden. There is also this:

Neil Young's Harvest Turns 40 Today

2012-02-14T03:47:00.000-08:00

Area Code 615: Hey Jude

[Buy Harvest]

[Buy Some Area Code 615]

The download isn't a tune from Harvest , the best selling album of 1972, or even from Neil Young. I figure anyone who finds their way to this blog has Harvest. The featured track is from Nashville session band Area Code 615. Young wanted the band to back him up for a session or two while he was in Nashville doing The Johnny Cash Show. Only drummer Kenny Buttrey could make it and , as it runs out, he didn't really get a chance to show his stuff. It was Neil's idea to limit him to the "Boom-Boom-Pah" beat on four album tracks: "Heart of Gold", "Old Man", "Alabama" and the opener "Out on the Weekend".

Buttrey: That’s the way he heard it; he wanted [the rhythm] to be felt on the guitar. He dictated everything: bass, drums, all the parts. We improvised a bit on the verses, and I even managed to throw in a little hi-hat here and there, but that was about it. Later, when we were doing ‘Alabama,’ I tried to hit a tom-tom, and Neil stopped the whole thing and really came down on me. I did sneak one in right near the end of the song. I remember thinking, ‘It’s a little too late for him to pull this one out!’"

The fact that Neil was even in Nashville and not bedridden in California was something of a minor miracle.

Anyone who has ever experienced severe back problems knows how debilitating it can be. Neil Young had been in and out of hospitals for the two years between After The Gold Rush and Harvest. As he told Rolling Stone 's Cameron Crowe in 1975:

I have one weak side and all the muscles slipped on me. My discs slipped. I couldn't hold my guitar up. That's why I sat down on my whole solo tour. I couldn't move around too well, so I laid low for a long time on the ranch and just didn't have any contact, you know. I wore a brace. Crosby would come up to see how I was, we'd go for a walk and it took me 45 minutes to get to the studio, which is only 400 yards from the house. I could only stand up four hours a day. I recorded most of Harvest in the brace. That's a lot of the reason it's such a mellow album. I couldn't physically play an electric guitar. "Are You Ready for the Country," "Alabama" and "Words" were all done after I had the operation. The doctors were starting to talk about wheelchairs and shit, so I had some discs removed. But for the most part, I spent two years flat on my back. I had a lot of time to think about what had happened to me.

Neil and the Nashville session musicians ran through the songs quickly, usually no more than three takes.
They recorded master tracks for "Heart of Gold", "Old Man" and several others the first night.

From Songwriter101:
Producer Elliot Mazer: Everyone was within about five feet of each other. There’s some leakage on account of that, but that’s what gave the record such a nice feel. Neil sat on a chair in the doorway between the living room and dining room, because that spot around the doorway had such a nice sound. ( Bassist )Tim (Drummond) and (steel player) Ben (Keith) were to his right, with Kenny on the other side so he could watch Neil’s right arm and get a feel for the backbeat on those songs.

After the telecast the next night, Neil brought back two other performers from the Johnny Cash Show: Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor. The three of them cut the backing vocals to "Heart of Gold" and "Old Man" from a couch inside the control room. Taylor also added some banjo flourishes to "Old Man".

The Nashville sessions only make up half the album. "A Man Needs A Maid" and "There's A World" were both recorded with The London Symphony Orchestra with arrangements provided by Jack Nitzsche.

His devastating anti-drug number "Needle and the Damage Done", seen here on the above mentioned Johnny Cash Show and inspired by the death of Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten, came from a live performance at UCLA.

The "rockers" of the album ( "Alabama", "Words" and "Are You Ready For The Country?") were recorded in a barn on Young's Northern California ranch.
"Alabama" had some overdubs: a lead guitar line and harmonies from Crosby Stills and Nash.

Mazer tells the story of mixing the album at Young's ranch:

The PA was still out in the barn,and we had those JBL monitors in his house across the way. For a laugh, we ran the left channel into the barn and the right channel to the JBL monitors, then faced the speakers in the direction of Neil, who was sitting in a rowboat in the middle of this small pond that was located directly in front of the house. During the playback I asked Neil through the talk-back how the balance was, and he yelled back, "More barn!"

Harvest spent two weeks at Number One. "Heart of Gold" would top the charts in 1972 before getting bounced by America's Neil Young impression "Horse With No Name". "Old Man" also made the Top 40. But not all critics were impressed. Rolling Stone's John Mendelsohn wrote

(Neil Young)'s seemingly lost sight of what once made his music uniquely compelling and evocative and become just another pretty-singing solo superstar.

Young would eventually revisit the acoustic country arrangements of Harvest in Comes A Time and Harvest Moon. But as he wrote in his liner notes for Decade:

'Heart of Gold' put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore so I headed for the ditch.

That ditch would lead to some of the most exciting and puzzling albums of his career.

40 Years Ago : Jo Jo Gunne Makes A Run Run Run For The Charts

2012-02-13T03:27:00.000-08:00

Jo Jo Gunne: Run Run Run

[Get Yer Gunne]

40 years ago this week, Jo Jo Gunne, founded by two former members of Spirit, began climbing the UK charts with "Run Run Run", a tune as catchy and dumb as anything Sweet had recorded and yet NOT glam rock. Jo Jo Gunne would crack the Top Ten overseas and the Top 40 in the US before fading into obscurity.
Or have they? In 2005 the band reunited for more tours and recording:

40 Years Ago This Week: Bowie Performs Queen Bitch on The Whistle Test

2012-02-12T13:04:00.000-08:00

The Man who Sold The World ...By Turning Himself "Into a Bizarre Self Constructed Freak" with Mick Ronson in gold lame. Ziggy Stardust is fewer than four months away.

40 Years Ago Today: Allman Brothers Release Eat a Peach

2012-02-12T04:20:00.000-08:00

{buy it}

Released just months after 24 year old lead guitarist Duane Allman's fatal motorcycle accident, the double album Eat A Peach entered the Billboard album charts in the Top Ten and rose to #4. The album begins with a song that shows the determination of a grieving band to continue: "Ain't Wastin' Time No More". The band didn't waste much time at all. The Allman Brothers began touring without a new guitarist four weeks after Duane's funeral.

The band plays its first set without their lead guitarist at Duane's funeral

16 year old Rolling Stone writer Cameron Crowe got some insight on the band's psyche for a 1973 article.

“I think,” says a close friend of the Brothers, “that Duane’s loss was much more traumatic than anyone realizes. He was pretty arrogant sometimes, and I think one critic said he had ‘an ego that could fill the Grand Canyon,’ but he had a talent to match. Most of the guys at that funeral were stuporous with grief, but they handled it beautifully, and I think you really have to look at it communally. Duane’s death was like an amputation. The organization cauterized the wound and tried to forget about it. They had to.

“See, most of the Brothers are from rural areas in the south, from tight, close-knit families. They took their new identity partially from Duane and partially from the band. When Duane died, the question of identity became paramount. They switched their total allegiance to the family: The constant mention of brothers and sisters isn’t any sham. It’s a necessity.

Greg and Duane

“But if the band hadn’t made it, it would have fractured the structure of their identities. They had to be successful, and if they hadn’t – in 1971 anyway – I think each and every one of those guys could have tumbled off the deep end in some way.

One of the album highlights -- and my favorite Allman Brothers song -- "Blue Sky," was written and sung by Dickey Betts for his wife, a native American woman named Sandy "Bluesky" Wabegijig. Duane played the song in concert only four times. We're fortunate the SUNY Stonybrook gig was recorded.

Sandy "BlueSky" Wabegijig

Dicky Betts

After a side of new songs ( including "Melissa"), the rest of Eat A Peach pays tribute to Duane with live cuts ( including the 33 minute "Mountain Jam"), tracks recorded with Duane ( like "Blue Sky") and a solo acoustic instrumental Duane recorded called Little Martha.

Six Degrees of Separation: Booker T and the MG's to Luther Ingram

2012-02-10T07:18:00.000-08:00

1. Booker T and The MG's: I Want You (She's So Heavy)

[Buy it]

In 1969, The Beatles and Booker T & The MG's had mutual fan clubs. John Lennon called the Stax band "Book a Table and the Maitre D's" and, in 1970, The MG's covered the entire Abbey Road album.

2. Bill Withers: Do It Good

[Buy it]

In 1971, Booker T Jones produced and played on the Bill Withers debut Just As I Am. On the short track "Do It Good", Withers tells listeners how "Mr Jones" told him to just do what he does, and do it good. The following album Still Bill included the #2 1972 single "Use Me", a track on the Anchorman soundtrack .

3.Gene Chandler: Groovy Situation

[buy the soundtrack]

Another track on the Anchorman soundtrack was the million selling single "Groovy Situation" from 1970. "Groovy Situation" was originally recorded by an R&B duo The "Duke of Earl" discovered, Mel and Tim.

4. Mel and Tim : Starting All Over Again

[Buy it]

Best known for 1969's "Backfield in Motion"Cousins Mel Hardin and Tim McPherson scored a Top 20 in 1972 with "Starting All Over Again". That was a the year they performed at Wattstax,a concert held to commemorate the seventh anniversary of the Watts riots. Other performers included The Bar-Kays, Issac Hayes and The Staple Singers.

5. The Staple Singers: We The People

[Buy the album]

The Staple Singers performed "We The People" at Wattstax as well as "Respect Yourself, a 1971Top 20 pop hit written by Stax Records singer Luther Ingram and songwriter Mack Rice. Frustrated with the world, Ingram told Rice "black folk need to learn to respect themselves."

6. Luther Ingram: If Loving You Is Wrong (I Don't Want To Be Right)

[Buy the album]
In the Summer of 1972, Luther Ingram topped the Billboard R&B charts ( and hit #3 on the pop charts) with "If Loving You is Wrong ( I Don't Want To Be Right)". He sold nearly 4 million copies of this song about an adulterous affair. Millie Jackson covered the song in our last Six Degrees.

40 Years Ago This Month: Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything

2012-02-09T01:05:00.000-08:00

Todd Rundgren: You Left Me Sore

[Buy the album]

Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything, released in February of 1972, is a generous double album full of melodies so sweet 4 out of 5 dentists suggest you brush heavilly after listening. On the first three sides, labelled "A Bouquet of Ear Catching Melodies", "The Cerebral Side" and "The Kid Gets Heavy", Todd is playing all the instruments: guitars, bass, keyboards, drums and of course the instrument he mastered most...the studio itself. The fourth side, called "Baby Needs a New Pair of Snakeskin Boots", is a live in-studio recording featuring a full band.

First, the sweet stuff:

The first side is full of sweet pop songs, including album opener "I Saw The Light" which, now that it's been mentioned a thousand times, does sound a bit like a good Carole King song. "It wouldn't Have Made Any Difference" and "Cold Morning Light" are both songs from a sweet boy who has apparently lost his dream girl. The entire album teems with sugary pop tunes, something Rundgren admits came so easily to him he got bored writing them.

"As soon as something becomes automatic," he told Rolling Stone's Cameron Crowe in 1978, "like the pop formula of Something/Anything?, I don’t consider it creative anymore. You’ve heard of crossover artists — I like to think of myself as a double-crossover artist.”

Still Todd could hardly argue with success. His Nazz era tune "Hello It's Me" hit the Top 5 in 1973, leading to this bizarre appearance on The Midnight Special.

Something/Anything? features more challenging tunes as well. Like all of Side Two's "Cerebral Side". For those who play the "Turn That Flawed Double LP Into a Single Great LP "game, these are the tracks that are most endangered. But you don't want to lose the playful "Intro".

As Todd told Creem Magazine's Ben Edmonds in 1972, Something/Anything? is a record about more than four discs of studio wizardry and a true star's songwriting skills:

"Something/Anything? is a record of experience, but the thing is that I'm bringing the experience into a really specific focus, and the experience is the whole thing that's creating the experience. It's not only a record about the experience, it's a record about recording the experience."

So along with the power pop classic "Couldn't I Just Tell You" you get flubbed count-ins and band members cracking up, all leading to our deep cut "You Left Me Sore" which, yes, could be about venereal disease. Or not.

So my Great Something /Anything? single disc album goes like this:

Side A

1. I Saw The Light
2. It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference
3. Wolfman Jack
4. Cold Morning Light
5. Intro
6. Black Maria

Side B

7. One More Day (No More)
8. Couldn't I Just Tell You
9. Hello It's Me
10. Some Folks Is Even Whiter Than Me
11. You Left Me Sore
12. Slut

What's yours?

For a one hour radio show Todd made to promote Something/Anything? visit Willards Wormholes

One of Paul McCartney's Kisses on the Bottom

2012-02-08T04:40:00.000-08:00

Sam Cooke: Get Yourself Another Fool

[Buy Paul's album]

[Buy the Sam Cooke album]

With covers of such standards as "Bye Bye Blackbird", "It's Only A Paper Moon" and Fats Waller's "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter", Paul McCartney's new album Kisses On The Bottom may appear to be slipping into the Songbook snare that swallowed up Rod Stewart. After all, McCartney, who turns 70 this year, has already paid tribute to the music he grew up hearing his father play by writing songs like "Your Mother Should Know" , "When I'm 64" and "Baby's Request" (from 1980's Back To The Egg)

Regardless, there is at least one surprising choice on the album and it's not "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive" .

It's a cover of the 1949 Charles Brown hit "Get Yourself Another Fool", also recorded by Sam Cooke in February 1963 for his bluesy cigarette and coffee classic Night Beat.

McCartney's old bandmate Billy Preston plays organ on this cut (Ray Johnson is the pianist), but my guess is Sir Paul picked this song at the urging of Diana Krall whose band backs up McCartney. Krall's husband, Elvis Costello, recorded the song in 1984 with The Attractions. It can be found on his Out of Our Idiot collection.

Five Mean Years of The Doors

2012-02-07T04:23:00.000-08:00

[buy the debut album]

"Interviews are good but...critical essays are really where it's at."
-Jim Morrison, 1967

Longtime Rolling Stone writer Greil Marcus really takes this quote to the extreme, using Doors songs as launching pads for essays that bring up pop artist Richard Hamilton, Thomas Pynchon, Charles Manson, Mildred Pierce, Elvis Presley, Harvey Keitel and Allan Moyle's Pump Up The Volume among many others. Marcus has listened not just to the albums ( dismissing both Waiting for the Sun and Soft Parade as all but unworthy of attention), and seen the Oliver Stone movie ( which he admires) but he's also studied numerous bootlegs. Read The Doors: A Lifetime of Listening to Five Mean Years [buy it] for the description of Morrison trying to find the willpower to get through "The End" before a heckling Queens,NY crowd in 1968. A year in, and you just knew this band wasn't going to end well.

One curious personal note: The first place I ever saw Talking Heads perform is the last place The Doors played: The Warehouse in New Orleans. Some folks are making a documentary about the least glamorous music club in the US
P.S.The BigO Audio archive has recently posted a few Doors bootleg cuts here. One called "Jimbo's Blues" is a spectacular set of live songs from 1970.

40 Years Ago Today: John Lee Hooker Jams With Rock Stars

2012-02-06T04:50:00.000-08:00

John Lee Hooker: T.B. Sheets

[Get on the bus]

Blues master John Lee Hooker hosts a bit of a blues and rock summit on Never Get Out Of These Blues Alive, recorded with Elvin Bishop, Steve Miller, Charles Musselwhite and Van Morrison. Morrison and Hooker trade growling lines on the ten minute title track but it is Hooker's creepy cover of Van the Man's "T.B. Sheets" that is the real standout track. Back in 1967, when Morrison originally recorded this song about visiting a young girl dying of tuberculosis, Van broke down in tears and cancelled the rest of the day's session. Which reminds me that Hooker recorded this solid blues album in just two days.

On Mardi Gras Day In N'Awlins, Da Best show Ain't On Da Floats

2012-02-05T09:38:00.000-08:00

Wild Magnolias: New Suit

[Buy Some uh Dat Mardi Gras]

Every Year for Carnival Time, We make a new suit,

Red yellow green, purple or blue, We make a new suit,

We all try to make ours, as best as we could,

So when we out at Carnival, We be looking good,

Every Year for Carnival Time, We make a new suit,

Red yellow green, purple or blue, We make a new suit,

We got rhinestones on our suit, that shines like diamonds and stars,

Got to be sure that we 're together, cause we're sold on Mardi Gras, oh yall!

Every Year for Carnival Time, We make a new suit,

Red yellow green, purple or blue, We make a new suit,

Every Year for Carnival Time, We make a new suit,

Red yellow green, purple or blue, We make a new suit,

We got feathers, on our crowns, that stand a'bout eight feet high,

In every color, of the rainbow, We're beautiful , I ain't lying, oh yall!

Every Year for Carnival Time, We make a new suit,

We make a new suit

40 Years Ago This Month: The Sweet Release "Poppa Joe"

2012-02-05T01:58:00.000-08:00

The Sweet: Poppa Joe

[Buy Something Sweet]

Before Sweet ( nee The Sweetshop, then The Sweet) wrote their own hits, UK songwriters Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman ( who already made this 1001Songs post ) helped them recruit teeny bopper bubblegum fans with songs like "Co Co", "Little Willy" and this mindless nugget "Poppa Joe".

"Poppa Joe" is basically a re-write of The Sweet's 1971 UK #2 hit "Co Co". It even includes the same cheesy Caribbean steel drums... and inane lyrics like :

Poppa Rumbo Rumbo
Hey Poppa Joe Coconut
Hey Poppa Joe Hey Poppa Joe

Nevertheless "Poppa Joe" soared to number 11 in the UK and topped the chart in eight different countries.

Mardi Gras in Central Lock Up (1984)

2012-02-04T04:00:00.000-08:00

Stop Inc: Second Line Pt 1

[Buy Dis Here]

The krewes are already cruising the streets of New Orleans for Mardi Gras. In 1984,when I apparently considered myself a wry humorist, I wrote the following article for The Tulane Hullabaloo's Arcade.

Once again Mardi Gras will be celebrated in New Orleans! All of those rumors about the big Spring fete being moved to Sherman Oaks, California have finally been quashed. And this makes a party hearty fellow like me very happy and very eager. So when the Arcade asked me to write about my experiences last year I did a happy jig and agreed.

I was rather brutally awakened that morn, on a day known to many as Shrove Tuesday and to others as a bit of a Fat Tuesday. It was 5:30 AM, an ungodly hour for anyone to be up, and as my senses slowly rambled back to me, I realized I was in a place called Central Lock-Up. To this day I know not why I awoke that glorious morning in jail, but I'm almost certain it had to do with a brief conversation I had with a man named Charlton Heston. Chuck was once again riding a chariot but this time in the role of Bacchus. No sooner had I rebuked Mr Heston for not having made a good movie since "Planet of the Apes" (I mean "Earthquake " and "Airport 1975" had their moments) when a crashing blow came down upon my billy clubbed head.

A few hours later I found myself regaining consciousness to the fungal fumes of a hobo named Skeeter, who played Mardi Gras tunes all night on his guitar. We inmates sang along to Professor Longhair's "Mardi Gras in New Orleans", The Hawkettes' "Mardi Gras Mambo" and a rousing rendition of Al Johnson's "Carnival Time". I did a solo whistle of "Second Line" that almost brought a few of the guys to tears. It was the best night I'd had in jail since Christmas.

But it was all too good to last. That morning the guards shoved me down a hall to get booked. Helplessly I explained I didn't want any books, that I didn't feel like reading, and that I hadn't even figured out where the Howard Tilton Memorial Library sat on the Tulane campus*. An officer told me to shut my face and handed me a "Court Summons" which I tossed in the trash as I walked out of Orleans Parish Prison.

Ah! Mardi Gras. You could smell the beer, the debauchery and the vomit in the streets. At Happy's Liquor Store ( Get yer drunk on! Get Happy's) I picked up a pint of Mister J. Daniels and thought about the songs we sang the night before and one line in particular: "If you come to New Orleans/You've got to meet the Zulu King". I headed to Eads Plaza where I was arrested for intoxication and tossed back in jail.

Night fell by the time I got out. The trucks were racing down St Charles. Here was a parade I understood. No artistry really. Just unadulterated greed. I always cheer wildly for the trucks, especially for the orange public service vehicles that drive by measuring tree branches. I tossed a few pebbles into the street. Those kids will dive at anything that hits the ground on Fat Tuesday! I discovered I liked throwing stuff so I hopped on the next truck and whipped entire bags of purple beads at people. That's about the time a crashing blow fells upon my head.

So that night while King Rex and Mrs Rex danced together with all the little Rexettes inside Municipal Auditorium, I slept like a baby. In my own little dreamland. A place I like to call Central Lock Up.

*This sentence is dedicated to my old roommate, Micah, who specialized in puns so bad that they almost became funny.Almost.

Nick Rhodes ( Duran Duran) Picks Top 10 ( 1981)

2012-02-03T01:48:00.000-08:00

Duran Duran keyboardist Nick Rhodes made this list for the April 2nd, 1981 issue of Smash Hits weeks before the release of the band's debut album. This list is courtesy of Like Punk Never Happened

1. Talking Heads : Remain in Light - my favourite album; I especially like "The Overload" and all the rhythm tracks.
2. David Bowie: "Win" ( from Young Americans)- With the Station to Station and Heroes albums coming close behind. I also like "My Death" from a bootleg as well.
3. Brian Eno: "R.A.F" ( B-side to "King's Lead Hat") - How did I narrow down the Eno tracks to this one ? Probably because I like the sounds of it - and Snatch are on it too!
4. Yellow Magic Orchestra: "Nice Age" - A great pop song!
5. Roxy Music: "Sentimental Fool" (from Siren)- One of the hardest decisions of my life, but "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" is still my favourite title.
6. Giorgio Moroder: "The Chase" ( from Midnight Express soundtrack) - Love the drum sound and the sequencer.
7. Joel Grey: " Mein Herr" - From the soundtrack to "Cabaret". Makes a change from the rest of raucous rabble; reminds me of the bit in the film.
8. Marianne Faithful: "The Ballad of Lucy Jordan" - The best track on a Great Forgotten Album of Our Time.( Broken English, released two years earlier)
9. Siouxsie and the Banshees: "Israel" - One of their many classic singles. Great guitar sound.
10. Sparks: "Tryouts for the Human Race" ( from No 1 in Heaven) : Always had a soft spot for Sparks and they just managed to edge out Peter Gabriel, Grace Jones, Syd Barrett, Lou Reed, Kate Bush, The Doors and Kraftwerk.

A Slice Of 40 Year Old Cheese: Paco Paco - "Taka Takata" (1972)

2012-02-02T01:32:00.000-08:00

Paco Paco: Taka Takata

[buy a vinyl copy]

A new 1001Songs series that delivers thick slices of 40 year old cheese.

A handsome singer known in some corners as "The King of Rumba", Paco Paco had a Top 40 Dutch hit with "Taka Takata" in the Summer of 1972. The song was also popular in the USSR and on a recent car trip with my kids.

What is "Taka Takata" about? According to the Yahoo translation service Babel Fish, it's a celebration of summertime on the beach:

how we like the summer In order to rise to us early To go to the beach single to bathe to us calm And if we do not go single we go with all the friendly We like to see many boats, to see much contented people And to see the sentadita viejecita in its door

Among the many covers ( including one from Paul "Love Is Blue" Mauriat) is this sped up version from French singing star Marian Conde. You won't find choreography like this on TV anymore, and that IS a shame.

Deep Cuts: Al Green - Ain't No Fun To Me (1972)

2012-01-31T04:00:00.000-08:00

Al Green: Ain't No Fun To Me

[Buy the Album]

When the President crooned a little "Let's Stay Together" earlier this month, sales of Al Green's best known song increased 490%, selling 16,000 downloads in the week ending January 22nd. Not a bad way to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of Green's Let's Stay Together album, released January 31, 1972.

There are better Al Green albums ( Call Me, I'm Still In Love With You and Explores Your Mind are all better in my opinion) but Let's Stay Together has all the essential elements: there's the funky Willie Mitchell production featuring some of the best studio musicians in Memphis and there's Al Green himself. You get the sense he knows what he wants to say but hasn't written down a single lyric. He's got this incredible sense of timing and he'll stretch every line just right so it hits the pocket. Every performance is absolutely organic.

Our "deep track" is the last cut on Let's Stay Together, a churning blues number featuring Teeny Hodges on guitar.

40 Years Ago This Month: David Bowie Announces "I'm gay"

2012-01-30T04:10:00.000-08:00

Why let being married and having a son get in the way of making a big splash?

In an interview for the January 22, 1972 issue of Melody Maker David Bowie told interviewer Michael Watts "I'm gay and always have been."

David's present image is to come on like a swishy queen, a gorgeously effeminate boy. He's as camp as a row of tents, with his limp hand and trolling vocabulary. "I'm gay," he say's, "and always have been, even when I was David Jones." But there's a sly jollity about how he says it, a secret smile at the corners of his mouth. He knows that in these times it's permissible to act like a male tart, and that to shock and outrage, which pop has always striven to do throughout it's history, is a ballsbreaking process. And if he's not an outrage, he is, at the least, an amusement. The expression of his sexual ambivalence establishes a fascinating game: is he, or isn't he?
-Michael Watts, Melody Maker

If the gesture was meant to shock Bowie's waning career back to life, it worked. The press had a feeding frenzy and kids raced into the store to buy Hunky Dory. "Changes" hit the Billboard charts in the US and "Starman", released in April of '72, would go Top 10 in the UK. That summer Bowie would release Ziggy Stardust, a UK Top 5 album that still sits atop critics' lists of best all-time rock albums. And in September he'd release "John, I'm Only Dancing", a single with such homosexual overtones it was judged too risque for release in America.

Clockwork Creep Or How To Survive A Bombing At 33,000 Feet

2012-01-29T05:00:00.000-08:00

On January 16, 1972 Serbian flight attendent Vesna Vulovic was on board JAT Flight 367, 33,000 feet high, when an explosion tore the plane apart. It took three minutes for the wreckage to hit the ground. She was found alive, but with serious injuries: a fractured skull, three broken vertebrae and two broken legs. Vesna was in a coma for 3 days. The first thing she did when she woke up to see the stunned faces of her parents was to ask for a cigarette.

“When I saw a newspaper and read what had happened, I nearly died from the shock,”

she told The New York Times.

She was the only survivor of 28 people aboard and remains the only person to survive a fall of that height without a parachute.

"...I was in the middle part of the plane. I was found with my head down and my colleague on top of me. One part of my body with my leg was in the plane and my head was out of the plane. A catering trolley was pinned against my spine and kept me in the plane. The man who found me, says I was very lucky. He was in the German Army as a medic during World War II. He knew how to treat me at the site of the accident."

A Serbian hero, she was awarded her Guinness Record title alongside Paul McCartney in 1985

In recent years, journalists have challenged the "bomb" theory, suggesting the plane was accidentally shot down by The Czech Air Force and had been attempting to land when it broke apart.

40 Years Ago This Month: Nils Lofgren, Leo Kottke & Malo

2012-01-28T09:00:00.000-08:00

[Buy It]

Nils Lofgren and band mates hit power pop perfection with the single "White Lies" but it only received heavy airplay in the Washington D.C. area. Even with an "A" rating from Robert Christagu, 1 +1 , released in January of 1972, did not sell. C'est dommage! At 20, Lofgren had already played guitar and piano on After The Gold Rush and with Crazy Horse on their debut. After Grin broke up, years before touring worth Springsteen, Lofgren recorded a self-titled album in 1975 that will always stand out as a personal favorite.

BTW, I planned to post a song from this album. I know I used to have "Lost A Number" on a now-deceased IPod. In the digital age we can lose songs as easily as a sock in the dryer.

[Buy It]

Fingerpickin' guitarist Leo Kottke gets funky all by himself on this opening track from his January 1972 release Greenhouse, my introduction to this brilliant musician. "The Song of The Swamp", "Louise" and the buoyant "Spanish Entomologist" reveal the exuberant talent of this Athens GA native.

[Buy It]

Carlos Santana's brother Jorge was one of the guitarists in the 12-piece San Francisco band Malo. You'll hear more brass than on any Santana album, often used to great effect. "Suavecito", which has become something of an anthem for American Chicanos, hit the Top 20 in 1972. Maybe it's because I was growing up in Malo's hometown then, but this song transports me to a spot on the Marina Green beneath dozens of flying kites.

[Buy It]

Members of the Rolling Stones jamming with Ry Cooder may sound like a great way to spend your time and money but it's really nothing more than a curiosity.

The Barracudas Pick Their Top 10 Fave Songs ( 1980)

2012-01-27T02:00:00.000-08:00

Criminally ignored Brit power popsters/ surf revivalists had scored a minor hit with "Summer Fun" when they provided this list to the September 18th, 1980 issue of Smash Hits. How cool that they showed so much love for The Sonics! Via Like Punk Never Happened .

1. The Sonics: Boss Hogg - Words can't describe the sub-human splendour of this song. Makes the Sex Pistols sound like The Carpenters.
2. Jan Berry: Universal Coward - The pits in right wing protest.
3. The Flamin' Groovies: Shake Some Action - The ultimate seventies single by the last true rock and roll band.
4. The Mousketeers: Schnitzelbond - A quality novelty hit.
5. P.F. Sloan: This Precious Time - Folk Rock genius Sloan's premier sob story.
6. The Beach Boys: I'm Bugged At My Old Man - Shows how bad a good group are at their best/worst.
7. The Ramones: I Want You Around - Joey sounds more like a sick sheep than ever.
8. The Byrds: Bells of Rhymney - A thing of beauty is a joy forever.
9. The Dictators: I Live for Cars and Girls - A group whose taste has no place in human affairs.
10. Annette Funicello/ Beach Boys: The Monkey's Uncle - A record of orang-utan proportions

40 Years Ago: Blue Oyster Cult, Jackson Browne and Solo Jerry Garcia

2012-01-25T06:14:00.000-08:00

[Buy It]

Long Island hard rockers Blue Oyster Cult made their debut in January of 1972 with what Rolling Stone critic Lester Bangs called an "authentic boogie beast". To sell the record, BOC went on one tour that made sense: opening for Alice Cooper ...and another that didn't: with Mahavishnu Orchestra.

[Buy It]

Though he was still in his early twenties when this album was released, Jackson Browne had already written songs for The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Tom Rush and Linda Ronstadt and apparently had an affair with Nico, a woman ten years his senior. "Doctor My Eyes" was his highest charting single until 1982's "Somebody's Baby" from the Fast Times at Ridgemont High soundtrack.

[Buy It]

Deadheads did not have to settle for the Grateful Dead's mediocre Europe '72 album. The smart ones picked up Garcia ( released 40 years ago this month) featuring Jerry playing everything but drums. Garcia was a man who really knew how to play with himself. ( what?) This is a great record, with lyrics from Robert Hunter. No wonder several of the songs wound up in the Dead repertoire.

Deep Cuts: Aretha Franklin - Border Song ( Holy Moses) 1972

2012-01-23T03:33:00.000-08:00

Soul music may have no better A-side in 1972 than Aretha Franklin's Grammy Award winning Young Gifted and Black, released 40 years ago this week. Side One includes the US Top 5 pop song "Daydreaming" , the Top 10 "Rock Steady" ( featuring cowbell from Dr John), and the Nina Simone-penned title track. A five star album in the first two versions of Rolling Stone Record Guide, it may have fallen from favor because Franklin's improvisation exercises clearly inspired the histrionics we've all had to endure from the likes of Whitney Houston, Celine Dion and Mariah Carey.

The last track on the album takes the Elton John/Bernie Taupin song "Border Song" to church. The Sweet Inspirations- the same backing vocal group who sang on Aretha's Atlantic recordings-bhelp the Queen drench the tune in a gospel-soul. Then there's the exquisite guitar solo by the late Cornell DuPree. Finally, Aretha changes just one line, but to great effect, asking "Can we live in peace?" ( instead of "let us live in peace").

What a question for our times.

This was just part of Aretha's spiritual-journey-on-record that would lead , only six months later, to the masterpiece Amazing Grace, recorded with the Reverend James Cleveland and the Southern California Community Choir.

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: Paul Chastain: Halo

2012-01-22T06:48:00.000-08:00

[out of print]

Champaign Illinois romantic Paul Chastain refused to hide the R.E.M influences on his terrific 1985 EP "Halo", released a few years before he teamed up with drummer Ric Menck and went all power pop on us in Velvet Crush. The man who produced those early R.E.M. albums, Let's Active's Mitch Easter, got out from behind the board to sing and play on the tour for their second album, 1994's glorious Teenage Symphonies to God. Sadly, there's not much of a market for power pop anymore. The group broke up and the name "Velvet Crush" was adopted by a Dayton Ohio 80's cover band.

Tom Robinson's All Time Top Ten (1979)

2012-01-21T08:20:00.000-08:00

Tom Robinson photo courtesy of Crying All The Way To The Chip Shop

[Buy it Now]

As told to Smash Hits Magazine in 1979 via Like Punk Never Happened . At the time, The Tom Robinson Band's debut album Power In the Darkness was climbing up to #4 on the UK album charts. CD reissues of the album include two of their best known singles "2-4-6-8 Motorway" and "Glad To Be Gay".

1. U2 : I Will Follow - Forget the critical bullshit. Just go see them. Great on record, staggering live.
2. Richard and Linda Thompson : I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight - Possibly the finest album of English music recorded in the 70's. Timeless and compelling.
3. The Out : Who is Innocent? - Along with Clive Pig's "Sweet Sixteen", the most underrated mini classic of '79.
4. The Cure : Boys Don't Cry - It's not what they say, it's the way they say it.
5. The Clash: White Man in Hammersmith Palais - Barely dented the Top 100 while "Tommy Gun" soared into the hit parade. Is there no justice?
6. Echo and the Bunnymen: All That Jazz - See you at the barricades babe/ See you when the lights go low, Joe.
7. Coil : Alcoholstark/ Motor Industry - Two chilling sides by sadly defunct Northampton band. Search out and listen.
8. Peter Gabriel: I Don't Remember - a personal favourite from a favourite person.
9. XTC: Roads Girdle The World - Ever since "Drums and Wires" I've been an avid fan.
10. The Teardrop Explodes: Treason - Once a good band becomes too popular ( i.e. Teardrop Explodes, Joy Division, Specials, Police), it suddenly becomes uncool to admit you like them. Me, I love 'em all.

40 Years Ago: Bread Rocks Out...Kind Of

2012-01-19T00:01:00.000-08:00

[Buy It Now]

They were the sultans of soft rock schmaltz. Bread sent hearts aflutter with love ballads like the title track of their fourth album, released 40 years ago this month. And there was "Make It With You", "It Don't Matter To Me", "Lost Without Your Love" and that most conditional of songs "If" (covered by such bad asses as Percy Faith, Johnny Mathis and Frank Sinatra).

Baby I'm-A Want You opened with the surprisingly rocking single "Mother Freedom", a crunchy guitar sound songwriter David Gates referred to as "Bread Zeppelin". It's just one of the great songs on the album. "Down On My Knees" is top-notch pop and "Everything I Own" just might be the best song Bread ever recorded. For those with heart conditions brought on by snare drums, there's "Diary". Because buying a Greatest Hits album is a sensible but cowardly way out, Baby I'm-A Want You might just be the best way to re-introduce yourself to Bread, the best thing since sliced ...schmaltz!

If SOPA Becomes Law Here's What 1001Songs Will Look Like

2012-01-18T16:21:00.000-08:00

The 1001Songs Singers: Baby I Got Abba

[not available for purchase]

Remember the days before Congress passed SOPA, The Stop Online Piracy Act ? We could post songs for a week or two and turn people onto artists the rest of the world had forgotten or never even heard of. Well, now with Internet censors watching so closely, all I dare post are my own songs.
Like this tribute to ABBA I wrote way back in the early 90's.

I saw my best female friend get married and realized we'd no longer be able to do the same things we used to do, including listening to ABBA on car trips. So I knocked out this tune. Plucked it out of the ether as Paul McCartney would say. I made a video of the demo version,which can be seen above unless censors have pulled it because of copy written photos. Years later, I recorded another version with friends in a Seattle studio. In 1999, as part of The Rocket's annual "Demo Derby" one of their critics likened our sound to The Kinks and cited the lyric "Frida and Agnetha /Dance like Swedish whores" as a personal fave. It helped that I enclosed a coupon for a free coffee with the CD.

Speaking of coffee in my next post I'll discuss "Venus In a Coffee Shop" another song you've never heard of and probably won't like. Or you could let your U. S. Representative know the internet doesn't belong to a few media corporations. They had their chance to tell you what to think. Now it's your turn to think for yourself.

Six Degrees: Garland Jeffreys To Drive By Truckers

2012-01-17T04:35:00.000-08:00

[Buy it]

1. Before Garland Jeffreys recorded the anthemic "Wild In The Streets" in 1973 (it would finally appear on the 1977 album Ghost Writer), he played guitar on John Cale's first solo album, 1969's Vintage Violence.

[Buy It]

2. The bass player on this album which Cale himself thought was too simplistic was Harvey Brooks who also played on Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited, The Doors' Soft Parade and arranged Karen Dalton's 1971 album In My Own Time.

[Buy It]

3. Among the songs Dalton recorded was this George Jones/Leon Payne number "Take Me" which Jones had recorded on his 1966 album Love Bug.

[Buy It]

4. Though his duets with wife Tammy Wynette are better remembered, Jones also recorded duets with Melba Montgomery, who was raised in Florence Alabama ( the same hometown as Sam Phillips and W.C. Handy) , one of the Quad Cities along with Muscle Shoals.

[Buy It]

5. Muscle Shoals Sound Studio is home to some notable recordings including The Rolling Stones' "Brown Sugar" and "Wild Horses", mush of Paul Simon's There Goes Rhymin' Simon, Lynyrd Skynyrd's Street Survivors and Millie Jackson's Caught Up, recorded in 1974, with the studio house band known as The Swampers.

[Buy It]

6. David Hood, the bass player for The Swampers, recorded with Traffic, Cat Stevens and Bob Seger. His son Patterson is the frontman for Drive By Truckers. This song , from the 2011 album Go Go Boots, was written by Eddie Hinton who also wrote Dusty Springfield's "Breakfast in Bed".

Patterson Hood

40 Years Ago This Month: Italian Prog Rockers PFM Release Debut

2012-01-16T10:29:00.000-08:00

[Buy It]

Italian progressive rockers Premiata Forneria Marconi - the name means Award-Winning Macaroni Bakery--released their first album Storia Di Un Minuta in January of 1972 and immediately topped the Italian album charts. Inspired by British prog bands like Genesis, King Crimson and Moody Blues, PFM blended Classic rock with Classical music, adding dashes of Mediterranean flavouring and ethereal vocals. The debut and its follow-up, Per Un Amico, are both albums of great taste and beauty. PFM began singing English lyrics by the third album which made the Billboard album charts. One of prog rock's great bands.

40 Years Ago This Week: Paul Simon's First Solo Album

2012-01-13T10:00:00.000-08:00

[Buy It Now]

As great a year in music as 1972 was, only three albums received an A+ rating from Robert Christgau, the Dean of Rock Critics: Exile On Main Street, Manfred Mann's Earth Band ( more on this exceptional album in February) and Paul Simon's first solo album since the break-up with Art Garfunkel.

Simon told music journalist Stuart Grundy a lot was riding on the album.

It was dangerous again, to a certain degree, to go and start all over again as just me. I was nervous . . . it's good to be nervous. After all those years of automatic success, you don't get nervous any more. It's really necessary to be nervous and be a little bit frightened.

The album opens with the reggae-ish "Mother And Child Reunion", recorded in Kingston Jamaica with, among others, two members of The Maytals. The title comes from a Chinese dish featuring boiled eggs and chicken. The lyrics--written after the band lay down the tracks--is explained by Simon in a 1972 Rolling Stone interview with Jon Landau

Last summer we had a dog that was run over and killed, and we loved this dog. It was the first death I had ever experienced personally. Nobody in my family died that I felt that. But I felt this loss--one minute there, next minute gone, and then my first thought was, "Oh, man, what if that was Peggy? What if somebody like that died? Death, what is it, I can't get it." And there were lyrics straight out forward like that. "I can't for the life of me remember a sadder day. I just can't believe it's so." Those are the lyrics. The chorus for "Mother and Child Reunion"--well, that's out of the title. Somehow there was a connection between this death and Peggy, and it was like heaven, I don't know what the connection was. Some emotional connection. It didn't matter to me what it was. I just knew it was there

Next comes "Duncan" with the "El Condor Pasa" reminiscent flutes played by the same Andean group Los Incas. (The version above comes from Live Rhymin' and was also one of the tracks on Greatest Hits Etc.)

The entire album could be a textbook for intimate songwriting and may provide some insight into Simon's marriage to his first wife Peggy. The next three songs are "Everything Put Together Falls Apart, "Run That Body Down" ( which can be heard above) and "Armistice Day".
Of "Run That Body Down", a tune that predicts the nation's health craze, Simon told Landau:

Musically it derives from a Bach prelude I was playing, and lyrically it makes it for me because I like the idea of a song about taking care of your health. I was reading a lot of Adelle Davis at the time

Side Two begins with "Me and Julio Down By The Schoolyard", a song that had the whole world asking "What was it that the mama saw these two boys doing?" Simon told Landau:

Something sexual is what I imagine, but when I say "something," I never bothered to figure out what it was. Didn't make any difference to me. First of all, I think it's funny to sing--"Me and Julio." It's very funny to me. And when I started to sing "Me and Julio," I started to laugh, and that's when I decided to make the song called "Me and Julio"; otherwise I wouldn't have made it that. I like the line about the radical priest. I think that's funny to have in a song.

The video, which begins with an introduction by Big Daddy Kane and Biz Markie, was made in 1988.

Of the next song, "Peace Like a River", Simon tells Landau :

It's a serious song, although it's not as down as you think. The last verse is sort of nothing; it sort of puts the thing back up in the air, which is where it should be. You end up, you think about these things that are something to do with a riot, or something in my mind in the city.

As with "Mother And Child Reunion" and "Duncan" Simon finished up the lyrics to "Peace Like A River" after the tracks were laid down.

"Papa Hobo" is next, a satirical put down of a basketball town in the Midwest.

"Hobo's Blues" is 80 seconds of Simon jamming with violinist Stephane Grappelli who found fame performing in Parisian nightclubs with Django Reinhardt.

"Paranoia Blues" follows. A study in lyrical story telling from a songwriter who taught his craft at NYU.

Among his students: Maggie and Terre Roche ( who would provide backing vocals on 1973's There Goes Rhymin' Simon before forming The Roches with sister Suzzy) and Melissa Manchester who told Crawdaddy's Timothy White:

One of the most fun things he used to do was tell us stories about all his hassles and paranoias as a successful songwriter and the silly things he'd done. He told us about the first time he ever met Bob Dylan. He said he went over to his house all excited, and the place was a total mess, with junk all over and wrinkled old scraps of paper covering the floors. Dylan kept walking around the room talking and thinking out loud. Paul followed, picking up every loose scrap of paper he could find--anything with words on it--and stuffing them in his pockets. He said he was dying to find out how Dylan did it.

"Congratulations" is the final cut. Another song that shows some wear and tear on a relationship.

I remember seeing Simon tell a late night TV interviewer that his songs typically began with an inspired first line. For his 1972 chord book Simon expands:

Once I pick a key and start to play, I sing any words that come into my head without trying to make any sense out of them. I tend to sing easy words with a concentration on "oos" and "ah" sounds, which are musically pleasing to me. I also like words beginning with "g's" and "l's" and words that have "t's" and "k's" in them. Sometimes during this stream of consciousness singing, a phrase will develop that has a naturalness and a meaning, in which case I keep it and start to build a song around it.

50 Years Ago Today: Howlin Wolf Releases Rockin Chair

2012-01-11T04:36:00.000-08:00

At 6 foot 6, "300 pounds of muscle and man" , Howlin' Wolf was literally a giant in the Chicago blues scene. But his recording career didn't begin until the age of forty-one. He worked as a farmer, a fertlizer salesman and as a disc jockey.

Fifty years ago on this day he released his most influential album, Howlin' Wolf ( also known as the Rockin Chair album for its cover). Famous songs--most written by Willie Dixon-- include "Little Red Rooster", "Wang Dang Doodle", "Back Door Man" and the Wolf's version of "Spoonful". This is one of the albums all the skinny British blues fanatics studied. In fact just about every British blues band had a Howlin Wolf song in the repertoire. The Stones covered "Little Red Rooster". The Yardbirds, Manfred Mann and The Animals did "Smokestack Lightnin". Cream covered "Spoonful". You get the idea. The album comes as part of a two-fer with Wolf's first LP, Moanin' in the Moonlight, recorded by Sam Phillips.
In 1964, Howlin' Wolf toured Europe as part of the American Folk Blues Festival. Below, one of the performances in England. Little Hubert Sumlin is playing lead guitar. Sunnyland Slim is on piano. Willie Dixon is playing bass and Clifton James on drums.

Ian Dury Picks His 12 All Time Faves (1979)

2012-01-09T04:52:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits October 18 1979 via Like Punk Never Happened. His #1 UK hit, "Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick", would be voted the best single of 1979 in the Pazz and Jop poll of music critics taken by The Village Voice.

1.Millie Small: What Am I Living For? - Terrible record but it's a magic song by Chuck Willis
2. Dean Martin: That's Amore - Because I think Dean Martin's really great in a way.
3. J.J. Zackerley: Dinner With Drac - He was a DJ in America who made one record. Good words, great sax solo.
4. Billy Fury: Jealousy - The best singer that England's ever seen. My ambition has been to write enough songs so that Billy Fury can do an album called "Fury Sings Dury".
5. Kay Starr: Rock and Roll Waltz - One of the few bits in three four time that I like.
6. Groovy Joe Poovey: Ten Long Fingers and Eighty-Eight Keys - Wonderful old rock and roll record.
7. Minnie Ripperton: Lovin' You - Beautiful record, specially now that the poor girl's gone.
8. Gene Vincent: Hot Rod Gang EP - The best four songs he ever did.
9. Merle Haggard: Okie from Muskogee
10. Wilson Pickett: In the Midnight Hour
11. Adriana Celentano - Anything, preferably something in Italian
12. Roger Collins: Oh, You Sexy Thing - He's a local soul singer from San Francisco. The inventor of the short sleeved suit.

RIP Tom Ardolino of NRBQ

2012-01-08T10:04:00.000-08:00

We lost a great member of The Ravioli Rhythm section this weekend: drummer Tom Ardolino,56 , of NRBQ.
A fan of the band, Ardolino was at a show when original drummer Tom Staley got ill and left before the band could perform an encore. He spoke to Mike Skully, who made a documentary for A&E's "Breakfast With the Arts":

I told them I played drums but I never was in a band before. I learned to play with records in the basement.

Bassist Joey Spaminato continues the story:

And Terry just pointed to Tom and said "Get on." He came up and he just laid it down.

Tom:

Al (Anderson), the guitarist then, turned around. He thought it was the old regular drummer.

Joey:

So when it came time to try out for drummers in our band, he was the first one who came to mind.I said "It might be crazy. We don't know if he can play all the styles of music that we play. We know that he likes it and we know that he's smart. But we've got to give him a shot"

Tom played on 15 NRBQ records and in thousands of shows from 1974 to 1993* ( actually 2004), endearing audiences with his rare turns on the mic to sing "Volare".

photo by Merritt Brown

Al Anderson said "He was a great drummer and a great guy.He had a totally unique style of drumming that nobody can ever duplicate. That was one of the baddest rhythm sections in the world."

RIP Tom

Last Ramone Standing

2012-01-07T11:56:00.000-08:00

Just in case your winter months aren't depressing enough, a new tumblr blog called Live! uses photoshop to edit out deceased members of rock bands from album covers. The above image may be the most disturbing: original drummer Tommy Ramone standing by himself, the lone survivor.

In fewer than three and a half years we lost three Ramones:

Vocalist Joey Ramone died April 15,2001of lymphoma.
Bassist Dee Dee Ramone died June 5, 2002 of a heroin overdose
Guitarist Johnny Ramone died September 15, 2004 of prostate cancer.

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: Art In The Dark - Number

2012-01-06T04:29:00.000-08:00

Art in the Dark: Number

[out of print]

Thanks to a door blown wide open by R.E.M., if you lived in Athens GA in the mid-80s, could sing with sincerity and knew enough guys to form a jangly rock band, you were already halfway to getting played on college radio. Art in the Dark was better than most. They often opened for R.E.M in their hometown. R.E.M. producer and Let's Active founder Mitch Easter produced their 1983 EP at his Drive-In Studio. They even covered Big Star's "Way Out West" on their first and only full length album The Icons. At the time, the only way to hear Big Star was to find a used vinyl copy in the back of a record store.

The Icons had a number of good songs but at WTUL we played the lead off cut, "Number", the most. If expectations were for even greater things in the future, they weren't met. The boys split up. Some went to grad school. Some opened businesses. Most have kids. Humid nights in stuffy Southern clubs are now just a memory.

Jim Kerr of Simple Minds Picks His All Time Faves

2012-01-04T03:00:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their April 16th, 1981 issue issue, via Like Punk Never Happened

1 Velvet Underground: Waiting For the Man - Music from the original Factory - America's Premiere journalist.
2 Ike and Tina Turner: Nutbush City Limits - Best ever melting pot where synthesiser shows its soul in solo.
3 Eno: Needle in the Camel's Eye - Not many pieces could live up to the promise of such a title - beautiful and sad.
4 Magazine: The Lights Pours Out of Me - Howard the insect and true star climbs on producer John Leckie's marble wall - best song of the last three years.
5 T Rex: Get it On - For the saxophone and the cloak full of ego.
6 Neu: Neu 2 (LP) - Sheer feelings, clear sounds, new musical realities for me. Take it to the hard hinterland.
7 Peter Gabriel: The Intruder - The darker side of Gabriel that maybe does exist. Look into his eyes and you'll see what I mean.
8 Joy Division: Love Will Tear Us Apart - The most uplifting single in a long - long time. It floats around me
9 Iggy Pop and David Bowie: The Idiot - Bass, drums, refrigerator and striplight combine - the offspring is "Baby, baby I like your pants"
10 Talking Heads: Don't Worry About the Government - The building is over there. A mixture of greatness and overpowering admiration for Tina Weymouth. Unworkable and Uncontrollable.

Deep Cuts: Ry Cooder - FDR in Trinidad (1972)

2012-01-02T02:00:00.000-08:00

[Buy It!]

This is not the album version but a 1974 solo performance. I shrank the video box because of the annoying shot of the candy character.

With the dawning of 2012 1001Songs has a new year of music to explore: 1972. The year Stevie Wonder and Al Green each released two great albums while Big Star gave us #1 Record. The year The Stones dropped Exile on Main Street. Of Harvest and Ziggy Stardust. Of Backstabbers and Can't Buy A Thrill. Of Sail Away and The Slider.

We begin with a deep cut from Ry Cooder's Into the Purple Valley, a tremendous album released 40 years ago this month. It could have been a dust bowl era concept album, with its covers of Woody Guthrie's "Vigilante Man", Leadbelly's "On a Monday" and "Taxes On The Farmer Feed Us All" from the public domain. But Cooder--a session guitarist who had played with The Rolling Stones, Randy Newman and Captain Beefheart --digs even deeper, unearthing this calypso gem from Fitz McLean originally recorded in 1937 by Attila The Hun to commemorate the president's visit to "The Land of the Hummingbirds". Buy Purple Valley and Paradise And Lunch first, but don't stop there.

By the way, here's the original version:

[Buy It!]

FDR aboard the USS Indianapolis off the coast of Trinidad.

Bashing the New Year in With The Clowns!

2011-12-31T13:00:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

Happy New Year from Seattle!
Thanks for reading 1001Songs.
See you in 2012.

#49 Dan Hicks And His Hot Licks: Canned Music, 1969

2011-12-30T04:00:00.000-08:00

[Buy It]

Nearly ten years before Jonathan Richman decided his Modern Lovers had to turn down the volume, stuff a pillow or two in the bass drum, and add some pretty voiced girls to the mix, Dan Hicks did just that with his Hot Licks. He even gave the pretty voiced girls a name: The Lickettes.

Hicks had been the drummer for The Charlatans, one of San Francisco's most influential psychedelic rock bands. Psychedelia may be the only genre of music you won't find on Original Recordings. You'll hear jazz, swing, and country and western. The lovely "Canned Music" is a sweet reminder that live music can be twice as good as hearing anything on the radio or jukebox.

Dan Hicks is still touring. He's as ageless as the music he plays.

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: Dumptruck - Back Where I Belong

2011-12-28T20:20:00.000-08:00

[buy it]

Dumptruck, one of college radio's favorite jangly guitar pop bands, was formed by two Connecticut songwriters who met in Boston. Seth Tiven and Kirk Swan seemed to share an affinity for the dual guitar attack of Television and the morose lyrics of Joy Division.

For their second album, Positively Dumptruck, Tiven, Swan and their rhythm section teamed up with producer Don Dixon whose recent credits included R.E.M., Guadalcanal Diary and Tommy Keene. Great stuff! We played the very hell out of this album at WTUL, but if Dumptruck ever made it to New Orleans I missed the show. I did see Dumptruck open for Big Time Records label mate Alex Chilton in San Francisco in the fall of '86.
Must have been a dismal tour because when it was over...so was this incarnation of Dumptruck. Swan left. Tiven kept the name, recording an even better Dumptruck album in 1987, the Wilco-esque For the Country. In 2001, Dumptruck released a live album of recordings made in the mid-80's, Lemmings Travel to the Sea, along with a disc of recent material.
I can't vouch for that one but both Positively and For The Country are can't miss classics from an era when jangle pop ruled college radio.

Six Degrees of Separation: Parliament to Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes

2011-12-27T09:19:00.000-08:00

[buy it]

1. Parliament's 1975 platinum funk album Mothership Connection was the first to feature Maceo Parker and Fred Wesley who had left The JB's, James Brown's backing band.

[buy it]

2. James Brown liked his horn sections. His alto sax player Nat Jones co-wrote this 1966 Top Ten R&B hit. What Brown didn't like was having an opening act mock him on stage. Joe Tex did just that, tossing a blanket over his shoulder and singing "Please, please, please-get me out of this cape!" They had some history. Brown thought Tex swiped his dance moves. Tex knew Brown swiped his wife. When JB shot at his rival in a nightclub, he wound up paying off customers hit by stray bullets with $100 bills. Tex emerged unscathed.

[buy it]

3. The same year Brown released "Bring It Here" Joe Tex released his #2 R&B hit "The Love You Save". You can find it on the Joe Henry produced soundtrack to Jesus' Son released in 1999.

[buy it]

4. The Jesus' Son soundtrack also includes Barbara Mason's " Yes I'm Ready" a #5 pop #2 R&B hit from 1965. The lush strings are an early example of what would become the Philly Soul sound.

[buy it]

5. Those strings were played by the house band of Philly's Sigma Sound recording studio. They played on hits by The O'Jays, The Spinners, The Stylistics and many more...including their own #1 hit in 1974, as MFSB ( Mother Father Sister Brother, not Masters of Funk Soul and Blues). The song,"TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia)" became the Soul Train theme.
The man on the top right corner is drummer Earl Young.

[buy it]

6. Before he founded The Trammps ( of "Disco Inferno" fame) , Young is credited with inventing the disco style of rock drumming with his use of the Hi Hat cymbal, first heard in 1973 on the Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes' #7 hit , "The Love I Lost".

Joe Jackson: All Time Fave Songs

2011-12-26T04:36:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their August 23-September 5, 1979 issue via Like Punk Never Happened . That year Joe Jackson released his first two albums, Look Sharp and I'm The Man.

[purchase]

1. Bruce Springsteen: Born To Run
1. The Clash: London's Burning
1. Prince Buster: Al Capone
1. David Bowie: Drive-In Saturday
1. Gregory Isaacs: Mr Know It All
1. Public Image LTD: Public Image
1. Taper Zukie: M.P.L.A.
1. Big Youth: Hit The Road Jack
1. Ray Campi and His Rockabilly Rebels: Teenage Boogie
10.The Legendary Stardust Cowboy: Paralysed

a) "Choosing ten favourites is hard enough; putting them in order is impossible. Anyone who can name their favourite record ever must have narrow musical tastes. Therefore I've chose nine number one's.
b) Number 10 is probably the worst record ever made.
c) Reggae is my favourite music so I've chose four reggae tracks.Next time I do a top ten it'll be four different ones.
d) I didn't choose anything more than three or four years old except Prince Buster-the old favourites are everyone's favourites."

Big Youth: Hit the Road Jack

Legendary Stardust Cowboy: Paralysed

All I Want For Christmas...

2011-12-23T20:51:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

The 1001Songs Holiday Theme song.
Enjoy the holiday weekend and come back soon, ya hear?

My Own Top Ten ( A List Made in 1984)

2011-12-21T20:23:00.001-08:00

My top 10 albums as provided to WTUL's Vox Humana for the Spring 1984 edition, just weeks after I had joined the staff. I still listen to all of these albums.

1. The Beatles ABBEY ROAD

2. Talking Heads '77

3. Mott the Hoople ALL THE YOUNG DUDES

4. R.E.M. MURMUR

5 Otis Redding THE HISTORY OF OTIS REDDING

6. The Jam ALL MOD CONS

7. Bob Marley And The Wailers RASTAMAN VIBRATION

8. Al Green GREATEST HITS

9. T-Rex ELECTRIC WARRIOR

10a. Love FOREVER CHANGES

10b. Squeeze ARGYBARGY

Prince Concert, Tacoma, December 20,2011

2011-12-20T19:13:00.000-08:00

On the last night of what must have been an exhausting tour, the purple gnome played a predictable set that, even with two encores, timed out shorter than a Winnie The Pooh movie. Maybe he was in a bad mood. Maybe was feeling that short-timer thing. Maybe he had a bad case of the Muhnnnn-Days.

Prince failed to sell out The Tacoma Dome. My wife and I bought cheap seats and got moved up to Row 25.
Wearing a black doo rag, high heeled shoes and several pounds of silver jewelry, Prince emerged from a smoke screen playing "Let's Go Crazy" followed by "Delirious" and "1999". The crowd went wild. He would also play "Little Red Corvette", "Raspberry Beret", "When Doves Cry" and "Kiss". Prince's guitar work reportedly made Pearl Jam's Mike McCready drop his jaw. Yes, at times we were in the presence of a master showman.

Then there were other times. He brought 68-year old Maceo Parker out a few times too many to show us all what a sax can do. Is this not a too obvious attempt to grab the "King Of Soul" scepter from James Brown? Some of his supposed ad-libs ("You don't have to watch Dynasty ...or Real Housewives" from Kiss) were at least part of his Vancouver act. And when he sat down at what looked like a piano, it appeared instead that he was playing a karaoke machine ( for "Alphabet Street" and "I Would Die 4 U"). What's worse? Lip-syncing to real instruments or singing karaoke? Finally he made the classic "old and in the way" speech about radio play: "You want to occupy something? Let's occupy the radio stations" before launching into an over-the-top rendition of "Nothing Compares 2 U".

After two brief encores of "Purple Rain" and "Controversy", the Prince had left the building. It was 10 PM. The lights went up but nobody believed the show could possibly be over. It was for us....and the people who had paid $200 for floor tickets. But not for Prince who headed up to Seattle for an after party where he jammed with his band for 90 straight minutes.

I finally got to see Prince. I probably don't need to see Prince again.

Glenn Tilbrook Of Squeeze Picks His All Time Top Ten

2011-12-17T06:08:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their July 11-24, 1981 issue ( via Like Punk Never Happened ) At the time Glenn was promoting East Side Story released by Squeeze two months earlier.

1.Kasenetz-Katz Singing Orchestra Circus" Quick Joey Small ( Run Joey Run) - First ever punk record.
2. Michael Jackson: Don't Stop Til You Get Enough - The definitive dance record. Wish he'd record one of ours.
3. Jimi Hendrix: The Wind Cries Mary - Understated guitar. Underrated song.
4. Robert Wyatt: Strange Fruit -Bessie Smith song in the 30's which made 7 people commit suicide when first played on the radio
5. Madness: All the Madness singles - An incredible singles group
6. Cliff Richard: Devil Woman -Classic British pop production by the old devil himself.
7. The Monkees: Last Train to Clarksville -Classic US production-line pop
8. The Beatles: Strawberry Fields Forever - Damn good backwards bit at the end
9. Elvis Costello: Alison - Simply one of the best songs ever , written by one of the best song-writers.
10. The Undertones : It's Going to Happen - THE Summer record of '81. And probably '82/3/4/ etc.

2011: A 40-Something Music Snob Picks His Top 10 Songs

2011-12-14T19:54:00.000-08:00

If you're over 40 you simply don't have time to keep up with what the kids are listening to these days. You're too busy watching your career slip away, trying to raise children and cleaning out hair from the drain. ("You're not losing your hair, " the Super Cuts stylist says,"you're just shedding".)

Here now a helpful, at times obvious, guide to the music you've been missing:

1.

[purchase]

Athens Alabama soul revival band features jubilant front woman Brittany Howard singing her heart out.

2.

[purchase]

From Portland, OR ( who isn't from Portland,OR?) comes Blouse with the song I listened to most this year.
Reminds me of something I might have played between a Jesus and Mary Chain track and something by Memphis-era Dusty Springfield on my college radio station in the mid-80's.

3.

[purchase]

Australian hook-makers that make music you'll want to listen to for sheer pleasure. Ain't nothing wrong with that.

4.

[purchase]

From Portland OR ( Who isn't?) comes The Decemberists with an album featuring cuts that wouldn't have sounded out of place on R.E.M's Life's Rich Pageant or Document, in part because Seattle holdout Peter Buck plays on them.

5.

[purchase]

From Finland comes our fave chill out album of 2011. Atmospheric, dreamy pop.

6.

[purchase]

You could spend every minute of Kaputt playing spot the influence ( Fleetwood Mac, Al Stewart, America...) or you could just settle back and enjoy one of the best albums of the year.

7.

[purchase]

Seattle's Fleet Foxes expand the sound and ideas from their 2008 breakthrough on this lush sophomore album.

8.

[purchase]

It doesn't get any catchier than this return to form for the Swedish band that came out of nowhere in 2006 with the whistle-along anthem "Young Folks".

9.

[purchase]

With apologies to the members of Hootie and the Blowfish, Chaz Bundick has to be the hippest South Carolina Gamecock to ever emerge in the music scene. Innovative and positively grooving.

10.

[purchase]

From Portland OR (again) comes Wild Flag featuring ex members of Sleater-Kinney, Quasi and The Minders. They rock.

I'm pretty sure I was able to find all these tracks via Hype Machine so I don't feel too bad about posting them here.
Other great albums from 2011:

HM: Paul Simon's So Beautiful Or So What , Washed Out -Within And Without, Radiohead- King of Limbs, Dawes-Nothing Is Wrong, Black Keys- El Camino, Wye Oak-Civilian, The Feelies - Here Before, & Wilco - The Whole Love.

Six Degrees of Separation: Dave And Ansell Collins to The dB's

2011-12-12T04:00:00.000-08:00

1. With their UK #1 single " Double Barrel", Dave and Ansell Collins brings reggae to the masses in 1971. This is the first record a 14 year old drummer named Sly Dunbar ever plays on.

2. The following year Sly teams up with bassist Robbie Shakespeare. Sly And Robbie become one of the most sought after rhythm sections in the world. They play with, or produce, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones and reggae greats like Peter Tosh and Black Uhuru. In 1981 they back up Grace Jones on her club hit "Pull Up To The Bumper", the single from her album Nightclubbing.

3. The title track is a cover of the 1977 Iggy Pop/David Bowie tune which appears on Iggy's album The Idiot.

4. In 1994 Trent Reznor samples the kick drum sound from "Nightclubbing" for his disturbing hit "Closer". The video is directed by Mark Romanek who has won 19 MTV Music Video Awards.

5.The following year Romanek directs the video for R.E.M.'s "Strange Currencies" which, for some reason, can't be found on YouTube. This is the third single from Monster, produced by Scott Litt ( who produced the Katrina and the Waves hit "Walking On Sunshine" as well as the final Replacements album All Fall Down).

6. Litt made his debut as a producer on The dB's 1982 album Repercussion, which is best known for the cut "Amplifier". So we're going to dig a little deeper into this terrific album and post "We Were Happy There".

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: Rage to Live - Enough Is Never Enough

2011-12-11T09:07:00.000-08:00

Yet another band from Hoboken, the New Jersey city that gave us The Bongos, The dBs, The Feelies and Frank Sinatra, Rage to Live dropped its first album in 1986 ( well before anyone in the music biz used that annoying phrase "dropped"). The band was made up of ex-Necessaries guitarist Ed Tomney and ex-Individuals member Glenn Morrow. They played well crafted edgy power pop."Enough is Never Enough" even made MTV's 120 Minutes playlist.

Their debut was the first album released on Morrow's Bar/None label. When the second album did nothing to lift the band's fortunes, Glenn became full time owner of Bar/None and signed a few artists you've heard of: 10,000 Maniacs, Alex Chilton, The Feelies, Freedy Johnston, Yo La Tengo and They Might Be Giants among many others.

Annie Lennox: All Time Top Ten Fave Songs

2011-12-10T08:45:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their December 13-26, 1979 issue ( via Like Punk Never Happened ) At the time Annie was a member of the Tourists and promoting their second of three albums. She and fellow Tourist Dave Stewart formed the Eurythmics in 1980 after the third album stalled

1.Marvin Gaye: Heard It Through the Grapevine - If ever I had to pick my favourite single of all time, this would be it.
2. David Bowie: Fame - Inspired, brilliant - luv it!
3. The Beatles: I Am The Walrus - Of all the Beatle toons, this has to be the one for me. A beautiful conglomeration of psychedelia.
4. Sam The Sham And The Pharohs: Woolly Bully - Let's dance!
5. Dusty Springfield: I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself - This is shivers up the spine music
6. The Kinks: You Really Got Me - One of the best bands ever.
7. Otis Redding: Dock of the Bay - When I'm feeling down this is great to listen to.
8. Martha And The Vandellas: Dancing In The Street - Get on your feet to this classic. What a voice! What a song!
9. Stevie Wonder: Living For The City - This has to be one of the seven wonders of the world
10. The Beach Boys: Good Vibrations - I couldn't forget The Beach Boys and all those sound vibrations.

1001Songs Fave Tourists tune is "So Good To Be Back Home Again". Did Annie's get up inspire Lady Gaga?

40 Year Anniversary of Frank Zappa's Worst Week ...Ever

2011-12-08T04:23:00.000-08:00

DECEMBER 4, 1971 MONTREUX, SWITZERLAND - In the middle of Don Preston's synthesizer solo on "King Kong", someone in the Montreux Casino audience decided to shoot off a flare gun into the rattan covered ceiling. And so Frank Zappa's worst week began.
Frank told the story like this:

There were between twenty-five hundred and three thousand kids packed into the room- well over capacity. Since more kids were outside, trying to get in, the organizers had cleverly chained the doors shut. When the fire began, the audience was left with two ways out: through the front door, which was pretty small, or through a plate-glass window off to the side of the stage.

I made an announcement- something like: "Please be calm. We have to leave here. There is a fire and why don't we get out?" You'd be surprised how well people who speak only French can understand you when its a matter of life and death. They began filing out through the front door.

As the room was filling with smoke, one of our roadies took an equipment case and smashed the big window. The crew then began helping people to escape through it into some kind of garden place below. The band escaped through an underground tunnel that led from behind the stage through the parking garage.

A few minutes later the heating system in the building exploded, and Some people were blown through the window. Fortunately, nobody was killed and there were only a few minor injuries- however, the entire building, about thirteen million dollars' worth, burned to the ground, and we lost all our equipment.

From across Lake Geneva, members of Deep Purple watched the fire. Together they wrote their most famous song,"Smoke On the Water".

They burned down the gambling house/

It died with an awful sound/

Funky Claude (Nobs--director of the Montreux Jazz Fest) was running in and out/

pulling kids out the ground

On the live album version of "Smoke on the Water", Deep Purple's Ian Gillan yells "Break a leg, Frank". It's not really that funny a line.

DECEMBER 10, 1971 LONDON, ENGLAND - That's because six days later, a deranged member of London's Rainbow Theatre audience attacked Zappa on stage. In the melee, Zappa fell ( or was pushed) off the stage:

"The band thought I was dead." Zappa wrote in The Real Frank Zappa Book. "I had fallen fifteen feet down into a concrete-floored orchestra pit, my head was over on my shoulder and my neck was bent like it was broken. I had a gash in my chin, a hole in the back of my head, a broken rib and a fractured leg. One arm was paralyzed."

As a result the rest of the Winter European tour was cancelled. Zappa spent most of 1972 in a wheelchair and endured chronic back pain for the rest of his life. The fall also crushed Zappa's larynx which is how he came to acquire that mysterious deep singing voice. The next several albums, Waka Jawaka and The Grand Wazoo, would feature a jazz fusion sound but almost no vocals at all.

Here's Zappa and the band performing at The Roxy in 1973

40 Years Ago Today: First Wings Album Released

2011-12-06T16:35:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

Wild Life is largely high on sentiment but rather flaccid musically and impotent lyrically, trivial and unaffecting.
John Mendelsohn, Rolling Stone

Perhaps Paul McCartney's most critically maligned album, Wild Life ( released December 7, 1971) deserves to be heard at least once. Yes, it is Lo Fi and many of the songs seem to have been written in 5 minutes or less but that's part of the charm. It feels spontaneous and innocent ( thanks to the frankly unskilled presence of Linda) and even sloppy in places. Well, it was recorded in two weeks. But give a listen and you'll find some fine moments among the filigree.

Wings ( made up of Paul, Linda, Ex-Moody Blues singer and guitarist Denny Lane and Ram drummer Denny Seiwell) was McCartney's attempt at putting together a band that could play live.

The first track, "Mumbo", rocks as hard as anything McCartney has done since "Helter Skelter". Those aren't words he's singing by the way. McCartney--who created such beautiful lyrics for "Yesterday" and "Here, There and Everywhere" -- is phonetically tossing out "word-sounds". The reason: "Mumbo" is being made up on the spot. ( More than half the cuts on Wild Life are first takes, by the way.)

The lyrics may be silly at best but "Bip Bop" is a hypnotic bit of backwater boogie. The song infuriated critics. George Harrison is reported to have cried out "C'mon Paul! We know you can do better than that!" But in a re-evaluation in which they named Wild Life one the greatest albums of all time, Mojo Magazine called the song "absurdly hypnotic".

Now we're getting in some trouble. This reggae-treated Mickey and Sylvia cover was originally going to be the single. That didn't happen.( Phew!) In fact Paul simply doesn't talk about this album. Referring to Wild Life, Linda simply said: "We could have done it better."

The nearly 7 minute title cut ends side one. Linda's backing vox sound multi-tracked. I believe we may be entering new ground for McCartney: "filler". That said, I assume I'll be hearing from some fans who will tell me that this is their fave cut. McCartney dug out "Wild Life" on tour every so often.

SIDE TWO

Side Two offers some love songs beginning with "Some People Never Know". Judging by the number of covers one can find on YouTube, I guess this a fan favorite. It's probably for Linda.

God bless Linda. Paul's soul mate has to sing some solo lines on a cut that sounds like a 1963 Beatles throw-away. But what do you know? A Hit Parader critic called this the best song on the album. And I'm sure a few readers will say this is their fave.

>

One of Paul's most overlooked gems. Mojo Magazine says "Tomorrow" could have had a place in the Abbey Road medley. I believe this cut got the most radio plays when the album originally came out.

"Dear Friend" is seen as an attempt at reconciliation with John. After the break up Paul struck in song with the Ram cut "Too Many People" ("that was your first mistake/you took your lucky break and broke it into two") Lennon retorted in "How Do You Sleep?" ("The only thing you done was yesterday/And since you're gone you're just another day") In "Dear Friend" Paul is offering the peace pipe.

The first CD version offers three non-LP cuts including "Oh Woman Oh Why", the B side to the previously mentioned "Another Day". This isn't a Wings cut. McCartney plays all the instruments. That's why it really should be an extra cut on Ram ( which is this writer's fave Macca album).

Following the backlash, McCartney hired ex Spooky Tooth guitarist Henry McCullough and toured UK college towns where they played impromptu concerts. Then he did some other stuff.

Paul Weller's All Time Top Ten Songs

2011-11-30T18:25:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their Sept 20-Oct 3, 1979 issue ( via Like Punk Never Happened ). At the time he was promoting The Jam's fourth album, Setting Sons.

1. The Nips: Gabrielle
2. The Slits: Instant Hit
3. Purple Hearts: Millions Like Us
4. Gang of Four: Elevator
5. Vapors: Spring Collection
6. Wire: Outdoor Miner
7. Skids: Into the Valley
8. Whirlwind: Rockin High School Baby
9. Joy Division: Transmission
10.The Undertones: Family Entertainment

These are in no particular order. You could put in any single by Wire, The Nips or The Skids because I like them all. ~ Paul

Odds And Sods: George Harrison - Party Seacombe

2011-11-29T02:03:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

I dedicate this post to George Harrison who passed away on this date ten years ago. His last words: "Love one another".

Harrison's Wonderwall Music , released on November 1st of 1968--three weeks before The White Album , is considered by many to be the first Beatles solo album. ( Those people would be Beatle fans and Beatle buffs. Beatle fanatics would argue that McCartney's 1967 "The Family Way" soundtrack was first).

Wonderwall Music IS actually a soundtrack to a little seen 1968 film starring Jane Birkin. At the time Harrison --like Lennon--was playing with tape loops. Most of the album was recorded with Indian musicians already on hand for the Beatles "Lady Madonna" B-side "The Inner Light", but Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and even The Monkees' Peter Tork played on one or more cuts using pseudonyms (Ringo was "Richie Snare" - a terrific name for a cat). Harrison himself did not play on the album. ( So there's a bar bet for you: who was the only Beatle to play on George Harrison's Wonderwall Music? The answer is Ringo Starr.)

Our track, "Party Seacombe", is a first cousin ,once-removed of the Magical Mystery Tour cut "Flying". At 4:37 it's probably twice as much melotron as you need, but there you go.

George from the liner notes of Wonderwall Music

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: Sex Clark 5 - I Want You Mine

2011-11-26T10:00:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

A Southern-friend Young Fresh Fellows, The Sex Clark Five hailed from "Rocket City": Huntsville, Alabama.
In 1985, a copy of their 45-sized EP Neita Grew Up Last Night made its way to the basement of the Tulane University student center. It was full of short lo-fi Beatlesque pop tunes like "I Want You Mine" ( now deleted) and "Red Shift". Naturally I played it every week.

The EP also caught the attention of legendary BBC Radio DJ John Peel who brought them in for at least one Peel session. A.C. Newman of The New Pornographers nominated the SC5 as one of his "unsung heroes" in a 2006 issue of GQ.

BONUS!

WTUL Promo: Mel Noonard "If"

My first promo for WTUL was inspired by all the cool band promos we would get and Bill Murray's lounge singer routine. Not sure where I got the backing instrumental version of "If".

Robert Forster of The Go-Betweens: Ten Rules of Rock And Roll.

2011-11-25T17:12:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

"Sometimes I play a game in my head: name the five best American rock bands of the ’60s. My list goes: The Velvet Underground, The Byrds, The Beach Boys, The Doors, and then I stall on the fifth. Creedence? The Band – although they’re mostly Canadian. Simon and Garfunkel? Jefferson Airplane? The Lovin’ Spoonful? But I plump for The Monkees."—Robert Forster

Robert Forster tried his hand at rock criticism for the Australian magazine The Monthly and won the Pascall Prize for Critical Writing in 2006. His book 10 Rules came out in 2009 but I know how much 1001Songs readers like lists so here we go:

1. Never follow an artist who describes his or her work as "dark".
2. The second-last song on every album is weakest.
3. Great bands tend to look alike.

4. Being a rock star is a 24-hours-a-day job.
5. The band with the most tattoos has the worst songs.

6. No band does anything new on stage after the first 20 minutes.
7. The guitarist who changes guitars on stage after every third number is showing you his guitar collection.
8. Every great artist hides behind their manager.

9. Great bands don't have members making solo albums.
10. The three-piece band is the purest form of rock and roll expression.

Deep Cuts: The Kinks - Oklahoma U.S.A.

2011-11-23T16:02:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

When asked what was his favorite Kinks album, Ray Davies liked to reply the most recent one...and Muswell Hillbillies.

The band's ninth album celebrates the North London neighborhood where the Davies brothers grew up.
Stereo Review magazine called the poor-selling record "album of the year" in 1972 ( even though it was released on November 24, 1971). The best known cuts include the concert fave and single "20th Century Man", "Complicated Life" ( life is overrated/ life is complicated) and "Have a Cuppa Tea" which, like most cuts on the album, sounds like a music hall number. You can picture the lads on the cover all joining in on the chorus.

Our deep cut is the tenth track It's a quiet number that remembers the effect of the big American films played at the local Muswell theatres.The song is about the dreams of a working girl ( if life's for livin', what's livin' for) who fantasizes about trading her dreary existence for something in brilliant Cinemascope: ( But in her dreams she is far away/ In Oklahoma USA/ With Shirley Jones and Gordon MacRea.)

Yo La Tengo covered "Oklahoma U.S.A." on their 1991 album Fakebook.

Before They Fell In Love With Their Own Voices...

2011-11-22T03:20:00.000-08:00

All artists have the right to evolve and to perfect their craft. At the risk of losing readers, I reserve the right to say I wish they hadn't.

David Byrne Before

David Byrne After

I liked when David Byrne sang out of tune. (I even liked when Tina's bass was out of tune). Now he's wearing the dreaded double earplugs and singing opera. And even so, I'm not so sure he's nailing the notes. And you may ask yourself, well, can I leave already?

Sting Before

Sting After

Sting couldn't hit those ball imploding high notes all his life but did he really have to go for baroque? The young Sting would have torn that neck-er-cheif off the old Sting too.

Elvis Costello Before

Elvis Costello After

The day Elvis started giving his lyrics an extra degree of "importance" by adding vibrato, he lost a little love here.

Michael Stipe Before

Michael Stipe After

In the early days Stipe buried his vocals and lyrics in the mix ( and his identity behind his hair). Now he's bald-- in a hip way-- his vocals are upfront and his earnestness all too apparent. Could an album of whaling songs be far behind?

who would you add to this list?

XTC's Andy Partridge Picks His Top Ten Songs

2011-11-20T07:47:00.000-08:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for their Sept 20-Oct 3, 1979 issue ( via Like Punk Never Happened)

Andy made this list as XTC was promoting Drums and Wires.

1.The Who: Happy Jack-For the bit at the end when one of them says " I saw ya".
2. Desmond Dekker 007 (Shantytown) -I spent hours trying to work out the words to this around the youth club. Ah! memories...that's the week I stole my first guitar.
3. Danny Kaye: Mommy, Get Me A Drink Of Water-I used to have a nightmare when I was little that an airplane was flying around my room. So, it seems, did Danny Kaye.Mommy...get me a drink of Storyyyy!
4. The Beatles: Hello, Goodbye-The start of this song exhilarates me...aural Tizer.
5. Can: Babylonian Pearl-I believe that Mu existed. This song has a rude texture, twitches great. Read about Mu.
6. U Roy: Natty Rebel-Jump it up, skip it up.Rock it on over, skip it on over.yaaaaay. Step it, step it ( Are you alright, Andy --ed.)
7. John Martyn: Solid Air-Ssssh...listen. Cut the air.
8. Philip Glass: River Run-If snowfall was orchestrated it would sound like this. That beautiful world when you're half awake, half asleep
9. The Ramones: Blitzkrieg Bop-Hey ho, let's go.
10. Everyone: Everything That I've Liked-I have no favourite top ten. Don't ask me about this list as I already like ten different ones. All you need is love. Optimism, optimism.

Listen to the way "Babylonian Pearl" starts. It seems to point XTC in the direction they were heading with the forthcoming Black Sea and English Settlement.

Colin Meloy: 10 Songs That Made Me Want To Be a Singer

2011-11-18T20:33:00.000-08:00

As tweeted on November 18, 2011

Colin Meloy is the lead singer and songwriter of The Decemberists and the author , with his wife Carson Ellis, of Wildwood [purchase]

10. The Waterboys - Fisherman's Blues

9. The Jesus and Mary Chain - Just Like Honey

8. The Smiths - I Know It's Over

7.R.E.M. - Swan Swan H

[purchase]

6.Replacements - Unsatisfied

5. Camper Van Beethoven - Sweethearts

4. Husker Du - Hardly Getting Over It

3. Big Star - Thirteen

2. Robyn Hitchcock - The Ghost Ship

1.Morrissey - Sing Your Life

I Was A College Radio DJ In The 80's: The Flies - Something Wrong With Me

2011-11-17T19:08:00.001-08:00

In Which We Play A College Radio Nugget From the Mid-80's

The Boston scene in the mid-80's was full of reckless guitar bands that updated the garage rock sounds of the 60's.There were The Lyres, Dumptruck, Salem 66, The Neats, Dinosaur, Mission of Burma and The Volcanosuns among many others ( including google-proof Christmas, eventually made up of the Cudahy brothers, Michael and Nick, whom I went to school with ten years earlier)

Enter The Flies. In 1984 the practically foolproof label Homestead Records released the trio's LP Get Wise. It was as raucous as the rest of the Beantown bands but the lead singer, Nat Freedberg, had this quasi-Dylan, somewhat slacker drawl going for him. I guess the band broke up by the time I started cranking this song up on the progressive stereo found at 91.5 on the FM dial in New Orleans. But then, in New Orleans, every summer seemed endless.

Face It: A Nod Is As Good As A Wink... Turns 40 Today

2011-11-16T17:14:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

With the release of A Nod Is As Good As A Wink ... the Faces, with (Rod) Stewart singing lead, have three albums out, each of them duller than the one that preceded it, and with the first one having been none too great to begin with.
-- Jon Landau, Rolling Stone Magazine (1972)

1971 is one hell of a year for Rod Stewart and a pretty memorable one for Faces. In February Faces releases Long Player. The opening track "Bad "n" Ruin" contains all the DNA necessary for The Black Crowes to thrive for 20+ years. Three months later Rod launches one of the very best albums of the year , Every Picture Tells A Story, which tops the charts thanks to "Maggie May" and the Temptations cover "(I Know) I'm Losing You" recorded with the entire Faces band. Now with 1971 winding down, Faces releases A Nod is as Good as a Wink... which contains their biggest hit "Stay With Me" and several memorable Ronnie Lane tunes.

The album also contains the poster above. Look closely for pictures of pills and naked groupies.I assume lawyers quickly suggest the record company re-issue the album in 1972 without this collage/ homage to the rock n roll lifestyle.

Side One

The album kicks off with the raunchy and rollicking Ronnie Wood riff on "Miss Judy's Farm"...apparently located just across the river from Maggie's Farm.
I dig the Ian McLagen organ lines but Rolling Stone critic Jon Landau calls the song a "dog...and what started off sounding funky now just sounds like rock band hacking".

Next comes "You're So Rude", another highlight and the B-Side to "Stay With Me". Lyrically, Lane's tune is a much funnier version of Rod's future #1 hit "Tonight's the Night", except that this seduction takes place while the family is out visiting Auntie Renee. If you haven't explored Ronnie's solo albums you're missing out.

"Love Lives Here" is pretty pleasant and bleak but breaks no new ground.

"Last Orders Please" is one of those shuffling Ronnie Lane tunes we'd be hearing a lot of in his solo career and with Slim Chance. Ronnie would be taking more of a lead role in Faces as Rod became distracted by his fame but only for one more album, Ooh La La.

SIDE TWO

Faces's biggest hit, "Stay With Me", peaked at #6 in the UK and #17 in the US. The song could be part 2 of the tale of Maggie May's young Lothario. At least in this song of a one-night stand with a groupie, Rod caught her name, "Rita" ( as opposed to Lynyrd Skynyrd's tryst in Boise, Idaho). Last year Rod told an interviewer he actually never had sex with a groupie and hardly ever had one night stands.

To anyone who has grown up with a dad, this song really hits home. Fathers can begin as heroes and wind up friends. Along the way they become real people. My father was my best man at my wedding. Ronnie's own father took his teen age son to a music store where they met an employee named Steve Marriot.

Landau's favourite track from Nod is this Chuck Berry cover: "It is only here that the band creates a fully satisfying groove," he writes. " and sustains it for any length of time." This live version doesn't really do the recorded version justice. But you can see that , live, Rod is already more than just a front man and the Faces already seem to be relegated as background players. The end is nigh.

"Too Bad" is another Faces rocker that, despite strong performances, doesn't stand out to these ears.

Ronnie Wood plays bottleneck guitar on the final track. Robert Christgau says it's a song about a brother becoming a hippie, but there could be any number of reasons the brother shows up one night at the door all but unrecognizable with eyes that are getting muddy.

Six Degrees of Separation: Jack Bruce to Suzi Quatro

2011-11-14T20:17:00.000-08:00

[purchase]

1. In 1971 ex-Cream bassist and vocalist Jack Bruce records his proggy solo album Harmony Row with session guitarist Chris Spedding adding tasteful licks on tunes like "The Consul At Sunset".

[purchase]

2. Chris Spedding establishes himself as one of the first guitar heroes of the punk rock era with his 1977 UK #14 hit "Motor Bikin'", produced by the famed Mickie Most.

[purchase]

3.Two years later Mickie Most produces the 1979 UK #2 Racey hit "Some Girls" written by Mike Chapman and Nicky Chinn, whose "Chinnichap" brand of music created a series of 70's hits for artists including Sweet, Mud and Smokie.

[purchase]

4. Apparently not above getting really baked before a TV appearance, Smokie had a five year hit-making stretch with the help of Chapman and Chinn. The 1977 single "Lay Back in The Arms of Someone" hit #1 on the European charts, thanks in part to Chris Norman's Rod Stewart-ish vocals.

[purchase]

5. In 1978 Chris Norman joins Suzi Quatro on another Chapman and Chinn song called "Stumblin' In". The song peaked at #4 on the US charts and appeared on the album If You Knew Suzi.

[purchase]

6.UK Pop Music fans did know Detroit's Suzi Quatro by then. Not so much in the US. Suzi scored a string of Chapman Chinn hits in the UK including the #3 hit "48 Crash" from her 1973 debut album.

Kate Bush All Time Top Ten Fave Albums

2011-11-12T10:21:00.000-08:00

As Told to Smash Hits Magazine for the November 27 - December 10, 1980 issue
via Like Punk Never Happened

Kate made this list a few months after her third album Never For Ever was released. Wait, you're still looking at the photo aren't you?

1.Frank Zappa: Overnite Sensation -"Montana"was the first Zappa track I ever heard and it's stuck as a firm favourite.
2. A.L. Lloyd and Eran MacColl : Blow Boys Blow - I was brought up with this album.
3. The Eagles: One of These Nights - I played it to death when studying with Lindsay Kemp and it reminds me of him.
4. David Bowie Young Americans - It reminds me of 1976, the drought summer and open windows.
5. The Beatles Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - Because it's an album of excellent songs.
6. Eberhard Weber Fluid Rustle - It's like having your brain massaged.
7. Captain Beefheart Blue Jeans and Moonbeams - This is the Beefheart album where he writes love songs like nobody else.
8. Stevie Wonder The Secret Life of Plants - Because it's a modern symphony with a high emotional content.
9. Pink Floyd The Wall - Because it reminds me of last Christmas and open fires and I wish I'd written it.
10. The TV National Iranian Chamber Orchestra Treasures of the Baroque Era - Because it allows my mind to sit down and go "aah". I listen to it when doing paperwork. In fact while writing this list!

I Was A College Radio DJ In the 80's: The Wind - House on Fire

2011-11-11T21:26:00.000-08:00

In which we play a college radio nugget from the mid-80's...

The Wind : House On Fire

[out of print]

Back when Mitch Easter could do no wrong, he spent just enough time with Miami trio The Wind to record the 1984 EP Guest of the Staphs. Critics compared the dense pop sound to Easter's band Let's Active (naturally) and The Spongetones.

I played this track at Tulane's progressive college radio station WTUL-FM because, as hip as I've always tried to appear, deep down I'm just a big fan of good three minute pop songs. And in 1984, with Easter produced R.E.M, The dB's and Let's Active records getting so much airtime, anything associated with Mitch Easter got some revolutions on the turntable.

BONUS!

Here's a college radio promo I made one night when I probably should have been trying to catch up on some sleep:

WTUL Lift-Off Promo

Odd And Sods: Serge Gainsbourg "En Melody"

2011-11-09T19:36:00.000-08:00

Revealing Rock's Oddest Songs...

The sexy and seductive --or is it seedy and vulgar? -- 1971 concept album Histoire De Melody Nelson tells the tale of a doomed love affair between a dirty old man ( the French chain-smoking pop maestro Serge Gainsbourg as himself) and an English school girl ( His lover, the actress Jane Birkin).

"En Melody" is a funky instrumental guaranteed to make you smile. That's because the sweet Lolita on the album cover, Birkin, giggles, laughs and squeals throughout the three and a half minute track. Sounds like quite the hotel room romp but in fact Jane's brother was tickling her.

The album never did become a commercial success but its influence can be heard on artists like Beck and Air. When Gainsbourg died, Jane placed the monkey from the album cover in his coffin.

Celebrating 40th Anniversary of Led Zeppelin IV

2011-11-07T18:00:00.000-08:00

32 Million Copies sold and counting...

Has any album remained more mysterious than Led Zeppelin's ?

Consider the album cover alone. As Jimmy Page told NME.com "Almost 40 years after the album came out, nobody knows the old man featured on the cover, nor the artist who painted him. That sort of sums up what we wanted to achieve with the album cover, which has remained both anonymous and enigmatic at the same time." and if the cover's an enigma, how about the name,

Four symbols, The Fourth Album, The Runes, The Hermit, Untitled or ZOSO,?

In his 33 1/3 book, Erik Davis suggests the four symbols are Earth, Air , Fire and Water.
But they may just be the Discs, Swords, Wands and Cups of Tarot cards.
There are four guys in the band
Four songs on each side
And it's Led Zeppelin's fourth album

TRACK BY TRACK

SIDE ONE

Driven by a bass riff developed by John Paul Jones, "Black Dog" is the first track and first single. Robert Plant says the lyrics are a basic sexual come-on, but many Led Zep fans believe the song pays tribute to the black dog with red eyes that led Jimmy Page down a mountainside to make a deal with the devil.

Another riff-driven single that came out of an in-studio jam as the band was recording "Four Sticks". Ian Stewart of The Rolling Stones joins the band on keyboards but this song belongs to John Bonham and his incredible drumming.

An epic acoustic duet featuring Sandy Denny of Fairport Convention. The lyrics, possibly based on Tolkein's Lord of the Rings apparently are a bit of an embarrassment to Plant. "If it suffered from naivete and tweetness-- I was only 23--it makes up for it in the cohesion of the voices and the playing". On their 2008 tour to promote Raising Sands, Allison Krause sang the Sandy Denny parts.

Probably the most played song on the radio, (and not just because the DJ needed to take a dump) "Stairway to Heaven" has that soft acoustic beginning and hard rock ending that inspired bands like Aerosmith, Guns N Roses and Metallica to come up with their own dynamic epics. The song is made up of bits of guitar pieces Page had come up with and a great deal of lyrics Plant wrote spontaneously.

The opening riff appears to have been borrowed from Spirit's "Taurus".

But then, Led Zep did a lot of borrowing in their day.
There's also the allegations of a backwards message praising "Sad Satan".
Listen for yourself

SIDE TWO

When Robert Plant says of Led Zeppelin IV, "if the feel was good and it was a little bit out of tune, flat or sharp, it didn't matter. We'd keep it just for the feel", he may have been talking about "Misty Mountain Hop". There's a subtle point at 2:11 in the song when the band loses the groove and a few flat notes, but the song rocks. Fans seems to believe it's a bout a love-in broken up by cops.

Named "Four Sticks" because drummer John Bonham played on it with four drumsticks, this tune has been described as "abstract" by Jimmy Page. It certainly adds to the myth of "Four" surrounding the album.

Plant and Page re-recorded the song in India in 1972. It's a bit of a mess but here you go:

Yet another song inspired by Joni Mitchell. ("To find a queen without a king/ They say she plays guitar and cries and sings") Earlier that year Joni had released Blue which featured a song called "California". In a recent introduction Plant said it was written in an "extreme hippie period about the new hope in California and the new world that was being born with the youth generation".

For the fat drum sound, two mikes were dangled three stories above a stairwell in which Bonham played the drums. The recording was then slowed down for the big thick sound. A cover of an old blues number about the Great Mississippi Flood, the song achieves some of its power from Page's studio magic. There's panning, flanging, backwards echo, and backwards harmonica ( as played by Plant).

I'll give the final word on the album to the dean, Robert Christgau: As always, the band's medievalisms have their limits, but this is the definitive Led Zeppelin and hence heavy metal album. It proves that both are--or can be--very much a part of "Rock and Roll.

Elvis Costello's All Time Top 12 Fave Songs

2011-11-06T18:00:00.000-08:00

As Told to Smash Hits Magazine October 29-November 11,1981
via Like Punk Never Happened
(If you haven't checked out Brian's site yet, do so now. He's posting a new issue of Smash Hits on its 30th anniversary.)

This list was made at the same time Elvis released his country covers album Almost Blue.

1. The 101-ers: Let'sGetABitOfRockin ( see video below)
2. The Expressos: Tango In Mono (also below)
3. Little Richard: Commandments of Love
4. George Jones: Say It's Not You
5. The Subterraneans: My Flamingo
6. Mel and Tim: Backfield In Motion
7. Billie Holiday: Don't Explain
8. Dexy's Midnight Runners: Dance Stance
9. James Brown: Talking Loud And Saying Nothing
10. Dusty Springfield: Just One Smile
11. Was ( Not Was): Wheel Me Out
12. Chet Baker: The Thrill Is Gone

40 Years Ago Today: Elton John's Madman Across the Water released

2011-11-04T20:34:00.000-07:00

Though, commercially, it was one of the least successful of Elton John's albums in the UK, Madman Across the Water ( released November 5, 1971) stayed in the US charts for nearly a year. That's despite having no major hit singles. Still, Madman remains , next to 1970's Tumbleweed Connection, 1001Songs's all time favorite Elton John album. One of five Elton recorded in an 18 month period, Madman is an album you can relax around. Most of the cuts top five minutes and eventually become good, solid friends.

It begins with one of Elton John's greatest songs, written about lyricist Bernie Taupin's first wife. To this day Taupin says Madman Across the Water reminds him of driving down LA freeways listening to the car radio. No, Elton isn't asking Tony Danza to hold him closer. In 1971, Danza was still an unknown college student at The University of Dubuque.

Named after Band drummer Levon Helm, "Levon" hit #24 in the US charts. There are live cuts available on YouTube but you lose the orchestration which takes this song ( which seems to be about father/ son relationships) to an extraordinary level.

"Razor Face" is the third cut. Another character sketch, Razor Face sounds like a rough looking dude with a drinking problem and a good heart. Rick Wakeman plays keyboards on the album track.

The title cut is another classic song. Taupin has said this is his most misunderstood lyric. Many people suggested it was about the troubled President Richard Nixon. Taupin has refused to explain the lyrics further. Good for him. Madmen were big topics in the early 70's among John/Taupin contemporaries David Bowie, James Taylor and Alice Cooper. That's Chris Spedding with the repetitive electric guitar line. And Paul Buckmaster with the string arrangements. (Buckmaster orchestrated strings for The Bee Gees Odessa and Bowie's "Space Oddity")

"Indian Sunset" is sung from the point of view of a young Indian warrior who sees his race, culture and art facing extinction.

Elton's contribution to the rock'n'roll road song. He explains the track better than I could at the beginning of the video clip above.

A man who's seen hard time in prison works the peach orchards of South Carolina and Georgia. Another character study that reveals Taupin's tremendous gift.

Things get proggy on "All The Nasties" with the addition of the Cantores em Ecclesia Choir. Elton has said the song is a reaction to all the nasty critics out there. This might have given the critics some extra fuel.

Madman ends with the beautiful, sad and brief "Goodbye". As with "Levon", are we getting another reference to Jesus with the lyrics about wine flowing into the land to feed his lambs?

My Fave Song of 2011: Blouse "Into Black"

2011-11-03T20:27:00.000-07:00

[Purchase]

I know 2011 is a little out of regular music blogging timeframe but I was recently shocked * shocked I tell you* by how many times I've played "Into Black" on my iphone.
22!
The second most played song ( Elvis Presley's "I Believe in the Man In The Sky") has been played 5 times.
What is it about "Into Black"? Is it the Julee Cruise meets early Cure vibe?
I can imagine this song coming out in the mid-80's on a small white 45 rpm single that slipped behind record shelves at college radio stations...only to be discovered this year. But the truth is Blouse is a modern-day Portland band ( yes, another Portland band).

I don't know much else about Blouse. They have a debut album coming out this month. But I do have to agree with some Swedish bloggers I came across:

Idag släppte Portland-trion Blouse sitt självbetitlade debutalbum på skivbolaget som är ett måste om du gillar drömpop.

No I don't what it means, but I think Drompop pretty much says it all.

#48 Honeybus - Fresher Than The Sweetness in Water (1970)

2011-11-03T04:18:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

With a sound that merges the best of Brinsley Schwarz and Emitt Rhodes, the inventive UK band Honeybus didn't release Story until after they had broken up in 1970. Naturally the album failed to chart, but if 1001Songs has anything to say about it, Story will get a second life.
Honeybus is best known for a 1968 baroque pop single called " I Can't Let Maggie Go", one of the all-time faves of XTC's Andy Partridge.

Kim Wilde Picks Her All Time Fave Songs

2011-11-02T04:16:00.000-07:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine for the August 6-19, 1981 issue via Like Punk Never Happened

1.Elvis Presley: Trying To Get To You
2. Elvis Costello and The Attractions: Shot With His Own Gun - a lesson for all you miserable slaves out there.
3. The Beach Boys: Caroline
4. The Only Ones: Out There In The Night
5. Clive Pig and the Hopeful Chinamen: Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen - Reminds me of a lovely year in St. Albans and a lot of lovely people
6. The Skids: Masquerade - Great dance record
7. Mo-Dettes: Tonight - Girls are best, n'est-ce pas
8. Kirsty MacColl: They Don't Know About Us - Wish I'd written it
9. Kraftwerk: The Model - The title speaks for itself
10. John Cale: Fighter Pilot - LA la la la la! La la la la! La la la la! Laa!

Six Degrees of Separation: Deaf School to Death Cab For Cutie

2011-11-01T04:31:00.000-07:00

1. Liverpool art rockers Deaf School record "Get Set Ready Go" for their debut album 2nd Honeymoon, released in 1976. The band's guitar player and songwriter is Clive Langer.

2. When Deaf School breaks up producer Clive Langer gets Elvis Costello's help with the lyrics to a song he's written called "Shipbuilding". Robert Wyatt has a Top 40 hit with the song recorded as a bonus track for his 1982 compilation album Nothing Can Stop Us.

3. Wyatt is a former member of Soft Machine. So is Kevin Ayers who recorded a solo album in 1970 called Shooting at the Moon with a seventeen year old bass player named Mike Oldfield who is featured prominently on the first track "May I".

4. In 1973 Oldfield records Tubular Bells [purchase], the first album for Virgin Records.In the middle of the album "Master of Ceremonies" Viv Stanshall reads a list of instruments being played.

5. Stanshall did something similar on "The Intro and The Outro" for his original group, The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band. It appears on the Bonzo's 1967 debut album Gorilla [purchase]. The roll call includes Adolph Hitler on Vibes, John Wayne on xylophone and Roy Rogers on Trigger. This televised version, instead, includes future members of Monty Python.

6. Performing on the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour TV special, The Bonzos played "Death Cab for Cutie" which became the name of a popular Seattle band whose "You Are A Tourist" is the debut single off the 2011 album Codes and Keys [purchase].

Pink Floyd's Meddle Turns 40

2011-10-30T10:10:00.000-07:00

Pink Floyd's sixth album, Meddle, may be the best of that English art rock band's lesser known era, between Piper at the Gates of Dawn and Dark Side of the Moon. Recording began in 1970. After nights of fruitless experimentation, bottle of wine and some finely rolled joints, Floyd's keyboardist Richard Wright accidentally found a way to make a submarine-like "ping". The rest of the band fell in and the result is Side Two's "Echoes".
Meddle was a total band effort. Every member contributed lyrics...even the fifth Floyd, "Seamus", Steve Marriot's dog. Despite mostly positive critical reviews, Meddle was not the break though Floyd album. That would come two years later with Dark Side. Maybe poor sales can be blamed on the album cover, supposedly it's an ear underwater. But as graphic designer Storm Thorgerson admitted "Meddle is a much better album than its cover."

TRACK BY TRACK

The album beings with a menacing 6 minute instrumental, "One of These Days" featuring Roger Waters's double tracked bass. Nick Mason can be heard saying "One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces." For the Japanese release the title was more evocative: "Blow, Wind! Call Forth, Storm!"

"A Pillow of Winds" is a sweet acoustic love song. You know, like Pink Floyd always used to make.

"Fearless" is Floyd's football tune. The actual word refers to an awesome soccer player's play. And you can hear Liverpool FC fans chanting "You'll Never Walk Alone" in the background. This is 1001Songs fave cut.

Roger Waters wrote "San Tropez", a jazzy little number. Floyd played a gig in this sunny town on the French Riviera in 1971. It really is the kind of place where people drink champagne like big tycoons.

"Seamus" is a mercifully short blues number starring the howling blues of Steve Marriot's dog. For the live version recorded at Pompeii, the band borrowed a Russian Wolfhound named Nobs. When critics say Pink Floyd had a lot of ideas --good and bad--and used them all, this might be an example.

And finally there is the Side Two's 23 and a half minute epic "Echoes"( which only makes it the third longest Floyd song ever recorded by the way).
The signature theme appears to have been "borrowed" by Andrew Lloyd Webber for his musical Phantom of the Opera.
Roger Waters told Q Magazine: "Yeah, the beginning of that bloody Phantom song is from "Echoes" DAAAAA- da da da da da. I couldn't believe it when I heard it. It's the same time signature--its 12/8--and it's the same structure and it's the same note and it's the same everything. Bastard. It's probably actionable. It really is!But I think that life's too long (sic?) to bother with suing Andrew fucking Loyd Webber."

40 years ago today: Duane Allman killed

2011-10-29T10:07:00.000-07:00

Just months after the release of the live At Fillmore East album, slide guitarist extraordinaire Duane Allman, 24, was killed in a motorcycle accident in Macon, Georgia.
He was speeding on a flat stretch of road 40 years ago today when a flatbed truck began making a left hand turn in front of him. For some reason the truck stopped mid-turn, blocking the entire lane. Duane tried to finesse his way past the truck but didn't make it. The impact sent Duane flying off the bike. His helmet was sent spinning. The bike landed on Duane. Its motor still revving.
Duane looked OK. Just some scratches. But he suffered massive internal injuries and died three hours later in surgery.
Almost exactly a year later Allman Brothers bassist Berry Oakley died when his motorcycle crashed into a bus.
The essential Duane Allman can be heard not just on the first Allman Brothers recordings but on Derek and The Domino's Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs and on R&B tracks like Wilson Pickett's cover of "Hey Jude". That's the cut that drew Clapton's interest:

I remember hearing Wilson Pickett's "Hey Jude" and just being astounded by the lead break at the end. I had to know who that was immediately--right now."
-Eric Clapton

My Little Monsters Pick Their Favorite Halloween Tunes

2011-10-28T13:38:00.000-07:00

After last year's relatively tame costumes, our cat plans to become a corpse bride and our superhero an escaped zombie convict. The guy in the middle isn't talking because he just a bunch of bags filled with leaves. The kids are now 9 and 6 so Halloween is a big deal. So big the kids chose the songs for this post.

Happy Halloween!

George Harrison : Speed Freak

2011-10-27T16:37:00.000-07:00

Although better known for embracing the cultures of India and Hindu, George Harrison was also an avid fan of Formula One racing. Especially after he befriended three time World Champion Jackie Stewart, who inspired the 1979 single "Faster" and even appeared as the chauffeur for the video.

It's fascinating when you know the drivers and the teams and all their problems, and you can see them as people.
Because they are just people, but to go to work they have to get in this car and do 180 miles an hour.
-George Harrison

In the Olivia Harrison book George Harrison Living In The Material World [ purchase], Damon Hill--a Formula One World Champion who also formed a punk band called Sex, Hitler And The Hormones--says he once told George his biggest dream was to go on a rocket and blast off into outer space. George replied "No, man. Inner space, not outer space."

George owned a rare McLaren F1. They take three months to build. His was painted purple. 630 horsepower ( my Honda Civic as 140) No power brakes, no power steering, no traction control. George loved the car and he loved the noise it made.

It looked something like this.

Jackie said Formula One Racers and great guitarists are both artists who often live on the edge. For whatever reason, George made friends with all kinds of champion drivers. Here's George being interviewed by his friend Jackie at the 1986 Australian Grand Prix.

#47 Neil Young - Vampire Blues (1974)

2011-10-25T20:56:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

Could Neil Young have predicted the vampire craze caused by the God-awful Twilight series and HBO's True Blood? Actually this tune from 1974's On The Beach isn't about fangers. It's about the original oil crisis. The same one that inspired Tower of Power's "Only So Much Oil In The Ground" and John Denver to build huge underground tanks on his property outside Aspen.

I'm a vampire baby suckin blood from the earth/
well I'm a vampire babe, sell you twenty barrels worth.

OK. To be fair, Denver was hoarding gas for the Aspen Summer Camp buses that brought underprivileged kids to his fair mountain town. But this post is about Neil. Vintage Whine indeed!

John Peel Picks His All Time Top Ten Songs

2011-10-24T17:01:00.000-07:00

Celebrating John Peel Day with a list he made for Smash Hits Magazine which appeared in the August 20- September 2, 1981 issue, via Like Punk Never Happened .

1.Duane Eddy: Peter Gunn Theme - This is the perfect instrumental
2. The Undertones: Teenage Kicks - In my job I'm always searching for the perfect single and this must come the nearest. My all-time fave.
3. Gene Vincent: Race With the Devil - I often think far too much attention is paid to lyrics. I like this one because the lyrics are unintelligible.
4. The Birthday Party: Release the Bats
5. The Specials: Ghost Town - Definitely the best number one for years and years and years.
6. Andy Capp: Pop-A-Top - This was one of the first Jamaican records to be played on the radio and it is terrific. My wife and I go round the house singing to this, in so far as that's possible to do!
7. The Fall: How I Wrote Elastic Man - I like The Fall very much and love going to see them every chance I get.
8. Linda Jones: Your Precious Love - This song is both terribly sad and angry at the same time (also sad because the singer is now dead). Just been re-issued.
9. Lee Perry: Baffling Smoke Signal - Lee made the best reggae records ever.
10. Bill Doggett: Honky Tonk - Very sexy. P.S. If you ask me again tomorrow, it'll probably be all different.

George Harrison's "Dirty" Secret

2011-10-22T18:17:00.000-07:00

I'm reading Olivia Harrison's intimate photo-heavy biography George Harrison Living in the Material World [purchase ] backwards so I've been immediately struck by how much the ex-Beatle loved spending time gardening. There's this quote that leads off the final chapter "Fresh Air":

Sometimes I feel like I'm actually on the wrong planet, and it's great when I'm in my garden, but the minute I go out the gate I think "What the hell am I doing here?"

His son Dharma says until he was seven he only saw his dad "in jeans, khakis, covered in dirt just continuously planting trees."

Harrison had a 63 acre estate on Maui where he shot the "This Is Love" video in 1987.

He also had a home off the coast of Australia. But, of course his best known crash pad was Friar Park aka "Crackerbox Palace", a huge 120 room Victorian neo-Gothic mansion that came with 35 acres purchased when George was 27.

Olivia told Radio Times her husband "never felt more at peace than when he was gardening. He loved the gardens( at Friar Park)and always said you felt closest to God when you were in the garden."

(It was, after all, in Eric Clapton's garden that George wrote "Here Comes the Sun".)

Friar Park was previously owned by an eccentric millionaire named Sir Frank Crisp. George's sister-in-law Irene says George would point out trees amazed that Crisp planted them as saplings knowing he'd never see them as a stand of trees. That's how George planned his own gardens,she said, doing the best he could...even though he knew he'd never see the final results.

Harrison's Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp ( Let It Roll) is one our fave cuts on All Things Must Pass.

Years after George passed away from lung cancer, his friend Neil Innes (Bonzo Dog Band, Rutles) and wife Yvonne designed a garden in tribute to George for the Chelsea Flower Show. For Neil's designs and memories click here .

A Taste for the Exotica

2011-10-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

An exotica-esque mash up from Messer Chups featuring guitarist Oleg Gitaracula, screamer and bassist Zombierella and Marvelous Boris Twang on drums.

Visit their MySpace page here .

Bonus shot of Zombierella:

Deep Cuts: Badfinger - Perfection (1971)

2011-10-20T20:38:00.000-07:00

Highlighting a lesser known track from a classic album

[purchase]

Badfinger's third album, Straight Up, produced two Top 20 singles in the U.S. The group's highest charting single ever, "Day After Day", peaked at #4 while "Baby Blue" peaked at #14. The album also featured the radio-friendly 1001Songs favorite "I'd Die Babe".

But this post is about deep cuts, so we're featuring Track #11 "Perfection". In light of songwriter Pete Ham's suicide four years later, it is interesting to hear his thoughts on this gem:"Well it basically says that I think people have to -- before they try do anything about the world-- admit that they've got a lot of faults themselves. Admit that there is no real perfection. People get too obsessed with ideals. The perfect world or the perfect human being and there's no such thing. So all basically that song says is realize our imperfections and talk about them and then try and do something about it".

Joan Armatrading Picks Her All-Time Top Ten Songs (1981)

2011-10-19T18:26:00.000-07:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine in the October 15-28, 1981 issue via Like Punk Never Happened

1. Smokey Robinson and the Miracles - Tears of A Clown This must be one of the best songs written!
2. Led Zeppelin - Stairway to Heaven One of my favourite bands. This track is just one of their classics
3. Adam and the Ants - Antmusic This is what I call Good fun music
4. Van Morrison - Madame George Anything by Van is good but this one is special as it's the very first thing I heard from him
5. Tubeway Army - Are "Friends" Electric It's very original.
6. John Martyn - May You Never This one's great!
7. Ike and Tina Turner - River Deep, Mountain High Another classic, this song will never grow old
8. Walker Brothers - No Regrets Written by Tom Rush and superbly sing by Scott Walker, this reminds me of my first US tour when I met Tom.
9. Frank Zappa - Sulphur No 1* This is genius ( It's OK to say that, isn't it?)
10. Tony Hancock Anything by this great comedian is brilliant!

*A reader points out the real name of the song is "Sofa No 1". Some insight, perhaps, on Joan's accent?

Suggs of Madness Picks His All-Time Top Ten Songs (1981)

2011-10-17T09:08:00.000-07:00

As told to Smash Hits Magazine in the October 1-14, 1981 issue via Like Punk Never Happened

1. ( Ian Dury) Kilburn and the High Roads - Hufferty Pull This song reminds me very much of early gigs I went to
2. UB40 - Dream a Lie Good chaps and a good song
3. Cockney Rebel - Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)This is nostalgia
4. Julie London - Cry Me a River This one I like as it's got so much soul
5. Jimmy Cliff - She Does It To Me Right He's just smashing!
6. The Beatles - I'm Only Sleeping The Beatles are my favourite group
7. Robert Wyatt - Strange Fruit This one I like as it's so far out of tune - it's fantastic!
8. Psychedelic Furs - Dumb Waiters Love the song. Love the video
9. The Four Tops - Bernadette Songs, songs, songs
10. Clive Langer and the Boxers - Have a Nice Night This is unappreciated music by an unappreciated guy. It's so great, and like a poem

Six Degrees of Separation: Wire to The New Seekers

2011-10-14T21:11:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

1. In 1977, art punkers Wire record an 83-second classic "Three Girl Rhumba" for Pink Flag, one of the greatest rock albums of all-time according to everybody.

[purchase]

2 In 1994 Justine Frischman borrows the "Three Girl Rhumba" riff for "Connection", a Top 20 UK single from the self-titled Elastica, the fastest selling British debut album in history.

[purchase]

3 Before forming Elastica, Justine and her boyfriend Brett Anderson form Suede. They crack the UK Top 20 with "Metal Mickey" in 1992 thanks to the raucous guitar sounds of Bernard Butler, hailed by some critics as the greatest guitarist of his generation.

[purchase]

4. After Suede, Butler forms other bands, plays on other artists's records and produces The Libertines 2003 single "Don't Look Back Into The Sun".In 2007 NME readers vote the song number 5 in a "Greatest Indie Anthems" poll.

[purchase]

5 Oasis's "Live Forever" wins that Indie Anthems poll. The single comes from the 1994 album Definitely Maybe. Other singles include "Supersonic", "Cigarettes and Alcohol" and the Top 20 UK hit "Shakermaker".

[purchase]

6. Because of "Shakermaker", Coca Cola sues Oasis for allegedly lifting words and melody from The New Seekers's "I'd Like To Teach the World To Sing" ( an adaptation of Coke's "I'd Like to Buy The World A Coke" jingle). The band winds up paying Coke a lot of money ( $A500,000 according to Wikipedia). Noel Gallagher jokes "Now we drink Pepsi".

#46 Bobby Womack - California Dreamin' (1968)

2011-10-12T20:23:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

Bobby Womack wrote The Rolling Stones' first UK number one, "Its All Over Now" and co-wrote his own #1 R&B hit "Woman's Gotta Have It". But in 1968, he recorded this sublime cover of The Mamas and The Papas "California Dreamin'" for his debut album Fly Me To The Moon. I heard it just a month or so before I saw the disturbing 2009 British film Fish Tank, where the main character, a spunky chick named Mia, dances to it for an audition. One listen and you'll wonder where the sunshine went.

Video of the Week: Hoodoo Gurus - I Want You Back ( 1984)

2011-10-10T20:00:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

In which Dave Faulkner is talked into wearing blue eye shadow and primping his hair like Robert Smith of The Cure. ("Nobody will even notice Dave. They'll all be looking at the singing dinosaurs.") Best power pop song of the 80's.

The Gurus are big faves of the kids, mine included. And not just because of this video --which does look like something out of an episode of Yo Gabba Gabba! The Gurus even had a video ( for "Another World" from Magnum Cum Louder) play in heavy rotation at Toys R Us stores in 1989.

The Gurus have their own website. (Who doesn't?)

http://hoodoogurus.net/

Deep Cuts: Bob Seger - Come to Poppa

2011-10-10T07:36:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

With Deep Cuts I highlight a lesser known song from a classic album you may think you know.

Bob Seger's 1976 platinum album Night Moves is best known for its brilliant title track, a Top 5 hit inspired by both Springsteen's "Jungleland" and a dark haired Italian girl he dated when he was 19. The album has two more singles, "Mainstreet" (US #24/ Canada #1) and "Rock and Roll Never Forgets" ( US #41). But there's a great Track 7 called "Come to Poppa", co-written by Al Green producer Willie Mitchell and Hi Records staff songwriter Eric Randle. "Come to Poppa" finds a mean groove and stays right there. Just one of the great tracks on an album I figured I'd never have to hear...until I did.

In '76, Rolling Stone Magazine's Kit Rachlis said "If there's any grace in heaven, Night Moves will give Bob Seger the national following which has long eluded him. It is simply one of the best albums of the year." Robert Christgau gave Night Moves an A- citing "lyrics as hard-hitting as the melodies".

Six Degrees of Separation: James Brown to The Grateful Dead

2011-10-08T16:22:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

1. In 1973 James Brown records "Down and Out in New York City" among other funky tracks for the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film Black Caesar. His backing vocalist, "funky soul siren" Lyn Collins, sings lead on another track, "Mama Soul".

[purchase]

2. A year earlier, Lyn Collins --nicknamed "The Female Preacher"--had a Top 10 hit composed by James Brown called "Think ( About It)". The part where JB shrieks "Yeah!Woo! " (heard over and over again in the 1988 Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock hip hop hit "It Takes Two" ) is probably the most sampled section.

[purchase]

3. In fact De La Soul samples "Yeah!Woo" for "Jenifa Taught Me ( Derwin's Revenge)" for their 1989 debut album, 3 Feet High and Rising.

[purchase]

4. Another track sampled on "Jenifa" is the "hoo hoo hoos" from "Take the Money and Run", a Top 20 Single by the Steve Miller Band in 1976. (You know, the one you can sing "Sweet Home Alabama" to.) Steve Miller wrote all of his biggest hits except for one.

[purchase]

5. Steve Miller took this 1973 unreleased five minute jam from blind guitarist Paul Pena and condensed it into a Top Ten hit in 1977. One of music entrepreneur Albert Grossman's gross misdemeanors was preventing the release of Pena's brilliant second album New Train, which featured musical contributions from Steve Miller Band keyboardist Ben Sidran ( who turned Miller onto "Jet Airliner"), The Persuasions and Jerry Garcia.

[purchase]

6. That same year, 1973, Garcia's band The Grateful Dead release the first Dead album on their own label. Wake of the Flood features 1001Songs's favorite Dead song "Eyes of the World".

Odds And Sods: Astrud Gilberto -You Didn't Have To Be So Nice (1967)

2011-10-07T09:17:00.000-07:00

[purchase]

With the weekly "Odds and Sods" posts, we look at some of rock and pop's oddest songs.

In the same way fathers are biologically wired to have their testosterone levels drop by as much as 50% after babies arrive, mothers must be wired to believe their children are waaaay more talented than they really are.
From an album selected in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Astrud enlists her six year old son Marcello to help her sing the Lovin' Spoonful's "You Didn't Have To Be So Nice". Even Toots Thielemans on harmonica can not save this from being one of the most uncomfortably saccharine recordings in music history. Let's just say I'm not expecting the servers to be overwhelmed by this post.
However the rest of the album makes fine dinner music and Marcello did eventually become the bass player in her band. God, I hope she didn't call him up to the mic to sing this duet when he was fully gown.