Wonderful Tonight

Eric Clapton : Wonderful Tonight

[Purchase]

On May 19, 1979 Eric Clapton married Patti Boyd, the inspiration for her ex husband George Harrison's "Something", "I Need You" and her new husband's "Layla" and "Wonderful Tonight". Eric and George remained the best of friends despite what happened. At the reception, three of the Beatles reunited on stage for what were reportedly drunken and very loose versions of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," "Get Back" and "Lawdy Miss Clawdy". Only John Lennon was absent. 

Enjoy the wedding album below:

There's Paul and Linda McCartney ( dragging on a cigarette unfortunately) at :42 in. Apple Publishing manager and longtime Beatles associate Terry Doran, George Harrison and his wife Olivia appear at :44.  And there's Paul, George and Ringo together with the King of Skiffle, Lonnie Donegan at :51.

Sky Cleared Up

George Harrison : Blow Away

[Purchase]

I think what happened between this album and the last album (Thirty Three and 1/3) is that everything has been happening nice for me. My life is getting better all the time, and I'm happy, and I think that it's reflected in the music -George Harrison

On February 20, 1979 George Harrison released his self-titled album, one of the very best of his career, and one that still gives me great pleasure forty years on. I realize now I bicycled across state lines, a major infraction at my boarding school, to buy a copy of this album in Millerton, New York's Oblong Books and Music store. All I had heard at this point was Top 20 hit "Blow Away", but I was hooked. 

With the help of Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood and producer Russ Titelman ( Randy Newman's Good Ole Boys, Ry Cooder's Paradise and Lunch), Harrison gives us ten catchy songs that reveal his domestic bliss with new wife Olivia and the recent birth of his only child Dhani. 

Critics were for the most part pleased. In his review for Rolling Stone, Stephen Holden calls George Harrison his finest album since All Thing Must Pass:

George Harrison is refreshingly lighthearted. The austere, pontifical tone is gone, and the singer sounds more like a happily eccentric gentleman/mystic than a burningly devout Krishna advocate.

Robert Christgau is less kind, grading the album a C:

 In which Harrison returns to good old commercial rock and roll, he says, presumably because he shared songwriting on one track with Gary "Sure Shot" Wright and let Russ Titelman produce. Well, there is a good song here -- "Faster," about a kind of stardom. He remembers! 

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, " Harrison once said. " Because they are just people, but to go to work they have to get in this car and do 180 miles an hour."

For most of us, this was the first time we got to hear Harrison's White Album era "Not Guilty", which may in fact be guilty of airing some of The Beatles dirty laundry with lines like:

I won't upset the apple cart I only want what I can get 

I'm really sorry that you've been misled 

But like you heard me said  Not guilty

My favorite deep cut is "Dark Sweet Lady", his love song to Olivia, which ends with the simple line "I love you dearly".

Mama Called Me Lazy

Don Williams : Tulsa Time

[Purchase]

On January 8, 1979 'The Gentle Giant", Don Williams, was celebrating his eighth #1 country music hit, "Tulsa Time". It was written by Danny Flowers, seen below playing lead guitar in a red jumpsuit,  and also recorded by Eric Clapton on his 1978 album Backless and on his live album Just One Night. That version hit US#30 in 1980, the year Williams appeared as himself in Smokey and the Bandit II.

Country music fans were then complaining that the song sounded too much like rock 'n'roll. They wouldn't recognize what country music sounds like today. 

Underneath The Velvet Skies

Eric Clapton : Lay Down Sally

[Purchase]

On November 25, 1977 Eric Clapton released Slowhand, one of his most successful album, selling three million copies un the U.S. thanks to songs like the radio hit "Cocaine", "Lay Down Sally" and "Wonderful Tonight". The first of those was written by J.J. Cale whose quiet but driving sound seemed to inspire this album as much as it would the Dire Straits debut in 1978.  The A side of this album is pretty classic, but the second side is weighed down by an eight minute jam called "The Core".

From Rolling Stone, here's John Swenson's review:

Eric Clapton's solo albums have tended to be so evenhanded and laconic that they often seem interchangeable. His pain was always so apparent that every move he made seemed frozen for enternity. At first glance, Slowhand does nothing to alter that pattern -- a few good tracks interspersed between the usual filler -- but there's a lot more going on here beneath the surface. Clapton is showing signs of psychic rehabilitation. His love songs are pointedly realistic. In a chilling moment of self-revelation called "Next Time You See Her," he focuses his long-subliminated anger at losing his lover. Perhaps most importantly, for the first time since leaving Cream he seems comfortable with his image as the hotshot guitarist, using his old Yardbirds nickname for the album title and flashing the old superstar form. 

 The pyrotechnics are mostly restricted to a long (8:42) jam, "The Core." The band (Dick Sims on keyboards, Jamie Oldaker on drums, bassist Carl Radle and guitarist George Terry) rolls into a boogie rhythm reminiscent of Derek and the Dominoes. Mel Collins blows a searing, double-tracked soprano sax break, and Eric takes off on a lightning solo that sounds more like his classic run on "Crossroads" than anything he's done since. Glyn Johns' production is superb -- the guitar/drums relationship is crisp and authoritative, powerhouse Clapton caught in a glimpse of white hot frenzy

Except for Eric's great slide guitar playing on the hard-edged slow blues, "Mean Old Frisco," the rest of the album is more subdued, with the influence of country songwriter Don Williams dominating Eric's writing. The devotional love song, "Wonderful Tonight," the sprightly shuffle "Lay Down Sally" and the calmly vengeful "Next Time You See Her" have the same modest intensity and forthrightness of "We're All the Way," the Williams song Clapton covers here. On "Next Time You See Her" Clapton sings, "And if you see her again, I will surely kill you," an unusual enough sentiment for him. But the line is all the more powerful because it is delivered quietyly, with matter-of-fact resignation and even a touch of sympathy for the guy who will be his victim. In as striking of an effect as this it's easy to see that Clapton has learned the lesson he's been striving for all these years. He is an touch with the horrible moral power and long-suffering self-righteousness that is the essence of the blues. And that knowledge gives him the power to stand up and be himself.

Robert Christgau gave the album a C+,  writing:

As MOR singles go, "Lay Down Sally" is a relief -- at least it has some soul. But the album leaves the juiciest solos to George Terry, and where four years ago Eric was turning into a singer -- in the manner of Pete Townshend -- now he sounds like he's blown his voice. Doing what, I wonder.

A Gift of the Wind

Pete Townshend : My Baby Gives It Away

Ronnie Lane : Nowhere To Run

[Purchase]

On September 16, 1977 Pete Townshend and Ronnie Lane released Rough Mix, an album the two collaborated on with the help of Eric Clapton, John Entwistle, Ian Stewart and Charlie Watts. I picked up a cassette copy of this album at a Reno pawn shop for a couple of dollars in 1981 while I wS on a bit of a run on Who albums. It is clearly a high point for both artists, even with its relaxed atmosphere.

The album may sound relaxed but not all of the sessions were. Although both were followers of the Meher Baba, Lane had a mouth on him and he and Townshend got into at least one fight that got physical. Road crew member Russ Schlagbaum recalls running into a studio to fund Lane curled up in a ball and Pete Townshend kicking him with big Doc Martin boots. Rough Mix indeed.

It was during the February 1977 sessions that Ian Stewart and his wife convinced Ronnie to see a doctor. Ronnie would wake up mornings with his hand too numb to hold a pen. He blamed all of his physical ailments on drinking and was shocked by the MS diagnosis even though his mother had it. He would live for 21 years with the disease.

Rough Mix was released to critical praise and low sales.

Robert Christgau was among those who loved the album, giving it an A- grade and writing:

Meher Baba inspired psalmody so plain and sharply observed, maybe he was all reet after all. Three of Townshend's contributions--"Keep Me Turning," "Misunderstood," and an unlikely song of adoration called "My Baby Gives It Away"--are his keenest in years, and while Lane's evocations of the passing scene are more poignant on his Island import, One for the Road, "Annie" is a suitably modest folk classic. Together, the two disciples prove that charity needn't be sentimental, detachment cold, nor peace boring. Selah.

 Rolling Stone's  Dave Marsh was also a fan of the album, which received a 5 star review in one of the Rolling Stone Album Guides.  He wrote:

It's almost impossible to avoid describing Rough Mix as devotional music, but it's equally difficult to reconcile that description with some of the album's components. Townshend's stinging guitar on "My Baby Gives It Away," the chugging. Faces-like title instrumental and the wailing saxophone coda on Lane's Fifties-style "Catmelody" are hardly typical of spiritual music. But then matters meditative have never before been fully integrated into the ugly, angry sounds we call rock and roll. Their juxtaposition here, in fact, might be one meaning of Rough Mix; it certainly ain't smooth. 

 The Who's Townshend and former Face Lane come by their rock and roll inclinations honestly, and obviously, but spiritual inclination is their long suit here. Both men are followers of Meher Baba, the Indian spiritual master who died in 1969, and this has given the album a sort of humility — not to say modesty — which is its special virtue. 

 Not surprisingly, almost everything Townshend does here owes a debt to the Who. "My Baby Gives It Away" is one of his improbable sexual misadventures, like "I'm a Boy" or "Pictures of Lily." "Misunderstood" is more understated musically — just voice, guitar, harmonica, cowbell and a drum machine — but belongs with his best boasts, in the tradition of "My Generation." "Just one want to be misunderstood/Want to be feared in my neighborhood." Ten years ago, this probably would have been called a Dylan parody, but the resolution of the lyric is actually a lot closer to the self-doubt of The Who by Numbers. 

 "Street in the City" is helped by Townshend's marvelous acoustic guitar, but it is dominated by an utterly unlikely horn and string arrangement. It is schmaltzy enough to pass for an outtake from Days of Future Passed, and as the album's longest track, it is simply its most vexing. 

 "Keep Me Turning" is a spiritual parable that is undoubtedly much clearer to its author than to any other listener. The organ, guitar and drum interplay makes the song exciting, but what draws me back time and again is the yearning and vulnerable quality of Townshend's vocal. This is spiritual rock and  roll in the very best sense: it doesn't always make sense except in the heart, which won't ignore it. Its wit and charm strike beyond the confusion of its verses to the heart of the chorus, where the devotional imagery is most complete, and the guitar part at the bridge, which is among the most supple and liquid Townshend has ever done.

 Lane's songs reflect his recent work with Slim Chance; his last album, which has not been released in the U.S., had a hint ("Harvest Home") of what is fully realized here. Lane has moved past straight rock and  roll — although he makes his share of it on "Catmelody" and "Rough Mix" — into a merger of rock with Irish ballads and Scottish and English folk music. There is a kind of wisdom and assurance to these songs, and when he sings, "God bless us all," or, of "all of my family and all of my friends," he does so with sincere conviction. More wonderfully, there is no distance, no sense of trying to recapture something lost in a modern age. In addition, as John Prine once said of Jackson Browne. I don't know where Lane gets his melodies. but I'd sure like to go there. 

 Lane makes his music with guitars, fiddles, banjos, drums, harmonica, electric bass. Although that sounds like a formula for folk rock, there is nothing of the haunted quality or joyousness of the greatest folk rock. Instead, there is a meditative air to the music, captured eloquently in the opening verse of his best song here, "Annie," which might merely be "Harvest Home" with lyrics:

 Old rocks stand tall, Annie 

Seen the world grow small, Annie 

 But when they fall, Annie 

 Where will they be? 

 What Lane does is hardly unprecedented. Dylan's soundtrack to Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, Eric Clapton's 461 Ocean Boulevard, even Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" share a part of its wise and ancient spirit. (Clapton brings a blues guitar to "April Fool" that is its prettiest touch.) Townshend has made his share of songs with a similar feeling — silly as it was, The Who by Numbers' "Blue, Red and Grey" had it — as has Lane himself: listen to the Faces' "Debris." What's important is that the dedication and beauty of the music is as crucial as the homage it pays to its masters and traditions. 

 So the final numbers on Rough Mix, among the few true collaborations on the record, have a special flavor. Don Williams' "'Til the Rivers All Run Dry" is a country love song, but in this context — and considering Baba's love for Jim Reeves' "There's a Heartache Following Me," which Townshend did on his first solo album — it is clearly a tribute to the master.

 "Heart to Hang Onto," written by Townshend but on which Lane sings the verses and Townshend the choruses, wears an even thinner veil. There's a brutal war going on in the song's midsection between Townshend's Tommy-like guitar and John Entwistle's brass arrangement. This is the perfect musical expression of the cosmic quest — this is the real "The Seeker." The lesson here is stated through a series of metaphorical characters, the most tragic of whom is Danny: "Danny, he wants to save for a new guitar/He's gonna learn to play but he won't get far." Implicitly, Danny's not going anywhere because he hasn't made the connection; he has no "heart to hang onto," which is to say he lacks the spirit to make the music move.

 The glory of this album and of the work of Pete Townshend and Ronnie Lane throughout their careers is that art and the deepest spiritual aspiration are completely intertwined. Often, of course, that makes for a rough mix, and a rougher life. But it's worth the turbulence, for it touches closer to the heart of the rock & roll experience than almost anything I know.

The Last Waltz

The Band : Up on Cripple Creek

[Purchase]

On Thanksgiving night in 1976, at San Francisco's Winterland, The Band called it quits in the biggest way possible --with an all-star concert celebration starring Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Bobby Charles, Paul Butterfield, Emmylou Harris, Joni Mitchell, Ringo Starr, Neil Young, Ron Wood, Muddy Waters, Van Morrison, Dr. John, Ronnie Hawkins and the Staples. Oh, and for some reason, Neil Diamond. Movie director Martin Scorsese filmed the farewell concert, which was billed as The Last Waltz.  

In his recently released memoir, Testimony, guitarist Robbie Robertson writes about the moment they launched into "Up On Cripple Creek", the first song of the night:

The sound on the stage felt powerful and clear. Levon was knockin' on wood -- his drums were punching right through Garth's electric jew's harp sound and my rumbling guitar tone. We were all adjusting to the altitude and finding our footing. I looked over at Rick and Richard, and they were both in the zone. Levon's vocal was strong and authentic, and he did the yodel section at the end of the song with a grit I'd never heard before. Okay. This was it, I let go of the rope and never looked down.

40 Year Itch : The Birth of U2

It was all the drummer's idea. 14 year old Larry Mullen pinned a "Musicians Wanted" ad on the notice board at Dublin's Temple Mount School. It read "Drummer seeks musicians to form band".

'So on Saturday 25th September 1976, ' recalls Larry. 'This odd group of people convened in my kitchen in Artane. And that's where it started.'

The odd group included 16 year old Adam Clayton who bought his first acoustic guitar at thirteen and then convinced his parents to get him a bass.

Clayton wasn't  happy at school and found refuge in music.

 "We would listen to The Who, The Grateful Dead, Kris Kristofferson, Carole King, Neil Young, people that were around at that time, singer- songwriter things and some far-out stuff, Hawkwind, The Edgar Winter Group, Edgar Broughton. And then the prefects at school would listen to Rory Gallagher, The Beatles, The Stones, Eric Clapton, so we'd hear a bit of that, and some American performers like the Doobie Brothers. So I was getting pretty turned on to music and it always seemed to change my mood; it somehow made it bearable to be in that school situation. I remember reading that Clapton hadn't started playing guitar until he was fifteen or sixteen and I thought, 'Well, there's still time for me!'"

15 year old David "The Edge" Evans grew up sharing records with his brother

"Along with our Beatles LP's we got some by Led Zeppelin, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, Yes, Rory Gallagher and Taste. I discovered Derek and the Dominos while staying with my older cousins in Blackpool. It is hard to explain the significance of music for all of the kids in our area. There was nothing else nearly as important in terms of establishing your identity. I would have huge arguments with my friends about who was the best band in the world, or what was the best record ever made. The TV music shows Top of the Pops and The Old Grey Whistle Test were considered unmissable."

Evans heard about a wild kid called Paul Hewson at a neighboring school.

"He seemed to share our interest in high-explosives: there was some story involving a small fire, and some rivet-gun caps, taken from the building site that was to become our new school. So I heard about Bono a couple of years before I even met him."

16 year old Hewson was already a wild child when his mother died of a brain hemorrhage while attending the funeral of her own father. His musical influences?

 "Before I got to the Who, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin, and those kinds of things -- I really remember John Lennon's Imagine. I guess I'm twelve; that's one of my first albums. That really set fire to me. It was like he was whispering in your ear -- his ideas of what's possible. Different ways of seeing the world. When I was fourteen and lost my mother, I went back to Plastic Ono Band.

 "Bob Dylan at the same time. Listened to his acoustic albums. Then starting to think about playing those acoustic songs. My brother had a Beatles songbook -- so trying to teach myself guitar, and him sort of helping.

 "And that song -- which is actually such a genius song, now that I think about it, you're embarrassed the day after you learned it—'If I Had a Hammer.' That's a tattoo, that song."

The band briefly had a fifth member. Evans' brother Dick. They decided to call themselves "Feedback". They would play their first gig at Mount Temple Comprehensive School in October, a messy ten minute set beginning with a cover of Peter Frampton's "Show Me the Way", followed by the Bay City Rollers "Bye Bye Baby",and ending with a Beach Boys medley. For an encore, they played the Rollers tune a second time.

40 Year Itch : One Way Ticket to Ecstasy

J.J. Cale : Travelin' Light

[Purchase]

In September of 1976 the reclusive Tulsa singer /songwriter J.J. Cale released Troubadour, his fourth album of catchy, shuffling, bluesy tracks highlighted by "Cocaine" which became, like Cale's "After Midnight",  a huge radio hit for Eric Clapton. 

The critics have complained that Cale's albums are indistinguishable. Well, among his biggest fans, the versatile Troubadour is usually either their favorite album or pretty damn close.

I really like this album, especially the first single, "Travelin' Light",  which has a groove that disco prince Bohannon would call "Foot Stompin' Music". (Clapton also covered this tune as did Widespread Panic.) Troubadour's appeal is immediate and will likely last the rest of your life.

Cale also experiments with new instruments. Horns on "Hey Baby", a vibraphone on "Travelin' Light" and an ARP synthesizer on "You Got Something".  But it all goes back to that mellow groove, understated singing and fine guitar playing.

40 Year Itch : Rethinking the Electric Guitar

[Purchase]

Henry Cow founder Fred Frith's stunning Guitar Solos is an album of eight tracks recorded in four days of improvisation using modified and specially tuned guitars. On the track "No Birds" he's simultaneously  playing two guitars placed neck to neck on a table. 

   The album made the NME Critics Poll of Best albums of 1974. At the 9:45 mark, you can probably hear why Brian Eno wanted to record Before and After Science and Music for Films with Frith.

   The rest of the NME Critics Poll looked like this:

NME Albums 1974
 1. Pretzel Logic - Steely Dan
 2. It's Only Rock 'n' Roll - Rolling Stones
 3. Before The Flood - Bob Dylan
 4. 461 Ocean Boulevard - Eric Clapton
 5. Todd - Todd Rundgren
 6. On The Beach - Neil Young
 7. Rock Bottom - Robert Wyatt
 8. Fulfillingness First Finale - Stevie Wonder
 9. Country Life - Roxy Music
 10. Average White Band - Average White Band
 11. Future Days - Can
 12. Smiler - Rod Stewart
 13. Secret Treaties - Blue Oyster Cult
 14. Maria Muldaur - Maria Muldaur
 15. Another Saturday Night - Various
 16. Sold American - Kinky Friedman
 17. On The Border - Eagles
 18. Court And Spark - Joni Mitchell
 19. Odds And Sods - The Who
 20. Kimono My House - Sparks
 21. Okie - J.J. Cale
 22. Grievous Angel - Gram Parsons
 23. Radio City - Big Star
 24. Mysterious Traveller - Weather Report
== Sheer Heart Attack - Queen
 == Big Fun - Miles Davis
 27. Rock 'n' Roll Animal - Lou Reed
 28. Deal Gone Down - Michael Chapman
== I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight - Richard And Linda Thompson
== It's Too Late To Stop Now - Van Morrison
31. Teasin' - Cornel Dupree
 == Close Up The Honky Tonks - Flying Burrito Brothers
 33. Feats Don't Fail Me Now - Little Feat
== Veedon Fleece - Van Morrison 
35. Paradise And Lunch - Ry Cooder
== Dreamer - Bobby Bland
 37. In Concert - Beach Boys
== Fear - John Cale
== For Everyman - Jackson Browne
== His California Album - Bobby Bland
 41. Limited Edition - Can
42. The Psychomodo - Cockney Rebel
== Good For You Too - Toni Brown
 == Live - Marvin Gaye
 45. Live From Deep In The Heart Of Texas - Commander Cody
 46. All American Boy - Rick Derringer
== Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash - Mike Nesmith
== Streetwalkers - Chapman-Whitney
 == Keep On Smilin' - Wet Willie
 == Planet Waves - Bob Dylan
 51. Anthology - Marvin Gaye
 52. Soon Over Babaluma - Can
== Spyglass - Greenslade
54. Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley - Robert Palmer
 55. Propaganda - Sparks
 56. The Shipbuilder - Bob Pegg & Nick Strutt
== Learn To Love It - Jesse Winchester
 == Guitar Solos - Fred Frith
 59. Angel's Egg - Gong
== Good Old Boys - Randy Newman

40 Year Itch : Strength To Carry On

[Purchase]

   I'll state it right out front: 461 Ocean Boulevard is not a great album. But it is immensely better than anything Clapton had given us in the three years leading up its release in July of 1974. In those three years, we heard nothing but silence from Clapton. Well, we heard rumors that he had become a heroin addict. But outside of the Bangladesh tribute and Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert in 1973, an unimpressive affair that probably saved our hero's life, we were all left wondering: what happened to "God"? In a 1974 Rolling Stone interview Clapton admitted he was trying to live the life of a secret junkie.

Also, when you're on H the last thing you want is to be bothered by people. A telephone ringing or a doorbell drives you up the wall.

   By the time that interview ran, a healthy looking Clapton was on a 23 date US tour to promote an album that would shoot up the charts to #1. His cover of Bob Marley and The Wailers' "I Shot the Sheriff" would also hit #1. What made the difference? Well, Clapton did spend some time working on a farm in Wales. But my guess is Layla probably had something to do with his renewed interest in life. After years of being in love with Pattie Boyd, she finally left George Harrison for him in 1974.

    In any case Clapton wanted to get back to work. He didn't have any songs but he wanted to make an album. His manager Robert Stigwood suggested Miami.There, in a studio surrounded by Tulsa musicians and Hellmann's Mayonaise scion Yvonne Elliman, Clapton jammed and jammed until he came up with most of the songs on the album. 

     

To hear these songs in their best light, you need Give Me Strength, The '74/'75 Recordings box set. Not only do you get the original 461 Ocean Boulevard cuts remixed and remastered, you also get seven cuts of Clapton and the band "getting acquainted". I prefer hearing the band knocking out these instrumental jams to what the songs eventually became: three minute numbers like "Motherless Children", "I Can't Hold Out" and "Steady Rollin' Man". 

   At the end of the day you've got an album with seven covers sung by a man who wasn't yet confident about his voice. ( But , hell, he must have been thinking, if J J Cale can sing on his records why can't I?) Rolling Stone critic Ken Emerson said the album " suffers from timidity" and..."is easier to appreciate than it is to enjoy". 

    No 461 Ocean Boulevard isn't a great album...but it IS great seeing Clapton standing in the sunshine on the album cover and hearing songs that proved he was very much still alive.

40 Year Itch : Catching Up With Yardbirds Guitarists

On May 10, 1974 recovering heroin addict Eric Clapton recorded his cover version of Bob Marley's " I Shot the Sheriff", his first and only #1 hit. It appeared on his comeback album 461 Ocean Boulevard, which he recorded with J J Cale pals The Tulsa County Band.  

       Backing vocalist Yvonne Elliman says when the band wasn't recording in Miami, they were off sailing and not every journey was pleasant and mellow

"We were in the Bermuda Triangle. It freaked me out, because we had a terrible storm out there. We were all drunk, we were terrible. And the captain was quite straight. He was saying "We can't go any further!" And I was going "Sail on! Come on! Let's hit the storm! Let's get bounced around and have a good time!" And the guy said "I'm sorry, but we have to turn back, and as captain of this ship what I say goes".

    Also on May 10, Jimmy Page and friends attended a party to celebrate the launch of Led Zeppelin’s Swan Song label at Los Angeles’ Bel Air Hotel ends with the guests tossing food and chinaware at one another. 

The next day Robert Plant and Jimmy Page met the King after Elvis’ L.A. Forum concert.By some accounts, Page and Presley sang "Love Me " together. In other stories, Presley grilled the boys about their sordid stories on the road. This account comes from an Australian Elvis fan blog:

   Elvis finally turned to them. 'Is it true', he said, 'these stories about you boys on the road?' Plant answered, 'Of course not. We're family men. I get the most pleasure out of walking the hotel corridors, singing your songs'. Plant offered his best Elvis impersonation. 'Treat me like a fool, treat me mean and cruuuuel, but looooove me...'. For a moment Elvis Presley eyed them both very carefully. Then he burst out laughing. Then his bodyguards burst out laughing. For two hours he entertained them in his suite. He had never heard their records, he said, except for when his stepbrother played him 'Stairway to Heaven'. 'I liked it', said Presley. Later, walking down the hallway from the hotel room, Page and Plant congratulated themselves on a two-hour meeting with the King. 'Hey', came a voice from behind them. Presley had poked his head out the door. 'Treat me like fooool...'.

“When Led Zeppelin started doing huge concerts, I was just sitting in my garage listening to the radio. I was like, ‘What’s going on? I started this shit and look at me!’” - Jeff Beck

  Five months before sessions began for his Fusion masterpiece Blow By Blow, Jeff Beck was most likely producing and playing some guitar on the self titled debut album of the young British rock jazz fusion band Upp. I say "most likely' because there is no mention of Beck's involvement on Upp in the liner notes.

Rock Scene's Readers Super Group Poll

For their December 1973 issue, Rock Scene Magazine published the results of a readers Super Session poll, a kind of fantasy Super Group featuring All Star team of rock and roll artists for that year. Ryan Richardson has uploaded issues of Rock Scene on his website.

LEAD VOCALIST Alice Cooper

LEAD GUITARIST: Eric Clapton

SECOND LEAD : Mark Farner ( of Grand Funk Railroad)

BASS: Jack Bruce ( Cream, West, Bruce and Laing)

DRUMS : Neil Smith of  Alice Cooper

KEYBOARDS: Rick Wakeman of Yes


Honorable Mentions
Vocalists : Robert Plant, Rod Stewart, Mick Jagger
Guitars : Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix
Drums: Don Brewer, Ringo Starr, Ginger Baker
Bass: Dennis Dunaway (Alice Cooper), Mel Shacker (Grand Funk Railroad), Bill Wyman
Keyboards : Keith Emerson, Leon Russell, Edgar Winter

40 Year Itch : Back From The Abyss

[Purchase]

"It really wasn't difficult to get people to help. In fact, you might be surprised at a few names I could mention who would have given their right arms to join in this band."- Pete Townshend


On January 13, 1973 Eric Clapton headlined a pair of charity concerts at the Rainbow Theatre in London. The real charity might have been Clapton himself. Three years deep into his heroin addiction, Clapton had been seen only once since Derek and the Dominos dissolved. At George Harrison's Bangladesh bash.

It was Pete Townshend who got Clapton back on stage where he fronted--with little in the way of rehearsal-- an all star band that includes Stevie Winwood, Jim Capaldi and Ronnie Wood. The resulting live album is ragged, almost lifeless.

 Rolling Stone's Bud Scoppa wrote

 "Rainbow Concert presents some of the best people in rock at their most egoless and supportive. But the crucial question — is Clapton able to come out of isolation and return to his music and to the people who care about it? — remains unanswered."


But critical reviews aside, Clapton admits Townshend saved his career and possibly his life: "I did that very much against my will. It was purely Townshend's idea. I'm indebted to him."

And things would get much better from here on out, beginning with the sensational 461 Ocean Boulevard.