In The Light- Led Zeppelin Seven Years In Tibet- David Bowie Ch-Check It Out- Beastie Boys Loose Ends- Bash & Pop Alice- Mott The Hoople Don't Make Promises- Timebox A Man I'll Never Be- Boston
I had a few conversations with myself about the notes I'd write for this week's selections and most included the voices of the detractors. Mention Jimmy Page's brilliant riff on "In The Light," hear the voices saying Zeppelin sucks or calling Page a thief...again. Talk about the daring foray Bowie had taken into electronica on the underrated "Earthling," get the usual strikedown about how all his records sucked after "Scary Monsters." Mention the Beastie Boys, clear the room completely, regardless of how funky and hook-filled a song might be, because rap ain't music. And forget about Boston! I've been wanting to share "A Man I'll Never Be" for years. This song is big and has one of the great rock vocals of all time. But ya know, Boston sucks.
Then I thought, fuck it. I can take it. If things got really bad, at least Bash & Pop would cheer everyone up. And I could tout Timebox one more time, one of my favorite bands that no one knows. Here they cover Tim Hardin, but I highly suggest listening to the Deram collection, which has great single after great single. (Timebox featured Ollie Halsall, John Halsey and Mike Patto who then went on to form Patto, by the way.)
Maybe I just won't write any notes and let the music do the talking.
A new box is coming in November featuring seven U.S. Beatles albums all released in 1964. Check out the video above if you're interested.
I am interested. I will always be interested.
Here's why.
Two conversations took place this week. One was with my friend Michael, as we discussed, yet again, new music versus old, good versus bad, and why we need to stop comparing everything to The Beatles.
Michael: “Saying it isn’t as good as the Beatles is not a useful metric for music, at least not for me."
I agree. But our conversation was more than that.
Me: "Music of the last 25 years simply isn't as good as it was between 1955-1995, and I included the 90's just to be nice."
People seem to get very defensive about
music in the last 25 years. Everyone always needs to point out the 10-20 solid artists they love, which is great.
"Have you
heard so and so?"
Maybe the metric shouldn't
be "as good as The Beatles" but instead "here's some music that isn't awful." The bar is so
low, people glom onto anything that doesn't outright suck. That's worse
than comparing artists to The Beatles or Aretha or the Stones. It's delusional.
It's not about enjoying pop music. It's about recognizing the difference between well made records and poorly made records. You can love both. Just stop trying to sell mediocre as exceptional and maybe people will stop bringing up The Beatles and the Stones.
The other conversation was with a few strangers on social media, after I saw this pretty unfunny meme posted. (Sorry for the blurry pic. Enlarge if you need to.)
I understand the joke there, it's just really poor execution. But more important is that there are people, and I use that term loosely, on social media, who claim to love music but think this meme is an accurate description of The Beatles. A few too many think this is how The Beatles sound- a goofy, love sick boy band who took drugs a few years after they began and started writing psychedelic gibberish. Okay, that's not completely untrue. But you probably shouldn't be waxing Liverpool after admitting to only "knowing a few Beatles songs," one of which is "Imagine."
Right now, the fanatics are up to 75 pages of discussion on the Steve Hoffman forum about this new Beatles box, ruminating over mixes and other minutiae. I love these guys. That's what music should do to you.
As press time, there are the cynics calling this $300 box a cash grab, though you don't have to buy the set. You could buy the records individually at $30 a pop. I don't think it's a cash grab. Multiple color variants, with a different bonus track for each country and alternate art are all cash grabs. A new way of hearing great music is not a cash grab. For some, like those social media Beatles mockers, this could be the very first time they experience this amazing music. Though, my gut feeling is that they couldn't care less.
There needs to be a middle ground, somewhere between "all new music sucks because it isn't as good as The Beatles" and "Just listen to any old crap and let the kids have fun." I do believe the less the younger generation pays attention to musical history, the worse music is going to get.
I once said this to a customer many years ago. He laughed in my face, but then a few days later, came back to apologize, saying, "The more I thought about what you said, the more it made sense." I believe the subject was Jessica Simpson and her new CD which I thought was crap.
I said, "If you bring home a new puppy and it pees on the couch, you need to stop him. If you coddle him, and just chalk it up to the pup's inexperience, he'll continue to pee on the couch. No one got angry, so the puppy thinks it's okay."
An old friend Ruben, who I hadn't thought about in years, once told me back in the NYCD retail days, that his wife Jeannie's favorite singer was Eva Cassidy. I had some of her CDs in stock, but never bothered playing any of them. I was judging a book by its cover and I assumed the music found inside would be something like The Corrs or Enya, and I wasn't a fan of either.
25 years later and my relentless scrolling told me it was National Album Day, whatever that is. Apparently, Eva Cassidy's "Live At Blues Alley" was released on vinyl for the first time on National Album Day, whatever that is, a few years ago. That made me think of Ruben and so, finally, I decided to see what his wife Jeannie was talking about.
Holy crap!
This record was not what I was expecting at all.
Now, this may be old news to many of you. Some of you may have been raving about Eva Cassidy for years. But if even a few of you don't know about Cassidy, you need to listen.
Eva Cassidy's voice is as pure as it gets. Whether belting out an old blues or a revved up standard, or working her away inside and out of a beautiful ballad, Eva Cassidy is in complete control.
Here is a bit of William Cooper's review from All Music:
Admittedly, the titles on Live at Blues Alley seem like a set list for a bad Vegas lounge act; songs such as Irving Berlin's "Cheek to Cheek" and Louis Armstrong's"What a Wonderful World" have been done to death for decades.
Fortunately, Eva Cassidy had an obvious affection for these standards.
She sounds as if she had a ball performing the Irving Berlin number, while her subtle reading of the Louis Armstrong tune is nothing less than extraordinary. She was equally successful
with more contemporary pop classics like "Bridge Over Troubled Water"
and "Take Me to the River." Ultimately, the slower songs are the most
stirring, particularly her rendition of "Fields of Gold." Her
tear-jerking version of the Sting tune could very well be one of the greatest cover songs ever recorded.
Eva Cassidy, as many of you might already know, never got a chance to shine, dying tragically at 32 from cancer after only one proper studio recording.
Cassidy's cover of Sting's "Fields Of Gold" is breathtaking and it's sitting over to the right as the cover of the day. "What A Wonderful World" just might be definitive, and that's saying a lot.
With contributions from Leon Russell, Stephen Stills, Eric Clapton, Peter Frampton, Billy Preston, Ringo Starr and its producer George Harrison, Doris Troy's 1970 Apple release should have been better. David Fricke says it is one of his top five non-Beatle Apple albums, which isn't exactly praise when you look at the discography. And while everyone is in fine form, especially Miss Troy, I find that most of the material falls flat. The album comes and goes without leaving a mark, almost.
"Exactly Like You" surprised the hell out of me. I've listened to "Doris Troy" a number of times over the years, but nothing ever stayed with me. So, when "Exactly Like You" popped its head out of the grooves, it was as if I had never heard it before. This is a solid and soulful take on Jimmy McHugh's standard, who also wrote "On The Sunny Side Of The Street," by the way.
I've had an on again but mostly off again relationship with Jack White since the very first White Stripes album. I could not get on that bus. People said, "It's just like Son House and Skip James, but for the kids. If the kids get turned on to old blues thanks to the White Stripes, it could only be a good thing."
Yeah, ok. Ask all those White Stripes fans how many Son House and Blind Willie Somebody records they bought because of "De Stijl."
But then, I bought a ticket for a bizarro triple bill at Madison Square Garden that was opener, legendary country star Porter Wagoner, Grinderman with Nick Cave in the middle slot, and The White Stripes closing things out. It was one of the greatest nights of music I had ever seen. The White Stripes, a duo of just guitar and drums, somehow managed to get 20,000 people on their feet for the entire set. I'd never seen anything like it. It was just the two of them, but it sounded like seven people on the stage. The Garden was shaking!
Still, I don't care for those White Stripes records.
White's solo career has been hit and miss with me too, yet I love The Raconteurs. And I know people loved "It Might Get Loud," but Jack White got on every one of my nerves and I still haven't finished watching it because of him and that...what? What exactly was that performance? (P.S. I think Jack White is an amazing guitar player.)
As for Third Man Records, I love that they exist. I've enjoyed many of their releases but I despise every one of their gimmicks. Records that play inside out, records that play at 34 1/3 R.P.M., different colors, subscriptions, these are all things that give an old school record buyer the twitch.
This brings me up to date and a text I received from a friend, which was a screenshot showing how he got shut out of the Jack White show at White Eagle Hall in Jersey City. He was in a queue with 2716 people and then, typical of what seems like any show these days in New York Shitty, it sold out in 48 seconds. I said, "I didn't realize you were a fan." He said, "I like the new album so I thought I'd go see him."
If I didn't get that text, I don't think I would have bothered listening to "No Name," another annoying gimmicky release, as it was given out for free as a white label promo, clandestinely stuffed into buyer's bags at Third Man Records while they were still trying to figure out how to play the last Jack White release.
Well, guess what kids?
Jack White's "No Name" knocked my socks off!
This record is the best rock record of the year. I did not expect this at all.
Thankfully, there is an official release that we can all just buy the normal way, you know, with song titles and other old unhip things for people of a certain age, like an album cover and an inner sleeve. (I assume the vinyl will play outside-in when it is released on Friday.)
The music you will hear on "No Name," at least to these very Zep friendly ears, is what Jimmy and Robert were doing on their first three records. It's swampy and funky, and it reeks of Son House and Skip James, just like those White Stripes records were purported to be, only "No Name" nails it.
And that's my Jack White story.
Listen to these tracks and do your best to NOT play air guitar or shake a few body parts.
Rock And Roll Queen- Mott The Hoople Love Me Tonight- Tom Jones Every Time I See Her- Dave Edmunds Salt Lick- ZZ Top Long Time Woman- Pam Grier Streets Of Bakersfield- Buck Owens Seeland- Neu
I was reading about this 60 year feud between Tom Jones and Engelbert Humperdinck the other day. It's still going on, with Tom most recently commenting about Eng, "Once a c**t, always a c**t." I listened to Englebert last week. I enjoy a number of his 60's singles. Tom's catalog goes deeper, but I went with the hit "Love Me Tonight."
That ZZ Top record blew me away when I first heard it. I still can't believe it's them, and boy does it sound good setting up that Pam Grier.
Try to get lost in that Neu closer. It's a beautiful piece of music.
