I didn't remember until the track came around the half way mark that California Dreaming was this lot. I'm learning not to just assume it was their song but I have confirmed it was written by two of them a couple of years prior to the release of this album. From my perspective it's their most famous song yet Monday Monday (the opening track) was their only number one.
Maybe that's not so weird. Cultural importance can push things to the forefront more effectively than record sales perhaps. If that's true, I think that's a good thing in general. But it does expose the extent of how fucked up the world is that a laborious dirge like California Dreamin' could outstrip a song like Monday Monday.
Here was a tune that starts with a catchy tag but has the self awareness to get away from it before it causes irritation. It not only uses those hooks sparingly but the changes create blue notes and genuine shiver points that mitigate the record sales. It is a travesty then that a progression as arduously repetitive and lyrics so boring Dido could've written them could exceed the cultural endurance of this plaintive requiem for the weekend.
Their harmonies are without question, beautiful and that is sustained throughout this album. I'll say no more about it. Just assume that if I comment or don't comment on a track, I think the harmonies are lovely.
There are times when they're too nice, mind you, and in those moments the saccharin levels rise to nauseating levels that are only made worse by the arrangements. Specifically, these low points are Do You Wanna Dance, Spanish Harlem and I Call Your Name, proving that I am not dyed in the wool with regards the Lennon and McCartney catalogue.
Got A Feelin is a well placed song on the album, being a slow song at track 3, chilling us out after the up beat very-obviously-about-drugs Straight Shooter. Got A Feeling is a song of suspicion in a relationship and concludes with a dark foreboding that the unfaithful will get what's coming to them. Throughout the song the rhythm emulates the ticking of a clock, symbolising that time is running out for the subject, which I like.
It appears Aretha Franklyn did the most successful version of Spanish Harlem. I've not heard it but I can't imagine it's up to much considering the base material. In context, this now means five tracks on the spin have been a disappointment with California Dreamin only offering relief cuz it's familiar.
In short, after a good start with the first 3 tracks, it's all starting to look a bit dicey for the foursome but then, just in the nick of time Somebody Groovy comes along. This is a five star song on a two star album and thankfully, it is every bit as groovy as the title suggests.
Sadly, Hey Girl is a Beatles emulation that doesn't really hit the mark and You Baby, whilst a considerably better paint-the-fence[1] boogie is still not up to the standard I had hoped would endure throughout.
The album closes with another addictive groove monster in The In Crowd and with the girls taking the lead vocal it's very reminiscent of Darlene Love or Nancy Sinatra and there's fuck all wrong with that.
It's short and at points it's very sweet but it lets itself down too often. I can see that perhaps it was done in the pursuit of variety but they strayed too far from the path of grooviness for my liking.
[1] I don't know what the dance is called if it has a name at all. But it's that 60s step where you alternate your weight every other up-beat from side to side while doing an exaggerated "paint the fence" move from The Karate Kid.
Saturday, March 22, 2014
Monday, March 17, 2014
#0066: The Kinks - Face To Face [*****]
The first thing that struck me was how much like the Beatles it sounded. Indeed the opening track even had all the cheeky mischief of some of Lennon's more comical output. But once that initial impression had faded, it became clear this was much more than another cloned cash-in on the Fab Four's era-defining sound.
These songs have great character both lyrically and musically. From the first song I knew that I was in the hands of a songwriter of skill and imagination. Clearly defined and smoothly navigated A and B sections with melodies that negotiate each turn in a manner that delights and impresses.
The production is interesting too. From track to track, still operating in that reasonably primitive 60s framework, it's not just a formulaic treatment of the composite tracks with regards reverb and panning.
Even on tracks that give way to what could easily be an endless and tiresome jam (Rainy Day In June), the spontaneity and transience of the idea is preserved by not making too much of it. They appear as interludes used as epilogues.
Occasionally we get sound effects interlaced with the songs and as introductions. The lyrics discuss everything from big houses to the weather, and while those are fairly bland topics to explore in every day conversation it is the carefree delivery that stops it being dull. I've a feeling Blur may have been influenced by The Kinks.
Little Miss Queen Of Darkness is a stand out track for me. It's such a happy-go-lucky tune but the lyrics present quite an acerbic view of the subject. Even here at what perhaps constitutes satire, still they manage to sidestep the pretentious.
12 tracks in and I'm enjoying it so much the idea of whether a song I know might be on here hasn't even entered my mind. And then there it is; Sunny Afternoon. Bold as a mandrill's buttocks it sits there in the penultimate position, familiar and comfortable and you would expect it to seem out of place among the album tracks. But the fact is it's no better than any of the songs preceding it.
I've always liked what I've heard of the Kinks but never got around to hearing more. This is an album that is consistently good with very few weak points and even then they're not really stinkers. I'm Not Like Everybody Else and Dead End Street didn't really grab me but these were only included on the 1998 re-issue as a bonus track along with a handful of others.
So I can breathe a sigh of relief. I really didn't want to be let down by this one.
So I can breathe a sigh of relief. I really didn't want to be let down by this one.
Saturday, March 15, 2014
#0065: Monks - Black Monk Time [*]
I shouldn't have looked. It's a big 60s, cavernous sound and the opening track is a thrashing, 2-beat - a polka set at breakneck pace. It sounds clean and spacious though and it's not looking too bad until the vocals come in. It's at this point the question presents itself to my conscious mind.
"What the fuck is this?"
It's a guy shouting about Vietnam for a bit and then they launch into a chant-style chorus purporting that it is "Monk time".
Fair enough. Not my bag and at just over two and a half minutes, it's not a total turn off. The term "monastic silence" doesn't come from nowhere however and I do fear that by the end of this I may be praying for exactly that. But not wanting to dismiss it out of hand just because they wanted to make an entrance I reserved judgement.
I did a little background reading. They were a group of US soldiers stationed in Germany. They only made one album. Like I said, I shouldn't have looked. I shouldn't have looked because now instead of "musicians trying to do something new", I've got "boys having a knock about, working out their frustrations".
The next track, ironically is called "Shut up" and it's a kind of fucked up tango - could be a foxtrot too, thinking about it but still fucked up. It's got a slow, ascending, chromatic hook line played on an organ, which is quite reminiscent of the Doors. Although we've yet to encounter any of their stuff on the list yet. It's different from the first track which works in its favour but it's still kinda loud and unskilled.
See? I'm tainted.
It's still playing now while I form these thoughts and I have to say I'm blocking it out so I can concentrate. If this was on, even quietly while I was trying to work or have a conversation, it would raise my blood pressure and make me very tense and uncomfortable.
Apparently a cult following has built up around this group, who have been touring since 1999 without recording any new material.
There are tunes. I just don't like them. There are arrangements. I just don't like them. There are solos and harmonies. I just - don't - like them. Now, if I could just leave it there, things would be so much easier but I have to listen to the rest of the album.
The variety of rhythm isn't quite diverse enough to offer a break from the overused floor tom. The bass follows the chord so predictably as to be unnoticeable. The neanderthal sexism in some of the lyrics is particularly pitiful and the stereotype of the rape-and-pillage GI mindset is woefully supported in that respect.
The keyboard player can go quite fast on the one scale he knows but loses his way quickly and his phrasing is choppy and awkward - all the signs of someone playing with too much enthusiasm and not enough confidence.
Drunken Maria is a very short song that could've done with being shorter. I think it's a baritone sax that makes the arrangement interesting and the tune is peculiar and entertaining. But once the words kick in, it just sounds like all the other songs. Cut that second minute, or even replace it with a variation and they might've been onto something.
Love Can Tame The Wild offers a long overdue display of competency and I actually like it. There is texture here and character. The harmonies are well placed and balanced and the piano is quirky and interesting if still a little clumsy.
One star or two? As far as likelihood that I'll return to this, it's one. Yet, in spite of how much I disliked the sound, you can still see how much love has gone into this recording. But giving points for effort sets a dangerous precedent. When the arm returns to the cradle, this is just another 40 minutes I had to waste to get to one song.
"What the fuck is this?"
It's a guy shouting about Vietnam for a bit and then they launch into a chant-style chorus purporting that it is "Monk time".
Fair enough. Not my bag and at just over two and a half minutes, it's not a total turn off. The term "monastic silence" doesn't come from nowhere however and I do fear that by the end of this I may be praying for exactly that. But not wanting to dismiss it out of hand just because they wanted to make an entrance I reserved judgement.
I did a little background reading. They were a group of US soldiers stationed in Germany. They only made one album. Like I said, I shouldn't have looked. I shouldn't have looked because now instead of "musicians trying to do something new", I've got "boys having a knock about, working out their frustrations".
The next track, ironically is called "Shut up" and it's a kind of fucked up tango - could be a foxtrot too, thinking about it but still fucked up. It's got a slow, ascending, chromatic hook line played on an organ, which is quite reminiscent of the Doors. Although we've yet to encounter any of their stuff on the list yet. It's different from the first track which works in its favour but it's still kinda loud and unskilled.
See? I'm tainted.
It's still playing now while I form these thoughts and I have to say I'm blocking it out so I can concentrate. If this was on, even quietly while I was trying to work or have a conversation, it would raise my blood pressure and make me very tense and uncomfortable.
Apparently a cult following has built up around this group, who have been touring since 1999 without recording any new material.
There are tunes. I just don't like them. There are arrangements. I just don't like them. There are solos and harmonies. I just - don't - like them. Now, if I could just leave it there, things would be so much easier but I have to listen to the rest of the album.
The variety of rhythm isn't quite diverse enough to offer a break from the overused floor tom. The bass follows the chord so predictably as to be unnoticeable. The neanderthal sexism in some of the lyrics is particularly pitiful and the stereotype of the rape-and-pillage GI mindset is woefully supported in that respect.
The keyboard player can go quite fast on the one scale he knows but loses his way quickly and his phrasing is choppy and awkward - all the signs of someone playing with too much enthusiasm and not enough confidence.
Drunken Maria is a very short song that could've done with being shorter. I think it's a baritone sax that makes the arrangement interesting and the tune is peculiar and entertaining. But once the words kick in, it just sounds like all the other songs. Cut that second minute, or even replace it with a variation and they might've been onto something.
Love Can Tame The Wild offers a long overdue display of competency and I actually like it. There is texture here and character. The harmonies are well placed and balanced and the piano is quirky and interesting if still a little clumsy.
One star or two? As far as likelihood that I'll return to this, it's one. Yet, in spite of how much I disliked the sound, you can still see how much love has gone into this recording. But giving points for effort sets a dangerous precedent. When the arm returns to the cradle, this is just another 40 minutes I had to waste to get to one song.
Saturday, March 08, 2014
#0064: Bob Dylan - Blonde On Blonde []
I suppose I should be grateful that all 35 of this self-satisfied, eternally ready for a close-up of his own prostate's drivel are not on the list. It's not surprising he's so prolific. At my most prolific I was writing 8 songs a month. I go for a shit twice a day. Case closed.
This particular collection of slowly putrefying offal is #9 on the Rolling Stone list and the second most highly rated of his albums. Considering what a ball-piercing waste of time Highway 61 Revisited-Over-My-Dead-Body was I will not afford this the same attention. It's not like I haven't listened to it before. I remember being told his definitive work was to be found on this and Blood On The Tracks. I listened to them both at the time - a good ten years ago - and didn't get on with them then. I think that's when I started developing my fierce animosity towards him. How dare he squander my attention with this appalling display of amateur doggerel?
Onto the album. Rainy Day Women #12 and #35 is the opening track and I like the oompa slash New Orleansy kind of feel but after the novelty of that and the cheeky giggle you get on "everybody must get stoned" you're left with "they'll stone you" followed by a random reference which if it does have meaning is esoteric and shuts off the piece in a pretentious little box. And what a stupid title. Do the lyrics shed any light on it? Of course not. What a cunt.
The next track - who gives a fuck what it's called - is a vehicle for his shit-sucking harmonica playing. Harsh and abrasive, it cuts through my head like a bread knife through a tin of beans resulting in instant migraine and fury.
"They sent for the ambulance and one was sent.
They said he got lucky but it was an accident."
He says that like it's meant to be clever. Wanker.
Visions Of Johanna starts well and indeed has a nice groove but there are three things working against this piece. His voice, his harp and the fact he refuses to edit his words so we end up with 7:34 of extraneous bum mustard. There's still 5 minutes left of it but I've heard enough of this tosser to know it's not getting any better. I've had hangovers where I felt less suicidal than listening to this.
"These visions of Johanna kept me up past the dawn."
Well maybe they did, Bob. Maybe they did. But maybe they kept you up so late because there's three hundred and seventy fucking eight of them!
More of the same dry heaving vocal for another couple of tracks until we get to the next seven minute editing fail. No effort made to make the song interesting. Just verse after verse after random, senseless, tuneless verse.
A few interminable tracks later, "she makes love just like a woman but she breaks like a little girl". That's nicely put I suppose. There's a bunch of reputable singers who have covered this. Maybe I'll listen to their versions. Actually, I think anybody who covers a Bob Dylan song should be given a writing credit for the melody they sing. It's not like they had one to start with is it? Somebody should get the credit who actually did the work, right?
Temporary Like Achilles is an interesting title. Let's see what an abortion he can make of it. Yep. Same "note" repeated for the words, same hideous harmonica like a buzzsaw through a creche. Five minutes and three seconds later, I'm thinking he needs to look up "Temporary".
Listening to this is like being in a sort of Hellish Narnia. The witch Dylania cuts the webbing between your fingers and toes with a blunt razor soaked in chilli sauce and does it slowly over the course of 3 hours and when you come back to this world only a minute has passed. How in the name of all that's holy can anyone bear to listen to this? It is physically painful. It is so shit that no stars is not low enough. I'm gonna have to go back and take a star off one of the other reviews to make up for it.
Last track. Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands. Eleven minutes twenty one seconds. What can you possibly have to say that the preceding three sides of the album did not already cover with saturated ambiguity? Huh?
"With your silhouette when the sunlight dims
Into your eyes where the moonlight swims"
"With your silhouette when the sunlight dims
Into your eyes where the moonlight swims"
Good words but not exactly a new idea is it, genius? Why don't you fuck off, Bob? Fuck off and die in a fucking hole with a live piranha up your arse you fucking detestable little twat.
#0063: The Byrds - Fifth Dimension [*****]
I don't know much about the Byrds other than they are near the top of a very long list of artists who have pulled Bob Dylan's execrable wank out of the u-bend of Mount Effluent and turned them into classics.
The stereo picture of these songs is beautiful. The 60s trend of left and right panning separate instruments is followed here but whereas in other works you feel like your headphones are broken, an elegant balance is struck widening the sonic experience to heavenly levels. Over the top of this is a canopy of harmonic cloud, full and fluffy and quite reminiscent of Crosby, Stills and Nash.
So I go look it up on Wikipedia to discover that most of the songs were co-written by David Crosby. Duh.
I am finding time and again with these albums that the good stuff has variety within a clearly defined style but the Byrds demonstrate a versatility of style ranging between classic folk and almost rockabilly pop. I don't know how I never listened to these sooner. It is one of the hopes I had when I began this project that I would discover things that will become a regular part of my listening patterns. It's this level of songwriting, musicianship and sound engineering that make it worthwhile suffering the worthless guff in between.
Stand out tracks include 5D, Mr Spaceman, Eight Miles High and a version of Hey Joe. The much-covered Hendrix version was in fact written by a guy called Billy Roberts. This rendition is almost unrecognisable from the crashing, heavy lead laden classic so familiar to most. It's fast, a real driving song and not without its own intricate guitar flavours.
And then out of the back of that frenetic tale of murder and abscondment comes Captain Soul. I'm thinking about doing a cover version of it. It's bloody fantastic.
The remainder of the album continues to surprise and delight with interesting production ideas and lyrical hooks and basically I can't find fault with it. I think I've just come in my (not broken) headphones.
The stereo picture of these songs is beautiful. The 60s trend of left and right panning separate instruments is followed here but whereas in other works you feel like your headphones are broken, an elegant balance is struck widening the sonic experience to heavenly levels. Over the top of this is a canopy of harmonic cloud, full and fluffy and quite reminiscent of Crosby, Stills and Nash.
So I go look it up on Wikipedia to discover that most of the songs were co-written by David Crosby. Duh.
I am finding time and again with these albums that the good stuff has variety within a clearly defined style but the Byrds demonstrate a versatility of style ranging between classic folk and almost rockabilly pop. I don't know how I never listened to these sooner. It is one of the hopes I had when I began this project that I would discover things that will become a regular part of my listening patterns. It's this level of songwriting, musicianship and sound engineering that make it worthwhile suffering the worthless guff in between.
Stand out tracks include 5D, Mr Spaceman, Eight Miles High and a version of Hey Joe. The much-covered Hendrix version was in fact written by a guy called Billy Roberts. This rendition is almost unrecognisable from the crashing, heavy lead laden classic so familiar to most. It's fast, a real driving song and not without its own intricate guitar flavours.
And then out of the back of that frenetic tale of murder and abscondment comes Captain Soul. I'm thinking about doing a cover version of it. It's bloody fantastic.
The remainder of the album continues to surprise and delight with interesting production ideas and lyrical hooks and basically I can't find fault with it. I think I've just come in my (not broken) headphones.
#0062: Fred Neil - Fred Neil [*]
Heavy on the tremolo, please and sing it like your dog just died.
It's almost early Pink Floyd-esque how spacey the guitar sounds on this and then his voice comes in. Deep and resonant, yes, a very good voice but it's incongruous to the sound. As the album drags on - sorry, did I say drags? I meant draaaaaags. As it plods along, they dial back the tremolo and it sounds a lot more like traditional country-folk crossover.
It sounds like he's trying to write Everybody's Talkin from Midnight Cowboy. Oh wait, that is actually on here. Oh so _that's_ who sings that. Okay. My bad.
So the guy spends half an album coming up with the best song on there and then doesn't have the imagination to try a different recipe or the sense to recognise that that idea isn't going to get any better.
He's got a really nice voice but for this style of music you've got to like the words and I don't really connect with them or the sound. There are some great moments: the harp solo on Dadi-da is excellent and certain people would've done well to investigate the existence of actual musicians like this when they recorded their septic cock drippings. Mentioning no names.
Faretheewell is track 5 out of 12. Oh how I wish it was. You little bastard. Still haven't got to Everybody's Talkin yet and already I wanna wipe up the guck on my cooker and drink it down with the bleach it's soaking in.
Oh thank god. Everybody's Talkin. Oh no, what's this? This is a different version. Where's the lovely guitar riff and the skiffle drum beat? Oh ffs, you utter wanker. Why _why_ WHY would you fuck up a classic like that? Ah ok. Harry Nielson recorded the good version. Thank you Harry for spotting the potential in this song. This version is just stick-a-nail-up-your-jacksie boring.
I'm properly fucked off now. I was really looking forward to hearing that and now I've got to suffer the rest of this twaddle with no hope of reprieve.
Great harmonica on Sweet Cocaine but the song itself is too reminiscent of Cocaine Blues, which is a far more dextrous exposition of the substance that should've been called Instant Arsehole.
Green Rocky Road is the one track I actually like. It's got a feel that carries you forward and a tune you want to sing along with. It's too little too late but maybe it's just one of those albums that gets good at the end.
Nope. The closing track is an eight minute hot skewer down the urethra called Cynicrustpetefredjohn Raga. There is the suggestion of a skiffle beat somewhere among the previously redeeming but now directionless harp but it's lost in the cacophony. Exacerbating the torture are the sitars, which are irritating at their best but in this case appear to have been left out in the sun covered in bird seed and what we're hearing is what happened when the pigeons arrived.
You see? This is what happens when you do too much cocaine. You start thinking this sort of noise is acceptable or in some way constitutes art. Preach subjectivity all you want but there have to be limits surely?
#0061. The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds [****]
It has not escaped my notice that the Rolling Stone top 5 albums are all from the 60s and 3 of them are by the Beatles. You trying to tell me it's all been done? Quirk's Law(*): Nothing is original under the sun.
Pet Sounds. It was the Sixties people, you'll have to excuse me if I avoided listening to this for a long time because I assumed it was recordings of people's dogs and cats.
Among the great things about this album are the layered harmonies and massive amount of space created between the lead vocal and the other instruments with the use of reverb. But it is that same reverb that gives me the sense that I'm listening to this band in an empty hall. It is both pleasant _and_ annoying. Like when your legs are waking up after you've been on the toilet too long.
I'm not fond of the falsetto style but the melodies are lovely, memorable things and while the songs are richly detailed with distinct verse, chorus and middle eight sections, they are still kept short with very few of them exceeding even three minutes.
Like The Who album, each song has its own character but is still characteristic of a distinct sound and as much as a part of me wants to dismiss its foppish, wet schmaltz I know that's the ageing rocker talking. My inner blond surf Adonis, his tanned pectorals festooned with beads cannot resist these tunes. He is driving a jeep down the sand of a California beach with a brace of surfy chicks in the back sharing a doob and shaking their hair out in the rushing salty air while Sloop Johnny B blasts out of the primitive stereo.
Aside from the biggies like Wouldn't It Be Nice and God Only Knows, many of the others with future listens I'm sure will become just as familiar.
The title track is not animal noises and for that we can be grateful. I'm sure I've heard it used as theme music somewhere. Maybe what I've heard is a 70s travel programme copying the style. It's nice. Very Ronnie Hazlehurst, y'no?
It could easily have been the last track which would give the album the same conclusion as Madness Absolutely which ends with The Return of the Los Palmas 7. Instead, they save Caroline No for that last track giving that anti-climactic wistful end.
But that's not the end. Just as Caroline No finishes, here comes the barking together with the sound of a train coming thru a crossing. Does the train run over the dog? Maybe that's my ageing rocker again.
(*) - John Quirk, a top flight musical director and composer who gave me my first lesson in songwriting. He was and I assume still is a very patient man, a great teacher and a multi-instrumentalist of exceptional talent. Over the few years that I knew him during my time with the West Glamorgan Youth Theatre, he said a number of things that resonated with me and so I compiled them into a list, which in homage to the film Cocktail, I called Quirk's Laws. Find out more about John Quirk.
Friday, March 07, 2014
#0060: The Beatles - Revolver [*****]
This is Rolling Stone's #3 album of all time. It's not mine but it's up there somewhere.
Although the first time I heard Taxman, I thought my mate had put the Jam on cuz Start was in the charts at the time and the similarities are undeniable. Of course, I had myself a bit of an anachronistic, arse-about-face plagiarism paradox. Though, being a boy of 12 and a soi-disant dickhead to boot, one shouldn't be surprised.
Over the years Taxman has become a favourite as has Eleanor Rigby. It is quite simply one of the best songs ever written. The things that can be done with it when you're playing it seem almost limitless. Check out Stanley Jordan's jazz version for an extreme example of this. I do my own version on the piano. It's a wonderfully woven tale lyrically too. A sad tale of a lonely, unattractive woman. Well, let's face it, she's probably not a looker is she? The priest would rather darn his socks than take a punt and she hasn't even got the nouse to offer. Jokes aside, the strings are the really special thing about the original version.
Now I want to be careful not to gush uncontrollably over this album cuz it's not without its stinkers. I'm Not Sleeping is ok I guess but sleeping is usually exactly what I end up doing cuz between that and George Harrison with his fucking sitars twiddling on like a dodgy curry house there's not much to keep my interest other than the promise of better things to come.
And they do come. I don't want to commit to this but Here There & Everywhere is definitely a contender for my favourite Beatles song ever. It's just beautiful. Usually a song like this you would attach to a lost love and it would always remind you of them. Not so with this. The song is about nascent love and as such it detaches you from past love and begets you once more into that sickeningly fluffy world of candy floss, mooning and gawping.
From the piano on Good Day Sunshine, the illicit legend of Doctor Robert to the blaring romper stomper Got To Get You Into My Life and the ethereal, cosmic mind bender Tomorrow Never Knows, all presented with the ubiquitous trademark harmonies, this album is just exquisite.
If it wasn't for the weaker dross I'd've given it six.
And they do come. I don't want to commit to this but Here There & Everywhere is definitely a contender for my favourite Beatles song ever. It's just beautiful. Usually a song like this you would attach to a lost love and it would always remind you of them. Not so with this. The song is about nascent love and as such it detaches you from past love and begets you once more into that sickeningly fluffy world of candy floss, mooning and gawping.
From the piano on Good Day Sunshine, the illicit legend of Doctor Robert to the blaring romper stomper Got To Get You Into My Life and the ethereal, cosmic mind bender Tomorrow Never Knows, all presented with the ubiquitous trademark harmonies, this album is just exquisite.
If it wasn't for the weaker dross I'd've given it six.
#0059: The Who - My Generation [****]
Ever since Live-8 a few years ago when Daltrey and Townsend played, I've been referring to them as The Twho. I've always loved them but I only ever heard the Polydor Story OF The Who compilation, Tommy and to a lesser extent Quadrophenia and Who's Next. So I'm grateful for the chance to go back to the start and try to listen with fresh ears.
My Generation is their first album and unlike the Stones they've steamed straight on in with original songs from the off, which I dare say was seen as a bold move in those days.
Daltrey's legendary battleaxe vocal sits astride Moon's unbridled drumming while Entwistle, whom I heard Daltrey once describe as a "lead bassist" and the brains of the outfit put the flesh in between. It's rich and gutsy and each song is distinct from the last.
Listening to the title track reminds me of their farewell gig in 1980. Some farewell. It was the first time I'd seen Daltrey sing "why don't you all fuck off". Good job my parents weren't in. I was so impressed with All The Swearing tho.
I'm only giving this 4 stars cuz some of the songs are lacking the inventive arrangement ideas seen elsewhere on the album. The Ox was a bit of a nasty surprise. I thought it was going to be a bass feature but it's a thrashing drum-dominated thing with Jerry Lee Lewis-esque piano on it. So that was a bit shit. Some people like all that punky cacophony but it leaves me cold.
The lasting feeling I get from this album is the versatility in Daltrey's voice and how the songs manage to stand apart from one another while still being unmistakably Who songs.
The lasting feeling I get from this album is the versatility in Daltrey's voice and how the songs manage to stand apart from one another while still being unmistakably Who songs.
Monday, January 20, 2014
#0058: Bob Dylan - Highway 61 Revisited [**]
Okay strap in folks, this is the money shot.
This is the highest ranked of all Bob Dylan's 35 studio albums. Critics seem to agree it is the most important of his works with one author even claiming the Sixties "started" with this album.
So I'm gonna set the counters to zero. I'm gonna pretend I've never heard of him. I'm gonna _try_ as hard as I can to see something positive in it. The odds are not good, but I'm still willing to put my money down.
1. Like a Rolling Stone
I know this song well and I have always loved it. It's the one song that completely suits his ill equipped vocal style and the harmonica is used sparsely, which is a blessing to us all. Cuz even in short bursts, it's fucking horrible. Still, it says in the Bible that even a fool when he keepeth his silence is considered to be wise and keeping the lid on that mouth organ was a very wise move indeed.
It's a wonderful starting point for the album too. It's a driving rhythm with rich layers of simple parts supporting his voice at its weakest points.
It's always been unusual for a longer song to be a hit and at 6:13, this was the one of the first aberrations of running time for a US top ten hit. The really surprising thing is that I looked up at the display when I was starting to lose interest to find that there was less than a minute left. So I feel good after the first track and having cracked the 5 minute barrier, hopes are high in spite of the overriding concern that it will be short lived.
2. Tombstone Blues
2:08. I managed two minutes and eight seconds before my heart sank. It's a quick song, snare on the up beat, rockabilly style. His words are for the most part indecipherable and his voice has returned to that persistent whine created by a child unable to form words so urgently making whatever noise it can to get its point across. It gnaws at my nerve endings like a razor to the spine but I was hanging in there.
After the second chorus loop, I thought the instrumental section would deliver the reprieve I needed but my hopes were dashed. The guitar "solo" we are treated to is as monotonous as his caterwauling as he drives on like a drowning comedian who has gone over time but is flailing in the water, gasping for a big laugh that will never come so he can leave the stage with some dignity.
This is the pattern of my torture. Three times round the keel is my body drawn, my skin reattached and flayed once more. Until finally I hear the words of the chorus reprise and blessed rescue from my horror is promised as it must mean now that this corrosive cocksweat will cease.
3. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry
Now why can't he play harp like that all the time? It's like every mistake he made in track 2 has now been addressed. The progression has a nice turnaround. The rhythm has a rolling, easy feel to it that carries you along. When the third verse comes in after the harp break, he shortens the vocal before the next repeat. Has he done a Bill and Ted and popped off in a time machine to do a course? Even his voice is bearable.
It's totally surreal how he can swing between these stark extremes of the most utterly abhorrent noise and...quite acceptable.
Okay, 2-1 to Bob and everything to play for.
4. From A Buick 6
Well at least now I know where Stephen King got the idea for his book From A Buick 8. That and the layers are the only positive notes I have on this though.
I found myself reaching out to the organ sound that is used throughout this piece to satisfy my need for notes but was disappointed. It was too high in the mix for the simple padding it provided. If they'd dropped that down and got somebody else to sing it would've been passable but #4 on the Rolling Stone list?
At 3:19 it's the shortest track so far though so...there's that, at least.
5. Ballad Of A Thin Man
Something is happening here and I don't know what it is. I've got a pretty good idea though. A perfectly decent descending minor progression, given character by a wild-west-saloon of a honky tonk piano and a squealing but properly placed organ line is being crucified with each nail his pitifully inadequate vocal drives into the pleading hands of what could've been a great song.
It really could have been a great song as demonstrated by the Grateful Dead, Golden Earring and Kula Shaker to name but three of the twenty artists who have made a better job of this.
6. Queen Jane Approximately
Once upon a time, in an effort to placate the Dylan fans who attended the pub quiz I used to run, I used this song in a music round themed on "Queens" for QE2's diamond jubilee.
Good words in this and while the title is pretentious beyond the pale, the wise decision to recapture the sound of track 1 for the beginning of side 2 means that faith is restored. Until the vocals come in that is.
In fairness, they're not as piercing on this track and it is also one of the shorter tracks meaning a minimum 20% reduction in harmonica and weasel strangulation.
7. Highway 61 Revisited
Entrance Of The Gladiators, you may already be aware is the title of that piece of music inextricably associated with the clowns at a circus. You have only to hear that chromatically disjointed melody and the image of 12 middle aged men piled into a very small car becomes so vivid in your mind you can smell the greasepaint and the shaving foam.
A comedian, possibly Eddie Izzard pointed out the ludicrous incongruity of the title with its application but in the case of this track, the tables are turned. Surely the siren whistle was associated with the circus long before it was used on this recording? It does make a mockery of the song somewhat.
Some background reading reveals that somebody brought the whistle into the studio for other purposes but that it was suggested Dylan use it instead of his harmonica. I can only assume that was some kind of practical joke made at his expense. In the absence of confirmation it remains a lamentable low point in what one might reasonably expect to be the flagship song.
For those who haven't heard it, it begins with a siren whistle, which reappears throughout. That's what I get for trying to cut the poor guy a break: a clown's sound effect. There's nothing else of note. The background music just seems to be a jam the band thought up to try to disguise the fact he was yet again shoehorning syllables hamfistedly into lines on the same repeated note.
He just never learned how to fit his poetry into tunes did he? Not being able to sing you can understand why but surely he could not have been so arrogant as to not recognise his limitations?
Art is art. Somebody, somewhere will like it. Whether I can understand that or not is immaterial. I think the reason this baleful racket irritates me so much is because it is so highly praised so I am obligated to listen to it and expected to agree.
Heat a rapier until it's white hot and then shove it up a goose's butthole and you don't even get close to the hideous claxon of his voice. It defies the definition of singing in the most fundamental of ways. And the worst thing is that people have been emulating it because it has been so lauded they think it's okay to make these noises themselves. It's truly heartbreaking.
8. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
A pattern is emerging. The slower songs have more chord changes and this seems to guide him to attempt different notes. On quicker songs, the chord endures, supported by a riff of some kind but he is unable to negotiate the scale and produce a melody.
The harmonica is not atrocious on this one.
9. Desolation Row
He's pronouncing row the wrong way.
The longest track on the album by some 4 minutes begins with the vocal delicately disguised by a solo acoustic guitar line.
Then 2, 3 maybe 48 verses later something interesting happens. The song ends. Eleven minutes. Occasionally the acoustic just drops out, presumably because the soloist has fallen asleep and needs a poke.
At one point my girlfriend held a knife to her eye and begged me to turn it off.
If you're a fan of Bob Dylan I hope you feel equally tortured by the length of this review. Fair exchange is no robbery.
Final score 6-3 in my favour and there was chalk dust on Queen Jane Approximately. So I'm converting that to a percentage and rounding down to yield the star rating shown.
What a waste of my time. I actually feel sick with bitterness.
This is the highest ranked of all Bob Dylan's 35 studio albums. Critics seem to agree it is the most important of his works with one author even claiming the Sixties "started" with this album.
So I'm gonna set the counters to zero. I'm gonna pretend I've never heard of him. I'm gonna _try_ as hard as I can to see something positive in it. The odds are not good, but I'm still willing to put my money down.
1. Like a Rolling Stone
I know this song well and I have always loved it. It's the one song that completely suits his ill equipped vocal style and the harmonica is used sparsely, which is a blessing to us all. Cuz even in short bursts, it's fucking horrible. Still, it says in the Bible that even a fool when he keepeth his silence is considered to be wise and keeping the lid on that mouth organ was a very wise move indeed.
It's a wonderful starting point for the album too. It's a driving rhythm with rich layers of simple parts supporting his voice at its weakest points.
It's always been unusual for a longer song to be a hit and at 6:13, this was the one of the first aberrations of running time for a US top ten hit. The really surprising thing is that I looked up at the display when I was starting to lose interest to find that there was less than a minute left. So I feel good after the first track and having cracked the 5 minute barrier, hopes are high in spite of the overriding concern that it will be short lived.
2. Tombstone Blues
2:08. I managed two minutes and eight seconds before my heart sank. It's a quick song, snare on the up beat, rockabilly style. His words are for the most part indecipherable and his voice has returned to that persistent whine created by a child unable to form words so urgently making whatever noise it can to get its point across. It gnaws at my nerve endings like a razor to the spine but I was hanging in there.
After the second chorus loop, I thought the instrumental section would deliver the reprieve I needed but my hopes were dashed. The guitar "solo" we are treated to is as monotonous as his caterwauling as he drives on like a drowning comedian who has gone over time but is flailing in the water, gasping for a big laugh that will never come so he can leave the stage with some dignity.
This is the pattern of my torture. Three times round the keel is my body drawn, my skin reattached and flayed once more. Until finally I hear the words of the chorus reprise and blessed rescue from my horror is promised as it must mean now that this corrosive cocksweat will cease.
3. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry
Now why can't he play harp like that all the time? It's like every mistake he made in track 2 has now been addressed. The progression has a nice turnaround. The rhythm has a rolling, easy feel to it that carries you along. When the third verse comes in after the harp break, he shortens the vocal before the next repeat. Has he done a Bill and Ted and popped off in a time machine to do a course? Even his voice is bearable.
It's totally surreal how he can swing between these stark extremes of the most utterly abhorrent noise and...quite acceptable.
Okay, 2-1 to Bob and everything to play for.
4. From A Buick 6
Well at least now I know where Stephen King got the idea for his book From A Buick 8. That and the layers are the only positive notes I have on this though.
I found myself reaching out to the organ sound that is used throughout this piece to satisfy my need for notes but was disappointed. It was too high in the mix for the simple padding it provided. If they'd dropped that down and got somebody else to sing it would've been passable but #4 on the Rolling Stone list?
At 3:19 it's the shortest track so far though so...there's that, at least.
5. Ballad Of A Thin Man
Something is happening here and I don't know what it is. I've got a pretty good idea though. A perfectly decent descending minor progression, given character by a wild-west-saloon of a honky tonk piano and a squealing but properly placed organ line is being crucified with each nail his pitifully inadequate vocal drives into the pleading hands of what could've been a great song.
It really could have been a great song as demonstrated by the Grateful Dead, Golden Earring and Kula Shaker to name but three of the twenty artists who have made a better job of this.
6. Queen Jane Approximately
Once upon a time, in an effort to placate the Dylan fans who attended the pub quiz I used to run, I used this song in a music round themed on "Queens" for QE2's diamond jubilee.
Good words in this and while the title is pretentious beyond the pale, the wise decision to recapture the sound of track 1 for the beginning of side 2 means that faith is restored. Until the vocals come in that is.
In fairness, they're not as piercing on this track and it is also one of the shorter tracks meaning a minimum 20% reduction in harmonica and weasel strangulation.
7. Highway 61 Revisited
Entrance Of The Gladiators, you may already be aware is the title of that piece of music inextricably associated with the clowns at a circus. You have only to hear that chromatically disjointed melody and the image of 12 middle aged men piled into a very small car becomes so vivid in your mind you can smell the greasepaint and the shaving foam.
A comedian, possibly Eddie Izzard pointed out the ludicrous incongruity of the title with its application but in the case of this track, the tables are turned. Surely the siren whistle was associated with the circus long before it was used on this recording? It does make a mockery of the song somewhat.
Some background reading reveals that somebody brought the whistle into the studio for other purposes but that it was suggested Dylan use it instead of his harmonica. I can only assume that was some kind of practical joke made at his expense. In the absence of confirmation it remains a lamentable low point in what one might reasonably expect to be the flagship song.
For those who haven't heard it, it begins with a siren whistle, which reappears throughout. That's what I get for trying to cut the poor guy a break: a clown's sound effect. There's nothing else of note. The background music just seems to be a jam the band thought up to try to disguise the fact he was yet again shoehorning syllables hamfistedly into lines on the same repeated note.
He just never learned how to fit his poetry into tunes did he? Not being able to sing you can understand why but surely he could not have been so arrogant as to not recognise his limitations?
Art is art. Somebody, somewhere will like it. Whether I can understand that or not is immaterial. I think the reason this baleful racket irritates me so much is because it is so highly praised so I am obligated to listen to it and expected to agree.
Heat a rapier until it's white hot and then shove it up a goose's butthole and you don't even get close to the hideous claxon of his voice. It defies the definition of singing in the most fundamental of ways. And the worst thing is that people have been emulating it because it has been so lauded they think it's okay to make these noises themselves. It's truly heartbreaking.
8. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
A pattern is emerging. The slower songs have more chord changes and this seems to guide him to attempt different notes. On quicker songs, the chord endures, supported by a riff of some kind but he is unable to negotiate the scale and produce a melody.
The harmonica is not atrocious on this one.
9. Desolation Row
He's pronouncing row the wrong way.
The longest track on the album by some 4 minutes begins with the vocal delicately disguised by a solo acoustic guitar line.
Then 2, 3 maybe 48 verses later something interesting happens. The song ends. Eleven minutes. Occasionally the acoustic just drops out, presumably because the soloist has fallen asleep and needs a poke.
At one point my girlfriend held a knife to her eye and begged me to turn it off.
If you're a fan of Bob Dylan I hope you feel equally tortured by the length of this review. Fair exchange is no robbery.
Final score 6-3 in my favour and there was chalk dust on Queen Jane Approximately. So I'm converting that to a percentage and rounding down to yield the star rating shown.
What a waste of my time. I actually feel sick with bitterness.
#0057: The Byrds - Mr Tambourine Man [**]
It's not because it's a Bob Dylan song. The version of Mr Tambourine Man found here is marvellous. It's the hit version I was referring to in Bringing It All Back Home. Lovely harmonies and doesn't go on so long you skip the land of Boredom completely and arrive instantaneously in the Vale of Pass-Me-A-Scissors-That-I-May-Gouge-Out-Mine-Eyes. That's what you need from a chilled out 60s pop hit. Job's a good'un.
The mistake The Byrds made is to collect 11 songs of almost identical rhythm and key and put them on the same album, which, it turns out is aptly named because that's what we've got here: twelve versions of Mr Tambourine Man.
Just to show there's no bad blood I'll put the title track on a compilation but this soporific, directionless drone couldn't hold my attention if you had my balls in a lion's gob while I was listening to it.
The mistake The Byrds made is to collect 11 songs of almost identical rhythm and key and put them on the same album, which, it turns out is aptly named because that's what we've got here: twelve versions of Mr Tambourine Man.
Just to show there's no bad blood I'll put the title track on a compilation but this soporific, directionless drone couldn't hold my attention if you had my balls in a lion's gob while I was listening to it.
#0056: Bert Jansch - Bert Jansch [****]
This is one man and an acoustic guitar recorded in what sounds like the same take. In the opening track Strolling Down The Highway there are moments where it feels like he could've benefited from recording the vocal separately.
The guitar accompaniment is quite complex being a sort of country blues vamp and on occasion the vocal seems to buckle under the strain of coordination. When it first started, my redneck radar kicked in but I think it was a false alarm. His voice is slightly southern but not to the point of irritation. It's calm. The guitar too is more sophisticated than the picking patterns I've heard before in this style.
Smokey River, the second track is instrumental and shows off his guitar technique but it's a very short piece and that speaks volumes about how this guy is serving the music rather his need to show off. This is followed by a song much more toward the folk end of the spectrum. Again, his voice is just present and comfortable. There are no vocal gymnastics here and no over-stylised quirks and licks. It's simple, which compliments his quite busy guitar accompaniment.
He has command of more than a few patterns tho so each song sounds a little different from the last even though they are in closely related if not the same keys.
I've never heard of Jansch before so I had no expectations but I have to say I'm very pleasantly surprised by this most mellow of recordings. The first time I heard Mellow Morning by Spirit or Going To California by Led Zeppelin or Solid Air by John Martyn, I had this wave of happy calm come over me. My first joint was still years away but I already knew what it was to be nicely crusted.
Yeah. We like this one.
I was just about to leave it there and then the last track started. It's called Angie and it's a minor descending progression with a hook made out of a turn. I've heard I don't know how many acoustic guitarists play this at various nights and never knew it was Burt Jansch. I love it when that happens.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
#0055: The Beatles - Rubber Soul [*****]
There has to be a list of Best or Most Iconic opening bars of an album somewhere. If there isn't, we should start one and this should be on it. Not at number one. A Hard Day's Night would obviously be ahead of this but I do listen to those first few notes of Drive My Car and think, "Yeah, I'm alright for the next 35 minutes." There are other albums that produce the same thought albeit with different running times. You've got yours too. You feel alright cuz you know there won't be a single track you feel like skipping over.
"No, no", I corrected him loftily, "this is Sgt Pepper. I can't believe you've got two copies of this CD and you don't know how it goes?"
In the old days, we'd just zone out if one of the songs was a bit shit. We'd become more involved in the conversation or go and make a cup of tea, have a piss, smoke a fag - something to take up the time while the crap song finished cuz the album was on tape and you knew better than to try to fast forward. You don't wanna break the continuity.
I first discovered Rubber Soul in...I wanna say 1987. It was the same year Sgt Pepper Knew My Father came out. Remember that? The 20th Anniversary of Sgt Pepper saw the collaboration of artists to recreate the album. The original album I think was remastered on CD at the same time. My brother bought it. But when he got it home, even though the CD was printed with the Sgt Pepper title and the Sgt Pepper track list, the album on that CD was Rubber Soul.
I had no idea of course, I'd never heard either one. My intention was to listen to the original album so that I would know whether Billy Bragg's version of She's Leaving Home was worth all the fuss they were making over it. So I did. Got right into it too. My brother came into my room one day while I was singing along to Drive My Car and instead of berating me for nicking his CDs he went "yeah, great album Rubber Soul".
"No, no", I corrected him loftily, "this is Sgt Pepper. I can't believe you've got two copies of this CD and you don't know how it goes?"
My brother chose that moment to reveal his ruse.
"Yeah. I had to buy another copy cuz the first one had Rubber Soul on it."
"Wha'?", I intelligently enquired.
I can't recount what he actually said next. It was over 25 years ago and he does have a tendency to over egg the pudding with his yarns does my brother.
Apparently, he'd got the CD home, played it, realised the mistake and thought, "Fuck it", and then simply bought another one. His thinking was, "I like Rubber Soul and you never know, it might be worth something in a few years."
And indeed today, that CD is worth approximately fuck all.
I've no idea what a mis-burnt copy of Sgt Pepper is worth in mint condition but the one I found down the back of my brother's sofa in 1998 was barely passable as the thing that stopped all the loose change going down inside the frame.
Nowhere Man I think was the first song I ever knew off this album. It was included in that Stars On 45 medley I mentioned on Hard Day's Night. I wouldn't say that I was a loner through school but I certainly felt alone a lot of the time. But I didn't realise that until I heard this song and I figured they were singing about me.
Really? You sure you weren't just an adolescent narcissist who thought _every_ song was about you?
I dunno. Maybe. Who cares - it was 30 odd years ago. What matters is that I'm now a middle aged narcissist who _knows_ every song is about me.
Clearly, I can't write a bit about every song or we'd be here all day so I'll just mention two more and if I skipped your particular favourite then please be assured that I love it only marginally less than you do.
Girl - who would've thought of recording a man taking a breath in harshly over his teeth? It expresses the mixed feelings of the song with unbeatable brevity.
Girl - who would've thought of recording a man taking a breath in harshly over his teeth? It expresses the mixed feelings of the song with unbeatable brevity.
And then there's Michelle.
Michelle captures the story of a man falling in love across a language barrier and has so much character. Its simplicity elegantly camouflages its musical complexity. The word genius is often used with regards the Beatles but in my view this tune is one of the cases it is truly warranted.
I wouldn't put it at #5 of my all time list as Rolling Stone did but still a wonderful album that I love very much.
#0054: BB King - Live At The Regal [***]
I heard a story about a guitarist I know, though I haven't seen him for a few years. This guy was (and as far as I know still is) a fuckoff guitarist. Satriani, Vai, Page, Slash, Blackmore and Howe - he could play it all.
There's a flourish of 4 songs at the end of the album that gave me the variety I had been craving but it was too little too late. Worry Worry is a slower blues number with a storming instrumental middle section and if I was doing a mix tape...
That's an idea. I might do a ".pd.'s 1001 - best of the xxxties" series of playlists. Let me know if that's something you'd be interested in.
But yeah, Worry Worry would go on that compilation for sure. Outstanding track.
Let's call him Jeff.
Some fellow muso (Dave) was having a piss and a moan about Jeff having said in a rehearsal at some point in the past that during his solo, the rest of the band should sit back and come down in volume so that his notes could be heard.
"You're the backing band", he said.
Dave was extremely put out at the arrogance of this statement. If Jeff had been talking about the whole song then Dave would have had a point. As it was, Jeff was just talking sense to a band that weren't listening to each other; a band that weren't serving the song. You need to be able to hear the solo prominently over the rest of the instruments in the same way you need to hear the words. If the rest of the band are playing too freely it gets messy fast.
From the top of this album you can hear that what the producers most want you listening to is the lead guitar. It stands head and shoulders above all other voices - and with good reason. It's full, rich and rounded. That may be just a matter of hardware. Why is such a fuss made of the player? Maybe he came up with the combination of whatever it is - amp, pickups, compression and what-have-you.
Either way, you listen to his choice of notes and the tiny little details of expression intently poured into them and you know you're in the presence of greatness.
That said, these are all 12 bar blues songs and I couldn't tell you which was which. It's great. The arrangements are tight and that vibrant audience noise captures the atmosphere in its tried and tested way, giving us a taste of the zeitgeist. But I get bored after a few tracks.
There's a flourish of 4 songs at the end of the album that gave me the variety I had been craving but it was too little too late. Worry Worry is a slower blues number with a storming instrumental middle section and if I was doing a mix tape...
That's an idea. I might do a ".pd.'s 1001 - best of the xxxties" series of playlists. Let me know if that's something you'd be interested in.
But yeah, Worry Worry would go on that compilation for sure. Outstanding track.
#0053: John Coltrane - A Love Supreme [****]
This is a post-bop, modal jazz album. You either get it or you don't. There will be many among you who would be tortured by this 33 minutes of saxophone, piano, bass and drums. If it transpires that those people are the same ones that find Bob Dylan soothing and insightful then I will not be surprised. This is about as far in the other direction as it gets.
There are 10s of notes jockeying for position at the forefront of your attention at every instant. It spirals and darts and weaves and interweaves. It drops away suddenly into a drum or a bass solo and returns thrashing like a crocodile in a vat of acid.
For the most part, however, it is not my bag. It's too vague and repetitive for my taste and the so-called 'Trane is not inspirational to me, an aspirational saxophonist. Well, that's not strictly true. The opening of part 2 of this 4 part concept (Resolution) has a lovely main melody (or "head" as the jazzers call it) and as he plays it, I can hear purity, texture and intonation that I would sell a kidney to have. It is only when he goes into one that he loses me with that esoteric squawking and the seemingly random interval jumping bringing me to picture a pissed vampire going round a crazy golf course. At noon.
Haven't mentioned the piano player yet though have I? Holy Mother Of Fuck. His name is McCoy Tyner and I have never heard anybody as fast or as precise. That's not much of a yardstick, I realise but these 4 stars are given mainly because I will be returning to this album mostly just to listen to his playing. It is very rare that I listen to a piano player and with jaw already dropped have to shout at the stereo to fuck off.
I used to have a running joke with my friends that when I was really impressed with somebody I would say, "if I ever meet him I'm gonna smack him in the face".
McCoy Tyner is still alive, y'know. He might still have time to make .pd.'s shiner list.
#0052: The Beach Boys - Today! [***]
Remember how flinging flanging ridonculous the Bee Gees looked and sounded in 1978? I poured scorn on that disco crap from the ivory tower I'd painstakingly built over my 9 year lifespan. Today, Night Fever and Stayin Alive are among my favourites. Things change us and in turn change the way we see things.
The Bee Gees weren't doing anything new though it seems. They were just copying the Beach Boys and the Beach Boys may well have nicked their falsetto style from the soul singers. I'm not in this for the history. All I'm saying is that I thought they both sounded stupid when I first heard them.
I've never been a big fan of the Beach Boys but over the years I've come to want to listen more closely to what Brian Wilson achieved having heard about him through friends who were a lot more interested.
This album kinda reminds me of the Phil Spector Christmas album a while back. Its fat production and reverb-drenched drums put me particularly in mind of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer. The other Christmas connection I get is that feeling I described before; of hearing what is peaceful and/or happy music but being nevertheless over-swept by some underlying melancholy.
If you listen to the words, these tales are dripping with sadness. From the vexatious uncertainty of When I Grow Up To Be A Man to the repentant self-castigation of She Knows Me So Well these songs ooze regret, jealousy, confusion and despair - the main food groups of rock and roll.
Now, you can't listen to a Beach Boys album without talking about the harmonies. This is apparently their 8th album and I don't know what the previous 7 sounded like but the chords the 3 and 4 voice parts form throughout are nothing like anything I've heard from the sample group to date. Daringly dissonant on occasion, I can only marvel at what was either a profoundly able inner ear or an insatiable appetite for trial and error.
In other news, directly before making this album Brian Wilson took up smoking pot.
Towards the end of the album, the levee of levity breaks and the waters of that thinly shrouded sadness pour through. Even the harmonies drop away by the very last track, written by Brian Wilson's brother Dennis. Interestingly, all the tracks on side 2 were written by Brian Wilson except In The Back Of My Mind (Dennis), whereas the first side was all collaborative. Can it then be assumed that the influence of Mike Love on side 1 is what stopped this from being a giant, wallowing miseryfest?
I vowed I would not give half stars but I really think - for the harmonies alone - this is worth more than 3. But I don't think it's good enough for 4. I don't think I'll come back to it that often. I've gone back and forth on this and here's why I've stuck with 3.
The very last track isn't a song. It's a recording of them sitting around chatting and eating. It's...self indulgent wank. Maybe some fans would be entertained by hearing the band talking about being on tour, how many mistakes they made, blah blah. It does lighten the mood so that shows some self awareness that the order of these songs is taking the listener on a downer.
But I expected more.
This is a band that released FOUR albums the previous year, a band that after this offering would release two more albums in the same year. I think that's a prolific enough output that if they needed filler material they could just have written another song instead of leaving the tape running while they jerk each other off over french fries. Is that asking too much?
The Bee Gees weren't doing anything new though it seems. They were just copying the Beach Boys and the Beach Boys may well have nicked their falsetto style from the soul singers. I'm not in this for the history. All I'm saying is that I thought they both sounded stupid when I first heard them.
I've never been a big fan of the Beach Boys but over the years I've come to want to listen more closely to what Brian Wilson achieved having heard about him through friends who were a lot more interested.
This album kinda reminds me of the Phil Spector Christmas album a while back. Its fat production and reverb-drenched drums put me particularly in mind of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer. The other Christmas connection I get is that feeling I described before; of hearing what is peaceful and/or happy music but being nevertheless over-swept by some underlying melancholy.
If you listen to the words, these tales are dripping with sadness. From the vexatious uncertainty of When I Grow Up To Be A Man to the repentant self-castigation of She Knows Me So Well these songs ooze regret, jealousy, confusion and despair - the main food groups of rock and roll.
Now, you can't listen to a Beach Boys album without talking about the harmonies. This is apparently their 8th album and I don't know what the previous 7 sounded like but the chords the 3 and 4 voice parts form throughout are nothing like anything I've heard from the sample group to date. Daringly dissonant on occasion, I can only marvel at what was either a profoundly able inner ear or an insatiable appetite for trial and error.
In other news, directly before making this album Brian Wilson took up smoking pot.
Towards the end of the album, the levee of levity breaks and the waters of that thinly shrouded sadness pour through. Even the harmonies drop away by the very last track, written by Brian Wilson's brother Dennis. Interestingly, all the tracks on side 2 were written by Brian Wilson except In The Back Of My Mind (Dennis), whereas the first side was all collaborative. Can it then be assumed that the influence of Mike Love on side 1 is what stopped this from being a giant, wallowing miseryfest?
I vowed I would not give half stars but I really think - for the harmonies alone - this is worth more than 3. But I don't think it's good enough for 4. I don't think I'll come back to it that often. I've gone back and forth on this and here's why I've stuck with 3.
The very last track isn't a song. It's a recording of them sitting around chatting and eating. It's...self indulgent wank. Maybe some fans would be entertained by hearing the band talking about being on tour, how many mistakes they made, blah blah. It does lighten the mood so that shows some self awareness that the order of these songs is taking the listener on a downer.
But I expected more.
This is a band that released FOUR albums the previous year, a band that after this offering would release two more albums in the same year. I think that's a prolific enough output that if they needed filler material they could just have written another song instead of leaving the tape running while they jerk each other off over french fries. Is that asking too much?
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
#0051: Otis Redding - Otis Blue (Otis Redding Sings Soul) [*****]
I can't tell you what a relief it is to be starting the new year with an album I not only enjoyed but actually struck home to me very deeply. That happens less frequently the older you get. Each experience desensitises you to the next until finally you die, bored shitless, having seen it all before. Maybe that's what ultimately kills us; there's nothing good on telly.
I've been aware of Otis Redding for many, many years but have never gone looking for more than the one song I knew.
When I was a teenager, I loved a girl. You'll read that more and more as we approach the music of my adolescence and beyond. But I did. As I loved many girls. Well, inasmuch as I became sufficiently fixated on them to write a song of desperate longing, hope and ultimately rejection and vilification. Ah the pubescence of an infatuation junky. I used to fall in and out of love so quickly you could hear a faint humming as I passed. Sad perhaps, but at least I never got chlamydia.
In spite of my affliction, I did manage to build up genuine, honourable feelings for this girl and we were very close. One night, she put on I've Been Loving You a Little Too Long, and we danced to it in her living room. Then we had a cup of tea and I went home.
Yeah, maybe I should have kissed her.
But looking back at who I was, I don't think it would've ended well. So I'm content to have the memory of a beautiful evening rather than the memory of a beautiful evening that I ruined by trying to start a relationship I wasn't capable of having.
So now that I've told you that story, you can understand there is a certain bias toward this particular singer for me and perhaps unconsciously my earlier attachment to Sam Cooke is partly explained by the similarities between their two voices. Indeed, two of Cooke's songs are present on this collection.
A Change Is Gonna Come isn't indistinguishable from Cooke's version. If I remember rightly, the original is mostly accompanied by piano but their voices are very similar and I don't believe it would've been appropriate at the time to have made changes that would have detracted from the central message of the song. It is a rare circumstance when the political objectives of the song are more important than how it is played but this is certainly one instance.
Wonderful World is very different from the version that perhaps most people associate with Cooke's easy, laid back rendition. This is much more in the soul vein with stabbing horns and harder corners.
My Girl, a song made famous by the Temptations and dosed up on saccharin even further by the schmaltzy film of the same name is given a treatment here that actually lets you enjoy the simple contentment of the song, rather than spending the whole time looking for somebody to hold your hair.
Up until I heard this album I had not realised Respect was originally a song for a man. From the lyrics in this version, it seems to be a song about an unreasonable woman, who isn't doing her part in a time when the man worked and the woman stayed home. Must've been wonderful for the hardcore feminist lobby when Aretha turned it round on the chauvinist phalanx and made it an anthem for women ever since.
I think it would've have tasted sweeter if a woman had written it from scratch, mind you. There is a part of me that tends to think of this as Adam being stabbed with a knife made from his own rib. But that in itself is a cautionary tale to the established axiom, "Don't shit where you eat."
I could bang on about this album for hours (and I may already have) and talk about the addictive party feel of Shake, the exhausted, noble misery of Old Man Trouble and the version of Satisfaction so good that Ronnie Wood says the Stones now emulate it themselves.
It's just superb and I'm gonna listen to it again. Right now.
I've been aware of Otis Redding for many, many years but have never gone looking for more than the one song I knew.
When I was a teenager, I loved a girl. You'll read that more and more as we approach the music of my adolescence and beyond. But I did. As I loved many girls. Well, inasmuch as I became sufficiently fixated on them to write a song of desperate longing, hope and ultimately rejection and vilification. Ah the pubescence of an infatuation junky. I used to fall in and out of love so quickly you could hear a faint humming as I passed. Sad perhaps, but at least I never got chlamydia.
In spite of my affliction, I did manage to build up genuine, honourable feelings for this girl and we were very close. One night, she put on I've Been Loving You a Little Too Long, and we danced to it in her living room. Then we had a cup of tea and I went home.
Yeah, maybe I should have kissed her.
But looking back at who I was, I don't think it would've ended well. So I'm content to have the memory of a beautiful evening rather than the memory of a beautiful evening that I ruined by trying to start a relationship I wasn't capable of having.
So now that I've told you that story, you can understand there is a certain bias toward this particular singer for me and perhaps unconsciously my earlier attachment to Sam Cooke is partly explained by the similarities between their two voices. Indeed, two of Cooke's songs are present on this collection.
A Change Is Gonna Come isn't indistinguishable from Cooke's version. If I remember rightly, the original is mostly accompanied by piano but their voices are very similar and I don't believe it would've been appropriate at the time to have made changes that would have detracted from the central message of the song. It is a rare circumstance when the political objectives of the song are more important than how it is played but this is certainly one instance.
Wonderful World is very different from the version that perhaps most people associate with Cooke's easy, laid back rendition. This is much more in the soul vein with stabbing horns and harder corners.
My Girl, a song made famous by the Temptations and dosed up on saccharin even further by the schmaltzy film of the same name is given a treatment here that actually lets you enjoy the simple contentment of the song, rather than spending the whole time looking for somebody to hold your hair.
Up until I heard this album I had not realised Respect was originally a song for a man. From the lyrics in this version, it seems to be a song about an unreasonable woman, who isn't doing her part in a time when the man worked and the woman stayed home. Must've been wonderful for the hardcore feminist lobby when Aretha turned it round on the chauvinist phalanx and made it an anthem for women ever since.
I think it would've have tasted sweeter if a woman had written it from scratch, mind you. There is a part of me that tends to think of this as Adam being stabbed with a knife made from his own rib. But that in itself is a cautionary tale to the established axiom, "Don't shit where you eat."
I could bang on about this album for hours (and I may already have) and talk about the addictive party feel of Shake, the exhausted, noble misery of Old Man Trouble and the version of Satisfaction so good that Ronnie Wood says the Stones now emulate it themselves.
It's just superb and I'm gonna listen to it again. Right now.
Sunday, December 29, 2013
#0050: Bob Dylan - Bringing It All Back Home [*]
I thought I told you to fuck off.
Okay. Fair's fair. If Hitler showed up with a new plan to eliminate poverty, you'd give him a chance to speak, right? Yes, his solution would be kill the poor but you'd wait for him to say it, right? Oh you wouldn't? I suppose he is Hitler after all and you know what you're in for.
You see where I'm going with this? I know this wasp-eyed whingocrat well enough to predict a bleak sojourn in a wilderness of monotonous nasal straining.
But I'm gonna let my Hitler speak. And once I've listened to what he has to say, then I'm gonna cut his legs off and feed him to the pigs.
Ah bollocks. The first track is Subterranean Homesick Blues; one of those songs I've always loved when other people have played it and never knew it was Bob Dylan's work. This is enjoyable because I know the song but it does just sound like he's doing a shit cover version. Much nicer production on this album though. The next track's okay too. If I concentrate really hard, I can just about make out enough variation in the note he's singing[1] to make what in his terms constitutes a melody.
Bob Dylan's 115th Dream is everything I hate about this torpid, rat-faced sore on the penis of rock n roll. After a false start, which they left in the take like the self-satisfied arrogant cunts they are, he proceeds to tell a story that goes nowhere and does nothing for too long. Desperate rhymes on meaningless lines that could've been cut, leaving the track half as long and twice as bearable.
Mr Tambourine Man. Well fuck me, it's a song. An actual song, with words that actually mean something. And a tune! Oh, wait a third verse straight after the second chorus with no discernible change at all. Aaand here comes the fucking harmonica a day late and a dollar short. Oh for god's sake boy, put it down. Thank you. No, no, no not another fucking verse! Jesus. Why does this song need to be 5 and half minutes long? Bohemian Rhapsody was only 5:55 and that was 10 years later and even then they were told they'd never have a hit with a 6 minute song. But you know what? It had seven harmonically distinct sections and even in the operatic bit when the words made no fucking sense, all those beautiful harmonies provided a more than adequate distraction. This is just a tautologous mess. The Byrds made this a hit; a number one hit. Running time: 2 minutes 16 seconds. Booyah Bob you self indulgent prick.
I've had a tit full of this cunt now.
People say, "oh if you only had a time machine, you could go back and see what was happening and experience the impact of his music in context". No. If I had a time machine I'd go back and pay for his mum to have an abortion.
[1] and by singing I mean I'd be unable to distinguish that sound from a Yorkshire terrier chewing on a scorpion.
#0049: The Sonics - Here Are the Sonics [***]
In terms of originality, this is ground breaking stuff and I'd go so far as to say this was the real beginning of punk. It's brash, rough and thrashes about in your lugholes like an electrocuted octopus.
It is still basically rock and roll though. The same progressions, the same words and as is irritatingly common for this period, the same actual songs. Money, for example has appeared on 4 of these albums so far if my count is correct.
The vocal comes in the form of two singers in what I assume is supposed to be unison but who are separated by a quarter tone and 0.0125 of a semi-quaver at every turn. Punk isn't really my bag and neither is this. The quality of their voices is not sufficient to be recorded this primitively.
That said, they do some interesting stuff before slouching back into the 12 bar pattern. Dirty Robber, I liked a lot for example. Have Love Will Travel, one of the few deviations from the familiar 1-4-5 pattern has a very addictive hook and the distorted guitar and vocal is just the right side of dirty. The sax that bursts through after the first couple of rounds is a stabbing, spluttering joyride of grungy ecstasy.
It is very much a counter culture album I think. From the mood and the anti-establishment tone, you can tell these chaps are going for something different and that's great. I'll come back to a few of these - Psycho I enjoyed and indeed their version of Money benefits greatly from the cheeky little chromatic kink they shove in the first change. And a song with a title like Strychnine is gonna have to work very hard for me to dislike it.
But those 5 that I really liked don't even make 50% of the content so it's an album to cherry pick, rather than consume whole.
It is still basically rock and roll though. The same progressions, the same words and as is irritatingly common for this period, the same actual songs. Money, for example has appeared on 4 of these albums so far if my count is correct.
The vocal comes in the form of two singers in what I assume is supposed to be unison but who are separated by a quarter tone and 0.0125 of a semi-quaver at every turn. Punk isn't really my bag and neither is this. The quality of their voices is not sufficient to be recorded this primitively.
That said, they do some interesting stuff before slouching back into the 12 bar pattern. Dirty Robber, I liked a lot for example. Have Love Will Travel, one of the few deviations from the familiar 1-4-5 pattern has a very addictive hook and the distorted guitar and vocal is just the right side of dirty. The sax that bursts through after the first couple of rounds is a stabbing, spluttering joyride of grungy ecstasy.
It is very much a counter culture album I think. From the mood and the anti-establishment tone, you can tell these chaps are going for something different and that's great. I'll come back to a few of these - Psycho I enjoyed and indeed their version of Money benefits greatly from the cheeky little chromatic kink they shove in the first change. And a song with a title like Strychnine is gonna have to work very hard for me to dislike it.
But those 5 that I really liked don't even make 50% of the content so it's an album to cherry pick, rather than consume whole.
#0048: Jerry Lee Lewis - Live At The Star Club Hamburg [***]
I don't know enough about this guy to comment on whether he was considered a virtuoso piano player. Certainly from this recording, any competent player would not be daunted to replicate his trademark key smashes and hand-heeled glissando. The range of roles a piano can play in a band extends from the almost toneless attack that earned it its place in the percussion section of the orchestra all the way to the furthest reaches of harmonic complexity and in this band, the piano is definitely closer to a drum kit than a voice.
As with the other live recordings from this time, the acoustics of the room have been captured and the ambient audience noises provide the subtle details in an aural picture that makes you feel like you were present.
It's a big sound and full of energy, unrelenting and driven. His presence as a performer is tangible as he stamps, hammers and swoops thru these rock n roll showstoppers. In the 47 albums preceding this, I have heard nothing like it before and I have to assume that when he emerged in 1954 (according to wikipedia) that nobody else had either. Of course, my perception is polluted by the more than 50 years of musical influences that followed this so I can't truly imagine what it must've been like for people to be hearing this for the first time. But I can well understand why its urgent power would be arresting.
I don't think it's something I'm going to come back to that often. Perhaps a couple of tracks might make it onto an oldy-worldy mix tape but it does all rather blend into one. It's the sort of music I'd dance to rather than listen to intently. But it does sound great and is enjoyable for as long as it remains interesting.
As with the other live recordings from this time, the acoustics of the room have been captured and the ambient audience noises provide the subtle details in an aural picture that makes you feel like you were present.
It's a big sound and full of energy, unrelenting and driven. His presence as a performer is tangible as he stamps, hammers and swoops thru these rock n roll showstoppers. In the 47 albums preceding this, I have heard nothing like it before and I have to assume that when he emerged in 1954 (according to wikipedia) that nobody else had either. Of course, my perception is polluted by the more than 50 years of musical influences that followed this so I can't truly imagine what it must've been like for people to be hearing this for the first time. But I can well understand why its urgent power would be arresting.
I don't think it's something I'm going to come back to that often. Perhaps a couple of tracks might make it onto an oldy-worldy mix tape but it does all rather blend into one. It's the sort of music I'd dance to rather than listen to intently. But it does sound great and is enjoyable for as long as it remains interesting.
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