Category Archives: Breakfast Blend

Breakfast Blend: Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, “Prove it all Night”

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The Biletones have had as busy a summer–one that has compounded just how crazy my day job has been–playing no fewer than five gigs since June, with one more benefit ahead mid-October.

Demanding or not, it is big fun, not just playing, but playing live is among the greatest feelings I have experienced.

Unfortunately, because the band does have day jobs and busy lives, we only manage practice once a week, and with that many performances on top of one another, we have pretty much kept the same set list all summer.

And, needless to say, we have become sick of most of the songs we play, no matter how much we might like them at the core.

Since there is roughly a month between the last two shows this run, we did troll one another for song suggestions, coming up with roughly ten tunes new to us to throw onto the possibles for the October soiree.

One that made the cut was The Boss’s Prove it all Night, a great cut from his equally great Darkness on the Edge of Town record.

Darkness made my Essential 50 albums, and it clearly stands as my favorite Springsteen album amongst a very strong body of work.

Say what you will about Springsteen, being a superstar, dismissing his “art” due to his fame along with the spectacle of arena rock that follows him, but, mark my words, his band is as strong and tight as any other group whoever hit the stage, and no one is more dedicated–performance by performance–to delivering a quality and entertaining show to his minions as is Springsteen and his cartel.

Similarly, Bruce is an excellent song writer, penning a variety of numbers over the years that do indeed explore the angst and uncertainty of life that we associated with rock’n’roll. In fact, because Bruce and his band have endured, we have seen him grow and reflect upon life, not just as an artist, but as an aging and maturing one who accepts his life and fate and is able to translate that experience into songs that hit a chord with his audience.

If there is a problem with Bruce and the band, he has a voice, and they have a sound that seem to make it hard to break out. Rarely do the songs from album to album differ in essence and approach as say the Stones do when you compare Aftermath to Beggar’s Banquet to Their Satanic Majesty’s Request.

True, Bruce has had his more than interesting explorations, such as the uber-satisfying Nebraska but as noted, the essence of the band has been constant over the years, and thus I think as a result he gets dismissed a little.

In fact, Springsteen and the band have been largely missing from this site (there are other bands too I have thought of that deserve reminders of just how good they are) so I thought I would try to right.

The clip below is and excellent example of the Springsteen way, which is basically concocting a four-minute gem for an album, and then blowing it into a ten-minute tour de force live.

What is different about this clip, is that Bruce is the lead guitar player, and he delivers killer notes and tone (thank you Mr. Telecaster!). Roy Brittan also provides a  lovely keys in this treatment, but the guts all go to Bruce.

Breakfast Blend: Friday On My Mind

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I first heard Jonathan Richman on the Beserkely Chartbusters album, which included some new Modern Lovers (not the original band) recordings with some of the other bands the Beserkely label were offering. This was the first recorded version of Roadrunner, in 1975, to be released.

In 1976 Beserkely licensed the John Cale produced Modern Lovers sessions and released them. I have no idea which version John Lydon heard before his audition, but the Cale version, titled “Roadrunner (Once)” was a hit in England in 1976. But some NYC record mavens were listening the year before, especially to the tunes Government Center and New Bank Teller, which were different.

But Beserkely was created mostly out of frustration that a Bay area rock band called Earth Quake wasn’t breaking large. The first single the label released was Earth Quake’s version of the Australian band the Easybeat’s 1967 hit Friday On My Mind.

This live version is less, um, concise than the single, but I have to say, for me this is rock ‘n’ roll and remnants, too. I love this band and the video. Less so the pants.

But if it’s Friday, we shouldn’t ignore the far more economical and Mod Australian Easybeats version.

It is a great song. Portugal. The Man should cover it. Or Lorde.

Obit: Cosimo Matassa

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Is this the first rock ‘n’ roll song?

That was 1947. Some say it was this Fats Domino tune from 1950.

I always thought this Joe Turner tune was the one, but obviously this was a process.

The unifying thing here, however, is that all three tunes were recorded in Cosimo Matassa’s studio in New Orleans, with Matassa engineering.

Jerry Lee Lewis cut his first demos in that studio. Frankie Ford’s iconic New Orleans tune Sea Cruise was recorded there. Little Richard’s hits? Matassa recorded them.

You can read all about his rockin’ life in this New York Times obituary.

Breakfast Blend: Hawkwind

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This morning I stumbled upon a blog by a guy who owns more than 3,000 CDs. His plan was to write about one of them each day for 3,000 days, a goal with the virtue of insanity. He started back in June of 2012, writing about (for some reason) an album called New Gold Dreams by Simple Minds.

After a few months of feverish production the blog posts slowed, and ground to a halt early this year. Then, in March, he announced that he would be taking on a more manageable load, writing about one song per day. For some reason he was soon into Hawkwind, and after writing eight increasingly dispiriting posts about Hawkwind songs, production again stopped.

Having invested 6+ minutes listening to Hawkwind’s The Psychedelic Warlords, and getting to know just a bit about a band I’d heard of but don’t think I’d ever actually heard, it seemed like something to share. I don’t actually have anything to say about it, except I’m glad I’m not tripping.

But that’s from 1974. What did Hawkwind sound like at the beginning, in 1969? Their first album was produced by Dick Taylor, of the Pretty Things, and was recorded live in the studio.

The first song is a folk-rocker, Hurry On Sundown. Pretty nice.

But the song that drew attention for its visionary electronics is the long jam, Seeing As You Really Are.

Breakfast Blend: Dancing Barefoot

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When Patti Smith was awarded the Swedish Polar Music prize in 2011, her song Dancing Barefoot was sung by two up and coming sisters from the suburbs of Stockholm who go by the name First Aid Kit.

The incantatory power of that song gets me every time, but I wonder what Patti is thinking. Her visage is stern, but it’s hard to believe she is being hypercritical at that point. And by the end she too seems caught up in the power of her song and the loveliness of the harmonies and then the audaciousness of the poetic recitation (and maybe the length of her history, at this point).

The incantatory power of Dancing Barefoot bubbles up in this clip from Rockpalast TV in 1979, too. I’ve watched many Rockpalast TV clips and don’t recall being aware of the audience, particularly, but in this churning version of the song, which wouldn’t be out of place at a Quicksilver Messenger Service show, the audience suddenly breaks through and Patti has to handle the mess, and she does. It is very strange theater that comes with a terrific vocal performance and her very solid band. Plus, she blesses the pope!

Breakfast Blend: Jawbreaker

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I got an email from my friend Walker yesterday afternoon. He was walking in the East Village over the weekend and ran into the singer/songwriter Rachelle Garniez, with whom he’s friendly. She was with a woman who was in the band The Friggs named Palmyra Delran. Walker looked the Friggs up on Wikipedia. He found, he wrote to me, a prize-winningly unique line.

“The Friggs’ song “Bad Word for a Good Thing” appeared in both the films Jawbreaker and Fuck.”

I checked and am pretty sure he’s right. No other song can make that claim.

I happened to see Jawbreaker in a press screening before its opening in February 1999. The Friggs’ song has a good sound that Blondie got to 20 years earlier.

Another song from the Jawbreaker soundtrack is Imperial Teen’s winning confection Yoo Hoo, and it’s weird and vivid video, which is a lot more winning than I recall the movie to be.

 

Breakfast Blend: The Terrible Stones

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I’m starting this post having just stumbled on this one, which is irredeemable. Awful. Even though the groove might work. If I had a liberal definition of riff, this isn’t a terrible one. But it is an absolutely terrible song.

There isn’t much to redeem this one, Indian Girl, either. If you last to the end you may rank it lower than She’s So Cold. Maybe.

But those are my worst Stones songs. Post yours in the comments.