Category Archives: lawr

OBIT: Dan Hicks, 1941-2016

by

Dan Hicks might not be as well known as some of the rock mainstays who have left us the past few months, but never-the-less, Hicks, leader of the seminal Bay Area Gypsy Jazz/Rock-a-Billy/Jug Band/Folk troupe, “Dan Hicks and his Hot Licks,” passed away February 6 from Cancer.

Hicks’ band involved a country swing core (violins) along with guitar, bass, and three vocals–Hicks and two women singers–but he certainly was a wordsmith, as well as a man who carried his bay area sensibilities to heart.

I remember in 1973, seeing the Kinks at Winterland, with Hicks and Licks playing second on the bill. His band turned in a great set, but Hicks spent a few moments sort of happily sneering at the crowd that he knew the audience really couldn’t wait to “see the motherfucking Kinks” (who were on tour supporting Everybody’s In Showbiz). Still, the band (both in fact) were great.

I Scare Myself, might well be Hicks best known tune, and this great clip features Hicks on his 60th birthday, playing the Warfield in The City, with virtually all the musicians who had graced his band at one time or another.

But, my favorite was the uber-clever, How Can I Miss You (When You Won’t Go Away).

One less funny irreverent musician on the planet.

Give Me Spotify, or Give Me Death?

by

whiteI recently initiated my own hashtag: #iambecomingabesimpson.

Mind you, it is not that I desire to become the sometimes senile, emotionally bankrupt, confused denture wearing sire of Homer Jay Simpson, it is just that I am getting old.

My next birthday, my family will be able to sing When I’m 64 to me, and while it is true I am aging, I am trying to adapt.

I do have an IPhone 6, and I score my golf on it, do my banking, retrieve my boarding passes, text a lot, do Twitter (@lawrmichaels in case you are interested) but in some ways I am not so much resisting aspects of the future and technology that have already run amok it seems. It is more, I am just not interested.

For example, I have an MFA in literature with a specialty in 19th Century British authors. That means I know a lot of George Eliot, Charles Dickens, the Brontes, and for sure Jane Austen.

So, when Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was released last week, all I can do is shake my head, cupped in both hands, and wonder why the fuck someone would even try such a thing let alone how it could possibly be any good? (And, if they were thinking, they might have considered Austen’s first novel, Northanger Abbey, which holds literary vehicles from the Gothic novel, in that there are castles and mysterious hallways and personages, all perfect for bloodsucking.)

More to the point: How did we seem to run out of story ideas?

But, I digress.

I do have this IPhone, but Lindsay (and her sister Kelly) always give me gentle shit because I have 116,000 un-deleted emails (my baseball mates here on the site will probably attest to the amount of stupid industry spam and such we get), or I cannot figure out how to turn the horizontal view on the phone off.

But, Lindsay is my music mate in the family, and she has been on me to to get Spotify for over a year now, and this last Saturday, I kind of relented. That is, I downloaded the app, made an initial favorites list (The Who, The Kinks, Mick Ronson, Richard Thompson, Yo La Tengo, and Wilco) and streamed on my way to the golf course. Mind you, no money has exchanged hands as of yet, for I get the free service, with commercials.

My conundrum is I am not sure just how much to commit to Spotify.

For one thing, I really like listening to the radio. I love two stations–KTKE, and KEXP–both off the wall independent ones just like I love listening to baseball on the radio. It is something I grew up doing, and somehow the commercials (I can so hear Vin Scully talking up “Farmer John’s sausages”) don’t bother a lick within those contexts.

Another thing, though, is I started buying albums in 1963 (Surfin’ USA) and did so until the 70’s when 8-track, and cassettes burst onto the scene. In the end, though, the tapes were not reliable, so most of the stuff I bought on tape I wound up repurchasing on vinyl.

And, then came CDs, meaning now 25 years into their existence I have about 800 albums and 800 CDs, and probably 15% I cross own. For example, I think of the Beatles White Album.

I bought that on regular vinyl when it came out, and then again in the late 70’s when re-issued on white vinyl. But, I also bought it on cassette so I could listen to my player on my headphones at night when I went to sleep. Needless to say, I also own the White Album on CD, meaning I have purchased the rights to listen to Dear Prudence no less than four times.

And, now, in order to stream the White Album on Spotify, I have to pay a fee to listen again?

OK, so you could say the music moguls saw me coming, and it is not that I am against streaming or using my IPhone as such.

My old IPhone 4 had 1300 songs on it from all over the map, and that made for some killer streaming, but when I upgraded to the IPhone 6, I lost three-fourths of what was on my playlist for one technical reason, or another (never that I had not purchased the rights: more like I am too lazy to put the album information in anywhere).

But, I also have TuneIn radio, and stream KTKE and KEXP so I can listen to what I want when I want.

Lindsay, however, says all this will be wrapped into one nifty package–sans commercials–and that we can share playlists and songs without having to burn anything.

OK, that sounds like fun, but, how long till I have to switch when something falls out of favor (Napster or MySpace, anyone)?

I probably will wind up subscribing just to make life easier, and well, I love the fact that in Lindsay I simply have someone in the family who loves music as much as I do, so this is a small price for sharing something so wondrous.

Also, though I am getting older, it is not like I don’t want to grow or change, or stay open. After all, when I returned to the golf links after a 40-year layoff, I played in high top cons for over six months. My friends all said I should get some cleats, but I waved that off as such an affectation.

“When the grass is wet,” I was cautioned, you will see.

Sure enough, one fall morning I hit a tee shot on a par 3 into one of the bunkers guarding the green. It had rained a little, and the bunker was muddy, and as I stepped in to get ready to make my shot, I slipped.

I was able to catch my balance, and did not fall, but my planted left hip and leg, which was anchored, got tweaked and bothered me for two weeks.

The next day I bought cleats, and when Diane asked me why, suddenly, I said “I am getting older. I understand at my age if you break your hip in public, they just shoot you in the head where you are and leave you there.”

As Elvis Costello said:  “Don’t bury me cos I’m not dead yet.”

OBIT: Maurice White (1941-2016)

by

Once again a significant figure in the pop music world has passed to another plane, this time in the form of Maurice White, leader, songwriter, and force behind the dynamic Earth, Wind, and Fire.

My first real job out of college was spent as a social worker for the Housing Authority of the City of Oakland. That meant managing public housing units, and that meant my day was indeed spent on some of the city’s tougher ghettos.

I did always get on just fine in such circumstances, and though I was indeed into 801, Springsteen, and then punk when it arrived, I never backed away from soul, starting from the earliest days of Motown.

EWF, or “the elements” as my cool work mates referred to the group, were certainly a band at the time I really did like, but I probably would not have been exposed to White and crew in the same way had I not held my job.

But, my workmates turned me onto their Way of the World album, that featured the great Shining Star. And, though Shining Star is a killer cut, I chose the title track as my tribute to White, who passed this morning after suffering from Parkinson’s Disease at 74.

Way of the World is a love song that indeed features White’s strong melody and lyrical skills, his band at full skill, and this particular cut has a killer guitar solo, something we all love.

EWF are still the elements, and White is eternal. Sigh.

 

Afternoon Snack: Avi Buffalo, “What’s In It For Me?”

by

Back in the days before the market crash and stuff like that, I subscribed to Mojo Magazine. But, it got expensive and well, print is dead, so after six or seven years I let it drop.

I do sort of miss the rag even though I was forever behind in reading and remotely staying current with the what was new, for Mojo was great for that in my view.

I found Arcade Fire, My Morning Jacket, and Avi Buffalo, among others via Mojo, which made it a lot easier to identify newer bands I might find challenging.

I had pretty much forgotten about Avi Buffalo till last week, when I accidentally wiped out the albums I had stored on my car playlist. So, in the process of rebuilding, I found a mix disc I burned with What’s In It For Me.

Granted, this tune is nothing earth shattering, but it is tuneful pop with really fine guitar interplay and pretty good drums. The bass player plays a Hofner, but he is the weak link.

Anyway, for what it is worth.

 

OBIT: Paul Kantner (1941-2016)

by

Paul Kantner, who evolved as the driving force behind first Jefferson Airplane, and subsequently Jefferson Starship (not The Starship, mind you) has passed away at the age of 74.

It is hard for me to believe that almost six years ago I posted this piece right here on the Remnants as I declared the Airplane the best rock band of the San Francisco psychedelic era. That article was on the passing of drummer Joey Covington, and sadly, now it is Kantner.

It is cool that Peter already published Have You Seen the Stars Tonight?, for that was the first song I thought of posting for Kantner, but there are certainly a zillion more I love.

I was lucky enough to live in the Bay Area during the heyday of the SF bands, so I got to see the Airplane more than a few times, even at Winterland, with the Dead, Big Brother, and Quicksilver. Good as those other bands were, the Airplane were easily my fave.

For starters, this clip of Crown of Creation, from The Smothers Brothers Show in 1968, is emblematic of the band–which did feature three singers unlike most bands at the time–in their flower power heyday. (Note that Paul plays a Rickenbacker!)

It was largely Kantner’s vision that pushed the band through five great studio albums along with a killer live one before the metamorphosis into Jefferson Starship,

Kantner was soft-spoken, but equally outspoken with respect to the causes of the left, but he was ultimately a musician and artist whose band left a significant body of great work.

Like this fantastic treatment of the traditional song, Good Shepherd from Volunteers, performed at the Fillmore East in 1969.

 

But, my favorite moment of Kantner occurred in 1981, when U2 first was gaining a buzz. I went to see the up-and-coming Irish band, and who should be sitting behind me at a little table, all by his lonesome, but Paul Kantner?

I will leave with two treatments of Fred Neil’s The Other Side of this Life. This first is the band, interrupted during play at the infamous Altamont gig in which Kantner, clearly the leader of the band confronts Hell’s Angel Ralph “Sonny” Barger.

But, this second treatment, from the wonderful live Bless Its Pointed Little Head just fucking smokes.

I will see the stars tonight Paul, and will see you among them.

Iowa Caucus, Politicians, The Boss and Seeing Clearly

by

I was streaming KTKE on my way to the links the other morning and Bruce Springsteen’s fantastic Brilliant Disguise  came streaming through the car radio, allowing me to sing my ass off along with the Boss, finishing just as I pulled into the Buchanan Fields parking lot.

No question, Bruce sticks largely to his working class roots and experience when composing lyrics, and he is indeed a strong songwriter with respect to words, meter, and rhyme.

Springsteen’s Darkness on the Edge of Town LP made our initial Top 60, and still is my favorite album by Bruce, but Brilliant Disguise, and Out in the Streets (from The River) are my two favorite songs by the artist.

Brilliant Disguise, which riffs of the early days of Rock’n’Roll in two nice little homages, is really a great tune about relationships, honesty, how we present ourselves to others, and most important, how we see others and how they see us.

The Boss implores a lover’s confusion about barriers for two choruses asking “tell me what I see, when I look in your eyes?” but concludes his last chorus turning the tables asking “tell me who you see when you look in my eyes?”

Brilliant Disguise riffs  in its nod to the beat of The Drifters’ Save the Last Dance for Me, and then as the words complete, makes reference to Lou Christie’s The Gypsy Cried, both tunes from 1962.

Anyway, just before latest Republican debate and the Donald Trump travelling sideshow, days before the Iowa Caucus, well, let the words of the Boss ring in the back of our minds.

OBIT: Glenn Frey, “Already Gone”

by

Wow, things are getting tight for the rockers of our youth, for now Eagles guitarist Glenn Frey has passed away today at the age of 67, apparently from multiple illnesses.

Again, I was slow to come to the Eagles although I remember an ex-girlfriend, Cindy Graham, playing Already Gone for me the first time in 1976 saying how much it was my kind of song.

Cindy was right and that started my interest in the band that did indeed grow to some pretty good respect.

Frey was core to the band along with Don Henley, Bernie Leadon, Randy Meissner, and later Timothy B. Schmidt (a great bass player) along with the great Joe Walsh. Say what you will: these guys could play.

I am sure there will be more words to come, so I will keep this short and just give you the song with thoughts of Glenn as he changes planes.

 

OBIT: Bowie

by

Like many, I was not open to David Bowie when he appeared in my circle in 1974 or thereabouts.

In fairness to Bowie, when I first saw a picture of the Stones, I remember at the age of 12 thinking the band was going just a little too far with the hair and clothing, and later, when I first heard of Johnny and the Sex Pistols, again, I thought it was a joke. Needless to say, both bands became all time favorites.

But, going into my senior year at college I had the lucky fortune to live in a house with three women (sigh, those were the days), one of whom, Evie Gandleman (at the time, not sure if she got married and changed her name), and her boyfriend, Rebel (see why it was hard to take seriously?) were nutso for Bowie, calling him the “man of the future.”

It was embarrassing to see them go into the chant of the ever circling skeletal family, seeming more like Moonies than rockers.

However, the album they chanted–Diamond Dogs— contained the fantastic song Rebel Rebel, a tune I could not deny then, and still dig, and eventually Bowie won me over (if Evie and Rebel are still together, are they now One Direction fans?).

As a result, I saw Bowie twice, once in the late 70’s on the Low tour, and again 20 years later when Bowie toured with Trent Reznor and his band Nine Inch Nails.

The Low show was great, it being my favorite period of Bowie’s, and the NIN one so interesting as there was no formal set change. NIN started the show, and seven or eight songs in, one-by-one, a member of Reznor’s band would leave the stage and a member of Bowie’s replaced him.

This went on till Reznor was the only member of his band, at which point Bowie came on and they did a song together.

I saw that NIN/Bowie show with my late pal, Cathy, whom I had been dating for about three months and I will never forget Reznor kicking into the song Closer, snaking my fingers through Cathy’s, and saying, “This is our song” (I got a squeeze back).  So, well, I have to drop that video in just because (if you don’t know the song, listen to the words and think that Cathy was, in some ways, a very shy and modest woman).

Back to Bowie, aside from a long and interesting and influential career of great songs, it is because of Bowie that I got to know Mick Ronson who is one of my three all time favorite guitar players (Bill Frisell and Richard Thompson being the others).

Like many other great artists, part of what made Bowie great was his desire to change paths along with his art and try to go somewhere new. And, being more of a rocker than anything, it is why Ziggy Stardust and Tin Machine are among my favorite albums by the artist (with Low and Diamond Dogs) while his more dance-based projects (Dancin’ In the Streets, Young Americans) ranked lower on my love list.

I think the real power of Bowie, though, is in that word, his name. For, he is iconic enough to be regarded by just one, like Dylan and Cher (sorry, but she is huge). Which is kind of a big deal.

I had planned on finding some choice Bowie tune to drop here, but there have been plenty in the previous posts. Plus, while looking for a song, I stumbled onto this fabulous interview with Mick Ronson, who explains (sort of) his band’s guitar sound, and then demonstrates. It’s awesome, and for sure you get both late great artists, Bowie and Ronson.

Earth misses both of you!

Afternoon Snack: For Lemmy, Knopfler, and all Guitar Players Everywhere

by

I started looking for this video the day Lemmy left us, with the intent of posting it as my little tribute to the guy.

When I looked on YouTube, I could not find it (apparently the skit was on a BBC series and the posting was a copyright violation) so I had to scrounge.

The video really speaks for itself and, it is way funny and cool (and must have been a blast to do).

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=7e3_1375973597

 

Movies: Josh White, “You Won’t Let Me Go”

by

I don’t really have nearly as much of a familiarity with the blues–at least their origins–as I do Brit Pop, and New Wave, and 60’s pop and a lot of other musical categories that would be nothing without Robert Johnson and the Reverend Gary Davis.

And, I am a serious TCM junkie, in addition to my dependencies on just about everything else in life, and I have been watching Westerns a lot lately, for what reason I do not know other than I like them. Westerns do seem to speak to a simpler time, though I am surely not suggesting we turn back the clock on much of anything.

But, the exploration and development of the West was indeed the romantic period of America’s bloodline like King Arthur is to England, Samurai are to Japan, and Star Wars is, for example, to space movies.

Well, the other day, as I was surfing through the channels and on the Western channel, the film The Walking Hills was on.

Unfortunately, it was about 40 minutes into the film, and what grabbed my attention was the motley group gathered around a fire ring in the desert, when suddenly Josh White broke into a great song, playing guitar and singing.

I did not know who Josh White was, and I had never heard of The Walking Hills, so I went to the IMDB and looked up the film, and discovered a boatload of good shit.

Like:

  • Directed by John Sturges, in 1949. Sturges was the son of Preston Sturges, and also directed The Magnificent Seven (which is a riff on The Seven Samurai), Bad Day at Black Rock, and The Great Escape, among others.
  • The Walking Hills is considered to be the only “noir western.”
  • Preston Sturges was the king of the screwball comedies, having made Sullivan’s Travels, The Lady Eve, and Remember the Night, among others, and was among the first screenwriters to use his skill to move into direction, and then control of his films during the heyday of the Hollywood system.
  • The Walking Hills featured a ton of folks who were great character actors during those golden Hollywood years, but that most of us grew to know via television. Among them:
    • Edgar Buchanan: Uncle Joe in Petticoat Junction, Shane, and The Talk of the Town.
    • John Ireland: Spartacus, Red River, and Day of the Nightmare.
    • Arthur Kennedy: Was in a zillion movies, including Lawrence of Arabia, Elmer Gantry, High Sierra, and Emmanuel on Taboo Island (I guess even actors have to eat?).
    • Randolf Scott: Big western star in the 40’s and 50’s, was in Sam Pekinpah’s Ride the High Country, Santa Fe, and My Favorite Wife.
    • Ella Raines: OK, I had never heard of Ms. Raines, but man was she hot in this film. Swear.
    • Josh White: A blues musician who recorded with Leadbelly, among others, and who made me search hither and yon in for the song White sang at the campfire, but I couldn’t. I had never heard of White either, and the beauty of the campfire scene is White really focused as much on playing guitar as singing. And, he could really play.  Anyway, this is what I could find to share that gives you an idea: