A few weeks back Peter noted some great stuff about Little Willie John on the site.
And, that kicked my brain cells back to Robbie Robertson’s eponymously named debut album which is a killer in my meager opinion.
Employing Peter Gabriel and U2 and the Bodeans among others to help with instruments and especially vocals, the album really goes all over the map musically, with each song a little stronger than the cut before.
This one, Somewhere Down the Crazy River is clearly the one that tripped the Little Willie John wires:
But, this song, Hell’s Half Acre is as driving and kickass a rocker as ever lived. I can actually leave it in a loop for five or six playings on my phone it is so good and visceral.
Here is hoping everyone out there has a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving holiday!
This is the real AC/DC. Buzzing dual rhythm guitars threatening to zap themselves right off the stage with excess electric energy. Not pitch-perfectly in tune? Yeah. So what?
Power trios are OK, but nothing beats a great rhythm guitar.
I chose the song because it is relevant given all of the current allegations (e.g. Harvey Weinstein, Lewis CK, Roy Moore, Al Franken, and sadly, our president) that have brought attention to how our patriarchal (and often misogynistic) society allows men use their positions of power to take advantage of women or keep them down. More on that later.
Amos was a piano prodigy, raised in a very strict religious family headed by her Methodist minister father. Legend has it she could play the instrument before she could talk. When she was only 5 years old she won a full scholarship to the prestigious Peabody Institute for gifted children; the youngest person to be admitted).
By the time she was a teenager she became interested in rock music. In the mid-80s she was heading a band called Y Kant Tori Read. This was a career misstep that is obvious just by looking at the album cover and press photos. (The album still commands very high prices in record collecting circles.)
Around 1990 she went solo where she really found her footing and began a very successful career with a following that is passionately loyal.
This brings us back to “God” which was on her second solo album, Under the Pink (1994).
The lyrics are edgy, taking on Christian religion and how women are portrayed as sexless (e.g. the Virgin Mary) and how that tradition has left women in a “less than” role, even today. She challenges this dominant male point of view and the subservient role of women, singing “God sometimes you just don’t come through / Do you need a woman to look after you?”
In the book Women, Sex and Rock ‘n’ Roll – In Their Own Words by Liz Evans, Amos expands on what “God” is all about.
I’ve written a song called ‘God’ about patriarchal religion, and how it’s just fucked the whole thing up. Basically I say to Him, “You know, you need a babe and I’ve got nothing to do Tuesday and Thursday this week!” lt’s unacceptable in how it’s affected people. And it isn’t just women who’ve been affected. Men have had to cut out a whole part of themselves too, which is why we have to deal with all that shit from our boyfriends! Men and women are going to have to recognize the female energy that we’ve cut out.
Beside the thought-provoking lyrics, the music is cool. During this period, Amos mostly performed and recorded solo – just her voice and piano. But on “God” she employs a full band and electronic loops. The result is a cacophony of keys, guitars, drums and effects that yield scronks and squeals that sound like seagulls swarming above.
Over the years I’ve learned that Tori Amos is the type of artist that divides people into lovers or haters. There’s no middle ground – you either get it or you don’t. I think she’s great and “God” is one of my favorite cuts!
I bought an album by German band Kadavar a couple years ago and liked it OK, but I found it a little too straight Sabbath rippy to hold my interest for more than a couple listens.
Classic Rock magazine told me tonight that their new album, Rough Times, is uncharted territory for them. This song has perhaps just enough pop sensibility to make the whole thing work better. I’m gonna give Rough Times a try.
The drummer’s eyes, the singer’s teeth, the hairbrush at the end. Intriguing!!!
You know how you’re going from place to place on the internet, and then you end up someplace and you have no idea how you got there? Tonight that happened to me, when I landed at clubdevo.com.
Devo would seem to be an internet savvy band, all techno and futuristic, even if that represents the devolution of humankind. But clubdevo.com is a wasteland. Only the Twitter feed is alive with content. You can check in here: http://www.clubdevo.com/
I bought the Basement 5 album 1965-1980 unheard. Cool logo, promise of reggae-punk fusion, and I’m not sure what else. Did I know the drummer was in the Blockheads? I don’t think so, but maybe I did. Don Letts sang with the band at some point, but they weren’t Clash or PiL associated that I remember at the time. But who knows, it was a long time ago.
I stumbled across the artwork yesterday, remembered I owned the disk, then found that the elpee had been rereleased recently on vinyl by Rough Trade. And then I stumbled upon this Peel Session recording from 1980, which sounds a whole lot better than the album did. Or does.
I was talking about this at dinner last night at a friend’s house, the song immediately appears on our host’s Spotify over Sonos magnificent sound system from the elpee, and it sounds terrible.
Peel Session sounds great. Last White Christmas is a keeper. My attention has wavered on and off after that one. But for an obscure one-off from a long time ago, having one song worth listening to is pretty darn good.
There is good playing here, and a minimum of offensive show biz (while there is plenty of show biz). It feels amazing that this clip is from a Grammy Awards show, but who knows? The last time I watched one of those might have been in 1986. This is fun, musically, and larded with a ton of contextual social stuff that someone else might like to unpack.
For me, it is the playing and seeing these big stars live (on tape).
Today’s SotW is another installment of the “evolution series.” The featured song is “I Can’t Let Go” that was written by Al Gorgoni and Chip Taylor. (Not to be confused with the great Lucinda Williams tune with a similar title.) Gorgoni was a NY based session guitarist that played on hits for everyone from the Four Seasons to The Shangri-Las to The Monkees and Van Morrison (and more). Taylor is most famous for also writing “Wild Thing” and “Angel of the Morning,” an odd combination, I know! He’s also lesser known as the brother of Jon Voight (and uncle to Angelina Jolie).
The original version was released in 1965 by a 19 year old Evie Sands but didn’t receive much airplay outside of her home base of NYC. It was a bigger hit by the artists that recorded and released it after her.
Poor Evie Sands was star-crossed. She released a cut of “Angel of the Morning” as a follow up to “I Can’t Let Go.” It was initially popular but sunk like the Titanic when her record company (Cameo-Parkway) filed for bankruptcy. Merrilee Rush “rushed” out her own version a few months later that made it into the Top 10!
The Hollies released their 1966 recording that topped off at #46 on the charts in the US.
The Hollies always had the uncanny ability to recognize a good song and put their own twist onto it by giving it a British beat feel with soaring harmonies. This is the best version and one of my favorite tracks by the Hollies.
Linda Ronstadt reached #31 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1980 with the rendition she released on her Mad Love album.
A few weeks ago I took a mild swipe at Ronstadt, so I’m making amends today. This is a fine recording – well sung, well played and well produced. My only gripe would be that it so closely follows the Hollies arrangement.
All in all, it’s a strong cup of blue eyed soul in all three styles.
My daughter went to elementary school with a boy whose father writes for the Please Kill Me web site. I’ve only met Todd a couple of times, in passing, so he’s not my friend, but he wrote this weirdly cool history of Dave Alexander, who played bass on the first two Stooges albums and was then kicked out and died.
What I like about Todd’s treatment is he reports what people said or wrote about Dave. He goes easy on the dramatic build up and is beautifully empathic to the storytelling of Alexander’s peers by using their quotes. Plus he includes some choice descriptions of behavior by various Rolling Stones. This is classic rock storytelling, for sure, but easy going the way rock should be.
You’ll get the chance to play the video of Down On the Street while you read the piece, but you might also play it now.
One last thought. How different is Down on the Street from some Doors songs? Especially live? Which provokes the question: When it comes to classifying rock, do we maybe distinguish too much between hitmakers and their edgier cooler peers? The Stooges are punk pioneers on Elektra records, sounding here like the Doors, who made many hits on Electra records at roughly the same time. That’s a sonic fact, but not a complete one. But what is the real story of sound, aesthetics, ambition and commercial viability? Every one thing changes all the others.
This is a reason to read Greil Marcus’s Doors book, which goes deep into the band’s non-hit life as a live band, how they sounded different than the hits, and darker than the public image.
By the time she was a teenager she became interested in rock music. In the mid-80s she was heading a band called Y Kant Tori Read. This was a career misstep that is obvious just by looking at the album cover and press photos. (The album still commands very high prices in record collecting circles.)
