The Double Album, Edited

 

There have been some great double albums, even some that play well from beginning to end. Layla is difficult to edit. XTC's English Settlement needs no editing, even if some listeners prefer the single disc version with five less tracks. There is an occasional exception for greatest hits records and compilations. Chuck Berry's The Great Twenty-eight is pretty much perfect. The Kink's Kronikles is also hard to mess with. 

Most double albums need some editing to approach perfection, and turning them into a single record of 45-50 minutes almost always makes them better. So making a playlist of an edited down single disc record can enhance the enjoyment of these often bloated double albums.

Then there's double CD releases that often run 140-150 minutes. They all need the work of a hatchet. 

So here's a few personal edits of double albums. I'll start right out with the sacrilege of reducing The White Album. Here's the improved Beatles White Album:
Back In The U.S.S.R.
Glass Onion
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Happiness Is A Warm Gun
I'm So Tired
Blackbird
Yer Blues
Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except For Me And My Monkey
Helter Skelter
Revolution 1
Savoy Truffle
Dear Prudence

Grateful Dead Grateful Dead (Skull And Crossbones):
Bertha 
Mama Tried
Big Railroad Blues 
Playin' In The Band
Me And My Uncle
Big Boss Man
Me And Bobby McGee
Johnny B. Goode  

See what I did there? It's side 1 and side 3. Anybody that says you can't possibly exclude The Other One (there are 50 other versions) is obsessed about The Dead. Don't bother to argue with them. Sides 1 and 3 of Allman Brothers At The Fillmore is another easy edit.

The Who Quadrophenia:

The Real Me 

Quadrophenia

The Punk And The Godfather

I'm One

5:15

Sea And Sand

Drowned

Doctor Jimmy

Love, Reign O'er Me

The Byrds (Untitled):

Lover Of The Bayou

Positively 4th Street

Nashville West

So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star

Mr. Spaceman

Chestnut Mare

Truck Stop Girl

All Good Things

Yesterday's Train

Just A Season

Cream Wheels Of Fire:

White Room

Sitting On Top Of The World

Politician

Those Were The Days

Born Under A Bad Sign

Crossroads

Spoonful

The Kinks Everybody's In Showbiz:

Sides 1 and 2 (Just remove sides 3 and 4, the live material.)

The same can be said of The Rascal's Freedom Suite (Removing the boring jams on sides 3 and 4).

And again for Moby Grape's Wow/Grape Jam (Skip the jams again.)

Todd Rundgren Something/Anything?:

I Saw The Light

It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference

Sweeter Memories

Breathless

The Night The Carousel Burned Down

Saving Grace

Marlene

Black Maria

One More Day (No Word)

Couldn't I Just Tell You

Dust In The Wind

Hello It's Me

Bruce Springsteen The River:

The Ties That Bind

Sherry Darling

Independence Day

Hungry Heart

Out In The Street

Crush On You

You Can Look (But You Better Not Touch)

I Wanna Marry You

The River

Fade Away

The Price You Pay

Drive-By Truckers Southern Rock Opera:

Ronnie And Neil

72 (This Highway's Mean)

The Southern Thing

The Three Great Alabama Icons

Wallace

Zip City

Let There Be Rock

Women Without Whiskey

Shut Up And Get On The Plane

Prince Sign 'O' The Times:

Sign 'O' The Times

The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker

Housequake

U Got The Look

If I Was Your Girlfriend

Strange Relationship

I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man

The Cross

Adore

I know, I left off the best song. How could I? Feel free to tell me about it in comments or propose your own edited version of one of these or any other double LP that needs editing. It's a fun and rewarding exercise.

Always On My Mind

 

I'm a big fan of greeting cards. Birthdays, Valentine's Day, Christmas, sometimes just for the heck of it. I'm particular when I'm looking for a good one. If I open the card and there's a lot of words, I put it back. If there's a lot of words, I know some of them won't express my sentiment. I like the succinct card that has a brief but effective message. Sweet, funny or punny are my favorites.

My least favorite is the apology card. There's a ton of them, and for all the aforementioned occasions. These cards are from a man to his sweetheart/wife/significant other. They start with a line like "I know I don't say it enough" or "I'm not the guy that does that thing you really want from me". I'm not perfect, but when I know something my wife wants from me, she's going to get it. I say I love you every day. I do things that I know will make my wife happy. And I never need to buy a card that starts with something I haven't done that I know I should have done.

The guys that buy these cards are assholes. Their wives should not forgive them for being a jerk (or worse) because they bought an apology card. And when it comes to expressing love for someone, starting with what is wrong with you is just stupid. Don't apologize. Stop being a jerk. Change.

Which brings us to Always On My Mind. It is a lovely song, a great melody that enhances the melancholy with some minor chords and sevenths. Just beautiful. But the lyrics are straight out of an apology card, and just godawful. I didn't tell you how happy you make me, I didn't treat you well, I didn't love you often enough, I didn't hold you when you needed me, and little things I should have said and done, I never took the time. Well, that's because I'm a shithead that doesn't deserve you. 

But you were always on my mind. Bullshit. If you were thinking of her and didn't do anything to express it, it doesn't count.

And when he finally says " Tell me that your sweet love hasn't died, and give me one more chance to keep you satisfied", she should be calling an attorney and filing for divorce. You can do better, and if not, you're still better off without this guy who does not deserve your love. 

Album Art

The stereo rack sits in the corner of the living room. Above it in the corner are two framed album covers. In this picture, it's Kim Richie's Rise and The Honeydogs' Love and Cannibalism. They worked together because the colors are similar and they are both collage designs. The selections change frequently. Usually there's a theme.

Like highways. That's the back cover of Jimmy Buffet's A1A and Tower of Power's Back to Oakland. 

Or Blue. Kenny Burrell's Midnight Blue and Joni Mitchell's Blue.

Or love. Stacy Kent's In Love Again and Nat King Cole's Love Is the Thing.

Or paintings with animals. Dylan's painting from the cover of The Band's Music From Big Pink and Calexico with Iron and Wine's In The Reins. 

Here's Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon with Billy Cobham's Spectrum. 

These two work nicely with the color of the wall. Donovan's Barabajagal and Ten Years After's Cricklewood Green. They are both from the same time period, and they are great records.

OK, breasts. I don't think these stayed up all that log. The Rondstadt is my favorite of her records, and the Marilyn Monroe is better than you'd think. It includes her famous Happy Birthday, Mr. President as well as songs she sang in movies, such as Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend. The cover is the gatefold picture she did for Playboy magazine. I'm guessing it sold well.

And then there's the Christmas season. I don't own all that many holiday records, but I have these two combos that I rotate year-to-year.

John Fahey's Christmas Guitar is a very lovely record. The Bolshoi Theater Orchestra's Nutcracker is a classic recording, and good, but there are better versions of the material. Perfect cover though.

Diana Krall's Christmas Songs and Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings' It's A Holiday Soul Party. Both are fun holiday covers, and also happen to be fabulous music.

And there we have it. There's a bunch of combos I didn't remember when I was taking the pictures, so maybe I'll return to this later, or I'll do it when I'm discussing two different records. If I leave anything up too long, the director of home decor keeps me updating fairly regularly.

Music Streaming (is killing me)

I started streaming music about a year ago. I bought a Bluesound Node, hired an electrician to run an ethernet line from my router to my living/music room, and subscribed to Qobuz. I don't use the DAC in the Bluesound Node, I use the DAC in my Benchmark DAC3 HGC.

Why Qobuz? Well, Qobuz streams everything in the highest resolution available. I think high resolution audio sounds better than CD, and I find mp3 to be unlistenable. I can check something out with mp3, but it sounds like crap to me on the music room kit. I know that Tidal and some others also offer high resolution streams, but Qobuz is also the service that pays artists the highest royalty rate, although it is still too low. If you want to support artists, listen on a streamer, and then buy what you like on Bandcamp, which actually pays artists reasonably well.

But streaming is killing me because I can no longer keep up with all the music I want to hear. New music listed on Qobuz, old music by artists I've liked but not fully explored, recommendations from music blogs I read, and music reviewed in magazines (I've also started using Libby, a library app which lets me read a ton of magazines).

I have 86 records saved in Favorites in BlueOS, the software interface from Bluesound. A while back I put four that I'd like to get back to on a list on my iPad just to get them out of Favorites. That's 90 records I want to hear again, or which I haven't gotten to yet. Many of them get one listen and are then removed, but if I want to hear them again, I leave them in favorites. There might be a better way to save things or file them to a different list in Roon, I'm not sure. I tried Roon for a while but the BlueOS coupled with iTunes Remote (to listen from my iTunes library on my computer) seemed to do most of the Roon functions, and the additional info in Roon didn't seem all that much better than in BlueOS, especially given the cost of Roon, which is even more than Qobuz. If I want credits or more info, Discogs and Wikipedia do a good job with that. Liner notes would be nice, but I guess I'll get over it.

I have over 1100 vinyl records and over 1300 CDs. Over the years, and with recent purges, I have sold off at least as many vinyl records as I now own and a whole bunch of CDs. I am currently working on putting all the CDs on a hard drive accessible through iTunes. I'm about 1/4 of the way through that tedious job. I still buy vinyl occasionally. I used to take a lot of music out from our local library system to hear it, but streaming has replaced that function almost entirely.

When I want to listen to music I love in the best sound, I listen to vinyl. I know the technical arguments regarding digital music's superiority, but those arguments by themselves don't make music sound better. Maybe it's because I grew up with and never left vinyl. CDs generally sound fine to me unless they were transferred to CD in the mid-late eighties, before record companies and mastering facilities got their act together. I very rarely have bought the vinyl version after I bought the CD. For casual listening or background music (music is never really background music to me), I like the playlists I can find on Qobuz, or ones I have generated myself either in iTunes or Qobuz. Everything in my iTunes is lossless digital. I bluetooth music directly to my hearing aides from my phone at the gym. In my car, I have music on a USB flash drive.

Now I have to go work on catching up on my list of Favorites. I've never used the word "work" when discussing listening to music before now. It's killing me.

True Love Travels On A Gravel Road

 

 

One of my favorite songs ever. Great melody, beautiful lyric, and several fine performances. Written by the songwriting team of Arthur Owens and Dallas Frazier, the first performance was by Duane Dee, and it's a good version that made it to #58 on the country charts. 

In 1969, Elvis Presley recorded it on his fabulous comeback record From Elvis In Memphis, and it is certainly the definitive version. The Memphis guys play it perfectly, and Elvis is fully invested in the lyric, and sings it straight from the heart. A highlight of what is arguably Elvis' best record.

Next up was a soul version by Percy Sledge, taken maybe a little too fast, but Percy sings it big like he usually does. Another solid interpretation, but nothing beats Elvis.

In 1992, The Afghan Whigs covered the song, and it is a different interpretation for sure. I haven't warmed to it much. Not great, not terrible.

In 1994, both Nick Lowe and The Highwaymen covered the song. Nick Lowe's version is a lovely, heartfelt take, and the Highwaymen do a decent job even with the four of them taking vocal turns.

Ultan Conlon, an Irish singer-songwriter did a nice version featuring Katie Theasby in 2020.

Involuntary Musical Imagery (Earworms)

Like many others, I am prone to getting a song stuck in my head. All day long I'll be humming, whistling, or singing the same tune, unable to escape the melody. I'm not usually too bothered by this, but sometimes they get stuck for just too darn long. I can usually remedy the problem by listening to the song, and then listening to something else. I do occasionally get a new song stuck, but mostly these songs come from my formative years, songs I've known and loved for decades. In fact, these are all from the sixties. Here's my top five most likely to be earworms for me:

5. Suspicious Minds- Elvis Presley  Elvis's last number one, and one of his best.

So if an old friend I know
Stops by to say hello
Would I still see suspicion in your eyes?
Here we go again
Asking where I've been
You can't see the tears I'm crying

We can't go on together
With suspicious minds
And we can't build our dreams
On suspicious minds

 

4. The Poor Side Of Town- Johnny Rivers   One of a very small number of songs Rivers actually wrote, and another number one hit.

 

How can you tell me
How much you miss me
When the last time I saw you
You wouldn't even kiss me

That rich guy you've been seein'
Must have put you down
So welcome back baby
To the poor side of town

 

Do-doo-doo-wah, shoo-be-doo-be

3. It's A Beautiful Day Today- Moby Grape.  A lovely ballad with great guitar parts.

Dawn to dawn a lifetime
The birds sing and day's begun
The heavens shine from dawn to dusk
With golden rays of sun

People on their way
Beginning a brand new day
I love hearing people say
It's a beautiful day today

2. Chapel Of Love- The Dixie Cups  Just a perfect melody, and the Dixie
Cups make it into one of the great girl group singles, and again, a number one hit.

Bells will ring, sun will shine, whoa
I'll be his and he'll be mine
We'll love until the end of time
And we'll never be lonely anymore

Because we're goin' to the chapel
And we're gonna get married
Goin' to the chapel
And we're gonna get married
Gee, I really love you
And we're gonna get married
Goin' to the chapel of love

1. Expressway To Your Heart- The Soul Survivors   This one gets stuck in 

my head all the time. The opening bass and drums intro always starts the earworm, and it's always hard to get out of my head. Usually, its an all day affair.

I was wrong, baby, it took too long
I got caught in the rush hour

Fellas started to shower
You with love and affection

Now you won't  look in my direction

On the expressway to your heart
The expressway, not the best way
At five o'clock it's much too crowded
Much too crowded, so crowded
Oh, too crowded

Hiatus of sorts

 

It has been five years that I've been writing this blog. During that time I have made a conscious effort to publish at least 4 times per month or more, and I've generally achieved that goal. There have been about 30,000 visits to the site during that five years (with an error of up to 50-80% in either direction), but not all of those visitors actually read anything. There are at least three people that have followed the blog, and several (or quite a few?) more that are regular readers. Thanks especially to you.

I want to also thank ChrisGoesRock, whose blogroll has given my blog more traffic than any other source. Hat's off to Willard's Wormholes and Brady Bonk's Ketchup Is A Vegetable, other blogrolls that have helped sustain traffic of late. And thanks to Dan, too, for your comments and your own blog.

I'm not completely signing off. I'll have to do some Zappadan blogging in December, and I'll pick it up when I feel like it. I'm just saying that the promise to myself (and you, if you've read this far) is mostly over.

Thanks again sincerely to anyone who ever read a posting. I really appreciate it.

Here's ten records that I highly recommend:
Allen Toussaint The Bright Mississippi 
Bruce Cockburn Breatfast In New Orleans, Dinner In Timbuktu
Boz Scaggs Come On Home
The Clash London Calling
Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham Live-Moments From This Theatre
The Detroit Cobras Life, Love, And Leaving
Matthew Sweet Kimi Ga Suki * Raifu
Vampire Weekend Contra
Shelby Lynne I Am Shelby Lynn
Eric Hutchinson Moving Up Living Down

Drummers

I used to sing in a garage band when I was younger. In fact, we still get together once a year and play one weekend party thrown by my good friend, one of the guitar players, and a singer himself. The parties are fun and usually the band sounds good. Sometimes I lose my voice, but there are four other singers in the band. I digress. The drummers are always the nicest guys. Every drummer I've ever played with or known was just a great dude.

And totally essential. I've said before, and still believe, that you can have a great band with a great singer, a very good songwriter, and a good drummer. It's not that the rest isn't important. But you can get by with a sub-standard guitarist, mediocre bass and keys, if there's a drummer pushing everything forward. And when a band has a boring drummer, nothing can save it.

Yes I'm going with the drummer over the other instrumentalists. They make all the difference in the world. You know, for me. And did I mention what nice guys they are? I'm certain that it is happenstance alone that accounts for the fact that every drummer I've ever known was such a nice guy. There must also be the other kind.

There are those not flashy, perfect time-keepers, and the little flourishes they add are always perfect (Ringo Starr, Charlie Watts, Levon Helm). They may not be hotshots, but it's hard to find them anything but right for the song, every time. Then there are the wild men, jazz and vinegar-infused, verging on chaos, that make it impossible to imagine their bands without them (Mitch Mitchell, Ginger Baker, Keith Moon). Between are those classy percussionists that add so much flavor to everything they do (Ainsley Dunbar, Jim Brock, Clyde Stubblefield). And the thousands of others that fall into one of those categories. I suppose I've left out the outright bashers of hard metal that deserve their own space in the annals of drummerhood (Phil Rudd, John Bohnam, Lars Ulrich).

I know there are plenty of other categories, and I've left out lots of great drummers, but my point is they are really that important.

Look at Grand Funk- Songs, OK, singing, OK, drums, OK, guitar and bass, uh, well, ya know, limited utility. Don Brewer was holdin' down the fort. You really think the Who would have excited anybody without Moon? That arrogant Townsend might think so, but just listen to their music. I know it's a great band, and you can't really give any one person more credit, but they had the singer and the songwriter, and Townsend's guitar wasn't going to get the attention without Moon. Listen to Hendrix with Buddy Miles. Need I say more?

Drummers. If you don't have a good one, fuggedaboutit.

Christmas 1969

My oldest brother recently started reading this blog, and it reminded me of an ages old Christmas musical moment. I have two siblings, both older brothers. My middle brother (for lack of a better term) is 2 years older than me, and my oldest brother is 6 plus years my senior. In 1969, my oldest brother left college to play bass guitar in a famous one-hit wonder rock band, and he was touring and did not get home for the holiday. 

But he sent presents home. He sent me and my middle brother one gift- a package that contained exactly seven record albums for us to share/divide. Now if you know anything about sibling rivalry, you'll understand how twisted this move was. Seven is a hard number to divide two ways, and sharing things is not the strong suit of adolescent brothers (we did date the same girl once, but not at the same time). I honestly don't remember the outcome, and I know we didn't really fight about it, but it was a dilemma on which we no doubt spent hours and hours of deliberation. We were, after all, 14 and 16 years old, so what else did we have to do? I know that I ended up with the Band and The Sons Of Champlin records eventually. They're in the living room now.

Do I remember all seven of the titles? No, I do not, but I sure wish I did. This blog post would be way better if I remembered them all. I do absolutely remember four of them, and they were Music From Big Pink 1968 by The Band, Cream's Wheels Of Fire 1968, the first Dr. John "The Night Tripper" album, Gris-Gris 1968, and The Sons Of Champlin Loosen Up Naturally 1969. I think two of the  other three were Procol Harum 1967, and Mother Earth, with Tracy Nelson singing her signature "Down So Low", on Living With The Animals 1968, but I really can't be sure.

Two of those records, Music From Big Pink and Loosen Up Naturally were the opening salvos from bands I would follow for the rest of their careers. The Band is one of my all-time favorites, and The Sons come pretty close. The Gris-Gris album was and is a trip to the (swampy New Orleans) beach . Let's just say it is not the Dr. John of Right Place, Right Time fame. This is much darker terrain. And what can I say about Wheels Of Fire? Not a great Cream record. Either that, or their best. It's definitely eclectic, and you don't get many times to use that oft-overused term accurately these days.

I was already way into music, but it was one hot bundle o' wax. I certainly don't remember any of the other presents I got that year.

Shopping Trip

I had the good fortune of visiting the Bay Area recently, as I have frequently for several years. I went back to my very favorite haunt, the Amoeba store on Haight St. I'm not sure when I'll get back, so I gave myself permission to buy whatever struck my fancy. I stayed in the vinyl sections of the store, because to add CDs would make the visit take all day.

It turned out to be an interesting and varied motherlode of fine tunes. I've already discussed the Live Mott The Hoople, but I also picked up three 12-inch EPs by XTC, The Mayor Of Simpleton, Five Senses (both including swell tracks not on any LP), and Love On A Farmboy's Wages, which includes live versions of Burning With Optimism''s Flame and English Roundabout that are marvelous.

I grabbed an older M. Ward record, End Of Amnesia 2001, a reissue of Superchunck's 1994 outing Foolish, Matthew Sweet's most recent, Modern Art 2011, and Dave Alvin and the Guilty Women 2009, which also features the lovely voice of Christy McWilson throughout.

And then there's the Proclaimer's classic Sunshine On Leith 1988, which I already owned on CD, but the vinyl  was pristine, and I really love this record. I suppose 2001's Persevere is still my personal favorite, but Sunshine On Leith is darn close.

I've made my way through all these new records once (I did spend more time with the Mott), and hopefully I'll have more to say about some of them down the road. It's all been good, but I haven't been keeping track. Lazy listening, I do love that.

By the way, that list of Popular Posts over there on the right lists the more frequently hit posts during the last thirty days. Frank Zappa's Chunga's Revenge has gotten more traffic than almost anything I've ever posted. Go figure.

Two Years

While I'm not into the whole meta-cognitive "lets blog about blogging" concept, I just can't resist at this, the two year anniversary of this blog. There have been 155 entries made, almost exactly 1.5 per week. Here's the breakdown:
3 reviews of live shows
5 editions of Spinning Vinyl
3 mentions of stereo equipment
10 artist career overviews, or features regarding box sets of music
5 entries devoted to Frank Zappa, often written during the December celebration of Zappadan
111 individual records or CDs reviewed. The release dates and the number of recordings from each year/period of those reccords/CDs is:

  1957- 1
  1961-1967- 4
  1969- 6
  1970-1975- 12 
  1976-1980- 2
  1981-1985- 5
  1986-1990- 11
  1991-1995- 6
  1996-2000- 8
  2001-2005- 12
  2006-2008- 11
  2009- 17
  2010- 14
  2011- 7

17 other various entries that don't fit the above categories
and a couple I must not have counted, because those numbers don't quite add up.

The most frequently viewed entries ever are an odd mix of Dusty Springfield, Boz Scaggs, Christian Cuff, Richie Havens, and Elton John and Leon Russel. The reasons for these being the top five are different for each of the five. Respectively, one because there's just a ton of interest, one because no one else blogs about him much, especially his older stuff, one because he's an interesting young artist that very few others have reviewed, one because it's so obscure and out there, and one because I spelled a name wrong, so I got hits because other people searched the same wrong spelling. My apologies to Mr. Russell. I couldn't figure out why I was getting so many hits on that entry for weeks. Ha!
Statistically, the blog sees about 100 visitors per week, but most of them click away before they read anything when they realize that I neither sell or give away anything.  Depending which counter system I trust (neither of them), there's between 1-5 people or 20 or so per day that actually read something. I'm pretty sure it's closer to the low end, but who knows.

Of course the blog has an obscure web address and title, neither of which help identify its content, so if you've been here before, welcome back. Thanks for coming by.

Cool Off

Taking the Kelly challenge (see comments on the last post), since it's HOT, maybe we should try to chill a little.

Cool It Down- The Velvet Underground
Cool- West Side Story Soundtrack
Cool Operator- Sade
Cool Water- Joni Mitchell
Coolin' In Cali- 7A3
Cool Love- Wanda Jackson
Cool Turkey- James Booker
Cool Jerk- The Capitols
Cool Me Out- Lamont Dozier
Cool World- American Men

Midwest girl may still be too hot extra cut:

Cool Off- Detroit Executives

Special thanks to the new GEMM.com site search tool for helping me track down some obscurities!

Very Hot Hotness

It is (at least) 95 degrees in Kleaveburg today.
I know it's hotter elsewhere, but here in the frozen north, it's smokin' hot for us.

Some Like It Hot- Power Station
Hot Fun In The Summertime- Sky And The Family Stone
Hot In The City- Billy Idol
Hot Summer Day- It's A Beautiful Day
Hot Hot Hot- Buster Poindexter
Hot For Teacher- Van Halen
Hot Smoke and Sassafras- The Bubble Puppy 
Hot Plate Heaven At The Green Hotel- Frank Zappa
Hot 'lanta- The Allman Brothers
Hot Blood- Lucinda Williams
Too Darn Hot- Stacey Kent

Death of the Music Industry?

I don't know if it is really death, but certainly serious atrophy. I'm not all that sad to see sales back to 1993 levels, nor would I call that a death knell, but it is bad news for record moguls. If the CD trend continues and digital sales only grow at the present rate, it could be back to pre-85 sales levels in no time, and this is not a good thing.

The record companies, at least the major players, probably deserve their fate, if for no other reason than for being greedy bastards who have made a series of remarkably stupid moves (SACD vs DVD-A anyone?). Anticipate the future? These guys can barely respond to it.

But when most of the loss in sales is due to illegal file sharing (and don't kid yourself, it is), the artists who make the music also get robbed. Corporations may not get my sympathy, but singers and songwriters and players of instruments deserve a better fate. Yes, new music delivery systems are coming into being, and some people are accepting those new retail outlets and purchasing digital downloads, while others are buying CDs and vinyl on the internet. But compared to CD sales in the 90s, sales are gone. There may come a new paradigm, but it should protect the product from theft, somehow. Probably not any of the ways that that have been tried, but somehow.

Is music gone? No. Are young people listening to music? Yes. Do they buy it? No, at least not many from what I can tell. And I suppose there are plenty of older music fans that have gotten on board as well. Why pay for a product that you can get for free? Because there is an artist you are stealing from. If you were stealing a painting, or a piece of stained glass, or a sculpture, you'd have to pick it up and run, and hide it somewhere, and find someone you could sell it to. But music, you can put it on the internet for anyone to take, and you can go there and take all you want. And nobody gets paid.

I don't like the big record companies, but I'm an ardent fan of artists. The changes we are seeing are bad for artists that make music. The artist's situation isn't just different, it is worse. And eventually it will mean that there will be less high-quality product on the market, because you can't make a living making a product that most consumers steal. So who's going to be attracted to that life?

Classics '69-'71

Back in the glorious cassette days when the only portable device was a cassette tape player, the Mix Tape was a thing of romance, style and pre-programmed party soundtracks. I made many a mix tape for various friends and lovers, and when the cassette's days were numbered, I bought a Marantz CD recorder that alloys me all the same freedom of mixing from CDs and LPs and, well, cassettes.

And so I continue the mix tape tradition of the cassette era into the CD era. One of my all-time favorite mix tapes of my own was a two-tape issue called Classics '69-'71. I recorded it from vinyl to two 90-minute cassettes. A few years ago I re-made the mix on three CDs, adding another 45 minutes or so of additional songs.

The music all comes from 1967- 1973, but most is from the title years, and I liked the way it sounded, even if it wasn't completely accurate. Here's the three CDs:
Disc One:

1. Australia The Kinks

2. You’re So Rude The Faces

3. Turn My Life Down Jefferson Airplane

4. Son Of Your Father Elton John

5. Going Mobile The Who

6. No Matter What Badfinger

7. Keep On Growing Derek and the Dominos

8. Just A Season The Byrds

9. Station Man Fleetwood Mac

10. We Were Always Sweethearts Boz Scaggs

11. Delta Lady Joe Cocker

12. Trust Me Janis Joplin

13. Sugar Magnolia The Greatful Dead

14. Savoy Truffle The Beatles

15. Only You Know And I Know Dave Mason

16. Done Somebody Wrong The Allman Brothers

17. Cinnamon Girl Neil Young

18. Can’t You Hear Me Knockin’ The Rolling Stones

Disc Two:

1. Sweet Jane The Velvet Underground

2. Caledonia Mission The Band

3. Superlungs My Supergirl Donovan

4. Bold As Love The Jimi Hendrix Experience

5. Don’t Wait Too Long New York Rock Ensemble

6. Jewel Eyed Judy Fleetwood Mac

7. Holler And Shout The Elvin Bishop Group

8. Stay With Me The Faces

9. Flames Of Love Boz Scaggs

10. Come On (Part 1) The Jimi Hendrix Experience

11. Law And Order New York Rock Ensemble

12. Feeling Alright Joe Cocker

13. Bitch The Rolling Stones

14. Me And My Uncle The Grateful Dead

15. We Can Talk The Band

16. What Goes On The Velvet Underground

17. People Got To Be Free The Rascals

18. Boppin’ The Blues Carl Perkins And NRBQ

19. Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad Derek And The Dominos

20. Try (Just A Little Bit Harder) Janis Joplin

21. Amoreena Elton John

Disc Three:

1. Revolution The Beatles

2. Evil Ways Santana

3. Domino Van Morrison

4. I Can’t Take It Badfinger

5. Black Dog Led Zeppelin

6. Everyday People Sly And The Family Stone

7. Baba O’Riley The Who

8. Apeman The Kinks

9. Trudi Donovan

10. I’m So Glad Cream

11. Can’t Be So Bad Moby Grape

12. Do You Know What I Mean Lee Michaels

13. Green Eyed Lady Sugarloaf

14. What Is Life George Harrison

15. Mississippi Queen Mountain

16. China Grove The Doobie Brothers

17. Honky Tonk Woman The Rolling Stones

18. My Old School Steely Dan

19. Over-Lovin’ You The Electric Flag

20. Caravan Van Morrison

21. Take Me To The Pilot Elton John

So that's my classic rock station there, and many of my earliest favorites. I suppose I could turn it into a playlist on the iPod these days. If you want a soundtrack for my life in my teens, and a fine mix for the car, there you go.

The Eighties

I was looking back at this blog the other day and I realized that there weren't many entries from the eighties. Lots of seventies, and plenty of recent and nineties releases. Were the eighties a bad decade for music (or is it just me)?

I know, it is ten years. It can't be all bad, and I agree with that. There were some good Talking Heads records, at least. But was there a general slump in the overall quality of popular music in the eighties? And if this hypothesis could be demonstrated to have merit, what could have caused this period of melodic malaise.

I can't really support the idea that the quality of music went down in the 80s, except based on my own personal anecdotal evidence. But what is it about 80s music? Too many synthesizers, sure, but that doesn't explain it all.

First, the decade began on the heels of the punk peak, and disco was still very much alive. Not a good sign. Then there is the synthesizer thing, and that was a major problem in the 80s. Lots and lots of synthesizers everywhere. It was the decade of the hair band. It was in the eighties that Jefferson Airplane became Jefferson Starship. And Elton John became, well, bad Elton John. Artists that had done some vital work turned in their worst work in the eighties: Van Morrison, Billy Joel, Tom Petty, Phil Collins, J. Geils Band, Fleetwood Mac.

It was also the time when pop music became very very big business. The arena tour, the zillion sellers. The major labels knew what they wanted to sell, and if you weren't making it, they didn't want it. Artist development began to change. No longer could an artist release two of three records before one of them really sold. And of course, the independant recording and distribution we see today was not yet established, so if it wasn't on a major label, you didn't know about it.

And the new bands coming up didn't seem to bring much of interest to the table. Let's just look at some examples of mediocrity that seemed to take up so much of the airwaves in the 80s: Bon Jovi, Duran Duran, Journey, The Bangles, INXS, Rick Springfield, Night Ranger, Poison, Culture Club, Styx, Men At Work, Wang Chung, Paula Abdul, Loverboy. Yipes!

Oh, I know it's easy to pick on some schlock from any decade. Goodness knows there was terrible crap in every decade. But who was doing the best work in the 80s? OK: Madonna, Michael Jackson, REM, Squeeze, Devo, Talking Heads, Prince, The Cars, U2, Van Halen, ACDC, Marshall Crenshaw. And who among those brought anything new to the table?

So the decade opened up with post-punk and disco at odds. Over-synthesized pop crap dominated the middle of the decade, and the birth of hip-hop and grunge arrived before the decade was over.

The eighties reminds me now of how good the end of the seventies really was, with the punk and new wave bands revitalizing popular music and at least bringing some emotion into the game. Granted, most of the emotion was anger, but at least somebody cared. And at least disco and punk pushed most of the country-rock out of the way. Although country-rock has made an unfortuanate comeback in the newer "country" music of today, which is mostly just rock balladry learned from those hair bands of the eighties.

In the seventies, everything was happening at once. Sixties artists that hadn't overdosed continued to make some good records, and there were lots of ideas/genres/styles to choose from. Some of the soul music was fabulous, and you certainly can't say that about the eighties. In the nineties things seemed to open back up again, with more styles and genres to choose from, and that seems to continue today.

In fact, the slow death of the major labels is producing music from more artists in more styles today than ever before. It may not be easy to find in a store, but there's everything out there.

All Back To My Place

MOJO magazine has a regular feature where they ask musicians and celebrities a specific set of questions about their musical tastes. Not unlike the Bernard Pivot questionnaire that James Lipton used on The Actor's Studio program, but focused on musical taste.

The feature in the magazine is called All Back To My Place. Since it seems unlikely that MOJO will ever call me, I'll give you my answers here.

What music are you currently grooving to?
Right now it's Justin Currie's The Great War, Lady Gaga's The Fame Monster, The Band Of Heathens' One Foot In The Ether, Melody Gardot's My One And Only Thrill, and Don Dixon Sings The Songs Of The Jeffords Brothers.

What, if push comes to shove, is your all-time favorite album?
Oh well, sometimes it's Rubber Soul by the Beatles, or Kiln House by Fleetwood Mac. But the one that rises to the top of the list most often is probably The Band by The Band.

What was the first record you ever bought? And where did you buy it?
The first record that was actually mine was 50,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong, which was given to me for my eighth birthday. My older brothers always had records and I got to listen to those, so the first record I actually bought was much later, and it may have been The Guess Who's Wheatfield Soul. I always liked These Eyes, the single from that record. I bought it at Culver Military Academy, where I attended one summer.

Which musician (other than yourself) have you ever wanted to be?
I'd want to be a musician that isn't too badly screwed up. Who would that be? Maybe Eric Clapton, or Elton John. No, make that Van Morrison. But I just want their talent and money, and I'll develop my own psychoses.

What do you sing in the shower?
Whatever is stuck in my head at the time. I always liked a lot of Elton John's stuff, so maybe Rocket Man or Amoreena. But it could be anything I heard recently. Boppin' The Blues by Carl Perkins is always good.

What is your favorite Saturday night record?
Getting ready to go out, I might fire up some ACDC, maybe You Shook Me All Night Long, or Edgar Winter's Keep Playing That Rock And Roll, or Sniff 'n' The Tears' Driver's Seat, or NRBQ's Me And The Boys. Sometimes it's more dancable, like Kirsty MacColl's Mambo De La Luna or Jackie Wilson's Baby Workout, or One Nation Under A Groove by Funkadelic.

And your Sunday morning record?
For a long time my Sunday morning music was Donovan's A Gift From A Flower To A Garden. These days it's more likely to be a female jazz singer such as Karrin Allyson or Barb Jungr.

The Top Five What?

So Stereophile magazine has a write-in "contest" to list five songs or albums that "most strongly evoke the places and times in your past, music with which you have a transrational emotional connection". The "winners" get a free CD from their web site, which is pretty lame, although they do have some good CDs.

Here's my entry.

For me these evocative songs all deal with love, love remembered, or love in dysfunction:
Right In Time - Lucinda Williams, from Car Wheels On A Gravel Road, 1998
The Song Remembers When - Trisha Yearwood, from The Song Remembers When, 1993
Hard Line To Draw - Cheryl Wheeler, from Circles And Arrows, 1990
Late For The Sky - Jackson Browne, from Late For The Sky, 1974
Come A Little Bit Closer - Fleetwood Mac, from Heroes Are Hard To Find, 1974

Maybe I'm a romantic.

Birthday Ten

My friend Bob celebrates his birthday this weekend, and in deference to this occasion, I offer up the next ten off my iPod (which Bob himself does every Friday over at Loud Mouth Soup).

Happy Birthday, Bob.



Caring Is Creepy-The Shins
She's The One-World Party
Meet Me In The Middle-The Continental Drifters
To The Stars-Erin McKeown
Feet Don't Fail-Bleu
Radar Love-Golden Earring
Crimson And Clover-Joan Jett
Cut You Loose-Angela Strehli
Give It Up Or Let Me Go-Dixie Chicks
Start With The Ending-David Wilcox

Bonus Bob's BD cut:
The Rake's Progress-Honeydogs

Power Pop

For me, the idea of Power Pop started with the pop side of what was called New Wave music in the late seventies. Nick Lowe, Dwight Twilly, Elvis Costello, The Romantics, and a few others received the label first, followed by retroactive Power Pop status awarded to The Raspberries and Big Star. Clearly the roots of this sound are found in sixties rock from The Beatles, The Who, and Small Faces, with a long list of other highly melodic, guitar-based, hook-filled wonders.

The Power Pop sound has been alive and well for the last three decades. Quite a few purveyors have added to the fray, and many of them are excellent. The Spongetones, Marshall Crenshaw, Del Amitri, Sloan, The Smithereens, Matthew Sweet, Tommy Keene, Material Issue, and countless others.

So here's a few good ones:

Matthew Sweet Kama Ga Suki 2003

Steve Ward Opening Night 2000

Sloan Between The Bridges 1999

The Smithereens Green Thoughts 1988

The Spongetones Odd Fellows 2000

The Mood Elevator Married Alive 2003

Fountains Of Wayne Welcome Interstate Managers 2003

Richard X. Heyman Hey Man! 1991

Tommy Keene Ten Years After 1996

Del Amitri Some Other Sucker's Parade 1997

Brendan Benson The Alternative To Love 2005

Gigolo Aunts Minor Chords And Major Themes 1990

The Hang Ups Second Story 1999

Bill Lloyd Set To Pop 1994

The Proclaimers Persevere 2001

And the record that while it did not define the form, certainly perfected it:

Marshall Crenshaw Marshall Crenshaw 1982