Jennifer Warnes Famous Blue Raincoat 1987

If you know this record, you might be asking yourself why I should write about it. It's one of the most written about records in recent music history, at least within the audiophile press, and deservedly so. To hear it for the first time on a serious hi-fi is an ear-opening experience. It has music on it that can help you evaluate the quality of the system you're listening to, maybe thinking about buying. The recording is legend.

But that doesn't mean anything if the music and performance aren't there. The same people who worship this record for it's sound often listen to inferior performances just because they are well recorded. This one really has it all.

This is a record of Leonard Cohen songs, and that generally sounds like a bad idea to me. I don't like the ones he makes. I just can't stand his singing. But Warnes has a deep respect for the man, and sang in his band throughout much of the seventies. She inhabits this music, and her beautiful voice makes it clear what a superior songwriter Cohen is.

The music is made by a band of exceptional musicians, studio aces and guest celebrities. The personnel on the record reads like a who's who of modern popular music circa 1987. Cohen's deeply personal ballads and mid-tempo rockers are performed at the most professional level imaginable, and yet, yet, even then, these performances have soul and depth beneath the gloss. Much of that is due to Warnes herself. If she isn't the very best singer of her generation, then she's the most underrated. She's made several other fine records, but she hasn't bettered this one.

If you haven't heard it, you should. Original Cypress Records vinyl pressings go for big bucks unless you find one at a garage sale and they don't know what they've got. There's new vinyl at criminal prices that's said to sound great, but no current, reasonably priced vinyl exists. There's a nice sounding 20th Anniversary CD that's fine. Whatever you do, don't buy this one in mp3. That would just be wrong.

Marshall Crenshaw I Don't See You Laughing Now 2012 and Dr. Dog Wild Race 2012

So last week's Black Friday was also Record Store Day. Labels release quite a few new items for this semi-annual event, and this November 23 was no different. So I visited one of my local record stores, My Mind's Eye in Lakewood, where I picked up these two EP items (Extended Play: shorter than an album, longer than a single).

The Crenshaw is a three-track 10-inch 45 rpm red vinyl record. Before you think I'm a lost cause, let me say right here that the color of the vinyl most certainly does not matter. Ever. But of course the songs do, and this record contains a well-recorded, great new Crenshaw song (the title track), an oddball Jeff Lynne cover (No Time) that's fun, and a slow live version of There She Goes Again that has a raw, feral guitar sound, and is a nice reimagining of the song's arrangement.

Dr. Dog's Wild Race EP includes five tracks on one side of a twelve-inch record. The other side has no groove, and is embossed with a photo of the band. So it's one side of a record. In fact, it's pretty much side three/bonus tracks for their last LP, the fine Be The Void 2012. (I should have reviewed Be The Void by now, but I have such a hard time describing their music, completely unlike the easy time I have loving it.) The first track from this EP is Be The Void, the title track that was omitted from the record of the same name. It's great, but you can see why they might have left it off, just because they had so many great songs to replace it. The Sun, a live track follows. It's nice to hear some live music from this band, and it's a good song. The other three are studio tracks that sound like they were just edged out for a spot on Be The Void. Wild Race is especially good, but all five tracks are strong. There is a hodgepodge effect that comes from tossing out some songs that didn't fit anywhere else, but it's all surprisingly good.

I had a couple other "collectibles" in my hands walking around the store (a reissued 1964 Rolling Stones EP and a single from 1967 by The Mothers Of Invention), but I put them back and left with these. Another excellent Black Friday as far away from the mall as possible.

Robert Palmer Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley 1974

Robert Palmer's first effort is a fine debut. While not quite fully formed, the funky New Orleans-Caribbean blend that will carry him through the seventies is mostly here. His vocals are as assured as they will be ten years later.

He's helped a great deal by The Meters and Lowell George of Little Feat, who are featured on at least half the record, and are as funky as you wanna be. Two Allen Toussaint songs doesn't hurt either.

The main reason to return to the record over and over is the loose medley of Lowell George's Sailin' Shoes, Palmer's Hey Julia, and Allen Toussaint's Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley that opens Side one. These three have always been worth the price of admission. Great songs, great singing, great band. The groove that the Meters lay down is killer. They are one of the great rhythm sections.

Get Outside follows, and it's slow, simmering funk and Palmer's sweet soul vocal make it a winner. Blackmail foretells the rockier side of future 80s Palmer, and sounds like a good Bob Seger song.

Side two opens with How Much Fun, another Southern funk workout, this time with a hot female backing chorus. Then Palmer incinerates Toussaint's From A Whisper To A Scream with a fine vocal of steamy boudoir soul. Through It All There Is You has a great bass line, syncopated guitar, drums and organ, and digs a deep groove that can't quite sustain interest over it's 12 minutes. It's lyrically weak, and it meanders.

It's not quite the perfection that the follow-up, 1975's Pressure Drop will be, but it's one heck of a debut. More Robert Palmer here.

Van Morrison Born To Sing: No Plan B 2012

I was suspicious from the title. What does a 66 year old millionaire need with a plan B? After 40 releases, did anyone think he wasn't born to sing? Then the CD arrives, and there's three "reviews" of the record on the first four pages of the booklet. Alarms sound.

There's some redeeming material here, but this is not one of Van's better outings. In fact it may be the weakest since Days Like This, his disappointing effort from 1995 (not counting The Skiffle Sessions 2000 and Pay The Devil 2006, both disastrous forays into non-Van music forms).

The best of the record is the first half. Open The Door (To Your Heart) is upbeat and swinging. The smooth jazz-R&B of Goin' Down To Monte Carlo is loaded with great solos from all band members, and it is hot. End Of The Rainbow is a mellow ballad with great solos on sax and trombone. And the mostly instrumental Close Enough For Jazz features more great playing from the band. Kudos to Chris White on sax and Alistair White on trombone on the entire record.

The second half slows down and drags some fairly small ideas over long stretches of music. Two of the songs are eight minutes long. Retreat And View and Born To Sing are at least OK. But the rest really drags, and the entire record suffers from weak, lazy writing from The Man himself. He has a lot to complain about: he's pissed about greed and materialism; he wants to be left alone; the little guy gets screwed. He's been here before, but it's in almost every song on this one. Even the romantic-sounding Open The Door is a rant against materialism. There's one spiritual searcher song (the terrible Mystic Of The East), and one failed attempt at a John Lee Hooker-styled blues (Pagan Heart). Dave Keary does a fine job on guitar, but Van mails in the vocal.

Four good ones, and two others worth hearing. And even then you need to ignore the lyrical content, and just listen to the music and singing. Considering some of the fine work he's done in the last twenty years, this one's a let down.

I wrote a comprehensive career overview of Van's work last year. It's here.

The Kinks The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society 1968

This record sounds English in a way few records do. Some of the Small Faces work comes to mind, and some of the English folk-inspired music comes to mind, such as Fairport Convention and Fotheringay (those sound English, but not like this).

This is something else entirely, and uniquely English. It is at once pop confection, ode to a romanticized simpler English past, and rock and roll record. Ray Davies had a clear and unique vision in 1968, and it sounded like nothing else. The intricate arrangements were rivaled by only Lennon and McCartney and Brian Wilson in 1968.

The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society was released near the end of a ban from live performance in America that had harmed the Kinks popularity here, and it sold poorly (in America and the U.K.) despite positive press. It is the only Kinks record to stay off the charts in both America and the U.K., and the band would never again see the U.K. album charts except for compilation records, although they continued to sneak a single in once in a while. The lack of a hit single on the record probably didn't help. It's one of those records that became famous long after it's initial weak sales. Dusty Springfield's Dusty In Memphis suffered the same fate, and has since, like this one, become an "instant classic".

There are, of course, quite a few songs about the idyllic English past and quaint pastimes. The title track, Picture Book, Last Of The Steam-Powered Trains, Sitting By The Riverside, Animal Farm, and Village Green all focus lyrically on nostalgia for some idealized past. The mature psych-rock of Do You Remember Walter and Big Sky is refreshing, and the blues-rock of Wicked Anabella and Steam-Powered Trains recalls their early singles. Throw in Starstruck with its Beach Boys chorus, the odd chamber-pop of Phenomenal Cat, the Latin styling of Monica, and a bit of Davies' music hall/carbaret influence on the self deprecating All My Friends Were There, and you've covered a lot of territory.

The songs and arrangements are almost universally strong. Mick Avory is an outstanding drummer. Nicky Hopkins is still assisting on piano and harpsichord. Ray and Dave Davies both bring unique assets to the rock and roll game. The recording is good, if at times a bit thin on the low end.

Is it THE Classic Kinks record? If you say so, I won't argue with you. It is the culmination of the style they birthed two years earlier with Face To Face, and which will begin to change with Arthur. They will begin to rock just a little bit more after this, and branch out a bit stylistically. The next few years hold quite a few more highlights.

For me, Ray Davies wrote his strongest song cycle for Arthur, where he combined the nostalgia for the past on display here with bitter social commentary on the present. A couple of years ago, I reviewed Arthur, or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire 1969 here.

Here's my other Kinks reviews:
Face To Face 1966
Something Else By The Kinks  1967
Ray Davies The Kinks Choral Collection 2009

Brad Paisley American Saturday Night 2009

I'm not the biggest fan of what country music radio calls country music these days.

And this record contains every modern country cliche: patriotic rocker (the title track); sentimental weepers (Then, No, Oh Yeah You're Gone); assorted topical rockers (Welcome To The Future, Water); modern romance (She's Her Own Woman, You Do The Math); humor to a two-step (The Pants); lessons learned (Anything Like Me).

The band is stellar. Paisley is a highly qualified singer and songwriter. The recording and production are clean and clear. It sounds great.

There's one other thing. Brad Paisley might be the best living guitar player on the planet. Or he might just be the best one in country music. Either way, it's well worth your coin.

Loose Fur Loose Fur 2003

Loose Fur was a side project of Wilco. Jeff Tweedy, Glen Kotche, and Jim O'Rourke went into the studio and made this little slice of experimentation in 2000. It didn't get released until 2003 as Tweedy and Wilco (with O'Rouke's assistance) were working on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

There are moments that sound like deconstructed Wilco (So Long, You Were Wrong). There are several songs that include long, spacey jams that are subtly delicious (Laminated Cat, Elegant Transition, So Long, Liquidation Totale).

So Long is a crazy discordant mess that has a melody that eventually crawls out from under the cacophony. Elegant Transition is a soft, gentle, slightly country ballad. Laminated Cat, a reworked version of a Wilco demo entitled Not For The Season, has spacey lyrics followed by a long instrumental jam section. You Were Wrong is a sad breakup song with a nice keyboard part from O'Rourke. Liquidation Totale is a mellow, slow-building instrumental that includes an interesting banjo part. Chinese Apple contains some of the lyrics that became Heavy Metal Drummer, but is a very different song, gentle and repetitive.

It is a quiet record mostly. There are clearly keys to what would become the Wilco sound on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and later records A Ghost Is Born and Sky Blue Sky. But this isn't Wilco. It's casual. It was fun for these guys to make, and there were no commercial aspirations. Both O'Rourke and Kotche have been blamed for much of the turmoil that lead Tweedy to disband and reform Wilco's personnel line-up, and Tweedy has been quoted as wanting to take Wilco in the direction of Loose Fur. For Wilco fans, this is an interesting record for it's effect on that band.

Three players that work well together, doing whatever they want to do. It is well worth hearing, and could easily become a late night, low key staple.