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Kinks break

Those of you following this blog know I am a big Kinks fan, since my teen years.

They were a genre-defying band that were described in many ways: quirky, satirical, whimsical, a garage band , uber British, and so on. They got kicked out of the U.S. during the British invasion for bad behavior so they missed out on big fame for a while. Ray and Dave fought a lot and I mean physical brawls, tearing hotel rooms apart. Although Dave’s pioneering heavy metal guitar in early to mid-1960s with You Really Got Me and All Day and All Night brought attention, there came a lull. They went through a period where they were experimenting with concept album, mini-musicals if you will.

Most people, during that 1970s period turned away. The albums such as A Soap Opera, a splendid little story piece, or the Preservation albums, wound up in bargain bins or, worse, garbage. Many thought they were a lightweight band. They should have known better from the 1960s heavy metal  riffs, although even back then lead Kink Ray Davies wrote catchy little love songs (see Tired of  Waiting, Stop Your Sobbing, etc.)

One of their biggest songs ‘Lola’ was about a transvestite.

So when my buddy Michael Ludden, former boss, novelist and all around music lover turned me on to a video blues number by the Kinks, it was not only a further validation of arguments I’ve had with folks who think the Kinks never earned their rootsy stripes like the Beatles, Stones and the Who. It was somewhat of a revelation seeing the early Kinks performing a damn good Slim Harpo blues rendition, ‘Got Love if You Want It,’ worthy of the best of the Yardbirds or the Animals, at least. From deep cuts, I knew they did this kind of stuff now and then but to see the performance is eye-opening:

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Mark Knopfler, Kitaro 382, 381

ALBUM: Local Hero (movie soundtrack 1983); Kitaro.

MVC Rating: Local”4.5/$$$’ Kitaro, 4.0/$$$

For the Now Playing portion of my column featured on this website and AL.com, we have a movie soundtrack from Mark Knopfler that is good, very good, as is the movie.’

Local Hero,’ beautifully filmed in Scotland is a droll and understated comedy fits right in with Knopflers’s smooth sounding finger-pick work. Like all soundtracks, there are incidents of incidental music, and the album is mostly instrumental. But the overall quality is superb.

I’m adding into this review another sleepy time album -by – a musician who happens to be in alphabetical order, more or less, as I reach into the New Age and pull out Kitaro. If ‘Local Hero’ puts you in a restful peaceful state, Kitaro will just knock you out . A New Age record, for those who don’t remember, is light bright soft serve ice cream. I don’t know that image just came to mind. But I’ve enjoyed New Age musicians, such as George Winston, Michael Hedges and Kitaro.

It’s also fine background music where you don’t want the music to drown out the talk. I find that a lot of folks get into New Age music when they have little ones, nothing like a soothing Kitaro waterfall with flutes to ease those temper tantrums. Because when you finish your tantrum, you’ll be able to help the children, right?

Got that?

I highly recommend Local Hero, a good one that has held up.

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Kid Creole and the Coconuts, Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band –384, 383

ALBUMS: Kid Creole: ‘In Praise of Older Women (1980);’ Dr. Buzzards Original Savannah Band’Meets King Penett.

MCV Rating: KC: 4.0/$$; Dr. B: 4.0/$$

And now for something completely different. Swing influenced disco jazz.

Stony Browder and Thomas Browder AKA August Darnell, started Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah band in 1974 and it sounded far different from anything on the radio at the time.

Buzzard was more swing-y old timey whereas Kid Creole and the Coconuts was more jump jazzy and funky.

Taking a break from my Kinks and Who and Stones, I really enjoyed the throwback exotica and tropicalia of these bands. August Darnell, whose parents were Italian and Caribbean, according to Wikipedia, had a Master’s degree in English and a way with words.

The fun dance songs were flirty with steamy romance. Either of these or anything by either of the groups would be a great bargain bin find. I’ll bet Prince had some Kid Creole in his collection.

If you’re looking for something different.

 

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Carole King — 385

ALBUM: Tapestry (1971)

MVC Rating: 5.0/$$$

When I was growing up — I was about 11 when this came out — nearly all of the songs on Tapestry were on the radio. Or so it seemed. They are among the all time greatest pop songs ever written.

Rolling Stone magazine has her and writing partner Gerry Goffin at #7 on the list of greatest songwriters behind Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Chuck Berry, Smokey Robinson and Mick Jagger/Keith Richards. She’s the highest ranking female on the list. But I could argue for an even higher rank.

I think King hops the Stones’ boys and Smokey, all brilliant mind you, and on my desert Island I’d probably take the Stones first. But from a purely objective point of view, I think she’s a No. 5 on the list. And if you pulled the two Beatles together into one rank – the No. 2 slot — she would move up to the No. 4 slot. I’m not going to do a side-by-side on these but Tapestry, the album, is astonishing in that nearly every song is a standard.

But the kicker is this: Look at what she has written for other artists including a song — Chains — covered by the Beatles. Here’s a small sampling of non-Tapestry songs she wrote:

  • ‘The Loco-motion’ for their babysitter Little Eva.
  • “Go Away Little Girl,’ Donny Osmond and Steve Lawrence.
  • ‘Up on the Roof,’ the Drifters.
  • ‘Don’t Bring Me Down,’ the Animals.
  • ‘If it’s Over,’ Mariah Carey.
  • ‘One Fine Day,’ the Chiffons,
  • ‘I’m into Something Good,’ Herman’s Hermits.

At one time I remember Tapestry being the biggest seller ever, at least for a period, eclipsing Beatles. Then I remember hearing Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ surpassed Tapestry. Don’t know if this is accurate, but it comes out of my Lewy body dementia memory that way. Tapestry is still in theTop 10 best selling album of all time.

The copy of Tapestry I have in the house is from my wife’s collection. We began dating in 1978 and were married 1981 and that involved ‘merging’ of some records and tastes. Catherine loved Tapestry and knew every word to every song. Here’s the songs from Tapestry as listed on Wikipedia.:

Side 1

  1. “I Feel the Earth Move” – 3:00
  2. “So Far Away” – 3:55
  3. “It’s Too Late” (lyrics by Toni Stern) – 3:54
  4. “Home Again” – 2:29
  5. “Beautiful” – 3:08
  6. “Way Over Yonder” – 4:49

Side 2

  1. “You’ve Got a Friend” – 5:09
  2. “Where You Lead” (lyrics by Carole King and Toni Stern) – 3:20
  3. “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?” (Gerry Goffin, King) – 4:13
  4. “Smackwater Jack” (Goffin, King) – 3:42
  5. “Tapestry” – 3:15
  6. “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman” (Goffin, King, Jerry Wexler) – 3:59

I was learning to like some of Catherine’s music: James Taylor, for whom I skipped class to camp out and buy tickets to his sold-out concert at Auburn University in, oh, 1980 maybe; Carly Simon, whose ‘Your So Vain’ was one of the few songs I could listen to a million times without getting tired of it. Other groups she loved that I came to appreciate, for the most part anyway: Bread, America, the Carpenters and Diana Ross.

Here’s a good overview of her work by Rolling Stone.

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King Crimson — 386

ALBUM: Discipline (1981)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$$

This is a good progressive album. And as I’ve stated before progressive is not my go-to genre. Those who have been following this blog know that — but also know that I admire and own some good examples: Emerson, Lake and Palmer; Yes; and Genesis.

And I also own what I’d call genre-busting proggers: Captain Beyond, Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd, and Crack the Sky.

It all starts on this album with ‘Elephant Walk’ with clever wordplay on the meaning or lack of meaning in verbal communication. Robert Fripp and Adrien Belew deliver some articulate and geometric guitar that blazes, stops and fills better than anyone this side of Zappa on his A-game.

But it’s the opening lyrics that set the tone in ‘Elephant Talk.’

Talk/It’s only talk 
Arguments, Agreements, Advice, Answers , Articulate announcements 
It’s only talk 

Talk /It’s only talk 
Babble, Burble, Banter, Bicker/bicker/bicker, Brouhaha, Balderdash, Ballyhoo 
It’s only talk/ Back talk 

Talk talk talk/It’s only talk 
Comments , Cliches, Commentary, Controversy, Chatter, Chit-chat/Chit-chat/Chit-chat, Conversation, Contradiction, Criticism 
It’s only talk/Cheap talk’

Better at alphabetical order than I am. Some call it ‘math rock.’ You can see for sure that Robert Fripp and crew influenced progressive New Wavers, especially the Talking Heads.

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King of Comedy (movie soundtrack)–387

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$

I remember buying this 1983 compilation soundtrack for one song. Van Morrison’s ‘Wonderful Remark.’ A great great song that at that time appeared on no other albums; it was written explicitly for this movie.

Yet I believed it was as good as anything Morrison has done — and that’s alot.

Now there are other good songs on here, some like the Pretenders’ ‘Back on the Chain Gang’ I already had (and loved). Since then the ‘Wonderful Remark’ cut has been on several compilation albums.

Listening to the soundtrack, I almost want to see the Martin Scorcese movie starring Jerry Lewis and Robert DeNiro. A black comedy it was blistered by critics at the time but now seems to have fallen into the good graces of some critics.

Play list with links from rateyourmusic.com

Here’s Van Morrison video. This song was worth the admission for me, esp. because it was unreleased at the time. but as you can see there’s other good songs here.

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Kaleidoscope -388

Kaleidoscope was a pioneering psych rock folk world music band from San Francisco.

ALBUM: ‘Incredible’ (1969)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$$

If you like psychedelic banjo music you’ll love this.

Actually, I do. But it’s not for everybody. I became aware of this band because I’ve long been a fan of David Lindley who has put out some fun, eclectic music over the years on his own. And he also has been a fixture in Jackson Browne recordings and performances over the years.

Excellent on guitar, steel guitar, banjo – and assorted string instruments you may have never heard of. In his youth, Lindley won the Topanga Canyon Banjo Contest two years in a row back in tIhe 60’s, according to Wikipedia.

This band, Kaleidoscope, preceded Lindley’s work with Browne. It’s a product of the psychedelic 60’s but what separates it from some in this genre is the highly skilled playing of the instruments and its infusion of world music. And banjo.

It’s also an example of how now and again I decide to buy LPs.

I bought this just about a year ago for a few bucks. I saw it, saw the name David Lindley and pounced. I’ll be doing some Lindley reviews coming up after I finish the K’s .

One of the videos below is “Banjo’ and another is ‘Seven Ate Sweet’ a progressive instrumental in 7/8 time. Enjoy, or, at least, admire.


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The Greg Kihn Band — 389

ALBUM: RocKihnRoll

MVC Rating: 3.0/$

At the risk of releasing a giant ear worm, here’s the band that wrote and recorded ‘The Break-up Song.’ Don’t remember it?

How about if I add the rest of the song title. (‘They Don’t Write ‘Em) No?

How about this hint:

Ah-ah-ah, ah-ah-ah-ah, ah

Yes, they don’t write ’em like that anymore.

It’s a decent song with little to say other than people are dancing to a song like you don’t hear much anymore. That may be profound. Or, like a lot of things, profundity is in the eye of the beholder, or in this case the ear of the listener.

Remember this was 1981. So we can look back and say the same thing about this song.

Ah-ah-ah, ah-ah-ah-ah, ah. They don’t write ’em like that any more.

Maybe we are thankful.

Some decent power pop rock on this album with the emphasis on ‘some.’ I don’t recall buying this but I must have obtained it pretty cheaply. Mostly forgotten fodder. Most of the songs are written or co-written by Kihn. But there’s a cover of “Sheila” by Tommy Roe, he of ‘Dizzy’ fame. “I’m so dizzy, my head is spinning.’

Ah-ah-ah, ah-ah-ah-ah, ah.