I bought it at a community flea market in Athens, Ga., because it was cheap, interesting cover and the live album led off with ‘Here Comes the Sun,’ the George Harrison/Beatles song. I listened to it a few times but it never really registered until I got to the last song called ‘Make Me Smile.’
How did I never hear this song before? Cool tune with several long stops and silent holds. Its stop-start delay effect is effective — and you can dance to it. Love the song. I later found that I had it on a compilation record called Monument to British Rock. I think I probably like the studio version even more with it’s exaggerated Dylan vocal style.
My understanding this band was big in England, even huge in the 1970s.
Not a lot of love in the states though. I’m sure Cockney Rebel– the band’s name left many Americans scratching their heads. And maybe it is a British thing in the way that British comedy often leaves Americans wondering what they missed.
See the video of Make Me Smile. Fave line:‘Maybe you’ll tarry for a while.’
MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$$ (NOTE: I bought several months ago the latest reissue of George Harrison’s classic ‘All Things Must Pass,’ which I mention in another post.
Here the man who was one-quarter of the Beatles seems in good spirits.
But George is going to be passionate in a song defending his side. And George’s ordeal with the legal battle highlights the fine line between borrowing and plagiarism. (See Led Zeppelin.)
Harrison is so easy to listen to. Great, underrated voice and some good solid guitar playing and songs that, while not quite Beatles, you can easily hear at least one-quarter of the Beatles.
With “This Song’ he delivers a scathing (for him) rebuke of the plagiarism controversy. Of course George lost that dispute and the songs do sound very much alike. But I don’t think he did it on purpose.
This Song l
This song has nothing tricky about it
This song ain’t black or white and as far as I know Don’t infringe on anyone’s copyright
When the Beatles broke up I was just becoming aware of who the Beatles were at about 10 years old. My mother dropped me in downtown Athens at the Georgia Theater – yes that used to be a movie theater before becoming a music venue — where I went in to see ‘Let it Be,’ the bittersweet documentary of the Beatles recording one last time before breaking up. I was alone. Yes that’s kind of weird, but I’d often go see movies by myself as young’un. Saw ‘Vanishing Point’ my favorite B-movie when I was 12. But I digress.
Billy Preston played on Thirty-three and 1/3.
Beatles became my favorite band and probably shaped my future view of rock and roll.
When they broke up, it was hit or miss for me in getting their solo material.
My brother had ‘Venus and Mars’ and ‘Band on the Run from McCartney and listened to those sometimes inane — but rockin’ — albums. I never bought a Ringo record, bless his heart. I’ve had several John Lennon albums including his classic, but dark, first solo album.
The one thing I regret is not having picked some more Harrison, especially All Things Must Pass. I am going to pledge that I will use a coveted bucket list item to listen to All Things Must Pass all 3 records in the box from start to finish.
I’m looking for suggestions as we enter the Halloween season.
I’m just going to start with one song that is big time on my playlist right now. My NP is a Brummies song, and it really has nothing much to do with Halloween other than it’s “Haunted.”
ALBUMS: Suite for Susan Moore (1969); The Shock of Grace (1981)
MVC Ratings: Suite 3.5/$$$$; Shock 3.5/ $$$$
My vinyl collection of Tim Hardin is not representative of his work. The essential Hardin is caught mostly in his first few 2 albums and also in compilations with those songs from the first two.
I have a compilation of some of his more obscure experimental songs and a key album that fed that compilation. Suite for Susan Moore is as provocative as it is frustrating. Interesting jazzy acoustic guitar is spoiled when Hardin goes on these spoken word jags that sound more dippy than trippy. Too bad because there was clearly interesting music going on.
Allmusic.com has an interesting take on this part of his career: Even the folkier and more upbeat tunes had a casual and distended air: Hardin added to the strangeness by occasionally reciting somber poetry, both unaccompanied and to meandering, jazzy instrumental backing. The drowsy mood, both affectionate and vulnerable, is more important than the message on this haunting album. That means it’s not recommended as the first Hardin recording for neophytes, but it is recommended to those who already like Hardin and are up for something more obtuse than his early records.
His better known songs — which I have somewhere on CD — are well-cover classics and near classics: ‘Reason to Believe;’ ‘If I Were a Carpenter; ‘Lady Came from Baltimore’; How Can you Hang on to a Dream.’ ‘Black Sheep Boy; ‘Misty Roses,’ ‘Don’t Make Promises’ and more. Some of those like ‘Reason’ are classics. (I like Rod Stewart’s version of that song as well as Hardin’s.)
I really like all those listed above except ‘Carpenter’ which just irritated me as it was covered by what seems like every crooner who crooned. Also I can’t listen to it these days because the “would you have my baby’ line reminds me too much of that awful Paul Anka song “Having My Baby.”
On the vinyl I have, as I said, there’s some interesting jazzy-blues work but at this time Hardin was deep into the heroin. The Vietnam veteran of the U.S> Marine Corps. died of an overdose in 1980. He is buried near his hometown of Eugene, Oregon.
I onetime had an idea of doing a book profiling Tim Hardin, Elliott Smith, and Chris Whitley, all pioneering songwriters whose voices were as distinct as their lives were troubled and cut short. Artists whose legacy teeters on the songs that are left behind.
I thought of it when I started taking my youngest, Claire, to school at the University of Oregon in Eugene and upon learning Hardin was from there and Smith was based in Portland. Dunno, bit depressing, but also I thought the three would be interesting case studies, exploring the parallels. Sadly I think I’d start already knowing the parallels: D&D. Drugs and Depression.
(Scene is End of the Line Tavern in the year 2525)
Old Timer: “People say it’s climate warming or global changing or some shit like that. Ha. They been having them for years. The one in 2511 is legend.”
Of course Prosby knew the 2511 storm. Everyone with a well-made Walkie Talkie knows that one. Cat 5 with sustained winds of 220 mph. Turned St. Petersburg into Florida’s Venice.
Forty-foot storm surge dug its own canals.
Old Timer: “Glad I wasn’t down there at the time. You know 678 people died.”
Both men knew that much of Florida is underwater now. There is some dry land in Bithlo, but then you gotta live in Bithlo.
Lightning storms and meth heads made it difficult to venture out in that area of Florida anyway. Refugees from the now underwater Daytona Beach came to occupy Bithlo bringing more drugs upon drugs.
Prosby looked for the bartender, sat in silence for a while and then asked a question of the Old Timer.
“What is it then that storms coming out of nature keep getting bigger and bigger. If not climate change, what is it? God trying to kill us or trying to scare the hell out of us?”
“Don’t be skeered,” Old Timer said. “Just watch the spirals.”
Unconsciously Prosby put my hand on my gas mask, a high end military grade CBRN. Most folks wore them outside and lived in highly filtered airtight homes or apartments. If you didn’t wear one outside, it would only take a month or so before you were coughing up blood.
“Spirals? You mean these hisicanes and hurricanes?”
“No, something bigger,” he said, strapping on his pistol as he made a move for the door.
Hey folks. Grin is not a household name but you vinyl record aficionados ought to seek it out.
It’s a band fronted by Nils Lofgren in the 1970s. Nils is not exactly a household name either but after his youthful foray in Grin, he became a member of bands formed by some major household names: Bruce Springsteen’s E-Street Band and Neil y Young’s Crazy Horse. Not bad. Two of the best rock singer-songwriters of our era. (Actually Grin happened while he was in Crazy Horse.)
Lofgren is an excellent guitarist. But don’t come to Grin expecting life-changing music, like you might have found when you first heard Neil Young or Bruce Springsteen.
I think those two saw a musicality from Lofgren that covered a lot of ground. I think they also must have seen some bright rock and roll fun spirit in his music. Lofgren is a classically trained musician (classical accordion, according to his Wikipedia page –is that a joke?). Glad he ventured into rock and roll as I doubt I would ever be blessed with his music if he was 2nd chair accordion in the Los Angeles symphony.
Anyway Grin is a fun garage band styled group from Lofgren’s early life. The album covers are wild and they alone may be worth the $10 or so you may have to pay for a used copy.
In these blogs, I wrote a little earlier about the Grateful Dead.
Short take: I really never have understood the ulra-passionate appeal for a band whose songs, at least half, sound like sleepy Americana tunes, a genre that didn’t exist — at least in name — in the Dead’s heyday. Or it could also be described as Ronnie Lane music, only without the deep English musical accent that British musician layered on vocals and music.
I did promise further research into the Dead, noting that the only vinyl album I had was ‘Terrapin Station.’ So since that time I found some Dead I’d had digitally, namely the albums ‘Workingman’s Dead’ and ‘American Beauty.’
Of course like many listening to music in the 1970s, I knew ‘Casey Jones’ and the classic band on the road song, ‘Truckin’ ‘ which blesses us with one of the shrewdest summation lines of these years: “What a long strange trip it’s been.”
So this little additional homework has left me with two observations.
The Dead are certainly good (in a down home sloppy sort of way). Listening to more of their music, I had my needle pushed above half a tank. I could listen to Ripple, Box of Rain, and Brokedown Palace on the porch with the sun shining all day.
But I still don’t get how they are in the conversation of best rock band ever. But that’s the rhetoric I’d hear in some circles (California especially.) Jerry Garcia would probably agree that’s a strawman argument.
Man, this music sounds like it came out of the same sessions as ‘Wish You Were Here.’ It was around that time period that the Pink Floyd guitarist put out this restrained but so so nice recording.
With it’s slow building solos and fluid note extensions, it sounds like it would fit right in on ”Wish You were Here’ next to ‘Shine on You Crazy Diamond.’And ‘Wish’ is my favorite Pink Floyd record, so I love this, almost like a sequel.
Don’t think this record sold all that well despite its quality and Floyd’s soaring popularity at the time. It’s Gilmour without Floyd himself putting out some very pretty but powerful guitar meditations without the Big Theme histrionics of Floyd.
As one of the commenters on a YouTube video of this album said this shows how big a role Gilmour played in the sound the Pink Floyd. This is fantastic album for Floyd fans and even not-so-much fans.
I got this for $3 at my excellent downtown books/records/cultural curios store: Reed Books.
Here’s another bargain bin find. One takeaway I am having doing this blog and going one-by-one through my 678 albums is that I was not a bad ‘picker’ of records. I could find some good ones for a couple of bucks.
Lowell George, the lead singer of Little Feat, put this one out in 1979 just before he died of a drug overdose in a Virginia hotel room while on tour for this record.
I agree with AllMusic.com that at first this record seems slight, and it didn’t follow in the jazz-fusion direction that Little Feat was heading (part of the reason he did the solo thing.) But back to being ‘slight’ or not so slight. Some really good renditions of songs here. “What Do You Want that Girl to Do,’ an Allen Toussaint – penned song, is excellent. The Ann Peebles song ‘I Can’t Stand the Rain,’ though oft-covered, is done well by George.
“20 Million Things,’ a George original, is gorgeous and should be a classic. George was a multi-instrumentalist prodigy from childhood. Born in Hollywood, Calif., he was a binge eater, binge alcohol consumer and then, of course the drugs. He weighed more than 300 pounds when he died. Sad we only have this one solo album from him. But there’s a lot of good Little Feat music, which I’ll review when I get to the ‘L’s.”
If you do find this record you get the bonus of having a very cool cover by Neon Park that apparently has several pop culture references including Bob Dylan in there.
I’m including a live video of George with Little Feat backed by Bonnie Raitt and Emmylou Harris to show you just how good that George and Little Feat were.
