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Faces — 492

ALBUM: Snakes and Ladders, Best of Faces (1976)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$

Let me preface this by saying the Small Faces  evolved into Faces after Steve Marriott  left. Rod Stewart then hopped on board. They always seemed like they were having a real good time and seemed to be  shit-faced  half the time.

Put this one on and bring the pub to our home.

Feet sticking to the floor. Band so bad it’s the best;  Chuck  Berry chords. Dancing.  Here hold my beer!

You either love Rod Stewart or you don’t. No?

I  think he’s great. His distinct voice always seemingly on the verge of laryngitis,  his vocal skills, timing. his rock and roll sensibilities. Even his highly commercial Top 40 years and brief fling (like the Stones and Bowie, TinaTurner, etc.) with disco. I took heat from my peers about having too much Rod Stewart in my collection.  But these uninformed critics (my HS, college buddies) didn’t know the  early stuff which was raucous rock and roll. He went commercial, sure, with his eye on mass consumption. But come on, the guy is only ranked 23rd on the rock star net worth charts at $235 million.

I mean Stewart  is a guy who can sing ballads with feeling, belt the blues rock songs and do a standard that brings grandmas running to the stage. It Had to be You  ,,,,

Here though it is mostly rock and blues.

He’s been successful for decades. This Faces record is a best-of one of his early bands, the Faces.  It doesn’t feel like a compilation, however. as the party songs flow and nearly every song has that famous Small Faces/Faces live sound. It’s roots music, especially as influenced by the  wonderful Ronnie Lane, before they called it roots music.

Favorite lines from Miss Judy’s Farm:

Miss Judy she could have me
Any hour of the working day
She’d send me in the corn field mid-afternoon
Said son it’s all part of your job
Miss Judy had a cross-eyed poodle
That I would kick if I was given the chance

Best known song here,  probably ‘Stay with Me’ which feels like the prequel to his later smash, ‘Maggie May.’ Although ‘Ooh La La’ has had some staying power over the years.

Strange command in the ‘Stay with Me’ song: Sit down, get up, get out.

All right, already. Make up your mind you sexist pig.

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Father John Misty — 493

 

ALBUM: Pure Comedy (2017)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$$$

Lot of things going on here. Josh Tillman           aka Father John Misty is a smart guy. I think he knows it.

Pure Comedy is a song that is near brilliant.

Tillman’s story in one sentence: The drummer of folk rock group Fleet Foxes took some psilocybin mushrooms a few years ago, became enlightened, started using a pseudonym, and began wearing better clothes.

Couple of anomalies to clear up before I go forward. The usual My Vinyl Countdown records are ones I picked in the 1970’s and 1980’s. I’ve been counting them down, 678 in all, to raise awareness of Lewy body dementia, which I have. I have about 500 records to go .

Pure Comedy breaks the mode a bit in that this is a 2017 vinyl recording that I received from family members who want to extend my life under the theory that the more I have the more time I have to live. And it is true that this disease shortens lifespans but that I have vowed to finish the reviews, which on my current pace will be about 2 or more years from now unless I accelerate.

So, anomaly one, this is contemporary. Not my golden 1980s — stop-making-synth records. I will review and countdown new vinyl, when I get it and have done  so at least two other times with Joseph Arthur and Max DeMarco.

I have some more coming up, including, I believe, the Fleet Foxes which connects to the Misty record here.

And, anomaly two, this double record set came with two of the same records – I got two side 3’s and side 4s. I did not get a side 1 and 2.  What the hell? It’s a factory packaging mistake that in no way makes it more valuable. So, I filled in the rest of this record by going on YouTube to listen to the songs I was missing, especially the title track, a key song here.

Opening line is one strong couplet, foreshadowing and outlining the album’s life-is-so-bad-it’s-funny themes. The  comedy of it all. The divine comedy of it all. Star.

The comedy of man starts like this; our brains are way too big for our mother’s hips.

But the album itself cannot stay at that high level and sinks slowly back into the primordial pool. To make this totally work, you would have to love the words so much to hang with this singer who is not working much in traditional pop structures. Dylan could be like that – so could early Billy Joel who went 180 degrees the other way later toward more formulaic derivative pop.

Would it be fair to say Tillman is somewhere between Billy Joel and Bob Dylan? Probably not. More like a day-glo Randy Newman.

But Tillman started something, by starting the album  in this way. He caused me  to be on alert for a real honest-to-God trailblazing singer-songwriter. The rest of the album didn’t tip me over though. So he is still on my ‘watch’ list. Update: I just watched/saw Misty’s ‘God’s Favorite Customer’ on  YouTube.  Excellent. Beautiful. I’m starting to tip. Then I watched ‘Mr.  Tillman video. Wow. Now I have to get this on vinyl  and put the new one on my countdown.

Back to Pure Comedy, here’s the opening that says it all and forecasts more:

The comedy of man starts like this; our brains are way too big for our mother’s hips.

And so nature, she divines this alternative:
We emerge half-formed and hope whoever greets us on the other end

Is kind enough to fill us in

And babies, that’s pretty much how it’s been ever since

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John Fahey — 495, 494

  ALBUMS: Volume 1 Blind Joe Death; Guitar Vol. 4;

MVC Rating: Blind 4.5/$$$$; Guitar 4.0/ $$$$

John Fahey’s music is hard to categorize. And he may have been the most influential guitarist you’ve never heard of.

Not a shredder, but a plucker.

He said he considered himself a classical guitarist.  But the category he was usually placed under was ‘primitive guitar, blues, folk.’ It was mostly like nothing you’ve ever heard. Light finger-picking guitar delivered  pieces that lulled you into the deeper recesses of the song. Hypnotized without consent.

You listen and think, I could do that. Then he does something so quick and unexpected that you have to stop and reshape or get lost in it.

By Ellis408 at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31511739

To continue my metaphorical ways, the music was like a lazy river, no whitewater. Rolling, rolling through small eddys. Lay a  soft whispery vocal on some of these songs and it would sound like Nick Drake.

There are versions of Blind Joe Death that are rare and expensive. When I found Blind Joe Death in used record store in Leesburg, FL, I thought I had hit the jackpot. I had just read an article about Fahey and how he released only 100 copies of Blind Joe Death. But alas, it was not the valuable one. Although this version is being shopped around out there in the $30-40 range.

From a well-sourced Wikipedia page we learn that he bought his first guitar for $17 from Sears, Roebuck. (Hey didn’t Tom Petty buy his from Sears as well?) And Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong have a record together on the Sears label.

Sears slogan: Where your past is about all we have left.

From WIki:

Fahey discovered his love of early blues upon hearing Blind Willie Johnson‘s “Praise God I’m Satisfied” on a record-collecting trip to Baltimore with his friend and mentor, the musicologist Richard K. Spottswood. Much later, Fahey compared the experience to a religious conversion and remained a devout blues disciple until his death. {FROM MIKE: I like that he took record-collecting trips.}

As his guitar playing and composing progressed, Fahey developed a style that blended the picking patterns he discovered on old blues 78s with the dissonance of contemporary classical composers he loved, such as Charles Ives and Béla Bartók. 

Rolling Stone put Fahey at 35th in their Top 100 Guitarists of all time.

Some traditional songs on the two albums I have include ‘Will the Circle Be Unbroken,’ Oh Come, Oh Come Emanuel,’ “Uncloudy Day,’ and ‘St. Louis Blues.’

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The Eurythmics — 496

 

 

ALBUM: Be Yourself Tonight (1986)

The song about not lying. Riff hard.

The song about the Angel.

The song about Sisters with Aretha.

Those are the highlights. Never really liked the Eurythmics much. I always thought Annie could sing, but I thought she thought she could sing better than she can sing. I bought this on the singular best song and overplayed song she and Dave Stewart have ever done: ‘Sweet Dreams.’ (Which to me sounded like a great Madonna song.)
So I guess I’m realizing this 30 years too late. But I bought the wrong record..

I wouldn’t lie to you about that.

 

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Emerson, Lake and Palmer –498, 497

ALBUMS: Emerson Lake and Palmer (1970); Works Vol. 2 (1977)

When it comes to Emerson, Lake and Palmer I find myself feeling inadequate.

I loved ‘Lucky Man,’ when I was 13 or so  (actually still do) so I got that album.

But that was written by Greg Lake when he was 12! OMG.

The classically influenced forays by Emerson and gang are labeled pretentious by some critics.

I don’t mind saying, I don’t find them pretentious. They are sometimes beautiful to my ears and sometimes they are over my ears and over my head.

ELP was no obscure Soft Machine here (see my home page graphic).

ELP sold about 50 million records worldwide.

When I posted on my Van Cliburn  albums, I wondered in the column if Emerson could have beaten Van Cliburn in the International Tchaikovsky Competition. Well I didn’t wonder so overtly but I did set up ‘dueling’ videos.

I don’t know what’s going on when someone sounds like they have three hands on the piano. I can never break this down like altrockchick.com, a multi-instrumentalist, multilingual and probably one of the most insightful rock critics I’ve read of late.

. Read a snippet from her review of ELP’s Trilogy:

Here Keith Emerson demonstrates his dynamic flexibility on the piano, quieting detractors with a delicately played and beautifully phrased sequence. His return to percussive piano chords signals the intro to Part 2, a passage with tiny hints of Copland, foreshadowing the later track, “Hoedown.”  Greg Lake then returns to sing the enigmatic closing verses.

I cannot write that. But I believe she knows it based on her other writings and the authority with which she writes.

Now my mentor and adversary (he has no idea who I am, of course), Robert Christgau, the grand poo-bah of acerbic crank, famously panned ELP, and said the fans are as pretentious as the band, or something like that.

Uh oh. I recently sat listening to ELP with my daughter, late 20s, and we thoroughly enjoyed Works Vol. 2 and their self-entitled debut album. Emily would read a bit during the contemplative pieces and perk up and grab the album cover on some of the more brazen ones. She is the least pretentious person I know. (She likes Dixie Chicks, who can also play their instruments.)

And I can listen to a master pianist,  Emerson, play Scott Joplin all day.

Now I’m digging through my box ‘o cassette tapes because I remember I had Tarkus in that format.

I sold my Insect Trust .45 Saturday so Tarkus might be a good replacement in my rotation.

OK, 1,2,3. Rotate.

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Endless Beach (Major Lance, various) — 499

Did you know the mayor of Atlanta is the daughter of Major Lance?

Interesting. I  did not know that.  I learned this as I was researching this record compilation called ‘Endless Beach.’

Who is Major Lance, you ask?

A lesser known R&B singer who had some hits in the 1960s, notably ‘Um, Um, Um, Um, Um,’ and ‘The Monkey Time.’

This record also led to a search of information on Carolina Beach Music, a sub-genre of old and new R&B closely associated with the dance called the Carolina Shag. My take on listening to this album is that it is quite nice, pleasant, feel-good music. Undiscovered gem.

Some of the artists here, playing music represented from 1963 to 1979, include Robert John, Tower of Power, The Tymes, Tina Charles, Wild Cherry, Otis Leavill, and Spiral Staircase.

This two – record set has a very detailed R. Crumb-like cover credited to Ellwood Smith.

Keisha Lance Bottoms

Liner notes explain the Carolina Beach sound.

Lance’s daughter is Keisha Lance Bottoms, the 60th mayor of Atlanta.

 

 

 

 

 

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Joe Ely — 501

ALBUM: High-Res (1984)

MVC Rating: 4.0/$$

Joe Ely I forgot about you. How good you are.

I pulled this out of the collection and couldn’t recall a song on it but had the feeling that I used to like this. Ely, pronounced Eeelee, is a Texas roots rocker who was once good  friends with Joe Strummer and played with the Clash.

Great guitar player, good songwriter and club-disciplined live performer.

He defies classification.  That said, I wish I had more of his  records. Hi-Res is good but has a little bit of that 1980s over production veneer. Songs of notice: ‘What’s Shakin’ Tonight,’Cool Rockin’ Loretta,’ and probably my favorite ‘Letter to Laredo,’ which has some nasty guitar licks, and also some not-so -nasty Duane Eddy-like bass string ‘twang’ reverberation.

According to Wikipedia, which I am careful with, Ely toured with the Clash, ultimately performing together in Ely’s hometown of Lubbock, Texas. The Clash even name checked Ely in their song ‘If Music Could Talk’ off  of the Clash’s Sandinista. Ely was preparing to record with Strummer when the Clash front man died.

Here’s from ‘Laredo:’

As I was rolling across the Mississippi, I stopped there and I cried, no use for a man to keep a mighty river all dammed up inside

I jumped bail from  Sweetwater County,  now I’m on the run, on my head is a five-number bounty, for a crime I never done.

Take this letter to Laredo to the one I love, tell her to stay low, beneath the stars above, her love is my only alibi, it’s for her love I lied

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Duane Eddy — 502

ALBUM:  Twangin’ the Golden Hits (1964)

MVC Rating: 3.5/$$$

Twang.

Twang. Twang. Twang. What’s that called when the word sounds like the sound it is a word for? Let me run to Google.

Shite, I already had this in my head as the answer but I looked it up anyway. I hate when  I do that. Of course it’s onomatopoeia. Meow.

Duane Eddy it seems couldn’t shake that twang thang.

The twang sound was a technique of playing lead on his guitar’s bass strings to produce a low, reverberant ” sound. according to  his Wikipedia page.

Dang. I wrote earlier that John Anderson had a twangy voice, broadening the boundaries of the word’s descriptive power. Over three decades or four, Eddy put out 33 albums, a number of which were recycled greatest type packages.

But of those 33, nearly half — 14 — had Twang or some version (Twangin’, Twangy) in the title.  So he was all about the Twangin,’ and I’ll proffer here the guy could twang.

This ‘greatest hits’ album I have is frustrating, however. It doesn’t have the ‘Peter Gunn’ soundtrack, a Henry Mancini piece that was the theme song for the self-entitled television show.

‘Rebel Rouser’ is good, maybe not rousing good, but sock hop tuneful.

Raunchy’? Not much. ‘Shangri La’ didn’t get there.

Instrumental music guitar has always been a bit difficult. I admire good music but I also like my words, you know I do. Oops sorry I just had to slap myself, ‘Last Date’ just about twanged me to sleep. “Honky Tonk’ had words but needed women. Now ‘Rumble’ is good in a slow grind way. Nice sax  — which is also present and well played on several tracks. And then there’s ‘The RIver Kwai March,’ yes that one that opens with whistling. Actually in Eddy’s cover version, it sounds like a piccolo has replaced human lips. But this upbeat war music piece seems oddly out-of-place here.

Overall, my take is this is background music for a late 50s  dinner party. But he is a R&R hall of famer and Grammy winner, so what do I know.

File this one next to the Chet Atkins album I reviewed earlier.  Now for some instrumental party guitar, more what Eddy strives for, not Chet (a legend by the way),  I will in the future review a little known band called the Raybeats. Now they rock.

Also, I have a copy of an album by a group called the SIlencers from Pittsburgh which has a locked and loaded version of ‘Peter Gunn.” to be reviewed when I get to the S’s in my alphabetical journey.

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Forgive J.R. Smith (blog version)

NOTE:  A version of this originally appeared on AL.com.

I remember it like it was yesterday (and I have a degenerative brain disease.)

Playing right field, I reacted to the crack of the bat. This was big time Little League baseball in Athens, Ga.

“Please don’t let it come to me” went through my head like 1,000 times in a millisecond. Everything slowed down. My adrenaline was surging through my body. Everything slowed waaaay down. People were shouting 33-1/3 rpm when they should have been 45 rpm:

“Dooon’t Drop The Ball,” a horde of deep bass Lurches were yelling . I was moving in slow motion like I was underwater. I thought about my dog, Lucy.  Lucy had died recently. Oh my gosh,  Lucy is dead. I grieved in a millisecond.  I thought about my Dad in the stands, won’t he be proud of me if I catch this.  i thought about my Aunt Velma in Idaho, wait a minute,  I don’t have an Aunt Velma in Idaho.

Then things sped up triple speed. Whoooooooooosh!  Bat crack. Baseball is tiny dot in earth’s upper atmosphere. Falling, falling, getting bigger. Smacks my leather glove. Rolls out.

I dropped the ball.

In three seconds, I lived a lifetime.

The bases– which seemed pretty well  occupied by other team baseball kids — cleared . I’m not sure,  but I think all nine of their players touched home plate in the frenzy afterward.

The game, or life as they like to call it in Athens, Ga., was over.

Just like in the Johnny Cash song , ‘I  hung my head and cried.’

Flash forward to just a few weeks ago, I was playing basketball in  my Old Man Hoops League here in Birmingham. Good friends we all are. They helped organize a basketball fund-raiser for Lewy body dementia last year which we are looking to reprise (stay tuned for details).

So these are very good friends. They know my game and have an extensive scouting report on me. Boiled down the report is:  He used to be good, now he’s not.

Fair enough. Good bulletin board  material. (Smiley face insert here).

It was a next-bucket-wins the game thing. I had the ball. Most of the time I’d take a shot in that situation. But  out of the corner of  my eye  I saw Paul in an area  where he is comfortable  and accurate with his sweet little jumper. My faithful  and often painful worship of my childhood hero Pete Maravich possessed me to swing a behind-the-back pass to Paul which was rather easily picked off by Clay.

There commenced a race down the court which my 58-year-old legs denied me permission to participate in. They scored, they won.

My team avoided eye contact with me.

I know this is a long way to  getting to  the J.R. Smith headline. J.R, a good longtime NBA sharpshooter now with Cleveland Cavaliers, famously made a boo boo last week  in an extremely important  NBA Playoff game. The consensus is that he thought  his team was ahead when he rebounded the ball   with seconds left.  But it  was tied. Instead of putting it back up for a score and a win, he dribbled the ball out. Tied, the clock ran out and the game went into overtime.

Guess who won in overtime.

I’ll bet the world slowed down and sped  up for him.

National headlines. A public shaming.

Few thoughts. First he needs to come clean  and apologize to his teammates. And maybe he has. If so good for him!  I sought forgiveness  and it was good. “Don’t do that ever again,” my teammates said.

Thanks for your forgiveness, I said. (That’s how we usually say we forgive each other: Don’t ever let it happen again.

Secondly, J.R. needs to seek therapy.

This isn’t the first high level boneheaded play for him. For goodness sakes there’s a YouTube video chronicling his mistakes. Maybe there’s something from childhood that is stopping him from being all he can be.

I have a friend, yeah that’s right, a friend,  who was having recurring nightmares  about dropping a baseball and then after therapy he  had a dream that he caught it. Yaaaaaay. He ran around with ball in hand triumphantly.

But everybody was pointing and laughing.

Because he had no clothes on.

AAAARGH. Just a dream. Just a friend’s dream. Sometimes therapy doesn’t work.

But I forgive you J.R Smith.

I’ve been there.

 

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Dave Edmunds – 503

ALBUM: The Best of Dave Edmunds (1981)

MVC Rating: 4/$$$

Ah, rock and roll. Smooth unfiltered like good Kentucky bourbon. It’s Berry DIddley and for Everley Buddy Lee Lewis.

(Well that last sentence sort of belies the unfiltered description. Maybe filtered just right like Marlboro Lights? Not so good but I am deviating again.)

I picked up on Dave Edmunds from the group Rockpile’s ‘Seconds of Pleasure,’ which is similar to this best-of (although Rockpile is better).  It is just rock and roll with Edmunds, and when Lowe was involved, there were some great lyrics to go with the  three or four chords.

Dave is primarily a cover singer. Here he  does Crawling from the Wreckage’, a Graham Parker song and John Fogerty’s  ‘Almost Saturday Night’ and Elvis Costello’s ‘Girls Talk.’ And he covers his buddy Lowe, or does he expose himself?

Nick and Dave lent a hand in Carlene Carter’ very good album ”Musical Shapes,’   which has an Edmunds-Carter duet that seemed very friendly.

And Nick married Carlene.

And Nick wrote the song “I Knew the Bride (When she used to Rock and Roll).

And  Dave Edmunds covered the song,  coming up with what most say is the definitive version. Nick recorded several versions to lesser success than the Edmund’s.

Carlene and Nick divorced.

Subject for further research: the timeline that the above happened.

Sample lyrics.

Take a look at the bridegroom smilin’ pleased as pie
Shakin’ hands all around with a glassy look in his eye
He got a real good job and his shirt and tie is nice
But I remember a time when she would never even look him twice