ALBUMS: The Real Donovan (1965 ); Hurdy Gurdy Man (1968); Barabajagal (1969).
MVC Ratings: Hurdy 4.5.$$$; The Real Donovan 3.5/$$$; Barabajal 4.0/$$$$
I am skipping ahead here only slightly in my alphabetical placement. I should be doing my Dire Straits and Bo Diddley and db’s before Donovan.
But in the previous post I compared up-and-comer Mac DeMarco to Donovan and since I brought him up, I figured let’s review my three Donovan records before I get back to my not-so-strict alphabetization. At least we’re keeping it in the D’s.
If Donovan sounds interesting to you, I’d probably start with one of his several greatest hits albums. The three records I have cover most of his hits: Sunshine Superman, Hurdy Gurdy Man, Atlantis, Catch the Wind, Mellow Yellow and Colours to name the bigger hits.
The first song of the 1965 album is called Turquoise and it was what first made me connect DeMarco’s style to Donovan. And from DeMarco, Salad Days, the title song, sounds like a whimsical Donovan song.
As for other comparisons, the Donovan song Atlantis with its repetitive singalong chorus could just as well have been an Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros’ song, had Donovan not done it 40-something years ago.
Donovan was born in Glasgow, Scotland and was a high school dropout and sort of wandering beach bum, according to his bio. His early work seemed heavily influenced by folk music and Bob Dylan. Although Donovan has said some of his songs that people say sound like Dylan were composed and recorded before Donovan even knew who Dylan was.
Donovan comparisons go only so far. Donovan isn’t or wasn’t as ‘chill’ as DeMarco, at least from what I hear on Salad Days. Donovan had some pretty heavy electric guitars in Sunshine Superman, Hurdy Gurdy Man, and Barabajagal to name some.
While DeMarco’s ‘lo-fi’ sound has just a tincture of psych, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck played on some of Donovan’s songs and Donovan dove head-long into that 60s psych-o-melodics. (My word, just going to try it out for a while.)
And then there’s Mellow Yellow and the ‘electrical banana’ — yes he wrote that.
Of course, I have to stifle a laugh when I hear an earnest young singer of 23 open the album with: ‘As I’m getting older, chip upon my shoulder.’
Mac DeMarco, who is now 27, says his ‘salad days are over.’
Well at 58 my lettuce wilted long ago.
Act your age, he says on the record. Not going to do it.
One thing, this Canadian is as mellow (maybe even yellow) as an old folkster.
I like him.
He’s got an updated Donovan style with a little frost on it. That’s Donovan Leitch of Hurdy Gurdy man and Sunshine Superman fame. (See now I’m pulling my old man references — back to the 1960s, how about that! Donovan was charting 50 years ago). Also that’s Donovan of Mellow Yellow fame if you missed the reference above.
Donovan was kind of dismissed as a hopelessly helpless hippie at points in his career, a Dylan clone at other parts. But he put out some great music.
Like Donovan, Mac does some spacey slow note-bending guitar work. His words, despite my funning with them, are good. Production is immaculate. It’s that ethereal feel that reminds me of Donovan mixed with a little sleepy time jazz as you hear on Johnny’s Odyssey.
This is a new album, 2014. My sister and her family gave me this one along with some others still yet to be reviewed. The idea being that if I keep my vow of counting down all my vinyl before I die of brain disease, she (and others) are extending my life by adding to my collection. I can’t argue with that, although I do have a lot of albums before I get to the Z’s!
Thanks for this one, nice gentle sound. DeMarco is a young person with a wise heart. Just like my younger sister.
ADDITIONAL ADDS (SEE NOTE BELOW) Deep Purple Made in Japan Live:45/$$$$; Machine Head 4.5/$$$$; Who do we think we are — 3.5/$$$
I more or less have been untethered from the Internet, and thus my blog, for a long weekend out of state.
It was an accidental untethering. I forgot my laptop and phone charger. I really did. But it forced me to actually be more ‘there’ with family and friends. So, that was great. I highly recommend forgetfulness in certain parts of your lives, forgiveness in other parts.
Anyway, I’m working my way through the D’s and thought I’d do a three-fer. Only other time I did three artists in one post on this blog was for the Bongos, Blue Rodeo and BoDeans. If you missed those, check them out. Some good music by those groups.
This time I have three records that are widely different except that they came out in the 1970s. They come at different turning points in these bands’ careers.
Deep Purple, Stormbringer
This heavy metal band is known for giving us the most recognizable (and simplest) riff in rock and roll history. At least it’s in that conversation. That rift being the crunching seven-chord sequence opening ‘Smoke on the Water.’
The riff is so well known it’s a cliche. I’ve heard their are music stores (where they sell guitars) that have signs posted: “No Smoke on the Water allowed.”
Deep Purple has had some good musicians over the years. By the time Stormbringer rolled around, there had been several personnel changes. The album was basically the beginning of the end. The group still had (disgruntled) guitarist, Ritchie Blackmore. This was to be his last DP album before leaving and forming Rainbow. He does blister the guitar on the way out of the door though. While some fans call this an underrated album, I hear a distinct drop-off from their previous two.
For those interested in Deep Purple I would recommend a live album I no longer have (whoever borrowed it 30 years ago, please give it back, Nevermind keep it): The album is Made In Japan and is actually worth a little money if you can find it.
NOTE UPDATE: After publication of this blog, AL.com’s J.D. Crowe, our in-house cartoon drawer and illustrator surprised me with not only ‘Made In Japan,’ but also a primo version of ‘Machine Head.’ Thanks JD, that puts me into the purple.
Detective
This is the debut album of this group and one of only two studio albums. They were signed by Led Zeppelin’s Swan Song label. (Bad Company was also on that label).
Detective is heavily influenced by Zeppelin, probably to a fault. It’s hard to imitate the sound that Zeppelin created. To me Zeppelin teetered toward a parody of the blues, but avoided that pitfall by sheer will of outrageously creative playing and performances. In other words, they took the blues and made it their own.
It was a magical elixir that Robert Plant and company put together. I do think Detective is good and there are some rabid fans out there who say their live concerts were as good as any in the late 1970s.. To my ears, they were missing an ingredient.
What’s that ingredient?
I don’t know. That’s why it’s a magical elixir.
John Denver, Poems Prayers and Promises
OK, don’t hire a lawyer for the whiplash I am giving you right now.
John Denver after a Led Zeppelin soundalike band and the heavy guitar sounds of Deep Purple is like slamming on the rock and roll brakes.
This is not rock and roll ladies and gentlemen. This is a pleasant voiced singer-songwriter putting out his fourth album, a commercial breakthrough, which led to a meteoric rise to celebrity-hood. With his golly gee outdoorsman image and environmentally friendly folky tunes, he won over middle America before tragically dying in a glider/experimental plane crash off a cliff in California.
This album has some covers such as ‘Let it Be’ by the Beatles which is somewhat unnecessary. But it has a couple of songs that made Denver a household name: Sunshine on my Shoulders, and (Take me home) Country Roads. While I can tolerate Country Roads, Sunshine on my Shoulders makes me run screaming from the room; the only thing that could possibly be worse would be Detective trying to do ‘Stairway to Heaven.’
Still if you think you’d like Denver music, and many millions do, it’s probably best to start at one of his greatest hits albums.
I don’t know if it’s a Lewy thing but I’m enjoying this jazz more than ever. I’ve played this Miles record, both sides about five times in the past two days. It’s old new jazz. (Also jumped into a Dizzy Gillespie record, I’ll review in the G’s.}
It’s modern jazz, sometimes ‘played too darn fast’ Chuck Berry famously complained. It’s modern but it’s 1958, a year before I was born and a year before Davis gave us his masterpiece (IMHO) ‘Kind of Blue.’
But this one with Cannonball Adderly and John Coltrane burned pretty well. I gave it a ‘5’ anyway. I remember buying this used at some kind of flea market in Anniston, AL. Would have been 1982. I knew who Davis was but upon seeing the cover photo I felt like I had to have the album. Pretty intense and cool looking dude. And that’s what his music looks and sounds like: Him.
In youth sports they have a day when the sideline crowd of Moms and Dads must be quiet. No shouts of encouragement (Kick the ball!). No shouts of disparagement (Joey why didn’t you just kick it already?).
It’s called Silent Saturday. But as I found out, today is another kind of Silent Saturday, and it’s tied to Easter weekend.
I slowly became aware of this when my wife, Catherine, associate pastor at First Presbyterian Birmingham, didn’t respond to my ‘Good Morning’ as I walked by on the way to the coffee pot.
The reverends Cat Goodrich and Catherine Oliver on Palm Sunday at First Presbyterian Birmingham.
I didn’t think much of it, she must be absorbed in her Easter preparations, I thought.
I found this video that has more than 350 million page views. What? That’s a page view for everyone in the United States and then some.
The video was by a group called Disturbed and it was a cover of the old Simon and Garfunkel classic, ‘Sound of Silence.’ I watched the video, very dramatic, even melodramatic. I can see how this is popular.
I went to show Catherine because I knew she loved the song. She used the music in a presentation at her church in Athens, Ga., in her youth and always cranked it up when it came on the radio. (Ha, funny, cranked up Sound of Silence.)
By this time I had forgotten that Catherine didn’t say good morning back at me. I came walking in with my laptop and said I wanted her to see a video. She made hand gestures. Eventually she spoke very softly and said she was coming out of her silence, and that this was Silent Saturday.
I Googled and found this from popular Christian writer Max Lucado discussing Easter weekend:
Jesus is silent on Saturday. The women have anointed his body and placed it in Joseph’s tomb. The cadaver of Christ is as mute as the stone which guards it. He spoke much on Friday. He will liberate the slaves of death on Sunday. But on Saturday, Jesus is silent.
Whoa. My brain gets a kickstart with back-up help from the coffee: I told Catherine the video was ‘Sound of Silence,’ a cover version. Her face conveyed a mixture of confusion and amazement.
How did you know? She thought I had pulled the video because of the day, which I really knew little to nothing about.
Anyway, it’s a heck of a video, and my only hint is that this version is befitting of a band called ‘Disturbed.’ Catherine and most pastors I know after six weeks of Lenten preparation and Holy Week might also be described as disturbed. But that’s another story.
Watch the video below (Looks like you may have to click through to play video but it’s well worth it):
‘Glad All Over,’ ‘Bits and Pieces,’ ‘Catch Us if you Can,’ ‘Do you Love Me’ — the hits kept coming from this Fab Four plus One.
No, not really close to the Beatles in both performance and songwriting, although ‘Glad All Over’ and “Because’ and ‘Can’t You See that She’s Mine’ — which the vocalist, Mike Smith, vows to ‘keep on holding her hand — sound just like early Beatles. ‘Because’ is the name of a Beatles song — but not this one.
This is one of the better British invasion bands and there were many.
The interesting anomaly here is Blueberry Hill, the song made famous by Fats Domino. Smith does some hard-kick vocals here, channeling, or trying to channel Wilson Pickett or Otis Redding and gets close enough to make it interesting.
It sounds like a command, a rude command at that. Merge!
[Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsWe can’t all do it at the same time. But we have to do it. The sign says so.
Now, what if I can’t merge. The cars are too jammed together. Then, I need someone to YIELD. I like that word.
The other word I don’t like is dementia. I have Lewy body dementia or (LBD). Sometimes it’s called Dementia with Lewy bodies. Sometimes, people take the dementia out altogether and say Lewy body disease. But dementia is the most used and most accepted description. It is a word that broadly describes damage to the brain that affects cognition, memory, speech, etc. That brain damage can be caused by Lewy bodies (proteins) or Alzheimer’s or other brain diseases. Although we know the process of this brain damage, in cases like Lewy, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, we don’t know the cause of these diseases. And there is no cure.
So why don’t I like the word dementia? Well for one, it is a root word of demented, which sounds menacing.
The word itself, demented, sounds too much like ‘demon.’ The dictionary says demon is a bad spirit or ‘one who acts as a tormentor in hell.”
The dictionary says demented means “driven to behave irrationally due to anger, distress, or excitement.”
Now that’s a little better than being in hell. But if I’m driven to irrational behavior it’s because I am ‘driven’ to it.
Because of my LBD, I have quit driving and am now being driven by other people: my wife, my daughter, my colleagues, friends, neighbors, church folk, Uber drivers. Just about anybody I can flag down.
I must admit it has been an interesting life-changing adventure. No longer in the driver’s seat, I’m on the passenger side.
The general consensus is that I’m one of the worst backseat (or passenger side), drivers in the world.
It does allow me time to get work done via phone or laptop while someone else is driving. If I’m not gripping the seat with my white-knuckled hands
Or stomping the floor like I may find a brake on the passenger side.
I have so far resisted the urge to discuss the correct method to merge with my drivers.
Take the zipper merge, for example, which according to my Internet research (Wiki) is a “convention for merging traffic into a reduced number of lanes. Drivers in merging lanes are expected to use both lanes to advance to the lane reduction point and merge at that location, alternating turns.”
Like a zipper.
But I usually keep these tidbits of information to myself, as I have seen my drivers get a little agitated when I ‘help’ them drive.
I usually save my instruction on my rides to things like: WATCH OUT FOR THAT TRUCK!
Um, oh, OK, we have the green turn arrow, I see that now. Sorry, I just couldn’t tell if that truck was stopping; it did roll a bit.
So I think I’ll hold onto that merge information until we put some time between my unnecessary shouting.
HONK HONK, the car behind us blares the horn because we are slow to merge.
These albums by members of supergroup bands going solo come to me with low expectations. They are usually forced at least in the musical sense by the artist working out of his role. That’s part of the appeal to the artist and part of the ego-driven decision.
Look at Diana Ross, they think. She didn’t need no Supremes.
Look at Mick Jagger’s solo work. He DOES need the Stones.
ROGER: Uh, Pete, it’s just a little side project like you did with Ronnie Lane.
But that side project — Rough Mix — was good! One of my favorite albums. One of the best songs in that Townshend-Lane creation is the song ‘Annie.’
Daltrey, who never learned to button his own shirt, put it all out there on “One of the Boys’ — ballads, rockers, a little country. Hoping something would stick.
Daltrey is a great rock vocalist and quintessential front man for one of rock’s greatest rock bands, The Who. But this album is fair at best. But not without ambition.
Best song (ironically): Avenging Annie.
I have Andy Pratt’s version of Avenging Annie — he wrote it. And you could certainly argue that Daltry’s is better.
Daltrey is a singer, an interpreter of other’s songs. Townshend did the lion’s share of writing of the Who’s classics not the chiseled, shirtless frontman with flowing blond hair.
Funny side note: In my album, which is a cutout has an advertisement sheet offering “RogerDaltrey Hologram’ pendant that makes Daltrey look like a cross between Andre the Giant and Thor.
ALBUMS: Chronicle (1976); Green River (1969); Willy and the Poor Boys (1969); Mardi Gras (1972).
MVC Rating: Chronicle 5.0 Green River 4.5; Willy and the Poor Boys; Mardi Gras 4.0
In the liner notes. (Stop. Need to explain: Liner notes are essays, histories or any little write-up written on all that ample space on the cover, jacket or sleeves of records. It’s a way to give some history, preview the new record or point out something. They all but disappeared when CDs came out b/c space was so tight on the much smaller recordings.)
But I digress.
In the liner notes, Greil Marcus makes a reference to ‘striking a chord.’ Marcus is the godfather of rock writers who once wrote for Creem. Five points if anybody remembers that influential magazine. Anyway, I continue to digress. So Marcus wrote this in the liner notes to ‘Chronicle,’ the 20-song greatest hits double -record released after the group broke up.
So here in part is what he wrote:
“Making music against the grain of the post San Francisco pop music of the Sixties, Creedence struck a true chord with records that were clean, demanding, vivid and fast — with what might be called straightforward lyricism.”
The keyword here is chord. Listen to Creedence and you will notice rock and roll chords, minor chords that sound just right, rhythm guitar out front. Chords are different notes that make a nice sound when they get played together.
I could go a dozen ways in a post about CCR. My first two 33 and-a-third RPM LPs were ABC by the Jackson 5 and Cosmos Factory by Creedence Clearwater Revival (Up Around the Bend, Run Through the Jungle, Long as I Can see the Light.) Excellent stuff.
Loved both albums. I was into Michael Jackson early. Basically Michael and I were the same age so it was about 9 or 10 when I got into MJ. I remember Mama Pearl jumping out of the radio, and of course the best — ‘I Want You Back.’ Both of those albums, ABC and Cosmos Factory, are long gone from my collection. Although I think I still have Wilson Pickett’s 45 ‘Don’t Let the Green Grass Fool You.’ As I write this, I’m thinking now how I came to like such disparate music. J5 and CCR were far apart except for two things: they connected to a lot of people and had something you can’t manufacture — talent.
They were hit machines.
I remember I was about 9 or 10 when I got Cosmos Factory from my father who was out of town on a business trip and came back with the album. He knew I liked CCR because on long trips from Georgia to see grandparents in Texas, I’d flip the dials on the radio. ‘Looking out My Back Door’ was big then as was ‘Who’ll Stop the Rain’ which my mother loved. Probably ‘Rollin’ on the River.’
This was some family harmony tied to music by these long haired rockers who sounded like they crawled out of the bayou we just drove past in Louisiana. But they were actually from the SF Bay Area, Fremont, I think. A town that would be many years later where my employer ran the local paper there (in addition to a handful of other papers.)
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