Posted on

MVC blog update, through the looking glass

Ever wonder what are those numbers near the title of each My Vinyl Countdown  blog item.

It is there at the top next to the singer’s name. Some know that’s the number of records left to go before having done them all. So for example, Broken Homes is 624 and that means 623 were lef  to review  at the time that was being written. THe Head and the Heart was the last blog I did so it is at the top of the website, counting down in alphabetical order. The H&H is at 429.

So if you knew nothing about the numbering, you could assess which letters I have been through by picking on of the Letter categories to your right.

For example I’m on the H’s now with Jimi Hendrix, Heart, etc. In C’s we had the Carpenter’s, Eric Clapton. There are more than 200 musical posts.

My goal for my records is 678 which I counted before I started this thing about 14 months ago. That number definitely won’t stand as I have been receiving records and yes, occasionally still buying, records. But 678 has been my number I’m sticking to until the end and then maybe we’ll start down an Odds ‘n Ends list with whatever’s left over

TO find older material, the search field works really well on laptop/desktop. Not so sure on mobile.

Upcoming: I’ve decided to file a short update on my fitness training each week, the quest to dunk.

My Bucket List item.

 

Posted on

The Head and the Heart — 428

ALBUM:  ‘Let’s Be Still” (2013)

Okay, here’s another from a relative, and a relatively new record at that. The Head and the Heart is the name of this earnest alternative folk group.

There seems to be a real genre beginning with this big band easy folk-rock, atmospheric music. Kind of like a mix of Fleetwood Mac and Fairport Convention. With a hint of and updated sounding Pentangle. (John Renbourne, look him  up).

Other artists such as the Fleet Foxes, Mac DeMarco, and to a certain degree Father Misty (originally in the Fleet Foxes) and Arcade Fire appear to be sharing some of this ground.

Some fine singing and harmonizing on this. Fun to listen to with your eyes closed in an easy yoga position.

Band members, should and probably do understand the increasing competition in their space, maybe due to  higher demand for the sound.

I’m leaving out to play some more of these newer ones that I haven’t listened to as much. This particular album has a very good soft jam thing working here.

Posted on

Heart — 435

ALBUM:  Dreamboat Annie (197

MVC Rating: 4.5 $$$$

5)

I owe Heart some money.

It was April in 1980. I was an Auburn University student. I was out walking and heard music from the auditorium or arena or whatever it was called.

Concert going on. I walked closer. Closer. Up a ramp. The door was ajar. Hmmm. Took a peek inside and there appeared to be no one at this particular door. Walked in.

Now this is where it gets fuzzy in my memory. I think I saw Blackfoot as the opening act. I know I saw Heart. My memory fails as to whether this was two different incidents or one. I’m leaning toward one. Anyway, that’s why I say I  owe Heart money — for the ticket I didn’t buy. Maybe I owe Blackfoot too. I’ll pay up if either of the bands’ members contact me.

I heart heart. Or, at least, hearted heart.

I was an early consumer of this hard rocking female-fronted  band. The female Led Zeppelin. I played Dreamboat Annie their debut ceaselessly in high school. Sure there was soft pretty stuff, which I secretly sang along to. But there was real rock and roll and real guitar licks especially in Magic Man and Crazy On You. Check videos below to get sense of their rock and roll acumen.

The reason I said I ‘hearted’ Heart because by college at Auburn, I was over them. I  didn’t particularly like the overplayed Barracuda and was lukewarm to the whole Dog and Butterfly thing.

But I’ll always dig Dreamboat Annie, the album which came out in 1975, the sweet spot of my high school days.

Posted on

TIm Hardin — 439, 438

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.

Video below shows couple of Hardin’s classics.

Posted on

His and Hurricanes in the future (Part. 2)

 …continued

(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.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Posted on

His and hurricanes in the future

Part 1

It is the year 2525, and a storm described as ‘apocalyptic’ is barreling down on Florida and Alabama’s Gulf Coast.

The TV reporters hyperventilate and exaggerate their inability to stand in a stiff breeze.

But this is a big one. The biggest they say since the National Weather Service upped the gender equality correctness by calling the boy’ hurricanes, ‘hisicanes.’

This is Hisicane Donald.

Millions of Americans stared, transfixed by the spiral on TV screens.

Counterclockwise swirling. Hypnotizing.

It looked like the cosmic spiral of our galaxy.

Everybody asked: When is landfall? Where is landfall? When is that TV reporter going to be conked in head by a wind-driven coconut?

Hisicane Donald’s path had been surprisingly fast moving.

And it is upon us now.

Some people had chosen to flee, pack up the car and head out. Others chose to stay, shoring up their houses with boards and their doors and yards with sandbags.

And some, hesitated, caught up in staring at the spiral and wondering if it is really worth running from or should they just ‘hunker down.’

This is historic. Never been seen before, the TV blared.

“This your first ‘herckun?’ Old timer nursing a 16-oz PBR asks.

Prosby had just walked in and sat down at the End of the Line Tavern.

“Oh no, no,’ Prosby said.

To Be Continued …

 

Posted on

Poem Drop

Soul Sisters:  Caring, love as I rearrange everything

Hello again, and?

Ain’t life grand?

Now that you can see it.

Now that you can be it.

Any other explanation doesn’t stand

How it’s all connected, perhaps not quite perfected, like the best can come from breaking with the plan

 

Every place

My love for you I find

In heart, body and mind

Let go, let go and shine

Yes is the better answer, like a clinging leaf is the better dancer, most of the time

 

For more of what I call ‘Attempted Poetry’ hit the so-named button on the right of  yuor screen or just click here:  https://myvinylcountdown.com/category/warning-attempted-poetry/

 

Posted on

Addendum on Grateful Dead

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.

Posted on

Somebody needs to tell Ted Turner his brain disease is fatal (blog version)

This is an opinion column by Mike Oliver, who frequently writes about his own diagnosis of Lewy body dementia and other health, life and death issues.

So who told Ted Turner, CNN magnate, that his newly diagnosed Lewy body dementia is not fatal.

Is he just playing it down?

TedTurner.JPG

Because I’ve got news for him:  It is 100 percent fatal. You get it you die.

Like a  lot of diseases, right? No.

What Ted has, Lewy body dementia, shortens lifespans. Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, on average, do not. (Some say Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s shortens life 2 or fewer years.)

There is no cure for any of these degenerative brain diseases.

Turner, the billionaire TV cable mogul, said in an interview today on CBS This Morning that he has been diagnosed with Lewy body dementia.

“It’s a mild case of what people have as Alzheimer’s. It’s similar to that. But not nearly as bad. Alzheimer’s is fatal,” Turner told Koppel at his 113,000-acre ranch near Bozeman, Montana. “Thank goodness I don’t have that.”

I don’t think Ted fully knows what’s coming. Maybe he does. But it sounds like Turner — like the vast public and, most troubling, the medical community — doesn’t have a clue about what he has.

The fact is that Lewy body dementia is not a form of Alzheimer’s disease and, not that a debate over ‘severity’ of the diseases accomplishes much, Lewy’s damaging symptoms can be equal to or worse than AD, if that’s even possible. Both kill the brain eventually and every step of the way you lose a little more control.

Turner said something else that goes to the heart of my mission:

“But, I also have got, let’s – the one that’s – I can’t remember the name of it.” (Bold emphasis mine.)

(MORE ABOUT THE UNDERDIAGNOSED DISEASE: LEWY LEWY, CALL IT BY ITS NAME)

Turner said, “Dementia. I can’t remember what my disease is.”

Too often patients don’t know what they got, some doctors know little about it.

I seek to raise awareness of this disease. I have — with generous help from the community — conducted two basketball tournament fund-raisers for Lewy body research at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. I have written quite a bit about it for my blog and AL.com. Go to my website and click on the Lewy Dementia button for some of my writing.

Come join me Mr. Turner.

Robin Williams had Lewy body dementia, and it was undiagnosed. He thought he was  going crazy. The suicide I believe could have been prevented. The knowledge itself would have helped reduce anxiety. And with treatment targeted to Lewy body, not Alzheimer’s, not Parkinson’s, he might have had some good time left.

In the interview aired today, Turner said something that puts a point on what has become a mission of mine: Raise awareness for Lewy body. I write this right now on my laptop slowly in the hunt-and-peck mode because my right hand can’t type. Lewy body can present with Parkinsonian symptoms on top of the cognition issues.

Lewy body disease (LBD) is a umbrella term which covers Lewy body dementia, which I have. It’s been two years since I was diagnosed. I guess you would say I am in early stages and still highly functional.

But Lewy isn’t going anywhere.

Lewy body dementia will kill you on average 5 to 8 years after diagnosis. There are several sources for this including Mayo Clinic (other sources say  4 to 7 years or 5 to 7 years.)

Lewy body disease presents symptoms that include impaired cognition, and the kind of  tremors associated with Parkinson’s.

Lewy body dementia has changed my world.

MikeMadness T-shirts.jpgTrisha Powell Crain

You have a choice to get interested in what may kill you prematurely and do what I’m doing: Spreading the word. I’m a columnist for an AL.com and write about Lewy body dementia frequently here and on my music blog:  www.myvinylcountdown.com

I have never heard anyone describe Lewy body as being milder than Alzheimer’s. They are two different things and affect everybody differently. But Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s patients have less of a reduction in lifespan than Lewy body dementia patients.

Mayo Clinic says this:” Lewy body dementia, also known as dementia with Lewy bodies, is the second most common type of progressive dementia after Alzheimer’s disease dementia. Protein deposits, called Lewy bodies, develop in nerve cells in the brain regions involved in thinking, memory and movement (motor control).”

Let’s find a cure.

Reach me at moliver@al.com and see my blog at www.myvinylcountdown.com

Posted on

Al Green — 445, 446, 447

ALBUMS:  Greatest Hits (Reissue: 1982 of 1975 release); Truth In Time (1978); Soul Survivor (1987)

MVC Rating: Greatest 5.0/$$$$; Truth 4.0/$$$; Soul Survivor/$$$

One of my favorite  artists  — all time.

I have three albums that capture the essence and soul of a man with essence and soul. He was the best at covering other’s work and elevating. But he wrote his own as well.

His earlier stuff collected on the hits album is classic R&B, soul. Some of the best made.

The Al Green-penned ‘Let’s Stay Together,’ ‘Let’s Get Married,’ ‘Call Me,’ and ‘I’m Still in Love With You’ all smolder with  love and hotter love. Green’s falsetto is the best. That’s not up for debate with me. It is the best.
His song, “Tired of Being Alone” is a timeless classic.

But it’s his cover of the  Bee Gee’s ‘How Can You Mend a Broken Heart’ that takes the prize for top, not to be too hyperbolic, perhaps Top 3, covers of all time. That is an emotional workout listening to Green sing that.

The only song not on the Greatest Hits that should have been is ‘Take Me to the River,’ a Green song covered quite successfully later  by the Talking Heads.

Green in 1974,  after some traumatic  life events and hospitalizations,  became a pastor. He leads a big church in  Memphis near Elvis’ Graceland. Over the years he has wavered between recording pure gospel music and a hybrid of popular, with God infused throughout.

Some of his ’80s’ work is as  powerful as anything he’s ever done. I got religion about three times listening to Soul Survivor and his sung version of the 23rd Psalm with a full gospel choir. In my copy of ‘Soul Survivor’ I was happy to find a 5X7 photo and a bio sheet.