WEDNESDAY SHUFFLE
Well, here we are again. Or rather, here you are again, since I am somewhere else, remotely blogging from some rocky New England beach. (Lobster dinner, anyone?) But so long as I don't get my iPod waterlogged...
1. "The Colour of Your Eyes" / Dusty Springfield
From Dusty . . . Definitely (1968)
Written by Dusty's partner Norma Tanega, this shimmering tone poem may not rank up there with Dusty's great soul numbers, but for pure late 60s schmaltz -- turn on the strings! hear that quivering flute! -- it's pretty darn lovely.
2. "Be My Love" / Geraint Watkins
From Dial W for Watkins (2004)
Maybe I first discovered this guy's work because he plays keyboards for Nick Lowe. So what? That's Watkins' dilemma --he's so in demand as a session man, somehow he never got around to the solo career he deserves. "Come on, little darlin' / Be my love" -- Geraint trips pleadingly down the scale, dropping into a throaty coax. There's just a whiff of zydeco in the rhythm, and a touch of twang in the chugging chorus -- pitch-perfect Americana, served up by a Brit.
3. "I Want to Break Free" / Queen
From The Works (1984)
Of course I listen to Queen -- what are you, some kind of rock snob? I love the over-the-top drama, Freddie Mercury's histrionic vocals, the synthesizers, even the arena-rock guitars. (Only when Queen is doing it, that is -- they're just having so much fun.)
4. "Pieces of What" / MGMT
From Oracular Spectacular (2007)
Reverbs, synths, the whole electronica package, mixed up with yelping vocals that sound just amateur enough to make this endearing. In fact, I sometimes mistake this for a Minus 5 song when it first comes up -- that's how loose and genial it is. I enjoyed this debut album so much more than I expected.
5. "Wine Do Yer Stuff" / Commander Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen
From Lost in the Ozone (1971)
Why, oh why, oh why didn't I discover these guys back in the 70s? I would have had SO much fun listening to this in college. Laidback country-rock, topped off with a little psychedelic druggie culture -- Americana begins here.
6. "Solar Sex Panel" / Little Village
From Little Village (1990)
I amuse myself, when listening to Little Village tracks, by imagining which one of the talents in this all-star project contributed what. The piled-on puns have to be Nick Lowe, but I'm betting John Hiatt was right there, throwing in all those car puns. Yes, it's ultimately a stupid song, hardly worthy of their talents. But Hiatt sings it as if it mattered.
7. "Six-Fingered Man" / Elvis Costello & Allen Toussaint
From The River In Reverse (2006)
Elvis gets funky -- as who wouldn't, with Allen Toussaint sitting over there at the piano, tossing off those elegant little riffs? It's a wonderful swampy stew.
8. "I Think We're Alone Now" / Tommy James and the Shondells
From I Think We're Alone Now (1967)
THE perfect groping teen make-out song.
9. "Ten Girls Ago" / Graham Parker
From Struck By Lightning (1991)
Resurrecting a perky New Wave beat, my (new) idol Graham Parker trotted out this endearing track on Struck By Lightning, one of the best albums I've ever heard. He's not slamming that old romance, more poking fun at himself (and grateful that now he's in a better place). The sound, though, takes me back to my own crazy 80s. "It was just a crazy thing / Flying an airplane made of string / Sweet pain of a needle's sting / Ten girls ago...."
10. "Woman In a Bar" / Lloyd Cole
From Antidepressant (2007)
Here you go, Uncle E -- I am listening to Lloyd Cole. And I like it. Witty, articulate lyrics and a sweetly rocking beat.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
"Big Sky" / The Kinks
R.I.P. Pete Quaife 1943--2010
I'm well and truly gutted. For several years now, the Kinks were the last of the great British Invasion whose original members were all still alive, which was probably why that reunion rumor kept rearing its head. But the clock was ticking, and we all knew that bassist Pete Quaife -- the first to quit the band, back in 1969 -- had been in failing health for quite a while. Still, when news leaked out yesterday that Quaife had finally passed away, it truly felt like the end of an era.
Going through the Kinks' catalog, there were any number of songs with great bass parts I could showcase. "Waterloo Sunset," "Sunny Afternoon," "Picture Book" -- none of these iconic tracks would have been the same without Pete Quaife's commanding bass lines.
And how tempted I was to feature the elegaic song "Days" -- a song which, an apocryphal story claims, Quaife rechristened "Daze" as he sat for endless hours in the recording studio, his own part already recorded, while Ray Davies made the entire band wait until the song was tweaked to his obsessive satisfaction. Trouble is, there's very little emphasis on the bass in that song (which must have made Quaife's enforced captivity even more frustrating).
In the end, I felt I had to choose a track from The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society -- not just because it was Quaife's last outing with the band, but because his playing was never stronger or more melodic. On this album as no other, track after track allowed the bassline to come to the fore, adding depth to the songs. Just think of the slouchy underpinning of "Last of the Steam Powered Trains," the tuba-like bloops of "All of My Friends Were There," the brooding menace of "Wicked Annabella," the steel-band skipping rhythms of "Monica." It's all done with the bass.
So how could I resist writing about "Big Sky"?
(Dig that photo of Pete tuning his bass!)
Theologically, it's a perplexing song, depicting a distant, uninvolved supreme being -- the Big Sky of the title -- calmly looking down on all the insignificant humans scurrying around, looking like frenzied ants. Ray Davies adopts an odd half-sung voice, almost like a BBC newscaster, as he describes Big Sky looking down on all the people. It's hardly a comforting worldview. People are pushing each other, children are screaming, adults sit depressed with their heads in their hands -- it's practically a scene out of Hieronymous Bosch.
And in the chorus, in a syncopated sort of fanfare, Ray declares, "Big Sky too big to cry." This deity barely sees what's going on, and though he feels some vague sorrow and sympathy, he's unable to do anything about it. Gloomy, eh? That melodic leitmotif is the riff that Pete repeats over and over, cutting through the rest of the song like the trumpets of heaven (or of hell -- it's not clear which).
And yet, and yet, and yet . . . against all odds, the bridge somehow lifts the spirits, as Ray sings, "One day we'll be free, / We won't care, just you see / 'Til that day can be, / Don't let it get you down." The melody floats over the drumbeats, the vocals go high and sweet -- and somehow everything feels better. That theme of freedom, of a longed-for escape, runs throughout Ray Davies' songwriting, but rarely does it feel so liberating, so consoling, as it does here.
I have to say, I'm a little baffled by the next part of the bridge, as Ray adds wistfully, "When I feel that the world is too much for me, / I think of the Big Sky, and nothing matters much to me." Hunh? How can he feel better because God doesn't care? But I have to say, the song truly feels lighter and happier there. And when I think about it, it IS better to believe in a detached God than in a malicious, eye-for-an-eye type.
If this were the Beatles -- whose White Album was released the same week as VGPS, thereby knocking it cleanly out of the charts -- they'd be offering "I'd love to turn you on." But in "Big Sky" Ray Davies accomplishes his own kind of Nirvana, without drugs. If the petty toils of this life don't matter to Big Sky, then why should they matter to us? Detach, detach, detach -- that's the sort of philosophy that made sense in 1968. (Who says VGPS wasn't an album of its era?)
For a minute, as the vocals float high and vague, we can be like Big Sky ourselves, gazing down serenely on the rat race. (It's just like Ray's character watching the people swarm into Waterloo Underground, while he gazes on the Waterloo sunset -- and he is in paradise.) I like to imagine Pete Quaife up there in the Big Sky now, looking down on us with a genial, wry smile.
R.I.P. Pete Quaife 1943--2010
I'm well and truly gutted. For several years now, the Kinks were the last of the great British Invasion whose original members were all still alive, which was probably why that reunion rumor kept rearing its head. But the clock was ticking, and we all knew that bassist Pete Quaife -- the first to quit the band, back in 1969 -- had been in failing health for quite a while. Still, when news leaked out yesterday that Quaife had finally passed away, it truly felt like the end of an era.
Going through the Kinks' catalog, there were any number of songs with great bass parts I could showcase. "Waterloo Sunset," "Sunny Afternoon," "Picture Book" -- none of these iconic tracks would have been the same without Pete Quaife's commanding bass lines.
And how tempted I was to feature the elegaic song "Days" -- a song which, an apocryphal story claims, Quaife rechristened "Daze" as he sat for endless hours in the recording studio, his own part already recorded, while Ray Davies made the entire band wait until the song was tweaked to his obsessive satisfaction. Trouble is, there's very little emphasis on the bass in that song (which must have made Quaife's enforced captivity even more frustrating).
In the end, I felt I had to choose a track from The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society -- not just because it was Quaife's last outing with the band, but because his playing was never stronger or more melodic. On this album as no other, track after track allowed the bassline to come to the fore, adding depth to the songs. Just think of the slouchy underpinning of "Last of the Steam Powered Trains," the tuba-like bloops of "All of My Friends Were There," the brooding menace of "Wicked Annabella," the steel-band skipping rhythms of "Monica." It's all done with the bass.
So how could I resist writing about "Big Sky"?
(Dig that photo of Pete tuning his bass!)
Theologically, it's a perplexing song, depicting a distant, uninvolved supreme being -- the Big Sky of the title -- calmly looking down on all the insignificant humans scurrying around, looking like frenzied ants. Ray Davies adopts an odd half-sung voice, almost like a BBC newscaster, as he describes Big Sky looking down on all the people. It's hardly a comforting worldview. People are pushing each other, children are screaming, adults sit depressed with their heads in their hands -- it's practically a scene out of Hieronymous Bosch.
And in the chorus, in a syncopated sort of fanfare, Ray declares, "Big Sky too big to cry." This deity barely sees what's going on, and though he feels some vague sorrow and sympathy, he's unable to do anything about it. Gloomy, eh? That melodic leitmotif is the riff that Pete repeats over and over, cutting through the rest of the song like the trumpets of heaven (or of hell -- it's not clear which).
And yet, and yet, and yet . . . against all odds, the bridge somehow lifts the spirits, as Ray sings, "One day we'll be free, / We won't care, just you see / 'Til that day can be, / Don't let it get you down." The melody floats over the drumbeats, the vocals go high and sweet -- and somehow everything feels better. That theme of freedom, of a longed-for escape, runs throughout Ray Davies' songwriting, but rarely does it feel so liberating, so consoling, as it does here.
I have to say, I'm a little baffled by the next part of the bridge, as Ray adds wistfully, "When I feel that the world is too much for me, / I think of the Big Sky, and nothing matters much to me." Hunh? How can he feel better because God doesn't care? But I have to say, the song truly feels lighter and happier there. And when I think about it, it IS better to believe in a detached God than in a malicious, eye-for-an-eye type.
If this were the Beatles -- whose White Album was released the same week as VGPS, thereby knocking it cleanly out of the charts -- they'd be offering "I'd love to turn you on." But in "Big Sky" Ray Davies accomplishes his own kind of Nirvana, without drugs. If the petty toils of this life don't matter to Big Sky, then why should they matter to us? Detach, detach, detach -- that's the sort of philosophy that made sense in 1968. (Who says VGPS wasn't an album of its era?)
For a minute, as the vocals float high and vague, we can be like Big Sky ourselves, gazing down serenely on the rat race. (It's just like Ray's character watching the people swarm into Waterloo Underground, while he gazes on the Waterloo sunset -- and he is in paradise.) I like to imagine Pete Quaife up there in the Big Sky now, looking down on us with a genial, wry smile.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
WEDNESDAY SHUFFLE
Funny thing about my iPod -- almost all the songs on it have some subtle Nick Lowe connection. Just for fun, let's see if I can do Six Degrees of Nick Lowe for everything that shuffles up today.
1. "This Boy" / The Beatles
From Past Masters, Vol. 1 (compilation)
Okay, I'll admit, I was a Beatle fan LONG before I ever heard of Nick Lowe. (Flash to the instrumental version of this song, in A Hard Day's Night, when Ringo is wandering around down the docklands, communing with the street urchins.) But Nick's first band Kippington Lodge recorded several Beatles covers, and then Brinsley Schwarz toured with ex-Beatle Paul McCartney's band Wings. I think it's safe to say Nick was a Beatle fan as a teenager. With lush harmonies and a fox-trot tempo, this song sounds to me like a bid to charm our parents, so they'd let us listen to the frantic rock & rollers. But you know what? Even when they were trying to do schlock the Beatles could do no wrong.
2. "String Pull Job" / John Hiatt
From Two Bit Monsters (1980)
Obvious Nick link, since Nick produced and played bass on Hiatt's breakthrough album Bring the Family, then joined him in the band Little Village. (Even though I knew Hiatt as a kid, growing up in the same neighborhood, it was the Nick link that finally led me to Hiatt's grown-up music [smacks self on forehead].) But here's a bonus connection -- listen to this song's jerky tempo, the brittle grating guitar, the hostile lyrics ("She's doing that jerk, she's pulling it tight-err..."). During this period, Hiatt styled his music to fit being marketed as "the American Elvis Costello" -- and we all know that Nick was Elvis's first producer.
3. "Trouble in Mind" / Merle Haggard
From Down Every Road (compilation)
Here's a 180-degree turn from Hiatt's edgy early days, closer in spirit to Hiatt's current alt.country sound. A shuffling two-step full of twang, with a fiddle solo in the first break, honkytonk piano in the second, and Merle's dreamy vocals. Far from his outlaw image, here Merle sounds positively laidback -- even though his life's going wrong, he seems to know it'll all straighten out some day. Nick Lowe connection? Well, Nick just recorded this Merle Haggard song on Bill Kirchen's latest album.
4. "Baby My Heart" / Bobby Fuller Four
From Never To Be Forgotten: The Mustang Years (compilation)
Clean, uncomplicated rock & roll, circa 1966, with crunchy guitars, strict time cymbals, and loads of reverb on Fuller's boyish vocals. "You gotta baby my heart / Treat it gentle and kind . . . " IMHO, Bobby Fuller was the missing link between Ricky Nelson and fellow Texan Doug Sahm -- if only he hadn't died young in a tragic car crash! In the liner notes to Nick Lowe's Wilderness Years CD, he sets up his song "I Don't Want the Night to End" thusly: "With the ghost of Bobby Fuller riding shotgun, this one composed in the back of a Queensgate-bound mini-cab sometime in 1977."
5. "Run" / Vampire Weekend
From Contra (2009)
The diametric opposite to Bobby Fuller -- jump forward 40 years, to East Coast privileged smart kids with a knack for complex rhythms and world-beat sounds. Dig those layered keyboards, alternately stabbing and shimmering, laid over a slapping drum track. Textures like crazy, from the anxious tension of the verse to the waterfall of sound in the chorus, to the poppy syncopation of the bridge "(honey it's you /oo / oo / And a battery radio)"... I am coming up empty on any Nick Lowe connection for this one, I have to admit.
6. "That's Not the Way That It's Done" / Minus 5
From Down With Wilco (2003)
Several members of this band are also in the Venus 3, musical collaborators of Nick's label-mate and sometime opening act Robyn Hitchcock. I love the slightly boozy, woozy good-times vibe of this band. Picture graying beards and flannel shirts, with a sweetly snarky sense of humor. All he's trying to do is put her in the mood for love...
7. "Black Lincoln Continental" / Nick Lowe
From Pinker and Prouder Than Previous
Yippee!! Graham Parker's rockabilly romp, as faithfully rendered by Nick Lowe on one of his most obscure and underrated LPs. Grrrr-EAT organ counterpoint by Paul Carrack. This track is so adorable I could eat it up. (Sorry, Graham, but I actually think I prefer Nick's version...)
8. "Sing A Song For Them" / Jenny Lewis
From Acid Tongue (2008)
I loved Jenny's autobiographical, country-inflected debut album; I never warmed to this self-consciously poetical second one, despite all the guest artists -- INCLUDING the aforementioned Nick Lowe colleague Elvis Costello. (Though getting Elvis Costello to sing on one track of your album is apparently not that difficult these days.)
9. "Pistol on the Shelf" / Eggs Over Easy
From Good 'N' Cheap
Ah, the band that gave birth to pub rock and inspired Nick's band Brinsley Schwarz -- a bunch of American visitors to London, led by the much beloved Austin DeLone (that's him on the piano), who later played in the Moonlighters with the aforementioned Bill Kirchen. Mellow, mellow, MELLOW country-rock, with not a jot of angst.
10. "Ordinary Millionaire" / Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3
From Propellor Time (2010)
Speak of the devil! Keep this on the Q.T., but some days I'm nearly as besotted with Robyn Hitchcock as I am with Nick Lowe, though it was the Nick connection that first led to Robyn. I never 100% know what's going on in an RH song -- it seems like there's always a little novel hidden in it, which only Robyn has read -- but this one sounds like a love affair running aground on mistrust and thwarted ego. "I don't know where you've gone from me / I know you don't belong to me / I only know you're there." But man oh man, the sinuous melody, the fluid rhythms, the shifting key changes -- I'm hyp-mo-tized!
Funny thing about my iPod -- almost all the songs on it have some subtle Nick Lowe connection. Just for fun, let's see if I can do Six Degrees of Nick Lowe for everything that shuffles up today.
1. "This Boy" / The Beatles
From Past Masters, Vol. 1 (compilation)
Okay, I'll admit, I was a Beatle fan LONG before I ever heard of Nick Lowe. (Flash to the instrumental version of this song, in A Hard Day's Night, when Ringo is wandering around down the docklands, communing with the street urchins.) But Nick's first band Kippington Lodge recorded several Beatles covers, and then Brinsley Schwarz toured with ex-Beatle Paul McCartney's band Wings. I think it's safe to say Nick was a Beatle fan as a teenager. With lush harmonies and a fox-trot tempo, this song sounds to me like a bid to charm our parents, so they'd let us listen to the frantic rock & rollers. But you know what? Even when they were trying to do schlock the Beatles could do no wrong.
2. "String Pull Job" / John Hiatt
From Two Bit Monsters (1980)
Obvious Nick link, since Nick produced and played bass on Hiatt's breakthrough album Bring the Family, then joined him in the band Little Village. (Even though I knew Hiatt as a kid, growing up in the same neighborhood, it was the Nick link that finally led me to Hiatt's grown-up music [smacks self on forehead].) But here's a bonus connection -- listen to this song's jerky tempo, the brittle grating guitar, the hostile lyrics ("She's doing that jerk, she's pulling it tight-err..."). During this period, Hiatt styled his music to fit being marketed as "the American Elvis Costello" -- and we all know that Nick was Elvis's first producer.
3. "Trouble in Mind" / Merle Haggard
From Down Every Road (compilation)
Here's a 180-degree turn from Hiatt's edgy early days, closer in spirit to Hiatt's current alt.country sound. A shuffling two-step full of twang, with a fiddle solo in the first break, honkytonk piano in the second, and Merle's dreamy vocals. Far from his outlaw image, here Merle sounds positively laidback -- even though his life's going wrong, he seems to know it'll all straighten out some day. Nick Lowe connection? Well, Nick just recorded this Merle Haggard song on Bill Kirchen's latest album.
4. "Baby My Heart" / Bobby Fuller Four
From Never To Be Forgotten: The Mustang Years (compilation)
Clean, uncomplicated rock & roll, circa 1966, with crunchy guitars, strict time cymbals, and loads of reverb on Fuller's boyish vocals. "You gotta baby my heart / Treat it gentle and kind . . . " IMHO, Bobby Fuller was the missing link between Ricky Nelson and fellow Texan Doug Sahm -- if only he hadn't died young in a tragic car crash! In the liner notes to Nick Lowe's Wilderness Years CD, he sets up his song "I Don't Want the Night to End" thusly: "With the ghost of Bobby Fuller riding shotgun, this one composed in the back of a Queensgate-bound mini-cab sometime in 1977."
5. "Run" / Vampire Weekend
From Contra (2009)
The diametric opposite to Bobby Fuller -- jump forward 40 years, to East Coast privileged smart kids with a knack for complex rhythms and world-beat sounds. Dig those layered keyboards, alternately stabbing and shimmering, laid over a slapping drum track. Textures like crazy, from the anxious tension of the verse to the waterfall of sound in the chorus, to the poppy syncopation of the bridge "(honey it's you /oo / oo / And a battery radio)"... I am coming up empty on any Nick Lowe connection for this one, I have to admit.
6. "That's Not the Way That It's Done" / Minus 5
From Down With Wilco (2003)
Several members of this band are also in the Venus 3, musical collaborators of Nick's label-mate and sometime opening act Robyn Hitchcock. I love the slightly boozy, woozy good-times vibe of this band. Picture graying beards and flannel shirts, with a sweetly snarky sense of humor. All he's trying to do is put her in the mood for love...
7. "Black Lincoln Continental" / Nick Lowe
From Pinker and Prouder Than Previous
Yippee!! Graham Parker's rockabilly romp, as faithfully rendered by Nick Lowe on one of his most obscure and underrated LPs. Grrrr-EAT organ counterpoint by Paul Carrack. This track is so adorable I could eat it up. (Sorry, Graham, but I actually think I prefer Nick's version...)
8. "Sing A Song For Them" / Jenny Lewis
From Acid Tongue (2008)
I loved Jenny's autobiographical, country-inflected debut album; I never warmed to this self-consciously poetical second one, despite all the guest artists -- INCLUDING the aforementioned Nick Lowe colleague Elvis Costello. (Though getting Elvis Costello to sing on one track of your album is apparently not that difficult these days.)
9. "Pistol on the Shelf" / Eggs Over Easy
From Good 'N' Cheap
Ah, the band that gave birth to pub rock and inspired Nick's band Brinsley Schwarz -- a bunch of American visitors to London, led by the much beloved Austin DeLone (that's him on the piano), who later played in the Moonlighters with the aforementioned Bill Kirchen. Mellow, mellow, MELLOW country-rock, with not a jot of angst.
10. "Ordinary Millionaire" / Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3
From Propellor Time (2010)
Speak of the devil! Keep this on the Q.T., but some days I'm nearly as besotted with Robyn Hitchcock as I am with Nick Lowe, though it was the Nick connection that first led to Robyn. I never 100% know what's going on in an RH song -- it seems like there's always a little novel hidden in it, which only Robyn has read -- but this one sounds like a love affair running aground on mistrust and thwarted ego. "I don't know where you've gone from me / I know you don't belong to me / I only know you're there." But man oh man, the sinuous melody, the fluid rhythms, the shifting key changes -- I'm hyp-mo-tized!
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Tuesday Guest Blogger
"The Cave" / Mumford & Sons
By Hugh Ward, Guest Blogger
Mumford & Sons seems like a simple band. Comprised of a guitar, acoustic bass, keyboards, and banjo, this London band -- formed in 2007 -- nevertheless creates an overwhelming sound with an acoustic approach. Their method for creating such a large sound comes from passion. The band's energy, especially that of singer and guitarist, Marcus Mumford, vibrates throughout their debut album, Sigh No More. This aspect really makes Mumford & Sons stand out in a crowd of folk sound.
"The Cave" leads off with one of my favorite guitar lines, a riff that creates a soothing sound as Mumford starts to sing with an equal tone. Ben Lovett eventually comes in with light piano chords that highlight the melody, and Ted Dwane begins his bass line. As the chorus comes around, however, Mumford changes his pleasant guitar riff into abbreviated chords, conveying a mood change. Backing vocals pour in to fill out the sound.
After this, the featured sound shifts from guitar to banjo, played by "Country" Winston. The, after another short verse, comes the best part of the song: when all band members yell out the lyrics while they bash away at their instruments. The song, at least for me, is most appreciated when performed live. Take a look at the video for an intimate, live performance by the band.
Mumford & Sons have really found their vocal niche. All four of the band members belt out choruses like they were born to do it. Just as in my last week's post about Arcade Fire, today's song's lyrics carry a lot of emotion. The song starts on a depressing note: "It's empty in the valley of your heart." This sentiment continues through the verse as Mumford sings about famine and defeat. But as the chorus comes around, hope is restored: "But I will hold on hope / And I won't let you choke / On the noose around your neck". The rest of the song switches between the verse emotion and the six lines of the chorus. Much as I love the musical qualities of this song, the lyrics are my favorite part -- they carry the passion that energizes Mumford & Sons' music.
If you like folk music, listen to Mumford & Sons -- they offer folk music with an extra surge of passionate conviction. It's not just this track, either; Sigh No More is a very consistent album, filled with fantastic tracks. No two songs sound alike, but the quality is high, track after track.
"The Cave" / Mumford & Sons
By Hugh Ward, Guest Blogger
Mumford & Sons seems like a simple band. Comprised of a guitar, acoustic bass, keyboards, and banjo, this London band -- formed in 2007 -- nevertheless creates an overwhelming sound with an acoustic approach. Their method for creating such a large sound comes from passion. The band's energy, especially that of singer and guitarist, Marcus Mumford, vibrates throughout their debut album, Sigh No More. This aspect really makes Mumford & Sons stand out in a crowd of folk sound.
"The Cave" leads off with one of my favorite guitar lines, a riff that creates a soothing sound as Mumford starts to sing with an equal tone. Ben Lovett eventually comes in with light piano chords that highlight the melody, and Ted Dwane begins his bass line. As the chorus comes around, however, Mumford changes his pleasant guitar riff into abbreviated chords, conveying a mood change. Backing vocals pour in to fill out the sound.
After this, the featured sound shifts from guitar to banjo, played by "Country" Winston. The, after another short verse, comes the best part of the song: when all band members yell out the lyrics while they bash away at their instruments. The song, at least for me, is most appreciated when performed live. Take a look at the video for an intimate, live performance by the band.
Mumford & Sons have really found their vocal niche. All four of the band members belt out choruses like they were born to do it. Just as in my last week's post about Arcade Fire, today's song's lyrics carry a lot of emotion. The song starts on a depressing note: "It's empty in the valley of your heart." This sentiment continues through the verse as Mumford sings about famine and defeat. But as the chorus comes around, hope is restored: "But I will hold on hope / And I won't let you choke / On the noose around your neck". The rest of the song switches between the verse emotion and the six lines of the chorus. Much as I love the musical qualities of this song, the lyrics are my favorite part -- they carry the passion that energizes Mumford & Sons' music.
If you like folk music, listen to Mumford & Sons -- they offer folk music with an extra surge of passionate conviction. It's not just this track, either; Sigh No More is a very consistent album, filled with fantastic tracks. No two songs sound alike, but the quality is high, track after track.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
"Black Is Black" / Los Bravos
Summer of '66, this song was a constant presence on Indianapolis' WIFE-AM ("Home of the Good Guys"!). With my ear glued to that radio, I knew what it was instantly, from the very first bass notes. That tripping bass line, the feverish organ, the soulful horn section -- it sounded totally Stax to me. Just the right steaminess, just the right racing pulse for a hit summer record.
Only years later did someone -- a Spaniard, in fact -- inform me that this band was from Spain. You'd think he'd know, but even so I had to look it up to be sure, that's how surprising this was. I mean, I knew there were rock groups in European countries doing spot-on covers of the big rock hits of the day -- but to record an original song that would pop to the top of the UK (#2) and US (#4) charts? No European bands had hit records, not until Abba. I'll bet that the Good Guys on WIFE didn't know it themselves -- otherwise it would have come up time and again in their inane between-songs chatter.
After finding this out, I listened again, with new ears. And it's still amazing to me. The lead singer, Mike Kogel, was the one member of the group who wasn't Spanish, but even stranger, he was German, which shoots to hell my theory that this song merely applied Latin heat to the rock 'n' roll formula. But Kogel's voice is a pitch-perfect copy of Gene Pitney -- so good, that apparently Pitney himself went back to check his records, puzzled that he couldn't remember recording it. The echo effects, the whining urgency, the sliding yelps -- play this record for someone who's never heard and see if they don't guess it's Gene Pitney.
To increase the international profile, the song was written by an English team, Tony Hayes, Michelle Grainger, and Steve Wadey. Los Bravos, who sang pretty much exclusively in English, just had to learn the lyrics, not write them. And the lyrics aren't exactly Shakespeare. "Black is black / I want my baby back" (the Johnny Hallyday version in France changed that to "noir c'est noir," which doesn't have quite the same percussive kick). The color imagery carries on: "Gray is gray / Since she went away, oh no, / What can I do? / 'Cause I-I-I-I-I, I'm feelin' blue." The cleverness goes downhill in later verses ("If I had my way / She'd be back today," "I can't choose / It's too much to lose," and the from-hunger last verse, "Bad is bad / This fella is so sad.") No wonder we never hear of this songwriting team again.
Apparently, the BBC ignored this obscure track by a foreign band; it wasn't until pirate radio latched onto it that the record became a hit. (Yay for pirate radio!). With the driving beat and the Memphis-style arrangement, this was catnip to those pirate DJs. And once it had become a hit in the UK, getting tons of US airplay was no problem. British listeners may have loved it because it sounded American, but as far as American listeners were concerned, it just sounded like music -- and good music indeed.
Summer of '66, this song was a constant presence on Indianapolis' WIFE-AM ("Home of the Good Guys"!). With my ear glued to that radio, I knew what it was instantly, from the very first bass notes. That tripping bass line, the feverish organ, the soulful horn section -- it sounded totally Stax to me. Just the right steaminess, just the right racing pulse for a hit summer record.
Only years later did someone -- a Spaniard, in fact -- inform me that this band was from Spain. You'd think he'd know, but even so I had to look it up to be sure, that's how surprising this was. I mean, I knew there were rock groups in European countries doing spot-on covers of the big rock hits of the day -- but to record an original song that would pop to the top of the UK (#2) and US (#4) charts? No European bands had hit records, not until Abba. I'll bet that the Good Guys on WIFE didn't know it themselves -- otherwise it would have come up time and again in their inane between-songs chatter.
After finding this out, I listened again, with new ears. And it's still amazing to me. The lead singer, Mike Kogel, was the one member of the group who wasn't Spanish, but even stranger, he was German, which shoots to hell my theory that this song merely applied Latin heat to the rock 'n' roll formula. But Kogel's voice is a pitch-perfect copy of Gene Pitney -- so good, that apparently Pitney himself went back to check his records, puzzled that he couldn't remember recording it. The echo effects, the whining urgency, the sliding yelps -- play this record for someone who's never heard and see if they don't guess it's Gene Pitney.
To increase the international profile, the song was written by an English team, Tony Hayes, Michelle Grainger, and Steve Wadey. Los Bravos, who sang pretty much exclusively in English, just had to learn the lyrics, not write them. And the lyrics aren't exactly Shakespeare. "Black is black / I want my baby back" (the Johnny Hallyday version in France changed that to "noir c'est noir," which doesn't have quite the same percussive kick). The color imagery carries on: "Gray is gray / Since she went away, oh no, / What can I do? / 'Cause I-I-I-I-I, I'm feelin' blue." The cleverness goes downhill in later verses ("If I had my way / She'd be back today," "I can't choose / It's too much to lose," and the from-hunger last verse, "Bad is bad / This fella is so sad.") No wonder we never hear of this songwriting team again.
Apparently, the BBC ignored this obscure track by a foreign band; it wasn't until pirate radio latched onto it that the record became a hit. (Yay for pirate radio!). With the driving beat and the Memphis-style arrangement, this was catnip to those pirate DJs. And once it had become a hit in the UK, getting tons of US airplay was no problem. British listeners may have loved it because it sounded American, but as far as American listeners were concerned, it just sounded like music -- and good music indeed.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
"Having My Baby" / Paul Anka
I couldn't write about this in 80s Cheese Week because -- well, cheesy as it undoubtedly is, it was released in 1974. At that period of my life I had entirely given up listening to commercial radio, immersing myself instead in my stacks of vinyl LPs. Even so, I couldn't help being aware of -- and appalled by -- this song. In later years Anka, repeatedly slammed by feminist groups, changed the lyrics in concert to "Having Our Baby," but that doesn't fundamentally change the male chauvinism pervading this song. Anka was blindsided by the criticism, claiming the record was genuinely meant as a love song to his wife, the mother of his five daughters. (The wife he divorced in 2000, later marrying a Swedish model 3o years younger than himself -- I'm just sayin'...).
Well, I'm trying to cut Paul Anka some slack. (After all, he is Canadian.) When this song was released, it had been 15 years since Anka's last hit, "Lonely Boy." In the interim, the British Invasion had changed the pop world and he had had to fall back on his songwriting skills, penning tunes like Tom Jones' "She's a Lady" and the lyrics to Frank Sinatra's "My Way." (Not to mention the Tonight Show theme.) He must have been as surprised as anyone when "Having My Baby" shot up the charts.
Maybe it's my problem, my queasy reaction to lines about his seed growing inside her, and how pregnancy is her way of proving how much she loves him. (Sounds like forced servitude to me, but hey, I could be wrong.) But that line about "You could have swept it from your life"? I don't think that would please either pro-life OR pro-choice folks.
Though we all know Paul Anka was already going bald, let's pretend he's just wearing that hat because he wants to look like Neil Young. But what gives, that this video doesn't even include his duet partner, Odia Coates? Her vocals save this song -- without that, he'd sound even more clueless. Her presence suggests that maybe, just maybe, the woman genuinely wants this baby on her own grounds.
In 2006, this song was voted the worst song of all time in a CNN poll. So what made me think of it today? Well, I was doing a road trip with my daughter and she pre-empted the car stereo to play songs from her iPod -- an iPod which contains every number ever sung by the cast from the TV show "Glee." (Need I mention that my daughter is 15 years old?) Apparently there was one episode on which the kids deliberately worked up routines to famously bad songs -- naturally "Having My Baby" made that cut. And you know what? Their version isn't half bad. Take a listen...
Which begs the question -- did Paul Anka's rendition somehow add an extra offending tone to this song? Now, I don't know the man. There's no question he's a talented guy. But I did learn about a famous tape of him chewing out his crew, quotes from which have snuck into popular culture (next time you hear a comedian say, "The guys get shirts!", you'll know the reference). There could be a connection. This song isn't just cheesy, it's downright creepy -- at least I think so. Or am I overreacting?
I couldn't write about this in 80s Cheese Week because -- well, cheesy as it undoubtedly is, it was released in 1974. At that period of my life I had entirely given up listening to commercial radio, immersing myself instead in my stacks of vinyl LPs. Even so, I couldn't help being aware of -- and appalled by -- this song. In later years Anka, repeatedly slammed by feminist groups, changed the lyrics in concert to "Having Our Baby," but that doesn't fundamentally change the male chauvinism pervading this song. Anka was blindsided by the criticism, claiming the record was genuinely meant as a love song to his wife, the mother of his five daughters. (The wife he divorced in 2000, later marrying a Swedish model 3o years younger than himself -- I'm just sayin'...).
Well, I'm trying to cut Paul Anka some slack. (After all, he is Canadian.) When this song was released, it had been 15 years since Anka's last hit, "Lonely Boy." In the interim, the British Invasion had changed the pop world and he had had to fall back on his songwriting skills, penning tunes like Tom Jones' "She's a Lady" and the lyrics to Frank Sinatra's "My Way." (Not to mention the Tonight Show theme.) He must have been as surprised as anyone when "Having My Baby" shot up the charts.
Maybe it's my problem, my queasy reaction to lines about his seed growing inside her, and how pregnancy is her way of proving how much she loves him. (Sounds like forced servitude to me, but hey, I could be wrong.) But that line about "You could have swept it from your life"? I don't think that would please either pro-life OR pro-choice folks.
Though we all know Paul Anka was already going bald, let's pretend he's just wearing that hat because he wants to look like Neil Young. But what gives, that this video doesn't even include his duet partner, Odia Coates? Her vocals save this song -- without that, he'd sound even more clueless. Her presence suggests that maybe, just maybe, the woman genuinely wants this baby on her own grounds.
In 2006, this song was voted the worst song of all time in a CNN poll. So what made me think of it today? Well, I was doing a road trip with my daughter and she pre-empted the car stereo to play songs from her iPod -- an iPod which contains every number ever sung by the cast from the TV show "Glee." (Need I mention that my daughter is 15 years old?) Apparently there was one episode on which the kids deliberately worked up routines to famously bad songs -- naturally "Having My Baby" made that cut. And you know what? Their version isn't half bad. Take a listen...
Which begs the question -- did Paul Anka's rendition somehow add an extra offending tone to this song? Now, I don't know the man. There's no question he's a talented guy. But I did learn about a famous tape of him chewing out his crew, quotes from which have snuck into popular culture (next time you hear a comedian say, "The guys get shirts!", you'll know the reference). There could be a connection. This song isn't just cheesy, it's downright creepy -- at least I think so. Or am I overreacting?
Thursday, June 17, 2010
THURSDAY REVERB
Reaching way back for this one -- so far back, most of you faithful readers hadn't found this blog yet. So let's give it another spin. An obvious choice, perhaps, a knee-jerk "classic" -- but all the more reason to listen with fresh ears.
" Layla" / Eric Clapton
To plug or not to plug -- that is the question. On one hand you've got the blistering 1970 recording of this song by Clapton's band Derek and the Dominos; on the other hand there's the laid-back acoustic version from his 1992 Unplugged album. Instinctively I always go for the acoustic version of any song, especially when the original runs 7:07 minutes long with endless guitar solos. Instinctively, the very first time I heard "Layla" unplugged, I preferred it.
But then on the other hand...
The original version reminds me of freshman year in college, when my friend Kathy and I cranked it up loud enough to make our next-door neighbor -- whose name was Leila -- pound on the walls. At the time, though, (get this) I didn't even know Eric Clapton was in Derek and the Dominos. I didn't get the point of Eric Clapton until senior year, when I knew a lot more about both drugs and sex and suddenly his music made sense.
It was the Cream stuff that won me over, "White Room" and "Badge" in particular. Once I figured out that the lyrics were not important (a real leap of faith for an English major like me), I appreciated Eric Clapton in a whole new light. I happily lost myself in the dense tangle of that music, loving the bluesy syncopation, the passionate abandon of his guitar playing. As time passed and Eric dabbled in reggae ("I Shot the Sheriff, "Lay Down Sally"), or rootsy blues ("After Midnight," "Cocaine"), the groove worked so well, I didn't notice Slowhand was Slowing Down. "Wonderful Tonight"? "Tears in Heaven"? I was just impressed to hear Eric come into his own as a crooner. By the time Clapton unplugged for the MTV show, he and I were both comfortable with narcoleptic acoustic versions of his old hits, versions that sound more strung-out on heroin than the music he made when he himself was on heroin.
My brother eventually told me that "Layla" was about Pattie Boyd Harrison, Eric's best friend George's wife, but by then Pattie had married Eric so it was a moot point -- I never revisited "Layla" to check it out. Why? I never listened to Clapton lyrics. And now here I am finally listening to the lyrics of "Layla," and it's ripping my heart out. I mean, listen to this: "I tried to give you consolation / When your old man had let you down / Like a fool, I fell in love with you / Turned my whole world upside down." I'm not saying it's great poetry, but the story he's telling requires -- no, DEMANDS -- a howl of anguish.
Eric's voice was never suited for howling, but his guitar sure was. That peeling riff at the outset pierces through everything, a miserable wail that won't go away. Even when he strains his voice hoarsely, it's perfect for this song -- he's a lost soul, and she's got him on his knees, begging darling please . . . and when, in the last verse, he moans "Let's make the best of the situation / Before I finally go insane," it sounds like he's insane already.
That magisterial keyboard solo by Jim Gordon (who co-wrote the song with Clapton) no longer seems to me to go on too long; it's like a man staggering around, unable to give up this wrenching passion, and the obsessive pent-up frenzy of the song is just right. No wonder Pattie finally gave in. If anyone ever recorded a song like this about me, I'd be his in a nanosecond.
Reaching way back for this one -- so far back, most of you faithful readers hadn't found this blog yet. So let's give it another spin. An obvious choice, perhaps, a knee-jerk "classic" -- but all the more reason to listen with fresh ears.
Thursday, December 21, 2006
" Layla" / Eric Clapton
To plug or not to plug -- that is the question. On one hand you've got the blistering 1970 recording of this song by Clapton's band Derek and the Dominos; on the other hand there's the laid-back acoustic version from his 1992 Unplugged album. Instinctively I always go for the acoustic version of any song, especially when the original runs 7:07 minutes long with endless guitar solos. Instinctively, the very first time I heard "Layla" unplugged, I preferred it.
But then on the other hand...
The original version reminds me of freshman year in college, when my friend Kathy and I cranked it up loud enough to make our next-door neighbor -- whose name was Leila -- pound on the walls. At the time, though, (get this) I didn't even know Eric Clapton was in Derek and the Dominos. I didn't get the point of Eric Clapton until senior year, when I knew a lot more about both drugs and sex and suddenly his music made sense.
It was the Cream stuff that won me over, "White Room" and "Badge" in particular. Once I figured out that the lyrics were not important (a real leap of faith for an English major like me), I appreciated Eric Clapton in a whole new light. I happily lost myself in the dense tangle of that music, loving the bluesy syncopation, the passionate abandon of his guitar playing. As time passed and Eric dabbled in reggae ("I Shot the Sheriff, "Lay Down Sally"), or rootsy blues ("After Midnight," "Cocaine"), the groove worked so well, I didn't notice Slowhand was Slowing Down. "Wonderful Tonight"? "Tears in Heaven"? I was just impressed to hear Eric come into his own as a crooner. By the time Clapton unplugged for the MTV show, he and I were both comfortable with narcoleptic acoustic versions of his old hits, versions that sound more strung-out on heroin than the music he made when he himself was on heroin.
My brother eventually told me that "Layla" was about Pattie Boyd Harrison, Eric's best friend George's wife, but by then Pattie had married Eric so it was a moot point -- I never revisited "Layla" to check it out. Why? I never listened to Clapton lyrics. And now here I am finally listening to the lyrics of "Layla," and it's ripping my heart out. I mean, listen to this: "I tried to give you consolation / When your old man had let you down / Like a fool, I fell in love with you / Turned my whole world upside down." I'm not saying it's great poetry, but the story he's telling requires -- no, DEMANDS -- a howl of anguish.
Eric's voice was never suited for howling, but his guitar sure was. That peeling riff at the outset pierces through everything, a miserable wail that won't go away. Even when he strains his voice hoarsely, it's perfect for this song -- he's a lost soul, and she's got him on his knees, begging darling please . . . and when, in the last verse, he moans "Let's make the best of the situation / Before I finally go insane," it sounds like he's insane already.
That magisterial keyboard solo by Jim Gordon (who co-wrote the song with Clapton) no longer seems to me to go on too long; it's like a man staggering around, unable to give up this wrenching passion, and the obsessive pent-up frenzy of the song is just right. No wonder Pattie finally gave in. If anyone ever recorded a song like this about me, I'd be his in a nanosecond.
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