Category — Music

Wrecking Ball

Thoughts on the new

Bruce Springsteen Album

By Jeff Katz

I’m always amazed at Bruce Springsteen’s audience. When The Boss kills ‘em during a live performance, the crowd sings along at nearly every step, even when it comes to his newest songs. That was recently true when Magic came out, a little less so for Working on a Dream.  So, will the acolytes be belting out tunes from Wrecking Ball?

I have my doubts. Overall, the newest Bruce is passable. The songs simply aren’t as instantly memorable as those on Working on a Dream, the most similar album in Springsteen’s canon.  Some are sing-songy in a folksy way. Take “Shackled and Drawn” for instance. It’s a hokey little ditty that’ll stay with you, but the music undermines the heavy message.

That purposeful heaviness is the drawback. Much has been made that this album is the flip side of Nebraska, a highly produced brother to the stark 1982 classic. Different sound, same message, a hard look at present day economic misery. I don’t see it that way. Nebraska had, and still has, the fierce pain of the morning after a night drinking grain alcohol, when your brain feels like it’s walking down an echoey hallway, and you can’t stand the agony that, in some ways, feels far away, but is close by, hammering away.

What made Nebraska powerful were the intensely personal character studies that became universal in the telling. Pick any track – ”State Trooper,”  “Mansion on the Hill” – they hit hard. On Wrecking Ball, the grand sweeping terms, the overblown metaphors, suffer by their earnestness. By pushing meaning more, the songs mean so much less. John Lennon’s “Power to the People” comes to mind, a fine musical effort that doesn’t evoke any true emotional reaction. It’s sloganeering with guitars.  Compare Bruce’s new “Death to My Hometown” to  his old “My Hometown” on Born in the USA and tell me which one feels more real, more painful.

I’m ambivalent about the onslaught of aural effects. For a record that tries hard to make its voice heard, nearly all the lyrics are made distant by the mechanical sound. “We Take Care of Our Own,” the lead track, borrows a riff from The Carpenters’ “Hurting Each Other.” That ends up being all I hear. (Funny influences abound lately. “Outlaw Pete,” from Working on a Dream, lifted from Kiss’  “I Was Made for Loving You.”  What is spinning on Bruce’s personal jukebox these days?) Even guitarist Tom Morello, a most welcome guest, has a hard time bursting out of the mix, and if you’ve heard Morello play, especially when he plays Springsteen’s “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” the man jumps out of the song and grabs you by the throat.

When the songs aren’t of the dense, wall of sound, variety, they fall back into Seeger sessions mode.  I thought (or maybe hoped) that that sound was a one-off novelty. Seems I was wrong.  It’s an affectation that grows old fast.  Making an appearance is “Land of Hope and Dreams,” a first time studio track, recorded initially as part of the circa 2000 E Street Reunion and released on Live in New York City the following year.  An old chestnut as part of an album of contemporary commentary? It undermines the endeavor. “Rocky Ground” is a hot mess of overwrought soul and rap.

Death has permeated The E Street Scene these last years. Organist Danny Federici was hailed in song with “The Last Carnival.” Bruce’s longtime pal Terry Magovern was paid tribute to in “Terry’s Song.” Now Clarence Clemons is gone, The Big Man has left the stage. And what do we get? We are given two appearances of his sax, including a very weak, limited solo on “Land of Hope and Dreams.” In the accompanying booklet there’s an excerpt from Springsteen’s eulogy to his late band mate, but that’s it. Far be it for me to know what’s in the heart of a grieving comrade in arms, but it feels strange that Clarence casts so small a shadow.

Do I like Wrecking Ball? Sure, but without any real commitment. Will I be singing along with Bruce when I see him live in April? You bet I will.

About the reviewer:

Jeff Katz is Ragazine‘s music editor. You can read more about him, and catch his web page addresses on the “About Us” page.

California Reissues

from Swinging San Fran

By Jeff Katz

Blue Cheer screamingly welcomed in 1968 with the January release of Vincebus Eruptum and took the ear’s hammer and anvil literally, pounding out a volume that The Who and The Jimi Hendrix Experience were known for live but had yet to put to vinyl.

The San Francisco trio’s debut, recently reissued in rare mono by Sundazed Records, is as feedback fueled and heavy as they come. It’s more akin to Black Sabbath, who were still on the horizon, then contemporary power troikas like Cream and the aforementioned Experience and Who. Cheer’s take on Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” makes Townshend and the gang’s version sound like The Archies and leads off a killer set of six songs. Six? Blue Cheer’s extended jams, as on “Doctor Please,” put down what was still brand new to record buying audiences. “Doctor” clocks in at nearly eight minutes. The recent Disraeli Gears and Axis: Bold as Love were replete with standard three-minute tunes. “Parchment (sic) Farm” is all screechy guitar, not your standard tribute to the Mose Allison jail tune. It’s a musical howl of rage, angry in a way that John Mayall’s cover can’t match. It’s a tone much more appropriate to the subject at hand.

The mono mix is a bludgeon with little adornment, in the best sense. Paul Whaley’s drum sounds are positively Muppet-like, with the sense of abandon that Animal brought to the skins. The flat slap of Whaley’s kit coupled with Dickie Peterson’s resonant throbbing bass form a thick dense substance. Leigh Stephens’ guitar work, several notches above solid, if miles from Clapton’s and Hendrix’ virtuosity, lends a touch of the garage, making the sound more powerful. Peterson’s lead vocals are a less shrieky, even more male version of Janis Joplin, and the  joyfully psychedelic slop-take on the electric blues gives The Cheer much in common with Big Brother and the Holding Company. If you’re looking for the first contraction in the birth of metal, start here. Blue Cheer’s coming out wail is louder than any record of its time.

The group’s follow up, and last disc with the original lineup, is less successful. Outsideinside’s fairy cover scene of eyeballed flowers and hobbit houses is all that’s needed to signal we are journeying far from the head bashing of VE.

From the opening of “Feathers from Your Tree,” the second LP is an unwelcome departure. Blue Cheer turns more classically psychedelic with trippy harmonies and the neater wired blues of the time. The problems are all in the mix – fuller drums, lower guitar, smoothed out bass. What’s that, a piano? Come on! The assault chords of the debut are sorely missed.  Too bad, because you can feel the energy being smothered under a pillow.

“Just a Little Bit” rips straight from Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love.” “Gypsy Ball” is a thoroughly enjoyable exercise in channel switching and Stephens’ guitar runs speaker sprints from left to right and back again. “Come and Get It” is the closest to anything on Vincebus Eruptum. Outsideinside is a good record, but it’s not unique. Other bands did this sound much better, but maybe that’s unfair to Blue Cheer. How many bands can be expected to be visionary and live up to that epiphany again and again?

* * *

The late ’60′s bands with the most ridiculous names are the hardest to take seriously. Electric Prunes, Peanut Butter Conspiracy and their ilk are immediate jokes. These are the type of groups that end up instantly dated, the stereotypical sound of the Summer of Love as played in the background when ultra-straight Clint Eastwood walks into the discotechque in Coogan’s Bluff.

It may be a fair cop for some, but not for The Chocolate Watch Band. CWB at its best was a garage-blues triumph, with much made of lead singer Dave Aguilar’s similarity to Mick Jagger. It is not an unjust comparison.

On No Way Out, which starts with the classic “Let’s Talk About Girls” (later immortalized in the Nuggets compilation), the Los Altos Hills confab are to be reckoned with. “Dark Side of the Mushroom” is as accomplished as any period song. If further proof is needed, they do a solid cover of Buffalo Springfield’s “Hot Dusty Road” and the Springfields were a “real” and “serious” group. The Watch Band had the requisite chops to succeed. They even take on the Stones head to head with “Come On” and meet them as equals. Nowhere is the Aguilar-Jagger likeness more pronounced then on Dave’s own composition “Gone and Passes By.”

The group’s second effort, The Inner Mystique, starts with an instrumental, “Voyage of the Trieste,” that could’ve been done by Dick Shawn’s LSD character in The Producers; it’s pure, unintentional parody. Side one is weak, bookended by “Voyage” and a five minute flute fest that is the title track. Producer Ed Cobb wrote both instrumentals, enough of a reason for producers to stay behind the glass. But side two cooks, starting with a blast that ushers in the Kinks’ “I’m Not Like Everybody Else.” Overall the record is not as garagey as the band’s debut, which is a shame. “Medication,” also covered by The Standells (who shared producer Cobb), is more powerful and less gauzy than the “Dirty Water” band’s version. Dylan’s “Baby Blue,” as it is referred to on the track list, is transcendent in CWB’s capable hands, giving us the closest thing to a Stones cover of Bob.

 * * *

Lack of originals by band members, only one by Aguilar on the debut, three by Cobb over both records, is the sign of artistic downfall, especially as the decade drew to a close and cover bands were just not as relevant as songwriting bands and solo artists. Despite the fact that both LPs are part band, part studio musicians and, as a result, are a hodgepodge of sounds and styles, The Chocolate Watch Band, regardless of who they were on record, could use a good reclamation beyond greatest hits compilations and these reissues are a good time well spent.

About the reviewer:

Jeff Katz is Ragazine‘s music editor. You can read more about him, and catch his web page addresses on the “About Us” page.

A Short Thought on Pre-reviewing

By Jeff Katz
Music Editor

My kids have been surrounded by music their whole lives and, as they grew into their teens, I couldn’t have been more pleased to expose them to my record and CD collections. Of course, they would get schooled in The Beatles, Dylan, Springsteen, and, thankfully, they fell instantly in love. They also learned about Biggie, The Hives and Arctic Monkeys from a father probably a little too old for that sort of stuff.

These days, it’s a two-way street and Joey, the youngest at 16, is both a fine musician and a musical connoisseur with exquisite taste. He was the one who dragged me to see The Avett Brothers in September. It was an outdoor show at Cooperstown’s Brewery Ommegang, a few weeks after I had major back surgery, but he wanted to see the show and I wasn’t going to tell him no. Did I mention it was pouring? I mean buckets.

I was skeptical. I’d heard good things about the band, but I have an intrinsic aversion to bands with “brothers’ in their name. It goes back to the Allmans, I guess. The Avetts, The Felices, they all seem the same to me. Except The Everlys. I love The Everly Brothers.

The Avetts were truly spectacular. Their quirks and tics and verbal outbursts exuded a slight mentally challenged vibe. All their mannerisms were put to good effect. Cellist Joe Kwon looked like an evil Mongol extra from a bad Genghis Khan movie. I was happy to have seen the show. Afterwards, the parking lot was a muddy morass and, to add squelching insult to the soggy injury of the evening, we got stuck. We weren’t alone. Happily, college kids are young, strong and willing to do goofy things for fun; packs of them were gleefully pushing cars out. We took full advantage of their services. The road never felt so good, but it was worth it.

Since that night I’ve been hooked on Scott and Seth. They have a delicately sweet sensitivity that teeters on the edge of cloying but doesn’t quite cross the line. They have a new album in the offing, scheduled for a spring release, and I can hardly wait. The Avetts have exploded in popularity, with their last, I and Love and You, breaking into the Top 20, and that’s good. It was a long slog for this band to get anywhere. Someone closely connected to their career told me this summer that it used to be impossible for them to get heard, that they were too raw and unappealing. Not anymore.

It’s odd to write in advance of an album. Usually I’d wait until it was time for a review, but I got to thinking about anticipation and how that relates to reality. I don’t get too excited these days about upcoming releases. When I was younger I marked my calendar by what was coming out. I wanted certain records on Day One and can very much remember buying McCartney’s Back to the Egg, George Harrison’s eponymous 1979 release and Dylan’s Shot of Love immediately upon release. How much my appraisal of those records was distorted by my enthusiasm is obvious to me now. I still love them all, but with a more honest ear.

So, let’s see how this one plays out. I believe The Avett Brothers did “The Once and Future Carpenter” live. That song is slated for the new album. Will it sound as good as I remember it? You’ll have to check in later for the answer.

Doing the Borscht Belt Twist

By Jeff Katz
Music Editor

I have a friend named Mary. She’s very smart, mischievously funny and fiercely independent. Perhaps everyone in the Cornell Class of ‘45 was like that. At a Rotary meeting a few months ago, Mary came up to me, looked me right in the eye and said “Nick Lowe.” Mary knows I write about music and co-chair the non-profit Cooperstown Concert Series. Turns out she listens to NPR’s “Fresh Air” with great devotion and she’d been picking up on their musical guests. I love Lowe and was stunned and thrilled to talk with Mary about him. She liked what Nick said, but not his music. Still, when I got my copy of his latest, The Old Magic, I made her a copy. From that day forward, Mary fills me in on what she’s heard and it is due to her that I was turned on to Songs for the Jewish-American Jet Set: The Tikva Records Story 1950-1973.

I was bar-mitzvahed in ‘75, but my knowledge of Jewish culture doesn’t spread that much beyond The Marx Brothers, Woody Allen and other Hebraic idols. I’d never heard of Tikva Records. As Idelsohn Society for Musical Preservation co-founder Courtney Holt said, “This isn’t just lost Jewish history, this is lost American pop history as well.” (It is through the Society that Songs for the Jewish-American Jet Set comes your way). The tracks cut a broad swath, from the crooning humor of Bernie Knee’s “Orthodox, Conservative or Reformed” to the garage rock sounds of The Sabras, whose “Ho Yaldonet” would easily fit in ‘60’s retro-compilations like Back From the Grave. Tikva’s offerings were as diverse and schizophrenic as the post-war Jewish population that the label was created to serve.

The music is uniformly excellent and fun, from cornball to klezmer, it’s all an enjoyable hoot. Knowing Yiddish would help. A quick word on the packaging. The CD comes in a pale blue billfold, with photos on the cover of such artists as “The Jewish Cowboy” (Leo Fuchs), “The Yiddish Fred Astaire” (Leo Fuld) and “The Voice of Many Tongues” (Martha Schlamme). If that doesn’t hook you (and it was enough for me), then the neat booklet should seal the deal. In addition to a well written history of Tikva, the individual tracks are explored, often tongue firmly in cheek. Even better, scores of album covers adorn the text.

The Sabras are as shocking a vision as Moses’ burning bush, gold lame blouses side by side with electric guitars. Jo Amar, “The Moroccan Prince,” has a beautiful tenor, but when you see he looks like a member of The Mossad, it’s hard not to be a little scared. He’s probably carrying a pen gun. The star of this show is Fuchs. I keep coming back to him. The cover for “Shalom Pardner” is a Borscht Belt riot, a black and white photo of Fuchs’ kop (Head. I do know some Yiddish), topped by a giant cowboy hat accessorized with a Star of David, faces backwards as his cartoon body strides his cartoon horse. Best booklet fact: Fuchs played Hop Along Knish in the musical, A Cowboy in Israel. The prairie cum shtetl shtick continues with Knee’s “Passover Time On the Range” and Jack Brass’ “Sherele.” In a jarringly odd story, Brass’ plane to Tel Aviv was shot down over Bulgaria. Cowpoke Fuchs (him again!) does a wild turn on “Yiddish Twist.” Avram Grobard’s “Orcha Bamidbar” has the sound of a late ‘60’s Top 40 instrumental hit. It’s far out! So is the entire 20-track set. So thanks, Mary. Keep those recommendations coming.

An Interesting Question

By Jeff Katz

Like Rob of High Fidelity (movie or book), I do like my lists. While watching the Giants demolish the Packers, my mind wandered. Which artist had the best side one, track one on their debut album? It’s an interesting question, I commended myself, since many legends didn’t come out of the box with great first albums. Dylan didn’t, neither did The Stones or Simon & Garfunkel. That limits the pool a bit.

I came up with a handful and then turned to my Facebook pals for assistance. They are a smart and diverse bunch. I’ll focus on my favorite five, but there were scads of good ones to choose from. The Honorable Mention list:

• I Will Follow – US, Boy
• Welcome to the Working Week – Elvis Costello, My Aim is True
• Blister in the Sun – Violent Femmes, Violent Femmes
• 1969 – The Stooges, The Stooges
• Mirror in the Bathroom – The English Beat, I Just Can’t Stop It
• Suite: Judy Blues Eyes – Crosby, Stills, & Nash, Crosby, Stills, & Nash
• Purple Haze – Jimi Hendrix, Are You Experienced?
• The Witch – The Sonics, Here Are The Sonics
• Personality Crisis – The New York Dolls, The New York Dolls
• Jumping Someone Else’s Train – The Cure, Boys Don’t Cry
• Smooth Operator – Sade, Diamond Life
• Do It Again – Steely Dan, Can’t Buy a Thrill
• Just Like Honey – The Jesus and Mary Chain, Psychocandy
• Brown Eyed Girl – Van Morrison, Blowin’ Your Mind!
• Ol’ 55 – Tom Waits, Closing Time

I do want to comment on one that leaves me unsure. King Crimson’s  “21^st Century Schizoid Man” is a killer track, but I hate, hate, hate the rest of the album.  I can’t quite figure if that makes it fit above, or below. I do know I prefer Kanye’s use of it in “Power.”  I may give Crimson’s In The Court of The Crimson King another spin, in case I got it wrong, but when I hear “I Talk to the Wind” in my head it makes me want to hurl. Now on to the Top 5.

5 – Blitzkrieg Bop – The Ramones, The Ramones

            Hi, and welcome to our perverted little world! Johnny Ramone’s thrashing and Joey’s “Hey Ho” guide you through filthy ‘70’s New York, a place where talking to the wind accompanied by a flute is going to leave you mugged and bleeding out of an orifice or two. Bombs away.

4 – Janie Jones – The Clash, The Clash (UK)

            Oh those drums! That was enough for me the first time I heard it. Lovin’ rock and roll, gettin’ stoned, hatin’ your job – what’s more punk than that? Joe Strummer’s voice is a challenge, a dare. Don’t like it? He’ll tell you exactly how he feels. And when Mick Jones comes in all high at the end, it’s perfect.

3 – Break On Through – The Doors, The Doors

            There are plenty of great songs, and then there are great songs with a sense of purpose. “Break  On Through” is a manifesto.  Oh, you poor middle class white kids with your chained arms and lying eyes, there’s a whole different way of perceiving things and we’ll show you the way.  John Densmore’s bossa intro, Ray Manzarek’s trance inducing organ, Robby Krieger’s thundering guitar and, then, who’s this freak?, Jim Morrison destroying your night and dividing your day. Well, gang, things are gonna be very different from here on out. Very different.

2 – I Saw Her Standing There – The Beatles, Please Please Me

            No NASA countdown ever led to a bigger explosion. Paul McCartney seems innocent enough until he leers “you know what I mean,” lyrics courtesy of partner John Lennon. Ringo pounds away with glee as George Harrison’s twangy solo merges into the quintessential early Beatles song. There’s an unbridled force at work, still palpable five decades later. After years of Fabian and Frankie Avalon, the kids were most certainly not alright and the moment they heard that Liverpool boy shout “One!” they were on their feet. They wouldn’t sit for the rest of the sixties.

1 – Blue Suede Shoes – Elvis Presley, Elvis Presley

            Another numbered intro, and it only took Elvis until the count of three to be off and running. Clearly he had less time than The Beatles, who made it to four (or “Faaaaa!”). Elvis grabbed Carl Perkins’ song and sneeringly took charge. Scotty Moore’s solo created an army of guitar heroes. The rock and roll revolution began with the ultimate side one, track one on Elvis’ debut album and, in doing so, provided endless fodder for inane list makers.

2011 – A Different Kind

of Top Ten List

By Jeff Katz

They’re all around you. On TV, in magazines, on the radio and in your daily paper. You love them, you hate them. They are the end of the year top ten lists. Whether you’re a movie, or a book, or a celebrity sex tape, you will be ranked. Does the #8 “Year’s Stupidest Criminal” wish he made it higher up the list? Hard to know.

Top songs and albums are, in my role as music editor, my bag, but I got to thinking. Is it so important what was the best music released this year? Isn’t that initial listen the most important thing? What makes 2011 releases so special? And while I spent my college years running the SUNY-Binghamton record store, Slipped Disc, and getting into heavy duty debates over who heard the first Violent Femmes album first, a serious jockeying for position on the “in the know” pecking order, I realize now that those to-dos meant squat. Being a hipster leads nowhere.

Is the person who bought their first Beatles 45 in Liverpool in 1963 so much better than the one who bought theirs a year later at Korvettes in New York? Did our hypothetical 1963 Liverpudlian love that record any more than a random Brooklynite in 1964? Pushing it further, did that 1964 teeny bopper derive any more pleasure than I did when I bought Something New back in 1979, completing my Beatle collection? How about the kid who discovers the Beatles right now, in 2011 through the life-changing remasters of 2009? Joy is joy – doesn’t matter one whit if the first time your hear a song is the year it came out, or decades later.

So here’s my Top Ten list of 2011, a two-fisted list of old and new. What they share is that they all came to my attention these past 12 months.

10 – Art Garfunkel – Breakaway (1975)

His is a lesser light, who rode a genius’ coattails (see that genius’ latest further down the list). There’s no two ways about it. Handsome? Yeech. Charismatic? Please. His voice is that of a true castrato and his lack of balls came through during his solo career. Yet, after watching the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert DVD (I was actually there!), I pulled out my copy of Angel Clare. “Garfunkel,” as he was billed on his premiere solo disc, shoulda been “& Garfunkel.” I liked some of his solo hits – “Wonderful World,” “Breakaway,” and Jimmy Webb’s “All I Know.” So I figured if I saw Artie’s ‘70’s LPs used, I’d buy them. Not a few days later I was at Last Vestige in Albany and there was most of his catalog at three bucks a pop.

Breakaway is surprisingly good and effective. The title track shines, and I was tickled to hear Garfunkel tackle, in English, my favorite Jobim tune, “Aguas de Marco.” There’s also the single from the short-lived Simon & Garfunkel, “My Little Town.” All in all, Garfunkel’s fey voice is put to fine use.

9 – Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds (2011)

Despite their penchant for ripping off Beatle riffs, and Gary Glitter riffs, and everyone else’s riffs, I loved Oasis. Or maybe it was because of their plagiaristic “homages.” Either way, they made me happy. Yet their breakup didn’t bother me one bit, most likely because recent albums kinda sucked. Liam Gallagher’s first effort post-split, with his group Beady Eye, was predictably weak. Liam was the lesser of the two Gallagher brothers – his voice way too whiny, his songwriting talent non-existent. All hopes rested in big brother Noel’s debut.

He delivers with a strong set. “The Death of Me and You” is forceful and poignant in light of the band and family rift, and “(I Wanna Live in a Dream in My) Record Machine” stays on your mind. Who uses the term “record machine”? Eddie Cochran in “Twenty Flight Rock,” the tune Paul McCartney played for John Lennon and gained entry into The Quarrymen. And so the stealing continues, but it’s good fun.

8 – Syl Johnson – Complete Mythology (2010)

This monstrous box set of, to me, an unknown soul singer, became an obsession after seeing the still grinding Johnson at Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival this summer. The package is a beauty, with an exceptionally written booklet, five LPs with original covers, and a sweet portfolio of four CDs.

Granted, there’s a lot of repetition here – backing tracks used over and over in different incarnations, phrases used again and again in a number of songs – but I didn’t know the guy and a full scale immersion into his canon was a tremendously enjoyable experience. Syl is best known for the Wu-Tang’s sampling of “Different Strokes,” but he’s got a lot more where that came from. Plus, any catalog that has multiple songs about short dresses, hot pants and the power they contain is worth your time.

7 – Paul McCartney and Elvis Costello – The McCartney/McManus Collaboration (1998)

The songwriting summit of McCartney and Costello was much in the news in the late ‘80’s. “Ah,” pundits cried knowingly, “Elvis will provided the hard edge that Macca’s been without since he and John Lennon broke up.” It didn’t turn out quite that way. Much of what came out on Paul’s Flowers in the Dirt and Off the Ground    and Elvis’ Spike andMighty Like a Rose was soft. It was, on the whole, very good stuff, but it was soft. There was a higher brand of wit and emotion in their product – “Don’t Be Careless Love,” “Mistress and Maid,” “Veronica,” So Like Candy” – but, of course, it was never possible to recreate Lennon-McCartney in McCartney/McManus.

Or was it? Turns out there was one song that was inexplicably left off all the albums that contained parts of the team’s effort: “Tommy’s Coming Home.” It’s a beautiful tale of a girl waiting for her dead soldier boy to come home. The lyrics are superbly realistic and imagistic; the two voices soar in and around each other. It is one of the best songs in either artist’s solo career and it’s contained on this album.

6 – Eilen Jewell – Queen of The Minor Key (2011)

How great is Eilen Jewell? Even Tom Hanks is on this hard-drivin’, genre-bustin’ pixie’s bandwagon. Her latest turned the heat up during an already steaming early summer. Queen runs the gamut of styles; the opening and closing swamp-twang instrumentals surround an abundant sampling of traditional country, rockabilly, honky tonk, forlorn ballads, torch songs and the occasional 1950s’ guttural sax. Jewell embraces it all with style and energy, and, regardless of song type, pure authenticity. Maybe that makes her hard to peg but it’s the key to her wonderfulness. And it’s all delivered with a healthy amount of enjoyment and humor. Each song is a highlight, not a bit of filler in the mix.

Her band, a band she’s managed to keep together since 2006, cooks. The big star, the main man, is guitarist Jerry Miller. He’s Duane Eddy, Link Wray and James Burton rolled into one. (Note: Eilen Jewell’s Miller is not the same Jerry Miller of Moby Grape, the height of the Haight-Ashbury bands that came out of late 1960s’ San Francisco. Regardless of what you may read on the Internet, it’s not the same guy). Eilen Jewell is a turbocharged kewpie doll. Don’t be fooled by her innocent looks or you’ll be left behind. Queen is a good place to start.

5 – Emitt Rhodes – Emitt Rhodes (1970)

I’m a late-comer to the cult of Emitt. I knew his tune “Live,” which was covered by the Bangles, but I didn’t know him, or his one-album band, The Merry-Go-Round. I do now.

On a sweltering July day I journeyed to New Paltz and Rhino Records. There, waiting for me, was Rhodes’ debut. From the first spin I was in love. Rhodes is a McCartney clone and one can overlook how wonderful that can be. Sometimes we forget just how large McCartney looms  as a melody maker; Rhodes was heavily under his spell. Like his musical hero, Emitt plays all the instruments as he laid down the tracks in his home studio. These are pearls, each and every one, Like the aforementioned Oasis, there are snatches of familiarity, but Rhodes is more his own man than either Gallagher. Emitt Rhodes was the album I listened to the most this year.

4 – The Baseball Project – Vol. 2, High and Inside (2011)

Like a typical Yankee pennant winner made up of high priced superstars, The Baseball Project brought big guns together to win it all. After their debut album, Scott McCaughey (Young Fresh Fellows), Steve Wynn (Dream Syndicate), Linda Pitmon (Golden Smog) and Peter Buck (R.E.M.) went their separate ways, but came back this year with a new collection, Vol. 2, High and Inside.

The thirteen tracks cover a wide range of baseball history — Tony Conigliaro’s lost possibilities, the travails of the ’86 Red Sox, the death of quirky phenom Mark “The Bird” Fidrych, to name a few — and travels through straight ahead indie rock, to surf music, to Steely Dan inspired rock. Bemoaning the early death of “The Bird” in the opening number “1976,” Wynn sings “What does it say for the rest of us when our heroes die and leave us alone?” That’s deep stuff. “Here Lies Carl Mays” closes the album. Yankee Mays, whose pitch killed Indians shortstop Ray Chapman in 1920, croons from the grave, defending his career and expressing the remorse he never showed in real life. It’s a beautiful song about the curves life throws and how we are often left futilely explaining our actions to no one. Sad and touching, it’s the epitome of what The Baseball Project does well, presenting universal emotions disguised in a sports song.

3 – Doug Dillard & Gene Clark - The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark (1968)

Sundazed Music can always be counted on for quality reissues. They have beautiful taste and that was made clear with their three Gene Clark reissues of 2011. Clark, the most-forgotten but  most important of The Byrds, was returned to the pedestal he should always rest upon. For me, Fantastic Expedition was at the top of that trio.

The soft, often quaking, depth of Gene Clark’s voice on the lead track “Out On the Side” will break your heart. But this opener is a head fake, a rock song that serves as an amuse-bouche for an eight-course bluegrass feast. “Train Leaves Here This Morning” is bittersweet wonder, redone years later to much lesser affect on The Eagles’ first album. The country pickin’ gospel of “Git It on Brother” is a rollicking hoot and the only non-Clark penned tune. (Gene wrote or co-wrote every entry except this Lester Flatt number). From start to finish it is a wonderful record.

2 - Paul Simon  –  So Beautiful or So What (2011)

I’ll admit that I am predisposed to like a new Paul Simon album. From the get-go, Simon’s solo work left Simon & Garfunkel in the dust and, among his peers (McCartney, Dylan to name two), Simon’s solo work has been an unparalleled run of excellence.

So Beautiful is ridiculously good, bouncing effortlessly from the seriousness of Iraq and life after death to the goofiness of the secret of existence contained in an old Gene Vincent tune. “The Afterlife” is as funny a take on eternity as Albert Brooks’ Defending Your Life, and it’s only 3:40!  “Dazzling Blue” is an amalgam of Simon’s solo styles. Over tabla and clay pots, Simon strums a tale of a leisurely drive out to Montauk. It’s followed by “Rewrite,” where Simon thanks the Lord for interceding as he revises his work and his life, accompanied by djembe, glass harp and bass talking drum, in another fusing of the exotic with the common.

So Beautiful or So What mixes the best of Paul Simon; super melodies over solid beats, with words that’ll make you smile as you think. So, where does So Beautiful or So What sit among Paul Simon’s 12 studio albums? Classic.

1 – Liam Finn – FOMO (2011)

As with Syl Johnson, my Liam Finn focus began at Solid Sound. I’d heard of him, the offspring of Tim Finn, the effortless popsmith of Split Enz, The Finn Brothers and, for a short time, Crowded House. This apple is so close to the tree that it never fell off.

Liam’s songs are a life force, powerfully driving. From “Neurotic World” to “Jump Your Bones,” FOMO will move you. The drum and bass pulsate in a distinctive way. Finn’s voice floats lightly, though not weakly, above the music. Like his father before him, Liam has as many hooks as a tackle shop, but the best song of the bunch is “Cold Feet.” It was my favorite song of the year, the one I turned to most often. My #1 song belongs on my #1 album.

Happy New Year!

Deluxe Dilemma

(Or, Boxed in By Box Sets)

By Jeff Katz

It used to be so easy. Go into a record store or a department store, find what you were looking for, pay and leave. Even when CDs were foisted on a public not looking for an alternative to vinyl, the same process adhered. The shift to downloads was different only in its delivery and absence of physical space and touch. In this era, when the public has grown used to the idea that free music is a new human right, record companies, the few remaining, have figured a new way to milk the public: deluxe editions of back catalog classics.

I don’t mind being gouged on music. Hey, I bought both collections of Beatles remasters, mono and stereo, AND Beatles Rock Band in the same month. We older folks, the 45-65 set, have the money and the desire to buy yet another copy of Exile on Main St. and those evil executives know it. My very real problem, a dilemma that has induced quasi-paralysis, is the wealth of options being made available. Sometimes there can be too many choices, anti-American as that sounds.

My initial enthusiasm for The Promise, the collection of lost Bruce Springsteen songs created during his forced hiatus between Born to Run and Darkness On the Edge of Town (Bruce was in legal limbo as he attempted to switch managers) was squashed as thoroughly as the hopes of the couple in “The River.” Should I buy the 3 CD/3 Blu-ray deluxe edition with facsimile notebook of Bruce’s lyrical jottings? Nice, but that was $90. What about the slightly lesser cost option, with plain old DVDs instead of Blu-rays? That was $80. Or should I go basic, CDs only, for a ten spot?

I wanted the remastered Darkness, but that was only available in the big money packages. I didn’t need the videos, in either format. So it came down to this: was a remastered version of my favorite Springsteen album (well, that and Tunnel of Love) worth an extra 70-80 bucks? Short answer: no. Long answer: no, but give me time to think it over. It took me months to come to that decision and, by the time I bought The Promise, I’d lost nearly all interest.

That was one year ago. Since then the situation has worsened. Massive reissues of What’s Going On, Layla, Quadrophenia, and many others have left me as confused as Jimmy the Mod from the plain original version of The Who’s masterwork. (I assume he feels the same way in the $130 version that I won’t buy). The worst of all is Smile. I’ve waited a lifetime for an official release of Brian Wilson’s teenage symphony to God, and now it’s here. Have I bought it? No. Is the 2 CD set the one for me, or is it the double vinyl album? The set I really want has 5 discs, 2 LPs, a booklet and hardcover book plus a poster. That’s $140, reasonable for what you get, but, really, not reasonable at all for music I already own. I have a bootleg of the record, and then there’s Brian’s own version from 2004. Seeing Wilson perform the entire work live went a long way towards ultimate Smile satisfaction.  I know one thing, I’m not into the $700 package that lights up and has a Brian Wilson autograph. I could buy a piece of stereo equipment for that money.

So here’s what I’ve come up with. Each high end repackage of a timeless album finds a spot on my Amazon wish list. There they sit and wait, as I watch the prices like a stock ticker. One day, some day, I’ll find a copy of Achtung Baby for half-price. When I do, I’ll spend some time wondering whether it’s really worth even $70.

Friendship Enterprise:

The Car is Also a Time Machine

A lot comes my way. Some good, some not, but very little that makes me want to listen to an entire work and then write about it. So what happens if something I like comes from someone I know? Is it wrong to be enthusiastic about a group when I’m a friend of the family? Yet isn’t it also a mistake to deny that I’m hooked on a group and ignore them purposefully? What about the moral problem of writing about that? It’s not nepotism, they’re aren’t blood, and I do know that if I heard music from someone close to me and didn’t like it, I’d never jot down a word.  Where does it all leave me? Oh, what the hell, read on!

The Clabbys of suburban Chicago are a combination Von Trapp/Cowsills with more variety and broader talents. They sing, act, write, dress up, and all with great humor. Father Mike (not a priest) and I stood shoulder to shoulder, quite literally, for seven years in the S & P options pit at the Chicago Board Options Exchange. In a world of Gosselins and Kardashians, the Clabby clan, two parents and five kids, deserve a TV show of their own. They’re the family you wish you had.

It was from Mike that I was tipped off to Friendship Enterprise, a band grounded in an adoration of ‘80’s synth-pop, with healthy bits of Oingo Boingo and Kraftwerk and, to me a little same era Suzanne Vega. To show they aren’t late teens stuck in a time warp, they love Lady Gaga, The Strokes and Dutch minimalists I Am Oak.

If the name Friendship Enterprise gives you visions of Kirk in a death struggle against The Gorn, you’re on the right track. The group is a fivesome of sci-fi geeks, with many songs emanating from their devotion to Star Trek, Star Wars, and Battlestar Galactica, to a future that now seems old and past. That inspiration runs from mild to saturated, from general space age themes to actual fan fiction.

Kids today. It takes so little to create a polished track on Garage Band.  Full bands or solo multi-tracking, it all comes together in a jiffy.  Friendship Enterprise’s first salvo, a six song EP titled The Car Is Also a Time Machine (nice nod to the 1984 cult classic film Repo Man), was done old school, in the studio, over a three day period. The songs are all co-written by singer and keyboardist Lucy Clabby and drummer Brandon Waldon. Actually, Brandon is more a multi-percussion talent and all around musician, beyond what “drummer” signifies. The two near twenty year olds, met in the summer of 2010, found common ground, started with the band name and went on from there. In a year’s time they were playing locally and recording.

“Facebook Official” begins with spare keyboard space effects that burst into the danceable. Lucy’s slightly vulnerable voice is the perfect counterpoint to the mechanical sound. To reemphasize where they’re coming from aesthetically, a photo of Spock and Uhura appears as the song plays on Sound Cloud. Harrison Waldon (yes relation) thrashes away with a nice piece of punk guitar. Noah Lande is solid on bass and B. Waldon is excellent. His drum work shines on “Friendship with Extraterrestrial Benefits.” The haunting “On Plots and Plans” will stay with you. It’s Clabby’s vocals that keep me listening. She’s a bit of a Midwestern Kate Nash, plaintive, at times with little inflection, but in a way that is completely spellbinding.

For now, you can only hear Friendship Enterprise on Facebook, but soon The Car is Also a Time Machine will be available at your local Skylab and other intergalactic outlets.

www.facebook.com/FriendshipEnterprise

 * * *

Nick Lowe and The Smiler Dilemma

Nick Lowe’s career as a sarcastic troubadour, whose quiver was filled with songs of pointed invective and sharp wit, took a turn circa 1994, when a calmer, more sober (in all senses of the word) Lowe released The Impossible Bird. The country infused collection of laid back tunes was a triumphant look inward, his barbs directed more personally. Had “Basher” become a sensitive singer-songwriter? Possibly. Without doubt his songwriting style had changed.

Bird was followed by three more albums mining the same vein: Dig My Mood, The Convincer and At My Age. His latest, The Old Magic, is more of the same and that is both pleasing and worrisome. There’s no call for concern that Lowe has lost any of his cleverness. The leadoff track, “Stoplight Roses,” lays out the reasons why cheap flowers purchased from anonymous fundraisers at a red light don’t quite cut it. In a recent interview Lowe confessed that he fights being too clever, too cute. The old Nick the Knife, who could write a couplet like this – “Do you remember Rick Astley?/ He had a big fat hit, it was ghastly” (from “All Men Are Liars”) – and make it flow, is long gone.  Even in his weakest, silliest moments, Lowe made his snark work for him, but his admission makes sense.

Every song on The Old Magic is worth listening to and there’s a wide sampling of easy going styles (strings on “I Read a Lot,” Tex-Mex on “Somebody Cares for Me”). Lowe is nothing if not a master craftsman. In that sense, it is a fine album, but there’s more old than magic. Rod Stewart went through a similar problem in the early ‘70’s. His first four albums were monumental works, all following a similar format. By his fifth solo effort, Smiler, it got too damn predictable and tiresome.

The cover of The Old Magic presents a retro cutie, having a personal dance party. The photo is straight forward with a hint of mockery. Nick Lowe needs to bring back the rollicking pub-rocker, punk, New Wave performer that he used to be, even in small doses, if only to prove that that man does exist. The current recipe is starting to taste a little stale.

About the author:

Jeff Katz is the music editor of Ragazine. He lives in Cooperstown, New York, and blogs ferociously at  http://maybebabyoryouknowthatitwouldbeuntrue.blogspot.com/, and http://missionofcomplex.wordpress.com. 

The Sad Journey of Gene Clark

By Jeff Katz

“Poor Gene.”

I was talking to Tony Leone, drummer for the roots powerhouse Ollabelle. We were discussing a Roger McGuinn-Gene Clark bootleg, Live at The Bottom Line 1978. Indeed, Clark’s career is a tragic tale of a super talent who, preyed upon by personal demons, left the fame of the mid-‘60s rock scene and subsequently created album after album of fine work, only to be ignored by the record-buying public.

When Clark quit The Byrds after their second album, the group lost their best songwriter and finest singer.  Though the trembling warble of McGuinn was the signature voice and the crystalline precision of David Crosby’s harmonies made the band’s tunes richer than those of the average pop group, it was Gene who provided the soul, a warm husk with a strong hint of vulnerability.

Why did Gene Clark leave The Byrds in May of 1966?  His fear of flying gets the most press and it’s true he departed a flight and, in effect, the group.  There are other reasons: nervous strain, general illness, guilt over his financial success as primary songwriter (“I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better,”  “Eight Miles High”) that put him atop his band mates in wealth. There was also anger that McGuinn was often given the lead vocal nod on the group’s big releases and Dylan covers.  Who knows? He was gone, and though he’d come back briefly mid-year and again in October 1967, he had broken for good and despite his skill, Gene Clark was quickly forgotten.

It’s easy to elevate Gram Parsons, with his rich-boy good looks, his Rolling Stones connection and his spectacular flame out and death. Better to burnout than fade away, right? But take away Parsons’ gloss and, when you compare the grooves, Clark is clearly his superior. Chris Hillman, his Byrds-mate, as well as Parsons partner in The Byrds and The Flying Burrito Brothers, said this:  “As much press as Gram gets, I constantly remind people that Gene Clark wrote some amazing songs, and lots of them. Gram had some talent, but no discipline.”

Gene proved it from the get-go, with 1967’s Gene Clark and The Gosdin Brothers, a country and rock tour de force, the first of its kind. No one was ready to hear that in 1967, the psychedelic year of Peanut Butter Conspiracies and Chocolate Watch Bands. It’s the price a visionary pays. The lack of commercial viability began there and continued, regardless of quality. While Clark’s poor sales plagued his career, what he produced soared high.

Sundazed, they of top notch reissues and exquisite taste,  has released three of Gene Clark’s masterworks — The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark, White Light and Roadmaster — bringing them to vivid life on CD and LP. Each title is equal to or far surpassing the dedicated country rock dabbling of Bob Dylan or Neil Young, and collectively they go a long way to redeem this lost soul.

Like Gene Clark, Doug Dillard had recently left his band and needed some soothing. The two refugees convened at Dillard’s house for good-timey jam session, fueled by much beer, necessary to loosen the minds of the players. The chemistry was apparent, leading to the seven sessions that produced The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark. Two musicians, now on their own, found the camaraderie they needed.

The soft, often quaking, depth of Gene Clark’s voice on the lead track “Out On the Side” will break your heart.  But this opener is a head fake, a rock song that serves as an amuse- bouche for an eight-course bluegrass feast. Clark’s voice is terribly forlorn pitted against Dillard’s shiny banjo work that bursts forth like a thrown spear in a 3D movie. “Train Leaves Here This Morning” is bittersweet wonder, redone years later to much lesser affect on The Eagles’ first album. (It was co-written by Gene and Bernie Leadon, who plays on Fantastic Expedition and was a founding member of The Eagles, who made all their dough resting softly on the backs of artists like Clark and Parsons). The country pickin’ gospel of “Git It on Brother” is a rollicking hoot and the only non-Clark penned tune. (Gene wrote or co-wrote every entry except this Lester Flatt number).

Clark sings “Where do I fit in the plan?” on the album’s finale. The sad answer is nowhere. Undeservedly, the record was another flop. Said Dillard, “We didn’t make the charts but we sure influenced a lot of people.” For whatever that’s worth. It is a work of utmost sincerity; a quality absent in the masquerades of Dylan, the ever shifting career moves of Young and the pretense of Parsons.  Again, Gene Clark found himself ahead of his time. Nashville Skyline wouldn’t come out for another year and, with the clout that only Dylan had, make this kind of music acceptable to a rock audience.

By March of 1971, Clark had retreated to Northern California, far enough from the LA scene as to be a hermit. Here, at peace with a new family, Clark wrote his usual overflow of powerful tunes and headed south to create White Light under the production of guitar whiz Jesse Ed Davis, late of Taj Mahal and soon of Concert for Bangladesh fame

The harmonica blast that heralds “The Virgin” recalls Dylan’s John Wesley Harding. White Light is a stripped down opus that plays as a pastiche of late ’60s Dylan, but Clark’s simple, unaffected voice, coupled with his usual authenticity and clarity make the style his own. This is no put-on or copy, though the “Tears of Rage” cover is the necessary signifier.

 * * *

Much is made of this record by the few paying attention, as an entry into the singer songwriter movement of 1970/71 ushered in by James Taylor and Neil Young, but it’s not quite in that vein. It doesn’t seek mawkish sentimentality and an “oh look at my sensitivity” vibe. It is Gene Clark as Gene Clark, an honest performer and stellar songwriter. Davis created a wonderfully crisp recording in his first effort as producer. The acoustic guitars shimmer, and while there is little in the way of showy instrumental work, bare music matching bare soul, there is a beauty of a bottleneck guitar on “One in a Hundred” and straight electric mastery on “1975,” both courtesy of the man behind the control board.

In “Because of You,” the dark clouds break away and the rainbow comes on through. One can’t help but feel that was never quite the case. It shows in Clark’s voice — the sorrow and painful despair. Again, Gene Clark sent a gem out and no one cared. White Light was another commercial disaster.

Flashback one year previous. Jim Dickson, former Byrds’ manager, sought to halt the steep decline of Gene Clark’s career and found his former colleagues willing to help. That’s not to say they were willing to be in actual proximity. McGuinn overdubbed guitar and vocals and Crosby popped in separately to add harmonies. Clearly no room was big enough to hold the egos or peaceful enough to mend old wounds. Only Hillman and drummer Michael Clarke were willing to be in studio with Gene.

The two cuts, “She’s the Kind of Girl” with McGuinn’s jangle and classic group harmonies prominent, and “One in a Hundred” (in its first incarnation) are solid and far superior to the “real” reunion that would take place in late ’72, both in sound and spirit. That these songs were not released is beyond odd.

Roadmaster is a schizophrenic album. The first two tracks, The Byrds’ mock coming together of 1970, are followed by eight tracks from spring 1972 sessions that were abandoned after A & M got wind that the original group were planning their reunion for David Geffen’s Asylum Records. The songs are of the non-Byrds variety, though post-Clark band member Clarence White provides sharp guitar. It’s a solid piece of work, with Clark’s typical, and seemingly effortless, ability to write great songs. He alone was able to give top of the line work to the group reunion soon to come, perhaps because he could; there were plenty more where they came from. Roadmaster is less a grand statement than a solid album.

“Full Circle Song,” which appears here and would later show up as “Full Circle” was not written for the second coming, but very well could have. “Funny how the circle turns around/First you’re up then you’re down.” Gene Clark sings about himself, the former rock icon quickly turned rock remnant. Gene travelled tentatively to Los Angeles for the recordings, a city where he was once hailed a king. Now, only six years later, he didn’t even have the power to have his newest album released in the United States. Ariola, a Dutch subsidiary of A & M, set Roadmaster free, where it was warmly received. Gene remained a popular force in parts of Europe, though not in his own home.

The Byrds’ 1973 comeback was a spineless effort to replicate the smooth California sound of The Eagles, instead of revitalizing their unique brand. It was met with scornful reviews and sold moderately. Any plans for a future involving the five founding members were scotched. Gene Clark would produce more quality work, including 1974’s No Other, a gem once again unnoticed. McGuinn, Clark & Hillman would form in 1977, quickly becoming McGuinn & Hillman, featuring Gene Clark. Gene’s songs are consistently the best of these passable efforts. He still had it, though no one was listening.

At The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction ceremonies on January 16, 1991, Gene Clark joined Roger McGuinn, David Crosby, Chris Hillman and Michael Clarke on stage to accept their honor as newest members and they performed all together one last time. Clark was a very sick man, with ulcers exacerbated by years of alcohol abuse. By May 24 he was dead at 46.

About the author:

Jeff Katz is music editor of Ragazine. He and his family live in Cooperstown, N.Y., where in addition to cranking out articles for Ragazine, he routinely blogs on: 

http://maybebabyoryouknowthatitwouldbeuntrue.blogspot.com/ , and

http://missionofcomplex.wordpress.com

Eilen and Wanda Jackson, 1950s' legend.

By Jeff Katz
Music Editor

How great is Eilen Jewell? Even Tom Hanks is on this hard-drivin’, genre-bustin’ pixie’s bandwagon, declaring her as one of his summer must-listens. With her new album Queen of the Minor Key just released, and a heavy touring schedule, Jewell is turning the heat up on an already hot season.

Queen runs the gamut of styles; the opening and closing swamp-twang instrumentals surround an abundant sampling of traditional country, rockabilly, honky tonk, forlorn ballads, torch songs and the occasional 1950s’ guttural sax. Jewell embraces it all with style and energy, and, regardless of song type, pure authenticity. Maybe that makes her hard to peg but it’s the key to her wonderfulness.  And it’s all delivered with a healthy amount of enjoyment and humor.  Each song is a highlight, not a bit of filler in the mix.

Recently caught live at The Oneonta Theatre, Jewell and her band, a band she’s managed to keep together since her 2006 debut (Boundary County), cooked. Sometimes they simmered, sometimes they boiled over. Jason Beek,  a solid, powerful drummer, and Johnny Sciasia, doing a fine job of slappin’ the upright bass, provided expert rhythm. But the big star, the main man, was guitarist Jerry Miller. He’s Duane Eddy, Link Wray and James Burton rolled into one.  (Note: Eilen Jewell’s Miller is not the same Jerry Miller of Moby Grape, the height of the Haight-Ashbury bands that came out of late 1960s’ San Francisco. Just accept it, Dead fans. Regardless of what you may read on the Internet, it’s not the same guy). His solo during a performance of “Shakin’ All Over” (did I mention Eilen also has a penchant for ‘60s’ British Invasion?)  was a mini-history of rock and roll with snatches of “For Your Love” and a long bit of “Paint It Black” thrown in for good measure.

Eilen was an impish vision in black knee length dress, pearls and cowboy boots. Funny and hip, Jewell led the band through her catalog with enthusiasm, taking some detours into her side projects, the Loretta Lynn tribute Butcher Holler and the gospel of The Sacred Shakers (“not commercially viable,” she cracks). Introducing Lynn’s “I’m a Honky Tonk Girl,” and noting that this was Loretta’s first record AND first hit, Jewell marked that that was “not her path.”

The band revved it up with a cover of Arthur Alexander’s “The Girl That Radiates Charm,” and a hyperspeed psychobilly version of the title track of her new record. Her explanation of the deranged Cupid of “Bang Bang Bang” (also from Queen of the Minor Key) had the audience giggling. After a request time, that ignored most shouts with Eilen claiming the band didn’t know the tune  or that they would play something that someone would have requested had they only known (all said with great humor), they ended with the aforementioned “Shakin’ All Over,” more Johnny Kidd & The Pirates than The Who.

Eilen Jewell is a turbocharged kewpie doll. Don’t be fooled by her innocent looks or you’ll be left behind.

Bowl Food, Jon Nickoll

When we last checked in with Jon Nickoll, Cinema Music was his most recent release. (See “My Imaginary Friend Has a CD” in ragazine, April 2010). With his new album Bowl Food, Nickoll finds himself a first-time father without the free time to head to the recording  studio.

The recording is decidedly and unapologetically low-fi. Think Springsteen’s Nebraska meets Lennon’s Double Fantasy. Nickoll’s voice is his strongest point, a soothing Elvis Costello.  Weighty themes — emerging from periods of black, the passage of time, the transition from personhood to parenthood — are delivered with the spoonful of sugar that is Nickoll’s vocal signature. Baby Charlie appears as himself in “Liberty.” It’s a beautiful bit of harmony and, I’ll admit, made me a little teary.

An effortless tunesmith, Nickoll’s numbers flow smoothly. That’s not to say it’s a slow  album. At 25 minutes, it cruises along, veering a steady course between reflective and up-tempo.  “Which Friend First” exemplifies the former; “Still We Try” the latter, “Friend” contains my favorite line: “Though I didn’t cry/ I carried tears around.” Very relatable. Any guy who starts a song with a nod to “a box of records with Pet Sounds on the  top” (“Beginnings and Ends”), wins my heart.

Hints of influence pop out: a little snatch of The Doors’ “The End” in “Fasten Your Seatbelts,” a dash of The Beatles’ “It’s Only Love” on “Slowly,” but this is singularly Jon Nickoll and that’s good.

– Jeff Katz

No Banjo Hitters They:

The Baseball Project’s Vol. 2,

“High and Inside”

By Jeff Katz

The marriage of baseball and music has been a rocky one. Most attempts are jokey novelties: The Treniers tribute to Willie Mays (1954’s “Say Hey”), Teresa Brewer’s 1956 love song to Mantle, “I Love Mickey.” John Fogerty’s “Centerfield” connects with the joy of playing, but 26 years of incessant overplaying has rendered the tune impotent.  But who will speak to the nerdy devotion of the rabid fan who listens to good music as he or she scours the daily box scores and devotes disproportionate brain space to the names and games that mark the long seasons of their lives? Terry Cashman with “Talkin’ Baseball?” Certainly not.

Coming to the rescue like Mariano Rivera, The Baseball Project strode forth with 2008’s Vol. 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails. Finally, great musicians tackled baseball in a way that was satisfying to the ears of rock fans and the researchers at SABR. Two great tastes in one musical bar, The Reese’s Cup of hardball pop. (But don’t think of Pee Wee Reese’s cup; that would be gross!).

Like the 1997 World Champion Florida Marlins, The Baseball Project brought big stars together to win it all. After their debut album, Scott McCaughey (Young Fresh Fellows), Steve Wynn (Dream Syndicate), Linda Pitmon (Golden Smog) and Peter Buck (R.E.M.) went their separate ways, but are back again with a new collection, Vol. 2, High and Inside.

The thirteen new tracks cover a wide range of baseball history — Tony Conigliaro’s lost possibilities, the travails of the ’86 Red Sox, the death of quirky phenom Mark “The Bird” Fidrych, to name a few — and runs the gamut from straight ahead indie rock, to surf music, to Steely Dan inspired rock. The level of detail shows these band members are no dabblers in the national past time. In “The Straw That Stirs The Drink,” a look back to Reggie Jackson’s debut season with The Yankees, a reference to Manager Billy Martin’s drunken fight with a marshmallow salesman (which took place a few years after Jax’ 1977 start with The Bronx Bombers) comes across as both minutiae that works for an obsessed fan and a bizarre bit of imagery for the unknowing.

It would be easy to fall into the “Van Lingle Mungo” trap, a straight listing of funny ballplayer names that Dave Frishberg worked to magnificent effect in his classic jazz piano nostalgia trip. The Baseball Project sets themselves apart by combining a media guide knowledge of the game with a healthy amount of philosophy. Bemoaning the early death of “The Bird” in the opening number “1976,” Wynn sings “What does it say for the rest of us when our heroes die and leave us alone?”  That’s deep stuff.  “Fair Weather Fans” reels in the years as each band member recounts their own lifelong love of their hometown teams as they grow up and move on to other cities. And woe to that sad soul who grew up without a nearby pro team!

“Here Lies Carl Mays” closes the album. Yankee Mays, whose pitch killed Indians shortstop Ray Chapman in 1920 ( still the only fatality as a result of a thrown ball), croons from the grave, defending his career and expressing the remorse he never showed in real life. It’s a beautiful song about the curves life throws and how we are often left futilely explaining our actions to no one. Sad and touching, it’s the epitome of what The Baseball Project does well, presenting universal emotions disguised as a sports song. It’s the old hidden ball trick, performed masterfully. Gene Michael would be proud.

Look it up.

1 + 1 = 0

10 Musical partnerships that don’t add up

By Jeff Katz

Ever have someone you trust do something so stupid, show such obvious lack of judgment that your jaw drops and you scratch your head wondering if you were completely off-base in your assessment of that person? Sure, we all have. Sometimes these lapses come from our friends, spouses, children, political leaders, you name it. But I’m the Music Editor, so on to the topic at hand.

It’s easy to come up with a list of failed musical partnerships, but a tad more difficult if you stay away from the obvious: Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder’s dip into overly simplistic race relations in “Ebony and Ivory,” David Bowie and Bing Crosby’s psycho duet of “Little Drummer Boy/Peace On Earth,” Frank and Nancy Sinatra’s “Something Stupid,” an innocent song that became a creepy celebration of incest, to name a few.

Here’s a smattering of epic fails by musical icons.

1 – Johnny Cash and Fiona Apple – “Father and Son”

Most of the pairings in the latter part of The Man in Black’s career worked. Producer Rick Rubin connected him with many, including Tom Petty, Carl Perkins and Willie Nelson. Those matches are the best matches since Dolly Gallagher-Levi’s heyday. Some are less successful. (Sad to say, Cash and Joe Strummer’s take on “Redemption Song” doesn’t cut it for me). But the team of Cash and Apple is perplexing at best. There’s the obvious: Fiona can’t be Johnny’s son; she’s got lady parts! That’s number one. Number two is that their voices are impossible to mesh. Now, I love Ms. Apple. Her When the Pawn… and Extraordinary Machine are two of my all time favorite records, but this endeavor is pretty worthless. Her wispy feyness weaves itself unsurely in and out and around Cash’s craggy old-man voice. Plus, I can’t stand Cat Stevens and this song sucks.

2 – Burt Ward and Frank Zappa – “Boy Wonder I Love You.”

This cut requires some explanation. It’s not really a song at all. Conceptually, it’s hysterical; TV Batman’s Robin reads fan letters over a wry early ‘60’s pop sound that Frank presents tongue firmly in hairy cheek. It’s all done for ridiculous effect, but the problem is in the execution; it’s a one-joke record that gets old in a hurry. And it’s only two minutes and ten seconds long!  I take a back seat to no one in my adoration for the Batman TV series. Heck, I have a retro Batmobile sitting on the shelf to my left, still in box. It gives me hope and inspiration. But, Holy Hi-Fi, Batman, this record is a threat to the ears of all the good citizens of Gotham.

3 – R.E.M. and KRS-One – “Radio Song”

No band has been a greater disappointment to me than R.E.M. From the moment Chronic Town came out in 1982, at the same time I saw them open for The English Beat, I was madly in love. But I bailed after Out of Time and this opening track was the warning signal. KRS-One, influential rapper though he may have been, doesn’t go with Michael Stipe. It’s embarrassing and one wonders where their musical compass went awry. Lately, I’ve been trying to come to terms with the group and who they are, not what I wanted them to be, and were, from the first EP to Green, but, for me, “Radio Song” marked the beginning of the end.

4 – Cher and Beavis and Butthead – “I Got You Babe”

High camp can work. This one is painful; five minutes of painful. The back and forth of the two animated miscreants is a bit of a giggle, but nothing can wipe a smile off my face quicker than the opening strains of Sonny and Cher.  Even the boys know this sucks; “wuss music!” they cry. When the song cranks into heavy metal mode, they shout with glee. It still sucks. I get the feeling when Cher sings “Butthead, I got you,” she may have once used that line on Sonny, or Gregg Allman. “I Got You Babe” is execrable in its original form. “Cougar” Cher is beneath contempt as she finds that underage human males are no longer good enough for her; now she’s after cartoon minors.

5 – John Lennon and Frank Zappa – “Scumbag”

At The Fillmore in 1971, two of the most creative minds in rock history jammed as The Plastic Ono Mother to a plodding, unmemorable tune. Lennon’s lyrical skills were never lower than in the Sometime in New York City period, but the puerile, political sloganeering that marked that album seem positively Shakespearean compared to the relentless shouting of “Scumbag.”  Two legends (three if you count Yoko, which I don’t) at their worst.  Zappa does take the piss out of Lennon’s ultra-serious posturing. One snide “Right On” from Frank deflates the sanctimonious balloon.

6 – Paul McCartney and Elvis Costello – “You Want Her Too”

I get it; it’s the evil flip side to “The Girl is Mine.”  But that Macca/Michael Jackson ditty does work. This song, a product of the short-lived Paul and Elvis writing team of the Flowers in the Dirt (Paul) and Spike (Elvis) period is pure caricature. McCartney, as usual the sappy one, is at least true to form. Costello’s venom spitting is strictly faux. Much was made in the late ‘80’s that Elvis was the John to Paul’s Paul, but that year’s model of Elvis Costello was not the authentically mean prick of his first albums. It shows.

7 – Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel – “Born to Run”

At the end of the first night of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concerts at Madison Square Garden, Billy Joel came out as a surprise guest during The Boss’ set, creating in the flesh a Tri-State music fans’ wet dream. Though they are truly contemporaries, I never think of them together. Joel is Springsteen-lite. When Billy sings, it’s pretend toughness, a posture. Bruce is always the real deal. For “Born to Run,” Joel, searching for the balls needed for the Springsteen anthem, reached for a Bruce impersonation to do the trick. Weak, weak stuff. You may gather that I’m not a fan of Billy Joel.

8 – Elton John – Victim of Love

This entire album, released in October 1979 with disco past its peak, puts Elton’s voice over mindless throbbing beats. It’s terrible stuff; I defy anyone to listen to the whole record. Lord knows I’ve tried, but I simply can’t make it. I find myself wishing for the return of Kiki Dee.

9 – Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell – “The Onion Song”

Less a problem of performance than choice. “The world is just a great big onion?” Really, that’s the best metaphor they could come up with?  And why is Earth like the stinky Allium cepa? It’s because “hate and fear are the spices that make you cry.” That’s according to the songwriters of this dreck, Ashford and Simpson. Marvin and Tammi try hard, but I couldn’t help shed a tear in empathetic embarrassment.

10 – B.B. King and U2 – “When Love Comes to Town”

I love black and white cookies. The taste is sweet, the balance is perfect. Too much vanilla can ruin the entire experience. I’ll leave it at that.

Not Fading Away –

Two Old Men, Two New Albums

By Jeff Katz

How to Become Clairvoyant – Robbie Robertson

One of the biggest surprises of 1987 was Robbie Robertson’s self-titled debut. Yes, he wrote nearly all of The Band’s classic hits (though ex- drummer Levon Helm would later angrily dispute that claim). Sure he was a fierce lead guitarist, but his singing had always been an unknown. Robertson didn’t need to open his mouth in a band that contained Helm, Richard Manuel and Rick Danko, a trio of distinctive vocalists that are topped in rock history only by John, Paul and George. Yet, Robbie’s voice on his eponymous release was a gripping combination of coarse speak-sing, straight narration and straining high-pitched wails of beauty. It was an immediate classic and worth the decade long wait from the The Band’s final studio LP, Islands.

Since then, Robertson’s recorded output has been sporadic, and How to Become Clairvoyant is his first new album in 13 years. As such, it is much anticipated and delivers. Robertson appears on the cover dressed, seemingly, as the Unabomber, but he presents straight forward rock and roll; nothing as threatening as Ted Kaczynksi.

The album is built around its guests: Robert Randolph, Tom Morello, Trent Reznor (a little of Reznor’s moody sound baths go a long way. Hey, I’ve seen The Social Network twice; I get it), Steve Winwood, and the most promoted of all, Eric Clapton. The Clapton-Robertson sessions date from the early 1990s. Clapton has made no bones about wanting to join forces with The Band after the demise of Cream, but until now there were only brief encounters in The Last Waltz and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction ceremonies. The guitar and vocal interplay of the two is at the core of the record – Clapper is featured on seven of the 12 tunes, sharing lead vocals on the casually shuffling “Fear of Falling.” Stevie’s prominent organ bursts are also worthy of a shout out.

There are two musical and historical highlights. “When the Night Was Young,” about a certain youthful musician starting on the road, the road that would, for Robertson, turn out to be “a goddamn impossible way of life,” but for the then teenage Canadian and his band, the sights of Highway 61, God Bless America signs, and billboards touting guns and religious apocalypse were striking welcomes to the country that gave the birth to the music he followed.

“This Is Where I Get Off” is Robertson’s breakup song, 30 years late. Robbie makes it clear that he never wanted to leave the band, that he saw the growing alcoholism and rapid descent of band mates Manuel and Danko as the signal to move on. True? I don’t know. Certainly watching The Last Waltz would give one all the reasons they need to believe that Robbie had his sights on a new career of films and self-glorification with new friend Martin Scorsese. (They’ve worked on eight films together since). Were “the chances I’m taking against my will,” as Robertson sings? Hard to say. It’s an achingly wistful song, a soaring account of an unsure decision.

Scattered among the solid tracks is one big clinker. “Axman,” is of the worst type, in the tradition of tripe like “Rock and Roll Heaven.” Even the great Morello can’t save this singing laundry list of guitar gods. Despite that single lapse in judgment, Robbie Robertson has produced a superb record with How to Become Clairvoyant, adding significant bits of detail to the tales of rock’s past while not wasting a bit of time resting on prior accomplishments.

So Beautiful or So What – Paul Simon

I’ll admit that I am predisposed to like a new Paul Simon album. From the get-go, Simon’s solo work left Simon & Garfunkel in the dust and, among his peers (McCartney, Dylan to name two), Simon’s solo work has been an unparalleled run of excellence. The worst of his work (You’re the One, One Trick Pony and Songs from The Capeman) is quite good with moments of brilliance, and the best of his work (all the rest) are classics. Where does So Beautiful or So What sit among Paul Simon’s 12 studio albums?

The liner notes are off-putting and gave me pause. Written by Elvis Costello, they are grandiosely fawning and, for a second, I wondered if Paul was a little unsure of himself. He gets that way; after public failures like the movie One Trick Pony or the Broadway flop of Capeman, Simon tends to seek out a certain Garfunkel for financial, and perhaps artistic, rejuvenation. 2006’s Surprise was a top-notch recording, but not a hit was to be found.

No worries. So Beautiful is ridiculously good, bouncing effortlessly from the seriousness of Iraq and life after death to the goofiness of the secret of existence contained in an old Gene Vincent tune. “The Afterlife” is as funny a take on eternity as Albert Brooks’ Defending Your Life, and it’s only 3:40!

I’ll admit something else; I don’t particularly like the obtuse lyrics that mark Graceland and The Rhythm of The Saints. Paul doesn’t need to try so hard to convey deep messages and wry phrases. So Beautiful is straight-forward in its poetry, hearkening back to Paul Simon and There Goes Rhymin’ Simon in easy humor and heartfelt emotion.

“Dazzling Blue” is an amalgam of Simon’s solo styles. Over tabla and clay pots, Simon strums a tale of a leisurely drive out to Montauk. It’s followed by “Rewrite,” where Simon thanks the Lord for interceding as he revises his work and his life, accompanied by djembe, glass harp and bass talking drum, in another fusing of the exotic with the common.

Clearly, Paul has mortality on his mind. The sixties legends – McCartney, Dylan, Robertson, The Stones, etc.) – have created something new: the aging, artistically valid, rock star. Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard: they’ve been rehashing their hits for 50 years. That’s true, to a small degree about the ‘60’s icons, but, album after album these guys keep producing fresh, vital music. I’m sure it keeps them young, but they’re not young, and they know it (well, maybe McCartney and Jagger don’t know it).

Simon has always ably mixed seriousness with comedy, but he’s at his happiest stuck in the ‘50’s.  I saw that in full view when he sang doo wop background vocals for Dion at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concert in 2009. (Clearly, that night was important to Paul too. He thanks B.B. King, who shared the bill, for turning him on to the recordings of The Golden Gate Jubilee Quartet’s recordings, which Simon puts to use in “Love and Blessings.”) That affinity for basic rock, and a rededication to rhythm-based, rather than melody-based, tunes is what marks his pre- and post- Graceland albums. But So Beautiful or So What mixes the best of Paul Simon; super melodies over solid beats, with words that’ll make you smile as you think.

So, where does So Beautiful or So What sit among Paul Simon’s 12 studio albums?

Classic.

– Jeff Katz is music editor of Ragazine.

Marvin Gaye

Mercy Mercy Us

By Jeff Katz

Here’s how I remember the beginning of April 1984.

It was a sunny spring day; most welcome in Binghamton, one of the ten cloudiest cities in the country. I was a senior at SUNY-Binghamton, in the last month before a clerking job on Wall Street awaited to begin the slow process of sucking out my soul. As general manager of the campus record store, Slipped Disc, I got paid in records, the only currency that mattered to me back then. The day before I’d snatched a three-record Marvin Gaye Anthology and was in the midst of a soulful haze, the strains of “Can I Get a Witness” coursing through my skull.

As I walked toward the union from the library, someone came up to me and asked if I’d heard Marvin Gaye was killed. I hadn’t. In some inexplicable way, blame the butterfly effect, my plucking the Marvin record from the racks sent a blast of cosmic bad vibes from campus to California. Once there, they found a home in the confused brain of Marvin Gaye, Sr., and caused him to fire two fatal shots into his talented and troubled son.

The horrific events of April 1^st were revealed over the next few weeks. Marvin, back with his parents in the Crenshaw home he’d bought for them, was in a bad way. Two years after his huge comeback (“Sexual Healing” was a #1 hit), Gaye, Jr. had hit the skids, back in a world of heavy drug use, severe financial distress and depression following a disastrous concert tour. Always a mama’s boy, Marvin sat upstairs with his ailing mother Alberta, when they heard a hellacious ruckus down below.  Senior was on the first floor, in a rage as he futilely searched for some insurance documents.  Marvin called him upstairs, and the Greek tragedy unfolded.

When the father verbally attacked the mother, the good son interceded. The elder’s rage turned from documents to death, and he left briefly, returning with a .38 caliber revolver in hand. Shot one – a bullet through the heart. Shot two – the father leaned over his fallen boy, pointed the gun at point blank range and blasted prone son in the left shoulder, just for good measure. Then the old man went outside, found a seat on the front porch and awaited the police.

At 44, Marvin Gaye, Jr. was suicidal, a fact well known to his family and friends. He’d told those in his inner circle that he was about to exit the world by his own hand, even going so far as to put a gun to his head at least once in the presence of witnesses. He’d tried to overdose on pure cocaine after his 1976 divorce from Anna Gordy, sister of Motown founder Berry Gordy. Eight years later, in the grasp of heavy cocaine use, exorbitant alimony payments and an IRS induced bankruptcy (the government was looking for $2 million in back taxes), the walls were closing in on the greatest soul voice to emerge from the 1960’s pop revolution.

Though his 1982 return to form had brought him great success, it also led to a return to Los Angeles from a self-imposed exile in Belgium. Marvin was defenseless against the entourage that swarmed his house and the drugs which, after a brief cutback, came back in full force. And there was the ongoing psychological struggle between son and father, with the insecure child desperately attempting to prove his worth to a disapproving dad.

At the time he was pronounced dead at 1:01 PM, Marvin’s had nearly completed his new album, one that he hoped would rival Midnight Love as a return to form. Though his sales had dropped pre-“Sexual Healing,” his quality stayed as high as the man himself. Marvin Gaye had produced a non-stop series of excellent LPs after churning out a catalog of hit 45’s during his first decade of recording in the Motown-dominated Detroit that came to be referred to as Hitsville, USA.

Marvin’s 1970’s work was without peer. What’s Going On is the greatest rhythm and blues social statement ever put to plastic. His studio follow-up, Let’s Get It On, is the sex album, nearly melting itself as it spins on the turntable. 1978’s Here My Dear, a painfully personal account of his divorce from Anna set the bar for breakup records. And, his rendition of the National Anthem at the 1983 NBA All-Star Game has gone done as the ultimate version of the hoary chestnut. Watching it live was one of the most exciting musical events I’ve ever witnessed.

Marvin Gaye blazed the trail at Motown as the house artists sought to mature, much to the chagrin of management. It wasn’t without a struggle. In fact, What’s Going On was delayed in its release because the label’s vaunted Quality Control committee felt it was destined to fail. Instead, it became the biggest seller in Motown history, paving the way for Little Stevie Wonder to become plain old Stevie Wonder and embark on his own slate of stellar, profound and relevant records of the 1970’s. No Marvin, no Stevie.

It’s become a cottage industry to bemoan the loss of John Lennon. That’s fine; I share in that sadness. But let’s not forget that, on April 1, 1984, a void was created that, 27 years later, is no closer to being filled. That loss should make us all wanna holler.

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VIDEO: Eric and Mary Ross’s Kurzfassung

Composer Eric Ross, with video artist Mary Ross (USA), present a special concert performance at the Lueneberg Festival of New Music, Germany. Eric Ross performs on piano, guitar and synthesizer and is a master of the Theremin, one of the first electronic instruments. Eric’s compositions include elements of jazz, classic, serial, and avant garde. Mary Ross’s videos, projected in performance, are organized, arranged and edited to his music. In an hour-long performance, both artists presented their most recent work, the Boulevard d’Reconstructie, (Op. 54).

Visit: The Music of Eric Ross

Sundazed, Not Confused

Let me come clean: I’ve been obsessed with Sundazed Music since last summer. While working on a visit to the warehouse in Coxsackie, NY, and an audience with the great Bob Irwin, the creator of Sundazed and the ears behind the label, I’ve been biding my time listening to their records. So, as they said at the Latin Quarter, ego exspecto proinde ego recenso (I wait, therefore I review).

The Yardbirds’ Little Games and Canned Heat’s eponymous debut are two recent additions to the Sundazed catalog. Before I get into the merits of each title, a word on both, and all of Sundazed’s vinyl treasures. Each album is packaged precisely as originally issued. There are liner notes, if they existed at the time, none if they didn’t. That gives the new versions a very real taste of authenticity. Tribute must be paid to the 180 gram vinyl pressings. The heft of the disc is a tactile wonder, like holding a baby, there to be loved and cherished. Sundazed records are far removed from the flimsy 1970’s-1980’s shoddy vinyl that can be held at the edges and waved to make sounds, similar to playing a saw.

Little Games, the only Yardbirds studio album with Jimmy Page on lead guitar, is impossible to hear without the filter of Led Zeppelin two years off on the horizon. The 1967 repertoire has more than a few hints of the shape of things to come.

“White Summer,” a future Zeppelin concert staple, presages the Bert Jansch-infused British folk that Page would employ so well. The “Over the Hills and Far Away” intro can be traced here. “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor” will have those familiar with Zep thinking, “Now where have I heard that before.” Page’s guitar-bowing, perhaps the single most embarrassing, pretentious signature image in rock and roll history, makes its debut. It’s better to hear than see. “Glimpses,” the psychedelic centerpiece, also gives a peek at the early sound of Page’s future supergroup. The open, echoey feel of Zeppelin’s early work is present, though the tune on the whole is trippier than anything Page would do during his most famous period yet to come. Each song contains the dying of one band, the birth of another.

There’s some down and dirty blues, the type that, had the Yardbirds kept at it exclusively, would have kept Eric Clapton from quitting the group. “Drinking Muddy Water” is a blistering beauty, the equal to anything Butterfield or Mayall (or, OK, Cream) were putting out that year. “Smile on Me” is of similar merit.

Even the simple pop tunes, like “No Excess Baggage” and the opening title track, contain bursts of Pageian genius, feedback laced eruptions and wild bursts of virtuosity. Keith Relf’s vocals atop Jimmy Page’s playing make for a knockout combination. (I won’t get into my theories of Jeff Beck vs. Jimmy Page, or how The Jeff Beck Group outpaced Led Zeppelin due to the superiority of their lead singer. That’s for a different article.).

While producer Mickie Most’s work is, at times, a bit dense, Sundazed’s mono release brings to a sometimes muddy mix ear-pleasing clarity. Page’s acoustic numbers are crisp, the vibrations shimmering from the speakers.

Little Games is a mixed bag of styles, but important as Jimmy Page’s only full studio album with his pre-Led Zeppelin group. The seeds are sprouting for the plant that will grow and dominate the music scene for decades.

Far from London, emerging from the most unbluesy area of suburban Los Angeles, came Canned Heat, a group of blues writers, record collectors and music scholars, who, like Indiana Jones, knew how to turn dusty academia into a wild adventure through their burning dedication. Their first record is a solid set, resuscitated by our friends at Sundazed.

As good as Heat are, as authentic as their playing was, the delight of the band is in their dual lead vocalists, the gritty, deeply resonant Bob “The Bear” Hite, and the quirky, high-toned Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson. No vocalist produces smiles of pure pleasure as Wilson does. The mono mix rings as clear as a smog free LA day, the band’s passion pushing through and grabbing a late 1960’s record buyer by their swinging medallion, shouting “Hey, man, these are the real blues!’ And you better listen.

Henry “Sunflower” Vestine, fresh from his firing by Frank Zappa due to Henry’s penchant for  chemical intake, blazes through the album, wielding his six-string scalpel through precise blues phrasing. His work on “Catfish Blues” is so fiery that it’s a good thing stylus’ are diamond, for fear that any other substance would melt. Wilson, who John Lee Hooker called “the greatest harmonica player ever,” is omnipresent, but most dominating on “Goin’ Down Slow.”

Bob the Bear is featured on nearly every track, so when Wilson’s high hooting gets the spotlight on “Help Me” I can’t help but laugh. Nothing makes me happier than “Blind Owl” crooning in my ear.

Canned Heat, like Little Games, is a forgotten and undervalued record. At their release, both platters charted at nearly the same point. For Page, #80 would be the worst performing album he’d ever have. (Even The Firm’s first effort soared to #17). For Heat, topping out at #76 was good news for a band yet to hit its stride.

There’s a level of tragedy that hangs over both of these records. Keith Relf, dead at 33, electrocuted by an improperly grounded guitar. Bob “The Bear” Hite, dead at 38, collapsing after a heroin overdose. Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson, dead at 27, a barbiturate overdose, his body found near Hite’s Topanga Canyon home. Henry Vestine, dead at 53, cancer.

What makes Sundazed great is their appreciation for important pieces of music that have been lost over the years, and to those musicians who need to be heard. There’s a legacy far beyond sales, well past this temporal life. It lays in the music, in the grooves, and these lost treasures, sounding so alive, bring it back.

_______________________________________________

THE BASEMENT TAPES, from KKID in Rolla, Missouri

Be yourself on the radio

With Bootsy Hambone and Nick Thomas

of Diezelfitter.

_______________________________________________

Jeff Katz Photo

Doug & Telisha at the Otesaga Inn, Cooperstown

Sweethearts of the Rodeo:

Doug and Telisha Williams in Cooperstown

By Jeff Katz

February concerts in Cooperstown are usually jam-packed. It’s cold, there’s nothing else to do, and Cooperstown Concert Series (full disclosure, I’m co-chair of the non-profit CCS) always brings in little known, high quality musical acts. The downside is it’s February in Cooperstown! Severely slick roads and snow kept many away, but the sparse crowd that appeared was warmed as Doug and Telisha Williams melted the ice with sweet ol’ country music and red-hot Americana romps.

From the moment D & T’s album Ghost of the Knoxville Girl hit our desk, we were captivated by their twangy sound. Doug is a pretty mean picker and Telisha, well, Telisha’s voice is the second coming of Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn (yes, I know Loretta is alive). It’s a haunting record, one that sticks with you for the long haul. It did well, spending 15 weeks on the Americana Top 40 and making the Top 100 albums of 2009 on the same chart.

The Williams’ cut a striking figure on stage; he, head to toe in black with the best sideburns since Chester Arthur; she in fishnet stockings, brown boots and lace dress. As they played on through the night, the flower print curtains and chandeliers of the Otesaga Hotel ballroom morphed into a honky tonk roadhouse. If you closed your eyes you could see the neon signs blinking “Lone Star Beer,” and feel the sticky floors under your boots.

Up north from their Martinsville, VA, base, D & T sang songs of the struggling working man, some wallowing in the depths of unemployment (“20.2,” titled for the jobless rate in their hometown is the kind of song that John Mellencamp only dreams of writing), others taking to armed robbery and the bottle.

Don’t get the idea that this was a somber affair. Telisha is a hoot, chatting about her penchant for cemeteries and locomotives, combining both interests in the rocking “Graveyard Train.” With Tom Berry’s Hammond B3 as accompaniment, Telisha launched into a “gospel drinking song,” noting that if an audience doesn’t chuckle at the reference, the band changes the set list.

Doug, a recent convert to the electric guitar, worked wonders on the Telecaster. His solo on “I Fall to Pieces.” was soft and beautiful, so delicate that the notes disappeared in the quietest moment. On acoustic, Doug was often a furious strumming machine. And that boy can sing too!

On the road, the Williams’ watch downloaded TV shows and they were thrilled to be at The Otesaga, setting for a classic Ghost Hunters episode. Hoping to rile up a few spirits, they peppered their set with murder ballads and ghost stories. “Loretta’s Ballad,” a sordid tale that starts like an old Dylan folk song, revved up into a manic jam that threatened to explode into chaos. “Ghost of The Knoxville Girl,” D & T’s answer song to the classic Louvin Brothers’ woman-killing tune, got some bones a-rattling up on the spooked fourth floor of the classic old hotel. (Charlie Louvin, who passed recently, was long an inspiration to D & T. They served as the opening act for the cantankerous, chain-smoking Charlie on several occasions).

Here’s a lesson in southern speak, courtesy Telisha Williams. “Can’t” is the contraction of “can” and “not.” “Cain’t” means something else entirely. It means you “could” but you “ain’t.” After watching Doug and Telisha Williams live, I’m convinced there’s nothing they can’t do.

……………………………………………………

VIDEO: Eric and Mary Ross’s Kurzfassung

Composer Eric Ross, with video artist Mary Ross (USA), present a special concert performance at the Lueneberg Festival of New Music, Germany. Eric Ross performs on piano, guitar and synthesizer and is a master of the Theremin, one of the first electronic instruments. Eric’s compositions include elements of jazz, classic, serial, and avant garde. Mary Ross’s videos, projected in performance, are organized, arranged and edited to his music. In an hour-long performance, both artists presented their most recent work, the Boulevard d’Reconstructie, (Op. 54).

Visit: The Music of Eric Ross

Spinning Into Oblivion

or, Music in the Age of Dinosaurs

By Jeff Katz

I’m not a shopper. For me, going to the mall will result in increased irritability, nausea and headaches. It’s like Legionnaire’s Disease.

But I do like buying music:  records, CDs, doesn’t matter. There are few things as wonderful as flipping through stacks of LPs, the touch of the cardboard edge pressing against my fingertips, the blast of recognition at a long forgotten but instantly recognizable photo. Each one is a precious work of art, from the covers to the inner sleeves, to the inserts (the occasional poster or lyric sheet) and, most importantly, the black grooves of pure heaven. CD browsing was never as tangibly fun, whether in the bulky cardboard outer shell of early discs, or in their present incarnation with simple shrink-wrapping.

Regardless of the form, music was an item high on the list of necessary or impulse purchases. Sure, record stores were, and still are, a major destination point for me, but there were so many times I happened to see a great bargain CD that I bought for the drive home. Instant gratification! That wasn’t even true for albums, which needed to be safely delivered to their new home for playing.

Yesterday, I found myself in a few shops as I waited for my car to undergo a 60,000 mile checkup. First stop, Barnes and Noble, where the reissue of Band on the Run was piped throughout the store. Having not yet decided on which of the myriad formats to choose from (the plethora of packages at varying price points is driving me crazy with the wealth of “new” editions of McCartney, Springsteen, Lennon, et. al.). With “Mamunia” ringing in my ears, I figured I’d check out what the new Macca classic looked like.

Strolling through the music and movie section, I felt a wave of confusion sweep over me. Shelves and shelves of DVDs. Where were the CDs? Were they gone? Couldn’t be.

Finally, I hit a single rack with a smattering of new releases at B & N’s usual exorbitant prices. (The Complete Bob Dylan Mono Recordings, which I just bought online for $79 was nicely priced at $129!). It was a smack in the face – music is disappearing right in front of our eyes.  But it is a bookstore, I told myself soothingly,  not a music store, so perhaps it makes sense. Then I headed over to Best Buy.

Last time I was in a Best Buy over Christmas in Illinois, they had a decent, though much smaller music section, than they used to. I could comprehend that. CD sales are shrinking and have been for years. I was pleasantly surprised to see a sampling of vinyl; a good sign, I thought.

Not so anymore. The CD section was shrunken to about the size of the Hello Kitty accessory area. I did get to see the new Darkness on the Edge of Town deluxe set, but little else. This was Best Buy! This was an entertainment epicenter! And the amount of space dedicated to popular music was all but gone. Grief-stricken, I left.

Can it be that we have so devalued music as a commercial entity that there will be no place to purchase a physical piece of it? Will music only be available via computer or on my phone, like credit reports and porn?  Napster committed the eternal crime, creating the very idea that music is a monetarily valueless commodity, there for the taking. Only suckers BUY music, right? It is a major tragedy that CDs are on their way out. Love them or hate them, the little silver discs were the last bulwark against the ephemeral, the final trace item of a once popular purchasable.

There are still vestiges, tiny oases in most bigger cities. They are your local independent record stores and you better run there while you can if you care about the future of recorded music. As the great philosopher, James Douglas Morrison, once said, “When the music’s over, turn out the lights.” If people don’t tune in to the fact that musicians have to make a little dough in order to make a living creating the tunes we love, then all that will be left are darkened shops. The little light from your iPhone won’t help one bit.

(Top: Photo from Geekologie)

Top 10 for 2010:

A Different Kind of  List

By Jeff Katz

They’re all around you. On TV, in magazines, on the radio and in your daily paper. You love them, you hate them. They are the end of the year lists. Whether you’re a movie, or a book, or a celebrity sex tape, you will be ranked. Does the #8 “Year’s Stupidest Criminal” wish he made it higher up the list? Hard to know.

Top songs and albums are, in my role as music editor, my bag, but I got to thinking. Is it so important what was the best this year? What makes 2010 releases so special? And while I spent my college years running the SUNY-Binghamton record store, Slipped Disc, and getting into heavy duty debates over who heard The Violent Femmes first, a serious jockeying for position on the “in the know” pecking order, I realize now that those to-dos mean squat.

Is the person who bought their first Beatles 45 in Liverpool in 1963 so much better than the one who bought theirs a year later at Korvettes in New York? Did the 1963 person in Liverpool love that record more than the Brooklynite in 1964? Pushing it further, did that same 1964 teenybopper derive any more pleasure than I did when I bought Something New, the last Beatle album I didn’t have, back in 1979? How about the kid who discovers the Beatles right now, in 2010, through last year’s life changing remasters? Joy is joy – doesn’t matter one whit if the first time your hear a song is the year it came out, or decades later.

So here’s my Top Ten list of 2010, a two-fisted list of old and new. What they share is that they all came to my attention these past 12 months.

10 – To Bonnie from Delaney (Delaney & Bonnie, 1970)

Delaney & Bonnie

I spent the end of 2009 working on a book proposal on Delaney & Bonnie. The Bramletts were massively influential at the turn of the decade 40 years ago. They propelled Eric Clapton to solo stardom, Delaney taught George Harrison slide guitar and Delaney & Bonnie’s band went AWOL to join Joe Cocker and, under the leadership of the recently resurgent Leon Russell, became the musical punch behind the Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour.

So, during my initial research I had a conversation with the Widow Bramlett. Not Bonnie. Delaney’s last wife Susan told me in no uncertain terms that, though I had the right to write about D & B, Delaney’s story was hers and, if so inclined, she would have no hesitation letting her lawyers off their leash. Honest as always, I told my prospective publisher, who was spooked and called off our plans. Not before I bought a ton of Delaney & Bonnie records.

To Bonnie showcases the raucous and ramshackle good time music of the band at its peak. Bonnie belts “The Love of My Man” with the occasional squeak and squeal that is both scary and sexy. Delaney’s voice is uber-soulful; he’s a sadly forgotten giant and that was going to be my point had I moved forward.

Plus, Little Richard plays on “Miss Ann.” What could be better than that?

9 – The Soft Pack (The Soft Pack, 2010)

Soft Pack

Ever since having The Soft Pack’s first album recommended to me, I’ve loved their sound. Simple, straight ahead grinding guitar, very catchy, as piercing as the bullets that literally shot through their debut LP cover, back when they still had the balls to call themselves The Muslims.

Brilliant stuff, instantly memorable, and even though seeing them live at The Mercury Lounge was a surprising bore, that doesn’t detract from this magnificent album.

8 – Volume Two (She & Him, 2010)

Celebrities have a habit of being awful outside their milieu. Don’t believe me? When was the last time you listened to a Don Johnson record?

Not so for Zooey Deschanel. Great actress, better singer, fabulous songwriter. The first She & Him effort was the top album of ’08, Zooey and M. Ward knocking their version of classic pop sounds out of the musical ballpark. Their follow-up was much anticipated.

At first, Volume Two didn’t grab me like their first effort, but it grew on me quickly. Now I find it equal to the rookie masterpiece. Top tunes: “Ridin’ in My Car” and “Brand New Shoes.”

http://ragazine.cc/2010/04/she-and-him-volume-two/

7 – H. P. Lovecraft – (H.P. Lovecraft, 1967)

In the spring, my Aunt from Santa Monica let me know she had a bunch of old records. Frequent readers know that’s my drug and, like the vinyl junkie I am, I told her to ship them all out. Two boxes of treasures followed, the collection of her former step-daughter who was a very very in-the-know teen in late 1960s Los Angeles.

In the pile were lost psychedelic riches, foremost among them H. P. Lovecraft’s debut albums. I’ll admit, though loathe to do so, that this band was new to me. Hadn’t even heard of them, but when I placed the platter on my turntable, I was instantly smitten. Not so much by the band’s paeans to horror author Lovecraft, but by their soaring double lead vocals. HPL employed the same twin-lead interplay made more famous by Jefferson Airplane. By no means were George Edwards and Dave Michaels second class in quality. Just in popularity.

6 – Kings Verses – (Kings Verses, 1966)

I’ve been obsessed with Sundazed Records, a brilliant reissue label located in Coxsackie, NY. Since June I’ve been trying to arrange a visit for a ragazine article.  No luck yet, but I refuse to give up.

While I wait, I buy. There, in the garage sale section of the Sundazed website, I found an album by Kings Verses.  Classic garage rock, from a long lost L.A. band that reached the heights of opening for The Doors, and, with a recording contract nearly in their grasp, found themselves blackballed after testifying against abuses by Los Angeles club owners. They were immediately forgotten. “Lights” is one of my favorite tracks of the year.

5 – Juliet Naked – (Nick Hornby, 2010)

OK, it’s a book, but it is about music and Nick Hornby is great. He is so finely attuned to what music lovers think about and care about that his prose borders on the lyrical. Impossible to keep off the list just because it’s written, not played.

Also, in light of my affection for Double Fantasy Stripped Down (http://ragazine.cc/2010/11/music/), I run the risk of emulating the antagonist. Read it to know what I mean.

4 – Come and Get It – (Eli “Paperboy” Reed & The True Loves, 2010)

Ever since I saw Eli open as a solo act for Nick Lowe, I’ve been a disciple of his old time soul religion. Come and Get It, his first big label release on Capitol, is a danceable hoot, sure to put a huge smile across your now-grooving face. From “Young Girl” to “Explosion,” Eli provides the most fun your ears can legally have.

http://ragazine.cc/2010/08/eli-paperboy-reed/

3 – The Original Mono Recordings – (Bob Dylan, 2010)

I shouldn’t have to explain why. Just get it. (OK, this once. The mono version of “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” on Freewheelin’ emerges from the speakers as warm and live as if young Bobby was singing into your ear).

2 – Doris Troy – (Doris Troy, 1970)

One of the most interesting projects of the year was the remastering of Apple Records classics. Some, like James Taylor’s eponymous debut, or Badfinger’s catalog, are still well known to much of the listening public. But Jackie Lomax? Mary Hopkin? Doris Troy? This is strictly collector territory.

For me, the Troy disc was the most anticipated. With a cast that includes Stephen Stills, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton and George Harrison, the gospel/soul sound of Tory will shake you to the core. Take particular notice of the Buffalo Springfield original “Special Care,” which is a tad on the slow side in its band version on Last Time Around. Doris, with Stills’ help, makes it thunder. Harrison’s playing exudes the pure happiness that came with being away from the disintegrating Fab Four; he’s a marvel. Ringo, too, is eminently enjoyable.

Doris Tory would have been my #1 musical work of the year, if not for…

http://katzkomments.blogspot.com/2010/11/doris-troy.html

1 – The T.A.M.I. Show – (Various artists, 2010)

T.A.M.I. Show

It’s not often that great expectations are exceeded. For years I longed to see The T.A.M.I. Show, the legendary but elusive 1964 movie featuring a Who’s Who of contemporary pop stars. The Rolling Stones, James Brown, Marvin Gaye, The Beach Boys, Lesley Gore, on and on and on.

Finally, 2010 brought an official DVD release and, oh my Lord, it doesn’t disappoint. The frenetic energy of Smokey Robinson and The Miracles is still seared in my brain. JB, “The Godfather of Soul,” is barely constrained behind the screen. I’ve never seen a filmed performance that rivals it. And those poor Stones had to follow him! After a faltering start, they take over and are wonderful to behold at their bluesy brash best.

The T.A.M.I. Show is the top of the list for this year, hands down.

Happy New Year!

http://ragazine.cc/2010/04/music-grai/