Video of the Week: Lyle Lovett’s Smokin’ “White Freightliner Blues”

02 Mar 2012 Leave a comment

Lyle Lovett and his Large Band performed a smokin’, solo-filled four-and-a-half minute version of Townes Van Zandt’s “White Freightliner Blues” on Austin City Limits. The song appears on Lyle’s new covers album, Release Me, which Lost Highway Records did this past Tuesday.

Nice to see the boys in suits and ties. Lyle’s Large Band have always epitomized class and musicianship.

One other thought: This song, true to its title, actually is a “blues”. More often than not an artist will tack the word “Blues” to the end of a song title when the song clearly isn’t.

Video by Ed Cyphers

Video of the Week: Best Version of Bohemian Rhapsody Ever Played Inside a VW

01 Mar 2012 5 Comments

On the one hand, it’s comic. On the other, it’s no joke–these guys have real chops. And it’s their obvious seriousness about the music that makes it all the more funny. This is one of those vids I feel I could watch every morning, just to get my day off right.

They are award-winning Finnish street band Porkka Playboys. Check out http://www.porkkaplayboys.com/ if you’ve also got a hankering to see Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades” performed in a sauna (naked of course).

Video by Ed Cyphers

Video of the Week: Led Zep Mashup–The Howl of 80 “Black Dogs”

29 Feb 2012 2 Comments

80 cover versions of Led Zeppelin’s “Black Dog”, stitched together by the Israeli mashup artist known as Kutiman. Individually, probably none would make for scintillating viewing. Together, they are pretty awesome.

Video by Ed Cyphers

Video of the Week: Guitarist Randy Bachman Demystifies the Opening Chord of ‘A Hard Day’s Night’

29 Feb 2012 2 Comments

The following is reprinted from the website Open Culture:

You could call it the magical mystery chord. The opening clang of the Beatles’ 1964 hit, “A Hard Day’s Night,” is one of the most famous and distinctive sounds in rock and roll history, and yet for a long time no one could quite figure out what it was.

In this fascinating clip from the CBC radio show, Randy’s Vinyl Tap, the legendary Guess Who and Bachman-Turner Overdrive guitarist Randy Bachman unravels the mystery. The segment is from a special live performance, “Guitarology 101,” taped in front of an audience at the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto back in January, 2010. As journalist Matthew McAndrew wrote, “the two-and-a-half hour event was as much an educational experience as it was a rock’n’roll concert.”

One highlight of the show was Bachman’s telling of his visit the previous year with Giles Martin, son of Beatles’ producer George Martin, at Abbey Road Studios. The younger Martin, who is now the official custodian of all the Beatles’ recordings, told Bachman he could listen to anything he wanted from the massive archive–anything at all.

Bachman chose to hear each track from the opening of “A Hard Day’s Night.” As it turns out, the sound is actually a combination of chords played simultaneously by George Harrison and John Lennon, along with a bass note by Paul McCartney. Bachman breaks it all down in an entertaining way in the audio clip above.

Video by Ed Cyphers

Drink Me: ‘The Quietest Rock ‘n’ Roll Ever Made’

27 Feb 2012 2 Comments

by Ed Cyphers in Best of the Blog, General Posts Tags: ,

Listen to NPR’s “Dust-bin Bands” segment on 90’s Brooklyn duo Drink Me, the “dust-bin band” closest to my heart as well as my all-time favorite guitar-and-Fanta-bottle duo.

I consider myself fortunate to have seen them twice: first at Bloomfield Bridge Tavern in Pittsburgh and once more in a place called The Fez in Manhattan, where Jeff Buckley opened for them (I know). Mark Amft is alive and well and a high school teacher last I heard. Drink Me’s shtick is hard to describe but they sounded a little like Simon & Garfunkel with a sense of humor.

The term “Alternative” has never been properly applied in popular music. It should have been used to describe truly original artists like Drink Me.

“Ines” music video (most likely the only one they made):

 

Rockers Singing Standards: The Overdone, The Overdue, and The Overlooked

22 Feb 2012 2 Comments

by Ed Cyphers in Articles, Best of the Blog Tags: , ,

The Great American Songbook Collection (4CD/DVD)

The Overdone: Rod Stewart’s Great American Songbook was the album series that wouldn’t go away. It spawned five volumes (with Roman numerals, no less–like the Super Bowls), a four-disc box set and even had its own best-of. As Rod points at you in the above photo he’s thinking: I’m glad YOU don’t realize how much better Bobby Darin could do this.

Rod, write some songs now. Or…retire?

Kisses on the Bottom

The Overdue: Paul McCartney’s first-ever standards album is Kisses On The Bottom. It’s badly titled but tastefully arranged and given a pleasant, relaxed vocal treatment by one of the all-time great songwriters, who ironically seems to bring some of his best performances to others’ material. (Entered into evidence: his “It’s So Easy”, by all accounts a fiery highlight of a 2011 Buddy Holly tribute album:

Paul even includes two new originals which fit in quite well among the all-time standards. A nice trick, that.

On the downside, these arrangements are quite spare at times, and the vocals “in close”. The 69-year-old McCartney, despite having amazingly well-preserved vocal range, is not always ready for his closeup. Just a little breathy or rough around the edges here and there. It’s a small distraction, especially when I consider how much I love Jimmy Durante doing the same kind of material. My only real complaint for Sir Paul is that he didn’t do this sooner. His reason? Had to wait for Rod to finish. (No, really!)

Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night 

The Overlooked: Harry Nilsson’s A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night came, in 1973, at a point in his career when he should have been consolidating the mainstream success he’d found with the hit Nilsson Schmilsson album. Instead he insisted on singing an album of standards with Sinatra’s arranger Gordon Jenkins. Not the best career move perhaps. But in hindsight we’re probably just as lucky to have this collection of timeless songs, impeccably arranged and sung by one of the great voices of his era, as we’d have been to have another Nilsson Schmilsson. This one’s a comparatively little-known gem today, but worth seeking out. Of all the rock musicians who moonlighted singing the standards, no one could touch the voice of Nilsson.

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