Paul McCartney’s “Ram” Reconsidered

28 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in General Posts Tags: ,

ram

(via CultureSonar) by Ken Hymes

In early 1971, with The Beatles involved in some bitter legal disputes with each other and with their own management, Paul McCartney recorded Ram with his wife Linda and three hired guns, guitarists David Spinozza and Hugh McCracken, and drummer Denny Seiwell. The album was eviscerated by critics on its release, with Jon Landau and Robert Christgau particularly vicious in their assault on both the album and McCartney’s general reputation relative to John Lennon. Some writers were grudgingly complimentary about McCartney’s sheer mastery of the craft of production, but almost no one could be heard to support the material itself.

There has certainly been a reappraisal, with some glimmering that Ram represents not a failure to live up to The Beatles (or to the expectations of Village Voice writers), but rather a beginning of something new. Perhaps AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine is correct that “in retrospect it looks like nothing so much as the first indie pop album, a record that celebrates small pleasures with big melodies.”

Read more: http://www.culturesonar.com/ram-paul-mccartney/

“More Barn!”…Neil Young Finally Confirms The Most Popular Legend About Him

25 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in General Posts Tags: ,

UNSPECIFIED - JANUARY 01: Photo of Neil Young (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

(Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

(via Huffington Post) by Todd Van Lulling

Graham Nash — of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young — has a story about his friend, Neil Young, that has been almost too perfect to believe for nearly three decades.

As the myth goes, Nash was at Young’s ranch just south of San Francisco when Young asked him if he wanted to hear something. (That something would become Young’s now famous 1972 “Harvest” album, which features the track “Heart of Gold.”) Nash, of course, said yes and suggested going into Young’s studio. That wasn’t Young’s plan.

“He said, ‘Get into the rowboat,’” Nash explained on NPR’s Fresh Air in 2013. “I said, ‘Get into the rowboat?’ He said, ‘Yeah, we’re going to go out into the middle of the lake.’”

The two row out on the lake, with Nash assuming Young brought a cassette player and headphones with him.

“Oh, no,” said Nash on NPR. “He has his entire house as the left speaker and his entire barn as the right speaker. And I heard ‘Harvest’ coming out of these two incredibly large loud speakers louder than hell. It was unbelievable. Elliot Mazer, who produced Neil, produced ‘Harvest,’ came down to the shore of the lake and he shouted out to Neil, ‘How was that, Neil?’”

The best part is Young’s apparent response to the situation. As Nash explained, “I swear to God, Neil Young shouted back, ‘More barn!’”

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/neil-young-more-barn_us_576927bae4b015db1bca809f?

Donnie and Joe Emerson, and the most moving lost record of the 70s

13 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in General Posts Tags:

emerson

(via the guardian)

Among the great “what-ifs” of the recording industry, it has to be among the most unlikely: what if a farmer had never bought a tractor?

Fruitland, Washington has a population of 751. There are no zeros missing from the end of that number. This tiny rural town is where Donnie and Joe Emerson grew up, living a teenhood driven by the demands of the family’s 1,600-acre farm.

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As Donnie, says, during the summer in particular, “there wasn’t no messing around. You don’t run that type of farm by sitting around.”

Their life-changing moment came in the summer of 1978 when their father, Don Sr, bought a tractor that came with a built-in AM-FM radio. It was this that led, not so indirectly, to one of the greatest forgotten records of the decade, Dreamin’ Wild…

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/jul/28/donnie-joe-emerson-dreamin-wild

Pitchfork‘s review of Dreamin’ Wild:

Originally released in 1979, only to sit in the teenaged Emerson brothers’ home studio for decades, Donnie and Joe’s sole record showcases a prodigal talent for blue-eyed soul and landlocked yacht rock that’s only just getting its dues…

Read more: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/16841-dreamin-wild/

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18 Cover Songs That Transcend the Originals

11 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in General Posts Tags:

covers

(via Purple Clover) by Kevin Haynes

First released January 11, 1971, Janis Joplin’s “Me and Bobby McGee” redefined the limits of cover song success. Here, we celebrate Janis’ classic version and other artistic interpretations gone right.

‘Me and Bobby McGee’ — Janis Joplin

Kris Kristofferson’s vagabond road song was first recorded in 1969 by, appropriately enough, “King of the Road” Roger Miller. But Joplin’s only No. 1 hit, completed days before her death on October 4, 1970, is the ultimate trip down memory lane—a soulful, cinematic look back at love gone by.

Kristofferson, who’d been dating Janis, first heard her version of the song shortly after she died. “Afterwards,” he recalled in a recent interview, “I walked all over L.A., just in tears.”

clapton

‘I Shot the Sheriff’ — Eric Clapton

Slowhand played fast and loose with Bob Marley’s sly profession of guilt and innocence—hey, he didn’t shoot no deputy—propelling this reggae groove to No. 1 in September 1974.

‘Twist and Shout’ — The Beatles

The Fab Four didn’t just shake it up, baby, they incited a dance riot in 1963, a year after the Isley Brothers got the party started with their first Top 20 hit. (Bonus points if you knew the song was introduced in 1961 by the Top Notes.)

 Read more: http://www.purpleclover.com/entertainment/5844-cover-songs/

Did You Ever Realize…

03 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in Did You Ever Realize, General Posts Tags: , ,

call-me roach

Appreciating The Kinks’ Veddy, Veddy British Period

01 Jan 2017 Leave a comment

by Ed Cyphers in General Posts Tags:

kinks

(via CultureSonar)

by David Stewart

The Kinks are of course well-known in America, or at least several of their quite distinctive “periods” are. Their initial hard-rocking British Invasion period, their “Lola” period, their late 70’s “Low Budget” period and their early 80’s MTV/”Come Dancing” period, certainly. But it’s the period between the first two – to my mind their best – that I’d like to focus on for this piece. The fact that this period – which includes what are perhaps their two best albums –is lesser known to many Americans is largely a function of history and the band’s getting very specifically British for those two albums. But it would be a shame for American fans to miss out on their best work.

The band burst on to the music scene with a particularly noisy entrance. “You Really Got Me” arguably rocked harder than anything the Beatles or Stones released that year (1964), and indeed that record has often been called either the first metal or first punk single (take your pick). Lead guitarist Dave Davies allegedly once said that “They didn’t call it heavy metal when I invented it.”

Americans ate up the band’s early hard-rocking singles, but a legal dispute with the American musician’s union (AF of M) meant that after the band’s first US tour, they were not allowed to tour the US again till the end of the 60’s, guaranteeing that some of their best work would remain underappreciated on this side of the pond. Even “Waterloo Sunset”, the mid-60’s single often considered the best the Kinks ever released, failed to chart in the US at all, though it would belatedly become a staple on rock radio starting in the 70’s…

Read more: http://www.culturesonar.com/kinks-british-period/

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