ITT: /mu/ in 1971
>>128273090Holy shit
ha ha the year when the Rolling Stones have a hit with an extremely problematic song
Fuck James Taylor, man.
sneed
The Who - Who's NextNick Drake - Bryter LayterLeonard Cohen - Songs of Love and HateDavid Bowie - Hunky Dory T. Rex - Electric Warrior Alice Cooper - Love It to DeathCan - Tago MagoHound Dog Taylor & The Houserockers - Hound Dog Taylor and the HouserockersFaces - A Nod Is as Good as a Wink... to a Blind HorseGoing through this, I'm actually surprised how much glam was already around in '71
Those who dismiss them as unlistenable miss the point altogether--they Americanize Led Zeppelin with a fervent ingenuity that does broad service to the gestures of mass art. But now I read where similar men of taste, having arrived at the same conclusion, are claiming in addition to actually like the stuff. That's going too far. C
it's good
>>128273451>Led Zeppelin but without the icky Britishness and Tolkein worship? Sign me the hell up, my guy!
>>128273487remove the second LPthen yes
Back when he was an acoustic warrior who spelled out his group's name in full, Marc Bolan was known as "progressive", meaning he was as foolish as Donovan but not nearly as famous. A freak hit transformed him into a singer of rhythmic fairy tales for British prepubes, just what he was always suited for, while the great "Bang a Gong" explores the rock mythos, which has its limits but sure beats unicorns. Now if only he'd recycle a few more pop readymades I'd stop complaining about fey. B-
The usual competent loud rock with the usual paucity of drive and detail. Likeable in its own way--I actually find myself touched by "People, Let's Stop The War." But it doesn't tell me anything I don't already know. B-
Based Christgauchad
>>128273776>The usual competent loud rock with the usual paucity of drive and detailcould describe Paramore quite nicely
"Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" is a major annoyance. I tolerated Paulie's crochets with the Beatles because his mates balanced them out. I enjoyed them on McCartney because their scale was so modest. I actively enjoy them on "Moonberry Monk Delight" because it rocks! But the rest of the songs are so lightweight they practically float away even as Paulie layers them down with caprices. For God's sake, if you're going to be eccentric at least don't be pretentious about it. C
Duke Ellington never attempted a fifteen minute, six-song suite titled "Elegy." What makes James William Guercio and his self-styled band of revolutionaries think they can? Sterile and stupid. C-
This begins inauspiciously, with introductions and a thrown-away "Every Day I Have the Blues" (compare Live at the Regal and weep), and ends dubiously, with the sappy show-closer "Please Accept My Love." In between B.B. socks home old hits as familiar as "Sweet Sixteen" and as worthy as "Darlin' You Know I Love You" with a tough intensity he rarely brings to the studio. I prefer the horn arrangements on the Kent originals, but the unpredictable grit with which he snaps off the guitar parts makes up for any lost subtlety. A-
Ian Anderson is like the town freethinker. As long as you're stuck in the same small town as him, his inchoate cultural interests and skeptical views on human nature and organized religion can come off as refreshing. Meet up with him in the big city, however, and he can be a real bore. Of course he can also be Bob Dylan, it all depends on whether or not he abandoned provincial values out of a desire for more, or out of a more axiomatic (and somatic) negativity. And whether or not he was pretentious because he didn't know any better. C+
Steve Stills has always come on as the ultimate rich hippie--arrogant, self-pitying, shallow, sexist. Fortunately he's never quite reached his true level but flashes of brilliance remain--the single, "Marianne", is very nice especially if you don't listen too hard to the lyrics, but there's more to the tune of an all-male chorus with jazz horns singing straightly and in perfect unison the phrase "It's disgusting" over and over. Keep it up, SS, it'll be a pleasure to watch you fail. C-
>>128274551>Steve Stills has always come on as the ultimate rich hippie--arrogant, self-pitying, shallow, sexist.so much projection
This opens with "The Barbarian," a keyboard showpiece (not to slight all the flailing and booming underneath) replete with the shifts of tempo, time, key, and dynamics beloved of these bozos. Does the title mean they see themselves as rock and roll Huns sacking nineteenth-century "classical" tradition? Or do they think they're like Verdi portraying Ethiopians in Aida? From such confusions flow music as clunky as these heavy-handed semi-improvisations and would-be tone poems. Not to mention word poems. C
You'd think some compensation was in order a year and a half after the fact, but that old evil life's just got them in its sway. From titles like "Bitch" and "Sister Morphine" and (the one Altamont reference) "Dead Flowers" through "Brown Sugar"'s compulsively ironic and bacchanalian exploitation/expose to the almost Yeatsian "Moonlight Mile," this is unregenerate Stones. The token sincerity of "Wild Horses" drags me. But "Can't You Hear Me Knocking" and "I Got the Blues" are as soulful as "Good Times," and Fred McDowell's "You Gotta Move" stands alongside "Prodigal Son" and "Love in Vain." A
>>128274848>Contrary to popular belief, the cover art depicting a jeans-wearing male's crotch, was not Jagger but a different, unnamed and possibly gay male model Andy Warhol used for the photoshoot.[2]
>cuckgau schizo spamming his father figure's reviewsthis is sad, he doesn't know or care who you are
The creator of a feedback experiment titled "Rumble", who must have beaten the Yardbirds to it by six or seven years also appears to have turned hippie on his own, although his headband reflects loyalties to the Shawnee Nation. These days he runs a four track in a recording shack in rural Maryland where he and a couple of kindred spirits put together this blues and country-rooted document. The playing is better than the songwriting is better than the singing and on the whole it's pretty dumb. But hey, you have to give him credit where it's due. Any rock-and-roller who can sing about being persecuted by the Man as un-self-consciously as a back porch bluesman sings about trains has gotta be good for something. Right? C+
Those of you who thought album number five a letdown ought to find this one instructive--one side of "live" blues and another of dead rock. C-
>>128275355yeah yeah it was an unfinished album Capitol released without telling him. we know.
>>128275355>those two unnecessary covers of 50s pop hits
Is it rolling, James? The hit vamp (can't call it a tune, now can you?) "Escape-ism" was supposedly cut to kill time until Bobby Byrd arrived. The title track follows and it's a killer too, one of Brown's richest Afro-dances. "Blues and Pants" suggests that the title track is a mellowed down takeoff on "Sex Machine," which is good to know. And "Can't Stand It" is not to be confused with "I Can't Stand Myself." If you say so, James. Only he doesn't. I don't think he cares. And neither do I. A-
>>128273776This one probably had the sloppiest production of all their early albums and all the better for it. It has a very live sound that captures their scuzzy energy much better than almost anything else they did before, except maybe s/t.
As Joni grooves with the easy-swinging elite-rock sound of California's pop aristocrats, her relation to their (and her own) easy-swinging sexual ethic becomes more probing. But thoughtfulness isn't exactly making her sisterly--I've even heard one woman complain that she can't sing Joni's melodies any more. Well, too bad--they're getting stronger all the time, just like the lyrics. From the eternal ebullience of "All I Want" to the month-after melancholy of "Blue," this battlefront report on the fitful joys of buy-now pay-later love offers an exciting, scary glimpse of a woman in a man's world. A
>>128275735ditto the fact that the intro of "Footstompin' Music" was stolen for "Detroit Rock City" no surprise as KISS were huge Grand Funk fans
With its acoustic guitars and drumless bits, this triumph of hard rock is no more a pure hard rock album than Tommy. It's got more juice than Live at Leeds. And--are you listening, John Fogerty?--it uses the synthesizer to vary the power trio format, not to art things up. Given Peter Townshend's sharpness and compassion, even his out-front political disengagement--"I don't need to fight"--seems positive. The real theme, I think, is "getting in tune to the straight and narrow," and comes naturally to someone who's devoted a whole LP to the strictures of hit radio. Another sign of growth: the love songs. A
IMPEACH NIXON
Normally, I ignore records as rightfully obscure as this one, but I thought it was time I mentioned that our hippest record company is getting more complacent all the time--just how many L.A. airheads can we stand? Styvers is the kind of person who makes me like junkies--you know, the baby you want to steal candy from, so trite and pretty-poo in her fashionably troubled adolescence that you hope she chokes on her own money. One line says it all: "There just aren't words for the songs of the people who really feel." Oh shut up, Laurie. E
Good song selection overproduced to conceal the basic characterlessness of the singer, who is unfortunately no relative of Hound Dog. C-
Since affluence is a terminally American condition, it makes sense for the rich to not only inflict their sensibilities on the rest of us, but for us to also dig it. Too bad, though. It's one thing for "That's The Way I've Always Heard It Should Be" to voice a cliche, quite another to voice it with such a falseness and sense of precocity. If Carly's college friends are already old enough to have alienated their children, then her self-discovery program is a little post-mature anyway. C-
>>128276013FOUR MORE YEARS
>>128276013t. Hunter Thompson
>>128273090Why are there so many songs about Vietnam, I mean its stupid why are we there, but so cringe bruh, write more individualistic songs about your depressing divorce
>>128276354>Since affluence is a terminally American condition, it makes sense for the rich to not only inflict their sensibilities on the rest of us, but for us to also dig it.how sadly ironic considering 2010s pop music when this became the norm rather than the exception
>>128276426to think they're sore Dylan hasn't made any? cripes, what can he possibly say about the war that 30 other retards with guitars haven't already said?
>>128275770>it's a woman>who sings about being pumped and dumpedNo shock.
It's peak.
If even his admirers acknowledge that his music has lost some of its drive (_lost some of its drive?_), then even a sworn enemy can admit that he's capable of interesting songs and intricate music. Having squandered most of the songs on his big success, he's concentrating on the intricate music--the lyrics are more onanistic than ever, escapist as a matter of conscious thematic decision. From what? you well may wonder. From success, poor fella. Blues singers lived on the road out of economic necessity, although they often got into it; Taylor is an addict, pure and simple. A born-rich nouveau star who veers between a "homestead on the farm" (what does he raise there, hopes?) and the Holiday Inn his mean old existential dilemma compels him to call home deserves the conniving, self-pitying voice that is his curse. Interesting, intricate, unlistenable. C+
Go Pirates!
This disgraceful performance inspires the first annual Consumer Guide contest. Your challenge: Rename David Crosby (he won't know the difference). The prize: One Byrds lp of your choice (he ought to know the difference). The catch: You have to beat my entries, which are--Vaughn Monroe, Roger Crosby, Rocky Muzak. D-
Their worst since Friends, which just goes to show that making like a great group is as bad for your music as making like a buncha mystics. Except for the sophomoric "Student Demonstration Time," the songs on the first side are all right--"Take a Load Off Your Feet" is worthy of Wild Honey and "Disney Girls (1957)" is worthy of Jack Jones's Greatest Hits--but the pop impressionism of side two drags hither and yon. The dying words of a tree are delivered in an apt, gentle croak, but the legendary title opus is an utter failure even on its own woozy terms and there are several disasters from the guest lyricists--Van Dyke Parks's wacked-out meandering is no better than Jack Rieley's. I'll trade you my copy for Surfin' Safari even up, and you'll be sorry. B-
>>128276727yeah this album is shit. pushing BB in a direction they didn't belong in.
Primal goes pop--personal and useful. The title cut is both a hymn for the Movement and a love song for his wife, celebrating a Yokoism and a Marcusianism simultaneously, and "Gimme Some Truth" unites Lennon unmasked with the Lennon of Blunderland wordplay as it provides a rationale for "Jealous Guy," which doesn't need one, and "How Do You Sleep?," which may. "Oh Yoko!" is an instant folk song worthy of Rosie & the Originals and "I Don't Want to Be a Soldier" an instant folk extravaganza worthy of Phil Spector. "It's So Hard" is a blues. "Crippled Inside," with its "ironic" good-time ricky-tick, is folk-rock in disguise. And the psychotherapeutically lugubrious "How?" is a question mark. A
>>128276833Anything above a C plus was too generous.
>>128273938>"Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" is a major annoyanceListening to the album I'm pretty sure it's an answer to "How Do You Sleep At Night"
>>128276727Accurate.
When Scaggs announces that his girl is a looker because "she looks like she's standin' right there," you believe he's got a right to sing like Neil Young wishing he were Smokey Robinson. But when he praises "Downright Women" or concocts a pop instrumental w/strings for his rock band, you wonder. B
>>128277012Young Boz when he was still a hippie instead of Yuppie Cocktail Lounge Man.
>>128277087new kid i guess. album's not bad but why does he sound like Alvin and the Chipmunks.
Reddy applies a lean pop voice almost devoid of grit or melisma to what are basically rock songs--that is, songs conceived grittily and melismatically. At her best, as in the unadorned interpretations of "Crazy Love" and "A Song for You," she sounds refreshingly clear-eyed. At her worst, on Mac Davis's "I Believe in Music," she sounds like a Sunday School teacher pretending to be one of the girls. And the rest of the time she's holding gentility to a draw, or vice versa, as when the cellos that set up "How Can I Be Sure" turn into the violins that schmaltz it around. B
>>128277114Bah I'm not impressed. Last we'll probably see of him.
>>128277012ha ha wouldn't it be hilarious if Bob Seger blatantly stole the cover and used it on an album 11 years from now?
As an increasingly regretful spearhead of the great Grand Funk Railroad switch three years ago in which the critics defined Grand Funk as a good ol' white boy blues band, although I knew of no critic, myself included, who played the records, I feel obliged to put this one in its place. Grand Funk are American--dull. Black Sabbath are English--dull and decadent. I don't care how many rebels and incipient groovers are buying, I don't even care if the group actually believes their own Christian/liberal/satanist muck. This is a dimwitted, amoral exploitation. D+
After two overwrought excursions for Mercury this ambitious, brainy, imaginative singer-composer has created an album that rewards the concentration it demands instead of making you wish you'd gone on with the vacuuming. Not that he combines the passion and compassion of Dylan (subject of one song) with the full-witted vision of Warhol (subject of a better one) just yet. But he has a nice feeling for weirdos, himself included. A-
More even than "Rock and Roll," which led me into the rest of the record (whose real title, as all adepts know, is signified by runes no Underwood can reproduce) months after I'd stupidly dismissed it, or "Stairway to Heaven," the platinum-plated album cut, I think the triumph here is "When the Levee Breaks." As if by sorcery, the quasi-parodic overstatement and oddly cerebral mood of Led Zep's blues recastings is at once transcended (that is, this really sounds like a blues), and apotheosized (that is, it has the grandeur of a symphonic crescendo) while John Bonham, as ham-handed as ever, pounds out a contrapuntal tattoo of heavy rhythm. As always, the band's medievalisms have their limits, but this is the definitive Led Zeppelin and hence heavy metal album. It proves that both are--or can be--very much a part of "Rock and Roll." A
Greater even than "Just My Imagination" is "Smiling Faces Sometimes," in which for twelve minutes Norman Whitfield's spacey string and sound effects combine with a rhythm track that might as well be looped to transform Eddie Kendricks's soft lead into the rap of a paranoid soothsayer. But on the flip Whitfield funks up James Bond horns for nine horrible minutes and finds a Swahili title for an offensively defensive brotherhood appeal. B
Four country hits on Haggard's first straight studio album in a year and a half, but only the simple goodbye song "I Can't Be Myself" escapes bathos. "The Farmer's Daughter," "I'm a Good Loser," and "I've Done It All" have an acceptably archetypal ring. Forget the rest--Hag already has. C+
>>128275235why did anyone ever take this guy seriously?
Pacific rock, sure, but with a sharpness worthy of a Brooklyn girl--if there's a truer song about breaking up than "It's Too Late," the world (or at least AM radio) isn't ready for it. Not that lyrics are the point on an album whose title cut compares life to a you-know-what--the point is a woman singing. King has done for the female voice what countless singer-composers achieved years ago for the male: liberated it from technical decorum. She insists on being heard as she is--not raunchy and hot-to-trot or sweet and be-yoo-ti-ful, just human, with all the cracks and imperfections that implies. And for the first time she has found the music--not just the melodies, but the studio support--to put her point across as cleanly and subtly as it deserves. A-
A singer-guitarist (and occasional composer) who renders all the Collins/Baez melodrama superfluous. Raitt is a folkie by history but not by aesthetic. She includes songs from Steve Stills, the Marvelettes, and a classic feminist blues singer named Sippie Wallace because she knows the world doesn't end with acoustic song-poems and Fred McDowell. An adult repertoire that rocks with a steady roll, and she's all of twenty-one years old. A
>>128276660>>128277012wait a sec….
The tip-off is when in the middle of a lyric about needing someone who doesn't need etc. etc. Jim intones the line "I see the bathroom is clear." That's how you know the "raaght awn"s in "Cars Hiss by My Window" (hiss, huh?) and the jungle talk in "The WASP (Texas Radio and the Big Beat)" (wasps, huh?) and even the cover of John Lee Hooker's "Crawling King Snake" (take that, lizard-haters) are jokes. Which is nice, because the band has never sounded better--the blues licks are sharp, the organ fills are hypnotic, and they've even hired a bass player. But if "Been Down So Long" is also a takeoff, I prefer Randy Newman's. And Newman has better ideas about "L'America," too. A-
>>128278015Actually...yeah.
>>128277065can't fault the guy for finding his own way to adapt to turning 30 i guess
Despite sage advice from my female advisers, I cherished hopes that Coolidge's thick voice--which is grainy rather than gritty, like the Bramlett voice without the bravura--would grow on me the way Tracy Nelson's did. She does get more out of "Seven Bridges Road" than Tracy does by underplaying the overstatement just a little, and it's nice to hear "The Happy Song" as praise for a househusband. But in the end this is so solid that it never sparkles once. C+
>>128278105that chick was gangbanged by Steve Stills and Graham Nash
>>128277897Overplayed meme album.
Beginning with two absolutely classic songs, one about a mother's love and the next about a mother's sexuality, and including country music's answers to "Triad" ("If I Lose My Mind") and "The Celebration of the Lizard" ("The Mystery of the Mystery"), side one is genius of a purity you never encounter in rock anymore. Overdisc is mere talent, except "She Never Met a Man (She Didn't Like)," which is more. A-
>>128278248Cuckagu didn't review this one. no idea why. maybe he didn't have the time or disowned it for being an acoustic album.
>>128278248I forgot how lively young Seger was compared to the dadrock dreck he's most well known for.
Never would have figured this theatre type to come up with it, but he did--"I'm Eighteen," as archetypal a hard rock single as you're liable to hear in this flaccid year, or maybe ever. Almost as surprising, guitarist Mike Bruce surrounds it with the anthemic "Caught in a Dream" and "Long Way to Go." After which drummer Dennis Dunaway gives forth with "Black Juju," which lasts four seconds longer than all three of the above combined. B-
>>128278470cover looks like it's from the grunge era 20 years early
This is virtually the only good soul music to come from Atlantic in recent memory, which must mean something, probably not good. A standard solid soul LP, nothing ruinous and a couple of good singles to get off on. B
>>128278514god only knows how many hip-hop tracks sampled this one
This record almost gets over on sheer vocal excess. Neither Aretha in Paris nor any of her studio albums has ever caught her in such an explosive mood, and the result is a "Dr. Feelgood" that could heal the halt and versions of "Eleanor Rigby" and "Bridge Over Troubled Water" that sound like Sunday morning. But though the speedy tempos help vitalize those last two songs as well, they do less than nothing for "Respect" and "Don't Play That Song" and can't save "Love the One You're With" or "Make It With You" (did she have to do 'em both?). And while in theory nothing could be more exciting than an eight-minute duet with Ray Charles on "Spirit in the Dark," in practice I'd rather hear Ray sing "The Three Bells" and Aretha go it alone. B
People exercise themselves calling this a hype, but I've heard a lot worse and am happy to wish them humility and dues. Certainly the aptest use of Sal Valentino since the Beau Brummels were on Autumn (the Beau Brummels on Warners were my idea of a hype). In the best moment, Valentino's fake-dirty vocals interlock with a real dirty song called "Stroke Stand." B-
Between the cardboard leatherette jacket and the cold-type rotogravure souvenir booklet is a piece of plastic with good melodies and bad Westerns on it. Why do people believe that these latter qualify as songpoems? Must be that magic word "connection," so redolent of trains, illegal substances, and I-and-thou. Did somebody say Grand Funk Railroad was a hype? What about this puling phony? B-
A disastrous conceit, in which snippets of a "theme" song segue between tracks, makes it very hard to tell what happens to the Big Concept--Elvis Sings Ernest Tubb, Bill Monroe, Bob Wills, Anne Murray, etc. Most of his recordings sound suspiciously casual anyway, like preconcert runthroughs, and these segues add a rushed medley feel. "The Fool" and "It's Your Baby, You Rock It" work, and "Whole Lot-ta Shakin'" works out. But Tubb's "Tomorrow Never Comes" is a horn-fed monstrosity. And somehow I don't think Elvis had his heart in "Snowbird." B-
>>128276576>be wealthy trust fund kid>be some austin powers looking nerd (literally, austin powers was based on him)>weasel your way into a music career because your sister is dating paul mccartney>get handpicked to be apple's a&r man>discover james taylor and produce all his classic hits>make boatloads of money>david geffen dumps linda rondstadt on you>produce all her classic hits and make even more boatloads of money>pretty much create the sound of 70s soft rock>coast on that success and being mates with the beatles for the rest of your lifeBased
>>128276576all the critics hated JT back then
>>128277087>Cold Spring Harbor was the victim of a mastering error and recorded at too high a speed, causing Joel to have "helium" vocals. He expressed his opinion of the album by taking a copy and drop kicking it into the street in front of his house.[3]
Except for the eight-minute "Mean Town Blues," which damn near transforms John Lee Hooker's shuffle into a stumble, this is what every live album ought to be and all too few are: loud, fast, raucous, and to the point. But except for an intense "Good Morning Little School Girl" it doesn't get any encores. B-
GOT TO PAY THE JEWS IF YOU WANNA SING THE BLUES
McCartney is coming to terms with his own fluff--the overproduction sounds less cluttered this time--but it's still fluff, and not even goosedown. Maybe the thrill of leading his very own band has him distracted. (Yes, Linda is in it--that's the good part.) C-
JEREMIAH WAS A BULLFROG!
>>128278470Ballad of Dwight Frye is a great song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwd6nqLL0SIThe Raiders' last and only #1 hit in this John Loudermilk-penned song.
>>128279811I remember reading a magazine article somewhere from 1973 looking back at the original lineup of the Moody Blues, and closed with something along the lines of "and Denny Lane never did anything of note after leaving the band, the end." The cruel irony was that this was just months before Wings went into the stratosphere with Band on the Run.
Flo & Eddie Mothers is Worst Mothers of all time. I hope their equipment burns up and Frank gets pushed off the stage and breaks his neck.
Unlike my straightlaced friends, I've always dug the idea of Melanie--Edith Piaf as Brooklyn waif, preaching the hippie gospel in that absurdly flexible and resonant alto. But I've found the reality cloying. Here she grows up just enough. "Brand New Key" is one of those impossible celebrations of teen libido that renew one's faith in AM radio. "Steppin'" is the best breakup song since "It's Too Late," and though side two slips badly toward the end, she's rarely a simp this time out. B+
The best thing about this automatic boogie is the title. What else is one supposed to do when Little Richard sounds as false as Bob Hite except to sit around and contemplate the past? C-
It's reassuring to learn there are constants in this changing world. A dozen years ago, Nelson was a better than average fake, and he's still a better-than-average fake. This is a pleasant record and I would go see him in a club in Denver any time--country-rock at least as good as, shall we say, Poco. B-
Not bad. "Echoes" moves through 23:21 of "Across the Universe" cop with the timeless calm of interstellar overdrive, and the acoustic-type folk songs boast their very own melodies (as well as a real dog, rather than electronic seagulls, for sound effect). The word "behold" should never cross their filters again, but this is definitely an improvement: one eensy-weensy step for humanity, one giant step for Pink Floyd. B-
Jon Anderson, who delivers the inane Con III lyrics with prissy expertise, and Tony Kaye, whose keyboards run the gamut from vague to overweening, are the bad guys. Bill Bruford, who rocks the rather fancy tempos and signatures, and Chris Squire, best when he gets a good interlock going with Bruford, are the neutrals. And new guitarist Steve Howe makes the record worth hearing if not owning. His commentary throughout "Yours Is No Disgrace," his live acoustic solo "The Clap," and his duet with himself on "Würm" (that's German for "worm," in case you're interested) make the first side almost interesting, and he's at the heart of the album's one great cut, "I've Seen All Good People," where all their arty eclecticism comes together for 6:47. B-
Chuck isn't specializing in filler this time out, but the memorable cuts aren't exactly models of craftsmanship. "Festival" is the man at his most endearingly crass, envisioning a rock and roll circus featuring "bad Bo Diddley and the Beatles and the Mothers" in one line and the Woolies (his Detroit backup band) and the Loading Zone (San Fran backup, rhymes with Stones) elsewhere. The other is six minutes of doggerel over bass-and-piano accompaniment that is a good bad poem the way Husbands is a good bad movie. B-
Whew, these fellows can really play. They cook on "Smoke Signal," and you should hear the guitar solo on "Last of the Blacksmiths." Seem overly worried about the passing of the world as they know it, though--not just blacksmiths, but eagles, rivers, trains, the works. B-
My big problems with this record are no doubt why it's a hit: the artificially ripened singing, which goes down like a store-bought banana daiquiri, and the insufferable sexist condescension of "Wild World." B-
This postsoul big band isn't as messy as the sum of its cross-references; on the second side especially, the heavy guitar, post-Memphis horns, and off-center 4/4 all work to similarly disquieting effect, and even the African kalimba is suitably weird. But at times the brass locks into gear just like Vegas, and the expert vocal harmonies neither fit the concept nor assert any personality of their own. Worse, even the songs that work when you're listening have a way of slipping away unnoticed once the record is over. C+
>>128280386Mona Bone Jakon was better
Children, this is a funkadelic. The title piece is ten minutes of classic Hendrix-gone-heavy guitar by one Eddie Hazel--time-warped, druggy superschlock that may falter momentarily but never lapses into meaningless showoff runs. After which comes 2:45 of post-classic soul-group harmonizing--two altos against a bass man, all three driven by the funk, a rhythm so pronounced and eccentric it could make Berry Gordy twitch to death. The funk pervades the rest of the album, but not to the detriment of other peculiarities. Additional highlight: "Super Stupid." B+
God's wounds, it's a "rock" version of the myth of Hermaphroditis! (rock in quotes 'cos the singer seems to have the drummer a bit confused) Or maybe it's the invocation to Old King Cole. C-
Because he's tawdry enough to revel in stellar pop-and-flash, Stewart can refine the rock sensibility without processing the life out of it. His gimmick is nuance. Rod the Wordslinger is a lot more literate than the typical English bloozeman, Rod the Singer can make words flesh, and though Rod the Bandleader's music is literally electric it's the mandolin and pedal steel that come through sharpest. A smash as huge as "Maggie May" must satisfy Rod the Mod the way a classic as undeniable as "Maggie May" does Rod the Artist. But it's "Mandolin Wind" leading into Motown leading into Tim Hardin that does justice to everything he is. A+
>>128283685Young Rod much like young Bob Seger was a whole different animal. What turning 30 can do to a motherfucker.
Well hell.
Brown's farewell to his own indie label is so outre purists will probably prize it. Rock-funk instrumentals dominated by (literally) anonymous electric piano and guitar, both more rock than funk, which would never be said of the rhythm section. At moments it sounds like JB Meets BB--and I don't mean the bluesman, I mean Bela Bartok--in the person of arranger Dave Matthews. As for JB, he grunts a few times. Veddy interesting. C+
Olivia's debut album, a pretty big Australian success that went almost unnoticed in the states.
This time the hits Ashford & Simpson have written for Diana were written for Diana, which minimizes embarrassing comparisons. And the verve of side two--where Motown finally learns how to kowtow to Broadway and keep the songwriting royalties--suggests that she's learning to hold her own. B
In theory, the polyrhythms intensified the momentum while the low-definition songwriting served the freeflow gestalt. In fact, the Latin lilt lightened the beat and the flow remained muddy indeed. So the electricity generated by the percussion-heavy opening cut comes as a pleasant surprise, and the movement of what follows is a surprising pleasure. New second guitarist Neal Schon deserves special thanks for crowding out Gregg Rolie's organ. Maybe soon he'll come up with more than one idea per solo. B
The five rock sides--not counting 22:35 of Ravi Shankar, who has one-fourth of the music in this piece of rock history--average about thirteen minutes. They offer exactly what I heard at the Garden: five clear, straightforward, moving protest-era oldies from Bob Dylan, two clear, strong rock and roll oldies from Leon Russell, and Ringo singing "It Don't Come Easy." Plus eight songs by George Harrison and one by Billy Preston. And if you mail your check to the United Nations Children's Fund for Relief to Refugee Children of Bangla Desh you can avoid the middleman. B-
>>128273776No Lies is my favorite cut off this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAtwBgCvb-YI don't know whether to applaud the old git for hanging in there all these years, or...
The two decent songs here--I refer primarily to the melodies of "Tiny Dancer" (just how small is she, anyway?) and "Levon"--clock in (with lots and lots of help from Paul Buckmaster) at 6:12 and 5:37 respectively. In other words, they meander. The others maunder as well. Ugh. C
>>128285065I agree Elton hadn't found his footing yet.
Last time he announced his lack of "concern or interest in astrology," so when the zodiac showed up as a packaging motif I began to get nostalgic for the Impressions. But though the vagueness that was Curtis's chief flaw runs rampant musically ("Love to Keep You in My Mind" goes nowhere slowly) and lyrically ("Underground" is one long mixed metaphor), it's not all that bad--the relaxed, natural groove of Mayfield's falsetto and his rhythm section are both seductive. Only on the lead cuts, however--especially the heavy-breathing sex opus "Get Down"--does he sweep you off your feet. B-
>>128285125you can tell he's posing in a studio in front of a backdrop of a tree and it wasn't really taken outdoors
>>128273090FUCK ME!!! DUANE ALLMAN DIED YESTERDAY!! he crashed his motorcycle. That sucks soo bad. The band was just hitting their stride and this live album was gonna make him a star!! The band is fucked and surely cant go on without him.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWSoo3bLhIcRIP SKYDOG 10/29/71
>>128285608F
>>128284455I Come Tumbling for me
>>128285608>no stickymods are fascist pigs
Led by ex-folkie Toni Brown (the principal composer) and ex-blueswoman Terry Garthwaite (whose three rhythm songs sizzle joyously), this may not be your idea of rock and roll. The music revolves around Brown's piano, which rolls more than it rocks, and the band goes for multi-percussion rather than the old in-out. I find it relaxing and exciting and amazingly durable; I can dance to it, and I can also fuck to it. The musical dynamic pits Brown's collegiate contralto against Garthwaite's sandpaper soul, and the lyrics are feminist breakthroughs. "Too Late, but Not Forgotten" remembers a trailer camp while "Red Wine at Noon" touches international finance, but the two protagonists are united by one overriding fact--they're victimized as wives. And it's about time somebody in rock and roll said so. A
Was it only two years ago that the formation of Crosby, Stills & Nash brought gladness to the hearts of rock and rollers who remembered that they loved tight songs rather than endless jams and believed that an ex-Hollie's pop sense would temper Byrds/Springfield folk-rock? Who would have figured that none of them would remember that rock and roll is also supposed to be funky--and fast. And that the best stuff on their live album would be the jams, dominated by the new guy, who would also write their tightest songs? And for that matter that a singalong of dig-its and right-ons by the man who wrote "For What It's Worth" and a goody-goody song about Chicago by the ex-Hollie would sound like political high points? B-
>>128286454DP's The Mule, APP's I Robot and that unmade Wings rock opera belong to the underrated microgenre of Asimov-core.
>>128286448Another critic favorite band that nobody IRL listened to.
Wow this is pretty based. Can't wait to hear more drumming from this Klaus Schulze guy in the future.
I know you think they're dumb, but they're not, they're just slow, and this intelligent noise proves it. Every instrument in what is basically a trio format must make a solo-quality contribution, yet every one is held in check, by the tempos and the structures in which flash is strictly discouraged. The tension that results is more gripping here than on Fire and Water because vocalist Paul Rodgers and guitarist Paul Kossoff have mastered the reined-in expressiveness that comes naturally to drummer Simon Kirke and (especially) bassist Andy Fraser--last time they showed off, but this time you can hear them trying not to. Equally important, the tracks average 3:48 instead of 5:02. But though there are hints of melodic and verbal facility as well, there aren't enough. B
>>128278209Track 2 is kinda problematic, Dolly, dontcha think?
>>128276833it's ok if you skip track 1
The title means Spooky Tooth has lost Jersey--New Jersey, I guess I should say. Get it? Does that mean he's lost his roots or is returning to them? Anyway, he bites the bullet like a real American. Not too incisive, though. Get it? C+
>>128286950good old Paul. Always slow, always tasteful and non-schlocky, and always bland blues rock.
>>128287201There you have it. Zeppelin understood somehow that schlocking things up makes for more memorable music than being as pure as Free/BC.
>>128285146Your sister posed in front of a tree for me last night.
