ABC Wednesday Archives - Page 53 of 91

K is for the Kinks: Muswell Hillbilles

For WAY too long, I used to go around saying, “Why is life so COM-Plicated?”

The Kinks, commercially, went from being a rather successful rock band, to not so much, several times in its career arc. One of the latter was the 1971 album Muswell Hillbillies, “named after the Muswell Hill area of North London, where bandleader Ray Davies and guitarist Dave Davies [his younger brother] grew up and the band formed in the early 1960s.” I have alluded to this album so often I figured I must have written about it before, but I had not.

It was their ninth album, but their first for RCA. It was also the first one I ever bought. Even though it came from a particularly English POV, there was something quite universal about the feelings of alienation. It’s also sonically quite diverse.

Also in the band at that time were original drummer Mick Avory, bassist John Dalton (who had replaced Peter Quaife off and on for years), and pianist John Gosling, who joined the band in 1970, a year before the album’s release. Also new, the brass section, “The Mike Cotton Sound, which included Mike Cotton on trumpet, John Beecham on trombone and tuba, and Alan Holmes on clarinet.”

Side one starts with 20th Century Man [LISTEN], “I’m a 20th century man, but I don’t want to be here.” That’s followed by Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues

But it’s five of the next six songs that really sold me. A more eclectic bunch of songs I’ve seldom heard: the out of time Holiday [LISTEN]; the swing of Skin and Bone [LISTEN] (“stay away from carbohydrates”); Alcohol [LISTEN] (a boozy “Oh, demon alcohol”); and Complicated Life [LISTEN]. For WAY too long, I used to go around saying, “Why is life so COM-plicated?”

Side two starts with Here Come the People in Grey, and that’s followed by the very proper-sounding Have a Cuppa Tea [LISTEN]; my sister sells teas currently, and that’s a bonus for my enjoyment. After Holloway Jail comes Oklahoma U.S.A., which I DID write about before. Then Uncle Son and the title song. The 1998 CD re-issue bonus tracks were Mountain Woman and Kentucky Moon, which did not particularly enhance the enjoyment for me.

There was a 2CD extended package that came out in 2013, which I won’t get because what I already have is just perfect.

More about the Kinks and some of the Kinks’ better-known songs around June 21, when Ray Davies turns 70.

ABC Wednesday – Round 14

J is for the Jackson 5ive

When the group moved from Motown to Columbia/Epic, Jermaine stayed at Motown, largely because he was married to Motown boss Berry Gordy’s daughter Hazel for a time. Little brother Randy replaced him as the group became The Jacksons.

L-R: Tito, Marlon, Michael, Jackie, Jermaine

My sister Leslie, who’s a little younger than I, had each of the first four non-Christmas LPs of the Jackson Five (or Jackson 5ive, as Motown sometimes cutely designated the group). I wanted to write them off as a silly piece of “bubblegum soul”. The problem with that was twofold:
1) I rather liked many of the songs, and
2) I discovered that my vocal range was quite compatible with Jermaine, who had the second lead on many of the songs (Tito sang low harmonies, Jackie high harmonies, and Marlon somewhere in the middle)

Oh, there was a third thing:
3) that preteen Michael was pretty darn good

The first album had I Want You Back [LISTEN], a #1 hit in 1970, but also Who’s Lovin’ You [LISTEN], a cover of a Smokey Robinson song that, when I listened to it, I thought, “How old IS this guy?” He was an old soul.

The second album included both ABC [LISTEN], the title song, and The Love You Save [LISTEN], both of which went to #1 for two weeks in 1970. The imaginatively titled Third Album contained I’ll Be There [LISTEN], #1 for FIVE weeks in 1970. I was always a sucker for Maybe Tomorrow [LISTEN], the title song from the fourth album, which only went to #20 in 1971. They had other hits, most notably Dancing Machine [LISTEN], #2 in 1974.

I won’t necessarily admit to having watched their animated series, which is now available on DVD.

Michael, who had done some solo work even with Motown, had some subsequent massive albums on his own, with Off the Wall, and Thriller. But the brothers, including Jermaine, got together for the 1984 Victory album and tour. Michael, of course, went on with his own career arc.

The group never broke up officially, but they haven’t recorded an album since 1989, though Tito, Jackie, Jermaine, and Marlon did appear in some bizarre reality show back in 2009, which ended up including their reactions to brother Michael’s death.

ABC Wednesday – Round 14

I is for the Isley Brothers

You may not think you know the Isley Brothers, siblings out of Cincinnati, but it’s likely that you’ve heard at least some of their music, even if it was performed by someone else.

O’Kelly Jr., Rudolph, Ronald, and Vernon started out in gospel until Vernon’s early death from a bike accident. The remaining trio moved to the New York City area in the late 1950s. Their first significant song was Shout [LISTEN] in 1959, written by the brothers, which only went to #47, but eventually sold a million copies, and was heavily covered.

In a similar vein, Twist and Shout [LISTEN] got all the way to #17 in 1962. It was originally recorded by the Topnotes, and produced by Phil Spector, who was still learning his craft. The Isleys version spurred other covers, notably by a band from Liverpool, England.

The trio spent three or four years with Motown, but like other groups that weren’t developed in-house, such as the Spinners, they would fare better elsewhere. They did have one Top 40 hit, This Old Heart of Mine (Is Weak for You) [LISTEN], which went to #12 in 1966, but which would become a bigger hit for Rod Stewart, featuring Ronald Isley when it went to #10 in 1990.

Their biggest hit was It’s Your Thing [LISTEN] which soared to #2 in 1969. “By 1971, the Isleys’ younger brothers Ernie Isley and Marvin Isley and brother-in-law Chris Jasper started to add musical input to the band’s music.”

The big hit for them in 1975 was Fight the Power [LISTEN] which does, I should note, have an eight-letter word starting with bull contained therein.

After this, the brothers continued to perform in different combinations. Kelly succumbed to a heart attack in 1986, and Marvin died from diabetes in 2010.

They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.
***
Beastie Boys send copyright threat to toy company that remixed “Girls” However:
Before GoldieBlox, Beasties plundered the “Girls” melody (fair and square): “Here’s a timely (and fully rockin’) reminder that the Beastie Boys plundered the melody of The Isley Brothers’ ‘Shout’ for Girls.”

ABC Wednesday – Round 14

H is for Heart

Last time I noticed Heart was when I watched the 2012 Kennedy Center Honors,

The roots of the band Heart actually go back over forty years. While there have been a number of members of the group over the years, including, briefly, brothers Roger and Mike Fisher, it’s been sisters Ann Wilson on vocals, and guitarist Nancy Wilson, who have been at the heart of the group since 1974. Their careers have had lots of ups and downs, but they survive. They were, rightly, inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013.

One of my colleagues loves Red Velvet Car, their 2010 album, which was the group’s first Top 10 album in 20 years. I probably should check out that collection because it’s supposed to be “a return to the melodic hard rock and folk sound of early Heart albums.” And I loved early Heart.

The Dreamboat Annie album from 1976 featured Crazy on You [LISTEN]; given the airplay it got, I’m surprised it only made it to #35. Magic Man [LISTEN] was the bigger hit, going to #9.

The origin of their next hit was interesting, to say the least. From the Wikipedia:

Mushroom [Records, their label] ran a full-page advertisement in Rolling Stone magazine showing the bare-shouldered Wilson sisters (as on the “Dreamboat Annie” album cover) with the suggestive caption, “It was only our first time!”. When a reporter suggested, backstage after a live appearance, that the sisters were sex partners, the infuriated Ann returned to her hotel room and began writing the lyrics to “Barracuda”.

Amid dueling record label fussing – they quit Mushroom and moved to CBS/Portrait – Barracuda [LISTEN] got to #11, almost certainly my favorite Heart song.

They suffered some commercial decline in the early 1980s, but returned to commercial form in 1985 with the eponymous Heart album [LISTEN to all], featuring the #1 hit These Dreams (1986), plus What About Love (#10 in 1985), Never (#4 in 1986), and Nothin’ At All (#10 in 1986). But this wasn’t the Heart I really loved – I barely remember Nothin’ at All.

The last time I noticed Heart was when I watched the 2012 Kennedy Center Honors, and Ann and Nancy Wilson were asked to perform at the event in tribute to Led Zeppelin. The Wilson sisters, along with Jason Bonham (son of the late LZ drummer John Bonham) performed Stairway to Heaven [LISTEN!], which brought tears to Robert Plant’s eyes.
***
Seriously, it took me a little while to figure out there could be TWO women in music named Nancy Wilson. The one I knew first was a black songstress whose albums were hawked on the inner sleeves of my Beatles and Beach Boys albums.

ABC Wednesday – Round 14

G is for the Guthrie family

Arlo Guthrie was not a singles artist, but did have a modest hit with Steve Goodman’s train song, City of New Orleans.

arlowoody — Arlo Guthrie, and his father Woody

Woodrow Wilson Guthrie (July 14, 1912 – October 3, 1967) was an iconic American individual – songwriter, musician, political activist. He had a huge effect on Pete Seeger, whose group the Weavers, recorded So Long, It’s Been Good To Know Yuh [LISTEN to Woody’s version]. He also hosted a young Bob Dylan in his hospital room, after he had been diagnosed with the Huntington’s disease that would kill him. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 as an early influence.

I saw a video of Michael Feinstein, who tended to Ira Gershwin’s papers the last six years of the lyricist’s life. Feinstein was asked who is missing from the discussion of the Great American Songbook, musical standards written by Gershwins, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Duke Ellington, and the like in the first half of the 20th Century. Feinstein suggested Woody Guthrie, whose This Land Is Your Land is at least as beloved as Someone To Watch Over Me.

I wrote about Woody previously HERE.

One of his sons, with his second wife Marjorie, was Arlo Davy Guthrie, who became noteworthy from his performance of “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”, a satirical talking blues song about 18 minutes in length [LISTEN], which was the basis of a movie in which he played himself; it’s now a Thanksgiving tradition. He performed at Woodstock; LISTEN to the studio version of Coming Into Los Angeles. He was not a singles artist but did have a modest hit with Steve Goodman’s train song City of New Orleans, #18 in 1972. Here is his version of his father’s Oklahoma Hills. Arlo has toured with Woody’s old chum Pete Seeger. (Arlo on the late Pete Seeger.)

The Guthrie family is musical. Arlo’s “sister is record producer Nora Guthrie.” Arlo’s children “have also become musicians. Annie Guthrie writes songs and performs, and also takes care of family touring details. Sarah Lee performs and records with her husband Johnny Irion. Cathy plays ukulele in Folk Uke, a group she formed with Amy Nelson, the daughter of Willie Nelson. Abe Guthrie was formerly in a folk-rock band called Xavier and now tours with his father. Abe Guthrie’s son, Krishna, is a drummer and toured with Arlo Guthrie on his European tour…”

So music is a Guthrie family affair.

ABC Wednesday – Round 14

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