music Archives - Page 164 of 265 - Ramblin' with Roger

Music Throwback Saturday: Cars by Gary Numan

The didgeridoo was featured on the very first season of the “reality show” Survivor, which took place in the Australian outback.

Another one of those records I bought only as a single – we’re talking the 45 RPM record – was Cars by Gary Numan.

The song was a single from an album called The Pleasure Principle. “It reached the top of the charts in several countries, and today is considered a new wave staple.” It was #1 in the UK in 1979 and in Canada in 1980. It spent 17 weeks on the US charts, getting to #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1980, his only big hit song in this country.

“Musically, the new song was somewhat lighter and more pop-oriented than its predecessors.” Numan later conceding that he had chart success in mind: “This was the first time I had written a song with the intention of ‘maybe it could be a hit single.'”

I’ve tried to ascertain WHY it was instantly infectious. My working theory is that the very first sound one hears is reminiscent of a didgeridoo.

You know the didgeridoo, that wind instrument developed by indigenous people of northern Australia “within the last 1,500 years and still in widespread use today both in Australia and around the world. It is sometimes described as a natural wooden trumpet or “drone pipe'”.

The didgeridoo was featured on the very first season of the “reality show” Survivor, which took place in the Australian outback. My ABC Wednesday buddy Reader Wil wrote a post on the instrument, which explained, via a couple of videos, how one plays the instrument.

I’ve discovered that when I tried to replicate the sound of the instrument, humming with my mouth open while quickly covering and uncovering my mouth, I could approximate the sound of the first notes of Numan’s Cars.

READ/LISTEN TO:
ABC Wednesday, D for Didgeridoo.

LISTEN TO:
Survivor: The Australian Outback OST – Track 01 – Didgeridoo.

Cars by Gary Numan: HERE or HERE or extended play HERE.

Cars by Fear Factory, featuring Gary Numan (1998).

R is for Red

Modern surveys show red is the color most commonly associated with heat, activity, passion, sexuality, anger, love and joy.

Red, as Wikipedia notes, is “the color at the end of the spectrum of visible light next to orange and opposite violet.”

It’s also both one of the “additive primary colors of visible light, along with green and blue”… AND “one of the subtractive primary colors, along with yellow and blue, of the.. traditional color wheel used by painters and artists.

“Since red is the color of blood, it has historically been associated with sacrifice, danger, and courage.

“Modern surveys in the United States and Europe show red is also the color most commonly associated with heat, activity, passion, sexuality, anger, love, and joy.

“In China and many other Asian countries, it is the color of happiness.”

Of course, most STOP lights and stop signs are red. This means that RED is a contradiction. Action and stopping. Anger and joy.

I thought I’d list some RED songs. The links to the titles are descriptions of the songs; the links to the artists are the recordings. The chart action refers to the Billboard (US) pop charts.

Red and Blue
Dave Clark Five (#89 in 1967)

Red Red Wine
Neil Diamond (#62 in 1968)
UB40 (#34 in 1984, #1 in 1988)

Red Roses for a Blue Lady
Vic Dana (#10 in 1965)
Dean Martin

Red Rubber Ball
Cyrkle (#2 in 1966)
Seekers

Red Sails in the Sunset
Bing Crosby (1935)
Nat King Cole (#24 in 1951)
Tab Hunter (#57 in 1957)
Platters (#36 in 1960)
Fats Domino (#35 – and #24 soul – in 1963)

ABC Wednesday – Round 18

Music Throwback Saturday: Rare Earth

Motown did not have a name for the new division, so jokingly, the band suggested the name Rare Earth.

Rare Earth was NOT the first all-white group signed by Motown. Wikipedia cites The Rustix, The Dalton Boys, and The Underdogs as predecessors on the label; I actually have a couple of Underdogs tracks on some compilations.

But the group, which had started up in high school as “The Sunliners”, decided, after seven years to change the name of the band to “Rare Earth”, and ended up as clearly the most successful white band on the label.

Motown Record Corporation approached Rare Earth in the latter part of 1968 to sign a recording contract. At first the group was reluctant to sign because of knowing of other white groups and artists before them that had not had any success… It was when Motown decided they wanted to launch a new division of Motown to cater to white artists that Rare Earth started to seriously consider signing.

Motown did not have a name for the new division… so jokingly, the band suggested the name Rare Earth. Unbelievably they agreed.

On 20 Hard to Find Motown Classics, Volume 1 (1990), there appears Get Ready (pop #4, soul #20 in 1970) and (I Know) I’m Losing You (pop #7, soul #20 in 1970), both songs previously recorded by the Temptations. Both Rare Earth covers did better on the pop charts than did the Temps, whose pair of #1 soul hits only went to #29 and #8, respectively, on the pop charts in 1966.

20 Hard to Find Motown Classics, Volume 2 (1990) includes I Just Want To Celebrate (#7 pop, #30 soul in 1971) and Born To Wander (#17 pop, #48 soul) in 1971.

Get Ready was also the name of Rare Earth’s second album (#12 pop), with the title song, written by Smokey Robinson, taking up the whole second side. Ecology, the third album (#15 pop), featured Born To Wander and a nearly 11-minute version of I’m Losing You.

Many years later, Get Ready and Ecology were on a twofer CD, which I bought, but the Ecology songs were obviously shortened. They substituted the album version of I’m Losing You with the three-minute single version, and trimmed Eleanor Rigby and other songs, which really ticked me off.

I Just Want to Celebrate was on the fourth album, One World (#28 pop).

LISTEN TO
Get Ready – single version and album version and album version

I’m Losin’ You – single version and album version and album version

Born to Wander – the version here and here

I Just Want To Celebrate – the version here and here

Music Throwback Saturday: songs from the With the Beatles album

They became familiar with three-part harmonizing .

Here’s another article about how the Beatles influenced many other artists; there are plenty more examples.

But they too were influenced by other musicians. I’m rereading Steve Turner’s “The Beatles: A Hard Day’s Write,” subtitled “the stories behind every song.” Fairly often, the members of the group are quoted as having been inspired by a piece for their own creations. I thought I’d put some of their songs up against the source material, with links to all.

She Loves You:

Paul got the initial idea of using ‘she’ and ‘you’, instead of the familiar ‘me’ and ‘you’, from Bobby Rydall’s then current British hit ‘Forget Him‘ in which the narrator told a girl to forget about a boy who doesn’t appear to truly love her. ‘Yeah yeah’ was frequently used as an aside in Fifties skiffle music, as well as by Cliff Richard in ‘We Say Yeah‘ (1962).

I’ll Get You:

One of the songs musical tricks, the shift from D to A minor to break the word ‘pretend’ was taken from Joan Baez’s version of the traditional song ‘All My Trials‘ (1960). There, the shift takes place underneath the words ‘don’t you cry’.

Hmm. I own that Baez song but never made the connection.

All I’ve Got To Do:

John appears to have used Smokey Robinson’s ‘You Can Depend on Me‘ as the model.

Little Child:

Paul remembered that part of the song’s melody was inspired by ‘Whistle My Love‘, a 1950s song by the British folk singer Elton Hayes and used in the Walt Disney film Robin Hood.

Hold Me Tight: It was influenced by the Shirelles, though no specific song is mentioned. Here’s their ‘Baby It’s You‘, which the Beatles covered.

I Wanna Be Your Man (first link):

It was meant to emulate the feel of the Shirelles’ song ‘Boys‘, which Ringo sang in concert. The dragged out ‘maaaan’ of the chorus was inspired by Benny Spellman’s song ‘Fortune Teller‘.

This Boy:

They became familiar with three-part harmonizing by singing Phil Spector’s ‘To Know Him Is To Love Him‘.

Note: Yes, the first two songs weren’t on With the Beatles, but appear in that chapter in Turner’s book.

April rambling #1: music for tax day

Silence or Violence: Logan, Suicide, and the Culture of Masculine Silence.

Preventing Bullying and Cyber-Bullying.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Border Wall and Congressional Fundraising.

The Unabomber takes on the Internet.

The Tip That Led to Terrorist Abdelhamid Abaaoud’s Downfall Came From a Muslim Woman.

Ken Screven: And then I tossed a bourbon Manhattan in his face.

The Real Story Behind HBO’s ‘Confirmation’ From The NPR Reporter Who Broke The Story. Clarence Thomas, Anita Hill,and NPR’s Nina Totenberg.

Chip, Implanted in Brain, Helps Paralyzed Man Regain Control of Hand.

Facing life unarmed. “When I was born, everyone was expecting me to have arms.”

Within Our Gates (1920) – Oscar Micheaux Silent Film.

Arthur’s Outaversary.

Dustbury has been blogging 20 years, which, at 11 years, makes me a piker.

Sharp Little Pencil: Lost Word.

Now I Know: Voltaire’s Wager and The Revolt of the Dancing Grannies and They Blue It and The Birds that Sing for Their Supper.

You may have to be from upstate New York to appreciate this: This is a Halfmoon; This is a Black and White Cookie.

The Mystery of the Phantom Page Turner.

Can anything good come from an experiment involving whipped cream?

The funnies

Cartoon: The NYC pandering primary.

Frank Welker, will be honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 43rd Annual Daytime Creative Arts Emmy(R) Awards on Friday, April 29th, 2016. He is the legendary performer of the voices of Scooby-Doo and many others.

Guinness Book of World Records certified famed Mad artist Al Jaffee’s run as a world record for “Longest Career as a Comics Artist.”

How Mickey Mouse Evades the Public Domain.

An Audience With the King. That would be Jack Kirby. Bob Kane does not fare so well.

Book review: A Spanish Comic Book Exposes Franco’s Orphanages.

Music

R.I.P, Merle Haggard and Steve Earle: The Other Side of Merle Haggard and Coverville 1121: A cover tribute to Merle Haggard and some A Cappellaville!

10 Priceless Songs About Taxes and Coverville 1120: A Tribute to Tax Day.

New Paul Simon Album ‘Stranger to Stranger’ Coming June 3rd. Simon & Garfunkel – Bridge Over Troubled Water – Madison Square Garden, NYC – 2009/10 29 or 30.

18 Ripping 1960S ROCK & ROLL Bands That Performed On TV Sitcoms And Dramas.

The History of John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s Only Post-Beatles Session.

The Muppets on the Ed Sullivan Show.

This is a REALLY annoying K-Chuck Radio, especially the Oz piece, which I gave up on. They made a disco song out of THAT?!?

Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven may be partly stolen, judge says.

The lawyers who beat the ‘Happy Birthday’ copyright are taking on ‘We Shall Overcome’.

The Black Keys Say They Regret Inducting Steve Miller Into Rock Hall of Fame.

David Kalish: My ode to how music has shaped me.

SamuraiFrog’s 12 albums.