Tag: music

MOVIE REVIEW: Danny Collins

I’m always happy to see Bobby Cannavale NOT playing a mobster or thug.

Danny_Collins_Official_PosterI pretty much HAD to see the movie Danny Collins, which is based, sort of, on a message John Lennon sent to a budding musician named Steve Tilston, interviewed in a magazine back in 1971. Lennon saw the piece and sent a letter to the Tilston, care of the magazine, inviting Steve to call John, complete with his phone number. But the young musician never saw the letter until years later.

That actually happened, and it is the jumping-off point of this fictional piece of an aging musician (Al Pacino), who stays on the road, performing the same songs he wrote three decades ago, essentially selling out, and he needs to “self-medicate” to get through it all. His friend/manager Frank (Christopher Plummer) gives him the present of the aforementioned letter, and suddenly his too-young girlfriend, and excesses in his lifestyle, seem lacking.

He essentially moves into a New Jersey hotel room, tries to woo the hotel manager (Annette Bening, who reminded me of an older version of Annie Hall), and fix up a pair of hotel employees (Melissa Benoist, Josh Peck). Mostly, he tries to make things right by Tom (Bobby Cannavale) and his family (Jennifer Garner, young Giselle Eisenberg), though Tom, for good reason, wants nothing to do with Danny.

The Wife and I saw this at the Spectrum Theatre on our anniversary, and we liked it quite a lot. I think nearly ALL the reviews, positive (78%) and negative, are largely true. The cast makes the mushy journey about self-discovery palatable. The narrative isn’t particularly surprising, though it has a few twists, yet the story by writer/director Dan Fogelman was charming, engaging, and probably a bit schmaltzy. The John Lennon songs that made up most of the soundtrack, were overly familiar to me, but might be revelatory for someone not so seeped into his music.

I’m always happy to see Bobby Cannavale NOT playing a mobster or thug, but just a guy trying to get by.

As usual, I must complain about people leaving the moment the credits start, as they miss the REAL guy (Tilston) talking about, belatedly, getting the Lennon letter.

Oh, two last things: apparently, Michael Caine was originally cast as Danny’s manager, before being replaced by Plummer; Caine’s name still shows up in some cast listings. The original name of the film was to be Imagine, based on the Lennon song; I’m glad it was changed.

Pete Townshend is 70

‘A little! That’s good. Love is universal. Limitless.’

townshend_pete_best_of_pete_townshendAs I’ve noted, I really enjoyed the Pete Townshend autobiography, Who I Am. It was a warts-and-all look at his family and other relationships, his music, and especially his not-always-appropriate behavior.

I’d previously noted my favorite songs by the Who. Here’s just a few Townshend solo songs, mostly from two albums, though I own at least eight of them, mostly on vinyl.

6. Give Blood, from White City – A Novel. As a long-time blood donor, I approve of the title, though that’s not what it’s about. In fact, the song’s construction was quite peculiar. From my second-favorite Townsend album.

5. Heart to Hang Onto, from Rough Mix. This is from the album Pete did with Ronnie Lane in 1976. During the recording of it, Lane was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis; he suffering from the disease for 21 years, before dying in 1997 at the age of 51.

4. Empty Glass, from Empty Glass. Back in the days when my friend Fred Hembeck was living in Rensselaer County, across the river from Albany County, I once took a bus to visit him. On the way there, I walked by some department store, and went inside, for some reason. (I THINK it was raining.) I found the Empty Glass album as a cutout. (If you’ve never seen a cutout album, it has a slit into the cardboard in the upper right corner.) In any case, I LOVED that album, and still do.

3. A Little Is Enough, from Empty Glass (#72 in US Billboard). Townsend himself prefers this song to the larger hit from this album (see below). Pete tells this story: “Meher Baba’s secretary Adi Irani made a visit to London around this time, I tried to get his advice. ‘My wife doesn’t love me anymore,’ I said. ‘What should I do?’ ‘She doesn’t love you at all?’ he wobbled his head as he spoke. ‘She said she loved me a little.’ ‘Ah!’ Adi clapped his hands and smiled. ‘A little! That’s good. Love is universal. Limitless. So even a little is enough.'”

2. Face the Face, from White City (#26 in the US). This is a loud, bodacious song, especially the percussion near the beginning, with a big band feel. Townshend’s daughter Emma Townshend sings some parts.

1. Let My Love Open the Door, from Empty Glass (#46 in the UK, #9 US). I got annoyed with Townshend for being such a scold with his public for thinking this was a romantic love song. He claimed that was a spiritual treatise, and that “Jesus sings” on the track. Incidentally, there was a remake of this song – the E cola mix – and like most of these musical makeovers, I think it’s a lesser effort, though it’s twice as long.

Stevie Wonder is 65

One of the Spinners’ relatively few hits on Motown before they moved to Atlantic.

swonderPortraitSince I’ve tried to list my favorite songs by an artist on his/her 70th birthday, and Stevie Wonder’s is five years away, what to do this year?

Fortunately, I found this nifty list of songs written, co-written, by Stevie for other artists. Occasionally (Whitney, Macca, and Jermaine, e.g.), Stevie also performs. These are listed, more or less, up to my favorite Stevie song first recorded by another artist; Stevie did subsequently cover a couple of these. LISTEN TO ALL.

First, though, a couple of cuts introduced to me by Chuck Miller recently:
1966 All I Do (Is Think About You) – Tammi Terrell (S.Wonder/C.Paul/ M.Broadnax)
1983 The Crown – Gary Byrd And The G.B. Experience (S.Wonder/G.Byrd) – also has a Stevie vocal.

1974 Perfect Angel – Minnie Riperton (S.Wonder) I had forgotten that the late Riperton was the mother of former Saturday Night Live cast member Maya Rudolph.
1990 We Didn’t Know – Whitney Houston (S.Wonder). I have only two Whitney albums and one has this song.
1974 Take A Little Trip – Minnie Riperton (S.Wonder)
1980 Let’s Get Serious -Jermaine Jackson (S.Wonder/Lee Garrett). This was the benefit of Jermaine staying with Motown when his brothers moved to Columbia/Epic. Have this on vinyl.
1975 I Can See The Sun In Late December – Roberta Flack (S.Wonder). The last six minutes of this 12-MINUTE SONG are probably extraneous, but I like it. Also, own this on vinyl.

1982 What’s That You’re Doing – Paul McCartney (S.Wonder/P.McCartney). Pauly can be pretty soulful (Lady Madonna, e.g.), but I was glad to see Stevie back in form; much of his 1980s output was disappointing.
1982 Try Jah Love – Third World (S.Wonder/M.McCully). The one song on this list I did not know was co-written by Stevie.
1970 It’s A Shame – the Spinners (S.Wonder/S.Wright/L.Garrett). One of their relatively few hits on Motown before they moved to Atlantic.
1974 Tell Me Something Good – Rufus (S.Wonder). Couldn’t find a studio version, but this pretty representative.
1967 Tears Of A Clown -Smokey Robinson & The Miracles (S.Wonder/H.Cosby/S Robinson). Also love the version by the English Beat, or The Beat.

R for Radio

I’d especially listen to WWVA, Wheeling, WV, which played country artists such as George Jones, Patsy Cline, Buck Owens, Jim Reeves, and Eddy Arnold.

radio-004I listen to so little radio these days, mostly when I wake up, or if The Wife is playing it in the car. However, growing up in Binghamton, NY, radio was what I listened to all the time. WENE in nearby Endicott is a sports station now, but in its heyday in the 1960s, it was THE place in the area to listen to the Top 40 hits.

At night, though, when I was about 9 to 13, I would listen to a wide array of stations all over the Northeast US via a clear-channel station, which “is an AM band radio station in North America that has the highest protection from interference from other stations, particularly concerning night-time skywave propagation.” This is NOT to be confused with the stations owned by the company formerly named Clear Channel, now iHeartMedia, Inc.

I’d get my portable radio and hide it under the covers to muffle the sound. I’d listen to WSM in Nashville, TN (country), WABC (Top 40, heavy on the Beatles), and especially WWVA, Wheeling, WV, which played country artists such as George Jones, Patsy Cline, Buck Owens, Jim Reeves, and Eddy Arnold.

Some songs mentioning radio:

Turn Your Radio On – Ray Stevens (1971)
You Turn Me On, I’m A Radio – Joni Mitchell (1973)
Radio, Radio – Elvis Costello (1978)
On Your Radio – Joe Jackson (1979)
Do You Remember Rock N’ Roll Radio – Ramones (1980)
This Is Radio Clash – The Clash (1981)
Mexican Radio – Wall Of Voodoo (1983)
Devil’s Radio – George Harrison (1987)

ABC Wednesday – Round 16

Music Throwback Saturday: Oh, Babe, What Would You Say?

“Would you greet me or politely turn away
“Would there suddenly be sunshine on a cold and rainy day”

NomanHurricaneSmithIn late January 2015, my family attended I attended one of those Deconstructing the Beatles lectures by Scott Freiman, “a series of entertaining multimedia presentations about the composition and production techniques” of the band.

Previously, the Wife and I experienced Looking Through A Glass Onion: Deconstructing The White Album, which also covered the recording of ‘Hey Jude’. Freiman “discusses the studio techniques used by the Beatles during 1968 and share many examples of rare audio and video of the Beatles in action.”

More recently, the three of us saw YEAH! YEAH! YEAH! Deconstructing The Early Beatles, in which Freiman traces “the birth of the Beatles from Liverpool to Hamburg. The journey continues from their initial recording sessions at EMI for ‘Love Me Do’ through their first several groundbreaking singles.”

At some point, Freiman mentioned Norman Smith, the engineer on all of the EMI studio recordings by the Beatles through Rubber Soul. As an avid reader of liner notes, I did recognize the name. After he stopped working with the Beatles, he produced early albums for Pink Floyd.

What I did not know, until Freiman played a clip, was that Norman became a recording artist under the name Hurricane Smith. His big hit, which I remember quite well, was “Oh, Babe, What Would You Say?”, “which became a US No. 1 Cash Box and a Billboard Pop No. 3 hit. It reached No. 4 in the UK Singles Chart in the Northern Hemisphere winter of 1972-73, when he was nearly 50.

I always thought the song had a certain melancholy, both in the vocal and the lyrics:
“Would you greet me or politely turn away
“Would there suddenly be sunshine on a cold and rainy day”

Hurricane Smith died in 2008.

LISTEN to Oh, Babe, What Would You Say? HERE or HERE or HERE.

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