music Archives - Page 229 of 264 - Ramblin' with Roger

It’s all about the music: Ride, Zombies, Thunder…

One of my daughter’s “new” favorite songs is almost a half century old. She heard it on a Glee album, so I had to play it for her by the original artist.

Sally Ride, the first American woman in space, died a couple days ago at the too-young age of 61, after battling pancreatic cancer. According to the timeline on her website, she wasn’t even able to attempt to go into space until 1977 “when NASA conducts a national search for new astronauts and, for the first time, allows women to apply.” The next year, she was “selected by NASA as an astronaut candidate — one of six women among 35 trainees chosen,” the same year she received a “Ph.D. degree in physics from Stanford University.” On June 18, 1983, she “becomes the first American woman to fly in space, when she “serves as mission specialist… aboard space shuttle Challenger.” She had a second mission aboard Challenger in 1984, and was scheduled for a third flight when the Challenger exploded in 1986, after which she was “appointed to the Presidential Commission investigating the Challenger disaster.”

Arthur gives his POV, specifically about her posthumous coming out.

The song that’s stuck in my brain is the great Wilson Pickett’s live version of Mustang Sally. As the chorus goes, “Ride, Sally, Ride.” A true American hero.
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While I had read about this sentiment since the shootings in Aurora, Colorado, I actually heard someone in a physician’s office Tuesday morning, complaining to one of her colleagues, that neither President Obama nor Mitt Romney have said Word One about gun control. By contrast:
“Colin Ferguson snuck a handgun and 160 rounds of ammunition onto a commuter train in New York and shot more than two dozen people, killing six of them. His rampage dominated the news and stirred a national outpouring of shock and grief not unlike what we’re now seeing.

“It also prompted an immediate call from a Democratic president for a legislative response. Declaring that the epidemic of gun violence in America had ‘gotten so serious we should consider a lot of things that we haven’t done in the past,’ Bill Clinton made an explicit call for gun control on the day after the December 1993 massacre…

“Clinton’s subsequent push netted results, with the Democratic-controlled Congress passing an assault weapons ban in 1994. And just before the Long Island shootings, he’d signed the Brady Law, which mandated a five-day waiting period for the purchase of a handgun.” Unfortunately, the assault ban ran out in 2004, and the idea of bringing it back does not seem to be in the political wind.

The song that popped into my head is Lawyers, Guns, and Money by Warren Zevon; here’s the less-radio friendly version.
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From yesterday’s Los Angeles Times: “Sherman Hemsley, best known for playing George Jefferson on… “All in the Family” and its spinoff “The Jeffersons,” has died. Hemsley was 74…”The Jeffersons,” which ran on CBS from 1975 to 1985, was the first series about an upscale African American couple in prime time… Hemsley earned Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for his role as the irascible business owner.”

Wasn’t always a fan of the show, but always LOVED the Jeffersons theme, which told the narrative of the series in an entertaining way.

We had a very busy weekend. So I was quite tired Monday night, and went to bed at the amazingly early hour (for me) of 10 p.m. Then at about 11 p.m., the Wife and I heard incredible thunder, and saw lightning so bright, it lit up the room, even with the shades down and my back to the window; it went on for 15 or 20 minutes, yet the Daughter slept right through it. Lightning Strikes by Lou Christie popped into my head, though if I could have found a version by the Albany band Blotto beyond this snippet, I would have gone that route.

A very talented young cellist at my church belongs to some cello consortium. They will be playing, I learned from one of my fellow parishioners, the song Kashmir. I got the distinct impression that most of them had no idea what tune that was. It’s a song by Led Zeppelin, originally on the Physical Graffiti album, and sounds like THIS.

Speaking of Zeppelin, here’s a cover of the song The Ocean (track #8) by Kurt Hoffman’s Band of Weeds, which I own on a 4-song EP from Hello Records, which I happened upon in my collection.
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Also from yesterday’s LA Times: “Apple reported disappointing third-quarter results today that caused its stock price to plunge in after-hours trading. The technology giant said profit rose 21% to $8.8 billion on revenue of $35 billion, up 22% year over year. The results were less than what analysts had expected. Shares plummeted in after-hours trading, falling $34, or nearly 6%, to $566.78.” A 21% profit means falling stock prices.

The song: Oscillations by Silver Apples, from 1968, which I own on vinyl.
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One of my daughter’s “new” favorite songs is almost a half-century old. She heard it on a Glee album, so I had to play it for her by the original artist. It is She’s Not There, the first single by the British group The Zombies, which went to #12 in the UK and #2 on the US Billboard charts and in Canada. “Rolling Stone magazine ranked “She’s Not There” No. 297 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.” I love it because the harmony vocals in the chorus keep changing the song from the major to the minor mode. It was famously covered by Vanilla Fudge, which doesn’t sound like the Glee version at all.

After the Zombies broke up, Rod Argent formed a group called Argent, which had a big hit in 1972 with Hold Your Head Up, which I’m TRYING to do, because I’m still a bit fatigued.

Woody Guthrie would have been 100

The centennial of Woody Guthrie’s birth has turned out to be more significant to me than I would have thought 20 or 30 years ago.

As I have noted, my father was a singer of folk songs when I was growing up in Binghamton, NY. I did not usually know the source of the tunes that he performed, though I have subsequently have been discovered some of this information.

Back around 2002 or 2003, The Wife and I went to see Woody Guthrie’s American Song at Capital Rep Theatre, when this brace of songs, Worried Man and Ain’t Gonna Be Treated This Way came up. Both of them were in my father’s repertoire, especially the former. This was a couple of years after my father died, and I just lost it. The Car Song was also a Woody tune my dad sang, I’ve come to realize.

Of course, I was a big fan of This Land Is Your Land, mostly the versions by Guthrie’s good friend Pete Seeger. But it wasn’t until later when I learned all those great verses that one didn’t usually hear, such as those about No Trespassing, and the relief office.

But in the 1960s and 1970s, I was probably more a fan of Woody’s son Arlo, of Alice’s Restaurant fame. Woody had died in 1967 and was a remote figure to me.

Woody came alive again for me, though, because of a pair of albums that came out at the end of the last century, Mermaid Avenue, volumes 1 and 2, where Billy Bragg and the band Wilco completed song fragments by Woody. The albums have been re-released with additional material.

The centennial of Woody Guthrie’s birth has turned out to be more significant to me than I would have thought 20 or 30 years ago.

Woody singing:
Jesus Christ
Do Re Mi
This Land Is Your Land

Coverville 884: The Woody Guthrie Cover Story

Michael Eck’s Top 10 Woody Guthrie Collaborations

Woody Guthrie at 100 by Jim Hightower

Woody Guthrie at 100: The Return of a Pariah by Billy Bragg. “Woody Guthrie was shunned by his home state. Now Oklahoma can finally embrace the singer-songwriter’s work.”

Where’s Woody when we need him? He’s right there, inside each of us.

Roger McGuinn is 70

In those early days, the “Beatles were vocal in their support of The Byrds, publicly acknowledging them as creative competitors and naming them as their favorite American group. “

The Byrds, as this video makes clear, were a group of ex-folkies who were under the influence of the Beatles. They took a Bob Dylan song, processed it with a touch of Beach Boys!, which led to a number one single in the US and the UK, Mr. Tambourine Man (listen) in 1965. McGuinn’s “jangly” twelve-string Rickenbacker guitar also is featured on the US #1, Pete Seeger’s take on the book of Ecclesiastes, Turn! Turn! Turn! (to Everything There is a Season) (listen).

As Wikipedia notes, the Byrds “were pivotal in originating the musical styles of folk-rock, psychedelic rock, raga rock, and country-rock. The band underwent several line-up changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn remaining the sole consistent member of the group until their disbandment in 1973.” And I followed them through the many sometimes stormy permutations. When David Crosby left the group just before the release of The Notorious Byrd Brothers (1968), he was pictured on the album cover as the backside of an equine.

In those early days, the “Beatles were vocal in their support of The Byrds, publicly acknowledging them as creative competitors and naming them as their favorite American group. A number of authors…have noted The Byrds influence on The Beatles’ late 1965 album Rubber Soul, most notably on the songs Nowhere Man and If I Needed Someone (listen), the latter of which utilizes the same guitar riff as The Byrds’ cover of The Bells of Rhymney (listen).”

Other hits by the Byrds – with musical links:
Eight Miles High (1966), one of the first examples of psychedelic rock
Mr. Spaceman (1966)
So You Want To Be A Rock N Roll Star (1967)
My Back Pages (1967) – another Dylan cover
You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere (1968) – from the classic country-rock album, Sweetheart of the Rodeo

And though the group broke up back in 1973, Roger McGuinn has kept busy in the music business, as one can read on his website. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991.

But my favorite factoid about the leader of the group is this:
James Roger McGuinn (born James Joseph McGuinn III), known professionally as Roger McGuinn…When he originally started with The Byrds, he used the name Jim, which he thought to be too plain. During 1965 McGuinn briefly explored the Subud spiritual association… McGuinn changed his name in 1967 after Subud’s founder Bapak told him it would better “vibrate with the universe.” Bapak sent Jim the letter “R” and asked him to send back ten names starting with that letter. Owing to a fascination with airplanes, gadgets and science fiction, he sent names like “Rocket”, “Retro”, “Ramjet”, and “Roger”, the latter a term used in signaling protocol over two-way radios, military and civil aviation. Roger was the only “real” name in the bunch and Bapak chose it.

Good pick. Happy birthday, Roger McGuinn.

Y is for Yellow Submarine

The soundtrack to the movie Yellow Submarine was not released until January 1969, some six months after the movie debuted.

Yellow Submarine was a song by The Beatles, with Ringo Starr on the lead vocals. It was issued as a single, coupled with Eleanor Rigby, and released just before it appeared on the Revolver album. It has a peculiar little difference, though, which I remember distinctly; on the single version, during the last verse, the responses start one line earlier, with “life of ease”. Compare the album version with the single version around 1:40.

It became the title song of a 1968 animated United Artists film. The Beatles themselves had little to do with the making of the movie – other actors did the voices of the Beatles characters – though the movie was chock full of songs from the latter half of their career. This is a movie I saw at least four times, once on a day I saw ALL of the Beatles’ movies in one sitting. I even watched it on commercial television (CBS, I think), which is not recommended.

Oddly, the soundtrack to the movie was not released until January 1969, some six months after the movie debuted. The second side of the album was instrumental music arranged by George Martin. Side one starts with the album version of the title song and ends with All You Need Is Love. There were four other songs on that album:

Only a Northern Song
All Together Now
Hey Bulldog
It’s All Too Much.

In 1999, Yellow Submarine – Songtrack was released. It dumps the instrumentals for other Beatles songs used in the film, mostly or all remastered.

Now, The classic 1968 animated feature “Yellow Submarine” showcasing music by the Beatles has been “carefully restored frame-by-frame for a special DVD release May 28, 2012.”

I haven’t seen it in a couple of decades, and it’d be interesting to see how it stands up.
(Note: I had some links to movie segments that are no longer operational; I am willing to bet that you can find similar clips on YouTube from time to time.)

ABC Wednesday – Round 10

Blood, music, SCOTUS

I got a big chuckle out of my daughter vigorously singing the chorus to a Phil Ochs song.

I’ve now donated blood 149 times. The only two times I’ve ever had difficulty were time #59, obviously several years ago, and time #148, in April 2012. The commonality was that I was sitting in a chair each time, rather than lying down. The April visit was brutal, with three different attendants manipulating my arm, the needle…it took well over 20 minutes when it generally takes me 6 or 7; I’m talking about the actual blood flow time, not the preliminary exam, et al. I was so exhausted and bruised afterward, that I went home and went to bed, instead of going to choir, which had been my intent.

So when I went again last week – getting “back on the horse,” as it were – I made sure I went to a place (Empire State Plaza, for you locals) that had cots.

Sure enough, 7 minutes and 6 seconds, and I’m done. The medical person helping me this time insisted that lying down is better for the blood flow, and easier for recovery, but that people prefer the chairs because they are more comfortable. She also noted that 5 to 8 minutes is optimal; some guy who bragged about being able to donate in 4 minutes would be in serious trouble if HE were ever in a serious accident.
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For Father’s Day, my wife gave me a ticket to the Old Songs Festival at the Altamont Fairgrounds, about a half-hour from here. When I was younger, I went all the time, but I think the last time I attended was in 2002, the year my wife went to Ukraine. She did not go with me this time either because of church obligations; she is on the Administration Committee and is helping sort through over 100 resumes for a part-time church secretary.

But the Daughter went with me on Saturday, June 23. We spent the first hour trying to wash sunscreen out of her eye, but eventually, we could enjoy the program. Went to see a couple called Magpie, and another couple, Kim and Reggie Harris perform songs of Phil Ochs, the noted folk singer who died over 35 years ago. Sunny Ochs, Phil’s sister, was there, too, and she has long encouraged singers of Phil’s songs to change the lyrics to more contemporary references when necessary. I knew LOTS of the songs, but I got a big chuckle out of my daughter vigorously singing the chorus to Love Me, I’m a Liberal, one of those songs with changed verses. (No one knows who the late talk show host Les Crane was anymore.)

Then we went to the Songs of the African diaspora with Peace Train, a black woman and a white woman from South Africa, assisted by Kim and Reggie Harris, who had come from about as far on the fairgrounds as one can. Kim noted that the girl who was sitting in front at this show (yes, the Daughter) was dancing at the Ochs show (true) and that Kim wishes she had that kind of energy.

The last Sunday in June, the whole family attended a high school graduation party. Ever have a really good friend you lose touch with, even though they aren’t that far away? That was the case with my friend Debbie, the mother of the graduate, who was one of my very best friends in the 1980s, but who I’ve talked with only intermittently since. It was good to see her again, though she was so busy playing hostess that we didn’t talk much. Maybe next time…

So what did you think of that Supreme Court ruling last Thursday? Oh, not that health care thing, the decision that the Stolen Valor Act is unconstitutional. “The Stolen Valor Act…makes it a federal crime to lie about having received a military decoration or medal, punishable by up to a year in prison if the offense involved the military’s highest honors.” I support the ruling that the law was unconstitutional on First Amendment/freedom of speech grounds with the same biting-of-the-lip sensation that had when I agreed with the Court allowing Nazis to demonstrate in Skokie, IL. I support the principle more than I hate the action.

As for that OTHER case, I had taken a “Well, it’s better than the status quo” take on that 2010 health care bill, the Affordable Care Act. But with the meltdown by its opponents, I am enjoying its affirmation by the Supreme Court far more than I expected. Meanwhile, CNN should slink off in shame for reporting, for seven minutes, the absolute wrong outcome. (FOX News also muffed it for two minutes, but it HAS no shame.) The term “Obamacare” had been designed as a dis, but that putdown may now work in the President’s favor.