Music Madness

Bohemian Rhapsody On The Way To School

 

When I was a kid, it was usually The Doors, Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix or the Woodstock soundtrack in my dad's car -- but he was a Queen fan too. Either way, this rocks.

Chris Ethridge

Okay, between Dick Clark, Levon Helm and now Chris Ethridge, I'm getting a little tired of hearing news of deaths in the music community. But like Frank would tell you..."That's Life".

Former Flying Burrito Brothers bassist Chris Ethridge passed into eternity yesterday (April 23) of unknown circumstances. Chris was the solid bottom end sound of the Cosmic American Music pioneers (a term fellow FBB Gram Parsons preferred over "Country Rock") and, along with the late Michael Clark, made up a powerful rhythm section that would set a template later used by acts like The Eagles, Poco and many others of that ilk.

Ethridge was a member of the Brothers for only one album during their salad days, the unbelievable The Gilded Palace of Sin, but that was more than enough to leave a legacy.  The video below is all the evidence you need that that statement isn't hyperbolic (the video focuses, naturally, on Parsons but I would suggest listening rather than watching).  Ethridge co-wrote this masterpiece with Gram and this style of music would never be the same.

 

Ethridge left FBB before the second album, Burrito Deluxe, was recorded but made it back around to the band in 1975 to record Flying Again. Between those tenures and after, Chris stuck mostly to session work. His resume includes GP, Gram Parsons solo debut, two of Willie Nelson's best albums, Stardust and Honeysuckle Rose, also work with Ry Cooder, Linda Ronstadt, Graham Nash & David Crosby and one of my all-time favorites, White Light by former Byrd, Gene Clark.

Thank you for your service Chris, hopefully Gram was waiting in the ether to greet you.

Levon sings Bruce.

 

And he shall be Levon

Sad news yesterday in the music world.  The Band drummer, co-vocalist, all around gentleman Levon Helm is in the final stages of his fight with cancer.

The older I get, the more I have to say goodbye to things I enjoy.  Things that have given my life meaning and inspiration.  Fortunately for me, many of these things have left a body of work that can be revisited when longing sets in.  Levon Helm is soon to become one of these things.

Now, when you think of The Band, the dynamic was an interesting one.  4 of the 5 members were Canadian, yet their catalog is made of almost exclusively "American" music.  That sprang from a deep knowledge of all varieties of what America had to offer musically.  Tin Pan Alley, Chicago blues, R&B, Rockabilly, the list, like the road, goes on forever.  If Robbie Robertson was the songwriting spark, Richard Manuel was the tortured soul, Rick Danko was the innocent angel, Garth Hudson was the musical mad monk, then Levon was the street cred of The Band.  Hailing from Turkey Scratch, Arkansas, Levon was the miner that tapped the vein containing all the legitimacy that Ronnie Hawkins and Bob Dylan saw in 5 young men who would quietly change the course of late '60's music.  Post Cream, Clapton wanted to join The Band.  George Harrison expressed jealousy that a band could exist in a bubble with a (perceived) lack of ego.  Bob Dylan called upon them, not just to go electric but also in service of a return to the stage in 1974 after a long hiatus.  The Band was Dylan's security blanket.

Safe travels, Levon, as you prepare to make the swim to the other shore.  I will forever treasure you telling me, "hang tough, bro! Play the blues!"

 

Somedays...

...I miss my friend Shannon.  Today is one of those days.

 

Underrated Album v. 8-How I Spent My Summer Vacation by Truck Stop Love

Good Friday, 1995.  17 years ago, I attended the album release party of a Manhattan, Kansas band called Truck Stop Love.  They were releasing their first (and sadly only) full-length on Backyard Records.  How I Spent My Summer Vacation is that album.

TSL was, arguably, the most successful band to come out of Manhattan, not just in the 90's, but ever.  The 90's were the peak of Manhattan's local music scene.  Labels were scouring the states for the next this or that, bars in town were actually supporting live music, people actually showed up and creativity seemed to be at an apex.  There was a great confluence of bands in Manhattan at that time.  Between Puke Weasel/Spine, Roach Factory, Sufferbus, TSL, Ten Thumb and countless others, the "scene" kinda meant something.  Truck Stop Love got picked up by Scotti Brothers records, recorded an EP and then started in on the full-length that's the subject of this post.

With a Midwestern bar band sound that perfectly mixed influences of The Replacements, Urge Overkill, TSL running buddies God's Favorite Band, Big Star (this album was co-produced by Big Star drummer Jody Stephens) and many others, Truck Stop Love managed to coalesce all of that into an album that shines as the pinnacle representation of what it meant to be in this area, in the local music scene at the time. 

The album's cover art, a basic turntable book-ended with two well worn speakers, visually represented what awaited on the disc.  The lead track 'You Owe' is exactly what the title implies (if you read between the lines of the title).  It's an Urge Overkill-inspired blast that's over almost as soon as it starts.  The next song, 'Other Stars', shows how perfectly balanced this band was, in terms of utilizing their twin singer/guitarist threats, Matt Mozier (vocals on 'You Owe') and Rich Yarges (vocals 'Other Stars').  Mozier's voice was the gruff, Paul Westerberg-esque sound, capable of conveying both pleasure and pain, whereas Yarges owned the cleaner, more plaintive voice that reflected sorrowful heartache. 

I'm probably a bit biased but, all these years later, I still don't hear a clunker on the album.  'Walton's Mountain' adds a touch of banjo to the garage punk proceedings, the title track is one of the fastest, hardest rock songs you'll ever hear in the genre and 'Benny' is a quick strike tribute to the band's pals in God's Favorite Band.  'Bitter Boy' is the standout track, in my opinion.  I'll spare my words and just let you listen for yourself.

 

Also, listen to the slow build of 'Carolina's Eyes', to hear the best song Husker Du never wrote.

 

The band didn't hold together much longer after the release of this album, but the magic and inspiration they committed to this release stands as a document of a time when anything was possible.

A few words about "The New Beatles"

Good morning gang.  Now, I know we really try to foster positivity on this here blog but I feel there is something out there, Beatles related, that needs to be addressed and it's not going to get a lot of positive vibes from me.  That something is James McCartney (Paul's son) coming out and saying that he'd be up for forming a band featuring nothing but begotten Beatles.  Um, This. Is. Stupid.  Don't get me wrong, people are free to form bands in any permutation that they wish, I'm cool with that.  But, really James, let it be.

On the surface the prospect of James, Dhani Harrison, Sean Lennon and Zac Starkey coming together would seem like a marketing dream.  But let me posit that it would be an absolute nightmare for all involved (and by "all involved" I mean "the fans").  First off, what would you call yourselves, The Silver (Spoon) Beetles?  Second, Zac doesn't want to be involved.  Dude didn't even want to join The Who or Oasis on a full-time basis.  It's interesting that the least talented Beatle spawned the most (musically) talented Beatle kid.  Third, there's a reason you don't tinker with The Beatles formula-it's because you're not a Beatle.  Paul is Paul, you're James. 

Also, how'd this sort of thing work out for the New Monkees?  Not good, if I recall.  Those guys were just cobbled together-much like the original Monkees-and had nothing (generally) to live up to.  You're Beatle children.  I don't think it would be well-received if Jack Osbourne got the Sabbath progeny together and started a band called Jack Sabbath.  Now, it's one thing to have a group like The Temptations still performing and not one of the members is original, or under the age of 36 for that matter.  KISS most likely will carry on for eons without Paul and Gene, that's sort of what KISS is bred for now, to be a Broadway production that just plugs in a guy with a hairy chest and a star painted on his face when Paul Stanley gives up the ghost.  The Beatles aren't meant for those scenarios.

Again, I would not begrudge the lads if they decided to go this route.  They would at least be the only qualified people on the planet to do it.  I just don't get the part where you're inner pride or moxie or whatever doesn't kick in and say "hey, I kinda want to do my own thing and not make a big shadow bigger".  Anyway, I'm probably in the minority since most would respond with "what's the big deal?" but I feel that someone has to start the push back on this and I'll step into that breach.

Underrated Album v. 7-Electric Mud by Muddy Waters

So, let me get this straight.  There's an album out there by a blues legend featuring songs that Zeppelin credits as inspiring the riff for 'Black Dog', an album that Hendrix would listen to for inspiration and this same album has a gospel/soul cover of a Rolling Stones song ('Let's Spend The Night Together') and people flat out hate it?  Wow, I'm confused.

This album that I'm surprised about is Electric Mud by McKinley Morganfield, better known to the world as Muddy Waters (if I have to give you ANY background on Muddy, why are you reading a music blog?).  On paper, the pitch of this album makes total sense.  A generation extolling the virtues of blues music, the rise of psychedelic music and the fairly new melding of the two in the form of electric blues (Cream, Zeppelin, Mountain etc.).  However, this album has been heralded and panned, critically loved and crucified.  I happen to be in the camp that finds it misunderstood and innovative.  You take a master of the guitar and blues reasoning, stick him with a group of top flight Chicago Chess Records musicians, add a fuzz box and wah pedal and you have an entirely new form of interpreted blues.

Granted, in its context of the time, this album was received by a less sophisticated audience, not burdened by years of hindsight-this the same generation that booed Dylan for going electric, despite the fact that he already had at least one album out with electricity on it.  I get that it's more than all that but I don't care. 

Electric Mud has two Waters classics ('Mannish Boy' and 'She's Alright'), three from the legendary Willie Dixon, the aforementioned Stones tune, topped off with 'Tom Cat' and 'Herbert Harper's Free Press News', a song Jimi would listen to in order to draw motivation to continue his explorations.  Not much else needs to be said about this album, just listen.

 

As a post-script I will add that there is no truth to the rumor that Debbie Gibson's Electric Youth was a direct sequel to this album...simply an homage.

 

Underrated Album v. 6-Welcome to Sky Valley by Kyuss

As promised in a previous post, 1994's Welcome to Sky Valley is making its entry to the Underrated Album pantheon.  I post this album as a form of confession.  This record pulls a nice joke on the listener and my love of disrupting things gets fed by what Kyuss does here.  (As an aside, there is never any need to utter the phrase "spoiler alert" in my presence, I love spoilers and don't believe in protecting them)  What the band has done on this record is take 10 tracks and sequence them into 3 Movements, insuring that it's impossible to skip around to random tracks on your cd player/ipod.  Records like this are meant to be heard as a document and Kyuss presents it as such.

Movement I ends its 17 plus minute trek with 'Supa Scoopa and Mighty Scoop' and its false ending that would drive any dj crazy...oh wait, there aren't dj's anymore.  Movement II kicks off with the wah-wah intro to '100 (degrees)' and quickly gets down to business with a monster riff that eventually wraps up the cycle with the mellower 'Demon Cleaner', a song that pointed directly to Josh Homme's future in Queens of the Stone Age.  Movement III runs between the desert distortion the band practically invented, mellow tones found throughout the album and ending with the slightly proggy 'Whitewater'.  The last song, a stand-alone track called 'Lick Doo', is stupid but that's the point.  It ends the album on a refreshing note telling the listener not to take it so seriously, giving us all a moment to come down from the barrage of riffs, distortion and general haziness we've gone through.

Josh Homme, Brant Bjork, Scott Reeder and John Garcia had this one last go round before Alfredo Hernandez replaced Bjork on drums and that line-up efforted one more album in 1995, ...And The Circus Leaves Town, a self-aware title if I ever heard one.  All parties involved in the various incarnations of Kyuss have continued with their music explorations, some great (Homme and his Midas touch), some good (Brant Bjork and the Bros) and some not quite up to snuff (one-time bassist Nick Oliveri's Mondo Generator, not to mention felony charges that might land him 15 years in the grey-bar hotel).  Kyuss has done some reunion shows of late, without Homme's blessing or participation but with his cease and desist request.

 

Underrated Album v. 5-Sunrise On The Sufferbus by Masters of Reality

Speaking only personally, the '90's were a bit of a drag musically.  Obsessed with either cleaning up after the cocaine binge known as the '80's (and thus eliminating their creative motivation) or keeping up with the affectation of disaffection coming out of Seattle most bands forgot what it meant to just do what you do.  Enter Masters of Reality.

Now, I don't expect anyone to have any idea of who I'm talking about but this collective of musicians have been sporadically putting out albums of varying aptitude since their self-titled, Rick Rubin produced debut album in 1988.  Sunrise On The Sufferbus was the 1992 follow-up to that (also unappreciated) gem.  The master of Masters, Chris Goss, put himself, bassist Googe and drummer Ginger Baker-yes, the Ginger Baker who is the greatest drummer of all time-on to a 14 song disc that was, basically, unlike anything coming out at that time. 

The choice of Baker is probably not much of an accident, seeing how Goss has a higher register akin to Baker's former Cream nemesis Jack Bruce.  As such, this album has a bit of a desert-rock vibe shot through a prism of classic rock.  No mistake there either (on the desert-rock end), seeing as Chris Goss is long-time running buddies with Josh Homme of Kyuss/Queens of the Stone Age/Them Crooked Vultures/Eagles of Death Metal.  There's a deep west coast feel to this album that wouldn't truly be heard in its pure form until Kyuss released the Chris Goss produced Welcome to Sky Valley (the next installment of Underrated Albums).  Plus, how can you go wrong when one of the tunes, 'T.U.S.A.', has Baker griping about how we here in the colonies have no idea how to make proper tea.

The video herein is the song ('She Got Me') that got the most play off the album (read:it was on twice on MTV) and does feature a quick glimpse of Jenny From The Block dancing it up in the best Fly Girl fashion imaginable (for Pete's sake, the 90's were garbage).  Enjoy.