Lately

So, "enjoying" my retirement?

I have maybe half the energy I used to. I'm definitely not 55 anymore.

But I "musicked-out" twice in the past week, more than usual lately. Recently I've been playing two or three hours of music maybe once a month, if that often.

Last music session yesterday was mostly new-to-me or overlooked stuff on CD.

Previous session was mostly recently-purchased 45rpm singles I'd recently tracked down -- but eventually I got to a first listen to Stevie Wonder's 1973 album "Innervisions," which I found to be pretty great. Seven of its nine songs were well worth hearing, and the new ones that especially grabbed me were "All in Love is Fair" and "Golden Lady."

Of course "Higher Ground" has always been great, and I've loved "Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing" ever since I first heard it way back in 1974. I hadn't heard "Living for the City" in *years,* and had forgotten how passionately Stevie sang it. And I'd never heard the long version before.

But for me, "All in Love is Fair" and "Golden Lady" were the standouts. When Stevie gets into a groove he's really amazing.

Of course I should have known all this already, but there are many gaps in my listening. I've loved many of Stevie's hits over the years and have three of his studio albums and a couple of best-of's in the house. But I sure haven't heard everything.

Anyway, "Innervisions" is the best thing I've heard in awhile.

Awhile back I also heard Harmonium's 1977 album "The Five Seasons" -- very nice melodic progressive rock from Canada, very pretty. Nice moods, and parts were exuberant enough to make me laugh -- even if I couldn't tell what the guys were singing. They sang in French, because they were from Quebec.

These days I'm doing good if I can get through three albums in a sitting. After that, my mind starts to wander or I'm worn out.

Awhile back I went on a sort of crusade with old Van Morrison albums after I found his "Best of Volume 2" CD and was charmed despite the old-fashionedness of some of it.

Think I did five Van albums in a row -- most were only average. "Inarticulate Speech of the Heart," "Beautiful Vision," "Into the Music," "A Period of Transition" -- "Wavelength" was the best of these. Most of the albums had maybe one good track and a lot of filler. OK, pleasant, decent, but nothing stunning. Mood music at best. Linda said it was like Van just couldn't do it anymore -- "it" being the magical spell he weaved on "St. Dominic's Preview," "Moondance" and "Tupelo Honey" -- and on "Best of Volume 2," even though to me the jury was out for a long time on that one until he finally convinced me with the brief "Coney Island" and the live "Rave On, John Donne."

My mind wandering has been an issue with reading fiction lately, too. I can read a few short stories and then I get bored with fiction. I can't remember the last novel I made it all the way through. Best short stories I've read lately are Joyce Carol Oates's brilliant and spooky "Six Hypotheses" and Dan Simmons' dark and creepy "My Personal Memoirs of the Hoffer Stigmata Epidemic" -- both cosmic-horror short stories.

I've been reading a lot of non-fiction -- for months now -- but I don't have that much new non-fiction in the house, so have mostly been re-reading old stuff. Was on a binge of science fiction writers' autobiographies and biographies for awhile -- Alec Nevala-Lee's "Astounding," Julie Phillips' great biography of SF writer James Tiptree Jr., Robert Silverberg's "Other Places, Other Times," Damon Knight's excellent history of "The Futurians," "Hell's Cartographers," stuff like that. But there isn't enough of it. SF-author bios and autobios didn't become "a thing" until recent years, unfortunately.

Have been doing a little bit of writing, though of course I should be doing more. Wrote an entire 2,500-word ghost story a couple of weeks ago, but have held off going back to re-read it until it "cools off" a little. Started another science-fiction story the next day, and got down some ideas for a third new story a few days ago, but I don't seem to have much drive to finish any of them.

Added a couple scenes over the last couple days to a trashy '80s/'90s-style horror novel I originally had the idea to write a couple of years ago. I wrote maybe 7,500 words of it in a few days right after I first had the idea a couple years back, then backed away from it because -- although the words were coming out way easily -- it meant nothing to me personally. It was just a thing I was doing, it didn't actually involve me.

A couple mornings ago it occurred to me that if the words were coming and it was fun to do, why not just continue on with it? Writing used to be fun for me, so why not roll with it as long as I'm having a good time and not having to force it?

So we'll see where that goes.

Otherwise, I don't feel terrible, but my energy level comes and goes. On cloudy, rainy days it feels like I never really wake up. Each winter seems to get longer. This is a problem for me because the first 80-degree day we had here in western Washington was in the last week of June. The first 70-degree day we had was sometime in early May.

Some days it takes an act of Congress to get me out of the house, even if the sun is out.

What bothers me is, sometimes Linda feels the same way. And usually she was the one who got me to get up and get out even if I didn't want to. Now we both have to make an effort to get something rolling.

Did go see my daughter in Seattle for Father's Day, which was a real step out of my comfort zone. Visiting somewhere new? Riding a ferry across Puget Sound? Braving the Seattle traffic? Actually sort of getting lost for a bit? Pretty daring, for me. But my daughter was awesome as usual, and I got to meet her boyfriend and see their cute, tiny apartment, and had a wonderful couple of hours. So it was all good.

And that's what's been going on lately. More soon.

Recently heard

Heard all of these in a four-hour musicking-out session a week ago and have yet to report on them here:

* Henry Cow with Slapp Happy: "In Praise of Learning" (1975) -- Loud, screechy, sometimes annoying, but not completely terrible. One track, "Beautiful as the Moon - Terrible as an Army With Banners" actually gets its political message across in a compelling portrait of The End Times. Most annoying thing about this band is Dagmar Krause's sing-song vocals, like some kind of German music-hall. Occasional nice piano, screechy guitar, wayward horns, but overall not too far from National Health or Hatfield and the North. I might even keep it.

* Badfinger: "Straight Up" (1972) -- "Perfection" is the hidden gem on this album, but even so it doesn't measure up to the awesome "Baby Blue" and the gorgeous "Day After Day," or even "Name of the Game" -- a stronger version of which is included on Apple's Badfinger best-of. The best of this is pleasant enough, but it comes nowhere near hitting as hard as the two hit singles.

* David Bowie: "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars" (1972) -- Heard this once or twice before over the years and always thought it sounded cramped, pinched, uncomfortable. Listened to the whole thing from start to finish this time around, relaxed and enjoyed all of it, was no longer distracted by whatever Bowie was up to. Nor did I feel a need to connect the dots to make it all "make sense." Maybe I've finally gotten used to him?

* Bruce Springsteen: "Born to Run" (1975) -- I've loved the title hit since back in '75. I was the only person I knew who bought the single back in the day. But I'd never heard the whole album, so.... The title song's a classic of course, and I loved "She's the One." "Thunder Road"'s a good, solid opener and "Meeting Across the River" is a nice moody change of pace. But I admit I was starting to drift a bit by the time I got to "Backstreets" ... or whatever it was.

I also finished listening to Mott the Hoople's first album and "Brain Capers," both feature good, solid stuff on their Side 2's, but I admit the surprise and enjoyment I experienced when first hearing their early work awhile back has since worn off a little.

More soon!

New additions

Picked up during yesterday's trip to my favorite used-record store in the world, Hi-Voltage Records in Tacoma, Washington:

* Fanny's first album and "Mother's Pride."

* Family's "Old Songs, New Songs."

* David Sancious's solo-piano-jazz "The Bridge."

* Stevie Wonder's "Innervisions."

* Spirit's "Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus." I sold this off a few years back when money got tight, and I missed it.

* Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Bayou Country."

* The Association's first album "And Then, Along Comes...."

* The Lovin' Spoonful's "Daydream."

* Wall of Voodoo's "Call of the West."

* John Denver's "Farewell Andromeda."

* K-Tel's "20 Explosive Original Hits" by various artists, from around 1970.

Overall, an average visit to Hi-Voltage, nothing too shocking or surprising. I'll be reporting on all of these here, eventually....

Recently read and heard

Before we go any further, here's a list of new-to-me stuff I've been reading and listening to lately. This list covers my music and book intake back to June. Funny, I thought there was more:

BOOKS:

* Paul Theroux -- Figures in a Landscape. Theroux's third collection of essays, covering everything from a profile of Robin Williams to slabs of family history and autobiography. Theroux claims he'll never write a full autobiography or memoir, but he's already written at least one -- the brilliant history of a friendship "Sir Vidia's Shadow."

* The Best of Rolling Stone. This 400-page collection of nonfiction pieces was originally published as a special issue of the magazine back in 1992. There's some great stuff here (all cut for space), but the writers' introductions are the best part. Daisann McLane's awesome "The Girl in the Tweed Jacket" is maybe the best, most personal peek behind the scenes, but I wish McLane's wonderful 1979 portrait of Fleetwood Mac, "Five Not-So-Easy Pieces," had been included.

* Gene Sculatti and others -- The 100 Best-Selling Albums of the '60s/'70s/'80s/90s. Dull, unsurprising and full of errors, this low-budget rush-job series was a big disappointment. The only surprises come from learning what kind of crap music most people buy. Gene Sculatti's a good rock critic, but the editors gave him no room to write, and the editing and proofreading are hideous. Avoid.

* Michael Lesy -- Wisconsin Death Trip, The Forbidden Zone. "Forbidden Zone" is about people who deal with death every day -- homicide detectives, undertakers, pathologists, etc. Some of them are such odd characters that they deserved to be in a book. "Wisconsin Death Trip" is about what happened in a small rural Wisconsin town between 1890 and 1910, when an agricultural failure and depression followed outbreaks of diphtheria, dysentery, smallpox and more. People went crazy. Eerie, odd, depressing, one of a kind.

* David Leigh and Luke Harding -- WikiLeaks. Covers the frantic early days of the WikiLeaks classified-information-leak site, but for the rest of the story you'll have to consult Wikipedia.

* Judy Pasternak -- Yellow Dirt. Follows what happens when Navajos start mining uranium on their reservation in Arizona, and the U.S. government stonewalls the tribe about the effects of uranium exposure and radiation for the next 60 years....

* Barbara Moran -- The Day We Lost the H-Bomb. Recounts how the U.S. Air Force accidentally dropped three unactivated atomic bombs on a small town in southern Spain back in 1966. A fourth bomb fell into the Mediterranean Sea and took two months to find.

* Nicholas A. Basbane -- A Gentle Madness. About *extreme* book-collectors. One great long chapter is about a man who stole more than 5,000 rare books from libraries and universities over a 20-year period. Most of the schools never realized the books were missing.

* Six science fiction writers -- Hell's Cartographers. Writers like Robert Silverberg, Frederik Pohl, Brian Aldiss and Alfred Bester talk about what got them hooked on reading and writing science fiction.

* Nine more science fiction writers -- Fantastic Lives. This is more scattershot than "Hell's Cartographers" and much less interesting. Still, some good stuff by Barry Malzberg, Norman Spinrad, R.A. Lafferty.

* James Gunn -- The Listeners. This 1972 science-fiction novel has a great idea at its center, and the first chapter's pretty good. Then the absurd and insignificant "human drama" gets more and more in the way and the book gets sillier and sillier. Gave up halfway through.

MUSIC:

* Mott the Hoople -- first album, side 1. Brain Capers, side 1. Rock and Roll Queen early-best-of. "Rock and Roll Queen" sucked me in. Early Mott was great when they roared. Side 1 of their first album is mostly a great Bob Dylan impersonation. Side 1 of "Brain Capers" features more greatness. I'll be getting back to these guys soon.

* Funkadelic -- Maggot Brain. Loud and chaotic, with an awesome Hendrixy 10-minute guitar solo on the title track. Some throwback R&B-type cuts in the middle, leading to the crazed "Super Stupid" and the sound collage "Wars of Armageddon" -- which along with a steady beat includes protests, chanting, screaming, a mooing cow, and cosmic farts. "Revolution 9" should have sounded like this.

* Tim Buckley -- Happy Sad. Perfect music for lounging around all day in bed with your Significant Other.

* Amazing Blondel -- Evensong. Cute fake-15th-Century English folk music, but nowhere near as good as their later "Fantasia Lindum" and "England."

* The Kinks -- Arthur. Each song turns into real basic bash-it-out English rock'n'roll, and thank God. Includes the glorious "Shangri-La" and rockin' "Victoria," and nice bits like the hilarious "Yes Sir, No Sir" and "She Bought a Hat Like Princess Marina."

* Three songs from Magazine's "Real Life." More listening required.

More soon!

All new Strange Music marathon!

OK, here's the scam: I have this HUGE pile of previously-unheard Strange Music piled up here for a book project that may never get finished, and what I'm gonna try to do now is listen to a bunch of it and review it off the top of my head as it plays, and see how much I can take. Three hours is usually my drop-dead point, but I'm pretty bored musically right now, so let's see.
But first, something to warm up the turntable....
* Steppenwolf: Move Over, from MONSTER (1970) -- Hilarious lyrics about how that impatient younger generation is pushin' ol' John Kay to the brink. Nice screechy guitar. OK organ, too. Production seems a little muddy and bass-heavy.
* Touch: We Feel Fine, from their first album (1969) -- Loud organ and guitar fanfares, high-pitched vocalist. All I know about these guys is that keyboardist Don Gallucci later became a record producer. Psychedelic, a little crude, one nice lyric about "watching L.A. fall into the sea." A lot going on here in late-'60s heavy! fashion. OK group vocals on the "We feel fine" chorus-line. At least there was no drum solo. Nice spacey album cover, by the way.
* Touch: Friendly Birds -- This is as quiet as "We Feel Fine" was loud. Acoustic guitar and hushed vocals. Briefly sounds like it's gonna turn into a Broadway show-tune, like something from HAIR. Then nice guitar-and-piano mid-section. Meanders. Some talent, but a good snappy tune would help.
* Touch: Miss Teach -- No. Sounds like Pink Floyd's THE WALL cut down to 3-1/2 minutes.
* Touch: Seventy-Five -- This is the album's 11-minute magnum opus. Sounds like the Stories' Ian Lloyd on vocals. About dreams and dreaming -- nice spacey organ, if you're into "freaking out." Ah, so THIS is where the drum solo is. That repeating police-siren organ riff is really annoying. Made it through, tho. Eleven minutes I'll never get back. And a waste of $8. What else have we got?
* Trapeze: Black Cloud, from MEDUSA (1970?) -- This sounds like bad Deep Purple. I heard an earlier Trapeze album that was gentle and folky and psych-ish, and this is way cruder. Occasional flashes of a lighter touch, but not enuf. They're a power trio. And the singer's annoying. How did this end up on the Moody Blues' Threshold label? Produced by John Lodge of the Moodies. Glenn Hughes ended up in Deep Purple, didn't he? Lotsa cowbell, if you care.
* Trapeze: Medusa -- This is lighter, and moodier. And of course it's the last track. And the singing's still annoying. And then they heavy it up.... No.
* Funkadelic: Standing on the Verge of Getting it On, from the album of the same name (1974) -- Opens with squiggly comedy vocals, then into a funky dance groove with group vocals. Makes me want to move. Middle-break call-and-response vocals sound like James Brown. This is pretty nice -- I was actually expecting something heavier.
* Funkadelic: Jimmy's Got a Little Bit of Bitch in Him, from STANDING ON THE VERGE.... -- Sly, low-key vocals. The message seems to be -- you name it, it's OK! Over too fast.
* Funkadelic: Good Thoughts Bad Thoughts, from STANDING.... -- Opens with 6+ minutes of nice, spacey solo guitar, by either Eddie Hazel or Gary Shider. Then a low-key vocal offering Cosmic Advice, among which is: "Free your mind and your ass will follow. Good thoughts bring forth good fruit. Bullshit thoughts rot your needs. Think right and you can fly." Nice, laid back, very pleasant. Who knew?
* The Roches: The Hallelujah Chorus, from KEEP ON DOING (1982) -- Yes, THAT one. The Roches did some great stuff on their first album (1979): "Hammond Song" is heartbreakingly gorgeous, "Quitting Time" is almost as good, "We" is funny, and "The Married Men" is worth hearing. This is an impressive a capella exercise. And that's all. It's not funny, it's just odd.
* Roches: Losing True, from KEEP ON -- THIS is more like it. Gorgeous trio vocals, eventually followed by Bob Fripp's ghostly guitar. Maggie Roche was some songwriter. Fripp produced, of course. More songs like this and they woulda been world famous.
* Roches: The Largest Elizabeth in the World, from KEEP ON -- Cute, funny, silly.
* Roches: Sex is for Children, from KEEP -- Overlapping vocals with Fripp's guitar. Kinda noisy, at first. Then becomes a guitar duo. I can't really hear the words, and they're not included on the lyric sheet.
* Roches: Keep on Doing What You Do/Jerks on the Loose -- Their vocal blend was really magic. This is like the album's big production number -- it almost sounds like there's strings on here. Hey! Three-quarters of the '80s King Crimson is on this album! Says Bill Bruford's here, wonder where? OK, the vocals are fine and the playing's good, but I didn't really notice the words. For a Big Closer, I wonder if that's good. Two out of three?
* Mimi and Richard Farina: Pack Up Your Sorrows, from CELEBRATIONS FOR A GRAY DAY (1965) -- Wow, Bob Dylan and Joan Baez. Only Bob would never be this sweet. Charming.
* Nektar: Marvelous Moses, from RECYCLED (1975) -- Opens with lotsa keyboards, then wordy verses and choruses. Mildly funky. Then a keyboard fanfare. Which builds rather nicely. And gets cut off so we can go back to the verses. The Girlfriend points out there's nothing in the first half of the song to warrant the instrumental build-up. The vocals and the tune seem to be out of time just a bit. Not their best.
* Peter Gabriel: Here Comes the Flood, from his first album (1977) -- Wow, pretty dramatic. And I thought I didn't like him....
* Peter Gabriel: Moribund the Burgermeister, from the CAR album -- Hmmm. Could be Genesis. The mid-section is evil, mechanical music. GF says it sounds like Peter's making fun of something. Playful. Funny.
* Syd Barrett: Dark Globe, from AN INTRODUCTION TO.... (2017) -- "Won't you miss me at all?" RIP.
* Steve Hackett: Please Don't Touch, from the album of the same name (1978) -- Whiny, slidy guitar followed by light Mellotron-style keyboards and more twiddly guitar. Cover says to play this at maximum loudness; I was expecting something heavier. Inoffensive background music.
* Steve Hackett: The Voice of NECAM/Icarus Ascending, from PLEASE DON'T TOUCH -- Singer sounds vaguely like Peter Gabriel. This could be a Genesis song. Then more inoffensive background guitar....
* Justin Hayward: Tightrope, from SONGWRITER (1977) -- OK, I'm cheating here. I heard this once or twice about 40 years ago. Now it sounds thin, ESPECIALLY the horrible tinny whiny keyboards. Hayward's voice is OK, but his singing style is subtly different from how he sang with the Moodies. Not bad, but a bit self-referential. Does anybody really care about a rocker's hard times? Did anyone care back then? And the audience effects are silly. Bit of Hayward's tasteful guitar toward the end. But not enough.
TOMORROW: Three more hours of off-the-cuff reviews. If I feel up to it....

Great funny songs

We could all use a laugh, right? Now more than ever.
When I posted that "music or die" list a few days ago, I threw in a couple comedy songs at first, just to see if anyone was awake ... but then I deleted them after a couple days, because we take this music stuff Seriously here at The Back-Up Plan.
But to heck with that. My son once told me that if a song can make me laugh, I'm halfway to being won-over. And he's right. So here's some great funny songs (and albums) you may have overlooked. Or maybe not....
* AC/DC -- Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap.
* Aerosmith -- Big Ten Inch Record.
* America -- Muskrat Love.
* Kevin Ayers -- Connie on a Rubber Band, Butterfly Dance, Gemini Child, Soon Soon Soon, Singing a Song in the Morning, ODD DITTIES.
* Bare Naked Ladies -- Alcohol, It's All Been Done, Get in Line, Never is Enough, Who Needs Sleep?, Some Fantastic, STUNT, If I Had $1,000,000.
* Beach Boys -- I'm Bored With My Old Man, Vegetables, Gettin' Hungry, I'd Love Just Once to See You, BEACH BOYS PARTY!, SMILEY SMILE(?).
* Beatles -- I'm Down, Yellow Submarine, When I'm 64, Hey Bulldog, Honey Pie, Why Don't We Do it in the Road?, Octopus's Garden, Maxwell's Silver Hammer, Mean Mr. Mustard/Polythene Pam/She Came in Through the Bathroom Window, Her Majesty, Mr. Moonlight.
* Byrds -- Mr. Spaceman.
* Cab Calloway -- Minnie the Moocher.
* Camel -- Down on the Farm.
* Can -- Mother Upduff.
* Caravan -- Magic Man, Golf Girl, Waterloo Lily, The Dog The Dog He's at it Again, Cthulhu, A Very Smelly Grubby Little Oik.
* Carpenters -- Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft (long version).
* Neil Diamond -- Crunchy Granola Suite, Soggy Pretzels, Broad Old Woman (6 A.M. Insanity).
* Dickies -- Nights in White Satin, Stuck in a Pagoda With Trisha Toyota.
* Electric Light Orchestra -- Yours Truly 2095.
* Fairport Convention -- Mr. Lacey.
* Fleetwood Mac -- Oh Well, Not That Funny.
* J. Geils Band -- Love Stinks, No Anchovies Please (not really a song).
* Go-Go's -- Skidmarks on My Heart, Girl of 100 Lists.
* Gong -- Anything with Daevid Allen on it....
* Gryphon -- Don't Say Go, Flash in the Pantry.
* Slim Harpo -- Tina-Nina-Nu.
* Heart -- Hit Single, Strange Phenomena, Break.
* Herman's Hermits -- I'm Henry VIII I Am.
* Incredible String Band -- Minotaur's Song, Mercy I Cry City, THE HANGMAN'S BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER.
* Jethro Tull -- Back to the Family, The Mouse Police Never Sleeps....
* Nick Kershaw -- Gone to Pieces.
* King Crimson -- Cat Food, The King Crimson Barber Shop, Happy With What You Have to be Happy With, Prozack Blues.
* Kinks -- Apeman, Village Green Preservation Society, Lola.
* Led Zeppelin -- Whole Lotta Love, Hot Dog.
* Little Feat -- Dixie Chicken, Candyman Blues.
* Lyle Lovett -- My Baby Don't Tolerate, She's No Lady.
* Madness -- Embarrassment, Shut Up.
* Paul McCartney and Wings -- Magneto and Titanium Man.
* Pat Metheny Group -- Forward March.
* Monkees -- Gonna Buy Me a Dog, Your Auntie Grizelda, Randy Scouse Git, Tapioca Tundra, No Time.
* Moody Blues -- Om, Painted Smile, I Am.
* Motorhead -- Killed by Death.
* The Move -- Tonite.
* National Health -- Binoculars.
* Ted Nugent -- Wango Tango, Wang Dang Sweet Poontang.
* Parliament -- P-Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up).
* Pink Floyd -- Flaming, Careful With That Axe Eugene (?), Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered in a Cave and Grooving With a Pict, In the Flesh?, The Trial.
* Pogues -- Fairytale of New York.
* Police -- Does Everyone Stare?, On Any Other Day, REGATTA DE BLANC.
* Queen -- Death on Two Legs (Dedicated to...), Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon, I'm in Love With My Car, Good Company, Seaside Rendezvous, Don't Try Suicide.
* Bonnie Raitt -- Give it Up or Let Me Go, No Getting Over You.
* Rolling Stones -- Emotional Rescue.
* Todd Rundgren -- Song of the Viking, Lord Chancellor's Nightmare Song, An Elpee's Worth of Toons.
* Simon and Garfunkel -- At the Zoo, Punky's Dilemma, A Simple Desultory Philippic.
* Sky -- Tuba Smarties.
* Split Enz -- Poor Boy.
* Al Stewart -- Mondo Sinistro, Red Toupee.
* Strawbs -- Part of the Union, Backside.
* Pete Townshend -- Misunderstood.
* Rick Wakeman -- The Breathalyzer.
* Johnny "Guitar" Watson -- Gangster of Love.
* The Who -- My Wife.
* Yachts -- Tantamount to Bribery.
* Yes -- Every Little Thing, No Opportunity Necessary No Experience Needed.
...To be continued....

Two dozen better albums

As a follow-up to my last post, here's a list of two-dozen great (mostly Strange Music) albums everyone should hear, that aren't mentioned anywhere in 1,001 ALBUMS YOU MUST HEAR BEFORE YOU DIE. This list is entirely off the top of my head -- I'll take the blame for any inaccurate info. How many of these have you heard?
* Gryphon -- RED QUEEN TO GRYPHON THREE (1974).
* Gryphon -- TREASON (1977).
* Providence -- EVER SENSE THE DAWN (1972).
* Happy the Man -- CRAFTY HANDS (1978).
* Amazing Blondel -- FANTASIA LINDUM (1972).
* Group 87 -- (1st) (1980).
* Sally Oldfield -- WATER BEARER (1978).
* Caravan -- FOR GIRLS WHO GROW PLUMP IN THE NIGHT (1973).
* Caravan -- BLIND DOG AT ST. DUNSTAN'S (1976).
* Sky -- SKY2 (1980).
* Genesis -- A TRICK OF THE TAIL (1976).
* Camel -- THE SNOW GOOSE (1975).
* Camel -- NUDE (1980).
* Wigwam -- NUCLEAR NIGHTCLUB (1974).
* Moody Blues -- THE PRESENT (1983).
* The Jam -- SETTING SONS (1979).
* Renaissance -- LIVE AT CARNEGIE HALL (1976).
* Shoes -- PRESENT TENSE (1980).
* Split Enz -- WAIATA (1981).
* Yes -- YESSONGS (live) (1973).
* Queen -- INNUENDO (1991).
* Gentle Giant -- FREE HAND (1975).
* Go-Go's -- TALK SHOW (1984).
* Illusion -- OUT OF THE MIST (1977).
* Bangles -- ALL OVER THE PLACE (1983).
OK, there's 25. Get back to me after you've heard all these and we'll talk....

The usual suspects

Now, this is disappointing. OK, I admit it -- I'm officially Old. There is a LOT of crap listed in this book.
After having such a great time with 1,001 SONGS YOU MUST HEAR BEFORE YOU DIE, I thought I'd take a chance on 1,001 ALBUMS YOU MUST HEAR BEFORE YOU DIE (2005, general editor Robert Dimery). And mainly I'm reminded about how out-of-touch I've become.
I expected that this 950-page list of supposedly great albums (from Elvis's first in 1956 to the White Stripes' GET BEHIND ME SATAN in 2005) would have a lot of predictable choices in it. The shock was how very predictable many of them are ... in the period I'm familiar with.
I wish the contributors (90 of them, mostly British, one name I was familiar with) had gone a little farther out, gotten a little weirder. True -- Can, Neu!, Faust, Robert Wyatt, Soft Machine, and albums by other weirdies are written-up here. Yes, Genesis, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd and other progressive-rock heavies are included. Even Emerson, Lake and Palmer have a couple of albums included in the lineup.
But generally, the choices are what you'd expect -- the same acknowledged classics you've heard lauded in other books of this type. And even the off-the-wall choices are generally the "coolest," most acceptable cult titles.
And I refuse to accept the idea that Britney Spears has an album I need to hear before I die. I'll die happily without that, I'm sure.
There IS some good stuff in here. And the articles are almost always informative and well-written -- though I think the book's practice of highlighting "key" tracks in lists of album-contents misses some great stuff.
But many of the choices are The Usual -- SGT. PEPPER, PET SOUNDS, WHO'S NEXT, REVOLVER, ABBEY ROAD, WHITE ALBUM, LED ZEPPELIN IV, RUMOURS, EXILE ON MAIN STREET, TAPESTRY, BLONDE ON BLONDE, COURT AND SPARK, WHAT'S GOING ON, THRILLER, PURPLE RAIN, BORN IN THE U.S.A., etc.
The cult choices are obvious, too -- Velvet Underground, Nick Drake, Fairport Convention, Richard Thompson, early Roxy Music, early Brian Eno, The Stooges, MC5, New York Dolls, Ramones, Sex Pistols, Patti Smith, Kate Bush, Tim Buckley, etc.
There are a few surprises, but not enough. They could have been a lot more daring.
I have some reservations about their individual album choices, too.The Beach Boys' SURF'S UP is not a great album as a totality, and they note this. (Great second side, though. Add two songs from the first side and you've almost got a great album.) I don't think RUMOURS is the best thing Fleetwood Mac ever did. But the compilers include Mac's TUSK, too, so it all balances out.
There are some factual errors, too. Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour gets his name spelled wrong at least once. MEET THE BEATLES wasn't their first album release in the States -- INTRODUCING THE BEATLES was released a year earlier. And four students were killed at Kent State University in 1970, not two -- this is VERY simple fact-checking gone wrong: "Four dead in Ohio!" There are other proofreading errors.
And while I was happy to see Brian Wilson's reconstruction of SMILE listed here, I've come to see that CD as just a place-holder to keep the CD-player warm until the SMILE SESSIONS set was released a few years later (though the compilers had no way of knowing that release was coming, back in 2005).
I also think the book is skewed toward more recent releases. The '60s are covered adequately; the '70s are covered in much greater depth. But suddenly 1980 arrives and the book isn't even half-finished.
There is very little here that I can relate to after about the mid-1980s. Which may mean this book wasn't meant for me.
Also, unlike 1,001 SONGS, there is no index listing 9,000 more albums you really should try to check out in your spare time. Such a list would have helped -- and probably would have made me drop most of my complaints.
Here's the thing: Sitting here at the keyboard, off the top of my head, I'm sure I could come up with a list of two dozen great albums everyone should hear -- that aren't mentioned in this book. I'm sure you could, too. And your list would be just as good, or better. That's what musical taste is all about, right?
Well, this book shows that musical-taste-wise, I'm an old fuddy-duddy. So once again, I'll be changing the name of this blog to "Living in the Past."

The worst Number One hits ever

Ever get a REALLY bad song stuck in your head for no known reason? This has been happening more and more often to me lately. First noticed it awhile back when I was in the shower and suddenly Melanie's "Brand New Key" popped into my head, ghod knows why. I don't mind if songs suddenly occur to me -- but I'd like them to be songs I LIKE. Who's programming my brain?
Then other songs I liked even LESS started hitting me at odd moments, so I figured I'd do some research on this odd medical phenomenon. I dug out Joel Whitburn's reliable TOP POP HITS compendium of BILLBOARD chart data, and thought I'd scribble down what seemed to me the worst Number One hits ever. Here's what I came up with, in chronological order....
* "Monday Monday," The Mamas and the Papas (1966). Even songwriter John Phillips didn't know what it was about....
* "Sunshine Superman," Donovan (1966).
* "All You Need is Love," Beatles (1967).
* "Ode to Billy Joe," Bobbie Gentry (1967).
* "One Bad Apple," Osmonds (1971).
* "Brand New Key," Melanie (1971).
* "My Ding-a-Ling," Chuck Berry (1972). Never underestimate the power of a really bad and stupid dirty joke. Repeated endlessly.
* "My Love," Paul McCartney and Wings (1973).
* "Bennie and the Jets," Elton John (1974). Made worse by radio overplay. See below.
* "Billy, Don't Be a Hero," Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods (1974). Who?
* "The Night Chicago Died," Paper Lace (1974). Who?
* "You're Having My Baby," Paul Anka (1974). '74 really wasn't that great a music year....
* "Fallin' in Love," Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds (1975). Absolutely flat mainstream pop. Coulda been an insurance commercial.
* "Let's Do it Again," Staples Singers (1975). Yeah, they were pretty great. But not here.
* "Disco Lady," Johnnie Taylor (1976). See Chuck Berry. Too bad, because Taylor's "Who's Makin' Love?" is a classic.
* "Don't Go Breakin' My Heart," Elton John and Kiki Dee (1976). In the Bottom 10 among the worst things Elton ever did. I never thought "Philadelphia Freedom" was so great, either.
* "You Light Up My Life," Debbie Boone (1977).
* "My Sharona," The Knack (1979).
* "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)," Rupert Holmes (1979). Who? Ever hear Rupert's "Nearsighted"? Best thing Barry Manilow never did.
* 1981. Almost all of 1981's Number One hits were total crap. "Physical." "Bette Davis Eyes." The only exceptions were Blondie's "Rapture" (worth it just as comedy), one barely tolerable REO smash, and two OK songs by Hall and Oates. Otherwise, right down there with 1974 for bad music years.
* "I Will Always Love You," Whitney Houston (1992). Still being used to clear birds off of airport runways. Check out writer Dolly Parton's gorgeous original version instead.

Strange Music "before you die" list, Part One

In line with my last post, here's an attempt to do a "must hear before you die" list of songs by some of my favorite Strange Music artists -- with a few surprises thrown in.
The idea here is to try to sum-up an artist's career by listing a handful (or less) of signature songs that show the artist at their best or most characteristic, without which modern reality wouldn't be what it is. Whatever that is. A sort of definition, if you like.
I still think this whole "must hear before you die" premise is silly, but it does start some interesting thought processes. Onward, then.
* Amazing Blondel -- Fantasia Lindum suite, Seascape, Landscape.
* Argent -- Hold Your Head Up, Dance in the Smoke.
* Barclay James Harvest -- Hymn, Spirit on the Water, Poor Man's Moody Blues, Ring of Changes.
* Beach Boys (after 1965) -- Surf's Up, 'Til I Die, God Only Knows.
* Brewer and Shipley -- Witchi-Tai-To.
* Kate Bush -- The Man With the Child in His Eyes, This Woman's Work, Empty Bullring, Under the Ivy.
* Camel -- Sasquatch, Manic, Echoes, Breathless, Rhayader, Rhayader Goes to Town, Never Let Go.
* Can -- Father Cannot Yell, Uphill, Mother Upduff.
* Caravan -- The Dog The Dog He's at it Again, All the Way (With John Wayne's Single-Handed Liberation of Paris), For Richard (live), Dissociation, Memory Lain/Hugh/Headloss.
* Clannad -- The Wild Cry, Journey's End, In Fortune's Hand.
* Sandy Denny -- Listen Listen, The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood.
* Dixie Dregs -- Hereafter, Night Meets Light.
* Nick Drake -- Northern Sky, Pink Moon.
* Emerson, Lake and Palmer -- Fanfare for the Common Man, From the Beginning, Lucky Man, Karn Evil 9 (First Impression, Part One).
* Enya -- Storms in Africa.
* Fairport Convention -- Come All Ye, I'll Keep it With Mine.
* Genesis (middle period) -- Ripples, Madman Moon, Afterglow, Vancouver, Your Own Special Way, Like it or Not, You Might Recall.
* Gentle Giant -- Funny Ways (live), Think of Me With Kindness, His Last Voyage, On Reflection.
* Gong -- Wingful of Eyes.
* Group 87 -- One Night Away From Day, Moving Sidewalks.
* Gryphon -- Lament, Spring Song.
* Happy the Man -- Service With a Smile, Wind-Up Doll Day Wind.
* Hawkwind -- You Better Believe It.
* Illusion -- Everywhere You Go, Candles are Burning.
* Jethro Tull -- The Whistler, Living in the Past, Skating Away on the Thin Ice of the New Day.
* Journey (strange stuff) -- Daydream, People and Places.
* Kansas -- Carry On Wayward Son, Miracles Out of Nowhere, Journey from Mariabronn, Song for America.
* King Crimson -- Epitaph, 21st Century Schizoid Man, Frame by Frame, The Great Deceiver, Red.
* Lyle Mays -- Ascent.
* Pat Metheny (Group) -- The Search, Praise, New Chatauqua.
* Moody Blues -- Nights in White Satin, Tuesday Afternoon, Question, The Story in Your Eyes, You and Me.
* The Move -- Do Ya, Message from the Country.
* Nektar -- It's All Over, Do You Believe in Magic?, King of Twilight.
* The Nice -- America.
* Mike Oldfield -- Incantations Part One, Ommadawn Part One, Tubular Bells Part One.
* Alan Parsons Project -- Some Other Time, The Gold Bug, The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether.
* Pink Floyd -- High Hopes, Us and Them, Astronome Domine (live), The Great Gig in the Sky, Wish You Were Here, Money.
* Procol Harum -- Whiter Shade of Pale, Shine on Brightly, A Salty Dog.
* Providence -- If We Were Wise, Fantasy Fugue, Neptune's Door.
* Renaissance -- Northern Lights, Ashes are Burning (live, first three minutes), Rajah Khan.
* Scarlet Rivera -- Day of the Unicorn.
* Roxy Music -- The Thrill of it All, Over You, Love is the Drug.
* Todd Rundgren -- Real Man, Saving Grace, The Very Last Time (with Utopia).
* Sky -- Vivaldi, Watching the Aeroplanes.
* Steeleye Span -- Alison Gross, All Around My Hat.
* Al Stewart -- Year of the Cat, Modern Times, Running Man, Nostradamus.
* Stories -- Please Please, Love is in Motion, Words.
* Strawbs -- Where is This Dream of Your Youth? (live), Down by the Sea, Hero and Heroine, The Man Who Called Himself Jesus (live).
* Synergy -- S-Scape, Icarus, Warriors.
* Tangerine Dream -- Monolight (live), Igneous.
* Richard Thompson -- Cavalry Cross (live).
* Steve Tibbetts -- Ur.
* U.K. -- Time to Kill, In the Dead of Night suite.
* Vangelis -- Alpha, Spiral, To the Unknown Man.
* Yes -- Your Move, Roundabout, South Side of the Sky.
To be continued ... maybe....

10,000 songs

I'm not a sucker for this book. 1,001 SONGS YOU MUST HEAR BEFORE YOU DIE (AND 10,001 YOU MUST DOWNLOAD) (2010/2013) struck me at first as a gimmick and a joke. All of those "before you die" books seem kind of silly -- your life is your own, live it your way, set your own goals.
But I was looking for something new about music to browse, and this book is HUGE. So I picked it up for a closer look.
One of the first things I saw was a write-up on Nick Drake's gorgeous "Northern Sky." Then they listed the Korgis' "Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime," which I have fond memories of. Then I noticed Ike and Tina Turner's "River Deep, Mountain High," which I'd just played on the stereo that morning....
So I flipped a few more pages. Love's "Alone Again Or." The Beach Boys' "Surf's Up." Fairport Convention's "She Moves Through the Fair" (which I'd never heard before). By then I was pretty much sold. At least these folks seemed to have a pretty good ear for the overlooked and off-the-wall.
I still think that. But a more detailed browse through these 960 pages shows that the compilers (50 of them, British, all people I've never heard of, including general editor Robert Dimery) are also suckers for one-shot pop trash. My life would be complete if I never hear songs like Toni Basil's "Mickey" ever again. And it gets a write-up in this book.
Even more than the page-long articles on each song considered "essential" by the compilers -- and these are always informative, even if you don't like the song -- the index including 9,000 more songs to download is a field-day of obvious and not-so-obvious choices, leading a fan to ask the obvious "But how could they NOT include...?" questions.
For example. How many Britney Spears songs do you really NEED to hear? I'd say none. The index lists six, including one that's "essential."
How many AC/DC songs do you really need to hear? I'd say maybe one. The index lists 15, including two the compilers feel are essential.
OK, Tom Petty. I'd say one, the index lists 10. And the one I'd choose ain't here. Neither are some other rather obvious choices.
But the format's interesting. If you had to sum up an artist's achievements by picking just one or two songs, which would you choose? There's an argument starter. And an idea for a post I may write soon....
You name 'em, they're in here, from Abba to Zappa, with the index alphabetized the way your computer or smartphone or iPod or whatever would do it -- with Zappa filed under "F" for Frank. The book runs the gamut from Enrico Caruso in 1916 to David Bowie in 2013. Nice to see Cab Calloway's hilarious "Minnie the Moocher" from 1931 in here.
And the sections that focus on the '60s and '70s are jammed full of classics -- I mean, the songs I know. There's plenty in here that I've never heard. There's a ton to learn.
But I also have to note that there's a real downturn in well-known, often-heard "classics" after the mid-1980s. Which may just indicate that this book wasn't meant for me.
But for all the information in it, and all the new directions it points me as a fan, I'll be holding onto it.
For that, I'll forgive that they included as essential "Ode to Billy Joe." "Unchained Melody." "Walk on By." "Superstar." "Rock On." "Desperado." "Sweet Home Alabama." "Dancing Queen." "Hotel California." "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?" "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"....

All new stuff!

OK, I've put this off long enough. I have this HUGE pile of previously-unheard Strange Music in the house, which has been waiting for a YEAR to be listened to -- material for a book project that may never get finished. So I've decided to dip into it a few pieces at a time and see what happens. Maybe I can chop this pile down a bit.
At some point I'll live-blog my reactions to some of this stuff (when my energy level's up or the sun decides to come back out of the winter-western-Washington gloom) and see how far I can get through the pile before I can't take anymore. But for now, let's try this sampling....
* Happy the Man: Eye of the Storm, from 3RD/BETTER LATE.... (1983). Demo recorded in Feb '79, after Arista cut the Happys loose when their excellent second album CRAFTY HANDS failed to sell mega copies. Later covered by Camel on their half-decent '79 album I CAN SEE YOUR HOUSE FROM HERE. Camel's version has more impact. This original is in a lower key, though it's still pleasant -- though not haunting like Camel's version is. There's no real ending. One more flute solo/overdub would have set it off. A good production would have punched it up, too.
* Happy the Man: While Crome Yellow Shine, from 3RD. Pastoral keyboard driving music, watching as scenery passes by on the side of the road. Then guitar and keyboards pick it up. Their usual quick-changing, overlapping pastoral moods. Very pleasant, but needs some sax or flute to jazz it up and set it off.
* Omega: Hazug Lany, from OMEGA 5. From Hungary. Sung in Hungarian. Organ's not bad, though simple. Drums are rudimentary. Upbeat group-vocal chanting, kind of naively charming. This could have been a single -- I'm sure they're trying to chat-up some hot woman. Sort of a Hungarian version of Free's "All Right Now."
* Omega: A Madar, from OMEGA 5. Something's missing. Not enough beat? More bass? But the keyboards are a trip -- Benko Laszlo's pretty great on the Moog. But they need more energy. Naïve heavy rock, circa 1968. But the keyboards always help.
* Omega: En Elmegyek, from OMEGA 5. Uh oh, they're Slowing Things Down. Long, funereal organ opening. Low-key choir vocals. Going pastoral. Twangy guitar. Where'd the women back-up singers come from? There are no women in this band, or credited on the album cover. Enough.
* Alquin: Stranger, from NOBODY CAN WAIT FOREVER (1975). From Holland. Funky guitar. And they sing in English. Not terrible. The singer could be more forceful. OK "I know" choruses. Low-key instrumentals -- bass and keyboard solos, very modest. Low-register sax joins later, not bad. Builds slightly in intensity. Smooth sound overall. Produced by Rodger Bain (Black Sabbath, Rainbow, etc).
* Alquin: Mr. Widow, from NOBODY.... Surprisingly upbeat. The lyrics are silly. Maybe too light -- attempt at a single? Choruses are fairly catchy. The sax always helps.
* Alquin: New Guinea Sunrise, from NOBODY. Now they're gonna show-off on guitar. This needs to pick up fast. How about some sax and underwater keyboards? Beat picks up for a section called "Wake Me Up." Lyrics are still silly. Singer's annoying.
* Ray Thomas: High Above My Head, from FROM MIGHTY OAKS (1975). Moody Blues singer and flutist, who died a couple months back, shortly after it was announced that the Moodies finally made it to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Ray was always good for a solid song or two on Moodies albums. This is from his first solo album. Optimistic, big-band arrangement, lyrics are kinda silly. Middle break on Ray's harmonica, not bad. Production seems kinda bass-heavy. Could have been a single.
* Ray Thomas: From Mighty Oaks. Orchestral instrumental to lead off the album. Sounds like the start of a movie soundtrack. Lots of English hunting-horns. Not rock and roll. Pretty pretentious. Nothing here that would make you want to listen further.
* Greenslade: An English Western, from GREENSLADE (1973). Dave Greenslade was pretty nimble on the keys. This jumps around a lot. Can't find anything "Western" in it. Old-fashioned '70s organ sounds are pleasant. There actually seems to be a sort of repeating theme -- sort of a nautical, sea-going thing -- but not much of a tune.
* Greenslade: Melange. Jumpy old-English melody carried by sprightly keyboard and slightly-too-heavy guitar, heavy bass joins in later. Lower-key midsection with show-offy guitar and bass and wordless vocals. What's all the ominous atmosphere for? Then bubbly, aquatic keybs and bass -- jaunty tune -- then more atmosphere. Then back to the opening tune with heavily flanged guitar. Lots of noise, means nothing. A good tune would really have helped these guys. Lots of talent, but noodling around.
* Fairport Convention: She Moves Through the Fair, from THE ESSENTIAL/WHO KNOWS WHERE THE TIME GOES? An ominous ghost story, showcasing Sandy Denny's haunted voice. The best thing I've heard all day. I got addicted to Fairport around 1983, so why have I never heard this before?
* Fairport Convention: Ballad of Easy Rider, from ESSENTIAL. Sandy Denny singing the old Byrds classic. This version is downbeat and very different from the original. It's also about four times longer than the Byrds' version, which is not a good thing. Nice guitar work by Richard Thompson, of course.

...More of this stuff coming soon, along with reviews of 1,001 SONGS YOU MUST HEAR BEFORE YOU DIE, the BEST AMERICAN SPORTS WRITING series, THOSE GUYS HAVE ALL THE FUN (an oral history of ESPN), David Hepworth's NEVER A DULL MOMENT (about rock and roll in 1971), and much more....

More music books....

* Paul Williams: HOW DEEP IS THE OCEAN? (1997) -- Assembles in one book all of Paul's writing on the Beach Boys and Brian Wilson, and especially on their adventurous Middle Period (roughly 1966 to 1979), during most of which they could barely GIVE their albums away. Some of this is truly great stuff -- especially "I Believe You Anyway," the long review of the Boys' GOOD VIBRATIONS best-of box set. There's also a long interview with former BB's manager David Anderle about why the Boys' SMiLE album collapsed back in 1967. This book came out over a decade before the SMiLE SESSIONS box was finally released, so I don't know if Williams ever got his view of that package down anywhere.
Interesting career Williams had -- he founded the first rock-criticism newspaper (CRAWDADDY!), burned out and lived in a commune (wrote about it in TIME BETWEEN), assembled several books of his rock criticism (of widely varying quality), assembled an interview/biography of science-fiction writer Philip K. Dick (ONLY APPARENTLY REAL), and later became the literary executor of Dick's estate. But some of his best writing is right here.
* Angus Cargill, editor: HANG THE DJ: AN ALTERNATIVE BOOK OF MUSIC LISTS (2008) -- Dozens of contributors toss in 300 pages of off-the-wall pop-music Top 10 lists, from songs that never made it to Number One but should have, to the dozen meanest and ugliest Beatles songs. First published in England, so it definitely has a U.K. bias -- makes me want to investigate The Smiths, if only for their great song-titles. Also several raves about Amy Winehouse here. Contributors include Jon Savage, Simon Reynolds, Nick Kent, Johnathan Lethem.... Learned more from this than I did from other "music-list" books, including Dave Marsh's BOOK OF ROCK LISTS.
* DAVE BARRY'S BOOK OF BAD SONGS (1997) -- Yes, Dave is hilarious, but. This book came from the answers to Dave's infamous "Bad Song Survey" that he held years ago in his nationally-syndicated newspaper column. The first 40 pages include some of the funniest and most direct music criticism I've read in years. But then -- as in some of Dave's other books -- it's like Dave gets bored, and the jokes get tired. It's amazing that with all this great bad material (the worst pop songs ever, as nominated by and commented-on by his readers), Dave can't even put together 90 pages. We don't even get a list of the biggest losers! You can read this in an hour, but after page 40 you'll just be trying to get to the end of it. Six pages are wasted on copyright and permission-to-reprint notices for lyrics. One of the book's best points is that great rock songs don't really NEED lyrics....

9 Years?!?!

It was somewhere around this time nine years ago that I started blogging about music.
My first review (on a site my son set up for me) was about the Hollies' ROMANY album. My second was on Al Stewart's MODERN TIMES. Within a week I had two-dozen reviews posted. A week later I'd added another dozen. Then I contacted Internet-rock-review legend Mark Prindle (I'd made a few comments at his huge review site), he posted a link from his site to mine, and I kept on rolling.
That first year I posted pieces on everything from made-up music history (What would have happened if the Beach Boys' SMILE album had been released on time?: World peace, and Brian Wilson winning the Nobel Peace Prize), to how CNN became the Michael Jackson Network after MJ died.
After nine months I had 225 reviews posted. I wrote six posts in a day, once. I wrote all of them in shorthand "text English," like most people use on their cellphones and Twitter -- I was striking a blow against illiteracy or something, I thought. Besides, as an extra bonus, writing that way seemed to annoy some people. Every post I did before #666 on King Crimson is still in text -- I was going to put them all in Real English once, but ... you know, life's too short.
Then the old website started having trouble. Posts disappeared for no reason, and I had trouble accessing the site. So I gave up and moved here to Blogger, and everything's been great ever since.
I was surprised for awhile by how much the blog has meant to me. It's been a way to blow off steam about work, whine when I'm lonely, work through issues when I'm angry or depressed, rant about politics and modern life, etc. After 950 posts, it's really been the best diary I've ever had.
The rash of posts this month has also helped me avoid thinking about other things that have been going on. The Girlfriend was in the hospital for a couple days back in November, after she was having increasing trouble breathing. She was diagnosed with COPD and the beginnings of congestive heart failure. She's doing much better now after being on oxygen 24/7 for awhile. Her spirits are good, and she has more energy than I do, most days.
My car got back-ended on the way to work a couple weeks ago. Almost $7,000 in damage. I wasn't hurt -- and I was grateful the woman who hit me wasn't hurt either. She was nine months pregnant and had her four-year-old daughter in her SUV. So it could have been a lot worse. I just want my old car back. And now I REALLY hate to drive here.
But enough. Thanks for reading here. And as a special Christmas gift, I was going to post a list of the 40 worst Beatles songs I could actually remember. But then (after typing the list out) I discovered I'd already posted that list -- back in July of 2016. And that list is better and funnier than what I was going to post this morning. Alzheimer's is an amazing thing....
See ya next year!

"A Night at the Opera"

It's May 1976. Jeff picks me up in his tiny ticket-me-red Austin Healy Sprite -- a car so small I can just barely shoehorn myself in -- and gives me a lift to the end-of-schoolyear Newspaper Awards Banquet in downtown Boise.
For some reason, it was decided we'd have the semi-formal banquet at The Gamekeeper, a semi-classy restaurant where Jeff works. Jeff, the school newspaper's cartoonist -- who looks something like a self-drawn cartoon of Paul McCartney, all arms and legs and hair -- started out at GK as a dishwasher, then was promoted to try and become an assistant cook. That isn't going so well, judging by his stories from work, most of which revolve around gross and horrifying disasters with food. Did we all just think he was joking? His hilarious stories about the kitchen directly contradict The Gamekeeper's jingle playing on local radio stations. All together now:

The Gamekeeper, dining leisurely.
The Gamekeeper, dining in luxury.
The Gamekeeper, dining
Where you want to be
In delightful company.
Dining elegantly.

Yeah, uh huh. Tell that to the guy who burned beyond recognition 68 chicken breasts in the kitchen's huge cooker. Revealingly, Jeff does not choose chicken for dinner.
As we pull away from my house, Jeff says he has a surprise for the soundtrack on our 10-mile drive into town. It's the latest album by Queen.
I'd heard of Queen. Their "Killer Queen" single from a year earlier hadn't really thrilled me. It was too ... arch, too clever, and the guitar work seemed shrill. Jeff assured me their SHEER HEART ATTACK album was more brilliance, but....
A month or so earlier they'd come out with the six-minute "Bohemian Rhapsody," which I'd first heard while foolishly leaving the radio on while having dinner with my family. Halfway through the falsetto chaos, my mom and dad turned to me and said practically in unison "What IS this shit?" I shrugged. Hey, I didn't know....
But it grew on me, so I was mildly interested in their album, A NIGHT AT THE OPERA. Besides, Jeff had turned me on in the past to Kansas's LEFTOVERTURE, plus lots of great old Beatles, Elton John and Paul McCartney songs I'd never heard before, so....
The album started with a rumble, then some of that same bouncy, hyperactive guitar that marked these guys. Then it downshifted into mere overactive guitar and a set of vicious lyrics apparently pointed at Queen's former managers ("Death on Two Legs"). Hilarious. I thought maybe these guys had potential.
I was annoyed by their occasional silliness ("Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon," "Seaside Rendezvous," "Good Company"), but the good stuff was impressive. "I'm in Love With My Car" moved well, and seemed a good soundtrack for Jeff's involvement with the Sprite. "You're My Best Friend" sounded like updated Beach Boys. Then came the gorgeous "'39," a space-age folksong, still one of my Queen faves.
When they tried to get heavier, I wasn't impressed. They seemed to be straining to keep it simple and heavy, as on the kinda pathetic "Sweet Lady."
But when Jeff turned the tape over, the real heaviness kicked in: "The Prophet's Song" was stunning -- a misty, foggy tale of prophecy and doom, something like Led Zeppelin crossed with The Moody Blues. And it was a great soundtrack to careening in and out of downtown traffic.
We arrived at the banquet then, but the rest of the album was downhill anyway. The filler "Love of My Life," the silly "Good Company," and a dumb filler guitar-instrumental of "God Save the Queen." After "The Prophet's Song" and "'39," "Bohemian Rhapsody" was almost an anti-climax.
So I bought the album, and it grew on me, and I followed Queen for awhile, more or less. I was impressed with their 3/4's-great "It's Late" (did they always have to get Too Heavy?), amused by "Fat Bottomed Girls" and "Bicycle Race," and bought THE GAME later, mostly for its second side ("Rock It/Prime Jive," "Save Me," etc.) and for "Play the Game" and "Need Your Loving Tonight" -- emphatically NOT for "Another One Bites the Dust." I thought their team-up with David Bowie on "Under Pressure" was pretty great.
Then I drifted. Finally in 1991 I heard their INNUENDO, which has some amazing stuff on it, like "The Show Must Go On," "I'm Going Slightly Mad," and "These Are the Days of Our Lives." I thought at the time that it might be their solidest album. And of course that was Freddie Mercury's last hurrah.

On the Moodies reaching the RnRHoF

Well, it's about time!
This was really overdue.
I would have jumped on this faster, but when I read on Facebook a couple days ago that The Moody Blues had FINALLY been voted into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame ... well, all I could think are the two sentences above.
I don't usually follow too closely who gets into the RnRHoF. I think it's a useless, stupid institution, since the "history" of rock and roll gets added to every day. The "Rarnhof" should be a big beer-drinking pub in Germany or Switzerland.
But I'm glad for the Moodies. I never thought they got their due, back in the day. Once upon a time, their "Classic 7" albums meant way more to me than The Beatles, or anyone else. I still think if the Moodies had been signed to a hipper, more with-it record label, they would've had more hits and sold more albums.
Don't get me wrong -- I thought Decca was great. Decca at least had enough taste to offer a home to Caravan and Camel, among others, not to mention The Rolling Stones (after turning down The Beatles). But Decca was way uptight and old school, never even as "progressive" as EMI, and nowhere near as adventurous as Vertigo, Virgin, or Harvest. Not to mention Island.
But give the Moodies credit -- they stuck with Decca, even when they could have gone elsewhere. When Decca was bought by Polygram late in the '70s, the Moodies stayed on.
The Moodies were important to me because they were the first "strange music" I ever heard, and back in high school I spent way more hours stuck under headphones listening to the Moodies than to anyone else. Because Moodies albums were trips that you could got lost in -- for hours. I many times played their "Classic 7" albums all the way through one after another, back in the days when I had time to burn. When the radio got boring, the Moodies never disappointed me.
That doesn't mean I love ALL their stuff. I think IN SEARCH OF THE LOST CHORD is mostly dated psychedelic crap. I think most of the orchestral sections on DAYS OF FUTURE PASSED sound like bad movie-soundtrack music. I think one of their hits, "Isn't Life Strange?," is fourth-rate Bee Gees. And for most of their stuff after 1983 -- don't get me started.
But the Moodies could rock ("Story in Your Eyes," "Question," "Eyes of a Child Part 2"), or they could space you out ("Have You Heard?/The Voyage," "My Song"), or they could boggle you with a cosmic mix of the two ("You and Me"). Their later albums like LONG DISTANCE VOYAGER and THE PRESENT were at the very least good polished pop music for their time.
I know that without the Moodies and how strong their albums were, it would have taken me longer to get hooked on "strange music," and I would have been way less likely to stray from listening to the radio, no matter how bored I was. They deserve to be in the RnRHoF just for expanding my mind a bit.
Besides, when's the last time you heard any of these great overlooked Moodies songs on the radio?:
Peak Hour, Evening: Time to Get Away, Twilight Time, Simple Game, Voices in the Sky, The Actor, Lovely to See You, Send Me No Wine, Never Comes the Day, Eyes of a Child Part 2, Out and In, Gypsy, Watching and Waiting, Don't You Feel Small?, It's Up to You, Minstrel's Song, Dawning is the Day, Our Guessing Game, After You Came, One More Time to Live, You Can Never Go Home, For My Lady, You and Me, Land of Make-Believe, In My World, Meanwhile, Nervous, Veteran Cosmic Rocker, Blue World, Meet Me Halfway, Running Water, Sorry, No More Lies.
This was a choice for enshrinement in that silly, useless building in Cleveland that, for once, was well deserved.

More disappointments

* Richard Goldstein: GOLDSTEIN'S GREATEST HITS (1970) -- Goldstein was (along with Paul Williams -- no, not that short songwriter with the blonde hair and glasses) one of the very first rock critics -- he had a regular pop-music column in THE VILLAGE VOICE starting back in 1966.
The review that brought him the most attention was a slam of SGT. PEPPER that was published in the NEW YORK TIMES. He got tons of hate mail. And 50 years later, Goldstein's still right about that album -- it's totally artificial and way obsessed with production and detail, with one absolute killer song at the very end. Of course most of the other songs on there have long since become classics as well.
That SGT. PEPPER piece is by far the best thing in Goldstein's GREATEST HITS. I expected the book to be dated, but I also thought I'd enjoy the dated effect. Most of it just reads as thin and naïve. There's a nice interview with The Shangri-La's that I wish had been done in more depth. There's a decent review of Dylan's JOHN WESLEY HARDING. There's a brief look at art-rock that has a slam or two for my old heroes The Moody Blues. There's a long piece on the history and hype behind San Francisco bands of the late '60s. There's an interesting write-up on how singles were manipulated into hits back in those days.
Too bad the SGT. PEPPER review is also in the DA CAPO BOOK OF ROCK AND ROLL WRITING, which I already have, surrounded by lots of other good stuff. This was not worth my $9.99. But as a snapshot of the naivete of the times, you could maybe dig it, if you were there back in the day.

* THE SOUND AND THE FURY: 40 YEARS OF CLASSIC ROCK JOURNALISM, edited by Barney Hoskyns (2003) -- There is some good stuff in here. David Toop's piece on Charles Manson's connection to The Beach Boys is interesting, and it's good to have it all laid out finally. David Dalton's eyewitness account of Altamont is pretty chilling. But both these pieces end too abruptly. Nick Hornby is as amusing as always in his look at the Collected Works of Abba.
But that's about all, really. The rest of these selections are usually interesting, but not gripping. Good B-level material. Can't believe editor Hoskyns really thinks these are classic examples of what rock writers wrote about.
For that, check out the DA CAPO BOOK OF ROCK AND ROLL WRITING, or those annual YEAR'S BEST MUSIC WRITING collections that I'm still finding buried gems in.

Coming soon: More Nostalgia -- "A Night at the Opera."

Cousin Jim's band

In the fall of 1973, after I moved back to Idaho from Washington, my cousin Jim suggested we should team up to write songs. He was taking organ lessons and learning how to sort of string notes together. I'd been feverishly scribbling short stories for a couple years. Seemed like an obvious first step toward forming a band.
I had visions of my cousin becoming a younger Keith Emerson or Rick Wakeman. Turned out the organ he was learning how to play was one of those little living-room electric organs millions of families had back in the early '70s when they were briefly a fad -- the kind that "anyone" could play, with "automatic" settings and reedy keyboard tones and percussion noises like a popcorn machine.
I quickly churned out half a dozen lyrics for Jim, waiting to see where this might lead. The high-school girl who was teaching Jim how to make noise on the keyboard thought the lyrics were OK, and said she might be interested in joining us if we were planning on forming a group. It helped that Jim had a big crush on her. That was always motivational -- one of the lyrics I wrote was about a girl classmate I had a crush on. She didn't even know my name.
All we needed for our "band" was someone who could sing, a guitarist, bassist and drummer. None of that was ever going to happen. Mostly because neither Jim or I knew any musicians our age, and neither of us were very outgoing.
Jim never got any tunes written -- I'm sure it was much harder than writing lyrics -- and the band idea died. I thought making random squawking noises on the organ was much more fun (and much easier) than actually learning to PLAY the thing. But then, I never had enough self-discipline to learn how to play an instrument.
I didn't put much weight on any of this stuff at the time. It was just another phase we went through. After all, I grew up with Jim. He was my closest friend for years, and indirectly introduced me to radio, rock and roll, and science fiction. I thought he was a normal 14-year-old, just like me.
Then I started noticing that he was maybe just a little slow. I first noted this when I was the only one of his friends who showed up for his 15th birthday party. We didn't care. We had a great time anyway, fumbling our way through making homemade pizza. We managed to not poison ourselves, and even cleaned up after ourselves, which must have been a relief for my Aunt Vera, Jim's mom.
I spent most of the summer of 1974 with Jim, riding our bikes around Cascade Reservoir in the mountains of central Idaho, getting farther into music and science fiction, spending the whole summer doing what we wanted, as if parents and chores didn't exist. When I did talk to my aunt and uncle, it was mainly to tell them how out-of-date their musical tastes were. They listened to stuff from the '40s! They liked Lawrence Welk!
After high school, Jim would occasionally show up at my front door without warning, hanging around for three hours and expecting me to entertain him somehow. But that wasn't as easy as it had been when we were 14 or 15.
At one point, I lived next door to him in the same dumpy trailer court. There Jim pretty much kept to himself, which was kind of a surprise. But after my girlfriend Tina got grabbed while throwing out the trash one night, only then did Jim reveal that a woman had been raped in the trailer court a year earlier -- as if this information wasn't that important, as if we didn't need to be careful.
Somewhere I had passed Jim by. I realized it, maybe he did too. I was hanging out with people like me, with interests in music and writing, who were maybe too fast and glib for my cousin. Sometimes they were too fast and glib for me.
Later, when I'd moved to an apartment elsewhere, Jim showed up at the front door without warning for the third night in a row, and I told him to go home and try calling first next time -- that I wasn't put here to entertain him all the time.
He went -- and the next time I talked to him a year later I was unemployed and looking for work. Jim had started driving a taxi, and thought there might be a spot for me. I was set to join the Air Force in six months, but that wouldn't feed me right then. Jim got me an interview -- then told the boss that I was leaving in six months, and the boss refused to hire me. I was furious about that one.
But Jim DID take me and my future ex-wife out for drinks a couple nights before I went off to basic training....
I went off to the military and then reporting, and lost touch with my cousin for 25 years. The next time I saw him was at my mother's funeral in 2008 -- where I barely recognized him. Suddenly he was a foot shorter than me -- how could that have happened? Just a dapper little man in a dark suit. We didn't talk.
After that he got in touch by e-mail, and said maybe we should start corresponding. But his letters were very odd -- he kept trying to sell me things. He barely spoke about himself at all. I finally pried out of him that he was living in a small town, with a crazy woman who made him do all the household chores, and who allowed him two hours a day to go to the library, where he tracked me down on the Internet. He had no job, no car, no prospects. He sounded like he was trapped in hell.
I wanted to know what he'd been doing for the past 25 years -- we had a lot to catch up on, right? He wouldn't tell me. Naturally, as an ex-reporter, I wondered what he was hiding, and I said so. He said I was "verbally nasty," and threatened to send Mormon missionaries to my door. He said what was missing in my life was God. I said God had certainly done him a lot of good.
That's about where we left it. A year or so ago, he e-mailed me and suggested we start writing again, ghod knows why. I responded that if he planned to try to sell me things or talk about the weather, he might as well not bother. If he wanted to write about something meaningful, bring it on. Naturally, he didn't bother, and awhile later I found out his e-mail address no longer worked.
Last week, while brainstorming blog ideas, I thought about the band Jim and I never had, and I looked him up on Facebook. There I learned that he'd become a Trumper, is still into God, and is apparently addicted to on-line video games. His Facebook page barely says a word about him personally. Can't tell if he's still with the same crazy woman, but he's still in the same town.
I'm sure if I "friended" him he'd respond, and would likely become that one person in my life I seem to have a sick need to Argue With. I'd prefer to avoid that. But he reinforces my belief that God and Trump are lifelines for people who Can't Figure Out What's Going On and feel deeply threatened and scared by it.
So though I may feel bad about some of the things I've said in the past, I'm not so sure that I really want to get back in touch....

Growing up in the country

When my family moved from Boise to Meridian in June 1974, I thought we were moving to The Sticks, even though it was just 10 miles directly west, out into the country. Meridian wasn't the sprawling mess then that it is now -- back then it was just a small rural agricultural town of maybe 3,000 people, though it was soon to be home of the largest school district in the state.
Moved away from my favorite used bookstore ever, I had to find new places to supply my addictions. One tiny hole-in-the-wall bookstore in "downtown" Meridian briefly supplied me with old science fiction magazines from the late '60s, but they didn't have much else and they weren't around long.
So I fell back on Meridian Drug -- an old-style drug store from back in the day when drug stores had a whole lot more than just medical stuff. Meridian Drug not only had a great book and magazine rack, they had a music section, too -- all the latest vinyl, plus occasional surprises. Once they had on display a dozen new, sealed copies of INTRODUCING THE BEATLES, on Vee-Jay Records, selling for $1.99. Why I didn't grab one of those I don't know, unless I thought I had enough Beatles at home already.
Actually, I didn't have that much music at home. Lots of 45's and tons of cassette tapes filled up by recording songs off the radio, but not that much on album. The Moody Blues' SEVENTH SOJOURN, THE BEST OF BREAD, Neil Diamond's first GREATEST HITS, INTRODUCING LOBO, Three Dog Night's HARMONY, the first Osmonds album, TUBULAR BELLS, The Carpenters' SINGLES -- the usual child's starter-kit of pop music. Grabbing stuff a cousin was bored with, I added copies of Simon and Garfunkel's BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER (and finally heard the gorgeous "Only Living Boy in New York" and the great melodrama of "The Boxer"), The Beach Boys' SUMMER DAYS (AND SUMMER NIGHTS!) (worth it just for "Let Him Run Wild," "Help Me Rhonda" and "California Girls"), and Peter, Paul and Mary's TEN YEARS TOGETHER best-of. But that still wasn't much.
In the first few months of high school I'd add The Beatles '62-'66 and '67-'70, ABBEY ROAD and the White Album, plus YESSONGS, and the rest of The Moody Blues' "Classic 7." But there was still so much I hadn't heard yet, and I knew it.
Meanwhile, I'd been getting my science-fiction magazines second-hand for a quarter each. Meridian Drug carried GALAXY, a mag I'd never previously liked much, which was reborn from mid-1974 through 1977 thanks to editor Jim Baen -- it became the most interesting magazine in the field, publishing wonderful fun stories by John Varley, Larry Niven, Roger Zelazny, Frederik Pohl and a bunch more. The grocery store a couple doors down from the drugstore carried ANALOG, AMAZING and FANTASTIC, so one 10-minute bike ride from the trailer park we lived in could set me up with enough reading for a month. It never occurred to me to wonder how a small rural town in Idaho could be so well-supplied with SF magazines.
The book rack at Meridian Drug kept me well-supplied too. It was the first place I saw a copy of Samuel R. Delany's huge and notorious "science fiction" novel DHALGREN, which I never bought new and could never get more than 200 pages into, despite repeated attempts. Delany had been brilliant once, wonder what happened....
MD also put me in touch with a collection of writings about The Who from the pages of ROLLING STONE -- "THE WHO: TEN GREAT YEARS." I'd been a Who fan since hearing "Won't Get Fooled Again," "Behind Blue Eyes," "Love, Reign O'er Me" and "Bell Boy" on the radio a few years earlier. I'd soon add a copy of WHO'S NEXT to my cheap collection of tapes.
Next I tripped over a Beach Boys biography and a huge collection of record reviews from ROLLING STONE, and started longing for a bunch of music I'd never heard. So I started pursuing that. There was life-changing music out there that the radio never played, and I couldn't figure out why. It was easy to get interested in off-the-wall music then -- 1974-75 was a pretty dull musical period in a lot of ways.
That first couple years in the trailer park, I was still trying to figure out what interested me, where I fit in. Then I got on my high-school newspaper, and most of my uncertainties ended. I finally realized I was where I should be, where my talents fit in best.
My best friend ever lived in that same trailer park -- but I didn't meet him until three years later, I was so withdrawn and anti-social and scared of embarrassing myself by talking with people. Most of the friends I had ended up living in that trailer park at one time or another. It really was a small world, back then.

Roundup

While I mull over another music-and-nostalgia piece that's almost finished, here's a brief rundown on what I've been reading lately. There are a few good things in here. But most of it, eh.
* Tobias Wolff: IN PHARAOH'S ARMY (1994) -- If Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's THE VIETNAM WAR series on PBS got to you, you might try this, though I think the best book on Vietnam is still Michael Herr's brilliant DISPATCHES. Wolff was a field-artillery officer in a backwater village in the Mekong Delta in 1967-68, and was grateful to be assigned there, because he would rather have died than show how incompetent he was. Wolff tells 13 stories about his war experiences in this brief book, and all but one of them work. Some of it's even funny. Near the end it gets brutally funny. Vivid, direct, involved. There's no distance between Wolff and the events he describes. I wish the book had been twice as long. You can read it in an hour or two.
* Damon Knight: CHARLES FORT - PROPHET OF THE UNEXPLAINED (1970) -- Fort was maybe the first of those folks who keep track of bizarre occurrences -- rains of stones, rains of frogs, spontaneous combustion, unexplained disappearances, even UFOs. He kept track of these kinds of oddities for years in the 1920s and '30s, and eventually filled four books with what he'd learned and let readers be the judges. Unfortunately, he led to those folks who now track Bigfoot, compile details about UFO sightings, try to reach people beyond the grave, and think the Twin Towers were transported to an alternate universe during 9/11. At least Fort had a sense of humor. Knight covers the ground with some sensitivity. Fort had a truly weird childhood, and he was lucky he had enough money to follow the odd compulsions that led to his books. But I wished there was more about what's IN the books, and the reactions to them. Knight sometimes goes off track -- there's a whole chapter about Velikovsky's WORLDS IN COLLISION theories, ghod knows why.
* Viv Albertine: CLOTHES MUSIC BOYS (2014) -- Viv gained some attention as self-taught guitarist with English punk-noise band The Slits back in the day. I picked up the book for that. Her memoirs of that time are direct, intimate, funny, gross. She slept with Mick Jones of The Clash, Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious of The Sex Pistols, and other Names. But the only time she felt right was when she picked up a guitar. Short, hard-hitting chapters, and she doesn't romanticize what happened. Later, the book turned kind of self-indulgent as she drifted into the 1980s and I lost interest. I couldn't finish it.
* Anthony DeCurtis: IN OTHER WORDS (2005) -- Interviews with musicians, writers and movie-directors. I bought it for the Bob Fripp interview, which didn't tell me anything new. Phil Spector on John Lennon held my interest. The Van Morrison interview didn't seem as awkward as DeCurtis thought. Don DeLillo was pretty gripping when talking about his JFK-assassination novel LIBRA. The rest are all people you've heard from before. Includes the dullest front-cover I've ever seen on a book.
* Philip Caputo: A RUMOR OF WAR (1977/1996) -- I respect Caputo as a reporter, but this memoir of his tour in Vietnam is too distant. He's too far separated from the events he describes. It's dull. I couldn't finish it.
* Jon Fisher: UNINHABITED OCEAN ISLANDS (1999) -- If you want to get away from it all, this is a book you could consult. Didn't realize there were so many islands in the Pacific once used by the military and now uninhabited. One of them has been bulldozed and shaped to look JUST LIKE an aircraft carrier. The maps were not as detailed as I'd hoped. A full-color "atlas"-type edition of this book would be well worth the price. The descriptions of some of these places make them sound like they'd be interesting to visit. Some prices for the properties are even included.
* M. Harry: THE MUCKRAKER'S MANUAL (1980/1984) -- I thought Harry's guide to investigative reporting might teach me all the areas in which I'd unknowingly made mistakes as a reporter. Unfortunately, most of his advice is very basic: Everyone has dirt on them, and if you're careful, organized and never give up, you can get your hands on that information. Well, duh. I didn't learn much.