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Roberta Flack 02/2025

Roberta Flack (88) was born on February 10, 1937 in Black Mountain, North Carolina, to parents Laron Flack, a jazz pianist and U.S. Veterans Administration draftsman, and Irene Flack a cook and church organist. According to DNA analysis, Flack was of Cameroonian descent. Her family moved to Richmond, Virginia, before settling in Arlington, Virginia, when she was five years old.

Her first musical experiences were in church. She grew up in a large musical family and often provided piano accompaniment for the choir of Lomax African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church singing hymns and spirituals. She occasionally sings at the Macedonia Baptist Church in Arlington.  From time to time, she caught gospel stars like Mahalia Jackson and Sam Cooke performing there. Her father acquired a battered old piano for her, which she learned to play sitting on her mother’s lap and Flack took formal lessons in playing the piano when she was nine. She gravitated towards classical music and during her early teens excelled at classical piano, finishing second in a statewide competition for Black students aged 13 playing a Scarlatti sonata.
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Marianne Faithfull 1/2025

Marianne Faithfull (78) 1/2025 was born 29 December 1946 in Hemstead, London. Just to sketch her aristocracy come down it should be noted that

Faithfull was born at the old Queen Mary’s Maternity House in Hampstead, London. Her father, Major Robert Glynn Faithfull, was a British intelligence officer and professor of Italian literature at Bedford College, London University. Her mother, Eva, was the daughter of Artur Wolfgang Ritter von Sacher-Masoch (1875–1953), an Austro-Hungarian nobleman of old Polonized Catholic Ruthenian nobility. Eva was born in Budapest and moved to Vienna in 1918; she chose to style herself as Eva von Sacher-Masoch, Baroness Erisso in adulthood. She had been a ballerina for the Max Reinhardt Company during her early years, and danced in productions of works by the German theatrical duo Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill. Continue reading Marianne Faithfull 1/2025

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Mike Pinera. 11/2024

Mike Pinera (Captain Beyond/Iron Butterfly) (76) was born September 29, 1948 in Tampa, Florida. In his mid-teens Pinera played his parts in local bands like the Impalas, the Motions and the El Dorados, essentially teen garage bands.”

He co-founded Blues Image in Tampa in 1966 together with Mike Betematti (drums), Malcolm Jones (bass) and Joe Lala (percussion) when they met as students at Tampa’s Jefferson High School. Blues Image, thanks to the Cuba-born Lala, added Latin rhythms to its rock ‘n’ roll/blues mix. The band opened Tampa’s first “psychedelic” nightclub, Dino’s.

Two years after forming, the band relocated to Miami, where it became the house band at Miami’s ultra-hip Thee Image club, supporting international acts like Led Zeppelin. Zeppelin’s guitarist Jimmy Page had a years-long friendship with Pinera. Page called Blues Image, which by then included keyboard player Skip Conte, “the most dynamic sound in the country.”

The band then moved to Los Angeles and signed with Atco Records, releasing its self-titled debut album in 1969. Blues Image’s sophomore album, Open, included “Ride, Captain, Ride,” a song co-written by Pinera and keyboardist Frank “Skip” Conte. Pinera sang the lead on the recording and played the second guitar solo toward the end of the song; the single rose to #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Years later Pinera recalled the recording sessions for Open. Their producer warned them he didn’t hear a hit.

“I went into the bathroom and locked the door,” Pinera said. “I was in there for 10 to 15 minutes and all the words and melody came to me for ‘Ride Captain Ride.’ “It came at a good time because my parents were financially strapped and challenged and I made enough money from that gold single to pay off my father and mother’s house.”

Blues Image was unable to follow with another hit and by the time “Ride Captain Ride” reached the top 10 Pinera had left anyway, accepting an offer to replace the departing guitarist Erik Brann in Iron Butterfly. That group had already made waves with its monster 1968 hit “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida,” but Pinera, who contributed to 1970’s Metamorphosis album, remained with them into 1972 and then rejoined periodically as various band members reunited in the ’70s-’90s. In 1972 he formed the band Ramatam with female monster guitarist April Lawton and Mitch Mitchell, previously drummer for the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Pinera left the band claiming that Lawton, who wanted both Pinera and Mitchell out, wanted to turn Ramatam into the “April Lawton Band.

In 1973, Pinera helped form The New Cactus Band. They recorded the album, Son of Cactus, on Atlantic Records. In 1975, he formed the band Thee Image and they recorded two albums on Manticore Records, Thee Image and Inside the Triangle, both produced by Pinera.

In 1977, Pinera’s first solo album, Isla, was released on Capricorn Records. It was followed by Forever in 1979 on Capitol Records. The songs were written and produced by Pinera. The Forever album contained the single “Goodnight My Love,” which spent eight weeks on the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at number 70 in February 1980. It was also a hit in Latin America featured in Tele-Novelas Latin TV Series. Pinera joined the Alice Cooper band and he played in the band from the late 1970s to the early 1980s.

He later worked with the video medium and in 1992 launched the Classic Rock All-Stars, a band that consisted of former members of ’60s-’70s rock bands of some renown like Rare Earth, War and others.

In 2012 Mike joined Rockzion and then completed an album called “Came To Believe” Composed of 7 songs. He worked with Rockzion’s players Ronnie Ciago (drums, percussion, vocal BU) and Dennis Renick (keyboards, vocals). Mike and Dennis produced the album together. Mike Pinera wrote 3 songs and Dennis Renick wrote 3 songs. The title song “Came To Believe” was a co-write. It was partially released in 2022 with 2 songs as a promo. The album is slated to be released in 2025.

This is the last original work of Mike Pinera before he passed on November 20, 2024 of liver failure at the age of 76.

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Greg Kihn 8/2024

Greg Kihn (75) – Greg Kihn Band – was born in Baltimore on July 10, 1949 to parents Stanley J. Kihn, a city Health Department inspector who fought in the Battle of the Bulge during World War II, and Jane (Gregorek) Kihn. Kihn’s early influence was the Beatles and their appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show.

“Just about every rock and roll musician my age can point to one cultural event that inspired him to take up music in the first place: The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. If you were a shy 14-year-old kid who already had a guitar, it was a life-altering event… In a single weekend everything had changed. I’d come home from school the previous Friday looking like Dion Dimucci. I went back to class on Monday morning with my hair dry and brushed forward. That’s how quickly it happened.”

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John Mayall 7/2024

John Mayall was born in Macclesfield, Cheshire, on 29 November 1933 and grew up in Cheadle Hulme, a village not too far from Manchester, England. It was here as a teenager that he first became attracted to the jazz and blues 78s in his father’s record collection. Initially it was all about guitarists such as Big Bill Broonzy, Brownie McGhee, Josh White and Leadbelly. However once he heard the sounds of boogie woogie piano giants Albert Ammons, Pete Johnson and Meade Lux Lewis, his desire to play in that style was all he could think of. 

He was the son of Murray Mayall, a guitarist who played in local pubs.

At the age of 14, when he went to Manchester’s Junior School of Art, he had access to a piano for the first time and he began to learn the basics of this exciting music. He also found time to continue learning the guitar and, a couple of years later, the harmonica, inspired by Sonny Terry, Sonny Boy Williamson and Little Walter. Continue reading John Mayall 7/2024

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David Sanborn 5/2024

David Sanborn (78) was born in 1945 in Tampa, Florida where his father was stationed in the US Air Force.  David grew up in Kirkwood, Missouri, a western suburb of St. Louis. He contracted polio at the age of three. He “accepted his fate stoically” and endured a “miserable childhood”. He was confined to an iron lung for a year, and polio left him with impaired respiration and a left arm shorter than the right.

While confined to bed, David Sanborn was inspired by the “raw rock ‘n’ roll energy” of music he heard on the radio, particularly saxophone breaks in songs such as Fats Domino‘s “Ain’t That a Shame” and Little Richard‘s “Tutti Frutti”. He loved the sound of the saxophone and at the age of eleven was happy to change to saxophone from piano lessons when doctors recommended that he take up a wind instrument to improve his breathing and strengthen his chest muscles. When he was 14, he was competent enough playing saxophone to play with blues musicians in local clubs. Alto saxophonist Hank Crawford, who was a member of Ray Charles‘s band at the time, was an early and lasting influence on Sanborn. Continue reading David Sanborn 5/2024

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Doug Ingle 5/2024

Doug Ingle 5/2024 (78), was born in Omaha, Nebraska, on September 9, 1945. His father Lloyd, a church organist and accountant, introduced him to music at an early age. The Ingles moved within three months of his birth to the Rocky Mountains in Colorado and later, when he was 11,  the family moved to San Diego, CA.

With the timing right in the mid-sixties and California becoming the hotbed for love-ins and psychedelic rock, Ingle formed the original line up for Iron Butterfly with Ron Bushy on drums. As soon as Iron Butterfly formed, they moved to Hollywood Hills and started an excruciating practice and performing schedule.

Of the four musicians in the In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida lineup, Ingle was the only one who was a founding member, having formed Iron Butterfly in San Diego in 1966. After a handful of lineup changes, a five-piece Iron Butterfly including Ingle and Bushy put out the band’s debut Heavy in 1968; soon after release, the other three members left and were replaced by Brann and Dornan, resulting in the lineup that would create the 17-minute psych-rock epic “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.” Released less than six months after Heavy and the lineup shuffle, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida would sell a reported 30 million copies worldwide, and a three-minute version of the title track — whose title was based on Bushy’s mishearing of “In the Garden of Eden” — became a Top 5 hit on the Hot 100 and a classic rock staple. Continue reading Doug Ingle 5/2024

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Dickey Betts 4/2024

Dickey Betts 4/2024 (80) was born in West Palm Beach on December 12, 1943, and raised in Bradenton/Sarasota, Florida. He grew up in a musical family listening to traditional bluegrass, country music and Western swing. He started playing ukulele at the age of five and, as his hands got bigger, moved on to mandolin, banjo, and guitar.

At sixteen, feeling the need for something “a little faster”, he played in a series of rock bands on the Florida circuit, up the East Coast and into the Midwest, before forming Second Coming with Berry Oakley in 1967.

According to Rick Derringer, the “group called the Jokers” referenced in “Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo” was one of Betts’ early groups. In  February 1969, Betts and Oakley joined members of two other Sunshine State groups — guitarist Duane Allman and his keyboard-playing brother Gregg of the Hour Glass and drummer Butch Trucks – and Mississippi-born drummer Jai Johanny “Jaimoe” Johanson in a new unit that ultimately based itself in Macon, Ga. Continue reading Dickey Betts 4/2024

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Duane Eddy 4/2024

Duane Eddy was born in Corning, New York, on April 26, 1938. His father, Lloyd, drove a bread truck. He began playing the guitar at the age of five after hearing the cowboy singer Gene Autry. In 1951, his family moved to Tucson, and then to Coolidge, Arizona. He formed a duo, Jimmy and Duane, with his friend Jimmy Delbridge, who later recorded as Jimmy Dell. Eddy left school at sixteen and played in local bars. 

In 1957, Eddy had a weekly showcase on radio station KCKY and then a slot on a weekly hit parade television show in Phoenix, where he met met Arizona-based disc jockey, songwriter and music publisher Lee Hazlewood. Hazlewood produced the duo’s single, “Soda Fountain Girl”, recorded and released in 1955 in Phoenix, Arizona. They performed and appeared on radio stations in Phoenix and joined Buddy Long’s Western Melody Boys, playing country music in and around the city. Continue reading Duane Eddy 4/2024

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Mike Pinder 4/2024

Mike Pinder (82) – The Moody Blues –  was born in Erdington, Birmingham on 27 December 1941. His father, Bert, was a coach driver and his mother, Gladys (née Lay), was a barmaid. As a child, he had an affinity for rocket ships and outer space which earned him the nickname “Mickey the Moon Boy”. These interests would be recurring themes throughout his career as a song writer. (Mickey the Moonboy. In 1995 Mike got a personal tour at NASA and a treasured memento.)

He was a member of several bands in Birmingham in his teenage years, among them the Checkers, who won first prize of £50 in a talent competition. In his first band, rock’n’roll combo El Riot and the Rebels, Pinder played support to the Beatles in 1963 in a show at Tenbury. As a member of the short-lived Krew Kats, he played for two months in clubs in Hamburg where the Beatles had played.

Between 1962–63, Pinder worked for 18 months as a development engineer, responsible for testing and quality control, at Streetly Electronics in Streetly, Birmingham, a factory manufacturing the first models of Mellotron in the UK. In May 1964 he left Streetly Electronics to co-found The Moody Blues with Ray Thomas, Denny Laine, Clint Warwick and Graeme Edge. Continue reading Mike Pinder 4/2024

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Eric Carmen 3/2024

Eric Carmen (The Raspberries) was born August 11, 1949 in Cleveland, Ohio, and grew up in Lyndhurst, Ohio. Carmen was born into a family of Russian Jewish immigrants, and was involved with music since early childhood. By the age of two, he was entertaining his parents with impressions of Jimmy Durante and Johnnie Ray. By age three, he was in the Dalcroze Eurhythmics program at the Cleveland Institute of Music. At six years old, he took violin lessons from his aunt Muriel Carmen, who was a violinist in the Cleveland Orchestra. By age 11, he was playing piano and dreaming about writing his own songs. The arrival of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones altered his dream slightly. By the time he was a sophomore at Charles F. Brush High School, Carmen was playing piano and singing in local rock bands including the Sounds of Silence.

Though classically trained in piano, at age fifteen, Carmen started to take guitar lessons, but when his teacher’s approach did not fit with what he wanted, he decided to teach himself. He bought a Beatles chord book and studied guitar for the next four months. Continue reading Eric Carmen 3/2024

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Steve Harley 3/2024

Steve Harley (Cockney Rebel) was born Stephen Malcolm Ronald Nice on 27 February 1951 in Deptford, London, the second of five children. His father Ronnie was a milkman and semi-professional footballer; his mother Joyce was a semi-professional jazz singer.

During the summer of 1953, aged two, Harley contracted a severe case of polio and the doctors told his father he was going to die. He survived, but spent four years in hospitals between the ages of three and 16. He underwent major surgery in 1963 and 1966. After recovering from the first operation, aged 12, Harley was introduced to the poetry of T. S. Eliot and D. H. Lawrence, the prose of John Steinbeck, Virginia Woolf and Ernest Hemingway, and the music of Bob Dylan, which pointed him to future careers involving words and music.  While in hospital he wrote poetry, finding inspiration in Dylan’s ballads.

From the age of nine, Harley took classical violin lessons and he played in his grammar school orchestra. Aged 10, he began learning the guitar after his parents had given him a nylon-string Spanish guitar for Christmas, and he started to write his own songs.

Harley was a pupil at Edmund Waller Primary School in New Cross, London. He attended Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham Boys’ Grammar School until the age of 17. Aged 15, he took his O-level exams in his hospital bed. He left school without completing his A-level exams.

In 1968, at the age of 17, Harley began his first full-time job, working as a trainee accountant with the Daily Express, despite having gained only 24% in his mock O-level maths exam. From there he progressed to become a reporter, having wanted to be a journalist since the age of 12. After being interviewed by several newspaper editors, Harley signed to train with Essex County Newspapers. Over the next three years, Harley worked at the Essex County Standard, the Braintree and Witham Times, the Maldon and Burnham Standard and the Colchester Evening Gazette. He returned to London to work for the East London Advertiser , where he covered the story of the Kray murder at The Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel. At the age of 21, unwilling to write a story about a woman who had taken two tins of food from a shop, Harley determined to get sacked, an objective he achieved by not wearing a tie and growing his hair long. Among Harley’s peers who made successful careers in national journalism were John Blake and Richard Madeley, who took over Harley’s desk at the ELA in 1972.

Harley started his musical career in 1971 playing in bars and clubs, mainly at folk venues on open-mike nights. He sang at Les Cousins, Bunjies and The Troubadour in London on nights featuring John Martyn, Ralph McTell, Martin Carthy and Julie Felix, who were popular musicians in the London folk scene. In 1971, he joined the folk band Odin as rhythm guitarist and co-singer and there met Jean-Paul Crocker, who became the first Cockney Rebel violinist. He also recorded a number of his own songs as demos that year using his classical guitar at Venus Recording Studios in Whitechapel. Harley then began busking around London in 1972, including on the Underground and in Portobello Road, while also writing songs. He left the folk scene and formed the band Cockney Rebel in 1972, as a vehicle for his own work. The name was taken from an autobiographical poem he had written at school.

The original Cockney Rebel consisted of Harley, Crocker, drummer Stuart Elliott, bassist Paul Jeffreys and guitarist Nick Jones. Jones was replaced by Pete Newnham, but with the arrival of keyboardist Milton Reame-James, Harley felt the band did not need electric guitar and settled on the combination of Crocker’s electric violin and Reame-James’ Fender Rhodes piano.

In 1972, Mickie Most discovered the band at a London nightclub, The Speakeasy Club, and offered them their first contract with his RAK Publishing. This influenced the A&R department at EMI Records to offer the band a three-album deal. Cockney Rebel recorded their debut album, The Human Menagerie, with producer Neil Harrison in June and July 1973. Their debut single, “Sebastian”, became a hit across Europe but failed to chart in the UK. When released in November 1973, The Human Menagerie also failed to chart, although the album was well-received critically and quickly gained cult status.

The lack of UK success caused EMI to feel that the band had yet to record a potential hit single. In response, Harley re-worked the unrecorded song “Judy Teen”, which was released in March 1974 and peaked at number 5 on the UK singles chart. In February and March 1974 the band recorded their second album, The Psychomodo, which was produced by Harley and Alan Parsons. It was released in June and peaked at number 8 in the UK Albums Chart. Between May and July 1974, the band toured the UK to promote the album, but tensions developed as the tour progressed. They received a ‘Gold Award’ on 18 July for outstanding new act of 1974, but a week later, with the tour finished, several members left. Crocker, Reame-James and Jeffreys chose to quit after Harley refused their demands to write material for the group, despite the initial understanding that Harley was the band’s sole songwriter. Following the band’s split, “Mr. Soft”, taken from The Psychomodo, reached number 8 in the UK as a single.

Left without a permanent band, Harley soon began auditioning new musicians. Meanwhile, Harley and Parsons did some studio work with Dutch singer Yvonne Keeley, with whom Harley began a relationship, and EMI released her version of “Tumbling Down” as a single in August 1974, backed by another Cockney Rebel cover, “Loretta’s Tale”. Harley’s debut solo single “Big Big Deal” was released in November 1974. The song failed to enter the UK top 50; however, it did enter the unnumbered BMRB’s UK Breakers chart. By this time, a new line-up of Cockney Rebel had been finalized. With original drummer Stuart Elliott remaining in the band, the new line-up included guitarist Jim Cregan, keyboard player Duncan Mackay and bassist George Ford. Renamed Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, they recorded the album The Best Years of Our Lives in November and December 1974, with Harley and Parsons again producing.

The lead single from this album, “Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)”, was released in January 1975. It became the band’s biggest hit, reaching the number one spot on the UK Chart and receiving a UK Silver certification in February. It was also Harley’s only Billboard chart entry in the US, reaching number 96 on the Hot 100 in 1976. In a 2002 television interview, Harley described how the song’s lyrics were directed at his former band members who, he felt, had abandoned him. As of 2015, the song has sold around 1.5 million copies in the UK. The Performing Rights Society have confirmed the song as one of the most played records in British broadcasting and over 120 cover versions of the song have been recorded by other artists.

The Best Years of Our Lives was released in March 1975 and reached number 5 in the UK. A second single from the album, “Mr. Raffles (Man, It Was Mean)”, was also a success, peaked at number 13. The band embarked on a UK and European tour to promote the album, and then recorded their fourth studio album, Timeless Flight, in the summer. During the same period Harley also produced Dutch singer Patricia Paay’s (Yvonne Keeley’s sister) album Beam of Light, with members of Cockney Rebel performing on many of the tracks. Later in the year, Harley and the band went on tour in the US as a support act to the Kinks. As the band had not achieved commercial success there, the compilation A Closer Look was released exclusively for the US market.

Timeless Flight was released in February 1976 and peaked at number 18 in the UK. Two singles from the album, “Black or White” and “White, White Dove”, both failed to enter the charts, although they did reach number 2 and number 6 respectively on the BMRB’s UK Breakers chart. Another UK and European tour followed the album’s release, then the band recorded their fifth album Love’s a Prima Donna between June and September 1976. In July they released a cover of George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun”, which reached number 10 in the UK and became the band’s last top 40 single, discounting a later re-release of “Make Me Smile”. Love’s a Prima Donna was released in October 1976 and peaked at number 28, with a second single, “(I Believe) Love’s a Prima Donna”, reaching number 41. In the US, “(Love) Compared with You” was released as a single. For Mackay’s second solo album Score, recorded in August and September 1976, and released in 1977, Harley wrote the lyrics to four tracks and provided lead vocals on “Time is No Healer”.

In November 1976, Harley provided backing vocals on T. Rex’s song “Dandy in the Underworld”, which was released as a single from the album of the same name in 1977. In December 1976, the band embarked on an eight-date UK tour to promote Love’s a Prima Donna. During the early part of 1977, Harley provided lead vocals on The Alan Parsons Project’s song “The Voice” for their album I Robot. In July, Harley disbanded Cockney Rebel, the announcement of which was followed by the release of a live album, Face to Face: A Live Recording, which reached number 40 and spawned a single, “The Best Years of Our Lives”.

After Cockney Rebel’s split, Harley signed to EMI for a further three years. He began recording his debut solo album in London and then flew to Los Angeles in February 1978 to complete it. He subsequently decided to emigrate to the US and purchased a house in Beverly Hills. Harley stayed there for nearly a year to gain new experience and inspirations, but later admitted that during his time in America he was not inspired to write a single song. The album Hobo with a Grin was released in July 1978, but was not a commercial success, nor were its two singles, “Roll the Dice” and “Someone’s Coming”, although “Roll the Dice” was a radio hit. On the album, the tracks “Amerika the Brave” and “Someone’s Coming” featured Marc Bolan’s last studio performances, recorded shortly before his fatal car accident in September 1977.

Harley returned to London at the end of 1978 and recorded his second solo album, The Candidate, in February 1979. On 12 May, Harley and Peter Gabriel appeared as guest stars at one of Kate Bush’s Hammersmith Odeon concerts during her Tour of Life. The show was staged as a benefit concert for the family of lighting technician Bill Duffield, who had died after a tragic fall earlier on Bush’s tour. Duffield had previously worked for Harley and Gabriel. The concert was Harley’s first performance on stage in over two years. The Candidate was released in October 1979 and was another commercial failure, although its single “Freedom’s Prisoner” was moderately successful, peaking at number 58. In October, Harley performed a one-off show at the Hammersmith Odeon. Following the disappointing sales of The Candidate, EMI dropped Harley from their label.

During the 1980s, which he later described as his “wilderness years”, Harley took time off from the music business while his two children were growing up. In July 1980, he undertook a short UK tour with a new line-up of Cockney Rebel and this was followed by a UK Christmas tour. The latter tour followed the release of the EMI compilation The Best of Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel in November. During the same year, “Somebody Special” and “Gi’ Me Wings”, two songs co-written by Harley, were released by Rod Stewart on his album Foolish Behaviour. “Somebody Special”, as the album’s third single in 1981, reached number 71 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and “Gi’ Me Wings” reached number 45 on the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart.

In 1981, Harley provided vocals on the song “No Name” for Rick Wakeman’s album 1984. He also made an appearance to perform the song at Wakeman’s concert at the Hammersmith Odeon. Harley and his band embarked on another small UK tour during Christmas 1981. In March 1982, the Midge Ure-produced single “I Can’t Even Touch You” was released under the band’s name. Despite expectations that it would become a hit, the single failed to reach the UK Singles Chart. In August 1982, Harley made his acting debut as the 16th-century playwright Christopher Marlowe in the rock musical Marlowe at the John Crawford Adams Playhouse at Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York. In June 1983, Cockney Rebel played a one-off concert in London and Harley released the single “Ballerina (Prima Donna)”, which was written and produced by Mike Batt. It was one of Harley’s most successful singles of the decade, peaking at number 51 in the UK. In July, the band performed at the Reading Festival, followed by a one-off concert at London’s Camden Palace in December 1984. It was the band’s last show until 1989 and was filmed for a special TV broadcast. In 1985, it was also released on VHS as Live from London.

In 1985, Harley signed a five-album recording contract with RAK Records. “Irresistible”, recorded with Mickie Most as producer, was released as his debut single for the label in June 1985 and reached number 81 in the UK. Harley originally offered the song to Rod Stewart, who encouraged Harley to record it in the hope that it would put him back in the charts. Later that year, Mike Batt recommended Harley to Andrew Lloyd Webber for the recording of the title track of the upcoming The Phantom of the Opera musical, which Webber intended to release as a single to promote it. Harley’s audition was successful and the song was recorded as a duet with Sarah Brightman. It was released in January 1986 and reached number 7 in the UK charts. Harley then successfully auditioned to play the title role on stage and spent five months working on the part, including rehearsal with producer Hal Prince. He was later surprised to be replaced by Michael Crawford.

While rehearsing for the musical, Harley released the non-album single “Heartbeat Like Thunder” in April 1986, though it was a commercial failure. In June 1986, a newly remixed version of “Irresistible” was issued as the lead single from Harley’s forthcoming solo album El Gran Senor, but it failed to chart. When RAK folded and was sold to EMI shortly after, the album was shelved. Later that year, Harley starred again as Marlowe when the musical of the same name ran in London and his performance was described by one leading critic as “a major and moving performance.” During the same period, Harley undertook an English ‘A’ level course, to which he devoted three hours of study each day. He passed in June 1987 with a ‘B’ grade.

In 1988, Harley provided vocals on Mike Batt’s song “Whatever You Believe”, alongside Jon Anderson

In 1989, Harley assembled a new line-up of Cockney Rebel and returned to touring in the UK and Europe. He would continue performing as both a solo artist and with various incarnations of Cockney Rebel until his death. To promote the band’s 1989 summer tour, Harley released the solo single “When I’m with You”, which was recorded in early 1989 with ex-Cockney Rebel members Duncan Mackay and Jim Cregan at London’s Point Studios. In October 1989, concert footage from the tour was released on VHS as The Come Back, All is Forgiven Tour: Live.

Throughout 1989 and 1990, Harley continued touring and recording material for a new album. By the early 1990s, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel had re-established themselves as a major live act across Europe. In 1992, EMI released a new compilation album, Make Me Smile – The Best of Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel, along with a re-issue of “Make Me Smile” as a single, which reached number 46 in the UK. Harley’s solo album Yes You Can was released in Europe in 1992 and the UK in 1993. It featured older songs dating from the El Gran Senor period and some new tracks. “Irresistible” was released as a single from the album in Europe and “Star for a Week (Dino)” was released as a promotional single in the UK.

Harley released a new studio album, Poetic Justice, in 1996, which was a critical success. In 1997, Harley participated in the Granada Men & Motors TV music quiz show Elvis Has Just Left the Building, hosted by Mike Sweeney, with Noddy Holder and Clint Boon as team captains.[77]

In 1998, Harley embarked on his first acoustic tour “Stripped to the Bare Bones” with Cockney Rebel’s violinist and guitarist Nick Pynn accompanying him. The pair played over a hundred dates, including fifty-four concerts in the UK, and coincided with the release of a new compilation album, More Than Somewhat – The Very Best of Steve Harley, which reached number 82 in the charts. The live album Stripped to the Bare Bones, with tracks recorded at The Jazz Café in London during March 1998, was released in September 1999.

In 2000, Harley began working on a new studio album and opened talks with various record labels. Although no album materialised for a few years, the single “A Friend for Life” was released in April 2001 and reached number 125 in the UK. The song, co-written with Jim Cregan, was originally offered to Rod Stewart, who would record his own version for his 2015 album Another Country. In 2001, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel embarked on their first tour in four years, “Back with the Band”.

Harley was involved with the charity Mines Advisory Group from 2002. He became an ambassador for the charity and led two fundraising treks, one around Cambodia in 2002 and the other across Death Valley in 2007. In 2002, Harley was awarded a Gold Badge of Merit by the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters. In 2003, he released the live album Acoustic and Pure: Live, featuring recordings from various UK concerts played during the previous autumn with Cregan. Towards the end of the year, Harley travelled to Cologne to collaborate with German artist Guido Dossche on the song “Ich Bin Gott”, which was issued as a single in Germany in 2004.

In 2004, the live album Anytime! (A Live Set) was released under the name The Steve Harley Band. During June of that year, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel played at the Isle of Wight Festival and the full performance was released on DVD in 2005 as Live at the Isle of Wight Festival. In June 2005, a newly recorded version of “Make Me Smile” was released, dubbed the “30th Anniversary Re-mix”, and reached number 55 in the UK.

A new studio album, The Quality of Mercy, was released in 2005; it was Harley’s first studio album to be released under the Cockney Rebel name since 1976. The band embarked on their biggest UK and European tour since the 1970s to promote it, with over 50 dates set between September and December 2005. The album was a critical success and also charted at number 40 in Norway in early 2006. “The Last Goodbye“, released as a single from the album in 2006, peaked at number 186 in the UK Singles Chart and number 21 in the UK Independent Singles Chart.

In 2006, EMI released The Cockney Rebel – A Steve Harley Anthology, a CD box-set compilation album spanning the recording career of Cockney Rebel and Harley’s solo work. In 2007, Harley starred with Mike Bennett in the West End premiere of the Samuel Beckett plays Rough for Theatre I and Rough for Theatre II. The plays ran for a week in July at London’s Arts Theatre. In 2008, Harley released a book, The Impression of Being Relaxed, which is a collection of diary entries he had published on his website between 2000 and 2008. In 2009, Harley received a Special Award from Childline Rocks for his charity work at Classic Rock magazine’s award ceremony in London’s Park Lane Hotel. His efforts raising money for the Mines Advisory group and several schools for Disabled Children were cited in a speech delivered by blues guitarist/singer/songwriter Joe Bonamassa.

In May 2010, Harley released a new album, Stranger Comes to Town, which he described as a “protest album”. It peaked at number 187 in the UK and spawned two digital singles, “Faith & Virtue” and “For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn”. Earlier that year in February, Harley, a self-confessed technophobe, attributed poor literacy rates and the moral corrosion of British society to modern technology.

In April 2012, Harley embarked on a promotional tour of Australia, with Australian guitarist Joe Matera accompanying him. The pair made a number of appearances on radio and TV and performed live acoustic sessions. In October 2012, EMI released the remastered four-disc box-set anthology compilation Cavaliers: An Anthology 1973-1974, which chronicled the recording career of the original Cockney Rebel line-up.

In September 2015, Harley’s first new song of five years, “Ordinary People”, was released as a digital single. In November, Harley and the surviving members of the original second line-up of Cockney Rebel reunited for a 16-date UK tour to celebrate the 40th anniversary of The Best Years of Our Lives album. The band were also accompanied by the MonaLisa Twins.

In 2015, Harley pledged to help raise funds for a new memorial to his late friend Mick Ronson. He played for free at the Hull City Hall in April 2016 to help kick-start the appeal. In November 2016, Harley was one of a number of musicians who teamed up with British Members of Parliament and the Royal Opera House Thurrock Community Chorus to record a charity version of the Rolling Stones song “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” in memory of Labour MP Jo Cox. The song was released as a single in December 2016, with all proceedings going to the Jo Cox Foundation, and reached number 136 in the UK Singles Chart, number 24 in the Singles Sales Chart and number 9 in the Independent Singles Chart.

Harley released Uncovered in February 2020, an album made up of two Harley originals and nine interpretations of songs he said he wished he had written. The planned UK and European tour to promote the album was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with only the first nine shows played as planned. Two shows were, however, played in September 2020, both in the acoustic trio format, though bassist Oli Hayhurst accompanied the trio on the second of these shows. In addition, Harley held an online question and answer session via Zoom in mid-December 2020. The success of this event led to further Zoom Q and A events: two in November 2021 and one in November 2022.

In the aftermath of the pandemic, Harley’s live shows resumed in August 2021, and the rescheduled 2020 tour took place between May and July 2022. In October 2023, after touring earlier in the year, Harley was forced to cancel all upcoming late 2023 and early 2024 shows, citing “a medical procedure followed by a period of recuperation”. Harley later revealed that he had cancer, and was forced to cancel or postpone all shows scheduled for 2024.

In December 2023, Steve Harley announced on his website that he had cancer. He died at his home in Suffolk on 17 March 2024, aged 73.

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Wayne Kramer 2/2024


Wayne Kramer 2/2024 (75) was born Wayne Stanley Kambes in Detroit on April 30, 1948. He had a typically nomadic post-World War II upbringing. His parents divorced when he was young, and Kramer’s father, Stanley, effectively disappeared from his life. Raised by his mother and stepfather, the young Wayne sought solace in the seismic sounds of 50s rock’n’roll, apparently as a reaction to being abused by his stepfather and as a result turned to music as an outlet. 

In the music of the era there was one pioneering figure in particular shaping the course of his future.

“Quite simply, Chuck Berry was the reason I played guitar,” Karmer enthused in the sleevenotes for Rhino’s The Big Bang! The Best Of The MC5. “When I heard that sound when I was nine years old, that was it. That was the sound of liberation, the sound of release and of power. And I mean the electric guitar. The sound of the amplifier was a huge part of it for me. That visceral spirit formed me and got me into bands.”

While in his early teens, Wayne found a fellow disciple in childhood neighbour and friend Fred Smith. Obsessed with their instruments, the two young guitarists played with a variety of local acts and sought out the hardest and most dynamic rock’n’roll records they could find (they took their cues from The Rolling Stones as well as Chuck Berry) before forming their own band in Lincoln Park-Michigan, christened MC5. Short for “Motor City 5”, the name reflected urban Detroit’s primary industry – the manufacture of automobiles.

By 1965, MC5’s classic line-up had solidified, with Kramer and Smith joined by bassist Michael Davis, drummer Dennis Tomich and vocalist Bobby Derminer. The latter was responsible for doling out more fitting stage names to his bandmates. Having rechristened himself Rob Tyner (after John Coltrane’s pianist McCoy Tyner), the afro-sporting singer invented Fred “Sonic” Smith for Smith, Dennis “Machine Gun” Thompson for Tomich and suggested Wayne adopt the surname “Kramer” instead of Kambes. Wayne did so, legally changing his name in 1965.

During the early years, MC5 gigged constantly in and around the US Midwest. In the same way that punk later connected with the disenfranchised, the group established a solid fanbase among North America’s working-class communities.

“In Detroit, we ruled,” Kramer later asserted. “Our fans were the blue-collar shop rats and factory kids, and they connected with the energy and release in the MC5’s live shows. But our band was generally despised outside of the industrial Midwest power-base cities of Cleveland, Chicago and Cincinnati – and the hundreds of small towns across Michigan, Ohio and Indiana.”

Prior to signing with Elektra, MC5 released a couple of singles – the first a crunching cover of Them’s I Can Only Give You Everything, issued on AMG Records in 1967, with the follow-up pairing two self-penned songs, Borderline and Looking At You, for the small A-Squared imprint. However, while the records sold well locally, MC5’s attitude didn’t go down well with the era’s studio personnel – with Kramer in particular butting heads with the technicians attempting to tame the group’s sound for record.

In The Big Bang sleevenotes, Kramer wrote, “I’d start working on my guitar tone and the engineer would say, ‘Turn that down, it’s distorted!’ I said, ‘That’s what I want!’, that the Motown sound is not what I do. I wasn’t looking for a tight sound, I have my own ideas. So we had an adversarial relationship with the recording process from the beginning.”

In another future portent of punk music, MC5’s radical socio-political stance also concerned the powers that be. Until he was controversially jailed for the possession of a minimal amount of marijuana in 1969, poet, visionary free-thinker and activist John Sinclair, managed the band, whose collective world view was influenced by the Marxism of the Black Panther Party and Beat Generation poets such as Allen Ginsberg. Black Panther founder Huey Newton inspired Sinclair, who died exactly two months after Wayne Kramer, to found the White Panther Party, whose ideas seemed radical to the era’s establishment, but now chime with modern-day beliefs surrounding ecology and human rights.

“The White Panther Party was an anti-racist, cultural revolutionary group,” Kramer wrote in his book The Hard Stuff. “It was a logical extension of our reefer-fuelled political ideas and it was done in the spirit of agitprop theatre. John [Sinclair] wrote up a ‘Ten-Point Programme’ to fight for a cleaner planet and for the freeing of all political prisoners.”

Fortunately, Elektra Records weren’t put off by MC5’s revolutionary spirit. After John Sinclair told the label’s director of publicity (and future Ramones co-manager) Danny Fields about the band on a US radio show, an intrigued Fields went to see MC5 play in Detroit and was impressed enough to sign the band to Elektra in the late summer of 1968. With thoughts turning to the group’s debut album, the two parties bucked industry trends by deciding that their first record, Kick Out The Jams, should be a recording of one of their concerts. “The live show was the central experience [of the MC5],” Kramer explained later. “That was who we were. We wanted to present that on record.”

Featuring several of the best MC5 songs, including Come Together, the Kramer-sung Ramblin’ Rose and the ferocious title track, the charged, raucous and aggressive Kick Out The Jams was taped at one of the band’s many rapturously received gigs at Detroit’s Grande Ballroom, on 31 October 1968. Now widely regarded as a landmark proto-punk record, the album captured MC5’s garage-rock blitz in all its glory, and it even cracked the Top 30 of the US Billboard 200, staying on the chart for an impressive 23-week run. Rolling Stone Magazine considers the album one of the 500 albums that defined Rock and Roll.

However, because of the title song’s infamously controversial opening exclamation – “Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!” – influential Detroit chain store JL Hudson’s banned the record and went on to remove all Elektra product from its shelves. In a series of events that seemed to presage the scenario which unfolded when EMI sacked Sex Pistols following their notorious Bill Grundy incident just seven years later, Elektra then decided to drop the MC5 – only for the band to immediately find a new home with Atlantic Records.

Though still featuring songs with socio-political content such as The American Ruse and the anti-war Human Being Lawnmower, MC5’s Atlantic debut, 1970’s Back In The USA, largely dialled back the polemics and concentrated on sharp, smart garage-pop anthems such as Tonight, Teenage Lust and High School. Overseen by producer and future Bruce Springsteen manager Jon Landau, the record had the mainstream in its sights, yet it only hit the outer reaches of the Billboard 200.

“Kramer was one half of the explosive twin-guitar attack that drove the Detroit band’s incendiary live performances, helping to set the stage and template for punk rock. They were at the heart of the band’s sound and the centerpiece of its notoriously loud and frenetic live performances. Wayne Kramer and Fred (Sonic) Smith teamed to provide the twin-guitar attack 
In ranking Kramer and Smith, together and separately, were of world class among the 250 greatest guitarists of all time. Rolling Stone said the two “worked together like the pistons of a powerful engine” to “kick their band’s legendarily high-energy jams deep into space while simultaneously keeping one foot in the groove.”

MC5 self-produced their third and final studio album, 1971’s High Time, with help from engineer Geoffrey Haslam. At least in the creative sense, the band were still hitting new peaks, as Kramer asserted in The Hard Stuff.

“We had enough excellent new material, and good ideas for how to go about recording it,” he wrote. “We finally had enough experience to know how to be creative in the recording studio. We could now combine the raw energy of Kick Out The Jams with the studio chops of Back In The USA, and have it sound like the MC5 on record.”

High Time undoubtedly contained some of MC5’s most imperious music. Sister Anne, Over And Over and Kramer’s Miss X all rank among the band’s finest work, while the brilliant, brass-enhanced Skunk (Sonicly Speaking) adroitly married high-octane proto-punk with the free jazz music both Kramer and Fred Smith admired so much. “We loved Sun Ra and Archie Shepp,” Kramer noted in The Big Bang’s booklet. “We didn’t see any other rock bands trying to work them in. Skunk pointed to the future of what the MC5 would look like. The problem was the MC5 was a band that didn’t have a future.”

Despite High Time’s quality and a burgeoning European following which took the band across the Atlantic for half a dozen tours, MC5 were consumed by a combination of personal issues and drug-related problems. They split after an ignominious final performance at their old stomping ground, Detroit’s Grande Ballroom, at the end of 1972, but by then Kramer – who was now gripped by a sizeable heroin habit – had other priorities.

The next few years were the worst of the guitarist’s life. Though he somehow kept performing with different musicians on Detroit’s club circuit, most of Kramer’s energies went into feeding his habit, which he maintained through drug-dealing and petty larceny until – after one deal too many – he ended up in prison in Lexington, Kentucky, where he did a three-year stretch starting in 1975.

Upon his release from jail, Kramer moved to New York City and restarted his career, touring with post-punk pop act Was (Not Was) and playing on the group’s first two albums, and forming the ill-fated Gang War with fellow heroin user Johnny Thunders. Keen to quit drugs for good, Kramer temporarily eschewed music, working as a carpenter in Manhattan before moving to the Florida Keys in the late 80s, where he continued woodworking and also built custom homes.

During the guitarist’s wilderness years, however, MC5’s music was repeatedly cited as an influence by younger generations of musicians. The process had started with the UK punk firebrands (“In England, they really liked Back In The USA – you can hear what The Clash, Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe got out of it,” Kramer noted in The Big Bang booklet) and it eventually led to Kramer’s stock rising in the US – so much so that Epitaph Records (home to Bad Religion, Rancid and The Offspring) offered him a solo deal. Relocating to Los Angeles, Kramer released three well-received albums for Epitaph, The Hard Stuff, Dangerous Madness and Citizen Wayne, and toured extensively during the mid-to-late 90s.

Succeeding in his quest to also quit alcohol in 1999, Kramer went on to enjoy distinctions in a variety of fields. He embarked upon a highly successful career scoring music for TV and film, with commissions ranging from HBO’s comedy series Eastbound & Down to Will Ferrell’s Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby. For the ITVS/PBS documentary The Narcotics Farm, Kramer provided narration in addition to a separate soundtrack album, Lexington.

In 2009, after he returned to performing and recording as a solo artist, he established Jail Guitar Doors U.S.A., a nonprofit that donates musical instruments to inmates and offers songwriting workshops in prisons, in partnership with his wife, Margaret, and the British singer-songwriter Billy Bragg.
The name comes from “Jail Guitar Doors,” a song by the Clash that opens with a line about Wayne Kramer’s struggles with substance abuse and the law: “Let me tell you about Wayne and his deals of cocaine.”
“The guitar can be the key that unlocks the cell,” Kramer told High Times in 2015. “It can be the key that unlocks the prison gate, and it could be the key that unlocks the rest of your life to give you an alternative way to deal with things.”

Kramer had a fruitful solo career with several album releases and movie credits. In 2018, he released his memoir “The Hard Stuff: Dope, Crime, the MC5, and My Life of Impossibilities,” which won him a Michigan’s Notable Book Award.

Kramer and the MC5’s Fred “Sonic” Smith, who died in 1994, were both among Rolling Stone’s 2010 list of all-time top 100 guitarists. They “funneled Sun Ra’s sci-fi jazz through twin howitzers. Together they staked out a vision for hard rock that felt ecstatic, giddy, boundless,” the outlet’s David Fricke wrote.

Even though MC5 did not achieve great commercial success, their influence lives on through generations of musicians who were inspired by the group’s attitude and sound. Led Zeppelin, The Clash and Rage Against the Machine are among bands influenced by the MC5.

Wayne Kramer.

When MC5 guitarist and co-founder Wayne Kramer passed away from cancer, aged 75, on 2 February 2024, the rock world was quick to pay tribute to one of modern music’s genuine trailblazers. Iconic figures ranging from Alice Cooper through to Slash from Guns N’ Roses weighed in with well-chosen words, while in an especially heartfelt testimonial, Rage Against The Machine’s Tom Morello even said that Kramer and MC5 “basically invented punk rock music.”

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Melanie Safka 1/2024

Melanie, hippie singer-songwriterMelanie Safka 1/2024 (76) professionally known as Melanie was born on Feb. 3, 1947 and raised in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens, New York City. Her father, Fred, was of Ukrainian ancestry and her mother, jazz singer Pauline “Polly” Altomare, was of Italian heritage. Melanie made her first public singing appearance at age four on the radio show Live Like A Millionaire, performing the song “Gimme a Little Kiss”. She moved with her family to Long Branch, New Jersey, and attended Long Branch High School, but disturbed that she was rejected by her schoolmates as a “beatnik”, she ran away to California. After her return to New Jersey, she transferred to Red Bank High School. She graduated in 1966, although she was prevented from attending her graduation ceremony because of an overdue library book. (different times!!!). Yet, she was inducted into the school’s hall of fame in 2014.

In the 1960s while still in high school, Melanie started performing at The Inkwell, a coffee house in the West End section of Long Branch. After high school, her parents insisted that she attend college, so she studied acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. At that time she began singing in the folk clubs of Greenwich Village, such as The Bitter End, and soon after signed her first recording contract with Columbia Records. Melanie released two singles on the label in the U.S. She subsequently signed with Buddah Records and found her first chart success in Europe in 1969 with “Bobo’s Party”, which reached No. 1 in France. Her growing popularity in Europe resulted in performances on European television programs such as Beat-Club in West Germany. Her debut album received positive reviews from Billboard, which described her husky voice as “wise beyond her years” and said her “non-conformist approach to the selections on this LP make her a new talent to be reckoned with”.

Later in 1969, Melanie had a hit in the Netherlands with “Beautiful People” (which is how I got to know about her). She was one of only two solo female artists who performed at the Woodstock festival in 1969, and her first hit song, “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)”, was inspired by the Woodstock audience lighting candles during her set. The record became a hit in Europe, Australia, Canada, and the United States in 1970. The B-side of the single featured Melanie’s spoken-word track, “Candles in the Rain”. Her following hits included “Peace Will Come (According To Plan)” and a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Ruby Tuesday”.

In 1970, Melanie was the only artist to ignore a court injunction banning the Powder Ridge Rock Festival, which was scheduled to be held on July 31, August 1 and 2, 1970. She played for the crowd on a homemade stage powered by Mister Softee trucks. Not long after this performance, she played at the Strawberry Fields Festival held in August 1970, at Mosport Park in Ontario. She also performed at the Isle of Wight Festival 1970, at Afton Down. At the festival, she was introduced by Keith Moon, drummer of the Who and received four standing ovations. She appeared again at the Isle of Wight Festival in 2010. In June 1971, she was the artist who sang to herald in the summer solstice at Glastonbury Fayre (later the Glastonbury Festival) in England. She performed again at Glastonbury in 2011, the 40th anniversary of the original festival.

Melanie left Buddah Records when they insisted that she produce albums on demand. In 1971, she formed her own label, Neighborhood Records, with Peter Schekeryk, who was also her producer and husband. She had her biggest American hit on the Neighborhood label, the novelty-sounding 1972 No. 1 hit “Brand New Key” (often referred to as “The Roller Skate Song”). “Brand New Key” sold over three million copies worldwide and was featured in the 1997 movie Boogie Nights.

A vegetarian at the time, Melanie had just been through a cleansing fast in which she consumed nothing but distilled water for 27 days. She was so weakened by hunger that she was almost hallucinating, and a doctor recommended that she eat meat to build strength. One day, on a trip to a flea market with her husband, she found herself unable to resist the lure of the Golden Arches of a McDonalds.

“No sooner than had I finished the last bite of burger,” she told the newspaper, “I wrote ‘Brand New Key.’ It just came into my head. I had one of those little practice guitars in the van with me, and when my husband, who was a record producer, heard me singing, he said, ‘What’s that?’ And I said, ‘Oh, some silly song. I’m just playing around.’ He said, ‘No, no — do that part again!’ And I did, and he said, ‘Melanie, that’s a hit!’”

He was not wrong. With its sunny vocals and a percolating beat, “Brand New Key” set heads bobbing around the country. The song was No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks starting on Christmas Day, 1971. Billboard later ranked the infectious ditty the No. 9 song of 1972. But not everything about the song was rainbow happy.

“Brand New Key,” seemingly written from the point of view of a girl hoping to win the favor of an elusive boy, includes the freighted line “I’m OK alone, but you’ve got something I need,” and then takes an apparent Freudian turn, with many listeners gleaning a sexual undertone in these lyrics:

Well, I’ve got a brand-new pair of roller skates
You’ve got a brand-new key
I think that we should get together
And try them on to see

In a time when the guardians of mainstream popular culture fought to keep radio and television output squeaky-clean, controversy soon followed. “I guess I can see why it was banned by some radio stations all across America,” she said in an interview with the website Where Music Meets the Soul.

The clamor recalled other “hidden meaning” kerfuffles, including speculation over the Beatles’ Technicolor odyssey “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds,” which John Lennon always denied was a song about LSD.

“It was a time when people were reading things into lyrics,” Melanie said in the website interview. “Some said it was sexual innuendo or that it related to drugs, and ‘key’ a code for kilo.” But, she added, “I was just having a romp through my memory of learning how to ride my bike and roller skating,” along with the thrill of first love.

 I thought it was cute; a kind of old thirties tune. I guess a key and a lock have always been Freudian symbols, and pretty obvious ones at that. There was no deep serious expression behind the song, but people read things into it. They made up incredible stories as to what the lyrics said and what the song meant. In some places, it was even banned from the radio … My idea about songs is that once you write them, you have very little say in their life afterward … People will take it any way they want to take it.

In a 2013 interview with music journalist Ray Shasho, Melanie elaborated on the origin of “Brand New Key”.

 The aroma brought back memories of roller skating and learning to ride a bike and the vision of my dad holding the back fender of the tire. And me saying to my dad … “You’re holding, you’re holding, you’re holding, right?” Then I’d look back and he wasn’t holding and I’d fall. So that whole thing came back to me and came out in this song. So it was not a deliberate or intentional sexual innuendo.

The follow-up single to “Brand New Key” was “Ring the Living Bell”. To compete with this release, Melanie’s former record company released “The Nickel Song”, which she had recorded while still signed to Buddah Records. Both songs were simultaneous top 40 hits while “Brand New Key” was still on the charts, setting a record for the first female performer to have three top 40 hits at the same time.

Melanie won Billboard’s No. 1 Top Female Vocalist award for 1972 and was awarded two gold albums, and a gold single for “Brand New Key”. Three of her compositions were hits for the New Seekers. She is also known for her musical adaptations of children’s songs, including “Alexander Beetle” and “Christopher Robin”. When she became an official UNICEF ambassador in 1972, she agreed to forego a world tour in favor of raising money for the organization. She also took time to raise her daughter.

Melanie had another top 40 hit single in 1973 with “Bitter Bad”, a song that marked a slight departure from the hippie sentiments of her earlier hits, with lyrics such as “If you do me wrong I’ll put your first and last name in my rock n’ roll song”. Melanie’s other chart hits during this period were the self-penned “Together Alone” and a cover of “Will You Love Me Tomorrow”, which reached No 37 in the UK Singles Chart in March 1974.

In 1976, Melanie released an album on Atlantic Records, Photograph, which was produced by Ahmet Ertegun. The album was praised by The New York Times as one of the year’s best, although it was largely ignored by the public. It was re-issued on compact disc in 2005 with an additional disc of unreleased material.

Also in 1976, Melanie appeared at the tribute concert for Phil Ochs, who had committed suicide on April 9 that year. Held on May 28 at New York City’s Felt Forum, Melanie performed an emotional version of Ochs’s songs “Chords of Fame” and “Miranda”. She had appeared with Ochs on stage in 1974 at his “Evening with Salvador Allende” concert (also held at the Felt Forum), along with Dave Van Ronk, Arlo Guthrie, Bob Dylan, and others.

In 1983, Melanie wrote the music and lyrics for a theatrical musical, Ace of Diamonds, with a book by Ed Kelleher and Seymour Vall based on a series of letters written by Annie Oakley. Though never fully produced, several staged readings were performed at the Lincoln Center, with Melanie as the narrator and pop singer and actress Annie Golden as Oakley.

One of Melanie’s later albums, Paled By Dimmer Light (2004), was co-produced by Peter and Beau-Jarred Schekeryk and includes the songs “To Be The One”, “Extraordinary”, “Make It Work”, and “I Tried To Die Young”.

In 2007, Melanie Safka was invited by Jarvis Cocker to perform at the Meltdown festival at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Her sold-out performance was critically acclaimed, with The Independent saying, “It was hard to disagree that Melanie has earned her place alongside Joan Baez, Judy Collins, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Laura Nyro, Joni Mitchell, Nico, and Marianne Faithfull in the pantheon of iconic female singers. Meltdown was all the better for her presence.” The concert was filmed for a DVD, Melanie: For One Night Only, which was released in October 2007. She recorded “Psychotherapy”, sung to the tune of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic”, which parodied aspects of Freudian psychoanalysis. The song has been played on The Dr. Demento Show. Melanie won an Emmy Award for writing the lyrics to the theme song for the television series Beauty and the Beast. With one exception, her albums were produced by her husband, Peter Schekeryk, who died suddenly in 2010. Her three children — Leilah, Jeordie, and Beau-Jarred — are also musicians. Beau-Jarred is a guitarist and accompanied his mother on tour. In July 2012, Melanie headlined along with Arlo Guthrie and Judy Collins at the 15th annual Woody Guthrie Folk Festival, which is held to celebrate Woody Guthrie’s life and music.

In October 2012, Melanie collaborated with John Haldoupis, artistic and managing director of Blackfriars Theatre in Rochester, New York, to create an original musical about her love story with her late husband. Melanie and the Record Man made its premiere on October 19, with performances scheduled until October 28. The musical, conceived and designed by Haldoupis, featured Melanie’s music and told the story of meeting Peter, falling in love, and working together to produce her music. Melanie performed during the musical and was also the narrator. In June 2014, she toured Australia for the first time since 1977.

In April 2015, Melanie Safka was inducted into Red Bank Regional’s “Distinguished Alumni Hall of Fame”. She received the Sandy Hosey Lifetime Achievement Award at the Artists Music Guild’s 2015 AMG Heritage Awards on November 14, 2015, in Monroe, North Carolina. On New Year’s Eve 2019, she performed on the BBC’s Jools’ Annual Hootenanny. 

Melanie resided in the Nashville metropolitan area in later years, where she died unexpectedly from an undisclosed illness on January 23, 2024, at the age of 76. At the time of her death Melanie was working on a covers album titled Second Hand Smoke.

Despite her success during a period of singer-songwriter ascendence, Melanie was rarely mentioned in the same breath as Woodstock-era contemporaries like Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell. “It wasn’t the age of smiling women,” she said in a 2021 interview with The Guardian. “It had to be much more broody, and I was way too cherubic.”

She also seemed weary of her famous song celebrating steel-wheeled locomotion, and perhaps joys more libidinous; she had even expressed reservations about the success of the song when it was at its peak.

“I had already been battling this beatific image of, ‘Isn’t she ever so precious, every bit of Woodstock fluff person?’” Melanie told The Tennessean. “I wanted to be perceived as someone with some social commentary and relevance.”

She was even more pointed in her interview with Where Music Meets the Soul, saying, “It was the song that doomed me to be cute for the rest of my life.”

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Jimmy Buffett – 9/2023

Jimmy BuffettJimmy Buffett (76) was born on December 25, 1946, in Pascagoula, Mississippi, and spent part of his childhood in Mobile and Fairhope, Alabama. He was the son of Mary Lorraine (née Peets) and James Delaney Buffett Jr, who worked for the Army Corps of Engineers. During his grade school years, he attended St. Ignatius School, where he played the trombone in the school band. As a child, he was exposed to sailing through his grandfather who was a steamship captain and these experiences influenced his later music. He graduated from McGill Institute for Boys, a Catholic high school in Mobile, in 1964. He began playing the guitar during his first year at Auburn University after seeing a fraternity brother playing while surrounded by a group of girls. Buffett left Auburn after a year due to his grades and continued his college years at Pearl River Community College and the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, where he received a bachelor’s degree in history in 1969. From 1969 to 1970, Buffett worked for Billboard as a Nashville correspondent, and in 1969, he was the first writer to report that the bluegrass duo Flatt and Scruggs had disbanded. Continue reading Jimmy Buffett – 9/2023

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Gary Wright – 9/2023

Mr. Dream WeaverGary Wright was born on April 26, 1943 in Cresskill, New Jersey, to Ann (nee Belvedere) and Louis Wright. His father was a construction engineer, and his mother was a singer, as were his two sisters. His older sister, Beverly, enjoyed some success as a pop and folk singer in the 60s, while his younger sister, Lorna, released the album Circle of Love (1978) and several singles.

His mother encouraged Gary to take an interest in music and acting. He appeared in the TV sci-fi series Captain Video and His Video Rangers, and when he was 12 he was hired as an understudy for a Broadway musical, Fanny. This resulted in him going on stage in the role of Cesario, son of the titular Fanny, played by Florence Henderson, and in 1955, appearing with Henderson on The Ed Sullivan Show.

His enthusiasm subsequently switched to music, and while at Tenafly high school in New Jersey, he played in several rock’n’roll groups. He would cite the R&B artists Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin and James Brown among his musical idols, along with Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and the Beatles.

Having attended William & Mary College in Virginia and then focused on medicine at New York University, Wright was studying psychology at the Free University of Germany in West Berlin when he abandoned his academic plans and formed a group called the New York Times. They supported Steve Winwood’s Traffic at a gig in Oslo, Norway, where he met the Island Records boss Chris Blackwell. Blackwell introduced Wright to four of the five members of the now-defunct band Art, and Spooky Tooth was formed. Traffic’s producer Jimmy Miller worked on their first two albums, It’s All About and Spooky Two (1969).

Distinguished by the standout tracks Evil Woman and Better By You, Better Than Me, the latter was widely regarded as the band’s finest hour. It cracked the American Top 50, but this was the highest Spooky Tooth ever climbed, though they made four subsequent visits to the bottom end of the US Top 100. They pulled enthusiastic audiences, not least on sold-out US tours with Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones, delivered some powerful and inventive music, and garnered generous accolades from the press, but somehow the stars never aligned in their favor.

Wright identified their third album, Ceremony (subtitled An Electronic Mass and also released in 1969), as the moment where it all went wrong. It was a collaboration with the French electronic composer Pierre Henry, and, as Wright described it, was supposed to be a Henry album rather than being billed as the latest Spooky Tooth offering. “We said … ‘it will ruin our career’, and that’s exactly what happened.”

So at that time in the early 1970’s Wright took a hiatus from Spooky Tooth to produce records for Traffic and Rolling Stones producer Jimmy Miller’s production company. He quickly became a part of London’s elite session musicians, playing keyboards on George Harrison’s classic “All Things Must Pass,” which also featured Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr, Phil Collins and other greats. Thus began a continuing musical relationship with Harrison that embraced playing keyboards, as well as, co-writing several songs on George’s subsequent albums.

To the outside world I was strange that Gary Wright was allowed toput out solo albums? This was nearly unfathomable, a guy from a stiff group gets to put out his own music? We saw his 1970 album “Extraction,” with its pencil drawing cover, and thinking it was almost amateurish, like they didn’t have the money for color. As for the follow-up, 1971’s “Footprint”… It’s like it almost didn’t come out, that one many shops didn’t even stock.

Although Wright had left the band, in 1972 he got back together with another original member, Mike Harrison, and rebuilt it with a new lineup with the help of Mick Jones, who later joined Foreigner.. They recorded You Broke My Heart So … I Busted Your Jaw (1973), Witness (1973) and The Mirror (1974), but lack of commercial success prompted Wright to quit to pursue a solo career.

Gary then signed a solo deal with Warner Bros. Records in 1974. His ground-breaking 1975 release “The Dream Weaver” streatched the pop music envelope by featuring the first-ever all keyboard/synthesizer band, and by pioneering technologies in cut down versions of synthesizers and drum machines that revolutionized the musical instrument business and changed the sound of pop, rock and r&b forever.  It initially sold over 2 million and 2 million singles in the USA. The title track reached on 2 in America and no 24 in Australia. It was later used in the movie Wayne’s World. Wright also had a second hit off the record in the USA with ‘Love Is Alive’ (also no 2, USA, 1976).

But it didn’t work out for Gary Wright. There were numerous TV appearances, with a keyboard around his neck, a novelty at the time. He capitalized on his success, he wrung out every note. And then it was done. Two years later Gary put out another album, but the world had changed, synthesizer driven tracks were no longer a novelty, rock was becoming corporate, he never had another hit.

But for that one moment in time, that year of ’75, Gary Wright was as big as anybody on the radio, anybody in rock.

In a business where even the biggest success is often written in the wind, the popular appeal of Wright’s songwriting genius has endured. In 1991, Warner Bros. Records asked Gary to remake “Dream Weaver” for the “Wayne’s World” movie soundtrack — which went on to become Billboard’s #1 soundtrack album, selling over 2 million copies, “Dream Weaver” was also featured in the Golden Globe winner “The people vs Larry Flynt.”

The year 2001 brought 2 new versions of “Love is Alive” — one by Anastacia, whose International sales topped 3.5 million — the other by Joan Osborne whose version became the first single for the Michael Douglas/Matt Dylan film, “One Night at McCools.” In addition, “Dream Weaver” and “Love is Alive” were featured in the films “Daddy Day Care” and “Coyote Ugly” respectively. Eminem recorded one of Gary’s songs and re-titled it “Spend some Time” on his “Encore” album, and DJ Armand Van Helden sampled “Comin’ Apary” from “The Right Place” album and renamed it “mymymy.” The track became a huge hit in Europe and Asia selling over 4 million copies.

Gary Wright’s creative output was also extended to film scoring, with music for the Alan Rudolph thriller “Endangered Species,” the Sylvester Stallone-directed “Stayin’ Alive,” the Oscar-winning German film “Fire and Ice” and the 2000 Imax release “Ski to the Max” — both directed by Willie Bogner. It included Gary’s 1995 world music album, “First Signs of Life,” which incorporated music and percussion from Brazil and Nigeria, and featured guest appearances by George Harrison and Terry Bozzio. It continued with his solo effort “Human Love,” a studio album on which Gary is joined by guest artists Jeff Lynne, L. Shankar and Steve Farris.

The year 2007 marked the 40th anniversary of Spooky Tooth and ushered in the release of Nomad Poets live DVD featuring Gary and original members Mike Harrison and Mike Kellie. The band followed it up with sold out European tours in 2008 and 2009. During this stretch, Spooky Tooth was invited by Chris Blackwell, the founder of Island Records, to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Island, by performing at a concert in London in May 2009 along such artists as U2, Grace Jones, Amy Winehouse, Keane, Sly and Robbie and Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens).

In 2008, Gary became the newest touring member of Ringo Starr’s All Starr Band before releasing an instrumental album of ambient music called Waiting To Catch the Light and an EP called The Light of a Million Suns that featured a duet with his son, Dorian, on a re-record of his hit song “Love is Alive.”

As Gary Wright began another new decade as a musical pioneer, this one was immediately highlighted by the June 8, 2010 release of Connected, his first pop-rock album in over twenty years and a brilliant culmination of Wright’s vast life experiences, songwriting ability and production know-how. Connected also continued a life-long tradition of embracing esteemed musical camaradarie as the album’s first single “Satisfied” includes performances by Ringo Starr on drums, along with Joe Walsh and Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter on guitar.

In addition to shows throughout 2010 with his own band to support his new album, Gary once again traversed the U.S. during that summer, touring as a member of Ringo’s band, as well as, doing a European and South American tour in 2011 with Ringo. “Dream Weaver” was also prominently featured in Disney’s Toy Story 3 movie, as well as, in an episode of “Glee” and the series of “Once Upon a Time.”

Gary also appeared in Martin Scorcese’s highly-anticipated George Harrison biopic “Living in the Material World,” and Jay Z and Kanye West recently used a sample from Gary’s first release with Spooky Toothy, “Sunshine Help Me” on their latest album. The track, “No Church in the Wild also appears in the new Denzyl Washington film “Safe House” as well as in “The Great Gatsby.” Gary was writing a new book titled “The Dream Weaver” which is his autobiography. The book contains stories of the years he spent with George Harrison and their spiritual journey together. It will also be released as an E book with rare photos and unreleased music.

Gary Wright was diagnosed with Lewy body dementia in 2018. He died on 4 September, 2023.

So I was sitting in my living room last night and my wife comes in and says: “Gary Wright is dead”. I already had received the message earlier, but It was still a dagger to my heart. Not as much as the news about Jimmy Buffett, who I had known personally or David Crosby, who was my all time shining hero singer/songwriter. But still, I remember 1975/1976. Vietnam was finally over; the first oil crisis was freshly in our hindsight (and future), the Club of Rome had just predicted a devastating climate crisis and we kept ignoring it. The generational cohesiveness of the late 1960s was slowly fading into corporate greed, Music was still peaking until way after the arrival of MTV, and Gary Wright was there telling us about Weaving Dreams.  It just wasn’t music, it was life.

I have to admit that it sometimes makes me crazy when people younger than baby boomers say it’s the same as it ever was, that every generation has its own popular music, and it’s just as good. It’s not. That’s patently untrue. Rock Music was Michelangelo, The Sistine Chapel, The Mona Lisa. Music was mostly peaks, and sometimes valleys, but it was everything, it rode shotgun, it drove the culture, and Gary Wright was right there, even if it was only for a short flash in 1975.

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Robbie Robertson – 8/2023

Robbie Robertson (80)the Band was born in Toronto, Canada on 5 July, 1943. His mother, Rosemary Dolly Chrysler, was a Cayuga/Mohawk Indian who had been raised on the Six Nations Reserve near Toronto. The man whom he believed to be his father and who raised him until he was in his early teens, James Robertson, was a factory worker.

When he was a child, his mother often took him to the Six Nations Reserve, where it seemed that everyone played a musical instrument or sang or danced. He thought “I’ve got to get into this club. I think the guitar looks pretty cool.” His mother bought him one, his older cousin Herb Myke taught him how to play.

“Rock ’n’ roll suddenly hit me when I was 13 years old,” Robertson told Classic Rock magazine in 2019. “That was it for me. Within weeks I was in my first band, Little Caesar and the Consuls,” with whom he performed covers of the then current rock and roll and r&b hits. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete “Thumper” Traynor (who later founded Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film’s character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson’s guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes

His parents separated around that time, and his mother told him that his biological father was a Jewish professional gambler named Alexander David Klegerman, who had been killed in a hit-and-run accident before she met James Robertson. Years later In his memoir, “Testimony”, he wryly commented on his Indian and Jewish heritage: “You could say I’m an expert when it comes to persecution.”

In 1959, the Suedes, got a crucial break when they were seen by the Arkansas-based rockabilly star Ronnie Hawkins.

Hawkins saw enough in Mr. Robertson to write two songs with him, ‘Hey Baba Lou’ and ‘Someone Like You’, which he recorded, and he later invited that teenage guitarist to join his band, the Hawks, initially on bass. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson’s guitar style: “Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking, and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights.” Robertson soon developed into a veritable guitar virtuoso.

The Hawks also included Levon Helm on drums; by 1961, the other future members of the Band were also in the fold. They toured with Hawkins for two more years and recorded for Roulette Records. By 1964, they had gone off on their own as Levon and the Hawks.

The Hawks recorded a few singles for Atco, all written by Robertson, and in 1965 he was contacted by Bob Dylan’s management and invited to be part of his backing group. While he initially refused, he did perform with Dylan in New York and Los Angeles, bringing along Levon Helm for those gigs. At Robertson’s insistence, Dylan wound up hiring all the other future members of the Band (Garth Hudson, Levon Helm, Richard Manuel, Robbie Robertson and Rick Danko) for the full tour. Three of his fellow members — the drummer Levon Helm, the pianist Richard Manuel and the bassist Rick Danko — expressed those characters in distinctly aching vocals. Robertson rarely sang lead, instead finding his voice in the guitar.

Dylan also invited Robertson to perform in 1966 on a session for his album “Blonde on Blonde.” The next year, he asked the Hawks to move to his new base in the Woodstock area, and they rented a house in nearby Saugerties that was later known as Big Pink. It was there that they recorded the music released as “The Basement Tapes” and worked on the songs that would be included on “Music From Big Pink.”

“It was like a clubhouse where we could shut out the outside world,” Robertson wrote in his memoir. “It was my belief something magical would happen. And some true magic did happen.”

When “Music From Big Pink” was released in the summer of 1968, it boasted seminal songs written by Robertson like “The Weight” and “Chest Fever,”along with strong pieces composed by other members of the Band as well as by Dylan. “This album was recorded in approximately two weeks,” according to another close Dylan associate, Al Kooper. “There are people who will work their lives away in vain and not touch it.”

For the Band’s follow-up album, “The Band,” released in 1969, Robertson either wrote or co-wrote every song, including some of his most enduring creations, among them “Up On Cripple Creek,” “Rag Mama Rag,” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” which became a Top Five Billboard hit in a version recorded by Joan Baez. The album reached No. 9 on the magazine’s chart.

The Band’s next effort, “Stage Fright,” released in 1970, shot even higher, peaking at No. 5, buoyed by Robertson compositions like the title track and “The Shape I’m In.” Those songs, like many on the album, expressed deep anxiety and doubt, a theme that carried over to “Cahoots,” released in 1971. And while that album broke Billboard’s Top 20, it wasn’t as rapturously received as its predecessors. Possibly because time were changing fast in those year. Three of his fellow members — drummer Levon Helm, pianist Richard Manuel and bassist Rick Danko — expressed his anxiety and doubt in distinctly aching vocals. Mr. Robertson rarely sang lead, instead finding his voice in the guitar.

In its day, the Band’s music stood out as well by inverting the increasing volume and mania of psychedelic rock and by sidestepping its accent on youthful rebellion. “We just went completely left when everyone else went right,” Robertson said. The ripple effect of that sound and image went wide on impact, landing the group on the cover of Time magazine in 1970 and inspiring a host of major artists to create their own homespun amalgams, from the Grateful Dead’s album “American Beauty” (1970) to Elton John’s “Tumbleweed Connection,” released the same year. The Band’s music so affected fellow guitarist Eric Clapton that he actually lobbied for entry into their ranks. (The offer was politely declined.)

Robertson produced an album for Jesse Winchester in 1970 and played on Ringo’s ‘Ringo’ (1973) and ‘Goodnight Vienna’ (1974). He is heard on Joni Mitchell’s ‘Court and Spark’ and played guitar on ‘Mockingbird’ for James Taylor and Carly Simon. He was now one of the most sought after session musicians, working with Eric Clapton on ‘No Reason To Cry’ and producing Neil Diamond’s ‘Beautiful Noise’.

A collection of blues and R&B covers, “Moondog Matinee,” was released in 1973, and Robertson’s muse fully returned in 1975 on the album “Northern Lights — Southern Cross,” which included “Acadian Driftwood,” his first composition with a Canadian theme. The original group’s final release, “Islands” (1977), consisted of leftover pieces and was issued mainly to fulfill the group’s contract with its label, Capitol Records.

In 1976, Robertson made the decision that The Band would stop touring. It caused the break-up of the group but they went out with one final concert, called ‘The Last Waltz’. The Band was booked to perform at Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco on 25 November, 1976. Robbie asked film director Martin Scorsese to film the event. The Band would perform with famous friends including included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Emmylou Harris.

After the Band’s demise in 1977, Robertson released five solo albums, but devoted most of his artistic effort to movies, as a music producer or score composer.

The same year as “The Last Waltz,” Robertson produced a Top Five platinum album for Neil Diamond, “Beautiful Noise,” and a double live album by Mr. Diamond, “Love at the Greek,” which made Billboard’s Top 10 and sold more than two million copies.

Robertson told Musician magazine that he broke up the Band because “we had done it for 16 years and there was really nothing else to learn from it.” Another strong factor was Mr. Robertson’s frustration over hard drug use by most of the other members.

Without Robbie Robertson, the other members of the Band released three albums in the 1990s; the last, “Jubilation,” in 1998, was without Richard Manuel, who had died by suicide 12 years earlier at 42. Rick Danko died of heart failure in 1999 at 56, Levon Helm of throat cancer in 2012 at 71. 

Over the years, other members of the Band accused Robertson of taking more songwriting credits than he deserved. To them, it was a cooperative effort, with the other members adding important arrangements and contributing elements that helped define the essential character of the recordings. Levon Helm was particularly vociferous in his condemnation, amplified by his furious 1993 memoir, “This Wheel’s on Fire.”

In his own memoir, Robbie Robertson wrote of Levon Helm, “it was like some demon had crawled into my friend’s soul and pushed a crazy, angry button.”

The collaborations with Scorsese continued. Robbie scored Martin’s 1980 movies ‘Carney’ and ‘Raging Bull’ then later ‘The King of Comedy’ and ‘The Color of Money’. For ‘The Color of Money’, Robbie co-wrote the hit song for Eric Clapton ‘Its In The Way That You Use It’. Robertson also collaborated on film and TV soundtracks such as Casino (1995), Gangs of New York (2002), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Silence (2016), The Irishman (2019), and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023).

With his history it was remarkable that Robbie Robertson didn’t release a solo album until 1986. ‘Robbie Robertson’ was produced by Daniel Lanois and featured appearances from all members of U2, Peter Gabriel and his former Band mates Rick Danko and Garth Hudson.

Robbie Robertson’s fifth and final solo album appeared in 2019 with a title, “Sinematic,” that underscored his devotion to film work in his last four decades. He recently completed the score for his 14th film project, Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” which is scheduled to be released in the fall of 2023.

At the age of 80 years old Robbie Robertson took his marvelous talents elsewhere when he departed this world on August 9, 2023 after a lengthy battle with prostrate cancer.

Marveling over where life had taken him, Mr. Robertson once told Classic Rock magazine: “People used to say to me, ‘You’re just a dreamer. You’re gonna end up working down the street, just like me.’ Part of that was crushing, and the other part is, ‘Oh yeah? I’m on a mission. I’m moving on. And if you look for me, there’s only going to be dust.’”

Robbie Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Hall in 1989. In 1994, The Band were inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Robbie was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame in 2003. In 2005, he received a doctorate from York University and in 2006 the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award. In 2008 Robbie was given a Lifetime Grammy Achievement Award. In 2011, he was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and in 2011 made Officer of the Order of Canada. Robbie is also on Canada’s Walk of Fame, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards in 2017 and was given the keys to the city of Toronto in 2019.

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David LaFlamme – 8/2023

Violin for It's a Beautiful DayDavid LaFlamme (It’s a Beautiful Day) was born in New Britain, Connecticut, on May 4, 1941, the first of six children of Adelard and Norma (Winther) LaFlamme. His mother was from a Mormon family in Salt Lake City, and when he was eight years old, the family moved to Utah to be near her family. He spent his early years in Los Angeles, where his father was a Hollywood stunt double, before settling in Salt Lake City, where his father became a copper miner. David was about 5 when he got his first violin, a hand-me-down from an aunt back in Connecticut, whose daughter never took to the violin.

“I began fooling around with it on my own and taught myself to play ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,’” he said in a 1998 interview. Formal training followed and in Salt Lake City in later years, he won a competition to perform as soloist with the Utah Symphony Orchestra.

After joining the Army — he was stationed at Fort Ord, near Monterey, Calif. — he suffered hearing damage from the firing of deafening ordnance. He ended up in Letterman military hospital in San Francisco, and from there put down roots in the city after his discharge in 1962. He found lodging in the same house as his future wife, Linda Rudman. “By the second day that I was there, she and I had already written a song together,” he said.

During the ensuing years he performed with a wide variety of notable San Francisco acts, such as Jerry Garcia, Janis Joplin, Dino Valente (Love). In 1967, Mr. LaFlamme formed a band called Electric Chamber Orkustra, also known as the Orkustra, with Bobby Beausoleil, a young musician who played bouzouki and would later be convicted of murder as a follower of Charles Manson. He also created an early version of Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks.

But the times were the times, and in 1967, the year of the Summer of Love, he and his wife Linda, a keyboardist, formed It’s a Beautiful Day. The band bubbled up from the acid-rock cauldron of the Haight-Ashbury district, which also produced the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and other groups.

The band got its break in October 1968, when the promoter Bill Graham had them open for Cream in Oakland. It’s a Beautiful Day signed with Columbia Records soon after and the group’s eponymous LP was released by Columbia Records in 1969, containing their biggest hit, “White Bird”. The album was produced by David LaFlamme, who infused the psychedelic rock of the 1960s with the plaintive sounds of an electric violin. “White Bird,” encapsulated the hippie-era longing for freedom.

The LaFlammes wrote the song in 1967, when they were living in the attic of a Victorian house during a brief gig relocation to Seattle. The lyrics took shape on a drizzly winter day as they peered out a window at leaves blowing on the street below.

White bird – In a golden cage – On a winter’s day  – In the rain

“We were like caged birds in that attic,” LaFlamme recalled. “We had no money, no transportation, the weather was miserable.” He later said the song, with its references to darkened skies and rage, was about the struggle between freedom and conformity. In an email, Linda LaFlamme said that she considered it a song of hope, and that the only rage they had felt was about the Seattle weather.

Still, the song, with its pleading chorus, “White bird must fly, or she will die,” seemed to echo the mounting disillusionment of 1969, as marmalade skies turned into storm clouds with the realities of drug addiction and social turmoil, as epitomized by the bloodshed at the Altamont rock festival that year.

“It was a very solemn period of music on that first album,” Mr. LaFlamme said in a 2003 interview published on the music website Exposé. “If I would have kept going that way,” he added, “I would have ended up like Jim Morrison, getting more and more into that personal torture trip.”

My personal favorite on that album  was “Bombay Calling” and I didn’t realize until later that Deep Purple’s “Child in Time” was directly influenced by “Bombay Calling”. “Child in Time” was my favorite cover song to play in the band in those days. Here is Deep Purple vocalist Ian Gillan explaining how “Child in Time” came about. 

Ian Gillan said in an interview in 2002: “There are two sides to that song – the musical side and the lyrical side. On the musical side, there used to be this song ‘Bombay Calling’ by a band called It’s A Beautiful Day. It was fresh and original, when Jon was one day playing it on his keyboard. It sounded good, and we thought we’d play around with it, change it a bit and do something new keeping that as a base. But then, I had never heard the original ‘Bombay Calling.’ So we created this song using the Cold War as the theme, and wrote the lines ‘Sweet child in time, you’ll see the line.’ That’s how the lyrical side came in. Then, Jon had the keyboard parts ready and Ritchie had the guitar parts ready. The song basically reflected the mood of the moment, and that’s why it became so popular.”

Ironically enough David LaFlamme later on admitted that he got the idea for the song during one of his house jams when saxophone player Vince Wallace started out the tune.

It’s a Beautiful Day’s second album, Marrying Maiden, was released the following year. It was their most successful showing on the charts, reaching number 28 in the U.S. and number 45 in the U.K. Funny enough their opening track Don & Dewey featured clearly the riff  from Deep Purple’s 1968 release “Wring that Neck” on the album The Book of Taliesyn. Great humor in my opinion and also a strong indicator of how life has changed since those early days. Think how many times Zeppelin was taken to court for the opening riff on Stairway to Heaven. Randy California, the creator wouldn’t have cared a bit.

After two additional albums, Choice Quality Stuff/Anytime and Live at Carnegie Hall, LaFlamme left the group in 1972 over disputes regarding the direction and management of the band.
For a time he performed with the groups Edge City and Love Gun in the Bay Area before going solo.

In 1976, he released the album White Bird on Amherst Records. His remake of the song “White Bird” cracked the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at No. 89 that same year. This was followed by the album Inside Out in 1978, also on Amherst Records. Both project releases were co-produced by David LaFlamme and Mitchell Froom.
After years of legal wrangling over ownership of the band’s name, LaFlamme resumed formal use of It’s a Beautiful Day when former mis-manager/leech Matthew Katz let the trademark of the name go un-renewed. From 2000, he performed with the reconstituted band, which included his second wife Linda LaFlamme (not the same person as his previous wife Linda LaFlamme) and original drummer Val Fuentes.

LaFlamme also appeared on the television shows Frasier, Ellen, and Wings, as a strolling violinist who stands right at the table in a restaurant, playing loudly or annoyingly.
It’s a Beautiful Day was included in the documentary film Fillmore, which covered the final days of the famed San Francisco music venue Fillmore West in 1971. The group split in 1973, but later re-formed with new membership, David LaFlamme remaining the only constant into the present era. He occasionally recorded under the group’s name for various labels, and also maintained a solo career, releasing several solo albums and working with other bands.

The band never found the commercial success of its hallowed San Francisco contemporaries. Its debut album, called simply “It’s a Beautiful Day” and released in 1969, climbed to No. 47 on the Billboard chart. “White Bird,” sung by David LaFlamme and Pattie Santos, did not manage to crack the Hot 100 singles chart, largely perhaps because of its running time: more than six minutes, twice the length of most AM radio hits. Even so, the song became an FM radio staple, and an artifact of its cultural moment.

LaFlamme released several albums over the years, including a solo album in the mid-1970s called “White Bird,” which included a disco-ready version of the original single. It actually outperformed the original, peaking at No. 89 on the Billboard Hot 100. LaFlamme said in 1998, “It was a very difficult period musically, because during that period disco music ruled the earth.” “It was really the day the music died,” he said.

David LaFlamme died on Aug. 6, 2023 in Santa Rosa, Calif. Shortly after his friend Dan Hickman. He was 82. His daughter Kira LaFlamme said the cause of his death, at a health care facility, was complications of Parkinson’s disease. In addition to his daughter Kira, from his first marriage, Mr. LaFlamme is survived by his third wife, Linda (Baker) LaFlamme, whom he married in 1982; his sisters, Gloria LaFlamme, Michelle Haag and Diane Petersen; his brothers, Lon and Dorian; another daughter, Alisha LaFlamme, from his marriage to Sharon Wilson, which ended in divorce in 1973; and six grandchildren.

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Rodriguez 8/2023

Sixto Rodriguez 8/2023 (81) was born on July 10, 1942, in Detroit, Michigan. He was the sixth child of Mexican immigrant working-class parents Ramon and Maria Rodriguez.  They had joined an influx of Mexicans who came to the Midwest to work in Detroit’s industries. Mexican immigrants at that time faced both intense alienation and marginalization.  In most of his songs, Rodriguez takes a socio-political stance on the difficulties that faced the inner-city poor. His mother died when he was three years old. Growing up in a single parent, working class environment, Rodriguez first got turned onto music after hearing his father play Mexican folk songs. They often moved him to tears. “My father’s night would usually end with a couple of drinks, and a few songs. I would always listen to his heart-breaking songs. He loved music, and I picked it up through him.” Continue reading Rodriguez 8/2023

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Sinéad O’Connor – 7/2023

Sinéad O’Connor (56) was born on 8 December 1966 in Dublin, Ireland at the Cascia House Nursing Home on Baggot Street in Dublin.  She was named Sinéad after Sinéad de Valera, the mother of the doctor who presided over her delivery (Éamon de Valera, Jnr.), and Bernadette in honor of Saint Bernadette of Lourdes. She was the third of five children; an older brother is the novelist Joseph O’Connor.

Her parents were John Oliver “Seán” O’Connor, a structural engineer later turned barrister and chairperson of the Divorce Action Group and Johanna Marie O’Grady (1939–1985). She attended Dominican College Sion Hill school in Blackrock, County Dublin. Abused by an obsessively religious mother during her childhood, growing up in a politically charged environment of the Irish clashes and terrorist actions, she created a willingness to take a stand that made her powerful — and threatening, at the same time. Her mother also taught her to steal from the collection plate at Mass and from charity tins. In 1979, at age 13, O’Connor went to live with her father, who had recently returned to Ireland after re-marrying in the United States, in 1976. Continue reading Sinéad O’Connor – 7/2023

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Randy Meisner – 7/2023

Randy Meisner (the Eagles) was born on March 8, 1946, in Scottsbluff, Nebraska to a farming family.  He got his first acoustic guitar when he was around 12 or 13 and, shortly after, formed a high school band. “We did pretty good, but we didn’t win anything,” according to Meisner.
“We couldn’t find any work because there were a million bands out here,” he said.
Meisner moved to California in 1964/65 and played with the likes of Rick Nelson’s Stone Canyon Band and Poco, before co-founding the Eagles in 1971 alongside Don Henley, Glenn Frey and Bernie Leadon. 

They went on to define the country-tinged, laid-back West Coast pop-rock sound that ruled the US radio waves in the early 1970s, before later moving in a hard rock direction, essentially because of James Gang guitarist Joe Walsh being added to the line-up when Bernie Leadon left.

Once dubbed “the sweetest man in the music business” by former bandmate Don Felder, bass player Meisner stepped out of the shadows on the mournful, lovelorn waltz-time ballad Take It to the Limit – a song later covered by the likes of Etta James, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings. He was with the band when they recorded the albums “Eagles,” “Desperado,” “On the Border,” “One of These Nights” and “Hotel California.”
“Hotel California,” with its mysterious, allegorical lyrics, became the band’s best-known recordings. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 1977 and won a Grammy Award for record of the year in 1978. Continue reading Randy Meisner – 7/2023

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Tina Turner 5/2023

Tina Turner, proud queen of rockTina Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock on Nov. 26, 1939, in Brownsville, Tenn., northeast of Memphis, and spent her earliest years on the Poindexter farm in Nutbush, an unincorporated area nearby, where she sang in the choir of the Spring Hill Baptist Church, along with her parents and two sisters. Her father, Floyd, known by his middle name, Richard, worked as the farm’s overseer — “We were well-to-do farmers,”  — and had a difficult relationship with his wife, Zelma (Currie) Bullock.

Her parents left Anna and her older sister, Alline, with relatives when they went to work at a military installation in Knoxville, TN during World War II. The family reunited after the war, but Zelma left her husband in the early 1950s and Anna went to live with her maternal grandmother in Brownsville.
After her grandmother died, she moved to St. Louis, Missouri, rejoining her mother as she attended Sumner High School there. She and sister Alline began frequenting the Manhattan Club in East St. Louis to hear Ike Turner and the Kings of Rhythm.

At one time she requested to sing with a band led by a handsome, dapper guitarist who would soon become the profoundly dominant influence in her life. At first Ike Turner refused to entertain her pleas to be allowed to sing with his Kings Of Rhythm – until she grabbed a microphone during a band break, and belted out B B King’s ‘You Know I Love You’. Ike asked her if that was the extent of her repertoire. On finding out that it wasn’t, he let her sing a few more. By the end of the night she was the band’s newest ‘chick singer’. Continue reading Tina Turner 5/2023

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John Giblin – 5/2023

John Giblin was born on 26 February 1952, in Bellshill, a suburb of Glasgow in Scotland.

Little is known about John Giblin’s early years, but he must have picked up a guitar at an early age, considering how he became one of those musicians that gave rock and roll a foundation for others to shine on.

He worked as an acoustic and electric bass player spanning jazz, classical, rock, folk, and avant-garde music. Best known as a studio musician, recording film scores and contemporary music, Giblin also performed live and recorded with Peter Gabriel, John Martyn, Elkie Brooks, Annie Lennox, Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, Phil Collins, Empire with Peter Banks, Fish, rock/pop band Simple Minds,and has been closely associated with artists ranging from Kate Bush, Jon Anderson (Yes), to jazz fusion group Brand X, and with the avant-garde recordings by Scott Walker (including the album Tilt).
Later in life, Giblin moved further into the direction of acoustic bass, with projects involving drummer Peter Erskine (of Weather Report), and pianist Alan Pasqua (of Tony Williams Lifetime).

To get a feel for John Giblin’s work with the top of the crop, check out his oeuvre on AllMusic

Following his death, Kate Bush released a statement, saying: ” I loved John so very much. He was one of my very dearest and closest friends for over forty years. We were always there for each other. He was very special. I loved working with him, not just because he was such an extraordinary musician but because he was always huge amounts of fun. We would often laugh so much that we had to just give in to it and sit and roar with laughter for a while. He loved to be pushed in a musical context, and it was really exciting to feel him cross that line and find incredibly gorgeous musical phrases that were only there for him. He would really sing. It was such a joy and an inspiration to see where he could take it. We’ve all lost a great man, an unmatchable musician and I’ve lost my very special friend. My world will never be the same again without him.”

Giblin died from sepsis on 14 May 2023, at the age of 71.

 

 

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Gordon Lightfoot 5/2023

Gordon Lightfoot (83) was born on Nov. 17, 1938, in Orillia, Ontario, where his father managed a dry-cleaning plant. He was of Scottish descent. His mother recognized Lightfoot’s musical talent early on and schooled him to become a successful child performer. He first performed publicly in grade four, singing the Irish-American lullaby “Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral”, which was broadcast over his school’s public address system during a parents’ day event.

As a youth, he sang in the choir of Orillia’s St. Paul’s United Church under the direction of choirmaster Ray Williams. According to Lightfoot, Williams taught him how to sing with emotion and how to have confidence in his voice. Lightfoot was a boy soprano; he appeared periodically on local Orillia radio, performed in local operettas and oratorios, and gained exposure through various Kiwanis music festivals. At the age of twelve, after winning a competition for boys whose voices had not yet changed, he made his first appearance at Massey Hall in Toronto, a venue he would ultimately play over 170 more times throughout his career. Continue reading Gordon Lightfoot 5/2023

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Jim Gordon 3/2023

Jim Gordon (77) – Derek & the Dominos et al – was born July 14, 1945. He was raised in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles and attended Grant High School. He passed up a music scholarship to UCLA in order to begin his professional career in 1963, at age 17, backing the Everly Brothers. He went on to become one of the most sought-after recording session drummers in Los Angeles. The protégé of studio drummer Hal Blaine, Gordon performed on many notable recordings in the 1960s, including Pet Sounds, by the Beach Boys (1966); Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers (1967); The Notorious Byrd Brothers(1968); and the hit “Classical Gas”, by Mason Williams (1968). At the height of his career Gordon was reportedly so busy as a studio musician that he flew back to Los Angeles from Las Vegas every day to do two or three recording sessions and then returned in time to play the evening show at Caesar’s Palace. Continue reading Jim Gordon 3/2023

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Gary Rossington 3/2023

Garry Rossington (72) – Lynyrd Skynyrd – was born in West Jacksonville Florida on December 4, 1951. Anybody familiar with the area knows, that West Jacksonville was considered the tough part of town where things were different. It’s the area where Lynyrd Skynyrd was born.  And now every original member of Lynyrd Skynyrd is dead. A Southern Rock band of musicians that passed before their time. The kind that used “to rape and pillage” across the country, who got drunk, did drugs, got laid… That was Lynyrd Skynyrd or at least that was the band’s reputation.

I know I can’t say “rape and pillage” anymore. But that’s how we described the rock star lifestyle back in the seventies, and Lynyrd Skynyrd were part of the firmament of the seventies, even after the plane crash. Continue reading Gary Rossington 3/2023

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Micheal Rhodes 3/2023

Micheal Rhodes 3/2023 (69) was born on September 16, 1953 in Monroe, Louisiana and taught himself to play the guitar by age 13 and the bass soon after. In the early 1970s, Rhodes moved to Austin, Texas, where he performed with local bands. Four years later, Rhodes moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where he performed with Charlie Rich’s son Alan. Honing his chops he became a sought after session and touring musician. In 1977, Rhodes moved to Nashville, and he joined local band The Nerve with Ricky Rector and Danny Rhodes. He worked as a demo musician for Tree Publishing Company, and then as a session player.
Rhodes joined Rodney Crowell, Steuart Smith, Eddie Bayers, and Vince Santoro in the Cicadas. They recorded one album in 1997, but had been playing together for more than a decade. Rhodes was also a member of The Notorious Cherry Bombs, with Crowell, Bayers, Vince Gill, Hank DeVito, and Richard Bennett.

Rhodes has contributed to the recordings of numerous Nashville Royalty artists, including Neal McCoy, Chely Wright, Pat McLaughlin, Doug Stone, Wynonna Judd, Steve Winwood, the Dixie Chicks, Reba McEntire, Tanya Tucker, Hank Williams, Jr., Rosanne Cash, Vince Gill, J.J. Cale, Dolly Parton, Randy Travis, Faith Hill, Toby Keith, and Kenny Chesney.

And, while many of his recording credits involve country music, his work with Elton John, Larry Carlton, Peter Cetera, Mark Knopfler, Shawn Colvin, and Joe Bonnamassa prove that his talents on the bass transcended any single genre.

In 2013 he became an active sideman in recordings and touring of guitar virtuoso blues rocker Joe Bonamassa.
 
Besides session work, Michael Rhodes was a member of several local bands who play frequently in Nashville-area venues.
•The Fortunate Sons, with Gary Nicholson, Kenny Greenberg, Chad Cromwell, and Reese Winans.
•The Players, with Eddie Bayers (drums), John Hobbs (keyboards), Paul Franklin (steel guitar), and Brent Mason (guitar).They often perform with other artists, such as Vince Gill. 
•The Vinyl Kings, playing original Beatles style music, with Jim Photoglo, Vince Melamed (keyboards), Larry Byrom (keyboards), Larry Lee (percussion), Josh Leo (guitar), and Harry Stinson (drums).
•TAR (Trapp, Abbott, and Rhodes), a power trio with Guthrie Trapp (guitar), and Pete Abbott (drums).
•The World Famous Headliners, led by Al Anderson, and featuring Shawn Camp, Pat McLaughlin, and Greg Morrow.
In 2016, Rhodes won the Bass Player of the Year Award by the Academy of Country Music and was inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum in 2019. 

Michael Rhodes died on March 4, 2023, at the age of 69 of pancreatic cancer in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.

He skillfully integrates chord inversions, reaching for melodic lines that move from 3rd to 5th rather than root to root. His knack for sneaking in high fifth or dominant 7th chords is uncanny, as is the phrasing and placement of many of his fills. While his approach is often varied and surprising, it rarely catches the listener off guard, thereby enhancing instead of overplaying. He exudes the confidence of a master, the musical lexicon of a seasoned linguist, and the humility that comes from recognizing the power of a song.

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David Lindley 3/2023

David Lindley (78) was born in San Marino, California, on March 21, 1944. Growing up in Los Angeles, his father had an extensive collection of 78 rpm records that included Korean folk and Indian sitar music, as well as Spanish classical guitarists Andrés Segovia and Carlos Montoya. Lindley took up the violin at age three, and kept at it despite breaking the fragile bridge. He then moved on to the baritone ukulele in his early teens. Next he learned the banjo. By his late teens, he had won the Topanga Banjo•Fiddle Contest five times. He played banjo with the Dry City Scat Band which included multi-instrumentalist Chris Darrow, and Richard Greene on fiddle. Lindley and his bandmates aspired to emulate multi-talented folk singer Mike Seeger.

Lindley began to frequent the Los Angeles–area folk music scene of the 1960s, primarily going to the Ash Grove club, and the Troubador in West Hollywood, encountering an eclectic assortment of music including flamenco, Russian folk music, and Indian sitar music. At Ash Grove, Lindley shared ideas with local musicians such as Ry Cooder and Chris Hillman. Lindley formed an especially close relationship with Cooder as the two shared a love of “exotic music”, and they both turned away from corporate mainstream music to focus on less popular idioms such as folk and world music. Lindley also learned from traveling blues and folk musicians the “right” way to play certain styles, and he learned violin methods from local star Don “Sugarcane” Harris.

From 1966 to 1970, Lindley was a founding member of the psychedelic rock band Kaleidoscope which released four albums on Epic Records during that period. After Kaleidoscope broke up, Lindley went to England and played in Terry Reid’s (former Yardbirds and Renaissance vocalist) band for a couple of years. In 1972, he teamed with Jackson Browne, playing in his band through 1980 and occasionally afterward. During the 1970s he also toured as a member of the bands of Crosby-Nash, Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor.

In 1981, Lindley formed his own band, El Rayo-X. Jackson Browne produced their first album. The band’s final show was December 31, 1989. 

Lindley was especially known for his work as a session musician. He contributed to years of recordings and live performances by Jackson Browne, and also supported Warren Zevon, Linda Ronstadt, Curtis Mayfield, James Taylor, David Crosby, Graham Nash, Terry Reid, Dolly Parton, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Toto, Rod Stewart, Joe Walsh and Dan Fogelberg. He collaborated with fellow guitarists Ry Cooder, Henry Kaiser and G. E. Smith. Ben Harper credited Lindley’s distinctive slide guitar style as a major influence on his own playing, and, in 2006, Lindley sat in on Harper’s album Both Sides of the Gun. He was known in the guitar community for his use of “cheap” instruments sold at Sears department stores and intended for amateurs. He used these for the unique sounds they produce, especially with a slide.

After that in the early 1990s, Lindley toured as a solo artist, first with Hani Naser accompanying on hand drums, then with reggae percussionist Wally Ingram. He also played on a multitude of studio sessions. Between his work in the studio as a session musician or on tour as a sideman or bandleader, Lindley learned new instruments. He was famous for having written the only song glorifying a brand of condoms, “Ram-a-Lamb-a-Man,” from his album Win this Record!. The media often commented on his colorful polyester clothing, with jarring contrasts between pants and shirt, earning him the nickname Prince of Polyester.

Lindley also toured extensively and recorded with reggae percussionist Wally Ingram.

Lindley’s voice may be heard in the version of “Stay” performed by Jackson Browne. Browne’s version is a continuation of “The Load Out”, and its refrain is sung in progressively higher vocal ranges. The refrain of “Oh won’t you stay, just a little bit longer” is sung first by Browne, then by Rosemary Butler, then by Lindley in falsetto.

Lindley joined Jackson Browne for a tour of Spain in 2006. Love Is Strange: En Vivo Con Tino, a 2-CD set of recordings from that tour, was released May 2010, with Browne and Lindley touring together starting in June of that year. They played together at Glastonbury Festival in 2010, and they won an Independent Music Award for Best Live Performance Album in 2011.

He mastered such a wide variety of instruments that Acoustic Guitar magazine referred to him not as a multi-instrumentalist but instead as a “maxi-instrumentalist. The majority of the instruments that Lindley played are string instruments, including violin, electric guitar, upright and electric bass, banjo, mandolin, dobro, hardingfele, bouzouki, cittern, bağlama, gumbus, charango, cümbüş, oud and zither. He was the unparalleled master of the lap steel guitar in the rock music sphere, and an expert in Hawaiian-style slide guitar blues.

Lindley had obviously a large collection of rare and unusual guitars and other instruments from the Middle East and various parts of the world. He listed and categorized many of them on his website but admitted that he had “absolutely no idea” how many instruments he owned and played, having gathered them since the 1960s. A journalist described his home in 1994 as containing a “tidal flood of instruments strewn all over the house. In every room. On the floor, balanced against the wall, lying atop cabinets and just literally occupying virtually every inch of available floor space.”

David Lindley died after a long illness on March 3, 2023, at the age of 78. He had had COVID-19 in 2020, which his family said developed into Long COVID, with chronic kidney damage.

David Lindley was the epitome of a musician’s musician, not only for his comprehensive skills but also for his infectious personality. Lindley was best known as the ultimate sidekick,

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Renée Geyer 1/2023

Renée Geyer (69) was born September 11, 1953 in Melbourne, Australia to a Hungarian-Jewish father, Edward Geyer, and a Slovak-Jewish mother, a Holocaust survivor, as the youngest of three children. Geyer was named Renée after another Holocaust survivor who had helped her mother in Auschwitz after Josef Mengele had assigned the rest of her mother’s family to death. At a young age, the Geyers moved to Sydney where her parents were managers of a migrant hostel. Geyer described herself as a problem child, and her parents called her übermutig (German for “reckless”). She attended various schools and was expelled from a private school, Methodist Ladies College, for petty stealing. Her first job was as a receptionist for the Australian Law Society.

In 1970, at the age of 16, while she was still at Sydney Girls High School, Geyer began her singing career as a vocalist with jazz-blues band Dry Red. The group also contained Eric McCusker (later of Mondo Rock). For her audition she sang the Bee Gees’ hit “To Love Somebody”. She soon left Dry Red for other bands including the more accomplished jazz-rock group Sun. Geyer departed Sun in mid-1972 and joined Mother Earth whose R&B/soul music style was more in keeping with Geyer’s idiom.

In 1973, Geyer was signed to RCA Records, who had released Sun’s album the year before, Geyer, already showing signs of her self-proclaimed “Difficult Woman” tag, loyally insisted that Mother Earth back her on the album. Geyer’s self-titled debut studio album was released in September 1973 which mostly consisted of R&B/Soul cover versions of overseas hits. Geyer left Mother Earth by the end of the year.
In August 1974, Geyer released her second studio album, It’s a Man’s Man’s World, which became her first charting album when it peaked at #28 on the Kent Music Report. The title track, “It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World”, was a cover version of James Brown‘s hit from 1965 and became her first top 50 single.

Geyer then formed Sanctuary, to promote the album. Geyer quickly became disenchanted with RCA and their refusal to let her record more original material, made her prepared to wait out her contract if necessary. Former Chain members convinced Geyer to contact their label, Mushroom Records boss Michael Gudinski and band manager Ray Evans to strike a deal where they would record her and RCA would release the albums and singles with a Mushroom logo stamped on the label.
The arrangement led to Geyer’s third studio album, Ready to Deal, which was recorded in August–September 1975, and by this stage Sanctuary line-up was, Logan, Sullivan, Mark Punch (guitar; ex-Mother Earth) and Greg Tell (drums). They co-wrote most of the material for the album with Geyer and Sanctuary was renamed as Renée Geyer Band; the album was released in November to reach #21. It spawned one of Geyer’s signature songs “Heading in the Right Direction”, which reached the top 40 in 1976.

In 1975 Geyer contributed her voice to the Liberal Party’s theme song “Turn on the Lights”, and later stated she had only done their theme song to earn enough money to record an album in the United States, where she had signed a contract with Polydor Records.

Geyer relocated to the Los Angeles mid-1976 where in the course of the next decade she released several albums. In May 1977, Geyer released her fourth studio album Moving Along on RCA/Mushroom Records and peaked at #11 in Australia. It used Motown Records producer Frank Wilson, with the album’s Polydor Records release for the US market titled Renée Geyer. Her backing musicians, Mal Logan (keyboards) and Barry Sullivan (bass guitar) were supplemented by members of Stevie Wonder’s band, as well as Ray Parker Jr. and other US session musicians. It provided Geyer biggest Australian hit single, at the time, with “Stares and Whispers” peaking at #17. In the US, radio stations began playing several of the album’s tracks, in particular a re-recorded version of “Heading in the Right Direction” which was issued as her first US & UK single.
Polydor were aware her vocal style led listeners to incorrectly assume she was black and urged her to keep a low profile until her popularity had grown, thus they suggested her US album release should not include her photograph. Known for her uncompromising and direct personal manner, Geyer refused to allow this deception and insisted on marketing the album complete with a cover photograph of what she referred to as “my big pink huge face“. After the album’s release, interest in Geyer subsided in the US, which Geyer later blamed on her headstrong decision regarding her marketing. Geyer earned respect in the US recording industry and for several years worked in Los Angeles as a session vocalist although she returned to Australia periodically.

Geyer’s June 1979 release, Blues License, is unique in her catalogue as she combined with Australian guitarist Kevin Borich and his band Express to record an album of straight blues material. The added fire in her vocals was sparked by the harder edged backing. It reached the top 50 and became a favorite of fans.

In 1981, Geyer recorded her seventh studio album So Lucky in Shangri-La Studios, Malibu, California. Helmed by Rob Fraboni (The Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, The Band) and Ricky Fataar (Beach Boys), the album moved Geyer from the soul style she had been identified with and added a tougher, rootsy rock/R&B style, while incorporating salsa and reggae. The lead single “Say I Love You” was released in May 1981 and became her biggest hit when it reached #5 on the Australian charts and #1 in New Zealand.

Geyer continued as an in-demand session vocalist, which she had also done in Australia. She was on Sting’s 1987 double-album, …Nothing Like the Sun, including the single “We’ll Be Together”. She performed a duet with Joe Cocker on his 1987 album Unchain My Heart and, following the album’s release, toured Europe with him as a backing vocalist. She was audible on Toni Childs’ hit “Don’t Walk Away” from the 1988 album Union. Other sessions included working with Neil Diamond, Julio Iglesias, Buddy Guy and Bonnie Raitt. She also recorded “Is it Hot in Here” for the soundtrack of the 1988 film Mystic Pizza. She described her backing vocals as supplying “The old Alabama black man wailing on the end of a record so they hire the white Jewish girl from Australia to do it.”

In 1994 Geyer released her first solo studio album in 9 years. The exposure encouraged Geyer to move back to Australia and following the release of Difficult Woman, Geyer spent time reestablishing herself on the live circuit across Australia. These performances showed her more relaxed on stage than at her peak when her innate shyness was often cleverly disguised. Now a confident, mature woman she showed off a hitherto hidden wicked sense of humor.

In 2000, Geyer released her autobiography, “Confessions of a Difficult Woman”, after her 1994 studio album. In this candid book, she detailed her drug addictions, sex life and career in music. She described herself as “a white Hungarian Jew from Australia sounding like a 65-year-old black man from Alabama”.

In August 2003 Geyer released her eleventh studio album Tenderland. The album peaked at #11 on the ARIA Charts, equalling her highest-charting album in her career. Live at the Athenaeum was released in April 2004 and Geyer’s twelfth studio album Tonight in April 2005.
Geyer’s iconic status in the Australian music industry was recognized when she was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame on 14 July 2005. Geyer was also an internationally respected and sought-after backing vocalist, whose session credits include work with Sting, Chaka Khan, Toni Childs, Joe Cocker, Neil Diamond, Men at Work, Sting, Trouble Funk and many others.

In January 2023, Geyer was admitted to hospital in Geelong where she had hip surgery. It was subsequently discovered that she had inoperable lung cancer. She died from surgical complications on 17 January 2023 at the age of 69.

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David Crosby 1/2023

David Crosby was born August 14, 1941 in Los Angeles, California, second son of Wall Street banker turned Academy Award-winning cinematographer Floyd Crosby and Aliph Van Cortlandt Whitehead, a salesperson at Macy’s department store. His father was related to the famous Van Rensselaer family, a fiercely prominent family of Dutch descent during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries in the greater New York area. Members of this family played a critical role in the formation of the United States and served as leaders in business, politics and society. His mother—granddaughter of Bishop of Pittsburgh Cortlandt Whitehead—descended from the equally prominent Dutch descent New York Van Cortlandt family. For those of you interested in his ancestry, David Crosby could never have been anything else than what he became in life: freak, outspoken asshole and forever musical icon.

In all of Rock and Roll, this man was probably my very personal hero.  

David Crosby lived one of the wildest lives in rock and roll, flying the freak flag high through decades of global fame and several fortunes won and lost, a white knuckle outlaw ride crammed with drugs, sex, death and a stint in prison. But that’s not why I celebrate him or mourn his passing. Because he also participated in some of the most beautiful music heard in our times, writing gorgeous, complex songs of cosmic folk jazz, gilding the air with blissful harmonies and playing impossibly complex chords he seemed to pluck out of the ether. With his walrus moustache and a perpetual twinkle in his eye, he was a fantastic musician and a richly complex human being whose spirit became infused in the rock culture of the 1960s, seventies and beyond. Crosby always yearned for greater musical adventures. He was one of the great hippies, one of the great band members in a couple of the greatest bands, and just really one of the few absolute greats of rock and roll.

Continue reading David Crosby 1/2023

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Jeff Beck – 1/2023

Jeff Beck (78) Geoffrey Arnold “Jeff” Beck was born on 24 June 1944 in Wallington, South London to Arnold and Ethel Beck. Before Beck discovered guitar, his mother had wanted him to play the piano. But once his parents saw how Beck took to the guitar, they allowed it.  They probably thought, ‘If he’s got the guitar, he’s not going out stealing.’ The only friends he had were pretty low-life; most of them were one step away from jail.

Beck said that he first heard an electric guitar when he was six-years-old and heard Les Paul playing “How High the Moon” on the radio. He asked his mother what it was. After she replied it was an electric guitar and was all tricks, he said, “That’s for me”. As a ten-year-old, Beck sang in a church choir and his original musical direction was essential formed by the music his older sister, Annetta, brought home.  As a pre-teenager he learned to play on a borrowed guitar and made several attempts to build his own instrument, first by gluing and bolting together cigar boxes for the body and an un-sanded fence post for the neck with model aircraft control lines as strings and frets simply painted on it. Continue reading Jeff Beck – 1/2023

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Anita Pointer 12/2022

Anita Pointer (74) -The Pointer Sisters- was born on January 23, 1948 in Oakland, California, the fourth of six children to Sarah Elizabeth and Reverend Elton Pointer. Though she was born in California, Pointer’s parents were natives of Arkansas. As a result, her family traveled by car almost yearly from California to Arkansas to visit Pointer’s grandparents who lived in Prescott.

At one point in time, her mother allowed her to stay with her grandparents to attend fifth grade at McRae Elementary, seventh grade at McRae Jr. High, and tenth grade at McRae High School. While in Prescott, she played alto sax as a member of the McRae High School band. In 1969, Pointer quit her job as a secretary to join her younger sisters Bonnie and June to form The Pointer Sisters. Continue reading Anita Pointer 12/2022

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Dino Danelli – 12/2022

Dino Danelli (78) – The Young Rascals was born July 23, 1944 into an Italian American family in Jersey City, New Jersey. Danelli trained as a jazz drummer in his early years. Barely a teenager he played with Lionel Hampton and (by 1961) was playing R&B in New Orleans. He returned to New York in 1962 with a band called Ronnie Speeks & the Elrods. Later he also worked at times with such legendary performers as Little Willie John.

Dino was a prodigy from the Jersey City-Hoboken area, making the scene in his early teens, learning from the jazz greats like Krupa and Buddy Rich who played regularly at the Metropole, a very adult Club in New York City where the management took a shine to the young star-in-the-making and set him up with a cot in a dressing room years before he made it big. “They had vision, knew something was going to happen for me.” Young Dino held a daytime gig at the Metropole with a rock and roll band, travelled to New Jersey sometimes at night with his drum kit, performed with Lionel Hampton when he was fifteen years of age. Continue reading Dino Danelli – 12/2022

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Kim Simmonds – 12/2022

Kim Simmonds (Savoy Brown) was born Kim Maiden Simmonds on Dec. 5, 1947 in Caerphilly, Wales, to Henry Simmonds, an electrician, and Phyllis (Davies) Simmonds, a homemaker. As a child, he was drawn to the early rock ’n’ roll albums owned by his older brother, Harry, who later worked for Bill Haley’s British fan club.
“My brother took me to see all the rock ’n’ roll movies,I grew up with all that: Little Richard, Bill Haley and, of course, Elvis.”
By age 10 he had moved with his family to London, where his brother took him to jazz record stores that also sold blues albums. The singer and pianist Memphis Slim — one of the sophisticated blues guys that could keep one foot in the jazz world and one foot in the blues world became a favorite.
Simmonds bought his first guitar at 13 and began imitating the blues licks on the records he loved. So intent was he on a music career that he never completed high school.

A chance meeting at a record shop in 1965 with the harmonica player John O’Leary led to the formation of what was initially called the Savoy Brown Blues Band. (The first word in the name echoed the name of an important American jazz and R&B label) The group’s initial lineup featured six players, two of them Black — the singer Brice Portius and the drummer Leo Manning — making them one of the few multiracial bands on the British rock scene of the 1960s. Continue reading Kim Simmonds – 12/2022

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Dan McCafferty 11/2022

William Daniel McCafferty (14 October 1946 – 8 November 2022) was born in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland where he attended St Margaret’s school. He had no formal musical training, but in 1965 he joined the Shadettes, who dressed in matching yellow suits and played cover versions of Top 30 pop hits in local venues such as the Belleville Hotel and Kinema Ballroom. Every week the band had to add three new songs from the charts to their repertoire, learning them on Sunday afternoon to perform that night.

The Shadettes had been in existence since 1961, and when McCafferty joined, its members included bassist Pete Agnew and drummer Darrell Sweet. In 1968 Manny Charlton, who passed away earlier in May of this year (2022), joined as lead guitarist, and in December that year the foursome changed their name to Nazareth, inspired by the Band’s song The Weight and its line about pulling into Nazareth “feelin’ ’bout half past dead”. The reference was to the Pennsylvania town, rather than any Biblical connotation.

With financial backing and management from a local bingo-halls millionaire, Bill Fehilly, the band moved to London in 1970. Continue reading Dan McCafferty 11/2022

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Christine McVie – 11/2022

Christine McVieChristine McVie was born Christine Anne Perfect on July 12, 1943, in the Lake District of England to Cyril Perfect, a classical violinist and college music professor and Beatrice (Reece) Perfect, a psychic.
Her father encouraged her to start taking classical piano lessons when she was 11. Her focus changed radically four years later when she came across some sheet music for Fats Domino songs. At that moment “It was goodbye Chopin.”
“I started playing the boogie bass. I got hooked on the blues. And the songs I write use that left hand. It’s rooted in the blues.”

Christine Perfect studied sculpture at Birmingham Art College and for a while considered becoming an art teacher. At the same time, she briefly played in a duo and had a personal relationship with Welsh guitarist Spencer Davis, who, along with a teenage Steve Winwood, would later find fame in the Spencer Davis Group. She also helped form a band named Shades of Blue with several future members of Chicken Shack.

After graduating from college in 1966, she moved to London and became a window dresser for a department store.
As the sixties started swinging, she started performing with bands, eventually falling in with blues group Chicken Shack. Later, she was asked to join Chicken Shack as keyboardist and sometime singer. She wrote two songs for the band’s debut album, “40 Blue Fingers, Freshly Packed and Ready to Serve.” Even though her style never totally fitted with the group’s more raucous sound, the subtler songs she fronted ended up finding the greatest commercial success. She scored a No. 14 British hit with Chicken Shack on a cover of Etta James’s “I’d Rather Go Blind” for which she sang lead and Melody Maker readers voted her best female vocalist in both 1969 and 70. While Chicken Shack supported Fleetwood Mac on tour, Christine Perfect fell in love with Mac’s bassist John McVie and they married in 1968. Christine McVie served in Fleetwood Mac during several incarnations that dated to 1971, but she also had uncredited roles playing keyboards and singing backup as far back as the band’s second album, released in 1968. Continue reading Christine McVie – 11/2022

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Wilko Johnson – 11/2022

Wilko Johnson (Dr. Feelgood) was born John Andrew Wilkinson on 12 July 1947 in Canvey Island, Essex, UK. One of his earliest memories was of the 1953 floods, which hit low-lying Canvey badly and caused many deaths. His father, a gas-fitter, was “a stupid and uneducated and violent person”, according to his son, and died when Wilko was a teenager. Canvey became a romantic place in Johnson’s mind, with its lonely views of the Thames estuary overshadowed by the towers and blazing fires of the nearby Shell Haven oil refinery. Johnson and his contemporaries dubbed the area the Thames Delta, in homage to the Mississippi Delta, which spawned the blues musicians they admired.
He first began playing the guitar after watching the Shadows on television, then later was inspired by Mick Green, guitarist with Johnny Kidd & the Pirates. Green’s knack for mixing up lead and rhythm guitar parts had a clear influence on Johnson’s technique. Wilko instinctively began to play left-handed, but forced himself to switch to right-handed. When he found that playing right-handed meant he could not hold a plectrum, he perfected a way of flicking his fingernails across the strings, which helped him to play the speedy, slashing rhythms that became his stock-in-trade. Continue reading Wilko Johnson – 11/2022

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Jerry Lee Lewis – 10/2022

Jerry Lee Lewis (87) was born on Sept. 29, 1935, in Ferriday, Louisiana, to Elmo Lewis, a carpenter, and Mamie (Herron) Lewis. When he was a boy, he and two of his cousins, the future evangelist Jimmy Swaggart and the future country singer Mickey Gilley (who died this year), liked to sneak into a local dance hall, Haney’s Big House, to hear top blues acts perform.

He showed an aptitude for the piano, and his father borrowed money to buy him one. “The more he practiced, the surer the left hand and wilder the right hand became,” Mr. Tosches wrote in “Hellfire.”

At 14, he was invited to sit in with a band performing at a local Ford dealership, which was celebrating the arrival of the 1950 models. He played “Drinkin’ Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” — the tune, a hit for Sticks McGhee in 1949, would be a minor pop hit for Mr. Lewis in 1973 — and he took home nearly $15 when someone passed the hat. Continue reading Jerry Lee Lewis – 10/2022

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Bill Pitman 8/2022

Bill Pitman (102) – Wrecking Crew – was born in Belleville, New Jersey on Feb 12, 1920 and grew up in Manhattan. He developed an interest in music at a young age when his father worked as a bass player on staff at NBC in Rockefeller Center. During the Great Depression, Pitman’s father had steady income doing freelance work, radio shows, and movie soundtracks while he was still employed at the network.

When he was five years old, Pitman knew he wanted to be a musician. He tried several different instruments, including the piano and trumpet, before finally settling on the guitar. He received lessons from John Cali and Allan Reuss, teaching him fundamentals and techniques on the first guitar he ever owned, a D’Angelico. When Pitman applied for his Local 802 union card, he easily passed the test before they recognized his surname, saying “Oh, Keith Pitman’s son. Well okay.”

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Olivia Newton-John 8/2022

Olivia Newton-John 8/2022 (73), was born on 26 September 1948 in Cambridge, England. In early 1954 the family moved to Melbourne, Australia where she was schooled and grew up, the granddaughter of the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Max Born. As a matter of fact, her family tree, especially on her mother’s side, showed quite some prominence all the way back to Protestant theologian Martin Luther, the founder of Lutheranism. Newton-John’s father was an MI5 officer on the Enigma project at Bletchley Park who took German war architect Rudolf Hess into custody during World War II.

Newton-John went to primary school with Daryl Braithwaite, who also followed a singing career as lead singer for the Australian rock band Sherbet. At age 14, with three classmates, Newton-John formed a short-lived, all-girl group called Sol Four which often performed at a coffee shop owned by her brother-in-law.

Newton-John originally wanted to become a veterinarian but then chose to focus on performance after doubting her ability to pass science exams.

In 1964, Newton-John’s acting talent was first recognised portraying Lady Mary Lasenby in her University High School’s production of The Admirable Crichton as she became the Young Sun’s Drama Award best schoolgirl actress runner-up. She then became a regular on local Australian television shows, including Time for Terry and The Happy Show, where she performed as “Lovely Livvy”. She also appeared on The Go!! Show, where she met her future duet partner, singer Pat Carroll, and her future music producer, John Farrar. (Carroll and Farrar later married.) Continue reading Olivia Newton-John 8/2022

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Judith Durham – 8/2022

Judith Durham, born Judith Mavis Cock in Melbourne, Australia (3 July 1943 – 5 August 2022) would for most rock and roll aficionados not belong on a tribute website for rock heroes. But when I learned of her passing last week, I realized that many of her early songs with the Seekers played an important part in my early rock and roll involvement – from learning to play guitar to appreciation for soft melodic rock during the early years of my teenage awareness. Also, Judith had a voice that mastered and actually stood out in almost every category of 60’s modern music. She could sweet voice you into folksy romance, belt it out in jazz rock, make you inconspicuously suffer the blues or lead the pack in a pop song. She could even sing the classics.

Early in life Judith believed her future would be as a pianist. She went on to gain her Associate In Music, Australia (A.Mus.A.) in classical piano as a student of world-renowned concert pianist Professor Ronald Farren-Price at the Melbourne University Conservatorium, with her first professional engagement in the arts playing piano for a ballet school.

Still in her teens, although excelling on piano, little Judy Cock dreamed of fame singing opera or musical comedy and in 1961, aged 18, she was ready to begin classical vocal training.  One night, just for fun, she ‘sat in’ with a trad jazz band at a local dance called “Memphis”, and found instant success performing blues, gospels, and jazz standards of the 1920s and 1930s, also developing as a serious ragtime pianist. She began using her mother’s maiden name, and at 19 she made her first record, an EP for W&G “Judy Durham” with Frank Traynor’s Jazz Preachers.

Meanwhile, by day since leaving school, Judy’s first job was as Secretary to the Pathologist at the Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital, but on taking a new secretarial job at J Walter Thompson Advertising, on her first day she met account executive Athol Guy.  Athol played acoustic bass and also sang bass in a trio called The Seekers and invited her that very night to come and join him and the two guitarists Keith Potger and Bruce Woodley, to sing acoustic four-part harmony folk and gospel at a Melbourne coffee lounge “Treble Clef”.  Still singing regularly with various jazz bands nearly every other night, she then became a regular every Monday with The Seekers.  Adopting her birth name Judith, she recorded an album with The Seekers for W&G, appeared on local TV, then set sail for London in 1964 on “SS Fairsky” for a 10-week stay, singing for their supper on board.

On the advice of Australian entertainer Horrie Dargie, the group sent the album and TV footage ahead to a big theatrical agency, The Grade Organisation, and on their arrival in ‘swinging London’, agent Eddie Jarrett booked them extensively in clubs, TV, and variety theatre.  He asked Tom Springfield (Dusty’s brother) to write and produce a single, resulting in the surprise chart-topper “I’ll Never Find Another You” which made The Seekers the first Australian group ever to hit No.1 internationally, made Judith Australia’s very first international pop princess and pin-up girl, and unexpectedly cemented her in the group as a full-time Seeker.

The next few years brought The Seekers worldwide adulation, with tours, more albums, and a succession of huge and lasting hits including “A World Of Our Own”, “The Carnival Is Over” and “Morningtown Ride”, which rivalled all the top groups like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones for the No.1 spot.  The Seekers’ biggest international seller was “Georgy Girl”, originally written (music by Tom Springfield, words by Jim Dale) and recorded as the title song for the movie starring Lynn Redgrave, James Mason, Charlotte Rampling and Alan Bates.  The song was nominated for an Academy Award® and the single made history when the group became the first Australians ever to reach the No.1 spot in the USA.

In 1967, The Seekers set an official all-time record when more than 200,000 people (nearly one tenth of the city’s entire population at that time!) flocked to their performance at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl in Melbourne.  Their TV special ‘The Seekers Down Under’ scored the biggest TV audience ever (with a 67 rating), and early in 1968 they were all awarded the nation’s top honour as “Australians Of The Year 1967”.

But 24 year old Judith wanted to spread her wings, and without any notion of the lasting universal grief to be suffered by shocked Seekers fans worldwide, she plucked up courage to give ‘the boys’ six months’ notice.  She was to leave the group in July 1968 to return to Australia … possibly to pursue a career as a solo singer in opera or musical theater … and she hoped to find ‘Mr. Right’.

The surprise for Judith was to receive offers as a solo artist, so she asked a London-based freelance musician, Ron Edgeworth, to be her musical director, pianist and arranger and a couple of years later her Mr. Right.  In big demand as a London-based freelance musician, Ron had worked with all the big names, and had earlier toured and recorded with the legendary Alexis Korner’s All Stars.

From there on Judith started her solo career, with an occasional Seekers reunion over the years, and also focused on composing and writing music. Her one-woman shows stunned audiences and critics with her unique gift for singing in all styles – from folk to country, jazz to pop, blues to gospel, original songs, ragtime piano and even classical.

An indelible mark was made with Judith’s transition into her now classic mid-70s trad jazz recordings with bands she formed with Ron in San Francisco and London.  “The Hottest Band In Town Collection” is now available though Universal.  They also released a legendary album of their piano and voice performance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1978 (“The Hot Jazz Duo”).

Through the 80s Judith Durham and Ron Edgeworth based themselves on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, Australia, and for the first time Judith concentrated totally on writing and performing her own compositions, even completing a full scale musical “Gotta Be Rainbows” with book written by eminent playwright Ian Austin.  Having experienced her very first songwriting success in 1967 with co-writer David Reilly on The Seekers classic “Colours Of My Life”, by the 80s Judith had developed through the decades as a remarkably talented and prolific composer of both lyrics and music, writing more than 300 works.

After the untimely passing of her husband in 1994,  51 year old Judith, went back into recording albums and touring. In 1996 Judith again toured the UK as a solo artist with the release of “Mona Lisas” (later repackaged as “Always There” in Australia), her Abbey Road album of legendary 60s and 70s covers produced by the late Gus Dudgeon.

To welcome in the new millennium with delighted Seekers fans around the world, she embarked on The Seekers ‘Carnival Of Hits Tour 2000’, and in 2001 Judith celebrated her own remarkable life-long musical journey in her “40th Anniversary” Australian concert tour.

In the same year, as an unexpected treat for loyal Seekers fans, Judith recorded with ‘the boys’ the album “Morningtown Ride To Christmas”, and late in 2002 a double album “Night Of Nights … Live!” was released after The Seekers’ Australian tour, in conjunction with The Seekers’ Australia Post Souvenir Stamp Sheet commemorating 40 years of musical magic from Australia’s first-ever international pop icons.

2003 was one of Judith’s busiest and most artistically satisfying years ever. In March she toured Australia with ‘the boys’ on The Seekers` `Never Say Never Again! Tour` which was received joyfully by fans all over the country – and with barely a month to get ready, she flew to the UK for her massive solo tour. Highlight after highlight followed, leading up to the Magic Date of December 3, 2013, the 50th Birthday of the Seekers.

Judith was thrilled to embark on a whole year of celebration – marking half a century of Seekers music. Judith found herself back in the studio with the group recording and filming two standout tracks for ‘The Golden Jubilee Album: 50 Tracks For 50 Years’.  “Silver Threads and Golden Needles” and the visual feast of “In My Life” were destined to be standout moments in ‘The Golden Jubilee Tour’, when The Seekers hit the road in May/June 2013.

Following the media frenzy of their 50th Birthday Party in Melbourne came yet another accolade for The Seekers – the presentation of a 24-carat gold ‘stamp’ by Australia Post as part of their ‘Legends of Australian Music’ series – and the official handover of the portrait of the group to the National Portrait Gallery, painted by Helen Edwards, “The Seekers Reunite 50 Years On”.

The group announced and then sold-out a ‘Golden Jubilee Tour’ of Australia, which was abruptly halted when Judith suffered a brain hemorrhage after the first of four sold-out nights in Melbourne.  Six months of hospitalisation and rehabilitation followed – during which time Judith’s commemorative ‘Platinum Album’ was released to mark her 70th birthday – before she was given the green light for the Australian tour to resume. Another sold-out tour of New Zealand followed, before The Seekers toured the United Kingdom, performing 18 sold-out show culminating in two packed houses at London’s Royal Albert Hall.

Just prior to the return to Australia, The Seekers were advised that they had individually been awarded the Order of Australia (AO) – one of the highest honours that can be bestowed on Australian citizens.  Judith would add yet another honour to her tally by being named Victorian of the Year 2015 the following year.

Also, in 2015, Georgy Girl: The Seekers Musical opened to packed house in Melbourne, before moving on to successful seasons in Sydney and Perth.  Among the production’s many musical numbers were Judith’s “Mama’s Got the Blues” and “I Remember”, and “Colours of my Life”, which she co-wrote with David Reilly.

Judith undertook a solo ‘farewell’ tour of New Zealand, playing 18 sold-out concerts as her Colours of my Life compilation CD soared to No. 2 on the charts there.

And in 2018, Ambition Entertainment packaged The Seekers’ three record-breaking 60s TV spectacular into one magnificent collector’s edition set, The Seekers: The Legendary Television Specials.  Proving again that the music of The Seekers is timeless and much loved, the DVD set reached No. 1 on the ARIA chart!

Another highlight of 2018 is the release of Judith’s first solo studio album in six years.  Timed to mark Judith’s 75th birthday, So Much More is a collection of beautiful songs that Judith Durham has composed with some immensely talented writers and musicians from around the world – all lovingly crafted, and superbly sung.

These never-before-released tracks tell of hope and courage, pain and loss, all-consuming devotion, uplifting spirituality, friendship, and a profound love of Australia and its indigenous heritage.

Durham was born with asthma and at age four she caught measles, which left her with a life-long chronic lung disease, bronchiectasis. Durham died from bronchiectasis on 5 August 2022, at age 79. She definitely avoided the “Rock and Roll lifestyle” during her life, without smoking, little to no alcohol, a vegetarian since 1968 and a vegan in later life.

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Manny Charlton – 7/2022

Manny Charlton (80) – Nazareth –  was born on July 25, 1941 in La Linea, Cadiz, Spain, near the English territory of Gibraltar. The family moved back to Dunfermline, Scotland when he was 2 years old and Charlton grew up in drab, conservative 1950s Britain, finding his escape in playing the guitar and listening to the sound of American rock’n’roll.

Prior to forming Nazareth, he played in a few bands, most notably the Mark 5 and later the Red Hawks. He was 27 before he teamed up with singer Dan McCafferty, bass guitarist Pete Agnew and drummer Darrell Sweet in a band known as the Shadettes, playing covers of bubblegum pop hits in the local ballrooms while dressed in matching yellow suits.

“I knew Pete [Agnew] and Dan [McCafferty] because we were both playing in the Kinema Ballroom with the resident band.
“They played on one stage and we played on the other.”We used to walk up the road after the gigs with our fish suppers; we always spoke about trying to do something together one day. They had a pretty good guitarist who left to go to university.”
“They asked me to take his place, and I said sure, but only if we do originals.”

“I joined just as the so-called progressive music wave was starting to take over and at the time was listening avidly to John Peel’s radio show,” Charlton recalled. His arrival heralded a change of both musical direction and image, as the band “told the Brylcreamed Locarno ballroom brigade to stuff it”, grew their hair and replaced the suits with denim and loon pants.

 

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Ronnie Hawkins 5/2022

Born in Huntsville, Arkansas  on January 10, 1935 Ronnie Hawkins made quite the career for himself in Canada (where he became a permanent resident in 1964). A road warrior, he made his rounds across North America and launched the careers of many musicians, including the Band (who backed him as the Hawks from 1961 to 1964), Roy Buchanan, Pat Travers and others.

Musicianship ran in Hawkins’s family; Hawkins’s father, uncles, and cousins had toured the honky-tonk circuit in Arkansas and Oklahoma in the 1930s and 1940s. His uncle Delmar “Skipper” Hawkins, a road musician, had moved to California about 1940 and joined cowboy singing star Roy Rogers’s band, the Sons of the Pioneers. Hawkins’s cousin Delmar Allen “Dale” Hawkins, the earliest white performer to sing at the Apollo Theater in Harlem and the Regal Theater in Chicago, recorded the rhythm and blues song “Suzie Q” in 1957. Beginning at age eleven, Ronnie Hawkins sang at local fairs and before he was a teenager shared a stage with Hank Williams. He recalled that Williams was too drunk to perform, and his band, the Drifting Cowboys invited members of the audience to get on the stage and sing. Hawkins accepted the invitation and sang some Burl Ives songs he knew.

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Vangelis 5/2022

17 May 2022  – Vangelis (Greek film composer and keyboards-synthesizer for Aphrodite’s Child). Vangelis was born Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou on March 29, 1943 in the Greek town of Agria. He was a self-taught musician who became a young piano prodigy. Then he moved to Paris and co-founded with Demis Roussos, the popular prog-rock group Aphrodite’s Child. After several global mega hits the band eventually split and Vangelis got a solo record deal with RCA Records, while still collaborating often with Roussos.

In 1981 he composed the score for Chariots of Fire. Its opening theme, with its uplifting inspirational swell and ornate arrangement, was released as a single and reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100. His efforts earned him a win for best original score at the Academy Awards.

The success led him to other film work. Notably, he composed the soundtrack for the original Blade Runner, as well as Carl Sagan’s PBS documentary series Cosmos. Outside of composing scores, Vangelis was prolific in his solo career, regularly releasing albums up until 2021’s Juno to Jupiter.

While he was most associated with the synthesizer, the instrument was also a source of frustration for him. “I’ve been using synthesizers for so many years, but they’ve never been designed properly. They create a lot of problems.” he told NPR in 2016. “The computers have completely different logic than the human logic.” So for his 2016 record Rosetta, dedicated to the space probe of the same name, he built his own synthesizer.

Vangelis had a lifelong interest in space which was reflected in his music — in its breadth and atmosphere. He believed that there was something inherent in humans to want to discover — whether that meant up in the sky or in a studio. For Vangelis, becoming a musician was never a conscious decision. “It’s very difficult not to make music,” Vangelis told NPR in 1977. “It’s as natural as I eat, as I make love. Music is the same.”

Vangelis, who gave the movie Chariots of Fire its signature synth-driven sound, died on the May 17, 2022 in a hospital in Paris, due to heart failure.. He was 79 years old.

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Ric Parnell – 5/2022

Ric Parnell (70) – Atomic Rooster/Spinal Tap –  was born in London, England on August 14, 1951 into a long family history of musical careers. His grandfather Russ Carr was a music hall artist and his father Jack Parnell was a jazz drummer and musical director for Associated Television. He had two brothers, Will and Marc Parnell, who are also drummers. His two sisters elected not to enter the music business.

In 1970, he was a member of the short-lived hard rock band Horse, who recorded one album before breaking up. Shortly after, he briefly joined the progressive rock band Atomic Rooster, leaving after just two months with the band. By the end of 1971 he had been invited to rejoin Atomic Rooster, this time staying long enough to play on the band’s last two albums.

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Jerry Doucette 4/2022

Jerry Doucette (69) – Doucette – was born in Montreal, Canada on September 7, 1952 and grew up in Hamilton, Ontario, where his family moved when he was 4. Two years later his father bought him a guitar and he started learning quickly.  He joined his first band, The Reefers, at age 11 and would go on to play in Brutus, Seeds of Time, and The Rocket Norton Band.

The young Doucette turned out to be a guitar prodigy. By the time he was 11, he was playing with three other guys, four or five years older school in a Hamilton group called The Reefers (as in refrigerator truck). The band played paying gigs throughout the area, including a spot opening for Roy Orbison. By the time he was 20, he was living in Toronto, playing in a string of bar bands.

In 1973, he was invited to Vancouver for a recording session with Mushroom recording artist Alexis. The move became permanent. In Vancouver, he established a reputation as one of the city’s hottest guitarists, playing with groups like the Seeds of Time and the Rocket Norton Band. He wrote the B-side, “Donkey Chain”, for the band’s first single. He subsequently signed a solo recording deal with Mushroom Records, and commenced recording under his surname only. He began writing his own songs in 1976 and offered up a demo to Mushroom. The demo included “Mama Let Him Play.”

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Bobby Rydell 4/2022

Bobby Rydell (80) – early teen idol – was born on April 26, 1942 in Philadelphia and was the son of Jennie Ridarelli (née Sapienza) and Adrio “Al” Ridarelli. Both of his parents were of Italian descent. He grew up in the Lower Moyamensing neighborhood of South Philadelphia.

As a child, he mimicked the singers he saw on television, and at the age of seven his father Adrio took him around the clubs of Philadelphia, asking if he could sing and do some impersonations. Adrio loved big-band jazz and often took his son to see his favorite bands, including Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw. Bobby shared his dad’s enthusiasm for the music, and inspired by Goodman‘s flashy drummer Gene Krupa, he began learning to play the drums. Bobby soon showed he had the skills to be an all-around entertainer, and by the time he was eight, he was singing at local nightspots. At the age of nine, he made his television debut, appearing on a talent showcase, TV Teen Club, hosted by bandleader Paul Whiteman. The show marked his first appearance using the stage name Bobby Rydell; legend had it Whiteman suggested the more streamlined name since he had trouble pronouncing Ridarelli. Whiteman was impressed with Rydell’s voice and likable persona, and the young singer became a regular on the show.

Rydell played in several bands in the Philadelphia area. As a 14-year-old he was the drummer for the Emanons (NoName spelled backward) which included his childhood friend Pat Azzara on guitar. Azzara later assumed the stage name Pat Martino, and went on to achieve recognition as one of the preeminent jazz guitarists of all time. Another band was Rocco and the Saints, in which he sang and played drums. After releasing three unsuccessful singles for small companies, he signed a recording contract with Cameo Records. This was run by Bernie Lowe, who had been the pianist accompanying him on TV Teen Club. After a couple of flops, “Kissin’ Time” made the charts in 1959. In May 1960, Rydell toured Australia with The Everly Brothers, Billy “Crash” Craddock, Marv Johnson, The Champs, The Crickets, and Lonnie Lee.

Rydell was on his way to become a rock and roll teen sensation. Along with Frankie Avalon and Fabian, Rydell was one of the leading Philadelphia-based stars who dominated the pop charts (and the TV show American Bandstand) in the years after Elvis Presley went into the Army and before the British Invasion changed the landscape of rock & roll. Rydell had both talent and charm, and sustained a career as a singer longer than many of his peers; he was in demand as a live performer decades after his days as a hitmaker ended in 1964.

But Between 1959 and 1964, Rydell would place 19 songs into the Pop Top 40, including “Wild One,” “Swingin’ School,” “Sway,” and “Volare.” Rydell was also a popular live attraction, selling out shows across the country and headlining concert tours in Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Japan, and the United Kingdom.

His second success was “We Got Love“. The album of the same name, his first, sold a million copies and obtained gold disc status. “Wild One” was followed with “Little Bitty Girl” which was his second million-selling single. He continued releasing hit songs with “Swingin’ School” backed by “Ding-A-Ling” and “Volare” later in 1960, which also sold over a million copies. It is estimated he sold over 25 million records in total.

In 1961, he performed at the Copacabana in New York City, where he was the youngest performer to headline at the nightclub. In February 1961, he appeared at the Festival du Rock at the Palais des Sports de Paris in Paris, France.

Rydell’s success and prospects led his father, Adrio, a foreman at the Electro-Nite Carbon Company in Philadelphia, to resign in 1961 after 22 years to become his son’s road manager.

In 1963, Rydell released the song “Wildwood Days“, which reached Number 17 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and remained there for nine weeks. A mural on the Wildwood, New Jersey, boardwalk, painted in 2014, honors Rydell, whose song placed the community in the national spotlight.

That same year, Rydell portrayed Hugo Peabody in the film version of Bye Bye Birdie, also starring Ann-Margret and Dick Van Dyke. The original stage production of Bye Bye Birdie had no real singing role for the character of Hugo, but the movie script was rewritten specifically to expand the part for Rydell. In 2011, Sony Pictures digitally restored the film. Rydell and Ann-Margret were in attendance at the restoration premiere in Beverly Hills, hosted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

During the 1960s, Rydell had numerous hit records on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. His recording career earned him 34 Top 100 hits, placing him in the top five artists of his era (Billboard). They included his most popular successes: “Wild One” (his highest scoring single, at number 2), “Volare” (number 4), “Swingin’ School” (number 5), “Kissin’ Time” (number 11), “Sway” (number 14), “I’ve Got Bonnie” (number 18), and “The Cha-Cha-Cha” (number 10). His last major chart success was “Forget Him“, which reached number 4 on the Hot 100 in January 1964. The song, written by Tony Hatch, was his fifth and final gold disc winner.

Rydell left Cameo-Parkway Records later in 1964 and signed with Capitol Records. By that point, the British Invasion had arrived and acts such as Rydell suffered a dramatic decline in popularity. Bands such as The Beatles became more popular, and Rydell unknowingly inspired John Lennon and Paul McCartney to write “She Loves You“, a song which paved the way for their success in the US.

During that time, he performed on many television programs, including The Red Skelton Show, where a recurring role as Zeke Kadiddlehopper, Clem Kadiddlehopper’s younger cousin, was written for him by Skelton. He also appeared on The Danny Thomas Show, Jack Benny, Joey Bishop, and The George Burns Show. He was a regular on The Milton Berle Show and was a panelist on To Tell the Truth in 1964. On October 6, 1964, he made a guest appearance on the episode “Duel” of the television series Combat!. It was Rydell’s first dramatic acting role.

In January 1968, it was announced in the UK music magazine NME (New Musical Express) that Rydell had signed a long-term recording contract with Reprise Records. He then continued to perform in nightclubs, supper clubs and Las Vegas venues throughout the 1970s and 1980s, but his career was hampered by the refusal by ABKCO Records to reissue Rydell’s Cameo-Parkway catalog, so it was completely unavailable until 2005, although he did re-record his hits in 1995 for K-tel Records. He had one more hit after 1965, a disco re-recording of “Sway”, which reached the Billboard Easy Listening chart in 1976.

In 1985, promoter Dick Fox approached Rydell about appearing in a special for PBS in which he would perform alongside fellow Philadelphia teen idols Frankie Avalon and Fabian. Rydell agreed, and the show, called “The Golden Boys,” clicked with viewers. In response, Fox booked a concert tour for the Golden Boys, with Rydell and his co-stars discovering their old fans were still eager to see them perform. The Golden Boys tours would provide the backbone of Rydell’s career well into the 2010s, and when a long struggle with alcoholism led to him receiving kidney and liver transplants in July 2012, he was back at work the following October. March 2013 saw him sidelined again when he had cardiac bypass surgery, but ever the trooper, Rydell bounced back to play an 11-date Australian tour in February 2014. His autobiography was published in 2016.

Bobby Rydell maintained a steady touring schedule into the final years of his life; he died on April 5, 2022 due to complications of pneumonia. He was 79 years old.

• In additional to the Grease namecheck, Rydell’s legacy lives on in his hometown area, where at least two streets bear his name, and in the 2018 Oscar-winning film Green Book, in which he was portrayed by actor Von Lewis.

• His influence can also be heard in one of the most enduring and popular songs of the 1960s: The Beatles’ “She Loves You.” Paul McCartney has said that he and John Lennon were inspired to write the instantly famous “yeah yeah yeah” lyrics after hearing a similar call-and-response approach in a popular Rydell song, most likely the 1960 hit “Swingin’ School,” in which Rydell sings, “Yeah yeah yeah I go a swingin’ school.”

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Taylor Hawkins – 3/2022

Taylor Hawkins (50) – Foo Fighters – was born in Ft. Worth Texas on Feb. 17, 1972. Four years later his family moved to Laguna Beach, California, where Hawkins grew up. He was the youngest of three, with an older brother and sister, Jason and Heather and started playing drums at the age of 10.  He graduated from Laguna Beach High School in 1990, where he had been friends with future Yes-reincarnation lead vocalist Jon Davison.

Hawkins played in the Orange County–based psychedelic rock band Sylvia before he became the drummer for British/Canadian rock woman Sass Jordan. After drumming for Sass Jordan, Hawkins joined Alanis Morissette’s touring band Sexual Chocolate for nearly two years (June 1995-March 1997). During that time, he toured the world with the Canadian singer as she supported her breakthrough album, Jagged Little Pill. Hawkins also appearing in the Jagged Little Pill, Live home video and music videos for “You Oughta Know,” “You Learn” and “All I Really Want.”

Here is the true story on how he joined Foo Fighters:

In 1997, you replaced William Goldsmith as Foo Fighters’ drummer. Is it true you offered to join when Dave Grohl called to ask you to recommend someone?
“Well, it didn’t actually go like that. I was a huge fan of the first Foo Fighters record. I’d met Dave a couple of times on the road and we’d become sort of friends. I was driving with my girlfriend at the time, and we were listening to [Los Angeles radio station] KROQ. I heard William had departed and they were looking for a new drummer. I scrambled to get Dave’s number and called him. I said, ‘I heard you guys are looking for a drummer,’ and he said, ‘Well, do you know any?’. I thought Alanis wanted to go in a more laid-back direction, and it seemed like the right time to jump. Alanis didn’t need me! I basically said to Dave, ‘I’ll play drums for you,’ and we jammed a couple of times. I remember I was at home watching [1995 erotic drama] Showgirls with my girlfriend, and Dave called to ask if I wanted to join.”

On his Stage Fright Taylor said:

“It’s really with Foo Fighters shows. I do shows with my other bands, but I just feel a certain way when there’s 100,000 people waiting for you to go onstage. I put a big burden on myself to play perfectly – whatever that means – and keep in perfect time. We’re not one of those bands who are hooked up to a computer or play to backing tracks. We have no safety net, and what happens is what happens. If it’s a trainwreck, it’s a fucking trainwreck. We live and die by the great sword of rock’n’roll. You’re getting something real: you’re getting blood, you’re getting guts, you’re getting a human exchange, and we’re actually really feeding off the audience and the excitement.”

Hawkins first appeared with the Foo Fighters in the music video for the 1997 single “Monkey Wrench“, although the song was recorded before he joined the band. In addition to his drumming with the Foo Fighters, Hawkins provided vocals, guitar, and piano to various recordings. Hawkins played on 9 studio albums with Foo Fighters and toured incessantly.

Yet, he still found time for numerous side projects and collaborations.

In 2000, Hawkins was contacted by Guns N’ Roses to replace Josh Freese on drums. Hawkins seriously considered the offer before Queen drummer and friend Roger Taylor convinced him to remain in Foo Fighters. In 2006, Hawkins released a self-titled LP with his side project, Taylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders. Taylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders subsequently released two more studio albums: Red Light Fever in 2010, and Get the Money in 2019. He occasionally played with a Police cover band alternately called the Cops and Fallout. At Live Earth in 2007, Hawkins was part of SOS Allstars with Roger Taylor of Queen and Chad Smith of Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Hawkins recorded the drum tracks for the Coheed and Cambria album Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World for Tomorrow as the band’s regular drummer, Chris Pennie, could not record because of contractual reasons. Hawkins also toured with Coheed and Cambria shortly during the months of the album release. Hawkins can also be heard drumming on Eric Avery‘s (formerly of Jane’s Addiction) first solo effort, Help Wanted and on Kerry Ellis‘s album, Wicked in Rock. Hawkins and Grohl split drumming duties on Harmony & Dissidence, the third album by Foo Fighters bandmate Chris Shiflett‘s own side project, Jackson United.

Hawkins played on the track “Cyborg”, from Queen guitarist Brian May‘s 1998 solo album, Another World; he also played drums at VH1‘s Rock Honors 2006 while Queen performed “We Will Rock You“. He sang backing vocals on the Queen + Paul Rodgers single, “C-lebrity“.[33]

Hawkins was commissioned to complete an unfinished recording of a song by Beach Boys‘ drummer Dennis Wilson titled “Holy Man” by writing and singing new lyrics. The recording, which also featured contributions from Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen, was issued as a single for Record Store Day in 2019.

While the Foo Fighters were on break in 2013, Hawkins formed a rock cover band called Chevy Metal.

Then Hawkins appeared on Slash‘s solo album Slash, released in 2010, providing backing vocals on the track “Crucify the Dead”, featuring Ozzy Osbourne.

Also in 2013, he made his acting debut in the role of Iggy Pop in the rock film CBGB. Hawkins recorded the drums on Vasco Rossi‘s last song, “L’uomo più semplice”. This song was released on January 21, 2013, in Italy.

In March 2014, Hawkins announced his new side project called the Birds of Satan. It features Hawkins’s drum technician and bandmate from Chevy Metal, Wiley Hodgden on bass guitar and vocals as well as guitarist Mick Murphy also of Chevy Metal. The band’s self-titled debut album was released in April 2014, with a release party at ‘Rock n Roll Pizza’ featuring the Foo Fighters guesting on some of the cover tracks.

In an interview with Radio X, Hawkins revealed that his initial idea with his solo projects was to duet with female singers. Hawkins invited other stars to sing in the Taylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders album Get the Money, such as LeAnn Rimes, who sang on one of his songs titled “C U In Hell”. Loudwire named the album one of the 50 best rock efforts of 2019. The album features a ridiculous list of guest appearances: his boss Dave and bandmate Pat Smear are on there, alongside Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell, The Eagles’ Joe Walsh, The Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde, Level 42 bassist Mark King, former Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones, and Roger Taylor, the man who gave Taylor the idea to hit stuff for a living in the first place. “It really is ridiculous, isn’t it?” he laughs. Other musicians who appeared on his projects included Brian May, Heart’s Nancy Wilson  and many more.

In October 2021, Elton John released The Lockdown Sessions, which featured Hawkins playing drums on the song “E-Ticket”. Also in 2021, Hawkins and Jane’s Addiction members Dave Navarro and Chris Chaney formed a supergroup called NHC. Described by Hawkins as being “somewhere between Rush and the Faces“. The band made its live debut in September 2021 at Eddie Vedder‘s Ohana festival, with Taylor’s Foo Fighters bandmate Pat Smear on additional guitar. The band recorded an album in 2021, which released in 2022.

Along with the other members of Foo Fighters, Hawkins starred as himself in the comedy horror film Studio 666, released on February 25, 2022. He posthumously appears on select tracks on Ozzy Osbourne‘s 2022 album Patient Number 9 and Iggy Pop‘s 2023 album Every Loser.

Hawkins told Rolling Stone that the toll of performing live was starting to wear on him.

“I’m still a spaz; but I’m trying really hard to figure out how to continue to keep the intensity of a young man in a 50-year-old’s body, which is very difficult,” Hawkins said in 2021. “I’m not whining, I’m really not … I’m just saying it’s f—ing hard work.”

Perhaps too much work, perhaps an enlarged heart or perhaps an overdose, sadly Taylor Hawkins passed away in Bogota, Columbia on March 25, 2022.

Tributes:

  • dozens of musicians and artists paid tribute to his life across the globe.
  • Hawkins was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2021 as a member of Foo Fighters. He was voted “Best Rock Drummer” in 2005 by the British drumming on magazine Rhythm. After his death, the Foo Fighters and his family announced two tribute shows, which took place in September 2022.
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Gary Brooker 2/2022

February 19, 2022Gary Brooker (76) founding lead singer of the late 1960’s musical sensation Procol Harum was born on May 29, 1945, in London’s Metropolitan Borough of Hackney. His father was a professional musician and Gary followed in his footsteps learning to play piano, cornet and trombone as a child. But his most awesome instrument over the years became his voice.

After high school, he went on to Southend Municipal College to study zoology and botany but dropped out to become a professional musician.In 1962 he founded the Paramounts with his guitarist friend Robin Trower. The band gained respect within the burgeoning 1960s British R&B scene, which yielded the Beatles, the Animals, the Spencer Davis Group, the Rolling Stones, and many others. The Rolling Stones, in particular, were Paramounts fans, giving them guest billing on several shows in the early 1960s.

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Ian McDonald 02/2022

Ian McDonald (75) – King Crimson/Foreigner – was born on 25 June 1946 in Osterley, Middlesex, England, the son of Ada (née May) and Keith McDonald, an architect. He grew up in a musical family and taught himself the guitar. His music interests ranged from classical orchestra to dance bands to rock. At 15, he left school and began a five-year stint in the British Army as a bandsman. In 1963 he enrolled at the Royal Military School of Music at Kneller Hall, where he took clarinet and learned to read music. He later learned piano, flute and saxophone and taught himself music theory. His experience of playing with army bands gave him great musical adaptability as he had to learn many different musical styles such as show tunes, classical, jazz, and military marches. It was this that honed his style to what eventually became the beginnings of the Prog Rock movement.

After leaving the army, McDonald moved back to London, and began making music with his girlfriend, former Fairport Convention singer Judy Dyble. In May 1968 Ian McDonald placed an advert in Melody Maker which read: “Musicians wanted. Serious ones only.”

Among those who replied was guitarist Robert Fripp and drummer Michael Giles. It proved to be a seminal moment in prog rock that led to the birth of King Crimson. Blending elements of jazz, rock, proto-metal and symphonic music with avant-garde improvisation and complex time signatures, over the next few months the nascent group created a unique sound that was to change the face of popular music.

However, the relationship with Dyble ended and she left the band before they played their first gig in 1969, by which time McDonald, Fripp and Giles were joined by Greg Lake and lyricist Peter Sinfield.

King Crimson’s debut album The Court Of The Crimson King, was filled with McDonald’s multi-instrumental presence on flute, saxes, woodwind, vibraphone, various keyboards, and of course, arguably the album’s signature sound, the Mellotron. Alongside all of that technical virtuosity, built and honed during his stint as an army bandsman in the mid-1960s, Ian was blessed with an ability to write and compose, something he often did on guitar.

Three months after their first gig, they supported the Rolling Stones at their famous free concert in Hyde Park (with new guitarist . They stole the show, with The Guardian reporting that the Stones’ performance was “indifferent”, but that King Crimson were “sensational”. McDonald’s saxophone solo was a high point on their track “21st Century Schizoid Man“, and he went on to play this on their first album In the Court of the Crimson King.

The high point of the Hyde Park gig came when the entire audience of some 650,000 cheered McDonald’s blazing blitzkrieg of a saxophone solo during the band’s show-stopper 21st Century Schizoid Man. “I remember the hairs on the back of my neck rising as the roar from this huge crowd went up,” King Crimson roadie Richard Vickers remembered.

 The album jump-started the progressive rock era, and paved the way for similar bands such as Yes and Genesis, Emerson, Lake, Palmer, Barclay James Harvest and the Moody Blues. McDonald composed 2 of the 5 album tracks, including the title track and “I Talk to the Wind” on which his jazzy flute solo is one of the album’s defining musical moments, and co-wrote the other 3 tracks with the other group members.

Yet within months, growing emotional friction within the group had led him to quit. Along with drummer Mike Giles, he left in the middle of King Crimson’s first US tour. “To keep the band together, I offered to leave instead,” Fripp said. “But Ian said that the band was more me than them.”. (McDonald later ).

McDonald later regretted his hasty decision and apologized to Fripp for leaving the band in 1970. “I was not quite ready for the attention we were getting and I wasn’t emotionally equipped to deal with what was going on,” he said. “I was away from home and it was a spontaneous decision. Perhaps I should have gone home and thought about it a little bit, but there you are.”

McDonald and Giles formed a duo that released one album titled McDonald and Giles, which featured an orchestral backing instead of a Mellotron as used with King Crimson.

Following McDonald And Giles the pair went their separate ways and McDonald’s next contribution to rock’n’roll history could not have been more different. If prog rock meant “taking different influences and expanding the basic combination of drums, guitar and bass”, as he put it, he promptly went back to just such basics when he turned up as a session player on T Rex’s 1971 glam-rock chart-topper Get It On, where he borrowed Mel Collins‘ baritone saxophone and, at the other end of the commercial spectrum, the free-jazz and rock ensemble opus, Septober Energy by Keith Tippett’s Centipede, underlining his view that all music had a value regardless of stylistic considerations. Production work beckoned including Canis Lupus by Darryl Way’s Wolf in 1973, and after his guest spot on King Crimson’s Red in 1974, he went on to produce Fruup’s Modern Masquerades in 1975 and American proggers’ Fireballet’s debut Night On Bald Mountain the same year.

There was a brief attempt to reunite with Fripp and King Crimson in 1974 but it led to nothing and after moving to New York City in 1976 McDonald became a founder-member of Foreigner. With a six-strong line-up of British and American musicians playing a classic, radio-friendly form of stadium rock, the band had huge hits with Feels Like the First Time, Cold As Ice and Hot Blooded. With Foreigner, McDonald played guitar as well as his woodwinds and keyboards.

He recorded three multi-platinum albums that made Foreigner one of the biggest-selling acts of the era before he was bounced out of the band by lead guitarist and main songwriter Mick Jones.

As a session musician McDonald appeared on To Cry You A Song, a Jethro Tull tribute album released 1996 by Magna Carta Records, appearing on Nothing Is Easy and New Day Yesterday. He also appeared on Centipede‘s album Septober Energy. He produced the Darryl Way’s Wolf album Canis Lupus and Fruupp‘s Modern Masquerades (1975). The closing track on Canis Lupus, “McDonald’s Lament”, was dedicated to him. In 1996, McDonald toured with former Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett, which was included on the album The Tokyo Tapes. The group included a performance of King Crimson’s “The Court of the Crimson King“, and “I Talk to the Wind“, the tour also included fellow King Crimson alumni John Wetton. In 1999, he released a solo album, Drivers Eyes, which featured John Wetton, Lou Gramm, John Waite and Gary Brooker.

In 2002 McDonald teamed up with other King Crimson alumni in the 21st Century Schizoid Band, toured for three years and released several live albums.

He said of his chameleon career: “I just contribute to whatever situation I’m in and really it’s all the same to me. It’s music and I’ve been lucky to make it my life’s work.”

“One of the things I’ve always done when I’m recording a song is I ask myself, ‘Could I listen to this 500 times?’ So you have to be honest with yourself when you are making a record. All the while in the studio when we were recording the album I was thinking, ‘Will I still want to listen to this in 50 years’ time.’ So part of me was thinking 50 years ahead if you like.” 

McDonald contributed saxophone and flute to several tracks on Judy Dyble‘s 2009 release Talking With Strangers. The album saw McDonald reunited with Fripp on the 20-minute “Harpsong”.

In 2017, McDonald, his son Maxwell and singer-guitarist Ted Zurkowski formed the band Honey West, which released an album Bad Old World in 2017, which he described as “an alt-country band with rock leanings”.

McDonald died from cancer at his home in New York City on Feb 9, 2022. He was 75 years old.

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Ronnie Spector 1/2022

Ronnie Spector (78) – The Ronettes – was born Veronica Bennett on August 10, 1943 in East Harlem, New York City, and grew up in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. She was the daughter of Beatrice and Louis Bennett, a subway worker. Her mother was African American and Cherokee, and her father was Irish. Veronica and her sister Estelle Bennett (1941–2009) were encouraged to sing by their large family, as was their cousin Nedra Talley (born 1946). The trio formed the Darling Sisters in 1957 and later became the Ronettes.They performed locally while attending George Washington High School in Washington Heights. Their look was fashioned by Estelle, who had a job at Macy’s on the cosmetics counter. They sang at school events, and had a residency at the Peppermint Lounge, a nightspot in Manhattan, the birthplace of the Twist and go-go dancing.

The Ronettes became a popular live attraction around the greater New York area in the early 1960s. Looking for a recording contract, they initially were signed to Colpix Records. After releasing a few singles on Colpix without success, they tracked down record producer Phil Spector, who signed them to his label Philles Records in 1963. Their relationship with Spector brought chart success with their biggest hit “Be My Baby” in 1963, which peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. A string of top 40 pop hits followed with “Baby, I Love You” (1963), “The Best Part of) Breakin’ Up” (1964), “Do I Love You?” (1964), and “Walking in the Rain” (1964). The group had two entries on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1965 with “Born to Be Together” and “Is This What I Get for Loving You?“.

In 1965, the Ronettes were voted the third-top singing group in England behind the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. They opened for the Beatles on their 1966 US tour without their lead singer. Phil had forbidden Bennett to tour with the Beatles, so her cousin Elaine stood in as a third member. The original group’s last charting single, “I Can Hear Music“, was produced by Jeff Barry and reached No. 100 on the BillboardHot 100 in 1966.

The Beatles and The Rolling Stones were huge fans of Ronnie’s group the Ronettes and many a rock and roller vied for her affections, including Jimi Hendrix and David Bowie. But none were as besotted as John Lennon. During those early days she was sometimes referred to as the original “bad girl of rock and roll

The Ronettes broke up in early 1967, following a European concert tour. After Bennett married Phil in 1968, she began to use the name Ronnie Spector, but she forcibly withdrew from the spotlight because husband Phil Spector prohibited her from performing and limited her recordings. In 1969, Phil signed a production deal with A&M Records and he released her record “You Came, You Saw, You Conquered”, credited as “The Ronettes Featuring the Voice of Veronica”, with “Oh I Love You”, an old Ronettes B-side, as the flip. Her vocals were used for the lead and backing vocals. Phil Spector – a sick mind – kept many of the group’s unreleased songs in a vault for years.

Following the couple’s divorce in 1972, Ronnie re-formed the Ronettes and began performing again as Ronnie Spector and the Ronettes with two new members (Chip Fields Hurd, the mother of actress Kim Fields, and Diane Linton) in 1973. They released a few singles on Buddah Records, but the records failed to chart. By 1975, Spector was recording as a solo act. She released the single “You’d Be Good For Me” on Tom Cat Records in 1975. In 1976, she sang a duet with Southside Johnny on the recording “You Mean So Much To Me”, penned by Southside’s longtime friend Bruce Springsteen. She also made appearances with the E Street Band the following year, including a cover version of Billy Joel‘s 1976 track “Say Goodbye to Hollywood“.

In 1980, she released her debut solo album Siren, produced by Genya Raven of Ten Wheel Drive fame. Her career revived when she was featured on Eddie Money‘s song and video “Take Me Home Tonight” in 1986, a Billboard top five single, in which she answers Money’s chorus lyric, “just like Ronnie sang”, with, “be my little baby”. The song’s music video was one of the top videos of the year and in heavy rotation on MTV. During this period, she also recorded the song “Tonight You’re Mine, Baby” (from the film Just One of the Guys). In 1988, she began performing at the Ronnie Spector’s Christmas Party, a seasonal staple at B.B. King Blues Club & Grill in New York City.

She also went on to release the albums Unfinished Business (1987), Something’s Gonna Happen(2003), Last of the Rock Stars (2006) which featured contributions from members of The Raconteurs, Nick Zinner of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Raveonettes, Patti Smith, and Keith Richards and English Heart(2016), her first album of new material in a decade. The album features her versions of songs of the British Invasion by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Yardbirds, the Bee Gees, and others. She also recorded one extended play, She Talks to Rainbows (1999) which featured a few covers of older songs. Joey Ramone acted as producer.

In 1990, Ronnie Spector published a memoir, Be My Baby: How I Survived Mascara, Miniskirts, and Madness, Or, My Life as a Fabulous Ronette. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Ronettes in 2007.

In 2018, Spector appeared in the music documentary Amy Winehouse: Back to Black (2018), based on Winehouse and her final studio album Back to Black. The album was inspired by 1960s girl groups Winehouse gathered inspiration from listening to, such as The Ronettes. It contained new interviews as well as archival footage. Spector was a great inspiration for Winehouse, who emulated her hair, as well as vocal style. In return, Ronnie Spector covered “Back to Black”, the Winehouse’s signature song. She recalls that Winehouse turned up at a concert looking just like her while she sang her song. Spector recalled seeing “a tear out of her (Winehouse) eye and it made me cry”.

In September 2020, Deadline reported that actress Zendaya would portray Spector in a biopic adapted from her memoir Be My Baby. In December 2021, the Ronettes returned to the Top 10 for the first time in 58 years with their 1963 recording of “Sleigh Ride“.

A couple of weeks later Ronnie Spector died on 12 January 2022. She was 78.

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Michael Nesmith 12/2021

December 30, 1942 – Robert Michael Nesmith was the only child of Warren and Bette Nesmith, who divorced when he was four. Bette remarried and relocated to Dallas where, as executive secretary at Texas Bank and Trust, she developed her own typewriter correction fluid. In 1979, a few months before her death, she sold her Liquid Paper Corporation to Gillette for $48m. Her son and heir finally acquired financial freedom.
Rewind 20 years to find a teenage Nesmith dabbling in music and drama at school before enlisting in the US Air Force in 1960. Two years later he was honorably discharged at his own request, swapping mechanics for music. Cutting his teeth in touring folk, country and rock’n’roll bands, he moved to Los Angeles.

A publishing and recording deal followed, yielding a handful of underperforming solo singles. Nesmith joined the queue of 437 hopefuls to audition for a part in a new TV show, inspired by The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night, about a co-habiting pop band. The producers wanted Nesmith and his hat for their Prefab Four, The Monkees.

Admiring Jimi Hendrix chops in a shared bedroom

Monkeemania ensued but Nesmith was quick to push back against the bubblegum material selected by the show’s musical director Don Kirshner. Nesmith negotiated alongside his bandmates for greater control of their output and image. Their subsequent psychedelic film and soundtrack, Head, was a flop (though later lauded as a cult favourite). Still the piece of the puzzle that didn’t fit, he bought his way out of his contract several years early, forfeiting future royalties.

Robert Michael Nesmith was raised by his mother, Bette, who supported him by working as a secretary. Frustrated creating mistakes on her electric typewriter, she developed a typewriter correction fluid. The invention later became Liquid Paper. Bette Nesmith sold the Liquid Paper Corporation to Gillette in 1979 for $48 million. She died a few months later, at age 56, with Michael inheriting the fortune.

Mike Nesmith, the beanie-hatted quiet man of The Monkees, was an accidental trailblazer from a family of accidental trailblazers. He came late to music-making, only picking up a guitar in his early twenties. Yet in a matter of years he was a (somewhat ambivalent) pop star and TV celebrity, then an unsung country rock pioneer and then the man who invented MTV for the guys who invented MTV. Not bad, and maybe not surprising, for the son of an imprecise typist who created Tipp-Ex to cover her errors.
Nesmith never quite made a commercial killing from his almost clairvoyant creativity. While his own songs were hits for the likes of Linda Ronstadt, Run DMC, Frankie Laine and Lynn Anderson, he struggled with fame in a fictional band whose best-loved tunes flowed from the pens of other writers.
The Monkees’ TV show ran for two series from 1966-68 but acquired pop immortality through school holiday repeats. The band members – Davy Jones, Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork and Nesmith – played fictionalised versions of themselves. The Monkees struck popular music with hit songs like “Last Train to Clarksville”, “Daydream Believer” and “I’m A Believer.” The group was created for television, starring in their popular TV sitcom and later spin off motion picture “Head.”
The Monkees broke up in 1969, after which Nesmith formed his First National Band. He also wrote the song Different Drum, which became a major hit for singer Linda Ronstadt.

Nesmith founded Pacific Arts, a multimedia production and distribution company, in 1974. Pacific Arts pioneered the home video market, but collapsed in a dispute with PBS over licensing rights. A federal jury eventually awarded Nesmith $47m in 1999. After filming a music video for his 1977 single Rio, Nesmith came up with the idea of a TV program consisting entirely of music videos. Nesmith called his idea PopClips, which aired on Nickelodeon in 1980. He later sold the PopClips intellectual property to Time Warner, who used it to develop and launch MTV. Intrigued by the promotional possibilities of the embryonic format, Time Warner bought the rights and used it as a template for MTV. 

In 1981, Nesmith won the first Grammy Award for Video of the Year for his hour-long television show, Elephant Parts. He was also an executive producer of the film Repo Man (1984).

Nesmith’s involvement in various Monkees reunions was sporadic, however, he did rejoin his three amigos in 1996, marking the band’s 30th anniversary with the Justus album and accompanying TV special ‘Hey, Hey, It’s the Monkees’, before contributing to the 50th anniversary album Good Times!
The Monkees continued with occasional reunion tours despite the loss of original members Peter Tork and Davy Jones. Remaining members Nesmith and Micky Dolenz ended a tour just weeks before Nesmith’s death. The final date of the tour was held on November 14, 2021, at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles.

Michael Nesmith crossed the rainbow on December 10, 2021

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John Hartman – 12/2021

John Hartman (71), a co-founder of the Doobie Brothers, was born March 18, 1950, in Falls Church, Va.

From the band’s official website: It all began in 1969, when drummer John Hartman arrived in Northern California. He was there to meet Skip Spence from the band Moby Grape and become part of a supposed band reunion that never quite got off the ground. But it wasn’t all for naught. Spence (who had also played in the Jefferson Airplane) introduced Hartman to his friend Tom Johnston, a local singer/songwriter/guitarist -and they connected. Hartman and Johnston began playing local Bay Area bars under the name Pud. After Pud collapsed, the pair began jamming with bassist Dave Shogren and guitarist Patrick Simmons, whose finger-style playing richly complimented Johnston’s R&B strumming-style, and the foundation for the Doobie Brothers (a slang term for marijuana) was set.

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Graeme Edge 11-2021

Life long drummer for the Moody Blues

Graeme Edge (80) – The Moody Blues – was born on March 30, 1941 in Rochester, Staffordshire. Edge co-founded The Moody Blues in 1964 in Birmingham, England, along with original band members Denny Laine, Clint Warwick, Mike Pinder and Ray Thomas.

His mother worked in silent movies as a pianist whilst his father, grandfather and great-grandfather all worked as musical hall singers.

He first moved into the music industry himself as the manager of the Blue Rhythm Band and whilst he did try his hand at the drums from time to time, he only started playing the instrument professionally when he was forced to step in for the drummer, who had quit the group.

In 1964 he formed the original blues-rock band the Moody Blues with Mike Pinder, Ray Thomas, Denny Laine, and Clint Warwick who in January 1965 produced the smash cover hit “Go Now”. (Bessie Banks original)

In the years following, Edge’s influence as a poet who happened to be a drummer as well, moved the band towards the prog rock genre, which they defined as no other group, giving direction to later outfits such as Yes, Barclay James Harvest, Electric Light Orchestra and others. Justin Hayward, who joined with John Lodge in 1966, credits Edge as the one who kept it all together for so may years.

“Graeme and his parents were very kind to me when I first joined the group, and for the first two years he and I either lived together or next door to each other,” Mr Hayward said. “We had fun and laughs all the way, as well as making what was probably the best music of our lives.”

“In the late 1960’s we became the group that Graeme always wanted it to be, and he was called upon to be a poet as well as a drummer,” said Hayward; “He delivered that beautifully and brilliantly, while creating an atmosphere and setting that the music would never have achieved without his words. I asked Jeremy Irons to recreate them for our last tours together and it was absolutely magical.”

Edge’s drumming and spoken word poetry was instrumental to the band’s biggest hits in their “classic” era of the ’60s and into the ’70s, including “Nights in White Satin,” “Tuesday Afternoon,” and “I’m Just a Singer (In a Rock and Roll Band).”

When The Moody Blues went on hiatus from 1974 to 1977, Edge traveled around the world on his yacht and also recorded two solo albums, “Kick Off Your Muddy Boots” (1975) and “Paradise Ballroom” (1978), inspired by his visit to the Caribbean.

In 1978, the band reunited for the album “Octave,” after which they pivoted from prog-rock to a more synth-pop sound in the earlier ’80s. Around this time, Edge linked with a jazz-combo group formed of various musicians from London’s club scene, called Loud, Confident and Rong.  In my opinion, he was one of the most consistently solid British ‘60’s music drummers who continued to perform and record original music right up until late 2017 when The Moody Blues performed a special “Days of Future Passed” concert in Toronto, Ontario, Canada , which was recorded at The Sony Centre Theatre for the Performing Arts.

Graeme composed many of the songs and wrote poetry for The Moody Blues albums along with his fellow band mates Justin Hayward, John Lodge, Mike Pinder, Ray Thomas and Denny Laine and along with Adrian Gurvitz (Baker-Gurvitz Army), Graeme wrote the songs, recorded the music and performed with his own band..”The Graeme Edge Band”.

After suffering a stroke in 2016, Edge retired from touring in 2019. Yet he remained an official member of The Moody Blues until his death, nearly 60 years after its founding.

“When Graeme told me he was retiring I knew that without him it couldn’t be the Moody Blues anymore,” said Hayward in his statement. “And that’s what happened. It’s true to say that he kept the group together throughout all the years, because he loved it.”

In 2018, The Moody Blues was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Their last album was released in 2003. They have sold more than 70 million albums to date. Overall, Edge recorded 16 studio albums with The Mood Blues, ending with 2003’s Christmas-themed “December.”

Graeme passed away from metastatic cancer on November 11th, 2021 at the age of 80 at his home in Bradenton Florida. He had been living there for more than 20 years as he called the area, the last hold out of hippiedom.

Edge, who has married and divorced twice, is survived by his wife, as well as his daughter, Samantha Edge; his son, Matthew; and five grandchildren.

Several fans, musicians and musical institutions paid tribute in the wake of Edge’s passing.

“Graeme was one of the great characters of the music business and there will never be his like again,” Hayward concluded. “My sincerest condolences to his family.”

“Edge’s mystical poetry on the Moodies records created flights of fantasy and otherworldly journeys for generations of fans,” the The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame posted on their official Facebook page with a video of Edge’s speech at The Moody Blues’ induction ceremony.

Rod Argent of The Zombies, The Moody Blues’ rock contemporaries, also shared a statement on the “very sad” news. “Way back in the mid sixties we were invited to a couple of the legendary Moody Blues parties in Roehampton – where the original band had a house – and we particularly remembered how much Graeme, along with the rest of the band, was just so welcoming and hospitable,” he reminisced. “That quality was something Graeme never lost.”

Kiss frontman Paul Stanley tweeted “RIP Graeme Edge” and shared a memory of an “EPIC” performance he attended in 1970. “Sounded just like their recordings. NOBODY could touch them at what they created and to this day you know them as soon as you hear them.”

Bassist John Lodge posted a statement of his own on the band’s official website. “To me he was the White Eagle of the North with his beautiful poetry,” he wrote. “His friendship, his love of life and his ‘unique’ style of drumming that was the engine room of the Moody Blues. … I will miss you Graeme.”

I was fortunate enough as a young kid, to see the original Moody Blues perform Go Now live in the studio in 1965 and was totally blown away. Seven years later I witnessed their genre metamorphosis with an unbelievable concert at Hammersmith-Odeon in London where they performed their perennial hits Just a Singer in a Rock and Roll Band, Tuesday Afternoon, Nights in White Satin, The Story in your Eyes and all the rest. And even though in my deepest heart I am a blues-rocker, I have always kept a soft spot for the Moody Blues, Supertramp and several of the progressive rock and underground formations.

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Barry Ryan 9/2021

Barry Ryan (72) was born Barry Sapherson on 24 October 1948 in Leeds, England. He was the son of Marion (née Ryan) and Fred Sapherson. Fred left when the boys were two, and Barry and his identical twin brother Paul were brought up by “Nana”, their adored grandmother. While Marion, who had had her boys as a teenager, pursued her singing career. She became a successful performer, rising to prominence in the 1950s with the band leader Ray Ellington, and was a regular on the television musical quiz show Spot the Tune.

By the time the twins were 11, Marion was earning enough as a 50s pop singer to buy Nana a big house and to pay for boarding school. At 16 Marion sent them to a kibbutz in Israel, where they lasted two weeks and were later discovered singing in a Tel Aviv nightclub.

Now they knew what they wanted.

When we came down from Leeds to London we didn’t know what to do with ourselves. We had no skills, we weren’t academic, we came from quite a working class background, so the idea of going to university then was just not an option really so they didn’t really know what to do with us, so mum said “why don’t you guys become singers?” We thought, “Sounds a bit mad that, but why not? Better than working for a living.” 

Through Marion’s husband-to-be, the impresario Harold Davison, Paul and Barry Ryan signed with Decca. The pair belted out catchy, dramatic love ballads, songs that drifted around the UK Top 20, bobbing tantalizingly close to the big time until, in 1968, they had a hit single with Eloise, and with it came the perils, pressures and pleasures of stardom. Soon Paul ceased performing to concentrate solely on songwriting and Barry became a solo artist. His most successful hit, “Eloise“, reached number 2 on the UK Singles Chart in 1968.

Paul had written the track for his brother’s deep, soulful voice; in later life, Barry would tour with Eloise as a tribute to Paul, who died from lung cancer in 1992.

Eloise is mysterious. Its collision of styles – Puccini meets gospel meets Broadway musical – was part of what was being manufactured as “new” in pop. Not everybody warmed to it, with one critic describing the song as “sounding like a man being strangled by a cat”. The orchestral textures and structural intricacies were clearly influenced by Jimmy Webb’s MacArthur Park; and its “popera” owes much to Phil Spector’s Wagnerian overlays on tracks such as Walking in the Rain. Hyper-melodramatic content with soaring male vocals were in vogue. Yet none of this accounts for the enduring allure of Eloise. Freddie Mercury even mentioned that the song had an influence on him writing Bohemian Rhapsody

No one can agree whether it is a sugary madeleine of a song about a man’s idealization of an unobtainable woman, or a melodrama of dark obsession and savage yearning. But everyone does agree that the vocal style and the power of Barry’s voice carries the song. “Singing from the heart,” one critic noted. Barry performed the recording in two takes, with a high degree of professionalism in the production. Jimmy Page,  and John Paul Jones, in the run up to founding Led Zeppelin, were two of the session musicians on the recording. Barry’s life hereafter got its share of Dionysian excess – parties at his flat in Eaton Place were renowned; Jimi Hendrix spent his first night in London there.

In 1969, Barry was injured in a studio fire in Munich. Although he was not physically scarred it had a psychological impact, which may have increased his dependency on alcohol. In 1986 both brothers entered rehab and Barry never drank again.

Years later, in 1986, when the punk rock band the Damned made their cover of Eloise, Peter Barnes, their music publisher, remembered: “Dave Vanian adored the song and mirrored the vocal performance as a tribute.” Barry, in the audience, was heard to say, “I like their version more than my own.”

By the mid-70s the twins had disappeared from the music scene and Barry turned to his lifelong passion, photography. His friendship with the German photojournalist Christa Peters exerted a strong influence and his photographic sensibility developed into an unusual fusion of self-expression and documentation. It surprised no one but him that when he submitted six pictures to the National Portrait Gallery, all were bought.

In 1976 Barry married Miriam, daughter of Sultan Ibrahim of Johor, Southern Malaysia close to Singapore. They divorced amicably in 1980. Barry had a talent for not falling out with people – and that stood him in good stead when, after Paul’s death, he published a memorial book of 80 portraits, donating profits to Cancer Research. Everyone he contacted agreed to pose, including Sting, Paul McCartney, Björk and Stephen Hawking.

He also photographed Margaret Thatcher, who had left office by this time. Mid shoot, noticing the hem of her curtains was adrift, she fetched a needle and thread. Without turning around when he moved his camera, she scolded him: “Don’t even think about it, Mr Ryan.” Thatcher subsequently helped Barry secure a portrait with Ronald Reagan.

Ryan maintained a successful career as a fashion photographer, from the late 1970s, and his photographs appeared in such magazines as Ritz and Zoom. But most of his fame derived from his brief, if meteoric, success as a pop star and teen idol in the mid to late 1960s.

Barry Ryan died on Sept. 28, 2021, aged 72 after complications from a lung disorder.

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Charlie Watts 8/2021

charlie watts, lifelong drummer for the Rolling StonesDrummer Charlie Watts, who has died at 80, provided the foundation which underpinned the music of the Rolling Stones for 58 years.

A jazz aficionado, Watts vied with Bill Wyman for the title of least charismatic member of the band; he eschewed the limelight and rarely gave interviews. And he famously described life with the Stones as five years of playing, 20 years of hanging around. 

Charles Robert Watts was born on 2 June 1941 at the University College Hospital in London and raised in Kingsbury, now part of the London Borough of Brent.

He came from a working-class background. His father was a lorry driver and Watts was brought up in a pre-fabricated house to which the family had moved after German bombs destroyed hundreds of houses in the area.

Continue reading Charlie Watts 8/2021

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Ron Bushy 8/2021

Ron Bushy (79) – Iron Butterfly – was born on December 23, 1941 in Washington DC. Little is recorded on how he ended up on the west coast but, following the band’s relocation from San Diego to Los Angeles, replacing previous drummer Bruce Morse, who left due to a family emergency. Bushy became part of the group’s classic lineup, along with vocalist and keyboardist Doug Ingle, guitarist Erik Brann, and bassist Lee Dorman.

Continue reading Ron Bushy 8/2021

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Don Everly 8/2021

Don Everly (The Everly Brothers) was born in Brownie, Kentucky on February 1, 1937. He was of German, English and Cherokee descent. His formidable father, “Ike” Everly was a coal miner in Brownie, Ky., and Don was born in Brownie’s coal camp. Ike also was a guitar player, taught by Arnold Schultz, the Black musician who taught Bill Monroe. And when the coal was gone, Ike moved the family to Chicago in the late 1930s in search of a career in music. A second son, Phil, was born there, and the family moved to Shenandoah, Iowa, where Ike had a radio show in the mid-1940s. “Little Donnie” sang the theme, “Free as a Little Bird as I Can Be,” and then Phil was brought in, and with that the Everly Family was on the air. Don and Phil attended Longfellow elementary school in Waterloo. They sang on their father’s radio show and the family entertained and sang around the area.

In 1953, the Everlys moved to Knoxville and both boys attended West High School where Don graduated. While in Knoxville the two high school brothers performed on the Cas Walker Show on TV until they added some early rock and roll to their country music set list. At that point, Cas Walker fired them adding that “Rock and Roll don’t sell groceries.”

The teenage brothers were viewed as long-haired, leather-jacket-wearing toughs. Ike got a meeting for the boys with country music mogul Chet Atkins in Nashville, and Atkins was so impressed with Don’s songwriting that he placed one of his songs with Kitty Wells.

“Don said he was considering college but when Kitty Wells bought his song “Thou Shalt Not Steal” (which Don wrote at WHS) and recorded it, the check came in the mail and he was now a songwriter.” He confirmed the old Knoxville urban legend: seeing the check and knowing that Nashville would be the next step. “That check bought us four tires and we were heading to Nashville,” Everly  recalled.

In 1955, the family moved to Nashville and the boys auditioned for labels as a brother act. A single they made went nowhere. After one difficult session for Columbia, yielding the rare 1956 single Keep A’Lovin’ Me/The Sun Keeps Shining, they signed with the New York label Cadence, later switching to the newly formed Warner Bros Records. From 1957 to 1965 they had 28 hits in the British Top 30, and comparable success in the US.

When they signed with Cadence and were given a tune (Bye Bye Love) to kick around, written by two of the hottest songwriters in town, Felice and Boudleaux Bryant. “Bye Bye Love” topped the country chart and hit No. 2 on the pop chart right behind Elvis Presley’s “(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear” and No. 5 on the rhythm and blues chart in 1957. It became the Everly Brothers’ first million-seller. They opened for Buddy Holly on the road for almost 2 years before another Bryant number, “Wake Up Little Susie,” topped the pop charts in 1957. When Chuck Berry was asked what song he most wished he’d written, he declared it was “Susie.” “All I Have to Do Is Dream” followed in 1958.

Rock ‘n’ roll was in ascendance, but if the music was mostly about revolt and rule-breaking, here was a style that felt both pre-rock and yet of the moment, built on family harmony and gentle sadness that seemed innocent even then. The music floated on the brothers’ harmonies, in effortless chromosomal alignment and held in place by the crisp playing of Nashville studio veterans.

The boys were seasoned professionals by the time they poured out their magic vocals on to a run of hits that married hillbilly harmonies and Nashville nous, their full-chorded acoustic guitars embracing Bo Diddley’s exotic rhythms to create the rock’n’roll end of country music’s rich, commercial sounds.

In a five-year span from 1957 to 1962, they had 15 top 10 hits, among them: “Bye Bye Love,” which launched them; “All I Have to Do Is Dream,” written by Boudleaux Bryant; and “Cathy’s Clown,” which was a No. 1 hit in 1960 and a No. 1 country hit for Reba McEntire in 1989. The hits continued: “Devoted to You” and “Bird Dog” in 1958; “(Til’) I Kissed You,” written by Don, in 1959; and “Let It Be Me,” and “When Will I Be Loved” in 1960. “Crying in the Rain” and then “That’s Old Fashioned (That’s the Way Love Should Be)” from 1962 were their final forays into the top 10.

The Everly Brothers were certainly pioneers in rock and folk music and inspired artists like the Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, They influenced everyone from The Beach Boys to The Rolling Stones and The Beatles, Bee Gees, Buddy Holly and many others. In fact, the Everlys toured with Buddy Holly for two years before his untimely death. Fifteen years later their Appalachian roots inspired country rockers such as Gram Parsons and Linda Ronstadt, who had a hit covering their “When Will I Be Loved” in 1975.

Personal problems (including Don’s addiction to amphetamines) began wearing away on the pair, and in 1973 the Everlys broke up during a concert at Knott’s Berry Farm in Buena Park, California. Mutual dislike and differing temperaments caused Don and Phil Everly to retire and they both went solo. During that time Phil sang backing vocals in Warren Zevon’s debut album. He also recorded for Clint Eastwood’s ‘Every Which Way But Loose’ and ‘Any Which Way You Can’. Don recorded ‘Blue Kentucky Girl’ with Emmylou Harris.

Don found some success on the US country charts in the mid- to late-1970s, in Nashville with his band, Dead Cowboys, and playing with Albert Lee.

Don also performed solo at an annual country music festival in London in mid-1976. His appearance was well received, and he was given “thunderous applause”, even though critics noted that the performance was uneven. Don recorded “Everytime You Leave” with Emmylou Harris on her 1979 album Blue Kentucky Girl.

The Everly Brothers reunited in 1983 for a show at the Royal Albert Hall, London. The following year they released the album ‘EB84’, produced by Dave Edmunds. Paul McCartney wrote the first single ‘On The Wings of a Nightingale’.

Simon & Garfunkel took the Everly Brothers on tour in the 1980s but instead of the brothers opening for them, they appeared in the middle of the Simon & Garfunkel set.  The Everly Brothers also sang backing vocals for Paul Simon’s ‘Graceland’.

Don and his younger brother, Phil, were in the first group to be inaugurated in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, alongside Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis. Their family harmonies set them apart from the rest, as did an out-of-time gentleness: the Everly Brothers’ well-crafted songs floated between country and city and moved with the rhythms of a dream.

In the time line of rock & roll they were the heroes of our heroes.

But that became also the reason why their hey days were cut short, way too short actually.

They had the gravitas to cover other artists’ crucial songs, from Little Richard’s Lucille, given a keening, slow-motion vocal fall, to the blues classics Trouble in Mind and Step It Up and Go, and Mickey & Sylvia’s Love Is Strange. Don, taken through the Maxwell Street market in Chicago as a young boy by his father, was ever after aware of gospel and blues. In an era of pretty pop, the Everlys sought a tougher sound on records such as The Price of Love (1965) and their extraordinary revival of the standard Temptation (1961), which pre-figured Phil Spector’s “wall of sound”. But, like Spector’s River Deep, Mountain High, the Everlys’ Temptation was (by their standards) a flop in the US, and The Price of Love a bigger one.

Then there were the Beatles, whose “new” harmonies made the Everlys old-fashioned overnight. Made redundant before they were 30, Don and Phil felt, wrongly, that the Beatles had stolen from them without acknowledgment – John and Paul ‘admitted’ that they had taken inspiration for the harmonies on Please Please Me from Cathy’s Clown.

Sidelined further by prog rock, Don and Phil tried first to sound like Simon and Garfunkel, and then their influential 1968 album Roots which, with the Byrds’ Sweetheart of the Rodeo, marked a step towards the emergence of “country rock”.

Don continued to write songs: Human Race (1970), the cri de coeur I’m Tired of Singing My Song in Las Vegas on the album Stories We Could Tell (1972), and most of the magnificent ignored solo album Don Everly (1971), a compelling collection that sings of human frailty with profound compassion (yet which, Phil told a biographer, he had felt as a betrayal, “like cheating on a marriage”).

These were perilous decades, especially for Don, the more temperamental and creative of the pair, whose drug adventures probably loosened an already shaky grip on reality. After a childhood paraded as a cute novelty item, dressed as if he were a twin, in cowboy clothes, his only sample of “normal life” was a spell in the Marines (of which he was proud) in the middle of being half of a pair of teen idols: one of the world’s most influential, well-loved and successful acts – and then, suddenly, one of the most passé.

The Everly Brothers split up in public acrimony, their last performance together on 14 July 1973, in Buena Park, California, at which Phil hurled down his guitar and stormed off stage, leaving Don to finish the concert alone.

On two other occasions Phil managed without Don. In 1962, on tour in Britain, a drug-fueled Don tried to throw himself from a hotel window and Phil had to perform solo on the remaining dates. And then, recording a solo album in 1983, right at the end of the brothers’ bleak 10 years of separation, Phil brought in Cliff Richard, and on one track they duetted as if Don could somehow be replaced. Phil and Cliff’s She Means Nothing to Me was a Top 10 UK hit, just to compound the enormity of the “betrayal”. Don saw it as nothing less, though it was he who had actually dissolved the brothers’ lifelong professional partnership.

It was a further trauma for both to discover that separately, no one cared that much about either of them. But in 1983 they staged a moving reunion concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

They still sang exquisitely, and a small segment of their shows offered songs learned from their father, whom they worshipped, and the Kentucky guitarist Mose Rager: authentic old-time country material. Don played loving, intense guitar, though sparingly in latterday performances. Singing lead, he lived in the spontaneity of the moment, his phrasing inspired, warm and free. He was an artist. But they hardly dared stray from their teenage hits. Besides, to have done so would have meant having to rehearse together, and that was not in the stars in those days.

Off-stage, Don was a glutton for life and a connoisseur. He had always seen the latest film; he read widely; he was interested in modern art and, on a modest scale, collected it. An avid explorer of restaurants, he loved to talk of food and to cook it. On tour, the Anglophile rock star would rise early and roam the towns he found himself in. These explorations made his professional duties tolerable, as he would deftly concede. At showtime in 90s Croydon, he realised he had forgotten to change into his stage clothes. Told he looked fine, he answered: “No, I better change. That suit knows the words.”

In later years the story of the Everly Brothers stranded in time. And when we, the audience, were paying attention again to their revival, they couldn’t get along. And if you were born in the forties and experienced their hits firsthand, this was probably gut-wrenching, much as the Beatles break up in 1969. But to the younger later generation, the Everlys were more cartoons than legends.

But then they had a late victory lap. They opened for Simon & Garfunkel on their 2003 reunion tour. It was a last hurrah for both Simon & Garfunkel and the Everlys. Garfunkel lost his voice and by time it came back Simon no longer wanted to go on the road. As for the Everlys? They still couldn’t get their relationship right.

Don Everly attended the Annual Music Masters as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame paid homage to the Everly Brothers on October 25, 2014, several months after Phil’s demise. Don took the State Theater stage and performed the Everlys’ classic hit “Bye Bye Love”.

Don stopped performing in 2018. His final performance was a guest appearance with Paul Simon on Simon’s 2018 farewell tour in Nashville. Don and Simon performed “Bye Bye Love”, with Simon on Phil Everly’s original tenor harmony.

In many ways the Everly Brothers were there first. They established the paradigm. I was maybe too young to be there, to be infected, but the people I was listening to ate up all those records. Even in Europe Phil & Don were gods, no matter what they did thereafter, those tracks were just that big and special. The Everlys are truly one of the building blocks of rock and roll. Which meant so much, that the Rock and Roll homage created a Rock and Roll hall of fame and built a museum to contain it, and the Everlys were installed in the first induction ceremony in 1986.

And now Don Everly has also been released from his earthly contract on August 21, 2021, aged 84. His brother Phil had died in 2014. The Everly family matriarch, mother Margaret Embry Everly, died four months later in December, aged 102. 

About their influence on superstars that followed, Paul McCarthy of the Beatles said it best: “They were one of the major influences on the Beatles. When John and I first started to write songs, I was Phil and he was Don.”

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Jeff LaBar 7/2021

jeff labar, lead guitar for cinderellaJeff LaBar (lead guitarist for Cinderella), born March 18, 1963 in Darby, Pennsylvania, he was of American and Japanese ancestry through his mother, June. He grew up in Upper Darby, , where he received primary education. Jeff had a particularly close relationship with his mother, June, who was his biggest inspiration in life. Young Jeff picked up guitar playing as a teenager, inspired by his older brother Jack, and he joined the local rock band Cinderella, replacing Cinderella’s original guitarist, Michael Schermick in 1985. The band was formed 3 years earlier and developed a following in the region, but with the arrival of LaBar, the band sparked into international stardom, with a string of platinum selling albums.

Jeff’s biggest musical influences though his early career were 1970s British rock bands, such as Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, while he also enjoyed the psychedelic music of Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull and Genesis. In later years, he grew a liking to a heavier style of rock, particularly played by Alice Cooper and Black Sabbath.

Cinderella received first major recognition from the Kiss bass guitarist Gene Simmons, who tried to get them a deal with Kiss’ record label PolyGram, which the members of Cinderella ended up declining. However, after watching them perform in 1984, Jon Bon Jovi convinced the Mercury/Polygram Records executive Derek Shulman to sign Cinderella to his label, after extensive negotiations.
Cinderella released their debut album, “Night Songs” in August 1986, which became a huge success, launching the band into international stardom. Continue reading Jeff LaBar 7/2021

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Rusty Young – 4/2021

Rusty Young (75) – Poco – was born  Feb 23, 1946 in Long Beach, California, but grew up in Denver, Colorado. He began playing lap steel guitar at age 6, and taught guitar and steel guitar lessons during his high school years at Jefferson High School, Lakewood, Colorado with George Grantham. By 16 or 17, he was keeping a schedule that would have left adult professionals panting. He taught lessons in a guitar studio in the afternoons and then played country music in bars until the wee hours of the morning. Then he would pack up and head to jam sessions, catching a few hours of sleep before it was time to go to high school. In 1966, he was surprised to get a call from a local rock band, the Boenzee Cryque. “Are you sure you want him?” Young’s mother apparently asked, “He’s in a country band you know.” Boenzee Cryque was about the most popular Denver rock band at the time and had done fairly well with several locally produced singles that were picked up by the psychedelic-obsessed Uni label. He worked with this band for two years, incorporating the pedal steel and utilizing some of his strange effects for the first time.

In the late 1960s, an acquaintance of Young’s, Miles Thomas, became the road manager for Buffalo Springfield. Richie Furay and Jim Messina needed a steel guitarist for the Furay ballad “Kind Woman” on their final album Last Time Around and after Thomas told Young about the opportunity, Young was hired. After Buffalo Springfield broke up Young and Randy Meisner (later of Eagles), Jim Messina (Loggins and Messina) and Richie Furay formed Poco with drummer George Grantham. Meisner quit a year later and was replaced with Timothy B. Schmit, who would also replace Randy later once again in Eagles. Along with Furay and Messina, Young became a founding member of Poco in 1968 upon the former band’s demise. Drummer George Grantham and bass player Randy Meisner rounded out the original Poco lineup.

“Richie had done country-rock with ‘A Child’s Claim to Fame’ and ‘Kind Woman’,” Young said in a 2014 interview. “That was the country part of the Springfield where Neil (Young) and Stephen (Stills) were way more rock ’n’ roll. You have to remember that in 1969, there weren’t synthesizers, so if you actually wanted a certain sound, you had to have a real musician playing. So that’s why I got involved — because I could play steel guitar and Dobro and banjo and mandolin, and pretty much all the country instruments except for fiddle. So I added color to Richie’s country-rock songs, and that was the whole idea, to use country-sounding instruments. Also, I pushed the envelope on steel guitar, playing it with a fuzz tone, because nobody was doing that, and playing it through a Leslie speaker like an organ, and a lot of people thought I was playing an organ, because they didn’t realize I was playing a steel guitar. So we were pushing the envelope in lots of different ways, instrumentally and musically overall.”

The band’s membership fluctuated over the years. After Furay left the group, Young took on more song writing responsibility, along with Paul Cotton and Timothy B. Schmit.

Young credited David Geffen for forcing him to become a singer-songwriter, after he’d initially only contributed a few songs to the band and never done any lead vocals on the early albums.

When it became clear that Furay was leaving to start up the Souther-Hillman-Furay Band, Young said, there was a meeting where Geffen “starts with Tim and says, ‘Now, Tim, you write songs and sing, don’t you?’ And Tim says, ‘Yes.’ So he says, ‘Well, don’t you worry about Richie leaving; you’ll be fine.’ And he looks at Paul, and he says, ‘You play guitar and sing and write songs, don’t you?’ And Paul says, ‘Yes.’ … Then he looked at me and George, and he looked me in the eye, and he said, ‘Now, you don’t sing, and you don’t write songs, do you?’ And I said, ‘No, I don’t.’ So he said, ‘Well, you’re in trouble.’ And that was the day I became a singer-songwriter, and if it weren’t for David Geffen saying that to me, it never would have happened, and I owe him greatly for that.”

Young is best known for writing the Poco songs “Rose of Cimarron” and “Crazy Love“. Actually Young wrote more than a dozen of the group’s most well-known songs. 

“Crazy Love,” was named the No. 1 adult contemporary song of 1979. In a 2008 interview, Young said, “The only reason we’re talking now is ‘Crazy Love’. That was our first hit single. It’s a classic, and it still pays the mortgage.”

A reunion album in 1989, “Legacy,” brought Furay, Messina, Meisner and Grantham back into the Poco fold for a single project. The band was active until the end of the ’80s, but seemed to make less and less use of Young’s instrumental talents as the years went on.

Although based out of Nashville, Young avoided the recording session work that is the bread and butter of most pedal steel players in that area, due to the lack of space for experimentation. He could sometimes be heard playing solo at that city’s Bluebird Cafe in the ’90s and 2000s, but his main venture in the late ’90s was a trio with John Cowan and Bill Lloyd called Sky Kings. The group recorded an album for RCA Nashville in 1992 but the label shelved the record. Sky Kings then moved to Warner, releasing three singles in 1996, but their completed From Out of the Blue never saw release. Rhino Handmade would release the unheard Warner album in 2000, while Sony put out the RCA Nashville album as 1992 in 2014. Starting in the year 2000, a reunited Poco was Young’s main concern. The group released Running Horse in 2002 and toured steadily over the next decade — several live albums were released during this period and 2013’s All Fired Up.

In 2009, a handful of reunion shows saw Furay and Schmit returning, including an appearance at the Stagecoach Festival in California. Otherwise, the group carried on with Young as the sole remnant of the group’s original legacy.

In 2013, Young was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame. At the end of 2013, Young announced his, what turned out to be a short-lived, retirement and a desire to write his memoirs. However a few shows were booked into 2014 including three farewell shows in Florida. One of those shows was a performance in a recording studio in front of a live audience for a DVD document of the band’s live show. Young said there could be some one-offs in the future after that, but the band would not be actively touring as before. The final version of the band, which had Young backed by Jack Sundrud, Rick Lonow and Tom Hampton, was still performing more than 100 gigs a year.

The group celebrated its 50th anniversary reunion in 2017. Young released  his first solo album, “Waitin’ For The Sun ” that same year. Young and Jack Sundrud wrote and recorded music for children’s story videos as the “Session Cats”. Young continued to do guest performances with former members of Poco and other country rock artists. Young then released new music “Listen to Your Heart”, in 2019 was released digitally and benefited a local Steelville, Missouri animal charity, Santana’s Hope for Paws (Friends of Steelville, MO Pound) Animal Shelter.

In 2020 Young reflected on his career saying, “I’ve been fortunate to have had a magical career. From the moment I was called to play on the Buffalo Springfield album, all through Poco, and now through my solo projects, things have just fallen into place. I’ve worked really hard to be the best I can be, and I think my music is the proof.”

Poco’s Rusty Young died on April 14, 2021 from a heart attack at age 75.

In a statement Blue Elan Records released, “It is with great sadness that we confirm the passing of Poco co-founder, Rusty Young, at the age of 75. Young suffered a heart attack last night. A beloved member of the Blue Élan Records family, Young was best known as the heart and soul of Poco – the band widely considered to be one of the founders of the classic Southern California country rock sound. Young was an integral member of the band throughout their influential six decade career.”

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Bunny Wailer – 3/2021

Bunny Wailer

Bunny Wailer (Bob Marley and the Wailers) was born 10 April 1947 in Kingston Jamaica. He was born Neville Livingston, and it was not until much later that he would take the sobriquet of Bunny Wailer, largely as a marketing device for his clear, ringing tenor voice and percussive arranging. 

Bunny was brought up by his father, Thaddeus “Toddy” Livingston, who took him to Nine Mile, where he was preaching. Bunny took with him some experience of music – in Kingston he had been a champion child dancer. At the Revivalist church in Nine Mile where Toddy preached, he banged the drum during hymns.

Although Toddy opened a store, he was more attracted to the area’s fertile land, perfect for marijuana growing. He financed his assorted businesses through being a “herbsman”, as ganja sellers are termed in Jamaica. After a time Toddy returned to Kingston, taking his son with him, and opened a rum bar.

Bob Marley’s mother, Cedella, had begun working in Kingston, returning to Nine Mile each weekend. One Sunday, she found herself traveling with Toddy Livingston, and they began dating. 

Cedella’s son Bob practiced singing with Bunny and another boy, Desmond Dacre (later Desmond Dekker); Curtis Mayfield and gospel music were particular influences. The pair soon encountered another youth wanting to try his musical chances – the gangly Peter McIntosh, or Peter Tosh, as he became known. 

Toddy Livingston employed Cedella Marley at his bar; she became pregnant and their daughter, Pearl, was born early in 1962, meaning that Marley and Bunny Wailer shared a half-sister. But Cedella Marley decided that her relationship with the womanizing Toddy was hopeless and she moved to the United States.

Bunny first met Marley in the village of Nine Mile, Marley’s birthplace; Bunny was aged eight, Marley two years older.

In 1962, Bob Marley recorded Judge Not, his first tune for producer Leslie Kong. Bunny Livingston had been booked in at the studio the same afternoon, intending to sing his first composition, Pass It On, but had been kept in school after class. A few months later, however, he formed the Wailing Wailers with Marley and Tosh.

They auditioned for the leading producer Coxsone Dodd, and Bunny suggested they play Simmer Down, a song written by Bob Marley a couple of years previously. By November 1964 the song was No 1 in Jamaica.

Though the Wailers were a runaway success, there was a hitch in June 1967 when Livingston was jailed for 18 months for possessing marijuana.

When he was released, he was noted as being more difficult than previously. In 1970 the Wailers recorded an album for Kong; when Livingston discovered that Kong wanted to call it The Best of the Wailers he was furious. Only at the end of one’s existence could an individual’s work be judged, he insisted; such a decision, he declared, must mean that it was Kong who was near the end of his life.

Laughing at what he considered typical Rasta doublethink, Kong put out the record with his intended title but soon after died of a heart attack – cementing Wailer’s reputation as an “obeahman”, someone who employs Jamaican voodoo-like practices.

Soon after, in a Kingston nightclub, Livingston attacked Lee “Scratch” Perry, who had produced the Wailers’ Soul Rebels and Soul Revolution albums. Perry had sold the records for UK distribution for £18,000 but the Wailers had seen none of the money.

The trio signed to Island Records, whose boss, Chris Blackwell, marketed their albums Catch a Fire and Burnin’ as though they were a rock act. For the second LP a set of US shows had been booked, but Livingston announced that he would not be taking part.

He was the most combative of all the Wailers in terms of black militancy. With his girlfriend Jean Watt he moved to live in a bamboo hut among the Rasta beach community at Bull Bay, outside Kingston. Squatting on a piece of land, he built his home himself, adding a touch of luxury with a polished wood floor.

When it came to his finances Livingston was on wobbly ground. He had established his own Solomonic label, but it was hardly a money-spinner. Towards the end of the Wailers’ career, he was so broke he was going to sea to catch fish.

As a settlement from Island Records, Livingston and Tosh were each offered $45,000; Livingston insisted on cash. With the banknotes stashed, he drove around Jamaica searching for land to buy. Finally, he discovered a plot in the hilly St Thomas countryside, 60 miles from Kingston, where he built a house.

″I think I love the country actually a little bit more than the city,″ Wailer finally told The Associated Press in 1989. ″It has more to do with life, health and strength. The city takes that away sometimes. The country is good for meditation. It has fresh food and fresh atmosphere – that keeps you going.

At first Livingston seemed to have vanished into this hilltop eyrie, but in the summer of 1976 he released his first solo LP, Blackheart Man, which brimmed with vitality, on Island: he had been saving up songs for some time. He was sensibly remarketed as “Bunny Wailer”, but refused to play dates to push his record. Despite that, his Protest album, released the next year, proved equally strong.

For the 1980 disc Bunny Wailer Sings the Wailers he reworked many of the band’s songs with the backing of the leading Jamaican rhythm section, Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare. He experimented with disco on his 1982 album Hook Line & Sinker, and during the 1990s he won three Grammy Best Reggae Album awards, for Time Will Tell: A Tribute to Bob Marley, Crucial! Roots Classics and Hall of Fame: A Tribute to Bob Marley’s 50th Anniversary.

In 1987 he had resumed playing live shows, to large audiences in Europe and the United States, and continued to perform for much of the rest of his career.

In 1988, he had chartered a jet and flew to Jamaica with food to help those affected by Hurricane Gilbert. ″Sometimes people pay less attention to those things (food), but they turn out to be the most important things. I am a farmer,″ he told the AP.

But the Wailers dominated. When Kevin Macdonald released his acclaimed Marley! documentary in 2012, Bunny’s voice was conspicuous (he had demanded $1 million to be interviewed, and though he did not get quite that, he was reported to have been paid a substantial sum). His appearance in the film cemented his position as the elder statesman of reggae – though still linked irrevocably to Bob Marley, his schoolboy friend.

In 2017 Bunny Wailer, who suffered two strokes in later life, was awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit. He was married to Jean Watt, known as Sister Jean, who was suffering from dementia; she went missing in 2020 and remained so by the time of his death. He is believed to have had 12 daughters and a son.

He died on March 2, 2021 in Jamaica

He was the third and last original Wailer. Marley died in 1981 of a brain tumor at 36 years old and Tosh was fatally shot in Jamaica in 1987 at 42 years old, leaving Wailer as the music’s elder statesman.

Tributes: 

“The passing of Bunny Wailer, the last of the original Wailers, brings to a close the most vibrant period of Jamaica’s musical experience,” wrote Jamaica politician Peter Phillips in a Facebook post. “Bunny was a good, conscious Jamaican brethren.”

His solo records include 1976’s Black heart Man, and 1981’s Rock ‘n’ Groove, with “Cool Runnings”, “Crucial” and “Bald Head Jesus” among his best-known songs.

In 2017, Wailer was awarded Jamaica’s fourth highest honor, the Order of Merit, and was recognized with a Reggae Gold Award in February 2019.

Wailer won three Grammy awards during his career, for Time Will Tell: A Tribute to Bob Marley in 1991, Crucial! Roots Classics in 1995 and Hall of Fame: A Tribute to Bob Marley’s 50th Anniversary in 1997. All were in the category of Best Reggae Album.

It was his friendship and work with Bob Marley, and later with Peter Tosh, that led to them forming the Wailers, an intensely creative and varied trio who gave reggae an immense international reach. Though it is hard to pull Livingston from out of Bob Marley’s shadow he remained a commanding musical figure.

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Mary Wilson – 2/2021

Mary Wilson (76) was born March 6, 1944, to Sam, a butcher, and Johnnie Mae Wilson in Greenville, Mississippi. She was the eldest of three children including a brother, Roosevelt, and a sister, Cathy. The Wilsons moved to Chicago, part of the Great Migration in which her father joined many African Americans seeking work in the North, but at age three, Mary Wilson was taken in by her aunt Ivory “I.V.” and uncle John L. Pippin in Detroit. Her parents eventually separated and Wilson’s mother and siblings later joined them in Detroit, though by then Wilson had come to believe I.V. was her real mother.

Wilson and her family had settled in the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects, a housing project in Detroit  where Wilson first met Florence Ballard. The duo became friends while singing in their school’s talent show. In 1959, Ballard asked Wilson to audition for Milton Jenkins, who was forming a sister group to his male vocal trio, the Primes (two members of which were later in The Temptations). Wilson was soon accepted into the group known as The Primettes, with Diana Ross and Betty McGlown, who lived in the same housing project with Wilson and Ballard. In this period, Wilson also met Aretha, Erma and Carolyn Franklin, daughters of the pastor at her local Baptist church. Wilson graduated from Detroit’s Northeastern High School in January 1962.

In 1960, the Primettes signed a contract with Lu Pine Records, issuing two singles from which Wilson sang lead vocals on “Pretty Baby”. Shortly after, McGlown left to get married and was replaced by Barbara Martin. During that year, they kept pursuing a Motown contract and agreed to do anything that was required, including adding handclaps and vocal backgrounds. By the end of the year, Berry Gordy agreed to have the group record songs in the studio. In January 1961, Gordy relented and agreed to sign the girls to his label on the condition they change their name. Motown lyricist Janie Bradford approached Ballard with a list of names to choose from before Ballard chose “Supremes”. Eventually, Gordy agreed to sign them under that name on January 15, 1961.

The group struggled in their early years in comparison to other Motown acts, garnering the nickname “no-hit Supremes” as a result. One track, “Buttered Popcorn”, led by Ballard, was a regional hit, but still failed to chart. Before the release of their 1962 debut album, Meet The Supremes, Martin had become pregnant and subsequently left the group, leaving the Supremes as a trio.
In December 1963, the single “When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes” peaked at number 23 on the Billboard Hot 100. Following the single’s success, Gordy assigned Ross as the group’s lead singer. In the spring of 1964, the Supremes released “Where Did Our Love Go”, which became their first number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100, paving the way for ten number-one hits recorded by Ross, Ballard, and Wilson between 1964 and 1967.

By 1965, the group had become international stars, appearing regularly on television programs such as Hullabaloo, The Hollywood Palace, The Dean Martin Show, and, most notably The Ed Sullivan Show, on which they made 17 appearances. As early as 1966, Florence Ballard‘s chronic alcoholism led to her missing press conferences and recording sessions. To serve as a stand-in for Ballard, Gordy selected Cindy Birdsong, a member of Patti LaBelle and the Blue Belles. In July 1967, following a contentious performance at the Flamingo, Ballard was removed from the Supremes and replaced with Birdsong. Simultaneously, Gordy re-named the group “Diana Ross & the Supremes”, beginning with the single “Reflections”.
The new lineup continued to record hit singles, although several stalled outside the top 20 chart range. Ross left the group in January 1970, and at her farewell performance Jean Terrell was introduced as the replacement for Ross. According to Wilson, Gordy told Wilson that he thought of having Syreeta Wright join the group in a last-minute change, after Terrell had already been introduced as lead singer, to which Wilson refused. From there, Gordy relinquished creative control of the group over to Wilson. With Terrell, the Supremes recorded seven top-40 hit singles in a three-year period, including “River Deep/Mountain High” (with the Four Tops), “Up the Ladder to the Roof”, “Stoned Love”, “Nathan Jones”, and “Floy Joy”. Unlike the latter years with Ross, the single “Automatically Sunshine” succeeded in reaching the top 20 charts, in which it had become the Supremes’ final top 40 U.S. hit.

Mary Wilson gained worldwide recognition as a founding member of The Supremes, the most successful Motown act of the 1960s and the best-charting female group in U.S. chart history, as well as one of the best-selling girl groups of all-time. The trio reached number one on Billboard’s Hot 100 with 12 of their singles, ten of which feature Wilson on backing vocals.

Beginning with the 1974 lineup, Wilson began doing almost half of the group’s lead vocal duties, as she was considered the group’s main attraction and reason for continuing.
In 1975, Wilson sang lead on the Top 10 disco hit “Early Morning Love”. In 1976, the group scored its final hit single with “I’m Gonna Let My Heart Do the Walking”, written and produced by Brian and Eddie Holland and included on the album High Energy. High Energy was well-received, but the follow-up album after another line-up change, Mary, Scherrie & Susaye, released in 1977, would be their last. During a meeting with Motown, Wilson’s husband Pedro Ferrer had notified Motown that Wilson would leave the Supremes to embark on a solo career. On June 12, 1977, Wilson gave her farewell performance with the Supremes at London’s Drury Lane Theatre.

In July 1977, just one month following her farewell performance with the Supremes, Wilson began a touring “Supremes” show with two background singers as the “Mary Wilson of The Supremes” show. The show was the result of Motown’s allowance of the group to go into hiatus despite the fact that there were still several un-cancelled international tour dates to complete. Mary therefore hired former Supreme, Cindy Birdsong and Debbie Sharpe to complete a summer tour of South America to fulfill contracts so venues would not sue. The three-week tour began in Caracas, Venezuela, and was composed of mostly small clubs. Despite the company’s displeasure and the fact that it owned the rights/distribution rights to the name “Supremes,” Motown never cancelled the tour. Later that year, Wilson hired Karen Jackson and Kaaren Ragland to tour with as background singers. She and Cindy rehearsed them for a year end’s tour of Europe, that was composed of dates at officers’ clubs and swank discos. Throughout the mid-1980s, Wilson focused on performances in musical theater productions, including Beehive, Dancing in the Streets, and Supreme Soul.

Wilson was inducted along with Ross and Ballard (as members of the Supremes) into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.

Wilson later became a New York Times best-selling author in 1986 with the release of her first autobiography, Dreamgirl: My Life as a Supreme, which set records for sales in its genre, and later in 1990 for the autobiography Supreme Faith: Someday We’ll Be Together.

Wilson became a frequent guest on several television programs and talk shows and began regularly performing in Las Vegas casinos and resorts. Wilson then recorded a cover version of “Ooh Child” for the Motorcity label in 1990. A year later, she signed with CEO Records and released the album, Walk the Line, in 1992. The label filed for bankruptcy the day after its national release. Wilson maintained that she was deceived about the financial status of the label. The available copies of the album quickly sold out, however, and Wilson continued her success as a concert performer.

In 2001, Wilson starred in the national tour of Leader of the Pack – The Ellie Greenwich Story. A year later, Wilson was appointed by Secretary of State Colin Powell as a “culture-connect ambassador” for the U.S. State Department, appearing at international events arranged by that agency. In 2006, a live concert DVD, Live at the Sands, was released. Four years later, another DVD, Mary Wilson: Live from San Francisco… Up Close, was released. During this period, Wilson became a musical activist, having been part of the Truth in Music Bill, a law proposed to stop impostor groups performing under the names of the 1950s and 1960s rock and roll groups, including Motown groups 

In April 2008, Wilson made a special appearance on 20/20 to participate in a social experiment involving pedestrians reacting to a young woman singing “Stop! In the Name of Love” with intentional amateurishness. Wilson approached the woman and gave her constructive criticism toward her style, in contrast to the pedestrians whose reactions were positive, yet dishonest. On March 5, 2009, she made a special appearance on The Paul O’Grady Show, which ended in a special performance with her, O’Grady, and Graham Norton. 
Wilson released two singles on iTunes, “Life’s Been Good To Me” and “Darling Mother (Johnnie Mae)”, in 2011 and 2013, respectively. In 2015, Wilson released a new single, “Time To Move On”, produced by Sweet Feet Music; the song reached the Top 20 on the Billboard Dance charts history, peaking at No. 17 as of December 26.
On August 15, 2019, Wilson published her fourth book, Supreme Glamour with co-author Mark Bego, dedicated to the history of the Supremes and their fashion. 

On February 8, 2021, Mary Wilson died in her sleep from hypertensive atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease at her home in Henderson, Nevada, at the age of 76. 

Motown founder Berry Gordy said he was “extremely shocked and saddened” by the news of her death and said Wilson was “quite a star in her own right and over the years continued to work hard to boost the legacy of the Supremes.” Diana Ross reflected on Wilson’s death, posting on Twitter: “I am reminded that each day is a gift. I have so many wonderful memories of our time together. ‘The Supremes’ will live on in our hearts.

Mary Wilson’s last single “Why Can’t We All Get Along” was released posthumously on March 5, 2021. The song was featured on a 2021 reissue of Wilson’s 1979 solo debut entitled, Mary Wilson: Expanded Edition.
Another posthumous project, Mary Wilson: Red Hot Eric Kupper Remix EP was released September 3, 2021. The EP featured three new different dance versions of Wilson’s 1979 single “Red Hot” produced by Kupper.

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Hilton Valentine 1/2021

Hilton Valentine – The Animals, was born on 21 May 1943 in North Shields, Northumberland, England, and was influenced by the 1950s skiffle craze – a kind of fusion of American folk, country, jazz and blues-. His mother bought him his first guitar in 1956 when he was 13, he taught himself some chords from a book called “Teach Yourself a Thousand Chords“. He continued to develop his musical talent at Tynemouth High School and formed his own skiffle group called the Heppers. They played local gigs and a newspaper described them at the time as, “A young but promising skiffle group”. The Heppers eventually evolved into a rock and roll band, the Wildcats in c. 1959. The Wildcats became a popular band in the Tyneside area, getting a lot of bookings for dance halls, working men’s clubs, church halls etc., and it was during this period that they decided to record a 10″ acetate LP titled Sounds of the Wild Cats. 

But then came the Animals! The group was formed in 1963 when Eric Burdon joined the Alan Price Rhythm and Blues Combo, which already included the other original members of The Animals. There are different versions of the origin of the name of the band. Some say they were nicknamed that way because of their “animal” attitude on stage and because they were sticky. Others say it was in honor of a friend of Eric Burdon’s who was nicknamed “animal”. They soon began to get noticed and in 1964, they moved to London to play at various well-known clubs in the capital.

Their style drew elements from blues, creating a style of psychedelic rock and hard rock that was unique for its time and influenced many later bands and artists. The Animals’ best-known song is “The House of The Rising Sun”, which reached number one on the popularity charts in both the UK and the United States.

Now the Animals were hobbled by being on MGM Records, which was never cool. We knew that back then, we saw the labels on the 45s, we knew the orange and yellow of Capitol, the red of Columbia…MGM was a lame label, without the infrastructure of its big time competitors. But the Animals were giants.

It was the summer of ’64. The summer of “A Hard Day’s Night.” The British Invasion was in full swing, our minds had expanded to encompass the work of seemingly everything from the U.K., assuming it was good. And the Animals were.

At that point most people had no idea “House of the Rising Sun” was a Dave Van Ronk staple, never mind being on Bob Dylan’s first LP, it was the rock sound that put the Animals’ version over the top. Of course you had Eric Burdon’s vocal, but there is not a boomer alive, that’s how ubiquitous hit songs were back then, who doesn’t know the opening guitar lick to “House of the Rising Sun.” That arpeggio lick was played by Hilton Valentine.

Now the original incarnation of the Animals only lasted until 1966. Sure, their hit-making era was only three years, from ’64-’66, but they’d paid dues before that, beginning in ’62, in Newcastle upon Tyne, an industrial area without the hipness of Liverpool, never mind London. The Animals had a dark name and they were perceived as dark. But they had a slew of hits.

“House of the Rising Sun”, of course was their breakthrough, and went to #1, but “We Gotta Get Out of This Place,” which only went to #13 in the U.S., was a bigger song, probably better remembered. Barry Mann and Cynthia Well wrote it, but the Animals made it their own, and it did not have the legacy of a standard, it was fresh, brand new.

As for “It’s My Life”…Eric Burdon was gonna ride that serpent, he was gonna break loose, because..

“It’s my life and I’ll do what I want
It’s my mind and I’ll think what I want”

This was the ethos of the sixties, it’s not the ethos of today. Our parents were not fighting us for attention, there was no question of them being our best friends, we were throwing off the chains of society, of expectations, we were gonna forge our own path.

It’s a great song, Burdon delivers it, but never underestimate the importance of Hilton Valentine’s twelve string guitar. And the Animals had other hits, but “Don’t Bring Me Down” is probably my favorite.

“When you complain and criticize
I feel I’m nothing in your eyes
It makes me feel like giving up
Because my best just ain’t good enough”

The hormones had awoken. Puberty was in full swing. What you wanted was too often unattainable. You had crushes. But to them you barely existed, if at all. But to you, they were everything. The only thing you had to soothe yourself was this music.

“Oh, oh no
Don’t bring me down”

Now in the case of “Don’t Bring Me Down” one cannot underestimate the importance of Dave Rowberry’s organ, and Eric Burdon sings with nuance, something absent from too much of today’s music, and it’s a great Gerry Goffin/Carole King song, but what truly makes “Don’t Bring Me Down” a hit is Hilton Valentine’s fuzz guitar. It’s a bedrock element of rock history. And you probably had no idea who Hilton Valentine was. He’s that guy!

Valentine left The Animals for a solo career after the original line-up split in 1966. He was very close with Eric Burdon and while there was no touring, Hilton lived in the downstairs basement apartment of Eric’s Laurel Canyon home and when Burdon became frontman for War, he took Hilton Valentine with him on tour as their guitar tech. Valentine went on to take part in several reunions and toured with Burdon in 2007. He never left the music.
Based in Connecticut with his wife Germaine in recent years, he also released music with his band Skiffledog.

Hilton Valentine died 29 January 2021 at the age of 77.

Our heroes no longer die before their time, they don’t O.D., their bodies give out and they’re gone, and there are so many of them these days that their deaths are less shocking and get less attention, after all, nobody lives forever.

Eric Burdon paid tribute to Valentine on Instagram, writing: “The opening opus of Rising Sun will never sound the same!… You didn’t just play it, you lived it! Heartbroken by the sudden news of Hilton’s passing.
“We had great times together, Geordie lad. From the North Shields to the entire world…Rock In Peace.”

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Tim Bogert – 1/2021

Tim Bogert, bassist for Vanilla Fudge

Tim Bogert – (Vanilla Fudge)  Born John Voorhis Bogert III on Aug. 27, 1944 in New York City, he grew up playing multiple instruments. When Tim was eight years old, he was already riding his bicycle to piano lessons. The piano lessons, however, were soon replaced by Little League. Music was in him, though and at thirteen, Little League was then replaced by a clarinet. Soon thereafter, Tim picked up the saxophone and played in his high school marching band. Time was living in New Jersey by now and he met a friend named Dale. They formed a band called The Belltones with Tim playing sax and made good money playing gigs around New Jersey at high school dances and VFW halls. This band evolved into The Chessmen. 

The Chessmen were introduced by WADO disk jockey Allen Fredericks, who helped them get gigs backing up doowop groups such as The Shirelles, The Crest, The Earl, and The Doves. The Chessmen were now playing New York City. With the advent of surf music which didn’t have much sax, Tim Bogert then picked up the electric bass.
After Tim left high school, he was in and out of a number of bands in the NYC area. In 1965, he went on a lounge tour of the Eastern Seaboard with Rick Martin and the Showmen, where he met Mark Stein, the keyboardist and vocalist. The two of them hit it off, and they soon left to join with drummer Joey Brennan and guitarist Vince Martell to form their own band, The Pigeons. After recording an album called “While the World was Eating”, they replaced drummer Joe Brennan with Carmine Appice and changed the name of the band to Vanilla Fudge.

“We had just gotten a recording contract from Atlantic Records, and the name Pigeons was taken, so in a couple of hours we had to think of a new name,” Bogert told For Bass Players Only in 2010. “Mark’s cousin’s nickname was ‘Vanilla Fudge’ — no, I don’t know why — and this name was picked and agreed to by everyone. It had nothing to do with blue-eyed soul!”

The band, known for fusing strains of psychedelia and proto-metal, mingled originals with cover songs on their early albums, including heavy takes on the Beatles’ “Ticket to Ride” and Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready.” Their 1967 take on the Supremes’ “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” served as the soundtrack to the climatic scene of Quentin Tarantino’s 2019 movie Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

The song that took them to the top was a cover of the Supremes, titled “You keep me hanging on. According to Mark Stein, he and Tim were “hanging out” one day in early 1967 when You Keep Me Hanging On by The Supremes came on the radio. They both agreed that the words were very soulful and that the song was too fast. Tim replies that they took the idea to slow it down back to Vince and Carmine. They performed it that night and refined the arrangement over the next few weeks and the rest is history. It was recorded in one take and that’s the version we’ve been listening to for fifty years! The album soared to number 3 on the national charts behind The Beatles and The Supremes. It stayed on the charts for over 200 weeks! The first notes Tim plays in the intro to this symphonic rock piece indicate his incredible speed and his unique ability take you on a “bass trip” while continuously doing what a bass player is supposed to do; holding down the bottom and completing the rhythm section. This was the emerging Tim Bogert style.

Tim recorded five albums with Vanilla Fudge between 1967 and 1969. As Vanilla Fudge matured, so did his style, on both the melodic and rhythmic sides. His “bass trips” became even more imaginative, utilizing more effects and greater speed, yet his rhythmic grooves were just as awesome. These techniques are prevalent on the Some Velvet Morning and Break Song cuts on the Near the Beginning album. Tim and drummer Carmine Appice became undoubtedly the tightest rhythm section in rock.

The quartet released five studio albums during their ’60s run, all of which cracked the top 40 of the Billboard 200: 1967’s gold-selling Vanilla Fudge, 1968’s The Beat Goes On and Renaissance; and 1969’s Near the Beginning and Rock & Roll.

Following the breakup of Vanilla Fudge in March of 1970, Tim went on with Carmine to form Cactus with guitarist Jim McCarty (Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels), and vocalist Rusty Day(Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes). About the name says Tim, “Carmine and I were lying in the back of a limo on the way home from a gig in Arizona. We were talking about leaving the Fudge. We passed under a sign that read ‘ The Cactus Drive-In’ . It was the easiest band name we ever thought of. “

This high energy rockin’ blues band gave Tim the opportunity to further prove his ability to fill the gaps in what was essentially an instrumental trio, while maintaining his meaty, melodic style. After three studio albums, Jim McCarty left the band and was replaced by an unknown guitarist, Werner Friching, from Germany that they met in New York. Carmine once said that he and Tim had trouble with many guitarists because the two of them were “crazy musicians from New York” and were too high energy. Well, so much the loss for the guitar players! With the addition of keyboardist Duane Hitchings, from the original Buddy Miles Express and a new vocalist, Pete French, from Atomic Rooster, they recorded a fourth album ‘Ot ‘n Sweaty in 1972. This Cactus version, lasted only another seven months before breaking up completely.

The Bogert/Appice rhythm section then teamed up once again. This time with the legendary Jeff Beck. Beck, Bogert, and Appice was the new supergroup. Tim and Carmine had wanted to team up with Beck for a long time. Jeff had called them up to do a session with Stevie Wonder and were asked to join the Jeff Beck Group. They left Cactus and did a national tour with Beck.

Their rendition of Stevie Wonder’s Superstition was an instant hit. Vanilla Fudge harmonies, provided by Tim and Carmine, were evident in Lady. BBA’s live album from Japan, which was coincidentally only released in Japan and is now a collectors item, displayed the intense energy they became known for. Ray Manzerek of The Doors described BBA as “one of the great power trios of all time.”

Ultimately, Tim dissolved his partnership with Beck and moved from New York to Los Angeles.

“I did nothing for six months. Just rode my motorcycle. Then I teamed up with Steve Perry for two years.” Tim met Steve at a rehearsal studio and they put a band together called Pieces.”

After that, Tim went to England to do one session and wound up staying for three and a half years. While there, he joined a band with Chris Stainton called Boxer. They recorded one album and toured England. 1979 found Tim back in California mainly living the life of a freelance musician working local clubs on a casual basis and doing his share of studio dates with the likes of Rod Stewart on his “Foolish Behaviour” album and Bo Diddley on his “20th Anniversary of Rock ‘N’ Roll album.

“After that I went back to Europe to live in Italy for seven months to do session work and tour.” Upon his return to Los Angeles, Tim joined Bobby and the Midnights with Billy Cobham and Bob Weir. That took him on another tour of the U.S. for a year and a half. The following year, Tim toured nationally with Rick Derringer.

Bogert then joined Bobby and the Midnites, a side project formed by Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead. Though he toured with the group, Bogert left before their debut album was released, joining the U.K. group Boxer in 1977. In 1981, Bogert became a faculty member at the Musicians Institute in Los Angeles, but continued to record, releasing his second album, “Master’s Brew,” in 1983 and releasing “Mystery” with Vanilla Fudge in 1984.

Over the years, Bogert contributed to multiple projects and tours, including stints with Rick Derringer, Steve Perry, Rod Stewart and others. He also participated in reunions with Vanilla Fudge and Cactus, including the former band’s 2007 record, Out Through the In Door, and the latter group’s 2006 LP, Cactus V.

In 1999, Bogert was recognized by the Hollywood Rock Walk of Fame for his contributions to the genre. Bogert continued to tour with various groups until he retired.  In August of 2005, Tim was involved in a serious motorcycle accident which left him unable to perform for a couple of years.

In August 2007, the all original Vanilla Fudge reunited again for a concert at Radio City Music Hall in New York City with Deep Purple, and continued to tour into 2008.

In 2009, resulting problems from the motorcycle accident forced Tim to reluctantly retire from touring. He was still doing session work locally in Simi Valley, California and over the Internet.

According to Bogert’s official biography, he “reluctantly” retired from touring in 2010 due to “resulting problems” from a motorcycle accident. He did, however, continue to do local session work. In 2020, Vanilla Fudge recorded “Stop In The Name Of Love”. At their invitation, Tim rejoined his buddies for this track, which would be his last recording as he was fighting cancer.

After a long battle with cancer Tim Bogert died on January 13, 2021.

“I loved Tim like a brother. He will be missed very much in my life. I will miss calling him, cracking jokes together, talking music, and remembering the great times we had together, and how we created kick-ass music together,” Carmine Appice wrote . “Perhaps the only good thing about knowing someone close to you is suffering a serious illness, is you have an opportunity to tell them that you love them, and why you love them. I did that, a lot. I was touched to hear it said back to me. Nothing was left unsaid between us and I’m grateful for that. I highly recommend it. Rest in peace, my partner. I love you. See you on the other side.”

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Sylvain Sylvain – 1/2021

Sylvain Sylvain Mizrahi (69) – The New York Dolls – was born in Cairo, Egypt on February 14, 1951. His Syrian Sephardic Jewish family fled Egypt because of the Suez Canal crisis in 1957, initially moved to France and then the USA in the late 1950s. They first settled in Buffalo, New York and later in New York City.

Sylvain, who grew up with dyslexia, attended Newtown High School in Queens and Quintano’s School for Young Professionals in Manhattan, where he met future New York Doll bandmate Billy Murcia and together they ran a clothing company called “Truth and Soul”, which helped define his fashion sense and would play a role in the band’s groundbreaking look. His early musical influences were the Who, MC5 and Iggy Pop.

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Alexi Laiho – 12/2020

Alexi Laiho (born Markku Uula Aleksi Laiho) on 8 April 1979 in Espoo, Finland. He showed virtuosic signs at an early age, learning to play violin at five and listening primarily to classical music as a youth. His parents even told him that he was singing before he could talk. 

“It’s a little weird, I know,  I was 10 years old and watching MTV when the video for Steve Vai’s For the Love of God from the Passion and Warfare album came on. That was the moment I knew I had to start playing. Not only did it blow me away, it also opened up a whole new world for me.” 

As Laiho’s interest in music shifted from classical to glam metal and shred, his parents were fully onboard with his transformation; his father even bought Alexi his first guitar when he was 11, a white Tokai Stratocaster.  “A good guitar,” Laiho stated later. “Every day I’d run home from school and play it until my parents would almost have to physically knock me out to get me to sleep.” Laiho took his obsession with the guitar to new heights while in high school, ultimately cutting classes to stay home and woodshed and teach himself heavy metal and shred techniques from instructional videos.

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Leslie West – 12/2020

Leslie West 12/2020 – (75) West was born in Forest Hills, Queens, New York City on October 22, 1945, to Jewish parents. He grew up in Hackensack, New Jersey, and in East Meadow, Forest Hills, and Lawrence, New York. His mother was a hair model, his father the vice president of a rug shampoo company. He grew up in the suburbs. When Leslie was 8, his mother bought him his first instrument, a ukulele, but he became entranced with the guitar after seeing Elvis Presley play one on television. He bought his first guitar with the money given to him for his bar mitzvah. After his parents divorced, he changed his surname to West. 

His professional career began in a band he formed in the mid-1960s with his brother Larry, who played bass. The band, the Vagrants, was a blue-eyed soul group inspired by a hit act from Long Island, the Rascals, one of the few teenage garage rock acts to come out of the New York metropolitan area itself (as opposed to the Bohemian Greenwich Village scene of artists, poets, and affiliates of the Beat Generation, which produced bands like the Fugs and the Velvet Underground) The two bands played the same local clubs, as did Billy Joel’s early group, the Hassles.

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Bones Hillman 11/2020

Bones Hillman (62) – Midnight Oil – was born May 7, 1958 in Auckland, New Zealand as Wayne Stevens. His first band was punk outfit the Masochists and then he went from actually learning his instrument in his Avondale teenage bedroom to joining New Zealand punk rock originals the Suburban Reptiles.“It was the most documented band that did fuck all,” Hillman says with a laugh of the notorious group that gave him the nom de punk the bloke born Wayne Stevens has used since.

“Although it probably reads really well on paper, in reality we never really played that much. With the Suburban Reptiles, I think we did a gig once every six months if we could actually convince someone to let us use their space.”

From the ashes of that short-lived headline-grabbing band came the nervy pop of the Swingers. And sparked by Hillman’s bassline, which came to him during a sound-check at a Christchurch pub, the title Counting the Beat became a transtasman number one in 1981 and perennial advertising jingle.

The Swingers foundered. So did his next band, Coconut Rough. Eventually, while Hillman was painting houses in Melbourne, his landlord, a chap by the name of Neil Finn, recommended him to Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst when the band needed a new bassist, replacing Peter Gifford in 1987. Helped by his vocal harmony abilities, Hillman got the gig. Initially, he was offered just an Australian and Canadian tour. But five albums later, he was still there – until frontman Peter Garrett decided he needed to swap political rock for actual politics and the band split in 2002.

‘Hillman later recalled that he was living with Kiwi expatriate musicians Neil and Sharon Finn in a Melbourne share house when Midnight Oil called to say they were looking for a new bassist.
His first thought was that Neil Finn, who passed on the message, was pulling his leg. But a few nights later, drummer Rob Hirst rang back wondering why Hillman had not returned his call and invited him up to Sydney to rehearse.

He played with Midnight Oil for 15 years, performing thousands of gigs and singing on every recording since 1990’s Blue Sky Mining, until the band took a break in 2002 when frontman Peter Garrett moved into federal politics. Hillman returned to New Zealand where he stayed active but bored, before moving with his family in 2007 to Nashville, Tennessee where he worked a lot as a session musician. He re-joined Midnight Oil for its Reunion Tour in 2018.

Midnight Oil were occasionally getting  back together for charity shows, but Hillman had given up on a more ambitious reunion. But then, Garrett having quit politics and delivered a solo album and the band decided to reconvene. After dates in Europe and North and South America, they went to New Zealand in September before shows in Australia.

Hillman said the reunion decision came against the background of a year in which many of rock’s old guard left the stage; the band, whose ages hover around 60, began thinking, “Well, now’s good … Last year was fairly brutal for artists shuffling off this mortal coil from David Bowie and Prince right down to Glenn Frey. I think we saw a lot of people were checking out. We are still in good health and we can still play, we can still walk … so why not embrace this heritage, this great career and music that we have done?”

Hillman knows a thing or two about embracing heritage. After the Oils split, he returned to New Zealand for three years, which included the recording of Dave Dobbyn’s 2005 Available Light and the subsequent album tour.

Then he had another urge: Nashville. But once there, it was time to unplug.

“I had to learn some new tricks. Just being the electric rock bassist had no pull in this town. For some reason, everyone wanted an upright bass. That resurgence of young people playing string band music just came into the culture.” Hillman bought a vintage double bass, listened to a lot of playing by Elvis Presley’s original bassist, Bill Black, and spent six months in the basement getting a new set of calluses on his hands as he learnt the instrument.

In the decade in Nashville, he played on nearly 20 albums by various acts, touring with artists such as prominent country singer-songwriter Elizabeth Cook and appearing on Late Show with David Letterman. “It really was an education. Just a different appreciation about playing,” he says. “I had no idea on that 747 flight out of Auckland I would end up playing upright bass with hillbilly musicians at the Grand Ole Opry.” His double-bass era came to a close after five or so years. He sold the instrument – “that was the end of the love affair” – and went back to electric bass guitar as a sideman to Canadian singer-songwriter Matthew Good.

Then came the call from the old firm in Australia.

The band’s most recent release  The Makarrata Project: a collaborative mini-album with the stated intention of keeping the Uluru Statement from the Heart at the forefront of the national conversation. In 2019 Hillman reconvened with band members Garrett, Rob Hirst, Jim Moginie and Martin Rotsey in a Sydney studio for the project, which came out on October 30 and features Indigenous artists. The album climbed to number one on the Aria charts on Saturday; Midnight Oil’s first chart-topping studio album since 1990.
The band was awarded the Sydney Peace Foundation’s gold medal for human rights, for its “commitment to the pursuit of human rights over an extended period … with a powerful, far-reaching impact”.
“This medal is in recognition of that relentless focus, and in particular for their environmental activism, their humanity and their drive to promote justice through both their music and their actions,” chair Archie Law said.

Bones Hillman, “the bassist with the beautiful voice” never told his band mates that he had cancer. He died November 8, 2020 at age 62 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

“We’re grieving the loss of our brother,” the band’s statement said. “He was the bassist with the beautiful voice, the band member with the wicked sense of humor, and our brilliant musical comrade.

Tributes remembered Hillman as “a lovely lovely man”, “a great and kind guy”, with amazing vocals. Actor Russell Crowe praised “what a grand chap he was”.

“We will deeply miss our dear friend and companion and we send our sincerest sympathies to (his wife) Denise, who has been a tower of strength for him.”

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Ken Hensley – 11-2020

Ken Hensley, Uriah Heep, was born on August 24, 1945 in South-east London. He learned how to play guitar at the age of 12 from a Bert Weedon manual. His first gig was at The Mentmore Pen Factory, in Stevenage (September 1960). After that, he played with The Blue Notes, Ken and the Cousins and Kit and the Saracens (1962). In 1963, this band evolved into The Jimmy Brown Sound, and they recorded some now lost songs. At this time, Hensley’s first “professional” opportunity almost came about: they were to back Ben E. King on a British visit, but it never happened.

In early 1965, Hensley formed a band called The Gods, with the young guitarist Mick Taylor, well known later for his work with John Mayall and The Rolling Stones. Hensley wrote most of the material, sang and played the Hammond B3 organ as the band already had Taylor on guitar. The Gods’ line-up included, at one time or another, vocalist and guitar/bass player Greg Lake (later of King Crimson and Emerson, Lake & Palmer), bass player Paul Newton (later the first Uriah Heep bassist), drummer Lee Kerslake (later also of Heep), bassist John Glascock (later of Jethro Tull), and guitarist Joe Konas. In early 1968, they signed with Columbia Records and recorded two LPs and several singles.

Hensley also then played on a one-album side project of The Gods initially planned to become their third album, but was recorded and eventually released in 1969/1970 under the moniker Head Machine’s Orgasm. The album was produced by David Paramor (producer of “The Gods”) and both Hensley and Kerslake featured, along with John Glascock on bass, Brian Glascock on drums, and David Paramor on vocals, all under pseudonyms. Hensley played mostly guitar again, as in the beginning of his career. Although Paramor was credited as composer, the songs bear many of Hensley’s influences. The album was released before Hensley joined Toe Fat, and might almost be considered a prototype for the harder side of his future work in Uriah Heep.

The band eventually split but Cliff Bennett, from the Rebel Rousers, decided to move in a more “progressive” direction and asked The Gods to join him. Under the name Toe Fat they released two LPs, but only the first featured Hensley.

Paul Newton asked Hensley (Christmas 1969) to join forces in Spice, as they were looking for a keyboard player to make their sound less bluesy and more progressive, in keeping with the current trend. In January 1970, Spice changed its name into Uriah Heep.  Also in the line-up were guitarist Mick Box and vocalist David Byron. With Uriah Heep, Hensley found a place to develop and showcase his songwriting and lyrical abilities as well as his keyboard and guitar playing. 

The band’s “classic” line-up featured Hensley, Byron, Box, Kerslake and bassist Gary Thain. During his time with Heep (1970–1980), they recorded 13 studio albums, and the live album Uriah Heep Live – January 1973 along with many compilations and singles. Hensley also recorded his first two solo albums, Proud Words on a Dusty Shelf (1973) and Eager To Please (1975) during this time. He was supported mainly by Mark Clarke and Bugs Pemberton.

After the departure of bassist Gary Thain (who died in 1975) and vocalist David Byron, (who died in 1985) other musicians were brought into the Heep family: John Wetton (FamilyKing CrimsonRoxy Music, later of U.K. and Asia), Trevor Bolder (from Spiders From Mars, later of Wishbone Ash) and John Lawton (Lucifer’s Friend), among others.

In 1980 Hensley left the band, unhappy with the musical direction they had chosen. After trying to put a new band together in the UK (Shotgun), he later moved to the US and played a few gigs in North America as The Ken Hensley Band. Around this time he released his third solo LP, Free Spirit (1980).

In 1982, Hensley joined Blackfoot, a hard rock Jacksonville, Florida-based band. With them, he recorded two albums (1983’s Siogo and 1984’s Vertical Smiles). Although the group had achieved some success, Hensley left after he was informed him of Heep vocalist David Byron’s death in 1985.

After 1985, Hensley lived in semi-retirement in St Louis, Missouri, making a few appearances with W.A.S.P.Cinderella and others. W.A.S.P.’s frontman Blackie Lawless stated that “Ken Hensley wrote the rule book for heavy metal keyboards as far as I’m concerned.” Hensley also owned “The Attic” Recording studio in St. Louis.

In 1994, From Time To Time, a collection of lost recordings, was released featuring rare songs recorded by Hensley between 1971 and 1982, as well as some early versions of Heep’s classic songs, played by Hensley and his roommates at that time, namely guitarist Paul Kossoff and drummer Simon Kirke(both of Free). Other musicians on the songs were bassist Boz Burrell (King Crimson and Bad Company), guitarist Mick Ralphs (Mott the HoopleBad Company), drummers Ian Paice (Deep PurpleWhitesnake) and Kenney Jones(The Small FacesThe FacesThe Who), amongst others.

IIn 1997 Ken established The Upper Room Studios in St. Louis, Missouri where Ken was involved with several projects including A Glimpse of Glory, together with his band Visible Faith produced by Ken and engineered by chief engineer Bud Martin. In 1999, Hensley’s musical activities began to increase, besides his work with St Louis Music.

During the fourth Uriah Heep Annual Convention in London, May 2000, plans were made for a one-off concert by the so-called “Hensley/Lawton Band”. Hensley was joined by former Uriah Heep singer John Lawton, their first public collaboration since the latter’s departure from Uriah Heep in 1979. With them were Paul Newton (the band’s original bassist) and two members of Lawton’s band, Reuben Kane on lead guitar and Justin Shefford on drums. They played a set of old Uriah Heep classics and some of Hensley’s solo songs, and the concert was recorded for a CD release, followed by an extensive tour of Europe during Spring and Summer of 2001 culminating with a concert on 12 May in HamburgGermany, featuring a full orchestra and a new rendition of Heep’s old classic song “Salisbury”. After the tour, both Ken and John returned to their respective solo careers. 

On 7 December 2001, both John Lawton and Ken Hensley appeared on stage with Uriah Heep during the annual Magician’s Birthday Party at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire in London. This concert was recorded and released as a CD/DVD.

Running Blind, his first studio effort in 21 years, was released worldwide in 2002 and followed by a world tour with his band called “Free Spirit”, that included Dave Kilminster (guitar), Andy Pyle (bass) and Pete Riley (drums).

After moving to Spain, Hensley released The Last Dance (with new songs), The Wizard’s Diary (Uriah Heep classics re-recorded in 2004) and Cold Autumn Sunday (Hensley’s solo songs re-recorded in 2005).

Featuring a number of special guests, the rock opera Blood on the Highway was released in May 2007. The story portrays the rise and fall of a rock’n’roll star. Lead vocals role were split between Hensley and Glenn Hughes (ex-Deep PurpleTrapezeBlack Sabbath), Jørn Lande (ex-The SnakesMasterplan), John Lawton and Eve Gallagher.

In September 2008, Hensley went on stage again with former Heep bandmates Lawton, Kerslake and Newton along with ex-Focus guitarist Jan Dumée, for the “Heepvention 2008” fans meeting.

Hensley continued to write and record a series of new albums, beginning with a collection of songs under the title of Love & Other Mysteries, recorded near his home in Spain and followed in 2011 by Faster, his first studio recording of new songs with his live band, Live Fire. A CD of one of his solo concerts was released by Cherry Red Records in 2013, shortly followed by a live CD recorded with Live Fire during a September/October tour. Trouble, an album of 10 new songs recorded with a revised Live Fire line-up, was released, again by Cherry Red, in September the same year.

In later years, Hensley and his wife Monica lived in the village of Agost near Alicante in Spain.

Hensley died on 4 November 2020, at the age of 75 following a short illness. He had finished an album titled My Book of Answers before his death, that was released on 5 March 2021.Ken  Hensley wrote many of the Uriah Heep songs during his tenure from 1970 to 1980, performing guitar and lead vocals on a number of occasions.

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Dave Munden 11/2020

Dave Munden (76) – The Tremeloes – was born Dec. 2, 1943 in Dagenham, Essex, England.

The group started in 1958 as Brian Poole and the Tremoloes, inspired by Buddy Holly and the Crickets. (They soon changed the spelling of their name.) Joining lead singer Poole were lead guitarist Rick West, rhythm guitarist/keyboardist Alan Blakley, bassist Alan Howard and Dave Munden on drums. As legend has it, they auditioned for Decca in 1962 and were signed in favor of another band, the Beatles.
In 1963, their recording of “Do You Love Me” (originally recorded by the Motown group the Contours) topped the British singles chart, replacing the Beatles’ “She Loves You” at #1. More Top 5 U.K. success followed, including their cover of “Twist and Shout.”

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Eddie van Halen 10/2020

Tapping virtuoso Eddie van HalenEddie van Halen 10/2020 (65) Born in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on January 26, 1955 Eddie van Halen was the son of Jan van Halen and Eugenia (née van Beers). Jan was a Dutch jazz pianist, clarinetist and saxophonist and Eugenia was born Indonesian from Indonesian and Italian parents in the town of Rangkasbitung on the island of Java in what was then called the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). Jan and Eugenie married in August 1950 and re-emigrated on March 4th 1953 on board of the ship “Sibajak” to Holland, where they settled in Amsterdam. Shortly after the birth of Eddie, the family moved to Nijmegen, where they lived at 59 Rozemarijnstraat. On February 22nd 1962 the Van Halen’s moved again, this time by boat across the Atlantic to New York. After which they proceeded on a continent-crossing journey by train to finally settle in California, where they lived in Pasadena at 1881 Las Lunas Street for two decades. It was here that the two Dutch born Indo-Americans started to write music history and the swirling Van Halen story began.

After experiencing mistreatment for their mixed-race relationship in the 1950s, the parents moved the family to the U.S. in 1962. They settled near other family members in Pasadena, California, where Eddie and his brother Alex attended a segregated elementary school. Since the boys did not speak English as a first language, they were considered “minority” students and experienced bullying by white students. 

Eddie and his older brother, Alex Van Halen, later became naturalized U.S. citizens. The brothers learned to play the piano as children starting at the age of six. They commuted weekly between Pasadena and San Pedro to study with an elderly piano teacher, Stasys Kalvaitis. Continue reading Eddie van Halen 10/2020

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Spencer Davis 10/2020

Spencer Davis (81) – Spencer Davis Group – was born in Swansea, South-West Wales, on 17 July 1939.
His father was a paratrooper during World War II. While his father was away, his uncle Herman was a musical influence on Davis, teaching him how to play the harmonica and accordion at age six. Davis lived through The Blitz: “The bombed city center was my playground. I watched the town being absolutely destroyed.” Davis’s mother continued to live in the West Cross area of Swansea until her death. He attended Dynevor Schoolin Swansea and became proficient speaking a few languages.

His early musical influences were skiffle, jazz, and blues. Musical artists who influenced Davis include Big Bill Broonzy, Huddy Ledbetter, Buddy Holly, Davey Graham, John Martyn, Alexis Korner, and Long John Baldry. By the time he was 16, Davis was hooked on the guitar and the American rhythm and blues music making its way across the Atlantic. With few opportunities to hear R&B in South Wales, Davis attended as many local gigs as practical. Continue reading Spencer Davis 10/2020

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Jerry Jeff Walker 10/2020

Jerry Jeff Walker was born  Ronald Clyde Crosby on March 16, 1942, in Oneonta, N.Y.

A native of New York, Walker spent his early career as a folkie in Greenwich Village in NYC. It was there that he wrote and recorded “Mr. Bojangles,” in the mid-1960s after having spent a night in a New Orleans jail where he met a man who “danced a lick across the cell.” Walker released the song as the title track of a 1968 solo album, shortly after he left the New York band Circus Maximus. In 1971, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band took “Mr. Bojangles” to No. 9 on the pop charts. 

This is the tribute to a man who wrote only one true hit, that turned into a folk rock standard like Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone”.

Walker was heading to California when he stopped in Austin and ended up staying. Along with Willie Nelson’s move here a couple of years later, Walker’s arrival helped to herald a prosperous time for Austin music, with terms such as “outlaw country” and “cosmic cowboy” used to describe the music Walker and others were making.

In Walker’s words:

“The mid-’70s in Austin were the busiest, the craziest, the most vivid and intense and productive period of my life. Greased by drugs and alcohol, I was also raising the pursuit of wildness and weirdness to a fine art. I didn’t just burn the candle at both ends, I was also finding new ends to light.”

Walker found a new adopted home in Austin, Texas, just as the city’s alternative country scene was being formed. He became one of the regular performers at Austin’s iconic Armadillo World Headquarters, playing with his Lost Gonzo Band on backup, and a member of the city’s legendary group of outlaw country stars. Walker sang backing vocals on bandmate Gary P. Nunn’s “London Homesick Blues,” which became the longtime theme song to the music performance TV show “Austin City Limits.

Walker’s 1973 live album “Viva Terlingua!” — recorded not in the West Texas town of Terlingua but in the hill country hamlet of Luckenbach — became a touchstone for that era. His influence looms large even today, as dozens of Texas country roadhouse bands and troubadours are essentially still following the same path that Walker blazed in the ’70s.

“Other than Willie, Jerry Jeff is the most important musician to happen to Austin, Texas, I would have to say,” Asleep at the Wheel leader Ray Benson. “He really brought that folksinger/songwriter form to its height in Texas. And for that, he’ll be eternal, because there’s all these kids today who write songs in that mode.

“But also, a la Willie, he wrote really giant hit songs. ‘Mr. Bojangles’ is a standard. His other songs are wonderful, but to write a standard, that’s something that’s very difficult in today’s day and age to do.” 100 other artists also recorded the song, including Bob Dylan, Sammy Davis Jr., Nina Simone and Neil Diamond.

Among Walker’s other better-known songs are “Little Bird,” “Sangria Wine,” “Charlie Dunn,” “Hill Country Rain” and “Pissin’ in the Wind,” which he wrote after doing just that on a roadside stop en route to Dallas for a Willie Nelson concert in the 1970s.

But Walker was equally known as an interpreter and champion of other writers’ songs. It was Walker who first brought Guy Clark to national attention when he recorded Clark’s “L.A. Freeway” for his 1972 self-titled album on major label Decca Records. “I remember telling him that I was going to record ‘L.A. Freeway’ and that he was on the verge of being a great songwriter,” Walker recalled after Clark’s death in 2016.

Walker cast a spotlight on a young Gary P. Nunn by not only including Nunn’s song “London Homesick Blues” on the “Viva Terlingua!” album, but having Nunn sing it.

“To him, it came down to the song, whether he wrote it or somebody else wrote it,” said Ray Wylie Hubbard, whose iconic song “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother” also appears on “Viva Terlingua!”

Walker’s recording of the song “gave me a career,” Hubbard says, but also a middle name. He was performing as Ray Hubbard until Walker’s Lost Gonzo Band member Bob Livingston identified him as Ray Wylie Hubbard in a spoken introduction to “Redneck Mother” that appears on the album.

Hubbard says Walker’s record label wanted to edit out that intro to avoid any confusion. “But Jerry Jeff said, ‘Nah, leave it on there.’ So because of him, I got a middle name. He was willing to acknowledge other songwriters; that was just such a gracious trait about him.”

In 2018, shortly after Walker donated a lifetime of artifacts to the Wittliff Collections at Texas State University in San Marcos, the collections’ exhibit space in the university’s Alkek Library featured an exhibit titled “Viva Jerry Jeff: The Origins and Wild Times of a Texas Icon.” It provided much detail about Walker’s pre-Texas years, including audio of early songs, rare photos and letters to family.

“I wanted to tell the story of the young man who had those dreams and that determination,” said Hector Saldana, Texas Music Curator for the Wittliff. “When you’re looking at the letters he was writing to his grandmother, thanking her for the few dollars she had sent him and mentioning just casually that he’d written this song called ‘Mr. Bojangles’ that he thought was good, you just can’t believe it.”

The exhibit also shed light on how Ronald Clyde Crosby became Jerry Jeff Walker. He’d been using an ID card from a friend he made in the New York Army National Guard named Jerry Ferris, and he had become a fan of Harlem jazz pianist Kirby Walker. He combined them to rename himself. (He added the middle name later; on the first Circus Maximus album in 1967, he was credited as Jerry Walker.)

Singer-songwriter Todd Snider, a longtime friend of Walker’s, has often told the story of walking through Santa Fe, N.M., with Walker one night when they happened upon an apparently homeless musician performing “Mr. Bojangles” on the street. 

In Snider’s 2014 book “I Never Met a Story I Didn’t Like,” he revisited the encounter:

“I was asking myself, ’Should I tell this guy that he’s playing Jerry Jeff’s song, and that Jerry Jeff is standing right here? But, no, I figured that if Jerry Jeff wanted to let this guy know who he was, he’d tell him. When the song was over, (Walker) said, ‘That sounded great,’ and then he put a (expletive)-load of cash — every bit of cash he had on him — into that guy’s hat.”

Austin keyboardist Chris Gage, who has been playing in Walker’s band since 2008, was among many who posted thoughts about Walker to social media Saturday. “I have my memories of countless plane, bus, train and van rides, green rooms with pizza and Arnold Palmers, packed theaters and showrooms, sunrise meals in Belize, scary car rides (if he was driving), passionate studio sessions and so much more,” Gage wrote.

Walker’s last appearance onstage in Austin was Feb. 22, 2020, to accept a Hall of Fame award from the Texas Heritage Songwriters Association. A star-studded cast — including Rodney Crowell, Michael Martin Murphey, Emmylou Harris, Joe Ely and the Dirt Band’s Jeff Hanna — performed Walker’s songs in his honor. Walker appeared at the end, with help from his wife and others to get on and offstage.

Jerry Jeff Walker ended his story on this planet on October 25, 2020. He was 79 years old.

Every couple of years Jerry Jeff Walker took a breather in the US Virgin Island of St. Thomas in the 1980s and played several venues. My time down in the islands co-existed with his for a couple of years and I had the pleasure of backing him up on several occasions. He was a man without air. A pure pleasure of a human being.

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Tommy DeVito 9-2020

Gaetano “Tommy” DeVito (The Four Seasons) was born on June 19, 1928, in Belleville,  New Jersey, the youngest of nine children. When he was still too small to hold a guitar, he borrowed an older brother’s and tried playing it while it was lying on the floor. His brother discovered him, he told The Star-Ledger of Newark in 2005, and gave him first a beating and then a counterintuitive warning. “Now that I’ve seen you doing it,” he recalled his brother saying, “every time I come home and I don’t see you practicing, that’s a beating.”  At eight years old, he taught himself to play his brother’s guitar by listening to country music on the radio. By the time he was 12, he was playing for tips in neighborhood taverns. He quit school after the eighth grade. (Belleville High made him an honorary graduate in 2007.) By 16, he had his own R&B band and was making $20 or $25 a night, getting into scrapes with the law from time to time.

The large DeVito family shared a flat with an uncle during the Depression, a difficult time. “You did anything to survive. You’d steal milk off of porches.”

Growing up in difficult circumstances in his native New Jersey, DeVito was, in his own words, “a hell-raiser” as a youth, but he found a purpose with music. He formed a band called the Variety Trio with one of his brothers and Nick Massi, who would become the fourth member of the Four Seasons when that group coalesced in about 1960. Massi died in 2000 at 73.

DeVito became a founding member, lead guitarist and vocalist with the Four Seasons, growing the close-harmony quartet that rocketed to fame  with “Sherry”, Rag Doll” and many other hits that earned new generations of rock and roll fans. The key component with the Four Seasons though, was Frankie Valli, with his falsetto vocals. In a 2008 interview with the music publication Goldmine, DeVito recalled that in the late 1940s his trio performed regularly at a bar in Belleville, N.J., when Frankie, a teenager six years younger than him, would sneak in to watch them play. He and the other band members knew Valli from the neighborhood and knew that he had magnificent pipes.

“I’d call him up to the stage and let him sing,” DeVito recalled. “He’d get off right away, because he wasn’t really supposed to be in there; he was underage.” Before long Frankie Valli was part of the group, which went through name and lineup changes before becoming the Four Seasons. “Sherry,” the group’s breakout hit, topped the charts in 1962, and a stream of hits followed, (27 top 40 hits and number-one hits “Sherry” (1962), “Big Girls Don’t Cry” (1962), “Walk Like a Man” (1963), “Rag Doll” (1964).

DeVito didn’t entirely shed his hell-raiser past; he ran up debts, for one thing, and caused tensions within the group. In 1970 he was either forced out, as some accounts say, or left because the pressures of touring had disagreed with him, as he explained it.

He quickly burned through whatever money he had from the group’s heyday and took jobs working in casinos and cleaning houses to get by.

The actor Joe Pesci, a friend since childhood (whose character in Martin Scorsese’s “Goodfellas” is named for Mr. DeVito), had lived with Mr. DeVito for a time before he was famous, and once Mr. Pesci broke through, he repaid the favor, helping Mr. DeVito out and getting him bit parts in movies, including “Casino” (1995), also directed by Mr. Scorsese. DeVito also had some success as a record producer and recorded an album of Italian folk songs.

Seeing a version of himself portrayed in “Jersey Boys” was startling, he said. But he was comfortable with the show, which he described as “about 85 percent true to life.”

“When you first see yourself being played, you look at the actor, who is Christian Hoff, and say: ‘Do I look like that? Did I talk like that? Was I really a bad guy?’” he told Goldmine. “And I was. I was pretty bad when I was a kid. There’s a lot of things I’d never do today that I did back then as a kid.”

“Jersey Boys” implies that he was somehow connected to organized crime, but that was an exaggeration, he said, done for the sake of the story.

“I was never part of the mob,” he said. “They might have asked me to play a private party or something, but they paid me for it. Mostly they asked me to do benefits.”

“Jersey Boys” opened on Broadway in November 2005 and ran until January 2017, one of the longest runs in Broadway history. (Clint Eastwood directed a film version in 2014.) The show won four Tony Awards, including best musical and best featured actor (Mr. Hoff).

If the musical massaged the truth a bit, Mr. DeVito generally complained about only one thing in the script: a crack about the cleanliness of his underwear. “I was the most cleanest guy in the whole group,” he said. “I’m clean. I’m very clean.”

Frankie Valli and Bob Gaudio, the two surviving original members of the group, announced Tommy DeVito’s death on Sept. 21, 2020. A spokeswoman for Valli said the cause was the Covid 19 coronavirus. 

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Steve Holland 8-2020

Steve Holland (Molly Hatchett) was born Feb. 22, 1954, in Dothan, Alabama. He began playing guitar at the age of 8, and moved to Jacksonville, Florida in the early 70’s.

He met Dave Hlubek, who had started the band in 1971 at a local record store in Jacksonville, FL. Holland joined in 1974 as the band was forming its classic six-piece lineup. The rest of the principal members of the original band were in place by 1976, eventually signing to Epic Records. But the band didn’t rise to national prominence until 1978, when the place crash involving fellow Jacksonville-based Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd left a void in the Southern rock space. Molly Hatchet stepped up with the release of their self-titled record and then in 1979 with the album Flirtin’ With Disaster is what put them on the national map. Steve played on the band’s first five albums, leaving after the release of 1983’s “No Guts … No Glory.” He is credited as a co-writer on some of the band’s biggest hits, including “Bounty Hunter,” “Whiskey Man” and “Gator Country.

The band released six studio albums on Epic Records between 1978 and 1984, including the platinum-selling hit records Molly Hatchet (1978), Flirtin’ with Disaster (1979) and Beatin’ the Odds (1980). They also had charting singles on the US Billboard charts, including “Flirtin’ with Disaster“.

Steve Holland recorded on 6 Molly Hatchet records and performed with the band through their heyday, leaving in 1983 after the band released the album No Guts…No Glory as the band was adopting a more hard rock sound. Holland chose to leave Molly Hatchet when it became more of a business than a band. “He decided he had enough of the cutthroat atmosphere and it wasn’t fun any more, so he retired,” long time friend John Pappas said. He was replaced by keyboardist John Gavin, reportedly telling John Galvin, the keyboardist in Danny Joe Brown’s solo band, “Wanna be in the band? You can take my place, I’ve had enough” during a show with Sammy Hagar in Detroit. Galvin accepted,
Holland never returned to Molly Hatchet, but there was a reunion of five of the original members — Roland was the exception — at a 1999 benefit after Brown had a stroke.

He later led the Steve Holland Band and played on and off with the Southern Rock Allstars. Holland later formed the band Gator Country in 2005 with former members of Molly Hatchet.

Molly Hatchet, named after a passionate female axe murderer, featured a triple-guitar lineup, with Holland sharing duties with Hlubek and Duane Roland. The classic lineup of the band also included singer Danny Joe Brown, bass player Banner Thomas and drummer Bruce Crump. All of them have now crossed the rainbow into Rock and Roll Paradise. Singer Danny Joe Brown passed away in 2005, guitarist Duane Roland died in 2006, drummer Bruce Crump passed in 2015, and guitarist Dave Hlubeck and bassist Banner Thomas died in 2017.

 He made his home on St. Simons Island, where he found sobriety in 2009 and became an every-Sunday church goer. He passed away on August 2, 2020 after a long illness at age 66.

Holland posted a video to fans several months earlier in which he said: “Hey, y’all. Thanks for all your wishes and prayers and stuff. Love you. Thanks for putting up with me all these years. Turn it up!”

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Peter Green – 7/2020

Peter Green – July 25, 2020.  Born Peter Allen Greenbaum, Peter was born into a Jewish family, the youngest of Joe and Ann Greenbaum’s four children, on Oct. 29, 1946, in Bethnal Green, London’s East End. His grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Poland and Ukraine. Fascism and anti-Semitism were on the rise in England as well as Germany in the years before WWII — thugs threw bricks and bottles through the windows of Jewish homes in London’s East End. After the war, Peter’s father officially changed the family name to Green.
The gift of a cheap guitar by his older brother Len, who had lost interest in learning how to play, put the 10-year-old Green on a musical path.
His other brother, Michael, taught him his first guitar chords and by the age of 11 Green was teaching himself. He began playing professionally by the age of 15, while working for a number of east London shipping companies. He first played bass guitar in a band called Bobby Dennis and the Dominoes, which performed pop chart covers and rock ‘n’ roll standards, including instrumentals from the Shadows (Cliff Richards’ backing band at the time). He later stated that Hank Marvin, lead guitarist for the Shadows was one of his guitar heroes and he played the Shadows’ song “Midnight” on the 1996 tribute album Twang.

He went on to join a rhythm and blues outfit, the Muskrats, then a band called the Tridents in which he also played bass. His reputation as a genuine blues guitarist grew rapidly and it was right around his 20th birthday when he got his first big exposure break, replacing Eric Clapton in John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers — initially for just 4 gigs in October 1965, after Clapton abruptly took off for a Greek holiday. Continue reading Peter Green – 7/2020

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Bonnie Pointer 6/2020

June 8, 2020Bonnie Pointer, a Founding member of The Pointer Sisters, was born July 11, 1950 as Patricia Eva Pointer in Oakland California.  All six siblings including the four sisters grew up in Oakland, Calif., where their parents, Elton and Sarah (Salis) Pointer, were pastor and minister and where the sisters honed their vocal skills at the West Oakland Church of God.

Bonnie and June, the two youngest sisters, began performing in 1969 under the name The Pointers — A Pair. Anita Pointer later said she quit her job as a legal secretary after seeing Bonnie and June onstage in San Francisco. “I saw them at the Fillmore West, and I lost my mind,” she said, adding that Bonnie was “the catalyst” in starting their musical career.

Renamed the Pointer Sisters, the three began working as backup singers. Mingling with the San Francisco-area rock scene, they sang with acts like Boz Scaggs, Grace Slick and the gender-bending pioneer Sylvester, and they were briefly signed to Atlantic Records. Their singles for that label failed to chart, although one 1972 B-side, “Send Him Back,” has over time come to be considered a minor funk classic. Continue reading Bonnie Pointer 6/2020

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Rupert Hine 6/2020

Rupert Hine (72) was born on Sep 21, 1947 in Wimbledon, London, England. He was the son of Maurice, a timber merchant, and Joan (née Harris), a Red Cross nurse. He grew up in a house full of music; his mother was an amateur ballet dancer and his father an amateur musician who also played drums in a jazz band when he was young. Hine’s mother was convinced he would be an architect, but Hine’s early ambition was to become a cartographer. Hine started playing in the school band at age 14 and played the mouth organ, mostly because it was the cheapest instrument to buy.

In the early 1960s, Hine formed half of the folk duo Rupert & David with David MacIver. The duo performed in pubs and clubs and occasionally shared the stage with a then-unknown Paul Simon. The duo’s one released single was a cover of Simon’s “The Sound of Silence“. The single was not a success, but was notable for featuring a young Jimmy Page on guitar and Herbie Flowers on bass. For several years Hine wrote songs with MacIver while working at temporary jobs, until he was helped by Deep Purple‘s bassist Roger Glover, whom Hine knew from Glover’s previous band Episode 6. Hine and MacIver were signed to Deep Purple’s Purple label. Glover produced Hine’s first solo album, Pick Up a Bone (1971). Unfinished Picture(1973) followed, but neither album was successful. However, Hine now became increasingly in demand as an independent producer.

As a record producer Rupert Hine worked on ‘The Getaway’ for Chris DeBurgh, Tina Turner’s ‘Private Dancer’ and ‘Break Every Rule’, Howard Jones’ ‘Human Lib’, Bob Geldof’s ‘Deep In The Heart of Nowhere’, Thompson Twins ‘Close To The Bone’, Stevie Nicks ‘The Other Side of the River’ as well as albums by The Fixx, Robert Palmer, Rush, Katey Sagel, Dusty Springfield and Norman Cook.

In 1973, Hine, along with guitarist Mark Warner, formed the band Quantum Jump, releasing two albums, Quantum Jump (1976) and Barracuda (1977). After the re-release of the single “The Lone Ranger” (from Quantum Jump) became an unexpected UK Top five hit in 1979, a third album – Mixing, a reworking of tracks selected from the first two Quantum Jump albums – was released.

After Quantum Jump disbanded, Hine released a trilogy of albums under his own name, including Immunity (1981); Waving Not Drowning (1982); and The Wildest Wish to Fly (1983). The American release of Wildest Wish dropped two tracks, radically reworked two others and incorporated two tracks from 1981’s Immunity – including “Misplaced Love”, which featured a guest vocal by Marianne Faithfull and had been a minor hit in Australia, reaching number 14 on the chart.

But it was as a producer that Hine made the biggest impact in popular culture. While the 1970s were a busy time for Hine, with titles by Camel, Anthony Phillips (ex-Genesis) and Kevin Ayers (ex-Soft Machine) to his credit, it wasn’t until New Wave engulfed the 1980s that he reached international success by becoming the go-to producer for The Fixx and Howard Jones, two of the genre’s biggest acts. Hine helmed the first four studio albums by The Fixx, including 1983’s Reach the Beach and its top-5 hit “One Thing Leads to Another,” and the first two albums by Jones.

Hine also had a hand in crafting Tina Turner’s 1984 juggernaut Private Dancer, having produced the single “Better Be Good to Me,” a top-5 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 that earned a Grammy Award — for best rock vocal performance, female — in 1985. He also co-wrote and produced “Break Every Rule,” the title track to Turner’s 1986 album, and again collaborated with the rock legend on 1989’s Foreign Affair.

In 1985, Hine wrote and produced much of the soundtrack for the black comedy film Better Off Dead. Later he and composer Eric Serra wrote “The Experience of Love”, the end title song for the Bond film GoldenEye. His film soundtrack credits also include The Fifth Element (composed by Serra), and The Addams Family.

Other production credits from the decade include Stevie Nicks’ The Other Side of the Mirror, as well as albums by the Thompson Twins, Underworld, Saga and Chris De Burgh, among others. He also linked up with Canadian progressive rock heroes Rush for a two-album run that included 1989’s Presto and 1991’s Roll the Bones.

In the 1990s, Hine worked on albums with Bob Geldof and French artist Éric Serra, as well as releases by actresses Katey Sagal and Milla Jovovich. One of his biggest hits of the decade arrived in 1996, when he produced the self-titled debut album by Duncan Sheik, which included modern rock radio staples “Barely Breathing” and “She Runs Away.” The pair teamed up again with 1998’s Humming.

Hine continued his work in the 21st Century, producing albums for Suzanne Vega, Ra, Stuart Davis and others. In 2008 he oversaw the benefit album Songs for Tibet: The Art of Peace, which had contributions from Rush, Vega, Sheik, Sting, Alanis Morissette, Ben Harper and Hine himself, among others. A follow-up compilation, meant to mark the Dalai Lama’s 80th birthday, featured Peter Gabriel, Lorde, Kate Bush, Elbow, Sheik and Howard Jones.

Over his 50 years of being active in music, Hine worked on over 130 albums.

“Rupert pioneered electronic musical instrument interfaces with the fledgling MIDI. Invited by Apple in the 90s to help demonstrate the powers of their ground-breaking software engines to the music-world’s creative thinkers, Rupert has consistently championed the incorporation of the digital environment into art and creativity”.

Rupert Hine died June 4, 2020 at the age on 72. He had been battling with cancer since 2011.

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Moon Martin 5/2020

May 11, 2020 – John David “Moon” Martin was born on October 31, 1945 (some report 1950 but not true) in Altus, Oklahoma.

If you go to Moon’s Wikipedia page, it says he was born in 1950. But if you read some of the obits, he was born in 1945. Which makes complete sense. If for no other reason than his hair was prematurely gray nearly instantly. And there’s no way he could have played with Hendrix and Joplin if he was only 20, they died in 1970. But Martin did.

His first band, The Disciples, later renamed Southwind, formed in Norman while he was a student at the University of Oklahoma and then relocated to Los Angeles where they attained some success and even toured with Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix before calling it quits in 1972. After a brief stint playing with Linda Rondstadt, John focused on session work and songwriting, penning the hit track “Cadillac Walk” which was recorded by Mink DeVille on his debut album.

And then came “Bad Case of Loving You.”

By this time we’d already moved on to the second album, “Escape From Domination,” “Rolene” was heard on KROQ, back when that was a free form station, before the ROQ of the 80s, before the death of rock and the decimation of the station this year. But at this point, Moon Martin was not famous for the Robert Palmer cover, but the Willy DeVille covers.

By 1978 he was recording under the moniker “Moon” Martin due to his multiple song lyrics referring to the moon. He began his solo career with his Victim of Romance EP that included his most successful song “Bad Case of Loving You.” Robert Palmer – Singer would later cover the song, making it a Top 20 hit a year later. Moon’s first solo album, Shots From a Cold Nightmare, remains a Power Pop classic.

Moon Martin sold his soul to rock and roll. He followed the music to the very last note. He died with his guitar strap on, coming out of the studio after a full day’s work on a new album. It wasn’t a fling, something Moon did before law school. He had no desire to work at the bank. (Although let’s not forget Harry Nilsson was a teller!) It was all music, all the time.

It is said they he had lived comfortably off his song royalties, until the day he died. A true exception i rock-n-roll.

He was 74 years old, and he had become a little frail over the last few years…He went to sleep in a big easy chair in his living room with a book in his hand, a blanket in his lap, and a little glass of Coke on the nightstand next to him. He left this world as peacefully as anybody could ever hope to

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Phil May 5/2020

Phil May (75) – Lead singer for the Pretty Things – was born Philip Dennis Arthur Wadey, later Kattner on 9 November 1944 in Dartford, Kent, England. He was raised by his aunt and uncle, whose surname was May. In childhood, he was sent back to live with his mother and stepfather, whose surname was Kattner, but later decided to change his name to May.

He formed the Pretty Things at Sidcup Art College in 1963 with guitarist Dick Taylor, a former bass player with an early incarnation of The Rolling Stones, when both bands were an integral part of the London blues-rock explosion. Keith Richards had also gone to Sidcup College and May, Taylor and the Stones’ then leader Brian Jones all shared a house.

With May as lead singer, the band became part of the British blues rock scene and quickly gained a recording contract. Initially an energetic R&B outfit, they had a string of hits in the mid-1960s,  “Don’t Bring Me Down” (nr.10) and “I’m a Road Runner Honey”. Playing raw and visceral rhythm and blues, they threatened to upstage the Rolling Stones as the bad boys of rock in those early days, although they never reached a commercial successful level.

In the late 1960s, The Pretty Things started to branch out into psychedelia and May became a prominent counterculture figure, known for his claim of having “the longest hair in Britain”, drug-taking and bisexuality. The 1968 album S.F. Sorrow, which was released on the Motown imprint Rare Earth, was regarded as the first rock opera album. The songs and lyrics were based on stories written by May, which were often composed while the album was being recorded. May later admitted that his usage of LSD had a major impact on the album, saying “”It was like a sharpening of the imagination for me. I don’t think S.F. Sorrow would have been impossible without it, but there’s a lot of acid in the imagery.” The album was not commercially successful at the time, but later became a cult favorite. 

“We thought we were making something special. It was to give you an experience, so you move from cradle to grave with somebody’s life – which they give you in opera all the time,” says Phil May, the singer in The Pretty Things. “In some ways, that added bitterness to the pill when it was ignored.”

They influenced David Bowie, who references them in his song, Oh You Pretty Things, and covered Rosalyn and Don’t Bring Me Down on his 1973 album, Pin Ups. The likes of Jimi Hendrix, Aerosmith and Van Morrison were acolytes of the wild boys of pop, who enjoyed not only chart success but a phenomenal 55-year-long career.

May remained with the Pretty Things until they retired in 2018, following a final concert with guests including David Gilmour and Van Morrison. He was one of the band’s main lyricists. He was the primary lyricist for the album S.F. Sorrow.

This longevity was very much down to the controversial, enigmatic May. In many ways he proved to be the stereotypical pop star, but also a performer who came to define counterculture itself.

In 1976 a new group called the Fallen Angels, led by guitarist Mickey Finn, with Greg Ridley from Spooky Tooth and Humble Pie, Twink from the Pretty Things, and Bob Weston from Fleetwood Mac set out to record an album and for vocals recruited May. However, after they had recorded only eight partially complete songs, all except May abandoned the project. May recruited some more players to complete the album Phil May and the Fallen Angels, which was then only released in the Netherlands.

“Before Led Zeppelin, The Who, or even the Rolling Stones arrived on the scene … the Pretty Things were the acknowledged perpetrators of mayhem, outrage and general carnage. Musically and visually they were well ahead of their time.”

May loved the rock n’roll lifestyle and revelled in friendships with the likes of Jimi Hendrix, with whom he shared a bill on the Parisian student circuit, as well as girlfriends.

When chart success waned in the mid-Seventies, the band continued to tour, having joined Led Zeppelin’s Swansong label. “During our Led Zeppelin years, the Pretty Things played at an infamous LA venue called the Roxy and Iggy Pop came along,” May recalled. “The Stooges were massive fans of The Pretties and we used to hang out together. We thought he was going to sing. But he didn’t, he just ran from one side of the stage to the other and head-butted the wall.”

The Pretties sold fewer records but still packed venues. May continued to have immense fun. “Viv Prince, in his madness, once said to me, ‘We’re going out on a double date, you and me.’ I said, ‘Oh right. Who is it?’ He said, ‘Judy Garland, and she’s bringing somebody for you.’

“So we go down to a club called the Ad Lib, and we’re sitting around and the lift doors open and there’s Judy – a bit gone on the sauce already – and she’s got Rudy Nureyev on her arm. So I say, ‘Thanks, Viv. Is that what you call a double date?’ Everybody wanted to know who slept with whom, but I honestly can’t remember. Wish I could.”

Phil May died on 15 May 2020 at the age of 75 after suffering from complications following hip surgery after a cycling accident. 

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Little Richard 5/2020

Little Richard in performance at B.B. King Blues Club & Grill in New York in 2007. “He was crucial,” one historian said, “in upping the voltage from high-powered R&B into the similar, yet different, guise of rock ’n’ roll.”

Little Richard, was born Richard Wayne Penniman on December 5, 1932. At an early age he already delved deeply into the wellsprings of gospel music and the blues, and screaming as if for his very life, he created something new, thrilling and dangerous, called rock and roll. Richard Penniman, better known as Little Richard, who combined the sacred shouts of the black church and the profane sounds of the blues to create some of the world’s first and most influential rock ’n’ roll records.

Little Richard did not invent rock ’n’ roll. Other musicians had already been mining a similar vein by the time he recorded his first hit, “Tutti Frutti” — a raucous song about sex, its lyrics cleaned up but its meaning hard to miss — in a New Orleans recording studio in September 1955. Chuck Berry and Fats Domino had reached the pop Top 10, Bo Diddley had topped the rhythm-and-blues charts, and Elvis Presley had been making records for a year.

But Little Richard, delving deeply into the wellsprings of gospel music and the blues, pounding the piano furiously and screaming as if for his very life, raised the energy level several notches and created something not quite like any music that had been heard before — something new, thrilling and more than a little dangerous. As the rock historian Richie Unterberger put it, “He was crucial in upping the voltage from high-powered R&B into the similar, yet different, guise of rock ’n’ roll.”

Art Rupe of Specialty Records, the label for which he recorded his biggest hits, called Little Richard “dynamic, completely uninhibited, unpredictable, wild.”

“Tutti Frutti” rocketed up the charts and was quickly followed by “Long Tall Sally” and other records now acknowledged as classics. His live performances were electrifying.

“He’d just burst onto the stage from anywhere, and you wouldn’t be able to hear anything but the roar of the audience,” the record producer and arranger H.B. Barnum, who played saxophone with Little Richard early in his career, recalled in “The Life and Times of Little Richard” (1984), an authorized biography by Charles White. “He’d be on the stage, he’d be off the stage, he’d be jumping and yelling, screaming, whipping the audience on.”

An Immeasurable Influence

Rock ’n’ roll was an unabashedly macho music in its early days, but Little Richard, who had performed in drag as a teenager, presented a very different picture onstage: gaudily dressed, his hair piled six inches high, his face aglow with cinematic makeup. He was fond of saying in later years that if Elvis was the king of rock ’n’ roll, he was the queen. Offstage, he characterized himself variously as gay, bisexual and “omnisexual.”

His influence as a performer was immeasurable. It could be seen and heard in the flamboyant showmanship of James Brown, who idolized him (and used some of his musicians when Little Richard began a long hiatus from performing in 1957), and of Prince, whose ambisexual image owed a major debt to his.

Presley recorded his songs. The Beatles adopted his trademark sound, an octave-leaping exultation: “Woooo!” (Paul McCartney said that the first song he ever sang in public was “Long Tall Sally,” which he later recorded with the Beatles.) Bob Dylan wrote in his high school yearbook that his ambition was “to join Little Richard.”

Little Richard’s impact was social as well.

Little Richard in the mid-1950s, around the time his first hit record, “Tutti Frutti,” was released.
Little Richard in the mid-1950s, around the time his first hit record, “Tutti Frutti,” was released.Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

“I’ve always thought that rock ’n’ roll brought the races together,” Mr. White quoted him as saying. “Especially being from the South, where you see the barriers, having all these people who we thought hated us showing all this love.”

Mr. Barnum told Mr. White that “they still had the audiences segregated” at concerts in the South in those days, but that when Little Richard performed, “most times, before the end of the night, they would all be mixed together.”

If uniting black and white audiences was a point of pride for Little Richard, it was a cause of concern for others, especially in the South. The White Citizens Council of North Alabama issued a denunciation of rock ’n’ roll largely because it brought “people of both races together.” And with many radio stations under pressure to keep black music off the air, Pat Boone’s cleaned-up, toned-down version of “Tutti Frutti” was a bigger hit than Little Richard’s original. (He also had a hit with “Long Tall Sally.”)

Still, it seemed that nothing could stop Little Richard’s drive to the top — until he stopped it himself.

He was at the height of his fame when he left the United States in late September 1957 to begin a tour in Australia. As he told the story, he was exhausted, under intense pressure from the Internal Revenue Service and furious at the low royalty rate he was receiving from Specialty. Without anyone to advise him, he had signed a contract that gave him half a cent for every record he sold. “Tutti Frutti” had sold half a million copies but had netted him only $25,000.

One night in early October, before 40,000 fans at an outdoor arena in Sydney, he had an epiphany.

“That night Russia sent off that very first Sputnik,” he told Mr. White, referring to the first satellite sent into space. “It looked as though the big ball of fire came directly over the stadium about two or three hundred feet above our heads. It shook my mind. It really shook my mind. I got up from the piano and said, ‘This is it. I am through. I am leaving show business to go back to God.’”

He had one last Top 10 hit: “Good Golly Miss Molly,” recorded in 1956 but not released until early 1958. By then, he had left rock ’n’ roll behind.

He became a traveling evangelist. He entered Oakwood College (now Oakwood University) in Huntsville, Ala., a Seventh-day Adventist school, to study for the ministry. He cut his hair, got married and began recording gospel music.

For the rest of his life, he would be torn between the gravity of the pulpit and the pull of the stage.

“Although I sing rock ’n’ roll, God still loves me,” he said in 2009. “I’m a rock ’n’ roll singer, but I’m still a Christian.”

He was lured back to the stage in 1962, and over the next two years he played to wild acclaim in England, Germany and France. Among his opening acts were the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, then at the start of their careers.

He went on to tour relentlessly in the United States, with a band that at one time included Jimi Hendrix on guitar. By the end of the 1960s, sold-out performances in Las Vegas and triumphant appearances at rock festivals in Atlantic City and Toronto were sending a clear message: Little Richard was back to stay. But he wasn’t.

‘I Lost My Reasoning’

By his own account, alcohol and cocaine began to sap his soul (“I lost my reasoning,” he would later say), and in 1977, he once again turned from rock ’n’ roll to God. He became a Bible salesman, began recording religious songs again and, for the second time, disappeared from the spotlight.

He did not stay away forever. The publication of his biography in 1984 signaled his return to the public eye, and he began performing again.

By now, he was as much a personality as a musician. In 1986 he played a prominent role as a record producer in Paul Mazursky’s hit movie “Down and Out in Beverly Hills.” On television, he appeared on talk, variety, comedy and awards shows. He officiated at celebrity weddings and preached at celebrity funerals.

He could still raise the roof in concert. In December 1992, he stole the show at a rock ’n’ roll revival concert at Wembley Arena in London. “I’m 60 years old today,” he told the audience, “and I still look remarkable.”

He continued to look remarkable — with the help of wigs and thick pancake makeup — as he toured intermittently into the 21st century. But age eventually took its toll.

By 2007, he was walking onstage with the aid of two canes. In 2012, he abruptly ended a performance at the Howard Theater in Washington, telling the crowd, “I can’t hardly breathe.” A year later, he told Rolling Stone magazine that he was retiring.

“I am done, in a sense,” he said. “I don’t feel like doing anything right now.”

Little Richard onstage at Wembley Stadium in London in 1972, on a bill that also included his fellow rock ’n’ roll pioneers Jerry Lee Lewis and Chuck Berry

Richard Wayne Penniman was born in Macon, Ga., on Dec. 5, 1932, the third of 12 children born to Charles and Leva Mae (Stewart) Penniman. His father was a brick mason who sold moonshine on the side. An uncle, a cousin and a grandfather were preachers, and as a boy he attended Seventh-day Adventist, Baptist and Holiness churches and aspired to be a singing evangelist. An early influence was the gospel singer and guitarist Sister Rosetta Tharpe, one of the first performers to combine a religious message with the urgency of R&B.

By the time he was in his teens, Richard’s ambition had taken a detour. He left home and began performing with traveling medicine and minstrel shows, part of a 19th-century tradition that was dying out. By 1948, billed as Little Richard — the name was a reference to his youth and not his physical stature — he was a cross-dressing performer with a minstrel troupe called Sugarfoot Sam From Alabam, which had been touring for decades.

In 1951, while singing alongside strippers, comics and drag queens on the Decataur Street strip in Atlanta, he recorded his first songs. The records were generic R&B, with no distinct style, and attracted almost no attention.

Around this time, he met two performers whose look and sound would have a profound impact on his own: Billy Wright and S.Q. Reeder, who performed and recorded as Esquerita. They were both accomplished pianists, flashy dressers, flamboyant entertainers and as openly gay as it was possible to be in the South in the 1950s.

Little Richard acknowledged his debt to Esquerita, who he said gave him some piano-playing tips, and Mr. Wright, whom he once called “the most fantastic entertainer I had ever seen.” But however much he borrowed from either man, the music and persona that emerged were his own.

His break came in 1955, when Mr. Rupe signed him to Specialty and arranged for him to record with local musicians in New Orleans. During a break at that session, he began singing a raucous but obscene song that Mr. Rupe thought had the potential to capture the nascent teenage record-buying audience. Mr. Rupe enlisted a New Orleans songwriter, Dorothy LaBostrie, to clean up the lyrics; the song became “Tutti Frutti”; and a rock ’n’ roll star was born.

By the time he stopped performing, Little Richard was in both the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (he was inducted in the Hall’s first year) and the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the recipient of lifetime achievement awards from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. “Tutti Frutti” was added to the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry in 2010.

If Little Richard ever doubted that he deserved all the honors he received, he never admitted it. “A lot of people call me the architect of rock ’n’ roll,” he once said. “I don’t call myself that, but I believe it’s true.”

Little Richard died on Saturday morning May 9, 2020 in Tullahoma, Tennessee. He was 87. The cause was bone cancer. 

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John Prine 4/2020

John Prine (73) was born on October 10, 1946 and raised in Maywood, Illinois. Prine was the son of William Mason Prine, a tool-and-die maker, and Verna Valentine (Hamm), a homemaker, both originally from Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. In summers, they would go back to visit family near Paradise, Kentucky. Prine started playing guitar at age 14, taught by his brother, David. He attended classes at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music, and graduated from Proviso East High School in Maywood, Illinois.

He was drafted into the United States Army during the Vietnam War, serving as a vehicle mechanic in West Germany, before becoming a U.S. Postal Service mailman for five years leading up to  beginning his musical career in Chicago.

“I likened the mail route to being in a library without any books. You just had time to be quiet and think, and that’s where I would come up with a lot of songs,” Prine said later.

While Prine was delivering mail, he began to sing his songs (often first written in his head on the mail route) at open mic nights at the Fifth Peg on Armitage Avenue in Chicago. The bar was a gathering spot for nearby Old Town School of Folk Music teachers and students. Prine was initially a spectator, reluctant to perform, but eventually did so in response to a “You think you can do better?” comment made to him by another performer. After his first open mic, he was offered paying gigs. In 1970, Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert heard Prine by chance at the Fifth Peg and wrote his first printed review, “Singing Mailman Who Delivers A Powerful Message In A Few Words”

Roger Ebert Review:

Through no wisdom of my own but out of sheer blind luck, I walked into the Fifth Peg, a folk club on West Armitage, one night in 1970 and heard a mailman from Westchester singing. This was John Prine.  He sang his own songs. That night I heard “Sam Stone,” one of the great songs of the century. And “Angel from Montgomery.” And others. I wasn’t the music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, but I went to the office and wrote an article. And that, as fate decreed, was the first review Prine ever received.

While “digesting Reader’s Digest” in a dirty book store, John Prine tells us in one of his songs, a patriotic citizen came across one of those little American flag decals. He stuck it on his windshield and liked it so much he added flags from the gas station, the bank and the supermarket, until one day he blindly drove off the road and killed himself. St. Peter broke the news: “Your flag decal won’t get you into heaven anymore; It’s already overcrowded from your dirty little war.”

Lyrics like this are earning John Prine one of the hottest underground reputations in Chicago these days. He’s only been performing professionally since July, he sings at the out-of-the-way Fifth Peg, 858 W. Armitage, and country-folk singers aren’t exactly putting rock out of business. But Prine is good.

He appears on stage with such modesty he almost seems to be backing into the spotlight. He sings rather quietly, and his guitar work is good, but he doesn’t show off. He starts slow. But after a song or two, even the drunks in the room begin to listen to his lyrics. And then he has you.

He does a song called “The Great Society Conflict Veteran’s Blues,” for example, that says more about the last 20 years in America than any dozen adolescent acid-rock peace dirges. It’s about a guy named Sam Stone who fought in Korea and got some shrapnel in his knee. But the morphine eased the pain, and Sam Stone came home “with a Purple Heart and a monkey on his back.” That’s Sam Stone’s story, but the tragedy doesn’t end there. In the chorus, Prine reverses the point of view with an image of stunning power:

“There’s a hole in Daddy’s arm Where all the money goes…”

You hear lyrics like these, perfectly fitted to Priine’s quietly confident style and his ghost of a Kentucky accent, and you wonder how anyone could have so much empathy and still be looking forward to his 24th birthday on Saturday.

So you talk to him, and you find out that Prine has been carrying mail in Westchester since he got out of the Army three years ago. That he was born in Maywood, and that his parents come from Paradise, Ky. That his grandfather was a miner, a part-time preacher, and used to play guitar with Merle Travis and Ike Everly (the Everly brothers’ father). And that his brother Dave plays banjo, guitar and fiddle, and got John started on the guitar about 10 years ago.

Prine’s songs are all original, and he only sings his own. They’re nothing like the work of most young composers these days, who seem to specialize in narcissistic tributes to themselves. He’s closer to Hank Williams than to Roger Williams, closer to Dylan than to Ochs. “In my songs,” he says, “I try to look through someone else’s eyes, and I want to give the audience a feeling more than a message.”

That’s what happens in Prine’s “Old folks,” one of the most moving songs I’ve heard. It’s about an elderly retired couple sitting at home alone all day, looking out the screen door on the back porch, marking time until death. They lost a son in Korea: “Don’t know what for; guess it doesn’t matter anymore.” The chorus asks you, the next time you see a pair of “ancient empty eyes,” to say “hello in there…hello.”

Prine’s lyrics work with poetic economy to sketch a character in just a few words. In “Angel from Montgomery,” for example, he tells of a few minutes in the thoughts of a woman who is doing the housework and thinking of her husband: “How the hell can a person go to work in the morning, come back in the evening, and have nothing to say?”

Prine can be funny, too, and about half his songs are. He does one about getting up in the morning. A bowl of oatmeal tried to stare him down, and won. But “if you see me tonight with an illegal smile – It don’t cost very much, and it lasts a long while. – Won’t you please tell the Man I didn’t kill anyone – Just trying to have me some fun.

”There’s another insightful one, for example, called “The Great Compromise,” about a girl he once dated who was named America. One night at the drive-in movie, while he was going for popcorn, she jumped into a foreign sports car and he began to suspect his girl was no lady. “I could have beat up that fellow,” he reflects in his song, “but it was her that hopped into his car.”

Roger Ebert’s laudatory review set the stage for this remarkable singer/songwriter. Quirky fact aside: “Ebert was being paid to watch and write a review of a film; but as he tells it the film was so bad that he walked out on it half way through, and went looking for a beer to cut the taste of the popcorn. If the film had been any better, Prine’s career might have been entirely different or started a little later”.

Singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson heard Prine at Steve Goodman’s (City of New Orleans) insistence, and Kristofferson invited Prine to be his opening act. Prine released his eponymous debut album in 1971, featuring such songs as “Paradise”, “Sam Stone” and Angel from Montgomery, giving bittersweet tragic-comic snapshots of American society and also fed into the anti-war movement. The album has been hailed as one of the greatest albums of all time.

The acclaim Prine earned from his debut led to three more albums for Atlantic Records. Common Sense (1975) was his first to chart on the Billboard U.S. Top 100. He then recorded three albums with Asylum Records. In 1981, he co-founded Oh Boy Records, an independent label which released all of his music up until his death. His final album, 2018’s The Tree of Forgiveness, debuted at #5 on the Billboard 200, his highest ranking on the charts.

Indeed, Prine was a rare songwriter with a gift for both melodic and lyrical incisiveness. He didn’t need to pull any verbal sorcery to make you gasp and think “Did he just do that?” The magic was all in how profoundly and bluntly he observed the most mundane details of life and death, even for characters living on the fringe. His melancholic tales were economical and precise in their gut-punches.

Prine’s lyrics work with poetic economy to sketch a character in just a few words. In “Angel from Montgomery,” for example, he tells of a few minutes in the thoughts of a woman who is doing the housework and thinking of her husband: “How the hell can a person go to work in the morning, come back in the evening, and have nothing to say?”

Prine can be funny, too, and about half his songs are. He does one about getting up in the morning. A bowl of oatmeal tried to stare him down, and won. But “if you see me tonight with an illegal smile – It don’t cost very much, and it lasts a long while. – Won’t you please tell the Man I didn’t kill anyone – Just trying to have me some fun.”

At the time John Prine was all over the magazines, but he was nowhere on the radio. But without a radio hit, Prine remained a cult item. Actually, he remained a cult item for his entire career. But it’s funny, cult can supersede major success if you hang in there and do it right.

But after the debut, Prine’s notoriety, his “fame,” the attention he got, seemed to go in the wrong direction, you knew who he was, but most people did not. He had fans who purchased his records, but only fans purchased his records and went to see him live.

Eventually Prine switched labels from Atlantic to Asylum, he worked with his old cohort Steve Goodman, but “Bruised Orange” did not live up to its commercial expectations. It was everywhere in print, I purchased it, but after its initial launch, that’s the last you heard of it. Eventually, after three LPs with the definitive singer-songwriter label, Prine took off on his own, with his Oh Boy Records, partnering with his manager Al Bunetta and their buddy Dan Einstein. It worked. His fans, supporting the project, sent him enough money to cover the costs, in advance, of his next album. Prine continued writing and recording albums throughout the 1980s. His songs continued to be covered by other artists; the country supergroup The Highwaymen recorded “The 20th Century Is Almost Over”, written by Prine and Goodman. Steve Goodman died of leukemia in 1984 and Prine contributed four tracks to A Tribute to Steve Goodman, including a cover version of Goodman’s “My Old Man”.

“How the hell can a person go to work in the morning, And come home in the evening and have nothing to say”

Everybody knew “Angel From Montgomery.” It was never a single, never a radio hit. They knew John Prine had written “Angel From Montgomery.” And the great thing about famous songs is they carry their writers along. So when Bonnie Raitt entered the music scene full force with a number of Grammy Awards in the 1990s, the original recorded version from “Streetlights” was superseded by her live performances, if the song got any airplay, it ended up being the live take from her 1995 double album “Road Tested.”

And as a result of this, suddenly the winds were at John Prine’s back, he was a known quantity, his impact increased, his career rose, and it was all because of this one song.

Of course Prine had songs covered by other famous artists, some of them you could even call hits, but I’m not sure fans of David Allan Coe really cared who’d written his numbers. And it wasn’t only Bonnie Raitt. Over the years other people had covered “Angel From Montgomery,” and Raitt’s success lifted all boats, suddenly “Angel From Montgomery” was part of the American fabric. And this is strange. This is akin to Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land,” a song everybody knows that was not featured on the hit parade, but contains the essence of America more than the tracks that are.

Now “Angel From Montgomery” reaches you on the very first listen.

“If dreams were thunder, and lightning were desire

This old house would have burnt down a long time ago”

That kernel, that inner mounting flame, if it goes out, you die.

“Just give me one thing that I can hold on to

To believe in this living is just a hard way to go”

But you wake up one day and you discover this is your life, that you’re trapped, that your dreams didn’t come true, and you’re not only frustrated, you’re angry.

So then there’s someone like John Prine, telling your story. That’s what you resonate with, you’re looking for understanding, someone who gets you. And America discovered this singer/songwriter en masse.

In 1991, Prine released the Grammy-winning The Missing Years, his first collaboration with producer and Heartbreakers bassist Howie Epstein. The title song records Prine’s humorous take on what Jesus did in the unrecorded years between his childhood and ministry. In 1995, Lost Dogs and Mixed Blessings was released, another collaboration with Epstein. On this album is the long track “Lake Marie”, a partly spoken word song interweaving tales over decades centered on themes of “goodbye”. Bob Dylan later cited it as perhaps his favorite Prine song. Prine followed it up in 1999 with In Spite of Ourselves, which was unusual for him in that it contained only one original song (the title track); the rest were covers of classic country songs. All of the tracks are duets with well-known female country vocalists, including Lucinda Williams, Emmylou Harris, Patty Loveless, Dolores Keane, Trisha Yearwood, and Iris DeMent.

In 2001 Prine appeared in a supporting role in the Billy Bob Thornton movie Daddy & Them. “In Spite of Ourselves” is played during the end credits.

Prine recorded a version of Stephen Foster‘s “My Old Kentucky Home” in 2004 for the compilation album Beautiful Dreamer, which won the Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album.

In 2005, Prine released his first all-new offering since Lost Dogs and Mixed Blessings, the album Fair & Square, which tended toward a more laid-back, acoustic approach. The album contains songs such as “Safety Joe”, about a man who has never taken any risks in his life, and also “Some Humans Ain’t Human”, Prine’s protest piece on the album, which talks about the ugly side of human nature and includes a quick shot at President George W. Bush. Fair & Squarewon the 2005 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album.

On June 22, 2010, Oh Boy Records released a tribute album titled Broken Hearts & Dirty Windows: Songs of John Prine.

In 2016, Prine was named winner of the PEN/Song Lyrics Award, given to two songwriters every other year by the PENNew England chapter. Prine also released For Better, or Worse, a follow-up to In Spite of Ourselves. The album features country music covers spotlighting some of the most prominent female voices in the genre, including; Alison Krauss, Kacey Musgraves, and Lee Ann Womack, as well as Iris DeMent, the only guest artist to appear on both compilation albums

On February 8, 2018, Prine announced his first new album of original material in 13 years, titled The Tree of Forgiveness. The album features guest artists Jason Isbell, Amanda Shires, Dan Auerbach, and Brandi Carlile. Alongside the announcement, Prine released the track “Summer’s End”. The album became Prine’s highest-charting album on the Billboard 200.

In 2019, he recorded several tracks including “Please Let Me Go ‘Round Again”—a song which warmly confronts the end of life—with longtime friend and compatriot Swamp Dogg in his final recording session.

Most of today’s music doesn’t even have any melody, they’re based on beats. And pop numbers are cotton candy, they could be written by school kids, they’ve got no depth, despite the industry hyping them. And then there’s someone like John Prine. Who was always about the songs, who never wavered, who grew by being small, by nailing the experience of the average person, struggling to get by, at least emotionally, if not monetarily. And isn’t it funny how Prine’s music survives. Will it be heard forty or fifty years from now? I don’t know, but the odds are greater than those of the songs on the hit parade.

Prine never sold out, he was the genuine article. And he might not have been in the mainstream, but he was always in the landscape. He even survived cancer. He seemed unkillable. And now he’s gone.

Prine underwent cancer surgery on his throat in 2008 – and on his lungs in 2013 – but joked that it had actually improved his singing voice. Grammy-winning singer/songwriter John Prine died on March, 2020, aged 73, due to Covid-19 complications.

Tributes:

Throughout his five-decade career, Prine was often labeled the “songwriter’s songwriter,” not just because his only chart-toppers were scored by other great writers recording his music, but because few songwriters were as universally beloved, admired, and envied by their peers as Prine was.

• Speaking to the Huffington Post in 2009, Dylan – who performed with Prine – described his music as “pure Proustian existentialism”.

• “Midwestern mind trips to the nth degree. And he writes beautiful songs.”

• Robbie Robertson, from The Band – who used to back Dylan – described Prine as “a genius”.

• “His work… a beacon of clear white light cutting through the dark days,” added former Led Zeppelin frontman and solo star Robert Plant. “His charm, humour and irony we shall miss greatly.”

• He won his first of four Grammy Awards in 1991, for The Missing Years, which bagged best contemporary folk album. It was a category he would top again in 2005 for Fair and Square.

“We join the world in mourning the passing of revered country and folk singer/songwriter John Prine,” the Recording Academy wrote in a statement.

• “Widely lauded as one of the most influential songwriters of his generation, John’s impact will continue to inspire musicians for years to come. We send our deepest condolences to his loved ones.”

• “If I can make myself laugh about something I should be crying about, that’s pretty good,” he said.

• “If God’s got a favorite songwriter, I think it’s John Prine,” Kristofferson said at Prine’s 2003 Nashville Songwriter’s Hall of Fame induction.

• “He’s just one of the greats, and an old, old soul,” his friend Rosanne Cash once said of him. Roger Waters declared in 2008 that he prefers the “extra-ordinarily eloquent music” of Prine to the modern bands influenced by Pink Floyd’s work, like Radiohead. Prine’s music, the Floyd bassist/vocalist said, lives on the same plane as icons like John Lennon and Neil Young.

• And the reigning American bard-in-chief Bob Dylan was effusive in one 2009 interview, naming Prine as among his favorite writers, adding: “Prine’s stuff is pure Proustian existentialism. Midwestern mindtrips to the nth degree. And he writes beautiful songs… Nobody but Prine could write like that.”

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Bill Withers 3/2020

Bill Withers was born in 1938 in a West Virginia coal miner’s town, the youngest of six children. His father died when he was a child and he was raised by his mother and grandmother.
His entry to the music world came late – at the age of 29 – after a nine-year stint in the Navy.
He taught himself to play guitar between shifts at his job making toilet seats for the Boeing aircraft company, and used his wages to pay for studio sessions in LA.
“I figured out that you didn’t need to be a virtuoso to accompany yourself,” he told Rolling Stone magazine in 2015.
He recorded his first album, Just As I Am, with Booker T Jones in 1970. It included the mournful ballad Ain’t No Sunshine, which earned him his first Grammy award the subsequent year. Continue reading Bill Withers 3/2020

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Bo Winberg 1/2020

Bo Winberg – The Spotnicks – was born 27 March 1939 in, Göthenborg, Sweden.
The Spotnicks originated from a duo, “The Rebels” (1956), formed by Bo Starander (later known as Bob Lander) and bassist Björn Thelin. Winberg was soon invited to join the group, and became “Rock-Teddy and the Blue Caps” in 1957. In 1958 they added Ove Johansson on drums, and changed their name to “The Frazers”. They signed a recording contract in 1961, and changed their name to “The Spotnicks”, a play on the Russian satellite Sputnik as suggested by their manager, Roland Ferneborg.

They became the first Swedish group to have international success with their czar sharp Bo Winberg inspired instrumentals. Like the Shadows in the UK and the Ventures in the US, the Spotnicks were instrument driven rockers.
One of their early records, “Orange Blossom Special”, became their first big international hit, making the Top 30 in the UK Singles Chart in 1962 and reaching No. 1 in Australia. Around this time they began wearing their trademark space suits on stage. They recorded their first album, The Spotnicks in London, Out-a Space, in 1962.

Further hits included “Rocket Man” (based on the Soviet/Russian folk march “Polyushko-polye”), and “Hava Nagila”.

This group of outstanding musicians faced the upcoming changes in musical flavors with the Beatles and Stones, The British Invasion, the later sixties Psychedelic rock and classic rock with many personnel changes, but split up in 1970 after releasing their fifteenth album: The Spotnicks Back in the Race; an album with a live feeling, lacking the perfection of their previous works, but still very good!

In spite of their breakup, the band was still popular in Japan, and they soon reformed under Winberg’s control in 1971 at the request of a Japanese record label. Bo Winberg takes part in the band for the Swedish production of the musical Jesus Christ Superstar.
Winberg continued to lead versions of The Spotnicks, occasionally including Lander and/or Björn Thelin, on tour and in recordings. They kept producing albums year after year and found an audience for their work and toured Germany and Japan numerous times.

In 2013, Winberg and Lander announced that they would be undertaking a final tour, finishing in May 2014.

Bo Winberg died in Sweden on 3 January 2020 aged 80.

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Paul Barrere 10/2019

October 26, 2019 Paul Barrere was born on July 3, 1948, the son of Hollywood actors Paul Bryar and Claudia Bryar. He joined celebrated cult band Little Feat in 1973, before the band recorded their third full-length LP, the gold-certified ‘Dixie Chicken’. For the recording of its fourth album, Feats Don’t Fail Me Now (1974), he wrote the title track. As Barrere stayed with the group, he took, along with keyboard player Bill Payne, an increasing role in singing, playing, and writing, as bandleader/founder Lowell George slowly retreated. When the group fragmented following George’s death in 1979, Paul led the group Chicken Legs.

Barrere then did sessions and recorded solo in the 1980s until the re-formation of Little Feat in 1988.

Barrere contracted Hepatitis C in 1994, but had managed to keep it under control, after he took a brief leave of absence. In 2015, he was diagnosed with liver cancer. Earlier this month, Barrere announced he was taking a medical leave of absence, but planned to be back on stage this upcoming January 2020, for the band’s headlining performance at Jamaica’s Ramble on the Island.

In a statement the members of Little feat announced:

It is with great sorrow that Little Feat must announce the passing of our brother guitarist, Paul Barrere, this morning at UCLA Hospital. We ask for your kindest thoughts and best wishes to go out especially to his widow Pam and children Gabriel, Genevieve, and Gillian, and to all the fans who were his extended family.

Paul auditioned for Little Feat as a bassist when it was first being put together—in his words, “as a bassist I make an excellent guitarist”—and three years later joined the band in his proper role on guitar. Forty-seven years later, he was forced to miss the current tour, which will end tomorrow, due to side effects from his ongoing treatment for liver disease.

He promised to follow his doctor’s orders, get back in shape, and rock on the beach at the band’s annual gathering in Jamaica in January 2020. “Until then,” he wrote, “keep your sailin’ shoes close by…if I have my way, you’re going to need them!”

As the song he sang so many times put it, he was always “Willin’,” but it was not meant to be. Paul, sail on to the next place in your journey with our abiding love for a life always dedicated to the muse and the music. We are grateful for the time we have shared.

Yours in music,

Little Feat: Bill Payne, Sam Clayton, Fred Tackett, Kenny Gradney, and Gabe Ford.

Little Feat released 16 studio albums over a span of 41 years, the last being ‘Rooster Rag’, in 2012. Barrere released three solo albums: ‘On My Own Two Feet’ (1983), ‘Real Lies’ (1984) and ‘If the Phone Don’t Ring’ (1986).

He also worked with Robert Palmer, Bob Dylan, Taj Mahal, Jack Bruce, Carly Simon and Nicolette Larson. That is his guitar work on Nicolette’s cover of Neil Young’s ‘Lotta Love’.

Barrere was a swing man as a guitarist who played a wide variety of styles of music including blues, rock, jazz, and cajun music and was proficient as a slide guitarist.
Barrere also recorded and toured as an acoustic duo with fellow Little Feat member Fred Tackett.
Barrere played several concerts with Phil Lesh and Friends in October 1999 and from March to June 2000. He also toured with Bob Dylan, and had most recently been writing and recording with Roger Cole.

Paul wrote Little Feat’s ‘Feats Don’t Fail Me Now’, ‘All That You Dream’, ‘Time Loves A Hero’ and ‘Down On The Farm’. He joined the band for their third album ‘Dixie Chicken’ was had been a member ever since.

Little Feat guitarist Paul Barrere passed away at the age of 71 on October 26, 2019

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Ginger Baker 10/2019

Peter ‘Ginger’ Baker – Cream/Blind Faith – was born on 19 August 1939 in Lewisham, South London. His mother, Ruby May worked in a tobacco shop. His father, Frederick Louvain Formidable Baker, was a bricklayer employed by his own father, who owned a construction  business and was a lance corporal in the Royal Corps of Signals in World War II; he died in the 1943 Dodecanese campaign. Baker went to Pope Street School, where he was considered “one of the better players” in the football team, and then to Shooter’s Hill Grammar School. Here he was nicknamed “Ginger” for his shock of flaming red hair.
While at school he joined Squadron 56 of the Air Training Corps, based at Woolwich and stayed with them for two or three years.

Ginger Baker began playing drums at around 15 years of age. In the early 1960s he took lessons from Phil Seamen, one of the leading British jazz drummers of the post-war era.
In the early 1960s he joined Blues Incorporated, where he met bassist Jack Bruce. The two clashed often, but would be rhythm section partners again in the Graham Bond Organization, a rhythm and blues group with strong jazz leanings. Their relationship was so volatile that Baker once attacked Bruce with a knife during a concert. Despite this volatile relationship, Baker and Bruce reunited in 1966 when they formed Cream with guitarist Eric Clapton, which became one of the first Supergroups of the 60s. He was the first guy we saw with two bass drums and the first guy to do an extended drum solo on record.

Cream played a fusion of blues, psychedelic rock and hard rock. The band released four albums in a little over two years before breaking up in late 1968.
“Disraeli Gears” was released in November ’67, the year underground FM radio began to burgeon, with KMPX in San Francisco joining the aforementioned WOR.
And then, during the summer of ’68, “Sunshine Of Your Love” crossed over to AM and the band and the scene exploded.

Now “Fresh Cream”‘s production was credited to Robert Stigwood, it’s unclear who really twisted the dials, who was really responsible for the sound, but it didn’t have the edge of what came after, it was almost like a blanket was thrown over the speakers.
But Felix Pappalardi produced “Disraeli Gears,” and it was a much better representation of the band’s sound. This was back when stereo was stereo, when instruments were in different channels, when we sat in front of the speakers, put on headphones to get the full effect. This was also when there was so much less on the records, you could hear all the instruments. You could hear Jack Bruce’s voice on “Sunshine Of You Love,” but the key to the track’s success, it’s infectiousness, was that guitar. It was the year we saw Jimi Hendrix‘s “Axis: Bold As Love” came out in January of ’68, so Cream was no longer alone, “Purple Haze” sat along “Sunshine Of Your Love” at the apex of riff-rock that started with the Stones’ “I can get no satisfaction. And then came “Piece Of My Heart,” by Big Brother and the Holding Company. Janis Joplin got a lot of ink, she was a dynamic performer, she could not be denied and when people purchased “Cheap Thrills,” with its R. Crumb cover, we were not in Kansas anymore, the screw had turned, it was a whole new world in music.

And “Wheels Of Fire” was released in August of that same year, double albums were not unknown, but this one came in silver foil and the second record was a live one.
The visual energy in Cream all came from the man behind the kit, Ginger Baker. Clapton just stood there being “Slowhand”. As did Jack Bruce, albeit a massive voice. You couldn’t help but focus on the drummer, who seemed on the verge of losing control as he stoked this freight train down the track. The sheer power impacted your gut.

And then “White Room” became a hit and the word got out. Suddenly everybody was talking about Cream. People you thought were decidedly unhip, out of the loop, got the message. And “Wheels Of Fire” started to explode. And on side four, there was a sixteen minute drum solo entitled “Toad.”
Yup, blame “Toad” for that execrable five to twenty minutes in every live show where everybody takes a pee break and the drummer flails on. They were all inspired by Ginger Baker, he was the progenitor, they all wanted to BE Ginger Baker, suddenly the drummer was no longer an afterthought, but a virtuoso who could express himself.
And then the band said it was breaking up and went on a final tour.

And the victory lap, “Goodbye Cream,” had a bigger impact in the public’s consciousness than anything that came before, it was the zeitgeist, people bought it after the band broke up, lamenting they’d never gotten to see the act. “Goodbye” resurrected “I’m So Glad” from the first LP. “Sitting On Top Of The World” was definitive. And “Badge” was a gift for those who’d been there all along.
It was like not only the band, but its members had died, there were posthumous live records, everybody wanted more of what they could never get again.
But they did get the short-lived “supergroup” Blind Faith, comprising of Eric Clapton, bassist Ric Grech from Family, and Steve Winwood from Traffic on keyboards and vocals and Ginger Baker on drums. They released only one album, Blind Faith, before breaking up.

Blind Faith was the first supergroup. That was the definition back then, they had to coin it for this concoction, an act made up of the stars of other acts, come together to make something new and triumphant.
But of course Blind Faith imploded, but the album gets short shrift, the first side is phenomenal, everyone knows the cuts, from the explosive opener “Had To Cry Today” to Clapton’s first shining solo moment, “Presence Of The Lord” and the cover of Buddy Holly’s “Well All Right” to Winwood’s piece-de-resistance, “Can’t Find My Way Home.”
The second side had Ginger Baker’s fifteen minute opus “Do What You Like.” Filler or a nod to Baker’s genius, who knows?
And when Blind Faith broke up, Winwood tried to go solo but got back together with Traffic. Clapton decided to play small, with Delaney & Bonnie, Ric Grech disappeared, and Ginger Baker formed his Air Force in 1970, yup, he was gonna continue to play for all the marbles.
Baker’s Air Force album sold, but then the act faded away, there was great playing but no songs.

After the demise of both groups Baker built a recording studio in Lagos, Nigeria. Paul McCartney & Wings recorded ‘Band On the Run’ at Baker’s Batakota Studios. The studio went bust not long after and its failure sent Baker to drugs.

Ginger Baker withdrew from the music industry throughout most of the 80s. He had developed a heroin addiction and withdrew to Italy where he lived on an olive farm until he overcame the addiction.

Eventually Baker played with the Masters Of Reality, in the nineties, which seemed a step down, but the truth was there was no band big enough to contain him. He had an edgy personality and still an original. He was the original Keith Richards, nothing could kill him. Everybody knew who Ginger Baker was, it’s just that we didn’t hear his playing that much. He was drunk, he was stoned, he played polo, he was involved in shenanigans, but the legend always exceeded the present.

And yes, there were the Cream reunion shows in 2005. A triumph in London’s Royal Albert Hall, an almost queasy afterthought in New York’s Madison Garden. He was still Ginger Baker, he could still do it, but this was nostalgia.

A decade later, living in South Africa, Baker revealed he had ‘serious heart issues.

Ginger Baker died 6 October, 2019 at the age 80.

But if you talk about legacy…
Ginger Baker is right up there. He was the first. He showed what could be done with the drumkit. He was a trailblazer, a true rocker, one who couldn’t be contained, there was nothing corporate about him. He was a beacon, may he continue to shine.

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Eddy Money 9/2019

Eddie Money was born Edward Joseph Mahoney in Manhattan, New York City on March 21, 1949, to a large family of Irish Catholic descent. His parents were Dorothy Elizabeth (née Keller), a homemaker, and Daniel Patrick Mahoney, a police officer. He grew up in Levittown, New York, but spent some teenage years in Woodhaven, Queens, New York City. Money was a street singer from the age of eleven. As a teenager, he played in rock bands, in part to get dates from cheerleaders. He was thrown out of one high school for forging a report card. In 1967, he graduated from Island Trees High School.

At the age of 18, he tried to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, father, and brother as a New York City Police Department trainee. However, after working as a clerk and typist, he left in 1968 to pursue a career in music, as the police did not allow him to grow his hair long. “I couldn’t see myself in a police uniform for 20 years of my life, with short hair,” he later said. His bandmates also fired him because they did not want a police officer in the group. His father was not happy with his decision to play music and tore Jimi Hendrix posters from his wall. He never lost sight of his blue-collar upbringing however and even at the height of his career with all the celebrity, millions of albums sold, and large sums of money he made, was one of the few artists who never changed. His ego was always in check, he remained a regular guy–someone you’d really have fun hanging out with. And he treated anyone he met, in any walk of life, exactly the same, with big respect.

‘Once he was traveling with a local music rep in New York–they were late for a radio interview and speeding on the Long Island Expressway. They were pulled over by the cops and it turns out one of the policemen was a guy who was a classmate of Eddie’s when they went through the Police Academy together. “Hey Eddie, you knucklehead, what are you doin’?!! Come on, I’ll give you guys a police escort!” That kind of fun luck used to happen a lot for Eddie.’

He began studying saxophone during a brief stint at junior college, inspired by rock musicians like David Bowie and Van Morrison who occasionally used the instrument.

In 1968, Money moved to Berkeley, California. There, he studied with vocal coach Judy Davis, and took on the stage name Eddie Money, dropping two letters from his last name and sarcastically referring to the fact that he was always broke.

Over the course of the next 8 years, Money became a regular performer at clubs in the San Francisco Bay Area. After gaining the attention of Bill Graham, he secured a recording contract with Columbia Records, releasing his debut album in 1977. He charted with singles such as “Baby Hold On” and “Two Tickets to Paradise”, about visiting his girlfriend despite not having money.

In 1978, Money opened for Santana at Boston’s Music Hall. The following year, he sang backing vocals on the bridge section on “I’m Alright”, a song written and performed by Kenny Loggins. In 2014, Money claimed that Loggins never gave him credit for his contribution.

His ascend started with “Baby Hold On.” The lyrics were not intellectual enough for the cognoscenti. But the music was undeniable, you heard it once and got it whereas so much vaunted stuff, then and now, you listen to over and over again and still don’t get.

Then came “Two Tickets To Paradise.”

Now that was a smash right out of the box. Great title, great track, great, emphatic chorus:

“I’ve got two tickets to paradise, Won’t you pack your bags, we’ll leave tonight”

This was 1978. When airline travel was still expensive. When you didn’t hop on a plane to go to a show or a game, you were stuck at home, dreaming, of what could possibly be, and Eddie Money was opening the top of your brain and filling you with hope

In 1982, Money took advantage of the MTV music video scene with his humorous narrative videos for “Think I’m in Love”, performed at The Mission Inn Hotel & Spa, and “Shakin'”. In the early 1980s, he appeared on The Midnight Special, Fridays, and Solid Gold. In 1978 and 1984, he appeared on American Bandstand.

Money’s career slumped temporarily following the commercially unsuccessful 1983 album Where’s the Party?. However, he made a comeback in 1986 with the album Can’t Hold Back, which received a music recording certification of platinum. “Take Me Home Tonight”, a single from the album, peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the United States. Money only agreed to perform the song—which included a line from “Be My Baby”, a song Ronnie Spector performed as part of The Ronettes—after Spector agreed to sing the line herself. In 1987, Money was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for “Take Me Home Tonight”. “I Wanna Go Back” and “Endless Nights”—two other singles from the Can’t Hold Back album—peaked at No. 14 and No. 21, respectively.

In 1988, Money released Nothing to Lose, which featured the Top 10 hit “Walk on Water” and the Top 40 hit “The Love in Your Eyes”.

It was 1992, “Unplugged” was flourishing on the now totally dominant MTV. Not that Eddie Money was cool enough to be featured, but he released his own acoustic live album, that positively ROCKED! “Unplug it in”.

“Gimme Some Water,” the opening cut. This was an album track from Money’s mostly hitless second LP “Life For The Taking.” Oh, “Maybe I’m A Fool” made it to number 22 on the singles chart, but at this point no one was listening to Top Forty, AOR ruled, and you didn’t need a pop hit to go platinum, as “Life For The Taking” did.

Also beginning in 1992, Money opened the summer concert season for the Pine Knob Music Theater in Clarkston, Michigan where he would return to open the venue for 27 consecutive years. In 1996, he wrote the theme music to Quack Pack, a Disney cartoon.

Money was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2008. In January 2010, he performed a medley of his hit singles during the halftime performance at the Liberty Bowl.

Eddie was a natural frontman and his original guitar player Jimmy Lyon played a role like Ronnie Wood did for Rod Stewart in the Faces – together they killed it onstage. Eddie was a very funny guy with quick wit and often the dumbest jokes.

In the beginning, he was a wild man like many rockers. On his first radio promotional tour he was going to be traveling with Warren Williams, a legendary Columbia rep for the western region. Eddie asked Warren to stop at a local liquor store, “Hey Warren, I just want to run in and get a pack of cigarettes.” About twenty minutes later Eddie emerged with a giant case full of Whiskey, Vodka, Tequila, and Gin – “OK, I’m ready now.”

In later years he toured as a classic rock act with his daughter and other family members in his band. He used to joke–“It’s like the Partridge Family, only with marijuana!”

Money wrote and performed original songs for the films Americathon (1979), Over the Top, Back to the Beach (both 1987), and Kuffs (1992), along with the television series Hardball (1989–1990).

Eddie Money died on Sep. 13, 2019. He was 70 years old.

In the three days following Money’s death, fans streamed “Take Me Home Tonight” more than 3.1 million times, which was an increase of 349 percent compared to the previous three-day period. Fans also streamed his other songs by 931 percent more than the three previous days.

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Art Neville 7/2019

art neville, keyboard in the neville brothersJuly 22, 2019 – Art Neville was born on 17 December 1937 the oldest son in the famous New Orleans blues/funk family that created the Neville Bothers. Art was born in New Orleans to Arthur Neville and his wife, Amelia (nee Landry). His father was a station porter fond of singing tunes by Nat King Cole and the Texan bluesman Charles Brown. His mother was part of a dance act with her brother, George “Big Chief Jolly” Landry.

The oldest of four brothers, his interest in playing keyboards was triggered at the age of three, when his grandmother took him to a New Orleans church where he spotted the organ. “I turned the little switch and hit one of the low keys,” he recalled. “It scared the daylights out of me, but that was the first keyboard I played.”
He later began playing the piano and performing with his brothers, and in high school joined (and subsequently led) his first band, the Hawketts. He was the lead singer on their version of Mardi Gras Mambo, a regional hit in 1954. It became a regular fixture at New Orleans’s annual Mardi Gras celebrations.
In 1958 he joined the US Navy, emerging in 1962 to continue his musical career. He formed Art Neville and the Neville Sounds, which included Aaron and Cyril before they quit to form their own group. Now a four-piece completed by guitarist Leo Nocentelli, bass player George Porter Jr and drummer Joseph “Zigaboo” Modeliste, they played regularly at New Orleans clubs, backing artists such as the Pointer Sisters and Lee Dorsey.

The Meters Era

In 1965 he was a founder not only of the Meters, whose music in the late 1960s and early 70s helped to define the genre of New Orleans funk, but of the Neville Brothers, who were masters of various soul, blues and gospel styles and were distinguished by their intricate vocal harmonies.
The Meters provided the musical backup for innumerable soul and funk artists, including on big-selling classics such as Lee Dorsey’s Working in the Coal Mine (1966) and Labelle’s Lady Marmalade (1974). But they also had hits in their own right, notably in 1969 with Cissy Strut (1969) and Look-Ka Py Py.

The Meters refined the loping, syncopated rhythm called the “second line” which became emblematic of New Orleans funk. Prime examples included the group’s hits Cissy Strut, Look-Ka Py Py, Chicken Strut (1970) and Hey Pocky A-Way (1974). Cissy Strut, which reached No 23 on the mainstream Billboard chart, was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2011.
The Meters made countless recordings as the house band for the songwriter and producer Allen Toussaint, with highlights including Working in the Coal Mine, which reached No 8 in the UK and the US, Dr John’s album In the Right Place (1973), and Labelle’s US chart-topper Lady Marmalade, a song about a prostitute in the French quarter of New Orleans with the famous line “Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, ce soir?”
In 1974 the Meters backed Robert Palmer on his album Sneakin’ Sally Through the Alley, and in 1975 Paul McCartney invited them aboard the Queen Mary ocean liner in Long Beach, California, to play at the launch party of the Wings album Venus and Mars. Also present was Mick Jagger, who invited the Meters to support the Rolling Stones on their tours of the US and Europe in 1975-76. The group now included Cyril, who joined for their album Fire on the Bayou (1975).

Forming the Neville Brothers

Art and Cyril quit the Meters in 1977 and formed the Neville Brothers with Aaron and Charles. The brothers had already gathered the previous year to back their uncle George Landry on the album The Wild Tchoupitoulas. At first the Neville Brothers were slow to gain recognition. Art recalled how when they used to play at Tipitina’s in New Orleans “you could have blown it up and not hurt anyone but the Neville Brothers”. Though Keith Richards hailed their 1981 album Fiyo on the Bayou as the finest of the year, sales were poor. They failed to release another studio album until Uptown (1987), a conscious effort to find a more mainstream sound (with Richards and Carlos Santana guesting) that prompted accusations of a sellout.

Outside the Neville Brothers Art began playing concerts with his former Meters bandmates, following a reunion at the 1989 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage festival.
They subsequently formed a new version of the band called the Funky Meters, and Art continued to perform with both outfits.
A change of fortune came with Yellow Moon, sympathetically produced by Daniel Lanois, which successfully moulded the group’s collective skills into a coherent whole. In that year the group won a Grammy for best pop instrumental performance for the Yellow Moon track Healing Chant, while the album also contained several landmark tracks including the title song, a version of Dylan’s With God on Our Side, and Sister Rosa, their ode to the civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks. 

Art won another Grammy in 1996 with various artists for best rock instrumental performance for SRV Shuffle, a tribute to the guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan. Their musical groove influenced artists as varied as Little Feat, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Public Enemy and the Grateful Dead.
Art Neville, who was nicknamed Poppa Funk, toured as part of the Neville Brothers and the Meters with major artists, including the Rolling Stones, the Grateful Dead and Tina Turner, and were traditionally the closing act on the final Sunday night of New Orleans’s annual Jazz & Heritage festival.

The Neville Brothers disbanded in 2012, but reunited for a farewell concert in New Orleans in 2015. Three years after Art announced his retirement after more than six decades in the music business.

Art Neville crossed the rainbow to rock and roll paradise on July 22, 2019 at the age of 81.

 

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Dr. John 6/2019

June 6, 2019 – Dr. John was born Malcolm John Rebennack in New Orleans on November 20, 1941, and early on got the nickname “Mac.”

When he was about 13 years old, Rebennack met blues pianist Professor Longhair (Roy Byrd) and soon began performing with him. At age 16, Rebennack quit high school to focus on playing music. He performed with several local New Orleans bands including Mac Rebennack and the Skyliners, Frankie Ford and the Thunderbirds, and Jerry Byrne and the Loafers. He had a regional hit with a Bo Diddley-influenced instrumental called “Storm Warning” on Rex Records in 1959.

Rebennack became involved in illegal activities in New Orleans in the early sixties, using and selling narcotics and running a brothel. He was arrested on drug charges and sentenced to two years in a federal prison at Fort Worth, Texas. When his sentence ended in 1965, he moved to Los Angeles, adopted the stage name of Dr. John, and collaborated with other New Orleans transplants. He became a “Wrecking Crew” session piano player appearing on works for a variety of artists including Sonny & Cher, Canned Heat on their albums Living the Blues (1968) and Future Blues (1970), and Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention on Freak Out! (1966).

Dr. John solo recordings include his debut LP, Gris-Gris (1968), Babylon (1969), Remedies (1970) and The Sun, Moon, and Herbs (1971) and Gumbo (1972). His 1973 release, In the Right Place, produced by Allen Toussaint, included his Top Ten hit “Right Place, Wrong Time.”

For the next three decades, Mac, as friends called him, collaborated with about everyone in rock and blues. Jagger and Richards, Springsteen, John Fogerty, Doc Pomus, Jason Isbell, Irma Thomas and so many more.

In the Movies, Dr. John appears in the Band’s opus, The Last Waltz and the sequel Blues Brothers 2000. Dr. John appears as himself in the second season of NCIS: New Orleans, playing his hit “Right Place, Wrong Time”.

He was the inspiration for Jim Henson’s Muppet character, Dr. Teeth and won 6 Grammy Awards and became a member of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 2011.

Dr. John, legendary New Orleans musician, died from a heart attack on June 6, 2019 at age 77.

 

 

 

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Gary Duncan 6/2019

Gary Duncan (72) – Quicksilver Messenger Service – was born on 4 September 1946 in San Diego, California as Eugene Duncan, Jr., but adopted at birth and named Gary Ray Grubb.

He grew up in Ceres, California, where (as Gary Grubb) he played guitar for the Ratz until they finished their performance itinerary as an opening act for the Byrds and the Rolling Stones at the War Memorial Auditorium in San Jose, California. It was in 1965 when, as Gary Cole, he joined the Brogues, in Merced, California, and met future Quicksilver Messenger Service drummer Greg Elmore. It was with the Brogues that he adopted the stage name Gary Duncan. He stayed with them until they broke up later that year.

In late 1965 Duncan received a call from John Cipollina offering an audition for himself and fellow Brogues member Greg Elmore to join Quicksilver Messenger Service. The group first performed in December 1965 at The Matrix. The complex guitar interplay between Duncan and John Cipollina had a big influence on the sound of psychedelic rock. In early 1969, after recording two albums “Quicksilver Messenger Service” and “Happy Trails”, Duncan left Quicksilver and as he describes it, “I left for a year and rode motorcycles and lived in New York City and Los Angeles and just kind of went crazy for about a year.” Continue reading Gary Duncan 6/2019

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Danny Kirwan – 6/2018

Daniel David Kirwan (guitarist for Fleetwood Mac) was born on May 13, 1950 as Daniel David Langran and grew up in Brixton, South London. His parents separated when he was young. His mother, Phyllis Rose Langran then married Aloysious J. Kirwan in 1958 when Danny was eight. Kirwan left school in 1967 with six O-levels and worked for a year as an insurance clerk in Fenchurch Street in the City of London.

His mother was a singer and as a consequence he grew up listening to the music of jazz musicians such as Eddie Lang, Joe Venuti, Belgian gypsy guitarist Django Reinhardt and 1930s–40s groups such as the Ink Spots. He began learning guitar at the relative late age of 15 and quickly became an accomplished self-taught guitarist and musician, influenced by guitarists such as Hank Marvin of the Shadows, Django Reinhardt, Jimi Hendrix, and particularly by Eric Clapton’s playing in the Bluesbreakers. Kirwan was 17 when he came to the attention of the newly formed blues band Fleetwood Mac in London while fronting his first band Boilerhouse, a blues three-piece with Trevor Stevens on bass guitar and Dave Terrey on drums. Boilerhouse played support slots for Fleetwood Mac at London venues such as the Nag’s Head in Battersea and John Gee’s Marquee Club in Wardour Street.

Danny Kirwan was a natural guitarist, much in the same vein as Peter Green, who could make a string sing and a note come alive without any pedal support, just his fingers. Officially the story is that Peter Green in search for a more melodic blues direction for the band, saw Danny as his perfect counterpart and Mick Fleetwood later said: “Danny was a huge force in our early years … Danny’s true legacy, in my mind, will forever live on in the music he wrote and played so beautifully as a part of the foundation of Fleetwood Mac, that has now endured for over fifty years. Danny was a quantum leap ahead of us creatively … He is the lost component. In many ways, Danny is a forgotten hero.”

Danny Kirwan himself however downplayed his contributions to Fleetwood Mac’s sound and ethos. “I was lucky to have played for the band at all,” Kirwan told the British paper. “I just started off following them around, but I could play the guitar a bit and Mick felt sorry for me and put me in. I did it for about four years, to about 1972, but … I couldn’t handle the lifestyle and the women and the traveling.”

Danny’s guitar playing was very melodic, much in the style of the Incredible Stringband and some California Commune bands like Mad River and Love in the late sixties, which was styled as psychedelic underground. Danny did vibrato bends and pull-offs that were until then hardly ever heard.
Danny had joined the band in 1968, barely 18 years old. He appeared on five of Fleetwood Mac’s albums: 1969’s Then Play On and Blues Jam at Chess; 1970’s Kiln House; 1971’s Future Games; and finally on 1972’s Bare Trees. His compositions clearly made an impact on everyone of those albums. But Danny became the second “victim” of Fleetwood Mac after his buddy Peter Green left the band in 1970. You see in those early days, the members in Fleetwood Mac were hard partying rockers. They had fun and were living the high-life. Peter Green out of a growing mental illness pushed by drug abuse was the first one to leave and young Danny Kirwan had lost his mentor and music partner.
When American westcoast guitarist Bob Welch was brought in to replace Peter Green, Danny entered a vacuum, as band victim #3, slide guitarist Jeremy Spencer was already translating their hard charging life style into a religious obsession. (He was supposed to tour North America with the band in early 1971, but he went missing shortly before Fleetwood Mac was to play a concert in Los Angeles. Spencer supposedly left the hotel he and the group were staying at to get some groceries, but he never returned.)

left to right: John McVie, Danny Kirwan, Mick Fleetwood, Peter Green and Jeremy Spencer

In 1999 Welch said Kirwan had been “a talented, gifted musician, almost equal to Peter Green in his beautiful guitar playing and faultless string bends,” but commented in a later interview: “Danny wasn’t a very lighthearted person, to say the least. He probably shouldn’t have been drinking as much as he did, even at his young age. He was always very intense about his work, as I was, but he didn’t seem to ever be able to distance himself from it and laugh about it.”
Before a concert on a US tour in August 1972, a backstage argument between a drunken Kirwan and Welch resulted in Kirwan smashing his guitar, trashing the dressing room and refusing to go on stage. Having reportedly smashed his head bloody on a wall, Kirwan watched the band struggle through the set without him, with Welch trying to cover his guitar parts. Welch remembered, “I was extremely pissed off, and the set seemed to drag on forever.” The band fired Kirwan, and the artistic direction of Fleetwood Mac was left in the hands of Welch and Christine McVie. Fleetwood said later that the pressure had become too much for Kirwan, and he had suffered a breakdown.

Danny Kirwin released three albums as a solo artist from 1975 to 1979, during which years he also recorded albums with Otis Spann, Chris Youlden, and Tramp, as well as worked with his former Fleetwood Mac colleagues Jeremy Spencer and Christine McVie on some of their solo projects. As a member of Fleetwood Mac, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, even though he did not come to the induction.

For most of the 1980s and 90s he battled mental illness, alcoholism and homelessness. It emerged that he had been living in basements and shelters, making ends meet through social security and small royalty payments.

In 1993, after Mick Fleetwood made inquiries about his well-being, the London paper The Independent and the U.K.’s Missing Persons Bureau tracked him down in a homeless shelter in London’s West End, where Kirwan had been living for the past four years in reasonable comfort, arranged for by his family.

Danny Kirwan died Friday June 8, 2018 in London at the age of 68, presumably according to his ex-wife from pro-longed pneumonia.

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Bernie Tormé 3/19

Bernie Tormé - guitaristMarch 17, 2019 – Bernie Tormé (guitarist for Ozzy, Gillan, Dee Snider and others) was born in Dublin on March 18, 1952, where he learned to play guitar. In 1974 he moved to London, joining bassist John McCoy in heavy rockers Scrapyard. After forming the Bernie Tormé Band two years later, he re-joined McCoy as a member of former Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan’s new solo project, playing on four Gillan albums: Mr. Universe, Glory Road, Future Shock and Double Trouble.

In 1981 Tormé left Gillan, and joined Atomic Rooster as a session guitarist. The following year briefly joined Ozzy Osbourne’s band, stepping in for Randy Rhoads in the aftermath of the guitarist’s tragic death. Ozzy Osbourne told Total Guitar that if it wasn’t for Bernie Tormé he “might never have got back on a stage”.

He then formed Bernie Tormé And The Electric Gypsies, and in 1988 joined Desperado, the band formed by Dee Snider after Twisted Sister were disbanded, playing on their only album, Bloodied, but Unbowed.

Tormé later later reunited with ex-Gillan colleague, John McCoy and drummer Robin Guy in GMT, and returned to solo work in 2013, releasing three acclaimed albums; Flowers & Dirt (2014), Blackheart (2015) and the 3CD set Dublin Cowboy. All three were successfully crowd-funded releases.

Tormé released his latest studio album Shadowland in November last year, but his family reported that PledgeMusic – who say they’re working on a solution to address late payments to artists – still owed the guitarist £16,000, which was due to be sent to him in December. 

Bernie Tormé passed away peacefully on March 17, 2019 , one day short of his 67th birthday, surrounded by his family. He had been on life support for the previous four weeks at a London hospital following post-flu complications and suffering from virulent pneumonia in both lungs. 

Snider tweeted, “Woke up to find out my friend Bernie Tormé has died. He was a guitar god who played with OzzyOsbourne & Ian Gillan. We worked together for 3 years, writing over 100 songs for the ill-fated Desperado. I loved that man & today my heart is broken. RIP Bernie. Your guitar weeps.”

 

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Scott Walker 3/2019

Scott Walker of the Walker BothersMarch 22, 2019 – Scott Walker (the Walker Brothers) was born January 9, 1943 in Hamilton, Ohio, despite the fact that he was perceived as British. One of the more enigmatic figures in rock history, Scott Walker was known as Scotty Engel when he cut obscure flop records in the late ’50s and early ’60s in the teen idol vein.

He initially found work in Los Angeles as a bass player, but rose to fame in the United Kingdom, after he hooked up with John Maus and Gary Leeds to form the Walker Brothers. They weren’t named Walker, they weren’t brothers, and they weren’t English, but they nevertheless became a part of the British Invasion after moving to the U.K. in 1965. They enjoyed a couple of years of massive success there (and a couple of hits in the U.S.) The Walker Brothers was a well-groomed trio famous for their British Invasion renditions of Brill Building pop. With the help of Scott Walker’s booming baritone, the act topped the British charts with covers of “Make It Easy On Yourself” (1965) and “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)” (1966), but in the US, the trio never achieved the superstardom that they enjoyed overseas. As their full-throated lead singer and principal songwriter, Walker was the dominant artistic force in the group, who split in 1967. 

While remaining virtually unknown in his homeland, Walker launched a hugely successful solo career in Britain with a unique blend of orchestrated, almost MOR arrangements with idiosyncratic and morose lyrics. At the height of psychedelia, Walker openly looked to crooners like Sinatra, Jack Jones, and Tony Bennett for inspiration, and to Jacques Brel for much of his material. None of those balladeers, however, would have sung about the oddball subjects — prostitutes, transvestites, suicidal brooders, plagues, and Joseph Stalin — that populated Walker’s songs. His first four albums hit the Top Ten in the U.K. — his second, in fact, reached number one in 1968, in the midst of the hippie era. By the time of 1969’s Scott 4, the singer was writing all of his material. Although this was perhaps his finest album, it was a commercial disappointment, and unfortunately discouraged him from relying entirely upon his own material on subsequent releases.

The ’70s were a frustrating period for Walker, pocked with increasingly sporadic releases and a largely unsuccessful reunion with his “brothers” in the middle of the decade. His work on the Walkers’ final album in 1978 prompted admiration from David Bowie and Brian Eno. After a long period of hibernation, he emerged in 1984 with an album, Climate of Hunter, that drew critical raves for a minimalist, trance-like ambience that showed him keeping abreast of cutting-edge ’80s rock trends.

It would 11 more years before Walker completed his metamorphosis from pop crooner to avant-garde godfather. That would come on 1995’s Tilt, a shocking post-apocalyptic work of art that matched dark, enigmatic songwriting and dissonant orchestral production. Tying it all together was Walker’s inimitable voice, which he pushed to awkward, operatic heights. Tilt was a harrowing listen, but its uncompromising singularity attracted experimental music fans of all types.

Again, it would be 11 years before Walker would release new music, but this time the lag was to no one’s surprise. He had developed a reputation as a perfectionist who operated on his own schedule. When 2006’s The Drift was released on 4AD, Walker again sent shockwaves through the avant-garde community. While Tilt was, in part, adored for its misdirection, The Drift was celebrated for its execution. As the second part of Walker’s late-career trilogy, it took his ornate orchestration to new depths; every second of its nearly 70-minute runtime felt intentional and intricate.

During the next several years, he contributed to soundtracks (To Have and to Hold, The World Is Not Enough, Pola X) and assisted with recordings by Ute Lemper and Pulp. He didn’t release another album until 2006. That year, Walker also contributed the track “Darkness” to Plague Songs for the Margate Exodus project, curated by the British arts organization Artangel. The concept centered around the retelling of the ten plagues of Egypt as recorded in the Book of Exodus in the Old Testament. In early 2007, the documentary film Scott Walker: 30 Century Man, premiered. Later that year, Walker released the limited-edition EP And Who Shall Go to the Ball? And What Shall Go to the Ball? Commissioned as a work for ballet by the Candoco Dance Company, it was comprised of a single piece of instrumental music, 24 minutes in length, performed by the London Sinfonietta and cellist Philip Sheppard.

In November of 2008, the musical theater work Drifting and Tilting: The Songs of Scott Walker was staged at London’s Barbican over three evenings. It was comprised of songs from Tilt and The Drift. Walker did not perform, but directed the work from conception to execution including staging, lighting, and orchestra. The vocals were performed by various singers, including Damon Albarn, Dot Allison, and Jarvis Cocker. In 2009, the album Music Inspired by Scott Walker: 30 Century Man appeared, featuring songs inspired by the film sung by Laurie Anderson and other female Walker devotees. Also in 2009, Walker dueted with British singer Natasha Khan on her Bat for Lashes album Two Suns. In 2012, he released Bish Bosch. He regarded it as the third and final part of the trilogy that began with Tilt and continued on The Drift and then surprised many fans with Soused, a collaboration with doom-metal droners Sunn O))), in 2014. The last recording released during his lifetime was the 2018 score to the Brady Corbet-directed film Vox Lux.

Scott Walker died from cancer at age 76 on March 22, 2019. He influenced everyone from Jarvis Cocker (Pulp) to Thom Yorke (Radiohead), and even newer artists like Bat for Lashes. 

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Dick Dale 3/2019

Dick Dale, king of the surf guitarMarch 16, 2019 – Dick Dale was born Richard Monsour in Boston on May 4, 1937 1937; his father was Lebanese, his mother Polish. As a child, he was exposed to folk music from both cultures, which had an impact on his sense of melody and the ways string instruments could be picked. He also heard lots of big band swing, and found his first musical hero in drummer Gene Krupa, who later wound up influencing a percussive approach to guitar so intense that Dale regularly broke the heaviest-gauge strings available and ground his picks down to nothing several times in the same song.

He taught himself to play country songs on the ukulele, and soon graduated to guitar, where he was also self-taught. His father encouraged him and offered career guidance, and in 1954, the family moved to Southern California.
At the suggestion of a country DJ, Monsour adopted the stage name Dick Dale, and he began performing in local talent shows, where his budding interest in rockabilly made him a popular act. He recorded a demo song, “Ooh-Whee Marie,” for the local Del-Fi label, which was later released as a single on his father’s new Deltone imprint and distributed locally. During the late ’50s, Dale also became an avid surfer, and soon set about finding ways to mimic the surging sounds and feelings of the sport and the ocean on his guitar. He quickly developed a highly distinctive instrumental sound and found an enthusiastic, ready-made audience in his surfer friends. Dale began playing regular gigs at the Rendezvous Ballroom, a once-defunct concert venue near Newport Beach, with his backing band the Del-Tones; as word spread and gigs at other local halls followed, Dale became a wildly popular attraction, drawing thousands of fans to every performance. In September 1961, Deltone released Dale’s single “Let’s Go Trippin’,” which is generally acknowledged to be the very first recorded surf instrumental.

In the space of a few short years, the Boston-born, Southern California transplant had merged the laid-back, sun-blasted lifestyle of the surf scene with a blistering rhythm of rockabilly and early rock-and-roll. As the mad scientist behind what was dubbed surf rock, Dale was, in the words of a 1963 Life magazine profile, a thumping teenage idol who is part evangelist, part Pied Piper and all success. The music Dale and his band the Del-Tones made poured out of radios, sound-tracked popular beach movies starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello, and lit inspirational fires in other musicians like the Beach Boys. Fans crowned him The King of the Surf Guitar.
Dick Dale wasn’t nicknamed “King of the Surf Guitar” for nothing: he pretty much invented the style single-handedly, and no matter who copied or expanded upon his blueprint, he remained the fieriest, most technically gifted musician the genre ever produced. Dale’s pioneering use of Middle Eastern and Eastern European melodies (learned organically through his familial heritage) was among the first in any genre of American popular music, and predated the teaching of such “exotic” scales in guitar-shredder academies by two decades. The breakneck speed of his single-note staccato picking technique was unrivaled until it entered the repertoires of metal virtuosos like Eddie Van Halen, and his wild showmanship made an enormous impression on the young Jimi Hendrix. But those aren’t the only reasons Dale was once called the father of heavy metal. Working closely with the Fender company, Dale continually pushed the limits of electric amplification technology, helping to develop new equipment that was capable of producing the thick, clearly defined tones he heard in his head, at the previously undreamed-of volumes he demanded. He also pioneered the use of portable reverb effects, creating a signature sonic texture for surf instrumentals. And, if all that weren’t enough, Dale managed to redefine his instrument while essentially playing it upside-down and backwards — he switched sides in order to play left-handed, but without re-stringing it (as Hendrix later did).
“I once made a million dollars a year with my career,” Dale reminisced to the Los Angeles Times magazine in 2001. “I made $10,000 for three minutes work on the ‘Ed Sullivan Show’ in 1963.”

Dale’s signature guitar style was the result of a happy accident. Most guitars are strung for a right-handed player. Dale, a lefty, originally picked up the guitar upside down so he could play naturally without restringing the instrument, leaving the thicker strings on the bottom of the fret board. “Nobody told me I was holding it wrong,” Dale explained to the Orange County Register in 2009. “I just taught myself to play it like that. It was hard at first.”

“Let’s Go Trippin'” was a huge local hit, and even charted nationally. Dale released a few more local singles, including “Jungle Fever,” “Miserlou,” and “Surf Beat,” and in 1962 issued his (and surf music’s) first album, the groundbreaking Surfer’s Choice, on Deltone. Surfer’s Choice sold like hotcakes around Southern California, which earned Dale a contract with Capitol Records and national distribution for the album. Dale was featured in Life magazine in 1963, which led to appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and the Frankie/Annette film Beach Party. Surf music became a national fad, with groups like the Beach Boys and Jan & Dean offering a vocal variant to complement the wave of instrumental groups, all of which were indebted in some way to Dale, who released the follow-up LP King of the Surf Guitar and went on to issue three more albums on Capitol through 1965.  But the British Invasion began to steal much of surf’s thunder, and soon Dale was dropped by Capitol in 1965. He remained a wildly popular local act, but in that same year he was diagnosed with rectal cancer, which forced him to temporarily retire from music.

Doctors told the guitarist that without aggressive surgery, he could be dead in a matter of months. He survived, but the cancer bout whittled Dale from 158 pounds to 98 pounds, and also drained his bank account of his pop star proceeds. He moved to Hawaii and stayed away from music for a number of years. He beat the disease, however, and soon began pursuing other interests: owning and caring for a variety of endangered animals, studying martial arts, designing his parents’ dream house, and learning to pilot planes. In 1979, a puncture wound suffered while surfing off Newport Beach led to a pollution-related infection that nearly cost him his leg; Dick Dale soon added environmental activist to his resume. In addition to all of that, he performed occasionally around Southern California throughout the ’70s and ’80s.
In 1986, Dale attempted to mount a comeback. He first recorded a benefit single for the UC-Irvine Medical Center’s burn unit (which had helped him recuperate from potentially serious injuries), and the following year appeared in the beach movie Back to the Beach. The soundtrack featured a duet between Dale and Stevie Ray Vaughan on, which was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental. In 1991, Dale did a guest spot on an album by the San Francisco-based Psychefunkapus, and a successful Bay Area gig got him signed with Hightone Records.

The album Tribal Thunder was released in 1993, but Dale’s comeback didn’t get into full swing until “Miserlou” was chosen as the opening theme to Quentin Tarantino’s blockbuster 1994 film ‘Pulp Fiction’. “Miserlou” became synonymous with Pulp Fiction’s ultra-hip sense of style, and was soon licensed in countless commercials (as were several other Daletracks). As a result, Tribal Thunder and its 1994 follow-up, Unknown Territory, attracted lots of attention, earning positive reviews and surprisingly strong sales. In 1996, he supported the Beggars Banquet album Calling Up Spirits by joining the normally punk- and ska-oriented Warped Tour.
Adding his wife and young drum-playing son to his band, Dale refocused on touring over the next few years. He finally returned with a new CD in 2001,’ Spacial Disorientation’, issued on the small Sin-Drome label. Dale stepped away from his recording career after that release, but he continued to play out frequently, even as he struggled with myriad health problems, including diabetes, rectal cancer, and heart and kidney disease. Dale still had a busy schedule of concert dates on his schedule when he died on March 16, 2019, at the age of 81.

Tributes have begun popping up online, with many celebrating his distinctive sound. But the musician’s life story was also a constant struggle against health problems — and to pay medical bills. After his first cancer diagnosis in 1965, Dale continued to battle the disease. Up until the end of his life, Dale was explicit that he toured to fund his treatment.

“I can’t stop touring because I will die. Physically and literally, I will die,” he told the Pittsburgh City Paper in 2015. “Sure, I’d love to stay home and build ships in a bottle and spend time with my wife in Hawaii, but I have to perform to save my life.”

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Peter Tork 2/2019

Peter Tork, bass player for the Monkees

Peter Tork, bass player for the MonkeesPeter Tork (The Monkees) was born Peter Halsten Thorkelson on February 13, 1942 in Washington DC. His father John taught economics at the University of Connecticut. He began studying piano at the age of nine, showing an aptitude for music by learning to play several different instruments, including the banjo, French horn and both acoustic bass and guitars. Tork attended Windham High School in Willimantic, Connecticut, and was a member of the first graduating class at E. O. Smith High School in Storrs, Connecticut. He attended Carleton College in Minnesota but, after flunking out, moved to New York City, where he became part of the folk music scene in Greenwich Village and with his guitar and five-string banjo he began playing small folk clubs. He billed himself as Tork, a nickname handed down by his father, and reportedly played with members of the soon-to-be formed band Lovin’ Spoonful (Summer in the City). While there, he befriended other up-and-coming musicians such as Stephen Stills (Crosby, Stills Nash and Young).When Tork “failed to break open the folk circuit,” as he later phrased it, he moved to Long Beach, California in mid-1965. Later that summer, he fielded two calls from his friend Stephen Stills (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young), who had auditioned with more than 400 others for the Monkees. Stills urged Tork to try out. “They told Steve, ‘Your hair and teeth aren’t photogenic, but do you know anyone who looks like you that can sing?’ And Steve told them about me,” Tork told the Washington Post in 1983.

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Mike Harrison 3/2018

Mike Harrison (75) – frontman with Spooky Tooth – was born on 30 September 1942 in Carlisle, in the NW Cumberland area of England.

He began his musical career with the Ramrods, a band originating from Carlisle in the historic county of Cumberland, the northern part of the ceremonial county of Cumbria. This was to develop the foundations of a career that led to him being notable as the lead singer of Spooky Tooth, a band that he initially co-founded, with Mike Kellie, Luther Grosvenor and Greg Ridley and which Gary Wright then joined. Harrison, Grosvenor, Ridley and Kellie had previously been in a Carlisle-based band called The V.I.P.’s, which also included Keith Emerson (Emerson, Lake and Palmer).

When Emerson left in early 1967 to co-found The Nice, the remaining band members changed the band’s name to Art and released one album in late 1967 on Island Records, titled Supernatural Fairy Tales, a psychedelic classic.  

Art lasted only that one LP, but, encouraged by label owner Chris Blackwell the band would soon take on a new member, keyboardist Gary Wright, and changed their name again, this time to Spooky Tooth. They  released four albums between 1968 and 1970, before breaking up for the first time. The band’s sound was considered to be particularly unique in that it involved two keyboard players, Harrison and Wright, whose singing style often involved alternating vocals, similar to the Righteous Brothers or Hall and Oates.

Spooky Tooth first broke up in 1970 and Harrison commenced a solo career in 1971, which was anticipated with The Last Puff, the band’s 1970 breakup album, billed as “Spooky Tooth, featuring Mike Harrison”. Harrison released two solo albums in 1971 and 1972.

In 1971, while still a member of Spooky Tooth, Harrison would issue his first solo album, simply titled Mike Harrison. It showed a different style from his work with Spooky Tooth and stands as one of his finest works. A second record, Smokestack Lightning, arrived the next year and saw him working with the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. 

Harrison left  the second coming of Spooky Tooth following 1973’s Witness and a third solo effort, Rainbow Rider, was released in 1975. Spooky Tooth would issue one more album before calling it a day, though they would reunite, with Harrison involved, for one final album in 1999. 

Harrison had discovered that the royalties from his solo albums were being applied, without his knowledge or consent, to debts allegedly owed by Spooky Tooth to Island Records. 

Harrison decided to leave the music industry entirely, and remained largely inactive from 1975 until 1997. 

The reason for his extended departure from music was primarily financial. Beyond a weekly stipend from Island Records, during their active period band members received no further benefits, including royalties. Instead, debts were accumulated and considered to be owed to the record company. During his absence from the music scene, among other occupations, Harrison worked as a barman and drove meat and milk delivery trucks.

During the early 1990s Harrison developed a renewed interest in music, resulting in the recording of three songs with original members Mike Kellie, Luther Grosvenor and Greg Ridley in 1997. Recording continued in 1998, resulting in the release of Cross Purpose in 1999, the first Spooky Tooth album in twenty-five years, following the 1974 release of The Mirror, in which Harrison had not participated. He had left the band in 1973, following the release of Witness. Cross Purpose was also the first Spooky Tooth album to feature four of the five original members since Spooky Two, released in 1969.

In 1999, Harrison was also offered a regular monthly engagement with the Hamburg Blues Band. This led to the release of Touch in 2001. The album featured lyrics by Pete Brown, longtime collaborator with Jack Bruce, with music by the Hamburg Blues Band and vocals by Harrison.

A 2004 reunion and tour with original Spooky Tooth members Gary Wright and Mike Kellie, resulted in the release of the concert DVD Nomad Poets in 2007. And in 2006, Harrison’s fourth solo album, Late Starter, was released.

Harrison, Wright and Kellie continued to perform as Spooky Tooth during 2008, after which Kellie departed and Harrison and Wright continued as Spooky Tooth during 2009.

Harrison continued to perform on occasion after that time, until he died on 25 March 2018 in Carlisle at age 75 of undisclosed causes.

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Lonnie Mack 4/2016

Lonnie Mack (74) was born Lonnie McIntosh on July 18, 1941 in Dearborn County, Indiana, shortly after his family had moved from Appalachian (eastern Kentucky). One of five children, he was raised on a series of nearby sharecropping farms.

Using a floor-model radio powered by a truck battery, his family routinely listened to the Grand Ole Opry country music show. Continuing to listen after the rest of the family had retired for the night, Mack became a fan of rhythm and blues and traditional black gospel music.
He began playing guitar at the age of seven, after trading his bicycle for a Lone Ranger model acoustic guitar. His mother taught him basic chords, and he was soon playing bluegrass guitar in the family band. Mack recalled that when he was “seven or eight years old” an uncle from Texas introduced him to blues guitar and that when he was about ten years of age, an “old black man” named Wayne Clark introduced him to “Robert Johnson style guitar”.

He soon taught himself to merge finger-picking country guitar with acoustic blues-picking, to produce a hybrid style which, Mack said, “sounded like rockabilly, but before rockabilly”.
His musical influences remained diverse as he refined his playing and singing styles. In his pre-teen years, Mack was mentored by blind singer-guitarist Ralph Trotto, a country-gospel performer. Mack would skip school to play music with Trotto at the latter’s house. Mack cited country picker Merle Travis, blues guitarist T-Bone Walker, R&B guitarist Robert Ward, and pop/jazz guitarist Les Paul as significant guitar influences. Significant vocal influences included R&B singers Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, Bobby “Blue” Bland, and Hank Ballard, country singer George Jones, traditional black gospel singer Archie Brownlee, and soul music singer Wilson Pickett. Mack later recorded tunes associated with most of these artists.

In 1954, at age 13, Mack dropped out of school after a fight with a teacher. Large and mature-looking for his age, he obtained a counterfeit ID and began performing professionally in bars around Cincinnati with a band led by drummer Hoot Smith. As a 14-year-old professional electric guitarist in 1955, he “was earning $300 per week—more than most workers in the area’s casket and whiskey factories in a month.” At 15, he was performing on local TV with his band, the Twilighters. He played guitar on several low-circulation recordings in the late 1950s.
While still a child, Mack learned fleet-fingered bluegrass and country guitar styles while playing at home in his “family band”. By his late teens, Mack had expanded his six-string repertoire to include blues, rockabilly, and the percussive chordal riffing of early rock’s Chuck Berry.
In the early 1960s, using a bluegrass-style flatpicking technique, he innovated rock guitar solos with a then-perceived “peculiar running quality” at “a million notes per minute”.

In 1958, he bought the seventh Gibson Flying V guitar (#007) ever manufactured by Gibson in Michigan and played the roadhouse circuit around Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky.

In the early 1960s he became a session guitarist with Fraternity Records, a small Cincinnati label.
And then Mack emerged in 1963 with his breakthrough LP, The Wham of that Memphis Man. It earned him lasting renown as both a blue-eyed soul singer and a lead guitar innovator. In the album’s instrumental tracks, Mack added “edgy, aggressive, loud, and fast” melodies and runs to the standard chords-and-riffs pattern of early rock guitar. These tracks raised the bar for rock guitar proficiency, helped launch the electric guitar to the top of soloing instruments in rock, and became prototypes for the lead guitar styles of blues rock and, soon thereafter, Southern rock.
Unfortunately Mac’s popular recording career was shortcut by the British Invasion hitting the US shores and his career “withered on the vine”.

Although his recording career had stalled out, Mack stayed busy as a performer, criss-crossing the country with one-night stands.
The ’60s, man, we was full of piss and vinegar, nothing bothered us. We had bennies, like the truckers had [and] we just stayed on the road all the time.” During that time, “[we] performed with just about everybody, [from] Jimi Hendrix [to] The Everly Brothers, Chuck Berry, and Dick and Dee Dee.” He also took on session work with James Brown, Freddie King, Joe Simon, Albert Washington, and other R&B/soul artists.

In 1968, at the height of the blues-rock era, Elektra Records bought out Mack’s dormant Fraternity recording contract and moved him to Los Angeles to record three albums. In November 1968, the newly founded Rolling Stone magazine published a rave review of Mack’s discontinued 1963 debut album, persuading Elektra to re-issue it. He was soon performing in major rock venues, including the Fillmore East, the Fillmore West, and the Cow Palace. He opened for the Doors and Crosby, Stills & Nash and shared the stage with Johnny Winter, Elvin Bishop and other popular rock and blues artists of the time.

It was the hippie era, however, and Mack’s rustic, blue-collar persona made for a rough fit with commercial rock’s target demographic. John Morthland wrote: “All the superior chops in the world couldn’t hide the fact that chubby, country Mack probably had more in common with Kentucky truck drivers than he did with the new rock audience.” In addition, after two multi-genre Elektra albums (both recorded in 1969) that downplayed his blues-rock strengths, including his guitar, Mack himself was dissatisfied: “My music wasn’t working that good then. I ain’t really happy with a lot of the stuff I did there.”

Mack’s career-long pattern of switching and mixing within the entire range of white and black Southern roots music genres made him “as difficult to market as he was to describe.” He enjoyed periods of significant commercial success as a rock artist in the 1960s and 1980s, but was mostly absent from the rock spotlight for two long stretches of his career (1971–1984 and 1991–2004), during which he continued to perform, mostly in small venues, as a roots-rock “cult figure”. In the end, his “influence and standing among musicians far exceeded his (commercial) success.”

At that point in his career, Mack took a break from performing and recording. According to Robbie Krieger, lead guitarist of label-mate the Doors, Mack was seen during this period “selling Bibles out of the back of his car.” He also worked for Elektra’s A&R department, helping to recruit new talent. In 1971, with one album left to complete his contract with Elektra, Mack moved to Nashville. There, he recorded The Hills of Indiana, a multi-genre (but country-flavored) LP with a vocal emphasis. It included only one track showcasing his guitar virtuosity, “Asphalt Outlaw Hero”. The Hills of Indiana attracted little attention.

Mack had begun missing the fun of small-town performance venues early in his time with Elektra and soon soured on the fantasy of rock celebrity status.

“It had a lot to do with how much value you put on money as opposed to what makes you happy. I wasn’t happy. So one of the best-feeling moments I ever had was when that L.A. sign was in my rear-view mirror and I was free again.” On another occasion, Mack said: “Seems like every time I get close to really making it, to climbing to the top of the mountain, that’s when I pull out. I just pull up and run.”

For the next fourteen years he was a low-profile multi-genre recording artist, roadhouse performer, sideman, and music-venue proprietor. In 1977, Mack was shot during an altercation with an off-duty police officer. The experience inspired Mack’s tune, “Cincinnati Jail”, a rowdy, guitar-and-vocal rock number that he favored in live performances later in his career.

In 1983, Mack relocated to Austin, Texas, for a collaboration with his blues-rock disciple, super guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan. Vaughan persuaded Mack to return to the studio and move to Austin, Texas. With Vaughan in production and backup roles, Mack’s return was postponed by a lengthy illness that Mack attributed to “so much drinkin’ and carryin’ on”. In 1985, Mack staged a “full-fledged comeback” with the blues-rock album, Strike Like Lightning (co-produced by Vaughan and Mack), a tour featuring guest appearances by Vaughan, Ry Cooder, Keith Richards, and Ronnie Wood of The Rolling Stones, and a concert at Carnegie Hall with Albert Collins and Roy Buchanan.

In 1986, Mack joined Roy Buchanan and Dickey Betts for the Great American Guitar Assault Tour. He released three more albums over the next four years, including his last, in 1990, a blues-rock LP entitled Lonnie Mack Live! – Attack of the Killer V!. Then, worn from the constant touring required to sell records, he ended his recording career. However, he continued to play the roadhouse and festival circuits at his own pace through 2004.

Lonnie Mack died on April 21, 2016 at the age of 74.

Tributes:

While largely unknown to mainstream audiences, Mack’s influence on an entire generation of rock guitarists is vital. Guitarists who have identified Mack as a major or significant influence include Stevie Ray Vaughan (blues rock), Jeff Beck (blues rock, jazz-rock), Neil Young (hard rock; country-tinged folk rock), Ted Nugent (hard rock), Dickey Betts (Southern rock), Warren Haynes (Southern rock), Ray Benson (Western swing), Bootsy Collins (funk), Adrian Belew (impressionist rock), Wayne Perkins (multi-genre), and Tyler Morris (multi-genre). According to a variety of sources, Mack similarly influenced guitarists Joe Bonamassa (blues rock), Eric Clapton (blues rock), Duane Allman (Southern rock), Gary Rossington (Southern rock), Steve Gaines (Southern rock), Dan Toler (Southern rock), Mike Bloomfield (blues rock), Jerry Garcia (psychedelic rock), Jimi Hendrix (psychedelic blues rock), Keith Richards (blues rock), Jimmy Page (blues rock), and Danny Gatton (blues rock; jazz rock).

Mack said: “It’s a great honor to be able to inspire other artists. What you do in this business, your whole thing is givin’ stuff away. But that makes you feel good, makes you feel like you’ve really done something.”

It is widely agreed that: Lonnie took rock guitar playing to a whole different level. You had to really know how to play now. Before Lonnie, the sax guys did all of the lead work. Lonnie made the guitar the preeminent lead instrument.
Mack’s early-1960s guitar tracks are said to have set the stage for blues-rock guitar and Southern rock guitar, styles that first enjoyed broad popularity a few years later. Real music fans realize that Lonnie Mack was the Jimi Hendrix of his time; the missing guitar link between the twangy, multi-string riffing of rockabilly and the bluesy, string-pushing players of the mid-sixties.

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Glenn Schwartz 11/2018

Glenn Schwartz, torn between rock and religionNovember 3, 2018 – Glenn Schwartz (the James Gang) was born on March 20, 1940 in Cleveland Ohio. While in Los Angeles on tour with the James Gang in 1967, Schwartz strolled onto the infamous Sunset Strip and stopped next to a small group of people listening to street preacher Arthur Blessitt, according to Stevenson’s book. Some time later he professed conversion to Christianity, saying “I was finally blessed by mercy for I heard the Gospel of Christ.”

Following his conversion, his zealous, new-found faith was not accepted well by the band, his family or his friends. As per Stevenson, Schwartz said: “I had some Christian friends who had some round stickers that read ‘Real Peace Is In Jesus’ and we stuck those all over our clothes … We put some on Janis Joplin but she didn’t like it and took them off. I remember she got pretty upset. Continue reading Glenn Schwartz 11/2018

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Tony Joe White 10/2018

Tony Joe White – October 24, 2018 was born on July 23, 1943, in Oak Grove, Louisiana as the youngest of seven children who grew up on a cotton farm. He first began performing music at school dances, and after graduating from high school he performed in night clubs in Texas and Louisiana.

As a singer-songwriter and guitarist, he became best known for his 1969 hit “Polk Salad Annie” and for “Rainy Night in Georgia”, which he wrote but was first made popular by Brook Benton in 1970. He also wrote “Steamy Windows” and “Undercover Agent for the Blues”, both hits for Tina Turner in 1989; those two songs came by way of Turner’s producer at the time, Mark Knopfler, who was a friend of White. “Polk Salad Annie” was also recorded by Elvis Presley and Tom Jones.

In 1967, White signed with Monument Records, which operated from a recording studio in the Nashville suburb of Hendersonville, Tennessee, and produced a variety of sounds, including rock and roll, country and western, and rhythm and blues. Billy Swan was his producer.

Over the next three years, White released four singles with no commercial success in the U.S., although “Soul Francisco” was a hit in France. “Polk Salad Annie” had been released for nine months and written off as a failure by his record label, when it finally entered the U.S. charts in July 1969. It climbed to the Top Ten by early August, and eventually reached No. 8, becoming White’s biggest hit.

White’s first album, 1969’s Black and White, was recorded with Muscle Shoals/Nashville musicians David Briggs, Norbert Putnam, and Jerry Carrigan, and featured “Willie and Laura Mae Jones” and “Polk Salad Annie”, along with a cover of Jimmy Webb’s “Wichita Lineman”. “Willie and Laura Mae Jones” was covered by Dusty Springfield and released as a single, later added to reissues of her 1969 album Dusty in Memphis.

Three more singles quickly followed, all minor hits, and White toured with Steppenwolf, Anne Murray, Sly & the Family Stone, Creedence Clearwater Revival and other major rock acts of the 1970s, playing in France, Germany, Belgium, Sweden and England.

In 1973, White appeared in the film Catch My Soul, a rock-opera adaption of Shakespeare’s Othello. White played and sang four and composed seven songs for the musical.

In late September 1973, White was recruited by record producer Huey Meaux to sit in on the legendary Memphis sessions that became Jerry Lee Lewis’s landmark Southern Roots album. By all accounts, these sessions were a three-day, around-the-clock party, which not only reunited the original MGs (Steve Cropper, Donald “Duck” Dunn and Al Jackson, Jr. of Booker T. and the MGs fame) for the first time in three years, but also featured Carl Perkins, Mark Lindsay (of Paul Revere & the Raiders), and Wayne Jackson plus The Memphis Horns.

From 1976 to 1983, White released three more albums, each on a different label. Trying to combine his own swamp-rock sound with the popular disco music at the time, the results were not met with success and White gave up his career as a singer and concentrated on writing songs. During this time frame, he collaborated with American expat Joe Dassin on his only English-language album, Home Made Ice Cream, and its French-language counterpart Blue Country.

In 1989, White produced one non-single track on Tina Turner’s Foreign Affair album, the rest of the album was produced by Dan Hartman. Playing a variety of instruments on the album, he also wrote four songs, including the title song and the hit single “Steamy Windows”. As a result of this he became managed by Roger Davies, who was Turner’s manager at the time, and he obtained a new contract with Polydor.

The resulting album, 1991’s Closer to the Truth, was a commercial success and put White back in the spotlight. He released two more albums for Polydor; The Path of a Decent Groove and Lake Placid Blues which was co-produced by Roger Davies.

In the 1990s, White toured Germany and France with Joe Cocker and Eric Clapton, and in 1992 he played the Montreux Festival.

In 1996, Tina Turner released the song “On Silent Wings” written by White.

In 2000, Hip-O Records released One Hot July in the U.S., giving White his first new major-label domestic release in 17 years. The critically acclaimed The Beginningappeared on Swamp Records in 2001, followed by Heroines, featuring several duets with female vocalists including Jessi Colter, Shelby Lynne, Emmylou Harris, Lucinda Williams, and Michelle White, on Sanctuary in 2004, and a live Austin City Limits concert, Live from Austin, TX, on New West Records in 2006. In 2004, White was the featured guest artist in an episode of the Legends Rock TV Show and Concert Series, produced by Megabien Entertainment.

In 2007, White released another live recording, Take Home the Swamp, as well as the compilation Introduction to Tony Joe White. Elkie Brooks recorded one of White’s songs, “Out of The Rain”, on her 2005 Electric Lady album. On July 14, 2006, in Magny-Cours, France, White performed as a warm-up act for Roger Waters’ The Dark Side of the Moon concert. White’s album, entitled Uncovered, was released in September 2006 and featured collaborations with Mark Knopfler, Michael McDonald, Eric Clapton, and J.J. Cale.

The song “Elements and Things” from the 1969 album …Continued features prominently during the horse-racing scenes in the 2012 HBO television series “Luck”.

In 2013, White signed to Yep Roc Records and released Hoodoo. Mother Jones called the album “Steamy, Irresistible” and No Depression noted Tony Joe White is “the real king of the swamp.” He also made his Live…with Jools Holland debut in London, playing songs from Hoodoo.

On October 15, 2014, White appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman alongside the Foo Fighters to perform “Polk Salad Annie”. Pointing to White, Letterman told his TV audience, “Holy cow! … If I was this guy, you could all kiss my ass. And I mean that.”

In May 2016, Tony Joe White released Rain Crow on Yep Roc Records. The lead track “Hoochie Woman” was co-written with his wife, Leann. The track “Conjure Child” is a follow up to an earlier song, “Conjure Woman.

The album Bad Mouthin’ was released in September 2018 again on Yep Roc Records. The album contains six self-penned songs and five blues standards written by, amongst others, Charley Patton and John Lee Hooker. On the album White also performs a cover of the Elvis Presley song “Heartbreak Hotel”. White plays acoustic and electric guitar on the album which was produced by his son Jody White and has a signature Tony Joe White laid back sound.

White died of a heart attack on October 24, 2018, at the age of 75

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Marty Balin 9/2018

Marty Balin (76) – Jefferson Airplane – was born Martyn Buchwald in Cincinnati, Ohio, on January 30, 1942. He was the son of Catherine Eugenia “Jean” (née Talbot) and Joseph Buchwald. His paternal grandparents had emigrated from Eastern Europe. His father was Jewish and his mother was Episcopalian. Buchwald attended Washington High School in San Francisco, California. As a child, Balin was diagnosed with what is now called autism.

In 1962, Buchwald changed his name to Marty Balin and began recording with Challenge Records in Los Angeles, releasing the singles “Nobody but You” and “I Specialize in Love”. By 1964, Balin was leading a folk music quartet named The Town Criers and along with the late guitarist Paul Kantner, co-founded Jefferson Airplane in 1965, recruiting vocalist Signe Anderson, who when left was replaced by Grace Slick.

Balin was the primary founder of Jefferson Airplane, which he “launched” from a restaurant-turned-club he created and named The Matrix and was also one of its lead vocalists and songwriters from 1965 to 1971. Balin was one of four Jewish members of the band, including bass player Jack Casady, drummer Spencer Dryden and guitarist Jorma Kaukonen. In the group’s 1966–1971 iteration, Balin served as co-lead vocalist alongside Grace Slick. Balin’s songwriting output diminished after Surrealistic Pillow (1967) as Slick, Paul Kantner, and Kaukonen matured as songwriters, a process compounded by personality clashes. 

Balin’s most enduring songwriting contributions were often imbued with a romantic, pop-oriented lilt that was atypical of the band’s characteristic forays into psychedelic rock. Among Balin’s most notable songs were “Comin’ Back to Me” (a folk rock ballad later covered by Ritchie Havens and Rickie Lee Jones), “Today” (a collaboration with Kantner initially written on spec for Tony Bennett that was prominently covered by Tom Scott), and, again with Kantner, the topical 1969 top-100 hit “Volunteers”. Although uncharacteristic of his oeuvre, the uptempo “3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds” and “Plastic Fantastic Lover” (both written for Surrealistic Pillow) remained integral components of the Airplane’s live set throughout the late 1960s.

Balin played with Jefferson Airplane at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and at the Woodstock Festival in 1969. In December 1969, Balin was knocked unconscious by members of the Hells Angels motorcycle club while performing during the infamous Altamont Free Concert, as seen in the 1970 documentary film Gimme Shelter. 

In April 1971, he formally departed Jefferson Airplane after breaking off all communication with his bandmates following the completion of their autumn 1970 American tour. He elaborated upon this decision in a 1993 interview with Jeff Tamarkin of Relix.

I don’t know, just Janis’s death. That struck me. It was dark times. Everybody was doing so much drugs and I couldn’t even talk to the band. I was into yoga at the time. I’d given up drinking and I was into totally different area, health foods and getting back to the streets, working with the American Indians. It was getting strange for me. Cocaine was a big deal in those days and I wasn’t a cokie and I couldn’t talk with everybody who had an answer for every goddamn thing, rationalizing everything that happened. I thought it made the music really tight and constrictive and ruined it. So after Janis died, I thought, I’m not gonna go onstage and play that kind of music; I don’t like cocaine.

Balin remained active in the San Francisco Bay Area rock scene, managing and producing an album for the Berkeley-based sextet Grootna before briefly joining funk-inflected hard rock ensemble Bodacious DF as lead vocalist on their eponymous 1973 debut album. The following year, Kantner asked Balin to write a song for his new Airplane offshoot group, Jefferson Starship. Together, they wrote the early power ballad “Caroline”, which appeared on the album Dragon Fly with Balin as guest lead vocalist.

Rejoining the band he had helped to establish, Balin became a permanent member of Jefferson Starship in 1975; over the next three years, he contributed to and sang lead on four top-20 hits, including “Miracles” (No. 3, a Balin original), “With Your Love” (No. 12, a collaboration between Balin, former Jefferson Airplane drummer Joey Covington, and former Grootna/Bodacious DF lead guitarist Vic Smith), Jesse Barish’s “Count on Me” (No. 8), and N. Q. Dewey’s “Runaway” (No. 12). Ultimately, Balin’s relationship with the band was beleaguered by interpersonal problems and his own reluctance toward live performances. He abruptly left the group in October 1978 shortly after Slick’s departure from the band.

In 1979, Balin produced a rock opera titled Rock Justice, about a rock star who was put in jail for failing to produce a hit for his record company, based on his experiences with the lawsuits fought for years with former Jefferson Airplane manager Matthew Katz. The cast recording was produced by Balin, but it did not feature him in performance.

In 1981, he released his first solo album, Balin, and in 1983 a second solo album, Lucky, along with a Japanese-only EP produced by EMI called There’s No Shoulder.

In 1985, he teamed with former Jefferson Airplane members Paul Kantner and Jack Casady to form the KBC Band. After the breakup of the KBC band, a 1989 reunion album and tour with Jefferson Airplane followed.

In 1989, he participated in a short-lived Jefferson Airplane reunion tour and returned four years later to Jefferson Starship, finally leaving for good in 2008.

Jefferson Airplane was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 and was presented with the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016.

While on tour in March 2016, Balin was taken to Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in New York City after complaining of chest pains. After undergoing open-heart surgery, he was transferred to an intensive-care unit to spend time recovering. In a subsequent lawsuit, Balin alleged that neglect and inadequate care facilities on the hospital’s part had resulted in a paralyzed vocal cord, loss of his left thumb and half of his tongue, bedsores, and kidney damage.

Balin died at his home in Tampa, Florida on September 27, 2018, at the age of 76.