A couple of beauties today from The Midnight Cafe from one of my favourites, Lyle Lovett from 2011 and 2009 . . . . . . Lyle Lovett - Canadaigua, NY 2011
Good to not bad audience recording mic on a stand in central position seventh row back but by choice I would take the earlier recording which sounds like a matrix or soundboard to me but was broadcast on BBC Radio so is a FM recording and is uniformly excellent and includes a couple of live tracks from a set in Woburn Abbey, England June 20th 1992 Lyle Lovett - Hammersmith Odeon 1992
Because . . . . . . . . for Molly . . . . . . Rob & Amy
ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK!!
Well I know I am old but not quite this old and no I didn't buy this track when it came out thank you!! . . . HOWEVER it is a seminal track for me in my introduction to music and I took this and a couple of others for granted somehow. It could have been that my brother Steve was somehow responsible but my parent's being almost exclusively classical in their tastes, it remains a mystery now that my earliest memory of Rock and Roll and Skiffle come from the family owning a 78' record player, wind up and with a horn and a very particular smell somehow. I recall the felt disc platter and the needles but the first 78 that I still have somewhere, that I heard and haunted me forever with it's slap bass and guitar based and special drum beat was this track by 'Bill Haley and his Comets' and along with some Paul Robeson discs, a copy of Lonnie Donnigan's 'Puttin on The Style' both were rarely off the wind up gramophone in my earliest years. Can you dig it? I think you can!
On this day in music history: July 9, 1955 - “(We’re Gonna) Rock Around The Clock” by Bill Haley And His Comets hits #1 on the Billboard Best Sellers chart for 8 weeks. Recorded on April 12, 1954 at the Pythian Temple in New York City, the song goes largely unnoticed when it is initially released in May of 1954 as the B-side of the single “Thirteen Women (And Only One Man In Town)”. It is only after it is used for the opening title sequence to the film “The Blackboard Jungle” (starring Glenn Ford), nearly a year later that record finally takes off. Entering the Best Sellers chart at #22 on May 21, 1955, it climbs to the top of the chart seven weeks later. The song creates a sensation around the world, causing teenagers to riot and dance in the aisles of movie theaters. It is regarded as a landmark in music history as the first number one single of the Rock Era. The record also earns a place in the Guinness World Book Of Records for the largest selling rock and roll record of all time, with sales to be estimated at over 25 million copies sold worldwide. “(We’re Gonna) Rock Around The Clock” is certified Gold in the US by the RIAA, and is inducted into the Grammy Hall Of Fame in 1982.
I bought Safe As Milk when it came out over here on the budget Marble Arch label from Pye International(albeit bearing Pye International labels on the disc itself) in 1967 (sic?*) as a 10-track, omitting "I'm Glad" and "Grown So Ugly". I cannot stress how important this album was to me and I have owned several versions and played them till they fell apart. Ry Cooder featured on guitar and the earliest Beefheart I knew apart from finding him on some 'Gutbucket' compilation of earthy blues and then, Hobo Chang Ba, Trout Mask Replica came out and nothing ws ever quite the same again. The story about how Ry Cooder left the band at Tamalpais free open air concert is worth a read if only to try to imagine what might have been . . . . . . . sure nuff and yes, I do!
*there is conflict over when this came out over here in the UK and is published variously as 67, 69, and a reissue in 70 (go figure?) but hey if you can remember the Sixties you weren't really there right?
again from sounds bought when they came out this soundtrack although we couldn't or didn't get to see the film for a while the soundtrack went around school like a dose of salts! The Melodians and Jimmy Cliff and Desmond Dekker and Toots stayed with me throughout my life . . . . . .reggae don't get any better . . . . .
On this day in music history: July 7, 1972 - “The Harder They Come - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack” is released. Produced by Jimmy Cliff, Derrick Harriot, Leslie Kong, Byron Lee, Guilly Bright and Bunny Lee, it is recorded in Various Studios from 1967 - 1972. The album serves as the soundtrack to the cult classic film starring reggae singer Jimmy Cliff. The film co-written and directed by Perry Henzell is about a Jamaican man turned reggae singer who turns to a life of crime after being taken advantage of by an unscrupulous record label owner. The soundtrack features original songs by Cliff as well as previously released singles by prominent reggae artists such as Desmond Dekker, Toots & The Maytals, DJ Scotty, and The Melodians. The film becomes an underground classic and the album (originally issued on Island Records’ Mango imprint in the US) helps to popularize and broaden the audience for reggae music in the US and around the world. In 2003, Universal Music Group releases a double CD Deluxe Edition of the album with one disc containing a remastered version of the original soundtrack, with the second disc consisting of numerous classic reggae singles recorded during the same era. “The Harder They Come” peaks at number one hundred forty on the Billboard Top 200.
On this day in music history: July 6, 1964 - The Beatles first film, “A Hard Day’s Night” has its world premiere at the Pavilion Theatre in London. With thousands of fans jamming Picadilly Circus in London, the premiere is attended by the band, and members of the royal family including Princesss Maragret and her husband Lord Snowden. Filmed for a modest budget of $500,000, the ninety minute long black & white film (originally released through United Artists), also starring Wilfrid Brambell, Victor Spinetti, Norman Rossington, John Junkin, and Anna Quayle is a fictionalized “day in the life” account of The Beatles’ lives. Written by screenwriter Alun Owen, produced by Walter Shenson, and directed by Richard Lester, the film breaks new ground visually for its innovative camera techniques, jump cut editing style and use of music throughout. Upon its release, it is rapturously received by The Beatles fans and critics alike, breaking box office records at the time. In June of 2014, the film receives its first release in high definition when it is released on Blu-Ray disc by The Criterion Collection, with it being fully restored from the original camera negative and fine grain interpositives. “A Hard Day’s Night” goes on to become one of the most influential rock films of all time.
Meanwhile seven years earlier . . . . .
On this day in music history: July 6, 1957 - John Lennon meets Paul McCartney for the first time at the Woolton Village Fete in Liverpool. They are introduced to each other by mutual friend Ivan Vaughn. The then sixteen year old Lennon is there with his skiffle band The Quarrymen, who are performing on a flatbed truck in the church garden. McCartney (fifteen years old at the time) attends the fete at the invitation of Vaughn. Following the bands performance, Lennon and McCartney meet. During this meeting, McCartney sings and plays the Eddie Cochran song “Twenty Flight Rock” (along with several other songs). He also shows Lennon how to properly tune a guitar. Impressed with McCartney’s musical skill, Lennon asks him to join The Quarrymen a short time later and he accepts. The first meeting between two teenagers marks the beginning of one of the greatest songwriting partnerships, and the genesis of one of the greatest rock & roll bands in history.
Happy Birthday Ringo! born in Liverpool (1940). He is known as the "easy-going Beatle." His genial quality proved to be a steady background to the moodiness of Paul McCartney, John Lennon, and George Harrison, his bandmates in the most famous band in the world, the Beatles.
Ringo Starr was born Richard Starkey. His father left the family early on, and his mother worked as a barmaid to support herself and her son, who was often seriously ill. As a child, he'd been hospitalized for appendicitis and peritonitis, even falling into a coma that lasted for days. He lost so much school time that he couldn't read until he was eight years old. At one point, he was in a sanitorium for two years. The staff tried to keep the patients happy by giving them instruments to form a hospital band, and Richard Starkey was given a kind of mallet made from a cotton bobbin and he used it to bang on the medicine cabinets-he was hooked.
When he was 15, he got a job as an apprentice in a Liverpool equipment factory and working for the British Rail. He also discovered the skiffle craze that swept Britain in the late 1950s. Kids made their own musical instruments and played songs that were a blend of blues and ska. He played in a band called Rory Storm and the Hurricanes and changed his name to Ringo, because of all the rings he wore, and Starr, because he felt it reflected his love for country and western music.
Ringo Starr was 19 and seriously considering moving to Houston, Texas, to be nearer to his musical idol, the blues musician Lightnin' Hopkins, when he was asked to join a popular local band called 'The Beatles'. He replaced a drummer named Pete Best, and the band's female fans were so distraught they followed the band from town to town, crying, "Pete forever! Ringo never!" They even gave George Harrison a black eye during a scuffle after a concert.
When the Beatles came to the United States on February 7, 1964, they set off a craze that lasted for the entire 60s. Ringo says, "I lived in a nightclub for three years. It used to be a nonstop party." In 1970, Paul McCartney quit the band. Ringo Starr went on to a fine solo career, earning seven Top 10 hits from 1971 to 1975 including 'Photograph'
Oh and incidentally I consider him one of the best drummers in the world who broke new ground as did all his band mates musically but the digs at Ringo's drumming are largely apocryphal and unwarranted. Listen to the last two Beatles albums if you don't believe me. He is one of the most recognisable signature drummers in music history and as such is a truly brilliant musician.
worth posting twice . . . . . . .
Thursday, July 06, 2017
Water Shrew at St Mary's Fields meadow
On a Sunday I have been going for an early morning walk again with my oldest friend, Leon, and we have been slowly stretching the distance I can manage to around four miles or so by walking down to the River Cherwell (a tributary of the Thames) and enjoying the weekly changes in the meadowland beyond the St Mary's church there which has been turned or transformed rather into a natural reserve featuring much flora and fauna of local interest. Struggling to identify many wild flowers and yet enjoying the sightings of birds from Buzzards to Red Kites and chaffinches and wrens and butterflies abounding from Gatekeepers to Meadow Brown and this Sunday many Marble Whites. Last Sunday however we spotted a rare treat and saw a shrew in the reed bed of the little dried up brook running across the field and stood long enough for him to pop back out so I could take an admittedly rather poor photo or two. It was enough to check him or her later and assuming we would have seen a common creature, I was delighted to discover he appeared to be a Water Shrew which is the rarest of the three possibilities (The common, the pygmy and the water). Beautiful little thing . . . . . he's there if you look close enough!
On this day in music history: July 5, 1969 - The Rolling Stones perform a free concert in Hyde Park in London before a crowd of over 250,000 fans, paying tribute to former band mate Brian Jones who died just two days earlier. The band’s hour long set is filmed by Granada Television and shown on UK TV. The band also use the occasion to publicly introduce Jones’ replacement, guitarist Mick Taylor. The band also perform their new single “Honky Tonk Women” for the first time publicly at this show. The Stones also debut the songs “Midnight Rambler” and “Love In Vain” from the then unreleased “Let It Bleed” album as well as “Give Me A Drink” which surfaces on “Exile On Main Street” three years later.
On this day in music history: July 4, 1966 - The Beatles play two shows a Rizal Stadium in Manila, The Philippines to over 80,000 fans. The band unintentionally snub President Ferdinand and First Lady Imelda Marcos when they do not attend an official reception at the palace. Manager Brian Epstein has declined the invitation on the bands behalf. The snub causes a public furor, touching off riots. The Beatles themselves watch in horror as the incident unfolds on live television. The band decide to leave the country as quickly as possible. They are greeted by angry mobs at the airport, and barely escape the country with their lives. with thanks to Jeff Harris' wonderful blog 'Behind The Grooves On this day in Music History
