UPDATE | ELTON says Goodbye Yellow Brick Road via GLASTONBURY 2023 | Big O

ELTON JOHN BIDS FAREWELL

Sir Elton John performs on stage during Day 5 of Glastonbury Festival 2023 Glastonbury, England. (Photo by Kate Green/Getty Images)

Mark Savage Music correspondent for the BBC said

"In the audience next to me, a fan hollered their encouragement: "Go on, you old sausage.””

THE BITCH IS BACK!

 Surprised to really REALLY enjoy Elton John's closing show last night (9-11.00pm) on BBC at Glastonbury. Saying Good Night to the old queen was a fitting way to celebrate his final show in the UK (we’ll see eh Elton? Chequebooks are already being cracked back open!) but the music! THE MUSIC! 

Not quite 'all killer and no filler' but adding youngsters nobody ‘our’ generation had heard of was no small thing despite allowing one such to sing his own song (Stephen Sanchez) amongst the great back catalogue was merely a well chosen mistake I guess! More pop pap to these ears and the choir with Jacob Lusk I could have done without but Brandon Flowers more than made up for the lack of the much vaunted mega ‘guests’ Four were mooted, Sir Paul the Macca hisself (who notably spent the entire time in the wings enjoying the Old Queen, Britney flew in allegedly - no sign, Dua Lipa was covered in Cold Heart (really well actually) but an apology for not being with us made me feel she had died!, a duet for Don’t Go Breaking with current hit machine Sawyama was well er, okay I guess and if Piers Morgan couldn't forgive him casting a sideways glance at the lyric sheet well tough, you do all your punditry from idiot boards and cards anyway! and as for hints of anyone else more famous? . . . . Meh!?

What did affect me where the songs! To open with 'Pinball Wizard' a stroke of genius ( a song he hasn’t played live in decades I think) and then whilst never a staunch fan it had taken my wife to turn me onto Elton in the first place so early songs seem to hit the hardest somehow. ‘Daniel' for obvious reasons reminds me of the loss of my dear brother and always raises a tear. 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road'. 'Sad Songs', Call it The Blues, Candle for MM always a favourite. The 'Your Song's, the 'Saturday Night', the 'Tiny Dancer's, the ‘Rocketman' to close. Genius!

The voice stood up remarkably well (he is 77 and Piers Morgan can go check in with his narcissistic warbling critical tosh time to find out who you really are Piers because you are coming across like an old fogey) but fans know what is happening here. Ask Sir Paul! He seems to walk about the stage really badly but in  his late seventies is anyone really surprised he is past piano jumping and humping time? There were shaky vocal moments of course there were and occasionally the phrasing leaves him and yet not a stumble or a falter in tone or volume and I definitely have heard him sing worse! This man is a consummate professional and the closing cadenza with the Davey on lead guitar was little short of ecstatic! Beautiful finale by a band that has been with him since the beginning of time itself. The drummer (one of three!) Nigel Ollson looking like even my Uncle (!) the ubiquitous master of percusion the much adored Ray Cooper and Davy Johnstone on lead guitar. All consumate professionals and closing with a bang AND a whimper is fine by me! He didn’t seem to want to go home!

Sir Elton John performs on stage during Day 5 of Glastonbury Festival 2023 in Glastonbury, England. (Photo by Harry Durrant/Getty Images)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001n9qh

Elton Glastonbury play list

Pinball Wizard

The Bitch Is Back

Bennie & The Jets

Daniel

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues

Philadelphia Freedom

Are You Ready For Love? (With Jacob Lusk and the London Community Gospel Choir)? Is that a gay thing?! 

Sad Songs Say So Much

Someone Saved My Life Tonight

Until I Found You (with Stephen Sanchez)? All killer no filler!? Dreadful ordinary pop!

Your Song - back to the classics

Candle In The Wind

Tiny Dancer (with Brandon Flowers)

Don't Got Breaking My Heart (with Rina Sawyama)?

Crocodile Rock

Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting

I'm Still Standing

Cold Heart (Rocket Man Dua Lipa mix version, announced she couldn’t be there?!)

Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me (for George  - whose 60th birthday it would have been

Rocket Man - great closer with Davey Johnstone on guitar

Don’t Go Breaking My Concentration!

Sir Elton John and Rina Sawayama perform on stage during Day 5 of Glastonbury Festival 2023  (Photo by Harry Durrant/Getty Images)

All good here! 

Big O has it HERE . . . . . .

Song/Video of the Day :: UNBELIEVABLE Bob Dylan

 

or this . . . . .

NAT MYERS :: YELLOW PERIL (NEW ALBUM - OUT NOW!)

 The new album from Nat Myers is finally here y’all! Go get cha copy! 

 Now I LOVE this young man’s style and singin’ slinging n a-playin' geetar! So here’s his new album, head on over to Bandcamp and getcha'll sum!

“I’m always searching,” says the Korean-American blues poet Nat Myers. “Itinerancy is something that I’ve owned. I’ve done a lot of traveling, but lately it’s started to seep into my songwriting and my music. Life just feels simpler on the road. You’re just trying to get to the next place in one piece.” His debut album, Yellow Peril, is full of jumpy blues songs about hopping trains, burning up highways, running from some danger but also running toward something harder to define and even harder to catch. Full of intelligence and soul, contradiction and nuance, these songs reflect his restlessness and wanderlust in their fleet riffs, complex rhythms, and quick tempos, as he draws from a variety of stylistic strains and historical threads to weave a complex epic about life in post-pandemic America. 

Myers’ story starts in Kansas, but quickly moves to West Tennessee and then Northern Kentucky. Even as a child, he was a restless spirit: “I had a rowdy little childhood. My parents signed me up against my will to play in the school band, but I hated it. I pulled a Who on my trumpet and just destroyed it.” Instead, he spent his days skateboarding and listening to pop-punk and hardcore. “My mom got me a left-handed starter guitar, just trying to keep me away from the riffraff I was hanging out with. I kept hanging out with them...  more

credits

released June 23, 2023 

Nat Myers is a folk and blues poet musician from Kenton county, Kentucky.

Nat Myers - Pray For Rain

This is as close as lil Gnat gets to a hit single in these here parts . . . . . .sending this out to all couples everywhere

My good wife, my son and daughter and their partnos

buy it here . . . . . .

yesirree Bob!

STEVE EARLE - HARDLY STRICTLY BLUEGRASS FESTIVAL BANJO STAGE, Golden Gate Park - SAN FRANCISCO 2018 - Big O

Steve Earle - Hardly Stricktly BlueGrass SF 2018

STEVE EARLE & THE DUKES

San Francisco 2018 

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. Banjo Stage, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA; October 6, 2018. Very good audio (ripped from HDTV webcast).

Track 01. Warren Hellman’s Banjo 2:38
Track 02. Feel Alright 3:47
Track 03. Jerusalem 5:47
Track 04. Guitar Town 3:27
Track 05. I’m Still in Love With You 4:41
Track 06. Goodbye 5:38
Track 07. The Galway Girl 4:10
Track 08. Train A-Comin’ 2:35
Track 09. I Know You Rider (trad) 4:52
Track 10. Dixieland 3:54
Track 11. Ben McCulloch 4:57
Track 12. Copperhead Road 4:55
Track 13. So You Wannabe an Outlaw 3:16
Track 14. Lookin’ for a Woman 3:24
Track 15. The Firebreak Line 3:46
Track 16. Taneytown 4:56
Track 17. The Revolution Starts Now 6:01
Track 18. San Franciscan Nights (Eric Burdon & the Animals cover) 5:10

This from Big O and very fine it is too!

Victor Wooten bass solo with Cory Wong Chicago 2023

 

Now I am not normally someone who enjoys virtuosity for virtuosity’s sake (I left jazz behind for that very reason and mostly it just begins to sound the same . . . endless virtuosity doesn’t move me much unless of course you are someone like Oscar Peterson, Keith Jarrett etc etc you know a unique voice is always what I’m looking for!) But occasionally someone catches my eardrobes and blows my little cotton socks off!

Victor is one of those here . . . . . . Cory Wong I am ashamed to say I didn’t know but of course what I don’t know would fill a mountain hall!

Boogie on Victor (and Cory too!)

THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE: SONG OF THE DAY BOWIE AND JAGGER AND THAT VIDEO :: Dancin’ In The Street!

 Let's start the day with this . . . . . . . .the boys having SUCH FUN! 

Bought this when it came out!

From David Bowie FACEBOOK page . . . . . . . 

who say:

BOWIE AND JAGGER AND THAT VIDEO

“Calling out around the world...”

Great to read your 35 year old memories in the BOWIE KOOKS Facebook group today, regarding the Live Aid benefit concert held on Saturday 13th July 1985.

Aside from all of the live music performed on the day, you will surely remember Bowie and Jagger’s remarkable video for Dancing In The Street, possibly the campest duet ever committed to tape. 

The friends recorded it at Spillers Millennium Mills in London with director David Mallet. Dancing In The Street was shown a couple of times at the Live Aid event and it was also used to promote the single released the following month.

Here it is for those of you that have never seen it or those who need to be reminded of just how rock stars are meant to behave.

PLAY IT LOUD & DANCE AROUND THE ROOM IN YOUR PANTS!

Sound of the Day :: K.T. Tunstall ‘Suddenly I See’ :: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

 Its her BIRTHDAY!

HAPPY 48th K.T.!

Luther Allison - More From Berlin {1991} | from the Floppy Boot Stomp archive

 

The criminally under exposed and under appreciated Luther Allison live in Berlin from Silent Way over at HQ this past couple days and a very fine set it is too! If you didn’t partake first time around then do check it out now! Why this man doesn’t have a greater following is totally beyond me but here ’tis! Have at it!

Enjoy!

Luther Allison Berlin 1991 - Floppy Boot Stomp

Luther Allison - More From Berlin (1991)

Berlin Jazzfest

Berlin, Germany

Soundboard @320

{Out of Print}

The Band:
Guitar, Harmonica, Vocals – Luther Allison
Guitar, Vocals – Bernard Allison
Bass – Peter Giron
Drums – Vincent Daune
Guitar – Frank Rabaste
Keyboards – Michel Carras
Saxophone – Sulaiman Hakim

 

Track List:
01 - Reaching Out 06:23
02 - L. A.'s Knocking On Your Door 05:30
03 - It Hurts Me Too 06:38
04 - You're My Woman 04:46
05 - Chicago 04:58
06 - Love Is Free 05:51
07 - Someday Pretty Baby 05:42
08 - Show Me A Reason 11:55
09 - Cold As Ice 06:55
10 - A Change Must Come 06:37
11 - Sweet Home Chicago 10:22

Now Silent Way posted this clip of Luther being ‘Serious’ at the legendary Rockpalast in Germany back in 1985 and if this doesn’t whet your appetite than there is something wrong with your eardrobes! (I usually try to post something else video wise to encourage folks to head over but frankly this is so staggeringly beautiful if this don’t cut it nothing will!) Simply beautiful!

More guitar . . . . . . Jeff Beck

 

beautiful reflective portrait here from Michael Putland

We are surely going to miss this man!

After his video clip on his guitar collection

comes this:

Jeff Beck:  

“The Les Paul was more challenging because of the weight of it, but the tone was there that the Fender will never have and vice versa. So you have to make a decision as to what you’re going to have as your main instrument. After seeing Hendrix, I thought, ‘I’ll stick with the ‘Strat.’”

“I don’t understand why some people will only accept a guitar if it has an instantly recognizable guitar sound. Finding ways to use the same guitar people have been using for 50 years to make sounds that no one has heard before is truly what gets me off.”

Now I am no Jeff Beck but enjoy the guitar and have a little collection that I love and it includes some electrics but the Les Paul I always found way too heavy and the tonal thing is an argument I would love to have chatted to Jeff about. Given bottomless funds my favourite would be a Fender Stratocaster pre - 1965. 

T’other day I was staggered to see on the Bargain Hunt antiques show a little Fender Jaguar (1962!) go for just over a grand (£1,010) they had estimated at £300- £400! and the lady who owned it got upset and emotional as it had belonged to a family member anyone doing their homework will know someone got a bargain. On a cursory search an ordinary Jaguar was about seven times that and the key cut off date of 1965 meant that earlier ones were going upwards of about £15,000!

Track of The Day :: THE CHURCH | Electric Lash | Guess I’m Dumb

• Track Name

  Electric Lash

• Album

  Seance

• Artist

  The Church

The Church - Electric Lash (1983)

A melancholy classic from the Church

"A bite then a caress . . . . . . . “

this from the ever interesting Guess I’m Dumb