Here’s more from the city that does death like no other.
Funeral for Juanita Brooks, New Orleans, 2009
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
Here’s a taste of the Syl Johnson show I recently saw.
Syl Johnson, “Same Kind of Thing,” live, Chicago, 11/27/10
Vodpod videos no longer available.Is any drummer more exciting?
Keith Moon, August 23, 1946-September 7, 1978
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
The Who, “Young Man Blues,” live, Isle of Wight, 1970
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
The man is a drummer.
*****
[N]othing had prepared me for the ferocious energy of The Who. . . . Pete Townshend’s hard, tense suspended chords seemed to scour the air around them; Roger Daltrey’s singing was a young man’s fighting swagger, an incitement to some kind of crime; John Entwistle’s incessantly mobile bass playing was like someone running away from the scene of the crime; and Keith Moon’s drumming, in its inspired vandalism, was the crime itself.
—James Wood, “The Fun Stuff,” The New Yorker, 11/29/10
*****
this just in
Scientists said Wednesday that the number of stars in the universe had been seriously undercounted, and they estimated that there could be three times as many stars out there as had been thought.
Memphis.
1953.
A little studio—Memphis Recording Service—over on Union Avenue.
Little Junior Parker, “Feel So Bad” (1953), “Sittin’ at the Bar” (1954), Sun Records, Memphis
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lagniappe
I’d like to dedicate this song to Little Junior Parker, a cousin of mine who’s gone on, but we’d like to kind of carry on in his name . . . .
Al Green, “Take Me To The River,” Hi Records, Memphis, 1974
Al wrote this, with guitarist Mabon “Teenie” Hodges, and recorded it first; Hi labelmate Syl Johnson had the hit.
Subtlety and delicacy aren’t usually associated with hard rock. But those are the qualities that (to these ears) stand out when you unpack this recording and hear the tracks separately. Listen to the guitar, the bass. Sledgehammers? More like sushi knives.
Rolling Stones, “Gimme Shelter,” 1969
voice (Mick Jagger & Merry Clayton)
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guitar/1 (Keith Richards)
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guitar/2 and piano (Keith Richards & Nicky Hopkins)
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bass (Bill Wyman)
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drums (Charlie Watts)
*****
all of it
(Yo, Don: Thanks for the tip!)
. . . the best and most original guitar player of his generation.
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Someday Quine will be recognized for the pivotal figure that he is on his instrument—he is the first guitarist to take the breakthroughs of early Lou Reed and James Williamson and work through them to a new, individual vocabulary, driven into odd places by obsessive attention to On the Corner-era Miles Davis.
Lou Reed with Robert Quine (guitar), “Coney Island Baby,” “White Light/White Heat,” live, 1984
This guy and the guy we heard Monday (Syl Johnson) are brothers.
Speaking of Syl, he’s getting a lot of attention right now: the cover story in this week’s Chicago Reader; a big new boxed set on the Numero label; and a concert tonight, in Chicago, with a top-flight band and guest Otis Clay (yeah, I’ll be there).
*****
replay: a clip too good for just one day
This take?
Or that?
Move the voice forward?
Back?
Make the guitar brighter?
Darker?
Enough bass?
Too much?
Enough room sound?
Mixing a record, as I learned when I worked at Alligator Records (back in the 1970s), involves a seemingly countless number of decisions. After a few hours, everyone starts to get a little punch-drunk. By the end of the night, for instance, this track had morphed—in the warped warble of engineer Freddie Breitberg (AKA, in his personal mythology, Eddie B. Flick)—into “Serve Me Rice For Supper.”
Jimmy Johnson, “Serves Me Right To Suffer” (Living Chicago Blues, Vol. 1, Alligator Records, 1977 [Grammy Nominee])
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lagniappe
reading table
The ’net’s filled with enough dreck for a thousand lifetimes; but then, as happened the other day (after hearing about it on the radio), you come across something that’s simply stunning—like the new, complete collection of the letters of Vincent van Gogh.
. . . Van Gogh’s letters are the best written by any artist . . . Their mixture of humble detail and heroic aspiration is quite simply life-affirming.—Andrew Motion, The Guardian (11/21/09)
(Originally posted a year ago [11/27/09].)
Deep, wide, strong: the groove, with this guy at the drums, is like a river.
The Levon Helm Band with guest Jim Keltner (drums), “Deep Ellum Blues,” live, Los Angeles (Greek Theater), 8/15/10
How many pop stars have given thanks so memorably?
Sly & The Family Stone
“Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin),” live (TV broadcast), 1973
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“Thankful N’ Thoughtful,” 1973
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
Michael Jackson and
George Clinton and
Miles Davis
Big influence on all three?
Short list.
James Brown
Sly Stone
Walk into a blues bar on Chicago’s south or west side in the mid-1970s:
this would jump out of the jukebox.
Syl Johnson, “Take Me To The River,” live, 1975, Memphis
If you have any doubts about the transformative powers of music, watch this. I’ve spent more hours than I could count in prisons, state and federal, in Illinois and Ohio and Wisconsin, meeting with clients. Never have I seen folks so relaxed.
Johnny Cash, live, San Quentin, 1969
“I Walk the Line”
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“Folsom Prison Blues”
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
“Orange Blossom Special”
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“Jackson” (with June Carter Cash)
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lagniappe
reading table
There is nothing in our material world more beautiful than the book.
—Patti Smith (after winning this year’s National Book Award for nonfiction for her memoir Just Kids)
