Tuesday, 5/15/12
what’s new
Black Dice, “Pigs”
Recording (Mr. Impossible, 4/12) & Video
I fell in love tonight. She left immediately when I played her this.
—YouTube comment
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Live (music starts at 1:40), New York, 2012
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
Category: guitar
2012
2012
Monday, 5/14/12
only rock ’n’ roll
This’ll wake you up.
The Men, “Open Your Heart,” live, SXSW (Austin, Tx.), 3/6/12
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More?
Here’s the whole show.
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
The pop music being made in the 1960s sounded nothing like that of the 1920s. But, today, the formula employed by The Men (and many other bands)—electric guitar + bass + drums + volume + energy—is the same one the MC5 was using when I first heard them in August of 1968, in Chicago’s Lincoln Park, during the Democratic Convention. What, if anything, does it mean that pop music—some of it, anyway—has changed so little in the last 40 years?
2012
Tuesday, 5/8/12
passings
Michael Burks, singer, guitar player, songwriter
July 30, 1957-May 6, 2012
Here’s what I wrote when I first posted this clip (2/28/11):
When something is this lyrical, this convincing, there’s only one thing I want to do when it ends—hear it again.
“Empty Promises”
Live, Falls Church, Virginia, 8/21/09
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Michael came to Alligator Records long after I left. But a few years ago I did some legal work for him and got to know him. Soft-spoken, gentle, warm: these are the words that come to mind. He collapsed at the Atlanta airport after returning from a European tour—heart attack.
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“Fire and Water”
Live, Denmark (Frederikshavn), 2010
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“Since I’ve Been Loving You”
Live, Jacksonville Beach, Florida, 2010
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“House of the Rising Sun”
Live, Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise, 2008
2012
Monday, 5/7/12
Muddy Waters with Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood, et al., “Mannish Boy,” live, Chicago (Checkerboard Lounge), 1981
Keith and Ronnie understand something many rockers don’t: the importance, in blues, of restraint. They also understand that when you’re a guest you don’t try to upstage the host. Mick, meanwhile, hasn’t got a clue.
2012
Sunday, 5/6/12
back to church
The Canton Spirituals
Live, Memphis, 1993
“Heavenly Choir”
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“Fix It Jesus”
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Gospel groups are hard to beat when it comes to longevity. This one got started, in Canton, Mississippi, in 1943. One of the founding members, Harvey Watkins, Sr., is featured here. He passed away in 1994; his son, lead singer Harvey Watkins, Jr., carries on today.
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lagniappe
reading table
my child’s rice cakes
my child’s rice cakes . . .
all in a row—Kobayashi Issa, 1813 (translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue)
2012
Wednesday, 5/2/12
Nothing hits the spot, sometimes, like a homicidal love song.
The Handsome Family, “My Beautiful Bride”
Live, Australia (Sydney), 2010
More? Here.
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lagniappe
art beat: Monday at the Art Institute of Chicago
Utagawe Hiroshige, Autumn Moon over Tama River (from the series Eight Views of the Environs of Edo), 1837-38
2012
Saturday, 4/28/12
James Blood Ulmer, “Are You Glad to Be in America?”
Live, 2008
Imagine this with bass and drums. Can’t? Me, neither. That’s one sign of a great solo performance: accompaniment is unimaginable.
2012
Wednesday, 4/25/12
two takes
“Run Joe” (L. Jordan, et al.)
Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers, live
Capital Centre, Landover, Md., 1987
*****
Louis Jordan and his Tympany Five, recording, 1948
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lagniappe
random thoughts
Last night, sitting at Wrigley Field with my brother Don (something we’ve been doing together for over 50 years), I thought of a line my younger son Luke, who turns 21 next month, wrote in elementary school in response to a prompt: “When I am 100 I will not be able to play baseball with my brother.” (P.S. Cubs 3, Cards 2—their second straight walk-off victory.)
2012
Tuesday, 4/24/12
not for the faint of heart
Phil Minton (vocals), Mats Gustafsson (baritone saxophone), John Russell (guitar), live, London (Cafe Oto), 2010
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lagniappe
art beat: Sunday at the Art Institute of Chicago
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Seascape, 1879
Sometimes, when posting an image of a painting, I wonder: “Why bother?” No art form resists reproduction more successfully.
2012
Sunday, 4/22/12
two takes
“Feel Like Going Home” (C. Rich)
Charlie Rich (vocals & piano), demo, 1973
*****
Tom Jones with Mark Knopfler (guitar), TV performance, 1996
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
I don’t think I ever recorded anyone who was better as a singer, writer, and player than Charlie Rich. It is all so effortless, the way he moves from rock to country to blues to jazz.
—Sam Phillips (Sun Records)
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radio
Happy Birthday, Charles!
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reading table
I thought that you were an anchor in the drift of the world;
but no: there isn’t an anchor anywhere.
There isn’t an anchor in the drift of the world. Oh no.
I thought you were. Oh no. The drift of the world.
—William Bronk,* “The World” (mp3 [Hudson Falls, NY, 1978], Selected Poems [1995])
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*Bronk, who died in 1999, was recently inducted, posthumously, into the ultra-exclusive MCOTD Hall of Fame, joining tenor saxophonist Von Freeman and poet Wislawa Szymborska.
music clip of the day 