Rhythm guitar. It’s a lost art. Go to any guitar store and listen to the people trying out guitars. Nobody is playing chords. I learned to play guitar from The Beatles' songbooks and only started playing lead much later. But these durned kids nowadays don’t seem to understand the art of accompaniment, though admittedly guitar-hero disease goes back to the late '60s.

Get It!

In the punk era, lead guitar was kind of frowned on. And then in power pop/new wave music there was more of an appreciation of songcraft and more of a focus on rhythm guitar as a basic building block of great pop music.

Self-titled

Marshall Crenshaw actually became a pretty accomplished guitar player, but on his first album the songs are more typically built on simple but effective rhythm guitar riffs. “Brand New Lover,” the song that ends the album is a great example. It’s open with a nice, funky riff; works through some very clever modulations; and generally gives off a genially horny urgency appropriate to its straightforward lyrical theme. Marshall needs a brand new lover. Rightnow rightnow RIGHTNOW.

Marshall Crenshaw, "Brand New Lover"

At the time lots of people wanted to cover Crenshaw’s songs. Not long after his debut album came out, Texas rhythm & blooz chantooz Lou Ann Barton recorded “Brand New Lover” on her own debut album, Old Enough.

Yes, I believe she is.

The album was recorded in Muscle Shoals and produced by Jerry Wexler (and Glenn Frey, but we’re going to let that go). Most importantly it was recorded with the Muscle Shoals rhythm section. A number of guitar players are credited on the album, including Frey and Wayne Perkins, famous for having played the lead part on Bob Marley’s "Concrete Jungle" and for supposedly almost joining the Stones. But almost certainly it’s rhythm guitar genius Jimmy Johnson we hear anchoring this version of the song.

Lou Ann Barton, "Brand New Lover"

The opening riff here is just awesomely funky. This is really Rhythm Guitar 101, even though it’s not something you can really teach. I don’t want to say Crenshaw sounds wooden by comparison, because there’s certainly nothing wrong with his version, and obviously he came up with the riff itself. But Johnson adds a swing to it that Crenshaw just doesn’t have access to. Now his part is doubled, with the each track panned left and right, but I don’t think that’s really where the rhythm resides. It’s in Jimmy Johnson’s fingertips. The rest of the rhythm section really brings the song home, and Barton’s sassy vocal doesn’t hurt. In fact it’s interesting how a woman singing “I need a brand new lover” just has a different tone than a man singing it.

Anyway I think her recording is an object lesson in what a good rhythm guitar player can bring to a song. What are some of your favorite rhythm guitar parts? If an earnest young guitar player came to you, willing to forgo guitar-hero status and wanting to learn how to serve the song, what are the tracks you’d point him toward?

Once more -- with feeling!

Thank you, friends. Let the healing begin!

Big Star, 1972: Can someone mess up that coffee table?

Even those Townspeople bold enough to choose one, in our current poll, between the first two Big Star albums, #1 Record and Radio City, would probably agree that both albums are fine additions to any rock fan's collection. But simply choosing is not enough, and as a Townsperson you know it!

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Hosts on the two sports-talk radio shows that I listen to often joke around about fan violations, those breeches to the unwritten code of cool sports fan behavior. Common violations that are cited range from the obvious, such as wearing the hat or jersey of a rival team if you're not from that city, to more subtle offenses to the code, such as wearing the shirt emblazoned with the name and number of a good-but-not-legendary player a few years after he has left town. At Rock Town Hall, we typically monitor the unwritten code of rock musician violations, from issues of Look, between-song banter, and gear to the practices of Holstering or playing with one's feet too close together, but have we ever discussed the unwritten code of appropriate rock fan behavior? Isn't it time we do a service to rock fans worldwide and identify rock fan violations?

Link: http://tinyurl.com/owhsm9

Townsman Al passed along a New York Post story of former Billy Joel drummer Liberty DeVitto bringing suit against Joel for unpaid royalties. This is a cautionary tale for hard-working drummers who fuel the massive hits of their bandleaders.

"Everybody always assumes that you make a lot of money because you worked with Billy Joel," DeVitto told The Post. "It didn't happen that way."

Although I can't help but agree with the sentiment that kicked off Al's message to our basement dwellers (ie, "I'm on the side of Liberty..."), for the following contribution to Joel's recordings alone I am tempted to root against DeVitto in his suit against his former employer.

DeVitto doesn't have a songwriter's credit but insists he was a major part of a collaborative creative process between Joel and his musicians.

"If Billy sang 'Only the Good Die Young' like he wanted to, it would have been a reggae song," DeVitto said.

See, I hate "Only the Good Die Young" as a song as much as I hate Joel as an artist. Without DeVitto's musical guidance perhaps that song would have been buried as a deep cut that Joel haters would never have had to hear, and perhaps Joel's career as a hitmaker would have petered out shortly after The Stranger.

In short, perhaps no one wins, but that DeVitto was a fine drummer on all those hideous hits!

This is quick one. When thinking about great bands that have deep catalogs of great albums, there are few of which I can say "This is their best, hands down." For The Beatles or Stones or Kinks or...there is no way I could pick a best.

But for XTC, I can say, hands down, English Settlement is their best. For classic Pink Floyd, I can say, hands down, Animals is their best. For Crowded House, I can say, hands down, Together Alone, is their best.

And I use "best" rather than "favorite" as with these albums, the bands, IMHO, delivered what they were growing towards all along and then never quite achieved again.

Feel free to agree with me regarding the above specifics but the question is really- Do you have any hands down albums?

They don't make All-Star Jams like A&M Records made them in 1967! (CAUTION: The segment beginning at 5:30 may not be safe for work.)

Are there tales of triumphant second bananas in rock? I know there are second bananas who've moved away from their original band to go onto success in their own right, such as Brian Eno, but are there second bananas who have triumphed and taken over the lead of the same band? There must be, but aside from possible situations like The Beach Boys, in which leader Brian Wilson had to set aside the reigns for any sibling brave enough to pick them up, I'm not coming up with a killer example of "triumph." Maybe the power plays I'm looking for were worked out in advance of the band making it in the first place. Do tell!

Horror...

Ever have one of those weeks when you're reminded too often of just how petty and self-centered some of your fellow adults can be? Man, oh Manischewicz, I'm having the second of such weeks out of my last three---don't worry, it's none of you and no one you know! Thankfully, over the course of the last two unseasonably chilly and gloomy days I've found comfort in some recently purchased songs. In case you're feeling anything like I'm feeling and have a lot of stuff on your mind that's better left unsaid, I thought I'd share the following mix. Enjoy!

Fairport Convention, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" (live)

Califone, "The Orchids"

Pumice, "Eyebath"

Jim Ford, "It's My Life"

MonoMono, "Kenimania"

Before departing for your desert island, you're allowed to choose ONE of the variety of rock voices typified by each of the following singers. Once settled on the island, all recordings featuring that singer will be sung in the one style you have chosen. You won't lose any songs in each artist's catalog, just any voice in which they sang that song other than the one style you have chosen. Got me? Now, choose wisely!

Mick Jagger: Typical Jagger (eg, "Satisfaction" or "Rock Off") style that all garage singers would attempt to mimic or "blackface" style employed on occasion in late-60s and early-70s.

Debbie Harry: "Tough chick" style of "One Way or Another" or high-pitched, dreamy style of "Heart of Glass" and "Dreaming"?

Roger Daltry: Coolly menacing Mod style of "Can't Explain" or the bare-chested, anthemic, shouting style perfected at Woodstock and throughout Who's Next?

Paul McCartney: Little Richard-derived rock belt; high-energy melodicism of "Magical Mystery Tour" and the rocking parts of the best Wings songs; or jaunty showman's voice of "When I'm Sixty-Four"?

David Bowie: Slyly rockin' voice of earlier rockers like "Queen Bitch" and "Rebel Rebel" or the Anthony Newly-inspired voice of "Heroes" and various ballads?

Following your choices, please feel free to add your own split-personality vocalists for us to consider.