I hate to convene the court over the weekend but the Rock Nation turns its lonely eyes to us.
The Hall will now hear arguments after which a sidebar poll will determine the verdict.
Dec 062008
Dec 062008
In the early ’90s, in Vancouver, a friend dragged me to a show by a band from Chicago called Urge Overkill. Good show, good band, nothing earth shattering. Then a couple years later he sat me down and put on a record called Saturation. We played that thing into the ground. This was a record that was simply not of the times. Urge Overkill didn’t look or sound the same as anyone else. They were inspirational. And they rocked hard.
Now, if you remember Urge Overkill you may be one of those people who had a problem with their image: they rode around in a convertible wearing smoking jackets and drinking martinis. They lived in an old bank with their massive record collection. It rubbed some people the wrong way. But not me. I had seen enough flannel for one lifetime.
The most important thing is this: the songs stood up and they still do today. Pretty much everything on Saturation is a knockout. Supersonic Storybook before it was top notch. Their swan song, the dark, stripped down Exit the Dragon? We didn’t like it at the time, none of us. But guess what? I threw it on the other day and it had aged, to me, like fine wine. Check out “The Break” and “Jaywalking.” It’s time for an Urge revival.
Dec 062008
After Creedence broke up in 1972, John Fogerty made a bluegrass album called Blue Ridge Rangers in 1973. Then in 1975 he released an album simply called John Fogerty.
I’m not sure why this album went nowhere, maybe Fogerty’s time had passed or maybe there was no promotion. Wikipedia says that “Rockin’ All Over the World” was a Top 40 hit, though I certainly don’t remember that. I thought sure that song had a second life being covered by other artists, but my research (ok, the All Music Guide) only shows that Status Quo recorded it.
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But the other great song on the album, “Almost Saturday Night,” was familiar to me before I ever heard Fogerty do it. Dave Edmunds did a fine version on the Twangin’ album.
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The Searchers did it on their terrific 1981 album Love’s Melodies. AMG says The Burritos, Rick Nelson, the Georgia Satellites, and Gene Clark also did it. Actually I thought both of these songs were more widely covered, but the Edmunds and Searchers albums were big in my world back then. Also I think my memory subsequently mixed in Kimberley (Soft Boy) Rew’s “Stomping All Over the World” (from the excellent Bible of Bop album). Probably influenced by the Fogerty song.
Kimberly Rew, “Stomping All Over the World”
The John Fogerty album is a little covers-heavy, but they’re done well. There are a couple of New Orleans classics – “Sea Cruise” and “I’ll Be Glad When You’re Dead You Rascal You” – but the best cover is of Jackie Wilson’s “Lonely Teardrops.” That’s one of those songs you’d think should never be covered, or at least that you couldn’t cover it well, but I love this version. Fogerty throws out the cha-cha feel and just goes with a straight shuffle. He even throws out the whole middle part (“just … give … me a … nother chance” etc) and sticks to repeating the verses. But he hits a nice groove and makes it work, which is surprising since I believe Fogerty did his thing of playing all the instruments (no credits on the album).
Oddly the tracks on this record seem more fleshed out than many CCR records. My theory is that Fogerty was such a control freak with his old band that the backing tracks often seem like demos to me. So when John started playing everything himself it paradoxically gave a more liberated feeling to the tracks.
Anyway the eponymous album seems to have become a victim of Fogerty’s label/legal troubles, so it’s currently unavailable, except for here on RTH.
John Fogerty
“Rockin’ All Over the World”
“You Rascal You”
“The Wall”
“Travelin’ High”
“Lonely Teardrops”
“Almost Saturday Night”
“Where the River Flows”
“Sea Cruise”
“Dream Song”
“Flyin’ Away”
Technical note: This is a vinyl rip, and you may find the sound a little thin and brittle, contrary to conventional wisdom. For LPs I used to use the Loudness switch they always had on receivers back in the day, and that works fine. Nowadays when I listen to these mp3s I use the “bass booster” effect on iTunes. Your mileage may vary.
Dec 062008
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What’s on your list?
Dec 052008
The subject line should be self-explanatory, but in case it’s not clear enough, this rules out lines from Spinal Tap, School of Rock, That Thing You Do, and that movie starring Paul Simon (with Lou Reed!), One-Trick Pony. On the other hand, I can think of killer lines about rock ‘n roll in movies like Repo Man and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, two movies that embrace rock ‘n roll culture but are NOT about rock ‘n roll in any way.
I wish I could find the full rant from Martin Donovan‘s character in Hal Hartley‘s Simple Men, but this brief excerpt give you an idea of what I have in mind to kick things off:
And oh how they danced…
Continue reading »
Dec 052008
Linda Rondstadt‘s gotta nothin’ on this, baby.
Dec 052008
HVB made a great point when this post first ran: The Who don’t get dragged through the ringer of Rock Town Hall with half the frequency of some other titans of rock around here. Maybe it’s because we’re mostly dudes and because The Who was so vital to our sense of budding dudeness as teenagers. Could there be Rock Town Hall without the rite of passage that was the Stages of Who? Rather than get too heavy, I say we revisit HVB’s hard-hitting questions on ’70s-era Who AND go one step further: add our own previously unasked question about this band.
This post initially appeared 10/17/07.
Ah, that lovely little band from Shepherd’s Bush: The ‘Oo. I’ve long been puzzled by the lack of pissing contests, name-calling and prissy, fists-thumping-on-your opponent’s-chest nerd-fights on the topic of this band. Sure, all the closet prockists in this Hall can agree that there’s something perfect and inviolate about pre-Tommy Who, but — after that? There’s loads of stuff we haven’t come to blows over. Yet.
In order to start the healing process even before the conflict has begun, I suggest you all take a moment out of your busy day to answer at least a few of the following questions. As always, feel free to take any one of these issues and really get serious with your answer.
1. Show of hands: let’s leave aside the issue of lip-synch’ing for a moment: rate the Who’s BBC “Join Together” clip as a source of rock entertainment. Scale of 1 to 10: how much do you enjoy watching it?
2. Our Moderator has said he finds Who By Numbers disappointing. I think that’s a mealy-mouthed way of ducking his responsibility to declare the thing a “turd” or a “treasure.” Where do you come down on this album?
3. Name the worst — and the best — album covers in the 1970s Who canon.
4. ‘Fess up: how many times have you actually listened to Live At Leeds from start to finish? Speaking for myself, I can barely make it through one track of that album at a time.
5. Once again, I ask: should the band have called it quits when Moonie died?
6. SHOWDOWN! Who’s Next or Quadrophenia?
I look forward to your responses.
HVB
