Blog Archives
Young Man Blues
55 years ago, 20-year-old Bob Dylan was interviewed on the Folksingers Choice radio program. Here’s a baby Bob quote from the Laughing Squid site… Oh, yeah, but then sometimes I write a lot of stuff. In fact, I wrote five songs last night, but I gave all the papers away. I don’t even consider even [...]
Oracle Encore
The Zombies reformed and started touring again a few years ago. Their masterpiece, Odyssey and Oracle turned 45 in 2013 and recent years have found the band doing regular runs to play their classic collection for live audiences. I caught the band in Nashville a few years back and it was a very good show. [...]
Celebrating Pop
Iggy Pop released Post Pop Depression last year, claiming that it would be his last album. Next month, Pop celebrates his 70th birthday. Unlike with his buddy Bowie, we have a chance to celebrate Pop’s music while the man himself is still here to enjoy it. Yesterday I found this fun rundown of Pop’s 18 [...]
Not Sham Rock
Lately I post a From The Archives selection to my social media on Fridays, but this Friday is St. Patrick’s Day and I wanted to share this great doc about Irish rock music. I originally discovered the BBC gem The Irish Rock Story: A Tale of Two Cities at the Nashville Public Library. It’s a [...]
Grand Grace
After a long week slogging through a bunch of late night art installations I slept in on Monday before getting a bath and a shave and a big cup of coffee and wading back into a more normal week. I didn’t post a bunch in the last few days due to my topsy-turvy schedule, but [...]
Brown Eyed Breakthrough
This year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of Van Morrison’s breakthrough solo hit, “Brown Eyed Girl.” Nowadays the song’s ubiquity and relative lightness have diminished its power in comparison to the rest of Morrison’s imposing catalog. But “Brown Eyed Girl” offers Morrison’s first great synthesis of imagery from Morrison’s Northern Ireland homeland with the propulsive [...]
Bowie’s Secret
David Bowie was always ahead of the curve. Even in the 1990′s, when it seemed like the entire music industry got blindsided by digital technology and the internet, Bowie was way out in front of the pack: in 1996 he was the first artist to distribute a new song — “Telling Lies” — as an [...]
Pink Animals
Over the weekend Roger Waters mocked Donald Trump with a satirical video display during a performance of the song “Pigs (Three Different Ones)” from the 1977 album Animals. Waters posted it on his Facebook page in time for the inauguration, but the Mexico City performance was recorded last September when Trump was only the Republican [...]
Punk Playlist
I celebrated the 15th anniversary of 24 Hour Party People in a recent post. And over the weekend I discovered this great old BBC show called The Way They Were. On this episode you’ll find the real Tony Wilson presenting a selection of punk and new wave acts on his So It Goes television show [...]
