10 albums a day #41

Pink Floyd
- The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1967, LP)
- A Saucerful of Secrets (1968, cassette)
- Ummagumma (1969, double CD)
- Atom Heart Mother (1970, CD)
- Meddle (1971, LP)
- Obscured By Clouds (1972, CD)
- Dark Side of the Moon (1973, CD)
- Wish You Were Here (1975, CD)
- Animals (1977, CD)
- The Wall (1979, double LP)
- Works (1983, CD)
- A Momentary Lapse of Reason (1987, cassette)

The first one to come into my possession was The Wall. Other early ones must have been Dark Side, Meddle and Piper because I have all those on LP. Later on, Dark Side was one of the first CDs I bought when I got my first CD player. Secrets is actually from a dupe tape of an LP, but it still sounds pretty good.

Works is a compilation album that is not entirely redundant. The tracks that appeared on previous albums are not all entirely identical to the original versions. It also has a few tracks that were released only as singles and were not included on any albums. It also has one track ("Embryo") which is not a Pink Floyd track but Roger Waters only, and must have come from the Sounds from The Body sessions.

I also have a cassette of A Collection of Great Dance Songs which I bought because it has an alt version of "Money" (I ripped just that one song), and a two-cassette set of The Delicate Sound of Thunder that I bought because it was cheap. I haven't ripped it yet.

I would still like to get CD versions of Piper, Secrets, and Meddle, and I would still like to add The Final Cut to make it complete. I suppose I should also get More, for completeness, and Relics because it has a couple of tracks that were previously released only as singles or B-sides.

The side-long track "Echoes" from Meddle is one of my overall favorite Pink Floyd pieces, by the way. Favorite album? Probably a tie between Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here.

Also, back sometime around 1990 or so, KZEP played the entire live album Live at Pompeii Live at the Paris Theatre* and I taped the whole thing. I should see if I can find it in the tape drawers and give it a listen to see if the sound quality is good enough to keep.

Album count: 415.

*Update: My memory failed me there.

Tom Russell - "Santa Ana Winds"

When these old adobe walls
Turn to dust and then they fall
And the creatures of the night call out your name
Mother Nature, she'll grab hold
Of all the things that we've let go
Here comes an ill-intentioned wind that knows your name


I had never heard of Tom Russell before, but I should have.  He has written songs that have been recorded by such artists as Johnny Cash, k. d. lang, Guy Clark, Nanci Griffith, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Iris Dement, Dave Alvin, and Suzy Bogguss; and he has put out more than 20 albums over a span of more than 30 years. "Santa Ana Winds" is a track from his newest album, Blood and Candle Smoke, to be released September 15.  Sung in a baritone voice with a world-weary tremble, Russell is backed up by members of the band Calexico who provide a certain kind of southwestern/Mexican flavor to the song, all the way down to a lonely mariachi trumpet to accent the close of each stanza.


You can read all about him at Tom Russell's bio at Shore Fire.  Russell is a visual artist as well as a musician; you can see many of his works at Tom Russell Art.

Tom Russell links:
Wikipedia
Myspace
Blog
Shore Fire

Listen:
Santa Ana Winds (link to my Tumblr site)
Release date:  9/15/09
Album:  Blood and Candle Smoke
Label:  Shout! Factory

 

Via FOUND Magazine.

All the bad news at once...

I am thankful for all the rain.  However, I really hate working in it.  Two days in a row that I was soaked to the bone for at least 4 hours--it's still far too hot to wear a raincoat.  I am not feeling entirely well at the moment.

I am now on my last bowl of Bayou Night until I can order more.  Most likely it will be at least a week before I get a fresh supply.

The news on my trucks is very bad--it's shot.  I'm going to throw down about $2,000 for a used engine.

I have to go to a family reunion this weekend, and I already don't want to be there.  I can feel a sick coming on.  The only plus I can see is that, if all goes as planned, we're going to take the kids to see Longhorn Caverns for the first time.  It will be about the fifth time for me.  My family has a connection with those caverns that goes way back.

10 albums a day #40

Patsy Cline
- 12 Greatest Hits (1988, CD)
- The Patsy Cline Collection (3 CD box set, 1991)
Peter Gabriel
- Peter Gabriel (1980, CD)
- Security (1982, CD)
- Peter Gabriel Plays Live (1983, 2 CD set)
- So (1986, CD)
- Us (1992, CD)
Peter, Paul & Mary - Best of (1970, LP)
The Pogues
- If I Should Fall From Grace With God (1987, CD)
- Hell's Ditch (1990, CD)
Phish - A Live One (1995, 2 CD set)

I'm pretty sure I bought Cline's 12 Greatest Hits myself, thinking that would be all I would ever need. My wife bought the box set later on. The box set contains 45 tracks total, and is amazingly not redundant with the other one--not by even one track.

I don't remember how I first got into Peter Gabriel, possibly I heard some of his stuff on the radio, although now I can't imagine ever having heard anything by him on any San Antonio station. Could have been the old KLLS, an "adult contemporary" station that I used to listen to in the early 80s. I can see myself buying more by him if I was in the mood. I would like to get his other two early eponymous albums; his first three albums were all titled Peter Gabriel, and are often referred to by their cover art. The one I have is called "Melting Face." When I was sharing a house with Babel in the late 80s I listened to a whole lot of Peter Gabriel from his record collection. One old one that I would particularly like to get is the soundtrack to Birdy, which is very ambient. As I already covered when I was doing my ambient category, I also have his soundtrack to The Last Temptation of Christ. My favorite of these albums is So.

When I was a kid my favorite song was "Puff, the Magic Dragon" and I had a single of it that was horribly destroyed because it was left out in the car and the sun melted it when I was 4 or 5 years old. I was heartbroken, of course. I came across this record in the ACU bookstore in 1982 or so and bought it immediately when I saw it; until that time I didn't even remember who had recorded that song. I still like this record a lot, even if they are a bunch of communists.

If I Should Fall From Grace With God is one of the Best Albums Ever. I don't remember why I bought it but I listened to it repeatedly. I got the follow-up when it was released, but after that the lead singer was kicked out because he couldn't get a handle on his alcoholism, and their following albums lacked the luster of his song writing. A co-worker bought the album following Hell's Ditch and I did listen to it, but it failed to thrill me. I read not long ago that he has since gotten his alcoholism under control and is back in the music business, so I might have to look him/them up again and see what they sound like now.

During the mid-90s I briefly subscribed to a music magazine called huH. Each issue came with a sampler CD--I still have all four of those CDs that I got before I canceled the subscription--and one of them had "Bouncing Around the Room" by Phish. So I got this set that has that song on it. The rest of the album is very different; that one song must have been the closest they ever came to having a "hit single." Phish is one of those groups who were never popular in the mainstream sense, but are very popular in the "rabidly fanatical and devoted fanbase" sense. They may have made more live recordings than studio albums. Anyway, they are known for their live shows and extended jams that incorporate influences from just about all genres of pop/rock music. Thanks to this album, I "get" Phish jokes when I read them on the internet.

Album count: 403.

Blogger updates

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Music industry mistakes

Collecting Vinyl Records has TOP TEN BIGGEST RECORD-COMPANY SCREWUPS OF ALL TIME.  Here's a sample:

Dick Rowe was not the only record-label executive who passed on the Beatles in the early ’60s, but he was the only one who brushed off their manager, Brian Epstein, with the astute prediction that: “Groups with guitars are on their way out.” Epstein begged Rowe to reconsider, so Rowe hopped a train to Liverpool to check out the band live. When he arrived at the Cavern, he found a mob of kids trying to force their way into the club in the pouring rain. Annoyed, he smoked a cigarette, went home and signed Brian Poole and the Tremeloes instead.

Interesting reading.

Signs of the end

Yesterday a 30-or-so year-old woman asked me "Who do I call to fix one of these leaky things?"

Well, I had to ask for clarification.  The question seemed far too simple; I assumed I had not understood what she was pointing at.

"This thing," she said, pointing to a hose bib.

So I told her everything on the house side of the meter is the home owner's responsibility, and she should call a plumber if she is unable to do it herself.

Holy chao.  She is going to call a plumber to change a hose bib.

What is the world coming to, when a grown woman can't change a simple hose bib?

10 albums a day #39

Neil Young
(& the Bluenotes) - This Note's For You (1988, cassette)
- Freedom (1989, CD)
(and Crazy Horse) - Ragged Glory (1990, CD)
- Harvest Moon (1992, CD)
- Unplugged (1993, CD)
- Mirror Ball (1995, CD)
The Nylons - Seamless (1986, LP)
The Oak Ridge Boys - Greatest Hits (CD)
Oingo Boingo - Dead Man's Party (1985, cassette)
Paul Austin Kelly - A Walking Oliver Sampler (2009, Amazon download)

I went through a Neil Young phase for some reason in the early 90s; the This Note's tape was purchased around that time when I saw it in a clearance bin. My favorite of these is Ragged Glory.

The Nylons were a male quartet who sang pop/rock a capella except for using a drum machine. The group is still around but numerous men have rotated through the group and only one original member still remains. One of the original tenors died in 1991 from complications related to AIDS.

The Oak Ridge Boys CD is their first Greatest Hits, which I like. I have no desire to get anything else by them. This CD does not include "Elvira" or "So Fine," which I like to refer to as "Elvira with slightly different lyrics but identical music." If I ever hear either of those songs again, somebody is gonna pay for it.

Dead Man's Party is my only Oingo Boingo album. I think I bought it after reading an article on Danny Elfman in Keyboard magazine. The only thing I still remember about the article is how he took a bunch of beer cans, filled with varying amounts of fluid so that they were "tuned," and then sampled them so he could play the sound on his sampling keyboard.

The Amazon sampler is a sampler all of one artist: Paul Austin Kelly, who does songs for kids similar to Dan Zanes.

Album count: 392.

10 albums a day #38

Mojo Nixon & Skid Roper
- Get Out of My Way! (1986, cassette)
- Bo-Day-Shus!!! (1987, cassette)
- Root Hog or Die (1989, cassette)
The Monkees - Greatest Hits (CD)
The Moody Blues - Greatest Hits (1989, CD)
Motorhead - No Remorse (1984, cassette)
Moxy - Moxy (1976, LP)
Nashville Dulcimers - Super Hits (2000, cassette)
Nena - 99 Luftballons (1984, LP)
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band - Greatest Hits (1990, cassette)

All three Mojo Nixon tapes were bought at about the same time at Hastings after discovering him on an Enigma label sampler CD. I recently turned the opening scream from "Burn Down the Malls" into a ringtone.

During my time at Mr. Gatti's I was very fortunate to have a long string of co-workers who all had what I considered above average interests in music and we had many interesting and fruitful discussions on that topic. One night one of them--his name was George--was making fun of one of the girls because she had said she liked the Monkees. "I like the Monkees," I said. "Yeah," George replied, "but it's okay if you like the Monkees." That really cracked me up. I most like the songs that Michael Nesmith wrote.

The Moody Blues compilation was a good addition for filling in the blanks. I have a couple of old records of theirs also that I haven't ripped yet.

No Remorse is my only Motorhead album. I like it, but my interests have diverged since then and I doubt if I'll go out of my way to get any more. It could happen, though.

The Nashville Dulcimers tape was bought at a truck stop somewhere in the U.S. when I was truck driving. I bought quite a few tapes during that time, because, believe it or not, there are still a lot of places--especially out west--where you just can't pick up any FM radio stations*. This is a great collection of mountain dulcimer music by a dulcimer band. There are other instruments in the band, but the focus is on the dulcimers. This is the last of my only three dulcimer music albums.

Nena is another familiar one from the 80s, although I didn't buy it when it was new. I found this one used sometime in the late 80s.

The Dirt Band tape is another from the truck driving days, and it's still one of my favorite road albums.

Album count: 382.

*Except for contemporary Christian. That's one format of FM station you can get anywhere.

Johnny Cash - Classic Cash (1988, LP)

When it comes to country music, I am very selective in what I still listen to. As a rule I don't listen to any of that modern cowpop, or faux-country. I guess you could call my tastes in that genre pretty much limited to "classic country." Johnny Cash is still one of my favorites.

I found this record in the inherited collection (from my late mother-in-law). I made a scan of the cover rather than using the thumbnail from Amazon because it has a promotional sticker on the cover (click to enlarge). Another odd thing about this particular record is that it must have originally belonged to a radio station or some other music promoter because of the "LENT FOR PROMOTIONAL USE ONLY" stamp on the back cover.

This is a somewhat controversial album because the songs are all remakes of his originals--they are not the original recordings. These days, you can buy CDs of his original recordings anywhere, so this may have become a "pointless" album. But back in 1988, I don't know, it might have been difficult to find new copies of his original recordings. Use of a "modern" (as in 1988) band might also have made this easier on the ears of newbies back in 80s, so I don't believe that it was a "pointless" record when it was initially released. There were supposedly even some synthesizers used on this album, but I didn't notice them so they must have been used very tastefully. The "purists" mostly consider this album as junk (just check the comments at Amazon). In my opinion, this is the height of pedantry. Get a clue, people. Just look at some of the musicians that he worked with in his last years; just remember his last big hit was a cover of a Nine Inch Nails song.

Anyway, it has 20 tracks that are mostly not redundant with my CD compilation (note: "Boy Named Sue" is not on this one, either). I got a perfect rip on this record and the sound is outstanding. I was really surprised and pleased to hear "Thing Called Love" on this one. I hadn't heard that song in decades, literally. When I was a kid, on the way to church every Sunday morning, we would listen to a radio program on KBUC (1310 AM; it has since changed callsign and format) called "Country Hymntime" with Alex Alvarez. That song was one of the staples of that program, and hearing it again so unexpectedly after so many years nearly brought tears to my eyes.

Amazon has it on both CD and mp3 download. So if you'd like to hear Johnny Cash do very good alt versions of his own big hits, check it out. They have sound samples of all tracks.

I also thought this commentary from the liner notes was worth reproducing here. Written by Tom T. Hall. I couldn't get an OCR scan of it because of the colors, but if you click to enlarge, you should be able to read it.


Amazon: Classic Cash: Hall of Fame Series

10 albums a day #37

Michelle Shocked
- The Texas Campfire Tapes (1986, CD)
- Short Sharp Shocked (1988, LP)
- Captain Swing (1989, CD)
- Arkansas Traveler (1992, CD)
- Kind Hearted Woman (1996, CD)
Midge Ure - The Gift (1985, cassette)
Midnight Oil - Blue Sky Mining (1990, CD)
Mieka Pauley - Elijah Drop Your Gun (2008, Amazon download)
Mississippi Fred McDowell - Live in New York (1971, mp3 download)
Moe Bandy - Picture in a Frame (1994, CD)

And then one day I walked into Sundance Records and heard "Memories of East Texas" from Short Sharp Shocked. I bought the album immediately. Michelle Shocked (real name Karen Michelle Johnston) is a Texan musician who probably now can best be described as an Americana artist who spent some time in the NYC punk scene.

The Texas Campfire Tapes was recorded by some Sony rep with a digital tape recorder at the Kerrville Folklife Festival. This recording was released as an album against her will, which is a long complicated story and is probably better read elsewhere than here; but still it was her first and it got her noticed. The sound is very raw, as might be expected. Crickets are heard chirping in the background and the occasional sound of a car driving past interrupts the music. Many of the tracks on this album were remade later in the studio, so that's an interesting thing about it. I put off buying this one for a long time because Shocked herself didn't want it out there, but then later she changed her mind and it's now available from her own website. So anyway, eventually I bought it just out of curiosity.

Short Sharp Shocked was her first studio album and is straight Americana (not quite country, not quite rock--it does include one old country song, ("The L&M Don't Stop Here Anymore") and is a great album. One seemingly out-of-place song is "Fogtown," the final track, which is not listed on the record or the jacket, and is more of a punkish number, and which Shocked herself only sings backing vocals on--the lead is by a man (I forget his name). This is one of the songs that can be heard in the raw, sung by Shocked, on Campfire Tapes.

Captain Swing slides sideways into the "swing" genre, sort of. It has some backing horns and is in the flavor of the swing bands, although still quite clearly the music of Michelle Shocked.

Arkansas Traveler is a truly great album, with songs that span the genres of pop/rock, folk and country. I would recommend this as a good starter album for anyone who is interested in hearing her stuff.

Kind Hearted Woman makes another change with a collection of songs that tend to defy genre categorization. One particularly interesting song on this album is "Eddie," which updates and tells the real (and dark) truth behind what happened in the song "V.F.D.," which was on the Shocked album.

Michelle Shocked has been very busy and has released several more albums since those dark days of the 90s when I ran out of money to buy albums. Sometime after the released of Traveler, she filed suit against her record company to break her contract, and won the suit by citing anti-slavery laws. Since then she has continued by producing her own CDs and selling them at concerts. She also has a website at which you can purchase all her albums as either CDs or mp3 downloads--all of which are now on my list.

Midge Ure was/is the lead singer of Ultravox. I have a couple of their albums that I've always really liked. This was his first solo album so I bought it when I saw it. If you like Ultravox, you'll probably like it.

I'm sure everybody is already familiar with Midnight Oil. I downloaded the Mieka Pauley album from Amazon when she offered it there for free.

Live in New York was downloaded from Kathleen Loves Music. It's a two-record set from bluesman Mississippi Fred McDowell, just him singing and playing his guitar. It was the last recording he made before his death, and if you want to hear some real blues, go download it.

The Moe Bandy CD is a "best of" compilation, and is another one that I wouldn't feel right without.

Album count: 372.

Vintage Ad, 8-track tapes

From a record album inner sleeve, 1962. Click to enlarge.

Funny how in retrospect, some of their claims seem to fall into the "it's not a bug, it's a feature" category, until you remind yourself that this was actually a step up in convenience from an open reel-to-reel tape player.

Sometimes you never know where you'll end up...

When you have a computer, internet access, and a lot of time to spend.

ASN Aircraft accident Convair CV-300 N55VM Gillsburg, MS