danasgoodstuff

As some of you may recall, I'm now on my 2nd Studebaker. Probably just reads 'weird' to most people now but back in the day the perception pf Stude's as old guy cars didn't help them or Packard or Hudson, despite the fact that when the board pulled the plug on the main plant in South Bend they were making the fastest production car in the world, the R3 engined Avanti. But they only sold 9. Perception is a funny thing. The US auto makers have made many, many mistakes over the years, including some moves so cynica/shortsighted/etc. the're hard to credit as mistakes...and as an american indepent fan I don't love the big 3, BUT I really don't want to see one or more of them go under, it would have a ripple effect that would capsize a lot of boats that ain't sone nothing wrong. Studes rule, big 3 drool.

Al, Nice thoughtful response, please feel free to go back and respond to any of my albums of the week that way... Dana "some people just sing up and down and still say nothig"

Clem's talked a lot of shit, but I don't think he's ever tried to tell other members who they could talk to...

My what a shit storm this stirred up, but at least y'all care enough to get worked up about it. Alexander, you know I think you shouldn't let Clem get to you so much but I think that's the best job you've done of saying just what your aesthetic differences are. I love the first three Ree did after coming to Atlantic, but they are a dead end if only 'cause Tommy Cogbill and Roger Hawkins do that particular shit as good as it can be. She was right to move on, but I'm sure glad she went there first. As far as her doing the Beatles, Paul Simon and the Band...well, to me she was just doing in her time what Dinah Washington did in hers to Hank Snow, among others. and you know 'Retha loved her some Dinah Washington. The only good example I can think of someone doing Ree before Ree did it right is Fontella Bass' "Rescue Me" - great record, great band, so what. Parting shot: to me the fact that Ms. Franklin was more 'pop' than some others who had equally good church trained voices is mostly a good thing 'cause to it is all about singing, and songs. Carry on...

To expand on my earlier "clear enuff why they didn't make the cut". /There are two nonalbum b-sides, some lo fi demos, a few not too radically different alternate takes, and lots of outtakes, some of which are not quite done, but most of which would be release quality for someone else or for Re sometime else, but most suffer from weaker songwriting or just not right for the album at hand, but musch of it is no worse than the run of themill album filler for aretha in that period, which contrary to clem I think of as being a pretty high standard. Re would be in my top handfull of any kind of singers anytime so I think this is well worth getiing as long as you understand what it is...and you should be able to get the two pretty full CDs of it for well under $20US. Dana

the scenario MG describes above is especially ironical in the case of canned Heat who made one great single, one pretty good one,and loads of worthless albums (refried Hockey Puck Boogie anyone?) Besides, haven't we already had this conversation, several times? For me the biggest disconnect was the Clash Jaguar commercial... And many 'cool' bands did coke, etc. commercials back in the day, before they discovered it was more commercial for them not to... and you can buy collections of such now.

Funny you should single out "Taking up another Man's Place" since it's one of the few that has been out before, on Atlantic Blues Vocals, 2 LP set some time back...

I just got the 2CDs worth of rare and (mostly) unissued stuff on Atlantic. Good stuff even if it's usually clear enuff why it didn't make the cut originally. What say you?

Paid $103 and change from local bricks 'n motor, loving it so far, trying to write something 'bout it. I think disc 6 was originally going to be disc 1...changed to make it seem more like it's all 'bout On the Corner not Beyond the Corner? Notes ain't much, maybe Henry Kaiser and the Yo Miles crew can elucidate...

round here we watch the Welk show on PBS every Sat night, I find that the color combos they use make drugs kinda unnecessary...

Damn, I wants to hear this shit, but I wants the whole reading the liner notes, looking at the package experience...

OK, so I went to the record show the other night and the sight of the assembled geekitude put me in a don't want to buy nothing kinda mood so I passed on the Savoy dbl LP reissues referenced above (Brothers and Other Mothers, vol I & II) in nice shape, v. reasonable. How bad did I fuck up...are they, for instance, as good as the Mosaic Single, The Brothers? I did buy a Spoon and Ben LP which is quite nice...

Yes, of course, they (bad+) are in some ways in the trad of AJ3, Ramsey Lewis, the 3 sounds, etc. But it's just that for my $, not to mention clem's, they ain't that fucking good at it (yet?) - nothing I've heard surprises and delights me like "But Not For Me", "The In Crowd", or "Walking the Floor Over You", much less Sonny doing "Surrey With the Fuzzy Dice and Hydraulics"... Studies Rule, Dana

negative attitudes towards commerce far predate the advent of recorded music, they are about as deaply embedded in our collective consciousness as anything in western culture (present in classical Greek/Roman times, compounded by the otherworldliness of the middle ages and the grubby grasping of the industrial revolution). But commerce is, of course, absolutely necessary, hence the deep uneasy ambivilence expressed above. It does take on a particular cast as regards jazz, given its complex relation to more overtly commercial musics. The mere fact that everybodies got to eat doesn't negate the choices one has to as to how, but speculation about ultimately unknowable motives doesn't replace hearing what's in front of your ears. Chicago may have had the purest of motives and Chuck Berry may wel have (as he claimed) done everything for $, but that doesn't make me like the former any better or the latter any less, nor are my standards any different for "jazz" despite my recognition that anti-commercialism was always implicit in the idea of jazz, explicit in most modern jazz. And no, I'm not a formalist nor much of a muso, music is 'about something' (a lot of things, a lot of different ways) - so what am I trying to say here? I think it's that this is knot that just won't come untied for me, your millage may vary but eventually you too will run outta gas...

Lester Bangs (the shit outta his typewriter) hyperprolific American rock 'riter, died relatively young, subject of intense veneration, bad imitations and at least one thread here where I said that he rocked more than x, w & z musicians/bands.

My best wishes for Mr. Cables. (period)

My best wishes for Mr. Cables. (period)

On the Dead, I can't stand Deadhead (qua heads, many are perfectly nice people otherwise) but I kinda like some of the band's work - Live Dead, Working Mans, American Beauty - when it's not for the traditiona pop verities of song slinging but rather for the jam, it's works for me precisely 'cause Garcia isn't a very strong Lead Guitarist in the usual sense, he doesn't dominate the band the was Cipollina did QMS, which allows the Dead to get as close to Red Norvo Trio level interplay as any 'rock' band...never saw them live, and the more I heard about the experience the less I wanted to.

This would seem to confirm my pet theory that the more books on a given subject, the worse most of 'em are.

I should be glad that this thread generated so much response, and i sorta am, BUT I'm surprised so much of it is narrowly 'rockist', for lack of a better term. On the other hand, I'm equally surprised to hear that tired old canard that rock 'n roll is just degenerate R&B...an attitude imported from other contexts where it didn't make much sense either (see the book Hole In Our Soul). While you, I or the next guy may not care for what white boy/suburban/ mainstream/corporate R-O-C-K made of its R&B roots (which are only part of its roots, naive reductionist warning), it long ago became its own animal with its own conventions, virtues and vices. By any purist definition of rock 'n roll, not much post-British Invasion woud get in and not even some pre-... But any such definition that omits doo wop and/or Chuck Berry is laughably inane. I think a balance between being admirably 'big tent', reflecting the reality of what rock means to its core audience, and still having some standard of greatness could be struck. I don't think the hall has done a very good job there, but Yawn Weiner is free to put in whatever he wants. In my hall o' fame, there would be very few who weren't at least working, if not recording, before Rolling Stone's pernicious influence, and lots of faceless sidemen/women and writers of songs and Lester Bangs...and probably no one would agree with me either.

The Spooky/Stormy/Sunny trio was recorded by almost evryone (slight hyperbole) back in the day but that's pretty close to our cutoff and the're not done so much since.

The Spooky/Stormy/Sunny trio was recorded by almost evryone (slight hyperbole) back in the day but that's pretty close to our cutoff and the're not done so much since.

In principle, I'm a descriptivist (more or less) regarding language, but in practise...my objection to the broader ahistorical use of "cover" is that, intentionally or not, it carries with it negative connotations that I feel are inappropriate outside of the narrower historic use9s) of the term. As far as I'm concerned the most interesting local bands are often cover bands, although not usually of current hits but of blues and/or jazz 'standards'. As far as what other term(s0 to use, I was perhaps too subtle in using and mentioning "version" at the same time in my post above. "rendition" is good, as is "reinterpretation" if that's what it is, or "reinteration" if it's not...I find most "origianls" to be not very original or interesting and have felt that way since the mid '70s, at least. As far as I'm concerned, if a rock band can't do a convincing Chuch Berry, etc. "cover" (in the broad sense), I don't care what else they do.

Haven't heard this one yet, and I'm not in any hurry to do so having lost interest back around the last ice age, but as far as I'm concerned, with bruce the poppier the better since it tends to undercut his tendency to take himself too seriously and drone on and on tunelessly...

Haven't heard this one yet, and I'm not in any hurry to do so having lost interest back around the last ice age, but as far as I'm concerned, with bruce the poppier the better since it tends to undercut his tendency to take himself too seriously and drone on and on tunelessly...