Album Of The Week #12 – Wish You Were Here

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on August 3, 2012
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As promised, our album of the week is Badfinger’s last album, Wish You Were Here.  I am featuring it, not because it is their best album but because it is their last album with Pete.

As you listen, I want to you think about the fact that this is the third album that they cranked out in less than a year.  The boys were being driven to constantly work by their management and record company commitments.  All during this time, they were living in near poverty while everyone else was getting rich based on their blood, sweat, and tears.   By this time, it was finally becoming clear to the boys that they were being screwed and the band was starting to come apart at the seams.

With that in mind it is amazing that the album, although not their best is actually very good and certainly worth a listen.  My favorite songs are Just A Chance, Got To Get Out Of Here, and Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch/Should I Smoke.  Let me know what you think.

Just A Chance

You’re So Fine

Got To Get Out Of Here

No One Knows

Dennis

In The Meantime/Some Other Time

Love Time

King of the Load

Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch/Should I Smoke

So….the moral to this story, and so many others, is that greed destroys the deserving while rewarding the financial vampires of the world.  In this case, it drove two of the most talented musicians of their generations to commit suicide and destroyed one of my favorite bands of all time.  I don’t know if it will ever happen, but I hope that one day Badfinger will make it into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  I can’t think of a better tribute to Pete and Tom.

So…while we are talking about greed, let me point out that it is alive and well here in the United States.  Just take a look at the tax proposals being made by Mitt Romney and the Republicans in Congress which can be summarized is cut the taxes of the rich and pay for those cuts by milking those that work for a living.  Checkout the video below for the details and vote.

Badfinger – The Most Tragic Story In Rock Music

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on August 2, 2012
Posted in: Tragic Rock Stories. Tagged: . 1 Comment

Here is a three part documentary that tells Badfinger’s story better than I ever could.

RIP – Pete and Tom

Tomorrow we will feature Wish You Were Here as our album of the week.

International Songs #4 – Rails and Rain (thanks Gerard)

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 31, 2012
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My friend Gerard, who I have been lucky enough to become acquainted with through this blog, was nice enough to send me a list of “Rain” songs from his collection.  Among those songs was Rain and Rails by a Dutch group called The Nits.  Let’s listen…..

I had not heard of The Nits before seeing them in Gerard’s list but I have to say that I love their sound!   I very much look forward to exploring more of their music…..thank you my brother for introducing me to The Nits!

Long Song Tuesday #26 – Timeless

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 31, 2012
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I feel guilty making this Badfinger post when I don’t really have the time to do the song or the band justice.  Everyone probably knows the incredible tragedies associated with the band so I will not repeat them in this post.  Just thinking about it breaks my heart all over again.  Maybe I will be up to saying more in a post later this week. Moving on….

Today’s long song post features Timeless, the last song on the second side of the band’s last album for Apple called Ass.  The song was written by Pete Ham and he is featured on lead vocals and on an incredible lead guitar.  Let’s listen…

To top things off today I have a live performance of the song from a 1974 concert in Vancouver, Canada.  Good stuff…..

RIP – Pete

Friday Word Of The Week #2 – Rain

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 27, 2012
Posted in: Word Of The Week. Tagged: , , . 2 Comments

It is a rainy day in northern Alabama so nature has declared the word of the week for me.  As with last week’s word, my iTunes library has a plethora of songs about rain.  It’s pretty interesting to look at the views on rain expressed in songs: some people have colored rain (Red Rain – Peter Gabriel), some people want to go in the rain (In The Rain – The Dramatics), some people want to stop the rain (Who’ll Stop The Rain – Creedence Clearwater Revival), and so on….

Enjoy the music…let me know if you have a favorite “Rain” song.  There are some interesting surprises in the tracks below so be sure to listen.

Be The Rain – Neil Young

Save the planet for another day
“attention shoppers, buy with a conscience and save”
Save the planet for another day
“save alaska! let the caribou stay”
Don’t care what the governments say
“they’re all bought and paid for anyway”
Save the planet for another day
“hey big oil, what do you say?”

We were runnin’ through the night
Never knowin’ if we would see the light
Paranoid schizophrenic visions
Livin’ in fear of the wrong decisions

We got to wake up
We got to keep goin’
If they follow us
There’s no way of knowin’

We got a job to do
We got to
Save mother earth

Be the ocean when it meets the sky
“you can make a difference, if you really try”
Be the magic in the northern lights
“six days….six nights”
Be the river as it rolls along
“it has three eyed fish and it’s smellin’ strong”
Be the rain you remember fallin’
“be the rain, be the rain”

Yeah rain was fallin’ and we’re soakin’ wet
Hail is beatin’ down on our heads
The wind is blowin’ through our hair
Faces frozen in the frigid air

We got to get there
Alaska
We got to be there
Before the big machines

We got a job to do
We got to
Save mother earth

Dream the hunter on the western plain
“the birds are all gone, where did they go?”
Dream the fisherman in his boat
“he’s comin’ home empty, he’s barely afloat”
Dream the logger in the great northwest
“they’re runnin’ out of trees, they got to give it a rest”
(there’s no other way to cut it)
Dream the farmer in the old heartland
“corporate greed and chemicals are killin’ the land”

Next mornin’ sun was up at dawn
She looked around and earth was gone
Dark visions he had last night
He needed peace, he needed light

He heard the rumble and
He saw the big machines
The green army rose
It was a bad dream

He had a job to do
He had to
Save mother earth

Be the ocean when it meets the sky
“greek freighters are dumping crap somewhere right now”
Be the magic in the northern lights
“the ice is melting!”
Be the river as it rolls along
“toxic waste dumpin’ from corporate farms”
Be the rain you remember fallin’
“be the rain, be the rain”
Save the planet for another day
“be the rain, be the rain”
Be the river as it rolls along
“be the rain, be the rain”

Album Of The Week #11 – New York Dolls

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 26, 2012
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Some call them glam, some call them the Godfathers of Punk (I think Iggy owns that title), some call them the fathers of the New York rock scene (The Ramones, Blondie, etc), some call them outrageous, and some thought they were a joke.   I thought they rocked and I loved them.  Come on, how could you not love these guys?  They are the only group that I know of that was honored as both the best and worst new group in the same year….in the same magazine.

Let’s listen to Jet Boy from their self titled first album released in 1973.

I love the guitar (Johnny Thunder & Silvain Silvain), love the vocals (the awesome David Johannson) and love the song.   Jet Boy closed the album, let’s balance that out by listening to the first song on the album, Personality Crisis.

The Dolls deserve more than a crummy two song post so here is their entire first album.  You better listen….and you better crank up the volume!

Todd Rundgren did a great job on the production of this album.  I thought he perfectly captured the Doll’s sound.  The original band managed to hang on and produce one more great album, Too Much Too Soon, but they were gone by 1975.  To paraphrase Neil Young, better to burn out than to rust away.

Yes…various incarnations of the surviving members of the Dolls have reformed, recorded, and toured during the last 10 years but to be honest I just don’t care.  The Dolls left us in 1975.

RIP – Johnny Thunder, Arthur Kane, and Jerry Nolan

New Music That Doesn’t Suck #6 – Summer Is Here…And Then Its Gone

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 25, 2012
Posted in: New Music That Doesn't Suck. Tagged: , . 1 Comment

Good Time, a new song by Owl City (an American synth pop artist), which features Carly Rae Jepsen (a Canadian singer), just screams “Summer is here!” to me.  No matter how tired or stressed I am this song makes me smile and want to get up and move.

The Beach Boys have always meant summer and this summer, the surviving original members of the group have patched up their differences and are making one last tour this summer to celebrate their 50th anniversary.  Yes….these guys are in their late sixties but they still have the most amazing vocals ever and Brian Wilson at 70 still has more musical genius in his little finger than most of today’s musicians.

This first clip was put together by 46807nipster on YouTube and features We’re Together Again (a 1968 Beach Boys song) paired with the lead off song on their new album Think About The Days.

There was a great story about Think About The Days in the June 21, 2012 Rolling Stone.

“Last May, the Beach Boys got to together at Capitol Studios to test the waters for a 50th-anniversary reunion.  The objective that day was to remake “Do It Again” a 1968 single that itself was a throwback to the group’s early sound.  But Wilson had something else in mind, too – so he asked the Beach Boys to gather around the piano to sing some new music he had  been working on.  “None of them knew what he was doing,” says Joe Thomas, a longtime Wilson collaborator who was enlisted to help bring the reunion together.  But Wilson kept on – “C’mon guys, let’s go.”

“When he first started playing the chord progressions,” Love remembers, “I was standing there , thinking ‘Wow, that’s cool, that’s a certain type of Brian Wilson chord change.’  I thought, ‘Shit – he’s still got all of his talents intact.'”

Then Wilson began to call out instructions for the vocals – “layering in our voices,” says Jardine.  “Somehow he had worked out the entire arrangement in his head.  He knew each person’s range, and just stacked one voice on top of the other.”

As great as Think About The Days is, it is the last song on the album, Summers Gone, that is the real masterpiece.  I guarantee that Summers Gone is a song that will makes us all cry the first time we listen to it in the future after Brian has left this world.  See what you think….

Coming Attractions

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 24, 2012
Posted in: Coming Attractions. Leave a comment

I’m sure that you have noticed that I have not been posting at my normal rate over the past week or so.  Things are very stressful at work so I have been spending nights and weekends doing real work rather than working on the blog.  I am also way behind in resounding to email so please bear with me if you have emailed me and I have not responded yet.

Although things are still quite hectic I have some amazing things coming your way this week.

  • A great “Album of the Week” post from an obscure early 70’s group
  • Several new posts of “New Music That Doesn’t Suck”
  • A new “Friday Word Of The Day” post

I am also trying to decide on a topic for a new series of posts now that “The Southern California Sound” series has completed.  Please let me know if you have any recommendations.

Thanks for continuing to read the blog….more good stuff is on the way!

“You People” – Let Them Eat Cake

Posted by thebestmusicyouhaveneverheard on July 24, 2012
Posted in: Completely Wrong, Politics. Tagged: , . Leave a comment

I know this is a music blog but from time to time I will choose to post about other topics, especially during this election year in the US .  If you aren’t interested in these non-music posts, please ignore them….I promise this blog will remain focused on music.

First up….Ann Romney, wife of presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney, letting slip how she and Mitt view the people that they want to “rule”.

I’ve selected Old Fart to present a response from “We The People” (that would be “you people” to Queen Ann).

If we know how they feel about us and still vote for them……we will get exactly what we deserve!

Let’s let Bob Dylan have the last word….

“You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows”