For a Song Solstice Special: Solstice Night

Michael Lewis: Solstice Night

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Sometimes in winter, there is a magical moment. It has snowed enough to completely cover everything, so the familiar world has been replaced by the mystery of smooth white shapes. The storm is over, the clouds have skittered away to their burrows for a winter’s nap, and the whole scene is lit by the full moon that wasn’t there a moment ago. Most of these images are not in Michael Lewis’ song Solstice Night, but he captures the same feeling in music as this scene does in in vision and feel. Lewis has only our sense of hearing to appeal to convey the full range of sensory and emotional response, and he succeeds brilliantly. No wonder he places this magic on the night of the winter solstice.

Lewis is the songwriting half of Traveler’s Dream, but The Natural World needed to be a solo album, because Lewis is after a different sound here. Some of the arrangements are a bit fuller than Solstice Night, but this music is rooted in the relatively young tradition of singer-songwriter music, rather than the British Isles folk stylings of Traveler’s Dream. The songs on The Natural World are personal, detailing the comfort Lewis draws from nature, and the awe it inspires in him. Where the Traveler’s Dream material is shaped by traditional forms, here Lewis can shape is words however he wishes. The result is every bit as much a collection of poetry as of music.

For a Song: The Waves

Stanley Greenthal: The Waves

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The bouzouki is an instrument that is often heard in Celtic folk music. But the word bouzouki is not any form of Gaelic. In fact, the instrument comes from Greece, and the word is also Greek, possibly derived from Turkish. So maybe that explains the mix of musical influences in the work of Stanley Greenthal. there are Celtic songs and dances, from Ireland, Scotland, and Brittany. But there are also instrumental pieces from Greece, Macedonia, Crete, and even Turkey. The Waves is an original song, sung in English, but inspired by the songwriting techniques of Crete. So words and phrases repeat, like the rhythm of the water gently lapping up onto the shore. The result is hypnotic and beautiful. The water’s caress of the sand becomes a powerful metaphor for love. First Song is an album with many such treasures. It makes unexpected connections, and finds a common beauty in varied traditions.

For a Song: The Promised Land

Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer: The Promised Land

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You might recognize the illustration I have chosen for this post. It’s the fool card from the Morgan-Greer tarot deck. The card represents a person who has set aside their old life, and set out to parts unknown in search of something new. The departure has no set destination, only the desire to go, and see what happens. Dave Carter’s song The Promised Land tells of a departure like this from a literal point of view, a physical departure. The card also has a spiritual element, the setting aside of ones comfort zone to seek new experiences and perspectives. Some of Carter’s other songs make this spiritual side more explicit, but I think it’s safe to say that it is an element here as well.

The Promised Land comes from Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer’s album Seven is the Number. This is a collection of songs Carter wrote, but it fell to Grammer to turn them into finished tracks and shepherd their release after Carter’s untimely death. This was the beginning for her of a spiritual journey that continues to this very day. Grammer’s journey has not been by choice however, so a different tarot card would suit her better.

For a Song: Indigo Rose

Salamander Crossing: Indigo Rose

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This blog is my space to play some music that I love for whoever cares to listen. And Indigo Rose is a choice I can certainly live with. The song comes from what would be Salamander Crossing’s last album, Bottleneck Dreams, and it is a beautiful bittersweet contemplation of lost love. The extended metaphor of the deep blue flower is perfectly rendered, and lead singer Rani Arbo gives the song all the emotion it needs in an understated performance that is stronger for it.

But Oliver di Place is also my space to get things about music off my chest. Salamander Crossing were hailed as a bluegrass band while they were together. I don’t hear it at all. Nowadays, this music would be called Newgrass, and that is one of my least favorite genre labels. Basically, you can make any music at all using bluegrass instrumentation, and it’s newgrass. So, the label is almost meaningless. In my next post, I have in mind to take a look at some of the variety of music that fits this very loose description. Stay tuned.

For a Song: Little Ramona (Gone Hillbilly Nuts)

BR5-49: Little Ramona (Gone Hillbilly Nuts)

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Things are kind of serious around here, as we await the arrival of Hurricane Irene on Saturday. So I wanted to lighten the mood. To my ear, Little Ramona (Gone Hillbilly Nuts) could not be more of a country song. But, even though BR5-49 recorded the song for Arista Nashville, they received minimal support from the label. The lyrics tell of a former punk rocker gone country, and the tongue is firmly in cheek. But the idea is not really that far fetched. There was a musical sub-genre in the 1980s and 90s known as cow punk. Jason and the Scorchers and Rank and File were two of the better known bands in this category. Also, John Doe and Exene Cervenka of the punk band X went on to form The Knitters as a side project, and an outlet for their form of country. So I find it easy to imagine that fans of punk might have traveled the same road. Little Ramona dons leather boots and western wear as a rebellion from the conformity of punk fashion. I find the irony of that irresistible. From Monty Python’s Life of Bryan: “Yes, we are all individuals!” “Eh, I’m not.”

For a Song: Galileo

Indigo Girls: Galileo

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I bought a book from Amazon a while back, called Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, by Charles MacKay. The book is well known in the world of finance, particularly for its account of the Dutch Tulip Mania. It also discusses alchemy, dueling, and supposed holy relics, among other things. The book dates from 1841, so the use of language is somewhat archaic, and MacKay rambles, so it’s not exactly an easy read.

Well, it got to be early May, and I got an e-mail from Amazon asking me if I wanted to sell back my text book. Huh? What text book? And then I read the rest of the e-mail. Apparently, Extraordinary Popular Delusions is used as a text book for some college courses. And apparently, no one at Amazon can imagine anyone in their right mind reading the book for fun. And that is exactly what I am now doing, and I am having fun. I don’t what that says about me, but there it is.

What does any of this have to do with music? Well, Galileo is one of my favorite Indigo Girls songs, so I decided to share it this week. The song opens with an interesting percussion sound, which carries through whole song. The vocal features the wonderful harmonies of Emily Saliers and Amy Ray, aided in this case by Jackson Browne and David Crosby on backing vocals. The fiddle part sounds like an entire string section, but used really well. And if you think from all of this that I never completely heard the lyrics before, you’re right. So, now I have, and that’s what reminded me of the book. One of the major themes of the book is that a society can get an idea in its head that just grows and grows, regardless of the fact that it never really made sense. This can also happen to an individual, and in the song, the idea is reincarnation. The narrator gets into her head that she has had a number of past lives, and these past lives become both an excuse and a burden. For her, being responsible for just one life was burden enough. But as I said, the idea grows and grows. The whole thing is delivered in a wonderfully tongue-in-cheek way. Maybe reincarnation is real, but it doesn’t follow that every person would be better off for knowing that.

For a Song: Veracruz

Warren Zevon: Veracruz

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I could tell you all about the occupation of Vera Cruz, how the refusal of a Mexican commander to offer a 21 gun salute to an American naval commander led to a six-month American occupation of the city, how the attempt by Woodrow Wilson to intercept an arms shipment from Germany failed, and the shipment only wound up being diverted to a different port. I could hold all of this up as an example of the follies that led to World War I. But what interests Warren Zevon and his co-writer Jorge Calderon is the human cost of war. And so, the song is the words of one man to his wife or lover, a loving probable farewell from a man who feels honor bound to fight in a losing cause. Inevitably, when the forces of one nation invade another, it is the civilians of the native country who suffer the most. So it was in Veracruz, and Zevon and Calderon make this point brilliantly by making it personal.

For a Song: Talula [The Tornado Mix]

Tori Amos: Talula [The Tornado Mix]

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The album title Boys For Pele has nothing to do with soccer. Like so many people, I first became aware of Tori Amos when her solo debut, Little Earthquakes, came out. Here was a set of songs by a woman who had been badly mistreated by the men in her life, and who was releasing years of pent up anger in her songs. Musically polished and emotionally raw, these songs featured Amos voice and piano, with only a bit of embellishment. Yes, there were strings, but the sound was still intimate. This couldn’t go on forever. At some point, Amos had to broaden her musical palette, and also her emotional range, or people would stop listening. And she did. Boys For Pele is Amos’ transitional album. Emotionally, she has talked about how she had to cast aside the various men who had hurt her, so that she could reach an emotional state where she could welcome love into her life. So each of the album’s songs is about one of these “Boys”, and Pele is the Hawaiian volcano goddess to whom Amos is symbolically sacrificing them. Musically, Amos started working with a band, particularly with bass and drums, and there are some unusual instruments in the album’s songs. This would lead Amos to the more muscular sound she is known for now. Talula [The Tornado Mix] is a key song in this development. Here a strong beat supports Amos’ lead on harpsichord. The combination shouldn’t work at all, but does. There are also horns on the song, used for accents. If you have an older edition of this album, you may be wondering about the “Tornado Mix” in the title. Apparently, this is not how the song was originally released, something I didn’t know until I researched this post. The strong beats were added in this remix, which has replaced the original version on more recent releases of the album. Amos apparently didn’t like the way the beats were done on this remix, and said that she would have rather done them herself. Since then, she has, and that has become a key part of her sound. I don’t have the original version of Talula. If anyone does, please let me know. I would love to add it to this post.

Update: I have the best readers in the world. A big thank you goes out to David Heil, who sent me the original version of Talula. Here it is:

Tori Amos: Talula (original version)

For a Song: If You’ve Got the Money (I’ve Got the Time)

Merle Haggard: If You‘ve Got the Money (I‘ve Got the Time)

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When people talk about Merle Haggard, the phrase “country music legend” comes up. And why not? Haggard began his recording career in 1963, I think, and he had 38 number one hits on the country charts. And he wrote at least one definite classic, Mama Tried. But the great secret about Haggard is that he is still at it. Mainstream country music passed him by about twenty years ago, but he keeps doing what he has always done. These days, his music would be considered alt-country, which is a shame.

By 2001, Haggard was already out of the mainstream. That year, he released the album Roots Volume 1. This is Haggard’s tribute to the songs and artists that influenced him early on. Haggard included three originals, to put his sound in context. The only other artist represented by more than one song is Lefty Frizzell. If You’ve Got the Money is the best known of these. Haggard in 2001 didn’t have the vocal power of his younger days, but he put what he had to the best use. Haggard also found a great set of musicians to bring out that 1950s country sound. For my money, Rascal Flatts, for one example, is a southern rock band, and this is what real country sounds like.

For a Song: Tenth Avenue Freeze Out

Bruce Springsteen: Tenth Avenue Freeze Out

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It’s funny how this works sometimes. I noted the passing of Clarence Clemons this past week, and I really wasn’t thinking about posting anything here. I have lived in New Jersey all my life, and I was fifteen when Born to Run was released. But I never took to Bruce Springsteen with the near religious zeal that many of my fellow Jersey residents did. Don’t get me wrong, Born to Run is a great album, and Springsteen is a great artist. I heard Born to Run not long after it was released, and I came to know the album well because one of my brothers bought it. But I never owned a copy, and it was the only Springsteen album that ever lived in our house.

Having said all of that, here is my post of Tenth Avenue Freeze Out. What happened? Funny you should ask. This evening, my family and I went to see some fireworks. You know how this goes, for fifteen minutes of fireworks, you get to sit through four hours of festivities, including the dreaded cover band. Actually, this one was about as good as they get, doing competent versions of everything from Disco Inferno to Honky Tonk Women. Oh, and Tenth Avenue Freeze Out. And, listening to this, I began to write a post in my head about why the original was so much better. And this is not that post.

I was going to talk about how Clarence Clemons was such an essential part of that band, that album, and that song. How Springsteen, Clemons, and the rest of the E Streeters captured the essence of rock and roll for one brief moment. But I got home and I listened to the song. Two things struck me immediately. The outstanding thing about the song and the album is not the rock and roll, but rather the soulfulness of the music. This music is heartfelt and honest, at a time when so much popular music was based on artifice. This is rock music, but the arrangement, with its use of keyboards and horns, owes a great debt to classic R&B. The other thing that struck me is about memory. I can hear in my head that big sound that Clemmons always got from his sax, squealing away solo throughout the song. But that’s not how the song goes. Clemmons does his part as part of a horn section, soloing only for a few notes in the middle of the song. Over the years, the other horns had disappeared in my memory, but there they are. So now I once again know what Tenth Avenue Freeze Out sounds like for real, and it’s great. But I can’t guarantee that it won’t change in my memory again going forward.

For a Song: Missing Person Afternoon

The Story: Missing Person Afternoon

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I have always loved the Latin rhythm of Missing Person Afternoon by The Story. If you are not aware, The Story was the duo of Jennifer Kimball and Jonatha Brooke, before each of them went solo. Brooke is much better known than Kimball. That’s not surprising, since Brooke did most of the songwriting, and played instruments as well as singing, while Kimball only sang. Still, both have made music as solo artists that is well worth seeking out. As a duo, The Story started from a foundation of folk-rock, but their ears were wide open, and many of their songs reflect this. Hence the carnivale feel of Missing Person Afternoon.

The lyric is another matter. The narrator sings the song to Luisa, who is evidently a recently departed lover. But the narrator tries to apologize to her, and sings, “But I was wrong, (and here is where you will have to imagine the rest).” So Luisa may be physically absent, but the narrator could be the missing person in the title. Her remorse seems genuine, but she can not express it in words. A part of her is not there, and maybe it never was. Maybe that’s why Luisa left.

For a Song: They Raided the Joint

Long John Baldry: They Raided the Joint

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I once did a post on Star Maker Machine where I tried to explain what jump blues is. But really, the best explanation comes from hearing it. Long John Baldry gives a perfect example with his version of They Raided the Joint. On the vocal, he channels the playfulness of Louis Armstrong. The arrangement is a textbook example of how to put a jump blues song together. There is great vamping on the piano throughout. The sax solo in the middle has the perfect feel. And the little statement on the trumpet at the end, with the band coming back at the very end for a single closing chord is a great dollop of sweet syrup and a dash of whipped cream on top.

I don’t know the full history of the song, but I found out that there was a movie of the same name in 1947, which included a version of the song. Shortly thereafter, Helen Humes had a hit with it, with the cleaned up lyrics the Baldry also uses. In the older lyrics, the narrator hadn’t been drinking at all; instead, they were high, probably on marijuana.

For a Song: Too Darn Hot

Janis Siegel: Too Darn Hot

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I live in New Jersey, and today is already the fourth or fifth day of the year where the temperature is over 90 degrees. That isn’t supposed to happen at all until July. So the choice of a For a Song this week was obvious. But I can never do anything in a completely obvious way. It takes a certain amount of courage these days for a female jazz singer to record Too Darn Hot. That’s because Ella Fitzgerald laid claim to the song and made it her own. If you’re a guy, you compete with Mel Torme on this one, but his claim is not as strong. Regardless, Janis Siegel can handle it. Siegel was a founding member of the Manhattan Transfer, and her jazz credentials as a solo artist are even stronger. She slides into this one, even including a playful quote from Heatwave to start, but the Siegel takes flight. By the time the full band kicks in, the listener is sailing right along with Siegel. I don’t know if I feel any cooler, but I certainly am enjoying the heat more now.

For a Song: Blitzkrieg Baby

Una Mae Carlisle: Blitzkrieg Baby

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I want to stay with jazz singers for just a while longer, to lead into my next album review. So here is Una Mae Carlisle singing her hit Blitzkrieg Baby, with, I believe, Lester Young and his band. This song has been collected in a number of places, and I would usually give a purchase link for an album by the artist. But this one is for a various artists collection with the somewhat misleading title of Ladies Sing the Blues. The music isn’t blues at all, but the album is a great introduction to classic jazz singers and their art. So, if Oliver di Place is the first place you ever heard a jazz singer, this album would be a great next step.

I mentioned that Blitzkrieg Baby was a hit in its time. Can you imagine a song like this about a current war? It wouldn’t work. The song belongs to my parents’ generation, and is specific to World War II. The Vietnam War forever changed how Americans feel about the wars we fight. The attack on the World Trade Center might have changed things back again, but the sense of a nation united against a common enemy was squandered in the handling of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now we are back to questioning the motives of our wars again. While this is probably healthier for us as a nation, something is lost as well. Blitzkrieg Baby reflects a time when the nation as a whole believed that it had an important job to do. I have never lived in a United States that felt that way, and I can’t help wondering how it would feel.

For a Song: The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul

XTC: The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul

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This is one of those times when a song told me what to do. The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul popped into my head as I started my day, and said, “post me”. XTC was always a band that used strong rhythms, and, especially late in their career, they loved to experiment with their sound. Most of it worked, while some of it flopped amazingly. The album Skylarking is a microcosm of this. It’s a flawed album that I always find myself drawn back to. The album was produced by Todd Rundgren, and some of it is almost ridiculous for how overwrought the emotions are. In particular, 1000 Umbrellas is a song I often find either laughable or pathetic. And yet, the good stuff on this album is great. Man Who Sailed is a fine example. The lyrics describe a man who looks back over his life, and finds much to regret. His tale is told against an almost jaunty jazzy musical setting. The tension between the sound of the song and its content give this one its power. This is, as far as I know, the closest XTC ever came to exploring jazz, and it is a sound I wish they would have done more with.

Call for help:

Teresa Storch: Happy Girl (demo)

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As I write this, Teresa Storch has 16 days to go to complete her Kickstarter campaign for her new album The Honesty Kitchen. The first thing I noticed about Storch was her voice. Her music is not blues, but her voice is a bluesy moan, and she does this as well as anyone I have ever heard. Some of the songs in her video look like they have jazzy touches, (one has fiddle and trombone together!), and I can’t wait to hear them. Happy Girl in its present form reminds me of the quiet intensity of a young Tracy Chapman. Please help Storch finish The Honesty Kitchen if you can. Thank you for whatever you can do.

For a Song: See See Rider

Lightnin‘ Hopkins: See See Rider

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While we are on the subject of the blues, let me present Lightnin’ Hopkins. Hopkins was one of those bluesmen who disappeared and was then rediscovered during the folk music revival of the 60s. Lightnin’ Hopkins, to my mind, is best appreciated as a solo artist, playing acoustic guitar. Listen to his See See Rider, and you might think that he was a sloppy player who couldn’t keep time. But that is because we are used to blues fitting a tight, even restrictive, format. Hopkins knew just what he was doing, and his guitar obeyed his will. Yes, he would elongate or compress musical phrases, especially when he soloed. But the result was a dramatic tension and release. Hopkins made the blues an unsettled music about unsettled emotions. His music has a real power that most blues players nowadays cannot or will not achieve. That doesn’t mean that their music is bad, but it doesn’t have the untamed feeling that Hopkins achieved. In the course of his career, Hopkins also made many recordings with small groups, and there is some great music there as well. But group settings tended to reign him in, and his solo works are it for me.

For a Song: Yvette in English

Joni Mitchell: Yvette in English

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In her younger days, Joni Mitchell seemed to believe that a relationship could be a complete merger of two personalities, with nothing held back. But her later songs take a different view. Yvette in English presents a chance meeting between a man and a woman. They are separated by the barrier of language. And yet, she can make the offer, “Please have this little bit of instant bliss”. In Cary, the joy promised to never end, but now, the whole thing has a quality that is more tentative and fragile. Perhaps, it is more valuable as well. The quality of the music reflects this as well. In the later part of her career, Joni Mitchell has become a fine storyteller, and Yvette in English is a fine example of this.

For a Song: Harpo’s Blues

Phoebe Snow: Harpo‘s Blues

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Have you heard Poetry Man this week? Maybe for the first time in years? Phoebe Snow passed on this week at age 60. Her story has much to tell us about the business end of how music gets made. Poetry Man, of course, was the monster hit from her 1974 debut. But Harpo’s Blues comes from the same album. The voice is unique, and it is certainly the same one on both songs. Snow’s voice shimmered, like gentle ripples on a moonlit pond. But, where Poetry Man leaned towards the pop-folk sounds of the then-new singer-songwriter movement, Harpo’s Blues is a wonderful bluesy jazz number. That debut album found Snow merrily genre hopping, and hitting most of her marks beautifully. It’s the kind of thing that no major label would touch nowadays. But in 1974, it was a viable way to launch a career. So what were some of Phoebe Snow’s hits from her later albums? Stumped? Let me tell you what happened.

Before the release of Phoebe Snow’s second album, she had a child. Daughter Valerie suffered from hydrocephalus, a severe form of brain damage. Phoebe Snow made the decision to care for her daughter at home, and this occupied far more of her time than the development of her musical career. So it was that many artistic decisions, including the choice of producer and material, were made for her. Because she transcended musical genres, this meant that her labels had a hard time finding material that was best for her. In some cases, like turning her into a rock singer for one album, poor judgments were made. Even so, that remarkable voice never faltered, and it is well worth picking through the rest of her albums for the many gems that are to be found there. As a parent myself, I applaud Phoebe Snow for the courage and determination she showed in deciding to keep her daughter out of institutions. I don’t know if I could be that strong. Still, can’t help wondering about the music she might have made… Valerie died in 2007. Phoebe Snow recorded only one album after her daughter’s death, Live in 2008. The amazing voice had gained some muscle since her debut, but all of the soulfulness of her youth was still there. If only she had had more time.

For a Song: Everybody’s Dancin’

Gove Scrivenor: Everybody‘s Dancin‘

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This post was born out of a discussion I started in the forum on the No Depression website. I asked about musicians who were fondly remembered, but whom the writer had lost track of, and Tom McD mentioned Gove Scrivenor. I remember Scrivenor fondly myself. He released two albums on the Flying Fish label in the 1970’s, Shady Gove and Coconut Gove. His music was a combination of acoustic blues and the poppier sound heard here. But Everybody’s Dancin’ is the song that stayed in my head all these years. Maybe it’s because I was a teenager when I first heard it, well into my hormones with feet stage, and this sounded like a party I wanted to attend. All I can say is that I am now older, and presumably wiser, but this still sounds like a great time.

For a Song: Shotgun Down the Avalanche

Shawn Colvin: Shotgun Down the Avalanche

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Falling in love is a very humbling experience. It is the acknowledgement that something has happened to you that you had absolutely no control over. I had several girlfriends before my wife, and each time, I thought I was in love. And, the next time always showed me that I hadn’t been. This is not a knock on any of my previous girlfriends; it’s just that my capacity to love was still growing. And then, one day I realized that I was with the woman I would spend the rest of my life with. It wasn’t a choice I made. Rather, it was an acceptance of my circumstance. I think Shawn Colvin knows what I mean. In the song Shotgun Down the Avalanche, she finds herself at the edge of a precipice, and there is a realization that she is going to fall. Her reaction is to let go of the impulse of self-preservation, and embrace the experience of the plunge. Her reservations are still there, but so is the knowledge that there is no longer a choice. This is why songs that simply make grand pledges of love often don’t do it for me. Colvin understands that the truth is far more complicated.