This year's Christmas find

 

Kate Rusby's "Sweet Bells" is a few years old, but I only discovered it recently. This is a collection of mostly traditional Christmas/wintery songs, but as often in traditional circles, many of the songs have been spliced onto a different melody than is commonly used. Kate's pure silvery voice, combined with guitar, accordion, fiddle and the occassional brass band makes for a wonderful musical experience. Check out the YouTube clip below to hear a sample. Cheers!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwyOnLeyk6I

Sing a Song of London

Can't remember where I found this, advertised in a catalog I think. The subtitle is "A Vintage Portrait" because it features recordings from 1916 through 1953. I don't know much about British Music Hall, so many of the performers are new to me, but I did recognize Noel Coward, Eric Coates (British light music composer), and Vera Lynn, plus Duke Ellington, the Mills Brothers -- no, they're not British but the music is -- each song reflects either a place in London or an aspect of London life. And "Forty Fahsend Fevvers on a Frush" sounds like it could have been recorded by Ian Dury with its great Cockney rhyming slang.

Lots of great fun here: "If It Wasn't for the 'Ouses in Between" (great view of the Thames, if it wasn't for the 'ouses in between), "Underneath the Arches", "The Changing of the Guard", "Christopher Robin at Buckingham Palace", "London by Night" -- 53 songs on 2 CDs.

This is a collection done right, and the ASV label deserves kudos for taking the time. The songs betray their origins a bit, but they've been spiffed up enough so it's not distracting.

Recording the Soundtrack of Nature

 

 

Gordon Hempton records nature sounds; "Soundtracker" is a DVD that shows him in action.Gordon's nature CDs are some of the best around (I'm a sound effects dweeb), along with the "Solitudes" series and some of the "Nature Recordings" series distributed by World Disc Productions out of Friday Harbor. Good luck finding any of these, I'm sure they're long out of print. And a WARNING: avoid at all costs any of the CDs that combine nature sounds with Mozart or tinkly piano -- you get the idea. It's not good for the nature and it's not good for the music.

Like I said, "Soundtracker" follows Gordon as he attempts to record nature sounds before they disappear. He travels -- a lot -- and the conversations with his college-age kids (and none with his ex-wife) reveal the price paid for his single-minded devotion to his craft. Plus there's the increasing frustration with the sounds of civilization encroaching more and more into previously remote locations. Gordon will set up his microphones, wait patiently for whatever bird or animal he's been tracking -- and then a plane flies overhead and ruins the take, a plane that hadn't registered its flight path.

There's a great sequence near the end where Gordon tries to set up a "sound event" by recording a particular bird singing during the approach of a train. Yes, he could just record them separately and layer them, but he's adamant about recording real events in real time.

And now I'm gonna have to track down some train recordings -- is that a geezer move or what?

RIP Kathi McDonald

Kathi McDonald passed away on October 3rd. Who? you might be asking. Kathi was the Northwest's own link with ROCK in a big, big way, but I doubt if any of the rock mags mentioned her passing.

Kathi was a member of Leon Russell's circus troupe that supported Joe Cocker on his Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour, she sang with the Stones on the "Exile on Main Street" album, she sat in the Janis Joplin chair with Big Brother and the Holding Company on some of their post-Janis albums --- and much, much more, as they say. She continued recording and performing here in the Northwest, still plugging away at it.

I think there's a fascinating story to be told of performers who were part of the earlier rock 'scene' who managed to continue their careers long after their early peak. I remember talking to a rep from a great (at the time) LP distributor in California and realizing "Crap, I was just on the phone with somebody who was in Big Brother!" or their resident Gram Parsons expert who went on to form his own band AND write a biography of Gram. These guys and so many like them managed to continue to work somehow in the industry they loved, certainly not at the same level as in their youth, but still.

So a tip of the hat to Kathi and the many more like her that had their brief shing moment and carried on. Rock and roll never dies, but sometimes it gets paid by the hour.

Last of the Summer Whine

Great summer ? Not so much for me, but, oh, those "golden autumn days", as Van said. The last few weeks were wonderful, so I managed to get in the last few spins of my favorite 'say goodbye to summer' albums, just before I dig out the Nick Drake and Sandy Denny.

So, four exhibits:

 

 

 

Exhibit One: "The Turning Point" by John Mayall. John's not a great vocalist, but what a band, what a langorous, stretched-out feel to "So Hard to Share", "California" and "Thoughts About Roxanne". Open the front door, open the back door, share the music with the neighbors...

Exhibit Two: "Hot Tuna" . For some reason, I play this when it's really hot (although when it's 'don't move a muscle' hot, it's time for the flutes, tablas and sitars). I know, white rich people play acoustic county blues. Politically, I should hate it, but I enjoy it too much.

One thing that ties the last two CDs together is that they both have bonus tracks -- no surprise in CD vs LP time -- but the bonus tracks are really good, and would have fit well on the LPs had vinyl been able to handle the 60+ minutes.




Exhibit Three: new Van Morrison! "Born to Sing: No Plan B". There's a reason this is #3, if you know anything about dramatic tension. This is the yes/no before the final thumbs up, just around the corner...
Bottom line: Van's assembled a crack band for this one. No, they're not even close to the Pee-Wee Ellis or Georgie Fame  bands, but they might be close enough, and they may expand in live performance. My dear wife and I underpacked our CD selections for our overnight trip to Concrete, so we heard this one A LOT. A few times through, we're sharing first impressions: a few 6-minute plus tracks work, lyrics hmm plowing the same furrows. But...there's a big media/promotion push -- Van's first studio album since 2003's "Keep It Simple"...and crap, librarian alert, there are a few major typos. Jeez, Van, can't pay a proofreader? It smacks of "here you go, I'm an artist, I don't care about marketing" -- but they got YOUR OWN LYRICS WRONG -- and they misquoted them in the fawning liner notes.

Finally, my latest summer favorite: the soundtrack to "The Descendants", and I haven't even seen the movie, so I'm not listening with some film scene in my mind. I know next to nothing about Hawaiian music, other than the Alfred Apaka LP my parents had (shrink-wrap bound and played never, except by me).

It's a very well selected collection, some instrumental slack-key guitar, some vocal, all of it seamless. It's not the tourist-centric music you may be familiar with, and for that I'm grateful to be able to hear a part of native culture I was totally unaware of. Great job!

Random Thoughts Part 2

I'll admit it -- I can be pretty slow on the uptake sometimes. Here's a recent example:

I read "Nile-ism" about the band The Blue Nile a few weeks back (oh, great pun in the title), mostly because I was curious -- how does a band that only releases albums every seven or eight years make enough to eat? I love The Blue Nile (as I mentioned in an earlier post, oh faithful reader) so I was naturally curious. Turns out that some of the band members (of which there are usually 3) eke out a living performing film scores, (and with the band apparently on permanent hiatus, I guess that's how it will stay.) But songwriter/singer Paul Buchanan said he survives because some big names have recorded his songs. Clue #1.

A friend of my wife is in a band, a band you'd probably recognize if I told you their name. She's recently had to stop performing for a while, and she revealed what a hardship it was. "People think because I'm in a successful band that I'm rich. But I have no health insurance, touring is expensive and I have to pay for it, and if I don't perform, I don't get paid. We don't write our own material ---THAT'S where the money is." Hmm, and she's recorded a song by the above-mentioned Paul Buchanan. Clue #2.

Finally I was reading an article about the late Levon Helm, former drummer/vocalist with The Band. This article focused on his post-Band work, his cancer, his recovery and lastly, his final bout with a return of his illness. I recalled earlier interview with Levon where her took Robbie Robertson (The Band's guitarist and main songwriter) to task. There was some deep bitterness there, and finally things began to line up for me.

Put the case, as the Beedle said in "Great Expectations" (I'm merely suggesting, I admit nothing) -- put the case that you're in a band. Another band member comes to rehearsal with a song they've sketched out. You work it over, tease it out, the bass player comes up with a killer lick, the piano player suggests a different spin on the chorus, and after a few hours, with a lot of hard work, a hit is born. Put the case that later an album is released, and all of the songwriting credits list 1 band member. Would you be pissed? And as it continues from album to album, do you think you might become bitter? And when the publishing royalties make the 'songwriter' very wealthy but you're basically paid as a musician for hire, what then? Do you think the remnants of bands now performing state and county fairs are doing it because they love touring?

Some bands credit the whole band for songwriting to deal with this problem, and then if you're not carrying your weight (drugs, whatever), you get booted, Fair enough, at least you have a portion of the song publishing to keep you somewhat solvent.

I know this is a gross simplification, and I don't know 90% of what's really going on, but I'm a little closer to understanding how bandmates can turn into enemies. Money's at the root; 'twas ever thus. 

Random Thoughts, Part 1

Listening to the radio on the way to work Saturday, heard one of my favorite shows - "The Big Bandstand" on KSER (90.7). Music of the '20s, '30s, and '40s. (Then I find that it's on the same time as the reggae show on another station. Curse you, programming gods!) So I bounce back and forth, and let me tell you, THAT'S a mash-up you won't believe!

I wondered, why does big band music still have the ability to keep me entertained? It's rhythmically stilted, sentimental, and completely out of sync with our current time. I mean, there's so much junk on the airwaves now, and yet the big band era shines -- what's up with that?

I think it boils down to math and history, two of my worst subjects. Nobody knows what's going to be a hit, so the record companies throw as much as they can against the wall to see what sticks. Working at record stores I'd see so many new releases that couldn't possibly make it onto the charts, a mixture of mimicry (sounds like another band that's a hit!) and test-tube experimentation (let's mix hip-hop with metal and see what happens...) and sometimes it works. Who knows? (I ignored the cynical American Idol machine.)

History (mostly) sifts through the chaff and leaves us with the wheat. I think the reason why big band music sounds so good is because time has let the crap fall by the wayside. I mean, the radio show covers the '20s, '30s and '40s -- 30 years and we usually draw from, what, 300 or so tunes?

"Not so fast, smartypants", you're thinking, "following your line of reasoning, that would mean that classical music would now be boiled down to the best of the best of the best." Well, yes, you might think so, but composers relied on selling their music to publishers, who then sold the sheet music to performers. Let's just say, they wrote more than they sold, they wrote like machines to give the public more of what they liked, and earnest scholars dig through dusty libraries to unearth hidden "gems", as yet unrecorded. Well buddy, there's a reason they should remain unrecorded....

More on publishing and why many of your favorite bands members hate each other next time!