From 1987, and their brilliant The Sound of Music album, please enjoy The dBs -- with the incomparable Syd Straw on guest vocals -- and the (should have been a massive hit) Peter Holsapple-penned (and sung) country/power pop weeper "Never Before and Never Again."
God, what a great song, and their voices fit together like Gram and Emmylou.
I should add that I had completely forgotten about the above until I stumbled across it online a few days ago, and it reduced me to a puddle of tears.
I think the lyrics had something to do with it.
This is the story of a mixed-up teen
What a dilemma, what a crazy scene
They had it out for the very last time
Never again, they made up their minds
She grew her hair and it changed her style
She wanted to stay that way for a while
She took a step and she didn't fall down
And that was just fine as long as he's not around
She got really small, hardly there at all
It took some days before she'd answer his call
And when she did, it just wouldn't sink in
Never before and never again
Never again and never before
Could two in love try to even the score
Never be lovers before you are friends
Never before and never again
He got a job, became immersed in books
His hair grew too, and that improved his looks
He stayed out nights, sometimes parties till four
Until he'd had enough, never again he swore
He took himself very seriously
He lost some friends and made some enemies
Still there were nights when he'd call out her name
Before he realized it was never again
Never again, she cried never again
We're too far apart and the days will not end
We're too far apart and I've taken the step
I've got a home now, not a place I've just slept
Never again and never before
Can two in love try to even the score
Never be lovers before you are friends
Never before and never again
Never again
Never again
Oh god -- the stuff about their haircuts is so wonderfully tragic/funny I can't even deal with it.
I should also add that there are people who are of the opinion that The dBs never really recovered artistically from the departure of estimable co-founder Chris Stamey.
Those people are -- what's the word I'm groping for? -- wrong.
That photo was shot around the corner, i.e., a block away from where a certain Shady Dame and I currently live in Forest Hills (aka the Paris of the North East).
None of those store fronts are still there; now it's a Starbucks, a CVS and a Fed Ex, among others.
But I can tell you from first hand -- the spirit lingers on!!!
Oh, and BTW -- I wanna know what happened to those two gals second and third from the left in the front row. Especially the brunette with the big black hairdo.
From his forthcoming (momentarily) new album 1967 Vacations in the Past, please dig Robyn Hitchcock and a thorougly lovely remake of The Kinks' "Waterloo Sunset."
"Waterloo Sunset," of course, is at this point pretty widely recognized as being the most beautiful pop song written in English in the second half of the 20th Century; as for Hitchcock's version, let's just say I think he did Ray Davies' creation justice.
As for rest of the new album, it's a mix of (mostly) covers of stuff from the titular year (a nice "Itchykoo Park," for example) and new originals that are thematically relevant to the year in question.
I'm not gonna comment on the latter stuff, but I must say that of the former, this one is pretty freaking awful.
In fairness to Hitchcock, of course, the song itself -- written by John Phillips, and don't get me started -- was a cynical exploitive piece of shit from jump, and the fact that it was conceived that way -- i.e.. as a wanna-be theme song for the bullshit that was the Summer of Love -- makes it all the more unlistenable to my contemporary ears.
Hitchcock may be making the same point, but hey, who knows -- maybe the above is meant straight. I'll reserve judgement on that until I digest the entire album a little more.
From 1991, and his album Perspex Island, please enjoy frighteningly NBA-sized Brit rocker Robyn Hitchcock (with The Egyptians) and the little power pop masterpiece that is "So You Think You're in Love."
In keeping with last week's Listomania, I should add that the above is a song I listened to obsessively when it first came out (and desperately wanted to cover with the Flo Mos, which was not, alas, to be). Hadn't seen that charming video before yesterday, however.
I should also add that I had more or less forgotten the whole thing until I learned recently that Hitchcock has a forthcoming (October) new album in which he pays tribute to the music made in 1967.
What I've heard from it so far is...er...interesting. Stay tuned for tomorrow's post for an early tasting.
[I originally posted a version of this back in 2009, when I was still 5'81/2" tall (don't ask). Anyway, I've done some rewriting and added some new entries, this despite the fact that I've had a terrible week and I can barely rouse myself. Sheesh -- the things I do for you guys. Anyway, enjoy. -- S.S.]
Well, it's Friday, and we're all still losing sleep over the innocent cats and dogs Donald Trump (aka Donny Demento) has informed us are being devoured au poivre in the wilds of Ohio.
That being the case, here's a fun little project to take our minds off the looming Pet Holocaust -- to wit:
Post-Elvis Singles or Individual Album Tracks That Changed Your Life!!!
Self-explanatory, I think, so no arbitrary rules this time. Except that we're specifically talking here about ONLY singles or album cuts, NOT whole albums (a topic for another time). Also, I'm disqualifying anything by The Beatles on the grounds that there are just too damned many tunes by the Fabs to choose from and that they're a little too obvious choices in any case.
Okay, and my totally Top of My Head Top Ten, in no particular order, is...
10. The Replacements -- I Will Dare
The lead off track from Let It Be. I had never heard a note by these guys before it came out, and the only reason I bothered to listen is that a colleague wrote a rave about it in the Village Voice. Needless to say, my head exploded when I heard it. Really, I couldn't believe people were still making music like that.
9. The Rolling Stones -- It's All Over Now
The Valentinos original of this (featuring Bobby Womack) is superficially similar -- two guitars, bass and drums, and a singer up front -- but if you've ever heard it, you know that it's actually kind of jolly. The Stones rethink keeps the basic arrangement model intact, but the guitars are stripped down to ominous Travis-picking meets scrubbed metal Chuck Berry, and the whole thing is invested with a palpable sense of menace completely unprecedented in pop music at the time. Plus: the concluding fade-out, with those circular guitar riffs altered just slightly each time as the echo creeps in, marks (no doubt about it) the birth of the style and esthetic we'd later call Minimalism. Alas, in the 70s, that moron Phillip Glass went on to adopt it for four-hour operas, thus totally missing the point, but this is what it's supposed to sound like.
Bottom line: Hearing this under a pillow via transistor radio over WMCA-AM is when I decided that Andrew Oldham's liner note claim -- that the Stones weren't just a band, they were a way of life -- wasn't as asinine as it seemed at first.
8. The Byrds -- The Bells of Rhymney
As I have said here on numerous occasions, if there's a more beautiful sound in all of nature than that of a Rickenbacker 12-string guitar well played, I have yet to hear it. In any case, this song -- even more than "Mr. Tambourine Man" -- is where the Church of the Rickenbacker opened. Nearly six decades later, I'm still dropping by for services, if you'll pardon the perhaps inelegant mixed metaphor.
7. The Beach Boys -- When I Grow Up
Obviously, it's melodically gorgeous and the harmonies exquisite. But it's also the first rock song (for me anyway) that combines adolescent angst and something like mature wisdom; when people say that Brian Wilson invented the whole confessional California songwriting school that people usually associate with Joni Mitchell or Jackson Browne, this is the song they have in mind, I think. Although "In My Room" or "Don't Worry Baby" are contenders as well.
6. The Miracles -- The Tracks of My Tears
This wasn't the first r&b record I loved, but it's the first one I bought and played as obsessively as I did any Beatles 45. Everything about it just killed me; the oddly sinister yet lovely sound of the guitars at the beginning, the way the rhythm section falls effortlessly into place, the sensual longing in Smokey's voice contrasted with the almost churchy background vocals...I still can't listen to it without thinking there's some detail I've missed, one that if I could only hear at last then some tremendous secret would be revealed. I suspect I'm not the only person who feels that way, BTW.
5. Jimmy Cliff -- The Harder They Come
A great song and a great voice, to be sure, and recognizably rock-and-roll, but at the same time it was indisputably...well, something else. If Sly Stone hadn't already titled an album A Whole New Thing, the movie soundtrack this astounding song derives from could easily have copped it.
4. Bruce Springsteen -- Spirit in the Night
The first time I heard this, the snare drum and near-mythic sax wail that open it hit me so hard that I thought I'd been wacked upside the head with a 2X4. Then I noticed the lyrics and had the absolutely eerie sensation that Springsteen had been reading my mail. Want to know what it felt like to be a a 20-something with no direction home in the early 70s? All you have to do is listen....
3. R.E.M. -- Radio Free Europe
Some records just have a vibe about them. Here's one (and the same can be said of Murmur as a whole) that has it in spades, a certain indefinable something that simply grabs you (or at least me) and won't let go. First time I heard it, I remember thinking it sounded simultaneously space age modern and as old as the hills. Still an apt description, actually.
2. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers -- King's Highway
From Into the Great Wide Open, and co-produced by Jeff Lynne, which I'd forgotten. In any event, after I first heard this I couldn't be bothered with the rest of the album, estimable as it is; I lost track of how many times I played the song. I should add that I hadn't heard it in a while, but I stumbled on the live version above last week and when Petty sang "I don't wanna end up in a room all alone/ Don't wanna end up someone that I don't even know" I just completely lost it.
And the Numero Uno mind blower, it's not even a contest, so don't give me any shit about this is ---
1. The La's -- There She Goes
Like "Tracks of My Tears" years before, when this first came out I played it over and over and over again in the hope of finally being able to hear into the sheer sonic density of it. I still do, from time to time, and to this day I haven't quite figured out what that twelve-string riff means. Or why Lee Mavers' voice sounds so simultaneously familiar and eerie. Or, finally, who she is and where the hell she's going.
Welcome to the “Best Rock 'n' Roll Music of the 21st Century, Part 4”, by Captain Al
Let me remind both you (Simels’ wonderful readers) and myself that these columns are about what I consider my favorite new music of the still new century. Coincidentally, I just happen to think the best has been made by women. And once again I will be throwing you a curveball with today’s selection: Rhiannon Giddens.
Her music (and possibly her) personality is a study in contrasts. She studied to be an opera singer. She is part of a movement to reclaim the banjo as an African-American musical instrument, And she's also a human rights activist.
Getting right to the point -- I think Rhiannon and her music could ONLY have been created in the 21st Century, precisely because of the traditions it draws on (stretching back hundreds of years). Which is to say I feel it could not have been created before now: it needed to percolate its various influences until OUR time.
Okay, let's examine some representative work. First, here she is as roots music creator:
Now let’s check her out on the banjo:
And finally, here are some of her semi-classical/operatic excusions:
Rhiannon presents quite a past and future for music, and I find her artistry both fascinating and beautiful. I wish I had some deep background to explain what makes her so special on a musical level but alas I don’t. So all I’ll say is -- just give into her magic and follow its wonderful paths.
You're right, Capt.; She's really something. I have to admit I was only fitfully aware of her work previously, but wow.
I mean, that evocation of Edith Piaf alone is kind of a jaw dropper. And the banjo stuff really makes you know who's records -- that superstar gal whose initials are Beyoncé -- sound like the work of a dilettante.
In any case, thanks for the music, pal, and I'm looking forward to episode five!!!
From that just-released Raspberry Park album I've been noodging you about lately, please enjoy the aforementioned Jersey guys and the niftiest cover of a Bruce Springsteen song imaginable.
Seriously -- a sorta tongue-in-cheek pop/punk version of "I'm on Fire"? What's not to like?
COMING TOMORROW: The next installment of Capt. Al's on-going series saluting pop music artists of the current century.
Hint: This one's a gal with folkie tendencies who's named after a fabulous hit song of the 70s.
From 2024, (possibly), please enjoy The Cheatles and their quite brilliant ode to everybody's favorite pre-Russian Revolution tsarist-beloved religious nut "Rasputin."
In case you're wondering, I stumbled across this over at YouTube yesterday, and my jaw still hasn't been seperated from my apartment floor.
From their just released (and brilliantly monikered) Raspberry Park, please enjoy power pop deities The Weeklings and their quite remarkable cover of the Fabs' Sgt. Pepper highlight "She's Leaving Home."
Attentive readers will recall my posting two earlier cool tracks from the album -- specifically, a Buffalo Springfield/Stones mashup and a glorious cover of "I've Just Seen a Face" -- but the above is, I think you'll agree, equally gorgeous and perhaps even more innovative. I mean -- the utterly surprising horns and guitars notwithstanding, I can't recall another cover of the song by anybody -- save perhaps Richie Havens -- that was particularly notewothy on any level.
In any case, having just perused the entire Weeklings album, I gotta say -- it's like totally wowsville and you need to get it now.
[I originally posted a version of this back in 2009 (oh god, oh god). As is my wont on these occasions, I've done some re-writing and made a few entry changes out of sheer guilt. Enjoy! -- S.S.]
Well, it's Friday, and once again I've run out of dumb topical jokes involving my Asian fille du whoopie Fah Lo Suee and the latest Republican/Trump outrage du jour.
Hey -- what can you do?
In any case, posting by moi will necessarily be sporadic for a few days.
But in my absence, here's a fun project for us all to contemplate:
Best or Worst Post-Beatles Song With Either the Word Week or a Specific Day of the Week In Its Title!!!
Self-explanatory, obviously, so no arbitrary rules. Although if you try to sneak in Loudon Wainwright's "April Fools Day Morn," or "Wild Weekend" or something similar, I will come to your house and taunt you unmercifully.
Get it? We're talking songs naming either actual days of the week or including the actual word "week."
And my Totally Top of My Head Top Ten is...
10. Tori Amos -- Wednesday
Not a particularly great song, but I've had a sneaking fondness for this woman dating back to that Crucify EP cover photo she did where she was naked except for a bunch of vegetables around her neck.
9. Elton John -- Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting
God, what a stupid song on every level. Have I mentioned I was never an Elton fan, mostly because of embarrasingly exploitive posturing drivel like this?
8. The Mamas and the Papas -- Monday, Monday
Pretty gorgeous, but mostly I'm including it as a way of repenting for the snide remarks the other day about the out of tune flute on "California Dreaming."
7. The Smithereens -- Groovy Tuesday
Originally heard on Especially For You, which remains one of the great underrated albums of the 80s. This version is a solo performance by much missed head 'Reen Pat DiNizio, from back in 2000.
6. The Velvet Underground -- Sunday Morning
Lou's big Brill Building move on the Velvets' otherwise kinda scary debut LP. Seriously -- this is so pretty, The Monkees could have covered it.
5. Kaiser Chiefs -- Saturday Night
Not a fan of the Chiefs per se, but I thought it might be appropriate to have something originally written and recorded in the current century.
4. The Beatles -- Eight Days a Week
First anthologized, in this country, on the non-canonical American LP Beatles VI. As Cameron Crowe famously said of something else, you still can't buy a better record.
3. Blondie -- Sunday Girl
You know, it's not exactly a secret that I'm a sucker for a woman in a man's dress shirt and tie, but Ms. Harry was really to die for, wasn't she?
2. Small Faces -- Lazy Sunday
One of the most evocative "knickers up at the pub" songs of 60's Brit rock. And those little psychedelic breaks in the middle, with the chimes and organ, are just exquisite.
And the Numero Uno 7 Jours Par Semaine song of them all -- c'mon for a change I'm not exaggerating here and there really can't be any doubt about this -- obviously is...
1. The Easybeats -- Friday on My Mind
Oh puhleeeze -- you knew this was gonna be the one, right? A totally great song, and the amazing thing is that it's not even the Easys' best, although that remains a fairly well-kept secret outside of Australia.
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