Thursday, April 23, 2009
049 HANK WILLIAMS-40 GREATEST HITS
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Wednesday, April 22, 2009
048 BEE GEES-GREATEST
The Bee Gees started the second phase of their extraordinary careers with 1975s stellar "Jive Talkin'" (#1 for 2 weeks in 1975) a song that heralded the beginning of their rule as disco masters. They continued their ascent with the equally danceable "You Should Be Dancing" (#1 for 1 week in 1976) and peaked a few years later with their trio of #1 hits from "Saturday Night Fever" - "How Deep Is Your Love" (#1 for 3 weeks in 1977), "Stayin' Alive" (#1 for 4 weeks in 1978), and "Night Fever" (#1 for 8 weeks in 1978). The brothers managed to stay on top of the music world with their next CD, "Spirits Having Flown," which yielded 3 more #1 hits - "Too Much Heaven" (#1 for 2 weeks in 1979), "Tragedy" (#1 for 2 weeks in 1979), and "Love You Inside Out" (#1 for 1 week in 1979). "Greatest" was released in 1979, on the heels of this phenomenal late 70s success. In addition to these great #1 songs, the set includes their two other Top 10s from the period - "Nights on Broadway" (#7 in 1975) and "Love So Right" (#3 in 1976). One of my favorite songs here is "Fanny (Be Tender with My Love)" which only went to #12 in 1976 but is a beautiful ballad worthy of greater attention. The Bee Gees were so huge at the time that they even managed to score a hit on the country chart: "Rest Your Love on Me," the b-side of "Too Much Heaven," peaked at #39 in 1979. I also really enjoy the non-hits, some of which were singles for others. "(Our Love) Don't Throw It All Away," for example, peaked at #9 in 1978 for their brother, Andy Gibb. In addition, two other songs from "Saturday Night Fever" are included: "If I Can't Have You" (#1 for 1 week in 1978 for Yvonne Elliman) and "More Than a Woman" (#32 in 1978 for Tavares). I particularly like "If I Can't Have You": their version adds some fantastic urgency to the lyrics - a really great song. Finally, some top-notch album cuts are here: "Love Me," "You Stepped Into My Life," and "Children of the World" (from 1976's "Children of the World"); "Spirits (Having Flown)" (from 1979's "Spirits Having Flown"); "Wind of Change (from 1975's "Main Course"). I'm really surprised that "Love Me" was never released as a single, as it sounds like a sure-fire hit. I really love "Greatest," and the Bee Gees have been enjoying a critical and popular rediscovery in recent years; they were even inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1997. This collection, however, has gone out of print and been replaced by the subsequent "The Bee Gees - Their Greatest Hits: The Record," a 2-disc set with 40 songs. That collection comprises hits from their entire career, from "New York Mining Disaster" (#14 in 1967) to "Alone" (#28 in 1997). However, "Greatest" is much more focused on their disco era success and thus sounds very cohesive. -AMAZON.COM
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047 EMERSON,LAKE AND PALMER-TARKUS
046 BOB MARLEY-LEGEND
I remember sitting in my room one Saturday listening to the horse races on the radio, and in betweem each race the DJ would play No Woman No Cry. The words were haunting.. "And I remember when we used to sit... In a Government Yard in trenchtown..." The vouce and lyrics seemed magical... so simple yet so beautiful. That was about 30 years ago and I have been a fan ever since. Bob's music spoke to me personally, as it did to people all around te world. As it will speak to you once you play this album. But don't stop there... buy more... listen to songs like Concrete Jungle; Talking Blues, and Roots Rock Reggae. In fact let your next album be the Live at the London Lyceum and you will get a flavour for the infectious Bob.
If you have a Jamaican friend have him/her explain the lyrics (if needed). But regardless, just enjoy the music. Enjoy it with fans from Africa, Europe, Canada and now the USA. I saw Bob once in Tampa and was amazed at the 'good old boys' in Cowboy hats and bandanas that screamed for Bob and sang his songs. I knew then that Bob's music was truly intended for the world to love.
When Bob died I heard the news over BBC radio. I was 20+ years old then but I cried. I had lost a good friend. Then I reached for my records and played Rastaman Chant, and cried some more when Bob sang... "One bright morning when my work is over I will fly away home.", the background containing soulful conga drumming. But as the song ended I felt better.. bob's music made me feel better. Fly on BOB. And you my friend... listen to the Music on Legend and experience an upliftment... fly with Bob. Enjoy Legend! But remember there is more great Marley music awaiting you. -AMAZON.COM
045 METALLICA-METALLICA
044 PHIL COLLINS-FACE VALUE
043 U2-NO LINE ON THE HORIZON
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
042 RADIOHEAD-OK COMPUTER (COLLECTOR'S EDITION)
OK Computer reached number one on the UK Albums Chart and marked Radiohead's highest entry into the American market at the time, debuting at number 21 on the Billboard 200. The album expanded the band's worldwide popularity, and has been certified triple platinum in the UK, double platinum in the US, and platinum in Australia. OK Computer received considerable attention and acclaim at the time of its release, and has since been considered by music critics and listener polls as one of the greatest albums ever recorded.
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Monday, March 23, 2009
041 JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE- ARE YOU EXPERIENCED
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040 DEEP PURPLE- MADE IN JAPAN
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039 MILES DAVIS -KIND OF BLUE
Though precise figures have been disputed, Kind of Blue has been cited by many music writers as Miles Davis's best-selling album, as well as the best-selling jazz record of all time. On October 7, 2008, the album was certified quadruple platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It has also been regarded by many critics as the greatest jazz album of all time and Davis's magnum opus, and it has been ranked at or near the top of several "best album" lists in disparate genres. The album's influence on music, including jazz, rock and classical music, has led music writers to acknowledge it as one of the most influential albums of all time.
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Sunday, March 8, 2009
038 Coldplay-Viva La Vida or Death and all His Friends
Gone are Chris Martin's piano recitals and gone are the washes of meticulously majestic guitar, replaced by orchestrations of sound, sometimes literally consisting of strings but usually a tapestry of synthesizers, percussion, organs, electronics, and guitars that avoid playing riffs. Gone too are simpering schoolboy ballads like "Fix You," and along with them the soaring melodies designed to fill arenas. In fact, there are no insistent hooks to be found anywhere on Viva la Vida, and there are no clear singles in this collection of insinuatingly ingratiating songs.
This reliance on elliptical melodies isn't off-putting — alienation is alien to Coldplay — and this is where Eno's guidance pays off, as he helps sculpt Viva la Vida to work as a musical whole, where there are long stretches of instrumentals and where only "Strawberry Swing," with its light, gently infectious melody and insistent rhythmic pulse, breaks from the album's appealingly meditative murk. Whatever iciness there is to the sound of Viva la Vida is warmed by Martin's voice, but the music is by design an heir to the earnest British art rock of '80s Peter Gabriel and U2 — arty enough to convey sober intelligence without seeming snobby, the kind of album that deserves to take its title from Frida Kahlo and album art from Eugene Delacroix. That Delacroix painting depicts the French Revolution, so it does fit that Martin tones down his relentless self-obsession — the songs aren't heavy on lyrics and some are shockingly written in character — which is a development as welcome as the expanded sonic palette. Martin's refined writing topics may be outpaced by the band's guided adventure, but they're both indicative that Coldplay are desperate to not just strive for the title of great band — a title they seem to believe that they're to the manor born — but to actually burrow into the explorative work of creating music. And so the greatest thing Coldplay may have learned from Eno is his work ethic, as they demonstrate a focused concentration throughout this tight album — it's only 47 minutes yet covers more ground than X&Y and arguably A Rush of Blood to the Head — that turns Viva la Vida into something quietly satisfying.
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037 ROBERT PLANT ALISON KRAUSS - RAISING SAND
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Saturday, March 7, 2009
036 SINEAD O'CONNOR-I DO NOT WANT WHAT I HAVEN'T GOT
I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got is the second album by Sinéad O'Connor released
in 1990 on Chrysalis Records.
The critically-acclaimed album contains her most famous single, "Nothing Compares 2 U", and was one of the best selling records in the world in 1990, topping the charts in many countries, including the US, UK, and Canada. The single "Emperor's New Clothes" found more moderate success, although it did top the Modern Rock Tracks chart in the US.
The album includes O'Connor's rendition of "I Am Stretched on Your Grave," an anonymous 17th century poem (originally written in Irish) translated into English by Philip King. The first song, "Feels So Different", starts with The Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr.
The inner sleeve notes acknowledge Kabbalah teacher, Warren Kenton: "Special thanks to Selina Marshall + Warren Kenton for showing me that all I'd need was inside me."
The album was nominated for four Grammy Awards in 1991, winning the award for Best Alternative Music Performance. O'Connor refused to accept the nominations and the award.
In 2003, the album was ranked number 406 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.
The album sold 7 million copies worldwide.
Sinead announced on her web blog that a deluxe anniversary edition of the album will be released in April 2009. She says it will contain "an extra cd of some unreleased tracks and b sides and hard to find mixes on so on".-WIKIPEDIA
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Friday, March 6, 2009
035 JACKSON BROWNE-THE PRETENDER
This is an impressive record, but a lot of the time I hate it; my grade is an average, not a judgment. Clearly Jon Landau has gotten more out of Browne's voice than anyone knew was there, and the production jolts Ol' Brown Eyes out of his languor again and again. But languor is Browne's best mask, and what's underneath isn't always so impressive. The shallowness of his kitschy doomsaying and sentimental sexism is well-known, but I'm disappointed as well in his depth of craft. How can apparently literate people mistake a received metaphor like "sleep's dark and silent gate" for interesting poetry or gush over a versifier capable of such rhyming dictionary pairings as "pretender" and "ice cream vendor" (the colloquial term, JB, is "ice cream man")? Similar shortcomings flaw the production itself--the low-register horns on "Daddy's Tune" complement its somber undertone perfectly, but when the high blare kicks in at the end the song degenerates into a Honda commercial. Indeed, at times I've wondered whether some of this isn't intended as parody, but a sense of humor has never been one of Browne's virtues. B
-ROBERT CHRISTGAU
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Thursday, March 5, 2009
034 ANDERSON BRUFORD WAKEMAN HOWE-ANDERSON BRUFORD WAKEMAN HOWE
033 DEF LEPPARD-HIGH 'N' DRY
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032 GREG LAKE-GREG LAKE
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031 GEORGE HARRISON-CLOUD NINE
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030 DIRE STRAITS-DIRE STRAITS
Despite initial misgivings, I've found this thoughtful and sexy. The decisive touch is how Mark Knopfler counterpoints his own vocals on guitar--only a musician with a real structural knack could sound like two people that way. But there's a streak of philistine ideology here that speaks for too many white r&b players these days--most of them can't be bothered articulating it, that's all. In "In the Gallery," an honest sculptor has his bareback rider, coal miner, and skating ballerina rejected by the "trendy boys," "phonies," and "fakes" who (literally) conspire together and "decide who gets the breaks." Those who find this rather simplistic should now ask themselves whether Knopfler's beloved Sultans of Swing--not to mention Dire Straits--have more in common with that sculptor than he suspects. B -Robert Christgau
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029 DAVID BOWIE-SCARY MONSTERS (AND SUPER CREEP)
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028 ARCTIC MONKEYS-WHATEVER PEOPLE SAY I AM THAT'S WHAT I'M NOT
It would be nice to think that a democratized music industry would mean the kids are tossing up alternatives to what they're already getting, but the Arctic Monkeys are, at their heart, the same sort of meat'n'potatoes guitar rock that has dominated the UK since the emergence of the Strokes, if not Oasis. They're a band that neatly sums up what's already selling, and in a relatively condensed media market the group was always going to be a hit; what's changed is that they were pegged quickly, mainlined to their target market and the UK mainstream press and radio for six months, then called an organic success story. (America, don't get smug: Your biggest download success to date is "My Humps".) And context still matters: When Oasis or the Strokes rolled into town, they were breaths of fresh air, antidotes to a lack of swagger or hooks or artists who wanted and deserved to be rock stars; Arctic Monkeys are yet another in a string of buzzsaw guitar bands with Northern accents.
What's meant to be different about them are sometimes keenly expressive lyrics and that irresistible backstory. The band's more starry-eyed backers compare their hardscrabble tales to those of predecessors such as the Specials, Smiths, Pulp, and the Streets. But wringing lyrics from the everyday or articulating the dissatisfaction of many is risky and difficult business and, unlike those listed above, the Monkeys aren't so much spinning deft tales of quotidian anxiety as just complaining about their first steps into nightlife, run-ins with bouncers, cops, and schoolmates. So they're the UK's emo, painting diaristic portraits of small-town and suburban life for teens in a country where fundamentalism is allegiance to a soccer club rather than religion.
Hey, fair play to them-- first steps into nightlife, run-ins with bouncers, cops, and schoolmates, these should be the worries in their lives, and of their peers they're among the best at addressing them. Almost everything that's appealing about Arctic Monkeys is down to singer Alex Turner, who possesses a gritty voice that gets increasingly appealing the more he allows it to stretch and wander. On sharp, observational, and detail-heavy Saturday Night and Sunday Morning tracks like the "Red Lights Indicate Doors Are Secure", "Mardy Bum", and "Riot Van" the band justifies taking their album name from the kitchen-sink drama. (Though it's still terrible-- alas, Don't Let the Bastards Get You Down was already taken). Outside of naming their record, when the band stumbles it's typically when they're fumbling around with women ("Dancing Shoes", "Still Take You Home") or complaining about the onset of fame (the dreadful "Perhaps Vampires Is a Bit Strong But...").
The singles are a mixed bag. The Five Minutes With... EP's "Fake Tales of San Francisco" is a witty call to arms, a plea for bands that say something about their lives, but "From the Ritz to the Rubble"'s whining almost makes you want to side with the bouncers. Of the Monkeys' starmaking tracks, neither sounds like a No. 1, let alone the first sounds from a burgeoning sensation: "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" grates every other time I listen to it; better is the offbeat "When the Sun Goes Down", the only track here that's three-dimensional structurally as well as lyrically. Should the band release album closer "A Certain Romance" as its next single, the hit/miss ratio will be greatly improved. A long sigh about living among chavs, "Romance" finds the Monkeys moving between bloody-knuckled and wistful as they paint a picture of boredom breeding violence, of being aware of the faults and faultlines in their environment but feeling too powerless or hemmed in by loyalty to raise a fuss. It's a neat summation of both the band's m.o. and a teenage life characterized by existential drift and geographic claustrophobia.
And in the end then this is about teenage life-- and a pretty specific type of teenage life at that. NME editor Conor McNicholas told The Guardian last year that "there's a big sofa supermarket by Doncaster train station. I always look at it and think someone's got a Saturday job there, they're 17, they're stuck in Doncaster and they fucking hate it-- that's the person we're publishing for." I'd guess that to a disaffected, chavbaiting 17-year-old from Doncaster (or Rotherham, or Hull...) this is the perfect soundtrack to moving loveseats around a stock room. Fittingly then the NME awarded this album a 10/10. To the rest of us, however, the album is at times charming, oddly affecting, and certainly promising but understandably something less than life changing.
- Scott Plagenhoef, January 25, 2006 (PITCHFORKMEDIA)
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Wednesday, March 4, 2009
027 KEANE-HOPES AND FEARS
026 JEFF BECK-BLOW BY BLOW
As an all-instrumental album it was a surprising commercial success, with a jazz fusion-like approach seldom seen on best-selling lists at the time. It was certified gold in 1976.
The album was produced by George Martin and recorded at his own AIR studios. Martin also composed string arrangements for two of the tracks, "Scatterbrain" and "Diamond Dust".
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025 DURAN DURAN-RIO
The album went gold in the US on 1 March 1983, and platinum on 26 April 1983, eventually reaching double platinum status. It peaked at number six on the Billboard 200 album chart in the US on March 12, 1983, and remained on the chart for 129 weeks.
In 2000, Rio was ranked #98 in Q magazine's "100 Greatest British Albums". In 2003, it was listed at #65 in the NME "100 Greatest Albums of All Time". In 2004, CMJ ranked it as #1 in their "Top 20 Most-Played Albums of 1982".
Rio became part of the Classic Albums series when released on DVD on 4 November 2008.
024 ABC-THE LEXICON OF LOVE
Most of the production team and sessions players listed below would form the basis for the ZTT label, and their work with Horn meant all concerned would be in constant demand throughout the industry in years to come. "Tears Are Not Enough" (in its initial release produced by Steve Brown), "All of My Heart", "Poison Arrow", and "The Look of Love (Part One)" were all Top 20 hits in the UK; the last two also charted in the US, peaking at #25 and #14 respectively. The album reached #1 on the British charts, and peaked at #24 in the U.S. charts.
In 2004, a deluxe 2-disc reissue including outtakes and early demos and a live performance of the album from 1982 was released on the Neutron label.
In 1998, Q magazine readers voted The Lexicon of Love the 92nd greatest album of all time. In 2000 the same magazine placed it at number 40 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever.
The woman who says "Goodbye" in "The Look of Love (Part One)" is the woman who dumped Martin Fry and this album is about his feelings of outrage about it. The idea of getting her to do that part of the song came from producer Trevor Horn-WIKIPEDIA
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
023 GENESIS-SELLING ENGLAND BY THE POUND
022 MICHAEL JACKSON-THE ULTIMATE COLLECTION
Much of the music is drawn from the height of Jackson's career, particularly from the main five albums: Off the Wall, Thriller, Bad, Dangerous and HIStory. Notable tracks on the compilation include the first release of the demos of songs such as "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)" and "Shake Your Body Down to the Ground", and rarities such as "We Are Here to Change the World" (from the film Captain EO), "On the Line" (from the film "Get on the Bus"), "Cheater" and "Monkey Business" (from the Dangerous sessions), and the original demo of "We Are the World", featuring Jackson as a soloist. The set also included four new songs, "In the Back", "Beautiful Girl", "The Way You Love Me" and "We've Had Enough", all written by Jackson.
The fifth disc is a DVD of a Dangerous concert in Bucharest, broadcast by HBO in 1992 which was released again in 2005 as Live in Bucharest: The Dangerous Tour.
021 MOZART-THE COMPLETE EDITION (PHILIPS-180 CDS)
An altered version of The Complete Mozart Edition was released in 2006. It consists of 17 individual boxed sets. This version also contains stripped down versions of the booklets that accompanied the original series.
In addition, a boxed set entitled The Best of the Complete Mozart Edition was also produced. This set contains 25 compact discs and represents a condensed version of the 1990-91 set.
020 PAT METHENY DAVE HOLLAND ROY HAYNES-QUESTION AND ANSWER
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019 JOHN COLTRANE-BALLADS
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018 JOHN LENNON-IMAGINE
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Monday, March 2, 2009
017 ERIC CLAPTON-CROSSROADS
016 BEE GEES-SPIRITS HAVING FLOWN
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"The record the world's been waiting for," reads an ad for Spirits Having Flown, and that's not just hype, since the Bee Gees' new album represents a deliberate attempt to fashion a "global" pop. Instead of extending the airy pop-disco of Saturday Night Fever, the Brothers Gibb have consolidated several styles, only one of which is disco, to make slower, more elaborate music. Miami Blue-Eyed Soul Meets Europop in Ecumenical Heaven might be an apt subtitle. Though impressively produced, Spirits Having Flown isn't nearly as powerful as the crux of Saturday Night Fever, and its failures suggest that the group's brilliant fusion of adolescent love songs and disco for the 1977 soundtrack LP was at least partly accidental.
From the beginning, the Bee Gees' mating of pop and R&B was shaky. True, the key cuts on the transitional Main Course, for which producer Arif Mardin taught the trio the rhythmic basics, were landmarks. But the following disc, Children of the World, on which the Gibbs and coproducers Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson toughened up the style, was less satisfying. There, the effort seemed forced, and the combination of harder rhythms and a much grainier sound created an abrasively shrill and somewhat cheesy blue-eyed soul that redeemed itself only once, in the poppers-in-the-fun-house smash, "You Should Be Dancing." Coming after this letdown album, the gorgeous and surprising Saturday Night Fever songs (from the same production team) elegantly underlined both the strength and delicacy of the special chemistry. These made-to-order movie tunes had such a magical flow and simplicity that, in one stroke, a universal dance music was born. Not since the heyday of Glenn Miller, forty years earlier, had the dreamy and aggressive impulses of pop meshed so seamlessly to stamp an era.
On Spirits Having Flown, not a single composition has the ethereal propulsion of "Stayin' Alive," "Night Fever" or "More than a Woman." "Tragedy," the new record's fastest dance number, is a mini melodrama that gallops along on a bed of synthesized lava, with a chorus of bleating seraphs cleaved midway by a thunderbolt. While the gimmickry is clever and the tune irresistible, the whole thing's a bit too self-conscious to take off. The other two danceable cuts—"Search, Find" (a milder but stirring echo of "You Should Be Dancing") and "Love You inside Out"—lack hard-core disco momentum. "Too Much Heaven," Spirits Having Flown's "How Deep Is Your Love," sets one of the group's most glamorous melodies against a cumulus of strings and a ticking Latin beat. Though as delicious as strawberry ice cream, the song misses the aching intimacy of its forerunner, and the message ("Nobody gets too much love anymore") rings like an official proclamation. To strengthen this impression of celestial omnipotence, when the Bee Gees lip-synced "Too Much Heaven" on the recent TV benefit for UNICEF, they were haloed in soft focus like blissed-out angels just back from a meeting with God.
This album's weaknesses are synonymous with the Gibbs' pseudodeific, megastar self-conception. Most of the songs are sung with perfect pitch, but the trio's piercing collective falsetto (built around Barry's lead vocals) is so relentless that the few moments in which the voices drop to their natural register come as a relief. The Four Seasons, alas, and not Smokey Robinson are the prototype for such an unearthly style: shrill, stiff, mechanical yowls that generate tension yet aren't expressive enough to carry an entire LP. This metallic shriek was made appealing on Main Course and Saturday Night Fever because it was softened and distanced into a floating, plaintive cry that found a workable counterbalance in a springy, clearly articulated electric bass. John Travolta's moving portrayal of young Tony Manero and his struggle for recognition in the film also lent poignant meaning to the falsetto, which became an aural metaphor for the anxious human spirit: an attestation of innocence, a cry for help, a sob of nostalgia.
Spirits Having Flown's lack of a cinematic subtext also causes problems with the lyrics. The Bee Gees have always taken a rather functional approach to words, basing their choices as much on phonetics as on the literal sense of what's being said, so that many of their lyrics scan like computer distillations of love comics. But with Saturday Night Fever, the real-life movie setting coaxed a more down-to-earth point of view, and the culmination, "Stayin' Alive," deservedly became a worldwide anthem. On the new record, the return to lyrical abstractions, when combined with such insistent falsettos, makes the Gibbs sound (not altogether unintentionally) like three android planetary overseers instead of fellow human beings.
Aside from the album's melodic consistency (nine out of ten tunes have substantial hooks), its major success is in the area of production: the Bee Gees, Galuten and Richardson offer a sugary, futuristic melange of Abba-styled Europop, post-Motown R&B and Miami disco, with greater emphasis on horns and synthesizer. A duet between falsetto voices and a sputtering saxophone over a brass choir in "Stop (Think Again)" demonstrates a particularly haunting use of horns. Throughout Spirits Having Flown, the synthesizer is integrated with far more assurance than before, so that the strongest songs outstrip Abba in sophistication while maintaining the requisite Europop tone of brittle, ultraaccessible cordiality. The title track is the producers' pièce de résistance. A mystical ballad that swells like the sea over a synthesized roar as a quasi-western movie theme is reiterated by a steel band, "Spirits (Having Flown)" carries international sci-fi/religioso pop to a decorative peak of opulence.
Along with Donna Summer and Abba, the Brothers Gibb are defining the emergent mainstream of space-age pop. The musical equivalent of such Hollywood screen extravaganzas as Star Wars and Superman, this international style giddily exalts a blind faith in technology, flaunting the artificiality while exhorting our wildest childhood fantasies of escape into toyland. The Bee Gees' mythos—they always wanted to be bigger than the Beatles, whom they originally cloned, and now they are, commercially speaking—lends their music a messianic right, albeit a somewhat muted one. We're not only encouraged to play with (or to try to become) futuristic toys, but to accept the Gibbs as heavenly castrati—Johnny Mathis robot voices come to soothe our hypereroticized climate with musical candy. Yet the falsettos cut two ways: even as they keen like rockets in the chill of space, their squall brings out the crybaby in all of us.
As millennial fever looms, the Bee Gees shrewdly answer our contradictory urges to rush forward and to retreat. Their soundtrack for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band represented one last pitiful attempt to get back and become the Beatles. On the UNICEF TV special, they finally got away with posing as the Fab Four's spiritual heirs. But the global consciousness that the Gibbs conjure is far different from that of the Beatles, who embodied a non-bureaucratic world community of hippie individualists. The Bee Gees' global village would be a junior high of androgynous, conformist goody-goodies: a world with no violence or sex, only puppy love, and every toy in creation. That's why Spirits Having Flown is a Sunday-school heaven of eternal childhood, stringently regulated by "angels."
-Rolling Stone,1979
015 FRANK SINATRA-SONGS FOR SWINGIN' LOVERS
Sinatra already had one youthful career behind him by the time he made Songs for Swingin' Lovers! His were no longer the lustrous pipes of the kid crooner from Hoboken--the voice that made bobbysoxers swoon--but from the first notes of the opening track ("You Make Me Feel So Young") he seems to have discovered a musical fountain of youth that fully justifies the exclamation point in the album title. There's a buoyant new spring in his step, accented by Nelson Riddle's lighter-than-air arrangements, that makes the Columbia records of Sinatra's younger days sound stiff and stodgy in comparison. Even chestnuts like "Old Devil Moon," "Pennies from Heaven," "Makin' Whoopee," and "Anything Goes" are rejuvenated by his vibrant touch. Put this alongside his previous Capitol album, In the Wee Small Hours, and you have the definitive statements by both sides of Sinatra's mature musical personality: the lonely "saloon singer" and the swaggering, sophisticated swinger. Sinatra's carefree confidence achieves its supreme expression in "I've Got You Under My Skin," a performance that builds steadily to an ecstatic climax. Cole Porter may have hated his lyrical embellishments, but by the time the singer jauntily breaks the "fourth wall" on "Anything Goes" ("...may I say before this records spins to a close..."), you can't deny he's taken the title to heart. --Jim Emerson amazon.com
014 ROBERT JOHNSON-KING OF THE DELTA BLUES SINGERS
If there is a recording that is required listening for every blues fan, it's this one. Robert Johnson wasn't just King of the Delta blues; he was one of its founding fathers, and these re-mastered tunes are as timeless and important today as they were all those years ago. The songs that passed into the blues canon, to be covered by countless guitarists over the years, are here: "Crossroad Blues," "Preaching Blues," "Come On In My Kitchen," "Walking Blues," and more. And on this particular version of this often-reissued recording, there's an additional treat: a previously unreleased version of "Traveling Riverside Blues." Absolutely essential. --Genevieve Williams amazon.com
013 STEVE HOWE-THE STEVE HOWE ALBUM
012 FLEETWOOD MAC-RUMOURS (DELUXE EDITION)
With the pop sense of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks now leading the band, Fleetwood Mac moved completely away from blues and created this homage to love, Southern California-style. Each songwriter makes his or her presence known: Nicks for her dreamy, mystical reveries ("Dreams," "Gold Dust Woman:); Christine McVie for her ultra-catchy slogans ("Don't Stop"); and Buckingham for his deceptively simple pop songs ("Second Hand News," "Go Your Own Way"). "The Chain," written collectively, is the Mac at their most dramatic. But it's the ensemble playing, the elastic rhythms, and lush harmonies that transform the material into classic FM fare. --Rob O'Connor amazon.com
011 BECK-MUTATIONS
So I'm in a bit of a spot here. How can I tell you something about the album you don't already know? How about this one: it's better than Odelay. Now let me qualify that statement. There are some who will tell you that Beck's last album is a masterwork of late 20th century American culture; I'm not one of them. On that landmark 1996 release, Beck fully realized his oft-heralded command of an unfathomable range of musical genres. It was a fantastically successful album, both financially and musically. But slightly lost in that jumbled collage of sounds and influences was the synergy of the album as a whole. In his efforts to plaster his genius credentials as subtly as a billboard, he failed to create the sense of unity that is a trademark of every true masterpiece. Ultimately, Odelay was a somewhat disjointed collection of great songs.
On Mutations, Beck's traded in his two turntables and microphone for a Moog synth and a copy of the Kinks' Muswell Hillbillies. Here, he fully explores his obsession with the 60s. He's always shared Ray Davies' ear for a tune and flair for the theatrical, but on "Bottle of Blues", he manages to co-opt the old Brit's voice, too. Yet, what makes Beck special is his ability to infuse his own musical identity into the lifted lines. Like Davies' Hillbillies and even Neil Young's Tonight's the Night, Mutations initially flows so easily that it sounds rudimentary. It's that very flow that's missing on Odelay, and subsequent listens reveal the complex details creating it. It's like pressing your nose against an impressionist painting to examine the thousands of meticulously placed brush dabs that make up the seascape.
If the backbone of the album is a string of rootsy melodies-- some of the best Beck has ever penned-- its mood is definitely driven by Godrich's patented pre-millennial assortment of buzzes, bleeps and quirks, giving it the spacy urgency of OK Computer, and leaving us with a beautifully futuristic roots album. A perfect example of this is the addendum to the album's last track, on which dueling lasers fire over a riff swiped off of the Beatles' Revolver.
Unfortunately, with the music biz buzz awaiting the release of Odelay's proper follow-up (due next year), Mutations will most likely be praised and then forgotten. Its low budget, soft-spoken demeanor, and lack of a standout single will surely count against it. For that to happen would be tragic. Beck is clearly working on a level most others can only dream of, and Mutations is proof of that. It seems impossible that his next album could be any better, but I can't wait to find out.
- Neil Lieberman, November 1, 1998 (PITCHFORK)
010 ELVIS PRESLEY-THE KING OF ROCK 'N' ROLL THE COMPLETE 50'S MASTERS
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009 YES-FRAGILE
Work on the material began while Kaye was still in the band. In a 2006 interview, he said, "I did rehearse Fragile before I left. I left in the middle."[1] Four of the nine tracks feature full performances by the new line-up with Wakeman, three of which were of eight minutes length or longer. Its best known track, "Roundabout," was released in the United States in an edited version as a single. Rick Wakeman contributed to the writing of "South Side of the Sky" and "Heart of the Sunrise" by adding piano interludes to both songs, but wasn't credited due to contractual conflicts. He was instead promised more money by Atlantic studio executives, which he claims he never saw.
The remaining five tracks showcase the band members' individual talents. "Cans and Brahms" is an arrangement by Wakeman of the third movement from the Fourth Symphony in E minor by Johannes Brahms, his utilization of synthesizers adapted to classical works in vogue at the time, evidenced in efforts by Wendy Carlos and Isao Tomita. "We Have Heaven" is by Jon Anderson in which he sings all the vocal parts, a technique later used on his solo album Olias of Sunhillow. Bill Bruford's "Five Per Cent for Nothing" derives its instrumental passages from the rhythm line, while "The Fish" and "Mood for a Day" serve almost entirely as bass and guitar solo pieces for Chris Squire and Steve Howe, respectively.
Side one"Roundabout" (Anderson/Howe) – 8:30 "Cans and Brahms (Extracts from
Brahms' 4th Symphony in E Minor, Third Movement)" (Brahms, arranged Wakeman) –
1:38 "We Have Heaven" (Anderson) – 1:40 "South Side of the Sky"
(Anderson/Squire) – 8:02
Side two"Five Per Cent for Nothing" (Bruford) – 0:35 "Long Distance
Runaround" (Anderson) – 3:30 "The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)" (Squire) –
2:39 "Mood for a Day" (Howe) – 3:00 "Heart of the Sunrise"
(Anderson/Squire/Bruford) – 11:27
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About Me
- winston
- A Beatles fan since December 1980.Now an oral surgeon and music journalist.He lives in Bangkok.