The Jeff Beck Group - I Ain't Superstitious

 #The Jeff Beck Group #Jeff Beck #Rod Stewart #blues rock # hard rock #British blues rock #British R&B #heavy blues rock #proto-metal #classic rock #1960s

Despite being the premiere of heavy metal, Jeff Beck's Truth has never quite carried its reputation the way the early albums by Led Zeppelin did, or even Cream's two most popular LPs, mostly as a result of the erratic nature of the guitarist's subsequent work. Time has muted some of its daring, radical nature, elements of which were appropriated by practically every metal band (and most arena rock bands) that followed. Truth was almost as groundbreaking and influential a record as the first Beatles, Rolling Stones, or Who albums. Its attributes weren't all new - Cream and Jimi Hendrix had been moving in similar directions - but the combination was: the wailing, heart-stoppingly dramatic vocalizing by Rod Stewart, the thunderous rhythm section of Ron Wood's bass and Mickey Waller's drums, and Beck's blistering lead guitar, which sounds like his amp is turned up to 13 and ready to short out. Beck opens the proceedings in a strikingly bold manner, using his old Yardbirds hit "Shapes of Things" as a jumping-off point, deliberately rebuilding the song from the ground up so it sounds closer to Howlin' Wolf. There are lots of unexpected moments on this record: a bone-pounding version of Willie Dixon's "You Shook Me"; a version of Jerome Kern's "Ol' Man River" done as a slow electric blues; a brief plunge into folk territory with a solo acoustic guitar version of "Greensleeves" (which was intended as filler but audiences loved); the progressive blues of "Beck's Bolero"; the extended live "Blues Deluxe"; and "I Ain't Superstitious," a blazing reworking of another Willie Dixon song.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/truth-mw0000262744

Ginger Baker's Air Force - Early in the Morning

 #Ginger Baker's Air Force #Chris Wood #Graham Bond #Denny Laine #jazz-rock #afro-fusion #blues rock #afrobeat #hard rock #R&B #supergroup #1970s #ex-Cream #Beat-Club

For a change, the late 1960s yielded up a supergroup that lived up to its hype and then some. Ginger Baker's Air Force was recorded live at Royal Albert Hall in January of 1970 - in fact, this may be the best-sounding live album ever to come out of that notoriously difficult venue - at a show that must have been a wonder to watch, as the ten-piece band blazed away in sheets of sound, projected delicate flute parts behind multi-layered African percussion, or built their songs up Bolero-like, out of rhythms from a single instrument into huge jazz-cum-R&B crescendos. Considering that this was only their second gig, the group sounds astonishingly tight, which greatly reduces the level of self-indulgence that one would expect to find on an album where five of the eight tracks run in excess of ten minutes. There aren't too many wasted notes or phrases in the 78 minutes of music included here, and Steve Winwood's organ, Baker, Phil Seamen, and Remi Kabaka's drums, and the sax playing by Chris Wood, Graham Bond (on alto), and Harold McNair, all stand out, especially the sax trio's interwoven playing on "Don't Care." Additionally, Denny Laine plays louder, flashier, more virtuoso-level guitar than he ever got to turn in with the Moody Blues, bending notes in exquisite fashion in the opening of Air Force's rendition of the Cream standard "Toad," crunching away on rhythm elsewhere, and indulging in some more introspective blues for "Man of Constant Sorrow."  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/ginger-bakers-air-force-mw0000202606

Thundermother - Revival

 #Thundermother #hard rock #heavy metal #heavy psych #blues rock #Swedish

The quintessential hard-rocking sound of Sweden's Thundermother takes cues from AC/DC and Motörhead but sees the group add a modern twist, as heard on acclaimed efforts like Heat Wave (2020) and Black & Gold (2022). The brainchild of Sweden's Filippa Nässil, Thundermother first came about in 2010 after she moved to Stockholm to start a classic rock band. Nässil teamed up with Italian guitarist Giorgia Carteri, who had also found herself in Stockholm, and they started to put together a band, finally settling down with drummer Tilda Stenqvist, bassist Linda Ström, and Irish vocalist Clare Cunningham in 2013. With the group a solid collective, they embarked on national tours, peddling their own modern brand of classic '70s rock before issuing their debut album, Rock 'n' Roll Disaster, in 2014.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/thundermother-mn0003244561/biography

Q: I would be silly to ask about Thundermother’s influences, so I’m just going to start with how did you come up with the band’s name and what have been your personal music heroes.

A: Filippa came up with the name when she founded the band, in 2010. She was just brainstorming and the name appeared in her head, like a miracle haha. She is a big AC/DC fan, and their sound has always been a core sound for Thundermother. My personal musical heroes are Iron Maiden, since I was a teenager, and as a drummer my main hero is John Bonham. And you can hear that in my drumming on our songs. People used to say that if John Bonham and Phil Rudd had a baby, that would have been me, haha!

Q: As a Runaways/Girlschool/Vixen worshipper myself, how do you girls really do with the guys? On 2020 AD how can a girl gang survive without receiving criticism about her looks and just focus on the music?

A: Well, we often feel that we need to over-prove ourselves, because people underestimate us only because we are women. But we love to be underdogs and we are confident in ourselves. We will always be judged but we decide to not care. And we take care of each other and support each other through tough situations. We need to get this world equal for real now, and if we can help by playing music we are super happy to do that!

Q: What has been the highlight of your career so far?

A: We’ve had many highlights - to play at Wacken was definiteley one of them! Also to play in the USA on the Kiss Kruise. To be able to have the band as our only job is also a really big highlight. We feel so lucky to have this band as our only employment, its a dream come true!

Q: How has coronavirus affected Thundermother and what can a fan do apart from streaming and buying merchandise during quarantine?

A: The only thing that has affected us is that we had to cancel a lot of shows, and that is of course a big deal for us. But otherwise we have just been going on as much as possible, and thank god we had already finished our album in February before everything closed down. I guess the best thing a fan can do right now is to support us by buying our new album, and help us reaching the charts and get us to the next level, so that whenever we can tour again, it will be like a big explosion!

From: https://metalinvader.net/interview-with-thundermother/

The Seldom Scene - California Earthquake

#The Seldom Scene #John Starling #Mike Auldridge #bluegrass #folk #progressive bluegrass #Americana #alt-country #contemporary bluegrass #1970s

The Seldom Scene was established in 1971 in a basement in Bethesda, Maryland. The original line-up, our Founding Scene Fathers, was John Starling on guitar, Mike Auldridge on Dobro, Ben Eldridge on banjo, Tom Gray on double bass, and John Duffey on mandolin. Charlie Waller, a member of the Country Gentlemen, can be credited for the band's name. Expressing his doubt that this new band could succeed, Waller reportedly asked Duffey, "What are you going to call yourselves, the seldom seen?" The band performed weekly at the Red Fox Inn before getting a residency at the Birchmere Music Hall in Alexandria, Virginia. The rest is history.
The progressive bluegrass style played by the Seldom Scene had become increasingly popular during the 1970s. Their weekly shows included bluegrass versions of country music, rock, and  pop. The band's popularity soon forced them to play more than once a week - but they continued to maintain their image as being seldom seen, and on several of their early album covers were photographed with the stage lights on only their feet, or with their backs to the camera. Though the Scene remained a non-touring band, they were prolific recorders, producing seven albums in their first five years of existence, including one live album (among the first live bluegrass albums).
Since forming, the band has gone through numerous lineup changes. The last big shakeup happened in 1995, when Duffey and Eldridge, the two remaining original members, recruited dobro player Fred Travers, bassist Ronnie Simpkins, and guitarist Dudley Connell to join the band. Mandolinist Lou Reid returned the following year and in 2017 Ron Stewart joined as the new banjo player. The current band has been together the longest in Seldom Scene history, and for good reason. With an inventive take on bluegrass, the Seldom Scene has displayed both their original material and their interpretations of songs from limitless genres.  From: https://www.seldomscene.com/band

Black Sabbath - The Writ

#Black Sabbath #Ozzy Osbourne #heavy metal #hard rock #classic rock #heavy blues rock #British blues rock #doom metal #1970s

"The Writ" is one of only a handful of Black Sabbath songs to feature lyrics composed by vocalist Ozzy Osbourne, who typically relied on bassist Geezer Butler for lyrics. The song was inspired by the frustrations Osbourne felt at the time, as Black Sabbath's former manager Patrick Meehan was suing the band after having been fired. The song viciously attacks the music business in general and is a savage diatribe directed towards Meehan specifically ("Are you Satan? Are you man?"), with Osbourne revealing in his memoir, "I wrote most of the lyrics myself, which felt a bit like seeing a shrink. All the anger I felt towards Meehan came pouring out." During this period, the band began to question if there was any point to recording albums and touring endlessly "just to pay the lawyers". Thematically, "The Writ" and "Megalomania" are intertwined, according to drummer Ward, as they both deal with the same tensions arising from these ongoing legal troubles.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabotage_(Black_Sabbath_album) 

Tony Iommi – identified by engineer Mike Butcher as Black Sabbath’s “unofficial leader” – has stated that Sabotage was in part a reaction to the complex style of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, on which the band had combined their signature heavy metal with elements of progressive rock, aided by Yes keyboard player Rick Wakeman and even an orchestra. “We could’ve continued getting more technical,” Iommi said, “using orchestras and everything else. But we wanted to do a rock album.” Iommi was also reacting, on a deeper level, to the ongoing litigation with Patrick Meehan. “We were in the studio one day and in court or meeting with lawyers the next,” the guitarist said. And his anger and anxiety fed into Sabotage. “The sound was a bit harder than Sabbath Bloody Sabbath,” Iommi explained. “My guitar sound was harder. That was brought on by all the aggravation we felt over all the business with management and lawyers.”

Am I Going Insane (Radio) is essentially a pop song written by Ozzy on a Moog synthesiser, which he played on the finished track. “Oz drove us all nuts with that Moog thing,” Ward recalls, “but the song was great. And in hindsight, it was kind of a precursor for his solo career. His personality was blooming on this song.” The ‘Radio’ in the title was British rhyming slang: Radio Rental – mental. Ozzy’s lyrics were “definitely autobiographical”, Butler says. Even better, and even more pointedly autobiographical, were Ozzy’s lyrics for the album’s heavyweight final track, in which he poured scorn on Black Sabbath’s tormentor, Patrick Meehan. ‘You bought and sold me with your lying words,’ Ozzy sang, before threatening a curse on his enemy. The song was named The Writ, a title that was suggested by Mike Butcher after Meehan’s lawyers arrived unannounced at Morgan Studios. “Some guy walked in and said: ‘Black Sabbath?’” Butcher recalls. “And Tony said: ‘Yeah.’ The guy said ‘I have something for you,’ and gave him a writ.” Adding to the threatening vibe of The Writ was a sinister intro mixing laughter and cries of anguish. The laughter was that of an Australian friend of Geezer’s. “He was a complete nutter,” the bassist says. “We invited him into the studio when he was visiting London.” The cries were those of a baby, recorded on an unmarked cassette tape that Mike Butcher found lying on a console at Morgan. When he played it at half speed, the baby’s crying took on an eerie quality. “It was so weird,” he says, “that it worked perfectly for that track.” Butcher never found out whose tape it was. For Ozzy, writing and singing the words to this song had a therapeutic effect. “A bit like seeing a shrink,” he said.  And yet, for all the vitriol in The Writ there was a note of hope, and defiance, in its closing line: ‘Everything is gonna work out fine.’ And, in the short term at least, those words would ring true. Patrick Meehan would not break Black Sabbath.

From: https://www.loudersound.com/features/how-black-sabbath-made-sabotage

Guerilla Toss - Dose Rate

#Guerilla Toss #neo-psychedelia #art rock #noise rock #experimental rock #space rock #indie rock #electronic #no wave #post-rock #music video

GT Ultra is the second full length album by Guerilla Toss on DFA Records. The album demonstrates a remarkable shift in sound, musicianship and songwriting, without ever giving up the unhinged quality that made their earlier recordings so exciting. The album title GT Ultra is a clever nod to ‘Project MK Ultra’, the government sponsored experiments using new experimental drugs to explore mind control, torture and forced confessions, often with LSD as their drug of choice. These tests lasted from the mid 1950’s-1960’s, but with a new administration in the white house, government sponsored torture is fresh again on many minds. The songs on the album ricochet back and forth between hyper bouncy pop and deeper darker longer, more nuanced tracks. Peter Negroponte’s drumming, always a major highlight for the band, are in full force once again, this time bringing a Nassau/Compass Point feel to many tracks, like the classic recordings of Grace Jones and Talking Heads.  Kassie Carlson’s vocals and lyrics are both more personal and more cryptic than ever. But you can hear every word this time, and there is a lyric sheet. As preferred, the meaning is within the listener. It is a dream state record for sure, meant to take you along on a similar vibe that the band has been tripping on these past few years, filled with an insistence to “hydrate, gyrate, think straight, no weight”, all the while under the influence of golden beams of orange sunshine, glimmering glitter and kaleidoscopic bursts. It is no mistake the album is wrapped in vintage blotter acid, created by legendary LSD archivist and artist Mark McCloud and The Institute of Illegal Images, based out of San Francisco.  From: https://guerillatoss.bandcamp.com/album/gt-ultra

Hedwig & The Angry Inch - Midnight Radio

 #Hedwig & The Angry Inch #John Cameron Mitchell #Stephen Trask #rock musical #movie soundtrack #hard rock #punk rock #glam rock #1970s retro

This song, to me, is about the fleeting thrills and glory of "ecstatic events" in one's life, be it becoming a rock star, playing a new record for the first time, winning a contest, or findng a perfect lover. "Midnight Radio” is a classic Rock & Roll Anthem for those of us that are, as Hedwig so eloquently states, "the misfits and the losers.” The pace and tempo of this song are as important to the meaning as the lyrics. "Midnight Radio" starts out slow and brooding, like that uneasy moment of anticipation before stepping out onto a stage, or that hesitant second before piercing the cellophane on a new LP (does anyone other than me even buy vinyl anymore?). Then the pace picks up a bit at the first chorus, and a hint of the "anthem" nature of this song starts to become apparent in the climbing scales and soaring sustains. Then the "Here's to" verse, really belts it out in true anthem spirit, ending with Hedwig practically growling out the word "tonight". And the "Yea, you know" harmony line is one of those rare musical moments that sends shivers down my back every time I hear it. This build to the climax of this song is, of course, representative of that glorious moment when those ecstatic events in one's life are peaking - the house lights come up to a roaring crowd, that first passionate kiss, the moment when the needle first drops in the groove of a new record and those first notes come from the speakers. And of course the finale "Lift up your hands,” repeating over and over again, is the trailing end of those ecstatic events, when the adrenaline rush is starting to taper off. The song gets louder, and then, although it still tingles with energy and power, it slowly fades out. Just like "real life.”  From: https://songmeanings.com/songs/view/68464/

The Beatles - Cry Baby Cry

 #The Beatles #John Lennon #Paul McCartney #George Harrison #British invasion #pop rock #psychedelic rock #blues rock #classic rock #British psychedelia #folk rock #1960s

"A piece of rubbish!" This was John Lennon's reaction in 1980 when asked about his "White Album" composition "Cry Baby Cry." Why would he react so negatively about this song? Those who take the time to examine the writing style of John Lennon through the years will easily notice the changes within the context of the time period. For instance, his output in 1967 generally used imagery to paint a picture that didn't necessarily make sense but sounded as if it did, such as with “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” and “I Am The Walrus.” By 1968, he put this aside for the most part and dealt much more with real occurrences in his own life and/or his interpretations of real events, such as with “I'm So Tired,” “Sexy Sadie” and “Revolution.” It is within the context of his 1968 output that we experience a “throwback” of sorts with “Cry Baby Cry,” a song which started to take shape the previous year and exuded the obscure but effective lyrics Lennon was known for at that time. Concerning John's negative opinion of the song in 1980, Beatles writer David Quantick offers the explanation that he “might have dismissed the song for not being about anything concrete.” This appears to make sense in light of the fact that, when looking back at his career as a songwriter, he would cite autobiographical songs, such as “Help!” and “Strawberry Fields Forever” as his best work. If that was the criteria he used in his later life, songs about imaginary characters involved in nonsensical activities could be seen as useless to him, or “rubbish.” Most Beatles fans and authors would wholeheartedly disagree, however. Ian Mac Donald, in his book "Revolution In The Head," describes "Cry Baby Cry" as “one of the most evocative products of that creative channel.” “An underrated Lennon royalty satire; it's his most accomplished Lewis Carroll pastiche,” writes Tim Riley. “A song with an air of a particularly dreamlike ghost story - one of the strangest and most beautiful lyrics on the 'White Album,'” writes David Quantick. “Alice trips gently through Lennonland for just about the last time. It ranks among his most magical,” writes Nicholas Schaffner.  From: http://www.beatlesebooks.com/cry-baby-cry

Queen Adreena - Suck

 #Queen Adrena #Katie Jane Garside #alternative rock #noise rock #indie rock #art rock #punk metal #gothic rock

Queen Adreena’s music is clearly unwholesome and conveys a feeling of gruesome schizophrenia. In my review of their excellent previous album entitled Drink me, I depicted the ex-Daisy Chainsaw’s music as, let me quote myself and have a swollen head, “on the one hand, urgent, noisy, fast and visceral punk songs in which Katie Jane Garside yells, shrieks and gives the impression of scarcely waking up from a terrible nightmare; and on the other hand, slow, poisonous atmospheric songs in which KJG’s unhealthy voice spreads its wings of depression. If you’ve never heard her voice, try to imagine Bjork performing ‘Army of Me’ completely stoned and trying to imitate Lydia Lunch. Add a punctual raucous tone due to helium inhaling and alcohol abuse,and you might have an idea of what her voice sounds like.”
What else other than drug addiction, unstable re-habs, alcohol abuse, and twisted minds can have possibly led Crispin Gray and Katie Jane Garside to play such a dubious music which really epitomize schizophrenia? When she stops yelling, shrieking and venting her rage or madness upon the listener, when she whispers or pants or just sings, KJ Garside’s changing child-like voice offers insane deliveries which, backed up by cryptic lyrics, sound like little girls’ nightmares (‘Pull Me Under’, ‘Join The Dots’, ‘Childproof’). There is certainly a child related theme in the lyrics but I do not dare analyse it, lest I become completely mad.  From: http://onlyangels.free.fr/reviews/q/queen_adreena/the_butcher_and_the_butterfly.htm

Grace Jones - Corporate Cannibal

 #Grace Jones #R&B #new wave #art rock #electronic #industrial #post-punk #post-disco #actress #performance artist #Jamaican #music video

The Corporate Cannibal video is in black and white, and the only images that appear on the screen are those of Grace Jones’ face and upper body, black against a white background. But Jones’ figure is subject to all sorts of electronic distortions. The most common effect is one of elongation: her face is stretched upwards, as if she had an impossibly long forehead, as if her notorious late-80s flattop haircut had somehow expanded beyond all dimensions. Or else, her entire body in silhouette is thinned out, gracile (if that isn’t too much of a pun), and almost insectoid. The image also bends and fractures: her mouth stretches alarmingly, her eyes bulge out and expand across the screen like some sort of toxic stain. And sometimes Jones’ figure multiplies into two or three distorted, and imperfectly separated, clones. Nothing remains steady for more than a few seconds; the screen is continually morphing, and everything is so stylized and disrupted that we don’t get a very good sense of what Jones actually looks like today. Her facial features remain somewhat recognizable — Grace Jones has never looked like anyone else - and at a few moments, we get a brief almost undistorted close-up of her eyes, nose, and mouth - but there is something monstrous as well about this individuated “faciality”; and in any case it is gone almost before we have had the time to take it in.  From: http://www.shaviro.com/Blog/?p=653

Fairport Convention - Doctor Of Physick

 #Fairport Convention #Richard Thompson #Dave Swarbrick #folk rock #British folk rock #progressive folk #1970s

The Fairports recall the making of 1970's Full House, the band's first album without founding member Ashley Hutchings and with new boy Dave Pegg “On my 22nd birthday - November 2, 1969 - I went to Mothers club in Birmingham with my ex-wife Christine to see Fairport Convention,” says the group’s current bassist Dave Pegg. “I had never seen them before but I knew [violinist] Dave Swarbrick from his work with Martin Carthy and I had played with him in the Ian Campbell Group.
“It was a new approach to traditional music,” he recalls. “It was such a great band: the interplay between [guitarist] Richard Thompson and Swarbrick instrumentally, and of course Sandy Denny’s singing and the great rhythm section of [drummer] Dave Mattacks, [rhythm guitarist] Simon Nicol and [bassist] Ashley Hutchings. I was blown away and said to Christine, ‘I would love to join that band.’ And bizarrely I got a call next day from Dave Swarbrick saying, ‘Ashley is leaving the band, would you come for an audition?’” Pegg, who had played in rock bands in the Birmingham area including The Uglys with Steve Gibbons and The Way Of Life with future Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham, landed the job. The following month, Fairport released the epochal British folk rock statement Liege & Lief, but its release coincided with Sandy Denny also quitting the band.
“It was a blow to lose them both but the mood was optimistic,” Richard Thompson recalls. “We thought it would be hard to replace Sandy, so let’s not replace her. We knew that the vocals would not be as strong, but instrumentally we were a very strong band. In the history of Fairport there had always been personnel changes. This was a big one, but our attitude was to soldier on.”
“It removed the rudder and the best part of the engine room of the Good Ship Fairport,” says Simon Nicol.“But at the same time we’d got this incredible energy coming from Dave Swarbrick. He was a born-again musician because he was a full member of a band for the first time in his life. There was a sense of, ‘I really like this and I’m really going to make it work.’ He made up for the loss of the engine room in many ways. And so we became a boy band.”
On Liege & Lief, Fairport had made the decision to incorporate more traditional British and celtic elements into their music, an approach they carried on to their next album, 1970’s Full House. Stylistically, much of this was essentially still uncharted territory. Musicians had long been playing medleys of traditional jigs and reels, but not in an electric rock band. Fairport were effectively learning on the job and were all in their early 20s, except Swarbrick who was 28, and Nicol who was still just 19.
Before he joined Fairport Convention the summer of 1969 Dave Mattacks had played in a dance band and various pop groups. “On Liege & Lief I was very much, on an aesthetic level, the deer in the headlights. I had no idea what I was doing,” he says. “I was responding to the music around me and starting to grasp it. Then I had a huge light bulb moment when I got what the band was about, and it had a profound effect upon how I wanted to play and how I heard music. But even on Full House, I can still hear a very green drummer.”
Speaking to the four surviving members who played on that album, it’s striking how much they respect each other’s playing. “Ashley had a very distinctive style that contributed to the early Fairport sound,” says Thompson, “but Peggy was much more funky, more solid. And it was astonishing that he started to play jigs and reels on the bass an octave or more under everybody else. That virtuosity became a part of the Fairport sound and was unveiled on Full House.”
Pegg describes Swarbrick as a “walking library of tunes” and for Full House he had put together the dazzling instrumental medley Dirty Linen, on which the bass player came into his own. “I knew something about traditional music from having played with the Campbells,” he adds “On Dirty Linen I play the bass in unison with all the other guys and was able to keep up with them. It got me a bit of a reputation, but to be honest, the only reason I played in unison was I hadn’t got a clue what else to play on it! The Flatback Caper medley is another thing that hadn’t been done before. That was kind of proggy, with Swarb and I both playing mandolin.”  From: https://www.loudersound.com/features/the-story-of-fairport-conventions-full-house

Earth Tongue - Microscopic God

 #Earth Tongue #psychedelic rock #electronica #neo-psychedelia #heavy psych #fuzz rock #1970s retro #New Zealand 

Sometimes music is supposed to feel weird and indescribable. It’s the moments of clarity within the dense, sonic mess that often feels the most satisfying. That’s the space that Earth Tongue occupy. At times, their songs are shrill and disorientating, other times their reverb-washed textures and instantly familiar hooks can wrap you in a warm, loving embrace. The one consistent thread through their music, however, is the thick and all encompassing fuzz. Guitarist Gussie Larkin has become a master of the fuzz-smothered riff, and along with Ezra Simons’ off-kilter drumming, they’ve been sending punters into transcendental states since they began gigging in their home town of Wellington, New Zealand in 2016.  From: https://www.flyingnun.co.nz/collections/earth-tongue-new-zealand-band

Heavy psychedelic/fuzz band who formed in 2016 in Wellington, New Zealand.  A male/female two-piece who play loud, energetic, disorientating songs, often with space and/or occult themes.  What do you get if you cross Black Sabbath with Stereolab?  Fuck knows, says Ged Babey, but listen to this Primitive Prog - it’s crazy cosmic jack! Sometimes music is supposed to feel weird and indescribable. It’s the moments of clarity within the dense, sonic mess that often feels the most satisfying. That’s the space that Earth Tongue occupy. At times, their songs are shrill and disorientating, other times their reverb-washed textures and instantly-familiar hooks can wrap you in a warm, loving embrace. Now that is a good description, from the bands press release.  Another two piece band - drums and guitar, re-writing the rules and making Prog-influenced music sound simultaneously pop and primitive.
Named after a glutinous fungus (Glutinoglossum glutinosum) Earth Tongue consists of two earthlings: Gussie Larkin (guitar) and Ezra Simons (drums). Both sing.  Their debut Portable Shrine EP was self-released in New Zealand but Floating Being is released this via Bristol (UK) based independent label Stolen Body Records – home of a load of cool international bands. Earth Tongue embrace the imperfections in their playing and recording – drawing influence from early 70s psych and prog rock. The last thing they wanted was to create a shiny, over-produced record – with that in mind, they recorded the drums to an old 8-track Tascam reel-to-reel in a friend’s garage in Melbourne. The result is a punchy, raw and fuzzy journey into psych-rock with songs that weave between melodic and jarring. Unexpected twists and turns leave the listener in a disorientated yet satisfying haze.  From: https://louderthanwar.com/earth-tongue-floating-being-album-review/

Jefferson Airplane - Mexico

 #Jefferson Airplane #Grace Slick #Jorma Kaukonen #psychedelic rock #acid rock #folk rock #hard rock #West coast psychedelia #1960s

President Richard Nixon engaged in anti-drug measure that went into effect from September 21 to October 11 in 1969 in order to fulfill a campaign promise, which resulted in a near shutdown of border crossings between Mexico and the United States.  He wanted to seal the border to stop the steady flow of marijuana into the states and he was determined to prove that he could establish law and order in a nation that seemed to be spinning out of control.  He called it Operation Intercept, and it did not sit well with Jefferson Airplane.  In the early part of 1970, the Jefferson Airplane released a single entitled ‘Mexico’ that was written and sung by Grace Slick.  The song was not played on some radio stations at the time because the lyrics referred to Operation Intercept, but this song became a classic on many of the so-called underground radio stations and it did reach #102 on the Billboard charts.  Five months after the release of ‘Mexico’, President Nixon requested that songs relating to drug abuse not be broadcast.
The Jefferson Airplane single ‘Have You Seen The Saucers’/‘Mexico’ was their last release for RCA before assembling their own subsidiary label, Grunt and it would be the only new material in 1970 that they released as The Airplane.  That year Paul Kantner released his epic Blows Against The Empire album and Hot Tuna’s self-titled live acoustic debut marked a separation for the band.  The single was recorded by Paul Kantner, Grace Slick, Marty Balin, Jack Casady, Jorma Kaukonen, Spencer Dryden and Joey Covington.  1970 was a year of total chaos for The Airplane, as Jack and Jorma played countless gigs as Hot Tuna, both Dryden and Balin quit and Paul and Grace would become a couple, but yet their live recordings from this period rank as some of their most aggressive and raw.
Grace Slick starts out this song by dropping the names “Owsley and Charlie”, and I knew right away who Owsley was, but I was curious about Charlie.  My first thought was Charlie Manson, but he was only arrested in October 1969 on unrelated charges, and his trial didn’t begin till July 15, 1970, so I don’t think that Grace knew who he was before she wrote this song.  Near the end of this song Grace mentions Charlie again saying, “But thanks Uncle Charlie” and other than discovering that drummer Spencer Dryden’s half-uncle was Charlie Chaplin, and that Charlie is often a reference to cocaine, I have no clue who Charlie is.  Maybe he was a marijuana dealer who inspired Grace Slick to write this touching and heartfelt tribute, but the only other name that popped us was a journalist and hippie named Charles Perry. Grace seems infuriated saying, “donde esta la planta”, which translates to where is the plant and it is very clear that the lyrics in the song ‘Mexico’ are about pot.  She says that Mexico is under the thumb of Richard who she says is a small-headed man.  Nixon’s anti-drug stance, and his advocacy for conservative values did not sit well with many of the nation’s youth, especially the revolutionary Grace Slick.
In April 1970, Slick received an invitation to attend a tea party at the White House being thrown by the president’s daughter Tricia.  Tricia and Slick were both alumni of Finch College, an all-girls school located in upstate New York.  Tricia was a recent graduate and this would have been like a ten-year reunion for Slick, who attended under her maiden name, Grace Wing.  Slick invited Abbie Hoffman as her date to the April 24 event.  Slick had 600 micrograms of LSD powder in her pocket, more than enough to provide a powerful hallucinogenic experience for anyone who ingested it.  Her plan was to tuck the powder into her long fingernail and drop it into Nixon’s tea cup during some polite conversation.  When Grace and Abbie were on line, a security guard wouldn’t let them in.  He told Grace that Abbie had been branded as domestic security risk for his anti-establishment views and actions.  Hoffman then took out a black flag with a multicolored marijuana leaf and hung it on the White House gate.  From: https://jimadamsauthordotcom.wordpress.com/2020/05/03/airplane-protest-song/

IC3PEAK - I’m Not Evil, I’m Sad

 #IC3PEAK #experimental rock #electronic rock #witch house #industrial rock #electro-metal #political #subversive #Russian

In the 2018 mini-documentary Let It All Burn, the Moscow duo IC3PEAK are about to play a show in the Russian city of Voronezh when health inspectors and police arrive to shut the venue down on suspicion of food poisoning. Although the alleged incident has taken place the day before the band’s arrival in town, the officers demand to speak to the band and their manager. This is the latest obstacle on a tour where every stop has been plagued by interference from government officials. As the club director is interrogated, the sound engineer and the duo’s manager sneak fans through a backdoor into the dimly lit room where IC3PEAK members Nastya Kreslina and Nikolay Kostylev launch into their song “Сказка” (“Fairytale”): “I come from a Russian horror fairy tale/It doesn’t matter where you come from,” Kreslina spits. “I do not play your games/Someday you will die.” At the end of their short set, a sizable crowd, most of whom didn’t even make it into the venue, lingers in the cold outside, singing along to their favorite IC3PEAK songs. Kreslina and Kostylev join them to sing the controversial hit “Смерти Больше Нет” (“Death No More”), which may have set off the government’s ire to begin with: “I fill my eyes with kerosene/Let it all burn, let it all burn/All of Russia is watching me/Let it all burn, let it all burn.” With their politically brazen lyrics about police repression and state hypocrisy, as well as a fierce, highly stylized goth maximalism, IC3PEAK is one of the most exciting bands to come out of Russia in a while - and Russia’s youth and officials both know it.  From: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/ic3peak-do-svidaniya-goodbye/

The Flying Burrito Brothers - Hot Burrito #2

 #The Flying Burrito Brothers #Chris Hillman #Gram Parsons #country rock #rock & roll #R&B #soul #psychedelic country #1960s #1970s

The Flying Burrito Brothers was an American popular musical group of the late 1960s and ’70s that was one of the chief influences on the development of country rock. The original members were Chris Hillman, “Sneaky” Pete Kleinow, Gram Parsons, and Chris Ethridge. Later members included Michael Clarke, Bernie Leadon, and Rick Roberts. Parsons and Hillman, former members of the Byrds, founded the Flying Burrito Brothers in Los Angeles in 1968, appropriating the name from a group of local musicians who gathered for jam sessions. Earlier that year, Parsons had been the driving force behind the Byrds’ pioneering country rock album, Sweetheart of the Rodeo. The Burritos’ first album, The Gilded Palace of Sin (1969), also displayed Parsons’s guiding hand: he contributed most of the songs and shaped its combination of classic country and western - punctuated by Kleinow’s pedal-steel guitar - and hard-driving southern California rock. Even after Parsons left the Burritos in 1970 (replaced by Roberts), his songs continued to appear on the group’s albums, including the live Last of the Red Hot Burritos (1972), which also prominently featured bluegrass musicians. Numerous other personnel changes - including the arrival and departure of Leadon, who helped found the Eagles - and the group’s limited commercial appeal outside a small, devoted following contributed to its dissolution by 1973. Kleinow and Ethridge re-formed the band in 1975, and there were other short-lived incarnations into the 1990s. Parsons is often called the originator of country rock. Although he disdained that moniker, his work provided the link from straight-ahead country performers like Merle Haggard to the Eagles, who epitomized 1970s country rock. Numerous performers have cited Parsons as a major influence, notably the singers Emmylou Harris (who collaborated with him in 1973) and Elvis Costello and the alternative rocker Evan Dando.  From: https://www.britannica.com/topic/the-Flying-Burrito-Brothers

The Oil Barons - Hot Cake Big Bad Sound

 #The Oil Barons #stoner rock #doom metal #garage rock #psychedelic rock #desert rock #punk metal #hard rock #power trio #1970s retro #music video

Formed in Los Angeles, CA in early 2016, The Oil Barons are a riff-crazed Heavy Rock power trio that draws from a deep well of influences ranging from Garage Rock to Doom Metal. They like slowing down - they like speedin' up!  They like to shred, Fred. They're the heaviest thing in standard tuning.  From: https://www.theoilbarons.com/

The Oil Barons debut album ‘The West Is Won’ is inspired by Paul Thomas Anderson’s classic movie ‘There Will Be Blood’. So you have a concept album based within the world of oil production and all the joys and pitfalls that industry brings you. Unless it’s influenced by Dallas and the guys are trying to be all intellectual. I’m kidding. Anyway, this is one album that sounds like it suffers from an identity crisis when you first listen to it. As the band play a heavy mixture of Blues Rock, Classic Rock, Stoner Metal, Doom Metal and even Desert Rock. If you’re a fan of bands such as Black Sabbath and Cutch then these guys should definitely be on your radar. ’The West Is Won’ is a brilliantly entertaining album packed full of thrills and (oil) spills with the band writing some progressive sounding riffs and OTT lyrics to match. The opening songs ‘The Oil Baron’, ‘Drill’ and ‘Snake Oil’ show that The Oil Barons have a deep and rich creative sound and when matched against the superb lyrics then a Stoner Metal/Doom Metal album based on ‘There Will Be Blood’ isn’t so crazy after all. The album has a deceptively old-school feel to it and that allows The Oil Barons to experiment with their sound on the later stages of the album. The vocals from Andrew are influenced by the Americana scene at times but still remaining in the Doom/Stoner Metal world. Jake provides solid back-up vocals along with his highly accurate and precise drumming. The Oil Barons continue playing their heavy Blues Rock inspired Stoner/Desert/Doom hybrid sound for the remainder of the album and they will keep you entertained with other cool songs such as ‘California City’, ‘Fuck The Sun’, ‘Vitch’ and the final epic song ‘Suicide Machine’ which ventures into some pretty dark places which I didn’t expect. The production is handled superbly well and the album sounds fresh and lively from the start. The music is very direct and you become part of the whole environment. Though it may take you a few listens to fully understand and actually enjoy the overall album. After that happens you’ll be amazed at how much of a good time you will have this with album.  From: https://outlawsofthesun.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-oil-barons-west-is-won-album-review.html

The Lovemongers (Heart) - The Battle Of Evermore

#The Lovemongers #Heart #Anne and Nancy Wilson #hard rock #heavy metal #folk rock #album rock #acoustic #Led Zeppelin cover #live music video

Led Zeppelin's "Battle of Evermore", from the group's iconic you-bought-it-you-name-it fourth studio LP, was destined to eventually be covered by Heart. Well, Ann and Nancy Wilson may not have recorded the pain-of-war cut under the proud Heart name, but the sister act finally took on the sobering Zep track in 1992 as part of The Lovemongers. Penned by the tag team of Jimmy Page and Robert Plant at laid back Headley Grange, Fairport Convention vocalist Sandy Denny assisted Plant on vocals during the recording sessions for the folk-rock "Battle of Evermore", while the arrangement is accented by Page's mandolin and acoustic guitar work. Ann Wilson's voice is perfectly suited for "Battle of Evermore", which like other Zeppelin songs lyrically leans on the literature of J.R. Tolkein. The Lovemongers capture the L.Z. magic via their inspired remake of "Battle of Evermore".  From: https://rateyourmusic.com/release/ep/lovemongers/battle-of-evermore/

On December 2, 2012, Led Zeppelin received the Kennedy Center Honors from President Barack Obama. It's an award bestowed upon those considered to have contributed greatly to American culture, with other recipients including Ella Fitzgerald, Leonard Bernstein, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Sammy Davis Jr., Dizzy Gillespie, Johnny Cash, Carole King and Joni Mitchell. In a world where awards are handed out like lollipops, The Kennedy Center Honors are a big deal. Every December, pandemics permitting, the awards climax with a gala event at the Kennedy Center Opera House in Washington, D.C., and in 2012 the show included an emotional performance of Stairway To Heaven by Heart’s Ann and Nancy Wilson, with Jason Bonham on drums. Did we say emotional? It's almost startlingly so. It's the looks the surviving members of Led Zeppelin give each other during the performance. It's Robert Plant's eyes watering as he watches Ann Wilson singing a song he famously has a difficult relationship with. It's the gospel choir paying tribute to John Bonham in the most unexpected way. It's Jason Bonham lifting his eyes towards the heavens as the song climaxes. It's extraordinary. "I knew we did a lot of damage to people's brains and ear drums, and I knew we wrote some great songs, but it was a very humbling experience," Plant told LA Weekly. "When I saw Heart perform Stairway To Heaven, I just couldn't believe that song had anything to do with this 64-year old man that was sitting next to John Paul Jones. I thought to myself, 'This is me... How did this happen?'"  From: https://www.loudersound.com/features/what-happened-when-ann-and-nancy-wilson-performed-stairway-to-heaven-for-led-zeppelin

The Mars Volta - Take The Veil Cerpin Taxt

#The Mars Volta #progressive rock #experimental rock #psychedelic rock #jazz rock #math rock #art rock #post-hardcore

When Mars Volta member Jeremy Ward died shortly before the release of their debut album, some heartlessly snickered about the relevance of a "sound manipulator" passing on. After all, it's not like the guy was playing a guitar or bass, right? But after forging numerous times through the dense De-Loused in the Comatorium, the severity of the loss screams blatantly; The Mars Volta focus most of their energy on sound manipulation. Watery vocals, phased synths, reverbed guitars, reversed bongos, and countless other dub twiddlings drench each busy, triathlon-long song. Ward is the second person close to The Mars Volta who has died. Julio Venegas, a close friend of the band's, committed suicide in 1996, and as the media has repeatedly pointed out, De-Loused in the Comatorium is supposed to be a chronicle of his life and death. This is a monumental case of the media blindly reviewing off their press kits - there's absolutely no way of gleaning this story/idea/topic/concept/whatever in the hilariously awful, sub-Burroughs, refrigerator-magnet montage of dark PSAT words that make up this album. The song titles - “Drunkship of Lanterns", "Televators", "Take the Veil Cerpin Taxt" - merely hint at Comatorium's purblind "poetry." Follow Venegas' footsteps as he makes his "ritual contrition asphyxiation half mast commute through umbilical blisters and boxcar cadavers!" Weep while he's "rowing shit smells for the dead"* before the "pinkeye fountain"* and "three half-eaten corneas!" At least I think that's what happened. The only sensible summation of Venegas' demise seems to be that he proclaimed, "Now I'm lost," then "searched" for "something" for a "long time," then cried "Is anybody there," and finally "took" the ol' "veil cerpin taxt." Huh. Reprinting these lyrics in the liner notes might have helped to clarify the story, but that could as easily have ruined the experience - dissecting the cryptic babble is half (or more) of the fun. These lyrics, like At the Drive In's before them, are pure stream-of-consciousness.  From: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/5117-de-loused-in-the-comatorium/

Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell - Ain't Nothing Like The Real Thing

#Marvin Gaye #Tammi Terrell #Motown #R&B #soul #gospel #ballads #1960s

Over a span of just 12 months beginning in April 1967, the duo of Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell enjoyed a string of four straight hits with some of the greatest love songs ever recorded at Motown Records. Sadly, only the first two of those four hits were released while Tammi Terrell was still well enough to perform them. In October 1967, just six months after the release of the now-classic “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” Terrell collapsed onstage during a live performance at Virginia’s Hampden-Sydney College. Two-and-a-half years later, on March 16, 1970, Tammi Terrell died of complications from the malignant brain tumor that caused her 1967 collapse. Terrell’s illness was at first downplayed by the Motown Records publicity machine while new material by the duo of Gaye and Terrell was still being released. Many of the singles released under their names were created by laying Marvin Gaye’s vocals over existing recordings of Terrell made prior to her illness. Gaye scored one of his biggest solo hits ever during this period with “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,” but following Terrell’s death in 1970, he stopped performing live for the next three years.  From: https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/motown-soul-singer-tammi-terrell-dies

Gjallarhorn - Dejelill and Lagerman

#Gjallarhorn #world music #European folk #Finnish folk #Swedish folk #traditional #medieval

Gjallarhorn is a Finnish band that performs world music with roots in the folk music of Finland and Sweden. The group was formed in 1994. The band's music echoes the ancient folk music tradition of Scandinavia with medieval ballads, minuets, prayers in runo-metric chanting and ancient Icelandic rímur epics in a modern way. The group is named after the Gjallarhorn associated with the god Heimdallr from the Norse mythology. The band hails from Ostrobothnia, a Swedish-speaking region on the west coast of Finland, one of the four regions of the historical province of Ostrobothnia and the only region in Finland outside Aland where more people speak Swedish than Finnish. The music of the band remains Swedish in character. Most of their repertoire is the acoustic folk music of these Swedish-speaking Finns, from the unique minuets and ballads that have only survived in Ostrobothnia, to the old traditional waltzes. The didgeridoo and sub-contrabass recorder offer an underlying drone, a technique shared by some other Nordic bands such as Garmarna. Also notable is their use of the hardanger fiddle and Jenny Wilhelms' kulning, a high-pitched, wordless vocal technique based on traditional Scandinavian cattle-herding calls.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gjallarhorn_(band)