Radio's Next Dimension
Chick Webb was known as “The King of the Savoy” where he and his orchestra would regularly win battles of music against the other leading big bands of the day. He stood tall amongst big band drummers even though his diminutive frame was only a tad over 4 feet tall. His major discovery was Ella [...]
Plastic soul…on a plastic record. Shifting gears was nothing new for David Bowie who seemingly shedded skin during the 1970s like others took out the trash. So when Bowie booked time in Philadelphia’s Sigma Sound Studios during a two-week break during the Diamond Dogs tour, it should not have come as a surprise to anyone [...]
By the time of the sessions for their sixth studio album (and seventh overall), Chicago had dozens of hits behind them and had grown restless and unhappy with the concise nature of their previous two records. Sure the albums established the group as a hit making machine, but the band began to feel that their [...]
Today’s Song Of The Day comes from Dire Straits’ third album Making Movies. The album was co-produced by Jimmy Iovine whom Mark Knopfler contacted because he liked the production sound he gave to Patti Smith’s single “Because The Night,” and Iovine brought a similar New Wave sheen to Making Movies. David Knopfler left the group [...]
Stephin Merritt is one of today’s greatest songwriters. Whether solo or with groups like Magnetic Fields, The Gothic Archies, The 6ths or Future Bible Heroes, Merritt has given us hundreds of great songs over the years with a Broadway sensibility, deadpan delivery and a droll sense of humor. He’s even released a soundtrack to the [...]
After going electronic on Trans, country and western on Old Ways, and then turning himself into a rockabilly cat with The Shocking Pinks, what else could Neil Young have had in store for fans whose patience was beginning to wear thin as the 1980s drew to a close? Soul man! In 1988, Neil Young put [...]
Oh lawd, have moicey…this “Bacon Fat” is show nuff greasy! I listened to Taj Mahal’s 1969 double album Giant Step earlier this week for the piece I wrote on his cover version of “Take A Giant Step.” The album also has a version of the song “Bacon Fat” that is credited to J.R. Robertson and [...]
Here’s an instance where an artist cribs from his own back catalog and creates another hit. Miller revisited this riff from this 1969 song that originally appeared on his “Brave New World” album again in 1976 for “Fly Like An Eagle” and took it to new heights. The bass and backing vocal duties on this [...]
So Daft Punk has released a straight-up ‘70s Disco album and everybody is going nuts. Daft Punk fans are going nuts because there are real instruments and, gasp, real voices on this record. Critics are going nuts because the group has made a ‘70s disco album, and a ‘70s disco album stands out because it’s [...]
There is no rhyme or reason as to how I come up with the songs I choose to write about every day. They usually spring out of something I’ve been listening to or something I’ve read. So, if you regularly follow this column, you’ll get a pretty good idea of some of the stuff I [...]
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