Posts Tagged ‘Pop’

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Judy Collins: In My Life

Monday, August 23rd, 2010

One of folk music’s greatest voices expands her horizons in 1966

After five folk albums, culminating in the superb Fifth Album in 1965, Judy Collins sought personal growth as an artist and broader synergy with the musical scenes developing around her. She’d already branched out from the traditional material of 1961’s A Maid of Constant Sorrow and 1962’s Golden Apples of the Sun (available as a two-fer) to contemporary material penned by Dylan, Seeger, Paxton, Ochs and Farina, but she’d kept to a traditional acoustic guitar and string bass approach. With this 1966 release she stretched even further for new material, adding pop songs and show tunes, while still championing newly emerging talents that included Leonard Cohen, Randy Newman and Donovan. She once again proved herself a unique interpreter of Dylan, singing the melody of “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues” with ease rather than haggard exhalation. Similarly, on “Suzanne” her voice adds delicacy and range that were beyond Cohen’s instrument, and gave the poet his break as a songwriter.

The arrangements push past the minimalism of her earlier albums with Joshua Rifkin-penned chamber-pop arrangements that add strings, woodwinds, percussion and harpsichord. This suits both the range of material as well as the moods Collins evokes as she extrapolates her interpretation into acting. Her readings of Brecht and Weill’s “Pirate Jenny” and Peaslee’s “Marat/Sade” are pitched to reach the last row and befit their stage origins, and Rifkin’s arrangement of guitar and violin provides dramatic backing for Jacques Brel’s dire “La Colombe.” Harp, bells and waltz time whirl Donovan’s “Sunny Goodge Street” nearly into carousel music, and now in retrospect, the closing cover of “In My Life” provides a bittersweet tribute to its author. Collectors’ Choice’s 2010 release is a straight-up reissue of the album’s original eleven tracks, with new liner notes by Richie Unterberger. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

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Dusty Springfield: Once Upon a Time – 1964-1969

Monday, July 5th, 2010

Sizzling performance clips perk up documentary of soulful ‘60s songbird

One Upon a Time: 1964-1969 is one of four documentaries released as part of a five-DVD British Invasion box set by Reelin’ in the Years Productions. Of the four artists profiles (which also include Gerry and the Pacemakers, the Small Faces and Herman’s Hermits), Dusty Springfield made perhaps the largest artistic impact on America. Herman’s Hermits had more hits, and the Small Faces were a bigger influence on the mod movement in the UK, but Springfield’s key works, “I Only Want to Be With You,” Bacharach & David’s “Wishin’ and Hopin’,” “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me,” and especially “Son of a Preacher Man” harbored a soulfulness that none of her UK peers could match. She exuded class in her demure, self-contained dance moves, elegant frilled blouses and long skirts.

As with many pop stars of the era, Springfield’s television appearances mixed lip-synching and live performances. Unlike most others, though, her lip-synching was truly expressive. While others simply mimed their vocals, Springfield acted them out with her movements, doing with her body and face what she’d already done with her voice in the studio. Better yet, she was a great live singer, as evidenced by a terrific 1965 performance of “All Cried Out” on the Ed Sullivan show and 1966 NME poll winner’s performances of “In the Middle of Nowhere” and “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me.” She exhorts the crowd while singing covers of Betty Everett’s “I Can’t Hear You” and Otis Redding’s “Shake,” and without a monitor speaker in sight, delivers pitch-perfect vocals.

Springfield had greater chart success in the UK than the US, but even songs that failed to conquer the states, such as “Some of Your Lovin’” and Bacharach and David’s “I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself,” were strong enough to lodge in the ears of American fans. Even her lower-charting US hits, such as “Stay Awhile” (perfectly covered in 1978 by Rachel Sweet) remain familiar. In 1968 Springfield took her singing to a new level with the sessions that resulted in the album Dusty in Memphis and the single “Son of a Preacher Man.” Amid players and producers whose music had provided the template for her own recordings, she sang with a reserve that spoke to her underlying strength rather than the explicit power she could unleash. Her gospel phrasings and confessional tone gave the hit an intimacy with which listeners connected on a deep, emotional level. Amazingly, the single only reached #10 and became her last hit until a 1987 teaming with the Pet Shop Boys on “What Have I Done to Deserve This?”

This 69-minute documentary includes sixteen performances, each of which (and four more) can be seen in full in the DVD’s extras. There’s also a 24-page booklet that’s stuffed with liner notes by Annie Randall, photos, ephemera and credits. Period interview clips with Springfield from 1964, 1971 and 1978 and contemporary interviews with two of her backup singers (Madeline Bell and Simon Bell) and Burt Bacharach provide interesting personal reflections. The details of Springfield’s anti-apartheid contract clause (for shows in South Africa) are particularly enlightening. The performances are terrific, but, in the end, the documentary doesn’t tell enough of Springfield’s story, and fails to explain (as the liner notes do) why her commercial success faded at the end of the ‘60s. This is worth seeing, particularly for fans, but if you’re interested more generally in the British Invasion, the volumes on the Small Faces and Herman’s Hermits are better documentaries. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

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Pancho Ballard: The Cut-Throat of Old Mexico

Thursday, July 1st, 2010

We wrote of Pancho Ballard and the Banditos – the best Mexican band to have come out of England – when they released the EP Five Songs for Oscar. We’re now happy to report that Pancho’s hooked up with animation studio Pew 36 to produce a terrific animated video for the song “The Cut-Throat of Old Mexico.” It’s a spaghetti western in which a zombie cowboy does battle with cactus monsters! Read the story here, and see the video here:

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Chubby Checker: It’s Pony Time / Let’s Twist Again

Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

The King of the Twist does the pony and twists again on his 3rd and 4th albums

One might imagine that the passing of Allen B. Klein in 2009 has something to do with the emergence of six Cameo-Parkway CD reissues, including this one and titles from Bobby Rydell, The Orlons, Terry Knight and the Pack, a vocal groups compilation, and a novelty outing from Clint Eastwood’s years on Rawhide. The legendary Philadelphia labels operated from 1956 through 1967, hitting a peak during American Bandstand’s years as a Philly institution, and becoming the root of Klein’s ABKCO Records in 1967. Klein reissued vault material on vinyl in the 1970s, but was very slow to adapt to CDs. Bootlegs and re-recordings proliferated for decades before the embargo was broken with the 2005 box set Cameo Parkway 1957-1967, and a series of best-of discs for the labels’ biggest stars. Five years later ABKCO is really starting to dig into the vault with this volley of original full-length album reissues.

Oddly, rather than starting the reissue program with Checker’s (and the Parkway label’s) first two albums (1960’s Twist with Chubby Checker and 1961’s For Twisters Only), the series jump-starts with the twister’s third and fourth albums. Checker ignited a worldwide dance craze with his chart-topping cover of Hank Ballard’s “The Twist,” and hit the Top 20 again with a cover of the 1940’s dance number, “The Hucklebuck.” With his third album, he once again topped the charts with a novelty dance number, “Pony Time.” The album also yielded the lower-charting “Dance This Mess Around.” Later that year, he dropped his third of four albums for 1961, and with it scored a Top 10 (and a Grammy award) with “Let’s Twist Again.” He’d continue to ride novelty dance songs onto the charts into the mid-60s, including a return trip to #1 with his original recording of “The Twist.”

Checker’s albums were literally filled with dance tunes, old and new, here including “The Watusi,” “The Hully Gully” (sung to the tune of “Peanut Butter,” which Checker covered on Let’s Twist Again) “The Stroll,” “The Mashed Potatoes” (which preceded his labelmate Dee Dee Sharp’s hit “Mashed Potato Time” by a year), “The Shimmy” (which would be recycled in 1962 as a hit duet with Sharp as “Slow Twistin’”), “The Jet,” “The Continental Walk,” “The Charleston” and “The Ray Charles-Ton.” Throw in a couple of R&B covers, like “I Almost Lost My Baby” and “Quarter to Three” and you have a standard-issue Chubby Checker album. Despite the many variations on a few themes, Checker throws himself into each song as if it’s brand new, and the Cameo-Parkway house band swings hard on everything it plays.

As James Ritz’s liner notes point out, these are great, non-stop party albums, driven in large part by the fat sax tone of Buddy Savitt, and a swinging rhythm section (Joe Macho on bass and either Bobby Gregg or Joe Sher on drums) that even manages to sneak in a second-line rhythm for house arranger Dave Appell’s take on Lerner and Loewe’s “I Could Have Danced All Night.” Collectors’ Choice’s two-fer reissue includes the twenty-four tracks of the original albums and full-panel reproductions of both albums’ front and back covers. It’s a shame that detailed session credits at the time didn’t log who played on each track, as the house players were every bit the equal of their more name-familiar counterparts in the Wrecking Crew,  Motown and Stax house bands. Audio is radio-ready mono throughout, just the way these albums were originally issued. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Chubby Checker’s Home Page

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Andy Kim: Happen Again

Monday, June 21st, 2010

Welcome return of talented 60s/70s singer-songwriter

Singer-songwriter Andy Kim’s time in the spotlight of mass public acclaim was surprisingly short. In 1968 he co-wrote the song of the year (and national anthem of the bubblegum nation), “Sugar Sugar,” along with its follow-up, “Jingle Jangle” and other effervescent Archies’ album cuts. He edged onto the charts with his own “So Good Together” and “Rainbow Ride,” and cracked the Top 20 with covers of the Ronettes’ “Baby, I Love You” and “Be My Baby” in 1969 and 1970. Despite several fine albums for the Steed label [1 2], further commercial success eluded him until 1975’s chart-topping “Rock Me Gently.” Then, as the single’s run ended, so did Kim fade from public view. He resurfaced in the 1980s with a pair of albums under the name Baron Longfellow, but mostly stayed out of the spotlight.

In 1995 Kim connected with Ed Robertson of Barenaked Ladies, and in 2005 was coaxed from retirement to record an EP and give sporadic public performances. Another five years further on – twenty years since his last full album – Kim returns in superb voice with a disc full of terrific new songs. His writing craft translates smoothly to modern production sounds, and his voice, lowered both by age and choice (his earlier hits were often sped up to sound younger), is more studied and reflective than the unbridled optimism of the 1970s. “Judy Garland” offers a note of support to the troubled star with a rolling rhythm, CS&N-styled harmonies and a killer chorus hook. His thoughtful contemplation of mortality, “Someday,” reaches back to the Brill Building for a baion beat, but dresses it minimally in riveting percussion and a moody organ.

Kim and his studio crew have gathered together instrumental elements across several decades, marrying power-, sunshine- and synth-pop sounds into a truly compelling whole. Kim’s clearly continued listening to new music during his time away from the limelight, as he incorporates the emotional grandeur and orchestral touches of Verve and Coldplay, but without surrendering his ‘70s roots. He writes of love and relationships, but his lyrics ask questions rather than proclaim answers.  On the album’s title track he wonders, “Do you feel connected / to sentimental times,” and laments innocence lost. He’s optimistic, but the tone hasn’t the brash certainty of someone in their 20s or 30s.

The exhilaration that Kim does find, such as the schoolboy love of “I Forgot to Mention,” only really busts out in the chorus, and even then its insular focus is nagged by the outside world. Ironically, his realization that “Love Has Never Been My Friend” is sung to a bouncy melody that playfully undermines the song’s plea for Cupid to keep his distance. If one were to mentally extrapolate Kim’s music from the ‘70s to today, you’d get exactly this album: a thoughtful, finely honed collection of songs that refract youthful enthusiasms through the grounding of adult living, expressed in melodies that linger in your ears. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Someday
Andy Kim’s Home Page
Andy Kim’s MySpace Page
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Dixie Chicks: Playlist – The Very Best of the Dixie Chicks

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Short overview of game-changing country trio’s career

Whether or not Natalie Maines’ opinions give you heartburn, there’s no denying her arrival in the Dixie Chicks launched the group to unparalleled commercial and artistic success. With her lead vocals and her bandmates’ harmonies and instrumental chops, the group cut a new template for commercial country radio, finding favor with both the mainstream and traditionalist crowds. All was peaches and cream until Maines’ outspoken criticism of the Bush administration placed them at odds with the Nashville establishment and many of the band’s fans. But in the face of a country radio backlash, the group stuck to their guns, found favor with the pop buying public, and netted their fourth consecutive country album Grammy – and their first Album of the Year – with the unapologetic Taking the Long Way.

This twelve song collection includes tracks from the four studio albums recorded with Maines’ as lead vocalist, and skips over the group’s three earlier releases. It follows the form of earlier Playlist releases by combining a selection of hits with album tracks that the artist has selected as representative of their career. That means most of the Dixie Chicks’ sixteen Top 10 hits are omitted in favor of album tracks (all twelve tracks have been previously issued and are readily available on the group’s regular releases), including the concert favorite “Sin Wagon” and a poignant cover of Patty Griffin’s “Let Him Fly.” The chronological set plays quite well, giving listeners a good helping of the Chicks’ vocal and instrumental talents, and shows how they straddled the line between rootsy twang and polished radio country with their cannily selected cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide.” The Dixie Chicks deftly bridged their country home base with their pop influences, magnifying, rather than losing, the potency of each.

These songs say as much about the group members’ lives as their careers, following the turbulence of divorces and marriages, professional daring, and settled family lives. The disc is delivered in an all-cardboard folder, with a digital booklet that includes six highly-styled photographs, liner notes, production/writing/chart credits, an interactive album discography (that conveniently links to Sony BMG’s online store), and a pair of desktop wallpapers. What’s here is compelling, but what’s missing is essential to really telling the group’s story; a recitation of the group’s hits can be put together from digital download services, but at a cost that’s likely to keep many waiting for a more definitive greatest hits collection or career anthology. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Dixie Chicks’ Home Page
Dixie Chicks’ MySpace Page

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Pancho Ballard and the Banditos: Five Songs for Oscar

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010

Funny and surprisingly endearing “Mexican” music from… England!

If Nick Lowe had felt despondent after the dissolution of Brinsley Schwarz, and while drowning his sorrows in a Mexican town had stumbled into a studio, the resulting music might have sounded like this UK band’s new five-song EP. The melodies are pure pop, but sung with the flair of a gringo trying on faux-Mexican drama, and a horn section that’s as authentically South-of-the-Border as Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. The songs cover masked Mexican wrestling, a relationship-restoring recipe (based on the writer Isabel Allende’s “reconciliation soup”), and a painter whose trade as a forger casts a shadow on his soul. This might play more as a joke if the band weren’t good, but they actually match up to their guarantee: “The best Mexican band to have come out of England!” Well, “Mexican,” anyway. Their self-titled debut album, heavier on the ‘60s guitars, country-rock and humor, is available for free on their website, but this EP, particularly “Lucha Libre” and “Soup Song,” more deeply fulfills the band’s promise. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Lucha Libre
Pancho Ballard and the Banditos’ Home Page
Pancho Ballard and the Banditos’ MySpace Page

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John Denver: Live at Cedar Rapids 12/10/87

Saturday, May 8th, 2010

Excellent John Denver live performance from the mid-80s

By the time John Denver performed this 1987 concert in Cedar Rapids, IA, he was a decade past his commercial peak of the mid-70s. He’d found continued success into the early ‘80s, but his most recent release, 1986’s One World, was both the last he’d recorded for RCA and the first album in fifteen years to miss the chart entirely. The album’s single, “Along for the Ride (’56 T-Bird),” had only middling success on the Adult Contemporary chart, and was left out of this set. Denver had forged a non-music public role as an activist, philanthropist, humanitarian, and social critic, but always remained an in-demand live performer. By this point in his career, his non-music activities flowed seamlessly into his stage performances.

This two-hour, twenty-eight track live set touches on fan favorites, social and political commentaries and well-selected covers. Denver’s voice hasn’t the youthful elasticity of his earlier years, but his investment in the songs, even those he’d been touring for fifteen years, is enthusiastic and resolute. He sings the hits at full length, rather than mashing them into medleys, and performs covers (Lennon & McCartney’s “Mother Nature’s Son” and Randy Sparks’ “Toledo”) that had been in his live set for nearly fifteen years. He was an endearing performer, as engaging with a story or a joke as with a song, and his invitations to the audience to sing-along are as warm as a summer campfire.

Denver performs most of the songs solo with his acoustic 12-string, adding a taped background for “Flying for Me” and welcoming a string quartet on stage for disc two. His material is drawn from throughout his career, going back as early as the title song of his debut album, Rhymes & Reason, and as current as “For You” (which was dedicated to his soon-to-be second wife) and the set-closing “Falling Leaves (The Refugees),” which he’d record the following year. His newer material is easily woven into the set, making evident that it wasn’t the quality or appeal of Denver’s music that had waned, only the interest of radio and the new generation of record buyers.

Disc two includes Denver’s statements on the arms race and world hunger and a segue into his then-current “Let Us Begin (What Are We Making Weapons For).” He reaches back to 1971 for the thoughtful “Poems, Prayers and Promises” and climaxes with a crowd-pleasing trio of hits. A dozen of these tracks appeared previously on a pair of PBS promotional releases [1 2], but having the entire concert start-to-finish gives fans an opportunity to relive the magic of Denver’s stagecraft. Collectors’ Choice delivers the discs in a double-digipack with a four page booklet (with liner notes by Gene Sculatti) tucked into a tight pocket beneath disc two’s tray. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

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On Tour: The Morning Benders

Wednesday, May 5th, 2010

Fresh off the release of their second album, Big Echo, and a headlining tour of the USA, the Morning Benders head back to the roads of North America with Broken Bells, and then with the Black Keys! UK/European dates coming soon.

May 18th || Humphreys Concerts by the Bay || San Diego, CA*
May 19th || Henry Fonda Theatre || Los Angeles, CA*
May 21st || Regency Ballroom || San Francisco, CA*
May 24th || Wonder Ballroom || Portland, OR*
May 25th || Showbox at the Market || Seattle, WA*
May 26th || Commodore Ballroom || Vancouver, BC*
May 29th || Gothic Theatre || Englewood, CO*
May 31st || Vic Theatre || Chicago, IL*
June 1st || St. Andrews Hall || Detroit, MI*
June 2nd || Queen Elizabeth Theatre || Toronto, ON*
June 4th || Royale NightClub || Boston, MA*
June 5th || The Fillmore New York at Irving Plaza || New York, NY*
June 6th || Electric Factory || Philadelphia, PA*
June 7th || 9:30 Club || Washington, D.C.*
June 10th || Center Stage || Atlanta, GA*
June 11th || 40 Watt Club || Athens, GA*
July 26th || DAR Constitution Hall || Washington, DC#
July 27th || Central Park Summerstage || New York, NY#
July 28th || Central Park Summerstage || New York, NY#
July 30th || Great Plaza at Penn’s Landing || Philadelphia, PA#
July 31st || Bank of America Pavilion || Boston, MA#
August 3rd || Kool Haus || Toronto, ON#
August 4th || Kool Haus || Toronto, ON#
August 6-8th || Lollapalooza || Chicago, IL
August 7th || Metro || Chicago, IL#
August 8th || Val Air Ballroom || Des Moines, IA#
August 9th || Anchor Inn || Omaha, NE#
August 11th || Iroquois Amphitheater || Louisville, KY#
August 12th || Ryman Auditorium || Nashville, TN#
August 13th || The LC Amphitheater || Columbus, OH#
August 14th || The Fillmore Detroit || Detroit, MI#

* with Broken Bells
# with The Black Keys

The Morning Benders’ Home Page
The Morning Benders’ MySpace Page

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Austins Bridge: Times Like These

Tuesday, May 4th, 2010

Soaring contemporary Christian pop-rock, country and soul

Austin’s Bridge is Justin Rivers and Jason Baird, a Christian Contemporary vocal duo whose big production sound (courtesy of Rascal Flatts’ Jay DeMarcus) mixes rock, country and soul. Originally a trio, founding member Mike Kofahl has apparently exited, leaving the pair to front a studio band anchored by their producer’s bass. DeMarcus also contributes two songs, alongside the work of several Nashville and CCM pros, and three tunes written or co-written by Rivers and Baird. Neither vocalist sings with the country inflections of Rascal Flatts, and though DeMarcus gives their record a polished studio punch, their passion makes this sound less slick and more rock – something like Journey singing CCM with harmonizing vocalists in place of a single Steve Perry. The songs are tightly written and uplifting, celebrating belief, salvation and the wonder of God’s creation. The lyrics will appeal to the faithful, the optimistic, and those who like well-crafted, powerfully sung contemporary rock. Those put off by unremitting hope and blind faith may not be swayed by the album’s belief-based answers to contemporary social problems – but you’ll have to admit the music is solidly produced and sung with conviction. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Austins Bridge’s Home Page
Austins Bridge’s MySpace Page

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