Reagan re-election campaign's famed 1984 TV commercial...
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Showing posts with label youtube. Show all posts
Showing posts with label youtube. Show all posts
TGIF Rock-n-Roll Oldies: The Hollies - 1971
The Hollies are amongst the most musically-flexible survivors one can imagine, and the band became one of the leading British groups of the era, enjoying considerable international success delivering hits in varied styles.
Along with The Rolling Stones and The Searchers, they are one of the few British pop groups of the early 1960s that have never officially broken up and that continue to record and perform here in 2010. The Hollies were inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame earlier this year as well.
The Hollies are known for their bright vocal harmonies. Though initially known for its cover versions, the band moved towards written-to-order songs provided to them by such writers as Graham Gouldman. Soon after, the group's in-house songwriting trio of Clarke, Hicks and Nash began providing hits.
Furthermore, he disagreed with the group's decision to make their next album one entirely comprising Bob Dylan songs. Nash relocated to Los Angeles, where he joined forces with former Buffalo Springfield guitarist Stephen Stills and ex-Byrds singer David Crosby to form one of the first supergroups, Crosby, Stills and Nash. Nash told Disc magazine at the time: "I can't take touring any more. I just want to sit at home and write songs. I don't really care what the rest of the group think."
Their album Hollies Sing Dylan reached the #3 position on the UK chart, but the record flopped in the US> The next album Hollies Sing Hollies did not chart in the UK, but the U.S. version called He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother included the hit single of the same name and reached U.S. #32.
Nash's departure saw The Hollies again turn to outside writers for their single A-sides, but the group's British chart fortunes rallied during 1969 and 1970 and they scored four consecutive UK Top 20 hits (including two consecutive Top 5 placings) in this period, beginning with the Geoff Stephens / Tony Macaulay song "Sorry Suzanne" (Feb. 1969) which reached #3 in the UK, followed by the emotional civil rights–themed ballad "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother", which featured the piano playing of Elton John, and which reached #3 in October 1969.
The next single, "I Can't Tell The Bottom From The Top", again featured the young Elton John on piano and reached UK #7 in April 1970, charting in twelve countries.
Later EMI lifted a track from their album Distant Light, the Creedence Clearwater Revival-inspired song, "Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress", which reached #2 in the US.
In 1974 they scored what was to be their last major new hit single with the love song "The Air That I Breathe" -Phil Everly- which reached #2 in the UK and US.
TGIF Rock-n-Roll Oldies: 10cc 1975
For the most part, 10cc featured two strong songwriting teams, one 'commercial' and one 'artistic'. Both teams however injected sharp wit to lyrically-dextrous and musically varied songs. Stewart and Gouldman were predominantly pop-song-writers, who created most of the band's accessible songs.
In contrast, Godley and Creme -who went on after the band's breakups to make a series of records together- were the predominantly experimental half of 10cc, featuring an Art School sensibility and cinematic inspired writing. However, every member was a multi-instrumentalist, singer, writer, and producer.
"Donna", released as the first 10cc single, was chosen by BBC Radio 1 disc jockey Tony Blackburn as his Record of the Week, helping to launch it into the Top 30. The song peaked at #2 in the UK in October 1972. A similar 50's influence/ can be found in many of the band's pop songs, on-through 1977's American radio standard "The Things We Do for Love".
After a series of moderate hits the band signed a major deal with Mercury Records- the catalyst for the deal was one song – "I'm Not in Love".
The band's producer recalled: "At that point in time we were... struggling. We were absolutely skint, the lot of us, we were really struggling seriously, and Philips Phonogram wanted to do a deal with us. They wanted to buy Jonathan King's contract. I rang them. I said come and have a listen to what we've done, come and have a listen to this track.
And they came up and they freaked, and they said "This is a masterpiece. How much money, what do you want? What sort of a contract do you want? We'll do anything, we'll sign it".
On the strength of that one song, 10cc did a five-year deal with them for five albums and paid a serious amount of money.The Original Soundtrack, an LP which was already complete, was released just weeks later. The album went on to both a critical and commercial success.
It is also notable for its opening track, Godley & Creme's "Une Nuit A Paris (One Night In Paris)", an eight-minute, multi-part "mini-operetta" that is thought to have been an influence on "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen. Its melody can also be heard in the overture to Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical "Phantom of the Opera".
"I'm Not in Love" then gave the band their second UK #1 in June 1975. The song also provided them with their first US chart success when the song reached #2....
Previous RR Rock-n-Roll Oldies features -here-
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10cc, I'm not in love, xxx, 1975, The Things We Do for Love, 10cc, xxx, I'm not in love, 10cc, Godley and Creme, The Things We Do for Love
TGIF Rock-n-Roll Oldies: Johnny Rivers 1966
Johnny Rivers (born John Henry Ramistella @ NYC 11.07.42) is an American rock and roll singer, songwriter, guitarist, and record producer.... styles include folk songs, blues, and revivals of old-time rock 'n' roll songs in addition to some of Rivers' original material.
Johnny Rivers's greatest success came in the mid-to-late 1960s with sequence of top US and international hits such as "Seventh Son", "Poor Side of Town", "Summer Rain", "Secret Agent Man" -theme to the TV show- then in the early 70's with a great cover of Jerry Lee Lewis' "Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie-Woogie Flu" that went to #6 on the Billboard Hot 100, his third million-selling single.
Rivers continues to record and perform to the present in 2010... love that voice, and the guy can play a guitar:
Johnny Rivers's greatest success came in the mid-to-late 1960s with sequence of top US and international hits such as "Seventh Son", "Poor Side of Town", "Summer Rain", "Secret Agent Man" -theme to the TV show- then in the early 70's with a great cover of Jerry Lee Lewis' "Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie-Woogie Flu" that went to #6 on the Billboard Hot 100, his third million-selling single.
Rivers continues to record and perform to the present in 2010... love that voice, and the guy can play a guitar:
R-n-R Oldies: Average White Band 1975/1977
The Average White Band (aka AWB) is a Scottish (!) funk and R&B band that enjoyed a series of soul/disco hits from 1974-80. They are best known for the million-selling hit single Pick Up the Pieces. As of 2010 -forty years after their formation- they continue to perform.
AWB was formed in early 1972 at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art (now part of the University of Dundee) in Scotland, and were previously members of a band called Mogul Thrash. The lads' breakthrough was a support slot at Eric Clapton's comeback concert in 1973.
MCA Records released the Average White Band's debut album, Show Your Hand, a commercial flop. But Bruce McCaskill -Clapton's tour manager- liked the band's music and agreed to manage them. He borrowed money to take them to the US and to promote them. McCaskill had many contacts from his days with Clapton and managed to get Atlantic Records to sign them.
The band relocated to New York, signed to Atlantic and released the follow-up, AWB, better known as The White Album (cover image above) . This album was the first of many with renowned producer Arif Mardin, and reached #1 in the US Hot 100 chart.
Sadly, AWB drummer Robbie McIntosh died of an accidental heroin overdose at a Los Angeles party on 23 September 1974. Lead singer/musician Alan Gorrie also overdosed, but it was Cher Bono that kept him conscious until medical help arrived.
The following year in 1975, the single Pick Up The Pieces - drawn from the #1 AWB album - reached #1 in the US Billboard Hot 100. The song bumped Linda Ronstadt's You're No Good out of the #1 position... and sold over one million copies.
They followed up with LPs Cut the Cake (1975) and Soul Searching (1976), both big sellers and yielding further Top 40 singles like the funk anthem -much sampled subsequently by rappers of the 80s and 90s- School Boy Crush.
Cut the Cake was dedicated by the surviving band members to McIntosh's memory. The group initially disbanded by 1982, but got back together in various forms and still tours to this day with two original band members remaining.
Here the highlanders kick-it-out live on Soul Train- what a truly unique and talented band. This was simply white-hot back in the mid-70s, too... take the T-tops off your Cutlass Supreme and let 'er rip!
Check-it-out, no lip-synch with AWB... it's apparent that they do like to jam live, these guys:
MCA Records released the Average White Band's debut album, Show Your Hand, a commercial flop. But Bruce McCaskill -Clapton's tour manager- liked the band's music and agreed to manage them. He borrowed money to take them to the US and to promote them. McCaskill had many contacts from his days with Clapton and managed to get Atlantic Records to sign them.
The band relocated to New York, signed to Atlantic and released the follow-up, AWB, better known as The White Album (cover image above) . This album was the first of many with renowned producer Arif Mardin, and reached #1 in the US Hot 100 chart.
Sadly, AWB drummer Robbie McIntosh died of an accidental heroin overdose at a Los Angeles party on 23 September 1974. Lead singer/musician Alan Gorrie also overdosed, but it was Cher Bono that kept him conscious until medical help arrived.
The following year in 1975, the single Pick Up The Pieces - drawn from the #1 AWB album - reached #1 in the US Billboard Hot 100. The song bumped Linda Ronstadt's You're No Good out of the #1 position... and sold over one million copies.
They followed up with LPs Cut the Cake (1975) and Soul Searching (1976), both big sellers and yielding further Top 40 singles like the funk anthem -much sampled subsequently by rappers of the 80s and 90s- School Boy Crush.
Cut the Cake was dedicated by the surviving band members to McIntosh's memory. The group initially disbanded by 1982, but got back together in various forms and still tours to this day with two original band members remaining.
Here the highlanders kick-it-out live on Soul Train- what a truly unique and talented band. This was simply white-hot back in the mid-70s, too... take the T-tops off your Cutlass Supreme and let 'er rip!
Check-it-out, no lip-synch with AWB... it's apparent that they do like to jam live, these guys:
TGIF Rock-n-Roll Oldies: The Band 1968
Original members of The Band first worked together as they joined Toronto-based rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins' backing group -The Hawks- from 1958-63 then onto The Levon Helm Sextet/Levon and the Hawks. They also released a single under the name Canadian Squires, but returned as Levon and the Hawks for a recording session later in 1965.
At about the same time, Bob Dylan recruited Helm and Robertson for two concerts, then the entire group for his '65 US tour/'66 world tour. With Dylan, they played a tumultuous series of concerts marking Dylan's final transition from folkie to full-electric-rocker.
These historic appearances were also met with the heckling of folk purists. The Band was used to an audience looking to have a good time, so being rejected on principle was a bizarre, unexpected experience. Levon Helm was so affected by the negative reception that he left the tour within three months and sat out the rest of that year's concerts, as well as the world tour in 1966... then spending much of this period working on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
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| Dylan with The Band 1966 |
Then in July of 1966 while on a break from touring, Bob Dylan was injured in a motorcycle accident, and retired into semi-seclusion in Woodstock, New York. For a while, the Hawks returned to the bar and roadhouse touring circuit, sometimes backing other singers (including a brief stint with Tiny Tim). Dylan invited the Hawks to join him in Woodstock, where they recorded a much-bootlegged and influential series of demos, subsequently released on LP as The Basement Tapes.
Because they were always "the band" to various frontmen, Levon Helm said the name "The Band" worked well when the group began recording their own material. They created two of the most acclaimed albums of the late 1960s: their 1968 debut Music from Big Pink (featuring the single "The Weight"- featured below) and then 1969's The Band.
The music fused classic country music and early rock and roll with a rhythm section reminiscent of a Motown beat. Every member was a multi-instrumentalist. There was little instrument-switching when they played live, but when recording, the musicians could make up different configurations in service of the songs.
Their rich harmonies blended together not sweetly but in an informal, flowing manner that gave them a unique sound, and their image and lyrics -steeped in traditional American culture- was also unusual, running counter to the hippie and psychedelic themes of the day. Levon Helm's drumming was often praised: critic Jon Carroll famously declared that Helm was "the only drummer who can make you cry."- and along with The Byrds this trailblazing group created a genre for later country-rock superstars like The Eagles.
Trivia: 70s Scottish hard-rockers Nazareth (Love Hurts, This Flight Tonight) named their own band from the first line of this song, "The Weight"... a favorite of theirs, and definitely one of mine, here performed live at Woodstock in the Summer of '69...
Rock Oldies FREEDOM EDITION: Elton John
And while the 80s' Candle in the Wind might not be my cup of tea, Elton also did much great early stuff besides the mega-hits that we all love like Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, Daniel, Bennie and the Jets, Someone Saved my Life Tonight, Your Song, Rocket Man, Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting ... i.e. his cover of the Stones' Honky Tonk Women, etc.
In 1975, Philadelphia Freedom was released by Elton John -as "Elton John Band"- as a single. The song was written by Elton John and longtime co-writer Bernie Taupin as a favor to Elton's friend, tennis star Billie Jean King: King was part of the Philadelphia Freedoms tennis team. Recorded in the summer of 1974, the only song Elton and Bernie ever consciously wrote as a single. Taupin reportedly said, "I can't write a song about tennis"... and so he didn't. He also maintains that the lyrics bear no relation to tennis, Philly Soul... or even flag-waving patriotism.
Nonetheless, his words have been interpreted as patriotic and uplifting, and even though released in 1975, the song's sentiment, intended or not, meshed perfectly with an American music audience already gearing up for the country's bicentennial celebration in July of the next year.
The song was also dedicated in part to the sound of Philadelphia, especially the music of the Delfonics, producers Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, and the Spinners and that group's producer, Thom Bell (and thus the Soul Train appearance)...
Previous RR Rock n Roll Oldies features -here-
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