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Engelbert Humperdinck: "'Younger people are catching on to elegant music".

He has sold more than 150 million records in a career that began in earnest nearly 50 years ago, when he changed his stage name from Gerry Dorsey to Engelbert Humperdinck. Yet the thing that strikes us as the most impressive feature of the British singer's phenomenal success is that Humperdinck - who perhaps never stood a chance, given his extravagant moniker - has sustained his career without ever being considered ''cool''.

I think younger people will love what I've done with this album - because it's made for people who want to listen to good music.

''It was probably called cheesy by some people,'' he says of his back catalogue, which includes suave '60s hits such as The Last Waltz and Release Me. ''But it did sell, you know? It did sell and became, you know, powerful in my life.''


He boasts a larrikin charm but it's not cool to listen to John Farnham. Illustration by Rocco Fazzari
The irony of this common perception of Humperdinck is that, with him having become a star during such a rich musical era, he counts among his peers some of rock history's coolest names.

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''Jimi Hendrix once played for me on stage,'' he remembers. ''I said to him, 'Jimi, my guitarist didn't show up, can you believe that?' He says, 'Don't worry, man, I'll play for you.' I considered that a great honour.''

Then there was one Elvis Aaron Presley, whom Humperdinck got to know well and denies ever considering a rival. ''Not at all … I said to Elvis, 'I'm gonna be recording some of your songs.' He said, 'You know what? Man, I've already recorded some of yours.' Ha ha ha!''

Yet despite never attaining cachet comparable with his friends back in the day, with his coming album of genre-spanning duets with superstar veterans including Elton John (pop), Smokey Robinson (soul) and Willie Nelson (country), Humperdinck might find himself in unfamiliar territory.

This doesn't surprise Charles Fairchild, a senior lecturer in popular music at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. ''We always get these seemingly unexpected, even organic attributions of 'cool' to people or objects or experiences that only a few years or even months earlier were marginal or sometimes almost entirely forgotten,'' he says.

''If you look at Humperdinck, Scott Walker, a musician like Rodriguez or even someone like Nick Drake … the trip from some nebulous rumour from the past to pervasive media presence seems to have become a lot shorter and faster than it used to be.''

The subject also intrigues Ian Maxwell, an associate professor in the University of Sydney's department of performance studies, who notes that the kind of music Humperdinck has been known for making is ''what your parents listened to - and rule one of youth culture is that you reject what your parents listened to''.

Tell Humperdinck, however, that his duets project might especially suit the tastes of your parents or even grandparents and he swats away the suggestion.

''I think younger people will love what I've done with this album - because it's made for people who want to listen to good music.

''Younger people are catching on to elegant music with good lyrics and good melodies … and you can see it on the Idol shows.

''You can see the kind of songs that they're singing are very typical of the past because the only kind of people that win on these things are people who sing quality songs.''

Humperdinck will be singing many such tunes of his own (or, at least, that he made famous) when his Greatest Hits and More tour arrives in Sydney on Wednesday. We mean it when we say ''sing'' rather than ''croon'', too, having read of his brilliant response to someone who didn't understand the difference: ''I can hit notes a bank couldn't cash.''

''Ha ha ha! So you read about that? Yeah, for the simple reason that if you're a crooner you have a range of about one octave and three notes after that, or something like that … I have a three-and-a-half-octave range, which takes me out of that category,'' he says.

Even now, at 77? ''Yeah, I'm still up there and hitting notes that banks …''

He laughs again. ''It's the same thing.''

So secure is the singer in both his talent and his oeuvre that he takes as a compliment the nickname once bestowed upon him by the press that would make some squirm: ''the king of romance''.

''I thought it was very flattering to be known as that … I think romantic music and the kind of songs that I sing always have a little comeback here and there, you know, because the world is built on romance.''

Indeed, an argument could be made that Humperdinck's self-belief and disregard for what others deem credible makes him, in a way, cooler than just about anyone.

''There's that idea of almost being about a kind of intense authenticity,'' Maxwell says. ''If he just owns it, I can imagine even a hardcore anti-romantic-music-type person saying, 'At least he knows what he wants. That's cool.'''



Now with extra cheese
We rate 10 of Humperdinck's living male contemporaries.

10 TONY BENNETT
Sure, he's done the duets thing in recent years with everyone from Lady Gaga to the late Amy Winehouse but Bennett has been cool since he left his heart in San Francisco in 1962. His ability to skilfully sing jazz elevates him way above your average purveyor of easy listening.
KEY STAT Has won 17 Grammy Awards.
RATING Coolest.

9 BURT BACHARACH
Whether his songs are being sung by a honey-voiced muse, such as Dionne Warwick (Walk on By, among many), or an unlikely superfan, such as Noel Gallagher (This Guy's in Love with You), one thing is clear when it comes to Bacharach: he has written some of the greatest tunes of all time.
KEY STAT Has had 73 songs reach the US top 40.
RATING Very cool.

8 ELTON JOHN
John's career graph is a roller-coaster of cool, from his humble origins as Reg Dwight through a superlative run in and beyond the 1970s to his recent collaborations with Pnau and T-Bone Burnett — as well as Humperdinck.
KEY STAT Was ranked the No. 1 solo male artist of all time by US chart compiler Billboard.
RATING Cool, but that changes from album to album.

7 NEIL DIAMOND
As a performer, Diamond shook off the "cheesy" tag only recently, mainly thanks to a couple of albums produced by Rick Rubin, who also helped ensure Johnny Cash went out on a high. He has always been a hell of a songwriter, though, from Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon to Sweet Caroline.
KEY STAT Has sold more than 125 million records.
RATING A resurgent kinda cool.

6 MICHAEL BUBLE
A younger pretender to the easy-listening throne, Buble makes up in charm and personality what his too-slick music lacks in terms of depth — you can't release a Christmas-theme cash-in, sorry, album in the 2010s and not be called out on it.
KEY STAT Has sold more than 30 million albums in a 10-year career.
RATING Not quite as cool as he or his fans think he is.

5 TOM JONES
The Welsh superstar has epitomised Vegas cheese for much of his career (and destroyed Prince's Kiss), but he has had some glorious moments: from early classics Delilah and She's a Lady to his more recent hit Sex Bomb.
KEY STAT Has had more ladies' underwear thrown at him than any other artist — we think.
RATING Only occasionally cool.

4 JOHN FARNHAM
Even at his most popular, you could never really call Farnsy cool — dated as it looks now, the mullet and trench coat combination for Whispering Jack looked ridiculous even in the mid-1980s. His larrikin charm has undoubtedly helped him get away with his many comebacks.
KEY STAT Has won 19 ARIAs and 10 Logies.
RATING Lukewarm.



3 BARRY MANILOW
Credibility was always going to be an uphill battle for a man so memorably dissed in '80s teen flick The Breakfast Club. Catchy though Copacabana, Bermuda Triangle and so on may be, there's a pungent whiff of irony when people are seen to be enjoying them.
KEY STAT Had five of his albums on the best-seller chart at once.
RATING Warm.

2 ANDRE RIEU
Few would dispute the fact that orchestras can make beautiful music but no one in their right mind could find a show with a bouffanted Dutchman and a castle on stage sexy.
KEY STAT Knighted in the Netherlands and France.
RATING Has cornered his market, but still not cool.

1 JULIO IGLESIAS
With his radioactive orange tan, sleazy tales of sexual conquests and songs such as To All the Girls I've Loved Before, you start to feel for Enrique and Julio's other kids.
KEY STAT Claimed to be the best-selling Latin artist ever.
RATING Eww.


Engelbert Humperdinck plays Hamer Hall, Melbourne, Monday and Sydney's Star Event Centre, Pyrmont, on Wednesday. Tickets $99.95 to $138.40 at ticketek.com.au or 13 28 49.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/tastes-test-the-vintage-editions-20130705-2pfjp.html#ixzz2YRyuLsVD

This thread needs more Ed Kuepper.

Best Bowie Era?
Spiders (Hunky/Ziggy/Aladdin) OR Berlin (Low/Heroes/ Lodger OR Other era?

Best Iggy Pop Era?
1st two Stooges Albums OR Raw Power/Kill City or Idiot/Lust?

tough one. Raw power is probably my favorite album of all time.

but i absolutely love the idiot and lust for life. still play them regularly.

i guess my personal preference is the idiot and lust for life

MICHAEL BOLTON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And Barry White of course.

The Best Of The Post-Beatles
By Mark Beaumont


For the total lack of Ringo we make no apologies – the toneless ‘Savoy Truffle’ that was his 1971 hit ‘It Don’t Come Easy’ was his only shot at this list, and even that isn’t fit to suck the piles off of ‘Mull Of Kintyre’. But in compiling a list of the best songs by post-Beatles Beatles, you have to start by nodding to those hardy tunes that nearly made it.







So we salute Macca’s ‘Temporary Secretary’ for trying its damndest to invent electro-pop in 1980. We hold a minute’s silence for ‘Pipes Of Peace’, whose melodic buzz-bomb landed just outside the list. We get stark bollock naked and wave a placard in the name of John’s slogan songs that seem a little too hippified for the modern day – ‘Power To The People’, ‘Give Peace A Chance’, ‘Instant Karma’. We pass our condolences to those fantastic tunes the ex-Beatles gave away to others’ albums – ‘Come And Get It’ to Badfinger, ‘Run So Far’ to Eric Clapton, ‘Veronica’ to Elvis Costello, ‘Handle With Care’ to The Travelling Wilburys – or those ruined forever by Bryan Ferry (sorry ‘Jealous Guy’). And we honour the noble nonsense of ‘The Frog Chorus’, but really, fuck off now.

And so to the greatest hits by The Band The Beatles Could Have Been:

1#9 Dream


A perfect crystallisation of the psychedelic hypno-state Lennon first explored on ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’, the Indian swirls of ‘Revolver’ and his smoother 70s Yoko-pop tendencies, ‘#9 Dream’ from John’s 1974 album ‘Walls And Bridges’ really was “a river of sound” and sounded like the ultimate 5-minute career summation. No wonder, besides finishing off a rock’n’roll covers album, he had to have a long lie down for five years after it.






2Maybe I’m Amazed


Sounding like a rough but passionate offcut from the ‘Let It Be’ sessions – which is sort of was – ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’ was the consummate climax of 1970’s ‘McCartney’ album, full of pounding piano, chilling church organ and Paul yowling “Maybe I’m a lonely man who’s in the middle of something that he doesn’t really understand” in one of his most raw and moving crescendos ever. Amazing.

3Oh My Love


Easily Lennon’s finest ever love song, the simplicity and tenderness of ‘Oh My Love’ was a glimmer of serenity amongst the political tub-thumping and emotional desperation of 1971’s ‘Imagine’ album. So gorgeous it could turn Justin Lee-Collins into a soppy-eyed romantic.


4Live And Let Die


BAM-BAM! LIVEUNLEDYYYYYEEE! BAM-BAM! DADADA! DADADA! DADA! Okay, so it’s essentially a song about being a psychopath and it’s got the grammatical nous of a Fat Les song – “But if this ever changing world in which we live in” Macca? REALLY? – but there’s no denying the punch, power and one-eyebrow-raising energy of Paul’s Bond masterpiece, these days adorned with columns of flame at the climactic chords when played live. Talk? No, it expects you to FRY.

5Imagine


Soporific, over-played, idealistic hippy bullshit? Or a vital socio-politico-antireligious message being slyly infiltrated over the decades into the pop-mushed brains of the world’s sheeple as the only way to get THE TRUTH embedded into the world’s collective subconscious? It’s an argument we recently had out on the NME’s debate page, but suffice it to say, I’m with the dreamers.

6My Love


Much of Macca’s output with Wings verged on the corny – ‘Silly Love Songs’ anyone? Anyone? - but ‘My Love’, Paul’s homage to 70s soul, was one tune that flirted with schmaltz and survived. Although it can be ruined somewhat if you consider that the “it” that Linda did so “good” was probably encasing wads of Quorn in edible cylindrical sheathes.

7Got My Mind Set On You


George’s mid-80s return to form was trumpeted by this hand-clappy, drum-slappy, sax-sunny pop classic from his 1987 comeback ‘Cloud Nine’. It birthed the Travelling Wilburys too, which is actually no bad thing.


8My Sweet Lord


The peak of his Hare Krishna era, 1970s Number One ‘My Sweet Lord’ – the precise antithesis of ‘Imagine’ - looked set to launch a post-Beatles George as the maharishi of mystical folk pop, like a brilliant Cat Stevens.

9Mother


An essential part of Lennon’s primal therapy sessions with Arthur Janov in LA in 1970 was coming to terms with his mother abandoning him and then dying young. The result was ‘Mother’, from the opening death knell bells to its tearful cry of “Mother don’t go/Daddy come home” an almost unlistenably pained and personal gospel howl of anguish and exorcism unlike anything in mainstream pop, then or now.

10Another Day

A timeless example of McCartney’s bittersweet storytelling pop tradition, ‘Another Day’ (from 1971’s ‘Ram’), ‘Another Day’ was an artful look at lonely, one-night-stand worker drone ennui in the style of ‘She’s Leaving Home’ or Simon And Garfunkel’s ‘Cecelia’. Probably invented ‘Parklife’.

11Mind Games


A pastiche of Procol Harum’s ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’ and just as rammed full of acid nonsense about mind guerrillas, druid dudes and finding an “absolute elsewhere” as this cut from 1973 sorts through years of Lennon’s extensive adventures in alternative ideas, philosophies, therapies and psychology to reach a basic positive message: “Yes is the answer… make love not war”. Like duh, we could’ve told him that for a fiver.

12Working Class Hero


Lennon as Dylan on this dark and desolate acoustic blueprint of life’s journey from crushed childhood through abusive schooldays and worthless working life, your down time “doped with religion and sex and TV”. Proof that Lennon was indeed a visionary, since he’s predicted The Tudors right there.


13Love


A favourite of indie rom-com soundtrack compilers, 1970’s ‘Love’ – from ‘John Lennon/The Plastic Ono Band’ – is as sweet a combination of music box piano and teary guitar as you can get without the pair of instruments growing limbs and running off to get married in Vegas.

14Happy Xmas (War Is Over)


Lennon’s 70s work was full of people-power sloganeering and demands that peace should be given a fair go for once, all things considering. But it was disguised as a jingly Christmas song that his message had the most impact, a musical football lobbed into global capitalism’s no-man’s land. Plus, we get presents!

15Band On The Run


Two years before ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ (although, admittedly, some years after ‘Good Vibrations’ and ‘Happiness Is A Warm Gun’), Macca popularised the sprawling multi-part hit single with 1973’s ‘Band On The Run’ title track, shifting from laid-back pastoral ballad to orchestral pop cracker to tell the story of some sort of rock’n’roll Italian Job.

16Gimme Some Truth


Frustrated by the endless spouting bullshit from “neurotic, psychotic, pig-headed politicians” and “short-haired, yellow-bellied son-of-tricky-dicky”s, John Lennon invented the internet comment with this bilious, incensed but beatific rant from 1971’s ‘Imagine’.



17Woman


Included partly for its heart-breaking status as the first single from ‘Double Fantasy’ released after Lennon’s death in 1980 - as if his final thought was one of love for his wife – and partly for the way its elated, angelic twangles make Yoko Ono seem like Helen Of Troy for three and a half minutes.

18That Day Is Done


A funeral paean adorned with a mournful mariachi parade and Macca gushing a moving elegy, ‘That Day Is Done’ was the highlight of his celebrated 1989 ‘Flowers In The Dirt’ album and co-written with Elvis Costello. It’s just a shame we can’t include the even-better ‘Veronica’ or ‘Pads, Paws And Claws’ that the pair wrote for Costello’s ‘Spike’.


19Say Say Say


While the world was scratching its head trying to fathom what on earth the keyboard-keys metaphor of ‘Ebony And Ivory’ could be all about (nope, still no clue), Macca was already off melding Beatles pop with disco hee-heees on ‘The Girl Is Mine’ and this prime Jacko collaboration from ‘83’s ‘Pipes Of Peace’.



20Every Night


Along with the plaintive ‘Junk’, ‘Every Night’ was a stand-out from Macca’s first solo album ‘McCartney’, concerned with the fragile mental state of drunkenness and insecurity The Beatles had left him in.


Read more at http://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/the-best-of-the-post-beatles?utm_source=nme&utm_medium=bestofnme&utm_campaign=bestofnme-The%20best%20of%20the%20post-beatles#t4G7U6ksFWmSlctC.99

Five Beatles songs you might be surprised to hear Paul McCartney play live

By Lavanya Ramanathan, The Washington Post
Posted: 07/11/2013 10:34:53 AM PDT
Updated: 07/11/2013 10:34:59 AM PDT

From the moment Paul McCartney, coolly holding his iconic, beat-up Hofner bass guitar, plucked the first notes of the "Out There" tour kickoff in Brazil, the audience must have recognized something momentous was happening.
He was playing "Eight Days a Week," the 1964 rocker that is one of the Beatles' most memorable No. 1 hits. And yet, until that show, the song, penned by McCartney and John Lennon, had never been played onstage. Lennon thought "Eight Days a Week," which the group struggled to write, was "lousy."
It's one of a handful of never-performed Beatles treasures that McCartney exhumed for his "Out There" tour. The nearly 40-song set list starts almost every night with "Eight Days a Week," then slips in four more rarely performed numbers from the Beatles catalog.
The list of songs the Beatles never played in concert is longer than you might think. The band's last ticketed performance was in August 1966, but the Beatles experienced their most fruitful years as songwriters after that, releasing "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" (1967), the double-album "The Beatles" (1968), "Abbey Road" (1969) and "Let It Be" (1970) before McCartney left the Beatles in 1970. It's difficult to know why McCartney has chosen them, but these are five rarely performed Beatles tunes that have turned up consistently on the "Out There" set lists:
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'Eight Days a Week'
This Lennon-McCartney tune, which kicks off with a rollicking drum roll,
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was released abroad on "Beatles for Sale" but became a smash when it was released as a single stateside. There are a few dueling tales about where the title came from, but a popular one suggests that a driver told McCartney he had been working eight days a week.
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'Lovely Rita'
A psychedelic little come-on (or, more likely, a sarcastic kiss-off) to a meter maid, the 1967 song off "Sgt. Pepper's" was sung by McCartney and featured a curious interlude with instruments made of paper and combs. McCartney has been including the tune in the middle of his set.
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'Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!'
Lennon wrote this whirling carousel of a tune after being inspired, he would say, by an elaborate carnival poster he picked up in an antique shop. The song appeared on "Sgt. Pepper's" and featured an unusually heavy assist from legendary Beatles producer George Martin, who added the track's carnival-esque sounds. On the album, it's Lennon who sings "Mr. Kite."
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'Your Mother Should Know'
This 1967 number, written and performed by McCartney, was released on "Magical Mystery Tour" and is an homage of sorts to the Busby Berkeley musical, although also a perfect example of the dreamy, hazy sound the Beatles had adopted.
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'All Together Now'
The chants of one-two-threes and A-B-Cs make this nursery rhyme-like 1969 number off "Yellow Submarine" insanely catchy. McCartney has confirmed that the ditty in fact was written for children, mostly by him, with some contribution from Lennon. It's also one of a handful from the Beatles catalog that has been licensed for commercials, making it recognizable to fans everywhere.

http://www.times-standard.com/entertainment/ci_23641556/five-beatles-songs-you-might-be-surprised-hear

From The Who to Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones: The albums that make you wish you’d been there

Ahead of a new compilation of James Brown shows, Robert Webb lists the best live records
ROBERT WEBB

The Who Live at Leeds (1970)

Recorded at Leeds University in February 1970, this was the Who’s return to roots; their Let It Be. According to Pete Townshend it was only intended to appease fans between albums: “Our intention was simply to blow you away”. The album helped inspire the heavy metal revolution of the early Seventies.

Download “Summertime Blues”

John Martyn Live at Leeds (1976)

With an Echoplex and Free’s guitarist Paul Kossoff at his side, Martyn hit the road in 1975 to promote his album Sunday’s Child. The resulting live recording, made at the same venue as the Who album and beautifully capturing Martyn’s breezy, bluesy jazz-folk, was initially distributed from the singer’s Hastings home in a limited, signed edition of 10,000.

Download “I’d Rather Be the Devil”

Bob Dylan Live 1966 - The “Royal Albert Hall” Concert (1998)

Among the most famous of all concerts – the one where disgruntled folkies heckle an indifferent Dylan. The bootleggers were wrong when it first appeared in the Sixties: it was Manchester’s Free Trade Hall and not the circular London venue. No matter, the official release is an essential recording of a pivotal cultural moment.

Download “Like a Rolling Stone”

Van Morrison - It’s Too Late to Stop Now (1974)

Cut with the Caledonia Soul Orchestra in California and London, this is one of those rare double-live sets that doesn’t drag. Morrison performs old Them hits, R&B standards and a roster of solo tracks. A joyful recital from a legendarily cantankerous performer.

Download “Listen to the Lion”

Thin Lizzy Live and Dangerous (1978)

Recorded during two world tours, using different tape sizes and conflicting noise-reduction settings. To even things out Phil Lynott replayed every bass part in the studio and the guitarists overdubbed licks. “The album is about 55 per cent live,” said producer Tony Visconti.

Download “Emerald”

Talking Heads - Stop Making Sense (1993)

When first released in 1984, this was a heavily-edited soundtrack to the movie of the same name. The expanded reissue addressed early complaints and finally provided fans with an essential live recording.

Download “Once in a Lifetime”

Aretha Franklin Live at Fillmore West (1971)

Franklin’s best live album ranges across classics from the likes of McCartney, David Gates and Simon and Garfunkel, all carefully chosen to appeal to the largely white hippie audience. Stunning on vinyl; later expanded to fill four CDs.

Download “Bridge Over Troubled Water”

The Band - The Last Waltz (1978)

Fourteen months before the Sex Pistols bid farewell at the Winterland Ballroom, asking if we had ever felt cheated, The Band bowed out at the same San Francisco venue. Between these two concerts pop music spun on its axis. The Band are joined on stage by a dozen dinosaurs, including Eric Clapton and Joni Mitchell.

Download “Helpless”

Bob Marley & The Wailers Live! (1975)

Few concerts have been as influential as the Wailers’ packed, hallucinatory shows at London’s Lyceum in July 1975. This was reggae’s crossover moment, making Marley an instant star in rock’s white firmament.

Download “No Woman, No Cry”

David Bowie Live at Nassau Coliseum ’76 (2010)

David Live was marred by botched recording and Stage lacked atmosphere. Bowie’s best live albums have been the unofficial ones. This concert recording, culled from his 1976 US tour (and now a bonus with the recent reissue of Station to Station) is unyielding in its monochrome intensity.

Download “Waiting for the Man”

The Rolling Stones - Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out (1970)

Recorded in late 1969 and probably issued to counter various bootlegs in circulation, this is the sound of the Stones (with new boy Mick Taylor) in the ascendancy. It was instantly hailed as the best concert album by a rock band to date and was the first rock live LP to make No 1.

Download “Midnight Rambler”

Johnny Cash At San Quentin (1969)

Keen to repeat the success of his Folsom Prison recording of a year earlier, and accompanied by a Granada TV crew, Cash booked the maximum security San Quentin gaol in February 1969. The improved sound quality and almost rioting audience tops Folsom.

Download “San Quentin” (first take)

Elvis Costello Live at the El Morcambo (1993)

A widely bootlegged promo from the late Seventies given official release in 1993. Elvis (below left) and the Attractions are caught at their raw best at the Toronto club in March 1978. The crowd holler and whoop.

Download “Less Than Zero”

Led Zeppelin - How the West was Won (2003)

The lumbering soundtrack for The Song Remains the Same failed to deliver an accurate document of Zep’s live appeal. This crushingly brilliant triple-disc set, assembled by Jimmy Page from June 1972 performances found during the production of the Led Zeppelin DVD, does the trick.

Download “Since I’ve Been Loving You”

Nirvana Unplugged in New York (1994)

Kurt Cobain was nervous at the prospect of playing an unplugged set for MTV. He refused to comply with the channel’s request for a set-list of hits and insisted on channelling his acoustic guitar through a hidden amp. Perhaps because of the tension between band and broadcaster, the performance at New York’s Sony studios was electric.

Download “The Man Who Sold the world"

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/from-the-who-to-bob-dylan-and-the-rolling-stones-the-albums-that-make-you-wish-youd-been-there-8648119.html

Restless Wanderer

MUSIC Updated June 26, 2013, 4:50 a.m.

By BILL WYMAN
The defining moment in the second half of Bob Dylan's long career came in early June 1988. The scene was the hills above Berkeley, Calif. It was a gorgeous evening; the sun had just set over the Golden Gate Bridge. The singer, in a dark frock coat, stepped to the stage at the University of California's Greek Theater. A backing band of three musicians introduced a crackling riff, and Mr. Dylan began to growl one of his most memorable songs:

"Johnny's in the basement,

"Mixing up the medicine. . ."

It's estimated that Bob Dylan has given more than 2,500 performances in the past quarter century.

He was introducing a new tour with four shows in Northern California. In each of them Mr. Dylan did the same thing, but also something different. He played sharply and clearly with that focused backup combo—led by G.E. Smith, who was also the "Saturday Night Live" bandleader at the time—and sang each song as if he meant it; yet he also performed a largely original set-list each night. Many of the songs, like "Subterranean Homesick Blues," he had never played live before. The performances shivered and shook; they were stripped down, almost elemental.

By his own admission, Mr. Dylan had spent the 1980s adrift. There was a pair of somewhat humorless gospel tours early on—and then years of desultory recording, broken only by celebrity outings with Tom Petty and then the Grateful Dead. In his autobiography, "Chronicles, Volume One," he reveals that a sense of anomie had overcome him. He thought that he might find salvation back on the road, so he told his manager to book him hundreds of shows. Cannily, he also realized that touring would help create a new audience for himself.

After those first shows, he performed more than 70 times during the rest of 1988; about 100 shows in 1989; and then kept going. What came to be called the Never-Ending Tour now comprises more than 2,500 performances. (This writer has seen almost 30 of them in more than a dozen cities in eight states.) They have all featured some variation of that unadorned backing band, with Mr. Dylan making unpredictable song selections from the breadth of his career, sometimes in unrecognizable versions.

It is a remarkable achievement—though not one that Mr. Dylan himself acknowledges. In the 1990s, he wrote, "There was a Never Ending Tour but it ended." His organization doesn't talk about his performances. No wonder then that, as the endeavor clicks into its 26th year with yet another leg of shows starting this week—dubbed the Americanarama Tour, with special guests Wilco and My Morning Jacket on board—no special note will be taken of the occasion.

But if it is not the Never-Ending Tour, it is a never-ending tour. As with many things Dylan, his motivations run deep. The shows align him with an earlier era—when blues and country musicians created their art on small stages in small towns or in small corners of big towns. They also trenchantly separate him from the current era. The modern rock-superstar act tours with a new album to sell and a new image to show off. (That's why Coldplay was running around in Sgt. Pepper jackets a few years ago.) Mr. Dylan just keeps playing, and rarely does interviews. Highly scripted video and light cues make spontaneity in most if not all big-name rock shows rare. By contrast, Mr. Smith has said he often didn't know what Mr. Dylan was going to play next.

Mr. Dylan turned 50 in 1991, and kept on playing, and did the same after he turned 60, and then 70. With preparation, travel and days off, his tours take up close to half of each calendar year. The sheer number and their sprawl are a testament to the 72-year-old star's formidable powers of endurance. Since 1988, Mr. Dylan has played more shows than Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones and U2—each of them a marathon touring act—combined.

On these tours, Mr. Dylan has wandered seemingly for the sake of wandering. With just a few exclusions—he has not played in Africa, or the Middle East outside of Israel—he has roamed the globe restlessly. He has played in 49 states (excepting only Alaska) and Washington, D.C., and in more than 50 other countries. Intrigued, perhaps, by the nooks and crannies of the country, Mr. Dylan has played in about 450 U.S. cities—from Aberdeen, Md., to Zebulon, N.C.—and another 350 or more overseas. Another tic: Mr. Dylan likes playing in venues he hasn't played before. In major metropolitan areas, he has appeared in up to a dozen different arenas, theaters, clubs, baseball fields, casinos, or stranger environments. It seems likely that he has played on close to 1,000 different stages.

The mental demands are high as well. Teleprompters are rock's dirty little secret. (Lou Reed rarely appears without a music stand holding his lyrics.) Mr. Dylan seems to be able effortlessly to call up the words of hundreds of songs—those of others and his own sometimes hyperverbal, sometimes epic compositions. Early on in the tour, Mr. Dylan was regularly playing more than 120 different songs a year—three or four times what a typical rock act might offer fans. (Two of Mr. Dylan's most obsessive and generous online catalogers—Boblinks.com's Bill Pagel and Bjorner.com's Olof Bjorner—are the source of these figures.) According to records kept on the singer's own website, Mr. Dylan has sung nearly 700 different songs on stage over his career—less than half of them from his own commercially released catalog.

Having defined the curious terms of the latter half of his career, Mr. Dylan has lived up to them fully. He lives and breathes as an artist, night after night and year after year, making himself more available, in a sense, than any star of his stature ever has, yet still cloaking his personality, thoughts and dreams behind a wall of impenetrable depth. He has given fans everything and nothing—just a portrait of an artist at work, hiding in plain sight.

Mr. Wyman is the former arts editor of NPR and Salon.com. He blogs at Hitsville.net.

A version of this article appeared June 26, 2013, on page D5 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Restless Wanderer.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324577904578557762905734342.html?

Michael Jackson and Freddie Mercury duets from 30 years ago to be released

MATILDA BATTERSBY TUESDAY 30 JULY 2013
   

Three previously unheard duets by music legends Michael Jackson and Freddie Mercury recorded in 1983 are set for release in two months' time.

Queen guitarist Brian May revealed he is working on the “unreleased material” with fellow bandmate Roger Taylor and producer William Orbit.

The three songs were recorded at Jackson’s home studio 30 years ago, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

May revealed the existence of the three unreleased tracks, which feature vocals from Mercury, in a blog post.

He described the experience as “exciting, challenging, emotionally taxing, but cool” and promised to have something “for folks to hear in a couple of months’ time”.

May said in 2011 that he had been given permission by Jackson’s estate to release the late singer’s recordings with Mercury.

Jackson died in Los Angeles on 25 June 2009, aged 50, from a lethal dose of the surgical anaesthetic propofol ; Mercury died from an Aids-related illness in 1991 aged 45.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/michael-jackson-and-freddie-mercury-duets-from-30-years-ago-to-be-released-8737903.html

I have to say the first two Stooges albums are by far the best, Even if Raw Power is the one album all Grunge bands and Alt Rockers state as the album that led them to their specific sound. (Both Cobain and Jack/Meg White have stated this)

Lust for life is a fantastic album as well with the haunting Passenger and everyone's favourite opening film track Lust for life.

But those first two albums were the heralds of the Punk era and showed the awesomeness of a free flowing thought process put into music.

The Beatles are easily the best band in the world.

My top 12 UK band list:

1. Beatles
2. Rolling Stones
3. Queen
4. Wings
5. Pink Floyd
6. The Kinks
7. Led Zeppelin
8. Yardbirds
9. Cream
10. The Who
11. Dire Straits
12. Oasis

So of the best of the rest include....

Genesis
Sex Pistols
The Clash
Black Sabbath
The Hollies
Roxy Music
Iron Maiden
The Faces/Small Faces
Def Leppard
Duran Duran
The Cure



Edited by Joffa: 3/8/2013 12:03:19 AM

Edited by Joffa: 3/8/2013 12:04:05 AM

"What Is This S***?" - Bob Dylan's The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 Another Self Portrait (1969 - 1971) Set For August 27 2013

New York, NY (Top40 Charts/ Columbia Records) Columbia Records will release Bob Dylan's The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 - Another Self Portrait (1969-1971) on August 27, bringing fresh perspective to one of the artist's most controversial periods and revealing it to be one of his most wonderfully creative and prolific. Containing 35 rarities and previously unreleased recordings, Another Self Portrait (1969- 1971 Bootleg Series and is available in both a standard two-disc set and in a four-disc deluxe box set.

The unreleased recordings, demos and alternate takes on Another Self Portrait -- drawn mainly from the 1970 studio recording sessions that resulted in the official 1970 albums Self Portrait and New Morning albums -- shed new light on an essential and pivotal period in the artist's ongoing musical evolution.

The original Self Portrait, released in June 1970, was Dylan's tenth studio album and his first to receive real pans from the music press ("What is this s***?" was literally the opening sentence of Greil Marcus's review in Rolling Stone while Robert Christgau gave the album a "C PLUS" rating in the Village Voice). Nevertheless, Self Portrait hit Number 4 on the US Billboard 200 and Number 1 on the UK album charts.

In the Self Portrait sessions, Dylan played a selection of songs accompanied by a small ensemble of musicians, primarily David Bromberg (guitar) and Al Kooper (keyboards, guitar), with producer Bob Johnston later adding overdubs to the basic tracks in Nashville. Another Self Portrait presents these original session masters for the first time without overdubs.

Another Self Portrait reveals fresh aspects of Dylan's vocal genius as he reimagines traditional and contemporary folk music as well as songs of his own. Across these unvarnished performances, Dylan is the country singer from Nashville Skyline ("Country Pie" and "I Threw It All Away"), an interpreter of traditional folk ("Little Sadie," "Pretty Saro") who's right at home singing the songs of his contemporaries (Tom Paxton's "Annie's Gonna Sing Her Song" and Eric Andersen's "Thirsty Boots") before returning to writing and singing his own new music ("Went To See The Gypsy," "Sign On The Window").

While the original Self Portrait was a deliberate act of iconoclasm that shattered Dylan's image as "generational spokesperson" while stretching the boundaries of pop music and his own, the album's successor, New Morning, marked Dylan's return to songwriting. Another Self Portrait gives fans a chance to reappraise the pivotal recordings that marked Dylan's artistic transformation as the 1960s ended and the 1970s began.

Featured on Another Self Portrait are a previously unavailable version of "Only A Hobo" and the demo version of "When I Paint My Masterpiece," a track that finds Dylan, who'd been signed as a recording artist not quite a decade earlier, looking to the future, promising that "Someday, everything's gonna be smooth like a rhapsody, when I paint my masterpiece."

Bob Dylan has created a new painting as the cover art for The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 - Another Self Portrait (1969-1971).

The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 - Another Self Portrait (1969-1971) will be available in a standard two-disc configuration as well as in a four-disc deluxe boxed set which will include, for the first time ever, the complete historic performance by Bob Dylan and The Band from the Isle of Wight Festival on August 31, 1969. Housed in a slipcase, the deluxe edition will include the newly remastered version of the 1970 Self Portrait album, in its entirety with original sequencing, in addition to two hardcover books featuring revisionist liner notes penned by Greil Marcus (author of the notorious "What is this s***?" 1970 Self Portrait review in Rolling Stone).

A vinyl version of The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 - Another Self Portrait (1969-1971) will include the album's 35 tracks on three LPs plus a 12" x 12" booklet.

Hardcore fans got an early taste of The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 - Another Self Portrait (1969-1971) when a limited edition 7" single of "Wigwam" (demo) c/w "Thirsty Boots" (a previously unreleased recording) was released for Record Store Day, Saturday, April 20, 2013.

A trailer previewing Bob Dylan's Another Self Portrait may be enjoyed online at http://smarturl.it/BDX_trailer.

The deluxe, standard and vinyl editions of Another Self Portrait are available at Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-hidden-keywords=B00DW5IM9Q|B00DY951RQ|B00DY951TO).

www.bobdylan.com

CD 1
1 Went To See The Gypsy (demo)
2 In Search Of Little Sadie (without overdubs, Self Portrait)
3 Pretty Saro (unreleased, Self Portrait)
4 Alberta #3 (alternate version, Self Portrait)
5 Spanish Is The Loving Tongue (unreleased, Self Portrait)
6 Annie's Going To Sing Her Song (unreleased, Self Portrait)
7 Time Passes Slowly #1 (alternate version, New Morning)
8 Only A Hobo (unreleased, Greatest Hits II)
9 Minstrel Boy (unreleased, The Basement Tapes)
10 I Threw It All Away (alternate version, Nashville Skyline)
11 Railroad Bill (unreleased, Self Portrait)
12 Thirsty Boots (unreleased, Self Portrait)
13 This Evening So Soon (unreleased, Self Portrait)
14 These Hands (unreleased, Self Portrait)
15 Little Sadie (without overdubs, Self Portrait)
16 House Carpenter (unreleased, Self Portrait)
17 All The Tired Horses (without overdubs, Self Portrait)

CD 2
1 If Not For You (alternate version, New Morning)
2 Wallflower (alternate version, 1971)
3 Wigwam (original version without overdubs, Self Portrait)
4 Days Of '49 (original version without overdubs, Self Portrait)
5 Working On A Guru (unreleased, New Morning)
6 Country Pie (alternate version, Nashville Skyline)
7 I'll Be Your Baby Tonight (Live With The Band, Isle Of Wight 1969)
8 Highway 61 Revisited (Live With The Band, Isle Of Wight 1969)
9 Copper Kettle (without overdubs, Self Portrait)
10 Bring Me A Little Water (unreleased, New Morning)
11 Sign On The Window (with orchestral overdubs, New Morning)
12 Tattle O'Day (unreleased, Self Portrait)
13 If Dogs Run Free (alternate version, New Morning)
14 New Morning (with horn section overdubs, New Morning)
15 Went To See The Gypsy (alternate version, New Morning)
16 Belle Isle (without overdubs, Self Portrait)
17 Time Passes Slowly #2 (alternate version, New Morning)
18 When I Paint My Masterpiece (demo)

Bob Dylan & The Band
Isle of Wight - August 31, 1969
1. She Belongs To Me
2. I Threw It All Away
3. Maggie's Farm
4. Wild Mountain Thyme
5. It Ain't Me, Babe
6. To Ramona/ Mr. Tambourine Man
7. I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine
8. Lay Lady Lay
9. Highway 61 Revisited
10. One Too Many Mornings
11. I Pity The Poor Immigrant
12. Like A Rolling Stone
13. I'll Be Your Baby Tonight
14. Quinn The Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn)
15. Minstrel Boy
16. Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

http://top40-charts.com/news/Oldies/What-Is-This-S***--Bob-Dylans-The-Bootleg-Series-Vol.-10-Another-Self-Portrait-(1969--1971)-Set-For-August-27-Release/91918.html?

Would you like some spotted dick and Toad in a hole with that? very English, don't you think? The fact that you rate Def Leppard in the best of the rest is cause for posting while high. I mean I do like DL but they don't come near the best of the rest especially when you have both Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden there as well.

Where's the Jimi Hendrix Experience?, big Brother and the holding company? The Doors? your very own Grateful Dead!
To even put Wings in is an insult to music. By sheer popularity sure many of those bands would be ranked in the greatest but that doesn't make them the best. Look at the sheer volume of U2 or Radiohead fans! all wrong yet I cop mountains of abuse for pointing out how generic and lame they are.

I'd even throw in an REM, Tragically Hip, Nirvana, The Saints, The Smiths, Sonic Youth, Bad Religion, so many more. there are probably many more Euro bands that I've never heard of that are greater but I don't know them so I can't judge but seriously some of your choices are miss guided for the best including the Beatles.

Dude I was only listing UK bands, I plan on having a look at a US list in the next day or so....and then Australian.

Well, that's not how the post reads. Still The Clash are a greater band than Dire Straits and should rank above Oasis, Wings and Even the stones(though the stones should be removed altogether for the atrocities to music that is the 80's,90's and 00's).

Paul McCartney could regain control of rights to the Beatles songbook

August 12, 2013

If he can hold on for five more years, Paul McCartney could regain the rights to part of the Beatles songbook, Fader reported on August 11.

Michael Jackson bought half of the rights years ago, while Sony/ATV Music Publishing holds the rest of the rights. The U.S. Copyright Act of 1976 enables songwriters to regain control of publishing rights on compositions published prior to 1978 after 56 years. That means that McCartney would regain control of the rights to his 1962 compositions in 2018 and those from 1970 in 2026. McCartney won't be able to have the rights held by Sony/ATV Music Publishing, but he will be able to get back the ones purchased by Michael Jackson and now currently held by his estate.

The new information comes as good news to the 71-year-old Brit rocker, who is also due to release another album later this year. It is rumored that he has been working with some big-name producers including Mark Ronson, Paul Epworth who works with Adele, and Kings of Leon collaborator Ethan Johns.

http://www.examiner.com/article/paul-mccartney-could-regain-control-of-rights-to-the-beatles-songbook?

50 years later, the Beatles still make €51m a year

16/08/2013 - 15:52:35

The Beatles have made an annual turnover of £43.5m (€51m).

The 'Hello Goodbye' hitmakers' business, Apple Corps Limited, has amassed the staggering figure - £2 million more than they made in 2012 - landing Sir Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and the estates of late members John Lennon and George Harrison €6m each.

Despite forming more than 50 years ago, The Beatles received €2,385,750 each in dividends, €2,267,480 in promotional activities fees and €1,376,270 for name and likeness payments.

A source told The Sun newspaper: "The Beatles have been the most famous band in the world since the 60s and it keeps on paying.

"The obsession with the Fab Four has never stopped, even half a century after they started.

"So the money just keeps rolling in."

Ringo recently said he believes the group would have reformed and gone on tour by now had John and George still been alive today.
The band split in 1970 and John was shot dead by a fan in New York in 1980, while George died of lung cancer in 2001.

When asked whether the band would have reunited, Ringo said: "I'd like to think, yes, we would.
Paul still goes out with his band, I go out with mine and John would have probably been going out with his.

"George was not big on touring so I'm not sure about him. But who knows ... it could have come together."

http://www.breakingnews.ie/entertainment/50-years-later-the-beatles-still-make-51m-a-year-603877.html

Pretty hard to mount an argument that The Beatles aren't the greatest band of all time. They aren't my favourite but their popularity, quality and influence on musical and cultural history puts them miles ahead of the rest. It's a bit like Elvis and Michael Jackson, you might not like Rock'n roll or pop, but to those genres they were perfection. To list the best musicians and favourite musicians should be very different lists.

This reasoning is retarded. Agreeing that popularity and influence makes them the greatest means that Justin Beiber is the greatest solo artist of his generation.

Iggy Pops Raw power has been sited as the key influencing album to the 80's Alternate music and Grunge scenes as well as the Clash. Igg y and The Clash changed the music landscape and created the greatest decade of music of all time (the 90's).

Whilst I like the Beatles and do throw them on every now and again, I wouldn't call them the greatest band of all time especially when Dark horse and Lennon solo created better music, if not less commercial as with Harrison.

Give me the Clash any day!

Whilst it definitely can't be the only measure, popularity, influence and longevity are good indicators. In effect it's a way of collecting everyone's individual opinion on the matter, just like the one you stated above. They may not be your or my favourite band of all time, but the fact that to the majority of people they are, by definition makes them the greatest band of all time. The tragic thing is that if people are still listening to Bieber in 25 years than sadly he will be one of the biggest solo artists of his generation. I guess it's a bit like Michael Jackson, only MJ was insanely talented and Justin Bieber is a cunt.

I think you'll find that people may throw it off hand that the Beatles are but if pressed they will realize that there are better and greater bands and many who rate the Beatles will inevitably realize that Pink Floyd are greater or (and I hope to hell they do) realize that te Who are by far a better band.

The problem is people no longer think and just spout off the same Standards so as to seem knowledgeable yet just come off as a Rolling Stones best of list or what Richard Wilkinson's told them this morning.

I mostly agree. I always find it funny that its always "who was the best: The Beatles or The Stones". If you only include 2 bands in the question, you're going to get pretty generic answers.

[youtube]u9bk2MrMGaA[/youtube]

Finally found Piper at the Gates of Dawn, looking well forward to it. Also dear old blokes what are the best Rolling Stones records?

Also recommend me some good ole blues artists plz

a lot of people will say Exile on mains street.

but my personal favorites are Sticky Fingers and Their Satanic Majesties Request.

as for blues.

one of my favorite albums is Howlin wolfs live album 'The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions'
Theres a fantastic section in the album where eric clapton is trying to play the song The Red Rooster, and fucks it up. And howlin wolf tears into him.   

Edited by switters: 20/8/2013 06:32:39 PM