CD Odyssey Disc 342: Led Zeppelin

I did my first serious Christmas shopping today. Being without a job makes this experience a lot less joyful, but as I was driving about I was cheered by a woman begging for change at a left turn signal.

Usually these people drive me nuts, particularly when they are hale and hearty as this girl was. However, she was just standing there, swaying happily (yet soberly) with a home-made cardboard sign that said simply, 'smile dammit!'

And she was taking her own advice, grinning away perfectly naturally, daring Those Who Would Turn Left to join her. She didn't seem full of her own self-importance, and she didn't seem like she was begging (although she obviously was). She just seemed like she was happy, and wanted everyone else to be happy as well.

So I smiled back, not because I felt awkward in the glare of her sign, but because she genuinely made me feel a little better. As I drove by I tipped my hat toward her in thanks, and she blew me a kiss. All in all, a good experience.

No, I didn't give her change, nor was I tempted. I don't want to encourage Left Turn Lurkers. I appreciated the smile anyway, and passed it on throughout the day. OK, on to the review

Disc 342 is...IV

Artist: Led Zeppelin

Year of Release: 1971

What’s Up With The Cover?: It is a picture of some old peasant caring sticks. It may be an iconic album cover now, but I find it pretty ho hum. I imagine the man's name is Dennis, and he is only 37. If you fold out the photo, you find that the wall the photo is hanging on is some collapsed building outside of a British town. This does not help, but imagining his name is Dennis does, at least a little.

How I Came To Know It: Led Zeppelin IV is one of those albums everybody knows. It has been playing at parties since I can remember going to parties, although less so in recent years for some reason. In terms of buying it, I think it was my second purchase of the remastered Led Zeppelin CDs, which I only started buying about four years ago.

How It Stacks Up: I now have five Zeppelin albums, two of which I've already reviewed. I'd put "IV" top of the heap, although it is a close call with "Presence."

Rating: 5 stars.

What is there to say about Zeppelin "IV" that hasn't been said before? Precious little, I'll warrant. In fact, I expect even my personal anecdote will be one shared, in one way or another, with most people who know the record. But let's not be hasty.

The record has Led Zeppelin's two most recognizable songs of all time, "Black Dog" and "Stairway To Heaven." I know these are their two most recognizable songs because I've only dabbled in the shallow end of Led Zeppelin's music until recently and I have known them both forever. In a way, my lack of detailed Zeppelin knowledge makes me an expert on just what makes them famous.

I've talked a couple of times on earlier reviews about my strange relationship to Zeppelin, but since those reviews are way back at Discs 27 and 72 a recap is in order. In brief, Zeppelin surpasses artistic excellence with their musicianship - they are on a short list of artists where every band member (vocals, guitar, bass and drums) is a master of his respective craft.

At the same time, I've often had a hard time emotionally connecting to their music. Yes, I feel the groove, and yes I admire the songs and the beauty of their arrangements, but they don't always kick me in the...well, they don't kick me like they should.

That's what I love about "IV" - it does connect with me on every level. It isn't the lyrics either, which are just as nonsensical as any other Zeppelin record, alternating between pointless blues-inspired shouting like these in "Black Dog":

"Hey, baby, oh, baby, pretty baby, tell me that you'll do me now
Hey, baby, oh, baby, pretty baby, do me like you do me now"

and these bizarre and equally pointless lyrics from "The Battle of Evermore":

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath,
The drums will shake the castle wall, the ring wraiths ride in black, ride on.
Sing as you raise your bow, shoot straighter than before.
No comfort has the fire at night that lights the face so cold."

These lyrics make Dio and Uriah Heep seem straightforward, and like Zeppelin "II"'s "Ramble On" manage to once again invoke characters from Lord of the Rings without any direction or purpose. So no, it isn't the lyrics.

I think it is the focus of "IV" that I appreciate. The excessive noodling on the first two Zeppelin albums is noticeably absent, and the band has seemed to recognize that each song should be as long as it has to be, but no longer. Sure there are long tracks, like "When The Levee Breaks" and "Stairway To Heaven" - both of which clock in at over seven minutes - but their length does not seem forced. In fact "When The Levee Breaks" is little more than a groove laid down, and in many ways is the simplest song on the record, but also one of my favourites.

As for "Stairway To Heaven", as everyone knows the song starts out with a quiet and restrained Jimmy Page guitar strummed alongside a light and folksy vocal by Plant, and slowly grows in complexity and tempo, eventually fading into a massive guitar solo that is rightfully famous.

It might seem over the top, but each part of this song so effortlessly fades into the next, you never feel jarred, or pulled by the nose by the song's construction. Each part is where it belongs. Yes, we've all heard "Stairway To Heaven" a thousand times, but I just can't get enough of it. It is more than a bathroom break for radio DJs, it is a perfectly constructed piece of art, and that's rare in this world.

Of course, we all have our own stories about "Stairway To Heaven" most of which revolve around the fact that it is a well established Canadian tradition to make it the last song at high school dances. When the first notes hit, you know the pumpkin is about to burst, and legions of teenage boys walk up and down in front of the bleachers looking for that girl they're going to be able to hold in a close and loving embrace for at least four minutes, and maybe more.

Apart from all the obvious memories I have to this song, including just how wonderful an angora sweater feels on a real live girl, I'll always remember a strange dance I attended in Grade Eight.

Back when I went to junior high, the area right in front of the stage was where all the cool Grade Ten kids hung out. One dance, a very pretty Grade Ten girl in a very short sweater-dress invited me into those hallowed grounds, after I had the audacity to ask her to dance to "Stairway To Heaven" (I had an atrocious batting average for such things in the day, but it never stopped me from swinging away at every opportunity).

Anyway, the girl had a boyfriend - one of those immense, jean-jacket wearing guys from the top field where everyone smoked. If I'd known that I probably would've checked down and tried to bunt for someone more my speed. Sometimes ignorance is indeed bliss. This guy was also dancing in the same area, and based on the look on his face, I thought a severe beating was in my future.

I was the shortest kid in my class in Grade Eight, and dancing with a Grade 10 Amazon was about as good a sexual experience as I had ever had to that point. She was blissfully unaware of my bliss - or maybe she knew and didn't mind. I felt certain her boyfriend got it, and it should have made me much more nervous than I remember being - but I guess I was just happy for the experience. Whatever horror might visit afterward, I'd still have the memories.

I wasn't just short in 1983, I was also really slender. Usually, when the song speeds up halfway through, there is that awkward point where the dancing couple separates, and finishes the song with a sort of half sway, girl with arms extended around boys neck, and boy with hands on the top of girl's hips.

I had automatically defaulted to this position when the girl decided I was simply to small and precious for such niceties. She picked me up and spun me around the dance hall like she was carrying me across the threshold. It could easily have felt embarassing, but let me assure you that this was about as awesome a sexual experience I had ever had to that point in my life. It still holds up pretty well almost thirty years later in fact.

Fortunately, the boyfriend saw me exactly for what I was; no threat at all. He rightly determined that his girlfriend thought I was little more than a cute little fellow - albeit a mildly sexually excited one - and mostly harmless. He just gave me a big smile and watched the show. Thank God he was a teenager confident enough in himself to let it go. I'm pretty sure I beat the odds on that count.

So thank you, "Stairway To Heaven" for that, and for every long, lash-filled look you ever helped conjure up from this girl and many others over the years.

And thank you Led Zeppelin, for making one of the greatest rock records of all time. The only thing this album suffers from is that everyone already knows how awesome it is, and are we really that petty to care about such things? I'm glad to know it, and glad to share it with the world.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 341: Supertramp

Today I woke up to find my voice almost gone. I've been fighting a cold the last couple of days, and while I've mostly beaten into submission through a rigorous and thorough disregard, it is having its final vengeance by removing my ability to speak.

It is at times like these that I always appreciate the ability to communicate through my blog. And so here I go with another music review, as that is what I do.

Disc 341 is...Breakfast In America

Artist: Supertramp

Year of Release: 1979

What’s Up With The Cover?: A very cool piece of art, drawn from the perspective of someone flying into New York City, if New York City were made out of giant breakfast table objects, and the Statue of Liberty were a diner waitress. This cover makes me want to have a glass of orange juice.

How I Came To Know It: This album was a massive hit when it came out back in 1979, and so I knew it from the radio when I was a kid. The CD version comes to the collection via Sheila, who also knew it from her youth. She bought it years ago, maybe even before we met, although I can't remember for sure at this point.

How It Stacks Up: We only have this one Supertramp album, although I was told last night in very passionate terms that their other big release, "Crime Of The Century" is a finer work. I can't say for sure, but plan to find out down the road.

Rating: 4 stars

"Breakfast In America" was a huge album when it came out, and I believe it remains one of the highest selling albums of all time.

Musically, this record is an odd duck among much of the stadium rock that was being made in the late seventies. Rather than guitar, the melodies are driven by piano and the distinctive falsetto vocals of Roger Hodgson. This gives the album a really fresh and unexpected sound that wears well thirty years later.

Many of the songs have strong pop licks, but Supertramp isn't afraid to trail off into long, progressive flights of fancy to end a song. Sometimes these arrangements stray dangerously close to noodling, but they stay on the side of the reasonable, and generally serve to support the emotional resonance of the song.

Lyrically, the songs are like a time capsule back to 1979, and all of the doubt and confusion of the young generation at that time. The front end of Generation X, wondering if they'd ever find our place in the world, or even if they wanted to. It is an album of lost innocence, not just for the youth at that time, but for America itself, making the cover's excessive cheeriness deeply ironic. Consider these classic lines from "The Logical Song":

"When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful
A miracle, oh it was beautiful, magical
And all the birds in the trees, well they'd be singing so happily
Joyfully, playfully, watching me.
But then they send me away to teach me how to be sensible
Logical, responsible, practical
And they showed me a world where I could be so dependable
Clinical, intellectual, cynical.

"There are times when all the world's asleep
The question's come too deep
For such a simple man
Won't you please, please tell me what I've learned
I know it sounds absurd
But please tell me who I am."

When I first heard these lyrics I was nine years old, the tail end of that same Generation X, and they spoke to me even then. It was like I was being given a glimpse into the future loss of innocence. Years later, as an adult I can still listen to this song, or similar ones on the record like "Take The Long Way Home" and "Lord Is It Mine" and those same questions hit just as hard as they ever did.

"Breakfast in America" is as relevant today with its questions as it was in 1979, and there are just as many confused people out there, trying to make sense of it all, and find some meaning and attachment to the world around them. It is thoughtful stuff.

On a lighter note, this record always reminds me of a playground incident I had when I was in Grade Five. There was this older boy - Grade Seven I think - that was a big Supertramp fan. He had a nasty reputation. A year earlier, I had witness him eat a live frog simply because someone paid him $5 and dared him. I think the dare motivated him more than the money. Anyway, as twelve year olds go, he was as tough as they came.

He cornered me on the playground of our elementary school one day and put me in a headlock and demanded I tell him "who was the greatest band in the world." In 1979 this was easy, and I quickly answered "Blue Oyster Cult". All hail the cult.

It turns out this kid was a massive fan of "Breakfast In America" and my answer, though objectively correct, infuriated him no end. He began to squeeze my head until I thought it was going to crack like the bones of the frog had the year before. He acknowledged that BOC was pretty good, but demanded I amend my answer to Supertramp before I could go.

I knew I couldn't do this and expect to ever be able meet the gaze of Buck Dharma or Eric Bloom on the cover of their records again. I refused, but for all my commitment to truth, this only resulted in further twisting and squeezing. I'd like to think that the water coming out of my eyes was simply squeezed out from the pressure, but I'm pretty sure it was tears. I gave him that, I suppose, but somehow I managed to stick with my original answer.

Maybe his arm got tired. Or maybe he decided that BOC was a fair answer after all. Or it could be that he recognized a kid as crazy as him over such minor points of honour, and knew we might be there all day. Whatever the case, he let me go and wandered off, confused and disgusted, to search out a new victim. He was a tough kid, but he was fair in his way, and I like to think he admired bravery in the face of adversity.

"Breakfast in America" is an important record, an excellent one, and it has changed my life along the way for the better. That said, I still owe Supertramp for all the pain of that headlock, so I'm going to say despite the application of torture, I continue to see four stars, not five.

Best tracks: The Logical Song, Goodbye Stranger, Take The Long Way Home, Lord Is It Mine, Just Another Nervous Wreck

CD Odyssey Disc 340: Rolling Stones

For someone actively without work right now, I'm amazed at how fast some days can go by. After job hunting, and running a few errands I looked at the clock and saw it was already four o'clock.

One thing is certain, I need to make time to get this review written, so I can stop listening to this album.

Disc 340 is...Their Satanic Majesties Request

Artist: The Rolling Stones

Year of Release: 1967

What’s Up With The Cover?: It looks like a Ren fair where all the participants are on hallucinogens. I don't like seeing the Rolling Stones look like this. It seems somehow...undignified.

How I Came To Know It: Recently I've had a bit of an uptick in my interest of the Rolling Stones, after many years of having little interest at all. I bought "Their Satanic Majesties Request" because it has a song ("2000 Man") that Kiss covered on 1979's "Dynasty" album, and I wanted to hear the original. Also, coming out in 1967, I felt it was relatively safe coming at the very beginning of my favourite Rolling Stone period that begins with "Beggar's Banquet in 1968 and ends with "Exile On Main Street" in 1972.

How It Stacks Up: I have six Rolling Stones albums. "Their Satanic Majesties Request" is by far the weakest. It is not even close.

Rating: 2 stars, and I'm being generous.

What the hell were they thinking?

This was the question I kept asking myself as I subjected myself to a couple of consecutive listens of "Their Satanic Majesties Request." Here they were, one of the world's biggest bands, well known for fusing pop, rock and blues sensibilities together and making strong music, going off the musical deep-end.

"Their Satanic Majesties Request" is a hodgepodge of psychadelic rock, full but directinless orchestration and what sounds like the liberal use of one of those musical jack-in-the-boxes. Of course, when the top opens instead of getting a spring loaded puppet, you get some drug fueled musicians, high on their own self-importance.

This album is what I imagine the studio sounds like very late on a Wednesday night, where the band has decided to eschew a night on the town in favour of staying up until 4 AM getting hammered and jamming. I expect that is a very fun thing to do if you are a musician, but what results shouldn't be permanently pressed onto vinyl, or any other storage medium known to civilized man.

There is a considerable divide of opinion on this record, and no doubt some Rolling Stones apologists will want to point out just how genius the band is. The song construction is certainly complex in places, and when Richards is allowed to play a guitar riff unhampered by bells and xylophones and the screeching of tortured cats, it comes off pretty well. Their talent is enough to drag this record into the very bottom reaches of 2 stars.

However, just because you are musically gifted doesn't mean everything you write will be good. In fact, the very effort made here to be innovative and creative with sound just makes the trainwreck that much worse. By way of proof, the two actually listenable songs on the record ("2000 Man" and "She's A Rainbow" are also two of the most straightforward. I know, it's only rock and roll, but I like it that way.

When I first bought this record, I was far less negative. I think I was overwhelmed by how different it is to anything else by the Stones that I have, and I admired their bravery to do such a record. Also, hearing "2000 Man" in its original sixties psychadelic rock style was a real treat, and simply for this reason I won't be selling the record despite its many faults.

Beyond that, the novelty has worn off like the cheap veneer on the door handle to hell. Now the whole thing just sounds tinny and discombobulated. Songs like "Gomper" and "Sing This All Together (See What Happened)" are all over the place. Strange stratching sounds mix with what I think are bongo drums; weird hoots accompany screeching whistles and bells. The problem is that there is no underlying melody to attach all this stuff to. It is just a big, hot mess. The two songs are five and eight minutes long, but feel three times that long.

The worst part is, that in the eternal Beatles/Stones battle, I am decidedly a Stones man. Nine times out of ten I'm on their side, and this is how they choose to repay me? I'm not generally given to the directionless, drug-fueled music coming out in the late sixties anyway - or at least not this particular style of it - but it can be done right. In fact the same year that "Their Satanic Majesties Request" came out there was another album that did the same thing, and did it far better: "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" by the Beatles.

Man it hurt to type that last sentence.

Anyway, if you're like me and you generally enjoy the Rolling Stones, a good place to start is "Sticky Fingers" or even the hit-laden "Some Girls." If you must hear "2000 Man" then I heartily recommend Ace Frehley's update of it on "Dynasty" (helpfully reviewed at Disc 78). At that time I wrote:

"I also really dig "2000 Man" which I had always thought was an Ace Frehley song. But when I looked at the liner notes, I see it is a Rolling Stones song - now I must seek out the original, if there is one."

What the hell was I thinking?

Best tracks: 2000 Man, She's a Rainbow

CD Odyssey Disc 339: Townes Van Zandt

There are few if any artists that have impacted me as strongly in the past couple of years as much as this one. I was glad to roll another album by him as the Odyssey rolls on.

This next album came out in 1969. That year some pretty impressive albums were also released by The Beatles (Abbey Road), The Rolling Stones (Let It Bleed) and Bob Dylan (Nashville Skyline).

I own and love all these albums, but it is time to give this next record its equal share of the glory.

Disc 339 is...Townes Van Zandt (self-titled)

Artist: Townes Van Zandt

Year of Release: 1969

What’s Up With The Cover?: A peaceful looking Van Zandt sits at a table in his kitchen, eyes closed. Was he waiting to be fed and fell asleep, or is he just deep in thought? We just don't know. I do know his pants are a little short, but hey, it is 1969, so maybe that was the style at the time.

How I Came To Know It: As I alluded in the teaser, I've been on a Townes Van Zandt rampage the last two or three years, and this was just me buying more of whatever I could find by him.

How It Stacks Up: In addition to a couple of live albums, I now have seven studio albums by Van Zandt (with three more on my search list). Of the seven, this self-titled effort is pretty sweet. I'd put it second, displacing my earlier choice for that spot, "Our Mother The Mountain", by the narrowest of margins.

Rating: 5 stars

It has been over a hundred reviews since I reviewed my last Townes Van Zandt album ("Our Mother The Mountain" at Disc 236) and it is good to be back.

Townes' self-titled album was not his first album, but his third, immediately following "Our Mother The Mountain", released earlier in the same year. Where "Our Mother The Mountain" has a more sombre, moody tone, and a lot of narrative songs, "Townes Van Zandt" has a more introspective feel that is equally engaging; perhaps more so.

The topics on this album are those that Townes knows well; troubled relationships, living wrong and his ongoing (and only occasionally successful) efforts to find much meaning in day-to-day living.

This is an album from a man who thinks too much, and too deeply; character traits that speak to his exceptional intelligence, but that would also doom him to a life of substance abuse and an early death. On "Lungs" he sings:

"Well, won't you lend your lungs to me?
Mine are collapsing
Plant my feet and bitterly breathe
Up the time that's passing.
Breath I'll take and breath I'll give
Pray the day ain't poison
Stand among the ones that live
In lonely indecision."

The words of this song trip out quickly, and on every listen a different section will catch my attention and appreciation. No matter what section grabs me, I can see Townes standing in the dark, smoking and brooding about what it all means. He may be in indecision, but he's always looking for answers, and that's what makes the song resonate.

When Townes sings about love, he is part romantic, part realist. Like all subjects, Townes wants to get to the essence of any idea, and not just pay it lip-service. The first song on the album, "For The Sake Of The Song" is a beautiful depiction of an argument between a woman demanding a man be more emotionally open with her, and his reply that if he does not feel it, than to say otherwise would be simply dishonest:

"Why does she sing/her sad songs for me/I'm not the one
To tenderly bring/her soft sympathy/I've just begun
To see my way clear/and it's plain/if I stop I will fall
I can lay down a tear/for her pain/just a tear and that's all
What does she want me to do?/She says that she knows/that moments are rare
I suppose that it's true/Then on she goes/to say I don't care
And she knows that I do

Maybe she just has to sing for the sake of the song
Who do I think that I am to decide that she's wrong

The song is so melodic and true to the natural cadence of speech that at first I thought it was a form of sprung rhythm, but it isn't. It is actually a complex trio of rhymes broken by a caesura, or dramatic pause within each paired line like this:

ABC/ABC/DEF/DEF/GHI/GHI

Then just when you recognize and slip into this pattern Townes adds one extra third, an extra G (the rhyme, not the note), where he sings "And she knows that I do," creating a deeper emotional hit to the moment where he admits to caring for her, just not in the way she wants him to.

For anyone who thinks form and structure in writing is pointless, let Townes show you otherwise. The ear may not take the time to dissect the rhyming structure, but the use of it hits you where it hurts, and in doing so helps to demonstrate not only a conflict between two people, but an internal argument within the songwriter himself.

Thematically, I love how each verse ends with that heroic couplet, where he acknowledges that if she feels the need to tell him something, then who is he to tell her she shouldn't. It is his way of finding a middle ground, where if he can feel as he wants to, he must acknowledge she has an equal right to react to it. Brilliant stuff.

While "For The Sake of the Song" is perhaps the best example, Townes' phrasing and song construction is captivating on all these tracks. He's every bit the poet that more famous artists like Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen are, and his songs are just as thought provoking.

Musically, "Colorado Girl" is one of the better examples of how Townes draws us in, with simple arrangements, driven by a light western-guitar style. He plays similar to Gordon Lightfoot only a bit more thoughtful and - frankly - better (sorry Gord - you know I love you). I've always felt this song would be a great bookend with Jimmy Rankin's masterpiece "Colorado." Townes' song is about going out to Denver to find a girl he loves, and Jimmy's is about the heartache after that same woman leaves you.

Four of the tracks on this record were actually on Townes debut album titled, "For The Sake Of the Song", but this is actually a positive. "For The Sake Of The Song" suffers from low production value that make the songs on it (including the excellent title track) sound tinny and hurried. On "Townes Van Zandt" the production hits exactly the right notes, and shows these amazing songs in all their rightful glory.

"Townes Van Zandt" is a very short album. There are only ten songs, and the total running length is just shy of thirty-five minutes. I found myself having the opposite reaction I sometimes have, in that I wish it were longer. I'm not sure it could be long enough, in fact. This is a winner, and worth your time.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 338: Barenaked Ladies

Sometimes randomness is stranger than pure fiction. One album after we have a cover featuring a barenaked lady, we have a band named after barenaked ladies. Thank you dice gods, for this entertaining bit of synchronicity.

Now if "Synchronicity" is my next roll things will really have taken a turn for the weird.

Disc 338 is...Gordon

Artist: Barenaked Ladies

Year of Release: 1992

What’s Up With The Cover?: The band members strike a variety of goofy poses. This cover is goofy, but not inspiring.

How I Came To Know It: At the risk of sounding like an annoying hipster, this is the Barenaked Ladies first CD, but I knew them before this. I had a friend who had an extra copy of a demo tape (known as "The Yellow Tape"), which featured five songs, four of which were to be re-recorded for Gordon, plus a cover of Public Enemy's "Fight The Power" which was surprisingly good. Anyway, I bought it off of her for two dollars, and bought "Gordon" when I saw it featured some of the songs I already knew I liked..

How It Stacks Up: We have four Barenaked Ladies records. They fulfill different musical needs for me, and so this one is either first or second best, depending on what style of pop music I'm in the mood for.

Rating: 4 stars.

After many years of college-play obscurity, The Barenaked Ladies hit it big with "Gordon" in 1992. The record went 'diamond' in Canada, which I assume means 'better than platinum.' Given that in 1992 grunge was still the king of the airwaves, I consider it no small feat that a smalltime humour-driven pop quintet would do so well.

When you listen to "Gordon" you can see why the band succeeded. They write very listenable pop music melodies, and they play well. The band has not one, but two gifted vocalists, Steven Page and Ed Robertson, who sound equally good as soloists, or blending together into harmonies, which they do often.

The album is best known for its novelty hits, like "If I had $1,000,000", "Be My Yoko Ono," and "Grade 9" all songs which I very much enjoyed singing along to in 1992 but have since lost their lustre with repeated plays (both were also on the "Yellow Tape" adding to the overplay). It is hard for a song founded on humour to have any lasting artistic value, but I think it is also important to take any style of music on its own terms. These songs are catchy, and even when I knew the next joke before it came, it still made my smile.

One demerit for the lyric indicating the band liked Duran Duran in Grade 9. That's just wrong. Fortunately, "Grade 9" makes up for this by playing Rush riffs lifted straight out of "Tom Sawyer" and "Spirit of Radio". The idea that these guys could've liked both bands is hard on the gulliver.

Those who bought the album, were treated to a much more well-rounded work. Sure there are many more songs based principally on humour. "Box Set" is a poke at aging bands that throw together a lot of questionable material to sell more albums (box sets were all the rage in 1992). "New Kid (On the Block)" is a song about the disturbing phenomenon that allowed that band to be wildly popular. Although clearly a poke at the NKOTB, the song is actually fairly sympathetic to twenty-three year olds forced to not grow up by soulless record execs. Best line:

"There's no need to be afraid of us
'Though it just might be your daughter on our bus."

For all this humour, my favourite tracks on "Gordon" after all these years are those where the band takes on a more serious topic. The breakdown of relationships in "The Flag," with its dark echoes of abuse and infidelity make it all the more dark, despite its soft, memorable melodies.

In "What a Good Boy" Page (he is the dark partner) explores how hampered we are by societal and parental expectations we may spend a lifetime straining against. He describes it thusly:

When I was born, they looked at me and said
'What a good boy, what a smart boy, what a strong boy'
And when you were born, they looked at you and said
'What a good girl, what a smart girl, what a pretty girl.'

We've got these chains that hang around our necks
People want to strangle us with them before we take our first steps
Afraid of change, afraid of staying the same,
When temptation calls, we just look away."

"Brian Wilson" is a song exploring the mental illness of the title character by internally musing on what he thinks about while 'just lying there.' At the same time Steven Page's own demons make him equate himself with Wilson at an emotional level. Songs like "Brian Wilson" and the excesses described in "Hello City" are early harbingers of the troubles Page would later have with fame, and the break up of the band. However, even if there weren't a single biographical note to be had, they are both fine songs.

The album is a little overlong at fifteen tracks, where it could easily be twelve without some unfortunate filler. It also has a few too many pop culture references, even if those references are very cleverly worked in. I almost lowered the record to 3 stars, but considering twenty years later I still liked it enough to play it twice in succession today without ever feeling the need to fast forward, it just clears the hurdle into four star territory.

Best tracks: Hello City, Brian Wilson, What A Good Boy, Box Set, The Flag

CD Odyssey Disc 337: Roger Waters

I spent yesterday afternoon lazing around the house, and part of that time was used in working on a diorama Sheila and I are building together. That qualifies as "painting" in the rules sidebar, and so I was through a second album in as many days.

However, when I went to review it I didn't feel inspired, so I downed tools for a day. I've just spent another day lazing around the house (although this time I watched football). My life is truly a thrill a minute.

Disc 337 is...The Pros and Cons of Hitch-Hiking

Artist: Roger Waters

Year of Release: 1984

What’s Up With The Cover?: A woman decides to try a new approach in attracting a ride while hitch-hiking. In this case, she is apparently relying on her bright red backpack and shoes to catch drivers' attention.

This cover reminds me of a road sign on the highway near Vancouver that always enrages me. It reads:

NO
HITCH-HIKING
PICK UP
IS ILLEGAL

This sentence advises drivers that there is no hitch-hiking pick up which is illegal. Does logic therefore dictate that all hitch-hiking pickups would be legal - even people wearing nothing but a backpack and red pumps? I don't think that is what is intended, but nor do I think the paint required to punctuate this sentence with a colon would break the budget.

How I Came To Know It: My friend Craig is a big Roger Waters fan, and he got me into "Amused To Death" (reviewed back at Disc 115). Based on my enjoyment of that album, I decided to get one of his earlier efforts.

How It Stacks Up: I only have two Roger Waters solo albums, and "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" is the weaker of the two.

Rating: 2 stars

Sometimes timing is everything. It has only been two albums since I reviewed Pink Floyd's 1979 masterpiece, "The Wall." Consequently, much of my reaction to "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" was coloured by demons of comparisons that were not kind.

"Pros and Cons" has a sound very similar to "The Wall", and it often feels like Waters is just rehashing musical themes that were already fully explored during his time with Pink Floyd. Efforts at an atmospheric sound, themes of alienation in the lyrics, even production decisions like putting in the sound of children's voices - it's all there, but in each case, delivered in a much more average way. Some of the melodies sound directly lifted from "The Wall" in fact.

Eric Clapton plays lead guitar on the album, and while Clapton is one of rock's greatest guitar players, he is a poor fit compared to David Gilmour for a work like this. I enjoyed the guitar, but it didn't really add another dimension as happens on "The Wall."

Lyrically, the album is apparently a concept album of some kind. I read the lyrics in the liner notes cover to cover, and I'm still not 100% certain what is going on. My best guess is that Roger Waters is having a series of dreams and nightmares, some of which feature the theme of hitch-hiking.

The songs are all named after a time on the clock, starting at 4:30 AM and progressing through twelve tracks to 5:11 AM (I believe matching the length of each song in the process). The songs also have subtitles that follow the time of the morning with a long, bloated title obsessed with its own importance. For example, track 3 is called "4:37 AM (Arabs With Knives And West German Skies)." Like the song titles, the whole album seems obsessed with its own cleverness, minus the cleverness.

I generally like concept albums, and I don't expect them to be replete with radio hits. That said, "Pros and Cons" didn't have much for me to hang my hat on. It goes along competently enough, but there are not enough swells or dips thematically to keep my ear interested. Also, for a concept album, the various dream sequences (if that is what they are) are not strongly linked to each other in any way beyond the thinnest of connections.

I am a big admirer of Roger Waters, mostly for his work giving Pink Floyd some much needed thematic direction. He is a smart man that is not afraid to try something different, and he usually succeeds. I quite like the other album of his that I own, "Amused To Death", but "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" didn't do it for me. It isn't a failure, but it isn't for me either, and I don't see myself putting it on often if ever after this point. Given this, I am going to reluctantly part company with it, and sell it for credit a a local CD store.

Best tracks: 4:41 AM (Sexual Revolution), 5:01 AM (The Pros And Cons of Hitch-Hiking Part 10)

CD Odyssey Disc 336: Parliament

Some albums make great driving music. Other albums are great for painting the house, and still others are good for sitting on the deck with a good book. This next album is great for parties.

Disc 336 is...The Best of Parliament: The Millennium Collection

Artist: Parliament

Year of Release: 2000 but with music from 1974-1980

What’s Up With The Cover?: A picture of the band, beautifully capturing just how truly whacky these guys were in the day. Yet a single picture can't do "Parliament's" craziness justice, so here's another one, presumably taken during a performance of "Flashlight."

How I Came To Know It: Before Parliament, the only funk I knew was a single cassette tape of James Brown's greatest hits. My buddy Spence introduced me to Parliament, and immediately upon hearing it I knew I needed to get some of my own.

How It Stacks Up: "Best ofs" don't stack up, but even if they did, this is the only Parliament in my collection. Sad, but true.

Rating: "Best Ofs" don't get rated. If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you'd know that. It just ain't right.

As I said in the teaser, Parliament is definitively party music, and for a few years in the early oughts, every house party in my circle of friends would have Parliament on heavy rotation. It invariably would get people up, laughing, dancing and quoting lines from the strange space-funk mythology that Parliament built around themselves.

One year for my birthday I even held a funk party, where the rule was to dress up in ridiculous fashion. Everyone had to wear sunglasses, because as Parliament advises us in "P-Funk", "that's the rule around here - you gots to wear your sunglasses."

Musically, funk is up-tempo soul with a heavy bass line. Topically, soul is often about love, but funk gets its kicks below the waistline, sunshine. Given all this free love, it is not surprising that funk fathered a lot of musical bastards in the years that followed, including disco and hip hop. Despite this, for a blissful period in the mid-seventies. funk ruled alone.

James Brown's band always inspires as one of the tightest musical you'll hear, with everyone coming in on their parts right on time, and following the Godfather of Soul's direction flawlessly. Parliament's sound is more a kaleidoscope of sound, with horns, keyboards and strange vocals seemingly coming in and out on a whim. Amazingly, despite all this musical hedonism, they manage to be just as precise.

Of course you can enjoy Parliament's music critically, marvelling at their innate ability to know when a horn section is called for, or the genius of Bootsy Collins' bass track, artfully laying a line through the song that all the other musicians can follow. Or even just the perfectly timed hooting and hollering by various band members who can't seem to contain themselves, but still manage to unload only where it serves the song.

You could do this, but instead I'd recommend you stop over-analyzing it so much and just let Parliament shoot you with their "Bop Gun." Loosen your backbone, dance around, and even clap your hands when you feel inspired to do so. You may feel compelled to utter a falsetto "whoo!" or two. Do not panic; this is normal. It is a funk revival, and you need to park all that stinking thinking and surrender to the groove.

Lyrically, Parliament talks a bunch of nonsense, but it is the most infectiously fun nonsense you'll ever hear. It is like early rap crossed with spoken word poetry. What is it about? Well, here's a sample from "Dr. Funkenstein":

"They say the bigger the headache, the bigger the pill
So call me the big pill.
Dr. Funkenstein.
The disco fiend with the monster sound.
The cool ghoul with the bum transplant."

Well, that clears that up. It also tells me that if the 19th century had had funk music, Frankenstein would've had a much happier ending.

Most of the songs that have an identifiable theme consist of band leader George Clinton warning listeners that they will be forcing you to dance and have a good time. Then, the music kicks in and they proceed to do just that. If Parliament's guitar licks, bass lines, blowing horns and bohemian philosophy don't get you up and moving then you are in desperate need of one of the aforementioned bum transplants Dr. Funkenstein is handing out.

I can't rank this album, since it is a best of, but I can say I had a damned fine time listening to it. I don't put it on that much lately, but the only reason is that this album got badly overplayed for a few years in the early oughts. Hearing it as part of the CD Odyssey reminds me that it is still great and deserving of a return to rotation.

Best tracks: P-Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up), Dr. Funkenstein, Up For the Downstroke, Bop Gun (Endangered Species),

CD Odyssey Disc 335: Pink Floyd

Before I get into what is one of the great rock albums of all time, I'd like to give a shout out to another one of my loves - football.

No, not my usual joyful exclamations about the Dolphins (although we did win today. We're 1-7, baby!) No, today I want to congratulate the fans of the Detroit Lions. It seems they are petitioning the Powers That Be not to allow Nickelback to perform at the halftime show of their annual Thanksgiving Day game. You can read more about it here.

Some things go beyond loyalty to a single team, and righteously opposing the terrible things Nickelback inflicts on the music world is one of those things. Good luck, Lions fans.

Disc 335 is...The Wall

Artist: Pink Floyd

Year of Release: 1979

What’s Up With The Cover?: Fairly self-explanatory. It is a wall of white bricks. Tear down this wall, Mr. Waters.

How I Came To Know It: My brother is seven years older than me, and I am therefore lucky enough to have had an introduction to 'serious' rock and roll music at a comparatively early age. He bought "The Wall" when it came out, and I've known it ever since. I myself never owned it until I bought it on CD in the mid-nineties.

How It Stacks Up: I have five Pink Floyd albums, and they are all great, but "The Wall" is their best.

Rating: 5 stars

When I rolled this album, I was excited, but I was also determined to not simply fawn over it without a proper and impartial listen. I reminded myself that it is in part, a musical, which is hardly my favourite art form. I reminded myself there were lots of little songs that would no doubt turn out to be overly fragmentary, or would serve only as filler. Three songs into my first listen, I recognized these thoughts for what they were; the ramblings of an idiot. There is nothing wrong with this album.

At some point in your life when you find yourself alone on some late night, I encourage you to put "The Wall" on. Turn off all the lights and listen to it straight through without pause, and without any other activity. Watching the movie, with the marching hammers etc., or some concert DVD doesn't count. It should just be you, the dark and "The Wall". Feel free to lie down, on your couch, or the bed or even the floor, and let it soak over you, musically and lyrically. In fact, if you've never done this you've never truly given this record the attention it deserves.

I had done it twice already, and knowing how emotionally affecting it can be, my plans on this listen were more modest. I basically intended to just get it done in chunks, while driving or painting. Early on, I knew this was not to be, and that I was going to have to give "The Wall" its due once again. Sheila went to bed early on Friday, and so I took it on once again, with no small amount of trepidation. It did not disappoint.

Is "The Wall" about the disconnect between a rock star and his audience? Yes, but it is more than this. Is it a cautionary tale of a bleak and totalitarian future? Yes, but taken simply in these terms would actually sell the record short.

"The Wall" is an album about alienation at every level – from our childhood ("The Thin Ice"), our education ("The Happiest Days of Our Lives"), our parents ("Mother"), our lovers ("Young Lust"), our careers ("Nobody Home"), and ultimately from ourselves ("Comfortably Numb"). It is a stark record about all the walls we construct as we grow into adults, and the dangers of how those walls can inadvertently cut us off from ourselves.

Lyrically, my favourite expression of this is about a third of the way in on "One Of My Turns" when Waters sings:

"I feel cold as a razorblade
Tight as a tourniquet
Dry as a funeral drum."

It is some stark stuff, but "The Wall" is great art, and great art is sometimes hard to look at square on.

Musically, "The Wall" has all of the great atmospheric sound that Pink Floyd is famous for. Waters is the mastermind behind the lyrics and themes, but David Gilmour's guitar suffuses the record with its emotional tone. They may have hated each other while making and touring this record, but their talents are perfectly matched.

Gilmour's guitar solos do what all good guitar solos should do; they take the themes established in the rest of the song, build those themes out even further and then return us smoothly back into the main melody. The best example on the record is the long fading solo at the end of "Comfortably Numb." Without this guitar work, the song would still be amazing, but with it it becomes one of the greatest rock songs ever written.

As a "Comfortably Numb" aside, I have a folk version of this song (Dar Williams) as well as a disco version (Scissor Sisters) and both are excellent. It is a song that you'd have to really work to wreck, regardless of how it is re-imagined.

I am also a big fan of the production decisions made on this record. The children playing in the background of "Another Brick In The Wall, Part Two", fading to the telephone ringtone and then the single heavy sigh that leads into "Mother" sets us on edge, and gives us the emotional cue that you can't always phone home and expect to get all the answers to life's tough questions.

At the end of the first disc (or side two, for you vinyl warriors out there), "Goodbye Cruel World" plays the same simple line of music over and over, with the end of the note being clipped short. It is creepy (especially on headphones) and effective.

With the dreary mood firmly established in the first half of the record, Pink Floyd use the second half (sides three and four) to further explore these themes. In "Hey You" there are even moments where we get glimpses of an effort to re-establish some human connectivity, but they are short lived; Roger Waters has not finished with his apocalyptic exploration of our own minds.

Because ultimately, that is what "The Wall" is, at least for me. It is a series of songs that warn us not to lose our human connections, by painting a picture of what it would look like if we did. The last lines of the last song on the album, "Outside The Wall" describe what people do once they've escaped:

"Some stagger and fall - after all, it's not easy
Banging your heart against some mad bugger's wall."

A rather pathetic epilogue, especially when the mad bugger in question is you, and just how high and wide your wall has become is entirely your own doing.

"The Wall" is about as perfect as rock music gets. It is profoundly affecting, and it always makes me recommit to not losing touch with myself. Musically it is inspiring, and if it is lyrically dark and unpleasant in places, that's just how it makes sure you're taking it seriously.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 334: Bob Dylan

Earlier today I received yet another rejection letter. No, not for my book, just the run of the mill, 'you weren't shortlisted' reply to a job application. O, the joy. With his mix of everyman folk, rock and above all, the blues, this next artist was the right tonic for an underwhelming day.

Disc 334 is...Time Out Of Mind

Artist: Bob Dylan

Year of Release: 1997

What’s Up With The Cover?: An out-of-focus Bob sits in front of a studio panel, looking a bit fuzzy and, to be perfectly honest, underdressed. Maybe he wasn't told that the album photo shoot was that day. More likely, being Bob, he didn't care. You can do that when you're Bob Dylan.

How I Came To Know It: This was just me drilling through the Bob Dylan collection. I probably got this record in the early oughts, a few years after it came out. I had a lot of Dylan by that time, and recognized the title as one that had received recent critical acclaim.

How It Stacks Up: According to wikipedia (which is always right, of course), Dylan has 34 studio albums. I only have 17 of those, though I have plans to get more when it feels right. Of the 17 I have, "Time Out of Mind" holds up surprisingly well. That said, the competition is fierce, so I couldn't put it higher than 11th or 12th depending on my mood.

Rating: 4 stars.

"Time Out Of Mind" represents a comeback album of sorts for Dylan. It won three Grammys (although that means less and less with every passing year) and it is ranked among the top 500 albums on Rolling Stone's website (this also meaning less and less with every passing year).

More notebably, while not having any recognizeable hits on it, it was Dylan's first album to crack the top 10 since 1979's "Slow Train Coming." This is ridiculous considering how good 1989's "Oh Mercy" is, but I'll talk about that when I roll it.

Like "Oh Mercy", "Time Out of Mind" benefits from a strong effort from superstar producer Daniel Lanois. Lanois is famous for his big, atmospheric sound most famous on huge albums like Peter Gabriel's "So", Emmylou Harris' "Wrecking Ball" and a whole slough of U2 records including "The Unforgettable Fire", "The Joshua Tree" and "All That You Can't Leave Behind."

"Time Out Of Mind" is Dylan returning to a softer, acoustic sound, less folksy but much more heavily influenced by traditional blues, and it finds a good match with Lanois' ambient-sound styles. He gives the sparse arrangements more volume, and he smooths out the rough-edges of Dylan's scratchy voice without going so far as to remove his signature sound. I wouldn't want to hear every Dylan album produced by Lanois, but I love the way they work together on this material.

For all the big sound that Lanois layers in, the songs themselves are mostly introspective. They are songs about lost love, bad love and unrequited love. This far into his career, Dylan has a lot of experiences to draw on, and he makes this oldest of topics new again.

There are traditional 'woe is me' blues music on this record, like "Love Sick" and "'Til I Fell In Love With You", which as someone just starting to blossom into a blues fan, I really enjoyed. These songs are all-in-one trips through the evolution of the art form. He starts with basic blues riffs, adds in the smokey bar sound of sixties and seventies rock, and then slows it back down and backs out the loudness so you can see the song laid out for you. Coupled with Lanois' lazy atmosphere, they almost stray into pop music.

There are also songs that are more folk rock. Unlike Dylan's early sixties work, these songs aren't trying to be particularly clever with the lyrics, nor (with the exception of "Highlands") is he going for laughs. Instead, he is focused on simple language designed to convey emotion as direct as possible. There are many great songs on this album that follow this approach, but my favourite is "Not Dark Yet". Here's a sample:

"Well, my sense of humanity has gone down the drain
Behind every beautiful thing there's been some kind of pain
She wrote me a letter and she wrote it so kind
She put down in writing what was in her mind
I just don't see why I should even care
It's not dark yet but it's gettin' there"

This stanza, like a lot on this record had me thinking about Hemmingway, who was so great at expressing complex emotion through simple language.

There were places listening where some of the lyrics sounded so plain that they were cliched, but when I went back to find an example, everything read beautifully. Maybe it was just Bob's easy delivery that had me thinking he wasn't getting at a point.

The record is an unweildy 72 minutes (the vinyl version is a two record set), and I think I was ready for it to be over before it was for that reason. At the same time, there are only eleven songs, and I couldn't find a single one that needed to be cut.

The final track, "Highlands" is more than a little bloated at 16:31. Like the record as a whole, despite its meandering nature, I would be hard put to cut it down any further. At my best, I don't think I could edit it down by more than two and a half minutes.

"Highlands" is a bit goofy, but so is Dylan at times, and we rightfully love him for it. There is a particularly clever exchange in the song between him and a waitress in a diner taking his order and later trying to convince him to draw a sketch of her. The beginning of their exchange goes:

"Well it must be a holiday, there's nobody around
She studies me closely as I sit down
She got a pretty face, and long white shiny legs
I say, 'tell me what I want'
She says 'you probably want hard-boiled eggs.'"

Strangely, when I went to look up my favourite line on Dylan's own website, the lyrics were totally different, following a more traditional dialogue with her asking what he wants and him replying "soft-boiled eggs." This is just Dylan messing with his own product. He likes doing that, and I suspect he likes it even more if it bothers us. It didn't bother me, although I prefer the quirky version on the recording.

In fact, very little of this record's quirks bothered me. Most were inspiring, and by the end of my third listen I found I had upgraded a record I thought was 3 stars all the way to 4.

Best tracks: Love Sick, Standing In The Doorway, Tryin' To Get To Heaven, Not Dark Yet, Highlands