CD Odyssey Disc 624: Sarah McLachlan

I’ve really been jumping from genre to genre lately on the Odyssey. I went from the dark progressive metal of Tool to the light and upbeat indie pop of the Ting Tings. Now I am bumped to new age folk-rock with this next album.

Disc 624 is…. Touch

Artist: Sarah McLachlan

Year of Release: 1989

What’s up with the Cover? I assume this is what it would have looked like if Galadriel had kept the One Ring (her golden hair would look black in ‘ring vision’).  Take the ring off, Galadriel – the Dark Lord can see you!

Also what are those creatures drawn in corners of the art border? Up top they look like fat Dr. Seuss birds, and down below they look like overweight octopuses.

For all the kidding, I do like this cover, which has a nice magical quality. Bonus points to McLachlan for doing the ‘hand tinting’ to the photograph, which I assume accounts for the Morgul-glow it has.

How I Came To Know It:  I heard the song “Vox” on MuchMusic and I liked it, so I bought this album. I am one of those fans from the beginning when it comes to Sarah McLachlan.

How It Stacks Up:  We have five Sarah McLachlan albums (her first five) and I must reluctantly declare “Touch” the least of the bunch. Sorry, Sarah – something had to be last.

Rating:  2 stars

“Touch” is an album by an artist still struggling to find her niche. McLachlan would go on to not only release a series of excellent records, but also to almost single-handedly launch the power of the all-woman tour with Lilith Fair. Back at the beginning she was just a newly discovered ingénue trying to figure it all out.

First the good stuff, because there is plenty of promise on “Touch” of what would come later. McLachlan’s voice is a thing of beauty, and she controls it with the grace and authority of an opera singer. A lot of these songs are incredibly vocally demanding and she delivers them well when lesser talents would have gone sharp or out of breath.

The hit off this record (minor as it was) is “Vox” and it is easy to see why. McLachlan’s vocals deliver the lyrics in a mysterious and breathless way that would help define the greatness of her next record, 1991’s “Solace.” Also, the keyboard riff on “Vox” is a pretty cool pop hook that nicely offsets the new age feel of the rest of the song. Even the lyrics of “Vox” are solid, as they describe a dreamy but troubled relationship (everything with this record is dreamy in some way):

"Through your eyes the strains of battle like a brooding storm

You're up and down these pristine velvet walls like focus never forms

My walls are getting wider and my eyes are drawn astray

I see you now, a vague deception of a dying day."

Unfortunately, someone decided that there can’t be too much of a good thing and ended the record with an extended version of “Vox”.The extended version is only two minutes longer, but those extra two minutes pack in a lot of terrible choices. Worst of all is the weird percussion sounds at the beginning that reminded me of the Dead Milkmen’s “Instant Club Hit” except without any of the self-aware mockery. Not all music is made for dancing, and trying to force it only makes it worse.

The drumming and percussion decisions on “Touch” are generally annoying. I’m not sure if they are trying to evoke tribal sounds or new wave drum machines but they often manage to mangle them together into a Frankenstein’s monster of distracting noise. McLachlan is game to keep these songs stable, and with the evocative power of her voice she generally succeeds. Her only reward for rescuing the songs is to have her pushed even lower down in the production mix. It was like when they made this album they hadn’t yet figured out that McLachlan is the reason people would buy it.

I will say that the title track has very pretty New Age production, where the drums and keyboards serve the melody, rather than overpowering it. The song has McLachlan singing in a simple hymn-like fashion that had me thinking of Enya’s first two albums. It may be a bit too much like Enya, in fact, but since I like Enya’s early albums I have no complaints with a little honest emulation.

This mood is broken by more goofy percussion on “Steaming” and then two terribly named songs in “Sad Clown” and “Uphill Battle.” While not a great song, “Sad Clown” has passable lyrics which are not – thankfully – about some morose circus performer. “Uphill Battle” is an instrumental that desperately needs McLachlan’s vocal talents to rescue it from itself.

Kudos to McLachlan for sticking to a reasonable 10 songs rather than going overboard and I also like the cover design as I noted earlier. However, the lyrics printed inside are provided in an almost unreadable handwritten scrawl. It may give it an organic look, but a note to artists; if you are including the lyrics it is presumably because you want us to be able to read them. Keep that in mind when you choose a font.

I’ll end on an up-note with “Ben’s Song.” This song shows the promise of everything “Touch” could have been if McLachlan’s talents were fully utilized. “Ben’s Song” is a meditation of sorts on the death of a loved one. Not the actual death, but merely the agony of imagining it will one day come to pass – the kind of dream that is so real it gives your heart a pain that threatens to knock you over with grief.

The song begins with McLachlan singing in a high, keening chant that is so pure and ethereal that you’re sure she’s stepped right out of the world of faerie. The only instruments are bass and piano. McLachlan plays the latter, reminding us of her exceptional talent as a pianist as well.

"On the hills of fire, the darkest hour

I was dreaming of my true love’s pyre

Who will bring a light to stoke the fire?

Fear not for you’re still breathing

"On a winter’s day, I saw the life blood drained away

A cold wind blows on a windless day”

The lyrics made me think of an ancient Viking woman sending her husband off to Valhalla, and the song fades out with McLachlan repeating “on a winter’s day” with a haunting resonance.

“Ben’s Song” would be the perfect ending to this album, and when I remember to rouse myself from its spell in time I stop the record here. Unfortunately, the “Vox” extended version is what the record execs leave us with instead – proof that they just didn’t know what they were doing.

Best tracks: Vox, Touch, Ben’s Song

CD Odyssey Disc 623: The Ting Tings

I felt under the weather all day today. On Saturday I ate a whole lot of potato chips, jujubes and two slices of pizza. I don’t eat that much crap anymore and my system can’t handle it. Washing it down with rum was equally unwise. Damn stuff was like a dog wrapped ‘round my leg.

Disc 623 is…. We Started Nothing

Artist: The Ting Tings

Year of Release: 2008

What’s up with the Cover? Hey everyone - let's scrap book! Let’s not.

How I Came To Know It:  A while back I watched a whole bunch of Jools Holland episodes and the Ting Tings were on a couple of them. I liked them and I thought Sheila would like them though, so I bought her this album. As gifts go it went…OK.

How It Stacks Up:  The Ting Tings haven’t been around that long and they only have two albums. “We Started Nothing” is the only one we’ve got, so it can’t really stack up.

Rating:  3 stars but almost 4

Some would call me a musical snob, and I admit that I can be a bit snobbish here and there when it comes to Top Forty music. In my defence, if you are playing the percentages Top Forty and New Country are the two most likely genres to be…er…not good. That was me being kind.  However, with “We Started Nothing” the Ting Tings buck the trend, and deliver a fun, upbeat and intelligent pop record.

By intelligent don’t mistake that I mean the lyrics have a lot to say because they don’t. This album compares people to traffic lights, roundabouts, and fruit machines (I think this last one refers to a slot machine). These references aren’t particularly insightful and at times they feel a bit forced.

The cleverness is more in the composition, which is a damned sight more complicated in a good pop song than most people give it credit. When you’re working with three chords things are only going to go in so many directions. The Ting Tings keep things fresh with interesting percussion decisions and grooves that are hard not to dance to.

To paraphrase Fatboy Slim, if a song like “Shut Up and Let Me Go” don’t make your booty move, your booty must be dead. “Great DJ” is a great club anthem that hopefully happened (I have no idea; my clubbing days are a rare occurrence these days). The lyrics of “Great DJ” sum up the combination of emptiness and fun this record provides:

“Imagine all the girls

And the boys

And the strings

And the drums…the drums…the drums.”

Not much to read, but if you’re listening and you resist singing “the drums…the drums…the drums” along with the record then you’re missing the point. Also, you are missing a great deal of fun. If you aren’t going to get out to a club at least let the Ting Tings encourage you to dance in your living room – I know I do.

If I’m hearing them right, the band has a lot of positive influences. “Keep Your Head” has a melodic refrain that sounds like it was lifted from a Cure song, except without all the teen angst. “Be the One” has a pop ‘n’ wan feel of the Cure mixed with a bit of ‘Til Tuesday. And although the result on “Be The One” sounds a bit too much like contemporaries Rilo Kiley it is a good likeness, not a bad one.

Other places they have the frenetic dance fever of early B-52s as well. It may not be the case (I didn’t look it up) but listening to this band I feel like they grew up appreciating a lot of the good artists that came before. Maybe that’s why they called the album “We Started Nothing.” If so then well played, Ting Tings, well played.

Lead singer Katie White isn’t likely to win any singing competitions for pure vocal power, but she has a nice tone and these songs perfectly suit her. In addition to being easy on the eyes (hey, I’m human) she has a good feel for a song’s timing and knows how to ride in the back pocket of the beat. It is harder than it looks but she does what you are supposed to, and makes it feel easy.

After the oppressive listening experience of Tool (however gifted) the Ting Tings were exactly the tonic I needed to lift my spirits. This is a fun record, and I was surprised to find it hadn’t done nearly as well in North America (it was a solid #1 record in the UK, but floated between 8^th and 78^th on US music charts). Maybe everybody thought it was indie and wanted to make sure it didn’t sell too well, so it could stay cool.

Well, it is pop music, hipsters, and that’s OK. In fact it is really good pop music. It may not change the world, but it might just improve your mood, and it’s worth your time.

Best tracks: Great DJ, That’s Not My Name, Shut Up and Let Me Go, Keep Your Head, We Started Nothing

CD Odyssey Disc 622: Tool

I am just back from an evening of listening to music with friends – one of my favourite things to do. Now it is time to review the album that I listened to as I walked the last part of my journey home – making it a musical night right up the very last!

Disc 622 is…. Lateralus

Artist: Tool

Year of Release: 2001

What’s up with the Cover? Tool always manage to do covers that are both innovative and totally creepy.  This one has a plastic black sleeve over it, but when you take that off there is a booklet that looks like those see-through layered anatomy pages you find in encyclopedias.  Except when you flip through this one you find weird extra items buried inside, like a vortex ending in a burning eye, a pentagram and a pearl at the centre of four ornate handles. For Tool the human anatomy isn’t just fascinating; its filled with eldritch horror.

How I Came To Know It:  My friends Kelly and Chris told me to get this when it came out but like a chump I ignored them for several years. When I finally did buy it, they were proved right. If I didn’t give them credit at the time, let me make up for the oversight and say thank you now.

How It Stacks Up:  It is a close call with “Undertow” (reviewed way back at Disc 131). I originally put “Undertow” second to “Lateralus” when I rolled it, but there are a couple of small faults at the end of “Lateralus” that knock it just south of 5 stars. Since I gave “Undertow” 5 stars, and I’m not going to do that here, I’ve got to reluctantly put “Lateralus” second.

Rating:  4 stars but ever so close to 5.

When I go to house parties, I’m known to take an ornate drinking glass with me – I call it the Goblet of Rock. The Goblet of Rock is an ornate steel frame depicting dragons, pagodas and naked ladies. The glass the frame holds is a deep cobalt blue. It is ridiculously over the top, and I love it.

Or at least I did.  Last night while I was unpacking my knapsack, it slipped out of my hand and the cobalt blue glassware smashed into tiny pieces on my kitchen floor. I was listening to this album at the time on headphones, and the song that was playing was “Schism.” As the glass bounced unscathed off the tile once, and then fell a second time and disintegrated, I could hear Tool’s Maynard James Keenan singing:

“I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them tumble down

No fault, none to blame, it doesn't mean I don't desire to

Point the finger, blame the other, watch the temple topple over.

To bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication.”

It was a weird coincidence, but exactly the kind of weird coincidences you almost expect when listening to the crazy genius that is “Lateralus.” Listening to this album walking to and from work for a couple days, I felt like I was in some kind of Lovecraftian tale of horror. The sun was shining, but everything seemed disconnected and alien. Yet last night walking home at two in the morning, the album felt more like a warm blanket of sound. The dead of night is just a better conduit for the Tool listening experience.

Wherever you listen to it, “Lateralus” will cast its spell on you. This record is a masterpiece of musical precision, crisp yet layered sound production and thoughtful, evocative lyrics. Like all Tool albums, it explores the dark recesses of the human mind as it casts its considerable imagination into what it means to be human.

Grounding it all are Danny Carey’s drums. Carey’s drumming is always amazing, but I think he is never better than on “Lateralus.” He lays down a web of complicated and unexpected time signatures. My untrained ear can never figure out what they are (I’m pretty much a 4/4 guy), but it doesn’t prevent me appreciating how they give every song a centre that is both focused and disorienting at the same time.

And beyond being technically interesting and intricate, these songs draw you down into a fugue state where your lizard brain can get lost in the groove even as your frontal lobes dance nimbly on the melody.

There are portions of this album that drag slightly, like the echo-filled “Mantra” or the muted “Parabol” but they are deliberately placed to give context and emotional layering to the songs that come just before and after. Without these little tracks, “Lateralus” would never let you up for air.

Songs like “Schism,” “Parabola” and the title track, “Lateralus” explore the nature of the human experience, and what it means. Can we step outside of ourselves? What is our condition, and is it divine, or merely self-aware? Tool never provides easy answers to these questions, but they always encourage us to think outside the lines, and contemplate our place in the universe.

And then there are songs like “Ticks & Leeches” where Maynard James Keenan just gets his anger on at all those people who suck him dry. For all I know he means the fans (he has been known to baa like a sheep at his own audience until the start baaing back). I’d tell the band to lighten up, but frankly I enjoy listening to them get their anger on. Maybe that’s what Maynard’s getting at.

Like my last review for James Brown, a lot of the songs on “Lateralus” are long (eight of the thirteen songs are six minutes or more) but they never feel too long and although the album clocks in at an unwieldy 78 minutes, I’m not sure what I’d cut to make it shorter.

Well, there is one thing. Once again, Tool decides to end a song (“Triad”) with two minutes of dead air, and then finishes up with “Faaip de Oiad,” a panicked ‘true recording’ of some guy describing an alien conspiracy. This just knocks this record down to four stars. Just.

Best tracks: The Grudge, Schism, Parabola, Ticks & Leeches

CD Odyssey Disc 621: James Brown

I’ve been having a crazy week as I work to clear the decks for some quality time off over the first week of June. My week off is an almost sacred ritual for me, when I recharge my batteries for the rest of the year, get some writing done and generally decompress. Last year this was interrupted by a family crisis, so this year I am even more in need of a break.  Sometimes you just need to slow down.

Of course, there are other times when you need to get on up! For those times, here is the album I’ve been working through for the past week or so.

Disc 621 is…. Foundations of Funk: A Brand New Bag 1964-1969

Artist: James Brown

Year of Release: 1996 but the music is from 1964-1969

What’s up with the Cover? Soul Brother No. 1, aka Mr. Dynamite, getting down on stage as only he knows how. I usually love outlandish clothes (I wear them myself) but this cape is not doing it for me, style-wise. Also, I bet it is a bitch to clean.

How I Came To Know It:  My buddies Nick and Spence both had this album and played it a lot when it was first released. I liked what I heard and so I bought it for myself.

How It Stacks Up:  This is a compilation album, so it doesn’t really stack up at all. If it did, it would stack up well.

Rating:  you can’t put a rating on a ‘best of’ album.

Two full albums, twenty-seven songs – eight of them over seven minutes long, and a total of over two and a half hours of music, and not once did this album lose my attention.

I talk a lot on the CD Odyssey about double albums that should be single albums, and how albums should ideally not exceed 14 tracks. I am also not keen on compilation albums because they tend to gloss over an artist’s career. “Foundations of Funk” breaks all these rules, and yet still comes out shining like the diamonds on James Brown’s cape.

In terms of overall length, when you deliver the funky stuff as consistently as James Brown and his band, you can play all night as far as I’m concerned. I recently reviewed Glenn Miller and as tight as that is, there is nothing more together than James Brown’s band in these years.

The album is perfectly timed during the latter half of the sixties where Brown’s band has some of the finest musicians. Other than the amazing Maceo Parker on saxophone, I didn’t know any of their names, but I broke my own rules to look them up and give them the recognition they deserve. Pee Wee Ellis also plays Saxophone, Jimmy Nolen delivers the funkiest guitar ever, and Bernard Odum (bass) and Clyde Stubblefield (drums) hold down the rhythm section.

Brown is the consummate band leader and guides the band, calling for them to be softer or faster, “give the drummer some” or at times to just let it ‘ooze out’.  They respond to every one of his directions perfectly in time, and never lose the irresistible grooves that make these songs the most sampled in rap music history.

A lot of James Brown compilations make the mistake of choosing very short versions of James Brown songs, sometimes even just having them fade out prematurely, like a bad K-Tel record. “Foundations of Funk” recognizes that part of James Brown’s charm is his ability to maintain and develop a powerful energy over a long period of time. Long cuts of “I Can’t Stand Myself” (7:19), “Cold Sweat” (6:50), “I Don’t Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing” (9:43) and “Ain’t It Funky Now” (9:28) take time to develop their groove and let you sink into the full band experience.

There are 27 tracks on this album, but with the exception of the last one (“Mother Popcorn”) there isn’t much chaff to complain about. These are all great versions of these songs that sound as organic and natural today, over forty years later, as they must have to the amazed audiences in the sixties, as James Brown set about almost singlehandedly inventing a new style of music – funk – out of the soul of the times.

In terms of covering an artist’s career, “Foundations of Funk” avoids the pitfall of trying to cover the many decades of James Brown’s catalogue. Instead it focuses tightly around six critical years where he developed from a basic soul crooner into a unique artist.

The songs are a mix of general good times, political messages of self-affirmation, often fused together. “I Don’t Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing (Open Up the Door I’ll Get It Myself)” and “Say It Loud – I’m Black and I’m Proud” deliver a message of self-empowerment that spoke positively and unequivocally about the need for racial equality. On the other end of the spectrum, “Ain’t It Funky Now” and “I Can’t Stand Myself (When You Touch Me)” are just good sexy fun. All the songs get your head bobbing and fill you with positive energy.

I don’t have any studio albums by James Brown (all three of my albums are compilations), and I would be happily be introduced to those someday. That said, as compilations go, you can’t do much better than “Foundations of Funk” – it takes its time to immerse you in the music and doesn’t rush you past all the things that make it great, just like each individual song on it. It is well worth your time.

Best tracks: Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag, Money Won’t Change You, Let Yourself Go, Cold Sweat, I Can’t Stand Myself, Say It Loud (I’m Black and I’m Proud), Give It Up or Turnit Loose, I Don’t Want Nobody to Give Me Nothing, Let a Man Come In And Do the Popcorn, Ain’t It Funky Now

CD Odyssey Disc 620: Matthew Sweet

I am five minutes removed from watching the hated Montreal Canadiens knock my beloved Bruins out of the playoffs. It doesn’t get any lower than this.

Disc 620 is…. Girlfriend

Artist: Matthew Sweet

Year of Release: 1991

What’s up with the Cover? It’s a picture of actress Tuesday Weld, looking both glamorous and approachable. Tuesday Weld is a great name for a silver screen heartthrob, and a beautiful girl despite apparently not having a neck.

How I Came To Know It:  Yet another album introduced to me by my old roommate Greg, which I later bought for myself. Thanks, Greg!

How It Stacks Up:  Matthew Sweet has quietly released thirteen albums over almost thirty years. I’ve only got this one, so can’t really stack it up against the others.

Rating:  2 stars but almost 3

It is fitting I should get an album like “Girlfriend” today.  With all its moroseness and self-doubt it suits my current frame of mind well. On second thought, it is probably not quite murderous enough.

“Girlfriend” is Matthew Sweet’s third album, and the only one that I can remember ever making a splash. The title track was a moderate hit on the alternative scene probably because of its reverb and layered sound, which while not itself grunge, made a nice complement to that scene. I didn’t love “Girlfriend” the song, finding it busy in places, and even a bit boring. Fortunately my buddy Greg bought the album, which allowed me to get to know the deeper cuts, and they won me over.

The opening track on the album, “Divine Intervention” is my favourite with an opening sting of guitar feedback and then a reverberating riff that is both groovy and wistful. “Divine Intervention” is a song about being down and out and not knowing if you’re going to ever get out of it. You want to fall back on the notion that the universe has a plan for you, but deep down you know it doesn’t.

When I first heard this song, I was twenty-two or twenty-three years old. I was recovering from a broken heart, carrying the debt of a university education, and working a minimum wage warehouse job to try to pay it off. It wasn’t a great time, but it sure made the song resonate. I’m now solvent, with a good job and a good woman, but this song can always bring me back to what it feels like to not know your way, or even if there is a way, so I give it credit for that.

The problem with “Girlfriend” as an album is that it can take all this cryin’ and moanin’ a bit too far, and come out pathetic. “Divine Intervention” holds up alright, but weaker tracks really come off as the gripes of a pale and wan poet who needs to get more sun.

 “Thought I Knew You” and “You Don’t Love Me” are every bit as maudlin and passive aggressive as their titles would suggest. “You Don’t Love Me” is particularly bad, with lines like:

“Cause you don’t love me

You don’t love me

You can’t see how much I matter in this world

Even though I loved you

You can’t believe that

If you find something

You think might make you happy

Then I guess it’s okay, I think it’s okay.”

Jeesh. At least be honestly angry about the situation, Matthew. Take some advice from Sir John Suckling, “if looking well can’t move her/ looking ill prevail?” (hint: the answer is ‘no’).

Despite this tendency to push the self-pity button a bit too hard, Sweet’s songwriting has many moments when it rises above. “Nothing Lasts” is equally sad but the song is of sufficient quality that you enjoy a bit of a wallow.

“Winona” and “Evangeline” are two pretty little romantic numbers as well. “Winona” (reportedly named for 1991 it-girl Winona Ryder), is a little sad, but it feels more emotionally honest than it does manipulative. The tune has an innovative use of the pedal steel guitar while remaining at its core, a rock song.

“Evangeline” is a variation on the “Only the Good Die Young” theme of self-righteous moralistic girls that could really do with a fun night out. “Evangeline” also captures the early guitar groove of “Divine Intervention” and lifts up the middle section of the record at just the right time.

The album is too long, with fifteen songs (at least one too many) and many of the songs linger for a few bars longer than they need to. If you pick and choose your spots there are quite a few good tracks worth your time, however.

I also found myself thinking that “Girlfriend” is a precursor to the indie music (back then, we called it alternative). It takes pretty basic musical concepts and reinterprets them in a modern (for its time) way – something indie does now. In some respects it is superior to indie music, because despite it being a bit moan-y, at least it doesn’t try to detach itself from its own emotional core.

I don’t put this record on very often (partly because Sheila doesn’t like it) but I still enjoyed this visit, and more than a few of the songs that came with it.

Best tracks: Divine Intervention, Winona, Evangeline, Holy War, Nothing Lasts

CD Odyssey Disc 619: ACDC

A quiet weekend is what I needed, and a quiet weekend is what I’ve given myself. Today will be music day, starting with this review and then moving on to some guitar practice.

Disc 619 is…. Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap

Artist: ACDC

Year of Release: 1976

What’s up with the Cover? It’s the band, posing as regular folks, along with two young attractive women and an old lady – all with their eyes blacked out. I am guessing the idea is that although they are blending in with the crowd, they are actually dangerous criminal types. The whole scene looks lifted from a Tarantino movie.

How I Came To Know It:  I’ve known this album since I was a kid, but my love for it was rekindled in the early nineties by my buddy Greg, who owned it on tape. We used to crank “Problem Child” in his car over and over again

How It Stacks Up:  I have nine ACDC albums, and “Dirty Deeds” is one of the best. I’ll put it second. If you’re wondering what’s first, you’ll have to wait until I roll it.

Rating:  4 stars

“Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” has everything you look for in an ACDC album; driving power chords, relentless energy and even a little humour. At a time when the future of ACDC is in doubt, it is fitting that I rolled an album that helped launch their international career.

“Dirty Deeds” is not a complicated record, but that isn’t what ACDC is about. If you are after creative time signatures and innovative song construction go look elsewhere – maybe in the jazz section. If you are looking for power rock that gets your head banging, and your hands inadvertently playing air guitar in public, then “Dirty Deeds” will serve you well.

The record opens with the title track. Decades after its release, “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” is still an instantly recognizable rock anthem. The song is told from the perspective of a hit man, offering his services to kill your girlfriend or your high school head (principal). The opening guitar riff sets the scene for such dark deeds, low and crunchy with a predatory menace.

The whole album is a clinic in how the rhythm guitar drives a great rock song. On “Ain’t No Fun (Waiting Round to be a Millionaire).” An amateur guitar player will tend to increase the speed of his playing by accident, but “Ain’t No Fun” incorporates a deliberate, perfectly measured increase to the tempo that slowly builds the urgency and impatience of waiting for fame.

Only a few weeks ago it was discovered that rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young has a serious illness and may never perform again.  As lead guitar, Angus Young gets the majority of the glory in ACDC, cavorting about the stage in his school uniform, and he is a lot of fun to watch. “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” reminds me that Malcolm is the glue holding this band together. Sad as it would be if he never performs again, this record is a fitting legacy to his talents.

Meanwhile, lead singer Bon Scott brings his lascivious, dirty vocals to every song. On the title track he is simmering with violence, and on “Squealer” he is sexually disturbing. And while it isn’t my favourite song on the record, Scott is positively hilarious on “Big Balls.” “Big Balls” is one long double entendre in which Scott is ‘itching to tell us’ about his big balls, by which he means parties. Oh, and also his testicles.

“Big Balls” was a favourite in my high school, and to this day I get a juvenile thrill out of quoting lyrics from the song. My current favourite section is near the end of the song, where Bon Scott begins discussing some of the things at his big balls, including ‘seafood cocktail, crabs, crayfish.’ I’m not sure how crayfish fit into the scene, but I know that when Bon Scott sings it, it is dirty.

While the title track and “Big Balls” are the albums best known songs, my two favourites are “Problem Child” and “Ride On.”

“Problem Child” has the perfect combination of Malcolm laying down an amazing rock riff, Angus delivering a kick ass solo and Scott singing about how badass he is. The lyrics are simple, direct and decidedly anti-social:

“I’m hot

And when I’m not

I’m cold as ice

See me comin’

Step aside

Or pay the price

What I want I take

What I don’t I break

And I don’t want you.”

Not exactly Alfred Lord Tennyson, but it gets the point across.

My other favourite, “Ride On”, is the emotional opposite; a slow bluesy number about depression and loneliness. “Ride On” shows Bon Scott’s softer side, and reminds me of just how tragic it was that he would be dead less than five years after recording it. The whole song smells of road dust and musty cheap hotel rooms:

“It’s another lonely evening

And another lonely town

But I ain’t too young to worry

And I ain’t too old to cry

When a woman gets me down.

“Got another empty bottle

And another empty bed

Ain’t too young to admit it

And I’m not too old to lie

I’m just another empty head.”

This is the confused youth of Alice Cooper’s “Eighteen” ten years later, with the burden of the world weighing him down, but still without answers. “Ride On” is a song for late night drinking, when you’ve switched to whisky when you should’ve switched to water.

“Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” is a ballsy blast of rock enthusiasm from a band that knew it was going to be famous and was ready to pay whatever price came with that. Its message may not be complicated, but it is delivered with confidence and authority and still fresh nearly forty years after its release.

Best tracks: Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, Problem Child, Ain’t No Fun (Waiting Round to be a Millionaire), Ride On. 

CD Odyssey Disc 618: Tom Waits

Wow that was a stressful day. I wrote a large cheque for a home improvement project, and then followed that up with a 1-0 overtime win by the Bruins over the Habs. I feel like I’ve aged three years in three hours.

On to the next album which is a good one, so good that I’m once again delving into five star territory, despite the fact that it has 19 tracks.

Disc 618 is…. Rain Dogs

Artist: Tom Waits

Year of Release: 1985

What’s up with the Cover? A woman and a man share a hug. The man needs a shirt. The woman needs a nicer shirt. This album needs a better cover.

How I Came To Know It:  For more detail on how I know Tom Waits see the review for “Closing Time” and “Frank’s Wild Years.”  Getting “Rain Dogs” was just digging through his discography after I was hooked.

How It Stacks Up:  This is classic Tom Waits, I put it second out of his nineteen albums, with only “Mule Variations” (reviewed back at Disc 455) topping it.

Rating:  5 stars

Chronologically wedged between the great albums “Swordfishtrombone” and “Frank’s Wild Years,” “Rain Dogs” captures what is best on both of them., and then some.

This is Tom Waits during his ‘crazy circus’ period, with inspired songwriting, featuring innovative percussion and frenetic syncopation, which makes you feel like you’re in a big top tent run by the devil himself. Ray Bradbury eat your heart out.

“Rain Dogs” takes old time song forms like the rhumba, tango and polka and reimagines them to serve the freakshow of characters the songs portray. There is a polka about trying to pry money out of a rich aunt and uncle before they die (“Cemetery Polka”), followed by people who hit the Cuban clubs to “Tango ‘Till They’re Sore.”

Over it all is Waits’ voice, which sounds like the second coming of Louis Armstrong crossed with Howling Wolf and then possessed by a homeless prophet.

On songs like “Singapore” and “Big Black Mariah” Waits rollicks along with a bouncy rhythm that is strange and wonderful, painting crazy pictures of excess that make you want to play along. You’ll be bouncing along merrily to “Walking Spanish” and then mid-way through realize it is a song about heading to your death sentence. Then you’ll forget yourself again and keep walking – the devil’s big top indeed.

In other places, he turns to spoken word magic, with the exceptional urban poetry of “9^th and Hennepin” which I think is the finest crossover of spoken word with music I’ve ever heard. To the sound of a piano tinkling in a minor key and the occasional whine of accordion or recorder, he paints a picture of a steaming, low-class end of town:

“Well it's 9th and Hennepin

And all the donuts have

Names that sound like prostitutes

And the moon's teeth marks are

On the sky like a tarp thrown over all this

And the broken umbrellas like

Dead birds and the steam

Comes out of the grill like

The whole goddamned town is ready to blow.”

Then when you think Waits can’t top himself, he takes the musical richness of songs like “Big Black Mariah” and the lyrical brilliance of “9^th and Hennepin” and delivers a series of ballads that are as touching and emotionally resonant as anything you’ll hear in his catalogue.

This album has at least three Waits classics that fit this category, “Time,” “Blind Love” and the oft-remade (but never equaled) original version of “Downtown Train.” These are songs about deep longing, with images that throw your mind back to the America of the twenties and thirties, but sound as current as if they were written yesterday.

They are timeless because tapping into the need for human connection, and how hard we lean out of our own comfort zones – sometimes to reach for it, and sometimes to flee from how it makes us feel. These are songs for anyone who’s stood out in the rain and got drenched because it was the only way they could get their exterior to match what they were going through on the inside. Like Tom Waits, we’re all rain dogs in that sense. From “Time”:

“When you’re east of East St. Louis

And the wind is making speeches

And the rain sounds like a round of applause

Napoleon is weeping in the Carnival saloon

His invisible fiancé is in the mirror

And the band is going home

It’s raining hammers, it’s raining nails…”

Through “Blind Love”

“Now you’re gone

And it’s hotels and whiskey and sad luck dames

And I don’t care if they miss me

And I never remember their names.”

Each love affair on “Rain Dogs” is flawed in some way, but that makes it more beautiful and fragile. As Waits reminds us, it must be blind love, because the only kind of love is stone blind love. If you’re busy looking around wondering what’s happening and why, you’re doing it wrong.

This album has a gratuitous 19 tracks – five more than my usual maximum. For this reason, when I started writing this review I planned to grade it down a star just to punish the hubris of it all. But it is only hubris if you over-reach yourself. When you write 19 songs this good then by all means put them on a single record – you’ve earned it.

Best tracks: all tracks. 

CD Odyssey Disc 617: Glenn Miller (sort of)

After a great weekend of hanging with friends, including a win by my beloved Boston Bruins and the start of another season of Ultimate it was back to work today.

I was a little nervous about how this next disc would fare against the Monday blues, but it put me in a positively sunny mood on the walk both to work and then home. 

Disc 617 is…. The Glenn Miller Story

Artist: Glenn Miller’s songs, but technically arranged and played here by Joseph Gershenson and the Universal-International Orchestra and Louis Armstrong.

Year of Release: 1954, but the music originally dates from the thirties and forties

What’s up with the Cover? I think this is a variation on the movie poster. Glenn Miller is played by Jimmy Stewart, and I think that’s him on the cover pretending to play the trombone.

How I Came To Know It:  This is Sheila’s album. Sheila learned about him when she watched a 1979 made-for-TV miniseries called “The Last Convertible.” The movie is so obscure not even IMDB has a plot, but Sheila advises it was based on a book by Anton Myrer. I looked it up and it is about five young Harvard men, their women and (you guessed it) the car that came to symbolize their youth.

Anyway, the song “Moonlight Serenade” features prominently in the miniseries so that was Sheila’s introduction to big band music. When her paternal grandfather died she got a record from his collection called “The Golden Age of Dance Bands” which had “Moonlight Serenade” and other Glenn Miller remakes, all done by less famous folks.

Although “The Golden Age of Dance Bands” is not the subject of this review, it has an excerpt on the back describing the music that I can’t resist sharing:

“For we ‘squares’ over thirty, these wonderful songs are a welcome relief from the monotonous din of rock and roll. And after all – we knew how to dance in the Golden Age of Dance Bands.

Bold words, but for all I know every dance in the forties ended like “It’s A Wonderful Life” with everyone falling in the pool.

How It Stacks Up:  This is the only Glenn Miller album we have, so it doesn’t really stack up. Technically it is a soundtrack as well, although I keep it under “Glenn Miller” and never thought to add it to that list. If I had, it would have done pretty well – top third anyway, maybe around 8^th.

Rating:  4 stars

I usually prefer the aforementioned monotonous din of rock and roll to big band, but I can’t deny this album put a smile on my face and (yes) a swing in my step.

This is music for having a good time and not thinking too hard about why. No lyrics to distract you as with popular music or folk songs, and nothing too mathematically complex to muddle your frontal lobes like you get with classical. This is just melody-driven whimsy, where the horn section drives the bus and the other instruments are along for the ride.

As with pop music, the ability to consistently write a good hook should not be casually dismissed. It is hard work, yet every song on “The Glenn Miller Story” has a hook so memorable that these same songs are still routinely used in movies to establish a mood. These songs have been like old friends to generation after generation for going on 75 years now. While they aren’t as popular now as they once were, when you hear “Moonlight Serenade” or “In The Mood” you instantly know it, even if you can’t name the song off the top of your head.

Also, while not the original band, the artists brought together for “The Glenn Miller” story do a great job with the material. Conductor Joseph Gershenson was a Hollywood legend at the time this came out, not to mention the appearance of the great Louis Armstrong on two songs (“Basin Street Blues” and “Otchi-Tchor-Ni-Ya”).

Sheila also has some other albums from her grandparents by “101 Strings” which are an abomination to music, so trust me when I say that even these classics could have been ruined in the wrong hands. Instead they get the care attention and talent they deserve.

My favourites are the upbeat numbers like “Little Brown Jug” and “In the Mood.” When the band tries to interpret the blues (“Basin Street Blues”) or go off on a jazz noodle (“Otchi-Tchor-Ni-Ya”) they lose me a bit. Sorry, Louis Armstrong.

I also really dig “Pennsylvania 6-5000” a song immortalizing how you used to give someone your phone number. Some government numbers start with a 356 prefix, and I hope one day to be lucky enough to get the phone with this number so I can tell people to call me at “Pennsylvania 6-5000.”

“Pennsylvania 6-5000” also has an early use of sound effects in music – where a phone rings before the band sings out the song title in joyful unison. It reminded me of the phone ringing in “Joan Crawford” by Blue Oyster Cult, although obviously without all the overtones of undead film stars returning from the grave to torment their children.

Then again, maybe Blue Oyster Cult cut the next line of dialogue that would come after we hear the hoarse whisper of “Chrissstiinaah…mother’s home…” I imagine it would be Christina responding with “Pardon me, but I think you have the wrong number” and then Joan Crawford’s zombie replying with an indignant, “What! Is this Pennsylvania 6-5000? Operator?” And cue the horn section.

But I digress…

Back to the album, which was a lot of fun, despite Glenn Miller’s music sounding a little staid to the modern era at times (someone suggested to me today that the music needs more ‘pelvic thrusts’ which I think was an apt, if graphic, description). That said, when jazz gets too out there it loses me. I like the energy and composition of Miller’s music. He's more interested in giving you a pretty song than impressing you with how complicated he can make it, and that swing rhythm can give you plenty of kicks below the waistline, sunshine.

Best tracks:   Tuxedo Junction, Little Brown Jug, In the Mood, Pennsylvania 6-5000

CD Odyssey Disc 616: Steve Earle

Synchronicity amazes me sometimes. I haven’t rolled an album by Steve Earle on the Odyssey since September 2012, but on the same day I purchase tickets to go see  him in concert I came home and rolled this next album. 

Disc 616 is…. Guitar Town

Artist: Steve Earle

Year of Release: 1986

What’s up with the Cover? Wow, there was a time when Steve Earle did not look like a hobo. He looks a little apprehensive as well, probably thinking that while the miles lay long behind him, he has still got miles to go.  Don’t we all, Steve.

How I Came To Know It:  I think my Mom or my Stepdad Lawrence owned this album. They didn’t put it on that often, but I really liked it, and played it all the time.

How It Stacks Up:  I have 17 Steve Earle albums, but one is a live album and one is an album of cover songs, so I’ll stack this up against the remaining 15. I’ll put it third best, right behind “Exit O” (reviewed back at Disc 423) and “I Feel Alright” (reviewed way back at Disc 14). I originally had it tied for second with “Exit 0” but I’ve gotta put it just a hair short.

Rating:  5 stars

The Nashville establishment would have been very happy if Steve Earle’s sound had never evolved beyond what he does on “Guitar Town,” his 1986 debut. Instead, over the next almost thirty years, Earle has dabbled in rock, bluegrass, roots music and written folk songs protesting about most things the Nashville establishment think are laudatory. Unlike the Nashville establishment, I’ve enjoyed every twist and turn of Earle’s musical journey, but I will still agree with them about “Guitar Town’s” brilliance.

“Guitar Town” is a subtle blend of very traditional Hank Williams type traditional country with a twist of heartland rock ballad that Bruce Springsteen would be proud of. The songs are sparsely arranged, and for the most part rely on basic guitar picking and strumming and Earle’s heartfelt vocals.

Earle is a strong guitar player, and his band – the Dukes – is polished and skillful (and sadly not credited on the cover). While Earle’s voice isn’t going to win any singing competitions, he writes songs that play to his strengths and he sings them with a conviction that is second to none.

The album is exceptionally mature for a debut, which isn’t that surprising given that Earle was already 31 years old when it was released. He had already been kicking around various music scenes, learning from fellow greats Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt, and his songwriting craft was well developed by the time the soulless record execs finally gave him a shot.

Lyrically, this record speaks deeply to me, partly because it has been in my life so long (since its release), partly because it reminds me of what it is like to live in a small town with dreams of getting out. Mostly it speaks deeply to me because it is so damned good.

Earle writes what he knows, with songs like “Little Rock ‘n’ Roller”, “Hillbilly Highway” and “Guitar Town” about the life of the travelling troubadour. “Guitar Town” in particular is a masterpiece of a song, with its simple, but instantly recognizable guitar strum and boundless energy.

The enthusiasm for this lifestyle is poignantly countered by the stories of those who haven’t yet found an opportunity to follow their dreams. “Someday” is the finest of these, beginning:

“There ain’t a lot you can do in this town

You drive down to the lake and then you turn back around

You go to school and you learn to read and write

So you can walk into the county bank and sign away your life.”

While the song later evokes images of small-town Texas (filling stations on the interstate, and the dreams of getting a football scholarship) those opening lines could be any tiny town in North America, including the one I’m from. I have literally driven down to the lake and then turned back around, just to have something to do.

Relationship troubles also feature throughout the record, including the grim finality of “Goodbye’s All We’ve Got Left to Say” and the quiet resignation of “My Old Friend the Blues” but Earle is at his core, an optimist. For all the broken hearts and broken dreams that “Guitar Town” presents us, most of the songs present us with the hope for a brighter tomorrow. The final stanza of the final song on the album, “Down the Road” puts the responsibility for seizing that brighter tomorrow squarely in his listener’s hands:

“Though the miles lay long behind you

You have still got miles to go

How’s love ever gonna find you

If it ain’t here it’s down the road.

Keep on lookin’ down the road.”

The album came out the same year as Dwight Yoakam’s debut “Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc. Etc.” and it has some of the same rockin’ twang. I recall at the time they were often lumped together by a lot music reviewers at the time. While I like Yoakam’s music, “Guitar Town” has an emotional weight to it that puts it a cut above not only similar offerings at the time, but most of what has come since. I’ve seen Earle in concert multiple times in the last ten years. Songs from “Guitar Town” still make it into his ever-changing set list, and still sound as fresh and compelling as they ever have.

Best tracks:   All the tracks are good, and while I don’t personally like “Little Rock ‘n’ Roller” it is a good song by objective standards.