Love That Album podcast episode 5 - Steve Earle "El Corazon"

Episode 5 of the Love That Album podcast sees myself and Earle fan Geoff Smith debating the merits of El Corazon, where it stands in line with his other albums and discussing Earle's passion for politics, Woody Guthrie, and a love song. The man knows a thing or two about love - hell, he's been married 7 times so he should!!!!

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Pat Metheny Group - First Circle

Apparently, Frank Zappa was quoted as saying that writing about music is like dancing to architecture. An article I read on Wikipedia has attributed it (or variations) to a number of quotable people. If that’s so, how much more difficult then is my task to write about an album without the luxury of lyrics? Yet, these articles are less music analysis and more how the music has made me feel. Could Zappa hold me to account for that?

Nearly 30 years ago, I made friends with a guy called Steve who, for the second time in my life, altered the bedrock I’d based all my musical perceptions on.

In a previous article, I’d described the first such change when a school friend played me the Beatles’ version of Twist and Shout, after I’d lived with mainly classical music for all of my then 10 years. Apart from some guidance my sisters and their folk records, I rampaged through the world of rock and pop – both good and bad – till Steve led me down a new musical path at the age of 17. When he scoffed at my love of artists like The Tubes and Rick Wakeman (or at least my perception that they were a genuine quality alternative to the Pina Colada song or whatever else top 40 radio was dishing out), he loaned me a record by the guitar trio of Al Dimeola, John McLaughlin and Paco DeLucia called “Friday Night In San Francisco”.

“Can people DO that with a guitar?” I kept asking rhetorically after listening to that album countless times? I had not yet entered the world of jazz or guitar histrionics, and this was like a nuclear bomb being dropped on my musical landscape. This was a supergroup. It was flashy and show-offy, yes, but there were melodies that I found absorbing. I bought my own copy and played it over and over.

Of course, it was only an evil side-step from the guitar trio to jazz-fusion with all its excess. Jean-Luc Ponty, Return To Forever….they were my new interests. However, to bastardise an interesting phrase, jazz-fusion was a brief madness.

Yet, I still hadn’t discovered other forms of jazz of which I eventually became smitten with. When the million notes per minute offered by jazz fusion became a bit tiresome however, there was an artist whose music wasn’t quite jazz, wasn’t rock, and wasn’t a fusion of the two. There were elements of the forms, but there were elements of country and Latin in his music. I’m talking about the guitarist with the world’s largest striped t-shirt collection – Pat Metheny.

My mate Rani loaned me an album called “Travels” by the Pat Metheny Group. Unlike traditional jazz which would have a form of the soloist playing a theme for a verse, a variation on the theme, improvising like crazy over the band, then returning to the theme at the end, Metheny’s music seemed to have a more compositional structure (if that’s a valid phrase). There were definitely moments for improvisation by Metheny and his long-time pianist Lyle Mays, but there was an almost classical structure to the frame of his music. With my lifetime love of classical music, it wasn’t too hard to fall for his music.

The Pat Metheny Group for all its ongoing personnel changes (and there have been many) have a sound that’s completely recognisable. Metheny’s guitar and Mays’ piano (the two consistent elements) help shape that sound. The other element that makes his music recognisable is the use of the voice as an instrument. From the late 1970s, Metheny would use very distinctive sounding vocalists starting with Nana Vasconcelos and then Pedro Aznar for a number of years. They always contributed to the ”Metheny sound”. 

Back in 1985, the Pat Metheny Group toured Australia for what (till now) has been their only tour here. They were touring off the back of what was to be their final album for the brilliant ECM record label – their final one for ECM - “First Circle”. We’re all used to tour advertisements with endorsements as to the “brilliance” of the artist. The posters for the Metheny tour claimed his guitar playing was like “the wind blowing through the trees of heaven”.  Normally, I’d roll my eyes at such a pretentiously worded accolade. In the light of the guitar machismo of some of the jazz-fusion musicians of the time, however, this made perfect sense to me about Metheny.  The music breathed, and was full of gorgeous melodies. Metheny could play the strings off any of his contemporaries (in my opinion), but he served the composition, not his ego.

The concert I saw in Melbourne opened up with the first tune from First Circle called “Forward March”. On record it didn’t make any sense. It sounded like a demented circus march of a herd of wounded elephants (I’ll return to the elephant theme soon) or a rehearsal by the Portsmouth Sinfonia. In concert, however, it was a perfect show opener.  Mays was on trumpet, Bassist Steve Rodby took the bass drum, and Aznar played a kiddie xylophone. Brilliant drummer Paul Wertico played march time on the snare, and Sgt. Metheny led them with one of his weird sounding synthesizer guitars. The members of the band entered the auditorium from the various foyer doors, not stage side. They all marched onto stage and their (deliberately) awful playing combined with the surprise of the entrance was funny. I can now happily listen to that on the album, thanks to the memories of that show.

“Forward March” was definitely a novelty, and yet it had a purpose. While the Pat Metheny Group are all serious musicians, this was no hardcore jazz purists’ band. They want to entertain you. They want you to smile (I’ve never seen a musician look as happy as Metheny does). For all its novelty, “Forward March” made its audience smile right from the word go.

The album then launches into “Yolanda, You Learn”, an uptempo  4/4 tune. Paul Wertico sets the pace with a driving bass / snare / half open high hat rock combination playing sixteenths on the hats. The melody itself just sticks in your head, because it sort of sounds like a child’s nursery rhyme – set to a rock beat. Hugely catchy.

The whole album is beautiful and memorable, but allow me to bring two more highlights. The title track is a 9 minute ray of sunshine that works with clever time signature changes (well, they wanted to use their jazz chops somewhere). It opens up with the group performing a pattern of hand claps for a number of bars. It sounds like a bar of 6/4 followed by a bar of 5/4 (Jazz.com says the tune is in 22/8 – how could I have not picked THAT?). Pedro Aznar sings the main wordless melody over the claps in some sort of contra time (but I ain’t educated enough to work it out), and you just know that this piece is going to be special. The claps break away and there’s a section - a movement perhaps - with Mays and Metheny playing a gentle melody before the whole band launches into the main tune. Pedro returns to sing the main melody for the last 3 minutes or so, and he sounds like he’s reaching some sort of ecstasic peak. Word of warning – if you listen to this tune and don’t feel elated by the end, check your pulse.

The other highlight is the album closer, “Praise”. By this point, I really am beginning to feel that Frank Zappa’s description of music writing may be true. I can tell you “Praise” is in 4/4. I can tell you it starts in the key of D, then modulates to E. I can tell you it’s a medium tempo tune. None of this conveys what the tune is about. What I can say is that like First Circle, it makes me feel stupidly happy. There are some seriously beautiful melodies here. It may be the Pat Metheny Group, but “Praise” belongs to Pedro Aznar and his soaring voice. The word beautiful has been overused, but “Praise” truly is. Hairs standing on the back of the neck.

After First Circle, the Metheny Group left ECM and Pat divided his time between the PMG and many side projects playing with the likes of John Scofield, Brad Mehldau, Jim Hall and Ornette Coleman. I confess to not being a fan of his Coleman collaboration, Song X. The music sounds to me like elephants fornicating. I still respect him for making an album like that, though. The important thing is that Pat Metheny can’t be tied down to the one sound of the PMG, as brilliant as that sound is. He’s forever experimenting, and in an ideal world, his compositional and guitar playing skills would make him a household name. All I can suggest in the mean time is for you to search out First Circle, or any of his other wonderful albums and make yourself smile. Try to describe how it makes you feel…. but don't try dancing near a building while doing it.

Love That Album - Episode 4 - Circus Animals from the East

CHISELLLLLLLLL!!!!! How many Australians who grew up in the early 80s would yell that out whenever one of their songs came on top 40 radio. How many of us still yell it out thanks to golden hits radio. Behind their iconic status however, was a band who played a passionate blues based rock with great musicianship, and keenly observant lyrics about growing up in Australia. Rolling Stone allegedly compared them (unfavourably!!!!!) to Ray Charles and Led Zeppelin. Sounds like great influencs to me.

In episode 4 of Love That Album, Jeff Jenkins and I discuss Cold Chisel and the music behind their two most popular albums, East and Circus Animals. Download it from this blog page or search for "lovethatalbum" in itunes.

Right click to download episode 4 here.

Getting The Knack - Podcast episode 3

Yes, I know I've written a lengthy article on the subject, but in episode 3 of Love That Album, Jeff Jenkins and I discuss why Get The Knack is a classic album, and should not be reviled by the shoe-gazing, too-cool-for-school, Nirvana-loving hipsters. Think about it - if My Sharona makes the Knack a one-hit-wonder, what does that say about Smells Like Teen Spirit? Simply put, Get The Knack is a hook-drenched rock and roll album about lust - isn't that the essence of rock and roll? Listen and be convinced.

Episode 3 is available either streaming or downloadable from the blogsite (look to the right hand side of the page near the top) or type "lovethatalbum" into iTunes podcast search.

Right click to download and save Episode 3 here.

Love That Album - Podcast #2 - sort of

Hey folks,

I have another podcast up....sort of. I recorded a great show with my good friend and fellow music enthusiast Geoff Smith with the intention of talking about the great John Hiatt album "Bring The Family". The show was divided up into a section where we just yakked about albums we'd been listening to, a section talking about Hiatt's history, and then the section talking about the album. During editing, I accidentally deleted that final section of the show. AAARRRRGGGGGGHHHHH. What a fucking knucklehead. I tried recording that section again with Geoff a week later and the recording software did something weird rendering the conversation unlistenable. Rather than do it again, I'm putting up the "shooting the breeze" discussion we have for your (hopeful) enjoyment.

Download it on the right hand side of this page in the embeddable player, or go to iTunes and subscrive to "lovethatalbum". Next podcast will be out mid to late October and will work....I promise!!!!

Right click to download and save Episode 2 here.

Songs that left me Speechless: Paul Simon - "Song About The Moon" and "The Late Great Johnny Ace"

As with a lot of folks, I owe a lot of my passion for music to my family. From my dad and my sister Sue, I owe my love of classical music. In particular, Dad loved operatic singers, be they the established secular singers like Enrico Caruso or Richard Tauber, or the cantorial singing (chazanut) of Moshe Kosevitzky. Dad passed on his love of this music to Sue and she did everything to encourage my love of these artforms -before I was bitten by the dreaded rock and roll bug.

While it’s true I didn’t listen to rock music before I was 10 years old, I was still exposed to more modern musical expression. My other sister Mary was a huge folk music nut. Joe and Eddie, Odetta, Peter, Paul and Mary, and early Dylan were the ones who got her imagination firing. For me, though, the kings of them all were Simon & Garfunkel.

When Mary got married and moved out, I’d visit her and always go straight to her record collection. My favourite of her albums was Simon & Garfunkel’s “Sounds of Silence” album. In a way, I guess my pop education started there, as this record had more in common with the pop harmonies of the Everly Brothers than a lot of the earnest folk music of the day. Simon’s music was far more personal in nature than the songs of protest or death often sung about in folk. My love of Simon’s songwriting and S & G harmonies has continued to this day.

When I was in my teens I was given a brilliant (now long out of print book) put together by George Martin called “Making Music”. The ex-Beatles and Goons producer had asked many people in the music industry to write an article about their craft (musicianship, engineering, business). Paul Simon wrote a great chapter for the book on his approach to songwriting. An article like this had the potential to spoil the pleasure of listening to his songs, as he was taking away the magic of a song simply being there to describe in some detail how it came to be “there”. On the contrary – I revelled in finding out how he approached song composition. After reading too many interviews with songwriters who flippantly describe their approach, Simon described his workmanlike approach. He wasn’t waiting for inspiration. For him, a great song had to be assembled from hundreds of useless and useful ideas. Hell, if Brill Building luminaries like Carole King, Gerry Goffin, Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil could approach songcraft like a day job, it was good enough for Paul Simon.

In this article I want to refer to two songs - “Song About The Moon” (written about in great detail in the book) and “The Late Great Johnny Ace”. Both of these songs featured on Paul Simon’s album Hearts and Bones. Simon had performed “The Late Great Johnny Ace” a couple of years earlier as part of the S & G reunion concert in Central Park. Bizarrely, towards the end of the song, just as Simon sang a line about the murder of John Lennon, an audience member ran onstage before being dragged away by security staff. I’ve never heard what his intention was or what happened to the guy, but it didn’t look like he was there to request Simon to play “Sounds of Silence”. I’ll return to “Johnny Ace” shortly.

Simon went into some detail about how he wrote “Song About The Moon”. Lyrically, the song serves as a masterclass for how to write a song. Ironically, while Simon infers that it’s easy to write a song if you follow some basic steps (“presto – a song about the moon”), the chapter in Martin’s book indicates anything but. He claimed that he can take months  to write a song – maybe weeks if he’s on a roll. There’s no “presto” in his approach.

Regardless of the simplicity or otherwise, his approach is definitely well thought out, and follows classic rules of song construction.

The structure of the song is three verses and a middle 8 (or AABA as Simon refers to it). Verse 1 starts off with instructing that if you want to write a song about the moon, you should use a metaphor. The potential violence of a city serves as his example:

If you want to write a song about the moon

Walk along the craters of the afternoon

Because the shadows are deep and the light is alien

And gravity leaps like a knife off the pavement

The next verse follows a similar structure but uses a different subject for a potential song – love. Of course, Simon has cleverly not ditched the original starting point either.

If you want to write a song about the heart

Think about the moon before you start

By coming back to the idea of using the moon as a metaphor for love, he’s introduced new subject matter to make things interesting for song advancement, but not to the extent where he’s lazily ditched the original purpose of the song – i.e. how to write a song about the moon.

The middle 8 seemingly goes down a different path altogether with a final line:

The laughing girl she laughed so hard, the tears roled down her face

Huh???? Where’s our continuity gone? Aaaah, look at the first line of Verse 3.

If you want to write a song about a face….

Once again, Simon has kept the verse structure and linked middle 8 back into the theme of the song. Inevitably, Simon once again will argue the case that if you really want to write a song about a face, you’re affectionate about , one you truly love ….well, write a song about the moon. Game, set and match – Mr Paul Simon. Which makes me wonder, if you want to write a song about tennis, should you just write a song about the moon?

So the structure here has been to take three distinct subjects – the moon, love and the memory of a face – and linked them to form a cohesive whole. The beautiful thing about this song is it’s clever without being too clever for its own good. No “Blonde On Blonde” Dylanesque lyrics. It’s straightforward, but no less clever for all that. It’s a lovely melody and lyric that really knocks me out whenever I hear it, but I can also appreciate the work that’s gone into it. The same holds true for the aforementioned “Late Great Johnny Ace”.

Johnny Ace was a 50s R & B singer who died as a result of playing Russian Roulette. I love his wonderful song “Never Let Me Go”, but I’m not that familiar with his music.

Structurally, this song is a little different to “Moon” . The Paul Simon song is not so much about Ace, but about Simon’s reaction to the death of three Johns:  Ace, Kennedy, and Lennon. He starts off with two verses devoted to the news of Ace’s death in 1954, and how Simon sent away for a photograph, feeling bad after hearing the news.

Simon then moves forward 10 years when he moves into the bridge. He’s recalling the time he was living in London and brings up images of the day (“it was the year of the Beatles / it was the year of the Stones / it was 1964”). How does this relate to the theme introduced at the start? A few lines further we find out – “A year after JFK “. Our second John.  JFK is mentioned here in more of a passing reference, but the lyric is very clever, because Simon has preceded this line with invoking memories of an exciting time in young people’s lives. The new music would invoke memories of how the times were changing, but then JFK is brought up, and all the grief that went with his death is recalled in one short line.

Finally, Simon moves forward 16 years to the final verse. The added bass instrumentation gives a feeling of dread and menace compared to the plain melancholy of the first two verses:

                On a cold December evening

                I was walking through the Christmas tide

                When a stranger came up and asked me

                If I’d heard John Lennon had died

                Then the two of us went to this bar and we stayed to close the place

Johnny Ace’s death was sad for Simon, who confessed he wasn’t a great fan, but John Lennon’s death takes on a much darker tone musically. Obviously Lennon’s death hit Simon and New York very hard.

There’s a coda on the recorded version of the song written by Phillip Glass for a small string section. It’s not present on the version presented at the Concert In Central Park. The coda to the Park version is lovely, but does sound like Simon didn’t know how to end the song. The Glass coda wraps up the theme of the three Johns into a bundle of a beautiful piece of musical melancholia. It’s real “hair standing on the back of the neck” stuff, probably best listened to late at night. It’s very different to “Song About The Moon”, but the idea of taking three subjects and cleverly linking them via reference to the song’s first idea is common between them.

Paul Simon has had a very popular career to be sure, but I think he’s not given his due often enough as a songwriter. His songbook doesn’t seem to be revered in the same way as Lennon/McCartney or Dylan which is a shame. His best rivals a lot of their output, and the songs don’t deserve to merely be relegated to the golden oldies pile. Paul Simon’s album of 2011 “So Beautiful So What” shows he still has incredible songwriting chops. The album’s highlight “Love and Hard Times” is one of the best songs I’ve heard all year. Maybe that’s a subject for a future article

"The Tubes" - The Tubes

Back in the early 80s, I have recollections of coming home from school and, like many other kids I knew at the time, turning on the TV to the ABC (there was just the one ABC channel back in the day, kiddies) to watch the Kenny Everett Video Show and The Goodies (or Wayne and Schuster if one of the other shows was on hiatus). Both shows seemed so anarchic in comparison to umpteen repeats of Bewitched or I Dream of Jeannie on the other channels. How we looked forward to seeing Kenny do a Brother Lee Love  routine or to see The Goodies' Bill Oddie hit someone with a black pudding in the name of his martial art, Ecky Thump.

Every day, for a time, before these shows would start there would be a rock video clip to fill in time. Whoever was the pop 15-minuter of the day (Adam Ant, Racey). One particular week, the clips were all devoted to a band I'd not heard of called The Tubes.

After that week, they would never be far away from my record player.

They had just released their latest album, The Completion Backward Principle, and had recurited video director-of-the-minute Russell Mulcahy to direct a video album to accompany the record - this may well have been the first one of its kind. Not that I was to know it yet, but The Tubes had been around for a while and were very much into theatrical shock-rock, like say, Alice Cooper. Unlike the Coop, the emphasis was less on horror and more on society parody of manners. Their act got them banned in someplaces (I have a feeling that included Australia, but am not sure), so it was no wonder that the clips shown that week on the ABC were more tame than what they were usually known for. Still, "Sushi Girl" in the 6.30pm time slot was pretty incredible for the day.

In fact, The Completion Backward Principle saw the band at Capitol Records with them trying to take a more commercial bent than previous records had been. The sheen that producer David Foster gave them gave a slickness absent from their earlier more creative records. They might have wanted top 40 success, but on their terms. Still, the first single, "I Don't Want To Wait Anymore" didn't garner (in Australia anyway) huge success.  Maybe a song with a lazy lyric like "Trapped in the freezing cold / Barely alive, had to make love to survive" didn't deserve to make it. Maybe the world didn't want another Toto.

If we only go back a few years prior to 1975 however, The Tubes released their first album eponymously titled on A & M, and it was a million miles away from the -admittedly very catchy - pop of Completion Backwards Principle. "The Tubes" had songs of bondage, bored spoiled rich teenagers, sex, rampant consumerism, floating in space, and even a song about themselves. There was one love song, but of course The Tubes would not do anything conventionally. It was an old mariachi number.

The seven piece band were all incredible musicians, and were led by the charismatic and energetic Fee Waybill. He had a number of stage personas with more costume changes than Barbara Streisand. The Tubes definitely believed in putting on a show, not just a concert.

So what's happening musically on their first album? I've already mentioned mariachi, but there's all sorts of art rock touches with crazy time changes. That statement could put many off, but it's not supposed to. Whereas a lot of the art rock or prog rock was taking itself very seriously with lengthy songs and keyboard solos all out of proportion (and I say that as a Rick Wakeman fan), The Tubes used their musicianship to serve the song, not their egos. Melodies are very strong on this record. They definitely share a sense of humour with Frank Zappa, but are far more interesting musically here than anything I ever heard from the Mothers of Invention (don't shoot me down, but I can't whistle a Zappa melody).

Before I get to the two obvious highlights of the record, I'll mention a couple of other gems. The album opens with a strong statement of intent with "Up From The Deep". The band are offering their audience an introduction to themselves and want to please them  ("This is how you want it / Then that's how we'll play it"). It plays like a mini symphony and has a shitload of weird time changes, but is nothing like Yes. It's not taking itself seriously, but is still musically majestic. Their sesne of humour comes to the fore with the catchy and yet sardonic "What Do You Want From Life?" Their statement on consumerism and peoples' superficiality in general is still funny enough to not make us feel shitty about it. It's also possibly the only pop song to make mention of "a baby's arm holding an apple".

Ostensibly, The Tubes were a very visual band and it's probably in a live context that they worked best, certainly with these next two songs I wish to mention: "Mondo Bondage" and "White Punks On Dope". Yet, these songs are both so forceful, that even if you never saw them live, the theatre of your mind can present images that might have made Fee Waybill himself blush. Certainly watch them on Youtube (the band should have sued) - with no kids around, of course - but the songs without visuals still stand up. WPOD is their take on bored rich white Californian kids of the early 70s (though it's probably still applicable now, and is certainly not geographically specific). I guess Billy Joel did a similar thing at the time with "Captain Jack". The Tubes' song is more a tribute to excess (with Waybill dressed in platform shoes, wig, and early 70s Elton John glasses) as well as a mockery of those who partook, whereas the protagonist in Jack actually sounds bored and lives just to score his next hit. On stage, WPOD looked like an inspiration for Spinal Tap!!!

As for Mondo Bondage, if the song wasn't so good, you'd feel guilty listening to it or watching a clip. Surely some sleazy 1970s ...ahem...adult film has used this song as its soundtrack. On the surface this could be a song about feeling one is tied up in life and wanting to break out of a rut. On the other hand, it's probably just a song about bondage. A very intense frightening song - but I'm sure the band thinks we're supposed to find it funny.,and it is....sort of.

I'm sure that when music critics are writing about the bloated excess of 70s rock, it could be all too easy to include this album and this band in general as an argument in their favour. That, however, would be doing discredit to The Tubes who were really more about taking the piss (no jokes on any Genesis albums that I can recall) - they just happened to do it with a myriad of time signature changes. Search this album out,or view them on youtube.