September 2006 Archives

By Tim Quirk

Rhapsody has almost 3 million songs in its catalog, and normally on this blog we single out one or two of those for discussion at a time.

But this post is going to be about 500 songs. Specifically, the 500 or so we're preloading on the Sansa Rhapsody, the new device we recently announced we're making with SanDisk. You might think choosing several hundred such tracks would be pretty easy. But it turns out putting together a list like that is an insomnia-inducing, ulcer-generating, choice-of-career-questioning affair that leaves you feeling like Meryl Streep at the end of Sophie's Choice.

Which doesn’t mean it's not a hell of a lot of fun, too.

Every once in a while, an artist feels that they have to stretch out over 2 records to try something new. The Beatles started it all with their untitled white album and now everyone does it.

Some of my favorite double LPs come out when someone really wanted to go out on a limb.

Take Stevie Wonder. The man had already put out one dynamite 2-record set but he had to tell the world about plants. The guy really likes his flora and fauna. Wonder ended his run of brilliant 1970s albums by putting out a double LP dedicated to the Secret Life of Plants. Half of America still can't get behind the fact that animals actually have souls and yet Stevie is clued into a world where plants are carrying on behind our backs.

  The album's two hit singles (and Wonder's track record up to that point) helped the record go to No. 4 on the pop charts. But the record didn't stay there long. But Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants is a pretty nifty 2 record set.

Kids of all ages should enjoy his song about a Venus flytrap eating a bug. Stevie convincingly acts out the part of the bug.

Then, there is Wonder's instrumental epic about a "Tree."" Phew, that is one dramatic tree.

While the whole family loved Stevie Wonder during the '70s, Lou Reed was looked at a little differently (if at all). Shocking lyrics and twisted desires were Lou's bread and butter back then. So, to do something completely different, Reed cut out his lyrics completely and released a 2 record set of blinding white guitar noise.

While an army of artsy New York City rock types (black t-shirts, skinny white arms) revere Metal Music Machine, you never know where Reed stands on his own work. One minute he says its a modern classical masterpiece that he spent a long time composing, then he turns around and says he just threw it together to try and break his record contract. I have to admit, this one is funner to talk about than to listen to all the way through (my arms may be skinny and white, but so are my t-shirts).

Around the same time that Reed was trying to lose what audience he had, Joni Mitchell was getting artier and artier. Her 1977 double album Don Juan's Reckless Daughter is remembered as something of a misfire but it actually went gold. Rock critics generally stopped liking Joni around this time, probably because she started working with jazz musicians (Wayne Shorter, Jaco, and (gasp) Larry Carlton) and stopped being openly autobiographical. Stupid rock critics.

I have no idea what the theme is for Reckless Daughter is, but the title track and other numbers on it sound great to me. It doesn't really play like a big double album, but I love the choppy rhythm guitar sound on it. I also like the vaguely poetic lyrics concerning coyotes, "bald headed days," and women with newfangled ideas concerning the subject of morality.

I like coyotes even more than I like plants.

The movie The Black Dahlia is getting a big opening push this weekend.

The film is based on a very good book, though it contains as much plot as atmosphere (and it has a lot of atmosphere), making it a better candidate for an HBO mini-series than a movie.

We don't have Mark Isham's score for the movie on Rhapsody yet, but the saxophonist/arranger Bob Belden cut a noirish theme album about the Black Dahlia murder a few years back. On that set, Belden tied his own brush with death with the 1947 murder of Elizabeth Short. Listen to the very cinematic title track -- it ended up getting Belden work as a film composer.

Rhino put out a nice comp of classic film noir themes a few years back. Here's the theme to 1944s Murder, My Sweet.

Chinatown was the artistic rebirth of noir. Jerry Goldsmith did the score for that one, matching buzzing synths with a searing jazz trumpet. John Zorn have covered the Chinatown theme. The movie's central theme comes up about halfway through Zorn's electronic swarm.

Jerry Goldsmith also penned the music for L.A. Confidential. One of the best movies of the 1990s, L.A. Con was also based on a book by James Ellroy, who wrote The Black Dahlia.

Ellroy often uses period music to help set the tone in his novels. He used Sinatra's "Ebb Tide" in a tense, cop peeps into bungalow scene. Damn if Gordon Jenkins swelling string intro and Frank's doomed vocals don't sound like their coming out of the heart of some old crime movie.

by Linda Ryan

The reason we work here is because we love music. It's an astonishingly simple fact, and one that none of us take lightly. We know we're lucky to be doing what we're doing -- and make the rent each month. But sometimes finding the balance between writing about the music we love and what's new or trendy or maybe even possibly interesting, can prove tricky. That's why we came up with the Dig This! program.

Dig This! gives each editor the opportunity to nominate a new CD (within 6 months of release is what we consider "new") from an artist that's currently residing "under the radar." The editorial department then votes on the nominees and the Top 5 become the Dig This! winners for that month, and get and extra bit of "spotlight love" from the folks who work here.

I finally had the opportunity to see the legendary Oscar Peterson play the other night.

After suffering what would be a debilitating stroke to most mortals, the jazz titan now a plays the piano with only one hand.

How does he do that? I'm not sure, but it turned out surprisingly well.

Canada's greatest jazz export, Oscar Peterson was a mainstay at Verve, a label that had him pretty much record with their entire roster of musicians and vocalists.

Oscar Peterson was always a creative pianist. Check out his version of "Something's Coming", the leadoff cut from his popular West Side Story songbook.

Peterson was also known for his vivacious live shows. His concert reading of "Sometimes I'm Happy" shows how he slowly ramps up the energy on a ballad until it suddenly morphs into a barnstormer. His biggest live set is probably Night Train. Here's the title cut.

None of these numbers show how incredibly fast Oscar Peterson could play. But speed ain't everything, even in bop.

The live numbers, however, do show how Peterson groans along to songs. This is bizarrely prevailent with jazz pianists. Errol Garner, McCoy Tyner and others just groan, growl and moan away like a hepcat version of Fred Munster. Eddie Palmieri must have decided to one-up the Frankenstein groaners because he actually lets loose with these bizarre operatic wails while he's tinkling the ivories.

Sure, all the groaning is kind of strange, if endearing (one day, I will make a "groaning pianists" playlist). That said, jazz is about freedom. These cats get so lost in the music that they make bizarre noises while they play. How cool is that?

Oscar Peterson loves music so much that he still plays even though one of his hands is no longer up to the task. The stroke hasn't slowed down his groaning at all.

Watched the Nick Park movie Curse of the Were-Rabbit again last night.

Completely brilliant. I enjoy movies that consist of stereotypical portraits of post war English life and countless ribald jokes involving gardening. The movie opens with a series of toothy portraits that capture a state halfway between British Dental Disasters and Mild, but Constant, English Uncomfortableness.

When I saw those portraits in the movie, I thought of the Bee Gees. not the disco Bee Gees that everyone knows and has learned to hate (the same way that people learn to hate mimes or the French), but the 1960s and early '70s Bee Gees.

First off, the Bee Gees were not Australian, they were English, born in Manchester. They lived in Australia for a few years, then came back in their teens, eager to conquer their homeland.

The Brothers Gibb were completely Beatles mad. The scrappy lads also had the kind of horse-toothed looks that signal a harsh childhood and a lack of proper nutrients (Barry, who was born before the family fell on very hard times, looks like he got the lion's share of the protein). The underrated Robin Gibb in particular had that "Please, Sir, give me a orange wedge" thing about him, its an element that Nick Park populates his Wallace & Gromit movies with.

The Bee Gees were a great band, regardless of what dental work they needed or the scorn they later earned for "going disco." For one, they took their Beatles template and added in lyrics involving historical tales of the British Empire. If someone died in a shipwreck, storm, war, or bicycle accident, the Bee Gees would write about it.

But the main thing about the early Bee Gees is that their songs were amazingly eccentric and oddly morose, when not downright depressive. "I Started a Joke" and "Massachusetts" (both major hits) are good examples of this.

There are literally dozens of songs I could give you as to the eccentric depths/heights the Bee Gees plunged/scaled, but I don't really think that you'd get past the completely bonkers-brilliant "Don't Wanna Live Inside Myself." This one sounds as if John Lennon woke up, took a good look at Yoko, yelped, and started dressing like Lord Byron and wandering around graveyards.

Like a Wallace & Gromit cartoon, you can't get any better than that.

1.) Happy 40th birthday, Pet Sounds ! You're much more than the Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band of the west coast.

2.) In the late '80s my friends and I got into the Madchester sound. The Happy Mondays were one of my favorite bands from this genre with their pill gobbling, baggy sound. I recently got hold of John Kongos' original version of "He's Gonna Step On You Again" and I gotta say that it blows doors on Sean Ryder and Co.

3.) My girlfriend turned me on to this self-titled Bang debut from 1972 and it's been blowing my mind like the first time I ever rode a motorcycle witout a helmet. It has a lot of phaser on the guitars and the songs are really heavy rock songs with double guitar leads but what really makes this album for me is the singer's voice. It sounds like someone is breaking his heart on every single song.

4.) Frankfurter Sandwiches! Frankfurter Sandwiches! Yes people were even perverted in the 1920s.

5.) Nobody & Mystic Chords of Memory is a great album featuring Chris Gunst who also songs for Beachwood Sparks. He still has that kid-with-hayfever sound to his voice, but his songwriting has really come a long way. I still can't wait for the Sparks to reunite. Lately, I've been in touch with my old buddy Brent Rademaker, or B-Rad as his friends call him, and it sure would be rad to hook up and pull out the vintage shred sleds for a catch-up session. Whaddaya say, B-Rad? It'll be just like new times! New times, old decks...

I came into work today all bleary-eyed and ready for a nap.

As usual, Brother Eric Shea came to the rescue and turned me on to the awesome new Tyde video. It gives you a top tune, a memorable moniker, and enough faux retro Super 8 surfing imagery to make up for having to work inside on a beautiful "end of" summer day.

The new Tyde album, Three's Co, is just as good.

The CD cover's design is based on those ever fashionable CTI jazz sleeves from the 1970s. I've passed along a CTI playlist before, but Rhapsody has so much of this stuff that I've got to push some at you.

CTI really started as an offshoot of A&M Records' jazz division and they specialized in keeping the rock album generation interested in jazz. We just got in Paul Desmond's take on the Simon & Garfunkel songbook, one of the very last Creed Taylor produced A&M sessions before he started CTI proper. The best cut on it is his gentle bounce through "Feelin' Groovy." Joining Desmond are Herbie Hancock on the Fender Rhodes and Ron Carter on bass. How can you go wrong?

From this same era comes Antonio Carlos Jobim's album Wave. If you're having a summer cocktail party or barbecue on this holiday weekend, you should be playing cuts like Jobim's "Captain Bacardi." No? You will be playing AC/DC instead? OK, please don't hit me...I bruise easily.

Getting away from the Creed Taylor produced lounge jazz, the Gal Costa/Caetano Veloso collaboration "Baby" is one of my favorite summer songs of all time. It even blows away the currently more popular Os Mutantes version. If you are having a pool party this weekend, "Baby" should be played.

If your Labor Day pool party turns into a night at the beach with bonfires blazing, acoustic guitars usually come out. In this case, go with the acoustic surf rock super-group The Duo-Tones.

If the subject of acoustic guitars come up, I often reach for Luiz Bonfa. If you disagree, listen to this and then come talk to me.

Actually, don't come talk to me. Its the start of Labor Day Weekend! Time to head down to the beach.