I just read that Michelangelo Antonioni passed away. If you've never seen Blow-Up or Zabriskie Point, you are totally blowing it. Blow-Up is easily the best mod film ever. Not only do you get to see Vanessa Redgrave and '60s model Veruschka in their heyday, but nowhere else will you ever see footage of the Yardbirds performing with both Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck at the same time. Check this awesome clip of them playing "Stroll On" (which is just a harder version of "Train Kept A-Rollin'" with different lyrics) at the legendary Ricky-Tick club. Any guitar player who has ever depended on a Vox amp will laugh at the portrayal of their unreliability in the aforementioned clip. Zabriskie Point came out in 1969, three years after Blow-Up, and it didn't do as much for the counterculture as did its predecessor, but check out the killer soundtrack it yielded. Antonioni obviously knew more about music than many of today's film directors and producers.
July 2007 Archives
Song: When The World Was Round
Album: Shrunken Heads
Artist: Ian Hunter
Selected by: Nate Baker
Date: July 31, 2007
I'm
a sucker for big, wave-your-lighter
choruses and this track by Ian Hunter has been a guilty pleasure of mine since
it came out in mid May. Hunter was the frontman for the much-loved yet
short-lived British rock group Mott
the Hoople and, at 68 years of age, he still has some golden pipes. What
grabs me most about this tune are the lyrics -- an
aging man's observation that life has out-paced him and that, indeed, the
changes haven't been what he would have imagined or wanted.
Song: Ode To Billie Joe
Album: Ode To Billie Joe
Artist: Bobbie Gentry
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 30, 2007
Most
No. 1 hits these days are lucky to move 100,000 units. Bobbie Gentry's
brilliant "Ode to Billie Joe" cleared the three million mark in a few
weeks back in 1967 (not bad considering it started out as the b-side to an acid
country rocker that failed to click with the public). A narrative mystery in
song form, teens used to whisper about Billie Joe's suicide being the result of
an unmentioned abortion. This always irked Bobbie Gentry, who has said that the
tune's secret is completely immaterial – "Ode to Billie Joe" is about
how a family fails to recognize the similar troubles each member is going
through.
Song: Gravel Roads
Album: If An Angel Came To See You Would You Make Her Feel At Home?
Artist: Black Oak Arkansas
Selected by: Mike McGuirk
Date: July 27, 2007
Before moving to LA, changing their band name (from the Knowbody Else to Black Oak Arkansas) and making it big, Jim Mangrum and his hillbilly crew lived in the woods outside of town, a necessity as they were wanted by the local authorities for grand larceny. Which means that when they were driving down the gravel roads depicted in this song (from their second album), they were probably transporting stolen TVs and casing neighborhoods. Cool band.
Song: Kung Fu
Album: Sweet Exorcist
Artist: Curtis Mayfield
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 26, 2007
Want summer grooves, cinematic sweep and grim social commentary? Try this 1974 Curtis Mayfield hit, which brings together Carl Douglas' unstoppably great "Kung Fu Fighting" and Johnny Cash's classic "A Boy Named Sue." Mayfield's music vamps along like a low, slow-moving shark while he relays a story of an inner city youth who has it so tough that his mother names him Kung Fu. What differentiates Mayfield from his many followers (besides his genius) is that he isn't bragging. Here, the protagonist employs his name like a shield as he tries to make it through the world unharmed.
Song: Never Young
Album: Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike
Artist: Gogol Bordello
Selected by: Rachel Devitt
Date: July 25, 2007
Everyone's favorite Gypsy Punks just put out a fantastic new album of cabaret caterwauling and Eastern European circus tricks. But if you really want to figure out why everyone and their mother and Elijah Wood-Gogol Bordello show, check out this thrashing, screaming (literally) bit of rock-around-the-former-Easter-Bloc. Oh, and that screaming? You're going to want to turn the volume up before you play this puppy.
Holy crap! I just realized that last week marked my eight year anniversary here at Rhapsody. I think that means I've worked in the San Francisco building longer than anyone. Back in the day we were called listen.com and what the hell were we listening to in 1999
Song: Caida Libre
Artist: Mala Rodriguez
Album: Malamarismo
Selected by: Sarah Bardeen
Date: July 23, 2007
Haven't yet heard Mala Rodriguez, the bad girl of Spanish hip-hop? Now's the time. This lady's got game, and she never breaks a sweat, even when she's dropping flows that put the fellas to shame.
As promised last week, here’s a list of my top ten albums of the year thus far. This was a pretty hard list to compile as there have been a lot of good to great albums this year. If you want a little more linear overview of trends in rap, check here. And my list is after the jump.
^^^ Jacek Sroka
Song: You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies
Album: Bookends
Artist: Simon & Garfunkel
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 20, 2007
Paul Simon was on such a
songwriting roll in the 1960s that he didn't even seem to care that this
baroque-pop wonder sank without a trace. The "what's wrong with you,
girl" romantic disdain of the lyrics is pure Dylan, though Paul's sleek
folk-rock guitar playing, the clever jazz bridge and Artie's pitch-perfect
vocal harmonies show the special magic that came out of the Simon &
Garfunkel musical partnership. This one comes tagged as a "rare
single," though it may actually be the b-side to "Fakin' It."
One of the weird things about reviewing music for a living is that when you discover a great new album you can't just keep listening to it like a normal person. You have to put it aside and go on to the next thing.
(I know, I know.. this job is tougher than being a fire fighter, test pilot or chum scrubber -- but some jerk has to do it).
The tough part comes when you hear a new release as fantastic as Star's In Our Bedroom After The War.
Here is my short Rhapsody review of the new album:
Stars' Set Yourself On Fire added guitars to the band's synthy retro sound, resulting in one of the finest albums of the '00s. On this equally superb outing, Stars bounce between digital and analog sounds, always letting Torquil Campbell's lush pop hooks and novelistic lyrics carry the day. Campbell's razor sharp songwriting and his vocal harmonies with Amy Millan are just a couple of things that put Stars miles ahead of their retro-new wave contemporaries. Whether it's the mad rock rush of "Take Me To The Riot" or the Feist-y romance of "My Favourite Book" or the private pain exposed on "Personal," the band always delivers.
What the above doesn't say is that Stars only released In Our Bedroom After The War four days after it was all done! That turnaround time is pretty much unheard of.
The album isn't getting its physical CD release for a couple of months now, but the Stars wanted their fans to get it right now instead of waiting for it to come out in a couple of months or stealing it from the inter-webs.
Is that groovy or what -- it makes me feel like I'm Mick Jagger or John Phillips getting to listen to the acetates of the latest Beatles release. What makes this even better is that Stars' In Our Bedroom After The War is so good it's actually worth not waiting for.
I get the feeling that this is the very first time we've seen this but it will quickly be a growing trend.
After you're done with R. Kelly, click here for a look at J Holiday's Soul Classics
Two of the coolest features in Playlist Central are the celebrity mixtapes and celebrity picks. For celebrity mixtapes, we interview artists and have them talk about their favorite tracks. Here's the one I did with Method Man where he broke down the science behind a lot of Wu Tang classics, and here's another from Van Hunt that is notable for Hunt's excellent taste. Celebrity picks are pretty much the same concept except that they're not compiled from audio interviews. Here are Tom Joyner's picks.
Yesterday, I think I may have received our best celebrity playlist to date when Zomba forwarded me R. Kelly's picks. (check it out here) But there was a problem...
^if you recognize that this man is a genius, please click through
Song: Who Ya Tryin' to Fool
Album: Sand
Artist: Sand
Selected by: Eric Shea
Date: July 19, 2007
Last week I was incredibly stoked to find this album in Rhapsody. Until recently it was only available in used vinyl bins. My friend Sam Graw is as enthusiastic about country rock as he is about architectural design, and he and I used to geek-out pretty hard on stuff like this. So one day he came back from record shopping and called me saying, "I found this self-titled album from 1973 by some band named Sand. It's great! Every single song rules." He was right. There are only eight songs here and they all rule...especially the first song. The soaring vocal harmonies are air-tight and remind me of listening to the AM radio in my dad's avocado green Pinto station wagon on family road trips in the summers of the mid '70s. I don't think you'll find a better pedal steel solo anywhere. Listen closely to the incredible picking and flowing and then listen to the second half of the guitar solo on Wilco's "Impossible Germany." Is it me or does it sound like Nels Cline is another fan of this album?
I know I'm a little late on the half year wrap up of hip-hop action, but my overlords at Rhapsody keep me fairly busy.
Anyway, It’s been a pretty weird year for rap.
^^ c/o aaron noble
Song: Watching Xanadu
Album: Loss
Artist: Mull Historical Society
Selected by: Linda Ryan
Date: July 18, 2007
There's something magically delicious about this sunshine-infused track from Scottish outfit Mull Historical Society. Is it the bells? Is it the Beach Boys-inspired backing vocals? Perhaps it's the Spector-esque production. Either way, you'd be hard pressed to find a more exuberant song than "Watching Xanadu."
Rhapsody's own Diamond Dave Krinsky has done it again. First, Dave cleared a bunch of out-of-print Psychedelic Furs albums for us. Then, he got a mess of out-of-print David Bowie E.P.s and B-sides for Rhapsody.
Well, The Psych Furs and Bowie are all well and good. but Rhapsody subscribers are a demanding -- not to mention violent -- lot. They grabbed pitchforks, lit torches and then gathered outside of our palatial Rhapsody compound in a mass protest.
Instead of screaming at us, they just let out a massive, collection sigh.
Song: Krazy World
Album: Take Me To Your Leader
Artist: MF Doom/King Geedorah
Selected By: Sam Chennault
Date: July 17, 2007
Taken from King Geedorah’s album Take Me to Your Leader (MF Doom’s other classic from 2003), “Krazy World” sounds like the kind of music sad, drunken super-heroes would make. The looping swells of strings are smeared and maudlin, giving the production a ramshackle majesty, while guest emcee Gigan’s rap is scratched, slurred and obscene.
Song: Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get
Album: Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get
Artist: The Dramatics
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 16, 2007
Detroit had such an embarrassment of brilliant soul acts that the Motown Records machine couldn't get behind all of them. Take the Dramatics, for instance. This searing ode to keeping it real went Top 10 in 1971 and is still widely heard today. Just try not to feel good when it's playing.
At 26 years old and 6'5", with thick crimson hair tangled in a bandanna, bare feet, freckled skin and a cabbage patch face, Brett Dennen renders a kind of honesty often lost among the "fake faces" of today's youth. Compared to legends like Bob Dylan and Paul Simon, his music is familiar and his lyrics are real. He is a man of truth, a testament to a frustrated generation seeking a social "revolution."
My first encounter with BD was last October at the San Francisco Fillmore as one of three opening acts for ALO's Abnormal Formal. I was instantly hooked after the audience's sing-a-long to the catchy chorus from "She's Mine," now a staple part of BD's live shows. The Abnormal Formal inevitably made it to my all-time-top-5-concerts-of-2006 list, mostly due to the special guest appearance by surfer hunk Jack Johnson. Together, BD, Johnson, ALO, Honey Cut and Blue Turtle Seduction covered Bob Dylan's "I Shall Be Released" and Journey's "Lights" during the triple encore -- a legendary finale.
Song: Man and Wife, The Latter
Album: Read Music/Speak Spanish
Artist: Desaparecidos
Selected by: Tim Quirk
Date: July 13, 2007
Bright Eyes’ Conor Oberst imagines himself as an unsatisfied housewife and yelps out her frustration against appropriately angry backing from his one-off punk outfit, Desaparecidos. Surprisingly, he makes a pretty convincing middle-aged lady.
By Tim Quirk
I'm beyond depressed. In just a couple of days,
Internet Radio will change, dramatically, for the worse.
Song: That's All Right
Artist: Elvis Presley
Album: Elvis At Sun
Selected by: Jon Maples
Date: July 12, 2007
Fifty-six years ago today, Elvis Presley signed a contract with Sun Records and quit his job as a truck driver. Celebrate the anniversary by listening to one of the King's first recordings in Memphis' historic Sun Studios.
Here is something interesting that happened today:
I was walking into my apartment building and suddenly this guy
on one of the floors up above started screaming really loud. The landlady and
security guard immediately went into emergency mode and started running through
the building knocking on doors and trying to find where the screams were coming from. First I
realized they were coming from my floor ...
Song: Let There Be Light
Album: † (Cross)
Artist: Justice
Selected by: Nicholas Baker
Date: July 11, 2007
With all the richly deserved hype surrounding the release of Justice's debut yesterday, it's only right to pick one of their songs for this blog. There's honestly not a weak track on this album, but "Let There Be Light" particularly stands out for the beautiful transition from massive electro banger at the start through to sweet little melody right at the end. Think of it as a welcome breather before the mosh pit starts going mental again – these Justice boys are nothing if not thoughtful
Janis Joplin once wrote a song about "great political and social importance," entitled "Mercedes Benz" (or "The Politician"). Joplin wrote the tune together with the poet Michael McClure and Bob Neuwirth as social commentary on how people relate happiness and materialism: "Oh lord, won't you buy my a Mercedes-Benz?/ My friends all drive Porches/ I must make amends."
Song: Tales From The Riverbank
Album: Snap!
Artist: The Jam
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 10, 2007
While all great summer songs have to do with memory, not all summer songs take place at the beach. Some are set on rivers or lakes. Here, the Jam's Paul Weller recalls childhood vacations spent running around rural England, singing, "True, it's a dream mixed with nostalgia/But it's a dream that I'll always hang on to." This brilliant number (one of the Jam's all-time best) was stuck on a B-side just because Weller wanted a single (the frantic "Funeral Pyre," in this case) that sounded as unlike Spandau Ballet as possible. Silly boy. Thankfully, when Paul cut an acoustic session for Rhapsody, he revisited the song.
Song: Til Death
Album: Slowly We Rot
Artist: Obituary
Selected by: Mike McGuirk
Date: July 9, 2007
From the debut record these seminal Florida death metal kingpins unleashed on us all back in 1989. The first totally awesome part comes at the 1:19 mark. Then at 2:20 -- holey moley. Just make sure you have all your volumes maxed.
...don't believe what I saw. Sting, John Mayer and Kanye West on the same stage! What the hell is going on! Oh, that's right -- it's the All-Star Game! No, wait. Check that, it's Live Earth! Man, Al Gore is such a bad ass he could fight Ghost Rider, the Transformers, Spider Man and Harry Potter all at once and still have time to save the world. So it's no wonder all these artists got together to rock with Al and spread the word about global warming at the same time. Were these performances any good? 
OF COURSE NOT! Roger Waters at least had the decency to perform "Brick In the Wall," however Madonna was intent on doing some new number about changing the world -- look, Madge, you don't have to sing about changing the world to change it. Sing "Lucky Stars," get people dancing, we'll change the world after we're done shaking it. But let's not criticize -- this is a good cause And Al Gore is sweet! Look, there I am shaking hands with him!
It's 6:32 a.m. and I'm already annoyed by the Madonna theme song and the non-stop celebrity commercials to try to change our behavior. I have to forward through about 15 of these 10 second PSIs to get to Shakira from Hamburg, who seems wide awake and performing, despite the fact that I'm not.
Live Earth is a series of wide world concerts designed to raise money and, more importantly, awareness for Al Gore's goal of curbing global warming. I've woken up early this morning on the West Coast and shows in Tokyo (that's Rihanna from Toyko on the right), Shanghai and Sydney have already wrapped up. The London and Hamburg stages are midway through their sets. Later, there are shows in the Meadowlands, on the National Mall in DC, Johannesburg and Rio de Janeiro.
7:00 am Back in London, Damien Rice & David Gray are covering Que Sera, Sera and the Wembley crowd, which is massive and subdued, seems to love it. And then they are gone. All the acts are performing a song or two and making way for the next act. Chris Moyles from BBC1 is on stage saying something about how we can protect a half a million trees by text messaging "share" to 82004. Not quite clear how that's gonna work.
The Live Earth folks are trying to get a million people to pledge to do something different to help the environment--from changing to fluorescent light bulbs to flying less.
7:30 am Kasabian plays for a total of 10 minutes in London and the Washington stage starts up, where we're all waiting for Al Gore.
7:45 am Washington: Al gave a quick speech where we didn't completely fall asleep (yay Al) and then Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood sang a "green" version of We Shall Be Free and got the hell off the stage. Meanwhile in London, Will.I.Am is giving a longer speech than Al's.
9:00 am The best way to experience the concerts is the website. You can see alot of the performances and do the call to action items, like check your carbon footprint and read the blogs. Hopefully, they won't post Geri Halliwell's preening and pretentious introduction of Duran Duran. Yuck!
Song: The Coolest Kid In School
Album: You're My Lover Now
Artist: The Teeth
Selected By: Nate Cavalieri
Date: July 6, 2007
Of all the sundry nonsense at SXSW this year, it was a pair of sweaty, manic performances by the MoDavis twins and their Philadelphia band The Teeth that were the most inspiring. They finally issued the full-length LP that I've been waiting for ever since and are currently traveling around the country to support it. "The Coolest Kid In School" is one of their gentle ones (about running out on a bulimic girlfriend, from what I can tell), but don't be fooled; the lion's share of the record is all lyrical daggers and bristling, brilliant power pop.
Song: Doomsayer [The Beginning of the End]
Album: Deliver Us
Artist: Darkest Hour
Selected By: Garrett Kamps
Date: July 5, 2007
Darkest Hour have a new album coming out next Tuesday, but until then you can hear it on Rhapsody as an exclusive Premiere, and hear it you should. Is it the band's best? Probably not -- that honor belongs to Undoing Ruin -- but it's still another slab of seriously brutal metalcore. Most folks gob all the Warper Tour, Ozzfest etc. stuff together, thinking: distorted guitars + unintelligible lyrics = that crap. Not so. Darkest Hour is an example of a band that's as extreme as it is musical, as heavy as it is agile. Listen for twists and turns, burning solos, weird time changes, and plenty of other surprises.
I have nothing to say about music this week, sorry. How about a story then? With links to awesome songs? Excellent.
Song: Sick, Sick, Sick
Album: Era Vulgaris
Artist: Queens of the Stone Age
Selected by: Jaan Uhelszki
Date: July 4, 2007
They don't make rock starts the way they used to, that is unless you're talking about Queens of the Stone Age. These shamans of desert rock stir up a sand storm on their latest album, Era Vulgaris, named for the world's most infamous Satanist Aleister Crowley's moment when he fully embraced his demons and accepted the dark lord as his savior. While Josh Homme and his band of not-so-merry men aren't avowed devil worshipers, they do whip up some dark visions on "Sick Sick Sick" which channels the dirty dangerous vision of the Stooges, the howling darkness of Nirvana, the bombast and comic misogyny of ZZ Top and the doomsday visions of Blue Oyster Cult.
Song: Black Cat
Album: Rhythm Nation 1814
Artist: Janet Jackson
Selected By: Rachel Devitt
Date: July 3, 2007
All right, so she's always been more sex kitten than "Black Cat" and yes, the RAWK is a bit contrived, but meee-ow, does Ms. Jackson (if indeed you are nasty, that is) sink her claws into this one. Bold, unfettered and absolutely ferocious, it's a reminder of why, come wardrobe malfunctions or high water, we still love her nearly twenty years later. (P.S. Janet's whole back catalogue just went live in Rhapsody and you know you need to hear "Nasty." Right. Now.)
Song: These Long Summer Days
Album: She's Spanish, I'm American
Artist: She's Spanish, I'm American
Selected by: Nick Dedina
Date: July 2, 2007
Josh Rouse
named his side-project She's Spanish, I'm American because 1) Paz Suay is Spanish; 2) he is American;
and 3) he must've wanted to sell as few records as possible. That's too bad
because "These Long Summer Days" is a real gem
tucked inside a nifty beach vacation record. Remember when summer days were
actually long and relaxing and you weren't stuck inside working? We don't
either.
Play It Now
- Portions of Album Content Provided by All Music Guide © 2008 All Media Guide, LLC.
![Krazy World](<a%20href="http://www.rhapsody.com/goto?rcid=tra.3628592&variant=play&lsrc=RN_htm"><img src="http://static.realone.com/rotw/images/buttons/playsm.gif" width="20" height="20" border="0"> Krazy World (featuring Gigan) by MF Doom</a>){kind=link}
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