Album Review- Rodney Crowell- Chicago Sessions

I grew up in a house that listened to country music. I wasn’t a huge fan myself though of course I did love certain songs. Who doesn’t love Johnny Cash?

I am not sure if I molded my taste in music or if music molded me, but here is what happened: in the late 80s, my aunt worked for a magazine publisher and I spent a lot of time at her house. Which included devouring “Country Music” magazine- the articles and the charts.

It also happens to be a great time for the genre (in my eyes)- Neotraditional Country which got popular between the era of Urban Cowboy and the rise of Garth Brooks.

If you know how big of a Steve Earle fan I am, you might think this is where it started. It didn’t. Though I knew and liked him and watched the record companies try to figure out how to market him. It was really 1996s I Feel Alright where I fell in love with his artistry.

Although I liked a few artists of the time, I would have to say that there were three that stood out as my favorites. Roseanne Cash, Rodney Crowell and Dwight Yoakum

Crowell was probably the most successful and yet he ended up being a bit forgotten. I hadn’t listened to him in years- and when I revisit those singles, they are so good. I never tire of them - “I Couldn’t Leave You if I Tried”, “Above and Beyond” “She’s Crazy for Leaving”, “If Looks Could Kill” and Many A Long and Lonesome Highway”

I had forgotten Crowell a bit too. But there are a lot more outlets for music now and when I heard some of his 21st Century songs, I got back into him.

2023s “The Chicago Sessions” is most likely the most attention given to Crowell in 30 years. He pairs up with producer Jeff Tweedy

Tweedy of course was in the bands Uncle Tupelo and Wilco. To attempt to label genres, I would say Tweedy and his bands (along with Whiskeytown, Old 97s and others) helped create Alt Country

Now labels and names get thrown around, so for the sake of this conversation, I would say Alt Country falls under a bigger umbrella of Americana music that includes the aforementioned Neotrad country but also Cowpunk, Cosmic Country, Red Dirt Country, jam bands, Outlaw Country, Roots Rock, Folk Rock and likely more related rivers that flow into the bigger Americana Ocean.

Which means if Tweedy and Crowell don’t sound the same sonically, they at least have similar mindsets

The Chicago Seasons cover immediately calls to mind 1978 debut. That album is a reminder that Crowell’s songs may be even more well known than he is - this particular album has “Leaving Louisiana in the Broad Daylight” a # 1 Country hit for the Oak Ridge Boys and the title track “Ain’t Living Long Like This”

I don’t know Crowell’s every note but I have some dablings with his 21st century material 2001s The Houston Kid is considered a masterpiece of the genre and rightfully so. I don’t know any of the next albums that well but know they are critically acclaimed and I have liked what I heard. Of those, I have spent a bit of time with 2014s Tarpaper Sky and 2017s Close Ties which have some great songs.

My intro back to Crowell was 2019s Texas, one of Uncut Magazine monthly picks. It ended up being a perfect jumping back on spot for me- having missed his post -80s work. I had loved his classic hits and likely presumed he was cranking out cookie cutter albums

Texas pairs Crowell with a bunch of cameos. So often it mirrors the personalities that he was playing with (Steve Earle, Billy Gibbons, Lyle Lovett, Ringo Starr and so on).

2021s Triage was a more intimate and personal album. Crowell is at his best with humor and pathos. It deals with mortality but has its fun moments too.

Which brings us to Chicago Sessions which with Tweedy involved seems to suggest it will take Crowell to one extreme or another

But it doesn’t Rock like Texas nor does it have the gravitas of Triage. If anything it’s..just fine. It doesn’t seem to do anything better than the last two albums did (or the other albums I mentioned earlier)

It’s not a particularly bad album. It just doesn’t feel like much more than background music. I half suspect that I don’t like Tweedy’s production which aspires for the intimate but is not my preferred version of Crowell. I prefer Crowell’s work with himself in the producer chair where he usually is.

Tweedy also produced Richard Thompson’s Still album (2015) another example of a lesser album in a great catalogue (in my opinion).

That said, it is an enjoyable listen with a few highlights and I do love the attention Crowell is getting and this seems to be well received so I quite possibly am an exception here.  

Album Review- Inna de Yard- Family Affair

It seems like every review of Inna De Yard mentions the Buena Vista Social Club and there are so many parallels, that it is understandable

The roots of the project start with a record label of the same name. The idea of a collective based on natural voices and instruments made outdoors.

There are two releases on the label that I heard and knocked me over - one from a new generation (the much missed Matthew McAnuff) and one from the older (the legendary Ken Boothe), but the world as a whole probably were introduced via the 2017 album and accompanying documentary The Spirit of Jamaica.

Family Affair is the collectives third album which returns some of the genre’s greatest elders : Cedric Myton of The Congos, Winson McAnuff and Kiddus I and some rising reggae stars: Derajah, Kevor “Var” Williams, Kush McAnuff and Steve Newland with a great backing band led by Dwight Pinkney (Roots Radics) that has played on the previous albums

Like any franchise, I think this third album is probably the third in quality if I am ranking them, but like any decent series, it just means that they are all strong.

On the first two albums, the star power was Boothe, the Viceroys, Judy Mowatt of the I- Threes, and Horace Andy.

On this album the headliners are Keith and Tex who sang the definitive version of the much-sampled/much covered reggae classic “Stop That Train”. A new version is here of course. Also, 70s/80s dancehall star Keith Osbourne to perform a version of 1979 hit “Truth and Rights”

I don’t think I can recommend the Inna de Yard albums enough and this one is as good as any to start with. You will be hooked. 

Album Review- VNV Nation- Electric Sky

Some of my favorite music came out in the mid 2000s. It seemed like such a creative era. As someone then entering their 30s, I think it’s probably typical to see newer bands as continuations of bands liked in the teen years or twenties. For example, I loved The Libertines, the Killers, the Strokes, Franz Ferdinand and others who were clearly born from influences like the Smiths, Clash, the Jam, the Cure and so on. There also was a movement at the same time that from a big picture point of view could be classified as “dark wave” (I have also heard “future pop”) which in my mind kind of starts with Depeche Mode and 80s synth pop and slowly added more modern elements like the techno industrial of Frontline Assembly, the hard goth rock of Sisters of Mercy, the rave elements of the Prodigy and them you can hear melodic pop elements and soundtrack elements and even maybe reaching back to an earlier lineage of artists like Jean-Michel Jarre, Tangerine Dream and Kraftwerk To me, the stretch of six albums from 1999s Empires all the way to 2011s Automatic is their golden era. At various points, it sounded like the band was done, though looking back, they never seemed to sit idle. Like their spiritual predecessor A Clan of Xymox, they have a lot of attributes in the fact of being incredibly prolific in a narrow genre. This means new albums can have a sense of repetition. Like Xymox, VNV Nation is now largely the work of one man (Ronan Harris with the departure of percussionist/drummer/keyboardist Mark Jackson in 2017). 11 albums in, there is, pardon the pun, nothing new under the sun, and I would still recommend new listeners to those earlier records but Electric Sun is their best album in at least a decade.

What I have been listening to: Funkadelic

 A favorite band of mine is Parliament. They were sliding into obscurity in the 90s until they seemed to come exploding back. I mean obviously rap and hip-hop, there weren’t many artists that got sampled as much. So many key Dr Dre moments had Parliament roots. But it wasn’t like it was just that. If you were a rock fan, bands like Red Hot Chili Peppers and Primal Scream were working with him. George Clinton made the Lollapalooza tour. He showed up in the 1994 movie PCU and on the soundtrack alongside bands like Mudhoney and Redd Kross. But Parliament was everywhere in the 90s- the band also was namechecked by Digital Underground and Clinton’s solo career was given an assist by Prince. Bootsy Collins was involved in bands as diverse as Dee Lite and Praxis. Bernie Worrell worked extensively with Talking Heads, Les Claypool and Govt Mule.

I probably regret not seeing the P Funk All Stars when I had the chance. Still, it always felt like the golden P Funk age has passed. But dang if going back and discovering the classic tracks was so rewarding. One part Sly and the Family Stone funk rock, one part Frank Zappa weirdness, some Hendrix guitar heroics and let’s throw in the kitchen sink of rock, jazz, soul, funk, disco, rave and rap. Parliament seemed to transcend a person’s age, race or any number of determining factors.

In 2018, Parliament surprised everyone by releasing a new album Medicare Fraud Dogg. I would be lying to say it was a great album but a handful of years removed, the album puts me in a specific time and place that I was listening to it. (It’s major defect being it’s 24 songs and should have probably been one album not two)

In any case, though I love Parliament, I had yet to really get into Funkadelic- the brother band who took that aforementioned mix and doused it with a heavy dose of Led Zeppelin and birthed a new generation of African American guitar heroes.

In recent years, Maggot Brain is probably considered the bands epic. It’s an album as weird as it’s cover - heavy in sound and heavy in spirit, influence impossible to measure- it would be ground breaking of released in 1981 or even 1991, but instead born in 1971

It is an album that like Trout Mask Replica, I have never quite seemed to crack. But I have been dipping into Funkadelic again recently.

Although I might go for a detour here and there, my recent jam is probably the bands most accessible point -1973s Cosmic Slop and what a great record it is.

Not a commercial success at the time, it feels like a classic album now- which finds all roads leading to a perfect tune - the title track.

It’s a roller coaster of emotions, musical genres and moods. The title track makes an appearance on Doing Dumb Sh*t from Ice Cube’s 1991 album Death Certificate. Though nearly 20 years apart, both albums have a lot in common- there’s Urban reality and a lot of sex. It sounds like a Party but there’s a lot bubbling underneath.

One of the things that makes so much of Maggot Brain special is guitarist Eddie Hazel who just could make soulful psychedelic music, but my understanding is he was only minimally involved with the band by Cosmic Slop. It is Gary Shider and Ron Bykowksi who do the guitar work here and it’s Shider who would feature on “One Nation Under A Groove” (At this point Funkadelic is a pretty slimmed down group but they are all great here- Worrell, Boogie Mosson and Tyrone Lampkin) and Shider playing guitar on one of my favorite P Funk related albums (and recent discoveries for me) “Stretchin’ out in Bootsy’s Rubber Band”

And it’s Shider on lead vocals that make that title track so compelling. With so many colorful characters and comings and goings in the P Funk collective, Shider gets overlooked. For better or for worse, he is known as Diaper Man for his memorable concert uniform.

Thirty years from when I first heard of Parliament, it’s amazing that there’s still so much ground for me to cover.

In March, Fuzzy Haskins passed away. A reminder that this artistic generation is getting older (Hazel, Shider, Worrell and Mosson have already passed). Haskins wrote “Up for the Downstroke” and pops up all across the band’s history going back to the original doo wop Parliaments to the Original P - a non-Clinton group that toured in the 90s. Haskins can be found on Parliament’s Clones of Dr Funkenstein (1976) and Funkadelic’s America Eats It’s Young (1972)

Unloved Music- Richard Thompson

Now is probably the chance I am looking for to write about Richard Thompson and it’s the #unlovedmusic series Allmusic gives Thompson’s 1996 album You?Me?Us? a dismal 2.5 stars out of 5 I am not sure where I first heard Thompson. I suspect I saw “Shoot Out the Lights” named in Rolling Stone’s Best Albums list and just bought it. I don’t know. I did it at times. I did have a friend who was a fan and I did see his albums at the college radio station so these are also possibilities. The summer of 1993 was the proverbial “best of times and worst of times”. I stayed at my Grandparents and that definitely stands out and was memorable. That summer, I played “Shoot Out the Lights” constantly (in a rotation with The The’s Dusk, 10000 Maniacs’ Our Time in Eden and quite possibly the Use Your Illusion albums). I still think It might be the best album ever. (I Want to See The Bright Lights Tonight is probably somewhere in the conversation too) Thompson feels like the most unlikely pop artist out there. Even while Lou Reed, Elvis Costello and others seemed to find an alt rock niche - Thompson still feels uniquely different. I remember 1991s Rumor and Sigh having a buzz and indeed “1952 Vincent Black Lightning” has gone to become a favorite of Thompson fans, a staple of Del McCoury Band concerts and covered by many. In 1994, Thompson got the Tribute treatment and I really enjoyed it. Beat the Retreat was a solid record with artists from REM to Bonnie Raitt to the Blind Boys of Alabama to Beausoliel. I’m not usually a tribute guy but it’s a great, great record. I pick up my story in 1996. That year Thompson released what feels like a very ambitious double album - one side Electric (Voltage Enhanced) and Acoustic (Nude) Everything from the title to the competing halves feels like a statement. The songs are top notch. The lyrics as good as any he or anyone could compose. But it feels like every album since Rumor and Sigh feels similar insomuch as they get some attention at the time, but upon not conquering the world, time moves to the next one and repeat. In retrospect, Y?M?U? doesn’t get a lot of attention. Yet I stick with my initial assessment. It’s a great album. Allmusic gives it the kind of review that tells people to skip it (Allmusic constantly says Mitchell Froom’s production ruins his records, but I don’t hear it). When I bring the album up to Thompson’s fans, I get a closer opinion to mine. I have followed Thompson’s career quite closely. He hasn’t seem to quite have had that album considered that late career classic with one exception- 2017s Sweet Warrior I don’t even know I loved it at the time. It was definitely ambitious. It felt implicitly and sometimes explicitly an Iraqi War era record. I think it certainly now sounds like an album built to last. I don’t think a real Thompson fan would complain that much about any of his recent work. Thompson might be unpredictable but I never got the impression that he wasn’t in perfect control of what he wanted to do next- soundtrack a Werner Herzog movie, write a concept album about the Industrial Revolution or covering Britney Spears 2018s 13 Rivers made my Year end best of. I mean it’s just Thompson doing what he does. For any other artist, you would probably call it a return to form- but he’s never been that far out of form. To finish the conversation, I should say I have never really delved into Fairport Convention as I probably should (outside the two albums that generally get the most attention - Unhalfbricking and Liege & Lief. Both great) I saw Thompson on the Y?M?U? with a fellow diehard. She said we would be the youngest people there and we were. I am pretty sure I saw the Cramps the same week and if I am misremembering, the story is close enough to the truth to make the point. It’s been so many years but I remember Thompson being great of course and making a comment (which I think I have heard him repeat) that Great Britain didn’t need any help from us to win World War 2. They were doing fine)

 AXS TV debuted the 2021 documentary Triumph : Rock and Roll Machine on American tv.

I am not a huge fan of the band but I love a good rock documentary and this is a good one. It’s generally a feel good story about a band that had a unique path for itself

Triumph feels like a forgotten band, but they had their moments. The generation before me loves the band, but they bridge the gap between the vinyl/FM radio generation and the MTV/pop generation

Many of those bands didn’t make it, though it seems like instead of dying that they just went dormant as vinyl and rock finds it way onto social media. Bands like fellow Canadians April Wine and Aldo Nova were also vinyl heroes who survive today through word of mouth.

It’s hard to discuss Triumph and not bring up that other Canadian prog rock power trio that has so many similarities.

Giving the topic some thought, it is even more fantastic that Rush somehow managed to stay true to themselves and remain a huge attraction while living through an ocean of change.

I can only think of a few artists who bridged that gap and somehow remain relevant. Foreigner and Night Ranger come to mind. The commercial pressures on Triumph were real, as they are for most bands.

Triumph is a band of dichotomy. At once, criticized for being a “faceless” act- they had one of the most amazing concert performances of their time. A band that always stayed to true to their working class roots and yet seemingly created the template for glam metal. A band that wasn’t the typical MTV fare of the 80s but used the medium early and effectively. A band that had doubleneck guitars and levitating drumsets but appealed to the serious musicians. A band that filled arenas and whose t-shirts were everywhere, but nowadays is difficult to find in a google search.

Triumph famously played the 1983 US Festival as one of the biggest metal bands on the planet with only Scorpions and Van Halen going on after. But pop music is an everchanging beast.

I know Triumph was popular in my local market’s rock station growing up but they seem to lack that evergreen single that nostalgia stations play today. I also now that radio was seeing the rise of "Hot Hits" and you had a few artists with that kind of crossover appeal like Billy Squier, but you really needed boatloads of charisma.

Glam metal would come to rule the day and it’s hard imagining Triumph wanted to go that route. I can't see them being interested in the sillier aspects of the genre- it just wasn't who they were. It was tough for the bands that wanted to play serious rock and they kind of get pushed aside like Y&T and Krokus.

It probably didn’t help that the band split vocals or that the drummer often sang. The doc mentions that Rik Emmitt was a guitar hero like an Eddie Van Halen who sang. The doc also mentions that their concert setup crew were poached by the Jacksons for the 1984 Victory Tour.

The band did make at least one commonly considered classic album-their fifth album 1981s Allied Forces. The bands history is one of internal politics eventually getting the best of the band. Emmitt left for a solo career in 1988 and though the band made an album without him in 1992, their record label folded and their career ended shortly thereafter. I suspect otherwise the band would have had enough fan base to continue onward indefinitely.

Though Emmitt left the band on not the greatest of terms, the doc gives a satisfactory ending. There is a fan convention and to everyone’s surprise the band gets back together to perform for these diehards.

The doc is well done- very entertaining and guest cameos from The Trailer Park Boys, Sebastian Bach and Brian Posehn. They are not really a band in my wheelhouse but they seem like admirable guys and are definitely an important band in terms of rock history. I am glad I watched it

Doc Watch: Fanny- The Right to Rock

 I watched Fanny: The Right to Rock as it made its #rockdocs debut on American public television.

The 2021 documentary features a band which almost seems fictional. Even with the cliche of “no one remembers”, I had never come across them before.

My first experience was when I was sharing #unheardmusic- bands and albums that o thought more people should hear and a friend of mine brought up Fanny.

Now, in the golden age of social media, they have finally seen their day, with millions of streams but it seems like they were almost destined to be forgotten.

They were the first all girl band to release a major label album and the first all girl band to really have national success.

While their early work was typical rock fare of the time, I find I really enjoy their later stuff as glam was coming into vogue.

The doc was compelling because the story is compelling but I was a bit disappointed in that it felt low budget.

Some online reviews complain about it being “woke” at the end because the women of the band stay politically active. Maybe some things don’t change. Still, I agree that it falls into that rock band doc trap of “what people are really interested in is our new album”.

It is a conundrum and rightfully, I shouldn’t be the one making the film. On one hand, the story of Fanny is a pretty typical rock band story with internal politics and record company meddling. On the other hand, the band are real trailblazers. But in a way, they are trailblazers because they just rocked like any band would. I don’t want a “how long have you been a female musician?” Doc but at the same time it is an amazing story and you want to hear about what their journey was.

I think it would have been better with a narrator, and if not, I would still like more of a focus on the bands history. Grabbing a quick glance at Wikipedia, there are interesting routes there and plenty of interesting cameos along the way that either got little time or skipped altogether.

I loved the guests - Earl Slick and Gail Ann Dorsey of Bowie’s band, true rock historian and Def Lep main man Joe Elliott, band producer Todd Rundgren and a who’s who of female rockers like Bonnie Raitt, Kate Pierson, Cherie Currie, Alice Bag and Kathy Valentine of the Go Gos

In a review for Point of View, Susan Cole laments there is no mention of the Riot Grrl movement.

I get it because essentially Fanny is RiotGrrl a full twenty years before it existed. But I also think it’s proper to say Fanny was important for all female rockers. It’s hard to hear them and not think of Heart. It seems to be important to frame their spot in history, Rock history.

It shocks me that I wasn’t familiar with the band. Sure, they exist in that era of old record albums stuffing crates - bands like Mott the Hoople, Humble Pie, James Gang, Spooky Tooth, Spirit and Wishbone Ash to name a few

And while those bands have slipped off the mainstream, I still feel like those examples are still largely discussed in genre specific media.

Fanny seemed bound for those album stacks. Because of all of their national TV appearances, I know they were popular, but the doc doesn’t really give me much to go on. As the band focuses on the personalities and high level career, I would have to loved to know more about the actual music.

It doesn’t help that the music industry has changed so drastically. The band had a Top 40 single from their second release but consensus is their third album Fanny Hill is probably their commercial and artistic peak. “Ain’t it Peculiar” a top 100 single and currently considered the bands representative single. With engineer work from Geoff Emerick and support from Bobby Keys, that album went to # 135 their high water mark on the album sales chart and is around the time, David Bowie wrote a fan letter to the band.

In todays world, a label might drop a band if they haven’t conquered the world by two records.

On their fourth album, they had changed producers to Todd Rundgren and a harder sound.

On their fifth album, they changed labels to Casablanca (which would be some famous for KISS, Donna Summer and The Village People) and it’s a drastically different band. They have a new producer Vini Poncia who was in between producing Ringo Starr’s biggest hits and going on to work with KISS.

They add Patti Quatro (yes, Suzi’s sister) on guitar and take lead vocals on some songs.

Here’s the thing. The album got mixed reviews and you can definitely hear the record company pressure. It’s not perfect. But it is also the album that gave them their biggest single “Butter Boy” which went to 29 on the US charts.

To my ears, these last two albums are my favorite. Now this is more attuned to my preference than to any other factor. And the kicker is as the song was becoming a success, the band broke up.

Patti is a good sport and participant. It’s got to be hard as the band was originally always the Millington Sisters and Patti was a hired hand go replace guitarist June. Her songs are pretty fantastic to my ears, though

I completely understand why the band doesn’t like the album which is an unwanted makeover, but it has some great moments and really underscores how totally unheralded Quatro is. With her sister, she’s responsible for the Pleasure Seekers “What a way to die” which is as good a Garage Rock song as one can find, written in 1965 Detroit, predating studio recordings by the Stooges, the MC5 and Alice Cooper.

We can’t really say if Fanny would have been bigger. A modern day listener would say five albums in as many years- they were done. But in the 70s, you had bands develop and gain new fans organically. If their last album sounds dated, it also has some songs that seem to be anticipating what the radio was going to play in the upcoming years. The fact is no record company is going to do anything with a defunct band and this literally is a case of breaking up at peak commercial success.

Fanny The Right to Rock is a success in that it sent me to listen to their music and learn more about them. It has helped their presence and they now fit comfortably on satellite radio shows like Little Steven’s Underground Garage. Younger audiences will likely look for their music because of this, which is the goal.

I was left wanting more, but here’s the thing, the music is out there and like anyone who watches, it sent me on a mission to hear the music.

1974 - Casablanca

Moms Music- Dan Fogelberg

I was in Peoria, Illinois last weekend and saw they had a statue dedicated to hometown son Dan Fogelberg I wasn’t planning on covering Fogelberg for #momsmusic but if truth is told, I would have to say he is on Moms Top 10. If we are being honest, I don’t like the soft rock of the 1970s. I won’t mention the artists that annoy me the most as they might be your favorites. But as we sit here decades later, yes I include Fogelberg in the group of 70s AM radio, but like the recently passed Gordon Lightfoot, I really have nothing bad to say about Fogelberg. Neither artist is among my favorites, but I appreciate their artistry and would definitely listen if they come on the radio Fogelberg has a solid career- four top 10 singles, seven more songs in the Top 40 and add three more for a total of 14 songs placed on the US Top 100 from 1975 to 1987. Even more charted on Adult Contemporary radio. Even though I classify him with the 70s, his peak chart years were between 1979 and 1984. Which means I should put Fogelberg on my #raisedonradio list of songs I grew up with. As you know, I love sports and music, so “Run for the Roses” a song commissioned for the Kentucky Derby is a perfect mix of both, so no wonder I liked it. It went to # 18. Which meant it stopped a Top 10 run of “Same Old Lang Syne”, “Hard to Say” and “Leader of the Band”. And listening afresh 40 years later, pales to those singles in comparison. I don’t have any particular thoughts on Horse Racing. I grew up just after this golden decade for the sport with Secretariat, Affirmed and Seattle Slew. So while there were some famous jockeys- Pincay, Shoemaker, Pat Day and so on - the Triple Crowd seemed elusive. And of course for me, I remember Swale which won the first two races of the Triple Crown and died before the third. I try to watch the Kentucky Derby each year and there is a lot of local owners and stables representing Iowa in recent times so that is of interest, but I am not all that passionate about it. I am sad to hear of the tragedies that seemed to occur more than normal this year.

Moms Music- Highway 61 Revisited

I probably never need an excuse to write about Bob Dylan but since we are talking #momsmusic well it was Mom introduced me to Dylan via Highway 61 Revisited I feel like there are a few things I should share here. As a kid listening to music, Dylan was already a legend, but like The RollingStones, the Eighties weren’t his best years. “Political World” got video play and I enjoyed it. His album with the Dead was panned but got a lot of attention. His greatest moment of the time frame may well have been his involvement with the Traveling Wilburys. But of course some of this came a bit later. In 1986 when MTV away making a big deal about Bob Dylan touring with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, there was no doubt in my mind who the biggest star was, and that’s the guy who ruled the land the previous year with “Don’t Come Around Here No More” H61R is and was great. There’s always enough room in Dylan’s discography to discover new stuff, and as far as “recent” discoveries, the Basement Tapes are something that really stand out. If I was forced to sit down and think and pick the Dylan album that I listen to most in recent years, it is probably “Bringing it all Back Home” I have one last story to share. In college, a roommate told me that you’re either a Neil Young person or a Bob Dylan person, and I was a Dylan person This is the kind of profound statement you make and ruminate about when you’re that age. It’s pure bunk of course. Not that it isn’t a good question, but I don’t think there is a ton of truth in it anymore. Also, I may have agreed then but I am undoubtedly sure I listen to more Neil Young now than I do Dylan.

Album Review- The Damned

 The Damned are probably one of my favorite bands. They famously take credit of being the first punk band (“New Rose” predating “Anarchy in the UK”). 1977s debut album Damned Damned Damned is as good as any punk album, produced by Nick “Basher” Lowe showcases four great personalities- Dave Vanian, Captain Sensible, Rat Scabies and Brian James.

The best distributed compilation of the Damned was 1987s The Light at the End of the Tunnel. I bought it twice! It’s 28 fantastic tracks.

I have a soft spot for 1985s “Phantasmagoria” a near contemporary album of when I first heard them. The mid 80s meant punk was fading, so artists like the Ramones, TSOL and Iggy Pop were leaning into metal, but the Damned went for goth and it’s a quite good album.

1986s Anything is really the end of the bands classic album run. But the band continued and I saw them live twice in the late 90s or early 00s with Vanian, Sensoble and Patricia Morrison and they were great. To the point, I don’t think one could see them and not wonder (with so many other reunions going on) if they had one last great album in them.

I bought three Damned albums in this time frame and played them quite a bit. The band does have quite a few options out there. 1987s Mindless Directionless Energy is what it is - a live recording of a 1981 concert. It doesn’t sound great but as a fan, I wasn’t disappointed about adding it to the collection. (And it includes the bands ribald take on Ballroom Blitz)

1989s Final Damnation is a collection of live material some with the original lineup recorded the year prior and is a fantastic glance at what a great band they are in concert (plus added charming concert conversation with the Captain) The ramshackle band evolving into a tight unit.

1993s Sessions of the Damned could be a functional greatest hits compilation. It is what it says on the cover- songs over the years recorded for John Peel radio sessions

The band had three studio albums between 1986 and 2018 and from what I recall, none of them made a ton of noise even if they hopefully were going to relaunch the bands career.

The one I am most familiar with is 1995s Not of this Earth which I know as 2002s I’m Alright Jack and the Beanstalk. It is an album the band disowns and it truly is a terrible album with no redeeming qualities. Although this is the nadir of the band’s career, on paper - the lineup should have worked - Vanian, Kris Dollimore (the Godfathers), Moose (New Model Army) and Scabies- it most certainly didn’t.

The one I am least familiar with is 2001s Grave Disorder which I either didn’t hear or didn’t click with me, but by all accounts is a decent album. It’s an interesting twist in the bands story as they signed with Nitro Records a label ran by The Offspring’s Dexter Holland and would play a lot of US punk festivals. Nothing wrong with that, but Nitro (and these festivals) seemed to be more focused on American punk bands and the waves that came after the Damned like classic US punk bands like TSOL and the Vandals and newer bands like AFI

These wilderness years finally end in 2018 with Evil Spirits. By this time, many of the band’s contemporaries had made that strong late career album or two - The Buzzcocks, Joe Strummer, the Stranglers, the Specials and so on. And Evil Spirits delivered to the fans with the opener “Standing at the Edge of Tomorrow” a goth anthem on par with their Phantasmagoria record.

With time and perspective (and I probably knew it sooner) I think it is safe to say Evil Spirits isn’t a great album. It is a very good album and as a fan, I am more than happy about it. It undoubtedly benefits from producer Tony Visconti and while I have no major complaints, I also know that my enthusiasm for it probably wouldn’t carry over to a casual fan

What’s good is that 2023s Darkadelic is a step in the right direction. It sounds like a continuation and certainly an improvement on its predecessor.

I don’t notice too much different in the credits except Paul Gray appearing in the songwriting credits (bassist Gray was with the band for the Black Album and Strawberries albums and previously with Eddie and the Hot Rods)

The songs as a whole are a better batch of songs with Captain Sensible writing some of the most pointed lyrics - Leader of the Gang about Gary Glitter and Beware of the Clown presumably about Boris Johnson and just about any other politician. The band veers into Stranglers territory often with the heavy synths, though the nod is there in the albums name and the Gray-era Damned who loved a bit of the Psychedelic stuff.

I still love the Visconti production (this album has Thomas Mitchener (Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes) at the helm but I do think the Damned finally managed to create that remarkable late career disc

Album Review- PJ Harvey

 Every new PJ Harvey album is an event.

I anticipated that after the 1-2 punch of Dry and Rid of Me that her career would follow most every musical artist who comes on the scene with a burst of energy. That there was no way it could be topped and like almost everyone else, it would be diminishing returns

In 2000, her fifth album Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea felt like a masterpiece. I have heard Harvey herself isn’t fond of it, but it feels like once the music press got it right- it was a top work of art.

23 years later, I no longer just consider Harvey a great artist. Like peers, Radiohead, Arcade Fire or the Killers, every album release is an event, but Harvey is on another level now.

Not only is it worth checking out any new material, you never quite know what direction she is heading. Like Nick Cave or Tom Waits, there’s a sense of constant reinvention. There are no “better” albums, just “different” albums.

While I didn’t rank 04’s Uh Huh Her and 07’s White Chalk so highly at the time, they have really held up.

I did indeed love 11s Let England Shake and 16s Hope Six Demolition Project. Closely related to Patti Smith and Nick Cave at their most raucous, the subsequently released Demos drew from all time great artists like Eddie Cochran and Niney the Observer

The new album I Inside The Old Year Dying is certainly a different beast. It is a very atmospheric album. Harvey has clearly made music like that before, but it’s been awhile.

I admit it didn’t grab me on first listen but I was never going to give up on Harvey that easily and it didn’t take too many spins to grab me. This ambient electronic style of Harvey’s seems to work best as (her work often does) as a singular piece of art and not a collection of singles.

Album Review- Metal Marty: Greatest Hits

 One of my favorite 90s bands is the Supersuckers. They were part of Sub Pops

second wave of fantastic mostly non- Grunge artists like The Spinanes, Eric’s Trip, Sebadoh, and the Rev Horton Heat among others.

Supersuckers played regular music, just in the fastest most profane way possible. It seemed that in some alternate universe, they were huge stars in the lineage of AC/DC, Cheap Trick, the Ramones and KISS - a blend of the furious punk bands mixed with the noise of 70s hard rock and metal.

Unexpectedly, the band’s frontman, Eddie Spaghetti has churned out a quite enjoyable solo career - the songs are every bit colorful and tasteless as the covers of the album they come in. Now, the contents are more “Outlaw Country” than Rock, but are surprisingly good listens.

Metal Marty’s Greatest Hits is his debut album. That’s the joke. Metal Marty Chandler has been the Supersuckers guitarist officially since 2014 and this certainly feels like a Supersuckers record since the lineup is the same, and Spaghetti produced and co-wrote it

That said, that is intended as more of a draw than a warning. If you like the Supersuckers, this is a pretty fun album.

The press kit makes comparisons to Steve Earle and Iggy Pop, and this definitely has an Earle feel (Earle has collaborated with the ‘Suckers in the past) - rowdy and rousing bar rock infused with country and blues.

But like his band, also kind of ridiculous. The songs form a theme around Magic City, Idaho and some melodies are cribbed unashamedly from pop standards like “She’s a Lady” and “Rock and Roll (Part 2)”

It might be hard to review an album that is so blatantly what it purports to be, but it’s a surprisingly solid record that offers a few surprises and doesn’t wear out it’s welcome.

Sinead O'Conner- An Appreciation

 I have to write about Sinead O’Conner and as I sit down, I realize I had an unusual relationship with her music.

I bought her second album when it came out. At the time, I made a habit of buying what I thought were the most “important” record of the day. I wasn’t necessarily that excited about it and when I got it, I didn’t listen to it very often. As a huge Smiths fan, I was particularly excited that Andy Rourke played bass on the album.

It wasn’t exactly the same case as the Sugarcubes, who had a drop in quality after their debut. I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got is unquestionably a good album. It’s just not like the raw early singles i hears and I dug like “Mandinka” It’s just a different vibe

No one could have anticipated that Sinéad would end up having the biggest song in the world. I wonder if I would have treated her second album any differently had it not.

After that, the focus really wasn’t on the music, and that isn’t fair to the artist but it was reality. I returned to her for her fourth album Universal Mother

The single Fire on Babylon was a tour de force. Part Bob Marley part John Lydon. The album was a mixed bag - a true cult album and again I didn’t spend a ton of time with it - but that single was powerful.

Sinead played a few dates on the one Lollapalooza I do attend and I think that (hazy memories many decades later) that we picked Yo La Tengo on the second stage to concentrate on instead. (Given YLTs resume, I doubt you can give me too much grief for this).

I picked up her 1997 Greatest Hits compilation So Far which collected some essential things that I didn’t have.

She had at least one more great single which unfortunately was too late for her compilation -2000s No Man’s Woman (off Faith and Courage)

Sinead sort of fell out of the spotlight, continuing to release albums. I crossed paths with her once more picking up what will be her tenth and final studio album released while she was alive -2014s I’m Not Bossy, I’m the Boss

Looking back now, you can see her massive influence and how those who came after- Tori Amos, the Cranberries, Beth Orton, even Alannis Morrissette and Lilith Fair to name a few.

I know I’m the early 90s, if asked I likely would have said she is one of my favorite artists. I haven’t really thought of her that way in awhile, but I do realize that I don’t have too many artists that I have four albums of. She was a really interesting artist and we are poorer without her on the Earth.