All posts by Egil

Bruce Springsteen, Great albums, Music Calendar

Today: Bruce Springsteen released “Live/1975–85” in 1986 – 26 years ago

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It’s not enough. By anyone else’s standards, of course, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band Live/1975-85 is an embarrassment of riches — five albums and ten years’ worth of barroom, hockey-arena and baseball-stadium dynamite; greatest hits, ace covers, love songs, work songs, out-of-work songs — the ultimate rock-concert experience of the past decade finally packaged for living-room consumption, a special gift of thanks to the fans who shared those 1001 nights of stomp & sweat and the best possible consolation prize for the poor bastards who could never get tickets.
~David Fricke – rollingstone.com

“Thunder Road” – October 18, 1975 at The Roxy Theatre:

a short promo:

From Wikipedia:

Released November 10, 1986
Recorded October 18, 1975 – September 30, 1985
Genre Rock
Length 216:13
Label Columbia
Producer Jon Landau, Chuck Plotkin, Bruce Springsteen

Live/1975–85 is a live album by Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band. It consists of 40 tracks recorded at various concerts between 1975 and 1985. It was released as a box set with either five vinyl records, three cassettes, or three CDs. There was also a record club only release which came on three 8-track cartridges, which is extremely hard to find.

Spirit in the Night – July 7, 1978 at The Roxy Theatre:

Springsteen’s long-awaited and highly-anticipated live album generated advance orders of more than 1.5 million copies, making it the largest dollar-volume pre-order in the history of the record business at the time. Record stores around the country found fans waiting in line on Monday morning before opening and one New York store reportedly sold the album right off the back of the delivery truck. The album debuted at #1 on the Billboard album chart, a rare occurrence that hadn’t happened in ten years since Stevie Wonder‘s Songs in the Key of Life in 1976.

Rosalita (Come Out Tonight) – (again) – July 7, 1978 at The Roxy Theatre:

Not surprising, given Springsteen’s reputation as a live performer and the sheer scope of the 40-song set, most reviews were overwhelmingly positive. There were, however, a few critics that felt the album could have been better, citing the omission of several concert highlights such as Springsteen’s live rendition of “Prove It All Night” and his rousing cover of John Fogerty’s “Who’ll Stop the Rain”, among others.

—

..I need to address this issue of leaving out a 78-version of “Prove It All Night”. This is a tragedy.. it’s alright for those of us collecting bootleg concerts… and thus having heard the 78-version countless times, but what about the rest ? IMO Bruce made a real bad judgement…

So I really need to include a brilliant version in this post:

Prove it all Night – Capitol Theatre, Passaic, NJ. 19-9-1978:

–

But.. back to “Live/1975-85”.. Here is the brilliant “The River” w/rap:

The River – September 30, 1985 at the LA Coliseum:

Let’s close the “youtubes” with Badlands..

Badlands – November 5, 1980 at Arizona State University, the night after the election of Ronald Reagan to the United States presidency:

Album of the day @ Spotify:

also check out:

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Blues, Music Calendar

Today: Bonnie Raitt is 63

I never saw music in terms of men and women or black and white. There was just cool and uncool.
~Bonnie Raitt

Religion is for people who are scared to go to hell. Spirituality is for people who have already been there.
~Bonnie Raitt

I would rather feel things in extreme than not at all.
~Bonnie Raitt

Melissa Etheridge inducts Bonnie Raitt Inductions 2000:

From Wikipedia:

Birth name Bonnie Lynn Raitt
Born November 8, 1949 (age 63)
Burbank, California, United States
Genres Blues, country, folk-rock
Occupations Singer-songwriter, musician, political activist, philanthropist
Instruments Vocals, guitar, slide guitar
Years active 1971–present
Labels Warner, Capitol
Website bonnieraitt.com

Bonnie Lynn Raitt (born November 8, 1949) is a renowned American blues singer-songwriter and slide guitar player. During the 1970s, Raitt released a series of acclaimed roots-influenced albums which incorporated elements of blues, rock, folk and country, but she is perhaps best known for her more commercially accessible recordings in the 1990s including “Nick of Time”, “Something to Talk About”, “Love Sneakin’ Up on You”, and the slow ballad “I Can’t Make You Love Me”. Raitt has received nine Grammy Awards in her career and is a lifelong political activist.

Maybe her best song… The beautiful “I Can’t Make You Love Me”:

“Bonnie Raitt does something with a lyric no one else can do; she bends it and twists it right into your heart.”
-Graeme Connors

  • After nearly 20 years, Bonnie Raitt achieved belated commercial success with her tenth album, Nick of Time. Released in the spring of 1989, Nick of Time went to the top of the U.S. charts following Raitt’s Grammy sweep in early 1990. This album has been voted number 230 in the Rolling Stone magazine list of 500 Greatest Albums Of All Time. Raitt herself pointed out that her 10th try was “my first sober album.”
  • In March 2000, Raitt was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio.
  • Bonnie Rait is listed at number 50 in the Rolling Stone magazine list of 100 Greatest Singers. 
  • She is also listed at number 89 in the Rolling Stone list of 100 Greatest Guitarists.

Album of the day:

Give It Up (1972):

From allmusic.com – STE:
Bonnie Raitt may have switched producers for her second album Give It Up, hiring Michael Cuscuna, but she hasn’t switched her style, sticking with the thoroughly engaging blend of folk, blues, R&B, and Californian soft rock. If anything, she’s strengthened her formula here, making the divisions between the genres nearly indistinguishable. Take the title track, for instance. It opens with a bluesy acoustic guitar before kicking into a New Orleans brass band about halfway through — and the great thing about it is that Raitt makes the switch sound natural, even inevitable, never forced. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg here, since Give It Up is filled with great songs, delivered in familiar, yet always surprising, ways by Raitt and her skilled band. For those that want to pigeonhole her as a white blues singer, she delivers the lovely “Nothing Seems to Matter,” a gentle mid-tempo number that’s as mellow as Linda Ronstadtand far more seductive. That’s the key to Give It Up: Yes, Raitt can be earthy and sexy, but she balances it with an inviting sensuality that makes the record glow.
…read more over @ allmusic.com 

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan recording sessions

Bob Dylan second recording session for “John Wesley Harding”

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JW: John Wesley Harding – why did you call the album that?
BD: We… I called it that because I had that song John Wesley Harding. It didn’t mean anything to me. I called it that, Jann, ‘cause I had the song John Wesley Harding, which started out to be a long ballad. I was gonna write a ballad on… Like maybe one of those old cowboy… You know, a real long ballad. But in the middle of the second verse, I got
tired. I had a tune, and I didn’t want to waste the tune, it was a nice little melody, so I just wrote a quick third verse, and I recorded that. But it was a silly little song….
~Bob Dylan to Jann Wenner November 29, 1969

This quiet masterpiece, which manages to sound both authoritative and tentative (a mix that gave it a highly contemporary feel), is neither a rock nor a folk album—and certainly isn’t folk-rock. It isn’t categorisable at all.
~Michael Gray (BD Ecyclopedia)

45 years ago Bob Dylan entered Columbia Studio A, Nashville Tennessee tempting his second recording session for “John Wesley Harding”.

Some background from wikipedia:

Dylan went to work on John Wesley Harding in the fall of 1967. By then, 18 months had passed since the completion of Blonde on Blonde. After recovering from the worst of the results of his motorcycle accident, Dylan spent a substantial amount of time recording the informal basement sessions at West Saugerties, New York; little was heard from him throughout 1967. During that time, he stockpiled a large number of recordings, including many new compositions. He eventually submitted nearly all of them for copyright, but declined to include any of them in his next studio release (Dylan would not release any of those recordings to the commercial market until 1975′s The Basement Tapes; and by then, some of those recordings had been bootlegged, usually sourced from an easy-to-find set of publisher’s demos). Instead, Dylan used a different set of songs for John Wesley Harding.

It is not clear when these songs were actually written, but none of them has turned up in the dozens of basement recordings that have since surfaced. According to Robbie Robertson, “As I recall it was just on a kind of whim that Bob went down to Nashville. And there, with just a couple of guys, he put those songs down on tape.”

Those sessions took place in the autumn of 1967, requiring less than twelve hours over three stints in the studio.

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Music Calendar, Ryan Adams

Today: Ryan Adams is 38

“I’ve never been to Vegas, but I’ve gambled all my life.”
― Ryan Adams (Oh My Sweet Carolina)

“Some people want to go forever, I just want to burn off hard and bright.”
― Ryan Adams (Firecracker)

From Wikipedia:

Birth name David Ryan Adams
Born November 5, 1974 (age 38)
Jacksonville, North Carolina
Origin Raleigh, North Carolina, United States
Genres Rock, alternative country
Occupations Musician, singer-songwriter,poet, painter
Instruments Vocals, guitar, piano, harmonica,bass guitar, drums, banjo,mandolin, ukulele
Years active 1991–present
Labels Bloodshot, Lost Highway, PAX AM, Capitol
Associated acts Whiskeytown, The Cardinals,The Finger, Patty Duke Syndrome, Blank Label
Website http://www.ryan-adams.com/

David Ryan Adams (born November 5, 1974) is an American alt-country/rock singer-songwriter, from Jacksonville, North Carolina. Adams left the group Whiskeytown and released his first solo album Heartbreaker in 2000. The album was nominated for the Shortlist Music Prize and Adams released six additional solo albums, including the UK certified-gold Gold. He released five albums with the rock band The Cardinals and in 2009 Adams married singer-songwriter and actress Mandy Moore. Adams left The Cardinals and announced that he was taking a break from music. He resumed performing in October 2010 and released his thirteenth studio album, Ashes & Fire, on October 11, 2011. The album peaked at No. 7 on the Billboard 200.

Oh My Sweet Carlonina:

Mark Deming (allmusic):
Mixing the heartfelt angst of a singer/songwriter with the cocky brashness of a garage rocker, Ryan Adams is at once one of the few artists to emerge from the alt-country scene to achieve mainstream commercial success and the one who most strongly refused to be defined by the genre, leaping from one spot to another stylistically while following his increasingly prolific muse. Adams was born in Jacksonville, North Carolina in 1974. While country music was a major part of his family’s musical diet when he was young (he’s cited Loretta Lynn, George Jones, Merle Haggard, and Johnny Cash as particular favorites), in his early teens Adams developed a taste for punk rock and began playing electric guitar.

Album of the day:

Gold (2001):

Check out these earlier posts on JV:

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Blues, Music Calendar, Rock'n Roll, Soul

Today: Delbert McClinton is 72

The venerable Delbert McClinton is a legend among Texas roots music aficionados, not only for his amazing longevity, but for his ability to combine country, blues, soul, and rock & roll as if there were no distinctions between any of them in the best time-honored Texas tradition.
~Steve Huey (allmusic.com)

2011 Texas Heritage Songwriters’ Association Hall of Fame Inductee:

From Wikipedia:

Delbert McClinton (born November 4, 1940) is an American blues rock and electric blues singer-songwriter, guitarist, harmonica player, and pianist.

Active as a side-man since 1962 and as a band leader since 1972, he has recorded several major record label albums, and charted singles on the Billboard Hot 100, Mainstream Rock Tracks, and Hot Country Songs charts. His highest-peaking single was “Tell Me About It”, a 1992 duet with Tanya Tucker which reached No. 4 on the Country chart. He has also had four albums that made it to No. 1 on the U.S. Blues chart, and another that reached No. 2.

He was inducted into the Texas Heritage Songwriters Hall of Fame, in March 2011, along with Lee Roy Parnell, Bruce Channel, Gary Nicholson and Cindy Walker.

“Giving It Up For Your Love” @ Austin City Limits:

Album of the day:

Live (2003)

Hal Horowitz (allmusic.com):
The best way to experience Delbert McClinton‘s rowdy roadhouse combination of blues, roots rock, R&B, country, and Tex-Mex is on-stage with a couple of hundred other fans on a Saturday night. In that spirit,McClinton’s second live album, and first since 1989’s Live from Austin, documents a single 2003 performance at Norway’s Bergen Blues Festival. Originally intended only as a radio broadcast, this is an unpolished example of a typical show. Although it shares five songs with its single-disc predecessor, Livefeatures McClinton weaving newer material in with hits he’s been playing for decades, such as “B-Movie Boxcar Blues,” “Giving It Up for Your Love,” and “Going Back to Louisiana.” McClinton’s in terrific voice and spirits throughout, and his seven-piece band (including two horns) is tight but loose and ragged enough to grind through rockers with garage band enthusiasm. “Rebecca, Rebecca,” the album’s slow blues showcase, proves how comfortable McClinton is with his band and being on-stage. This is clearly his forte, and even though he’s released some terrific, if not quite classic, studio albums, this is the best way to get an overall dose of his talents. The career-spanning set list isn’t a greatest-hits collection, but that just makes it more enjoyable as the singer throws in a few curve balls.
……. read more @ allmusic.com

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