Well, but you see, Columbia’s never offered to do that. They have done that with The Basement Tapes and the Budokan album. But they’ve never offered to put that out as a historical album or whatever. And believe me, if they wanted to do it, they could.
~Bob Dylan to Kurt Loder in 1984
“I still can’t believe they’ve finally put it out. I just keep staring at my copy.”
~Andy Kershaw (BBC Radio 1 DJ)
14 years ago today… they finally put it out, this surely calls for a celebration!
Baby, Let Me Follow You Down:
From Wikipedia:
Released
October 13, 1998
Recorded
May 17, 1966
Genre
Rock, folk rock, blues rock
Length
95:18
Label
Columbia
Producer
Jeff Rosen
Live 1966: The “Royal Albert Hall” Concert is a two-disc live album by Bob Dylan, released in 1998. Recorded at Manchester’s Free Trade Hall. It is from Dylan’s famous world tour in 1966, having been extensively bootlegged for decades, and is an important document in the development of popular music during the 1960s.
The setlist consisted of two parts, with the first half of the concert being Dylan alone on stage performing an entirely acoustic set of songs, while the second half of the concert has Dylan playing an “electric” set of songs alongside his band The Hawks. The first half of the concert was greeted warmly by the audience, while the second half was highly criticized, with heckling going on before and after each song.
Here are two (of many..) “real” bootleg covers of this concert:
Paul Frederic Simon (born October 13, 1941) is an award-winning musician whose talents in composing, performing, and vocal harmony placed him at the forefront of the singer-songwriters on an international scale. Simon’s fame, influence and commercial success began as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, launched in 1964 with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair’s songs, including three that reached No. 1 on the U.S. singles charts: “The Sound of Silence“, “Mrs. Robinson“, and “Bridge Over Troubled Water“.
Simon & Garfunkel – The Boxer – Live in Central Park, 1981:
The duo split up in 1970 at the height of their popularity, and Simon began a successful solo career, recording three highly acclaimed albums over the next five years.In 1986, he released Graceland, an album inspired by South African township music. Simon also wrote and starred in the film One-Trick Pony (1980) and co-wrote the Broadway musical The Capeman (1998) with the poet Derek Walcott.
Simon has earned 12 Grammys for his solo and collaborative work, including the Lifetime Achievement Award.
In 2001, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
in 2006 was selected as one of the “100 People Who Shaped the World” by Time magazine.
In 1986 Simon was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from Berklee College of Music where he currently serves on the Board of Trustees.
From allmusic.com – Mark Deming:
Paul Simon is one of the most successful and respected songwriters of the second half of the 20th century. Rising to fame in the mid-’60s, Simon‘s songs were mature and literate, but also melodically engaging, and spoke to the concerns and uncertainties of a generation. As the 1960s gave way to the ’70s and ’80s, Simon‘s work tended to focus on the personal rather than the larger world, but he also expanded his musical palette, and helped introduce many rock and pop fans to world music. ..read more over @ allmusic.com
“Mother And Child Reunion” (Live) – Paul Simon – Berkeley, Greek Theatre – October 20, 2011:
Album of the day – Paul Simon (1972):
From allmusic.com – William Ruhlmann:
If any musical justification were needed for the breakup of Simon & Garfunkel, it could be found on this striking collection, Paul Simon‘s post-split debut. From the opening cut, “Mother and Child Reunion” (a Top Ten hit), Simon, who had snuck several subtle musical explorations into the generally conservative S&G sound, broke free, heralding the rise of reggae with an exuberant track recorded in Jamaica for a song about death. From there, it was off to Paris for a track in South American style and a rambling story of a fisherman’s son, “Duncan” (which made the singles chart). But most of the album had a low-key feel, with Simon on acoustic guitar backed by only a few trusted associates (among them Joe Osborn, Larry Knechtel, David Spinozza, Mike Manieri, Ron Carter, and Hal Blaine, along with such guests as Stefan Grossman, Airto Moreira, and Stephane Grappelli), singing a group of informal, intimate, funny, and closely observed songs (among them the lively Top 40 hit “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard”). … read more over @ allmusic.com
Music washes away the dust of every day life.
~Art Blakey
You can’t seperate modern jazz from rock or from rhythm and blues – you can’t seperate it. Because that’s where it all started, and that’s where it all come from – that’s where I learned to keep rhythm – in church.
~Art Blakey
From Wikipedia:
Birth name
Arthur Blakey
Also known as
Abdullah Ibn Buhaina
Born
October 11, 1919
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania United States
Died
October 16, 1990 (aged 71)
New York City, New York, U.S.
Genres
Hard bop, bebop
Occupations
Drummer, bandleader
Instruments
Drums, percussion
Years active
1942–1990
Labels
Blue Note
Associated acts
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers, Art Blakey Quartet, Art Blakey Quintet, Art Blakey & the Afrocuban Boys
Arthur “Art” Blakey (October 11, 1919 – October 16, 1990),known later as Abdullah Ibn Buhaina, was an American Grammy Award-winning jazz drummer and bandleader.
Along with Kenny Clarke and Max Roach, he was one of the inventors of the modern bebop style of drumming. He is known as a powerful musician and a vital groover; his brand of bluesy, funky hard bop was and continues to be profoundly influential on mainstream jazz. For more than 30 years his band, Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, included many young musicians who went on to become prominent names in jazz. The band’s legacy is thus not only known for the music it produced, but as a proving ground for several generations of jazz musicians;Blakey’s groups are matched only by those of Miles Davis in this regard.
Blakey was inducted into the Jazz Hall of Fame (in 1982), the Grammy Hall of Fame (in 2001), and was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005.
From allmusic.com – Chris Kelsey:
In the ’60s, when John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman were defining the concept of a jazz avant-garde, few knowledgeable observers would have guessed that in another 30 years the music’s mainstream would virtually bypass their innovations, in favor of the hard bop style that free jazz had apparently supplanted. As it turned out, many listeners who had come to love jazz as a sophisticated manifestation of popular music were unable to accept the extreme esotericism of the avant-garde; their tastes were rooted in the core elements of “swing” and “blues,” characteristics found in abundance in the music of the Jazz Messengers, the quintessential hard bop ensemble led by drummer Art Blakey. In the ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s, when artists on the cutting edge were attempting to transform the music, Blakey continued to play in more or less the same bag he had since the ’40s, when his cohorts included the likes of Charlie Parker,Miles Davis, and Fats Navarro. By the ’80s, the evolving mainstream consensus had reached a point of overwhelming approval in regard to hard bop: this is what jazz is, and Art Blakey — as its longest-lived and most eloquent exponent — was its master. … read more over @ allmusic.com
Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers Moanin’ – Live In Belgium 1958:
Art blakey’s Jazz Messengers – Dat Dere (1961):
Album of the day – Moanin’ (1958):
From allmusic.com – Michael G. Nastos:
Moanin’ includes some of the greatest music Blakey produced in the studio with arguably his very best band. There are three tracks that are immortal and will always stand the test of time. The title selection is a pure tuneful melody stewed in a bluesy shuffle penned by pianist Bobby Timmons, while tenor saxophonist Benny Golson‘s classy, slowed “Along Came Betty” and the static, militaristic “Blues March” will always have a home in the repertoire of every student or professional jazz band. “Are You Real?” has the most subtle of melody lines, and “Drum Thunder Suite” has Blakey‘s quick blasting tom-tom-based rudiments reigning on high as the horns sigh, leading to hard bop. “Come Rain or Come Shine” is the piece that commands the most attention, a highly modified, lilting arrangement where the accompanying staggered, staccato rhythms contrast the light-hearted refrains. Certainly a complete and wholly satisfying album, Moanin’ ranks with the very best of Blakey and what modern jazz offered in the late ’50s and beyond.
“Jesus was a good guy, he didn’t need this shit.”
― John Prine
“And you may see me tonight with an illegal smile. It don’t cost very much, but it lasts a long while. Won’t you please tell the man I didn’t kill anyone.
No, I’m just tryin’ to have me some fun.”
― John Prine
John Prine (born October 10, 1946, in Maywood, Illinois) is an American country/folk singer-songwriter. He has been active as a recording artist and live performer since the early 1970s.
Sabu Visits The Twin Towns Alone (1978) w/intro:
In 2003, he was given a Lifetime Achievement Award for songwriting by the UK’s BBC Radio 2 and that same year was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. The following year saw his song “Sam Stone” covered by Laura Cantrell for the Future Soundtrack for America compilation.
Prine has taken his place as one of the most influential songwriters of his generation. In 2009, Bob Dylan told the Huffington Post that Prine was one of his favourite writers, stating “Prine’s stuff is pure Proustian existentialism. Midwestern mindtrips to the nth degree. And he writes beautiful songs. I remember when Kris Kristofferson first brought him on the scene. All that stuff about “Sam Stone,” the soldier junkie daddy, and “Donald and Lydia,” where people make love from ten miles away. Nobody but Prine could write like that.”
In Johnny Cash‘s autobiography Cash, he admitted “I don’t listen to music much at the farm, unless I’m going into songwriting mode and looking for inspiration. Then I’ll put on something by the writers I’ve admired and used for years (Rodney Crowell, John Prine, Guy Clark, and the late Steve Goodman are my Big Four)…”
When asked by Word Magazine in 2008 if he heard Pink Floyd‘s influence in newer British bands like Radiohead, Roger Waters replied “I don’t really listen to Radiohead. I listened to the albums and they just didn’t move me in the way, say, John Prine does. His is just extra-ordinarily eloquent music—and he lives on that plane with Neil Young and Lennon.”
Prine received the Artist of the Year award at the Americana Music Awards on September 9, 2005. The award was accepted in his name by awards host and long-time friend Billy Bob Thornton.
Speed Of The Sound Of Loneliness (2010):
“Have you ever noticed
When you’re feeling really good
There’s always a pigeon
That’ll come shit on your hood
Or you’re feeling your freedom
And the world’s off your back
Some cowboy from Texas
Starts his own war in Iraq.”
-John Prine
Album of the day – John Prine (1971):
From allmusic.com – William Ruhlmann:
A revelation upon its release, this album is now a collection of standards: “Illegal Smile,” “Hello in There,” “Sam Stone,” “Donald and Lydia,” and, of course, “Angel from Montgomery.” Prine’s music, a mixture of folk, rock, and country, is deceptively simple, like his pointed lyrics, and his easy vocal style adds a humorous edge that makes otherwise funny jokes downright hilarious.
Well kiss me baba, woo-oooooo….it feels good
Hold me baba
I want to love you like a lover should
Your fine, so kind
I got this world that your mine mine mine mine-ine
“Great Balls of Fire” is a 1957 song recorded by Jerry Lee Lewis on Sun Records and featured in the 1957 movie Jamboree. It was written by Otis Blackwell (under the pseudonym Jack Hammer). The Jerry Lee Lewis 1957 recording was ranked as the 96th greatest song ever by Rolling Stone. The song is in AABA form.
From Rollingstone.com (500 greatest songs):
With Lewis pounding the piano and leering, “Great Balls of Fire” was full of Southern Baptist hellfire turned into a near-blasphemous ode to pure lust. Lewis, a Bible-college dropout and cousin to Jimmy Swaggart, refused to sing it at first and got into a theological argument with Phillips that concluded with Lewis asking, “How can the devil save souls?” But as the session wore on and the liquor kept flowing, Lewis’ mood changed considerably — on bootleg tapes he can be heard saying, “I would like to eat a little pussy if I had some.” Goodness gracious, great balls of fire, indeed.
From allmusic.com – Cub Koda:
Written by African-American songwriter Otis Blackwell under the pseudonym of Jack Hammer, this was Jerry Lee Lewis’ third release and second consecutive hit. There are only two instruments on this recording, Lewis’ piano and J.M. Van Eaton’s drumming, with the echo from the Sun studios working as a third instrument. The song is over in a little more than a minute and a half and yet is perfectly realized with probably Jerry Lee’s best solo to recommend it and a vocal that borders on lascivious. You can do many things with “Great Balls of Fire” but most covers stick damn close to the original Jerry Lee strut and arrangement, so perfectly realized and empathetically played.
The song is best known for Jerry Lee Lewis’s original recording, which was recorded in the Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee, on October 8, 1957, and released as a 45rpm single on Sun 281 in November 1957.
The song title is derived from a Southern expression, which some Christians consider blasphemous, that refers to the Pentecost’s defining moment when the Holy Spirit manifested itself as “cloven tongues as of fire” and the Apostles spoke in tongues.
