All posts by Hallgeir

Classic Concert, Great albums, Live, Nirvana

November 1: MTV Unplugged Live in NY by Nirvana was released in 1994

November 1, 2015 Hallgeir 1 Comment

Nirvana unplugged in New York cover

This is not easy listening, it’s uneasy listening!

MTV Unplugged in New York is a live album by the American rock band Nirvana. It features an acoustic performance taped at Sony Music Studios in New York City on November 18, 1993 for the television series MTV Unplugged. The show was directed by Beth McCarthy and first aired on the cable television network MTV on December 14, 1993. As opposed to traditional practice on the television series, Nirvana played a set list composed of mainly lesser-known material and cover versions of songs by The Vaselines, David Bowie, Meat Puppets (during which they were joined by two members of the group onstage) and Lead Belly.

Rolling Stone ranked MTV Unplugged in New York at #311 in its list of “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time”

The album start with About a Girl:

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Americana, Elton John, Great albums

October 30: Elton John released Tumbleweed Connection in 1970

October 30, 2015 Hallgeir 1 Comment

Down at the well they’ve got a new machine
Foreman says it cuts manpower by fifteen
But that ain’t natural, well so old Clay would say
You see he’s a horse drawn man until his dying day.

“…Tumbleweed Connection, fortuitously recorded prior to Elton’s commercial explosion and thus dictated only by the artistic impulses of the artist and his creative team – Taupin, Dudgeon and string arranger Paul Buckmaster (who’d teamed with Dudgeon on David Bowie’s “Space Oddity”) – presented a far more unified musical and thematic vision. Not only that, but the LP was created as an album of interlocking songs, with no thought given to radio singles (an utterly pure situation that would be impossible for them to repeat).

Inspired by The Band’s Music From Big Pink, Tumbleweed… was born out of Taupin’s fascination with Americana, largely inspired by western movies, as John reacted to the sheaf of lyrics he was given with synergistic flights of musical fancy.”
– Uncut Magazine

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Tumbleweed Connection is the third album by Elton John (and collaborator Bernie Taupin). It is a concept album based on country and western/Americana themes. It is one of Elton John’s best albums.

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Music Calendar

October 30: Grace Slick was born in 1939

October 30, 2015 Hallgeir 1 Comment

Grace Slick (born October 30, 1939) is an American singer, songwriter, artist, and former model, best known as one of the lead singers of the rock groups The Great Society, Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship, and Starship, as well as for her work as a solo artist from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s.

Slick was one of the first female rock stars, alongside her close contemporary Janis Joplin, and therefore an important figure in the development of rock music in the late 1960s. Her distinctive vocal style and striking stage presence exerted influence on other female performers including Stevie Nicks and Patti Smith.

She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 (as a member of Jefferson Airplane).

Happy Birthday Grace Slick!

Jefferson Airplane – White Rabbit (live, Woodstock 1969):

– Hallgeir

Bob Dylan, Cover versions, Led Zeppelin, Robert Plant

The Best Dylan Covers: Robert Plant – One More Cup of Coffee

October 28, 2015 Hallgeir 1 Comment

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One More Cup of Coffee is a song from Dylan’s seventeenth studio album, Desire (Jan 5th, 1976). Desire is one of Dylan’s most collaborative efforts, featuring the same caravan of musicians as the acclaimed Rolling Thunder Revue tours the previous year (later documented on The Bootleg Series Vol. 5); many of the songs also featured backing vocals by Emmylou Harris and Ronee Blakley. Most of the album was co-written by Jacques Levy, and is composed of lengthy story-songs.

Bob_Dylan-Desire-Frontal

“One More Cup of Coffee” tells the tale of a girl whose family are gypsies and drifters, and of the man who must leave her to enter the “valley below”. The narrator describes a character who is beautiful: “your eyes are like two jewels in the sky” but for whom the narrator’s love and admiration are not reciprocated (“but I don’t sense affection no gratitude or love, your loyalty is not to me but to the stars above”). Dylan wrote the song at a corner table at The Other End nightclub in Greenwich Village in the summer of 1975.

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Robbie Robertson, The Band

October 27: Robbie Robertson released his self-titled solo debut in 1987

October 27, 2015 Hallgeir 1 Comment

robbie robertson

“…Robbie Robertson is an album that represents both a clear break from his past, and an ambitious attempt to take his fascination with American culture and music in a new and contemporary direction. It’s highly ambitious stuff…”
– Mark Deming (allmusic.com)

Robbie Robertson is the self-titled solo debut by Robbie Robertson, released in 1987. The album won the Juno Award for “Album of the Year”, and producers Lanois and Robertson won the “Producer of the Year” Juno award, both in 1989 as there were no Juno Awards held in 1988.

The album includes contributions from the members of U2 and Peter Gabriel, both of whom were also working with producer Daniel Lanois at the time. U2 was recording The Joshua Tree and Gabriel was recording So. U2’s contribution is heard in the song “Sweet Fire of Love” which is a duet of sorts between Robertson and U2 lead singer Bono. The other track featuring U2 is “Testimony”, again with vocals from Bono. Gabriel’s contributions are heard on the song “Fallen Angel”, which was dedicated to Robertson’s former Band bandmate Richard Manuel, and “Broken Arrow” which reverberates with Gabriel’s signature Rhodes electric piano. In addition, Tony Levin and Manu Katché, who were recording with Gabriel, are featured prominently on this record.

In 2005 the album was reissued together with Storyville as 2CD in an expanded edition, both with two bonus tracks.

Fantastic album, one of my favourite albums from the 80s.

Robbie Robertson – Somewhere Down The Crazy River (official video):

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