Tag Archives: recording

Bob Dylan’s best songs – Desolation Row (recorded August 4, 1965)

Redirecting to a newer version of this post….

When you asked how I was doing
Was that some kind of joke?
All these people that you mention
Yes, I know them, they’re quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces
And give them all another name
~Desolation Row

Bob, where is Desolation Row?
Bob Dylan: Where? Oh, that’s someplace in Mexico. It’s across the border. It’s noted for it’s coke factory. Coca-Cola machines are… sells -… sell a lotta Coca-Cola down there.
~San Francisco Press Conference – Dec 3, 1965

Bob Dylan: As I look back on it now, I am surprised that I came up with so many of them. At the time it seemed like a natural thing to do. Now I can look back and see that I must have
written those songs “in the spirit,” you know? Like “Desolation Row” – I was just thinkin’ about that the other night. There’s no logical way that you can arrive at lyrics like that. I don’t know how it was done.
KL: It just came to you?
BD: It just came out through me.
~Bob Dylan – Kurt Loder interview, Oct 1987

Continue reading Bob Dylan’s best songs – Desolation Row (recorded August 4, 1965)

August 9: The Beatles recorded Mother Nature’s Son in 1968

paul mccartney

Paul [wrote this]. That was from a lecture of Maharishi where he was talking about nature, and I had a piece called “I’m just a child of nature,” which turned into “Jealous Guy” years later. Both inspired from the same lecture of Maharishi.
~John Lennon (September 1980, Playboy interviews)

August 9: The Beatles recorded Mother Nature’s Son in 1968, well, they started to record the song.

Wikipedia:

Released 22 November 1968
Recorded 9 & 20 August 1968
Genre Folk
Length 2:48
Label Apple Records
Writer Lennon–McCartney
Producer George Martin

Continue reading August 9: The Beatles recorded Mother Nature’s Son in 1968

July 21: The Beatles recorded Come Together in 1969


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July 21: The Beatles recorded Come Together in 1969

“It was a funky record – it’s one of my favorite Beatle tracks, or, one of my favourite Lennon tracks, let’s say that. It’s funky, it’s bluesy, and I’m singing it pretty well. I like the sound of the record. You can dance to it. I’d buy it!”

“The thing was created in the studio. It’s gobbledygook, Come Together was an expression that Leary had come up with for his attempt at being president or whatever he wanted to be, and he asked me to write a campaign song. I tried and tried, but I couldn’t come up with one. But I came up with this, Come Together, which would’ve been no good to him, you couldn’t have a campaign song like that, right?”
– John Lennon (Playboy, 1980)

Come Together” is a song by The Beatles written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The song is the opening track on the album Abbey Road, and was released as a double A-sided single with “Something”, their twenty-first single in the United Kingdom and twenty-sixth in the United States. The song reached the top of the charts in the US, and peaked at number four in the UK.

I really love the song, one of John’s masterpieces!

John Lennon: vocals, rhythm guitar, handclaps and tambourine
Paul McCartney: harmony vocals,electric piano and bass
George Harrison: lead guitar
Ringo Starr: drums, maracas

 

uk_come-together

 

A-side Something
Released 6 October 1969 (US), 31 October 1969 (UK)
Format 7″
Recorded 21 July 1969,
EMI Studios, London
Genre Blues rock, hard rock
Length 4:18
Label Apple
Writer(s) Lennon–McCartney
Producer George Martin

..nice work by the editors!

Continue reading July 21: The Beatles recorded Come Together in 1969

July 6: Jackie Wilson recorded (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher in 1967

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July 6: Jackie Wilson recorded (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher in 1967

“(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher” was recorded on July 6, 1967 at Columbia’s studios inChicago. Produced by Carl Davis, the session – arranged by Sonny Sanders – featured bassist James Jamerson, drummer Richard “Pistol” Allen, guitarist Robert White, and keyboardist Johnny Griffith; these four musicians were all members of the Motown Recordshouse band The Funk Brothers who often moonlighted on sessions for Davis to augment the meager wages paid by Motown. According to Carl Davis, the Funk Brothers “used to come over on the weekends from Detroit. They’d load up in the van and come over to Chicago, and I would pay ‘em double scale, and I’d pay ‘em in cash.” Similarly two of Motown’s house session singers The Andantes, Jackie Hicks and Marlene Barrow, along with Pat Lewis (who was filling in for Andante Louvain Demps), performed on the session for “Higher and Higher”.

I first became aware of this gem of a song when it was re-released in 1987, accompanied with a new video.

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Jackie Wilson – Higher and Higher (official 1987 video):

Continue reading July 6: Jackie Wilson recorded (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher in 1967

Jan 10: Elvis Presley recorded Heartbreak Hotel in 1956


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Elvis Presley recorded Heartbreak Hotel January 10th in 1956

From Wikipedia:

Heartbreak Hotel” is a song recorded by Elvis Presley. It was released as a single on January 27, 1956, Presley’s first on his new record label RCA Victor. His first number-one pop record, “Heartbreak Hotel” topped Billboard‘s Top 100 chart, became his first million-seller, and was the best-selling single of 1956. It was written by Tommy Durden and Mae Boren Axton.

Well, Since my baby left me

These opening words set the tone, this is not a happy-song…

I got this record from my aunt when I was about 7 or 8 years old (1973/1974), I couldn’t  comprehend the heartache and suffering in the lyrics. I just thought it was the coolest thing I had ever heard. I still got that record. It is worn and scratched and it’s still the coolest record in the world.

Heartbreak Hotel (audio):

Continue reading Jan 10: Elvis Presley recorded Heartbreak Hotel in 1956