The 10 best for ‘09
by Paul Rosano on Dec.22, 2009, under Music
Last year I picked five albums I considered the best of the year. This time I’m upping it to 10 with a few bubbling under and some added tidbits.
1. Already Free, The Derek Trucks Band: Traditional blues with modern sensibilities and influences from jazz, roots and world music, all played by an array of accomplished musicians and one of the best slide players of our time.
2. The Deep End, Christine Ohlman and Rebel Montez: Stellar songwriting, impassioned vocals and infectious grooves highlight Ohlman’s fifth album, which also features an impressive roster of guests. Her best yet.
3. Electric Dirt, Levon Helm: On this electrified followup to his comeback album Dirt Farmer, Helm blends traditional roots music with elements of folk, blues, soul and gospel. The mix of new original material and classic covers works perfectly. The arrangements are clean and to the point and musicianship impeccable.
4. Middle Cyclone, Neko Case: A wonderful concoction of folk, rock, country and pop interlaced with enigmatic lyrics and penetrating melodies. All topped with Case’s crystal clear voice.
5. All In One, Bebel Gilberto: Her best since Tanta Tempo in 2000, this work is alive with beautiful songwriting and Gilberto’s gorgeous, hushed, cool vocals. Aided by her pals Carlhinos Brown and Didi Gutman among others.
6. Soul On Ten, Robben Ford: A ripping, rocking live set with two live-in-the-studio cuts, filled with Ford’s interesting blues-based originals, some classic covers and his unique take on blues, rock and jazz playing.
7. The List, Rosanne Cash: A love letter to her father Johnny and her audience, giving back songs from his list of 100 that he gave to his teen-age daughter. Arrangements and execution by Cash and husband John Levanthal are enthralling. (continue reading…)
Furay’s little bit of magic
by Paul Rosano on Aug.30, 2009, under Music
I expected to see a good performance from Richie Furay Friday night at Stage One in Fairfield, but I was taken back by just how good.
With a five-piece band that includes multi-instrumentalist Scott Sellen and Furay’s daughter Jesse Lynch, Furay played a set that traveled from his past to the present, playing many songs that helped lay down the country-rock tradition, leaning heavily on rock, and are rarely played by any band today.
This is not just an aging musician running through songs with which he is associated. This is an extraordinary band.
When the opening song started with drummer Alan Lemke laying down a beat on his tom toms, I asked myself is that what I think it is? It was. This little band was playing Crazy Eyes, a Poco epic from the album of the same name from 1973. And the arrangement didn’t lack one bit.
Furay’s voice was full, clear and able to scale the heights he has always been known for on a song that demands it from the start. Every time I looked to the left of the stage Sellen was playing a different instrument. First electric piano, then banjo, then lap steel guitar and electric guitar. (continue reading…)
Neil Young’s North Country
by Paul Rosano on Jul.30, 2009, under Music
The final music disc in Neil Young’s DVD Archive Box Set deals with the time surrounding the release of Harvest, his most successful album commercially. This is the record that inspired Young’s famous — or perhaps infamous — quote after the record’s success about him deciding to musically stay in the middle of the road or drive into a ditch.
By Young’s account he drove into the ditch and stayed away from the mainstream. That might be a little overstated. He’s had artistic and commercial successes since during his long and buoyant career and some were planted firmly in the mainstream.
But it is arguable if Harvest was really a mainstream record per se. It was if you’re only measure is commercial success. But in any era or in fact any time frame, Harvest is a perfect album at a perfect time, a synthesis of accessible songs combined with artistically uncompromising ones, ranging from acoustic and electric country-rock to hard rocking fare that struck at the right moment of the singer-songwriter era of the early 1970s.
The disc includes songs from Harvest, inexplicably not all of them, and a bit more musically. It also contains the most video content of the entire set — at least in my searching — either hidden on the Timeline or tucked neatly under the main menu of songs in the Video Log. And it’s all very interesting and fascinating. (continue reading…)
Neil Young Archives: The Concerts
by Paul Rosano on Jun.23, 2009, under Music
Three live performances are included in the Neil Young Archives Vol. 1 box set, two of which were actually released in 2008. Of course, that doesn’t include live video footage you can find in hidden tracks and the video log, usually tucked underneath track listing screens, throughout the set.
If you pre-ordered the set, you also received another previously released concert on DVD/CD, Sugar Mountain Live At the Canterbury House 1968, which I wrote about back in December in this post. Also in that piece, I mentioned a bit about one of the other discs, Live At Massey Hall 1971, which I picked up last year. Live At The Fillmore East 1970 with Crazy Horse and Live At The Riverboat 1969 are the other two performances in the set.
Suffice to say Massey Hall is Young’s best overall performance of these discs. He appears to have fully realized himself as a solo performer by this time despite touring with a rather serious back injury and playing in a brace. But he had found the perfect balance between polished performer and humorous and engaging stage personality.
As is revealed in an Archives meeting elsewhere in the set, he intended to release a live acoustic album from this tour at the time but it was ditched when sessions for the Harvest album began in February 1971. (continue reading…)
Neil Young’s Archive: Buffalo Springfield
by Paul Rosano on Jun.10, 2009, under Music
In addition to the three Topanga discs and Early Years (1963-65), I’ve been listening to the Buffalo Springfield disc quite a bit from Neil’s Young’s recently released Archives Box Set.
Disc 1 in the 10-disc set, which I have in DVD format, is titled Early Years (1966-68) and is dedicated to the mid-to-late ’60s group that many of its fans lament over for its short tenure on the rock scene, about two years.
The Springfield were truly one of the great rock groups of the ’60s, but let’s face it, it had too many creative forces within, if that’s possible: namely Stephen Stills, Richie Furay and Young. It made for a powerful combination — but only for a while.
The Springfield made two memorable albums, their self-titled debut and Buffalo Springfield Again, during which the group started to fracture. As Young says in a radio interview included on the disc, the third record Last Time Around was not a Buffalo Springfield album at all. It does contain two notable songs from Young, I Am A Child and On The Way Home, which he doesn’t sing lead on, but it’s disjointed.
It’s kind of amusing hearing Young rip Jim Messina, the Springfield’s second bass player, for ruining the mix on the album, since he would shortly use Messina and George Grantham, both of Poco, to record his first solo album. And Young adds that he and Stills really had nothing to do with the album at all. So Disc 1 is culled mainly from the first two Springfield albums with I Am A Child the only track from the third. (continue reading…)
Much to explore in Young’s Archive
by Paul Rosano on Jun.08, 2009, under Music
My initial misgivings about volume 1 of Neil Young’s Archive Box Set, based on a faulty Blu-Ray preview disc, are quickly being dispelled by the actual set, which arrived this past week.
The 10-disc set I have is in DVD format and it contains a plethora of re-mastered work, unreleased tracks, alternate mixes, videos and much more from 1963-72, my favorite period of Young’s career. It’s also available in Blu-Ray or as an eight-disc set in CD, minus the feature film Journey Through The Past and videos.
I have a dedicated SACD/DVD player connected to my stereo and that’s where I have listened to it the most, although I’ve played it through one of my computers to access the visuals available while songs are playing, hidden tracks and other goodies that you can only see with a monitor.
I don’t care for listening to music through my TV setup but this set has tempted me to add a small monitor to my player to access the extras.
Speaking of extras, to my surprise, the set came with a few unexpected items. The first thing you see when you open the large rectangular tower the set is housed in is a vinyl 45 by The Squires, one of Young’s first rock groups in Canada, of the instrumentals Mustang and Aurora, which are on Disc 0 of the set, covering 1963-65. The DVDs are in a special cardboard box that folds in half revealing five discs in each half and a poster of the file cabinet screen, which is used on the discs to access individual tracks. (continue reading…)
Taking a look into Neil Young’s Archive
by Paul Rosano on May.27, 2009, under Music
OK, I admit it. I caved. On pre-ordering the first installment of the Neil Young Archive Box Set, that is. I wrestled with this one for a while. And it wasn’t Neil’s testimonial to the Blu-Ray format on his web site that made me more amenable to the lofty prices for this set, which is available in three formats, Blu-Ray, DVD and CD.
But I figured I would wind up buying it at some point anyways because it covers what I find the most interesting aspect of Young’s career, 1963-1972, and it seems that recently the best prices you can find on new releases are available before they are released. Although I have noticed the prices going down a little on the CD and Blu-Ray sets since I ordered.
Also, if you pre-order it in either Blu-Ray or DVD, you receive a preview disc in Blu-Ray of the first disc in the set, labeled Disc 00 (how high tech!?!), just the kind of offer for which I’m a sucker.
This set has been in the pipeline for something like 15 years. Ridiculous, isn’t it? In the meantime, Young has refused to re-master any of his early albums, the ones I believe are his best, because he hates the CD format for sound quality almost as much as he hates digital downloads. (continue reading…)
From the Vaults: Hidden Treasure, No. 2
by Paul Rosano on Apr.06, 2009, under Music
After writing about Martha Velez’s 1968 release Fiends & Angels, I realized there are a number of albums that qualify as either era-defining or being highly influencial despite not having gained widespread recognition. These records weren’t huge sellers on first release but still made an impact, mostly with musicians, and all stand up today.
The self-titled album Full Moon from 1971 fits into this category. Three of its members came from the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, drummer Phillip Wilson and tenor saxman Gene Dinwiddie (billed as Brother Gene Dinwiddie throughout the album’s credits), both of whom joined Butterfield around 1967 for The Resurrection Of Pigboy Crabshaw, and Buzz Feiten, who joined Butter a little later in ‘68 replacing guitarist Elvin Bishop. Feiten, who did a stint with the Rascals after Butterfield, was one of the most unusual additions to Butterfield’s band, younger than most of the other players, precocious, almost punk for 1968. He brought a different sound and style and great versatility to the band with his piercing Fender Strat, cut more from a soul vein than blues.
They joined forces in 1971 with keyboardist Neil Larsen, from Florida, who later in the ’70s would record a string of exemplary jazz-fusion albums and also delve into pop rock with Feiten in 1980 as the Larsen-Feiten Band, and bassist Freddie Beckmeier. Over the years, Larsen and Feiten have also become legendary session players who have worked on hundreds of albums and with a who’s who of the music industry.
The resulting album, produced by Alan Douglas (yes, that Alan Douglas apparently, famous or perhaps infamous as onetime keeper of the Jimi Hendrix archive) was far from a blues-rock workout. It incorporated elements of soul, R&B and early jazz fusion built on strong songwriting from all members. Vocals were shared and more than capable and the playing a combination of forward-moving jazz, rock and soul with proficient and inspired soloing. (continue reading…)
A man of more than expected words
by Paul Rosano on Dec.23, 2008, under Music
I’ve seen Neil Young give acoustic concerts twice over the years, and he’s never been particularly loquacious in between songs. But on a new release of a concert from 1968, Sugar Mountain — Live at Canterbury House, he’s positively chatty.
There are seven raps interspersed throughout the set list and most are amusing, if not downright funny, from the laid-back, rambling Young. Perhaps the best is Bookstore rap, in which he talks about his only other job that lasted two weeks.
As for the concert, it’s excellent. It’s better than an earlier release from his archives, Massey Hall 1971, although not by much, from 2007. That one included a video DVD of the show, which is at times brilliant and other times (static shots of a reel-to-reel tape recorder) frustrating. This set comes in a two-disc version, the second being DVD audio.
What’s to like about Canterbury House is the era. The show is from around the release of his first very under-appreciated solo album The Loner, and many of the tunes are from it. These songs played acoustically makes the set all the more fascinating and rare.
The sound is very dry, very little reverberation, since it was recorded in a small coffee house in Ann Arbor, lending a more intimate air to the proceedings. Massey, recorded in Toronto, has more of a concert hall ambiance.
I have great respect for Young, but honestly haven’t been into his latest ventures. In fact only Freedom with Rockin’ In The Free World and Harvest Moon even scratch the surface with me in the past two decades. I love his early work and The Loner and After The Gold Rush are my favorite albums.
But to hear If I Could Have Her Tonight, I’ve Been Waiting For You, The Last Trip To Tulsa, The Old Laughing Lady and the title track from The Loner shortly after the album was completed makes for a significant document.
In addition, there are Buffalo Springfield tracks, among them Mr. Soul, Expecting To Fly and Broken Arrow, the last two big production numbers on record but here stripped down to the essentials. Also you’ll find an early version of Birds, from After The Gold Rush, done on acoustic guitar rather than piano.
These releases from the archives — they aren’t really reissues although they seem to be classified as such sometimes — almost make up for Young’s reluctance to remaster his early albums. He claims he hates the CD format and it’s unacceptable for the sonic quality he aspires to. Don’t get him started on MP3s. I kind of agree with him there at least on the low bit rates. But he’s scheduled to release the first volume of a long-awaited box set series next year and it’s going to be available on only DVD and Blue-ray audio versions at a ridiculously expensive pricetag of more than $300. Nothing on a CD release of any kind is in the works. It is eight discs but really. That’s a bit much.
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