THE IKE REILLY ASSASSINATION
SPARKLE IN THE FINISH
2004-ROCK RIDGE
Produced By ED TINLEY
1. I Don’t Want What You Got (Goin’ On)
2. Holiday In New York
3. It’s All Right To Die
4. Whatever Happened To The Girl In Me?
5. The Boat Song (We’re Getting Loaded)
6. Garbage Day
7. Our Lady Of Arturo
8. Ballad Of The Choir Boy Bank Robber
9. Waitin’ For Daddy
10. St. Joe’s Band
11. Ex-Americans
After releasing one amazing album for Universal, Ike Reilly returned to Chicago where he has been making music for the people on a small label ever since. Sparkle In The Finish is his first album after his critically acclaimed debut, Salesmen And Racists, and the first album recorded as The Ike Reilly Assassination. As on the rest of his albums, Ike does not disappoint here. He’s a storyteller, and a damn good one, with the energy and smarts of Springsteen and the local guy work ethic of Bob Seger…only in more modern terms. ‘Whatever Happened To The Girl In Me”, “Garbage Day” and “I Don’t Want What You Got (Goin’ On)” rank alongside Reilly’s best tracks, and show why he’s a legend…a regional one, but a legend is a legend.
The Assassination shows that they are a more than capable rock & roll band, with Reilly gleefully telling great story after great story. Everyone has that one artist that they want to tell the whole world about…mine is Ike Reilly. He’s exciting, he’s magnetic, he’s energetic, and he’s a songwriter in the same sense that Bruce and Dylan are songwriters. Reilly went on to make 4 more albums, all of them very much worth having.. Sparkle In The Finish is right up there with them, and should be a part of any Reilly collection. And I believe that everyone should have a Reilly collection. Drooling fan? Maybe. But that doesn’t happen with me much, so I think it says a lot. In all, it’s not perfect…but it’s damn good stuff, to be sure.
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
GARY JULES
TRADING SNAKEOIL FOR WOLFTICKETS
2001-SANCTUARY
Produced By MICHAEL ANDREWS & GARY JULES
1. Broke Window
2. No Poetry
3. DTLA
4. Lucky
5. Something Else
6. Pills
7. Boat Song
8. Umbilical Town
9. The Princess Of Hollywood Way
10. Patchwork G
11. Barstool
12. Mad World
13. Keep
Gary Jules is famous for exactly two things. His regular shows at the Hotel Café in Los Angeles in 2003 helped to establish the venue as the place to play for upcoming singer/songwriters. The other thing is “Mad World”. Jules covered the Tears For Fears song for the film Donnie Darko, and it ended up becoming the definitive version. It was also included on his second album, the rather unfortunately titled Trading Snakeoil For Wolftickets. The song was actually credited to Michael Andrews featuring Gary Jules, with Andrews playing the instruments and Jules singing. The popularity of the track outran that of the original version, and is what made this album sell as well as it did. The version is slower and instrumentally contains mostly just piano. It’s beautifully done, and has sustained the careers of both men for over a decade now.
As for the rest, this album is surprisingly great. The remaining twelve tracks were written by Jules, and it’s mostly him on acoustic guitar with minimal backing. “DTLA” is as close as it gets to rocking, but the album doesn’t really need it. In fact, Jules commands a very Nick Drake kind of air on this album. “No Poetry”, “Pills”, and “The Princess Of Hollywood Way” are the highlights, but by the end of the album you’ll have discovered a nice batch of beautifully written and performed gems. One of the best (and maybe the most underrated) singer/songwriter albums of the early 2000’s, despite how big the hit eventually became…maybe because of it. He has recorded only two albums since this one, and is currently touring in France. This album is still a pleasant surprise, and most likely available at a bargain price. Pick it up…it really is a gem.
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
BOB DYLAN
ANOTHER SIDE OF BOB DYLAN
1964-COLUMBIA
Produced By TOM WILSON
1. All I Really Want To Do
2. Black Crow Blues
3. Spanish Harlem Incident
4. Chimes Of Freedom
5. I Shall Be Free No. 10
6. To Ramona
7. Motorpsycho Nitemare
8. My Back Pages
9. I Don’t Believe You
10. Ballad In Plain D
11. It Ain’t Me Babe
Looking back at it now, it’s kind of humorous to see how outraged Bob Dylan’s fans and the press were at his wanting to simply evolve as a musician. Dylan plugged in and went electric on his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home, but the seeds of change were planted with the album before that. Another Side Of Bob Dylan was his last album of just him, a guitar (or piano) and folk songs, but you could hear the changes coming. The songs on Another Side are more personal, and Dylan begins taking more chances both in subject matter and with his voice. On songs like “All I Really Want To Do”, Dylan sounds downright gleeful and ranges into a falsetto that would stun critics who have sworn for years that he cannot sing. And while it is still technically a folk album, the changes in attitude, songwriting and overall feeling suggest that this is really the first Dylan rock album.
Several classics are pulled from this album. “Spanish Harlem Incident”, “Chimes Of Freedom”, “My Back Pages” and “It Ain’t Me Babe” all rank among Dylan’s most respected (and most covered) songs. He pulls out a piano for “Black Crow Blues”. And clearly, this was the album that The Byrds were most inspired by, as they covered four songs along with reworking a recording they had heard of the outtake “Mr. Tambourine Man”. And although Dylan himself has said that he is not thoroughly pleased with this record, it does stand as an important step in his evolution into what he ultimately became. Critics be damned…had Bob Dylan not changed in these critical mid 1960’s years, we would have missed out on a lot of great music, and on a lot of the evolution of rock music itself. And it all starts right here…you just can’t definitively hear it yet. An important and entertaining album. _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
DON HENLEY
BUILDING THE PERFECT BEAST
1984-GEFFEN
Produced By DON HENLEY, DANNY KORTCHMAR & GREG LADANYI
1. The Boys Of Summer
2. You Can’t Make Love
3. Man With A Mission
4. You’re Not Drinking Enough
5. Not Enough Love In The World
6. Building The Perfect Beast
7. All She Wants To Do Is Dance
8. A Month Of Sundays
9. Sunset Grill
10. Drivin’ With Your Eyes Closed
11. Land Of The Living
Don Henley’s first solo album, I Can’t Stand Still, was pretty bad stuff. His second, 1984’s Building The Perfect Beast, was most definitely a step or two in the right direction. And it definitely established him as a successful solo artist in his own right, and not just that singing drummer from the Eagles. The album was a hit, with four charting singles, helped along with an all star cast that would make anyone envious (Lindsey Buckingham AND Mike Campbell on guitar? Not fair!). And Henley distances himself from his former band by including not one trace of the signature Eagles twang. Henley wisely accepted songwriting help from his collaborators (not just Danny Kortchmar, but three of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers), resulting in a recording loaded with excellent songs. On paper, Building The Perfect Beast looks like the exact formula for a great, classic album.
So, what exactly is the problem here? The year was 1984, and the instrument in vogue in 1984 was the synthesizer. And on top of this collection of well written tunes lies a layer of synthesizers so thick that you could do a line off of them. Ten different musicians are credited with playing keyboards on the album, but it sounds more like twenty. This may be, in fact, the most keyboard heavy album of the 80’s…and that’s saying a lot. And we’re not talking piano here…we’re talking cheesy, plastic sounding 80’s synths that just a decade later sounded horribly dated. It’s now been three decades, and it hasn’t gotten any better. The songs are still there…”The Boys Of Summer”, “Sunset Grill”, “Not Enough Love In The World”, “All She Wants To Do Is Dance”, and the rocking “Dancing With Your Eyes Closed”. You just wish that someday Henley would go back and take all of those hideous keys off of it. Because if he did, this would be a truly amazing album. Maybe someday…
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
BOB DYLAN
ANOTHER SIDE OF BOB DYLAN
1964-COLUMBIA
Produced By TOM WILSON
1. All I Really Want To Do
2. Black Crow Blues
3. Spanish Harlem Incident
4. Chimes Of Freedom
5. I Shall Be Free No. 10
6. To Ramona
7. Motorpsycho Nitemare
8. My Back Pages
9. I Don’t Believe You
10. Ballad In Plain D
11. It Ain’t Me Babe
Looking back at it now, it’s kind of humorous to see how outraged Bob Dylan’s fans and the press were at his wanting to simply evolve as a musician. Dylan plugged in and went electric on his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home, but the seeds of change were planted with the album before that. Another Side Of Bob Dylan was his last album of just him, a guitar (or piano) and folk songs, but you could hear the changes coming. The songs on Another Side are more personal, and Dylan begins taking more chances both in subject matter and with his voice. On songs like “All I Really Want To Do”, Dylan sounds downright gleeful and ranges into a falsetto that would stun critics who have sworn for years that he cannot sing. And while it is still technically a folk album, the changes in attitude, songwriting and overall feeling suggest that this is really the first Dylan rock album.
Several classics are pulled from this album. “Spanish Harlem Incident”, “Chimes Of Freedom”, “My Back Pages” and “It Ain’t Me Babe” all rank among Dylan’s most respected (and most covered) songs. He pulls out a piano for “Black Crow Blues”. And clearly, this was the album that The Byrds were most inspired by, as they covered four songs along with reworking a recording they had heard of the outtake “Mr. Tambourine Man”. And although Dylan himself has said that he is not thoroughly pleased with this record, it does stand as an important step in his evolution into what he ultimately became. Critics be damned…had Bob Dylan not changed in these critical mid 1960’s years, we would have missed out on a lot of great music, and on a lot of the evolution of rock music itself. And it all starts right here…you just can’t definitively hear it yet. An important and entertaining album.
This is one of Dylan's weaker 1960s albums IMO, but it would have been a lot better if:
- he'd dropped 'Ballad in Plain D' - he's noted himself he doesn't like it in hindsight.
- he'd used a full band on some of these songs - feels like his songs are getting more complex, and he needed more support here. I usually don't mind his voice, but it's tough listening sometimes. _________________ https://albumreviews.blog
BOB DYLAN
ANOTHER SIDE OF BOB DYLAN
1964-COLUMBIA
Produced By TOM WILSON
1. All I Really Want To Do
2. Black Crow Blues
3. Spanish Harlem Incident
4. Chimes Of Freedom
5. I Shall Be Free No. 10
6. To Ramona
7. Motorpsycho Nitemare
8. My Back Pages
9. I Don’t Believe You
10. Ballad In Plain D
11. It Ain’t Me Babe
Looking back at it now, it’s kind of humorous to see how outraged Bob Dylan’s fans and the press were at his wanting to simply evolve as a musician. Dylan plugged in and went electric on his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home, but the seeds of change were planted with the album before that. Another Side Of Bob Dylan was his last album of just him, a guitar (or piano) and folk songs, but you could hear the changes coming. The songs on Another Side are more personal, and Dylan begins taking more chances both in subject matter and with his voice. On songs like “All I Really Want To Do”, Dylan sounds downright gleeful and ranges into a falsetto that would stun critics who have sworn for years that he cannot sing. And while it is still technically a folk album, the changes in attitude, songwriting and overall feeling suggest that this is really the first Dylan rock album.
Several classics are pulled from this album. “Spanish Harlem Incident”, “Chimes Of Freedom”, “My Back Pages” and “It Ain’t Me Babe” all rank among Dylan’s most respected (and most covered) songs. He pulls out a piano for “Black Crow Blues”. And clearly, this was the album that The Byrds were most inspired by, as they covered four songs along with reworking a recording they had heard of the outtake “Mr. Tambourine Man”. And although Dylan himself has said that he is not thoroughly pleased with this record, it does stand as an important step in his evolution into what he ultimately became. Critics be damned…had Bob Dylan not changed in these critical mid 1960’s years, we would have missed out on a lot of great music, and on a lot of the evolution of rock music itself. And it all starts right here…you just can’t definitively hear it yet. An important and entertaining album.
This is one of Dylan's weaker 1960s albums IMO, but it would have been a lot better if:
- he'd dropped 'Ballad in Plain D' - he's noted himself he doesn't like it in hindsight.
- he'd used a full band on some of these songs - feels like his songs are getting more complex, and he needed more support here. I usually don't mind his voice, but it's tough listening sometimes.
Dylan was critical of the entire album...and I do get that. I think it may have been partly because he was WANTING to have a fuller sound and that he may have wanted it to be more of a rock album than it was. I do believe that he was probably writing at this point with fuller arrangements in mind. But, man...some of these songs are just riveting. As for "Ballad In Plain D"...just take the lyrics aside for a moment...just as poetry, this is an amazing work. Compared to what others were writing and singing at the time? There is no comparison.
Dylan's voice...man, it's so easy to write him off as a bad singer. I believe that the style he mostly sang in was deliberate. I believe that he was actually a much better singer than he let on (for example...his vocal on "Lay Lady Lay" has none of the "swinging" of notes that he did most of the time...and it's actually a beautifully sung track.)
I like this album...it's not perfect, but the transitional nature of it is highly interesting to me. This is the sound of a folk singer getting ready to put on his rock and roll shoes. I love that aspect of it! _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
1. Good Times Bad Times
2. Babe I’m Gonna Leave You
3. You Shook Me
4. Dazed And Confused
5. Your Time Is Gonna Come
6. Black Mountain Side
7. Communication Breakdown
8. I Can’t Quit You Baby
9. How Many More Times
In 1968, this was what was left of The Yardbirds. Jimmy Page was left as the only member of the band with a Scandanavian tour commitment he had to honor. He brought together Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and John Bonham to tour as The New Yardbirds, then renamed the band afterwards Led Zeppelin, and the rest is history. The band recorded their debut album in just 36 hours of actual studio time, and because they didn’t have a record deal yet, paid for it themselves. Page has since said that they did it that way to insure artistic freedom. The result is the beginning of the Led Zeppelin legacy. A stunning album with a sound that was unlike anything before it, the vision that Page had for his new band was dead on. Lead by the stinging guitar and the ability of Page to pull great licks from seemingly nowhere, and the soaring vocals of Plant (who believed, until the second album, that this was a temporary gig), Zeppelin rode this album to the top and stayed there for the next decade.
What’s not to love? “Good Times Bad Times” opens the door as a great, loud pop song…and then Zeppelin begins reconstructing the blues like no other band was doing…basically killing the British Invasion with one quick lick. Oh, to have been a kid in 1969 and hearing this for the first time…what a pleasant shock this must have been! “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You”, “You Shook Me”, “Dazed And Confused”, “I Can’t Quit You Baby”, and especially the unbridled power of “How Many More Times” took British bands playing American blues to a whole new level, and changed the sound of the electric guitar forever. Throw in the pretty acoustic instrumental “Black Mountain Side”, and you have perfection. And it stayed that way, right up until Bonham’s death in 1980. This album didn’t begin the ascent to Led Zeppelin being the biggest band in the world…it put them square at the top from the start. A must have album.
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
FischmanRockMonster, JazzMeister, Bluesboy,ClassicalMasterProfile Land of Enchantment
Lost of ink/keystrokes over the years about the plagiarism. While Zep may have failed to properly credit some song originators, they certainly, as you indicated, succeeded in bringing forth an all new sount that was all their own. Wherever one stands with regard to originality of lyrical content and even melody lines, this album did not short on newness and originality overall. A true landmark album and a watershed moment in musical history.
YAZ
UPSTAIRS AT ERIC’S
1982-MUTE
Produced By E.C RADCLIFFE & YAZ
1. Don’t Go
2. Too Pieces
3. Bad Connection
4. I Before E Except After C
5. Midnight
6. In My Room
7. Only You
8. Goodbye Seventies
9. Situation
10. Winter Kills
11. Bring Your Love Down (Didn’t I)
Yaz was actually Yazoo, forced to shorten their name in the US because of legal reasons. A duo, Yaz consisted of singer Alison Moyet and former Depeche Mode keyboardist Vince Clark. They were together for only a year and a half, and made only two albums, but the mark they made on 80’s dance music cannot be denied. Upstairs At Eric’s is the first of the two Yaz albums, and it was a large presence in the musical landscape of 1982. Yaz had some bouncy, danceable tracks, but they also showed that synth music could have heart, thanks in large part to Moyet’s big warm voice. The second album, You And Me Both, was better and more consistent, but Upstairs At Erics showcases some great moments as well. “Only You” and “Don’t Go” were hits, but it was on “Situation” that everything came together. Still the duo’s most enduring hit, “Situation” is as infectious as anything by Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode or any other synth group of the time, and stands as one of the best dance tracks of the decade.
White Upstairs At Eric’s has such great highs, it also has dumbfounding lows. “I Before E Except After C” is simply terrible, and stands out like a giant sore thumb. Other poor tracks keep the album from greatness, and while they did get better on the next effort, they didn’t stay together long enough to realize the great potential that they had. Moyet went on to a solo career that has had success in the UK, but none in America. Clark went on to form another highly successful duo, Erasure. They have gotten back together recently for live dates, but with no new material. A testament of their influence can be seen in their discography: two studio albums and four compilation albums have been released to date. Upstairs At Eric’s is a good 80’s synth pop album, notable now mostly for Moyet’s voice and the undeniable catchiness of “Situation”.
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
MY BLOODY VALENTINE
LOVELESS
1991-CREATION
Produced By KEVIN SHIELDS & COLM O CIOSOIG
1. Only Shallow
2. Loomer
3. Touched
4. To Here Knows When
5. When You Sleep
6. I Only Said
7. Come In Alone
8. Sometimes
9. Blown A Wish
10. What You Want
11. Soon
With their debut album in the books, Ireland’s My Bloody Valentine hit the studio in 1989 to begin recording their second album. Little did anyone know the events that would be set in motion by the creation of Loveless, one of the most powerful and influential indie albums of all time. Guitarist Kevin Shields had decided to move into a more avant garde direction, and the band was given a disturbing amount of leeway in the studio by their record label. The result is a record that is as far from the late 80’s (and early 90’s) mainstream as you can possibly get, and album that marks the beginning of what is known as “shoegaze”, and one of the more hauntingly beautiful works of the late 20th century. But it came with quite the pricetag. Shields insisted on constantly changing studios and engineers, and the time they were taking with what became countless overdubs, increasing eccentricities and the pursuit of perfection nearly bankrupted the label, and the band was left to find a new deal after Loveless was released. Loveless became a landmark recording, and has long been considered as one of the greatest albums in history. It also marked the end of the bands ability to exist for the next two decades.
But if you can sit yourself down for about fifty minutes with the lights out and Loveless playing, you’ll get what it’s about. Or not…if your tastes don’t allow for music that relies more on layers and textures than it does on songs, then you may not get this. The beauty of loveless is its ability to turn emotion into sound. And it’s that quality that makes it a thing of beauty. The guitars are layered on top of each other with a lot of tremolo, and the vocals of Shields and Bilinda Butcher are buried in the mix to the point of sounding more like backing instruments than singing. And the effect is haunting. “When You Sleep” and “Only Shallow” are the definitive highlights, but the album plays almost like a single track. For an encore, Shields developed writers block and the band split. They reunited and finally made the follow up to Loveless in 2013, a 22 year span between albums. But the truth is that they would probably not have been able to duplicate the magic of this album had they gone directly back to work. Loveless is a thing of beauty, and it’s actually fitting that its creators more or less walked away afterwards.
Link _________________ I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum
Romanelli
Fischman
