Neapolitan

It is hard to just jump in a do a journal after so much absence. But I want to pay a little homage to a Phil Everly. I feel a little out of place going on about an artist from the early days of Rock n Roll. So I thought I might talk a little about a song he sang with his brother. It kinda connects The Everly Brothers to 70s Rock - which I am also a little apprehensive to talk about...

...before I really got to know The Everly Brothers' music I was familiar with a cover-song of theirs "Love Hurts" by Nazareth, which at the time didn't know that the EB did the original recording. And it just so happens Nazareth's version appears in one of my atf movies Dazed and Confused. I love the way Nazareth guitar player, Manny Charlton, approaches this song. His interpretation of the song is just perfect. His arpeggios are slow and meaningful, his playing is articulate and the sound of his guitar is very chorusy. His guitar solo just soars, it has a e-Bow like quality to it, though he could be just using his volume control on his guitar. It is timeless classic, one of the best cover-songs of all time. (...forgive me for sounding trite, journal writing is kinda new to me and maybe not my thing, but in this case I felt it had to be said.)

The original is pretty good too. I am certain the guitar player on EB version is Chet Atkins, his style is unmistakable. At some time Chet's career he had a tone/volume pedal that affected both tone & volume...naturally. It was somewhat similar to a Wah-wah effect, (though it isn't a true Wah-wah - and I think that effect Chet had predates the Wah-wah). I'm not 100% certain, but the way his guitar sounds sounds like he is using it on this recording. I am familiar with some Everly Brothers material and I always found it cool to hear Chet playing in the background. I became a Chet Atkins fan via Steve Howe who mentions Chet as one of his major influence.

Love Hurts was written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, they also wrote other songs for the Everly Brothers like Poor Jenny, Rocky Top, and list of other hits like the sentimental classic Devoted to You.

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Neapolitan

I thought of adding a special feature in my journal. I call it "Jazz for Trollheart." (If for any reason you don't think it's a good idea I'll put the kabosh on it.) Today in plug.dj/musicbanter/ we were talking about what would be a good start to get Trollheart into Jazz. (I thought about doing this idea months ago but I want someone to blame.) In a way I am curious to why he's not, because there is Jazz (among other types of music) in the whole Prog mix of things. Now he doesn't have to get into Jazz that is entirely his prerogative but if he willing to give it a try...

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GuD

oooo

I didn't see this before I will definitely be skimmin through here lookin for tunes.

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I spit bullets in my feet
Every time I speak
So I write instead
And still people want me dead
~msc

Neapolitan

Well... a few things put a damper on it, and it didn't pan out the way I expected. I also started a new journa here: http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...dern-rock.html

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Neapolitan

• Album
  • Title: Station to Station
    • Release date: 23 January 1976
    • Album cover: Photography by – Steve Shapiro
    • Track listing:
      • Side A track 1 - Station To Station
      • Side A track 2 - Golden Years
      • Side A track 3 - Word On A Wing
      • Side B track 1 - TVC 15
      • Side B track 2 - Stay
      • Side B track 3 - Wild Is The Wind

• Personnel
  • Artist - David Bowie
    • Vocals, Guitar, Saxophone – David Bowie
    • All songs written by – David Bowie (except Wild Is The Wind written by Dimitri Tiomkin, Ned Washington)
    • Arranged by – David Bowie
    • Producer – David Bowie, Harry Maslin
  • Studio musicians:
    • Bass – George Murray
    • Drums – Dennis Davis
    • Lead Guitar – Earl Slick
    • Piano – Roy Bittan
    • Rhythm Guitar – Carlos Alomar

David Bowie - Station to Station (Live 1978)
Live at the Nihon Budokan, Tokyo, Japan - December 12, 1978



DAVID BOWIE performing "Stay" at the Dinah Shore show, January 3rd 1976


time and place
At the time of album Bowie was living in America. He was married to Angela (née Barnett), and had a young son then known as "Zowie" - Duncan Jones.

Thin White Duke
For each album David Bowie would come up with a new persona and stay in character even off stage, as when he did interviews. After the Diamond Dog Tour David Bowie wanted to put aside all that entailed in his earlier shows and simply wanted to be a singer fronting a Rock band. And this was his last persona... the dapper Thin White Duke.

influences
At the time Bowie thought Roxy Music were made some of the best music coming from the UK in a long time. He was a fan of Brian Ferry David adopted Brian's fashion sense. Both were art students. Brian Ferry took the idea of the collage and applied it to music and bands image onstage. In Roxie music each member wore a period piece costumes whether inspired by the past or the future. Bowie dressed up in suite and his backing band dress-down, judging from videos I've seen of them.

Station To Station
For this song I chose the video of Bowie playing at the Nihon Budokan because of the intro. It is extended and better illustrates the sound of a locomotive steam engine beginning to move, which was recreated by a synth. The first time I saw this video I believe it is when Paul played this song in plug.dj. And the guitarist on on tour with Bowie than is none other than one of Paul's favorites, Adrian Belew.

TVC-15
TVC-15 is brilliant piece of music, and in my opinion the shining gem of the album. The plot of the song is very similar to Twilight Zone: The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine (S01, E04). But actually comes from real life incident where a hallucinating Iggy Pop believes his girlfriend is transmitted into the television set.

The song starts off with a bit of Louisiana Blues/ Boogie Woogie Piano somewhere between the styles of Professor Longhair, Jerry Lee Lewis and Dr. John. And suddenly there is introduction of a chaotic mix guitars creating a tapestry of a sonic textures. At one part in the song he hums, it seems instead of using strings, where it would seem others would naturally place them. When Bowie sing "Transmission, Transition" there is a return of the boogie woogie piano and a palm muted guitars and when he sing "Oh my TVC 1 5, oh, oh TVC 1 5" there is distorted guitar and a sax that is a premonition of sax one could hear in Psychedelic Furs' music, and a periodic bass note which sounds like a bellowing baritone sax. All these elements effectively construct a musical collage.


to be continued...

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Neapolitan

The Life Aquatic Studio Sessions Featuring Seu Jorge

artist: Seu Jorge (Jorge Mário da Silva)

tracks:

1. Rebel, Rebel
2. Life On Mars?
3. Starman
4. Ziggy Stardust
5. Lady Stardust
6. Changes
7. Oh! You Pretty Things
8. Rock N' Roll Suicide
9. Suffragette City
10. Five Years
11. Queen Bitch
12. When I Live My Dream
13. Quicksand
14. Team Zissou

This album consist of Seu Jorge, only accompanied by his nylon guitar, singing 13 David Bowie songs and one track that's his own composition. Even though the songs are sung in Portuguese, the emotion he puts into the songs transcends any unfamiliarity with the language.

I heard that to really know ourselves, we have to see ourselves through the eyes of another. I think the same could be said true of music. I think to know a song you have to hear it interpret by another. Cover songs either sink or float. The artist doing a cover song either does justice or discompose the listener who is familiar with the original. A really good cover will surpass the listens expectation and expose the hidden potential of the song. David Bowie said that "had Jorge not recorded my songs in Portuguese I would never have heard this new level of beauty which he has imbued them with."

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Neapolitan

• Golden Years It begins with a R&B guitar riff, finger snaps, and three note which have harmonica-like sound. He sings Golden years and in the background there is a Whop whop whop. He sings "Angel" with falsetto and slips back to a crooner Elvis-like voice. So from the very beginning Bowie is covering 20 years of Rock n Roll. As a side not the song was offered to Elvis sing, but was declined. Then Bowie moves on tot he present. There is a *snap* *clap* *stomp* before "Come get up my baby" which is such a great hook, the hand clap became prevalent sound effect in Disco and New Wave. There is a soupy drum beat which would be very common in Disco. When he sings "Stick with you baby for a thousand years..."there are muted acoustic guitars back with a Disco beat, which is very effective. The Phasey rhythm guitar backing Whop, whop, whop brings back the idea of a music collage of mix old with new.
  
• Word on a Wing ABBA meets Roxy Music.
  
• Stay The slap bass in this song foreshadows 80s music and bands like Duran Duran.
  
• Wild Is the Wind This song exemplifies Bowie idea the Thin White Duke singing love songs, but in a dispassionate manner.
  

Thoughts about the album:

Station to Station is basically a concept album, with the Thin White Duke, a character within his title track, persona he adopts for onstage performance and offstage interveiws. As with subjects and ideas he explores, it seems to borrow from real life, as if he is a method actor who lives the part before he performs it. He lives in the US first in NYC then in LA, and then decides to move back to Europe which is alluded to in the line "the return of the Thin White Duke."

Certainly Station to Station was not the last stop for Rock concept albums. The album stands at the precipice of Disco era, and was one of the more accessible ones considering the direction Prog took. The music that caught the public's attention in the beginning of the decade gave way to Disco, Punk, New Wave, Pomp Rock and Metal at the end. It contains some of the same elements that was incorporated into Disco i.e. Funk, Soul, but all in all it's a Rock album incorporating same elements. It also contains musical ideas from Europe especially from German, where Bowie would latter record his next three albums.

P.S.
If i had things I could wish for it would be I could write more extensively about the album, and posted it early last week. And the other would be for Trollheart to write a review of it. He piqued my curiosity what he would say about the album, since he mentioned he wish he had the opportunity to pick the album, when Bowie albums were first up for grabs for Bowie Week.

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Neapolitan

band: The Moody Blues

album: Days of Future Passed
released: November 1967
track listing:

1. The Day Begins: (5:50)
   • "The Day Begins" (Peter Knight & The Moody Blues) — (4:08)
   • "Morning Glory" (Graeme Edge) [unlisted track] — (1:42)
2. Dawn: (3:48)
   • (Intro) (Peter Knight) [unlisted track] — (0:38)
   • "Dawn is a Feeling" (Mike Pinder) - (3:10)
3. The Morning: (3:55)
   • (Intro) (Peter Knight) [unlisted track] — (0:21)
   • "Another Morning" (Ray Thomas) — (3:34)
4. Lunch Break: (5:33)
   • (Intro) (Peter Knight) [unlisted track] — (1:53)
   • "Peak Hour" (John Lodge) — (3:40)
5. The Afternoon: (8:23)
   • "Forever Afternoon (Tuesday?)" (Justin Hayward) — (5:06)
   • "(Evening) Time to Get Away" (Lodge) [unlisted track] — (3:17)
6. Evening: (6:40)
   • (Intro) (Peter Knight) [unlisted track] — (0:38)
   • "The Sunset" (Pinder) — (2:39)
   • "Twilight Time" (Thomas) — (3:23)
7. The Night: (7:24)
   • "Nights in White Satin" (Hayward) — (5:38)
   • "Late Lament" (Edge, Knight) [unlisted track] — (1:46)

* above information from Original Track Listing - Days of Future Passed - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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