portrait of this blog's author - by Stephen Blackman 2008

Thursday, March 28, 2024

BONNIE LASS : What’s On Your Mind? : Bonnie Raitt | Guitar Player Magazine +

 

Bonnie Raitt:  “Someone put it best when they said, 'You can’t change the noodle, but you can change the sauce.' I play the way I play, just like I sing the way that I sing. I’m not a schooled guitar player, and I can’t say I’m getting appreciably better, but I know how to do what I do. It’s the songs that change. 


“Taking risks is how I keep moving forward – that and being open to hearing things in a different way. Ultimately, I know there’s a safety net, and that’s the fact that I trust my ears and my instincts. 


“I’ll always try something different. That’s how you grow, and you also don’t want to be overly influenced by an inclination to dismiss something that’s new. So, I may do something I’m not really into – out of respect for Tchad and the musicians – but if it’s not working for me after a few days of letting it sit, then I’ll go, 'We gave it a try, but this song is sucking.'”


“I look at a player’s musical vocabulary, but I also consider the kind of person they are. To me, you can’t separate who someone is from the way he or she plays. It makes complete sense to me that Jon Cleary is so badass on the keyboards, and that he also reads Graham Greene. 


“I look for soul, intelligence, funk, and the ability to handle an extraordinary range of music styles. By the time I bring somebody into the fold, I already know they can do the things I need them to. I know George [Marinelli, guitarist in Raitt’s band] can do everything from Jimi Hendrix and Keith Richards to Richard Thompson, as well as being completely inventive in his own style.”


 -Michael Molenda / Guitar Player  

Photo: © Charlyn Zlotnik


Bonnie Raitt on stage watching Buddy Guy & Junior Wells perform at the Ann Arbor Blues Festival.⁣ by Jim Marshall 




 

Available now everywhere in all formats! https://lnk.to/justlikethat_b Stream “Made Up Mind” here: https://lnk.to/madeupmind Follow Bonnie: Official Website and Online Store: http://www.bonnieraitt.com Facebook:   / officialbonnieraitt   Instagram:   / bonnieraittofficial   Twitter:   / thebonnieraitt   Produced by Bonnie Raitt Recorded and Mixed by Ryan Freeland AUDIO TRACK CREDITS: Bonnie: vocal, electric slide guitar James “Hutch” Hutchinson: bass Ricky Fataar: drums, percussion, backing vocal Glenn Patscha: rhodes piano, hammond B3, backing vocal Kenny Greenberg: electric guitar MUSICIAN VIDEO CREDITS: Bonnie: vocal, electric slide guitar James “Hutch” Hutchinson: bass Ricky Fataar: drums, percussion, backing vocal Glenn Patscha: rhodes piano, hammond B3, backing vocal Duke Levine: electric guitar

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LADY GAGA!

Route says : 

Happy birthday to Lady Gaga, born as Stefani Germanotta in New York City on this day in 1986. She wants hold 'em like they do in Texas. Dont we all but . . . . . .


Now I think it was my kids who turned me onto Lady GaGa well my daughter specially who said to check her out she can really play and sing . . . . .I found an early piece of her playing keyboards and singing live and thought this lassie can cut the mustard all right!!
She can even if she keeps a poker face about it!
Always watchable and worth watching for what she does next!

TRUMP turns Bible Salesman! Gotta make a fast buck? Try Selling Bibles door to door . . . . PAPER MOON anyone!?

 Now I enjoyed this . . . . . seeing Trump advertising a special edition of the Bible!? (sic?) already published and already in the public domain with additional texts equally publicly available like you know the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights and all for $60! Boy is HE SKINT!? I don’t know everyone mentioned here, Ronna who? but The Late Show’s Stephen Colbert made me LOL!



 . . .say it’s only a paper moon . . . . . 




Women Bass players III | A Diamond Dave Special | A Taste of Honey - Boogie Oogie Oogie - Live (1978)

 Dave dropped by and suggested a couple of additional people after I went banging on about Tal Wilkenfeld t’other day . . . . . . . . he mentioned this lassie too! Enjoy!


On bass Ladies & Gentlemen - Ms. Janice-Marie Johnson


SONG OF THE DAY |Ear worms and classic first pop singles | Beauty from The Lightning Seeds ‘PURE'

from wandering around Flikkenabok! 



"Pure" is a song by British music group the Lightning Seeds from their debut album, Cloudcuckooland.  Released in June 1989, the song peaked at No. 16 in the UK.  The following year it entered the US Billboard Hot 100's top 40, peaking at #31 on March 26, and was the first hit for the band on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart, climbing to #8 in May 1990.

The first Lightning Seeds single release, "Pure" is significant in that it was also the first song Ian Broudie had "completely written and sung, ever".  After recording it, he only wanted 200 copies of the single pressed.  But after some radio play over the subsequent months the song began to gain traction and went for a second pressing.

 

Ear Worms and One Hit Wonders! | WILD CHERRY (of course!?) who? - PLAY THAT FUNKY MUSIC [White Boy!]

 This always makes me laugh but who ever knew (or even saw?) Wild Cherry!? 

Not us over here in Limey World I don’t reckon. Now we ALL now this meme and it has become a pop idiom and then some but could you picture the band!? If asked about the song I bet you could sing it (well the title!?) but I bet like me you couldn’t name the band who sang it and had a global hit with it! Did you think they were all black? I think lil whitey over here in suburbia nigh on had a coronary and imagined the band were all black and SCARY! Ha ha ha ha . . . check them out and remember to always . . . . 

PLAY THAT FUNKY MUSIC WHITE BOY!



Wednesday, March 27, 2024

Richard Serra - great American sculptor dies

Image
Richard Serra, Who Recast Sculpture on a Massive Scale, Dies at 85

His tilted walls of rusting steel, monumental blocks and other immense and inscrutable forms created environments that had to be walked thro
NYTIMES.COM



I may have mentioned Serra before. Now I had a problem with sculpture as an art student to a degree and like many (most? ED) of us I have strong opinions and may not know much but I know what I like. Coming across Serra’s Spinout in the Kroller-Muller sculpture park when my wife and my brother first went to Eindhoven and further south into Holland. It was a life affirming moment, cathartic somehow and has stuck with me. A tribute to Robert Smithson it was an eerie experience, the quiet and the atmosphere was quite unique and I loved it. By all reasoning and taste I ought to dislike Serra’s work but I don’t . . . . . 
Art I guess is like that. I DO like Picasso sculpture plus that of Brancusi, Dubuffet, Man Ray, Rodin and his muse fellow sculptor Camille Claudel, I admire the three-D work of Damien Hirst very much and the opprobrium faced by the Tate’s purchase of Carl Andre's bricks withe the reactionaries whipped into a bile filled fury by the red top newspapers was an affirming moment took lesson in how to deal with the public in their anger during my employ at MOMAO in Oxford as I had to field abuse and anger at the expense and lack of ‘meaning’  (now this should be seen in retrospect as a brilliant investment worth millions when it cost the public purse a mere £4,000!) - I loved fielding question with questions like 'well have you actually been to see it’?- so you are getting angry at something you haven’t see? It went on for weeks and I enjoyed being somehow one who was asked by Joe Shmo what it all meant! Hah! Such fun!

 So more sculptures than many but still feel I have massive blind spots . . . . . . . . 

Richard Serra in the studio by Sidney Felson


Transmissions :: Roger Eno LATEST RELEASE "The Skies, They Shift Like Chords."| AQUARIUM DRUNKARD

Incoming transmission from Roger Eno. This week on the show, he joins us for a freewheeling, friendly chat about art, place, and Dune (1984). Eno began his recording life in 1983, when he joined his brother Brian and Daniel Lanois at the latter’s studio in Hamilton, Ontario, to cut one of our favorite albums of all-time, Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks. Imbued with country and western ambiance, it suggests the vastness of space and man’s ventures into it. Not only that, but it serves as one of the foundational documents of the “ambient country” subgenre that practically forms its own corner of the Aquarium Drunkard sonic universe.

The Skies, They Shift Like Chords.

part of the 

Talkhouse Podcast Network



Boys Will Be Boys! Row in a Trenchtown! \ Lee Scratch Perry vs Joe Gibbs |thanks to Guess I’m Dumb


Lee (King) Perry! - People Funny Boy

People Grudgeful


Sir Gibbs 
Image

Sir Gibbs - People Grudgeful (1968)

Producer Joe Gibbs' answer song to Lee Perry's People Funny Boy. It's probably the Pioneers actually singing, though it has been long rumored to be the Ethiopians.

You can walk and talk But me no care at all


guessimdumb

#Sir Gibbs#People Grudgeful#Joe Gibbs#People Funny Boy#Lee Scratch Perry

Speaking of New Singles! There’s THIS| KATHRYN WILLIAMS AND WITHERED HAND - GRACE

 


"Grace" by Kathryn Williams & Withered Hand Listen here → https://kathryn-williams.lnk.to/grace Taken from upcoming album "Willson Williams" out 26th April Pre-order here → https://kathryn-williams.lnk.to/wills... Video by Marry Waterson https://www.marrywaterson.com Follow Kathryn Williams Facebook → https://www.facebook.com/KathrynWilli... Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/kathrynwill... Twitter → https://twitter.com/kathwilliamsuk Website → https://www.kathrynwilliams.co.uk/ Follow Withered Hand Facebook → https://www.facebook.com/witheredhand Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/witheredhand Twitter → https://twitter.com/witheredhand Website → https://witheredhand.com/

Patti Smith on motherhood and life after Fred (‘Sonic’ Smith that is) . . . .

ARTIST AT WORK 

Patti and the kids!     Photo by Frank Stefanko

I don’t know if I posted this before but I always find it so moving. Did you think Pop/Rock Stars always lived this life of luxury? Did you imagine they all must be minted? Did you even think what it was like to be a parent? A Mum to kids at home whilst being a counter culture heroine? I didn’t! . . . . . . . . 

Patti Smith on the biggest misconception about her...


The thing that bothered me the most was when I had to return to the public eye in ’95 or ’96 when my husband died. We lived a very simple lifestyle in a more reclusive way in which he was king of our domain. I don’t drive, I didn’t have much of an income, and without him, I had to find a way of making a living. 


Besides working in a bookstore, the only thing I knew how to do was to make records—or to write poetry, which isn’t going to help put your kids through school. 


But when I started doing interviews, people kept saying “Well, you didn’t do anything in the 80s,” and I just want to get Elvis Presley’s gun out and shoot the television out of their soul. How could you say that? The conceit of people, to think that if they’re not reading about you in a newspaper or magazine, then you’re not doing anything.


I’m not a celebrity, I’m a worker. I’ve always worked. I was working before people read anything about me, and the day they stopped reading about me, I was doing even more work. 


And the idea that if you’re a mother, you’re not doing anything—it’s the hardest job there is, being a mother or father requires great sacrifice, discipline, selflessness, and to think that we weren’t doing anything while we were raising a son or daughter is appalling. 


It makes me understand why some human beings question their worth if they’re not making a huge amount of money or aren’t famous, and that’s not right.


My mother worked at a soda fountain. She made the food and was a waitress and she was a really hard worker and a devoted worker. And her potato salad became famous! She wouldn’t get potato salad from the deli, she would get up at five o’clock in the morning and make it herself, and people would come from Camden or Philly to this little soda fountain in South Jersey because she had famous potato salad. 


She was proud of that, and when she would come home at night, completely wiped out and throwing her tip money on the table and counting it, one of her great prides was that people would come from far and wide for her potato salad. 


People would say, “Well, what did your mother do? She was a waitress?” She served the people, and she served in the way that she knew best.


Via Alan Light interview in Medium

Thanks Thatericalpter.com



Patti - study pastel on handlayed paper 1978 ©️A.M.Swapp

NEW John Cale single (and Album!) POPtical Illusion | HOW WE SEE THE LIGHT!


John Cale - "How We See The Light" from the upcoming album 'POPtical Illusion' out 14th June 2024 on Double Six / Domino. Subscribe to John Cale on YouTube: https://johncale.ffm.to/yt Stream & save "How We See The Light": https://johncale.ffm.to/howweseethelight Order & stream 'POPtical Illusion': https://johncale.ffm.to/popticalillusion



 

Song of The Day | GEORGE HARRISON and The Travelling Wilburys!

THE TRAVELLING WILBURYS - The Wilbury Twist! 


Only George Harrison could get these guys to be THIS silly!

"You put your hand on your head (hand on your head)
Put your foot in the air (foot in the air)
Then, you hop around the room (hop around the room)
In your underwear (in your underwear)"

I found myself think is Bob gonna take a verse! And sho nuff!


Tuesday, March 26, 2024

ALBUMS THAT SHOULD EXIST : World Party - Chicago 2006

World Party - Park West, Chicago, IL, 8-22-2006

Paul says : (To). .  all intents and purposes, the British band World Party was Karl Wallinger. Not only did he write all the band's songs and sing lead on all of them, he often produced the albums and played most of the other instruments on some of them. Sadly, he died earlier this month, on March 11, 2024, at the age of 66, due to a stroke. 

I didn't hear the news at first, but then I noticed a surge in World Party bootlegs at bootleg sharing sites, and I figured it out. A couple of years ago, I had a hard time finding even a single World Party bootleg. But in the wake of his death, a bunch were posted. I wanted to post something new to mark Wallinger's passing, so I looked at all the concerts I hadn't posted yet, and decided this was the best one. It came after most of his albums were released, so it serves as a de facto best of. He was backed by an excellent band, and gave a solid importance. But probably the most important factor of all is sound quality, and this is a fantastic soundboard. If you were to get just one live World Party recording, this would probably be the best one to choose.

Because this is a excellent soundboard boot, I didn't have to do much tinkering at all. But I did boost the volume of the vocals for the banter between songs, and sometimes I boosted the cheering after the songs.

This album is an hour and 28 minutes long.

01 talk 
02
Put the Message in the Box 
03 talk
04
Is It like Today
05 What Does It Mean Now
06 talk 
07 When the Rainbow Comes 
08 talk 
09 Best Place I've Ever Been 
10 I Thought You Were a Spy 
11 talk
12 She's the One
13 Love Street 
14 talk 
15 Who Are You 
16 Here Comes the Future
17 talk 
18 Vanity Fair 
19 Thank You World 
20 talk
21 Sweet Soul Dream 
22 Is It Too Late 
23 talk 
24 Way Down Now 
25 It Is Time
26 talk
27 Ship of Fools 
28 talk 

More John (Prine that is!) for Steve Goodman at his tribute concert . . . .

Always renowned for his brilliant intros and chat between songs, this one is especially warm for the obvious reasons and it always makes  me smile . . . . . . note: I couldn’t post Please Don’t Bury Me for the longest time . . . . . again for obvious reasons but again it does make me laugh so and let’s face it John more than most would appreciate how much we need more laughter right now!

John Prine - You Never Even Called Me By Name (live)

Song of The Day | John Prine - Please Don’t Bury Me!




Monday, March 25, 2024

MALLARD LIVE : WDR Studio L - THE ROCKPALAST, Cologne, Germany - September 7th 1976

 MALLARD 

So after my plea ZigZag Wanderer* dropped by and posted a link to this, the elusive Mallard set from the Rockpalast in Cologne Germany back in 1976. It is really good quality and I am endebted to him. He also posts a link to a five track video of the concert which I don’t know how to post here but again it is well worth having and watching. ZigZagWandereer says the vid is poor quality and has some noise bars across the bottom but frankly I have seen a whole lot worse! (the one I posted down below the other day is dreadful by comparison!)

* "probably the world’s biggest Beefheart fan” Silent Way at Floppy Boot Stomp! 






The text files from the original poster says:
Mallard
WDR Studio L
Cologne, Germany
September 7th 1976

Bill Harkleroad (Zoot Horn Rollo) and Mark Boston (Rockette Morton) created this band on guitar/bass respectively having split from Captain Beefheart's Magic Band. They recruited Sam Galpin as singer, moved to the UK and made two great albums. Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull helped them and they used his studio to make the debut album. Legend has it that they even recorded some material with Anderson but Harkleroad destroyed the tapes. (no mention here of George Dragotta on drums and while they cover four John French songs or co-written numbers he is notable by his absence here. George does a good job but he ain’t no Drumbo IMO - but then I hold John as one of the world’s best and his contribution to Beefheart compositions is a given that with him and his musical notations most things from Trout Mask on wouldn’t have come to fruition- just an opinion)

I have done a bit of remastering to my CD copy as that seemed very boomy on the bass frequency. Much nicer sound now I think.
By this time another Beefheart refugee, John Thomas, (stop sniggering at the back) had joined them on keyboards.
regards
Titus

01 She's Long & She's Mean
02 One Day Once
03 A Piece of Me
04 Green Coyote & His Companion
05 Harvest
06 Mamma Squeeze
07 Back on the Pavement
08 Reign of Pain
09 Winged Tuskadaro
10 Road to Morocco


Sam Galpin: vocal
Bill Harkleroad: guitar
Mark Boston: bass
John Thomas: keyboard
George Dragotta: drums

 It is a FLAC file so be patient but the increased quality is worth it

Meanwhile the vid is available here again for the avid fan really worth checking out 

Mallard
Rockpalast Cologne Germany
7th September 1976

Back On The Pavement
One Day Once
Reign Of Pain
A Piece Of Me [split]
Mama Squeeze

here . . .

note this vid file is 1.5GB so patience may be required . . . . 

On recording and playing with Mallard “[Virgin] put us up in this castle called Clearwell Castle, right on the border of Wales. We spent a couple of weeks there, and to me, it was a whole 'nother world. I loved it.” Mark Boston

Niether Sam nor George are still with us but the rest of the boys are working away and still around I am glad to say although Mark has periods of ill health having had heart surgery recently he is taking things easier , the sniggering joke about John JT Thomas is ironic to a degree as he is a very accomplished player and has a wide experience _having played with Bruce Hornsby And The Noisemakers, Mallard, ModeReko, Rattlesnakes & Eggs, The Magic Band) Bill’s info here Bill’s webpage here , Mark here at The Radar Station

drop by and buy one of Rockette’s psychedelic drawings


This has been a ZigZagWanderer/ Swappers production!