https://exchange.prx.org/p/623809
It's once again free-form week on Rockin' in the Days of Confusion, as we stay mostly in the years 1970-1973 for most of the hour.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience (II)
Title: In From The Storm
Source: LP: The Cry Of Love
Writer: Jimi Hendrix
Label: MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1970
Although nobody knows for sure what the final track lineup would have been for Jimi Hendrix's first studio album since 1968's Electric Ladyland, most everyone associated with him agrees that it would have been a double LP and that In From The Storm would have been included on it. The song was first released on The Cry Of Love, the first posthumus Hendrix album, and subsequently was included on Voodoo Soup, Alan Douglas's first attempt at recreating that legendary fourth album. The song also appears on First Rays Of The New Rising Sun, the CD that has replaced Voodoo Soup in the Hendrix catalog. The recording features Hendrix on guitar, Mitch Mitchell on drums and Hendrix's longtime friend Billy Cox on bass. Before Hendrix's death in September of 1970 the trio had often been billed as the Jimi Hendrix Experience.
Artist: David Bowie
Title: Hang Onto Yourself
Source: CD: The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars
Writer(s): David Bowie
Label: Ryko (original label: RCA Victor)
Year: 1972
David Bowie proved that he was quite capable of writing a straight up power pop tune with Hang Onto Yourself from The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars. The album itself, as the title implies, documents the short career of pop star Ziggy Stardust against a backdrop of the imminent destruction of the world. While most of the songs on the album are about Ziggy Stardust, I've always imagined Hang Onto Yourself as being one of Ziggy's own songs, a hit single along the same lines as Grand Funk Railroad's We're An American Band or Mountain's Mississippi Queen. Interestingly enough, Bowie had released an earlier version of Hang Onto Yourself as a 1971 single under the name Arnold Corns. Was "Arnold Corns" a dry run for Ziggy Stardust?
Artist: Iggy And The Stooges
Title: Search And Destroy
Source: LP: Raw Power
Writer(s): Pop/Williamson
Label: Columbia
Year: 1973
Raw Power, the third album by the Stooges, saw the addition of James Williamson on guitar, with Ron Asheton moving over to bass to replace the departing Dave Alexander. Williamson also co-wrote all the songs on Raw Power with vocalist Iggy Pop. The album's opening track, Search And Destroy, has been called "an archetype for punk rock" and has been covered by numerous bands over the ensuing years.
Artist: Rare Bird
Title: Epic Forest
Source: British import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Epic Forest)
Writer(s): Rare Bird
Label: Polydor
Year: 1972
In late 1968 organist Graham Field placed a classified ad in a local music periodical looking for a pianist. In November David Kaffinetti responded to the ad, and the two of them began working on what would eventually become the band called Rare Bird. Yet more classified ads led to the eventual recruitment of vocalist/bassist Steve Gould and drummer Mark Ashton in August of 1969. Rare Bird was one of the first bands signed to Tony Stratton-Smith's Charisma label, but Field was not happy with the terms of the Charisma contract and left the band in 1971. After securing permission from Field to continue using the name Rare Bird, Gould and Kaffinetti recruited drummer Fred Kelly, guitarist Andy "Ced" Curtis and bassist Paul Karas to fill out the new lineup. This new version of Rare Bird signed with Polydor, releasing the album Epic Forest in 1972. Rare Bird was never a commercial success in their native England, however, and eventually disbanded in 1975.
Artist: Elton John
Title: Whenever You're Ready (We'll Go Steady Again) (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Source: British import EP: Four From Four Eyes
Writer(s): John/Taupin
Label: DJM
Year: 1973
Elton John gave us an unexpected present when he released Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting as a single in 1973: not one, but two non-LP B sides for the price of one. The second one, Whenever You're Ready (We'll Go Steady Again), features David Johnstone on slide guitar.
Artist: Wishbone Ash
Title: Jail Bait
Source: CD: Argus (bonus track originally released on promo EP: Live From Memphis)
Writer(s): Powell/Turner/Upton/Turner
Label: MCA/Decca
Year: 1972
On August 12, 1972, Wishbone Ash made an appearance at Memphis radio station WMC-FM, performing one song from their 1970 debut album, and two more from the 1971 LP Pilgrimage. The band was so pleased with the quality of the recordings that they released all three songs on an EP later that year...but only as a promotional record to other radio stations. All three songs, including Jail Bait, were included as bonus tracks on the 2002 remastered CD version of their third album, Argus.
Artist: Grand Funk Railroad
Title: I Want Freedom
Source: CD: Survival
Writer(s): Mark Farner
Label: Capitol
Year: 1971
After being savaged by the rock press for their first three studio albums, Grand Funk Railroad mellowed their hard rocking sound a bit with their 1971 LP Survival. It was the first Grand Funk album to feature keyboards (played by lead guitarist Mark Farner) extensively, as a listen to I Want Freedom, which opens side two of the album, demonstrates.
Artist: Ten Years After
Title: Circles
Source: CD: Cricklewood Green
Writer: Alvin Lee
Label: Chrysalis (original label: Deram)
Year: 1970
Cricklewood Green continued the development of Ten Years After away from its blues roots and toward a more progressive rock sound that would ultimately lead them to their only top 40 hit, I'd Love To Change The World. That song, however, was still a couple albums in the future when Cricklewood Green was released in 1970. The seldom-heard Circles is basically an acoustic solo number from Alvin Lee.
Artist: Badfinger
Title: Money
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Tom Evans
Label: Apple
Year: 1971
Although Pete Ham was the primary songwriter for Badfinger, bandmate Tom Evans was no slouch either, as can be heard on Money, the B side of Day After Day.
Artist: Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Title: Knife-Edge
Source: CD: Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Writer(s): Janocek, arr. Emerson/Lake/Palmer
Label: Rhino (original label: Cotillion)
Year: 1970
Starting with the release of their first self-titled LP, Emerson, Lake & Palmer were known for incorporating classical music into rock compositions. One of the earliest examples of this is Knife-Edge, an adaptation of the first movement of Leoš Janácek's Sinfonietta that incorporates a section of Johann Sebastian Bach's first French Suite in D minor as well. All this on a piece that rocks out as hard as, if not harder than, anything else released in 1970.
Artist: John Hammond
Title: Shake For Me
Source: LP: Duane Allman-An Anthology (originally released on LP: Southern Fried)
Writer(s): Willie Dixon
Label: Capricorn (original label: Atlantic)
Year: 1969
In 1969 blues singer/guitarist went to Alabama to record an album with several members of the famed Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. At the same time, guitarist Duane Allman was a frequent guest musician at Muscle Shoals in between gigs with his own group, the Allman Brother Band. Allman ended up playing on several tunes on Hammond's Southern Fried LP, including the album's opening track, a cover of Willie Dixon's Shake For Me. Following the death of Duane Allman in 1971, Capricorn Records compiled a double LP called Duane Allman-An Anthology that included highlights of his studio work at Muscle Shoals.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Beggar's Farm
Source: CD: This Was
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Parallels can be drawn between the early recordings of Jethro Tull and the American band Spirit. Both showed jazz influences that would be less prominent on later albums, but that helped both bands stand out from the pack on their respective debut LPs. An example of this can be heard on the track Beggar's Farm, an Ian Anderson tune from the first Jethro Tull album This Was.
Artist: Crosby, Stills & Nash
Title: Just A Song Before I Go
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Graham Nash
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1977
By the mid 1970s Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young were almost as well-known for their backstage fights as they were for the music they had made. In fact, after deja vu was released in 1970, it was seven years before even the original trio of David Crosby, Stephen Still and Graham Nash made another studio album, and even then Neil Young was conspicuously absent from the sessions. In spite of (or maybe because of) this, the 1977 LP CSN was an instant hit, peaking at #2 on the Billboard albums chart and going on to become their all-time best-selling album. The album also contained their only top 10 single, Nash's Just A Song Before I Go, which peaked at #7.
No comments:
Post a Comment