Ah, the bicentennial. For '76 I went with a band that never got it's due among the Pantheon of great hard rock bands: Rainbow. Rainbow could rock with the best of them. Originally formed when Ritchie Blackmore felt Deep Purple was going in the wrong direction, he along with members of the American band Elf (featuring 5'4 lead singer & inventor of the devil horns, Ronnie James Dio), got together. (Side note: there is a statue erected in Bulgaria in honor of Dio.)
The problem with the band was that the leader singer role was a revolving door. They probably had their most commercial success in 1982 with Joe Lynn Turner and "Stone Cold."
To me the best era of the band was the middle one with Graham Bonnet taking lead vocals. The problem was, he didn't look like a hard rock singer of the mid '70's. He had short hair and wore suits. Not real fitting for a band that features the guy who wrote "Smoke on the Water." Anyway, the Russ Ballard penned "Since You've Been Gone" is a '70's rock favorite of mine. Rainbow and Thin Lizzy are the two bands from that era that I always felt never got their due; but a black-Irish bass playing lead singer is a story for another time. Enjoy.
This Melbourne band is totally a Sirius XMU find. I really dig the interplay between the jangly and the surf-rock sound in their guitars on this track.
I am enjoying your year-by-year run-through of the 1970s and now that you're halfway through, I feel like it's time I posted my response. Here are my choices for the first half of the decade - 1970-75.
1970 - "After the Gold Rush" - Neil Young
Dreams, visions, hallucinations and UFOs. That's what I think of when I think of the 1970s. I'm certain I heard the Prelude version of this song from the 1980s before I discovered the original, and Young's emotions really come through. Even if he has no idea what he's singing about. Dolly Parton tells the story of when she covered the song with Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris: "When we were doing the Trio album, I asked Linda and Emmy what it meant, and they didn't know. So we called Neil Young, and he didn't know. We asked him, flat out, what it meant, and he said, 'Hell, I don't know. I just wrote it. It just depends on what I was taking at the time. I guess every verse has something different I'd taken.'" Exactly.
1971 - "Life on Mars?" - David Bowie
Is there a more beautifully uplifting melody in the Bowie catalog? The lyrics are utterly surreal, quite like Bowie himself at the time. And the video is actually Bowie's fourth --pretty amazing considering this is 1971!
1972 - "Pink Moon" - Nick Drake
If you're of a certain age, you first heard this song thanks to a stirring Volkswagen TV commercial. Nick Drake's quiet beauty - and his melancholy - will probably never be matched.
1973 - "Do the Strand" - Roxy Music
This might be the most fertile year, musically speaking, of the early half of the decade. I could have easily gone with "Search and Destroy" by Iggy and the Stooges (and run the risk of being branded a Wes Anderson devotee what with Iggy and "Life on Mars" from 1971.) And while I always loved the song "Future Days" by Can, I have to give the nod to Roxy Music. They were far ahead of their time, taking glam to new levels of artistry and bringing experimentalism to the mainstream. They were also hugely influential -- on the punks and the New Wavers that came along a few years later. And they were visual pioneers as well, preoccupied with style and glamor.
1974 - "Autobahn" - Kraftwerk
This was music that the world hadn't yet heard. And it changed the shape of music for decades to come. Kraftwerk spawned new wave, electro, even hip hop and techno. Theirs is an enormous legacy -- and easily one of the most lasting and most diverse of any single artist. Plus their video paved the way for one of our all-time heroes Gary Numan.
1975 - "Make Me Smile" - Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel
1975 was a tough choice. It seems to be a particularly barren year, musically. Sure, Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run" is an easy way to go. And Dylan released Blood on the Tracks. But from there, it's a big drop. "Low Rider" by War? Foghat's "Slow Ride"? Glen Campbell's "Rhinestone Cowboy" ("Wichita Lineman" and "Galveston" are far better songs) Or "Jive Talkin'" by the Bee Gees? (No offense to the late Robin Gibb.) But this glam rock classic was covered by over 100 other artists, including Duran Duran, Erasure and The Wedding Present. Perhaps the best thing about 1975 are the terrific years that come after it, which we'll get to in future posts.
Yes, 1975 was the year of Born to Run, but to ruffle feathers, I went with Three Dog Night's "Shambala." 3DN covered the song, but theirs is the one most known to all. The song really stuck with me after watching one of the only "feel-good" episodes of Lost, as Hurley, Charlie, Jin & Sawyer get the VW bus working again.
Here are the boys in their heyday (bell bottoms, feathered hair,etc) with the feel good song:
Another day, another obituary. Doc Watson, the legendary blind folk, bluegrass and bluesman, is dead at the age of 89. Watson mastered the electric guitar at a young age, teaching himself how to play fiddle tunes on his Les Paul. By the 1960s folk revival, he ditched the electric and focused exclusively on the acoustic and the banjo, a move that launched his career.
I always liked his version of "Shady Grove". It features Doc's spectacular picking on the banjo along with his unassuming vocals.
If I were to build a Mt. Rushmore of Canadian musicians, I would have to pick Neil Young, Rush & Gordon Lightfoot (sorry Bryan Adams, Triumph, April Wine, etc.) Gordon Lightfoot is a cool dude. In college, I bought a used copy of Gord's Gold in a dollar bin. After going away one weekend, someone stole my copy. The secret society of Gord fans exists! I think I saw him perform in Colorado, but I'm not really sure. he looked like him, and sang his songs, but I walked in late and randomly sat at the bar. In Aspen, many people look like Gord.
To me, "Sundown" is a classic 70's song. Smooth guitar, and great lyrics that really fit the era: "I can see her lookin' fast in her faded jeans/She's a hard lovin' woman, got me feelin' mean." Good stuff Gord.
Last week I posted about the return of the dB's. That got me thinking about all those bands from the 80s that put towns like Athens, Georgia and Winston-Salem, North Carolina on the indie music map.
One of the more luminary figures of the era was Mitch Easter, a childhood friend of dB's bassist Chris Stamey. Easter is best known as the producer of bands like R.E.M., Pavement, Marshall Crenshaw and Suzanne Vega. But he also fronted the band Let's Active. And in 1984, they released their debut album Cypress, which features a gem called "Every Word Means No." Here's the video:
Cypress also includes "Easy Does", another great jangle pop tune.
