Tag Archives: Pop

John David Souther: John David Souther

JohnDavidSouther_JohnDavidSoutherThe debut of a ‘70s L.A. songwriter w/7 bonus tracks

Like many singer-songwriters, J.D. Souther is better known for songs performed by others, including the Eagles (“New Kid in Town”), Bonnie Raitt (“Run Like a Thief”) and Linda Ronstadt (“Faithless Love”), than for his own performances. But in the early ‘70s, the Detroit-to-Texas-to-Los Angeles transplant was introduced to David Geffen by his downstairs neighbor, Jackson Browne, and found himself signed to the nascent Asylum label. This 1972 debut features ten originals, and includes accompaniment by Souther’s then-roommate, Glenn Frey, as well as handpicked session stars Bryan Garafalo, Gary Mallaber, Wayne Perkins and Nashville West fiddler Gib Guilbeau.

The album’s sound helped develop the templates for ‘70s Southern California music, adding country to rock, while keeping the singer-songwriter sensibility front and center. The album was recorded at Pacific Recorders in Northern California, rather than one of the reigning L.A. studios, but you wouldn’t know it from the musical vibe. Souther sounds a bit like his pals Browne and Frey, and his songs have a similar shade of inviting introspection. In “Kite Woman,” which Souther had previously recorded with Frey as the duo Longbranch Pennywhistle, and “How Long,” you can hear the voice that would carry him forward, and the songwriting that would come to fit the Eagles. The latter song was in fact resurrected by the Eagles for their 2007 comeback Long Road Out of Eden.

The album failed to click commercially, and it would be four more years until Souther waxed his second solo effort, but the lack of sales doesn’t reflect on either the songs or the performances. Souther apparently didn’t have the commercial “it” of Browne, but his music is heartfelt and effective. Omnivore’s 2016 reissue augments the original ten tracks with seven period bonuses, including an alternate version of “Kite Woman” and six demos. The latter, stripped mostly to guitar and vocals, provide more intimate readings than the band versions, and include the otherwise unrecorded “One in the Middle.” Delivered in a digipack with a 12-page booklet, this is a worthy upgrade and a good introduction for those who haven’t yet dug J.D. Souther. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

J.D. Souther’s Home Page

Neil Sedaka: The Very Best Of (RCA)

NeilSedaka_TheVeryBestOfStereo catalog of Neil Sedaka’s late-50s and early-60s hits

Neil Sedaka topped the chart in 1974 with “Laughter in the Rain,” and as a songwriter with Captain and Tennille’s “Love Will Keep Us Together,” but these were far from his first brush with fame. In fact, this mid-70s resurgence (due in large part to his signing with Elton John’s Rocket Records) was a renewal of a talented Brill Building songsmith whose performing and songwriting success had tailed off a decade earlier in the wake of the British Invasion. From 1958 through 1966, Sedaka recorded charmingly boyish hit records for RCA, falling out of the Top 40 in 1964 with the arrival of the Beatles. This fourteen track collection includes all thirteen of Sedaka’s Top 40 sides for RCS, as well as one that just missed (“I Go Ape,” #42/1959). This represents the core of Sedaka’s first run of fame, including his chart-topping original version of “Breaking Up is Hard To Do” and the icons “Calendar Girl,” “Happy Birthday, Sweet Sixteen” and “Next Door to an Angel.” All of the sides are presented in true stereo, which will make some collectors happy, but begs Real Gone or Bear Family to step up and release the original mono singles. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Bon Scott: Early Years 1967-1972

BonScott_EarlyYears19861972Bon Scott’s pre-AC/DC pop, rock and soul sides

Bon Scott was so compelling as the howling front-man of AC/DC that it’s nearly impossible to imagine the more tender pop vocals of his earlier years. Compiled here are twenty-two tracks that Scott recorded with his earlier groups, The Valentines and Fraternity, in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Highlights include an Everlys-ish take on Phil Spector’s “To Know Him is to Love Him,” a soulful version of Arthur Alexander’s “Every Day I Have to Cry,” covers of the Small Faces, Soft Machine and Steppenwolf, and songs from the Easybeats’ Vanda & Young.

Hints of Scott’s distinctive tone can be heard, but the material, vocals and arrangements are drawn from the pop, rock and soul music of their times, rather than the hard-rock of AC/DC. By the time the Scott joined Fraternity in 1970, his more familiar bluesy phrasings began to emerge, but not yet with the full-blown leer he’d bring to AC/DC. Diehard fans will enjoy hearing Scott’s evolution towards his famous style, as will those interested in late ’60s pop and early ’70s blues-rock. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Brett Harris: Up in the Air

BrettHarris_UpInTheAirSuper sophomore release from a pop acolyte

Touring as a member of the dBs and the Big Star Third tribute cast, Harris had the opportunity to spend time making music with (and playing the music of) many of pop’s purest purveyors. His second full-length album is indebted to the Beatles, particularly on the Revolver-esque opener “End of the Rope” and the descending line of “Shadetree,” but you can also hear the influence of the dBs, Big Star, Badfinger and many others throughout the album. It’s not a period piece, but Harris makes no attempt to hide his musical lineage. The clarinet-led breakdown of “Lies” echoes the music hall influences that also struck Paul McCartney and Ray Davies, and the crooned vocal of “Out of the Blue” suggests Nilsson and Eric Carmen.

Harris’ southern connections surface in the soulful horns of side one’s closer (that’s right, the CD divides the song list into two five-song halves) “High Times,” sounding like something the Box Tops would have recorded for a B-side. The vibe continues in the organ lined “Rumor,” with sophisticated drumming and a lonely trumpet adding dramatic touches. You can continue to spot influences (early-70s Fleetwood Mac on the coincidentally named “Rumor,” and Todd Rundgren on the closing “Spanish Moss”), but Harris runs through his musical gears so smoothly as to turn his antecedents into jazz-like quotes rather than whole-cloth sources. The shadings have grown finer and more diverse in the six years since his debut, but the craft has been in place since Man of Few Words hit the racks in 2010.

Harris doesn’t often write directly from life, but he dips into personal heartbreak and indecision for “Lies,” singing memorable lyrics (“seems my mind’s made up, but my heart it feels so hollow, the unintended consequence of bitter pills I had to swallow”) with a Dylan-y rasp. Even without specific biographical details, Harris’ songs are clearly rooted in experience as he sings of damaging suspicions, healing hearts stumbling onto hope and cautious entry into new relationships. The Durham-area backing musicians are as talented and well-schooled as Harris himself, providing arrangements that are deep and surprising, such as the backwards guitar solo layered on the strings and bass of “Summer Night.” Harris has a lot of fans – famous and otherwise – and they’ll be happy to find their outsized expectations fulfilled by this terrific album. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Brett Harris’ Home Page

Brian Ritchey: Bordeaux

BrianRitchey_BordeauxFollowing Justin Townes Earle’s advice to “write what you know”

Nashvillian Brian Ritchey has been something of a chameleon as he’s rambled through Americana (E.P.), garage pop and singer-songwriter crooning (If I Were a Painter), and even an ambitious concept album (No Way Out of This House). It’s a sophisticated. disparate catalog threaded with a Southern sensibility that links to this latest full-length release. His earlier notes of Americana, garage blues, soul and singer-songwriter are here, alongside twangier bits of country and hummable pop-rock, but the arrangements are more straightforward and more quickly ingratiating than his last outing.

The songs suggest the Band (“Victory March”), canyon country (“We’re Just Wrong”), Pet Sounds-era Beach Boys (the clip-clop waltz time of “Someone Else”) and even Screaming Jay Hawkins (“Rest My Head”). Ritchey sings of yearning, getting by, breaking away and moving on, and his downbeat topics will surprise those who first latch onto his incredibly hummable hooks. The album strikes defiant notes with “I’m Not Gone” and “Not Today,” but Ritchey more often seems to grapple with a world he can only react to rather than impact, turning autobiographical seeds into compelling vignettes that could just as easily be the listener’s truth as they are the singer’s. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Brian Ritchey’s Home Page

Queen of Jeans: EP

This Philadelphia quartet’s first two tracks (“Dance (Get Off Your Ass)” and “Rollerdyke“) are now expanded with four additions into a eponymous EP, streamable below, downloadable from Bandcamp, and buyable as a vinyl 12″ from Third Uncle. The new songs are just as mesmerizing in their nods to 1960s girl groups and lush 1990s alternatives run through a dreamy DIY psych aesthetic. Great stuff!

And while you’re here, check out their live set for WXPN:

Roy Orbison: One of the Lonely Ones

RoyOrbison_OneOfTheLonelyOnesMysteriously unreleased 1969 album has several treasures

With an artist of Roy Orbison’s stature, it’s hard to imagine how a fully finished album could simply slip through the cracks of a major label’s release machinery. But such is the case for this 1969 set, which sat in the vaults unheard by the public for nearly fifty years. Released in conjunction with an exhaustive 13-disc box set of Orbison’s MGM albums and singles, one might get the impression that his output was simply too much for the market to handle, but a closer look at this period suggests MGM was losing faith in Orbison’s commercial potential. At the time this album was shelved, 1967’s Cry Softly for the Lonely One had failed to chart, its title single had failed to crack the Top 40, and 1968 found Orbison retreating from the road while he recovered from the death of his two oldest sons.

By early 1969 Orbison was back in the studio, recording the material that would become this unissued album. He paused the sessions for a Spring tour, and reconvened in Summer to finish an album that should have been released in November. And then… nothing. MGM sat on the album, and waited until the next year to release the covers set, Hank Williams the Roy Orbison Way. MGM whiffed again the same year by failing to release The Big O in the US, adding to the picture of a label that no longer believed in its artist. But as both the box set and this newly released album confirm, Orbison’s MGM catalog is filled with excellent, if not always hit single material. In light of the quality, Orbison’s contention that his releases weren’t promoted properly (or, in several cases, actually released) weighs heavily.

One of the Lonely Ones combines catchy original material (co-written with Bill Dees), with covers of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Mickey Newbury and Don Gibson. Like many of Orbison’s MGM albums, there are songs that might have been hits, just not in the year they were released. The wounded falsetto of “Laurie” would have done well in 1963-4, but was out of time for 1969. The personal context in which Orbison sang the title track elevates its drama, and with Elvis having charted “If I Can Dream,” one is left to wonder how this would have fared as a single. Same for “Give Up,” which could have found room on the country chart. This is among the better albums Orbison’s recorded for MGM, and a welcome addition to his legacy. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Roy Orbison’s Home Page

Alan Price: Savaloy Dip

AlanPrice_SavaloyDipLost 1974 solo album from the Animals’ Alan Price

Though Eric Burdon’s voice crowned the Animals’ sound, founding keyboardist Alan Price’s contributions were equally seminal. He brought the group a deep feel for R&B, blues and jazz, organ sounds that provided some of the band’s most memorable hooks, and songwriting chops that paired with Burdon’s. Though his run with the Animals ended in 1965, his solo career took off quickly, with singles and solo albums charting in the UK into the 1970s. This 1974 album came between his critically acclaimed soundtrack for O Lucky Man! and the socially astute Between Today and Yesterday. Incredibly, though the album was fully finished, artistically successful and had obvious commercially potential, it was released only briefly on 8-track tape and then recalled.

No one associated with the album recalls exactly why it was shelved, nor can anyone explain why it’s taken more than forty years to escape the vault. Price is in perfect form throughout, weaving together R&B, blues, soul, jazz, boogie, pop, rock and music hall sounds. It’s not unlike the post-British Invasion reach of Ray Davies and the Kinks, but eschews Davies’ concept album excess. The opening “Smells Like Lemon, Tastes Like Wine” borrows easily from Eric Burdon’s “Spill the Wine” and tinges the song with the rye attitude of Jerry Reed. Price’s extended piano solo on “You Won’t Get Me” is superb, and his organ keys the trad-jazz cross-dressing tale “Willie the Queen,” a song whose momentary Leon Redbone impression is apt.

Price’s songs are imaginative, delving into autobiography, nostalgia, social commentary and historical portraiture, and his voice, which was always worthy of the spotlight, is particularly flexible and compelling here. He sings soulfully, struts to the New Orleans ramble of the title track, and scats as an overdubbed chorus for the homespun story of small pleasures, “Country Life.” His fondness for Randy Newman comes through on the original “And So Goodbye,” and the album’s one cover, “Over and Over Again” is given a broad, circus-styled arrangement. From opening song to closing, this is a fine album, and one of the best in Price’s catalog. That it’s only finding proper release 42 years after the fact is both a shame and a delight. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

John David Souther: Black Rose

JohnDavidSouther_BlackRoseJ.D. Souther’s 1976 sophomore solo album reissued with bonuses

After releasing his 1972 self-titled debut (which has been concurrently reissued with seven bonus tracks), J.D. Souther joined with Chris Hillman and Richie Furay to release two albums as the Souther-Hillman-Furay Band. So it wasn’t until 1976 that he returned with this second solo album, produced by the red hot Peter Asher, and featuring performances from Lowell George, Joe Walsh, Waddy Wachtel, Jim Keltner and Andrew Gold, Linda Ronstadt, David Crosby, Art Garfunkel, Don Henley, Glenn Frey and other luminaries. The album is more refined and musically expansive than the debut, and Souther sounds more assured as he lets his songs unfold and reach beyond a singer-songwriter style.

Souther draws upon an expanded set of musical roots and allows himself to linger, as on the gospel-tinged vocal coda of “If You Have Crying Eyes.” Souther and Asher let the performance build to a crescendo and then wind down with emotional vocalizing atop the backing of Asher, Gold and Ronstadt. The musicianship is more sophisticated as well, with the opening “Banging My Head Against the Moon” taking on an island tone as the rhythm guitar, drums and Paul Stallworth’s bass provide intricate accompaniment. By 1976 Asher was hitting full stride as a producer, with seminal albums by James Taylor, Tony Joe White and Linda Ronstadt under his belt, and he helps Souther draw something deeper from his music.

Comparing the demo of “Silver Blue” to the album track, the song’s despairing, open-ended questions become more nuanced, and Stanley Clark’s beautiful double bass adds a duet voice. The recording is a textbook example of how instrumentation can reinforce and amplify a song’s tone, as does Donald Byrd’s flugelhorn on the late night “Midnight Prowl.” David Campbell’s arrangement of cello and flute on “Faithless Love” isn’t as surprising, but provides interesting contrast to Souther’s blue, crooned notes, and strings also add drama to “Doors Swing Open.” The latter’s wariness of hollow relationships weaves into Souther’s pessimistic tapestry of romantic turmoil, unrequited love and lost partners, culminating in the title song’s funereal symbol.

The album didn’t launch any singles onto the chart, though “Simple Man, Simple Dreams,” blossomed into a Ronstadt title song and inspired the title of her autobiography. But even with only limited commercial success (charting at #85), the album was a fuller expression of Souther’s music than was the debut, and remains a high point of his catalog. Omnivore’s 2016 reissue adds five demos, a live version of “Faithless Love,” and “Cheek to Cheek” from Lowell George’s Thanks I’ll Eat it Here. The demos highlight songs recorded earlier (by Ronstadt and Souther-Hillman-Furay) and later (by Souther), which are worth hearing, but don’t expound upon the album itself. Buy this for the original ten tracks, enjoy an under-heralded mid-70s classic, and get bonus tracks in the bargain. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

J.D. Souther’s Home Page