Blues Explosion “Extra Width”

I preferred to alphabetize the band as “Blues Explosion” rather than wait for later in the alphabet (and be faced with alphabetizing dilemmas–Spencer, Jon Spencer, The Jon Spencer?)– but this is indeed The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, one of my all time favorite bands, I’ll admit right away. This isn’t my favorite of their records (and I haven’t even HEARD all their records) but it’s pretty solid. Also nice is that it’s a record–one of the newest in the current collection I’m writing about– though it’s from 1993– which now seems as long ago as The Fifties. The boys look pretty young in their individual Richard Kern glamour portraits– Jon Spencer’s, on the cover, which should have sold a record or two, is particularly striking with all the stuff in his hair and his Kuchar-esque eyebrows. Hell– I’D buy that guy a double bourbon!

There’s even some pointless liner notes on the back, for an old-fashioned touch– by Herb Hitts– a description of a live show that is so generalized and cliché-ridden it may as well say, “they rocked” with one fist in the air. Is it meant to be ironic? While I think it is — the once ironic fist in the air, and heavy metal fist in the air, and expression “rocked!” — once intended to be ironic, is no longer taken, or even intended that way– so what you have instead is a willful reduction of the IQ by half. But with this band there is no discussing irony or sincerity, they are so far beyond those considerations, you can’t figure it out and you shouldn’t try. Though, I can imagine if I was in a band with Jon Spencer I might at some point beg him to “please sing normal for once!” I might roll my eyes violently when he comes into rehearsal with a song called “Back Slider.” It might lead to a fight, someone walking out on the session, sulking on a bar stool, but would any of that be real or just another episode in a cheap paperback version of the life of a blues band that’s a rock band and a punk band?

I guess the question with this band will always be (as it is with every band): are they just an act– are they merely ABOUT what they seem to be, or are they the real thing? I have had the benefit of seeing a live show a few years back (maybe the last live show I’ve seen) where that question was answered; either they were the real thing, or else the real thing doesn’t really exist. Which might be the case. As time goes on and layers of history are peeled away, and you closely examine what you considered the important bands from your past, you find out they were ALL acts. The only thing that is real are the rare moments when no one was looking, the mistakes, and the tiny miracles that occasionally transcend the cement weighted egos and vanities.

But enough about me. This record is the kind of record, unfortunately rare, that I always prefer to listen to all the way through. I love some of it and hate some of it, but to isolate individual songs seems pointless. It all runs together the way a record album should. I’ve listened to it now hundreds of times, but I couldn’t tell you what a single song title is or what any of them are about. There’s a lot of grunting, groaning, screaming, unsettling noises, and then suddenly you find yourself in a groove that you wish you never had to leave. The guy’s singing “typecast” but he may as well be singing “hotpants” – guitars are destroyed, and the side is over.

To all of you in the CD generation, you will, I’m sure, not believe me when I tell you that you will never, ever be able to understand the singular, sublime pleasure of turning a record over and putting the needle on the second side. After some Elvis from hell bullshit, we again find ourselves in a groove that is over far too soon. Then some kind of an incomprehensible plodding noise out of which suddenly can be heard the phrase: “a Roy Rogers roast beef sandwich!” Probably the high point of my life. Then an instrumental funk groove that serves a similar function as when, in certain times and certain cultures, one would excuse oneself from the table to gracefully throw up. Followed by an unpleasant exorcism of a song– but it all works together, because then you get to the last song on the record, which is also the best, and it’s like you endured your dreadful vegetables, formalities, and pleasantries so that you can be rewarded with (your favorite dessert here). Bon appetit!

Black Sabbath “Vol. 4″

Why I never had this album, which came out in 1972, in my adolescent record collection, is beyond me, since I had “Master of Reality” from the year before and I loved that one—particularly the song “Sweet Leaf.” Even as a lad, I thought it was both funny and awesome, simultaneously, though I’m sure I didn’t use the word “awesome” at that time. I probably thought it was “bad”— which in 1971 meant awesome.

So I’ve never put this one on a turntable until now, and it’s pretty satisfying. The first song, “Wheels of Confusion” starts out with some guitar excess that sounds just like Pink Floyd, and you have to wonder if it was a joke. Pink FLOYD… Black SABBATH—get it? Then it goes right into that super heavy, super slow, simple guitar heavy metal that I love so much, and it’s like eight minutes long, too! The next song, “Tomorrow’s Dream”—if you were ever going to put a heavy metal song into a time capsule and send it out into space—to represent “Heavy Metal”—this would be the song. “Changes” kind of brings me down, even though it’s so obviously pretty and an allowable step in a different direction. “Supernaut” brings you back to where your heavy metal brain wants to be—insane!

Side two is much of the same, with Ozzy working the brain/insane rhyme which he had been, was, and would continue to make a career out of. Actually, I don’t know how many times he or anyone else used that rhyme, and I’m sure not going to pursue it! There are some pretty obvious drug references—a clue: if someone in rock music mentions “snow” it has nothing to do with weather. Everybody back then wrote about drugs a lot… you’d think they were IN LOVE with drugs! Try to find someone from 1972 who WASN’T writing songs about drugs—that is the real challenge.

The cover is a classic high contrast photo of Ozzy that’s as boring as it is iconic. The inside cover is nicer, with, apparently large color photo pages of the band—most of which are missing in this tattered copy—though there is a good picture of Tony Iommi, who was one of the more cool looking guys in rock from that time, in my opinion. The band wishes to thank, in the credits, “COKE-Cola”—apparently they were the first ones ever to make that Coca-cola/cocaine connection, and for that we owe them a great debt.

George Benson “Weekend in LA”

Ever since the suffering, bored days of high school, I’ve always considered George Benson’s 1976 milestone, “Breezin’” as shorthand for “insipid.” So it was with great trepidation that I put on this double, LIVE, LP from two years later, the dreaded cultural abyss of 1978. But to my surprise, I’m rather enjoying this low key, smooth jazz experience—really, I’m not kidding. I’ve graced my turntable and neighbors with this LP more than a few times lately. Perhaps I have mellowed like a fine wine. I’m not exactly coming home from school, putting on the Sex Pistols, and pounding a quart of hard cider like I was doing in the days this was pressed. No, these days Ray Speen has used his crack pipe to prop up the wobbly leg of his game table where he’s slowly working on an enormous jigsaw puzzle of the Taj Mahal. That image in the reflecting pool—as still and perfect as it is—just drives you crazy! But that’s another subject.

At first I thought this was a single record, as the second disk is gone. Then I noticed that I was in possession of Record 1 Side I, backed with Record 1 Side IV. That’s Roman numeral “4″ for all you intravenous drug abusers who can’t get their minds off the dope. Try a jigsaw puzzle, really. The best song is on side “IV”—the awesome Leon Russell’s “Lady Blue.” Other standouts are “Weekend in LA”, which could be synonymous with “mellow,” and “On Broadway” which could maybe be the theme song for everything in the 1970s I’d like to forget. But in a good way. You can barely tell this is a live record, the audience is so subdued; they sound like they’re all sitting in comfortable seats next to blonde ladies, sipping gin sours.

The cover is as equally classic, with “George Benson” “signed” in red neon, and George assuming the (strictly reserved for superstars) Jesus on the cross pose, that is if Jesus had been gripping a hollowbody, George Benson signature Ibanez in one hand, which, who knows, maybe he was. There are a couple more good pictures of GB, and really, he’s got one of the best moustaches of all time. This could very well be my moustache model for my new look. I’m already, as it is well known, fond of those open collars big enough to double as a jib, Genoa, or even a mainsail. Not something you’d want to wear on the high seas, but fine for tropical, LA nights.

Jeff Beck “There and Back”

Trying to write about these five or so Jeff Beck albums is the hardest thing I’ve ever tried to do– it’s kind of like the aural equivalent of scaling a virtually unlistenable replication of Mount Everlast or something, made especially difficult without an oxygen tank or being allowed to overuse the “W” word. This record from 1980– was ever there more deadening, time to stop reading and do the crossword puzzle, words as “this record from 1980?” (Unless it’s “this record from 1988.”)

I just checked my statcounter and my readership has fallen to ONE PERSON– who I suspect is Mr. Beck himself. Fortunately he is also checking my statcounter or we might end up in quite a “row.” Seeing how he virtually invented the sleeveless look, I suspect he still works out– something I ceased to do long, long ago, unless you count working out Lil’ Ray.

I’ve never been to the Rock’n’roll Hall of Fame, but I wonder if there is a Disney Animatronic version of a guitar store complete with the annoying customer running though every guitar cliché known to man, sponsored by Applebee’s America’s Favorite Neighborhood Grill. Free downloadable Hollywood bad girls nude wallpaper free flat tummy tips and debt counseling I found you a job! Is there a large electronic billboard like the stock market or something with the top selling records of all time, or at least the “Dark Side of the Moon” ongoing sales statistics, and the Rolling Stone greatest guitar wankers of all time, Jeff Beck currently ranked at 14 but looking to crack the top ten with continued collaborations with unlistenable contemporaries. But I like Jeff Beck, don’t get me wrong. I love the man. He doesn’t make me listen to these records, and he sure as hell isn’t the one paying me $9 an hour to review them!

One big, huge complaint. The album cover, which is simply the name in white, in stencil letters on a black background in fake leatherette (meaning it’s a fake version of a fake version of a fake version– how self-aware is that?) is one of like A MILLION record album covers (if you don’t have records and would rather hear me complain about CDs, stop reading NOW) that have an image and/or words on the cover and then some other image or words on the back cover set SIDEWAYS– that is on a 90 degree difference from the front. As record albums are SQUARE, it is hard or impossible to tell, when this happens, which side is up, and which side faces to the right, where the opening is where the record is inserted. Sometimes, even, the record goes in the top rather than the side. And sometimes, as in this case, the printing on the back is presented sideways, at least in relation to that of the cover. I’m sure the people designing the records find this playful. I find it incredibly annoying.

Jeff Beck “with the Jan Hammer Group Live”

If that title makes you say, “Uh-oh,” you’re right. You’ve got to love the live album, though. By 1977 people still weren’t embarrassed by it, I guess. The rising crowd noise, obviously manipulated, the out of breath utterances of the rock star… There was never any need to make “Spinal Tap 2″ because you have all the endless, endless shit that Spinal Tap was making fun of.

This is the Jan Hammer that did the excellent Miami Vice Theme, so I don’t think he’s so much to blame here. There are these sections of pretty listenable light funk, but it always devolves into some kind of pretentious, unpleasant statement of virtuosity. Every song seems like two songs, an okay one that teases you, followed by utter crap. During one song on the second side they momentarily go into the “Stoll On/Train Kept a Rollin’” thing, and it sounds just right and heavy, but it’s just like the sugar to attempt to make palatable the unbearable jazz/rock fusion to follow.

Most notable is the back cover of the album with a photo of Hammer and Beck, presumably playing live, slapped down with the most amateurish cut and paste technique I’ve seen in recent memory. I mean, these days, even quickly done grocery store newspaper inserts are pretty sophisticated, but this bit of nostalgia is back from when it was done by hand. But was it done by hand WHILE DRUNK, or what? It literally looks like the photo was cut out in about three minutes– a six year old would do a much more careful job. And weirder, great care was taken to cut out the microphone that is over the drums, but where is the drummer? Cut out completely! It is actually too weirdly bad to accept that it was just sloppy; I have to think it was purposely evoking cheap Kinko’s flyer style of the time, and in that, it’s pretty excellent!

Jeff Beck “Wired”

Pretty much exactly like “Blow By Blow” but worse–but let me think about 1976. Wait, I’d rather NOT think about 1976. That’s when this record came out, by the way. Jeff Beck has found some peers, on this record. They have an uncanny ability to come up with unpleasant chords and progressions with great frequency. They have an uncanny ability to play something that sounds like it could be the soundtrack of a sleazy, Blaxploitation film, and then turn on a dime and turn in into something that sounds like it could be the soundtrack to a suburban, white, Christian, feelgood, moralistic afterschool special. They have an uncanny ability to render me, as a listener, fatigued.

Jeff Beck Group “Rough and Ready”

Did Helen Reddy ever put out an album with the title “Rough and Ready”? Or “Rough and Reddy”? I’d pay good money for that one! About 49 cents (and then only if it had a picture of a clown on the cover– for which I have a particular weakness).

This is the third Jeff Beck Group record, from 1971, and it sounds worlds away from the first record– which partly has to do with it being a completely different band. The only surviving member is… you guessed it. The sound is somehow really contemporary, like this could have come out in 2008– and at the same time sounds like it was dated even in 1971. The singer makes you REALLY MISS Rod Stewart, who, I understand, was in the hospital at the time this record was recorded, having his stomach pumped as the result of having spent too much time with excessive noodlers. Jeff Beck’s guitar playing has also evolved. Where he used to play 10 notes where one would do, he now gets by with 47. I have to admit that my copy here is in really bad shape, but I can tell that these cats are working overtime to remove the soulfulness from R&B.

The cover is remarkable, with five black and white photographs that reveal every bump, pore, and blemish on the faces of these guys, who could easily have been known as Jeff Beck and his band of lycanthropes. It is refreshing to see that they didn’t let airbrushes, makeup, or even shaving cream or razors anywhere near the photo session. The funniest thing is that while you’re listening to this virtual sex on vinyl, and your album cover is leaning up against the stereo or beanbag chair, these five guys are staring at you rather creepily. So you turn the cover around, and viola!– on the back cover: the SAME FIVE PHOTOGRAPHS! Either someone was really lazy or had a really warped sense of humor.

Jeff Beck “Truth”

This is the first Jeff Beck Group album, put out in 1968, and it starts off really well with a very weird version of the familiar Yardbirds song, “Shapes of Things.” It sounds like the tape is being sped up and slowed down–it’s really kind of playful and heavy at the same time. Jeff Beck’s liner notes say, about the song, “appropriate background music if you have the Vicar over for tea.” The next song, “Let Me Love You”– I will argue without even listening to anything else recorded by Jeff Beck in 40 years– is the best thing ever recorded by Jeff Beck. It’s got a nice bass part– maybe that’s why I like it– played by, apparently, Ron Wood—that sounds like a sleazy guy with a tiny moustache crawling through the slime and smoke of all the late night taverns of hell. But there are already warning signs of wanky guitar ahead. The singer sounds suspiciously like Rod Stewart– oh, it is! Four songs through side one, and it’s a great party record– I’ve already ripped the tabs off of three Stroh’s. And then… “Ol’ Man River”?

I guess this is back when rock stars thought they were gods, and they were, essentially. (They still THINK they’re gods.) They could do no wrong. So if they want to do a pretentious, uncompelling version of “Ol’ Man River” on their record, we just have to say it’s cool. But it just killed the party, that’s for sure. Turn the record over and it gets WORSE. A ridiculous acoustic version of “Greensleeves” starts off side two, and even though it’s only 1:47, the girls have left the party, went off with the dangerous Led Zeppelin guys. No one left but us blues aficionados and guitar technicians, so there’s nothing left to do but practice and practice, make that guitar sing. It sounds like a snake charmer, a cello, a violin… but then heavy metal strikes back momentarily. But the girls are still gone, and now there’s an EIGHT minute blues song with a fake “live” treatment that flashes forward 40 years to these guys playing dinner theater, bald, huge stomachs, and still, tragically, either puffy sleeves or no sleeves.

I’m being too hard on this record, maybe– there’s a really weird piano solo on this long blues number, played by Nicky Hopkins. But the guitar– I’m sorry we have the benefit and misfortune of 40 years of bad, excessive, uninspired, derivative guitar solos since this record was recorded. Maybe back then this sounded amazing– but I just don’t think so. The last song just embarrassed me for even owning a guitar and makes me want to cut my hair and do volunteer work or something.

Be Bop Deluxe “Axe Victim”

I listened to this record with great anticipation, not having any recollection of what this band sounded like, even though I remember the name well, from my youth. To my surprise it sounds more like David Bowie than anything, though not quite, kind of like that parallel universe Bowie created for the movie “Velvet Goldmine” by a lot of musicians, but most notably Brian Eno and Bryan Ferry. And I suppose you could say this sounds a lot like Roxy Music, but I never listened to that much Roxy Music, it was Bowie for me. I never listened to ANY Be Bop Deluxe– how did that happen? I would have loved this record had I bought it when it came out in 1974 when I was a huge glam rock fan and really into the whole androgynous sci-fi thing, and still a little afraid of the Rolling Stones. I pretty much know for a fact that guitar excess didn’t bother me as much then as it does now– and there is plenty of excess here! This is pretty much Bill Nelson’s band– not the Bill Nelson who is the Florida Senator who flew on the Space Shuttle– though this Bill Nelson has just as effectively seen the heavens firsthand on his six-string rocketship. The title “Axe Victim” could very well refer to the ears of the listener who is not somehow immune to this sort of thing. I mean, if you removed about two fingers on one hand and three on another, this guy could be a great guitar player. This record could be convincing argument for religious leaders not to condemn masturbation, just so young boys will have something to do with their hands besides practice, practice, practice. I’ve just got to say, if you really want to play with the London Philharmonic, get a fucking violin!

But for all that, somehow, perhaps against my better judgment, I really like this record! Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised, as it comes out of my favorite era of rock, the early seventies. And that should surprise no one– just look at my hair! Okay, I admit, I’m stuck a little in that time period, forever trying to relive the weird trippy sensation I had when I brought home that “Diamond Dogs” album from the Ontario store. Anyway, I’ve been listening to this thing over and over, and the more I listen to it the more I like it. The guitar still sounds tremendously overdone, like 300 notes where you could get by more effectively with one, but the singing is quite compelling, and most of the songs are great. Actually, the songs are all over the place, some much better than others, but together as a whole, and specifically as a record album with two sides, they really work together as a whole. The album cover is better not mentioned– I won’t describe it, and if you don’t remember it, believe me– don’t go searching it out. The back cover, however, is classic– a picture of the band– looking more goth than glam, almost– and there is every indication that if you were Bill Nelson’s lover, you’d always be in second place.

But really– I love this record– this is just the kind of thing that finding in some dingy basement could really make you have faith in the idea that there are still great things out there that you have somehow overlooked. I am going to go so far as to go out and buy myself a cassette tape device and record this in a lovely analogue fashion. I might ever go a little further and look up Bill Nelson on the internet. Well, actually I already did, a little bit. It kind of makes me happy, for once, that he’s still out there, maybe in space, making music.

Average White Band “Soul Searching”

It’s hard to figure out why I like this record so much, because for one thing, it’s AWB, after all, a band I never liked. But this turned out to be my summer record this year—that happens sometimes—a single record becomes the soundtrack for an entire season. It’s usually summer, when you’re lazier, slower moving, and the right thing just settles into your heat-compromised brain. My notes on this record are as follows, starting with July 8, 2008: “Overture” is my favorite. It’s not bad. Good. Too hot to really think soundtrack. Lot’s of band-in-the-studio pics. Good basketball music. I’m obsessed with it. Best: “Overture,” “I’m the One” (15-60-75), “Sunny Days”—great soul song. (End of notes.)

I’m not totally convinced that they sound much like 15-60-75 (The Numbers Band) but that one song always makes me think of them. The odd thing about liking this record so much is I am well aware of being at aesthetic odds with a lot of musical choices they make: in chord changes and progressions, in instrumentation, and in production. I like some songs way more than others. And still, I really like the record as a whole. It works really well as a record, from beginning to end. It goes from nostalgic to corny to boring to exciting and emotional, but it all works together.

“A Love of Your Own” is a really nice song. “Goin’ Home” has some really excellent repetition—to the extent that I had to check, the first couple of times I heard it, to see if the record was skipping. “I’m the One” and “Sunny Days” are my favorites. The song “Soul Searching” sounds like the title song for a 70s TV show about three guys (a hot headed handsome Italian-American, a freckly, goofy Irish-American with a huge afro, and a calm, articulate African-American) who travel the California coast in a flower-power dune buggy searching for the perfect wave, but finding trouble everywhere they go. They end up solving a lot of people’s life crisis’s, while teaching them not to be racist, to be open-minded and spiritual, and to generally chill out and laugh at things while still being serious inside. They break a few ladies’ hearts, as well.

I can only think that I must have heard this record while I was in high school. After all there was an intramural basketball team called AWB (for “Average White Basketball Team”). (It pains me to admit that I was on a team called “Utopia.”) All I knew was that it was baffling to me that a band would call themselves “average” and/or “white”—though they played “black” music. I was aware of their logo, scripty lettering with the W depicting a woman’s (or shapely guy’s) ass. Little did I know they were from Scotland! I was making the transition between prog rock and punk rock, and I had no time for the subtle charms of this record. But I really think I must have heard it. I think I must have been in somebody’s basement, a party going on, 1976, and I’m steadily drinking a 12 pack of Stroh’s. In spite of not being able to commandeer the sound system with Elvis Costello, and hating the smooth, commercial sounding crap that was on, there was something about the music, I guess—and maybe liking a girl that was there, and the magical process of intoxication—that remains.