Sammi Smith “The Best of Sammi Smith”

I’ve said it before—but I pick out records to review using a random system. At one point I had an elaborate process using a deck of cards, which is a lot more romantic than the way I do it now: I have all my records in a spreadsheet, and I use an online random number generator. Still, it works—and the reason I do this is because otherwise, choosing would be paralyzing. Especially considering I own records by people I know—and even a couple I’ve played on. I have favorites, naturally, as well as records I’ve barely listened to. Anyway, lately, there is no one I’ve enjoyed listening to more than Sammi Smith. I only discovered her because I saw one of her LPs at the used store and I liked the cover. I’d never heard of her. Which might seem like, to her fans, someone saying they just discovered Elvis. Yet, that’s what the entire younger, and yet younger, generations have to do with all music. You’re not born knowing it. So, well, I’m just a big fan of Sammi Smith. I’m like the kind person who might travel somewhere to see her, and it would be like a religious experience—that’s music at its best. So, it’s beyond heartbreaking that she’s no longer with us. But then, heartbreak is like my default state, so I can, more or less, revel in the sadness and longing that are inherent in a lot of these classic county songs, while feeling that extra level of longing and sadness, knowing that I am not living on the same plane of existence. It helps/doesn’t help, that ghostly photo on the cover, and the fan-club intimate notes on back—Height: 5 Feet, etc., and including Favorite Food: Soft Tacos with Ortega Green Chili Sauce.

If it sounds like I’ve been drinking—it’s not so—but I just re-read what I wrote about this record the last time I listened to it—I had opened this document, and wrote kind of freely, thinking I’d post something about it, at some point. Well, what I wrote then REALLY sounds like I’d been dri9nkjing. Maybe I was—after all, if I started drinking again, I’d probably be the last to know. Anyway, in my current “sober” state, it’s quite embarrassing. Fortunately, I have to option, and the authority, to just delete the whole paragraph. And thank God. Maybe by the time I finish the review, I’ll have come to my senses and delete the above paragraph, as well. In fact, maybe I’ll delete what I’m writing right now, and start over.

According to online sources, Sammi Smith released her first LP in 1970—which was called “He’s Everywhere”—after the excellent Gene Dobbins/Jean Whitehead song by the same title that sits in the middle of Side Two on this one. Kind of a sick place to put a song that’s so emotional it nearly makes you want to collapse in a heap. Later, that LP was re-released as “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” as that was a huge hit from that album. That Kris Kristofferson song may be one of the best and most well-known songs Sammi Smith has recorded—it’s one of my favorites—and it starts out this collection. She then put out albums in 1971 and 1972, and then oddly, this “Best of” record in 1972. Is it odd to put out a best of record that soon? Not when it’s this record.

All ten songs are excellent, of course, but—besides the above— particular other favorites here are: the Janette Tooley song, “When Michael Calls” (weirdly, there’s a horror movie with that name, starring Ben Gazzara, from this same year). “Teardrops in My Heart,” by Vaughn Horton, is a great one—a heart metaphor I wouldn’t have thought of. Also, “For the Kids,” by Shel Silverstein (someone I actually was in the same room with). “Then You Walk In,” a song by David Malloy and Johnny Wilson, would be a hit for anyone—but especially this version. My very favorite on this record, though, is another Kris Kristofferson song, “I’ve Got To Have You,” which was a hit for Carly Simon—and I love Carly Simon, but this version is 100 times better. It’s probably my favorite Sammi Smith song, at this point, and that means it’s my favorite song in the world on this otherwise bleak Tuesday in February 2022.

The Mamas & the Papas “Farewell to the First Golden Era”

It’s kind of crazy, release three records in three years, and then come out with one like this, a goodbye career retrospective. Of course, they had the songs to do it—if you’re a fan of The Mamas & the Papas, like I am, this is a thoroughly enjoyable, every-song-is-good record (1967) to keep on your turntable, especially when it’s time to break of the incense, weed, new friends, wine, what have you, on Friday at 4:45pm. I guess things were moving fast back then (late-Sixties) and kids would go from detasseling Kansas corn to “generational voice” to rehab to kneeling with gurus in the East—in the course of a few years. But I kind of think that most mortals (and even some immortals)—when it comes to songwriting—have supernova-like flares of inspiration, often followed by spectacular burnout. How else you can you explain all the beautiful, visionary songs arm-in-arm with tortured dogshit coming from the same individuals throughout the history of pop music? This record, of course, contains “Monday, Monday,” which I believe was their biggest hit, and happens to be one of my least favorite of their songs—for some reason it always turned me off—maybe it reminded me of fuckin’ Mondays! I see “California Dreamin’”—a song I inexplicably never get tired of—as the polar opposite of that other California song (the hotel one, that even pains me to mention). One of my very favorite of their numbers, “Twelve-Thirty,” is here—maybe I love it so much because I, as in the song, look out on a church steeple clock (until very recently, as it was obscured by a yuppie-condo. Also, it told perfect time—and there’s no canyon—and no young girls…) Still, love the song. And also, rather unfortunately, they have omitted, here, my favorite of all their songs, “Somebody Groovy.” And finally, I have to mention, my very favorite Mamas & Papas LP is their last one, People Like Us (1971)—which emerged after they were pretty much history. It’s not a very popular opinion, but maybe if there’s anyone who agrees with me about this, maybe we should start our own little club, and call it, I don’t know, how about: “People Like Us.”

Kitty Wells “The Kitty Wells Story”

I’m just not passionate about Kitty Wells the way I am about some other country singers, but I do appreciate her, and I’m glad to have this substantial double LP, which includes 24 of her hits. She certainly laid down the golden carpet for a lot of singers, particularity women country singers—seeing how her first hit, “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” was way back in 1952—and was about “cheatin’” and such. (It was written by veteran songwriter J.D.”Jay” Miller.) Kitty Wells was known as Queen of County Music—and I’m sure some would argue, but maybe not. (As far as who is the King of Country music, no one can rightly agree.) She had a lot of respect, and a long, serious career. I wonder if anyone’s made a movie about her, whether dramatic or documentary? I have not heard a lot of tragic, crazy, and depraved stories about her life, like you hear about a lot of successful country singers, or just singers, or just artists. I’m sure she had her share of heartbreak, though—everyone does—and she puts some in these songs.

David Bowie “ChangesOneBowie”

This record, which came out in 1976, seems to want to mark a change from sci-fi androgynous freak to good-looking mature artist, but it just rubs me the wrong way. It comes off more as midlife crisis, even though Bowie should have been much too young for that. It’s essentially a “greatest hits” record that doesn’t have a cheesy title like “Ladies and Gentlemen, The Very Best of…” But rather than approach it in context of the records the songs came from, I have to (I mean right now, for the sake of writing this) listen to it as the complete and unique art object it is.

“Space Oddity” is pure nostalgia for me, like everyone is sick of me rehashing. Blacklight posters and rootbeer incense and bad pot. But it’s just a good song, right? I’m sure there is a story behind “John, I’m Only Dancing” but I don’t care, because I can’t listen to it because it’s crap. Though, I would, some day, love to write a song with the title, John, comma, something. “John, Help Me To A Toilet So I Can Throw Up,” or something. “Changes” is a great song, and I suppose worth creating this particular record to get it out to the record buying public in a new format. “Ziggy Stardust” and “Suffragette City”–more nostalgia, but this time there is beer drinking involved. Whenever “Jean Genie” comes on, I’m just glad it’s the last song of Side One so I can take it off without listening to it and go directly to Side Two. White blues, but really white, and not blues at all.

Everyone who knows me is sick to death of me talking about how “Diamond Dogs” is one of maybe six favorite songs of all time. For some strange reason I just NEVER GET TIRED OF IT. I made the mistake, once, however, of looking up the lyrics on the internet, which almost ruined it for me, because they were NOT CLOSE to what I’ve been imagining all these years. I’ve been slowly deprogramming myself to go back to the way I used to hear it. “You’re dead,  they call them the Diamond Dogs.” Maybe it’s the cowbell, maybe it’s the way it sounds like the soundwaves are coming through some kind of viscous fluid. Maybe it’s nostalgia. I wouldn’t mind, however, NEVER hearing “Rebel Rebel” ever again. “Young Americans” has that 1980’s, Saturday Night Live, vapid entertainment sound. I think of Chicago (the city), comedy clubs, and those big pretzels, which, last time I ate one, I threw up. “Fame” is up next, White Funk, but REALLY white, and not funky at all. “Golden Years” is like a non-song with a non-hook, played as blandly as possible, and pretty much the perfect fit to end this record. It occurs to me that the lyrics might be interesting if I listened to them– after all, how do you justify calling a song “Golden Years?”– but I can’t even listen to the lyrics because I can’t listen to the song.

Aerosmith “Aerosmith’s Greatest Hits”

It’s 1980 and time to be old. This record looks like they were feeling old, or else being pressured to pay their coke bill. There are enough good songs from their 2nd and 3rd album to make a single greatest hits record, sure, but the problem is trying to come up with songs from the rest of them. Though, actually, “Dream On,” which starts this collection, sounds better to me now than it ever did. “Last Child,” from Rocks, which I’ve never heard before, sounds okay. “Back In The Saddle,” however, is something I’m afraid I HAVE heard before but had stored in some dark recess of my mind where things like images of repair guys’ butt cracks and squashed animals, and backed up public toilet smells, and TV shows from my childhood go, hopefully never to be dredged up.

Even as late as the late 1970s, I guess popular musicians weren’t able to escape the Lennon/McCartney cover curse, as in EVERYONE had to do one, and they are usually the most unlistenable songs on the record. “Come Together” isn’t horrible, it’s pretty much exactly like The Beatles version but about ten percent less fresh. That they included “Kings and Queens” on this record completely baffles me, but hey, a few days ago I’d NEVER heard it, and now I’ve listened to it several times, so I guess the jokes on me! “Remember (Walking in the Sand)” could pretty much mark the beginning of the Eighties, lamest decade of all time, or the End of Rock’n’roll, or the end of Aerosmith, or the end of all humanity, or it could just be a series of bad decisions (writing it, learning it, playing it, recording it, putting it on a record, putting it on THIS record).

The best two songs, “Sweet Emotion” and “Walk This Way” happen to be from Aerosmith’s best record, Toys in the Attic. This is why I love the internet; listening to “Walk This Way” compelled me to search for “cowbells in music” and I pretty much spent a couple of hours then reading crazy people writing about how great the cowbell is, including in this song. Of course, I agree– and I’ve always thought that little cowbell bit was what made a good song a great song. Boy, they really knew how to not overdo it, on this song, as excessive as it is in many ways.

You always have to wonder what it would be like to do some kind of art, like say playing rock music, and suddenly find yourself a commodity. To have some completely soulless money counters putting out a “greatest hits” of your work. I mean, I can’t imagine how weird it must feel! This record kind of documents, for me, the problem of the whole endeavor. Listen to side one, then side two—it’s an amazing illustration of what LEAN sounds like, and what BLOATED sounds like, side by side.