MUSIC THREAD

Southside's cover of "Back in the USA" is great, but I think Bruce's (unreleased version - only availlable on bootlegs) is better.

 

Wow, never heard that. Would love to find it.

 

i think i've got it on a disc i just packed away. if you're interested PM me. i'll be unpacking sometime next week and would be happy to copy it.

 

So I got a tip from the younger folks here at F_B World HQ and I bought a CD from this band called Cat Power that has an amazing female singer who writes very cool songs and (I think) is really what a lot of people think Lucinda Williams is. Best new artist for me since the Truckers.
Rod Stewart is a constant puzzlement. He is probably the best white male interpreter of classic soul, the best Dylan interpreter not name Jimi Hendrix, and a brilliant, goofy songwriter on his own. His first four albums -- The Rod Stewart Album through never A Dull Moment -- can stand with just about any stretch of material except The Great Dylan Trilogy, and the Rubber Soul-Revolver-Sergeant Pepper stretch. (My obscure fave -- the gorgeous "Handbags and Gladrags" from the first record.) Yet nobody has thrown more awful schlock onto the market than he has.

 

Cat Power is a person, not a band...a woman named Chan Marshall. She did a great tune a couple of years ago called "He War" and her last album "The Greatest" made a lot of best of the year lists.

 

"The Greatest" is what I bought. Like it a great deal.

 

i've got cat's covers record, titled, of all things, "the covers record." occasionally overdoes the somber thing, but what a voice.

i couldn't agree more on stewart. maybe my biggest pet peeve is a performer who takes someone else's (better) song and makes it more popular than the original. the most glaring example is rod's downtown train. he takes maybe the most perfectly written (and performed) love song of all time and schmaltzes it up into a piece of crap--which he then has the audacity to use as the title of his greatest hits collection. but then you listen to his early stuff--stay with me, miss judy's farm, hell, pretty much anything he did with the faces--and you're like, jesus, that guy can effing sing. good call on handbags, too.

 

Right on about Stewart. I have the Mercury Recordings collection and man, there is some sweet, sweet music on those discs. And then he goes and churns out utter shit later on.

New topic: Anyone have any recommendation for Top 5 essential jazz recordings?

 

My knowledge of jazz is way too superficial to come up with a strong list of 5, but the top 2 would be "Kind of Blue" by Miles Davis and "Blue Train" by John Coltrane.

Back to Rod - I love the fact that the original BBC version of "The Office" used "Handbags and Gladrags" as its theme music despite not having even a vague connection to the show, thematically or otherwise.

 

In my book, he's no. 1 on the list of "biggest sellouts/wastes of talent/etc."
Freaking love the Faces and his first couple of solo albums.
Those who think of him only for his stuff "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy"-forward are missing out.
Now I need to go listen to "Mandolin Wind."

 

The Faces box set is awesome and he did some great stuff with Jeff Beck.

 

Who can't do great stuff when Jeff Beck is involved? One of the absolute best guitarists ever.