Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun

Every year when I see who is getting inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, my reaction is either “it’s about time” or “why them?”  Maybe sometimes both.

This year, I got to thinking: what makes a band deserving anyway?  So I listed my 10 favourite bands and looked for the similarities.  Here’s the list:  The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Cream, Deep Purple, AC/DC, Pink Floyd, Queen, The Who, The Rolling Stones, CSNY, The Kinks, Dire Straits, Jethro Tull, U2.

OK, that’s more than 10, but nevermind.  And I know your list is different and that’s cool.

But what sets them apart?  Genre/subcategory?  Nope.  Great musicianship?  Mostly, but not – with the greatest respect to those listed – universally.  Killer song writing?  It helps, I suppose.  Clothes?  Just kidding.

Maybe it’s a combination of curiosity and fearlessness.  I tend to think of my favourite artists as explorers, trying new ideas, poking around in unfamiliar places.  Even after they’ve forged their own sound and persona, there’s a restless drive to seek out the new and see what it has to offer.

That drive, that curiosity, that willingness to try something new is why the music of these bands still sounds fresh and exciting.  That spirit of exploration keeps the music young.

I’m Glad, I’m Glad, I’m Glad

The 50’s and 60’s gave us a lot of delta blues dressed up, first as rock and roll, then as blues rock.  No surprise that Cream applied that treatment – brilliantly, in my books - to I’m So Glad by Skip James.

So if you’re a contemporary of Cream, you go looking for another tune, right?  I mean, what’s the point in re-doing See See Rider after the Animals?  No wait, someone did.  Actually, lots of people.  Nevermind.

Anyway, it turned out if you were Deep Purple you could re-do I’m So Glad and make it totally new.  You know, just weave Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherezade around it.  Obvious! 

Not really, and that’s what made that psychedelic era so freakin’ amazing.  Thanks to the fearless, restless exploration that dominated the times, a simple little ditty became a psychedelic, early prog rock tour de force.

Reelin’ In the Ears

Great songs hook you quickly, and reel you in.  This is nicely illustrated by Guitar World’s The 20 Best Guitar Intro’s of All Time.

Day Tripper, Sunshine Of Your Love, Smoke On The Water, Heartbreaker, You Really Got Me …  Hendrix, Van Halen, Chuck Berry, Hetfield, Keef …   Some of the best riffs of all time courtesy the greatest riff-meisters of all time.

Most great songs have a ‘hook,’ something that grabs you, catches your attention, somehow makes you feel like you already know the song even when you’re hearing it for the first time.  Sometimes that hook is a riff, but not always.  Sometimes the hook doesn’t show up until part way through the song.  But looking at GW’s list, I’d have to say the winning formula has got to be to snag ‘em right away.

Got Live If You Want It

As the introduction to Rolling Stone’s 50 Greatest Live Albums of All Time says, it’s impossible to capture the frenzy (and I would add joy) of a great live show on record.  But as the list shows, there have been some awesome live recordings.

Confession:  in general, I have always preferred studio albums, because the sound quality is better, there’s less self-indulgence from the band, and the mistakes land on the cutting room floor.  But I still enjoy a good performance, and I love going to concerts.

The list has something to satisfy just about every musical taste, and it includes some career-establishing performances.  But for me, its main virtue is that it serves as a healthy reminder that music is meant to be enjoyed live.

Crash and Burn

OK, I get Guitar World’s point about the ending can be – should be - the most dramatic part of the song, and, like, fade outs are maybe over done.  So, I wasn’t surprised to see Hotel California left off their list of Top 10 Greatest Rock and Roll Song Endings of All Time.

And the idea of a climax, as it were, to end the song, is laudable.  But the songs selected seem to have endings bordering on the apocalyptic.

Don’t get me wrong.  Won’t Get Fooled Again probably does have the best ending in the history of rock and roll, and the ending of 21^st Century Schizoid Man sure fits the song.  But how about The Beatles’ A Hard Days Night?  Oops, GW doesn’t like endings with strange chords.  Sure fits the song though.  OK then, how about Help!  Not enough guitar for you?  So what.  Listen to John’s voice.

Or, speaking of voices, how about Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit?

Well, if you want even more drama, how about Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody – or Under Pressure?  Not loud enough?

OK, I give up.  Drama bordering on self –immolation it is.  So then how about including Deep Purple’s Child In Time, then?  Or Hendrix’s Manic Depression?

But I’ll still take Nowehere Man or even Eight Days A Week.

Pick Up My Guitar And Play

You could disagree with the albums, but it’s hard to debate the artists who made Guitar World’s 10 Essential Classic Rock Guitar Albums: Van Halen, Aerosmith, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Hendrix, The Who, The Stones, The Beatles.

Personally, I would swap Are You Experienced? for Electric Ladyland and Wish You Were Here for Dark Side of the Moon, and I do not count myself among those who believe Exile On Main Street is The Stones’ masterpiece, but let’s not quibble.

Except: The Doors?  Really?  The Doors debut album is absolutely an essential part of the Classic Rock catalogue, but who considers them a guitar band?  And - with all due respect - who puts a ton of effort into learning how to play like Robby Krieger?  I didn’t even remember his name.

Not to take anything away from The Doors well-deserved legendary status, but on a list of essential guitar albums, I think we’d be better served by the likes of AC/DC, Dire Straits, Clapton or Petty.  Little bit more distinguished guitar playing came from those cats.

No One Here Gets Out Alive

In each of the six decades since the birth of rock and roll, you can find some magic, and you can shake your head and wonder how anybody could listen to such rubbish. 

But for me, the 70’s is the big enigma.  Some of the best rock, much of it indelibly stamped into the concrete of our collective consciousness, was made in that decade.  And I couldn’t do without it.  But it was a confusing decade, one with little or no direction, a time of extremes and excesses.

Hard rock, prog rock, power pop, funk, metal, disco, jazz fusion, punk, folk-rock, singer-songwriter … and the leisure suits.  Brother.

The 70’s were not kind to a lot of 60’s icons.  The Stones, Clapton, and The Who, for example, all had their moments, but really they drifted through with mixed results.  Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd triumphantly pushed through, and then collapsed at the finish line.  Deep Purple didn’t make it.  The Beatles and Hendrix didn’t even get out of the starting block.

The energy that began as punk and coalesced into New Wave was certainly welcome.  It brought some much-needed focus to all that aimless thrashing about.  To borrow from Rossini’s invective against Wagner, the 70’s had wonderful moments, and dreadful quarters of an hour.

Whole Lotta Riffs

The beat: definitely.  The energy: probably.  The simplicity: most of the time.  The lyrics: often.  The audacity: goes without saying.  But what really sets a great rock song apart is the riff.  The hook that buries itself into your DNA, where it forevermore acts as a switch, a trigger, a hypnotist’s command.

BBC Radio’s Greatest Guitar Riffs have most of the ones you’d expect: Whole Lotta Love, Sweet Child O’ Mine, Back In Black, Smoke On The Water and Layla landing in the top 5.  Can’t really argue with those.

And as you scan down the list, you realize – joyfully, I’ll bet – just how much great music we’ve been blessed with.  Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, Hendrix, Chuck Berry, Rush, Free, Fleetwood Mac, Cream … on and on it goes.  I can’t think of one riff on this list that doesn’t deserve to be here.

However, it is nothing short of shocking that the Stones and Beatles have only one entry each.  Nice of the BBC to spread the joy, but I can think of another dozen or so riffs from those two groups that are more than worthy.  Nevermind.  I’ll get over it.

Sad, though, that there’s nothing current.  Rock riffs seem to have gone the way of the dodo, and that is not a good thing.

Comeback Kids

Guitar World’s 10 Best Comeback Albums of All Time proves that you can’t keep a good band down.

Even the best artists sometimes:

1) Take risks that fans don’t dig

2) Let success get in the way

3) Run out of ideas

4) Lose their way

5) Just get overtaken by something new and exciting

Or, as the list also illustrates, people die and stuff.  So bravo AC/DC!  Well done, Foo Fighters!

But most of the list is about a wake-up call, followed by a determined (and successful) effort to proclaim, “Not down for the count!”

U2, Metallica, Johnny Cash, Aerosmith, John Lennon, Deep Purple, the Stones, The Dixie Chicks …  they’ve all proven they had a lot more to give.

Good for them … and lucky us!

Big Pink Music

Not many bands or artists deserve their own list, but Rolling Stone was smart enough to do a readers’ poll on The Band’s Ten Greatest Songs, because they do (deserve their own list).

The songs included, like The Weight, It Makes No Difference, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, Up On Crippled Creek and Chest Fever, demonstrate the enormous range, power and influence these cats had.  Not to mention appeal.

I remember the tremendous buzz when Music From Big Pink came out.  I didn’t get it, because I was pre-occupied with the likes of Hendrix and Zeppelin and Deep Purple, but I remember many people treating it like one of those “everything is changed” moments. 

As the years go by, though, my appreciation deepens, and I understand why some of my other heroes like Eric Clapton and George Harrison dug them.  They were a drunkard’s dream if ever I did see one.

Wring That Neck

Ritchie Blackmore is probably the best guitarist to never top a best-ever list, and I confess I’m just as guilty as the next person.

I was a huge fan, of course.  From Shades of through Burn, a period of almost seven years, Deep Purple would have been in my Top Three Bands list.  And I was always amazed, astonished, over-awed by Blackmore’s playing – but he never dented my favourite guitarists list.

I’m still not sure why.  Too much shredding (albeit before the term came into use)?  Really weird notes?  Impenetrable, unapproachably angry persona?  (Slightly) inferior songs to solo?

All of the above, probably, but it still doesn’t excuse the implied lack of respect.  His wow factor can top Hendrix, his that-was-surprising-but-those-were-just-the-right-notes ability could rival Clapton’s, and his duets with John Lord were pure magic.

It’s a mystery.  He’s a mystery, one as big as his choice of notes.  It’s got me chasing shadows.

Arena Rock

The 70’s was (were?) a good time to be a young rock fan, so says the Rolling Stone Readers Poll on the 10 Best Metal/Hard Rock Albums of the 1970s.

Sure.  Until things got a little excessive.  Then again, it was better than disco.

Anyway, here’s the list:

  1. Zeppelin - IV

  2. Zeppelin – Physical Graffiti

  3. Sabbath - Paranoid

  4. Deep Purple – Machine Head

  5. Van Halen

  6. AC/DC – Highway to Hell

  7. Aerosmith - Rocks

  8. Kiss - Alive

  9. Sabbath – Master of Reality

10. Montrose

I know I’m in the minority in my inability to adore Black Sabbath and Kiss, but it certainly isn’t a surprise to find them on the list.  At least Zep and Deep Purple are well represented.

Then again, a strong case could be made for a top ten list than only had Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple albums.  OK, ok, we’d need a couple of AC/DC albums to get to 10, and that wouldn’t hurt one bit.  But you know, Houses of the Holy, Deep Purple in Rock, Made in Japan … these were big records.

Not complaining, just sayin’.

You Know My Name

So I stumbled on Rolling Stone’s 13 Dumbest Names in Rock History list and figured it would be a romp.  You know, Toad the Wet Sprocket, that sort of thing.

But Dave Matthews Band?  Why pick on poor Dave?  Why not Steve Miller, Jeff Beck or Charlie Daniels?  OK, maybe it lacks originality, but it makes it clear who the leader is and all that.

But whoa!  The Beatles are on this list?  A band pun?  No deep hidden meaning?  No wisdom?  Huh?

We’re punishing The Beatles because the name lacks wisdom?  Like Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple and The Cars offered new insights into life with their names?  Excuse me?

1910 Fruitgum Compamy.  Strawberry Alarm Clock.  Creedence Clearwater Revival  …  we have options here, people.  Viable options.

Okay, okay, so I know I’m a tad biased about all things Beatles, so I googled bad/stupid/dumb band names, and found that Rolling Stone followed this list up with a Readers’ Poll on The Dumbest Band Names of All Time, and found The Beatles there too.  The google search yielded a bunch of lists, and The Beatles was on most of them.

All I can think is that these lists were created by people under 50.   If you were there, you remember that everything The Beatles did was cool.  Everything.  We all knew the name was a little silly, but they did it, so it was cool.  Simple as that.

Look up the number.

8 Miles High

Well, why not?  40 Great Stoner Albums, a list of albums Rolling Stone says are “great for blazing along, but also great when you’re not high as a giraffe.”

Item one:  I’m no stoner.  I only owned 3 of the 40 albums listed, and I only recognized 14 album titles in total.  Tons of bands/artists I had never heard of!  I kinda always thought that drug and pop culture weren’t that far apart, and that you didn’t need to partake to get it.  Maybe I’m wrong.

Item two:  item one aside, I wonder if all these records are for stoners, or if some of them are just by people who were stoned.  David Crosby’s, If I Could Only Remember My Name, for example.

Item three:  Rock & Roll is an interstellar escape pod?  Pardon?  What does that mean, exactly?  I must be straighter than I thought.

Item four:  there is no item four.  Still trying to deal with item one.  I mean, I expected to see one or two blues greats, maybe Cream, Zeppelin, Dylan, The Byrds, Neil Young, Deep Purple (Mark I), Donovan, Tull, one of the 70’s Brit prog bands, someone from California other than The Dead …  Just three albums (Axis, Dark Side and Rubber Soul).  Sheesh!

Maybe I need to take a dreadlock holiday.

We Will Rock You

So, there are all these lists out there, but I can’t find a list of best rock anthems.  Curious or what?  Radio DJ’s, critics and the like use the term casually, but no one’s bothered to assemble a list.  Interesting.

Wikipedia says an anthem is a song of celebration, usually acting as a symbol for a distinct group of people.  With that as a reference, we could easily come up with a few rock anthems, right?

Like: Won’t Get Fooled Again, Stairway to Heaven, We Will Rock You,

Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2, Born in the U.S.A., Imagine, Sunday Bloody Sunday

Or, if you soften the definition to say people easily identify with the song, you could add: Won’t Back Down, Hotel California, Smoke on the Water, Woodstock,

Bohemian Raphsody, Hey Jude, All You Need Is Love

Or maybe the song just gets your juices flowing, like: Armageddon It, Layla, Southern Man, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Solsbury Hill, Born to Be Wild, American Woman

Or  …  it just feels like an anthem, say: My Sweet Lord, Free Falling, Let It Be, or pretty much anything by Rush

Hmmm  …  that wasn’t easy.  Maybe the ‘identify’ bit makes such a list too personal; you could build your own list but couldn’t expect anyone else to agree.

Anyway, for my money, the song that should top the list is Won’t Get Fooled Again.  It kicks you in the butt, fills you with a “ya, dammit!” attitude, and entertains you with some of the most powerful rock ever recorded.  If that isn’t an anthem, I don’t know what is.

Decades

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I got to thinking about how your perceptions and loyalties change over time, and decided to fill in this matrix of who my favourite artists were decade by decade.  It came out like this:

 

Some time bending was required to jam things into the decade pigeonhole, and some revisionism is at work here.  Looking back as each decade turned over, I definitely would not have listed the Stones as my second favourite band of the preceding ten years.  The third place band would have been #2, and the likes of Deep Purple, Pink Floyd and The Cars – or maybe The Police – and Bonnie Raitt would have shown up.  Oh, and John Lee Hooker, just a few decades late.

But this is a pretty accurate reflection of how I would rank the music as I listen to it now.

A coupla “Ya I knows”:

1. The Stones have not really done anything since Voodoo Lounge, or arguably Tattoo You.  But somehow they remain cool and the concert DVD’s are fun.

2. Not a lot of newness in the past 20 years.  Yep.  I’m getting’ old.  What can I say?

Riffs Across the Water

New Musical Expresses 50 Greatest Guitar Riffs of All Time is another reminder for me that my culture is more rooted on this side of the Atlantic.

Lots of the expected suspects:  Back in Black, Smoke on the Water, Sunshine of Your Love, Voodoo Child, You Really Got Me, Satisfaction, Cinnamon Girl, Johnny B. Goode, and so on.

Glad to see Rebel Rebel made the cut.  Ditto Song2, Get It On, and Seventh Nation Army.

Speaking of The White Stripes, the list serves up a reminder (to me, anyway) that lots of great guitar-based music continued to be made after 1990.  Not enough, but lots.

That said, and with no disrespect to some of the newer bands listed, but no Springsteen?  No Creedence?  No Dire Straits?  No Tull?  No Zeppelin?  At all?  No Beatles?  Really?   Shouldn’t they have, like 6 or 7 on this list?  Hello?

Also, I get the feeling that the list is trying too hard to spread the joy; one for the Stones, one for the Kinks, one for him, one for her, one for them, one for you, one for me …   Fine, but I’m not sure I Can’t Explain is the Who’s best riff, or The Streets Have No Name the best from U2.  And yes, Free Fallin’ gets the audience singing, but is it really Tom Petty’s best riff?

Maybe these tunes just went better with the pictures.  The NME articles seem to be more about the pictures.

Monster Live

The Rolling Stone 10 Best Live Albums list makes the point that a good live album could actually make a career, and that’s true.

The reverse was almost true too.  There were some pretty bad – make that pathetic – releases that seriously damaged the image of some otherwise unimpeachable stars (at least for me).

Here’s the list:

 1.  The Who – Live at Leeds

 2.  Allman Brothers – Live at the Fillmore East

 3.  Peter Frampton – Frampton Comes Alive!

 4.  Rolling Stones – Get Yer Ya-ya’s Out!

 5.  Kiss – Alive!

 6.  Deep Purple – Made In Japan

 7.  Little Feat – Waiting for Columbus

 8.  Nirvana - Unplugged

 9.  The Band – The Last Waltz

10. Bob Seger – Live Bullet

I wonder if it helps to have an exclamation mark as part of your title?

Some great music by some fabulous bands here for sure.  Some are amongst my all time favourites.

The write-up talks about the colossal mistake Townshend made by destroying the rest of the recordings from the tour  - featuring mostly material from Tommy, which is what dominated their shows at the time.  But I remember how incredibly refreshing it was to not hear Tommy, how cool it was to hear The Who rock out, simple, pure and raw.

The albums on the list that had the most impact on me were the ones that were accompanied by films.  The visuals helped overcome the poor sound quality.

To be fair, technology, professional standards and perhaps reduced or alternative substance abuse have tremendously improved what can be achieved in a live recording.  But back then, things were a bit rough and uneven.

Speaking of visuals, when I first heard The Beatles at Shea Stadium, I was embarrassed.  It sounded just awful.  Remember, this was released not long after Abbey Road, one of the cleanest, best produced albums of all time.  Now, when I watch the doctored-up clips on Anthology, I’m convinced Shea Stadium was the best concert performance of ever.

And I guess that’s the challenge of a live album: technology and taste aside, does the recording and the performance manage to convey the magic these musicians can conjure up?  

Anyway, this list sure is a good representation of my generation.

Tired of Waiting

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Why have I taken so long to write something about The Kinks?

Maybe that’s my pattern.  I noticed them during the first British Invasion, of course.  And they seemed to hold their own during the transition from rock ‘n’ roll to psychedelic.  I remember playing Well Respected Man in my band when I was in Grade 8.

But then they got pushed aside during the second invasion, displaced by the likes of Cream, Zeppelin, Hendrix and Deep Purple.  Yes, I know Hendrix was American, but he arrived from England, didn’t he?

Like so many others, The Kinks just didn’t register on the new hard rock scale.  After Lola, they were gone and forgotten.

Ah, but they weren’t gone.  While everyone was dicking around with Prog Rock and Metal and Disco, they were out there, staying (mostly) true to their rock ‘ n’ roll roots.  And somewhere in the late-ish 70’s, when Punk had said “enough!” and radio stations began giving airtime to the likes of Steve Miller, Linda Ronstadt and Tom Petty, The Kinks resurfaced.

And, longing as I was for something less pompous and silly.  I finally, really noticed them.  A string of great albums, beginning with Misfits, helped them ride the New Wave well into the 80’s when, along with rock ‘n’ roll, they faded again.  Having finally become a fan, I hoped they might resurface one more time during the all-too-brief Garage Band thing in the early 90’s, but to no avail.  That wish turned out to be a rock & roll fantasy.

Now they’re gone, un-rescued by the local village green preservation societies.  Maybe that’s a good thing, ‘cause at least we’re being spared one more fossilized group out on tour.  I dunno.

Listen: I know I’m doing some revisionist history here, suggesting The Kinks were fabulous from start to finish.  They disappeared from most of our radars in the late 60’s and early 70’s because their dabbling in the emerging styles was unsuccessful.  But when they went back to what they did well, they gave us a big batch of terrific music.

They may have been surpassed by others in terms of both impact and longevity, but there are times when I could listen to their music all day and all of the night.

Under the Apex

That earlier post about U2 being the last great rock band got me thinking about who gets on the list, relative positioning, etc..

So if we stick with “larger than life” as one category, what’s below that?  I’d have to say “huge and influential.”  Really good.  Not quite larger than life.  As good or better than the “larger than life” folks, but never quite got there.  Maybe broke up or died too soon.

Below that?  Well, important.  Maybe not as big in our consciousness as those in the “huge” category, but very influential.  Just ask the folks on the “huge” list.

Below that would be the legions of acts you really like but …

Throw this all into a graphic and you get something like this:

 

The Beatles, of course, are larger than larger than life.  This is about perception more than taste, but I assume few would argue with the top two tiers.  Notice my indecision on The Police.  Almost got there, but not quite in my book anyway.

Notice my cop-outs on Dylan and Michael Jackson.  I know many would place them along with The Beatles.  Solid arguments could be made for any of the categories, so maybe this is more about taste than perception.

I didn’t get lazy in the “important” category; I just ran out of real estate.  There are simply too many influential blues greats, Motown artists and early rockers to list.  And maybe that’s the point of the graphic; it’s less about ranking and more about connecting.

Your taste – or perception – will differ from mine, so you may have different names, or different positions.  That’s cool.  Go build your own pyramid,