Or Else Expecting Rain

 

Check out the lyrics for Dylan’s Desolation Row. 

 

How can one guy be this …  insightful, cutting, good, clever, empathic, cynical, hypnotic, intimate?

 

Thanks, Bob.  Wow!  Ouch!  Right on!  Yeah, that’s what I thought.

 

I think.

Ain’t No Life Nowhere

 

You want psychedelic?  Listen to I Don’t Live Today by Jimi Hendrix.  That’s psychedelic.

Time Is On My Side

So you’re a bar band.  You start out playing Chicago Blues and 50’s R&B.  Rock and Roll takes over.  Then things move on to Motown, Psychedelic, Hard Rock, Disco, and Alternative.  How the devil do keep getting gigs through all these changes? 

Answer: you become the Rolling Stones.

Carry That Weight

I belong to too many Facebook groups, the consequence of which is that I am regularly subjected to posts declaring that The Beatles were overrated- if not downright awful.

To which I say this: If you were between the ages of ten and twenty in 1964 you are entitled to your opinion (even if you’re wrong).  If you are younger, you will never understand, because you weren’t there.  You didn’t experience those magical years.

Well I Realize I’ve Been Hypnotized

OK, I know Hendrix played the Chitlin’ Circuit, and near the end he was getting into funk and all, but Jimi Hendrix did psychedelic, right?  I mean he embodied the words Far Out.

But listen to Gypsy Eyes.  Underneath the trippy exterior is a Motown song.  It could have been done by The Temptations, right?

That’s what’s so cool about great artists, great recordings, and great songs.  They keep giving up something new.

Take A Breath

I’ve been trying to think of something nice to say about the saxophone for most of my life, and I finally got it: on some of David Gilmour’s best guitar solos, you can tell that he also plays the sax.

Just My Tears And The Orchestra Playing

Maybe it’s because I’ve heard them, like 7,000 times, but some songs are like symphonies.  Take, say, Third Stone From The Sun or Dazed And Confused.

As you listen to the ebb and flow, the music continually morphs into an entirely different vibe.  As you pick up on the nuances that drive those translations, you gotta think: this is musical genius of a higher order, like Wagner or something*. 

Or maybe it’s just because I’ve heard them 7,000 times.

* Yeah, I know.  Wagner was an opera guy, and not really known for his only symphony, which, as it turns out, was once conducted by Engelbert Humberdinck, whose namesake performed music which – especially compared to Hendrix or Zeppelin – was not particularly symphonic.

See how I worked that in?

At The Station

I dunno.  Listening to White Room by Cream, I just think that Jack Bruce was the most underrated singer in rock.

Come On You Painter, You Piper, You Prisoner

So  …  actually  …   underneath it all  ..  Shine On You Crazy Diamond is a blues song.

Only took me 4 decades or so to see that.  Guess I’m a slow learner.

Lost and Flying Down The Road

Have your favourite cocktail, enjoy your favourite meal and bottle of wine (if that's your pleasure), smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em, savour your favourite after dinner drink.  Listen to Hellbound Train by Savoy Brown.

You could listen all night long, right?

Getting Better

Part II of my rebuttal to Professor Armand Leroi’s preposterous assertion that The Beatles had virtually no influence on pop music.

Chuck Berry, Elvis, Little Richard, Buddy Holly, the Everlys - played by punks, punks who grew up listening to show tunes, folk songs, sing-alongs, music hall numbers, cowboy movies, and Granny’s weekly performance at the pub.

By the time they had emerged from Hamburg and those 6 hour sets, The Beatles had developed their own unique sound, a sound which incorporated that early rockabilly, 50’s R&B, and yes, their childhood influences.  They had become adept at absorbing other styles and transforming them into their own brand of rock and roll.

Then there was soul music, and the pixie dust of Motown, which had, in its own way, done the same thing.

Dylan, folk-rock, classical, Eastern, psychedelic, singer/songwriter, hard rock, each one studied, re-imagined and grafted on to that ever-expanding base.  Each new experiment set someone else off on another new idea, which looped right back to The Beatles for them to start all over again.  Getting so much better all the time.

There is no scientific way to explain the influence of The Beatles, because it magic.

You Can’t Do That

So, Armand Leroi, a professor at Imperial College London, has concluded that The Beatles had virtually no influence on pop music, having had computers analyze hits from 1960 through 2010.

To which I would say this:  At every step of their career, The Beatles absorbed the music around them, assimilating each style, giving it new life from the raw force of pure rock and roll. Each addition created new opportunities for other artists, which The Beatles then heard and absorbed in turn. And on and on it went.  That’s what you call music evolution.

Computer analysis is irrelevant.  The record shows that all the major artists over that half century have acknowledged the influence The Beatles had on them, and The Beatles freely and frequently acknowledged who they were listening to and learning from.

And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.

I Wonder What You People Do With Your Lives

Listen to Forever  by The Charlatans.  How did these guys not become huge?

Do You Believe In Magic

It used to be when you bought a new album and put it on, you expected to be astonished.

You Need Not Look Too Far

Probably not too many people remember Hot Smoke and Sassafras by Bubble Puppy, but I do.  And it’s great.

#1

My favourite song of all time is the last one I heard John Lennon sing.

Sunshine Came Softly

The other night, I had the pleasure of attending a Donovan concert in Toronto.

His voice isn’t what it used to be, but he’s such a good storyteller, and his songs practically sing themselves anyway, so it was all good.

What was especially heartwarming is that not everyone in the audience had white hair.  I was amazed at how many people under 30 were there – and they weren’t casual listeners.  They knew him.  They were fans.

Donovan himself described his music’s timeless appeal as hopeful melancholy.  He confronts that madness of our species, and shares his sadness at our willful self-destructiveness, but he celebrates the wonders of the world around us with an enduring spirit of hopefulness.

He is the hurdy gurdy man, singing songs of love.

Wait A Minute, Something’s Wrong Here

I’m grateful for all his other music and all, but when I hear songs like Red House, I can’t help thinking:  Man, I wish Hendrix played more blues.

Relax and Float Downstream

Here’s some Socratic reasoning:  Tomorrow Never Knows by The Beatles is an R&B tune because it has a hypnotic, driving beat.  It is also a folk song because it’s carried by simple strumming on an acoustic guitar.  But it’s pretty heavy, so you could argue it’s a rock song.  Or compromise and call it folk rock. 

Then again it’s very trippy, so really it’s psychedelic rock – or maybe even early prog rock, since it lifts from other genres and quotes strange modalities.

Or you could say it’s all of those things, which happens to nicely sum up The Beatles.  Now, if you can say a single song can represent the diverse canon of the best group of all time, then obviously that song is the best song of all time.

I Stick Around For More

There’s no way you could argue Bonnie Raitt’s Spit of Love, recorded in 1998, is an R&B tune.  It’s got a classic hook, a hypnotic groove, and a solid, driving beat.

So how come I’ve got it on my Psychedelic playlist?