DAY 129.
Caetona Veloso........................Caetona Veloso   (1968)








Have never heard of this fella before, but I do believe the people who he was likened to, should be claiming for defamation of character.


Maybe If I was fluent in Portuguese , it would make this album a tad more palatable as they say he was quite the activist, but I have no way of knowing if his lyrics portray his political views.

To be honest from "Soy Loco Por Tí, América" through to the end was quite passable in my humble opinion, but the previous nine tracks were very ordinary, this album won't be getting added to my collection, but with the added caveat that if I ever hear this album sung in English I have the right to change my mind.



Bits & Bobs;
Caetano Veloso is a Brazilian Singer, Guitarist, and Political Activist. He is most known for being one of the founding members of the Brazilian Artistic Movement in the 1960’s, which was locally known as Tropicalismo.

  Caetano Emanuel Viana Telles Veloso was born on the 7th of August, 1942 in Bahia Brazil. He was the fifth child of Jose’ Teles Voloso, who eventually fathered seven children. As a child, he was greatly inspired by the bossa nova style that was mastered by Antonio Carlos Jobin and João Gilberto, the latter he would name his ‘supreme master’ later in his career.  When Veloso turned twenty three years old, he moved to Rio de Janeiro with his sister, who was an amateur vocalist herself. Veloso then joined ‘Philips Records’ upon winning a competition for his song titled ‘Um Dia’. There, Veloso met esteemed musicians such as Gilberto Gil, Tom Ze Os Mutantes, and Gal Costa. Together with these musicians, Veloso became one of the founding members of Tropicalismo. The music of Tropicalismo was received as the new wave of Brazilian music, and according to music enthusiast John Dougan, Tropicalismo music retained the art of bossa nova, while it added elements of “folk-art and art rock to a stew of loud electric guitars”. Veloso garnered plenty of attention because of Tropicalismo, mainly because most of his music during the period focused on political awareness, and in opposition to the right wing Brazilian Military Government. This attention hampered Veloso’s music for a time, as the Brazilian Government imprisoned him and his counterpart Gil Gilberto for months at a time, and exiled them in 1968. Only in 1972 were the duo allowed to re-enter the country.

 Caetano Veloso’s exile made the news and attracted plenty of attention in music circles. This helped Veloso’s popularity in foreign countries as far as Israel and Greece. Veloso then released an album in the United States titled ‘Estrangeiro’, and in 1993, Veloso teamed up with Gilberto again to produce ‘Tropicalia 2’. The album was known for being highly charged about sociopolitical issues in Brazil, particularly about racism, poverty, and disease. Veloso’s dedication and commitment towards these issues were remarkable; he dedicated two albums and two singles to the Red Hot Organization that were aimed towards the generation of funds to eradicate the AIDS that was heavily prevalent in his home country.


 His immense worldwide popularity could be gauged by the fact that he was the center of three sell-out performances at the Public Theatre in New York in 1983 despite his albums having almost negligible presence at United States record stores.

 Caetano Veloso released 32 studio albums in all; about 27 of them were released after 1969. His 2004 album ‘A Foreign Sound’ reached number 2 in the Billboard World Hot 100 ratings. Veloso also won two Grammies for Best World Music Album in 1999 for ‘Jo’ and in 2000 for ‘Livro’. He was also the recipient of nine Latin Grammies.

We have now had over 10,000 views averaging about 77 views per album.

A big thank you to everyone who has looked in, and a special thank you to the regulars who contribute their thoughts, for which I am truly grateful, you know who you are  

Please don't be shy to post your thoughts, everybody's welcome and their is no right or wrong posts only opinions!

DAY 130.
Scott Walker...........................Scott 2    (1968)





Baroque Pop is seemingly the handle given to this type of music, mair like poppycock music. Over orchestrated depressing twaddle if you ask me.

No doubt the boy's got a good voice, but I think he suffers from delusions of grandeur as far as his chosen musical direction.

The Jacques Brel songs when sung by Monsieur Brel at least had a touch of tourettes in the delivery, where as Mr Walkers attempt reminded me of the prawn cocktail followed by chicken in a basket type of candlelit kind of do, that was prevalent in the late 60s early 70s.


So to be quite honest, I don't think there was any number on the album that I would give a pass mark, so wont be purchasing this one, in fact I think I'm going to stick on some Leonard Cohen to cheer myself up.   (only joking)


Bits & Bobs;


Scott Walker (born Noel Scott Engel; January 9, 1943) is an American-born British singer-songwriter, composer and record producer. He is noted for his distinctive baritone voice and for the unorthodox career path which has taken him from 1960s pop icon to 21st century avant-garde musician.

Originally coming to fame in the mid-1960s singing orchestral pop ballads as the frontman of The Walker Brothers, Walker went on to a solo career balancing a light entertainment/MOR ballad approach with increasing artistic innovations in arrangement and writing perspective. Despite a series of acclaimed albums, a disastrous drop in sales forced him back into straight Middle of the road recordings with little of his own artistic input.

This in turn eventually led to a Walker Brothers reunion in the mid-1970s (although the latter eventually moved, by mutual consent, into more avant-garde areas).Since the mid-1980s Walker has revived his solo career while drastically reinventing his artistic and compositional methods, via a series of acclaimed and vividly avant-garde albums. These combine his iconic singing voice with an unsettling avant-garde approach owing more to modernist and post-modernist classical composition than it does to his pop singer past.

The change in approach has been compared to "Andy Williams" reinventing himself as Stockhausen".Walker continues to release solo material, and is currently signed to 4AD Records. As a record producer or guest performer he has worked with a number of artists including Pulp, Ute Lemper and Bat For Lashes. Walker's success has largely been in the United Kingdom, where his first 3 solo albums reached the top ten.

Walker has lived in the UK since 1965; he became a British citizen in 1970.

Didn't find Caetona Veloso appealing, to be fair didn't listen to much of it.

Liked the Jeff Beck album, but can understand folk not paying money for it. It has a great line up of contributing instumentalists. I'm not a Rod Stewart fan (now) either, but liked his voice back many years ago.

Scott Walker is an enigma: big influence to a lot of singers I like, Julian Cope and David Bowies as examples.But I don't really get what he's about. A good singer, but there are lots of them.

arabchanter wrote:

shedboy wrote:

have you calculated the date when you will complete this?

870 days from todayWednesday, May 6, 2020

God willing

 
 

Fucking Hell 😂😂😂

DAY 131.
The Zombies.......................Odessey & Oracle    (1968)






To be honest I'd only heard of Blunstone through "I Don't Believe in Miracles" and Argent for "Hold Your Head Up," so I had this as going to be hybrid of meh and rock music, but was pleasantly surprised to hear a very clever, lyrically and melodically astute album that, while listening to for the second time as I write this is really, really growing on me.

The opening track "Care of Cell 44" nearly put me off, with it's beachboyesque harmonies, but even this on second playing wasn't so bad, the pick of the songs for me were "Time of the Season " and the very thought provoking "Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)", hats off to the songwriting capabilities of Argent, Blunstone and White.


Some critics have said "The Zombies were idealized harbingers of indie pop, decades ahead of its time" that's for somebody with a far greater musical knowledge than I, but I can see what they mean.

This album is not something I would normally like too much, and would probably not even think of giving a listen to but for some reason, that I can't put my finger on, has got me hooked.

I will be putting this into my collection, God knows I never thought I would be saying that, but would recommend that you have a listen to make up your own mind.


Bits & Bobs;



Five schoolmates at the St. Albans Grammar School in Hertfordshire began playing together in the early 60s for fun. Upon graduation, they all had career paths chosen; singer Colin Blunstone was an insurance broker, drummer Hugh Grundy a banker, pianist Rod Argent and guitarist Paul Atkinson were going to the university, and bassist Chris White was enrolled in teacher's college. In 1964, just before going their separate ways, the band adopted the name "The Zombies" and entered a band contest sponsored by The London Evening Post.


 The Zombies won and their prize included a recording contract with Decca Records. One of the band's hastily written originals "She's Not There" was chosen as their first single. Fame came quickly for the Zombies. A top twenty hit in Britain, "She's Not There," with its distinctive vocal harmonies and Argent's electric piano solo, rose to number two and sold a million copies in America in the wake of the Beatles' success there.


 The band members explained the origin of their unorthodox name to Melody Maker soon after their first record became a hit. "We chose it from desperation," explained Chris White; "My first reaction was horror," Colin Blunstone broke in, "We did have alternatives like Chatterley and the Gamekeepers but we were desperate."


 The Zombies would not have another major hit in England, but in 1965 "Tell Her No" became their second American top ten hit. The group played around the world to enthusiastic audiences through from 1965-67, but soon became frustrated by their record company's craving only for songs in the mold of their big hits. In a 1971 Melody Maker profile, Blunstone reminisced about the Zombies breakup; "As tactfully as possible, he intimated that the group wasn't making the money they hoped to make, and he in particular was feeling entirely disenchanted with the music, business, and the whole scene. [The band] all talked about it, and decided that they should have a break." The Zombies decided to retire after recording an album on which the band members had complete control. Recording sessions held at Abbey Road Studios in London during the summer of 1967 produced the band's swan song, Odessey and Oracle.




 Though it is now considered a high water mark of 1960s pop, Odessey and Oracle did not attract much attention upon its release in Britain, and would have possibly been forgotten if former Blood, Sweat, and Tears member and Columbia A & R man Al Kooper hadn't heard it during a trip abroad. Kooper adamantly insisted upon an American release; when Columbia finally relented, Kooper wrote in the sleeve notes, "While in London recently I acquired forty British LPs. Once home, I began to listen to all forty. This record stuck out like a rose in a garden of weeds."



 Swan Song Became Biggest HitThe album seemed destined to fade into obscurity in the United States until "Time of the Season" began picking up airplay in various cities a year after it was released. The record eventually sold over two million copies. The band members turned down offers to reform and tour America in 1969. Undaunted, unscrupulous booking agents sent several bands called "The Zombies" on tour, which featured no original band members.



 Some of the former Zombies continued their musical careers. Keyboardist Rod Argent and bassist Chris White formed a new band called Argent in 1972. Argent immediately had an international hit single with "Hold Your Head Up". Other artists had hits covering Argent material also, notably "Liar" by the Three Dog Night and "God Gave Rock n' Roll To You" by Kiss. Colin Blunstone had a successful solo career recording for Epic Records through the 1970s, beginning with a version of "She's Not There" backed by an orchestra and released under the pseudonym Neil McArthur.
 

.  Over the years since their breakup, The Zombies were remembered fondly enough for a Melody Maker writer to publicly wish for the band to reunite in a 1973 article entitled "Three Likely Reunions ... and Three We'd Like To See." After praising both Argent's and Blunstone's current music, writer Roy Hollingworth reasoned that "what Blunstone lacks now is some sense of identification, and what Argent lack is an attractive frontman of sorts. Argent and Blunstone have worked together in the studio. It would be fine to see them go the whole way, so to speak."



 Another bogus group calling itself "The Zombies" with no connection to the original band surfaced in 1988. According to Variety, "the band introduced its bassist Ronald Hugh Grundy as original Zombies drummer Hugh Grundy. The group explained Grundy's switch of instruments as an attempt to position 'the original Zombie' more prominently.... The actual Grundy reacted with 'shocked amazement.'"





 A Very Brief ReunionOn November 25, 1997, the real Zombies reunited to play their two biggest hits, "She's Not There" and "Time of the Season," at a party in London to celebrate the release of the Zombie Heaven box set. Writer Dawn Eden recalled on The Zombies' Fan Web Page, "... the five of them walked down the staircase from the balcony and the stage, and the whole room was thrilled.... Hugh Grundy went into that familiar 'she's Not There' intro and the crowd voiced its approval.... After they finished a wonderful 'Time of the Season' (yes, they really did only two songs), they left the stage to huge applause."



 Despite the brevity of their career, The Zombies are one of the most esteemed British Invasion combos. In addition to several hit records, their discography contains many more hidden treasures. At a charity concert in 2001 that by chance, Blunstone and Argent were both attending, the two jammed for an enthused audience. The two Zombies had been doing solo work separately, but after playing together again, the pair got the itch to collaborate. Later that year, Blunstone added his vocals to a collection of songs Argent had previously written. The resulting record, Out of the Shadows, hinted at the possibility of future Zombies material. At least fans hoped so.



 "It felt so fantastic to play live again that I was hooked," Argent told Keyboard magazine. Argent then supported Blunstone at some promotional shows for the album. "I fell into a snowballing situation where I was gigging with him more and more, and then we found ourselves in a studio. Honestly, it felt as if we'd done our last studio date just two weeks before rather than 37 years."




 The two later teamed up to write an album together, got a band and recorded As Far As I Can See... for Rhino. The record, released in September of 2004, was released under the name the Zombies. Joining Blunstone and Argent in the studio for As Far As I Can See... was a band that consisted of longtime friend Jim Rodford, his son Steve, and guitarist Keith Airey. Original Zombie member Chris White contributed also background vocals and Paul Atkinson championed the album shortly before his death from liver and kidney. In an interview with the Cleveland Free Times, Argent explained why he felt they should release the new album under the Zombies moniker; "...There were four [original] Zombies involved in this project, and also, when Rod and I were in the studio listen to takes coming back, there seemed to be a strong link of what we did before. It gradually dawned on us that it seemed honest for the first time to use the Zombies name again."




 A tour with 1970s band Love to support the album and various gigs around the world prepared the new touring version of the Zombies to record and release the 2005 concert album Live at the Bloomsbury Theatre. "Because we finished the band feeling that we'd been unsuccessful," Blunstone told the Austin Chronicle, "we now see that perhaps we were more successful than we realized—that we can go out and play these songs now and give people pleasure.


Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)

The writer of this song is Zombies bassist Chris White, who recalled in Mojo magazine February 2008 how this dark and chilling war protest number came about: "I'd been reading AJP Taylor on the First World War and my uncle had died at Passchendaele. I was driving to St. Albans and working out that in the first morning there were 60,000 casualties in the Battle of The Somme. The enormity hit me and I had to pull over to the side of the road because I was shaking. That's where that (lyric) came from. 'I just can't stop shaking.' In the flat I had an old American pedal organ with the knee swells. I wrote it on that, but Rod played it so much better in the studio."

 

Despite being the album's least commercial track, this was released as its first US single. White admitted in the same interview: "I was surprised. I think it was the resonance of the Vietnam War." Unsurprisingly the single flopped.

 
There was a printer's error with the title. It was actually called "Butcher's Tale Somme 1916" but they printed it as "Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)." This was on top of another error on the album as the designer of the LP cover misspelt the word "Odyssey" as '"Odessey."

 

Blunstone explained why he didn't sing on this track. "I don't know if you've ever listened to the lyric, but it's pretty dark stuff," he said. "People thought it was about Vietnam but really it's about the First World War, and I just couldn't see how it could fit on the album. But I was wrong. Everybody plays the album through, and I've never heard the running order questioned ever.



So, originally I was going to sing that, but I thought it was too dark for me, especially at 19. I could handle it now, but at 19 I just thought it was a bit dark."


Time Of The Season

Built around the bassline heard in the intro, this song has some very effective and unusual structural components that helped it endure. The bass riff is punctuated with a hand clap and the breathy "ahhhh" vocal. These elements add sonic texture during the verses, and also show up in the two interludes.




And while most hit songs pound you with the chorus, this one doesn't. The full chorus - "It's the time of the season for loving..." takes just eight seconds and is repeated three times. That's just 24 seconds of chorus, but this minimalist approach gave the line tremendous impact, resonating with listeners at a time of social and political turmoil in America.


 
The band broke up in late 1967, shortly after recording the album. When the album was released in April 1968, it sold poorly, stalling on the US charts at #95 and making no impact in their native UK. The "Time Of The Season" single, however, became a huge hit in America even though the group had disbanded and couldn't support it. It sold over a million copies, peaking at #3 on March 29, 1969.




With their newfound American success, band members Rod Argent, Paul Atkinson and Hugh Grundy got the band back together, minus lead singer Colin Blunstone. This reunion was short lived, and by the end of 1969 The Zombies were once again dead. Blunstone went on to have a successful solo career, including a #15 UK hit in 1972 "Say You Don't Mind," and was the guest vocalist on Dave Stewart's (not the Eurythmics Dave Stewart) 1981 UK #13 cover of "What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted." Rod Argent formed the band Argent, which had a hit with "Hold Your Head Up" in 1972.


 
The Zombies keyboard player Rod Argent wrote this song. He said in The Guardian February 22, 2008: "'Time of the Season' was the last thing to be written (for the album). I remember thinking it sounded very commercial. One of my favorite records was George Gershwin's 'Summertime;' we used to do a version of it when we started out. The words in the verse - 'What's your name? Who's your daddy? Is he rich like me?' - were an affectionate nod in that direction."




Argent added: "The album title's slightly high-flown, isn't it? As is the quote from The Tempest on the back. It was a very flowery time in all sorts of ways. Me and Chris (Chris White bassist and co-songwriter) shared a flat with a guy called Terry Quirk who was a very talented artist and he came up with this beautiful, florid cover that we adored. We didn't notice that the word odyssey was spelt wrongly, to our eternal embarrassment. For years I used to say, 'Oh that was intentional. It was a play on the word ode.' But I'm afraid it wasn't."


 
The famous lyrics, "What's your name, who's your daddy, is he rich like me?" are a nod to the Gershwin standard "Summertime," which The Zombies released on their first album. That song contains the lyrics, "Your daddy's rich and your mama's good looking."


 
The theme of "Seasons" was a concept on the album Odessey And Oracle. Albums were very popular in the late '60s, so artists could put songs together that meant something when played in a certain order.


 
In Word magazine January 2008, the vocalist Colin Blunstone was asked whether the word 'Odessey' in the album title was deliberately spelled wrong. Blunstone replied: "Rod (Argent) told this story for nearly 40 years of how it was deliberate and a play on the word 'ode,' hence 'odessey' when it should be spelled 'odyssey.' So I was astounded as anyone when he finally admitted about a year ago that it had been a simple spelling mistake. Too late to change by the time anyone noticed it. A bit embarrassing, but it's history now."


 
The recording of this song bought about a minor spat between keyboardist Rod Argent, who wrote the song, and the vocalist Colin Blunstone. The argument was over the phrase, "When love runs high." Blunstone struggled with the high note at the end of the line, and snapped at Argent, "If you're so good you come and sing it." Argent admitted in Mojo magazine February 2008: "It was written really quickly and we didn't rehearse it an awful lot. I was trying to change the phrasing."




Blunstone said. "It was written in the morning before we went into the studio in the afternoon, and I kind of struggled on the melody," he said. "Rod and I had quite a heated discussion – he being in the control room and me singing the song - and we were just doing it through my headphones. Because it had only just been written, I was struggling with the melody."




Blunstone added: "It makes me laugh, because at the same time I'm singing, 'It's the time of the season for loving,' we're really going at one another."


 
 
This song has been sampled or interpolated on tracks by a number of artists, who sometimes use vast swaths of the song as the basis for their tracks - it's the base for the 2009 Melanie Fiona hit "Give It To Me Right" and for Eminem's 2013 track "Rhyme or Reason." Other tracks to use it include "Rolling Stone" by ScHoolboy Q and "Don't Look Back" by Miguel.


 
Surprisingly, this song never charted in the UK, although it is widely known there. Rod Argent said: "'Time of the Season' was the #1 in most countries in the world, but it wasn't in the UK. It's been released three times in the UK, and it's never been a hit. But the extraordinary thing is that everybody knows it in the UK. We played Glastonbury this year, and we had a big audience of the young kids who went completely mad when we played 'Time of the Season.' So, it has become, strangely enough, a classic in the UK, but it's never been a hit."


 
"Time of the Season" was the first song picked by Al Kooper (just after leaving Blood Sweat & Tears) in his new position as staff producer in the A&R department at Columbia Records. As told in Kooper's "Backstage Passes And Back Stabbing Bastards" producer Clive Davis was about to sign off Columbia's options to release Odessey And Oracle. Kooper persuaded him to keep the option, and the Zombies' later success was the first feather in his cap.



Speaking of Columbia Records, their Manhattan offices (located at the CBS Building on Sixth Avenue between West 52nd and 53rd Streets) are known as the "Black Rock" after the appearance of the building. File that next to "Brill Building" in influential buildings in rock 'n' roll history.


 
According to Argent, he was told by Paul Weller that Odessey and Oracle is his favorite album of all time. Bassist Chris White added in the February 2008 Mojo interview: "The Foo Fighters said in a recent Rolling Stone they listen to it most mornings. Tom Petty's keyboard said to me, 'You guys don't realize how important that record's been. As far as we're concerned there's Sgt. Pepper and Odessey and Oracle."


 
In the UK, this was used in a a commercial for Magners cider. In the US, Fidelity Investments used it.


 
After this song became a surprise hit in America after the band had broken up, an opportunistic promoter in Michigan put together an ersatz version of the group and sent them on tour. Since no singer could convincingly imitate Colin Blunstone, the promoter announced that Blunstone had died, but the band decided to soldier on without him. The real Blunstone was surprised to learn of his demise, and kept the clipping explaining his death as a keepsake.


 
This was used in the movie Awakenings with Robert DeNiro in a scene when they are driving in the car.


Was going to buy that Al Kooper book "Backstage Passes And Backstabbing Bastards," but I think by the end of the book the fella that wrote this will have probably quoted most of it!

The Zombies: I've got their hit single on vinyl, but have never been a fan. However, I'm a bigger fan of these ones than the 2012 version from Govan.

And I'll just jump in regarding Van Morrison. He's another singer who I just never got into.

Didn't get a chance to listen to yesterday's as a bit "elephant's trunk" after funeral, will do a double tonight.

The Byrds have fucked this competition up, haven't they?

shedboy wrote:

This album and change in direction was very like selling the Tim two - someone thought it was a good idea but it ripped the heart out of a good thing.

haha - what a pish album iirc - might try and listen later again

I like your analogy, but I don't think they had the tim two to start with, imho.
 

DAY 132.
Van Morrison.............................Astral Weeks    (1968)







Fuck it , I'm up the now so lets get "Astral Weeks" sorted.

Back in the early '90s while squating in London, there seemed a bit of a  Van Morrisonfest going on at the time, I even went to see him at "The Fleadh" at Finsbury Park and that was probably when I thought "what a drunken arsehole" he came on and was basically an incoherent, babbling mess, and I thought sometimes it's better sticking to listening to albums rather than being let down by the live performance, especially in this instance.


In saying that, apart from "Cyprus Avenue" I didn't particularly take to any of the tracks on this album.


On this album we had, a 5, 2x7 and a 9 minute track, FFS there's absolutely no need for this pish, especially thon "Madame George,"
Sheesh what an overblown, stretched out waste of 9 minutes that was.


This album won't be getting added to my collection.



Bits & BObs;


Born in Belfast, Ireland, Van Morrison's musical career has bridged such a wide variety of genres that he is difficult to label. He has written and performed some of rock music's most enduring standards, including "Gloria," "Brown Eyed Girl" and "Moondance," and is a member of both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. At his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 1993, Robbie Robertson, former member of The Band, said of Morrison, "In the tradition of the great Irish poets and the great soul singers, he is the Caruso of rock and roll."


Morrison's career began as a teenager, covering popular hits at shows and in clubs in Northern Ireland. His first hit came as a member of the band Them when he wrote and recorded "Gloria" in 1964, which was the B-side of the single "Baby, Please Don't Go." Three years later as a solo artist, working for Bang Records executive Bert Berns, he released "Brown Eyed Girl" and while many consider it to be his signature song, he said in an interview with Time that he has "about 300 songs" that are better. Morrison certainly does not have good feelings about the song, which may also impact his lack of desire to perform it live. He has reported in more than one interview that he was never paid for the song. He told the Los Angeles Times in 2008, "I call that 'The Money Song' - because they got all the money and I got none. What happened after that is I ended up with zero money. I was broke and depressed and remained that way for many years after that, and I just decided to make a stand for myself and do things my way, not theirs."



 
Shortly after "Brown Eyed Girl" became a hit, Berns died and Warner Brothers bought out Morrison's contract. He was given three sessions to records the album Astral Weeks. Morrison said at this point, he was literally a starving artist. He had little time for reflection about his work. He needed money to survive. Rolling Stone magazine later named Astral Weeks #19 on its list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, saying that it defies easy description and Morrison was "never this open, and naked, again."



 
True to Morrison's form, he veered away from the almost sorrowful tone of Astral Weeks to the more uplifting Moondance in 1970, which became his first album to sell a million copies and also made the Rolling Stone greatest albums list, at #65. The title track and "Into The Mystic" received radio play for decades after their release. After continuing to make hit records, such as "Wild Night" from the Tupelo Honey album, along with its country-tinged title track, Morrison took a step back from recording and performing in 1974. He said in a 1978 interview with Rolling Stone that he had needed to get his "energy together, doing things I like to do, and just living as if I were nobody instead of somebody."


 
In interviews, he's a notorious scold, often stonewalling and berating reporters. "You're very naive. You shouldn't be in the business you're in," he said when David Fricke of Rolling Stone asked why he was once blacklisted.




Morrison continued to record and perform into the 21st century, including a live performance of the entire Astral Weeks album at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles in November 2008. He continues to maintain some bitterness for the industry – he did not attend the ceremony when inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame – although not for the music itself. He regularly collaborates with other artists, such as his recording of "Have I Told You Lately" with the Chieftans in 1995, which won a Grammy Award. Still, as he said in a 2008 interview with the Los Angeles Times, when the reporter questioned him about his music, "It's a funny feeling that you actually have the courtesy of asking me about my songs. Did you know there have been numerous books written about my music where none of the authors were interested in my take on my music? I guess they all want to make it into something it's not or was not intended to be by me."




Morrison married Janet Rigsbee in 1968. Known as "Janet Planet," she inspired songs like "Crazy Love" and "The Way Young Lovers Do." She became known as Morrison's Earth-goddess muse, but their relationship was rocky, and they split in 1973. The couple had one child together, a daughter named Shana.




He and his family moved to a ranch house in Woodstock, New York in 1969, largely because Bob Dylan lived there.




Morrison said that his song "Wonderful Remark" was "the only song that was really what Woodstock was about." The song "Brand New Day," meanwhile, was "kind of what it had been about, but it wasn't a brand new day anymore."






These statements echo the sour relationship that Van Morrison had with the town of Woodstock and, to an extent, with the hippie counterculture in general. Morrison went to Woodstock hoping for a peaceful, honest escape from the big lights, but ended up being turned off by the backstabbing and fakery that he perceived to fill the place.




Charlie's Angel Farrah Fawcett was a huge fan of Van Morrison. When the actress was dying of cancer and too sick to attend one of his concerts, the Irish singer taped it especially for her. It was one of the last things she ever watched.

DAY 135.
The Mothers Of Invention................We're Only In It For The Money   (1968)



    



We're Only in It For the Money is an experimental rock album by Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention. Bridging styles as diverse as doo-wop and avant-garde sound collage, and the album peaked at #30 on North America's Billboard Music Charts pop albums chart. The album satirizes many aspects of 1960s culture, lampooning the hippies, the conservative establishment, and everything in between.

Will double up tonight (probably)

Last edited by arabchanter (22/12/2017 1:29 pm)

shedboy wrote:

Love a good chanter quote "A change from psychedelic shite, to what seemed to be them playing country shite,, is still shite in my humble opinion."

PMSL cracking review
 

"Tell it like it is," eh!