Treasures From The Vault

Thanks to Steven Rubio, this weekend I discovered Wolfgang’s Vault, which is described on the Web site as “the home for the past, present and future of live music.” Specifically, you can find literally hundreds (over 1000, actually) of concerts from The Bill Graham Archives, as well as the King Biscuit Flower Hour (a name that will mean a lot to people over a certain age, and absolutely nothing to those under that age) and other radio shows which featured live concert programming.

The site is a treasure trove of epic proportions, and I can already tell I’m going to need to be careful with it, because it is absolutely addictive. I haven’t listened to a complete concert yet, but so far I’ve already listened to snippets from shows by Springsteen, The Clash, The Stones, The Who, Hendrix, Patti Smith, The Band, Elvis Costello, Warren Zevon, Van Morrison, and James Taylor. And that’s barely scratching the surface.

It won’t come as a surprise to my friends and the regular readers of this blog that the concert I’ve listened to the most is Springsteen’s Winterland show, recorded on December 15, 1978. The Winterland show is one of, if not the single, most famous shows in the Bruce pantheon. It was broadcast live, and I can remember listening to it in my room. I also remember it being one of the dumbest moments of my life, because inexplicably I didn’t record it. It’s widely available on bootlegs, but I’d never bought one, so until now I’d never listened to it again.

It is an amazing show; the blockbuster version of “Prove It All Night” the band played on this tour is worth the price of admission all by itself. For historians and completists, there are also early versions of “The Ties That Bind” and “Point Blank,” the former with a vastly different arrangement and the latter with some very different lyrics than those which turned up on The River.

It’s also a fascinating show, for the setlist alone:

Badlands / Streets of Fire / Spirits in the Night / Darkness on The Edge of Town / Factory / The Promised Land / Prove It All Night / Racing In The Streets / Thunder Road / Jungleland / The Ties That Bind / Santa Claus Is Coming To Town / The Fever / Fire / Candy's Room / Because The Night / Point Blank / Mona-She's The One - I Get Mad / Backstreets / Rosalita / Born To Run / Detroit Medley / 10th Avenue Freeze Out / Raise Your Hand / Twist And Shout

Check out the sequencing - of the first nine songs, 8 (!) are from Darkness on the Edge of Town. Only then does Bruce delve into the older albums, pull some rarities out of his back pocket, as well as some surprises (“The Fever,” “Because the Night,” which at the time was best known for being a hit by Patti Smith, “Fire”). I can’t imagine him doing something like this today – sure, the new album had been out for six months by the time the band played this show, but it’s still amazing to me that he would lead almost exclusively with songs from a single record.

But at this late date, who am I to quibble? Right now I just look forward to finding more treasures.

The Greatest Train Song?

"People Get Ready," as sung by the great Curtis Mayfield, with Taylor Dayne on backing vocal and with David Lindley and Hiram Bullock lurking in the background.

Son of Train Song

A very young Jimmy Page, perhaps wearing the same shirt Jerry Seinfeld would make famous more than 20 years later, with the Yardbirds, performing "Train Kept A Rollin'."

How About Another Train Song?

Don't forget...it's National Train Day!

And here's a train like no other before it, or since.

Still More Train Songs

Get on board...and just pretend you're not in the middle of a light beer commercial.

More Train Songs

In all likelihood, Arlo Guthrie's finest moment - "City of New Orleans."

Train Songs

In honor of National Train Day, it is the pleasure of this here blog to bring you some great train songs. First up, a medley of "Casey Jones" and "Orange Blossom Special," courtesy of the Man in Black.

Everybody Loves A Train

Let's everyone put their hands together for...National Train Day!

Ain't That Pretty At All

You ever get in one of those moods where just about anything and everything you read or hear pisses you off? For whatever reason, that seems to be my current frame of mind. And so what do I do to myself? Spend the evening catching up on email. Probably not the best idea I ever had.

But here's a song that never fails to cheer me up.

Hmmm...

I could be wrong, but I'd say that it's probably not a good sign for your campaign when major newspapers start prominently featuring photos like this one on their Web site.

And You Thought Mariah Carey Night Was Bad?

Some "live" (since you can't really watch it live on the West Coast) notes on "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame" night.

First, let me say it - bad idea. Might as well call it "let's set them up for failure" night.

David Cook: "Hungry Like A Wolf," Duran Duran. I like Duran Duran, but will admit that they're not the first band that comes to mind when I think "rock and roll hall of fame." Decent performance; not bad but certainly far from great.

Syesha: "Proud Mary," the Ike and Tina version. Well, you have to give her credit. There's no way she can match Tina, and of course she doesn't. But at least she doesn't embarrass herself.

Jason: "I Shot the Sheriff," Bob Marley & the Wailers. That sound you heard about 15 minutes ago? That was Bob Marley spinning in his grave. Definitely the single worst performance of the Top 12 this year, and it wouldn't be hard to imagine that this was the single worst performance ever in the Top 4.

David A: "Stand by Me," Ben E. King. This was the first song played at my wedding, so it holds a pretty important place in my life, and my standards for it are high. As usual David A. sucked, and as usual the judges (save for Simon) gave him a tongue bath worthy of a newborn kitten. It may all be over but the shouting, but that doesn't mean this kid is any good.

UPDATE #1: David Cook: "Baba O'Riley," The Who. OK, the patented David Cook treatment, but well done. But in the end, it just ain't the same song without the synths.

UPDATE #2: Syesha: "A Change Is Gonna Come," Sam Cooke. Oh right - making the Top 12 of American Idol is certainly a worthy notion to apply to this song, only one of the greatest ever performed. Poor performance. Randy is actually making sense - don't give THIS song the Whitney/Mariah treatment. Syesha is about to cry...Paula wants to give her a hug. Sorry, but it was still a poor performance. Syesha IS crying now, and Simon actually agrees with Paula, which makes me wonder if he sipped out of the wrong cup. Syesha is bawling now...oh, she RESEARCHED the song. It means a lot to her, but that doesn't change the fact - poor performance. Shouldn't have tried. Ryan gets on Randy's case...Oh sh*t, now I'm feeling sorry for RANDY?

UPDATE #3: Jason: "Mr. Tambourine Man," Bob Dylan. Dear God...Dylan? Decent start...whoops, forgot the lyrics! But it sounds OK. Well, he survived Dylan. Certainly could have been worse. Less memorable than Shatner's version, certainly. Randy doesn't like it, Paula doesn't make any sense, and Simon has Jason's bags packed. For cryin' out loud, don't do the guy any favors!

UPDATE #4: David A. does The King. More heavy breathing between notes - is ANYONE listening to what a poor singer this kid really is? Certainly not the judges.

Whew. That was really bad.

Just Spin, Baby

Only in politics, I suppose, can you win by losing. And you probably thought that judging of Olympic figure skating was subjective.

Don't get me wrong - I'm for Obama, and I'm ready for this thing to be over. But if the best evidence of it being over is the sincerity of Bill's hug and the heartbroken look on Chelsea's face (according to David Gergen), then I'm prepared to wait a little longer for the votes to be tallied.

But the spin tonight was disastrous for Hillary, at least on MSNBC, where the dominant theme was that after tonight, her staying in the race can only be viewed as a desire to destroy Obama.

The beginning of the end?

30 Years Ago, But This Year's Model

Listening to Elvis Costello is like walking down a dark, empty street and hearing another set of heels.

So began Kit Rachlis' Rolling Stone review of This Year's Model, the second album by Elvis Costello, and the first where Elvis was joined by his most famous backing band, The Attractions. Someone familiar with Costello only via his collaborations with such luminaries as Burt Bacharach and Allen Touissant, or because of his marriage to Diana Krall, might be surprised to read that Costello was capable of such power.

But Rachlis didn't stop there:

His music doesn't make you dance, it makes you jump. It doesn't matter that he's stalking his obsessions and not you, because nobody ought to be this sure of his obsessions. But Costello appears determined never to reach that age when, as Joan Didion once put it, "the wounds begin to heal whether one wants them to or not." This Year's Model, his second album in less than a year, is Costello's attempt to make certain those wounds stay open.

It's hard to express in words how exciting this album sounded when it was first released. Costello's first album, released in the fall of 1977, was great - no question about it. But little on that album prepared the listener for what This Year's Model would sound like. There was a hint in December, when Costello appeared on Saturday Night Live for what became a legendary performance, beginning the song "Less Than Zero," and a few bars in telling the audience, "sorry...there's no reason for us to do this song," and then tearing into a ferocious version of "Radio, Radio," which would become the anchor song on the new album. While Lorne Michaels came close to a stroke in the control room, wondering whether to pull the plug, Elvis and the Attractions tore into the song with a fury, with Costello literally spewing the venom that lay behind the strongest words on the album:

I wanna bite the hand that feeds me

I wanna bite that hand so badly

I want to make them wish they'd never seen me

And then:

You either shut up or get cut out,

they don't wanna hear about it,

it's only inches on the reel-to-reel

And the radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools

tryin' to anesthetize the way that you feel

It's anger like that which fuels This Year's Model - the edge in Costello's voice that, even though there was much great music to come (and probably still is to come), has never quite sounded like it did then. Costello was mad at the world, and it showed:

I don't want to see you 'cause I don't miss you that much

You think you all own little pieces of this year's girl

Forget your fancy manners, forget your English grammar

'Cause you don't really give a damn about this year's girl

I'd do anything to confuse the enemy

No, I don't want anybody saying

"You belong to me, you belong to me"

If I'm gonna go down

You're gonna come with me

Lip service is all you'll ever get from me

Sometimes I almost feel just like a human being

Sometimes I think that love is just a tumor

You've got to cut it out

I mean, come on...who would have thought this guy would later aspire to becoming this generation's Cole Porter?

And note for note, word for word, the Attractions match Costello's verbal venom - Steve Nieve's farfisa organ from hell, and the rhythm section of Bruce Thomas on bass and Pete Thomas on drums sound as if they're trapped in a room on fire, desperately making any sound they can to alert someone that they're about to perish in the flames.

It sounded great then, and it sounds great now - in fact, if it were released tomorrow, it would be the freshest thing out there.

More Answers

For an explanation of what this all means, see the previous post.

because he had a sense of a transcendent plane from which he was barred but wanted to work against

because we like to know a lot that we aren't told

because only the fear of life and death could beguile him to find the slightest meaning

because frozen memories gleam amid the blackness of loss

because the final five songs they played at their last ever show at High Hall, Birmingham University on May 2nd 1980, were Transmission, Disorder, Isolation, Decades and Digital, as always performing as if it was going to be the last show they ever did, even though they didn't really believe it would be, but it was

An odd coincidence, that I should happen to buy the album on the anniversary of their last show.

And this morning, I noticed something that escaped my attention yesterday - these writings are by Paul Morley, adapted from chapters LIV and LXIII of Piece by Piece: Writings About Joy Division 1977-2007.

Inhabiting the Space of a Song

There are few bands in the history of rock about which one could say, "they were one of a kind." For me, Joy Division is one of those bands. Their story is the stuff of legend, and I won't repeat it here - it's easy enough to find for those who are interested. Their sound was unique - Ian Curtis' voice combined with the sounds of Hook, Morris and Sumner to create something that, to this day, doesn't sound much like anything else. It was not easy; it was not simple. It could be a painful journey. There were only two albums, and their influence far outpaced their sales. And of course, the haunting single, "Love Will Tear Us Apart," one of the singular records of the past 50 years.

Today at lunch I made one of my periodic sojourns to The Beat in downtown Sacramento, something not quite as easy to do now as it was when I worked downtown, just a few short blocks away. Now, with my office on the other side of the river in West Sacramento, it's a drive, albeit a short one. It's always worth it.

The Best of Joy Division quickly caught my eye - the packaging looked new, and since all of my Joy Division is on vinyl, I snapped it up (for $11.98; great price). The packaging is spare - no history of the band; no track listing with instrumentation noted; just one simple picture on the cover, with the band in the distance. For all I know, it could have been staged.

But inside, a unique set of liner notes, titled Answers: Some answers to some questions. And over the course of 13 pages, the answers tell the story. Not all of it makes immediate sense; some of it seems wordy; but all of it is fun to read, even stimulating and dare I say it, poetic.

Some examples:

because Ian sang as though he'd already written the words down, on lined paper, in a cheap exercise book, with a wonderful, ragged right hard margin, keen to get it all out before the ruin, and something was giving him the heebie-jeebies

because of the connection between the order of things and the strange intersection of events in the world

because life is a means of extracting fiction

because each life makes its myths

and my favorite:

because [producer Martin] Hannett emptied the space of a song in order to let the listener inhabit it

To find one's way through a Joy Division record, that's the secret - inhabit the songs.

Mini Meme

...from Steven Rubio.

The way it works:

Ask me the seven questions below. Just copy and paste them into a comment, replace the blanks with anything you want--personal, silly, surreal or deep (and "clean," please) - and I'll answer honestly as I can, if not necessarily right away. If you have one, post this in your own blog and see what kind of things people want to ask you.

1. What do you think of _____________ ?
2. When did you last ____________?
3. __________ or ___________ and why?
4. What did you ______________?
5. What's your favorite ______________?
6. How would you ______________?
7. Who would you most like to ________ ?