WHY DON’T I KNOW ABOUT THIS GUY? #1 – JOHNNY A

For many in the North East region Johnny A may be on your radar. The Boston based guitarist seems to play regionally regularly and by the look of his videos he’s been doing it for a while. I know I have seen his name listed in Philly etc. in ads and listings but never knew a thing about him. Many of you may have seen his video in my recent blog UNDENIABLY CLASSIC SONGS – WICHITA LINEMAN which features and incredible instrumental version of that song by Johnny. I included it her again for those who missed it (if you saw it move on down for more cool originals and hip covers by Johnny A).

Once I saw this clip, I wanted to check this guy out. Finding this has inspired me to start this regular feature WHY DON’T I KNOW ABOUT THIS GUY/GIRL? So if you know of someone regional or off the beaten track, whether currently performing or someone obscure that you think I should hear about keep me posted.

JOHNNY A PLAYS WICHITA LINEMAN
A fantastic guitar instrumental version of this great Jimmy Webb tune. Wonderfully tasteful and sultry version of this great tune for jazzy trio. Sticking to the melody without a lot of harmonic variance, Johnny A’s touch and tone bring a nice, shimmering quality to Webb’s gorgeous melody. This was the first time I’ve heard this guy while working on a piece on the song Wichita Lineman.


So I look further and it seems he was signed to Steve Vai’s label for a bit and was asked to play on the G3 tour by Joe Satriani. I guess I’m not really plugged into to the shredder scene these days. He is much more a Hendrix/Page/Beck influenced modernist than a lot of the post DiMeola/Vai/Satriani trick-bag guys. More bluesy based but not really a blues player like Stevie Ray was. Now granted, there’s a bit too much Jimi and not enough jazzy in some of the live cover stuff but then again, I’ve already lived through Randy Hansen and Frank Marino, Robin Trower, Billy Gibbons and Stevie Ray so I’ve seen some decent guys approximate some of what Jimi did. I’ve always been one for more individualistic sounding players’ takes on Hendrix. Like Frisell, or Scofield or Clapton among those who have covered Jimi tune interestingly while never copping too much of the original while keeping their own distinctive stuff in tact.

But the reason I decided to do this blog on Johnny A is two-fold. First, I dug the simplicity and taste of the WICHITA LINEMAN so much and I think this guy’s touch and tone is a nice find and I’d go see him for a night of bluesy shredding. Granted, the originality of a Derek Trucks or a Jim Hall or a Richard Thompson will get me back over and over again. I have a feeling I’d like this tons but perhaps not feel compelled to return every time out. I find in my older age I’m not so drawn to technique and volume as much as either experimentation and audacious originality (a la Nels Cline) or sublime harmonic and melodic invention and emotion (a la Kurt Rosenwinkel).

Then again there are a lot of young guitar slingers out there who will never see Jimi or SRV or Garcia or Albert King or Wes Montgomery or Danny Gatton or Tommy Bolin or any of the heavy guitar slingers who are no longer around. Not everyone wants to hear post-Eddie VH pyrotechnics all the time. And truly with Jeff Beck (who I still believe remains, note-for-note the most interesting and unique sounding player out there today) touring so seldom where can you get a full night of smokin’ instrumental guitar music on a regular basis these days. Still, I’d prefer an evening of Johnny’s original music with a couple of his tasty covers thrown in. The Johnny A original tunes are way cool. These Johnny A signature model Gibson guitars are also extremely gorgeous works of art.

Before we get into the crowd-pleasing covers, check out some of his original stuff…

HIP BONE


OH YEAH


SING SINGIN’


2 WHEEL HORSE



THE COVER TUNES:

THE WIND CRIES MARY & JIMI STORY
A long but amusing story about seeing Jimi live when he was 15. Followed by a funky version of “…Mary.” From Sellersville, PA 5/17/08.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQHyMfo0ey0

YOU DON’T LOVE ME
Yes, he covers the tune made famous by the Allman Brothers Band, here done up funky and with a taste of Wes-esque octave work and slithery wah work.


AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL
Solo guitar rendition recorded right after 9/11
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aax-38C9LnY

JOHNNY A GUESTING WITH J.J. CALE ON GOIN’ DOWN
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Atzp9a9PFPc

RED HOUSE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOp_lbaEr64

JIMI JAM
Lots of Jimi riffs in here but he also quotes Beatles, Stones, Zep, etc. From King of Prussia, PA. 6/17/07
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PZA5aWJf9U

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE:
Check out the JOHNNY A. OPEN FORUM links on YouTube. There are five parts. Mostly of interest for tech heads and guitarists for the most part. Here’s the link for Pt. 1.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNPdsj3imBc

Check out his website for tour dates…looks like his playing nationwide this spring so don’t miss him…

Johnny A's Website

For more on Johnny A:

Wikipedia

Johnny A on MySpace

MY FIRST ROCK CONCERT EVER!

So I'm not counting the concerts I was taken to by my parents in a justified but at the time, not truly appreciated, effort to add culture to my Leave It To Beaver life. My mom would always take us to see classical concerts like Peter and the Wolf and we'd go to special Christmas Concerts and Easter things. Not my cup of chowder.

Then Dad started hauling us to something called The Southern California Hot Jazz Society where we were more into getting all grunged up in the L.A. River chasing tadpoles than watching the killin' Dixieland bands he was hot on. But I will write about that experience at length some other time.

So let's define this question a bit narrower...how about the first show that I WANTED to go to without outside influence and was ALLOWED to...

Okay, so I wanted to see the Beatles in '66 when I was ten. After having her ears blasted by screaming girls when she took the four of us (my bro and two cousins) to see HARD DAY'S NIGHT at at he Century Theater in San Gabriel (with my grandma, Nana, whose only comment was, "They looked like the Marx Brothers with better hair"), my Mom wasn't about to deal with that in the flesh.

So I had to wait a few years until ...

#1 - STEPHEN STILLS & MANASSAS – Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, CA. July 12 or 16, 1972.

I always thought it was the 12th but recently saw a poster that said the latter date. Perhaps they played two shows. I don’t recall and my ticket stub, I’ve yet to find amongst the boxes of same. The concert took place at the Hollywood Bowl.

I went with best friend and music buddy Kenny. We had really cemented our friendship a few years before while checking out a cassette from the “listening library” in 7th Grade at Oak Avenue Junior High. Scanning the lists we oddly both wanted to hear the same title, Buffalo Springfield’s Retrospective, a greatest hits compilation featuring Stills, Neil Young, and Richie Furay who, along with the Byrds prompted the L.A. singer/songwriter movement that caught fire in the early 70s. With just one copy of the tape, librarian Elmo Brigoli brainstormed a headphone splitter and two pairs of phones so we could listen to the music together. Reluctantly, we agreed and over those few minutes between classes became a lifelong friendship based on our love of music.

Within a year or two we were poised to hit our first live concert, if only our parents would agree to let us go. His were pretty easy. His older sisters had already been down that road. In fact, it was their record collection that we’d pick through listening to new things when they weren’t home. We had also started playing guitars and found that we could scratch together reasonable versions of Stills and Nash and Young’s three chord tunes. Other than “Long Time Gone”, Crosby’s complex tunings and chord changes would be beyond us for a couple of years still.

When we saw that MANASSAS was scheduled to play the Bowl, we put our plan into effect and after much cajoling convinced my folks to drop their guard long enough for us to trudge to the May Company and get tickets. The cost was $6.50 each and we somehow scraped up the fundage.

When the day arrived, my folks and brother dropped us off in the station wagon for I was still five months away from my driver’s license. Dad said, "We'll meet you at the gas station at the corner after the show." I’m sure my mother was worried senseless. They killed time at the Cinerama Dome a few blocks away on Hollywood Blvd. and saw Alfred Hitchcock's last movie FRENZY while we “ruined our lives” as Kenny likes to say.

As soon as we found our way up the long inclined drive and through the turnstiles, I was completely overwhelmed by how cool the Hollywood Bowl was. Granted, I'd been there for Easter Sunrise Services with my family many times before as a child which, of course, I hated because we had to get up before dawn, it was cold and early and I had to dress up in church clothes. No doubt some pastel blue Easter outfit. This was different. We were on our own and free in the adult world. The place was teeming with hippies and teenagers and cool people and girls! Wow!

As Kenny and I climbed to our wooden seats about half way up the sprawling Bowl, the anticipation was palpable. We’d heard about what went on at rock shows. We’d seen the Woodstock movie at the Alhambra Theatre. We’d heard about Altamont. The Beatles had played here and girls had leapt into the moat in front of the stage. And, yes, people got high at concerts. Now, we didn't smoke pot at the time. That was about a year away, I think. So I was a bit worried that the hippies would somehow force us to breath in that stuff and at the very least we’d succumb to the dreaded “contact high”. Little did I know we’d spend the next few years using that term to explain our funky smelling clothes, red eyes and voracious appetites to our parents.

If I recall, the guy next to Kenny looked a lot like a young Jerry Garcia and his "old lady" fit the bill too, all smiling in her granny dress and long ponytails with purple shades. Luckily, they were sitting next to Kenny and not me. To my left were a couple of older guys in varsity jackets from Bellflower or somewhere. I felt relatively safe.

Of course, as soon as the show started, the varsity guys lit up numerous joints and the hippies offered us some fried chicken from their picnic basket. Lessons in life were abundant before us.

The concert was great. Manassas was an album Stills had made in a break between CSNY business, the follow-up to his sophomore solo effort, STEPHEN STILLS 2. The band on the album featured Chris Hillman on mandolin, guitar and beautiful harmony & lead vocals from the Byrds and just a great band of stellar session guys. Paul Harris, the keyboardist, I knew from John Sebastian’s records had also backed B.B. King and Eric Anderson. The drummer Dallas Taylor and bassist Calvin “Fuzzy” Samuels had played with CSN (and Y). Pedal steel and slide player Al Perkins was a vet of Hillman’s previous band, The Flying Burrito Brothers and Mike Nesmith's proto-country rock group and would go on to join Emmylou Harris's band in later years. Joe Lala who came from the band Blues Image was ferocious on Latin percussion and added a whole other element to the show. Burrito alum and bluegrass fiddle master Byron Berline was on the LP and the gig during the country tinged numbers.

The band was extremely good, loose and well-oiled. They attempted most of the record and also some Stills solo stuff and couple of CSNY and even a Burritos song I think. Kenny and I were riveted and immediately hooked on the buzz that live music gave us.

Being my first rock concert, I wasn’t yet in the habit of writing down set lists or saving ticket stubs, a habit I would soon acquire. My recollection of the set list, other than the blanket generalities mentioned above, is sketchy. I do remember distinctly, at one point, Stills sitting center stage for a solo segment which featured him on acoustic guitar singing “Word Game” from STILLS 2 and “Black Queen” from his debut solo album.

I also recall the band playing “Sugar Babe” from STILLS 2 and Stills at the piano at one point alone playing “49 Bye-Byes/America’s Children” as on CSNY’s live Four-Way Street album which was a favorite of ours at the time. I believe the way the show was set up was that the band came out and did an electric segment featuring the entire first side of their debut LP. Followed by a Stills acoustic solo set. Then Hillman and Perkins (and Stills?) did a little bluegrass segment joined shortly by the full band (with Byron Berline on fiddle, I believe) for more rock and country tinged tunes before closing with a full band acoustic set. I THINK "The Treasure" was the encore. Love to find a list, or better yet a recording or some footage of this show. It ran about 3 hours.

THE TREASURE live on Euro TV Beat-Workshop from Bremen 1972



The self-titled debut record MANASSAS, was a double LP set made up of four distinctly themed sides - side A was called The Raven and featured bigger rock and Latin tinged tunes; side B was subtitled The Wilderness and was all country/rock and bluegrassy stuff which I loved and was just getting into at the time; side C, dubbed Consider was more acoustic based tunes, sort of like what CSNY called “wooden music” at Woodstock, singer/songwriter, folk/rock stuff, the forerunner of the AAA radio format; side D was titled Rock N Roll Is Here To Stay and was bluesy and rockin', big time and sonically Hendrix-esque in spots times with lots of texture. One of my favorite records of all-time. It is rumored that Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman, who played on and co-wrote "Love Gangster" on the LP, was quoted as saying he'd leave the Stones if they let him play with Manassas.

This was a long show. Afterwards, Kenny and I farted around looking at souvenirs and girls and stuff and when we finally got back to my Dad's car he'd been sitting there for nearly 2 hours (the show being longer than the movie) and he was fuming. Partially because he was still a cop at the time and there was a VW bus parked next to him with kids smoking pot and “acting like idiots” and he couldn't do anything because he had his wife and kid with him. My mother said, "It smelled sickeningly sweet, like burnt rope."...Hahaha...Kenny and I still get a kick out of that. What a memorable night.

While one of the most critically acclaimed albums of Stills’ long and illustrious career, the band would be unfortunately short-lived, releasing just one more single LPs worth of material during their lifetime called Down The Road. The follow-up to their debut featured much more of the Latin flavor that Stills, who spent time as a young man in South America, and Joe Lala were so fond of. There were two tunes in Spanish heavily leaning on Latin percussion. Hillman, whose mainstream bluegrass roots (The Hillmen) and later country hitmaking skills (The Desert Rose Band) would inform the rest of his career, contributed a cool tune, "Lies" as well co-writing the folky acoustic number "So Many Times" with Stills. Stephen's best tunes on the record were “Do You Remember The Americans” and "Isn't It About Time" which he still occasionally performs to this day. There was also the blistering bluesy title track which highlighted Stills guitar playing. It was actually a really fine album but not up to the high standards set by the debut. Rumors of lots of substance abuse in the studio and difficult working conditions which found the Albert brothers, producers of both releases bolting from the session, did not bode well for the future of the band.

Shortly thereafter Stills met with Crosby, Nash and Young and tried to record an album in Hawaii to no avail. He returned and did another Manassas tour with bassist Kenny Passarelli in tow but the spark and drive wasn't there and this coulda-been-a-contender band was knocked out cold. Hillman, Harris, & Perkins went on to join David Geffen's "supergroup" the Souther Hillman Furay band. Taylor struggled with heroin and alcohol addiction and is now recovered and a counselor for recovery programs. Lala continued to play with Stills for many years. I'm not sure where Fuzzy Samuels wound up. Byron Berline continued on with the legendary bluegrass group, Seldom Scene and remaine done of the most in demand fiddlers in country music. Stills obviously has continued to tour with CSN and solo since then with occasion forays with Neil young addd to the gumbo.

Oddly, at the last solo gig I played in Delaware before I came out West this past January, I pulled out a tune from MANASSAS, “So Begins The Task” which I had never played before. I was no doubt inspired by a recent listen to the brand new 2009 Manassas CD entitled PIECES. Strangely enough and without much fanfare, Stills just released this, the first of supposedly many archival projects. It is a single CDs worth of outtakes from sessions for both Manassas albums. It is comprised of of some fantastic material including incredible versions of tunes from his second solo album, "Sugar Babe" and "Word Game" as well as some never before heard gems, both originals and covers. This is indeed what could have been. Not a mish-mosh of lesser tracks but a really great group of tunes often surpassing original versions of these tunes and new songs that stand up to the classics. Even Bill Monroe's "Uncle Pen" gets a wonderful work out as does the old tune covered by the Burritos, Joe Maphis' "Dim Lights, Thick Smoke (And Loud, Loud Music)." Hillman's "High N Dry" which showed up on the SHF album is a real treat. Check this out to hear an amazing but under-appreciated band with these finally seeing the light of day after 38 years in the vaults.

Surprisingly, at my first gig back in Big Bear in February, our mandolinist, Roy Coulter started playing “Hide It So Deep” also from that 1st Manassas album. I followed with “It Doesn’t Matter” from side 3. These songs still resonate for me as standards of excellence and major fulcrums in my development as an appreciator of the music of my time.

HIDE IT SO DEEP live on Euro TV Beat-Workshop from Bremen 1972


IT DOESN’T MATTER live on Euro TV Beat-Workshop from Bremen 1972 the first single


All three albums are worth hearing and are available at iTunes and Amazon.com

During the next three years I’d see 90% of the live concerts I attended with my friend Ken. We’d continue to see shows together on occasion over the next three and a half decades but this one is one neither of us will likely forget anytime soon. The first cut is the deepest.

BOUND TO FALL live on Euro TV Beat-Workshop from Bremen 1972


SONG OF LOVE live on Euro TV Beat-Workshop from Bremen 1972


STILLS INTERVIEW
EntertainmentOnABC Australia
Interview with Stephen Stills and Manassas at Mascot Airport by Jeune Pritchard, Ep 467. Broadcast 12th April 1972

UNDENIABLY CLASSIC SONGS (TO ME AT LEAST!) - WICHITA LINEMAN

WICHITA LINEMAN
Words and music by Jimmy Webb

I am a lineman for the county.
And I drive the main road.
Lookin' in the sun for another overload.

I hear you singing in the wire.
I can hear you thru the whine.
And the Wichita Lineman
is still on the line.

I know I need a small vacation.
But it don't look like rain.
And if it snows that stretch down south,
won't ever stand the strain.

And I need you more than want you.
And I want you for all time.
And the Wichita Lineman
is still on the line.



What makes a song timeless, memorable and so spectacular that over forty years after hearing it for the first time it can conjure up the same feelings of wonder and melancholy that it did back then. In 1968, I didn’t even know what wonder and melancholy were. I was not yet 12 years old but this song grabbed me by the non-existent chest hair and made me listen, hard. I wasn’t quite sure what a lineman was. After close inspection I realized Glen Campbell wasn’t singing about a football player. I also misheard the line “I can hear you through the wine.” I just thought it was some adult secret I’d learn about eventually. And, yes, perhaps that misheard line even makes more sense to me now having been on the downside of a couple of long-gone break-ups while pouring quarters into a jukebox for repeated spins of “Tonight The Bottle Let me Down” but that’s another tale and song altogether. Still, something resonated within me and when the name of this tune comes up these days, people of my generation all seem to feel some kind of strong connection to this song. Not so much to Glen’s previous hits, “Gentle On My Mind” with John Hartford’s rolling country spun positivism or “By The Time I Get To Phoenix” which while gorgeously arranged like this tune doesn’t stick in the chest in spite of its with a lifting bridge and sad outcome. For some reason “…Lineman” is so simply stated amidst such a sweeping tonal canvas and beautiful melodic line that it seems at times the perfectly constructed tune to bring back some buried ache we had long lost thought forgotten.

If just reading Jimmy Webb’s lyric above, it presents a very simple picture of a moment of self-description of a workingman’s longing for his loved one. Pretty cut and dried. But in the case of this timeless hit which continued Glen Campbell’s string of mid-sixties chartbusters, the session guitarist turned pop vocalist turned TV and movie star, converted this beautifully captured moment of song into one of the most popular of it’s time.

While watching the various takes of Campbell performing it via the wonder of YouTube’s seemingly bottomless font of treasures, you can catch the elements that make this tune work, whether performed with a gigantic, overwrought orchestra with Glen cartooning a bit in his tux before them; a stripped down and flubbed duet version with Keith Urban; or a surprisingly well-balanced and simple yet reverential renditions by R.E.M. or by Glen sitting in with Stone Temple Pilots. What resonates first and foremost is the strength and grace of Webb’s heartrending melody and a handful of musical devices that are always present no matter the arrangement. The block chorded piano/orchestra/baritone guitar part that represents the solo section is essential. No frills. No extraneous guitar licks. Just riff as signifier of a big sound, representing a big moment even in the most stripped down versions. There is the telegraph sounding “dit-dit-di-dit” high end riff that sometimes Glen plays on guitar and in the big orchestral versions it is fleshed out by the piano and staccato string, while in the version from Glen’s TV show, John Hartford’s banjo doubles the part. And there is the vocal’s strong, held notes, which soar over and set up those telegraph blips, “still on the liiiiiiiiiine…”

For me the kicker is the chord change when the 2nd verse comes in, and the umph in the 2nd syllable of the last word in the line “I know I need a small vaCAtion”. You feel the need in his voice here. The strength of Glen’s delivery and the pushing of the melody on the line “and if it snows the stretch don’t south won’t ever stand the strain.” Powerful, especially when followed by the resigned confession of the lower toned and less stridently sung opening line of the last chorus, “and I need you more than want you / and I want you for all time…” Why didn’t I think of that? What a perfect line. The melody and delivery are just essential to putting this song across.

I do also love the versions where Glen adds an additional chorus of guitar instrumental and we get to hear some tasty licks demonstrating why, before he was a star, he could be found first in line at the studio for sessions by the era’s great producers such as Phil Spector and Brian Wilson as well as heard on on hits by The Monkees, Sinatra, Presley, Merle Haggard, Dean Martin, The Mamas & The Papas, Bobby Darin, Rick Nelson, The Champs and countless others.

Sometimes called “the first existential country song”, Jimmy Webb’s “Wichita Lineman” was penned in 1968 and as the first single and title song of Campbell’s album that year it rose to #3 on the U.S. pop chart as well as topping the American country music charts for two eeks and the Adult Contemporsry chart for six week. It stayed in the Top 200 on the pop charts for 15 weeks. Rolling Stone magazine’s writers mad it #192 on their 2004 list of “500 Greatest Songs of All-Time”.

Jimmy Webb wrote alot of songs that have been covered by radically diverse artists and like Burt Bacharach before him, he has suffered the stings and arrows of criticism for being schmaltzy, unhip, or God forbid, "Pop"...but a good song is a good song...some of Webb's best include "MacArthur Park", "Up, Up And Away", "By The Time I Get To Phoenix", "Galveston" and "The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress". His songs have been recorded by artists as diverse as Waylon Jennings, Art Garfunkel, Richard Harris, Johnny Rivers, The Supremes, Tanya Tucker, Isaac Hayes, Thelma Houston, Arlo Guthrie, Linda Ronstadt, Joe Cocker, Bud Shank, Frank Sinatra, Nina Simone, Bobby Vee, The Four Tops, Barbra Streisand, Roberta Flack, Diana Ross, Tom Jones, Harry Nilsson, Dionne Warwick, Cher, Lowell George, Donna Summer, America, Toto, Amy Grant, Kenny Rankin, John Denver, Kenny Rogers, David Crosby, Michael Feinstein, Nanci Griffith, Rosemary Clooney, R.E.M., Carly Simon, Aimee Mann and The Everly Brothers for starters!. Webb is the only artist to ever win Grammies for music, lyrics and orchestration. Webb, like Van Dyke Parks and a handful of other daring folks in that age were not afraid to test the limits of their respective genres and get a bit surreal, a little existential...these were daring times even for the world of pop music...times when everything from The Beatles to Paul Mariat to Glen Campbell to Smokey Robinson, The Rolling Stones, Andy Williams or the Fifth Dimension could rule the airwaves.

So back in the day, I was too young to know from hip...Glen Campbell wasn't the hippest guy around...this was country/pop before the labels got so insane and important...and strings were heard regularly on Top 40, R&B, pop, rock and country records...someone on one of the YouTube posts asked, "Am I getting old because I really like this music now?" and the answer was something along the lines of, "Hey It's a great song!"

Check out these versions of Glen singing this classic number followed by some unique cover versions:

GLEN CAMPBELL
Original 1969 video is worth seeing as an example of an early promo flick but unfortunately the sync is bad and the quality of the video is not great so I didn’t post here. But here’s the link:


GLEN CAMPBELL ON LATER... with JOOLS HOLLAND
Here is my favorite version, and it is the most recently recorded (2008). I think I enjoy it because it so so different and has Glen fronting a small group ensemble for Jools Holland’s BBC TV show. The treat is that we get more Glen guitar than on the other versions found. He takes an extended solo that is super tasty. His voice still sounds good.


The following version from Glen Campbell In Concert DVD (available from Eagle Vision and well worth the purchase with all of his hits included and more). This features Glen with a huge orchestra and another tasty Strat solo. Great quality sound and footage too.


For guitar heads out there…
Here’s Glen playing a baritone guitar (which is what the original solo on the record sounds like it was recorded on). This vid is from the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and Glen is singing live to a backing track (notice the track fades) but playing live guitar for the solo. He’s playing a Fender bass IV that isn’t actually a bass but a baritone guitar, I am told. It is also interesting in that he improvises a bit of a vocal vamp over the fadeout. For those too young to know Glen, this is the classic Glen look when he was in his prime. Swooping hair, turtlenecks and jackets and hip guitars. Okay, so I actually used to wear my hair like this but didn’t we all? No? Please don’t tell me that.


GLEN sings WICHITA LINEMAN sings in the middle segment of his network TV variety show, The Glen Campbell Good Time Hour. This if I recall correctly was the mid-point of the shows where he’d sit mid-audience and play and sing sometimes with his guests. Surrounded by the crowd, it always seemed real intimate and my favorite part of the show. More music than scripted variety stuff. Here he plays an early Ovation 12-string acoustic and is accompanied on banjo by the late, great John Hartford (composer of “Gentle On My Mind”). Granted the arrangement is still big like the hit, but Hartford doubles the staccato signature riff. Granted the instruments shown are practically inaudible and the song cuts before the solo. Love to see the full version of this.


A 2006 version with GLEN playing the solo on an Ovation acoustic. In fact, he may have been the first person I ever saw playing an Ovation guitar. Does anyone know? Was he one of the first endorsers?


GLEN CAMPBELL with, yes, STONE TEMPLE PILOTS doing playing “Wichita Lineman” in the studio. From the Thank You DVD. Glen looks like he’s playing a Danelectro longhorn or it could be a Jerry Jones, I can’t tell. Anyone?


Here we find GLEN playing an interesting electric 12-string, I can't identify. It doesn't sound great...This has got to be my least favorite of the Glen versions posted here. He seems a bit silly and unfocused and cuts off his phrasing a bit here and there. More schmaltzy, no extended guitar solo, sappy background_ singers, weak sound mix, too big ending. But funny hair though, Glen. Watch for the guy who looks a bit like Martin Landau on flute. Funny.


COVER VERSIONS:


JOHNNY A
A fantastic guitar instrumental version. Wonderfully tasteful and sultry take on this great tune for jazzy trio. Sticking to the melody without a lot of harmonic variance, Johnny A’s touch and tone bring a nice, shimmering quality to Webb’s gorgeous melody. This is the first time I’ve heard this guy. I’ll check him out further.


R.E.M.
1994 clip of them playing this live in a rehearsal hall. Unfortunately a bit of it is voiced over with interview footage but a cool version. I’d like to get the full-length version. There’s also a version of them doing Glen/Jimmy Webb’s “Galveston” as well.


James Taylor
For his most recent album, Covers, released in September 2008, JT brings his own distinctive voice to the Webb classic.


Dennis Brown
The late reggae legend doing "Wichita Lineman" in a decidedly non-reggae version. This is fairly early Dennis and a bit rough around the edges production-wise as a lot of homegrown reggae records of the period were but the slightly slower pace is perfect and his voice sounds wonderful. FYI - the header "Ultimate version" is not mine.


If there's a song you consider an UNDENIABLE CLASSIC..let me know and I'll consider showcasing your favorites...

TODAY'S LISTENING PLEASURES

BILL EVANS - THE COMPLETE VILLAGE VANGUARD RECORDINGS, 1961
(*****) 2003 compilation/boxed set

My first thoughts on returning to these recordings which I haven’t listened to in years--and this being a recent (2003) compilation of all existing material from the original recorded sets from August 25, 1961—is how much I love a great jazz bassist.

Since I first heard music from these sessions on various original LP releases such as Waltz For Debby and Sunday at the Village Vanguard back in the 70s when I was a college kid diving headfirst into the jazz world, I’ve spent inordinate amounts of time listening and watching live performances by some of the great bass players of the past half century…Dave Holland, Charlie Haden, Ron Carter, Christian McBride, Cecil McBee, Fred Hopkins, Buster Williams, Michael Moore are some of my favorites as well as their illustrious predecessors Ray Brown and Milt Hinton. Sad to say that I missed the incredible Scott LaFaro.

His playing with the Bill Evans trio were really historically important moments in the development of the bass in jazz. Much more eloquent scribes as well as his peers and antecedents on the instrument have sung his praises more knowledgeably and poetically than I could hope to. I am just obligated to mention how much I enjoyed every moment of his playing on these spectacular sessions after so many years away.

Not to take anything away from the atmospheric, introspective vision and harmonic beauty of Bill Evans’ unique approach to the piano or Paul Motian’s delicate and concise lyricism at the drum kit but to these ears it is LaFaro’s playing in this particular group that made this the benchmark for all piano trios to follow. He’d only been on the scene for seven short years but already made his mark with a myriad crop of jazz heavyweights from Evans, Ornette Coleman, and Stan Kenton to Benny Goodman, Chet baker and Booker Little. That he died tragically at 25 just 10 days after these recordings were made is one of the major losses in jazz music.

The three discs in this wonderful collection capture the ambiance of the venerable Vanguard and can be left in your CD changer indefinitely, listenable anytime of the day or night.



(The video above feat the pre-remastered version from the Sunday Night at the Vanguard cd, not the 2003 reissued remaster but wonderful nonetheless.)

REVEREND GARY DAVIS – DEVILS & ANGELS: The Ultimate Collection
(****) 2001 compilation/box set

From the two opening tracks, which are fascinating oddities in the entire realm of recorded music, Davis’s facile picking and unique style interspersed with his unique, off-the-cuff, and funny vocal stabs that set us up for the revelatory three CDs of essential music to come, this boxed set is a pleasure for new and old fans alike.

Many have known Davis only through the more famous covers of his material by 60s icons the Grateful Dead and more esoteric well-knowns such as bluesman Taj Mahal, roots rockers The Blasters and various gospel hitmakers, his “big hits” like “Samson & Delilah”, and “Death Don’t Have No Mercy” are not to be found here. There are tunes in this set that Davis worshipper Jorma Kaukonen has later oft covered solo or with his group Hot Tuna, such as “Keep Your Lamps Trimmed & Burnin’” and “I Am The Light of This World, as well as a handful of tunes rekindled often in gospel circles.

Davis’s primal and essential 30s material is collected elsewhere. These recordings compile sessions and live sets from 1954-1966, the cusp and tail-end of “the great folk music scare” when much of the music and many of the remaining and forgotten folk and blues artists of previous generations were unearthed and given their due by a whole new generation of music lovers. Davis is one of the few who never stopped performing. Music was always his day job.

His incredible facility and stylistic distinctiveness of his guitar playing took the Piedmont style of his early Carolina roots and updated it with an aggressive soloing edge that embraced some of the sophistication of the bigger world outside of the confines of his Southern roots.

Some modern listeners may have trouble with the primitive nature of these recordings and the fluidity of the “tuning” of his guitar, but the passion, dexterity and difficulty of many of these performances will unearth a treasure trove for fans of rural blues and of Davis. For anyone newly interested in real, impassioned guitaristics, blues, gospel and Americana, this set provides a lightning bolt. As the Reverend has done over and over again to young players and music fans, neophytes will be converted. Feel the power of the spirit.

At different points in this set I’ve been either sent to my guitar in the corner to practice and practice a certain riff or to sit and consider why I would bother to try to replicate anything so unique, timeless and iconoclastic.



NELS CLINE – COWARD
(****) 2009

First, I must admit that I love psychedelic music of all stripes. I adore guitar work-out a la Fahey, Kottke, Hedges, Bola Sete, Robert Fripp. I love atmospheric touches in the studio, be they Hendrix’ innovative guitar FX, Crimson’s edgy united front, Eno’s washes of ambience, Daniel Lanois’s musty, soulful and breathy sense of heavy air around everything…and put all of these reference points into an instrumental record by one of the top guitarists of the moment, Nels Cline. For you newbies, yes, the Nels Cline of Wilco fame, who has been a major part of some of the most interesting and luxuriously special progressive and challenging music of the past couple of decades.

On first listen, this disc took me immediately back to my early college days when I was camped on the couch of a couple of college teachers who nightly opened a can of worms via my ear canals, playing everything from Robbie Basho, Seta, Fahey, Indian music, Jim Hall, and vast esoterica while their canary Mimi chirped from across their big open, doorless home.

It also reminds me of my very earliest 4-track cassette experiments, albeit with much more technique and bigger ideas. Those were days of permanent headphone hair, where the ringing and the bliss started, where the hair looked ridiculous whether the phones were on or, rarely, off. That’s when I learned 90% of my later studio chops, through open-minded experimentation, trial and error, beautiful convergences and tragic misfires. Spectacular music.

This is an album I could put on at low volume and leave it on repeat for days and never hear the same thing twice or crank it until the rogue, half-squirrel/half-beavers finally vacate my chimney they have commandeered for the past year...hmmm, I may have finally solved that p[roblem...but I digress...Gotta love it. Nels Cline is an endlessly fascinating force of nature.



AND I’VE BEEN IN A NEIL YOUNG MODE LATELY…

NEIL YOUNG – AMERICAN STAR & BARS
(****) – 1977 / 2003 remaster

I hadn’t revisited this album in years. One of Neil’s stranger mish-moshes of tunes it features some of his most endearing country-tinged numbers which set linked the hit country feel of the Harvest LP with his first full foray into the Nashville side of his milieu, Comes A Time.

Side One of the LP jumped right out of the chute with a waltz and two-step feel, Ben Keith’s pedal-steel and a bit of fiddle for a pure country vibe, surrounding simple love songs about love and loss featuring the luscious backing vocals of Linda Ronstadt and Nicolette Larsen… “Old Country Waltz”, “Saddle Up The Palomino” (okay albeit weird rockin’ country), “Hey Babe”, “Hold Back The Tears” weren’t hits for Neil but for a guy like me living in So. Cal and recently advancing to a semi-proficient stage on my acoustic guitar, it was a great chance to add a batch of simple and heartfelt tunes to my living room concerts with friends. That Ronstadt claims she walked in thinking they were rehearsing and didn’t know Neil was rolling tape is a wonderful testament to the infectiousness of the tunes. “Bite The Bullet” is a nasty little song about cunnilingus gets grungy a la Crazy Horse (that band's rhythm section graces side one)and heats things up in a Southern Rock kind of way. This tune wouldn’t sound out of place on a Black Oak Arkansas, Lynyrd Skynyrd, or Outlaws album if it was slicked up a bit, but of course, comes off sounding like pure Neil as does everything the man puts out there.

The sessions for side one were the last recorded, all done in April of 1977 and sound decidedly different from everything on side two where things get a bit, uh, esoteric.

The first tune was the earliest recorded (Nov. 1974) and is acoustic with the exception of Tim Drummond's bass. Karl T. Himmel on drums and Ben Keith on Dobro round out the band alongside Neil’s strummed acoustic guitar. Emmylou Harris’s harmony is as radiant and pristine as anything she’s delivered in a career of glistening moments. The secret weapon in this mellow and easy flowing folk/country is the open ended question at the end of the song which gives the track it’s name, “Maybe the star of Bethlehem wasn’t a star at all…”

Next up is what, at the time, was possibly the strangest tune in all of Neil’s large and expanding repertoire. “Will To Love’ is a very spacey, languorous piece in which Neil seems to be singing about salmon spawning and their relentless drive upstream to keep up the bloodline. I know, "Huh?" The fact that the tune seems almost formless and out of time on first listen makes it even stranger. That Neil overdubs all of the instruments and vocals himself (recorded in May of 1976, there are sounds that resemble a popping fire a la his recording of “Soldier” first heard on Journey Through The Past in 1972, but could be buttons on his sleeve hitting the guitar?) was in and of itself interesting at the time. Then, as this ends and you are contemplating just what the hell you just heard, the next tune seems to burst out mid-riff into one of the heaviest yet Crazy Horse manifestos, “Like A Hurricane”.

The evocative live video for this song featured Neil wailing on Old Black--his iconographic Gibson Les Paul--with a big fan blowing his hair back (remember this is pre-MTV days). It helped cement this rave up as one of his fans all-time favorites…and for good reason – it became a show stopper year after year tearing the roof of shed, arenas, stadiums and clubs for the next 3 decades.

The album ended with another Crazy Horse stomper this one from the “Rockin’ The Free World”, “This Note’s For you” novelty/anthem school of Neil…”Homegrown” a sprite-ly sing-a-long ode to the joys of marijuana farming at home. He’d later revisit this theme on Comes A Times’s “Field of Opportunity”.

With the songs back to back on CD, and with 30+ years of hindsight and 100s of listenings later, American Stars n Bars doesn’t sound near as odd as it first did. In fact, it sounds like late night phone call from a quirky old friend.

Not to mention it bears one of my favorite all-time album covers. Don't ya miss album covers. I remember taking this home and laughing at it over and over while i listened to the LP for the first time.