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Entries categorized as “Rediscovering Our Record Collections” 39 results
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: “Red Headed Stranger” by Willie Nelson
by Josh Friedberg
Willie Nelson’s mainstream success began with a spare concept album (some would say “rock opera”) that went completely against the grain of country music at the time. Today, Nelson’s Outlaw persona is taken for granted, including in mainstream country circles: CMT (Country Music Television) even voted Red Headed Stranger as the #1 country album of all time.
But in 1975, this album came as a surprise to everyone, including Columbia Records. The label granted Nelson artistic control over his music, and they were shocked when they heard this bare-bones album that cost only $20,000 to make. To everyone’s surprise, the album sold millions of copies and became a beloved classic of the genre, including among rock critics.
Often forgotten, however, is the fact that Nelson didn’t write a lot of the songs on the album. This is surprising because up to this point, Nelson had been known as a songwriter of hits for other artists: in the ‘60s, his songs became hits for Patsy Cline (“Crazy”), Faron Young (“Hello Walls”), Ray Price (“Night Life”), and others. Red Headed Stranger is also full of instrumentals and fragments that move the story along.
When I first heard this album a long time ago, it struck me how scattered this album seems for such a classic: unlike earlier Nelson albums of the time, such as 1974’s Phases and Stages, there aren’t many fully fleshed out songs of even two or three minutes. There are, however, a few exceptions: gems like his classic version of a song Ernest Tubb had made famous three decades earlier, “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” and the five-minute, startlingly vulnerable “Can I Sleep in Your Arms” are two standouts.
Today, I love listening to this album, but I’m still somewhat mystified by the concept, as I am with a lot of higher-level concept albums. I have trouble following the storyline, though the album does feel cohesive. This is Nelson’s most acclaimed album, but if I want a collection of songs (as opposed to a concept album), I might prefer Stardust, his highly popular 1978 collection of pop and jazz standards like “Georgia on My Mind” and “Blue Skies.”
Still, this is a classic album experience that rewards time and repeated listening.
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: Stevie Wonder’s “Songs in the Key of Life”
Preachy, saccharine, bloated, inconsistent—call it what you will, but Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life has held up exceptionally well over the last 40 years. Maybe it’s because the messages are still relevant, maybe it’s because the arrangements to songs like “Sir Duke” and “I Wish” still sound fresh, maybe it’s because Stevie Wonder toured behind the album two years ago and audiences still love it. In any case, this month, Stevie Wonder’s double-LP-plus-a-7”-EP (!)-length monstrosity has been selected for Classic Album Sundays, which CHIRP is sponsoring in Chicago at Transistor (transistorchicago.com) on Sunday, September 25.
In terms of my relationship with this album, I saw it in my mother’s CD collection as a kid, and I eventually bought the later remastered version. I’ve sometimes had a mixed reaction to this album: as others have pointed out, the lyrics are convoluted and the songs go on and on, but if you just pay attention to the arrangements and the overall sound, the album is absolutely brilliant, and today it is among my ten (five?) favorite albums ever.
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: Carole King’s “Tapestry”
I’ve pretty much always loved Carole King’s 1971 blockbuster album Tapestry, but I’ve sometimes been conflicted about embracing its flaws. Yes, this is one of the most beautiful pieces of pop song craft ever made—it’s a different kind of candidate for “greatest pop album ever” than a dance album like Michael Jackson’s Thriller—but I would be dishonest if I acted like I think every single song is an absolute masterpiece. In fact, 1971 was so good a year for classic albums that Tapestry was probably not even one of the very best albums of the year, though it won Album of the Year at the Grammys. But today I do enjoy every single song on the album, while acknowledging that some are better than others.
One sleeper track, “Way Over Yonder,” has played a very special role in my life. I sang it at my college graduation ceremony and at a Take Back the Night march against sexual violence, dedicating it to a number of friends. But still, “Way Over Yonder” is by no means one of the album’s several all-time classics: “I Feel the Earth Move,” “So Far Away,” “It’s Too Late,” “You’ve Got a Friend,” and others far outdistance it in quality. But this song has woven itself into the story of my life in a way that different songs on the album did for millions of listeners in the ‘70s.
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: “Portrait of a Legend 1951-1964” by Sam Cooke
Jerry Wexler, the legendary Atlantic Records producer, once said, “Sam Cooke was the greatest singer that ever lived, no contest.” That’s some praise from the man who produced Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, and many others. But the 2003 compilation, Portrait of a Legend 1951-1964, does some justice to this praise. Unfortunately, it focuses mainly on his excellent pop work at the expense of his largely superior gospel records with the Soul Stirrers in the 1950s. Critic Dave Marsh once wrote something like that Cooke’s best records were his gospel ones, with 1964’s civil rights anthem, “A Change is Gonna Come,” being the exception that proves the rule.
When I first heard this compilation, despite some familiarity with hits like “Chain Gang” and “Cupid,” I was struck by how many of the songs used the same basic chord progression (some variation of I-IV-V, as it’s called in music theory terminology), and so I had trouble seeing how this CD deserved a spot so high on Rolling Stone’s list of the greatest albums ever (putting aside quibbles about if compilations should be included). Over time, the more I’ve gotten into Cooke’s music, I’ve grown to appreciate the variety in the arrangements on these songs even as the chord progressions still sound the same across most songs.
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: Peter, Paul and Mommy and Peter, Paul and Mommy, Too
by Josh Friedberg
For many, Peter, Paul & Mary were the most accessible entry point for the folk revival of the 1960s. Surprisingly, this remained true in the decades following, and part of this has to do with their participation in children’s music with two similarly titled albums.
I grew up on ‘60s folk music, and these were the two albums of theirs I grew up listening to the most. To be fair, I grew up with the Peter, Paul & Mary of PBS specials in the ‘80s and ‘90s, so my interaction with their music was different from most of their fans. This meant that I played the 1993 children’s album that they did, Peter, Paul & Mommy, Too, more than the original Peter, Paul and Mommy from 1969, and while both have their moments of beauty and pleasantness, I prefer the ‘90s album, partly because it has more songs geared towards adults, including Woody Guthrie’s “Pastures of Plenty,” though it also has moments much more targeted at kids.
Peter, Paul & Mary were actually a group put together by folk manager Albert Grossman in the early ‘60s, which makes their longevity all the more surprising. I remember reading in an obituary for Mary Travers in 2009 that the group won five Grammy awards during their initial reign in the ‘60s, the final one being for the 1969 children’s album. In the 2004 DVD, Carry It On: A Musical Legacy, Peter Yarrow talks about how from the beginning, the group put children’s songs on all their albums, including “It’s Raining” and “Puff, the Magic Dragon,” both reprised on the 1969 album.