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Post by berkley on Oct 17, 2024 1:47:08 GMT -5
I was certainly listening to Top 40 AM Radio prior to 1964. Enjoyed the surf music, girl groups, early Motown, 4 Seasons and other types songs on those stations. But I didn't think about who these performers were, didn't try to remember their names and back then, TV appearances were very rare. All this changed for me in 1964 at age 10 when The Beatles arrived in the USA. And up to then, no music recordings in my house besides what my mother owned. Half were Sinatra records, others from artists I still think as schmaltzy (Perry Como). And somehow this album was among that bunch and stuck out to me (in a good way). I guess it's the pure soulfulness in her voice, that she was singing from experience rather than from some lines on a paper. It was my first exposure to someone who could meld jazz, blues, R&B, gospel and pop together. This was Nina Simone's first live album. She became a star at the end of the 50's, had a great run of albums during the early 60s. And like Harry Belafonte beforehand, she became increasingly involved in Civil Rights activity from the mid-60's onwards As a sample I chose the song The Other Woman. Definitely not a song you'd expect a 10 year old to positively react to. But a song that stayed with me for decades
That's an amazing track, what an understated yet so evocative vocal performance. Unlike Harry Belafonte, Nina Simone is an artist I was completely ignorant of until just a few years ago and I'm still just in the early stages of learning about her music and about her as a person. I read somewhere that she took her stage name of Simone from actress Simone Signoret, which makes me wonder which particular film or performance of Signoret's inspired her.
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Post by berkley on Oct 17, 2024 2:05:31 GMT -5
#9 - The Best of Tex Ritter - Tex Ritter (Capitol 1966) Considering that the last two concerts that I attended were The Sons of the Pioneers and Riders in the Sky, I think it's fair to say that I love western music. I definitely got that from Dad. The only Sons of the Pioneers album that I can remember the old man having isn't one of my favorites, so we'll go with this one because I definitely loved it as a kid and I still do. Ritter was a successful singing cowboy appearing in 70 films and on 76 movie soundtracks. And while at this point I'm more likely to listen to Marty Robbins, Riders in the Sky or one of the better iterations of the Sons of the Pioneers, I still love me some Tex Ritter. And absolutely nobody does the High Noon theme like Ritter did it. And I love to listen to...and drink some Rye Whiskey. This was poker music. One of the records the old man would pull out when he and his friends were playing poker on weekend evenings. And...fun fact, Tex Ritter attended Northwestern Law School. He was a sharp dude.
Tex Ritter is someone I've been aware of only in a vague way, pretty much just as a name. I'll try listening to these two songs again later because I've often found my first impressions of music unreliable in the long run, but on first listen I like the second song way more than the first, which sounded droney and ponderous to me. Then I'm not a great fan of the movie or of Gary Cooper either, so possibly those factors are interfering in my immediate reaction.
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Post by berkley on Oct 17, 2024 2:49:12 GMT -5
9. Charley Pride ... uh, Best of? Greatest hits?
This is where I have to go off the rails a bit, because I can't even find a compilation that has all the songs, two in particular, that are most important in my personal experience of Charley Pride's music. Very strangely, to my mind, Crystal Chandelier doesn't appear on his first or second Best of compilations. And his first big song, The Snakes Crawl at Night, isn't on some of the later ones.
Anyway, if Johnny Cash was one of my father's favourites, Charley Pride was one of my mother's. I'll have to check this with her the next time we're talking, but I think he even played a concert in Newfoundland once, one of the very few big names to do so back then (60s-70s). I already mentioned the two songs of his I like best and those are the samples I'll put here, but I like his style and delivery in general - for example, even though I rate Doug Sahm's version of San Antone as the best I've heard, I'm very happy to listen to Charley Pride's rendition any time. I think he could do pretty much any country song and I'd like it. But here's my two special favourites:
The Snakes Crawl at Night: I winder if the title hindered its success? It makes sense when you listen to the words but still, people don't like snakes.
The Crystal Chandelier: this is one of my favourite country or pop-song in general lyrics - I think the phrasing and the rhymes are so well chosen and appropriate to the sense of the words. And the tune fits the words perfectly.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2024 8:15:28 GMT -5
9. The Jimi Hendrix Experience: Are You Experienced (1967).  So, this is the U.S. variation of the album, with "Hey Joe", "Purple Haze" and "The Wind Cries Mary" on it, right? If so, as well as having a much better front cover, I think the addition of those three songs, which were all released as non-album singles in the UK, make for a much stronger album overall. That said, the lack of "Red House" on the American version of Are You Experienced is an absolute travesty: that is one of the Top 5 songs that define Jimi Hendrix in my opinion. I feel as if there's an even better variation of this album waiting to be compiled that includes "Hey Joe", "Purple Haze", "The Wind Cries Mary" and "Red House". Great album though, in either of its variations. #9 - The Best of Tex Ritter - Tex Ritter (Capitol 1966)  Tex Ritter is a name I know, but I've never knowingly heard any of his music. Those two tracks you posted sound decent though. I This was Nina Simone's first live album. She became a star at the end of the 50's, had a great run of albums during the early 60s. And like Harry Belafonte beforehand, she became increasingly involved in Civil Rights activity from the mid-60's onwards  I like Nina Simone quite a lot, but I only own a CD "Best of..." disc and know none of her albums in their entirity. I do know "Black Is the Color of My True Love's Hair" from this album though. Good pick. 9. Charley Pride ... uh, Best of? Greatest hits? I think the only track of Pride's I know is "Crystal Chandeliers" and I like that one fine. It's got a nice, easy-going swing to it that appeals. |
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2024 8:43:58 GMT -5
#8 - Thriller by Michael Jackson (1982)  In the very early '80s, Michael Jackson was one of those artists that both my Mum and I were fans of. I had loved "Billie Jean" enough to tape it off the radio when it came out and I bought the "Beat It" single with my pocket money. A few months later, my mother picked up the Thriller album in late 1983. Unfortunately for her, pretty much as soon as the LP entered our house, I spirited it away and held it hostage in my bedroom. Suffice it to say that I absolutely devoured the album – spinning it over and over, day after day, soaking in all of its sonic wonder and becoming an obsessive Michael Jackson fan in the process. One of the things that impressed me most about Thriller as an 11-year-old, was that just how uniformly strong it was; this is an album that is "all killer, no filler" and that was something new to me. I still smile when I think of my Mum coming into my bedroom and asking in an annoyed voice, "have you got my Thriller album?". Of course, I always did! On some level, I still think of this album as belonging to my mother and I.  I'm gonna pick the song "Human Nature" to highlight the album. It's one of the less grandiose numbers from Thriller and is all the more affecting for it. I love the song's luscious, bubbling synths, its soothing guitar parts, and Jackson's delicately half-whispered vocal, all of which combine beautifully to conjure up the sleeping cityscape of the early morning hours that the song's lyrics allude to. There was a certain girl at middle school who I used to sing "Human Nature" to. She was my first girlfriend, when being boyfriend and girlfriend meant nothing more than holding hands in the playground and sneaking the odd peck on the cheek. Back then, I used to listen to "Human Nature" in my bedroom and think wistfully of her. On some vague level, I still do think of her whenever I hear this song.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 17, 2024 10:13:10 GMT -5
9. Charley Pride ... uh, Best of? Greatest hits? This is where I have to go off the rails a bit, because I can't even find a compilation that has all the songs, two in particular, that are most important in my personal experience of Charley Pride's music. Very strangely, to my mind, Crystal Chandelier doesn't appear on his first or second Best of compilations. And his first big song, The Snakes Crawl at Night, isn't on some of the later ones. Anyway, if Johnny Cash was one of my father's favourites, Charley Pride was one of my mother's. I'll have to check this with her the next time we're talking, but I think he even played a concert in Newfoundland once, one of the very few big names to do so back then (60s-70s). I already mentioned the two songs of his I like best and those are the samples I'll put here, but I like his style and delivery in general - for example, even though I rate Doug Sahm's version of San Antone as the best I've heard, I'm very happy to listen to Charley Pride's rendition any time. I think he could do pretty much any country song and I'd like it. But here's my two special favourites: The Snakes Crawl at Night: I winder if the title hindered its success? It makes sense when you listen to the words but still, people don't like snakes. The Crystal Chandelier: this is one of my favourite country or pop-song in general lyrics - I think the phrasing and the rhymes are so well chosen and appropriate to the sense of the words. And the tune fits the words perfectly. I'm a big fan of Charley Pride. My Mom had the one below, which was one of his earliest studio albums. It would likely come in at around number 13 or 14 on my list. '  |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 17, 2024 10:32:05 GMT -5
#8. Buck Owens In London - Buck Owens (Capitol 1969)  So there were at least four and maybe more Buck Owens albums at the house growing up. I went back and forth between this one and Bridge Over Troubled Waters, which I talked about when I did my Favorite Albums of 1971. Ultimately I went with this one because it's just such a strange album, but it still works so very well. It's 1969, ant-war sentiment is building to its peak, the British Invasion is at full throttle and here are Buck and the Buckaroos revving up a huge crowd in London. They're playing country music and feeding the crowd corn-pone humor and they're just eating it up. Buck and the band were just great live. While this isn't one of the GREAT live country albums, it's a damn good live country album...and Buck had two more that are almost as good. So if you see a lot of Buck Owens in my listening...this is where it came from. They did two different medleys on this one...and here is a great one. And their great live version of Johnny B. Goode.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 17, 2024 10:35:51 GMT -5
#8 - Thriller by Michael Jackson (1982) In the very early '80s, Michael Jackson was one of those artists that both my Mum and I were fans of. I had loved "Billie Jean" enough to tape it off the radio when it came out and I bought the "Beat It" single with my pocket money. A few months later, my mother picked up the Thriller album in late 1983. Unfortunately for her, pretty much as soon as the LP entered our house, I spirited it away and held it hostage in my bedroom. Suffice it to say that I absolutely devoured the album – spinning it over and over, day after day, soaking in all of its sonic wonder and becoming an obsessive Michael Jackson fan in the process. One of the things that impressed me most about Thriller as an 11-year-old, was that just how uniformly strong it was; this is an album that is "all killer, no filler" and that was something new to me. I still smile when I think of my Mum coming into my bedroom and asking in an annoyed voice, "have you got my Thriller album?". Of course, I always did! On some level, I still think of this album as belonging to my mother and I. I'm gonna pick the song "Human Nature" to highlight the album. It's one of the less grandiose numbers from Thriller and is all the more affecting for it. I love the song's luscious, bubbling synths, its soothing guitar parts, and Jackson's delicately half-whispered vocal, all of which combine beautifully to conjure up the sleeping cityscape of the early morning hours that the song's lyrics allude to. There was a certain girl at middle school who I used to sing "Human Nature" to. She was my first girlfriend, when being boyfriend and girlfriend meant nothing more than holding hands in the playground and sneaking the odd peck on the cheek. Back then, I used to listen to "Human Nature" in my bedroom and think wistfully of her. On some vague level, I still do think of her whenever I hear this song. This came out the start of my 9th grade year of school...which was the last year of junior high. So I was inundated with this album for what seemed like forever. I never cottoned to it. Just not my kind of music then or now. I get the love for it, but I can't feel it. |
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2024 11:32:22 GMT -5
#8. Buck Owens In London - Buck Owens (Capitol 1969) No surprise to see some Buck Owens making your list. I don't know this album at all, but I love that cover, with the famous neon light advertisments of Picadilly Circus in the background. I can well imagine that this is a great album. |
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Oct 17, 2024 11:36:02 GMT -5
One last album from my Mom's collection that I've wound up enjoying my whole life. Back before home video, soundtrack albums were the only way to (almost) conjure up in your mind the remembrance of a favorite film. Comic book adaptations didn't quite cut it and you could hope after many years that movie might get a theatrical re-release. If you look at the Top 10 Album Charts from the late 50's through most of the 60s, soundtrack albums were a dominant genre The original West Side Story soundtrack I thought was a true rarity in that it bridged both older and younger listeners I've seen the re-make. Well done but I didn't think it really needed an update  As a song sample, I chose the tune that most entertained 10 year old me |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 17, 2024 11:56:12 GMT -5
One last album from my Mom's collection that I've wound up enjoying my whole life. Back before home video, soundtrack albums were the only way to (almost) conjure up in your mind the remembrance of a favorite film. Comic book adaptations didn't quite cut it and you could hope after many years that movie might get a theatrical re-release. If you look at the Top 10 Album Charts from the late 50's through most of the 60s, soundtrack albums were a dominant genre The original West Side Story soundtrack I thought was a true rarity in that it bridged both older and younger listeners I've seen the re-make. Well done but I didn't think it really needed an update As a song sample, I chose the tune that most entertained 10 year old me As I've mentioned a number of times I HATE musicals. That being said, there are a couple of pretty good songs from that musical. I really like America as done by any number of artists. Including one that will be coming up later in my list. (Foreshadowing). |
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2024 12:08:26 GMT -5
One last album from my Mom's collection that I've wound up enjoying my whole life. Back before home video, soundtrack albums were the only way to (almost) conjure up in your mind the remembrance of a favorite film. Comic book adaptations didn't quite cut it and you could hope after many years that movie might get a theatrical re-release. If you look at the Top 10 Album Charts from the late 50's through most of the 60s, soundtrack albums were a dominant genre The original West Side Story soundtrack I thought was a true rarity in that it bridged both older and younger listeners Great album. I'm really not into musicals at all and I find the 1961 film pretty much unwatchable, but the music is something else. Leonard Bernstein's score and songs are audaciously unorthodox, and yet fiendishly memorable and catchy. That's quite some feat to pull off. |
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Post by impulse on Oct 17, 2024 13:53:23 GMT -5
#8 - Thriller by Michael Jackson (1982) It's funny, this is one of my runner's up that didn't make the cut. Ironically, its also one of the only ones that would have been my mom's taste as well as my dad's. I apparently used to listen to this record all the time...when I was two years old. It must have made a subconscious impression because I later came to really appreciate MJ's music, as well as other funk, R&B, soul and Motown music. It's just that was well into my 20s after doing the rock-to-metal pipeline. I don't remember listening to it as a kid, so it doesn't get on the list. Fantastic album, though, and in our current LP collection. My hot take is that "Workin' Day or Not" is energetically (not stylistically of course) basically a mainstream metal song. What I mean is it captures that same simple driving drum beat, that barely contained potential energy and momentum that makes you want to move without giving a full release, it has a horn break instead of a guitar solo. It's definitely not metal, but it scratches the same itch as some songs I like in that space. One example is Black Sunshine by White Zombie. |
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Post by impulse on Oct 17, 2024 14:00:32 GMT -5
8. Queen - News of the World (1977)   This is another one that came from my dad's record collection. I used to love flipping through them and seeing the art, and this is the main reason this one got pulled. Don't get me wrong, my first steps into rock included the pervasive radio one-two combo of We Will Rock You and We Are the Champions, which I listened to on this record quite a bit, but man, the art. Something about it just fascinated me. The robot looks so sad yet also menacing? Why did he kill the band? Why was he coming or them? Why is it so fascinating but sad at the same time?
I know many people get the mystique of album artwork and how much a part of the experience it seemed to be, especially back in the day, and this is the first one that made an impression on me.
My song selection is a different cut, though. It's one I didn't know going in but that I discovered and took a liking to. It's also more indicative of where my musical tastes would go over time.
Sheer Heart Attack
This was my first time hearing something this punchy, sneering, and just snotty. It's super up-tempo and catchy, too. I didn't know it at the time, but it's also one of those songs that shows how ridiculously wide and diverse Queen is among their peers. One of the pros and cons of how many different styles they do (and well) is that they have quite a lot of songs that are outside of taste, but they almost always have at least something on there I'm going to like because they cover so many bases.
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Post by berkley on Oct 17, 2024 18:24:40 GMT -5
8. Queen - News of the World (1977) This is another one that came from my dad's record collection. I used to love flipping through them and seeing the art, and this is the main reason this one got pulled. Don't get me wrong, my first steps into rock included the pervasive radio one-two combo of We Will Rock You and We Are the Champions, which I listened to on this record quite a bit, but man, the art. Something about it just fascinated me. The robot looks so sad yet also menacing? Why did he kill the band? Why was he coming or them? Why is it so fascinating but sad at the same time?
I know many people get the mystique of album artwork and how much a part of the experience it seemed to be, especially back in the day, and this is the first one that made an impression on me.
My song selection is a different cut, though. It's one I didn't know going in but that I discovered and took a liking to. It's also more indicative of where my musical tastes would go over time.
Sheer Heart Attack
This was my first time hearing something this punchy, sneering, and just snotty. It's super up-tempo and catchy, too. I didn't know it at the time, but it's also one of those songs that shows how ridiculously wide and diverse Queen is among their peers. One of the pros and cons of how many different styles they do (and well) is that they have quite a lot of songs that are outside of taste, but they almost always have at least something on there I'm going to like because they cover so many bases.
Great album, the last one of theirs that I really loved. I bought the next one, Jazz, and liked it all right but thought it was a bit of a falling off from the level of the records they had produced up to then. I never have listened much to the albums that came after that.
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