Losing Johnny Otis and his protege, Etta James, in the same week is a major reminder that the giants of R&B and soul are leaving us. This was always my fave Etta number. Tears me up every time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgLOreeGJps Hopefully, singers like Adele will carry on the legacy:
About a year ago, before the BT record Skins was released, I was fooling around with iMovie and a couple of the songs from the record. I had forgotten about these. But the long-delayed wintry mix here in Boston reminded me. Please understand that these are not “official” music videos. I might even get a …
They will be discussing Aretha Franklin’s seminal Amazing Grace LP today on NPR’s On Point with Tom Ashbrook. (Lots of info and clips there, check it out.) It reminded me of my old 2009 post about the same record, specifically her performance of the song, “Precious Memories,” here.
I am going to tell you what makes this song so great. I am not going to go into Greil Marcus territory and lay out some whole context — real or imagined. We all know everything about the sixties by now. Its arc is perhaps the most-documented six-year era ever. It goes something like this: …
A few people asked me which club the 1987 Johnny Ray show mentioned in the last post took place. My wife reminded me, Cozy Morley’s Club Avalon, long defunct. Read about it and Cozy, one of those Broadway Danny Rose-like old time comedians, here in an old Times article. Club Avalon was a barn. He …
In the summer of 1987, when I was 21, I got to see Johnnie Ray at a tiny little dump in Wildwood New Jersey. He was close enough to us that his sweat rained down on us. And sweat he did. The cat really brought it, much to the delight of all the sun-burned, snowy-haired …
Excellent piece on nostalgia for an old bar, here in today’s Times.
The author of the seminal Our Band Could Be Your Life, and the recent bio of Bob Mould weighed in a few years ago on this holiday classic. few people write this well about music.
It’s true! The Christmas Coyote is real! He came to our backyard this morning! It’s a Christmas Miracle! First I will write a song about him, then a children’s book, and then Stephen Spielberg will make a movie based on the book. I will be rich
