A Podcast of Album Discussions
The prove that just because they can make an important artistic statement like Tommy that they are still one of the most uproariously exciting live band. This was a crucial album to hold over the Mod rocking Who crowd till Who’s Next arrives. If you want to know how to put on a good maximum R’n’B live show this should be your bible.
Shankar envisioned a musical form that blended Indian classical music with Western rock and electronic styles. Shankar’s first album was one of the first to successfully explore the crossover of psychedelic rock with Indian music including simplified sitar covers of jumpin jack flash and light my fire . What sounds like a parody to use now was ahead of it’s time.
Another Nick Drake album and more great tunes that is heavy on the polish and light on the sales David Hepworth described “At the Chime of a City Clock” as “the perfect soundtrack for the dispensing of a cup of tea in a polysytrene cup, marrying sound and image in a way that made me unsure whether I was watching a commercial or actually in a commercial.”.
American Beauty eventually spawned the band’s highest charting single — “Truckin’,” the greasy blues-rock tribute to nomadic counterculture — but it also contained some of their most spiritual and open-hearted sentiments ever. While the Dead eventually amassed a following so devoted that following the band from city to city became the center of many people’s lives, the majority of the band’s magic came in the boundless heights it reached in its live sets but rarely managed to capture in the studio setting. American Beauty is a categorical exception to this.
Moondance found Morrison abandoning the abstract folk jazz compositions of Astral Weeks in favor of more formally composed songs, which he wrote and produced entirely himself. Its lively rhythm and blues/rock music was the style he would become most known for in his career.
Deep Purple entering their classic Mark 2 lineup has decided to go full on Rock in this fun album.
On their first two albums, Led Zeppelin unleashed a relentless barrage of heavy blues and rockabilly riffs, but Led Zeppelin III provided the band with the necessary room to grow musically.
Neil Young continues his gold era as he pursues the country ballads of love lorned heartbreak in After the gold rush.
Paranoid was not only Black Sabbath’s most popular record, it also stands as one of the greatest and most influential heavy metal albums of all time. This makes us rethink recording a second album so close to the first because this album rules!
One of the most hotly awaited second albums in history Déjà Vu lived up to its expectations and rose to number one on the charts. Those achievements are all the more astonishing given the fact that the group barely held together through the estimated 800 hours it took to record Déjà Vu and scarcely functioned as a group for most of that time.
The cliché about singer/songwriters is that they sing confessionals direct from their heart, but John Lennon exploded the myth behind that cliché, as well as many others, on his first official solo record.
Stephan Stills created a number one hit with “Love the One You’re With.” but this album leaves a lot to be desired with the amount of talent that was included on the album including the presence of Hendrix and Clapton on two cuts.
This second album saw the carpenters come into their own with Richard’s light, airy melodies and meticulously crafted, clean arrangements that appealed to a wide variety of audiences. Karen Carpenter’s calm, crystal bell like voice was distinctive and fit perfectly with the music. The result was a well crafted pop gem that gave them super stardom while at the same time confounded critics and the 1960’s rock n roll scensters. Is it Too clean? too pop? Too soft? We will discuss.
The Doors returned to crunching, straightforward hard rock on Morrison Hotel, an album that, despite yielding no major hit singles, returned them to critical favor with hip listeners. For as much as they returned I don’t know that the Doors were ever the same.
Black Sabbath’s debut album is the birth of heavy metal as we now know it. Compatriots like Blue Cheer, Led Zeppelin, and Deep Purple were already setting new standards for volume and heaviness in the realms of psychedelia, blues-rock, and prog rock. Yet of these metal pioneers, Sabbath are the only one whose sound today remains instantly recognizable as heavy metal, even after decades of evolution in the genre.
-AllMusic Review by Steve Huey-
An overlooked album that still has some great songs that should be heard. The band’s lowest charting album to that point, it peaked at #63 on the Billboard 200 in February 1971, spending only fourteen weeks on the chart. However, it sold well as a catalog item and became the band’s only album to ultimately attain a RIAA gold certification in the U.S., achieving that status in 1976
One of the most revolutionary albums in jazz history to some. We try and formulate our opinions for an album that is made to be all things and nothing at the same time.
Formed by guitarist/singer Eric Clapton with other former members of Delaney & Bonnie & Friends, in the spring of 1970. From late August to early October, they recorded the celebrated double album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs with guitarist Duane Allman sitting in. Powerful record but not everyone in the club is excited about more Clapton.
With the release of Cosmo’s Factory in July 1970, Creedence Clearwater Revival hit their commercial zenith. It was their fifth album in two years and became an international smash, topping the album charts in six countries. They sold millions of records, but never had a #1 hit. They did score five #2 hits on the Hot 100, the most of any act without a #1.
Hot Rats’ genius lies in the way it fuses the compositional sophistication of jazz with rock’s down-and-dirty attitude — there’s a real looseness and grit to the three lengthy jams. Frank is out there but some of the group don’t know that they want to be there. We also end with a Zappa True/False.
The album is sometimes called a “soundtrack to schizophrenia” and a “visionary solo effort,” but became delegated to bargain bins shortly after its release in the spring of 1969. However, those who did hear it were instantly drawn into Spence’s inimitable sonic surrealism.
The Stooges soon gained a reputation for their wild, primitive live performances. Pop, especially, became known for his outrageous onstage behavior—smearing his bare chest with hamburger meat and peanut butter, cutting himself with shards of glass, and flashing his genitalia to the audience. Pop is sometimes credited with the invention or popularization of stage diving.
Walker wasn’t on the chart with his fourth album, but the result was probably his finest ’60s LP. The over blown production and his subversive non commercial friend lyrics stand by a relatively stripped-down approach that works in way that is unexpected. It’s hard to pinpoint what was or wasn’t engaging about this album but we will try.
In the decades since its original release, more than one writer has declared Fairport Convention’s Liege & Lief the definitive British folk-rock album. We are pleasantly surprised with this seminal Fairport Album.