Junk and Sale Bin Shop Finds 6 : Joe South's Greatest Hits

I picked this one up for $2 - great buy.  Joe had bigger hits when other people sang his songs - I hope he had the copyright sorted out.

The copy I bought was the NZ version of this album which has two extra songs on each side (including the critical Rose Garden) and a tackier cover.  But the extra music makes it well worth having.

Some great songs, Games People Play (won the Grammy for Song of the year when it was released), Hush (more soulful than any of the other versions including those by Russell Morris, Billy Joe Royal and of course Deep Purple), Walk a Mile in My Shoes, Down in the Boondocks and Rose Garden.

But there is not a bad song on this album - Great Buy!!!

Junk and Sale Bin Shop Finds 5 : Fleetwood Mac Rumours (and comments on Mick's autobiography)

I got two copies of Mick Fleetwood's autobiography for Christmas. I have always had a passing interest in The Mac, have a few of the early Peter Green led blues albums and love The Green Manalishi and Oh Well but the later period (which has now been going for almost 40 years as opposed to the first ten years of the Peter Green period has not interested me that much.  I do love the song Tusk.

In the biography Mick claimed to have learned from his mistakes but proved over and over again that he had not and is in fact a bit of a plonker - I suppose that may be his drumming style "plonking".

Anyway I never owned this, never wanted to. But at $2 ........ Oh Well as Peter Green would say.

The copy has a scratch across one track fortunately not Go Your Own Way and having played the album I will probably never play it again all the way through.  What was everyone thinking in 1977 when they bought it in droves - some sort of mass hypnotism or even invasion of the body snatchers??

But when Chris comes to visit I am sure we will play Go your Own Way at maximum volume.

Song of The Day 42 : The Swingers - Counting The Beat (b/w One Good Reason)

Counting The Beat should have been a world wide hit then the whole world would now be overlooking its brilliance due to it being overplayed,  like we are in NZ.

Pity on both counts. 

Journey Through The Past : Bob Dylan : Blood On the Tracks

Blood on The Tracks, while not held in particularly high regard at the time of its release is now routinely placed in the top 3 Dylan albums, along with Blonde on Blonde and Highway 61 Revisited (and that means it is in the top albums of all time by my reckoning).

The album was apparently already to release covers printed etc when Dylan decided he wanted to record the whole thing again.  I have heard many of the original tracks and I have to agree with Dylan - the original versions lack the vibrancy of the final ones. The originals are generally played slower and as such have an added poignancy however it is the album versions that I play most often.  Ironically it is the once impossible to find original versions that are easiest to find on Youtube and so the links below are to those versions.

I also remember when it came out in 1975 DJs on 2ZM (Lloyd Scott and Paul Holmes in particular) used to play Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts (Original Version). I think being the "rebels" they were (ha!) they liked the fact it was so long.  I remember how I thought it was so clever at the time and it was for that song that I eventually bought a second hand copy in 1979.  It was on one of our flat forays to The Mousetrap - a great little second hand record story on Bealey Ave at Carlton Corner.

I still have that copy I bought then and play it every 2-3 months - pleased to say it is still in good nick.  I always play it all the way through - however ironically every time I think about skipping Lily's story.  There are gems aplenty on the album and many lines I quote when the occasion seems right.   If you see her say hello is one of my all time favourite songs and Tangled up in Blue is not far behind. Other highlights basically include the rest of the album (bar Lily)  but Idiot Wind does stand out - this original acoustic version is somber rather than vitriolic!!

I hope that this being the 40th anniversary year that it will get the Bob Dylan Bootleg version and we will get both album versions together (I already have a poorly transferred bootleg and some of the tracks on other releases). 

Junk and Sale Bin Shop Finds 4 : Hot August Night

When I was in the third form - everyone's parents seemed to have this.  In fact at the time it was claimed that there was a copy of Hot August Night in every NZ home.  Not true - but Terry had a copy so that is saying something!!!

It is easy to dislike Neil Diamond on principle. However he has written a lot of great simple rock/pop songs that deserve the revered status they get.  After slipping into a MOR rut from the mid seventies to now it looked like he would be stuck into just redoing progressively cooler and cooler August night shows.

However he seems to be having a late period of creative resurgence as his last few albums have received generally good reviews from a once dismissive music press.

I have not quite been brave enough to dip my toes back in (maybe I need to wait until I see them for $2 like this one)- but I am not unhappy to have this in my collection now.  

Song of the Day 41 : David Bowie I'm Afraid of Americans

At the time I thought of this as a late career highlight - I suppose now I have to call it a mid career highlight - 

Great Video as well and so pleased he played it in Wellington when I saw him last time.

I'm Afraid of Americans 

Junk and Sale Bin Shop Finds 3 : Beggars Banquet and Black and Blue

To get these two, with the Vinyl in great condition for a total of $4 is a real find.  The copy I found is an original NZ release judging by the white cover (as opposed to the toilet seat cover), the thickness of the vinyl and the orange Decca label.  The cover shows 45 years wear but the record plays perfectly and sounds amazing.

I first heard Beggars Banquet when a school friend Jeremy Wilkins lent it to me in what was probably the 5th form (40 years ago!). At the time it did not grab me.  Now to me it really signifies the start proper of The Stones as a rock and album band as opposed to a singles band.  While they had put out other serious albums prior to this (Satanic Majesties and Aftermath) in particular - this is the first time they really pulled it off. Of course the next three albums really grew that reputation but this to me is where The Stones (as opposed to The Rolling Stones) started.  Hard to pick a highlight from this album - Jan would say Street Fighting Man, I would probably go for the now obvious Sympathy for The Devil - a less obvious highlight would be No Expectations.

Black and Blue is quite a different album. A band trying to work out where to go and how to replace Mick Taylor who while he did not look the part is THE  Stones Second Guitarist as it was with him that they recorded their best work.  Three separate guitarist were tried on the album (Wayne Perkins, Harvey Mandell and of course Ronnie Wood who could obviously look and act the part - even if he would never in my opinion make the creative input that Mick made).  While the guitarwork floundered a bit Nicky Hopkins and Billy Preston made this perhaps the only Stones keyboard driven album

Not a much loved Stones' album but there are always tracks worth listening to with Memory Motel and Fool to Cry standing out to me.