Between my grandparents and parents I was exposed to everything from old, old country through the rock of the 70’s.
Saturday Morning Cartoons took care of classical music (just don’t ask me the composer of any specific piece outside of 5th of Beethoven)
It didn’t happen until I was in early HS, hanging afterschool with a buddy who had his dad’s album (not called vinyls) collection, that I really developed an appreciation for jazz.
I admit that I’m a late convert/aficionado of Herb Alpert, but man is he good. Also didn’t realize until somewhat recently his relationship with Sergio Mendes and introducing him to us gringos.
My dad had that one, too, and I was also intrigued. But not as intrigued as the James Bond one.
Casino Royale?
The album that introduced me to Herb. Ladyfingers is an all time classic.
I really like those Tijuana Brass records. As far a trumpet players go, Herb Alpert is okay. He was great at song selections and played pop music. What he excelled at was nice melodic phrasing but he was no Miles, or even an Al Hirt. He was a great band leader and a towering record company executive. If I were to make a list of the greatest trumpeters, Herb Alpert would be nowhere near the top of that list.
Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of the album New Threats from the Soul by Ryan Davis & the Roadhouse Band. It’s country at its core, but with enough oddball instrumentation and musical choices (and in one case, a weirdly good drum’n’bass breakdown) that it feels fresh and new.
The real draw for me, though, is this guy’s ability to write a lyric. In my book, he’s up there with Silver Jews or Bill Callahan. If you know those names, you know that’s high praise. If you don’t, give the song “Monte Carlo / No Limits” a try and see if it’s up your alley.
I liked the title cut better.
speaking of Men at Work, whatever thread that was in:
I was listening to Trout Mask Replica today for the first time. I’d checked it out from the library, and its condition is not pristine. In fact, there are multiple scratches and god knows what else that result in the weird skipping and stuttering you get from CDs sometimes. And Ighbedipped if I can tell when it’s an imperfection in the disc or an intentional part of the song.
I mention this for several reasons. One, I want Sphinx to chime in saying that this is one of his favorite ever records, along with Metal Machine Music and the Collected Choral Works of Schoenberg. Two, legend has it that the singer of U2 wrote to the Captain expressing an interest in a collaboration of some sort, and received from him in terse reply, “Dear Bongo: No”
Anyway, his vocals put me in the mind one minute of Howlin Wolf and the next of Robert Pollard.
I’ll probably return it tomorrow if the temperatures warm into the single digits or so.
The first time I saw an interview with Colin Hay I was very surprised at his heavy Scottish accent, come from a land down under and whatnot.
A quick Wikipedia glance shows Hay was born and raised in Scotland, moving to Australia as a teenager. Which I did not really know either.
His accent is 100% Trainspotting which previous to hearing him speak in a regular voice I didnae knae.
On the other hand I do not believe Howlin Wolf to be Scottish, mainly because I assume his throat issues would have been addressed competently by the NHS.
Since you asked, I like Trout Mask Replica but there are 4 or 5 Captain Beefheart albums that I think are better. I always thought Metal Music Machine was a prank Lou pulled on his record company. I never made it past the first few minutes. I’m not familiar with Schoenberg. However, I do like me some Karlheinz Stockhausen. I like humming along to Studie 1.
There were a flurry of articles about that album covers a few years back, both about how it was made and the model. I don’t remember much about how it was made except that she was wearing a dress underneath the cream. The model though ended up in East Texas, Nacogdoches maybe? I don’t think she was running a trailer park, but it was certainly an East Texas saga. There was an accompanying ranking of best album covers of all time, and that one was up in the top 5.
ETA: She has a wikipedia page that says it was a bikini under the shaving cream, and that it was Longview Washington, not Texas. Plus it was a bikini, not a dress. Dolores Erickson - Wikipedia
You have your reality, I have mine.
This is as of 2015.
I saw an article or YouTube video or something about tracking down the models from iconic album covers. I don’t remember if she was one, but there was the girl from Blind Faith, Candy-O, Mother’s Milk…
Lucinda Williams has a new album out today titled “World’s Gone Wrong” I haven’t listened to it yet, but seems like an appropriate background this weekend.
