Now we know the apocalypse is nigh

I would say hell has frozen over, but the Eagles already did that.

The on-again-off-again Beach Boys reunion to commemorate the 50th anniversary of one of America's most enduring contributions to the history of rock and roll is on again.

Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, Bruce Johnston and David Marks (a rhythm guitarist who played on their first four albums) are recording together and hitting the road on a 50-date tour set to kick off in April with a headlining performance at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

The anniversary will also be commemorated with reissues from the Beach Boys catalog, another greatest hits collection and a box set.

Oh. THAT's why.

Wilson says, "This anniversary is special to me because I miss the boys and it will be a thrill for me to make a new record and be on stage with them again."
wU

Really?

I am SO glad I don't actually watch this show

I realize that if you're going to be part of the zeitgeist in America today, you have to watch all of these competition shows. The problem is, I'm over here still listening to the Allman Bros. Band and even Green day; and I also like Railroad Earth and Leftover Salmon and the Flecktones (four of the best damn musicians you will ever hear) and Hot Tuna (who are playing at the Beacon Theatre this weekend, and if you didn't get to see any of last winter's shows with Charlie Musselwhite and G.E. Smith, and you're in the New York area, GO!). I like swing. I like bluegrass until they start singing "I'm going to heaven and you're not because I love Jesus and you don't" through their noses. I love black gospel music because it feels like praise and joy and not like smugness and elitism the way white gospel does. I love Motown. I love 1920's jazz as rendered by Bix and Tram and Satchmo and Sidney Bechet. I love acoustic blues and electric blues and the blues shouting of Wynonie Harris. I love the music from Tin Pan Alley that collectors are thankfully digitizing from old 78s and Edison cylinders. My musical taste is far and wide and eclectic. And if it doesn't include hip-hop, well, I'm 56 years old and I guess that's just going to have to be my excuse.

What I don't care for is what I think of as current pop music -- the stuff purveyed on talent shows like American Idol and Simon Cowell's Fall 2011 entry which I keep thinking of as the Rollerball of talent shows, The X Factor. I would have had ZERO interest in this show were it not for a promo that ran during The Simpsons one night in which a girl who was just a kid was belting out "Mercy", sounding like the love child of Janis Joplin and Axl Rose. And I was utterly blown away. This must be what it must have been like for the people at Island Records hearing Amy Winehouse for the first time, long before she became a hot mess.

Of course I have my pride, so it's not like I was going to sit there for two hours a week watching a parade of cookie-cutter shrei-ing pop divas trying to be the next Mariah or Whitney or Britney or Beyonce or Rihanna -- those overproduced divas who to my aged ears are completely and utterly interchangeable. But as little Rachel Crow, the chubby Betty Boop-faced kid with the infectious grin, the heartwarming backstory, and the ferocious confidence, charmed her way through this weekly mess of American decadence, growing as a singer even while we watched, it was hard not to get sucked in.

And I'm so glad I didn't (well, not too much). Because for all that Rachel Crow has the heart and soul and voice of a long-downtrodden blues singer, I'm not sure I could have watched her be eliminated this week.

The entertainment industry is littered with kids who starred early and flamed out quickly. For every Leonardo DiCaprio there are twenty River Phoenixes and Corey Haims. For every Justin Timberlake there are twenty Britney Spearses. And the trainwreck that was Michael Jackson is in a league by himself. So it's probably a blessing in disguise to not score a $5 million record constract at thirteen, I don't care how centered and sane her family seems to be. But while Rachel Crow may be able to sing like Etta James, this image:



...drives home that this is still a very little girl. The talent is there. The opportunities will come. There's too much money to be made off this kid for them not to.

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik

I'm sorry, but when my good friend DCap chooses his 10 Greatest Instrumentals and doesn't include Green Onions by Booker T. and the MGs, I shall have to ask him to step outside!



Or, if you prefer to travel forward in time from then:



Or the late, great, criminally underrated Roy Buchanan:

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik

It just does not get any better than this.

Except maybe this:

Maybe.

A little late to the game, but...

If you didn't already feel sad enough about the absolute unnecessary waste that was the death of Amy Winehouse, take a look at this appearance on Jools Holland from 2005, before she became the "hot mess" that we've seen most often and which finally killed her:

Damn.

And just in case you thought we'd forgotten about politics, there's this.

Republicans: Bashing dead people for political gain is what they do.

Pap Smears at Applebee's

It isn't so much that I want to write about the fact that the biggest pair of doofuses ever to appear on a cable TV show (and I'm including Snooki and JWoWW in that consideration too) think that you can get pap smears at Walgreen's. It's just that I can't pass up the opportunity to point out the latest example of right-wing idiocy when it also provides the opportunity to once again flog David Brooks for his "salad bar at Applebee's" observation about how Barack Obama can't relate to "the common man" as well as a pundit who deludes himself that he has a brain in his head.

And I think "Pap Smears at Applebee's" would be the greatest name for a rock band since the Fountains of Wayne were left orphaned by the closing of, well, The Fountains of Wayne.

If YOU decide to name your band "Pap Smears at Applebee's", please e-mail me a link to your YouTube video and I'll post it. But until then, here are the Fountains of Wayne:

And more music blogging

Rep. Donna Edwards lays some Jack White on the Republicans:

...and the source:

Friday night music blogging

I'm not a big Foo Fighters fan. I've heard this song a million times by the band and thought it's probably the best song they do. But I heard an acoustic version on the radio today and it just blew me away:

Just gorgeous.

Happy Bix Beiderbecke's Birthday!

There are certain mileposts that point to spring. The first one is the Super Bowl, which marks the end of the football season. The second is the day in mid-February when pitchers and catchers report to spring training. And the final milepost on the way to spring is Bix Beiderbecke's birthday.

Enjoy:

I'm more of a fan of the Bix/Frankie Trumbauer cuts, but this rare 1928 newsreel clip of Bix with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra (Bix can be seen about 1:10 in) is worth a look. Says Harry Oakley, who posted it (and disabled embedding):

It turns out that Bix' embouchure was as unorthodox as his valve technique and that he played with puffed cheeks - something which was not known before the discovery of this footage. Although it has been claimed that Bix misses notes and/or plays some notes without puffed cheeks, it is now clear that in fact he is written into the score for only a few notes of the passage and that he deliberately skips notes. Every note he does play is with puffed cheeks.

More about Bix here.

I had this song in my head today

Not sure why, but it's better than an endless loop of the theme from American Dad, which is stuck in my head most days:

And speaking of Seth MacFarlane, we sure do love the way that twisted motherfucker sings:

John Barry

John Barry Dies at 77; Composed for Bond Films

John Barry, whose bold, jazzy scores for “From Russia With Love,” “Goldfinger” and nine other James Bond films put a musical stamp on one of the most successful film franchises of all time, and who won five Academy Awards as a composer for “Born Free,” “Dances With Wolves” and other films, died on Sunday in New York. He was 77.

Wonderful, versatile film composer, came out of London's pre-Beatles pop scene. The Sixties were a great decade for Barry. Scored a number of hip British films in addition to James Bond. Won Academy Awards for song & score for Born Free, & for music for The Lion In Winter. Scored a Brando movie, The Chase; Midnight Cowboy; the underrated western, Monte Walsh. In 1971, Barry composed the music for three of my fav films: They Might Be Giants, with George C. Scott & Joanne Woodward, Murphy's War with Peter O'Toole, & Nicolas Roeg's Walkabout - two kids abandoned in the Australian outback.

Barry also won Oscars for Out of Africa & Dances With Wolves. Given his stature, I was surprised to learn he was nominated only two other times.

The Knack was the first Barry score I knew other than his Bond music. "The Good Times Are Coming" is from Monte Walsh, with lyrics by Hal David, sung on the soundtrack by Mama Cass Elliot. A minor hit for Cass, it should've been nominated for an Oscar (& lost to "Shaft.")

Got the Saturday mornin' more snow comin Wednesday blues

But Hot Tuna at Bergen PAC last night made it a bit better.

Find out where the tour is playing near YOU here. Don't miss it. Jorma is (OMG) SEVENTY.

UPDATE: First video uploads from the show are on YouTube now, and they are FANTASTIC!

Because this is just what I needed this morning.

Thanks, Rich! I feel a bit better now.

Just because a song has the word "Christmas" in it doesn't make it a Christmas song

I know that the holiday season is one of sad memories and loss for many people. It seems that a disproportionate number of people lose loved ones during the holidays -- parents, spouses, even children. I think of Elizabeth Edwards' young children, still raw from the loss of their mother, trying to find a way to observe Christmas in some way that doesn't make it worse. I have a friend who lost her husband in the fall and her father last week -- a double 4th quarter whammy. Colored lights and TV commercials showing large, loving families sometimes just serve to rub salt in the wounds.

Still, the fact that between 2 PM yesterday and 10 AM this morning I heard Joni Mitchell's "River" not once but THREE SEPARATE TIMES on the radio makes me wonder. I know we all feel that if we have to hear "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" one more time a well-placed icepick embedded squarely in one's own frontal lobe sounds like an appealing prospect, but I'm not sure that "River" is the answer.

It's one thing to be a brooding, depressive adolescent, writing sad poetry in a blank book while sitting alone at lunchtime at school and coming home to listen to the Blue album and crying. It's quite another for the very same people who perpetrate Burl Ives on us every Christmas to decide that the presence of the word "Christmas" in the first line makes "River" something to which even the loneliest, most depressive adult in the world should be listening on Christmas.

If you've got the blues on Christmas, there are far better choices. Like Sonny Boy Williamson's Christmas Blues:

Or Charley Jordan's Christmas Christmas Blues:

Or Eric Clapton, Crying Christmas Tears:

Or Blind Lemon Jefferson, Christmas Eve Blues

Or if your mood leans more to rage and cynicism than tears and depression, there's Maxine of the Hallmark Cards, Crabby Christmas Blues:

Or Ray Davis, in a solo performance of the Kinks, Father Christmas:

And just to seal the deal

Christmas may now proceed:

Because it's not Christmas until and unless Darlene Love sings.

And of course there's always this:

We're gonna make it

In case you need this to get you through your day:

(Thanks, Vernon!)

This just seemed appropriate

I myself have always been fond of this:

Not sure what else to say...

Celebrating the first day of Zappadan

"The Torture Never Stops" -- Barcelona, 1988:

It seemed appropriate.

(Oh, yeah. Happy this holiday too.)

Yes, Veterans Day....

Bob Marley:

Edwin Starr:

Somehow I missed this

R.I.P. Gregory Isaacs:

Aaahhh.....that was before dancehall, when reggae sounded like the tree frogs of the Jamaican night.