The 500 - #449 - Big Star -Third / Sister Lovers

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by Los Angeles-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

My plan (amended). 

• One record per week (ish) & at least two complete listens.
• A blog post for each, highlighting the important details and, when possible, a background story that relates to the record.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation of diverse forms of music.
• Listen to Josh and his guest on The 500 podcast to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 449

Album Title: Third / Sister Lovers
Artist: Big Star
Released: March, 1978
My age at release: 12
How familiar was I with it before this week: Not at all
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Kizza Me
Great Lyric:
"That I am
Flustered and erratic
'Cept when I lie with you
Naked on a southern love
Give down
Rub downs
Lie downs
Any downs at all." (Downs)

I've been a big fan of comedy for most of my life. I like it all, sketch, improv, situational, absurd. However, I love the art of stand-up comedy the most. A stand-up comedian, particularly at the club level, has to enter a room of strangers and for five to 90 minutes and generate joy. It is one of the few professions where the product of earnest labour is laughter. A club comic has to entertain everyone from a group of seniors who got free passes through the casino to the table of nine drunks who decided that Yuk Yuk's was the best place for Chris to celebrate turning 25.

In the world of stand-up, there are performers who garner respect from their peers at a level that far surpasses their commercial success. These are the "Comedian's Comedians". When they perform, the other comics stay at the back of the room or listen from the side of the stage. Artists such as Doug Stanhope and Colin Quinn, Patrice O'Neal and Greg Giraldo are among the best examples. 

Doug Stanhope

Big Star falls into a similar category. They are often called "the band that your favourite band is listening to". Many of the artists I have written about in this blog cite Big Star as a major influence, including R.E.M., Kiss and Wilco.

I really like Big Star, so I was excited to see a record from them coming up on The 500 list. However, I had never heard this record and, when I first played it, I unimpressed. It didn't seem like a Big Star record at all. As I listened, I just kept thinking "why can't this be more like the first album? Shouldn't that record be on the list?" 

It is, and so is the second record. I'll encounter Number One Record at #438 (probably this March) and Radio City at #403 (in late autumn of 2020). I will have many flattering things to say about those records but, for now, I am listening to their final record Third, (also called Sister Lovers) which featured two members who were dating sisters at the time this recorded. 

Alternate Cover

The story behind the release of the record is far more interesting than the tracks that are on it:

• It was recorded in the Fall of 1974 but would not be released for another four years.
• Although critically acclaimed, the first two records were commercial failures. Consequently, Third was recorded by only two remaining band members accompanied by what biographer Bruce Eaton described as "a large and revolving cast of Memphis musicians".
• The album documents the band's disintegration and deteriorating mental health of singer/guitarist Alex Chilton. It has even been suggested that this is an Alex Chilton solo record more than a Big Star album.
• Third was finally released in March, 1978, and numerous reissues followed. Consequently, there is no definitive version and Chilton distanced himself from the record. It was not a commercial success but has enjoyed cult status and is well regarded by music critics and die-hard fans. 

I listened to it at least six times and I really tried to connect with the material. It just didn't land for me. Perhaps my musical knowledge is insufficient to appreciate it. However, I am looking forward to hearing the other Big Star albums that I will feature in the coming weeks. 

The 500 - #450 - Jackson Browne - For Everyman

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by Los Angeles-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

My plan (amended). 

• One record per week (ish) and at least two complete listens.
• A blog post for each, highlighting the important details and, when possible, a background story that relates to the record.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation of diverse forms of music.
• Listen to Josh and his guest on The 500 podcast, which drops weekly, to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 450

Album Title: For Everyman
Artist: Jackson Browne
Released: October, 1973
My age at release: 8
How familiar was I with it before this week: One song
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: I Thought I Was A Child
Great Lyric:
"These days I sit on corner stones
And count the time in quarter tones to ten, my friend Don't confront me with my failures I had not forgotten them." (These Days)

In January, 2011, my brother and sister, who are twins, were turning 40. I wasn't sure what to get them for their birthday until it was announced that Rock and Roll Hall of Fame musician Jackson Browne had included London's John Labatt Centre (JLC) on his solo acoustic tour. I purchased three tickets and gave them the news on their birthday.

On April 18, 2011 we met for dinner and went to the show. We had great seats for an intimate performance. The JLC had curtained off half the arena with a heavy, floor-to-ceiling drape so it felt like a small theatre. The stage was simple. A rack with a dozen guitars and a small, electric piano. 

The tour was promoted as one without a prescribed set-list. Instead, Browne opted to take requests from audiences. At our event, rather than requests being raucously shouted, they were politely called out. There are not many things more mellow than a middle-aged, Canadian audience at a Jackson Browne acoustic gig. The soulful, soft rock of the 1970s has been dubbed yacht rock, dad rock and chillwave because of its very smooth, introspective and marijuana-friendly spirit.

At one point, a request for the song Our Lady of the Well was made and, after picking up a guitar, Browne paused and said, "I think I'll play that on the piano tonight." 

This is the musicianship of which I am most envious. I play saxophone and guitar at an intermediate level and have been taking piano lessons for three months. I can learn a song on each instrument and, if I practice enough, I can perform it reasonably well. However, nothing can change. 

• I can't change the key or the instrument. 
• If I learned it on guitar, I have no idea how to play it on the saxophone.
• I'm not able to participate in any kind of improvised jam - even if it is built around the melody. 
• Without sheet music, I am lost.

I'd love to be able to seamlessly embrace a piece of music in a way that resonates with me in the moment. That being said, I realize that Browne is a professional musician with 40+ years of playing experience behind him. He has certainly eclipsed Malcom Gladwell's 10,000-hour rule for expertise. Still, that casual, personal comfort with music is something to which I dreamily aspire. 

For Everyman is a wonderful record. It was my Christmas week soundtrack as I heard it at least a dozen times over five days. I also listened to Josh's podcast interview with Judd Apatow about this record twice. 

I am a huge fan of Judd's work and use his coming-of-age series Freaks and Geeks as part of my Grade 7 & 8 Health curriculum. During the interview, Judd ruminates on the influence Jackson Browne has had on his writing. Apatow acknowledges that many of his stories are built around the challenges associated with growing-up, an unmistakable theme on Browne's For Everyman. 

Apatow cites I Thought I Was A Child as direct inspiration for his 2007 comedy, Knocked Up. 

 As he puts it...

"Sometimes, when I make a movie, I'll work on it for years. So a movie will take 2 to 5 years to make. And then I'll hear a song and go...'everything I was going for in that movie, this person expressed in 3 and a half minutes'."

Apatow freely admits his fascination with the tribulations associated with aging. "I do have two movies with the number 40 in them" he jokes. 

I, too, have an odd, sometimes maudlin fascination with time, aging and maturity. 

Perhaps that is why I like Browne and Apatow so much? 

Perhaps that is why I took my brother and sister to see Browne on their 40th birthday? 

Okay, the second question is a stretch but...it does give me a tidy book-end to this blog.

Ticket Stub from that show.

Next up: #449 - Big Star - Third

The 500 - Checkpoint #1 - 50 Blog Posts Completed

On January 28, 2019, while puttering about the apartment, I tuned into the latest edition of Bill Burr's Monday Morning Podcast. Bill was joined by his friend and fellow comedian Josh Adam Meyers, who was promoting his new podcast The 500.  

Each weekly episode of Josh's show focuses on one record from Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, beginning with Album 500 and counting down to number one. Josh does not review each album. Instead, he and his guests (actors, comedians, musicians) use "facts from the albums and song meanings as a road map" for their interview.

Inspiration struck. I'd owned that 2012 edition of Rolling Stone magazine and wanted to give each record its due and now, with a subscription to Spotify, I had easy access.

. My initial goal was...

• Two records per week and at least two complete listens.
• A quick blog post for each, highlighting the important details and a background story.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation.
• I also subscribed to Josh's podcast to provide me with additional insight and information.

As it turns out, this pace was untenable and my approach changed. The slower progress is more enjoyable as it provides me with more time to appreciate both the album and Josh's podcast.

The Amy Winehouse post on December 16 marked my 50th record. To celebrate, I'll share a few statistics and thoughts on how things have gone. 

• I average a post every 6.5 days.
• I am 1/10th of the way through the list, on pace to finish in 2026.
• My most popular post was for Kiss Destroyer, with 115 clicks.
• I receive more readers when I write about education - but my audience for both topics seems to be growing. 
• The majority of my readership (70%) is evenly split between the United States and Canada.
• Russia and Ukraine rank 3rd and 4th (hmmm? bots?).
• In the last few months, I've had readers from Thailand, France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Poland and Argentina.
• Three of the 50 albums I've written about were released in the 1960s.
• 15 were released the 1970s.
• 14 were released in the 1980s with three from 1987.
• Nine were from the 1990s and nine more from the 2000s.
• 11 of the 50 records were familiar to me and 12 were new. 
• My favourite discoveries were Proxima Estacion: Esperanza by Manu Chao and 69 Love Songs by The Magnetic Fields. 
• I was most surprised by how much I liked Life after Death by Notorious B.I.G.
• I got a chance to meet Josh when he was in Toronto for the Just For Laugh's Comedy Festival.
• Rapper LLCool J "liked" my post about his record.
• Actor, Author and Comedian Jay Mohr (SNL, Jerry Maguire) also called one of my posts "brilliant"  - so that was a feather in my cap. 

A page with hyperlinks to all of my blog posts can be found here and I am continuing to build a playlist on Spotify featuring one song from each of the 500 albums.

Don't hesitate to give me feedback, and I invite you to join me on the rest of this journey, beginning tomorrow with a look at album #450, Jackson Browne's For Everyman. 

I'll hope to have more guest bloggers...perhaps even a few of my students. 

If all goes well, I'll check in again after album #401 Californication by Red Hot Chili Peppers, sometime next November.

Thanks for reading.

The 500 - #451 - Amy Winehouse - Back to Black

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by Los Angeles-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

My plan (amended). 

• 1 record per week & at least 2 complete listens.
• A quick blog post for each, highlighting the important details and a quick background story.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation of diverse forms of music.

Album # 451

Album Title: Back to Black
Artist: Amy Winehouse
Released: October, 2006
My age at release: 41
How familiar was I with it before this week: Very
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Back to Black (Suggested by James Spangenberg)
Great Lyric:
"This face in my dreams seizes my guts
He floods me with dread
Soaked in soul
He swims in my eyes by the bed
Pour myself over him 
Moon spilling in
And I wake up alone" (Wake Up Alone)

Even before she died in July, 2011 at the age of 27, it always felt as if the extraordinary talent of Amy Winehouse was a temporary phenomenon. She just seemed to have accidentally landed among us from another time or place and, soon enough, the universe would correct its mistake. Everything about her was undeniable. Her vocal talent and gift for songwriting were impossible to ignore and her style was both a classic fashion throwback and uniquely her own.  

In the early 2000s, I was working part-time as a bartender in a bistro restaurant called Garlic's in London, Ontario. A server named Aaron was responsible for providing dinner music. Regularly, he would arrive with new compact discs on which he had mixed a collection of jazz, blues, soul and world music. These discs would be shuffled throughout the evening on the restaurant's 4 CD carousel player. Aaron's taste, like mine, was eclectic and the diverse sounds he blended for the diners, and the staff, were a constant, refreshing surprise. Often, in the middle of a frantic shift, while shaking cosmopolitans, brewing espressos and pouring glasses of red wine, a melody would hook me. The song In My Bed from the 2003 debut album Frank by Winehouse was one of those tracks.

That night, as we were winding down, the song replayed. 

"Who is this?" I asked Aaron, "it sounds like Shirley Bassey"

"It's Amy Winehouse", he replied with a smile, clearly thrilled that I had noticed the song. "She's current...20 year's old...from England. You've got to check out the whole album. It's incredible." 

I did and became a fan immediately. When I saw that her second, and final album, Back to Black, was on this list I was thrilled to explore her work further. 

My good friend James Spagenberg (who also used to be a bartender at Garlics) picked the song for "The 500" Playlist I've been creating on Spotify. He selected the title track Back to Black because "it simply gets better with every listen." I agree. He owns it on vinyl and when I visit I love hearing Side One on his high-end turntable. Back to Black is a song that captures perfectly the heartache that fueled the intense talent of Amy Winehouse and propelled her toward an early death. 

Amy Winehouse died of alcohol poisoning on July 23, 2011. The news was tragic, but not surprising. Her struggles with mental health and substance abuse were well documented. 

She became another unfortunate member of the 27 Club, a group of musicians, actors and performers who died at the age of 27. They include Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain and Jim Morrison. These were artists who revolutionized their genre and left an indelible legacy. Generational talents, such as Winehouse, that seemed to have magically wandered among us for a brief, beautiful moment - before the universe realizes its mistake.

Next: I reflect on the First 50 Posts

The 500 - #452 - John Prine - Debut

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by Los Angeles-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

My plan (amended). 

• 1 record per week & at least 2 complete listens.
• A quick blog post for each, highlighting the important details and a quick background story.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation of diverse forms of music.

Album # 452

Album Title: Self Titled
Artist: John Prine
Released: June, 1971
My age at release: 5
How familiar was I with it before this week: Not at all
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Sam Stone (Suggested by Rob Hodson 
Great Lyric:
"But your flag decal won't get you into Heaven anymore
They're already overcrowded from your dirty little war
Now Jesus don't like killin', no matter what the reason's for
And your flag decal won't get you into Heaven anymore"

My students often overuse the word "hate". In 2010 many of the girls in my classroom had a singular obsession with Justin Bieber. His debut album My World 2.0 and the song, Baby, dominated our classroom playlist that year.

Meanwhile, the boys in my class would venomously announce that they "hated Justin Bieber". If allowed, they would have banned Bieber and played mid-2000s Gangsta Rap daily. 

Educators, particularly those teaching elementary school, are well aware of their role. We are expected to be paragons of virtue. Consequently, we must address any use of derogatory language. My typical "go-to" statement was (and is) as follows...

"C'mon now, hate is an awfully strong word. We should only use it for things that we truly despise, like racism. Why not say, "I'm not a fan of Justin Bieber." or "He's not for me." I don't think we should hate someone for creating music...right?"

Admittedly, there was hypocrisy hidden in those words. I recognized the voice of my youth in the vitriol of those male students. Sadly, I was an outspoken hater of many things between the ages of 13 and 21 - particularly musicians. Maturity has broadened my tastes and there is a tinge of chagrin as I accept my past as a brash, bitter contrarian. 

Such is the case with John Prine. In my youth, the words "I hate folk music - country-folk music doubly-so" certainly spilled from my lips. I believe my description was..."simple, hokey and dull". In my mind, John Prine was just another Bob Dylan: a terrible singer who writes mawkish songs for old, boring hippies still angry about the Vietnam War.

This past week, a lot of John Prine's music has played on my speakers and in my headphones. I graciously admit that I was wrong. His self-titled debut record is fantastic and the themes resonate as loudly in today's political climate as they must have in 1971. He creates a world of drama and humour inhabited by well-crafted memorable characters who range from the silly to the tragic.

I reached out to a good friend and teaching colleague of mine, Rob Hodson. I knew he was a fan and had seen Prine live in concert many times. I asked if he would pick the song for my Spotify 500 Playlist and, if he had time, share a few words to participate as my second guest blogger. I'll close this writing with the words he texted back:

What can I say about John Prine's  first album?

There is enough humanity, humour, heartbreak and intelligent observation that I feel I'm talking about a great novel instead of an album. SAM STONE showed the true consequences and destruction of war. PARADISE illustrates the powerlessness of the common person against the corporate destruction of our homes and lives. The first song I ever heard that said "I am talking about you, yes you", was DONALD AND LYDIA. All my adolescent awkwardness and angst in one heartbreaking poem. But, let's look at the very first song on the album, ILLEGAL SMILE. At the ripe old age of 24 Prine insisted that the opening track, a bouncy little piece about marijuana, be what people first heard. From the heart of the Bible Belt, at the height of social disruption in the west, the first thing he says is,
 
"Please tell the Man I didn't kill anyone, I'm just trying to have me some fun."

You have to hear these fun rhymes for yourselves. What an incredibly gutsy thing to do. But also, so nice, so humane, so Prine. The first song tells the listener, "This is where I'm coming from so, if you're not interested, I won't waste any more of your time." Funny, absolutely human, forgiving and utterly fearless.

Next: #451 - Amy Winehouse Back to Black