The 500 - #263 - Tracy Chapman (debut) - Tracy Chapman

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 Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

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Album: #263
Album Title: Tracy Chapman
Artist: Tracy Chapman
Genre: Contemporary Folk, Roots Rock, 
Recorded: Powertrax Studios, Hollywood, California, U.S.A.
Released: April, 1988
My age at release: 22
How familiar was I with it before this week: Very
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #256, moving up 7 spots since 2012
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Fast Car

A reflective Chapman on the cover of her debut record.
(Photo taken by Matt Mahurin - guest on The 500 Podcast).

In the summer of 1988, I was living a whirlwind life that, for the 57-year-old man who sits in front of this keyboard today, seems impossible to fathom. My day began at 8 a.m. with a seven-km ride to Wally World, a water park and recreation facility (batting cages, mini-golf, go-karts) sprawling across a dozen, treeless acres on the fringes of London, Ontario's city limits.

An arial view of Wally World's waterpark in 1988

The next six hours were spent in the blistering sun, monitoring hundreds of over-ebullient adolescents as they careened down waterslides and excitedly bobbed and splashed in the churning waters of the newly constructed wave pool. At 3 p.m. sharp, suntanned, with traces of neon zinc sunblock still on my nose, I pedaled home to grab the (now available) family car, a powder blue 1980 Chevy Chevette.

A Chevette similar to our family car.

Five o’clock saw me behind the bar at a local pizza restaurant (the now defunct London chain, Fluffy's). For the next four to six hours, I slinged pizzas, panzerottis, beers and shots. A post-work pint and I was in the Chevette heading to a municipal community centre near my home. This was my first job –  where I had worked as a custodian two hours a night, five days a week, since the spring of 1981. At 15, I was an early entrant into the workforce.

Byron Optimist Centre - renovated since my time there (81-89).

My summer work days were long and exhausting, but my spirits were always ballasted by music. I had my portable music player on bike rides and while cleaning floors and a well used car stereo. My other two places of my employment, Wally World and Fluffy's Pizza, played contemporary music through their speaker systems. It was the summer of big hair and bigger music, with songs from INXS, George Michael, Paula Abdul, Def Leppard, Guns and Roses, Van Halen and Richard Marx dominating the charts and setting the fashion trends.

Then, seemingly from nowhere, came a quiet song from a solo, black folk-singer that began to dominate the airways. The song was Fast Car and it was the first single from the debut record from guitarist, singer and songwriter, Tracy Chapman.

Tracy Chapman (1988).

The heart-wrenching realism of Fast Car levelled me the first time I heard it – a narrative about a woman, living in a homeless shelter, trying to escape the cycle of poverty in which she is trapped despite working minimum wage jobs. The desperation evoked by the tragic lyrics, juxtaposed against the backdrop of a light, pop-folk melody, was powerfully arresting. It stood in stark contrast to the life I was living -- residing comfortably at home, going to university and banking plenty of disposable cash at my three fun and socially rewarding jobs -- all of which paid more than minimum wage.

Final lyrics from Fast Car

Chapman was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1964 and was raised in an impoverished neighbourhood by her divorced mother. She was accepted into a social change program called A Better Way, which sponsored students from disadvantaged communities into college preparatory high schools away from their homes. Consequently, the bright and musically gifted Chapman graduated from Wooster School in Connecticut and was accepted to Tufts University in Boston.

The prestigious Wooster Private High School in Connecticut.

While attending Tufts, Chapman earned cash playing her guitar and singing in coffee shops in the hip, college neighbourhood of Harvard Square. It was there that she was discovered by a fellow Tufts student, Brian Koppelman. Who was destined to make his own mark in the entertainment industry. He co-wrote the films Rounders and Ocean's 13, as well as becoming the co-creator, producer and showrunner for the hit television series Billions.

At 20, Koppelman had managed bands in Long Island, New York, for several years before leaving for Tufts. His father, Charles, was a musician, music producer and businessman whose industry connections enabled  Brian to embark on securing  Chapman a music contract with a record company. It wasn’t easy, though.

Koppelman (2019).

Koppelman recounted on several podcasts that his efforts to secure Chapman a deal were fraught with challenges he had never anticipated. In his retelling, he would take record executives to hear Tracy perform. Despite being moved, sometimes to tears, by her raw talent, they always declined to sign her up. Flabbergasted, Koppelman’s refrain was, "Why not?" Their flat response was, "She's too black, too big and too masculine. We can't market that."

Eventually, she was signed to the American label Elektra Records and recorded her self-titled debut, releasing Fast Car as a single in April, 1988. Unsurprisingly, it did not sell well at a time when radio stations were dominated by Hair-Metal, Synth-Pop, Post-Punk,  Power Ballads and mainstream Hip-Hop. However, her break came on June 11 of that year when she was invited to be among performers at the iconic Wembley Stadium in England to mark the 70th birthday of imprisoned anti-apartheid revolutionary Nelson Mandela. 

Poster for the Nelson Mandela Tribute Concert

Chapman's three-song performance to a stadium audience of 90,000 spectators was broadcast globally to 67 countries and 600 million viewers. Her scheduled set, early in the day, featured songs from her self-titled debut record, Why?, Behind The Wall, and Talkin' 'bout a Revolution.

Screen shot of Chapman performing superimposed over 
a packed Wembley Stadium

By a quirk of fate,  circumstances led to an unscheduled second performance later in the show. Stevie Wonder had been flown in as a surprise guest. But when it came time for him and his band to take the stage, it was discovered that a computer hard-disc had gone missing for his Synclavier -- a then-state-of-the-art digital music sampling system. Unable to perform without it, Wonder stormed off and the promoters leaned on Chapman to fill in with her acoustic guitar.

A view of the crowd and stage at Mandela's 70th birthday concert

With an even larger audience tuning in, Chapman performed, Across The Lines and a riveting performance of Fast Car. Chapman went from being an unknown “too black, too big, too masculine” coffee house performer to global superstar.

The under-performing single rocketed up the charts, eventually selling millions of copies and landing in the Top 10, often #1, in dozens of countries. Chapman took home three Grammy Awards in 1989 for Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, as well as the MTV Video Music Award for Best Female Video of 1988..

Album cover for Fast Car by Tracy Chapman

Chapman, now 59, still performs. More than 35 years since her debut record, she has released seven additional albums. In April, 2023, the South African government announced that Chapman would be bestowed with the National Order to recognize her contribution to the fight for freedom and for raising awareness of human rights violations globally.

Chapman (2020).

Like many of my friends, we watched the Mandela Concert when it was rebroadcast on MuchMusic (Canada’s Music Video Station). We also became Chapman fans, purchasing her first CD. It, along with the music of other contemporary artists, informed the direction of my political viewpoint in ways I still recognize today.

Chapman performed in Toronto on September 15, 1988, as part of the Human Rights Now concert tour. The show was one of 19 performances held at venues worldwide to increase awareness of both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on its 40th anniversary and the work of Amnesty International. Chapman performed a small set along with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Sting, Peter Gabriel, Youssou N’Dour and k.d. lang. I wasn’t there, despite being flush from three summer jobs. It remains one of my biggest concert regrets.

The 500 - #312 - Nothing's Shocking - Jane's Addiction

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 Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

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Album: # 312

Album Title: Nothing's Shocking

Artist: Jane's Addiction

Genre: Alternative Rock, Alternative Metal

Recorded: Eldorado Studios - Los Angeles, California

Released: August, 1988

My age at release: 23

How familiar was I with it before this week: Very

Is it on the 2020 list? No

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Mountain Song

Two years ago, I wrote a post about the album Pink Flag -- the debut release by the band Wire. Artists and music critics who love it consider it to be part of the post-punk movement (which arrived in the early 80s). Therein lies the conundrum:

How could an album released at the outset of British punk in the seventies be influenced by the genre it was helping to create?

After all, Pink Flag was released in 1977, just as punk was gaining a foothold. Wire arrived on the British music scene along with the three most important punk bands of the era, The Damned, The Clash and Sex Pistols.

Pink Flag - debut record by Wire (1977)

Nothing's Shocking, the debut studio record from Los Angeles alternative-rock band Jane's Addiction is similarly perplexing. It was released in 1988, but sounds much more like the alternative rock that would become popular in the early 90s.

The late 80s were a time when the charts were dominated by hair metal -- a sub-genre of heavy metal that was influenced by the glam rock of the 70s. Popular bands included Bon Jovi, Poison, Motley Crue, Twisted Sister and Def Leppard.

The members of these groups were dressed in spandex, denim and leather, with long and teased coiffed hair. The music featured catchy riffs, "gang-vocal" harmonies, virtuoso-level guitar solos with a big drum sound. Most hair metal songs were hard-pounding anthems that invited audience participation, but every album contained at least one soft, heartfelt ballad. These songs were often the "hits" that, alongside each group's pretty-boy appearance, attracted a loyal female following.

I was more of a Progressive Rock fan in the late 80s. My favourite bands were Rush, Marillion, Queensryche, Genesis, Yes and Peter Gabriel. However, I certainly liked some hair rock - Def Leppard in particular - and I had adopted some of the fashion choices (see below).

With my future wife, Summer 1988 Algonquin Park

Little did we (or the hair metal bands we loved) know that things were about to change. In 1991, Grunge hit the mainstream. It was a sudden revolutionary groundswell in the landscape of music that, unless you experienced it, is hard to quantify.

Almost overnight, hair-metal was dead or at least comical and tragically dated. In November, 1991, I watched the band Skid Row perform on Saturday Night Live. I felt connected to popular music -- with my finger clearly on the pulse. This was my generation of sound on television's biggest stage.

Just a few weeks later, Nirvana appeared and everything shifted. Suddenly, I felt like a dinosaur, a member of a bygone generation. There was a new sound taking over -- and I didn't understand it...yet.

However, according to Vice writer Jason Heller, "if grunge was the nail in the coffin of 80s hair metal, then alternative metal built that coffin". At the forefront of that coffin-building movement was Jane's Addiction. Formed in 1985, they are Perry Farrell (vocals), Dave Navarro (guitars), Steven Perkins (drums) and Chris Chaney (bass).

Jane's Addiction promotional photo - 1987
(l-r) Navarro, Chaney, Perkins, Farrell

I can't remember who first played Jane's Addiction for me. At the time, I was working at a restaurant called Mother Tucker's Food Experience so I am pretty sure it was one of the cooks. I do remember that it was the song Jane Says from Nothing's Shocking.

I was fascinated by the inclusion of steel drums in the song and, and wondered about the band's name. Who was Jane?

Years later I learned that Farrell picked the name to honour his roommate and muse, Jane Bainter, who had originally pitched the name "Jane's Heroin Experience" -- no relation to my former place of work.

Bainter (1988)

Then, some time later, I saw a broadcast of a blistering performance of the band’s Mountain Song from the MTV studios. It reminded me of Led Zeppelin, but there was a grittier, androgynous and slightly dangerous quality about it. Written by Farrell before the group's formation, it chronicled the challenges of a heroin addict who climbs a mountain of euphoria when using, only to come crashing down to a painful reality.

Farrell (right) performing with Navaro and Jane's Addiction

Farrell, who lost his mother to suicide at age three, struggled with heroin addiction through the late 80s and early 90s. Despite this monkey on his back, he was a force in the music industry. Not only did he front Jane's Addiction and the side project, Porno For Pyros, he also conceived and created the Lollapalooza Music Festival in 1991.

Poster for Lollapalooza - Toronto (1991)

Unlike other music festivals that took place over several days in a single venue, Lollapalooza toured across the United States and Canada through the summer of 1991. Taking its name from a 19th Century expression meaning "an extraordinary and unusual thing, person or event", the festival featured artists from a number of musical genres (rock, folk, hip-hop, electronica) and non-musical performance artists, including the Jim Rose Circus Side Show – the  modern-day version of a carnival side-show, complete with strongmen, contortionists and the fully-tattooed "Lizardman". There was even Zamora - The Torture King who ate fire, swallowed swords and punctured himself with electrified skewers.

Zamora - adding weights to a sword swallowing stunt

The festival was a massive success and expanded to become a series of international tours, each featuring the biggest acts of the day. Now, the event is now held annually in Chicago's Grant Park. It is a four-day affair held in late July. This year's iteration features 150 bands on nine stages, including headliners Metallica, Dua Lipa, J. Cole and Green Day.

The event has made Farrell an incredibly rich man, but he still performs. He will be fronting his band Porno For Pyros on the final night of the 2022 Lollapalooza on July 31.

Thirty-seven years after forming, Jane's Addiction announced a multi-city tour supporting The Smashing Pumpkins. They will hit my region in Southwestern Ontario in late October. 

The band that was once ahead of its time is now a nostalgia act, playing songs from their four-album catalogue -- mainly hits from their first two records -- for fifty-somethings like me. However, the ever-creative Farrell has hinted that recording new material may be in their future. Who knows -- maybe there are more coffins to build.

The 500 - #317 - Surfer Rosa - Pixies

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 Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

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Album: # 317

Album Title: Surfer Rosa

Artist: Pixies

Genre: Alternative Rock, Art Punk, Post-Punk

Recorded: 2 Studios, Boston, Massachusettes, U.S.A.

Released: March, 1988

My age at release: 22

How familiar was I with it before this week: 1 Song

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, #390 - dropping 63 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Where Is My Mind?

Surfer Rosa, the debut studio album from Boston-based, alternative rock band, Pixies, was released in the spring of 1988. I was in university and working at a local pizza joint as a bartender and server. The crew with which I worked and socialized were into more conventional rock fare. Consequently, this is not a record that made its way to my radar.

Matches - one of the few relics from my pizza gig (1988)

Surfer Rosa is not an easy listen. It can be jarring and abrasive at times. However, if I had discovered it sooner, I probably would have enjoyed it for its mix of musical styles. Some of it is raw and unbridled, while other tracks are hauntingly melodic. The lyrical content is dark and often disturbing, leaning heavily on themes of Catholic repression. They mirrored my fascination with the macabre in my late teens and early twenties.

Pixies (1988) Francis, Deal, Lovering & Santiago

Formed in the mid-80s, the Pixies comprised songwriter, vocalist and guitarist Black Francis (born: Charles Thompson IV); bassist and vocalist Kim Deal; drummer David Lovering; and lead guitarist Joey Santiago.

They emerged as part of the blossoming alternative rock scene in the northeast United States, drawing on elements of punk and surf rock. Their dynamic structure of music writing has been dubbed "loud-quiet-loud". It was an evolutionary step in soundscapes as the band took the thrashing anger found in hardcore punk and delivered it in controlled, strategic bursts, offset by more melodic sections of quiet restraint.

The album was well received by critics but sales were initially underwhelming. Now it is  widely regarded as a powerful influence, leading to the grunge music scene of the 1990s. In retrospect, it is easy to trace. Nirvana front-man Kurt Cobain admitted to "ripping it off" while writing Nevermind (which appears at position #17 on The 500). PJ Harvey, with two records on this list (#431 and #406), said Surfer Rosa "blew her mind", and David Bowie, with five records on the list, said it was "among the most compelling music of the eighties". Bowie even covered the song Cactus from this record on his 2002 release, Heathen.

Although I had heard the name of the group in conversation, I wouldn't discover the band until long after their 1993 break-up. The song, Where Is My Mind? from Surfer Rosa, brilliantly serves as the audio backdrop to the explosive final scene in the 1999 film Fight Club.

Movie Poster for Fight Club

In 2004, the band reunited for an extensive and wildly successful world tour -- with ticket sales exceeding $14 million. In 2013, Deal left the group and was replaced by bassist Paz Lenchantin. This past February, Francis revealed he had more than forty songs already written for an upcoming record.

Pixies performing live (2019)

We will return to Pixies in about two years with album #227, Doolittle. Until then, Surfer Rosa will certainly make up for lost time with many spins as gyms reopen. I suspect it will serve as motivational work-out music. Loud-quiet-loud – sounds that are perfect for interval training on the elliptical.

The 500 - #328 - Daydream Nation - Sonic Youth

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 Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

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Album: # 328

Album Title: Daydream Nation

Artist: Sonic Youth

Genre: Indie Rock, Post Punk, Art Punk, Alt Rock

Recorded: Greene Street Recording Studios, Manhattan, New York

Released: October, 1988

My age at release: 23

How familiar was I with it before this week: In name only

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, 171 - moving up 157 places

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Teen Age Riot

When I secured my first teaching assignment, in September, 1999, I met Peter (Pete) Reid who was to be my teaching partner and mentor. Pete was a fascinating individual, only 49 years’ old and had been teaching since the early 70s. He actually began teaching while completing his education degree in Teachers’ College in London when he was barely 20.

The school where Peter and I met

Pete was not an outlier. Many young teacher candidates were hustled into the profession because of significant changes to Canada's immigration policies, leading to a population boom. Without getting too bogged down in details, the Prime Minister, Pierre Elliott Trudeau (Justin's Dad), announced in October, 1971, that Canada would embrace multiculturalism. Canada was in need of high-skilled workers and a points system was implemented to give preference to young immigrants based on education, experience and language proficiency. The consequence of this policy was rapid population growth through young immigrant families who would settle in Canada's major cities, Pete began a full-time teaching job while attending night school classes at Western University’s Faculty of Education.

Former P.M. Pierre Trudeau rode a wave of "Trudeaumania"
in the early 70s.

I share this to amplify Pete's resume. In the 30 years he had been teaching, he had experienced many changes in both Federal and, more importantly, Provincial leadership. Consequently, he had witnessed, and been part of, fundamental shifts in education policy, philosophy and practice. One of the many nuggets of wisdom he shared with me was that "education tries to reinvent itself every few years but, for the most part, its trajectory is more like a pendulum. Ideas fall out of fashion, but they usually make a comeback a decade later...slightly different and branded with a new name".

Throughout my teaching career, I've often thought about the things Pete shared. The idea of pendulum swings struck me as I did my research into this week's record, Daydream Nation. Released in 1988, it was the fifth studio album from the New York-based, four-member, art-collective Sonic Youth. The group was part of the No Wave Movement of the early 80s. This avant-garde art scene was a counterpoint  to the punk rock and new wave music popular at the time. No Wave music was, according to the Kill Your Idols documentary by Scott Crary, “more a set of ideas than a sound" – a reaction to the tropes of popular music and the belief that punk rock and new wave were simply recycling rock and roll cliches.

Poster for Kill Your Idols - a 2006 film about
art punk bands in New York

Bands such as Sonic Youth, Swans, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and even Suicide, whom I wrote about at #441, were part of a shift toward music that, according to Village Voice writer Scott Anderson; 

"pursued an abrasive reductionism to undermine the power and mystique of a rock vanguard by depriving it of a tradition to react against."  

No Wave music was intentionally atonal and repetitive, emphasizing musical texture rather than melody. It did not embrace the anti-establishment themes present in most punk rock. Instead, it was negative and nihilistic. If anything, it was inspired by 1960s improvisational psychedelia and acid jazz. If Punk Rock was "Chuck Berry, anarchy and Buddy Holly", No Wave was "Miles Davis, Frederick Neitzsche and Jim Morrison". Much like Pete had told me, things that fall out of fashion are reborn with a different name and a slightly different twist.

Sonic Youth (l-r) Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo, Steve Shelley
& Kim Gordon (1987)

Over my 25-year career, I have seen educational trends and philosophies come and go. I have even ridden the waves of a few. However, perhaps Pete's thinking was accurate. Maybe he was even aware of French New Wave director Claude Chabrol who once made the remark; "There are no waves, only the ocean".

Director Claude Chabrol