The 500 - #441 - Suicide - Self Titled 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). 

• 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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 441

Album Title: Self-Titled Debut
Artist: Suicide
Released: December, 1977
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: Ghost Rider

The list from which The 500 Podcast and my weekly posts draw their inspiration was originally published by Rolling Stone Magazine in 2005. It was compiled in 2003 when the magazine asked a panel of artists, producers, industry executives and journalists to select their favourite albums. These were then evaluated by the Ernst & Young accounting firm which "devised a point system" to tabulate the responses. The list was revised in 2012 and this is the list to which I adhere.

However, the criteria used to determine which albums were, and were not, the "Greatest Of All Time" is not easily ascertained. Is a voter's choice based on... 

• musicianship?
• Billboard chart position?
• record sales?
• musical impact or influence?
• personal taste?

Additionally, The 500 List is not without criticism. Edna Gunderson of USA Today described it as predictable, "weighted toward testosterone-fueled vintage rock". Additionally, Jonny Sharp, a contributor to the New Music Express described the list as, "a soulless canon-centric (list) of the same-old, tired titles," noting that "when only one album in the top ten is less than 40 years old, you need to rethink your approach."

I've done my best to avoid over-analyzing The 500 but I'll admit skimming through its titles. Perhaps it is because I am "a testosterone-fueled fan of vintage rock" who is over 40 that I am a fan of many of these records. Entry number 441, the debut album by the band Suicide, is not one of them.

To be fair, I played it five times in a variety of settings (my home stereo, on headphones & through car speakers). The opening track, Ghost Rider, which I have included on my Spotify Playlist, is the song I enjoyed the most. It draws its title from a lesser known Marvel comic book and its protagonist. 

This is the debut album by Suicide, the New York Minimalist, Electronic-Rock, Synth-Punk duo of Alan Vega and Martin Rev. Vega, a visual artist and sculptor, met Rev, an avant-garde jazz keyboardist, in the late-sixties. After witnessing the burgeoning New York punk scene, the two decided to "create art".

Rev bought a cheap, Japanese electric keyboard and ran it through a series of bass-and-treble boosting pedals to enhance its limited sound. Simultaneously, Vega would sing, speak and scream improvised lyrics over the strange, dry, electronic hum.

Vega (left) and Rev in 1988

If you've never heard this record, I encourage you to listen to a few tracks to experience this bizarre cacophony.

Unsurprisingly, the record was not well received critically and it failed to make the charts. Regardless, it served as a template for the electronic sounds that would follow and it is easy to see how it influenced bands such as Nine Inch Nails, Daft Punk, Radiohead and Devo (whom I wrote about last week). It has also be praised by music heavyweights Bruce Springsteen and U2.

Although I did not enjoy the record, I have to admit this record deserves its place on The 500. Alan Vega's passing in 2016 was recognized by countless artists who celebrate his and Martin Rev's five-record "art experiment" as groundbreaking and profoundly important.

The 500 - #442 - Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo. - Devo

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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 442

Album Title: Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo.
Artist: Devo
Released: August, 1978
My age at release: 13
How familiar was I with it before this week: Fairly
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Uncontrollable Urge (Selected by several friends, including my high-school chum and Devo fan Paul Dawson)
Great Lyric:
"I been dipped in double meaning
I been stuck with static cling
Think I got a rupto-pac
I think I got a Big Mac attack" 
(From the song: Too Much Paranoias)

In childhood, there are moments of liberation and freedom that resonate with us forever. Perhaps it was the first time you were allowed to sleep in a tent with a few friends or when you finally got permission to ride your bike to school. At Christmas, 1977, I received a Panasonic Radio and Cassette player, and a world of music was suddenly accessible...in the sanctuary of my bedroom. 

This isn't it exactly, but awfully close

At the time, I was 12 and living in Kingsville, Ontario. This sleepy, farm, fishing and hockey town is 41 km south-east of Detroit, Michigan - - home of two competing rock-music stations WRIF (Riff Radio) and WWWW (W4). Lounging in my room doing or pretending to do school work, I could quickly switch between stations, slowly building my internal music database.

On Sunday evenings, a two-hour broadcast of The Dr. Demento Radio Show was aired. This was appointment listening. It combined my two great loves: music and comedy. Each week, Dr. Demento (aka Barry Hansen) would spin an eclectic mix of novelty songs ranging from humorously peculiar to the hauntingly bizarre. It was where I first heard... 

• "Weird" Al Yankovic and his first parody hit "My Bologna" (which lampooned The Knack's My Sharona), 
• What's he Building in There? by Tom Waits
• Constantinople by The Four Lads,  
• and all the exquisite weirdness of Barnes & Barnes with songs like Fishheads or Something's in the Bag

The Dr. Demento also introduced me to the music of Frank Zappa (whose album Freak Out! appears at #246 on the list) and, of course, the music from Album #442 Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo by Devo. 

Formed in Akron, Ohio in 1973, Devo featured two sets of brothers, the Mothersbaughs (Mark and Bob) and the Casales (Gerry and Bob) with drummer Alan Myers. 

The band rose to prominence in the mid-70s on the strength of their stage shows which, according to Hardcore Live Magazine, "mingled kitschy science-fiction themes with deadpan, surrealistic humour and mordantly satirical social commentary." Their broad, dissonant songs took advantage of advances in technological instrumentation (particularly the Minimoog analogue synthesizer keyboard). The band created their name from the biological theory of De-Evolution, a notion that suggests a species will, over time, revert to a more primitive form.

Devo came to the attention of David Bowie, Brian Eno and Iggy Pop who have nine records on The 500 list. All three offered to produce Devo's first record and, in the end, it was crafted by Eno with assistance from Bowie. 

The album, released in the summer of 1978, sold briskly but was received with a mixed critical response. I was familiar with it through performances of Jocko Homo and Mongoloid on Dr. Demento's program. However, it was Devo's October 1978 performance on Saturday Night Live that galvanized my fandom. Decked out in yellow hazmat suits they performed a fidgety, otherworldly robo-funk version of the Rolling Stone classic I Can't Get No Satisfaction. 

I got the impression of a seismic shift in culture was taking place and, much like I felt when I first plugged in my Panasonic radio, there was an intoxicating feeling of liberation just bearing witness to it. 

The 500 - #443 - Cheap Trick - In Color

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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 443

Album Title: In Color
Artist: Cheap Trick
Released: September, 1977
My age at release: 12
How familiar was I with it before this week: Somewhat
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Downed (Suggested by friend and music aficiondo Claudio)


If asked to name my favourite bands when I was about 15, I would have said, without hesitation...

1. Rush
2. Van Halen
3. Cheap Trick

The album that made me a fan of Cheap Trick was their 1979 live release, At Budokan. It appears at #426 on this list and will be the focus of a future blog post. 

I never owned the album In Color even though I contemplated purchasing it many times. I was always fascinated by the jacket. On the front, in colour, were the band's "eye-candy", Robin Zander and Tom Petersson, straddling motorcycles and looking 70s, long-hair, uber-cool . 

However, I was more intrigued by the back cover - a black and white picture, printed upside-down that featured guitarist (and principal songwriter) Rick Neilsen, with drummer Bun E. Carlos, looking decidedly uncool...on children's bicycles. 

There was something liberating about the dichotomy of these two pictures and the band members in them. Sure, I wanted to grow my hair out and look like a rock-star. But, at a time in my life when I was an awkward, self-conscious bundle of hormones and acne, there was comfort in knowing that it was okay to embrace my inner-nerd.

Things I learned...

• The song Southern Girls is about girls from the southern part of Canada. The band, who are from Rockford, Illinois, toured Canada extensively in the mid-70s. The original lyric, "Southern Canadian Girls" just didn't work - so it was truncated.
• In Color was re-recorded in 1997. The band's intention was to "record the album on their own terms" unencumbered by the demands of the record company. Dubbed "The Steve Albini Sessions" (after the producer who worked with them on the re-recording), it has never been officially released. However, a rough mix of some of the tracks can be found here. After listening to it a few times, I'll admit that I like it much more. It's raw and rocking - more dirty punk than polished pop-rock.

The 500 - #444 - War - The World is a Ghetto

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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 444

Album Title: The World is a Ghetto
Artist: War
Released: November, 1972
My age at release: 7
How familiar was I with it before this week: A little
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: City Country City
Great Lyric:
"I knew we met each other this morning for a reason.
Thinking, talking, we've worked out our problems.
Looked like we should have better days in front.
Just because we took our time to think and talk,
For a much better understanding." 
(Four Cornered Room)

There is so much to like about the band War. They are a true, musical crossover act that blends elements of Latin-tinged funk with rock, soul, rhythm and blues, reggae and jazz. They boast a multi-ethnic line-up of talented players who, as BBC writer Daryl Easlea put it, "effortlessly transcended racial and cultural barriers."

Originally formed in 1969 by record producer Jerry Goldstein who paired Eric Burdon, former lead singer of the UK band The Animals, with a group of North Hollywood session players. The band were, at the time, backing NFL defensive-end turned musician and actor Deacon Jones in LA clubs. Those of my vintage might remember Jones best from his appearance on the television program The Brady Bunch.

The band's goal, according to original member Leroy "Lonnie" Jordan, was "to spread a message of brotherhood and harmony, using instruments and voices to speak out against racism, warfare, gangs, crime and poverty."

My exposure to the band was through a string of hit records played in heavy rotation on both FM radio and featured in film soundtracks through the 80s and 90s. In particular, Spill the Wine, The Cisco Kid, Why Can't We Be Friends and Low Rider. 

I've given The World is a Ghetto multiple listens this week. The rhythmic percussion is undeniable and the soulful, jazzy grooves feel like a slow drive in a large sedan through an inner-city in the early 70s, particularly City Country City which I selected for my Spotify Mix. Granted, my opinion is gleaned from films or television programs from the era and a few trips through downtown Detroit to see Tigers' games when I was a boy.

If you would like to learn more about this record, Josh's Podcast provides greater context and insight. His guest, former NBA champion Caron Butler, is an engaging and honest storyteller. Butler is currently working with producer/actor Mark Wahlberg on a film about his life based on his memoir Tuff Juice: My Journey from the Streets to the NBA.

The 500 - #445 - Steve Miller Band - Fly like an Eagle

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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 445

Album Title: Fly Like An Eagle
Artist: Steve Miller Band
Released: May, 1976
My age at release: 10
How familiar was I with it before this week: Very
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix:  Wild Mountain Honey  (selected by my chum, musician Cam Grant)
Great Lyric:
"This here's a story 'bout Billy Joe and Bobbie Sue
Two young lovers with nothing better to do
Than sit around the house, get high, and watch the tube
And here's what happened when they decided to cut loose"
(Take the Money and Run)

My first high school was in the small Ontario town of Kingsville located along the shores of Lake Erie, not far from the Windsor/Detroit border. The high school library was remarkable because it boasted an impressive collection of albums that students could borrow for two nights at a time.

Suddenly, some of the most important or commercially successful records of the past decade were readily available to me. This, along with my friendship with schoolmate Andrew Harris (who had access to his older brothers' collection), was my introduction to great music. Indeed, many of the records on Rolling Stone's list were in one or both of these collections.

Album #445 Fly Like An Eagle by Steve Miller Band and Greatest Hits (1974 - 1978) were two records I borrowed and listened to many times on my parents' stereo system in the back room of our home. To this day, any song from these two discs transports me immediately to lazy evenings, stretched out on the carpeted floor absorbing the sounds and while devouring the album cover content and liner notes, likely while avoiding homework.

Steve Miller has been pigeonholed as Dad Rock during the past few decades and his music has become a staple of soft and classic rock radio stations. However, he is an exemplary guitar player and a first-rate songwriter. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2016. The induction was, however, marred by controversy. Miller was introduced by musicians Dan Auerbach and Pat Carney of the band The Black Keys who are 35 years his junior. The pair grew up as fans of Miller but the experience that evening was horrendous for them. As Auerback put it in this interview in Rolling Stone Magazine.

We got a really uncomfortable feeling when we first met Steve. He had no idea who we were. No idea. The first thing he told us was, "I can't wait to get out of here." He knew that we signed up to do this speech for him. And he made no effort to even [laughs uncomfortably] — he didn't even figure out who we were. I don't live in New York City. This is like three days out of my life flying from Nashville and leaving my kids at home.

It seems that Miller has become a curmudgeon in his senior years and the speech he made following the induction was a profane tirade leveled at the music industry and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He may have had legitimate points but, this was the wrong place and time to vent.

This saddens me. I am always a little disheartened when an artist I've admired turns out to be unkind, mean-spirited or unable to show simple decency. Unfortunately, that moment on the stage in 2016 may be a lasting part of Miller's legacy rather than the fantastic music he created during my youth.

The 500 - #446 - MC5 - Back in the USA

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 to gather additional information and insights.

Album # 446

Album Title: Back in the USA
Artist: MC5
Released: January, 1970
My age at release: 4
How familiar was I with it before this week: Not at all
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Shakin' Street (selected by my friend Claudio)
Great Lyric:
"Sixty-nine America in terminal stasis
The air's so thick it's like drowning in molasses
I'm sick and tired of paying these dues
And I'm finally getting hip to the American ruse." 
(The American Ruse)

Around 1981, a school pal Pat Keep and I bonded around our mutual interest of fantasy literature, Dungeons & Dragons and the progressive-rock band Yes. Over the next few months we shared records and cassettes in an attempt to influence each other's tastes. 
Pat took to the sound of the hard-rock band Blue Ӧyster Cult (abbreviated to BӦC). Yes, they rocked the Metal Umlaut (Ӧ) in their name. It was a decorative diacrtic employed by several heavy metal and punk rock bands in the 70s/80s. I've mentioned my humourous relationship with the Metal Umlaut in a previous post about album #488 by Husker Dü.

One weekend, Pat loaned me Blue Ӧyster Cult's 1978 live release Some Enchanted Evening. It was a seven track record which featured five of BӦC's hits and covers of We Gotta Get Out of this Place by The Animals and Kick out the Jams by MC5. This would be my introduction to the high energy sound of MC5 (short for Motor City Five - a nod to their Detroit roots) and I became a fan, albeit a casual one. 

Kick out the Jams appears on the first record by MC5, which we will encounter when I get to Album #294 on the Rolling Stone's list -- in about fours years. I was unfamiliar with Back in the USA but loved it from the opening track, a boisterous, uptempo version of Little Richard's Tutti Frutti.  

There was a time when I pigeonholed this band as a straight-ahead garage band/proto-punk act. Infact, they embraced left-leaning, sometimes radical, politics from the late 60s. This is evident on the tracks The American Ruse in which the band "attacks the hypocritical idea of freedom espoused by the U.S. government" and The Human Being Lawnmower, a not-so-subtle commentary on America's involvement in the Vietnam War.

In 1975, addiction issues resulted in the arrest of guitarist/singer Wayne Kramer who was caught selling cocaine to undercover federal agents. He served two years in a prison in Lexington, KY where he met Jazz trumpeter Red Rodney (of Charlie Parker fame). The two began to perform each Sunday in chapel. Eventually, their musical collaboration contributed significantly to Kramer's recovery. 

In 1978, The Clash released the song Jail Guitar Doors, rooted in Kramer's incarceration. Thirty years later, to honour the life of Clash founder Joe Strummer, musician Billy Bragg began an program to provide musical equipment to help rehabilitate inmates in the U.K. The project was named for the aforementioned song and, in 2009, Wayne Kramer helped found Jail Guitar Doors: USA - completing an interesting musical circle. 

Addendum
I learned about Jail Guitar Doors: USA about seven years ago while listening to Kramer share his story on Episode 186 of Jay Mohr's podcast Mohrstories. If you would like to learn more about MC5, Kramer, or this project, give it a listen.

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The 500 - #447 - Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto - Getz/Gilberto

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 # 447

Album Title: Getz/Gilberto
Artist: Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto
Released: March, 1964
My age at release: Not born yet
How familiar was I with it before this week: Very Familiar
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: 
The Girl from Ipanema

Great Lyric:
"Tall and tan and young and lovely
The girl from Ipanema goes walking
And when she passes, I smile, but she
Doesn't see. She just doesn't see"

When I reached out on social media for assistance picking a song for my 500 Spotify Playlist I included the caveat ... "other than The Girl from Ipanema." To me, it was overplayed and that my list needed a deeper cut from the record.

My friend James, an ardent fan of jazz, immediately responded by saying, "It's overplayed for a reason. It's an incredible track." I agreed, and the track has been added to the playlist.

This is a record I heard many times while working as a bartender at Garlic's Restaurant. I was excited to learn more about the history of it through The 500 podcast. On this episode, Josh's guest was Jade Catta-Preta, a Brazillian-American comic and actor. Throughout the interview, she provided an engaging perspective on a Jazz/Bossa Nova masterpiece that was a staple in her home as a child. Additionally, I learned how to correctly pronounce Brazillian guitarist Joao Gilberto's name as well as many of the song titles I had been verbally butchering.

My first year of high school was in Kingsville, Ontario. Early on, I met Andrew and we bonded around our mutual love of comedy, Saturday Night Live and Steve Martin in particular.

Andrew older brothers had an impressive record collection and I spent hours in their den listening to records. This will certainly come up in future posts because this was my first exposure to albums by David Bowie, The Who and The Beatles that were not "Greatest Hits" packages.

The brothers also had a National Lampoon record called That's Not Funny, That's Sick. It was entirely inappropriate, full of vulgar, irreverent sketches and rife with profane language. In other words, everything a 13-year-old finds hysterical. 

The album featured John Belushi, Bill Murray, Christopher Guest and Richard Belzer well before they became television and movie stars. 

One track, Love Birds/Flashanova featured a parody of a Getz/Gilberto song. The music was strangely familiar and, even though it was a comedic version, it introduced me to the Bossa Nova sound and I was hooked. As a saxophone player, I was astonished by the gorgeous, almost wispy timbre of Stan Getz' playing.

A few years later, I tracked down this Getz/Gilberto record at the local library. At 16, I really felt quite mature when I piped it through headphones in the soundbooth. As an adult, I imagined, this would be the music I would play in my penthouse apartment while entertaining guests. We would be talk about the stock market, sip martinis and wear formal attire. Meanwhile, the record would provide the ideal soundtrack to our fascinating lives. The premier episode of season six of Mad Men came awfully close to my inaccurate teenage vision.

The magic has never gone away and I have played it at parties. I was just wrong about the other details. After listening to it again while writing this post, I'll gladly admit that James was right - The Girl from Ipanema is overplayed...and for good reason.