Tag Archives: Bob-Dylan

The Best Music of 2012

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It’s the last day of the year and I am finally getting around to posting my list of favorite albums of 2012.

The number one album goes to the one I listened to the most during the year, Standing at the Sky’s Edge, by Richard Hawley.

I have no idea how such a great album did not even make it on the KEXP listener’s poll of the top 120 albums. Watch the video. Take minute to request KEXP to play it, and buy the album.

Boys and Girls by Alabama Shakes comes in at number two.

KEXP listeners did approve of this album. It came in at Number 5.

Brian Jonestown Massacre comes in at Number 3 with Aufheben. Inexplicably missing from the KEXP list.

Bruce Springsteen put out his best album in many years. Wrecking Ball ranks Number 4 and it’s a perfect collection of political songs that was my soundtrack for the 2012 elections.

Dr. John put out his best album in decades. Locked Down was produced by Dan Auerback of The Black Keys, and he brought out the best of the Dr on this album.

No videos for the rest of this list. You know where to find them.

6. Banga, by Patti Smith
7. Sweet Heart, Sweet Light, by Spiritualized
8. Sonik Kicks, by Paul Weller
9. In Your Head, by Monophonics
10. Blues Funeral, by Mark Lanegan
11. Tempest, by Bob Dylan
12. Temple Beautiful, by Chuck Prophet
13. Blunderbuss, by Jack White
14. Circles, by Moon Duo
15. Sun, by Cat Power
16. O’ Be Joyful, by Shovels and Rope
17. Elegancia Tropical, by Bomba Estereo
18. Falling Off the Sky, by The dB’s
19. Twins, by Ty Segall
20. Synthetica, by Metric

I could go on but I’ll stop at twenty.

Tulip Frenzy chose Bend Beyond by Woods as the best album of the year. I recently bought it based on the review and it’s starting to grow on me. Other albums that caught my interest are Glad Rag Doll by Diana Krall featuring Marc Ribot on guitar, The House that Jack Built by Jesca Hoop, Tramp by Sharon Van Etten, Psychedelic Pill by Neil Young, Researching the Blues by Red Kross, and I Will Set You Free by Barry Adamson.

Political Songs – The 2012 Election Selection

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There’s just a little under four weeks until Election Day and you need a playlist of political songs to listen to from now until you vote.

Here’s a collection of songs that were mostly recorded in the past three years with a few oldies thrown in to keep it real.

It starts off with an appropriately titled song that tells how God and religion became intertwined with politics, then a song about monarchies, a few songs about greedheads, then about how the common man gets shafted by them, and a song in the voice of hard working man who does what he can, but would like to shoot the bastards. Next up are a couple of songs about racism in American and then a couple about how the oppressed ought to rise up and fight. The set closes with an uplifting song about how our generation must change the rules so that everyone gets an oppourtunity when it comes to education, jobs, and making a decent living doing what they want to do.

So put these tracks together however you can, and enjoy. Oh, and song-title links take you to lyrics, and album-title links take you to records label sites or Amazon for information about buying the music.

In the Beginning – Todd Snider, from Agnostic Hymns and Stoner Fables (2012)

Early Roman Kings – Bob Dylan, from Tempest (2012)

The Jolly Banker – Woody Guthrie, from Woody at 100 (1940)

No Banker Left Behind – Ry Cooder, from Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down (2011)

National Ransom – Elvis Costello, from National Ransom (2010)

Everything’s Raisin’ – Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band, from The Wages (2010)

Tin Can Trust – Los Lobos, from Tin Can Trust

We Can’t Make it Here – Joan Baez, James McMurtry and Steve Earle, from Occupy This Album (2012)

Jack of All Trades – Bruce Springsteen, from Wrecking Ball (2012)

Talking at the Same Time – Tom Waits, from Bad as Me (2011)

I’m Dreaming of a White President – Randy Newman (2012, free mp3)

Cold Cold Feeling – Ry Cooder, from Election Special (2012)

Rising of the Ghetto – Ryan Bingham, from Tomorrowland (2012)

The Ghost of Tom Joad – Rage Against the Machine – from Renegades (2000)

Black Spartacus Heart Attack Machine – Tom Morello, from World Wide Rebel Songs (2011)

Come On Come On Come On – Jackson Browne, from Occupy This Album (2012)

Our Generation – John Legend and the Roots from Wake Up! (2010)

Friday Night Videos Featuring Lydia Loveless, Bob Dylan, and Richard Hawley

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Here’s Lydia Loveless performing “Crazy” from her 2011 album Indestructible Machine, that would have made my top-ten list for 2011 had I only been smart enough to buy the album a year ago. She will be performing live at The Sunset Tavern on Saturday, October 13th.

Bob Dylan has a new album out, Tempest, and it’s getting rave reviews: Uncut Magazine gave it a 10, and MOJO Magazine gave it five stars. Here’s the video for the opening track, “Duquesne Whistle”.

Here’s the title track from Richard Hawley’s new album, Standing at the Sky’s Edge, that’s been on my hot rotation for the past couple of weeks.

Bob Dylan at Bumbershoot 2010

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I had not seen Bob Dylan since he toured with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers back in the eighties and did a show at the Tacoma Dome, so when he came to Bumbershoot this year, I had to go.

Dylan and Sexton 2

That’s Bob Dylan on the right and Charlie Sexton on guitar in the middle.  Charlie can play a mean guitar. 

Bob’s voice has, uh… changed over the years, and I wasn’t sure what to expect from him.  He started the show sounding like Tom Waits with a bad sinus infection, but his vocal chords loosened up as the show went on, and by the end, he still sounded very raspy, but much better than the start. 

Bob played quite a few songs from his latest albums.  The band was built to play those songs, but the songs from Highway 61 Revisited were easily translated into the blues-rock sound that these guys play, and play very well.

NPR Poll for Best Opening Track of an Album

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Today’s email from NPR included a link to this blog post asking readers to submit their choice for best opening track of an album.  I can think of a few.  My number one choice is:

“Gloria” on Patti Smith’s debut album Horses. Not only is that song the best opening track, it also has the best opening line.  The very first words you hear on the very first album by Patti Smith are, “Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine.”  With that line and that song on that album with one of the greatest covers ever, she became an iconic rock ‘n roll figure that has inspired thousands of young punks and poets to express themselves through music.

Number two would be “Like a Rolling Stone” from Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited.

Number three is “London Calling” from the Clash album of the same name.

What are your favorites?  Leave a comment here and/or go to the NPR page and submit your choice before they close it down.

Best Albums of 2009

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It’s New Year’s Eve and KEXP is just about ready to star their countdown of the best albums of 2009.  I’ll be listening and commenting on that later but, for now, here’s what you need to know.

The Top 10 Albums of 2009

1. Rising Mountains – Capsula:  I first heard Capsula on KEXP on July 3rd and I was immediately hooked.  They are the most exciting band I’ve heard since discovering The Duke Spirit three years ago.  The band is originally from Buenes Aires, Argentina and they relocated to Bilbao, Spain.  They are a guitar driven, hard rocking band that knows how to write songs with catchy lyrics and great hooks.  The album is currently available as an import only.  You can get it at Amazon.  I suggest you go there now and buy it.  They will be coming to the U.S. in March for a show in NYC and then will be in Austin for SXSW.  See them if you can.  More about them here.

2. Something’s Wrong/Lost Forever – Scott H. Biram:  Gorby turned me on to this guy by giving me an earlier album to listen to.  In May, I went to Austin with Gorby and Zippy, and we saw Scott live at The Continental Club.  GREAT one-man show.  I bought the album shortly after that, and I’ve been listening to it constantly.  Junkyard blues just don’t get any better than this.  Scott Biram will be in Seattle at the Tractor Tavern on Friday, February 12th.  See you there.

3. Truelove’s Gutter – Richard Hawley:  I read a review of this album in MOJO magazine, and immediately went out and bought it.  It is by far the most sonically interesting album of 2009.  He uses some really rare instruments:  the glass harmonica (based on the haunting tone you get when rubbing a wet finger around the rim of a wine glass – a.k.a. the hydrocrystalphone invented by Benjamin Franklin), the waterphone, the cristal Baschet, the ondes Martenot(kind of like a theremin), and a musical saw.  The key track on this album is “Remorse Code.”  Can’t stop listening to it. 

4. One Fast Move or I’m Gone, Kerouac’s Big Sur – Jay Farrar & Benjamin Gibbard:  I am a huge fan of Jack Kerouac, so I bought this they day it came out.  The cd is the soundtrack to a movie about Kerouac’s journey back to California to get some down time at Ferlinghetti’s seaside cabin.  The film is excellent.  It features readings of Big Sur by the man himself.  Kerouac’s voice is intoxicating.  I could listen to it for hours.  Oh, and the music by Farrar and Gibbard is stripped down and soulful.  I recommend “California Zephyr” and The “Void.”  They will be performing at The Showbox in Seattle on Sunday, January 24th.

5. Wilco (the album) – Wilco:  The guitar work by Nels Cline on this record is incredible.  The songs are great.  Tweedy sounds great.  What more can you ask for from a Wilco album?

6. I and Love and You – The Avett Brothers:  This is a beautiful sounding album produced by Rick Rubin who fleshed out the trio of banjoists and drummer with piano and sometimes lush orchestration.  The title track and “Tin Man” are my favorites. 

7. Broken – Soulsavers:  This is Mark Lanegan at his best.  A dark brooding album that matches his voice perfectly.  He gets excellent vocal support from Rosa Agostino (a.k.a. Red Ghost), and Richard Hawley makes an appearance too.

8. Welcome Joy – The Cave Singers:  I heard of this band, but never really knew what they were about until I saw them at Bumbershoot.  It’s real rootsy stuff with catchy lyrics and great vocals.  “At the Cut” and “Leap” are my favorites.

9. The Spirit of Apollo – N.A.S.A.:  That stands for North America South America.  It’s a duo that pulled together a whole lot of artists to sing vocals on twenty-some songs.  Who?  David Byrne, Chuck D, Tom Waits, Kool Keith, Kanye West, Mia, Del the Funky Homosapien, and more.  The first song I heard was “Spacious Thoughts” featuring Tom Waits and Kool Keith.  You just have to hear it.  The two with David Byrne, “The People Tree” and “Money” are really great.

10. A Woman A Man Walked By – P.J. Harvey & John Parish:  The album starts out with one of my favorite songs of the year, “Black Hearted Love,” a pop song, and then it veers off in all different directions.  Thanks to “That Irsih Fella on my block, I got to see P.J. and John put on a great show at The Moore Theater this year.  P.J. was in perfect form, and John and the band were tight.  They are PROFESSIONALS!

The Top Teen Albums of 2009

11. Tell ‘em What Your Name Is - Black Joe Lewis and the Honeydrippers:  My Austin pals told me about this band last year.  Black Joe Lewis has a huge fan base in Austin, and I was lucky to see the band at a sold out show there in May.  I love the fun energy in this album.  “Get Yo Shit” and “I’m Broke” are the shit.

12. ¡Let Freedom Ring! – Chuck Prophet
13. Horehound – The Dead Weather
14. Middle Cyclone– Neko Case
15. Together Through Life – Bob Dylan
16. Hombre Lobo – Eels
17. Through the Devil Softly – Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions
18. Secret, Profane, & Sugarcane – Elvis Costello
19. The Eternal– Sonic Youth

and number 20…
Backspacer  – Pearl Jam

This year’s best series of reissues is of course the first four albums by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds out on Mute records:  The First Born is Dead, From Her to Eternity, Kicking Against the Pricks, and Your Funeral, My Trial.  Buy them all and play them loud.

The best live album of the year is Tom Waits’ Glitter and Doom.

Friday Night Videos – Richard Hawley, P.J. Harvey & John Parish, Bob Dylan

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From what may be the most sonically intriguing album of 2009, Richard Hawley’s Truelove’s Gutter.

And here’s “Black Hearted Love” from one of my favorite albums of 2009, P.J. Harvey and John Parish’s, A Woman A Man Walked By.

And just for fun, here’s Bob Dylan doing  “Must be Santa,” from Christmas in the Heart.

Bob Dylan on Hitler and Obama

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If you’re looking for the big link here, sorry.  No comparison. 

I read an interview with Bob Dylan today in the the August edition of Mojo Magazine.  Bob had many things to say about his career, his songwriting and his “voice” in the songs that he says is always himself.   You can read the whole interview here, but here are a couple of excerpts that I thought were worth passing around.  The first is Bob’s impressions of Obama and how he doesn’t expect too much of him, because most all presidents don’t live up to their expectations:

What in his book would make you think he’d be a good politician?

Well nothing really. In some sense you would think being in the business of politics would be the last thing that this man would want to do.  I think he had a job as an investment banker on Wall Street for a second – selling German bonds.  But he probably could’ve done anything. If you read his book, you’ll know that the political world came to him. It was there to be had.

Do you think he’ll make a good president?

I have no idea. He’ll be the best president he can be. Most of those guys come into office with the best of intentions and leave as beaten men. Johnson would be a good example of that … Nixon, Clinton in a way, Truman, all the rest of them going back.  You know, it’s like they all fly too close to the sun and get burned.

The second one jumped out at me because of the Nazi post last week and because I recently saw Inglourious Basterds, about the American team of Nazi hunters.   (Quentin Tarantino’s best film in years.  Go see it!)

Do you remember images of Hitler from growing up?

No, not growing up. He was dead by the time I was four or five.  I never had a real understanding of that.

Never had an understanding of what?

How you take a failed landscape painter and turn him into a fanatical mad man who controls millions.  That’s some trick.  I mean the powers that created him must have been awesome.

Well, the social and economic conditions of the Weimar Republic were so different than now.

Yeah sure, looking back in hindsight, you can see that someone would have to take control.  But still, it’s so perplexing.  Like why him?  You could see that the man’s a total mutt.  No Aryan characteristics whatsoever.  You couldn’t guess his ancestry. Brown hair, brown eyes, pasty complexion, no particular type of stature, Hitler mustache, raincoat, riding whip, the whole works. He knew something.  He knew that people didn’t think.  Look at the faces of the millions who worshipped him and you see that he inspired love.  It’s scary and sad.  The torch of the spoken word.  They were glad to follow him anywhere, loyal to the bone.  Then of course, he filled up the cemeteries with them.

Like Leonard Pitt said last week, Obama is no Nazi and definitely not a Hitler, so he won’t be exterminating the white race like so many of his deluded detractors want every fool to believe.