Click images for desktop size: "Subway" by Tulivien Stiff and sore this morning. Too much walking. Shoulder (expected) throbbing and hips achey.
One good thing about doing all that walking is the time spent for listening to the iPod and for thinking. Yes, I think best when I have music at about 94 db pouring into the middle of my head.
One thing that has always fascinated me is the most popular recording artist of 1967 . . . What fascinates me is asking people who they think the top selling artist was in 1967. Most people hear 60's and guess the Beatles, following that wrong answer up with the Rolling Stones or Bob Dylan.
The number one record sellers in 1967 were a group from the west side of Chicago. They infused bright squirrelly pop with R&B and jazz. Starting out on the legendary local Destination label they recorded a little ditty called "Kind Of Drag". It hit number one in Chicago and then got picked up by Columbia for national distribution (every band's fantasy). It knocked the Beatles out of number 1 nationally and started the epic string of hits.
They were the Buckinghams. A seven piece outfit that even included a horn section! They stomped on everybody and just kept on churning out hit after hit. Happy songs, or sad songs sung with a smile. Astonishingly they had number 1's with covers of JAZZ tracks. Their cover of Cannonball Adderley's "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" made Adderley a pop star. His original even broke into the Top 10.
For me, the most astonishing Buckingham's single was a cover of the Beatles' "I Call Your Name". This might be heresy in some quarters but I think they handed the Beatles their heads. Your not supposed to dare to cut heads with the reigning Kings Of Pop, but to dare and then to cut them is a wonderful thing. (Paul McCartney probably just opened up another bank account with the royalties from this hot selling cover.)
The tight and rich 5 part harmonies even shocked the Beach Boys. Brian Wilson felt the need to retaliate and went from the modal mash-ups that typified the Beach Boys sound and moved into the esoteric intricate harmonies that set a new standard for pop.
The Buckinghams ended '67 with the quasi-psychedelic "Susan". It starts out pretty pedestrianly but after a rather silly seeming "psychedelic freak out" the track suddenly explodes with a driven chorus reflected and scatted over and over. This wasn't Leonard Cohen, for sure. This was teen pop with a purpose, a purpose only the little girls understood.
And then . . . nothing. The band was still around but they never had another hit. For the outside world the Buckinghams were as suddenly dead as razor cut haircuts. It was not a shock. Pop just moved along.
They haven't even hit the oldies or the revival circuit.
It was like they stopped existing or
Click images for desktop size: "Smoke" by Unknown maybe never even happened.
Their legacy was inspiring North Side Chicagoan Jimmy Guercio to swipe their sound and found "CTA" who metamorphosed into "Chicago". "Chicago" are still the largest sellers of albums in history. Go figure. That band pretty much ended when Bobby Lamm copped the true heart of the Buckinghams with the driving "Feelin' Stronger Everyday". I like neat circles even if I have to work hard to imagine them.
I guess I'm thinking a lot about Chicago because I miss our house guests. There was a lot more stupid laughing with them around. We need more stupid laughing in our lives. Who doesn't.
I think I sorted out the mp3 leeching grief. I resented it. One site based in Japan was selling a monthly subscription so you could stream your playlist via your browser. Except they streamed the music from others servers and not their own.
Its sort of incredible the depths that the RAIA has forced people to. Even corrupting politicians in their mad quest to terrify the world and force them to give them all our money.
But why aren't the Record Company Gestapo going after people who are actually making money from the music? You gotta figure the RAIA respects crooks. And it might be more difficult. Better to pick on an unemployed single mother who had an empty Kazaa folder in her system . . . Given the history of the RAIA it wouldn't be too surprising to find out that some members of the RAIA were clandestinely involved with these kind of sites.
So much better when musicians just wanted to make music and felt lucky to be able to make a living doing it.
Look, Gene Vincent is the greatest singer the world has ever produced. A whole world of music he created was after shows, hanging out in hotel rooms singing with friends and hangers on. Like when he was in some guys living room in Japan and someone had the sense to turn on a tape recorder to capture Gene Vincent singing "Bring It On Home To Me". Vincent was always broke. The man who wrote and recorded the largest selling single of 20 years
Click images for desktop size: "Celestial Reckoning" by Kayaga ("Be Bop A Lula") always needed money. But he still didn't want to get paid to sing with friends.
(Back then the RAIA stole from musicians by doling out publishing rights to managers and collecting hare brained fees.)
I'm tired and scattered.
I saw two really poor movies. "The Happening" and "The Ruins". They made me think that this is the summer of the killer plants . . . Yeah, two movies about dangerous shrubs.
I dislike the bad filmmaking of M. Night but I was intrigued by Mark Wahlberg and John Leguizamo in "The Happening". Of course I didn't realize that M. Night cast them as HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS!!!
I, for one, would be terrified of any school that would have those two on their faculty.
Zoey Deschanel gave the most horrible performance in film history.
This film was a disaster and not in a fun way. M Night has even forgotten to cop those ginchy Twilight Zone style endings, this one just grinds to a halt like a junker Studebaker with a blown rod.
"The Ruins" isn't much better. At least here the plant moves. Well it moves a little. It has a couple of gotcha moments and a couple of mildly interesting scenes. And no one attempts to talk to a plastic tree . . . At least the actors were working hard but this film is still a worthless mess.
Horror films used to be the easiest way to break into the business. Look at Rami with "Evil Dead", Hooper and "Texas Chainsaw Massacre". There hasn't been a great new horrow film in a long time. Now they're just another repository for the creatively bankrupt.
The dogs keep waking me up in the middle of the night. Too much heat and too many cats prowling in the yard.
I don't blame them . . . much.
I have to figure out the rest of the day. I have to make some money some how some way some day. But maybe not today.