You might have heard of this one. ***** Oh, were you expecting Revolver? There’s been a lot of talk going around these days that Revolver is a better album than Sgt. Pepper. And I don’t know about that. We’re all entitled to our opinion, de gustibus non est disputandum, yadda yadda yadda, but this has
1. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Beatles, 1967) Read More »
The Last Album. Nobody calls Abbey Road a concept album, but by now, I think it’s become one anyway. The concept? The Last Album. They might as well have given it the title The Last Album. Too similar to The White Album? I guess Cream beat them to it by titling their last album Goodbye.
2. Abbey Road (The Beatles, 1969) Read More »
He plays pinball by sense of smell? But how does he … where does he … Eh, just go with it. ***** Leave it to PBS to introduce a 14-year-old kid to the Who. In August of 1994, I’m not sure I would have known I was living through the 25th anniversary of Woodstock if
3. Tommy (The Who, 1969) Read More »
I used to think that, if you were a Beatles man, you had to be a Beatles man all the way. Never mind that the Beatles and the Stones, throughout their “rivalry,” hung out with each other like they were their generation’s Rat Pack. Never mind that the Beatles and the Stones staked out distinctly
4. Let It Bleed (The Rolling Stones, 1969) Read More »
The English poetic tradition is a long one, but in the vast annals of British verse – a lineage stemming from Shakespeare, Milton, Spencer, and Dryden on to Byron, Shelley, Wordsworth, and Coleridge – only a few scattered lines in a few select works have scaled the heights of linguistic incisiveness and rhetorical dexterity as
5. Led Zeppelin II (Led Zeppelin, 1969) Read More »
What the white whale was to Ahab, has been hinted; what, at times, he was to me, as yet remains unsaid. Aside from those more obvious considerations touching Moby Dick, which could not but occasionally awaken in any man’s soul some alarm, there was another thought, or rather vague, nameless horror concerning him, which at times
6. The Beatles (The Beatles, 1968) Read More »
Lou Reed, the lyricist, I like to compare to water flowing downhill: he takes the quickest, shortest path. It’s not always precise, it’s not always artful, but, like a garbage man making the morning rounds, he gets the job done. He cuts to the chase. He shoots first and asks questions later. I don’t even
7. The Velvet Underground & Nico (The Velvet Underground/Nico, 1967) Read More »
After coming home from the record store assuming I’d purchased either the soundtrack to a new Pixar film centered around a giant, anthropomorphic flamingo, or the latest release from the older sister of early 2000s dance-pop diva P!nk, and finding myself sorely disappointed, I decided to give it a couple of listens anyway and, well,
8. Music From Big Pink (The Band, 1968) Read More »
This is the beginning … the beginning of my essay … the beginning. ***** Maybe it’s just me, but have the Doors become the band that people “used” to like? To admit that you once went through a Doors phase? Perfectly acceptable of course. But to admit that you’re still a Doors fan? Isn’t that
9. The Doors (The Doors, 1967) Read More »
A rock band … doing a country album? What’s next? Sonny Bono, U.S. congressman? ***** Whenever I try to explain my immense and seemingly illogical passion for country music, I always offer a key qualifier: “I love country music that was released before I was born.” See, country music used to be made by musicians
10. Sweetheart Of The Rodeo (The Byrds, 1968) Read More »