Tag Archives: rock and roll

The Waterboys’ A Rock In The Weary Land

No’am Newman wrote this review. Oh No’am, I know you’re disappointed with this disc; I know that you were expecting The Waterboys of Whole Of The Moon and Fisherman’s Blues and instead you got something else. But it’s not my … Continue reading

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Sam Cutler’s You Can’t Always Get What You Want: My Life with the Rolling Stones, the Grateful Dead and Other Wonderful Reprobates

Oh, and a storm is threatening my very life today … Once upon a time, back when Marin County, California, was still the home of the Grateful Dead, I helped manage a bookstore, Mandrake Books, in San Rafael. It was … Continue reading

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Russell Smith’s Sunday Best: The Cream of the Solo Albums

Russell Smith and I go way back. I first heard of Russell Smith on a 1974 Jesse Winchester album, when Winchester covered Smith’s hilarious and poignant “Third Rate Romance.” Later Smith’s own band, The Amazing Rhythm Aces, had a hit … Continue reading

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David Ackles’ Five & Dime, Roger Chapman’s Mango Crazy, and Mail Order Magic, and Tommy Sands’ Man, Like WOW!

There is a huge market these days for obscure music. Once only available on vinyl, sometimes only on expensive import copies, now remastered and attractively compiled and packaged, this stuff is finding release by caring archival labels around the world. … Continue reading

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Vimma’s Tornadon Silmässä

A listener, especially one who doesn’t speak Finnish, could be excused for mistaking the music on Vimma’s Tornadon Silmässä for standard World music folk pop. The pretty voice of Eeva Rajakangas and the catchy, often lilting melodies of main composer … Continue reading

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Frank Zappa’s Zappa Picks – By Jon Fishman of Phish

Frank Zappa was an iconoclastic American musician. He surfaced in the ’60s but was decidedly non-hippie and anti-drug, and his music drew more on jazz and cabaret than the folk and acid-rock of that decade. If I had to pick … Continue reading

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Frank Zappa’s Zappa Picks – by Larry LaLonde of Primus

Frank Zappa has become legendary in death. He must be laughing as he looks down, or up, from wherever he is spending eternity. His music is still available in beautifully packaged editions, just the way he always wanted it to … Continue reading

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Muleskinner Jones’s Death Row Hoedown, and Terrible Stories EP

Muleskinner Jones is the English answer to the Handsome Family, crossed with the off-kilter cowpunk of the Meat Puppets, say, or perhaps Butthole Surfers. It’s a hole in the current musical scene that was just begging to be filled, and … Continue reading

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Various artists’ The Best of The Johnny Cash TV Show, 1969-1971

American musicians always have, for the most part, understood that the various categories of American music are mostly imaginary. They’re marketing tools drawn up by those in the business of selling music to the public, and they cater mostly to … Continue reading

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Podcast review: Discord & Rhyme episode 125, The Beach Boys’ All Summer Long and Sunflower

I was never a super fan of the Beach Boys. I liked all of their hit singles – and there were a LOT of them – at least those that were played on the radio after I started paying attention … Continue reading

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