tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3057436940280135342024-03-14T06:55:45.421-07:00BIG STAR'S RADIO CITYThe official world-wide headquarters for
Big Star's Radio City by Bruce Eaton,
No. 65 in Continuum's acclaimed 33 1/3 series.B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.comBlogger128125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-50529476423590584512019-09-13T06:39:00.000-07:002019-09-13T06:39:08.446-07:00Okay, B-Sides is officially published. There are a lot of interesting chapters in the book. I'll highlight some of my favorites over the next few weeks but will start off by tipping my cap (and a draft beer) to Joe Bonomo for writing about Hank Thompson's <i>Smokey The Bar</i>. If you're not familiar with Hank (and his ace group, the Brazos Valley Boys), he's a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame who specialized in a sophisticated fine-tuned country swing sound that went back to Bob Wills. He had a lot of hits in the 50s and 60s (more than Wills) and was still active into the early 21st century. If you've seen the movie <i>Crazy Heart</i>, the Jeff Bridges character "Bad Blake" was modeled after Hank Thompson in his later career after the Brazos Valley Boys disbanded and Hank's commercial star descended. Hank would tour like Chuck Berry, working with local bands without rehearsal. That would explain why the concert I saw in 1989 was really cringeworthy. I probably owned several dozen Hank records and was totally psyched to see him live. But the back-up band was clueless and tried to render themselves invisible as the (mercifully brief) set unfolded. Regardless, do yourself a favor and dial up some classic Hank over the weekend. You'll be glad you did. (Unfortunately, <i>Smokey The Bar</i> has never been reissued as near as I can tell. But <i>Dance Ranch</i> is a great starting point.)<br />
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Which brings me to my main topic today...how can you hear the Springsteen show I wrote about? For quite a long time, it was available in its entirety on YouTube but it seems to have disappeared recently. Not sure why that would happen as there are tons of Springsteen postings on YouTube. Bruce Inc. seems to have given up long ago trying to prevent uploads of independent origin. When I took my son to see Bruce in the early 2000s, someone on Bruce's crew had a fit that my son was trying to take a few pictures on his cheesy cell phone from the front row of the second level. Kept shining a laser pointer at him (must be nice to be that important). <br />
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So where to find it? Do a search and if you're familiar at all with "recordings of independent origin" and how they're shared, you'll find it. Below is a description from the posting where I discovered it. What really blows my mind is that Hobart and William Smith is a small college and my friends and I were at the center of the Springsteen fan base. My friend Peter Kapp took over the concert committee reigns after I graduated (he basically produced the 1975 Born To Run tour concert at the Geneva Theater for Mike Appel). So it would seem to have been likely that if a tape of this quality was made by a student, it would have found its way to Peter. I'm going to try to find out the ultimate source of the tape and will report back. <br />
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Springsteen has been releasing concert recordings through nugs.net for a while but very little from the 1970s (he's just gotten around to the legendary oft-bootlegged 1978 broadcasts). I've read a lot of the commentary on fan sites and there's been a debate as to why there's no releases from 1975 or earlier. A few of the main opinions as to why are:<br />
> high quality tapes don't exist<br />
> tapes exist but the ownership is murky (seems to me though that Bruce has enough money to be able to solve that problem with a check).<br />
> Jon Landau is loathe to highlight how great Bruce was before Landau took over from Mike Appel. It goes against the myth (perpetrated by Dave Marsh and others) that Landau saved Bruce from the clutches of the evil / clueless Appel. (That narrative doesn't quite explain how Bruce made arguably his two best albums with Appel behind the board.) I'll write more about Appel in future posts. Having worked with him on a concert and witnessed five early Springsteen shows, I've always firmly believed that Mike is the largely unsung hero in the Springsteen story. It's been great to see him get more credit in recent years for his pivotal role and for he and Bruce to reconcile. I was at the concert in Buffalo (Clarence's last concert) where Bruce acknowledged Mike (he had flown up with the band) and cheered mightily. <br />
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This is an audience tape and as someone with thousands of ROIOS, I can tell you that an audience tape of this quality from the early 1970s is rare indeed. A lot of the Springsteen fans on chat boards obsess over the quality of the nugs.net releases and would probably bristle over the release of an audience tape. That's never been a problem for me if the captured performance is as tremendous as this one. Play with your stereo knobs to dial in the best sound and turn it up loud. After a few moments you'll be swept along and not even notice that the sound quality isn't equal to an official live release (which as we all know may not be that "live" after all the overdubs in post-production).<br />
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So here's the info. Happy hunting...<br />
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<span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">Bruce Springsteen </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">Geneva Theatre </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">Geneva, NY </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">December 7, 1974 </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">previously uncirculated show and recording </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">ML reel source via JEMS </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">recording gear: unknown tape recorder > stereo mics </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">JEMS 2015 Transfer: Likely first-generation reel copy (3-3/4 IPS) > Otari 5050 mkII azimuth-adjusted transfer > USBPre 2 > Audacity 2.0 (24/96) capture > IZotope RX + Ozone 5 > iZotope RX MBIT+ resample 16/44.1 > Peak Pro XT (volume smoothing / edit / index) > xACT 2.21 > FLAC </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">01 Incident on 57th Street </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">02 Spirit in the Night </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">03 Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street? </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">04 I Want You (Bob Dylan cover) </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">05 Growin’ Up </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">06 E Street Shuffle </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">07 It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">08 Gimme That Wine (Clarence Clemons lead vocals) </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">09 Jungleland </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">10 Kitty’s Back </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">11 New York City Serenade </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">12 Rosalita </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">13 Sandy </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">14 A Love So Fine </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">15 Wear My Ring Around Your Neck (Elvis Presley cover, written by Carol and Moody) </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">16 Quarter to Three (Gary US Bonds cover) </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">Known Faults: </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">-E Street Shuffle: splice </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">JEMS is pleased to release another lost and found recording, this of a previously uncirculated show at the Geneva Theatre in Geneva, NY, December 7, 1974, Bruce and the band’s second to last gig of the year. According to the indispensible Brucebase, the concert was booked by the local Hobart & William Smith College and featured Jae Mason as the opening act. </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">Geneva turns out to be an unusually solid tape for the era, recorded with two mics in stereo and remarkably free of material cuts. The crowd around the mics, presumably the taper and his friends, are going crazy but it only adds to the atmosphere on this highly listenable document of a fantastic period in Springsteen’s concert history that featured Suki Lahav on cello. </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">While the show is largely standard for the era, that sells short a set list that includes a stunning “Incident” to open, the striking cover of Dylan’s “I Want You,” and an epic three-song stretch that moves from the as-yet-unreleased “Jungleland” to “Kitty’s Back” to what just might be the longest ever performance of “New York City Serenade,” clocking in north of 24 minutes of majesty. </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">From the sublime to the ridiculous, due to Bruce breaking a guitar string, we’re treated a rare lead vocal from the Big Man, Clarance Clemons, on the time-filling vamp, “Gimme That Wine.” The show wraps with a rousing “A Love So Fine” into a storming “Wear My Ring” and last but not least, “the greatest dance record ever recorded,” “Quarter to Three.” </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">The tape itself is one of half a dozen reel-to-reels loaned to JEMS from ML, which were all low-gen copies of known recordings with this one major exception. A big thank you to him for shipping out the reels and letting us release the show. Thanks as well to AM and PR, whose enthusiasm for Geneva got me even more excited about it. Tapeboy handled the pitch adjustments, which are much appreciated. And last but not least, thanks to mjk5510 for catching the files as always when they come off the post-production line. </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">BK for JEMS </span><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><br style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;" /><span style="background-color: #d4def5; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10.666666984558105px;">EDITED ARTWORK FOR A 3CD SET IS IN THE COMMENTS...</span><br />
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<br style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 204); color: #ffffcc; font-family: verdana, geneva, lucida, "lucida grande", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px;" />B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-6203246437038860412019-08-05T09:33:00.000-07:002019-08-05T09:33:00.047-07:00<a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/alex-chilton-doc/alex-chilton-why-should-i-care">/alex-chilton-doc/alex-chilton-why-should-i-care</a><div>
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Hi Everyone - Couple of things...</div>
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On the Big Star front, if you haven't checked out the Kickstarter page for the Alex Chilton documentary in the works, you'll want to do so immediately. The director is posting some very cool footage and you'll have the opportunity to contribute to help bring this project to fruition. (Note: I've donated my interview tapes for my book to be used however possible.) </div>
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<a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-33-13-b-sides-9781501342943/">the-33-13-b-sides</a></div>
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On the Springsteen front, the 33 1/3 B-Sides anthology is slated to be published early in September. One interesting twist for this book is that readers will be able to vote for the chapter that they would most like to see become a full-blown 33 1/3 book and the winner will be offered a contract. One of the parameters for B-Sides is that we were held to a strictly-enforced word count (2500). My first draft was nearly triple that in length – and I was trying to be concise! But writing about an essential chapter in the development of a major artist raised that to date has gone undocumented raised all sorts of questions / observations about how much the music business has changed since the early 1970s. Suffice it to say, if a young performer of Springsteen's level of skill and talent came along today, he or she wouldn't have to scuffle for years to get noticed. It was indeed a weird feeling to walk out of a Springsteen concert feeling like you'd just seen one of the greatest performers on the planet and realize that beyond a small (but quickly growing by word-of-mouth) group of fans, no one had even heard of him. </div>
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Once the book is published I'll expand on some of my observations but here's a small one. When you go to concerts today, it's the norm to see racks of guitars in the wings – almost like a mini-Guitar Center. Some guitarists swap out guitars almost every song. Even up-and-comer bands usually have back-up guitars for the back-up guitars. But when Bruce toured in late 1974, he travelled with one guitar. That's it. When he broke a string, he replaced it on stage while Clarence sang a song (<i>Gimme That Wine</i> in the case of Geneva). But those were the days when even the biggest bands in the world (The Who, Led Zeppelin etc.) used minimalist stage set-ups. Amps and drums on the stage floor (LZ might have added a riser later on I thing). Some monitors. Simple lighting (certainly by today's standards). Minimal, if any tricks like pyro. It all came down to what was coming out of the speakers. You sank or swam with the music and if you were drowning, there was no second stage you could magically fly via a harness / rigging to escape to / distract the audience. As much as I don't really connect to Ed Shearan's music (and at my age I imagine I'm not really his target audience), I'm a bit fascinated by the fact that a guy with just an acoustic guitar and a few foot pedals can perform to 80,00 people. </div>
B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-12390379393460836422019-01-10T09:12:00.001-08:002019-01-10T09:12:20.804-08:00<a href="https://pleasekillme.com/chris-bell/">https://pleasekillme.com/chris-bell/</a><br />
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As promised, here's a link to my interview with Rich Tupica, author of the outstanding Chris Bell bio, <i>There Was A Light, </i>for the Please Kill Me blog. As I noted earlier, this is really a must-have book if you're a Big Star fan. Check out the interview and then order the book from the publisher (HoZac) or Amazon. B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-26433957733871678892018-12-20T10:15:00.002-08:002018-12-20T10:15:32.051-08:00Back...Hi Everyone or Anyone who is still out there...<div>
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I've been on an extended medical adventure (bone marrow transplant etc.) but am back in the swing of things. There will be some upcoming posts about Big Star and also Bruce Springsteen in the very near future so stay tuned.</div>
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In the meantime, if you're a Big Star fan, the new Chris Bell biography - <i>There Was A Light</i> by Rich Tupica - is an absolute must-buy. A fantastic look at Chris and Big Star with lots of new interviews and graphics / photos. I'll be announcing a major interview I did with Rich on a well-known music website shortly. But buy the book for yourself as a Christmas present. You'll be glad you did. It's available from Amazon and the publisher (HolZac). </div>
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In the meantime, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! More to come soon...</div>
B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-48210273920866132032013-10-11T08:41:00.000-07:002013-10-11T08:41:17.273-07:00Those of you who have read the book or strolled through the back pages hear know of Peter LaBonne, a singularly unique artist who Alex really dug (he once told me that if he recorded an album of Peter's songs he would have his first million seller). Peter lives deep in the Adirondack mountains and rarely performs although his recorded output is immense. He recently performed in Troy NY. Here's an on-the-scene report by Chandler Travis - he being a cult artist with a rather significant following in the New England region (Incredible Casuals, Chandler Travis Orchestra). Chandler put out the only CD by Pete that captures his element to a significant degree (Meditation Garden on Sonic Trout - pretty easy to find a used copy online). Here's a link to Chandler's post...it includes some live footage...<br />
<a href="http://valetconfidential.net/2013/10/pete-labonne-performing-live-4-hours-away-road-trip/?fb_source=pubv1">Pete LaBonne live</a>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-44484656271883261482013-07-02T08:43:00.000-07:002013-07-02T08:43:03.968-07:00July 2, 2013So where did the year go? Two words: sandwich generation. And no, it has nothing to do with swiss cheese and ham. <br />
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As most of you know, <i>Nothing Can Hurt Me: The Big Star Story</i> goes into general release this week. I saw the movie in Rochester NY last month and was just knocked out. The filmmakers have done a fantastic job telling the Big Star story and that wasn't an easy task. However many hats I own, I take them all off to Drew, Olivia, and Danielle.<br />
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For starters, you could readily divide people who will see the movie into two groups: rabid Big Star fans who know the story and a lot of the detail and viewers who at best might have a thumbnail sketch of the story, if that. It's like when I tell music fans I wrote a book about Big Star...some will light up and be super-enthusiastic and some will just give me a quizzical look and I know I have to go into my brief (and well-rehearsed by now) explanation. But you could watch NCHM from either perspective and be really enthralled by the film. For a Big Star fan, it's heaven on celluloid. For an intelligent person who likes an interesting tale of art, commerce, and interesting people, it's very compelling, even if you've never heard a note of Big Star. <br />
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Then there's the matter of there being no live footage of the band from the 70s. And then add in the fact that neither Chris nor Alex were interviewed on camera (Chris for obvious reasons. The directors had extended conversations with Alex before he passed away before anything was resolved. I donated tapes of my interviews with Alex for my book to the directors and you'll hear a few snippets in the film.)<br />
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So whether the film is playing in a theater near you or you watch it on iTunes (available July 5th), your holiday week isn't complete without seeing the film. <br />
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B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-33081312386715240462012-06-26T15:48:00.004-07:002012-06-26T15:48:29.529-07:00Okay...I'm back. And glad to be back. I'll be catching you up on some things in the days ahead, but first something of importance on this day of June 26...the 33rd anniversary of the day I met Alex and we played the epic show at McVan's described in the book. <br />
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If you haven't checked out the Kickstarter page for the forthcoming Big Star documentary, please do so immediately. There are only 41 hours left for you to help with the completion of the movie and get some really cool BS swag in the process. I've spent some time with the filmmakers and am completely confident that this is going to be a rock doc that goes far beyond the typical story of a band. So click on the link below and get started. <br />
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<a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bigstarstory/big-star-nothing-can-hurt-me">Nothing Can Hurt Me</a><br />
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More soon...<br />
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<br />B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-50349793773374759502011-08-01T16:30:00.000-07:002011-08-01T16:50:24.545-07:00Trying to stay cool...<div><br /></div><div>If you haven't checked it out, go to the Ardent site and get a copy of the new EP from the Big Star tribute in Memphis last year with John Davis from Superdrag. John's performances came early in the show but they set the bar high and were never topped despite the strong talent that followed. My good friend and esteemed critic Parke Puterbaugh was with me at the show and agreed with that opinion. Shortly after the weekend I emailed John Fry and suggested that John Davis , Jody, Ken, and Jon do some recording with the legendary Fry behind the board. Probably will never happen but this will give you a taste of what could be...</div><div><br /></div><div>I recently "discovered" Dom Mariani (DM3), an power pop titan from Australia. These are some of the things you miss when you're raising a kid, working, and looking after aging parents. His song "Just Like Nancy" is absolutely killer and the original version would be worthy of Radio City if only he'd taken the time to write a great bridge for the song. Regardless, it's been at the very top of my playlist this summer. </div><div><br /></div><div>Next week I'm going to see Bob Dylan and Leon Russell. In the latter half of 1971, that would probably have been my dream concert (along with a double bill of The Who and Jethro Tull). I was (and have remained) a huge Dylan fan but had no hope at the time of ever seeing him live (have since seen him many many times). On the other hand, I'd just seen Leon Russell in a converted bowling alley in Buffalo NY with Freddie King opening. It was about a week after the Concert for Bangladesh and Leon just killed the place. I remember walking out of this low-ceilinged sweat box with my Levi's soaked through. So 40 years later I get my wish. From what I've been able to tell, the return of Charlie Sexton has given Bob a much needed jolt (the band after Charlie and Larry Campbell left was mundane to say the least) and there's some new dimensions to his performance (more singing at the mike with no instrument). Regardless, I regard seeing Dylan as I did seeing Miles Davis. You should feel fortunate just to be in the same space with him for a few hours. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>A reader inquired about my reference to Austrian economics giant Ludwig Von Mises in a recent post. Yes, in October of 1970 (I was a freshman in college) I attended a conference where I got to hear Von Mises speak in a small conference room to about 30 people. It made a huge impression. He talked about the need to have a national currency maintain a consistent value i.e no inflation of deflation. As I recall, he held up a ruler and essentially said that if a foot didn't maintain a consistent value of distance, every building would eventually collapse. And if a dollar (pound / mark / whatever) didn't maintain a consistent value, it too would eventually collapse. Not exactly rock and roll, but heavy none the less...</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-48562770731721867932011-06-09T07:59:00.000-07:002011-06-09T08:10:38.280-07:00<a href="http://ardentmusic.com/products-page/tshirt/">http://ardentmusic.com/products-page/tshirt/</a><div><br /></div><div>I'm sure that most of you are FB friends with Ardent Studios (a must for Big Star fans). But in case you missed it...Ardent is now offering official Big Star t-shirts at their site. If you're like me, you've looked at those bootleg shirts on eBay and held off thinking that the only thing worse than having no Big Star shirt is to have a cheezy knockoff. But now you can get the real deal. Mine hasn't arrived in the mail yet, but I can tell you that any t-shirt I've gotten from Ardent, going back to A Man Called Destruction, has been super quality. Father's Day is right around the corner and what would be better for the Fourth than a shirt with a big star. Order today!</div><div><br /></div><div>Who doesn't love a good Brian Wilson story ? Here's one I heard last week from a friend of mine...</div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: medium; "> </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">In the late 80s a friend of my friend – a veteran writer of network television comedy – was over at Brian Wilson's house when the phone rang. Brian answered and talked for a bit in the next room. When he came back he explained, "That was </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">folk music's Bob Dylan</span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">."</span></span></div><div><div style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">How great is that? That he thought that he needed additional info to identify Dylan, as if the name wasn't enough, and then chose </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">folk music</span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">...in the late 1980s! I can almost see Brian saying it with that sort of talk out the side of his mouth thing he does. Well, "That's surf music's Brian Wilson."</span></div><div style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;">I think that Alex C. would have gotten a kick out of that story....</span></div><div style="font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;"> </span></div></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-16757115850755306232011-05-24T14:28:00.000-07:002011-05-24T14:40:01.951-07:00Bob Dylan's 70th Birthday....<div><br /></div><div>I usually ignore these sort of supposed "milestones" but all the Bob talk got me thinking a bit. </div><div><br /></div><div>For starters, I've been a huge fan of Dylan since 1965. The first time I saw him (1974) was almost a quasi-religious experience (I never thought he would tour again). Since then I've seen him at least a few dozen times if not more. I've been backstage at a number of Dylan shows since 2001 (have never even sighted him except the time he drove by on a motorycycle) but have a few good stories out of it all. I firmly believe he's one of the great artists of our time. Right at the top. </div><div><br /></div><div>While pondering how lucky I've been to be in the same room with Bob Dylan and witness him creating in the moment (a few years ago it was from ten feet away in a small club in Toronto), I started to think about who else I've been in the same room with that could truly be deemed to be a giant...someone who changed the course of history in their field and will be remembered for generations. </div><div><br /></div><div>So here's my list...Bob Dylan, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix, Muddy Waters, Bob Marley, Paul McCartney, and Ludwig Von Mises. I've left out a lot from that category, including the Stones, Who, Springsteen and many many more. All sorts of jazz musicians (Sonny Rollins for starters) and rock (sorry Clash). And yes, Alex Chilton. </div><div><br /></div><div>And what about Ludwig Von Mises? Look him up...</div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-9702662558909595952011-03-12T09:41:00.000-08:002011-03-12T09:46:42.728-08:00<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgKgvrWj5fo&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgKgvrWj5fo&feature=related</a><div><br /></div><div>Here's a brief snippet of Pete LaBonne playing solo piano recently. Although he started out playing keyboards in soul bands around Buffalo in the late 60s / early 70s, he switched over to guitar and in about six months had pretty much mastered the instrument and created his own unique style. But he can still play the keys for sure...</div><div><br /></div><div>I hope to be posting some rare mp3s related to Alex Chilton over the next week. But only if I can find some inexpensive and easy way to host them on a third-party site and then link them to Blogger so that when visitors click on them, they play immediately without going to the third-party site. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. If I can work this out, you'll hear some cool stuff...</div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-52537916203137750062011-02-26T10:02:00.000-08:002011-02-26T10:13:00.550-08:00Below are four never-before-seen photos of Alex in action at McVan's in Buffalo in June of 1979. I didn't even know these photos existed until a few weeks ago. They were taken by the late Lynn Adams, a photographer and part of the Buffalo music scene back then. She passed away several years ago and right before this past Christmas her mother called a friend of mine and told her that she was going through Lynn's archives and came across some photos that might be of interest. Included were photos of Buffalo appearances by Patti Smith, Blondie, and Iggy Pop along with these photos of Alex. <div><br /></div><div>I find these photos to be really captivating and not because I was standing a few feet to Alex's right. These shots were taken very early in our set...probably in the first song. It was really hot that night and within a few songs we had taken off everything but our t-shirts (see photos in the book). I love how Alex has a pencil behind his ear. Combined with the sport jacket, he looks like he's about to settle in for an afternoon of reading and taking notes. Here we were, playing twenty-plus songs with no rehearsal at a time when Alex had a reputation for chaos and yet there's an analytical look to him that lets you know that there was a lot of method behind his purported musical madness. In the book I describe how Alex and Peter LaBonne started to trade solos in the first song (Bourgeois Blues) and things really started to click. You can almost see Alex start to listen to what Peter was doing and say to himself..."This is going to be a pretty interesting evening..."</div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-2413838839836348392011-02-26T10:00:00.001-08:002011-02-26T10:02:35.916-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMV5_wiOsNlH0iitMUiZHMwDgCvKc3yocvdaMa-O39sKcE30B7th-Wrdtrcz-aDECAtk4AkXm_j8dYpUjwbOuYdc70dutd3NOARgiOswq0APMVsv3wj3f8cDU5qNr9GVFAU2PLxumRjTOt/s1600/lx+3.jpeg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 226px; height: 333px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMV5_wiOsNlH0iitMUiZHMwDgCvKc3yocvdaMa-O39sKcE30B7th-Wrdtrcz-aDECAtk4AkXm_j8dYpUjwbOuYdc70dutd3NOARgiOswq0APMVsv3wj3f8cDU5qNr9GVFAU2PLxumRjTOt/s400/lx+3.jpeg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5578060162077401922" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU5ZE9NTVv9pp_3X3fBbUoU0G0-TyDVmccpT6MZjiAqivqyDSwaZPx7cD-6TACqTnC6wNtT0pdkgUJyOpFgA11tBtgfaW4eNiH_m3gce4dyMc7-ne5uo6XJPRyfVg1IepiOZ4T-uIXRAeq/s1600/lx+2.jpeg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 227px; height: 332px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU5ZE9NTVv9pp_3X3fBbUoU0G0-TyDVmccpT6MZjiAqivqyDSwaZPx7cD-6TACqTnC6wNtT0pdkgUJyOpFgA11tBtgfaW4eNiH_m3gce4dyMc7-ne5uo6XJPRyfVg1IepiOZ4T-uIXRAeq/s400/lx+2.jpeg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5578060045435815666" /></a><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEcakQ3IYvq4mtSftrD32tPA9qekbWCYDeAMoI_2CHYAhxHEh9KN6UOZLvW2d6_f6in_5ry-RTWtgQUKhezNxtcOrbUsSNIVqaEqKX3F-0HWq98wmL5I9ES85TLzVsWf38_yUzOA3Xpg_y/s1600/lx+1.jpeg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 223px; height: 334px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEcakQ3IYvq4mtSftrD32tPA9qekbWCYDeAMoI_2CHYAhxHEh9KN6UOZLvW2d6_f6in_5ry-RTWtgQUKhezNxtcOrbUsSNIVqaEqKX3F-0HWq98wmL5I9ES85TLzVsWf38_yUzOA3Xpg_y/s400/lx+1.jpeg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5578059875543189426" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB0koNHjrlzTZy8QnEWajKi1aA63G2PGCjCo_gfsqPqvv-PxntymkMCsMPANIwiMs4EwFXQopkdJ8KCqz3Orx8S92I-0YUMEMo3xukgz5dxOQv5ADPn5i9xD1nmyar2JuySPC6icEp0KbI/s1600/lx.jpeg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 226px; height: 334px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB0koNHjrlzTZy8QnEWajKi1aA63G2PGCjCo_gfsqPqvv-PxntymkMCsMPANIwiMs4EwFXQopkdJ8KCqz3Orx8S92I-0YUMEMo3xukgz5dxOQv5ADPn5i9xD1nmyar2JuySPC6icEp0KbI/s400/lx.jpeg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5578059773447075586" /></a><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-69666641713628428132011-02-13T13:11:00.000-08:002011-02-13T13:38:08.328-08:00A few random notes...<div><br /></div><div><a href="http://bigstarthird.com/">http://bigstarthird.com/</a> If you haven't been to Chris Stamey's site for his Big Star Third project, head on over right now. A must read (and follow). Thanks, Chris ! (One of the little sidebars I left out of the book was that in October of 1977 I was in NYC for a month and went to Chris's apartment twice to interview him for Big Star magazine. He was playing with Alex at the time. The interview never ran because Bernie Kugel ran out of money for the magazine. Less than two years later I would get to play with Alex because Chris had walked away from a semi-chaotic gig in Austin with Alex, leaving the opportunity for my friend Peter LaBonne to jump onstage and start the wheels rolling. And many years later, Chris's then girlfriend, who remembered me coming to the apartment, married a really good friend of mine, Erroll. Erroll worked at the New York Public Library with a woman I'd gone to college with. One day he mentioned that he had a friend (me) who had this friend named Peter who made all this wild music. His co-worker flipped out because Peter was her cousin. You got all that? A lot of strange intersections of lives going on...)</div><div><br /></div><div>On Grammy day, I'd like to say that I wish producers like T-Bone Burnett would take five years off. I'm sick of these guys who have a sound (which gets the critical seal of approval for supposedly being "retro") which they then impose on the artist or at the very least surround them with. Sort of like setting a gemstone in jewelry you create. The recent Gregg Allman album sent me over the edge on this. I respect Greg mightily. Love the ABB. His first solo album (Laid Back) is a classic. But I want to hear Greg's band (killer) with Greg picking the songs and then the producer bringing out the best from the band, not the producer calling all the shots with his pet legend of the month subjected to a predictable smooshy swampy sound of cool vintage instruments and amps. It's like a great looking meal that in the end doesn't satisfy. Which I guess is why I like producers / engineers like Jimmy Miller, Andy Johns, Glyn Johns, Bill Szymczyk, George Martin, and John Fry. The guys who made the band sound great on their own terms. </div><div><br /></div><div>I just got a batch of previously unseen photos of Alex performing at McVan's. Will scan and put up a few soon. There's a great photo of Alex performing with a pencil behind his ear. The photos were taken during the first song we played (Bourgeois Blues) as he still has on his sport coat and sweater. It was really hot and we were soon down to t-shirts. You can almost sense Alex looking over at Peter during one of his first solos and thinking "hmmm....this is going to be a fun night." </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-77271179575413120492011-01-26T12:19:00.000-08:002011-01-27T12:04:50.051-08:00Well, for those of you who have inquired about where they might hear a bit of Peter LaBonne, this one's for you: <div><br /></div><div><a href="http://www.popwars.com/petelabonne/">http://www.popwars.com/petelabonne/</a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /><div> </div><div>23 CDs worth of material. Gigunda! For the curious, I would start with the first disc and then move through the first handful if so inclined. (I think that disc two has some of his best material so you'll hit paydirt right away.) Pete lives way up in the Adirondack Mountains and doesn't have a phone. I found out about this yesterday via a short, cryptic email. Frankly, I think the price is way too high. I'd sell the whole wad for $20 and get people buzzing. But bit by bit, listeners are in for quite a ride. Read the reviews and listen to the samples and you'll get a taste. Keep in mind that after hearing the first five or six discs on this tape, Alex Chilton told me that if he ever recorded an album of Pete's material (he spent some time in the Hodge Podge Lodge where this was recorded), he'd have his first million selling album. But I'm not sure anyone could really play this stuff except for Peter.</div><div><div><div><br /></div><div>Peter plays virtually all the instruments and recorded all this on funky equipment under pretty primitive conditions - we're talking about a dirt floor shack. His standard M.O. was to get an idea over morning coffee, write the song, and then record it that day. He did a bunch of studio work in New Orleans and his cohorts would always try to back him up in the studio on his own material but all the attempts at capturing his sound came up flat. He's sort of like a one-man Magic Band. </div><div><br /></div><div>I've known Peter since 1966. What's sort of amazing is that there are people like this still out there. Barely on the radar. Making music that sounds like nothing else out. </div></div></div></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-35055438338978875832011-01-24T07:56:00.000-08:002011-01-24T08:46:36.304-08:00I promised in a recent post to address why Alex didn't approve of the book and just to set the record straight will offer a brief summary of what went down. <div><br /></div><div>Throughout the interview process there was an understanding (I believe) that if my tape recorder was on, comments were on the record unless otherwise specified. Alex made a few comments that he then requested not go in the book and those requests were respected. </div><div><br /></div><div>After the book had been out a few months I heard about Alex's dissatisfaction and called him. He was unhappy that I had delved into his family history. What was somewhat puzzling about this was that he had brought it up when we first got together to discuss the project as a key to understanding the Big Star story from his perspective. When I returned to do the formal interviews, I started off with his references to the family history and he immediately, and with a great deal of enthusiasm, started right in. A lot of his narrative is in the book. At no time did I feel that the commentary was off the record. </div><div><br /></div><div>We verbally jousted for a bit. When I didn't budge from my belief that I hadn't done anything wrong, he moved onto complaining that he didn't realize that I was going to talk about "a gig we did years ago." I explained how the description of the gig at McVan's was a way for me to explain and defend his post-Big Star work. It was a device to capture the reader's attention. After we went round and around for nearly an hour I told him "Alex, the next time you and I see each other, we're going to shake hands and still be friends." He replied in his inimitable soft drawl, "You really think so? Well okay then...I guess" That was the last time we spoke. I had tickets to see him with the Box Tops a few months later but it was the Saturday after Thanksgiving and I was tired from a few days of house guests. I gave my tickets away and stayed home. If not for comments by Alex that were reported in print, I wouldn't have ever have felt compelled to comment on the matter. </div><div><br /></div><div>It bothered me that Alex didn't like parts of the book (the actual coverage of Radio City passed his test) but after I spoke with him I called a friend of mine, Parke Puterbaugh, who had written a big article for Rolling Stone back in 1993. Parke had had a similar experience as mine. We speculated as to why Alex felt compelled to focus on the negative – or imagine it – in situations where people genuinely had his best interests at heart. The reason might lie in this exchange from an interview in Bernie Kugel's <i>Big Star</i> fanzine back in 1977</div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 12px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 17px; "><strong><em><br /></em></strong></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 17px; "><strong><em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Interviewer:</span></em></strong><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span><em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">What would you like written on your grave?</span></em></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 17px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><em></em></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 17px; "><strong><em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Alex Chilton:</span></em></strong><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span><em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">"A Self-Made Man" sounds best to me.</span></em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: normal; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div>Translation: if you see yourself as a self-made man, you may have a more difficult time accepting the well-intentioned help and support of others. But who really knows? If I were writing a biography, I might delve into these matters more. But I'll leave that to someone else. As for me, whether or not Alex liked the book, I stand by it and wouldn't change a thing. Except all those annoying typos. And they're being fixed in the next print run. </div><div><br /></div><div>As far as Alex's family history goes, it took me a while but I finally realized why it was important to the Big Star story from his perspective. His roots may have stretched back to England, but were firmly planted in New Orleans and the Mississippi Delta. His dad was a jazz musician who developed his sound in Mississippi and refined it in Memphis. Alex telling his family story was, perhaps, his way of letting us know that he wasn't a privileged Memphis teen who lucked into teen stardom. He was an outsider with a rich family musical and cultural background playing his way back home. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-28288838158080393792011-01-11T10:19:00.000-08:002011-01-11T14:59:50.406-08:00<a href="http://mp3.rhapsody.com/album/this-is-it-volume-4-greater-buffalos-greatest-1975-1989?artistId=art.32873841">http://mp3.rhapsody.com/album/this-is-it-volume-4-greater-buffalos-greatest-1975-1989?artistId=art.32873841</a><div><br /></div><div>A brief detour...</div><div><br /></div><div>Some of you have requested sound samples of the Blue Reimondos, my band that backed up Alex at the gigs mentioned in the book. I've resolved to figure out how to do that but in the meantime you can hear a few songs at the Rhapsody link above. </div><div><br /></div><div>Our track on this comp. (lead track) is actually two separate recordings spliced together and cover the beginning and end of the band until we reunited in altered form to back up Alex. The first part is "Kryptonite Tonight" – a Ramones-like concoction of a buzz-saw riff and off-the-wall comic book lyrics. Except this was 1975 and we'd never heard of the Ramones. This was recorded at a high school dance with a five-piece line-up that was still attempting to be a successful cover band on the Buffalo bar circuit. We'd start off the evening with covers and once the crowd got hopping, we'd slip in Peter LaBonne's songs. It was just way more fun to get a gym full of kids jumping around to a song like "Kryptonite Tonight" than playing "Layla." Eventually two of our members – we were all high school friends – decided that their heart's desire was to play note-for-note versions of Eagles songs and bailed. That left Peter on guitar and keys and John B. King on bass. I switched from guitar to drums because...we needed a drummer. </div><div><br /></div><div>The second song "Tarzan, Jane Hungry" features Peter on the Farfisa and was recorded in August of 1977 in a barn. More thought went into the recording but the technology was limited to several mics and a reel to reel. We ran through a chunk of our set just to get it on tape. By now we were established as the first new wave /original / whatever band in Western New York and a buzz was growing about Peter (one of the most uniquely talented musicians on the planet). I was going away on business for a few months and our plan was to reconvene in October and make some headway on a scene that was far more receptive to original material than when we started out. But right when I returned, Peter abruptly left town for good and that was basically "all she wrote" for the Blue Reimondos proper. "Tarzan" was yet another singular song by Peter. When we played clubs, this usually came later in the evening and would inspire demented conga lines for some reason. (Both of these recordings are in truncated form.)</div><div><br /></div><div>John B. King just uncovered some reel to reels of the Reimondos that we are going to transfer. The first is a live gig at Hobart College from October '76. We couldn't find a job in the Buffalo area so this was our first public performance, 100 miles down the Thruway. A lot of the students were from New York and we went over really well. The second is a rehearsal tape where we went through a longer version of our setlist. I'm hoping that the tapes held up all these years and the recordings are strong enough to merit sharing with listeners. Will keep you posted. </div><div><br /></div><div>In the meantime, find a copy of Peter LaBonne's "Meditation Garden" on the Sonic Trout label and get a relatively more recent peek into his creative world. (He can also be heard playing some great leads on Richard Hell's sessions from the 80s in New Orleans with Zig Modeliste. Check out the solo on "The Hunter Was Drowned." </div><div><br /></div><div>You can buy a used copy of "Meditation Garden" at amazon.com for under a buck. Check it out...</div><div><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Meditation-Garden-Pete-Labonne/dp/B00005ARCL/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1294772067&sr=8-2">http://www.amazon.com/Meditation-Garden-Pete-Labonne/dp/B00005ARCL/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1294772067&sr=8-2</a></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-33296008883714338552011-01-03T13:50:00.000-08:002011-01-07T15:14:17.509-08:00Happy New Year everyone! I've resolved to post more frequently this year. I must admit the loss of Alex and Andy and my little dust-up with Bob Lefsetz just sort of wore me down. After spending three intense years with Big Star I needed a bit of a break from the subject. So of late I've been immersed in Delaney and Bonnie (saw them open for Blind Faith and became an instant huge fan), Family, Spirit, Ben Sidran, Jaki Byard, and 70s Hall and Oates. For starters. Now on to the latest news...<div><br /></div><div>My book is going to go to a second printing. This is giving us the chance to correct all those annoying typos and errors that somehow got past a team of seasoned professionals (if you ask me, I think that someone hit the wrong button and printed an early proof of the book). One reader has provided me with a detailed list of possible corrections but if you spotted something that really bugged you, feel free to send it along. </div><div><br /></div><div>There's a biography of Alex Chilton in the works for Viking Press. The author is Holly George-Warren. I don't know Holly (we're going to talk this month) but she's a friend and former co-worker with my good friend and fellow Big Star fan Parke Puterbaugh. Parke tells me that she'll do a great job. She was a friend of Alex's, wrote some articles on him, and even spent time in the recording studio with him working on an album. Can't wait to read it. </div><div><br /></div><div>Several of you have commented on negative remarks Alex made about my book that were quoted in several European publications. The truth is that he didn't like something about the book and we didn't have the opportunity to resolve it. My last words to him (at the end of a sometimes contentious long phone conversation) were, "Well, Alex. You may disagree with me but the next time we meet we're going to shake hands and still be friends." His response, "You really think so? Well I guess okay then..." I passed on a chance to see the Box Tops when they came to a nearby casino in November 2009 (Thanksgiving fatigue) and then we lost him. But given that his opinion is out there, I'll set the record straight from my perspective in my next post. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div><div><br /></div></div></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-27503025637246283442010-11-01T05:45:00.000-07:002010-11-01T06:09:56.716-07:00Jimi at McVan's. I just finishing reading the book Becoming Jimi Hendrix: From Southern Crossroads to Psychedelic London, the Untold Story of a Musical Genius by Steven Roby and Brad Schrieber. I love musical biographies and this is one of the best in recent memory. The authors devote the book to Jimi's life before he became a superstar – his life after Are You Experienced? is almost a coda to the main story: how a boy who grew up in very difficult circumstances learned how to play the guitar and scuffled his way to getting signed by Chas Chandler and then heading off to England. Jimi spent a lot of time backing up some real greats: Little Richard, Isley Brothers, and King Curtis to name but a few. He played the great guitar riff on Don Covay's Mercy, Mercy single on Atlantic (later covered by the Stones). He was a journeyman but on his way to something much bigger. Everyone knows the story of what happened after the Monterey Pop Festival. The story and insights into how he developed as an artist are far more fascinating than yet another rehashing of his relatively brief time in the spotlight. The book reinforced one of my beliefs about music today: one of the reasons why few artists of real note (when compared to the 1950s through mid-70s) have emerged in the past thirty years is there are few opportunities for a potential Hendrix to go out on the road with a number of greats and develop his or her craft. Everyone wants to be a headliner right out of the box. And therefore, we don't get many younger headliners who have any sort of staying power. <div><br /></div><div>Along the way, Jimi did a stint with twister misters Joey Dee and the Starlighters. In my researching my book I came across some references to Jimi playing behind the Inkspots at McVan's in Buffalo. That apparently isn't true – this really well-researched book makes no reference to Jimi playing with the Inkspots. However, he did play at McVan's with Joey Dee for an entire week in November of 1965 and there's a picture of Jimi onstage with Joey where they're pretty much standing in the same spot of the picture of Alex and me onstage. I actually have some poorly shot photos of us playing taken from the same angle where you can see the audience alongside the stage. The 1965 photo shows men in sports jackets and ties. The 1979 photo shows my college friend and his brothers in t-shirts. A lot of musical legends passed through McVan's in its heyday. Alex was one of the last before it was torn down (before it collapsed) to make way for a convenience store. </div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-20381298163884092922010-10-05T09:10:00.000-07:002010-10-05T09:25:29.099-07:00Hi Friends...If you're like me, you associate some of your favorite albums with specific times of the years. Radio City always makes think of warm spring weather. John Barleycorn Must Die puts me right back to the first week of September – back to school (the album came out just before my first year of college and was a dorm hit on arrival). I associate Van Dyke Parks' album Song Cycle with the first chilly and rainy week of autumn – when the leaves are turning and you know that summer is definitely over. I've actually been playing Song Cycle a lot over the past six months and my interest was piqued when I saw that a 33 1/3 book was coming out about the album.<div><br /></div><div>I'm not familiar with Richard Henderson, the author of the Song Cycle book, but I can tell you that he did a great job. I've read pretty much everything written about Van Dyke Parks and the album but this book is a real revelation. In a way, the book pretty much follows the pattern of my Radio City book: author discovers album (with help of knowledgeable record store clerk), background leading up to the recording of the album, details about the sessions and the songs from the participants, the (non) commercial life of the album after it was released, and a brief but excellent summary of VDP's career post-Song Cycle. Henderson got to know Parks and had his full cooperation. The bottom line is that if you like Song Cycle and you liked my approach to writing about Radio City, you're going to love the book. It certainly inspires you to hear the album in a new ways and pick up a lot of details you might not have caught or known - even if, like me, you've been listening to it for the past 40 years. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-48984251507772369482010-09-14T10:20:00.000-07:002010-09-14T10:43:11.690-07:00Well, it's been awhile...I was driving in my car last night, headed towards a sunset with the latest Teenage Fanclub disc playing, thinking that it was just a year ago that the Big Star box set was just hours from being released and everything that's transpired since. I remembered that last year it even crossed my mind that someday perhaps Alex, Andy, and Jody would perform Radio City from start to finish in the recent tradition of artists performing classic albums in their entirety. Now, just a year later, Big Star is in the heavens for good.<div><br /></div><div>The Teenage Fanclub record (<i>Shadows</i>) is a fine record and reminded me that Alex thought highly of the band. During the interviews for the book I asked Alex what he thought of the many artists who worshipped at the altar of Big Star. He was complimentary of several (Chris Stamey, I recall) but then said with a twinkle in his eye "You know who's really good? The Fannies...they're <i>really</i> good." Most of you have probably heard the radio broadcast of Alex with TFC – certainly one of the highlights of Alex's post Big Star career. Hopefully one day a clean copy of the broadcast will find its way into circulation. Every version I've encountered has some serious issues (drop outs, speed ups). An official release would certainly be well-received and a fitting tribute to the trans-Atlantic musical friendship. </div><div><br /></div><div>More soon...</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-42144196788486011052010-07-22T06:42:00.000-07:002010-07-22T06:53:59.770-07:00<p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">ANDY HUMMEL IN HIS OWN WORDS PART THREE. Here's the third and final installment of my written interview with Andy (see previous posts for more background) three years ago. One thing that came across loud and clear was how much he enjoyed his life – family, work, community, hobbies – and even though he still loved music, he had not an ounce of regret from walking away from Big Star. He participated in two of the greatest albums ever made and then went out and lived a great life without looking back. I listened back to the long phone interview that we did after the written part and you can just hear the enthusiasm and contentment in his voice. One funny bit was that when he brought up Led Zeppelin (who he like as much as Alex didn't like), I told him that I had a lot of LZ boots. He had never heard the word "boots" used to refer to bootleg discs and thought that somehow I had a large collection of Led Zeppelin footwear. Pretty amusing. </span></b></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><br /></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i><br /></i></b></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>O My Soul </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Co-written by Chris Bell? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Song seems to have been demoed several times – was the final album version recorded when the band regrouped after the Rock Writers Convention (May 73).</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Who played Mellotron</i>?</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I have real memory problems on this song. I get the impression from everything I’ve read that it is considered an early one in the R.C. story. But everything about it, including what memory I do have, tells me it happened closer to the Dolby Fuckers period later in the process. I remember very consciously trying to depart from the “standard” Big Star sound on this. It sounds much more sparse than our previous stuff. I remember we were working with Jody to try and get out of the usual sort of rock and roll drum style of ride cymbal, bass drum on the downbeat, snare on the upbeat, etc. And in fact that’s what you hear. Jody’s just playing lots of sort of broken rolls and stuff, almost like an eclectic drum solo throughout the song or something. Also I’m not sure it isn’t an overdub. The bass part is definitely an overdub. This is the one where, once again trying to find different sounds, we put that old Showman out in the middle of the studio, turned it up until it distorted mightily, and recorded it through a Neuman set several feet away. All as opposed to running the bass direct. It’s my old Precision Bass for sure. I was trying to do a Paul Kossoff (or whatever his name is) [note - later we confirmed it as Andy Fraser] off-the-wall sort of bass part. And Alex pretty much did the same on guitar – very little strumming. I think this was when he really started getting great on guitar, picking out Little Wing, the Bach Bouree’ he liked so much, etc. Definitely Alex on the Mellotron. I think we had it set up in the control room. All in B studio of course. Also note the structure of the song. It starts off like it’s going to be a traditional sort of Big Star rock song, but then he started adding other parts different than the original line. This was very anti traditional Big Star and much more like Daisy or Dolby Fucker-like. In fact if no one had told me otherwise I’d say it was a Dolby Fucker song. If I had to guess I’d say the initial line was something that was written early on, then when we got around to producing it all the other parts and the different sounds got dialed in. Don’t know about the demo’s. Never really paid much attention to them. They were just a means to an end.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I can’t help you much on the convention timing issue but I’d guess it was way after.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>Life Is White </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><b><i></i></b><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 72.0px; text-indent: -72.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>What part(s) would you have worked on?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 72.0px; text-indent: -72.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 72.0px; text-indent: -72.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>When recorded? (i.e. after Writers Convention?)</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 72.0px; text-indent: -72.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 72.0px; text-indent: -72.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Who played piano? Alex? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><b><i></i></b><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>I heard an acoustic demo by Alex and it was pretty astounding how complete it sounded in terms of having the arrangement worked out. It had to have been done after the song had been completely written (i.e. it was all there). Was is it common for him to do a demo once the song was finished?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">From a standpoint of production concept I’d say this was a predecessor to Soul for sure. I hear all the same stuff, just not as mature in implementation. I’m playing the Rickenbacher direct I believe. I think I recorded the harp overdub with Alex playing out in the sound lock but it could have been Fry of Richard. I’m pretty sure it’s Alex on piano but it could very well be Dickenson or even Jack Holder. At this point Alex pretty well came into the studio with his parts completely worked out if memory serves.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>Way Out West </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><b><i></i></b><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Most accounts I’ve read confirm that this is solely your composition. However I did find one article that asserted that Chris was involved. Would like to nail down once and for all that you wrote it, how it developed from piano ballad to guitar song, and the unusual structure (how after the first verse and chorus, it gives way to a verse and chorus of guitar – not your usual pop song format). Did that come about when the song was cranked up in the studio with the band? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>When recorded? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Was this worked on early on i.e. before Chris left?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I definitely wrote all of West except Alex’s solo. Chris wasn’t even around by then. He and I arranged it. I had written it late one night on my mother’s Knabe. I had planned to do it as a solo act. It’s about Linda of course. She was at college in Denver at the time. I don’t remember if I had a demo or not, I might have. We had all the equipment set up in A studio for jamming. We did this a lot. Jammed in A, recorded in B. So I played this song, on the Yamaha I guess, and Alex immediately turned it into a rock and roll song. Oh well – best laid plans and all. We got it completely down that night arrangement wise. The arrangement is because there weren’t any more words. I had written the lyrics before the music and they were what they needed to be – no more. So the solo broke up the two verses. I was way too afraid to try singing after the India experience so Jody did it with Alex on back-up. Could have knocked me over with a feather when I hear the Bangles had covered it.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">That will have to do for tonight. </p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>What’s Going Ahn? </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>This one is intriguing because you’re a co-writer (any recollections as to what parts you worked on?) and yet it was recorded with with Richard and (likely) Danny Jones. Richard says that unlike the other two “Dolby Fuckers” tracks that this was a John Fry session and not done “after hours”. </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>So might this have been written in the second half of 72 before Chris left (or around then) and then recorded by the Alex with Richard and Danny sometime in the first half of 73 before the band reconvened? Or…???</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>The acoustic demo that exists of Alex is again pretty spectacular – pretty much the entire arrangement is right there. Might that have been done…when? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i> This is the only song for which no track sheet extists (although Adam Hill @ Ardent is still looking). Do you recall any overdubs being done later? (electric piano, some tom toms I think – sound like the tom overdubs on September Gurls and Daisy Glaze) </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span style="text-decoration: underline"><i>General question</i></span><i> about the three “Dolby Fuckers” tracks. When the band started to work on Radio City after the Writers convention, how did these three songs enter the mix? Was it assumed from the beginning “well, we can use these tracks…” or did Alex (or someone else) introduce the idea of including them later on as a way of shortening the time for completing an album (i.e. getting over the magic 30 minute mark)?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">OK, I’m going to try this again. I’m on a different PC and email account now so maybe things will go better. I think this is where we left off.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">If I recall, this is a song written in one of those songwriting sessions at Alex’s. As I’ve said before, I kind of think this occurred early on while Chris was still around but I could be wrong. It’s neither inconceivable nor unlikely that we might have had other such events later on. We hung out at Alex’s in his bedroom and listened to LPs on that cool little KLH stereo of his frequently there for a while. I don’t think it would be possible to say I wrote a particular thing or Alex wrote a particular thing. That’s not the way I remember it happening. The song was basically his idea. I just helped by throwing out the occasional chord turn, lyric, whatever. I think I took 10% writer credit or something like that. It’s his song.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I wouldn’t disagree with Richard about recording it, especially since I wasn’t there! That sounds about right.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">The timing you suggest is about as close as I could come.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">The only overdubs I kind of remember are the toms and the lead guitar parts. Once again, I wasn’t that involved with the recording of this song very much.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>You Get What You Deserve </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>When (approx.) was this song written and developed. I’ve read accounts that say that it was possibly the fourth track you recorded with Chris in late 72 (same demo session) as O My Soul, Got Kinda Lost, and There Was a Life. Speaking of these songs, I listened to a demo at Ardent that I believe came from your collection(?). Adam Hill and I both thought that they sounded like they were recorded post –Chris (sounded like the three-piece with Alex singing). When do you think the demo might have been recorded?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I’m pretty sure this is another of those songs we had from early on. It was probably written before Chris left, but entirely by Alex I think. I also think this was one of the four we did in the famous mono session. My recollection is that they were Deserve, Car, Lost, and the other Chris song. By everyone else says different, so who am I with my 35-year old memory to press the point?</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">The mono session was definitely done while Chris was still around. I mean you can <span style="text-decoration: underline">clearly</span> hear him singing on both the surviving Bell tracks on my ¼ track copy, even though Alex sings lead on the slow one! [Note: see discussion before the first installment. Chris was not there and Jody sang the backup.]</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>Back of A Car </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>I’ve read a quote from you that this was “only recorded once” and that it was the first song recorded. When might that have been? Before Chris left in late 72 possibly? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Do you recall your input into the song?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>It seems pretty established that this is one of the songs that Chris worked on before leaving and dividing up songs with Alex. Do you have any clear recollection of what the other song(s) might have been (this is a expansion of the question about O My Soul)?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>There have been a lot of conflicting accounts as to whether or not Chris actually played on the album…any thoughts, recollections? It would seem that if that were the case that this would be the song.</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">As I’ve said, I believe this is one of the songs originally recorded in the mono session. To me it has Chris written all over it. I think the concept of the song, the verse chord change and the initial words were something he came in with. But we collaborated in turning it into a song. You guys have unrealistic expectations if you expect us to be able to remember every little lick we may have contributed to a song. I mean a song writing session is not like, let’s see how much of me I can get into this. Whoever was there was just trying to come up with a song we could play. In any case, I remember this as being the first song we recorded with John as a 3-piece and that it went very smoothly. I also think this was on our set list at the Rock Writers Convention.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I am pretty sure Chris did not play on any of the RC songs. We started from scratch when we decided to do RC after he left. We probably would have used the mono session masters in some way, shape, or form but of course they couldn’t be found. They were the only recordings of any of the RC material that existed at that time as far as I know. I guess it’s possible he did some overdubs or something later on but I’m not aware of it.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">This song reminds me of driving through the Big Boy and Krystal parking lots in my old man’s Lincoln listening to a Led Zepplin tape right after their first LP came out. It floored us both. We had rigged up an early cassette recorder in the glove box. </p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>Daisy Glaze </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Any significance to the original working title of Knoxville? (John Fry actually speculated that Chris might have had input because it refers to where he / you went to school. Jody didn’t think so.)</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Richard says that this song took a long time to develop and that Alex worked on it – jamming with various people – over months. I’m thinking that he may be confusing it with O My Soul (which would lend itself more to that.) The only song credited to you, Alex and Jody, how do you recall it being written? When recorded (before or after Writers Convention)?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>This has some of the most inventive overdubs on the record. Who do you recall playing pump organ? Any recollection of the guitar in the first half of the song that more or less modulates on the beat? Any other recollections?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I don’t particularly recall the name Knoxville but then we used a lot of obscure nomenclature in those days and a lot of stuff had gone down in Knoxville over the years.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I don’t remember Chris having anything whatsoever to do with this. It was entirely (and probably the only) true Alex/Jody/Andy collaboration. My recollection of the genesis of this song was of Alex playing one of Handel’s Concerti Grossi (opus 6) for me on the little KLH in his bedroom. It’s the one with the intro where they play the same note over and over but twice as fast each measure or whatever. I’ve got the LP around here somewhere. I think John used to have it too – or maybe I have his, not sure. In any case we were in B studio later and just began playing licks and stuff around this. We all input and eventually, after several sessions of this, it became the music for a song. I kind of remember that we actually recorded it as we wrote it although that’s probably not the final band track. John probably recorded us doing that from scratch at some point. The Handel riff starts off the fast part of course. Then Alex went off and wrote some words and we finished it up. I know I overdubbed the pump organ part although it’s conceivable it was later re-overdubbed. I don’t think so however. The bass is my Rickenbacker direct. The acoustic rhythm guitar part was done as previously described in my email exchange with John. I think Alex played oscillator and I console on that. But it could have been John on console.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">Once again I have difficulty remembering the timing of things with respect to the convention. My sense of time just wasn’t particularly focused on that event. I do think this one was in work a while before it was actually produced into a song. But I don’t think we were working on it as late at the Dolby Fucker period</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>She’s A Mover </i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>You overdubbed the bass part and mention using a Fender Showman. What would have been your regular bass amp in the studio?</i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">After listening to this I become a bit confused because I think it’s the same bass rig on both this and Oh My Soul – or at least parts of the latter which is possible due to punching in and out which we did obsessively. But I thought we had only done this once. Obviously not. It’s my Precision Bass through the Showman as I discussed earlier. It was a pretty cool sound.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">When I was obsessing over the poor quality of the bass sound I’ve been getting lately my current guitar player, who has a very cool rig with a Rivera tube head and Mesa Boogie speaker, actually had the gall to suggest the amp sound doesn’t matter for a bass. So why don’t I just get one of those modern Ampeg high power non tube amps with all the elaborate “effects”?!?!. How wrong. The Showman rig’s sound is a perfect case in point although I liked the HiWatt better.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">But as I’ve said before, we usually ran the bass direct. In an ideal world I suppose I would try to recreate the direct/tube compressor sound on stage. That would take some doing though.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>September Gurls</i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Quite the masterpiece to say the least. Listening to the master tapes at Ardent I was floored that you did three takes and used the first take. If you isolate what the trio did live in the studio, it’s easy to hear that the band had real potential as a live band. Any thoughts? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>About when do you think you worked on this song? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><i></i><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i>Any thoughts / impressions upon first hearing it? Anything specific you recall about recording it? </i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">Yes – if there was ever a BS star that had major potential as a hit this would be it. Too bad. Remember, our goal when we started doing the RC band track sessions with John, based on the experience we had on the mono session, was to try to get them in as few takes as possible. Also this was the period not too long after the 4-piece “tour” and was right around the time of the convention, etc. So we had indeed been playing a lot and this was almost certainly one of the songs on the playlist. So we were tighter at this point than any other in BS history I suppose. We could indeed have been a pretty good live act if things had worked out a little differently. I didn’t use to like playing live. It scared me to death. Now I love it although it still scares me to death sometimes!</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">Once again, can’t help you much with the timing other than to note that this was certainly one of that early group of RC songs we did with John.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">As far as the song itself, it seems to me this was kind of the high point of the original sort of Chris-inspired Big Star sound I believe I discussed earlier. We were all still playing in that style. The song was written pretty much in that style, although much more evolved. And we had become kind of expert at it. All three of us came up with great parts, it was a great song to begin with, and it just worked.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><b><i>Morpha Too</i></b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><b><i></i></b><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">I’ll close with a brief comment on my recollection of this. I remember very late in the process, but while I was still running with Alex some, we ended up in A studio late one night, both blasted on Quaaludes or whatever I’m sure. He started playing this song on the Yamaha and we decided to record it. I can’t remember if we ran one or two mikes but I know the piano went through a compressor which we turned up as much as it would go, essentially totally eliminating the dynamic range of the instrument. It’s a very cool piano sound. The decay of the notes is a loud as when they’re first played. John later re-recorded this properly I believe but kept the compressor thing.</p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><br /></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial">This was pretty much my last hurrah with BS. After this Alex, or John and Alex, properly became concerned with finishing up the LP and getting it released. I was drifting off into other pursuits, like getting out of college. Alex was/had drifted off into the Lesa thing that consumed them both for a while. I was not involved with mixing the LP at all. That was pretty much a John and Alex effort. I remember getting together in John’s office or somewhere to divvy up the writer’s credits once it was sure it was going to be released. I also remember a discussion among the three of us about the Northeast tour they were planning after release (I think it was after the release). But it was nearly September and I needed to matriculate. So I did. <b>And as fun as it is to remember all this stuff every 5 years or so when someone wants to do an interview, I’m glad I did. No offense to anyone, but from what I can tell, the music business sucks. And being involved with designing and building airplanes is kind of fun.</b></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><b></b><br /></p>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-55151634706409053562010-07-21T05:36:00.000-07:002010-07-21T05:41:11.573-07:00<p style="text-align: left;margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">ANDY HUMMEL IN HIS OWN WORDS PART TWO.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: left;margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Here's Part Two of what will be three parts. See the last post for background info. Again, this is Andy is writing in response to my questions in July 2007. </span></p><p style="text-align: left;margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><br /></span></i></span></p><p style="text-align: left;margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; "><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">I’m trying to recreate as much as possible a timeline for how the album came together. Here are the key dates as far as I can tell. So even being able to place when songs were written and / or recorded within these blocks of time would be helpful.</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i></i><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">June 1972 – #1 Record released</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i></i><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">October 1972 – live dates wind down</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i></i><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Dec 1972 – Chris leaves the band</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i></i><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">May 1973 – Rock Writer’s Convention</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><i></i><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">December 1973 – Radio City mastered</span></i></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">So many writers have micro-analyzed this subject that whatever you have must come from more accurate sources than my memory. Instead of addressing this directly, let tell you a bit about musical relationships. You should be able to overlay the timeline on this fairly easily. This might be somewhat helpful.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">First, just for the record - In the early days, before Big Star, Chris and I were pretty inseparable musically as I recall. Outside the studio we both played with various combinations of folks occasionally. And, of course in the studio one went with the flow of who was present on any given evening. But our primary musical vehicle/core was the 3-piece of Jody, Chris, and me, with Tom Eubanks doing a stint as a fourth for a while. We actually played out quite a bit doing fraternity parties, department store openings and the like. The other people we, and especially Chris played with, like Terry Manning, Steve Rhea, etc. have weighed in so heavily on this subject that you get the impression early Big Star and pre Big Star was some sort of commune as opposed to a cohesive band. Of course they’re just going by their recollections and this is what they remember. At one point a few years ago I had read so much of that type of stuff I almost became convinced myself. But nothing could be further from the truth. Especially by the time we hooked up with Alex we were very much a committed 3-piece band with a decent amount of both gig and studio experience.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Anyway, as we recorded the 1</span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">st</span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> LP on National Street, and later Madison Ave, Chris and Alex became very tight musically. There was never any question we four were the band and we behaved as such, but Alex and Chris were just way more experienced than us so Jody and I were pretty much side men at this point. They each had songs they brought to the table, but when it came to producing and recording them they collaborated pretty seamlessly. I think they were rather surprised when I showed up with that horrible India Song. I never should have let Alex talk me into putting it on the record.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">As we neared completion of the 1</span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">st</span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> LP however, for whatever reason, Alex and Chris became increasingly independent of each other musically. Alex was all about branching out and experimenting musically while Chris was going through a personal crisis which inhibited his ability to socialize musically.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">So Alex and I began to hang together. By this time I had taken John’s Audio Engineering course and was competent to run the studio solo. Previously we had been dependent on John, Chris, or Richard to provide this skill set. For the two of us, like most of these folks, hanging out meant hanging out musically. We did all sorts of crazy things, recording until the wee hours of the morning, listening to all sorts of odd musical influences and the like. We recorded Do Right Woman at Dan Penn’s studio with Spooner at 4:00 one morning. I’m sure it was horrible. I guess this would all have been happening roughly throughout 1972.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Anyway, the reason for going into all this is that by the time we began R.C. there was kind of a concept of operations (ConOps) in effect. Alex and I did lots of demo type stuff in the middle of the night with whoever was around. I have a really cool demo I recorded one night of Vera singing DIVORCE with Alex playing all the instruments and singing backup. I usually ran the studio and Alex played the music. When we were ready to do a real band track we’d get John to record it if necessary, then we’d spend the next month or so doing all the overdubs ourselves – of which there were a lot as I’m sure you know. Most of what I call the “mainline” R.C. songs were done this way. Alex later used a similar ConOps for the Dobly Fuckers stuff, usually, but not always with Richard recording.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Anyway, all that stuff about early BS is just me venting a little about the perceptions past articles and books have created. But this latter stuff is how I remember R.C. happening, at least at the 20,000 foot level as we say in the aircraft business. And I think it’s useful to understand this ConOps of how we operated in the studio before going into details about each track and stuff.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">As far as the specific timelines go for R.C. … and this is not my strong area … first I’ll have to download the LPs from iTunes. I don’t seem to have copies. In the meantime, please note the following disclaimer: It has been about 35 years since all this occurred and I do not pretend to remember it all perfectly. So if you run into other evidence which seems to contradict me, it is probably more correct.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">As an interlude while we’re waiting I’ll tell the keyboards story.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">I started studying classical piano in the 3</span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">rd</span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> grade. My mother had a small Knabe grand at our house she got about 1947. It was a great piano. It had easy action and a nice mellow sound. I studied formally with various teachers for about 7 years, until about the 9</span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">th</span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> grade.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">But I played that piano constantly experimenting with all sorts of stuff including figuring out a lot of rock songs. I can’t think of anything better than growing up with a nice piano at your disposal like that. You can’t help but learn a lot.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">I actually played organ for a while for a soul band during my R&B period.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">When we first started going to Ardent on National they had what must be about a 5’5” Chickering grand. I think it had a walnut finish. It must have been early 60s vintage. This was also a great piano. It was brighter and with a bigger sound than the Knabe. Most of the piano on the 1</span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">st</span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> LP was this Chickering. Everyone used it for everything. When we moved to Madison we brought the Chickering with us and installed it in the B studio, the one we mostly used. So most of the piano on RC was also the Chickering. One hopes Fry still has it. Often I – and others – would go in and just play it for hours alone.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">For the A studio they had to buy an additional piano. Fry, I expect at Terry’s urging, did not skimp. He got a brand new Yamaha concert grand. I think it was 7’ at least. It was solid black. It was a wonderful instrument. Smooth action, not the pronounced double action you get with Steinways, and a beautiful big bright tone. We used it some for recording but since it was in A studio, which we liked less and which was less accessible (all the big paying sessions were booked there) not nearly as much as the Chickering. But I – and a lot of others – loved to just go in there, close the door, and play and play, and play. Again, I hope it’s still there and in good shape. I liked that piano so much when it came time for me to by my own after I moved to Texas, I got a big black Yamaha C3 – with was their 6’ concert model at the time. I still have it and taught 3 kids how to play on it, not that it took with any of them. I taught myself to site read in the process though!</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Alex had a Chickering at his house we played some too. I gather he grew up with this piano much like I did the Knabe. I remember it as being almost identical to the one in the B studio. His Dad was a jazz musician and used it when he jammed with his buddies,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">I don’t believe Chris ever had a piano. I gather his family wasn’t musical like Alex’s and mine.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Also in B studio was a Hammond B3 organ with a big old tube Leslie. Hammonds are kind of a special case in the keyboard world to me. You play them kind of like lead guitar players play except on a keyboard. Also you have all those drawbars to manage. I never quite got it although I played it all the time trying to. Love B3s though. I wish I had one. I don’t think we ever used the B3 on a record but we used its Leslie all the time. Ever since Eric Clapton first ran a guitar through one, I think either on Abbey Road or Badge, everyone wanted to use that sound. And we did. It didn’t hurt that in addition to the rotating Leslie speakers it also had a great tube amp that distorted perfectly.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Other keyboards in the studio:</span></p> <ul style="list-style-type: disc"> <li style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span style="font: 12.0px Symbol"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">•</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">They had one of the first Moog synthesizers. The damn thing was so complicated to operate I don’t remember using it very much. Then they replaced it with an Arp. I didn’t think it was much better but the Beatles apparently did so we screwed with it a lot. It probably ended up on a record somewhere. I’ll listen for it when my download completes.</span></li> </ul> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <ul style="list-style-type: disc"> <li style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span style="font: 12.0px Symbol"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">•</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">For a critical while they had an old pump organ out in B studio. I played this on Daisy Glaze. It belonged to someone though and they took it away finally.</span></li> </ul> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <ul style="list-style-type: disc"> <li style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span style="font: 12.0px Symbol"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">•</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Frequently Jim Dickenson would bring his tacky piano over. This was an upright and someone had actually stuck thumbtacks into all the hammers to get that tacky sound.</span></li> </ul> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <ul style="list-style-type: disc"> <li style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span style="font: 12.0px Symbol"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">•</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">They bought an early Mellotron. We all loved it. Notionally you didn’t need to hire strings or horns anymore! They were very controversial with the musicians union as you can imagine. We used it a lot.</span></li> </ul> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">That’s all I can remember about keyboards so let’s resume with the timeline discussion.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">As the Number 1 effort, and its very lame tour, wound down in mid to late 1972, new songs had already been written, both separately and jointly, mostly the latter. We hadn’t laid any tracks down to speak of but we had played many of the songs quite a bit in practice sessions, studio jams, and the like. Some writing occurred with the three or four of us in Alex’s bedroom. I know we did What’s Going Ahn there. Ditto Life is White and Back of a Car. It’s probably safe to say that the songs listed with both Andy and Alex writing credits were done this way. I’m almost positive Chris was present during some or all this. So it happened early on.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">So we had these songs nearly ready to record. We also had a couple of Chris songs, Got Kinda Lost and another slow Chris song that escapes me right now. So there came a point where we were like, hey let’s record again. We were all getting kind of sick of the conventional method or recording; close miking everything, laying down 30 tracks before you settle on one, then millions of overdubs to get the final song. Plus we were really interested in mono. So – to make a long story short – we got Fry to engineer a session in B studio in mono, basically using one old big Neuman microphone in the middle of the room, with the whole band at once, and recorded four songs. I don’t remember how well we succeeded but the goal was to do them all in one take. I think we came pretty close. They sounded great. They were hot, fresh, full of enthusiasm, etc. and the mono sound Fry came up with was amazing I know we did Got Kind of Lost and the other Chris song. We also did Back of a Car. I’m not sure about the last one but it was probably Oh My Soul or You Get What You Deserve. I still have a tape of the Chris songs. I think Fry does too. You should listen to it. Anyway the master of this eventually got lost but it became the genesis of RC.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">So after Chris left and we finally decided to do another LP, we started with these songs, subject of course to the deal Alex and Chris had cut on who would get writer credit on what, so we didn’t use the two Chris songs. Pity. But since the master was gone we had to re-record them. I recall a fairly long tortuous period during which we laid down the band tracks for Car, Soul, probably Life, Deserve, and later September and West. We then spent months producing and overdubbing them, often using the ConOps described above although eventually Alex took Fry’s course and started soloing on the console. This was sort of the Mainline part of the LP.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">As we got well into this process Alex and Richard started up the Dolby Fuckers thing. I believe they/we did all that ourselves. Fry wasn’t needed to do the tracks because they were usually just a guitar and drums with everything else overdubbed.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">The last two Alex songs were done way later right before mixing started.</span></p>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-63299252205063267662010-07-20T11:58:00.000-07:002010-07-20T18:37:34.698-07:00<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal">ANDY HUMMEL IN HIS OWN WORDS. </p><p class="MsoNormal">Andy was the first person I interviewed for the book. We did it in two stages. First I sent him a list of questions which he answered over several lengthy emails. Then we did a long phone interview. This was all in July 2007. Andy's wealth of information and good spirit really set the tone for the book and influenced its direction. I was always committed to writing about the music rather than the surrounding "drama" but an offhand remark by Andy, which you'll read below, about people who weren't in the room having an awful lot of say in the Big Star story made me think that the book would be best served if the interviews were confined only to those who actually had a direct hand in the creation of Radio City. So that was the seed planted by Andy and I think the book was far better for it.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">As with any sequence of events nearly fort years ago memories can differ. One thing you Big Star experts will note is that Andy remembered Chris being part of the four song demo sessions between #1 and RC. This differed from what John Fry, Jody, and Alex remembered. In fact, they were adamant that it had just been the trio in the studio. A possible source of the confusion is that Andy heard background vocals on the reference tape he had saved and thought it must be Chris. However, Jody told me that he had done the background vocals. This is all perhaps a minor footnote but it involved a lot of research – including listening to the demo tapes at Ardent – and I came away certain that it was just the trio. Also keep in mind that these guys spent a lot of time together in the same studio so it would be easy to confuse one session with another. I wanted to publish this as Andy wrote it. (There were also some other things that people had different recollections of but there was always a very solid majority on one side and some external facts that made a final decision relatively easy.)</p><p class="MsoNormal">So here is Andy Hummel in his own words Part One. The italics are my questions, designed just to gather some basic facts to establish a framework for future interviews. Over a series of evenings, installments would arrive in my inbox. For a Big Star fan just starting to dig into the story, each one was a real revelation. I'll post the next installment in a few days. Enjoy. </p><p class="MsoNormal"><i>Did you play any instrument besides bass on the album?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Any of the keyboard parts</i><span style="font-style:normal">?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></span> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The only instruments I specifically remember playing were the bass parts I did and the pump organ on Daisy Glaze.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>During the initial 3-piece period of the 2<sup>nd</sup> LP there could have been others though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We operated very collaboratively at this point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>See below under the timeline discussion for more on this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <i>What bass(es) did you use (make / model / approx. age / origin). (We’ll talk about your influences etc. when we talk. I also want to talk about your development as a musician and how, with more room to work, you really delivered the goods on Radio City. Also, what you would have been working on at Ardent when during the hiatus after #1 Record etc.)</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I love to talk about guitars, so bear with me as I tell the Big Star guitar story.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Chapter 1 – electrics:</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> When Chris and I first began playing together in our dorm room at UT in 1969 I had a cherry red Gibson 335-style hollow body bass with black nylon flat wound strings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It must have been a 1966 or so left over from my days playing R&B - a very cool, unusual bass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Chris played a cherry red Gibson 335 6-string guitar with P80 or P90 pickups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m pretty sure it had a Bigsby.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It must have been mid-60s as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I can’t remember Chris ever owning another electric guitar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He was a one guitar kind of guy with that 335 and he played the hell out of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I had a Kustom bass amp I never liked or used to speak of and he had a Fender Twin Reverb he used all the time.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> A little after we returned to Memphis I traded my Gibson in for a new, sunburst Fender Precision Bass (I believe they call them P-basses these days) with a maple fretboard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This must have been late 1970 or so.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Chris and I were obsessed with the sound John Entwhistle got out of his bass and heard him say the words “Rotosound Strings” on one of the songs on “Who Sellout”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We figured he must be talking about guitar strings and, sure enough, I went out and found some.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Of course Rotosounds were all round wound in those days – may still be – and no one I had ever heard of used them except Entwhistle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I put them on the Fender, turned the treble way up, and that was the sound.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This became my primary bass throughout the Big Star years, and other folks’ at Ardent too for that matter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was always in the studio and got used a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Precision Basses are very reliable and musically flexible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You can play any style of music on them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I flatter myself that I was one of the first folks (beside Entwhistle obviously) to kind of pioneer that trebly, twangy sound the Fender got with those strings which later became a mainstay bass sound, although I’m sure no one picked it up on my account since no one ever heard us.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> When we hooked up with Alex he had a gold Les Paul and a Super Reverb.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The Super Reverb was the most deafening thing I ever heard.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I think the Les Paul had humbuckers but they may have been P-style pickups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It’s hard to remember and doesn’t matter anyway because he didn’t use it much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They both played it a little on the 1<sup>st</sup> LP but then Alex got a Fender Stratocaster which became his primary electric for some time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m pretty sure it was ivory colored.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> So all those trademark trebly Big Star electric guitar sounds you hear on both LPs were primarily Chris’s Gibson and/or Alex’s Strat played through old Fender tube amps.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Most of the bass parts are the Precision bass recorded directly through the console and one of two old vacuum tube compressors Fry had in the “B” studio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We hardly ever amped the bass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’ll bet he still has those compressors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If not it’s a great tragedy.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> The studio had an old tube Fender Dual Showman everyone used a lot for everything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was a great amp.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>More on that later.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When we were getting ready to go “on tour” Ardent bought us all new equipment.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Chris and I got HiWatt heads because that’s what The Who used a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I can’t remember whether they were 100 or 200 watt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Alex had a Marshall he found somewhere.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We had HiWatt speaker cabinets, I think with 4 12-inch speakers each.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The original plan was for the guitar players to use two of these each with their heads like Cream or somebody.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This was ridiculously loud so we backed down to one cabinet each.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It was still too loud.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I had two JBL bass horns John Dando built for me but they wouldn’t do the twang sound so I ditched them and used one of the HiWatt cabinets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The HiWatt head and speaker cabinet was a perfect stage bass rig.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t recall recording with any of this stuff much, except maybe the Marshall, but we kept it all in A studio quite a lot and it was the standard Ardent jam setup off and on for a while.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>More on this later.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> While we were practicing to go “on tour” after the 1<sup>st</sup> LP I lucked into a Gibson Thunderbird which, of course, is precisely what Entwhistle used.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think I got it at Strings and Things back when it was a “mom and pop” operation on Cooper.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Unfortunately I didn’t get to play it much because Chris and I got into a big fight at practice at Alex’s house and he smashed the bass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So I went back to the Fender.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I always go back to a Precision Bass it seems.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Later while we were “touring” somebody gave me a Rickenbacker to play at that gig we did in New Orleans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think it was a supermarket grand opening or something ;-).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I loved it and got my own when I got back to Memphis.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Unfortunately there was something wrong with the neck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The guitar wasn’t fret true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So, as usual, I reverted to the Fender.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">This entire time there was always a Hofner at the studio – may still be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Hofners are great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>There’s no other sound like it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They have that short scale which is very easy to play and they are very light.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We used it some before and during the 1<sup>st</sup> LP.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Later Terry Manning or somebody put round wound strings on it and ruined it I think.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Hofners need flat wound strings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He bought a new one in the Bahamas or somewhere but he wouldn’t let anyone play it.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I didn’t own a bass at all from about 1974 until a couple of years ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Not that anyone will care, but these days I play a black American Fender Precision bass with the extra Jazz bass-style bridge pickup, BassLine Quarter Pounders, and a rosewood fret board.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m about to take the round wound strings off and put proper Beach Boys-style flat wound strings on it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I got it at a guitar show in Arlington about a year ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t like it much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It seems like the level is not well balanced across the strings and scale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Also, while the treble is nice I can’t get the bass tone I’m looking for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Maybe the new strings will be better.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Or it could be the amp I’m using.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It’s a newish 100 watt Bassman.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I think I need a big tube Ampeg or a Trace Elliott.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Or better yet, an old tube HiWatt like we used in Big Star days – good luck with that.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I also play a Hofner I bought new at Craig’s Music a couple of years ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I love it but it’s hard to play at gigs because there are no dots on the upper edge of the fret board making it hard to know where you are in dim stage lighting with that short scale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Also there’s something about the way I hold it that causes the G-string to pop off of the bridge a lot. What I really want is a Gibson SG-style solid body.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They used to call them EB3’s I think, with two humbuckers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The guy in Free played one of these.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m sure I’ll wind up back on a Precision Bass but it’s fun to experiment and you can never have too many guitars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’ve only got around 12 right now.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Lot’s of people have hundreds these days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t know what they do with them all though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Also Japanese collectors are buying up all the nice old American guitars for ridiculous prices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I bet the dealers sell them a lot of fakes!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I mean there can’t really be that many 1957 Les Pauls in this world.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And it seems like you see a couple of hundred at every guitar show.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Alex told Patti (my wife) he has 20ish, but that was before Katrina.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m guessing he may have lost some in the hurricane.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Also he’s not sure where they all are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He travels quite a bit and apparently leaves them around or something. My current little band’s guitar player, Mike, only has 3 that I know of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t really know anyone else that plays guitar.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I guess the interesting thing is that Big Star basically did the 1<sup>st</sup> two LPs with just 3 electric guitars - the Precision Bass and the Strat, plus the 335 on No. 1 - and a couple of old Fender amps.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t think people are that “efficient: these days.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Chapter 2 – Acoustics (this is a shorter story):</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I taught myself to play guitar on an old Silvertone flattop I bought new at Sears, probably for $15 or so, in Junior High School.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t know how I ever played it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I must have had very strong fingers and thick calluses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Later on in Big Star days I studied classical with a gypsy named Rene Fusco or Fuste’ – something like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He sold me a classical guitar made by a well-known transcriber named Frantz Schmidt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I still have both of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I used the classical for some demos at Ardent and wrote India Song on it (for what that’s worth!).</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> When Alex joined the band he showed up in the studio to record 13 and Watch the Sunrise with two Martin acoustics, I think a D-35 12-string and a D-28 6-string.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m sure he had used them there previously in his work with Terry but I hadn’t seen them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They were wonderful guitars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Apparently he had been doing a lot of folk music in New York right before he joined with us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They were used extensively on both LPs, especially the 6-string.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I played both a lot.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Chris bought a Yamaha dreadnaught-style acoustic, I think while we were recording the 1<sup>st</sup> LP.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It was a good guitar and used extensively on that LP and later on his solo stuff although it too was a victim of violence at one point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We were a very emotional band.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Prior to going “on tour” when Ardent bought us all those ampsI discussed earlier I also got a new acoustic.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It was a Guild D-25.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I put Schaler tuners on it, had the frets dressed down, and the action lowered.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It turned out to be a pretty good guitar and the only serious guitar I had for many years after Big Star.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Tommy Hoenn used it a good deal.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> John Dando installed Barcus-Berry pickups on all the acoustics so we could play through the amps live.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>These were a very early version of internally mounted acoustic pickups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They fed back like crazy and had to have standalone preamps between the guitar and amp.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>John built some from scratch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We never used them much though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Nowadays that technology has advanced tremendously with Fishmans and some of the factory pickup systems people like Taylor use.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It’s amazing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It’s suddenly practical to play amplified acoustic music with your neighborhood band.</p><p class="MsoNormal">By the way, Dando would be a good guy to talk to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He was sort of our technical manager.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He knows a lot about the technology side of things back in those days.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I think he’s still in Memphis.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Fry will know.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Nowadays I have about a 7 year-old Taylor 314 Koa with a Fishman, which I love and play all the time; the Guild which now has a Fishman but is in the shop to be refurbished; a 1968 NOS Gibson J-50 I bought at a little shop on Madison Avenue the weekend of the NARAS awards, which I love but don’t play much because the strings are a little too close for finger picking; and the old acoustics I already mentioned.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’ve played a lot of acoustic guitars in my time and I have to say Taylor has broken the code.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Their guitars are to die for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Unless you’re just married to old school luthier methods Martin, Gibson, etc. hang their hats on your primary acoustic needs to be a Taylor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t think the Martin and Gibson new technology guitars light a candle to the Taylors.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> That’s my Big Star guitar story.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Would you like to hear my Big Star piano story?</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <i>I’m trying to recreate as much as possible a timeline for how the album came together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Here are the key dates as far as I can tell.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>So even being able to place when songs were written and / or recorded within these blocks of time would be helpful.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>June 1972 – #1 Record released<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>October 1972 – live dates wind down<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>Dec 1972 – Chris leaves the band<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>May 1973 – Rock Writer’s Convention<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>December 1973 – Radio City mastered</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">So many writers have micro-analyzed this subject that whatever you have must come from more accurate sources than my memory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Instead of addressing this directly, let tell you a bit about musical relationships.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>You should be able to overlay the timeline on this fairly easily.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This might be somewhat helpful.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">First, just for the record - In the early days, before Big Star, Chris and I were pretty inseparable musically as I recall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Outside the studio we both played with various combinations of folks occasionally.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And, of course in the studio one went with the flow of who was present on any given evening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But our primary musical vehicle/core was the 3-piece of Jody, Chris, and me, with Tom Eubanks doing a stint as a fourth for a while.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We actually played out quite a bit doing fraternity parties, department store openings and the like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The other people we, and especially Chris played with, like Terry Manning, Steve Rhea, etc. have weighed in so heavily on this subject that you get the impression early Big Star and pre Big Star was some sort of commune as opposed to a cohesive band.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Of course they’re just going by their recollections and this is what they remember.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>At one point a few years ago I had read so much of that type of stuff I almost became convinced myself.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But nothing could be further from the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Especially by the time we hooked up with Alex we were very much a committed 3-piece band with a decent amount of both gig and studio experience.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Anyway, as we recorded the 1<sup>st</sup> LP on National Street, and later Madison Ave, Chris and Alex became very tight musically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>There was never any question we four were the band and we behaved as such, but Alex and Chris were just way more experienced than us so Jody and I were pretty much side men at this point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They each had songs they brought to the table, but when it came to producing and recording them they collaborated pretty seamlessly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think they were rather surprised when I showed up with that horrible India Song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I never should have let Alex talk me into putting it on the record.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> As we neared completion of the 1<sup>st</sup> LP however, for whatever reason, Alex and Chris became increasingly independent of each other musically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Alex was all about branching out and experimenting musically while Chris was going through a personal crisis which inhibited his ability to socialize musically.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> So Alex and I began to hang together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>By this time I had taken John’s Audio Engineering course and was competent to run the studio solo.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Previously we had been dependent on John, Chris, or Richard to provide this skill set.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>For the two of us, like most of these folks, hanging out meant hanging out musically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We did all sorts of crazy things, recording until the wee hours of the morning, listening to all sorts of odd musical influences and the like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We recorded Do Right Woman at Dan Penn’s studio with Spooner at 4:00 one morning.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I’m sure it was horrible.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I guess this would all have been happening roughly throughout 1972.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Anyway, the reason for going into all this is that by the time we began R.C. there was kind of a concept of operations (ConOps) in effect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Alex and I did lots of demo type stuff in the middle of the night with whoever was around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I have a really cool demo I recorded one night of Vera singing DIVORCE with Alex playing all the instruments and singing backup.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I usually ran the studio and Alex played the music.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When we were ready to do a real band track we’d get John to record it if necessary, then we’d spend the next month or so doing all the overdubs ourselves – of which there were a lot as I’m sure you know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Most of what I call the “mainline” R.C. songs were done this way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Alex later used a similar ConOps for the Dobly Fuckers stuff, usually, but not always with Richard recording.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Anyway, all that stuff about early BS is just me venting a little about the perceptions past articles and books have created.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But this latter stuff is how I remember R.C. happening, at least at the 20,000 foot level as we say in the aircraft business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>And I think it’s useful to understand this ConOps of how we operated in the studio before going into details about each track and stuff.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> As far as the specific timelines go for R.C. … and this is not my strong area … first I’ll have to download the LPs from iTunes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t seem to have copies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In the meantime, please note the following disclaimer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It has been about 35 years since all this occurred and I do not pretend to remember it all perfectly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So if you run into other evidence which seems to contradict me, it is probably more correct.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> As an interlude while we’re waiting I’ll tell the keyboards story.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I started studying classical piano in the 3<sup>rd</sup> grade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>My mother had a small Knabe grand at our house she got about 1947.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was a great piano.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It had easy action and a nice mellow sound.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I studied formally with various teachers for about 7 years, until about the 9<sup>th</sup> grade.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> But I played that piano constantly experimenting with all sorts of stuff including figuring out a lot of rock songs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I can’t think of anything better than growing up with a nice piano at your disposal like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You can’t help but learn a lot.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I actually played organ for a while for a soul band during my R&B period.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">When we first started going to Ardent on National they had what must be about a 5’5” Chickering grand.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I think it had a walnut finish.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It must have been early 60s vintage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This was also a great piano.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was brighter and with a bigger sound than the Knabe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Most of the piano on the 1<sup>st</sup> LP was this Chickering.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Everyone used it for everything.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>When we moved to Madison we brought the Chickering with us and installed it in the B studio, the one we mostly used.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So most of the piano on RC was also the Chickering.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>One hopes Fry still has it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Often I – and others – would go in and just play it for hours alone.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">For the A studio they had to buy an additional piano.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Fry, I expect at Terry’s urging, did not skimp.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He got a brand new Yamaha concert grand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think it was 7’ at least.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was solid black.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was a wonderful instrument.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Smooth action, not the pronounced double action you get with Steinways, and a beautiful big bright tone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We used it some for recording but since it was in A studio, which we liked less and which was less accessible (all the big paying sessions were booked there) not nearly as much as the Chickering.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But I – and a lot of others – loved to just go in there, close the door, and play and play, and play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Again, I hope it’s still there and in good shape.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I liked that piano so much when it came time for me to by my own after I moved to Texas, I got a big black Yamaha C3 – with was their 6’ concert model at the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I still have it and taught 3 kids how to play on it, not that it took with any of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I taught myself to site read in the process though!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Alex had a Chickering at his house we played some too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I gather he grew up with this piano much like I did the Knabe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I remember it as being almost identical to the one in the B studio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>His Dad was a jazz musician and used it when he jammed with his buddies,</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I don’t believe Chris ever had a piano.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I gather his family wasn’t musical like Alex’s and mine.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Also in B studio was a Hammond B3 organ with a big old tube Leslie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Hammonds are kind of a special case in the keyboard world to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You play them kind of like lead guitar players play except on a keyboard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Also you have all those drawbars to manage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I never quite got it although I played it all the time trying to.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Love B3s though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I wish I had one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t think we ever used the B3 on a record but we used its Leslie all the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Ever since Eric Clapton first ran a guitar through one, I think either on Abbey Road or Badge, everyone wanted to use that sound.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>And we did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It didn’t hurt that in addition to the rotating Leslie speakers it also had a great tube amp that distorted perfectly.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Other keyboards in the studio:</p> <ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;tab-stops:list .5in">They had one of the first Moog synthesizers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The damn thing was so complicated to operate I don’t remember using it very much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Then they replaced it with an Arp.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I didn’t think it was much better but the Beatles apparently did so we screwed with it a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It probably ended up on a record somewhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’ll listen for it when my download completes.</li> </ul> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;tab-stops:list .5in">For a critical while they had an old pump organ out in B studio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I played this on Daisy Glaze.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It belonged to someone though and they took it away finally.</li> </ul> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;tab-stops:list .5in">Frequently Jim Dickenson would bring his tacky piano over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This was an upright and someone had actually stuck thumbtacks into all the hammers to get that tacky sound.</li> </ul> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;tab-stops:list .5in">They bought an early Mellotron.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We all loved it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Notionally you didn’t need to hire strings or horns anymore!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They were very controversial with the musicians union as you can imagine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We used it a lot.</li> </ul> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">That’s all I can remember about keyboards so let’s resume with the timeline discussion.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> As the Number 1 effort, and its very lame tour, wound down in mid to late 1972, new songs had already been written, both separately and jointly, mostly the latter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We hadn’t laid any tracks down to speak of but we had played many of the songs quite a bit in practice sessions, studio jams, and the like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Some writing occurred with the three or four of us in Alex’s bedroom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I know we did What’s Going Ahn there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Ditto Life is White and Back of a Car.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It’s probably safe to say that the songs listed with both Andy and Alex writing credits were done this way.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I’m almost positive Chris was present during some or all this. So it happened early on.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> So we had these songs nearly ready to record.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We also had a couple of Chris songs, Got Kinda Lost and another slow Chris song that escapes me right now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So there came a point where we were like, hey let’s record again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We were all getting kind of sick of the conventional method or recording; close miking everything, laying down 30 tracks before you settle on one, then millions of overdubs to get the final song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Plus we were really interested in mono.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>So – to make a long story short – we got Fry to engineer a session in B studio in mono, basically using one old big Neuman microphone in the middle of the room, with the whole band at once, and recorded four songs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I don’t remember how well we succeeded but the goal was to do them all in one take.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think we came pretty close.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They sounded great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>They were hot, fresh, full of enthusiasm, etc. and the mono sound Fry came up with was amazing<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I know we did Got Kind of Lost and the other Chris song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We also did Back of a Car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I’m not sure about the last one but it was probably Oh My Soul or You Get What You Deserve.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I still have a tape of the Chris songs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I think Fry does too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You should listen to it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Anyway the master of this eventually got lost but it became the genesis of RC.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> So after Chris left and we finally decided to do another LP, we started with these songs, subject of course to the deal Alex and Chris had cut on who would get writer credit on what, so we didn’t use the two Chris songs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Pity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But since the master was gone we had to re-record them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I recall a fairly long tortuous period during which we laid down the band tracks for Car, Soul, probably Life, Deserve, and later September and West.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We then spent months producing and overdubbing them, often using the ConOps described above although eventually Alex took Fry’s course and started soloing on the console.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This was sort of the Mainline part of the LP.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">As we got well into this process Alex and Richard started up the Dolby Fuckers thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I believe they/we did all that ourselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Fry wasn’t needed to do the tracks because they were usually just a guitar and drums with everything else overdubbed.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> The last two Alex songs were done way later right before mixing started.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> Ok, now that you have the overall history of how the thing flowed we can start looking at specific songs.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But that will have to be a subsequent installment.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <!--EndFragment-->B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305743694028013534.post-67566133474896115462010-07-20T09:34:00.000-07:002010-07-20T10:10:08.353-07:00ANDY HUMMEL. I'm sure by now you've all heard the news of Andy's passing yesterday. There are some links to some good articles on the Ardent FB page. Check them out. <div><br /></div><div>I never met Andy (I had hoped to meet him at the Big Star tribute in Memphis) but even in our relatively time of communication I got the overwhelming feeling that he was a man who really enjoyed life and had no regrets about the path he had chosen. He was incredibly helpful when I started the book and just totally delightful to speak with. Generous, positive, and intelligent with a sense of humor. As we Big Star fans know, he was also a terrific musician. His contributions to Big Star can sometimes be lost in the shadows of Chris and Alex, but in writing about Radio City and listening closely to the tracks over and over I grew to have a deeper appreciation for his contributions. In a way he was George to Chris and Alex's Paul and John: a team player with his own arsenal of special things to add to the musical equation. Just listen to his bass line on Way Out West. Brilliant. And contrary to what Andy (along with many others) thought, India Song is a great track. It just belongs maybe on a different record. </div><div><br /></div><div>Tonight I'm going to dig through my interview with Andy and pull out some material that didn't make it into the book. In the meantime, remember that words may sometimes fail but prayer never does. Keep Andy's family and the Ardent family (who have had an extremely trying year) in your prayers. Back shortly.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>B. E.http://www.blogger.com/profile/06901334796702362641noreply@blogger.com3