70 Years Out: Bob Dylan

This week (May 24) Bob Dylan will celebrate his 70th birthday. Probably the most important figure in popular music, Dylan has built a body of work that is breathtaking in its scope. On top of that, it would be quite fair to say that when Dylan was at his peak in the 1960s his music helped change the world. Love him or hate him, you cannot deny his powerful influence on rock music. Thanks, Bob.

MP3: “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35” (live) by Bob Dylan & the Band

MP3: “Like A Rolling Stone” (live) by Jimi Hendrix

MP3: “Watching The River Flow” by Leon Russell

MP3: “One More Cup of Coffee” by Roger McGuinn & Calexico

MP3: “To Ramona” by the Flying Burrito Brothers

MP3: “Thunder On The Mountain” by Wanda Jackson

MP3: “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” by the Grateful Dead

MP3: “Girl From The North Country” by Johnny Cash & Joni Mitchell

MP3: “Si Tu Dois Partir” by Fairport Convention

MP3: “Groom’s Still Waiting At The Altar” by Bob Dylan

MP3: “My Back Pages” by the Hollies

MP3: “Masters of War” by Pearl Jam

MP3: “If Not For You” by Olivia Newton John

MP3: “Come Una Pietra Scalciata (Like A Rolling Stone)” by Articolo 31

MP3: “Chimes Of Freedom” (live) by Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band

MP3: “Wicked Messenger” by the Faces

MP3: “Everything Is Broken” by R. L. Burnside

MP3: “This Wheel’s On Fire” by the Byrds

MP3: “Gotta Serve Somebody” by Mavis Staples

MP3: “Highway 61 Revisited” by Johnny Winter

MP3: “Tweeter and the Monkey Man” by the Traveling Wilburys

MP3: “The Times They Are A-Changin’ ” by the Beach Boys

MP3: “All Along The Watchtower” (live) by Neil Young

MP3:  “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” (live) by Bob Dylan (w/George Harrison, Leon Russell & Ringo Starr)

MP3:  “Forever Young” by Bob Dylan & the Band

“Watching The River Flow” by Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts and Ben Waters

Video of the Week: Desert Rose Band & Roger McGuinn

From 1990, a show on the old Nashville Network: former Byrds frontman Roger McGuinn joins the Desert Rose Band, led by another ex-Byrd, Chris Hillman.  McGuinn possesses the weirdest stare and the neatest mullet I’ve seen in years.  They’re doin’ “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere,” the Bob Dylan gem cut by the Byrds on their classic 1968 album Sweetheart Of The Rodeo.

The song title is dedicated to all our friends up north, who are snowed in and home from work.  If you’re in Austin and looking to get out of the cold tonight, check out Chris Hillman and Herb Pedersen, live at the Cactus Cafe on the University of Texas campus.

Adios, Buddy!

Ranger (2001-2010)

Damn …  it’s time to say goodbye to my back porch beer drinking buddy, ol’ Ranger.  He lived with us for about nine years and yesterday he moved on over to the next life.  Ranger’s heart was bigger than 10 backyards but it gave out too soon.

He wasn’t afraid of anything that crawled, climbed or slithered.  The heat or cold didn’t bother him, although he didn’t mind paying a visit indoors once in a while.  That sonovagun liked to run, but he never ran away.  Adios, big boy – we’ll keep your house in case you ever come this way again.

MP3: “Bugler” by the Byrds

MP3: “40 Dogs (Like Romeo and Juliet)” by Bob Schneider

MP3: “He’s A Good Dog” by Fred Eaglesmith

MP3: “Hound Dog” by Big Mama Thornton

MP3: “Walking The Dog” by Rufus Thomas

MP3: “Old Blue” by Roger McGuinn

MP3: “Salty Dog” by Flogging Molly

MP3: “Red Dog Speaks” by Elvin Bishop

MP3: “Queenie’s Song” by Guy Clark

MP3: “Old Dog” by Shelby Lynne

MP3: “I Wanna Be Your Dog” by the Stooges

MP3: “Goodbye” by Steve Earle

40 Years Out: “Easy Rider”

Dennis Hopper, R.I.P.

“You know, this used to be a helluva good country. I don’t understand what went wrong with it.” – Jack Nicholson, in Easy Rider

While we’re celebrating events of 1969 this year, it would be a shame to forget the movie Easy Rider.   Perhaps the most famous road movie of all time, it was a touchstone of the era and a landmark in American moviemaking.  You should know the story: two rebels hit the road to discover America as it was in the late 1960s.  They encounter everything from happy hippies in a country commune to angry rednecks in a Louisiana diner.

The movie broke new ground in its primitive production techniques, after the French New Wave (Truffaut) and in its then-innovative use of already recorded rock songs on the soundtrack.  Even though many of the people who worked on the movie, including stars Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper (who also directed) and Jack Nicholson, are still alive and working, much about the movie’s production has passed into mythology so it’s tough to pick out the truth among the tall tales.

We know this much: the soundtrack forever tied Steppenwolf’s “Born To Be Wild” with motorcycle riding, the movie made Jack Nicholson a star and Easy Rider created the independent film industry.   Stephen Stills was asked by Hopper to write a song for the movie – he wrote “Find The Cost Of Freedom,” but it wasn’t used.  It later became the flip side of “Ohio” by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.  Bob Dylan was also asked to write a song, but he didn’t want to.  Instead, he dashed off a few lines and asked to have them delivered to Roger McGuinn, who then wrote and performed “Ballad of Easy Rider” heard over the closing credits.

Lost Classics! “Sweetheart Of The Rodeo,” The Byrds

Sweetheart Of The Rodeo, the Byrds’ sixth studio album from 1968, is justifiably famous because it features singer/songwriter Gram Parsons on his only album with the band.  Parsons, later to found the Flying Burrito Brothers, would spend only six months as a Byrd, but it was a tumultuous six months indeed.

At the time the album was recorded, the only remaining Byrds from the original lineup were Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman.  Hillman recruited Parsons, and with drummer Kevin Kelley and guitarist Clarence White, the Byrds (at the urging of Parsons) went to Nashville to record the album.  McGuinn’s original concept was a wide range of music including old-timey gospel and country evolving into futuristic “space” music.  Thankfully, Parsons and Hillman tipped the scales in favor of the prescient country rock that the album became.

Lost Classics! McGuinn, Clark & Hillman

In the late 1970s, country rock had pretty much run the course – the Eagles had appropriated the best parts of the genre and their watered down music reigned from the top of the charts.  The true innovators like Roger McGuinn, Gene Clark and Chris Hillman of the Byrds were left to cash in endlessly on their past reputations by playing their old songs as part of ridiculous package tours.

That’s where these boys found themselves in 1977, fronting their respective bands on a European jaunt.  The promoter had visions of people coming out in hopes of seeing a reunion; it didn’t happen for the most part, but the three did get together in London and that show was heavily bootlegged.  Gene Clark, although he had the best voice of the three, was the most unstable – he had legendary bouts of stage fright and an overwhelming inferiority complex that led him to quit the Byrds years before.

Everybody Must Get Stoned – Even Bob Dylan

From a 1990 tribute to Roy Orbison: Bob Dylan and the surviving Byrds.  Dylan has no idea what the chords are, David Crosby has to fill him in before the song.  Wonder why?  And how about that mullet on Roger McGuinn!  Have a great weekend!

Lost Classics! The Byrds

When the hype arrived in 1972, it was almost too much to believe: the five original Byrds were going to reunite for a new album.  For years the group had limped along under the Byrds banner, with original member Roger McGuinn heading a lineup that was sometimes brilliant (Gram Parsons, Clarence White) and sometimes shaky (Skip Battin). 

After having not played together since 1965, The Byrds’ original lineup – McGuinn, Chris Hillman, Gene Clark, Michael Clarke and David Crosby – came together at the urging of Crosby, who was hot at the time (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young) and wanted a chance to lead his former band.  The resulting album, simply titled Byrds, came out in 1973 on Asylum Records, run by up-and-coming mogul David Geffen.

Review: “Magic Tour Highlights,” Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band

Bruce Springsteen released a similar four-song live package in the 1980s called Chimes of Freedom to benefit Amnesty International. This time around he is helping out his fallen brother, Danny Federici, who lost his battle with melanoma in April. All the proceeds from the sale of Magic Tour Highlights go to the Danny Federici Melanoma Fund.

This quick peek into the Magic tour is great. Alejandro Escovedo joined the band on stage in Houston for “Always A Friend,” the first track off his new album Real Animal. I was at the show, and I remember Alejandro being way off on the first verse, so needless to say, he is pretty far down in the mix on this version, but it rocks from start to finish.

“The Ghost of Tom Joad” is a blistering version with Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine. His solo is something you have never heard on a Springsteen record, and on the accompanying video, Springsteen and Steve Van Zandt look in awe of this guy’s talent.

Roger McGuinn from The Byrds hops on stage for “Turn, Turn, Turn.” McGuinn’s voice sounds very thin against the freight train that is the E Street Band, but Springsteen does a great job on the backing vocals and when he takes his turn on lead, and it more than makes up for McGuinn’s shortcomings.

The collection wraps up with “4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)” featuring Danny Federici’s last performance with the band in Indianapolis.  It’s a touching audio and video performance because you can tell that everyone knows that this will be the last time they will be playing together.

The collection sells for $7.99. It includes all four songs and videos. We are not going to offer any freebies today. Go buy it and help out the Danny Federici Melanoma Fund.

Backstreets Magazine

Bruce Springsteen Official Website

(More Than) 30 Years Out: Night Of The Hurricane, 1976

 

I hate to advocate drugs or alcohol at a rock concert for everyone, but they’ve always worked for me.  Perhaps one thing more dangerous than paraphrasing the late, great Hunter S. Thompson is getting trashed before you go to a rock concert.

That’s the disclaimer for this concert memory and cautionary tale, going way back to January 1976 when Bob Dylan brought his Rolling Thunder Revue to the Houston Astrodome for “The Night of the Hurricane II.”  I mean: I know I went, I remember some of it, but everything else is a bit hazy.  One thing I’m sure of is that my concert companion that night was beer – a lot of it.