Cultural Detritus, Reviews, and Commentary
George Lewis – The George Lewis Solo Trombone Album Sackville Recordings 3012 (1977)
Great stuff. While solo horn albums tend toward the dour to the point of turning listeners away — For Alto the classic example — this one is refreshingly joyous and even humorous at times. A remarkable debut, and yet another overlooked treasure from the Sackville Recordings catalog.
Link to a review by Matthijs Krul of Jonathan Sperber‘s book Karl Marx: A Nineteenth Century Life (2013):
J.B. Lenoir – The Parrot Sessions: Expanded Edition V.I. Music 545 450 598-2 (2003 [1989])
A bit like the early electric blues of T-Bone Walker, but more loose, more raw, with an edginess more like Elmore James. It’s understandable that Jimi Hendrix would cite Lenoir as an influence. “Mama Talk to Your Daughter” is a classic, complete with an anti-guitar-hero one-chord solo, and “Eisenhower Blues” marked the emergence of his political side as a songwriter — something that would factor more heavily on his later albums.
John Lennon – Rock ‘n’ Roll Apple SK-3419 (1975)
On paper, this didn’t look promising. Covers of 1950s rock ‘n roll songs are generally hard to pull off in more modern settings, and all-covers albums can be the product of laziness. But John Lennon does mange to pull it off fairly consistently for Rock ‘n’ Roll. The main fault of the album seems to be Lennon’s vocals. His voice — the urban tone and accent — isn’t particularly suited to rockabilly and soul, both of which combined heavy rural influences that Lennon didn’t inherently possess. And he doesn’t exactly go the extra mile to overcome that fact. But the results are good enough.
Link to a chart from Shadowstats detailing current unemployment in the United States:
“Alternate Unemployment Charts” (at this writing, 23%, as compared to the widely-reported 5.5% “official” number)
Bonus link: “Response to BLS Article on CPI Misconceptions”
Link to an article by Susan Milligan:
Bonus links: “State Department Announces New ‘Long-standing’ Policy Against Backing Coups” and Killing Hope and “Administration Sets Record for Withholding Government Files” and “Oil Imperialism and Monetary Policy” and “Fear and Loathing 40 Years Later” and “When Our Monsters Speak, TV Journalists go Deaf”
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin III Atlantic SD 7201 (1970)
“Hammer of the go-ods!” With lyrics like that, you know that Zeppelin had reached the peak of silliness. As usual, they have a few good and heavy riffs, but this seems so much like self-parody that it’s hard to take seriously. Then again, it’s hard to believe this was meant to be taken seriously.
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin II Atlantic SD 8236 (1969)
The deal with Led Zeppelin was that they were a bunch of grown men living the dreams of a whole lotta 15-year-old boys. Their music has its merits I guess, but it’s also dreadfully boring when you get down to it. I’d take Black Sabbath over this any day. Still, if you must have Zeppelin, this is one of their better full-length albums.
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin Atlantic SD 8216 (1969)
Gotta agree with finulanu: “‘Good Times Bad Times’ should have been the blueprint for everything this band went on to do.” From that nice opening blast that follows on the legacy of The Yardbirds, things devolve pretty quickly into varying degrees of lameness. Well, allow me to step back for a moment. This might not seem lame at’all if you’ve never been exposed to decent blues before. Maybe you’ve never heard Otis Rush rip through “I Can’t Quit You Baby.” So, to be fair, these are merely wrote transpositions of awesome roots music into faddish pap to assuage the libidos of young boys/men. And damn, the next time I hear that John Bonham is a great drummer — fuck, even a decent drummer — somebody’s gonna get punched in the face, many times, in rhythm.
Link to an article by Jeffrey St. Clair: