#Allmusic Guide

[kiki-de-la-petite-flaque]

Rockabilly bombshell Sparkle Moore was born Barbara Morgan in Omaha in 1939. The quintessential bad girl, she dressed in leather (and often in men's clothes), with her short blonde hair greased back in an Elvis Presley-styled pompadour. Dubbed "Sparkle" in honour of a supporting character in the "Dick Tracy" comic strip, she signed to the Cincinnati-based Fraternity label to issue her debut single, the hiccupping "Rock-a-Bop," in late 1956, and though still just 17 years old she toured the US in support of the record, even opening for Gene Vincent at the peak of his fame. (A planned appearance on radio's Grand Ol' Opry was cancelled due to a bout with laryngitis, however.) The sultry yet sinister "Killer" followed in 1957, but soon after Moore learned she was pregnant and abruptly quit performing to focus on raising a family. No subsequent recordings are known to exist, although an unreleased Fraternity ballad called "Flower of My Heart" subsequently appeared on several compilations, most notable among them 2004's Good Girls Gone Bad: Weird, Wild & Wanted, the first to assemble her complete recorded output in one disc (including a handful of alternate takes).

From Allmusic Guide

[allmusic]

AllMusic Staff Pick: Guided by Voices The Best of Guided by Voices: Human Amusements at Hourly Rates

One of the key qualities of Dayton lofi rock legends Guided by Voices is their prolific output. From the start, they'd release new material so quickly that their self-editing process seemed almost non-existent. As a result, records were spotty and the ratio of duds to gems was usually pretty balanced. This 2003 greatest hits collection solves that problem with 32 of the band's best, catchiest, and most perfectly realized compact pop songs up until that point. It's a nearly flawless picture of what made the band so magical, with none of the filler that could bog their albums down.

- Fred Thomas

[radiomax]

Wednesday 1/25/23 6pm ET: Feature LP: Guides By Voices - La La Land (2023)

LA LA LAND Review by Fred Thomas CTSY AllMusic, Released January 20, 2023 Not many rock bands are still exploring new ideas after their 30th album, but Guided by Voices are not like many other bands. Though the lineup of GbV present on 2022’s prog rock-meets-power pop outing Tremblers and Goggles by Rank had only been together since 2017, the album was their 13th release in that short time, with…

[bitter69uk]

“Rockabilly bombshell Sparkle Moore was born Barbara Morgan in Omaha in 1939. The quintessential bad girl, she dressed in leather (and often in men's clothes), with her short blonde hair greased back in an Elvis Presley-styled pompadour. Dubbed "Sparkle" in honour of a supporting character in the Dick Tracy comic strip, she signed to the Cincinnati-based Fraternity label to issue her debut single, the hiccupping "Rock-a-Bop," in late 1956, and though still just 17 years old she toured the US in support of the record, even opening for Gene Vincent at the peak of his fame. (A planned appearance on radio's Grand Ol' Opry was cancelled due to a bout with laryngitis, however.) The sultry yet sinister "Killer" followed in 1957, but soon after Moore learned she was pregnant and abruptly quit performing to focus on raising a family. No subsequent recordings are known to exist, although an unreleased Fraternity ballad called "Flower of My Heart" subsequently appeared on several compilations, most notable among them 2004's Good Girls Gone Bad: Weird, Wild & Wanted, the first to assemble her complete recorded output in one disc (including a handful of alternate takes).”

/ From Allmusic Guide /

Happy 85th birthday to enigmatic platinum blonde rockabilly icon - and perennial Lobotomy Room favourite - Sparkle Moore (born 6 November 1939)! Now sing along with me: “You should be labelled with a skull and crossbones / You're a jinx to my soul, oh yeah …”

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"COLD. BITTER. BLEAK. DRUGGY. GLOOMY. INTENSE. MENACING. OMINOUS. VISCERAL. WINTRY. "VOL. 4.""

PIC(S) INFO: Spotlight on back & front sleeve cover art to the Warner Bros. pressing of "Black Sabbath Vol. 4," the fourth studio album by English heavy metal band BLACK SABBATH, released in September 1972.

MINI-OVERVIEW: "It’s oppressive in Sabbath-land, but also comforting. Like being wrestled by an overweight, somewhat dim giant who really wants you to have a good time – as long as you don’t mind a few bruises or perhaps a couple of broken bones. At the end you might well find that the thumping has demolished your blues with the cathartic cudgel of heavy rock.

At the time, Tom Clark in had this to say in "Rolling Stone" (December 7th, 1972;

"Molten rocks hurtling across space imitating the origin of the universe, you dig? Ah, lay those chord slabs on my grave… whew. The Sabs are genius."

For those of an adjectival bent, here are the ‘Album Moods’ associated with "Black Sabbath Vol 4" by the Allmusic Guide:

Cold. Angry. Bitter. Bleak. Druggy. Gloomy. Hostile. Intense. Malevolent. Menacing. Ominous. Paranoid. Sombre. Visceral. Wintry."

-- VINYL CONNECTION, "Hot Sabbath," published August 7, 2015

Source: https://vinylconnection.com.au/2015/08/07/cathartic-cudgel.

[projazznet]

Paul Bley – Footloose!

Footloose! is an album led by jazz pianist Paul Bley featuring tracks recorded in 1962 & 1963 and released on the Savoy label.

Allmusic described it as “one of Bley’s most enjoyable albums”. Rough Guide author Ian Carr calls the album “classic and highly influential” stating that the “quiet, focused intensity persists throughout.” Fellow pianist Keith Jarrett said he listened to the album “thousands of times.”

Paul Bley – piano Steve Swallow – bass Pete LaRoca – drums

[innervoiceart]

INXS - Original Sin (Official Music Video) - 1983

"Original Sin", originally titled "Brand New Day", is the first single from "The Swing" album. This was the band's first #1 Single in Australia. During 1984, it was #1 in Australia (for two weeks in January) as well as in Argentina and France.

‘Original Sin' is one of INXS' most enduring hits. It was their first Australian number one and helped them make inroads into markets around the world they would soon dominate.

The legendary Daryl Hall appears on the song's chorus, though Hall has since said he has no idea why.

“Nile Rodgers is a friend of mine. He was working on the record and he asked me to come down to the studio because they wanted me to sing on it for some reason,” he told Donnie Sutherland on Sounds in 1984. “I don't know why, they're good singers. They didn't need me. But I did it anyway.”

What the artist said:

“INXS just about lost their minds when they saw that Nile Rodgers was backstage at one of their shows in Canada. The band were fans of Chic and his productions and had tried to get the word out that they were keen to work with him on their next album.

“We gave him a copy of the ‘Original Sin' demo, and the next minute we found ourselves rehearsing in Florida, then going into The Power Station in New York City, literally just after David Bowie and his band had left the studio,” Andrew Farriss told FasterLouder in 2014.

“We walked straight in and the best part was the engineer who had worked on a lot of those albums with Nile, Jason Casaro, was there too.

“When I listen to ‘Original Sin' and compare it to other recordings, geez that sounds good. At the time there was this cutting edge of people who were really good at what they were doing, and two of them were sitting in that room.”

What Nile Rodgers said:

Rodgers not only affected the music, but he had a big say in the lyrics for the song's iconic chorus too.

“The original lyrics were, 'Dream on white boy, dream on white girl,' Rodgers told AdelaideNow in 2012. “I said, 'Why not make it 'black boy, white girl?' I come from an inter-racial couple. Psychologically that makes it a bigger statement.'

“Even when I rang up Daryl Hall from Hall and Oates to sing on it, his manager thought it was too controversial. I think the record would have been bigger had I not talked them into changing the lyrics.”

What the press said:

In a glowing review of the song for AllMusic, Ned Raggett particularly outlined the influence of Rodgers' production as a high point of the record.

“It's the monstrous groove and punch of the song that counts first and foremost,” he wrote. “With its stuttering drum breaks, the dark chime of the lead synth line matched by droning guitar, Kirk Pengilly's brisk sax, and the relentless, straight-up rhythm driving everything along.”

https://www.abc.net.au/listen/doublej/music-reads/features/nile-rodgers-beginner-s-guide/102675826?sf269838049=1&fbclid=IwAR0kRdgTHVUlzcLlRpD5cSpZNcuOvr-gOGOluaH495gl3T7aHSRMVI-rNC0

[lboogie1906]

Antonio Hardy (September 10, 1968) known by his stage name Big Daddy Kane, is a rapper who began his career in 1986 as a member of the Juice Crew. He is regarded as one of the most influential and skilled MCs in hip-hop. Rolling Stone ranked his song “Ain’t No Half-Steppin’” #25 on its list of The 50 Greatest Hip-Hop Songs of All Time, calling him “a master wordsmith of rap’s late-golden age and a huge influence on a generation of MCs”.

He is regarded as one of the most influential and skilled golden-age rappers. MTV put him at #7 in their “Greatest MCs of All Time” list. He is placed at #4 in the book There’s a God on the Mic: The True 50 Greatest MCs. About.com ranked him #3 on its list of the “Top 50 MCs of Our Time” and RZA listed him as one of his “Top 5 best MCs”. In 2012, The Source ranked him #8 on their list of the “Top 50 Lyricists of All Time”. AllMusic says “his best material ranks among the finest hip-hop of its era, and his sex-drenched persona was enormously influential on countless future would-be players”, and describes him as “an enormously talented battle MC”, “one of rap’s major talents”, refers to his “near-peerless technique” and “first-rate technique and rhyming skills”, and says he “had the sheer verbal facility and razor-clean dexterity to ambush any MC and exhilarate anyone who witnessed or heard him perform.

His first two albums are considered hip-hop classics and Rolling Stone says, “he has received consistent critical kudos”. In the book Rap-Up: The Ultimate Guide to Hip-Hop and R&B, Cameron and Devin Lazerine say he is “widely seen as one of the best lyricists of his time and even today regularly gets name-checked by younger dudes”, and music journalist Peter Shapiro says he is “perhaps the most complete MC ever”.

He debuted in Posse and appeared in The Meteor Man. He posed for Playgirl and Madonna’s book Sex.

He is married to Shawnette Hardy and has two children. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[vmonteiro23a]

UNDER THE RADAR: New Album - Guided By Voices – "Strut of Kings", released on June 28, 2024.

UNDER THE RADAR: New Album – Guided By Voices – “Strut of Kings”, released on June 28, 2024. “Holy crap this is Guided by Voices’ 40th album, depending on who is counting, and their hot streak continues”. brooklyn vegan “Robert Pollard indulges his love of prog rock and makes it exciting as his band continues their streak of top-notch LPs.” allmusic

[itwas50yearsagotoday]

1/17/74:  It was 50 years ago today, January 17th, 1974, Steve Miller Band’s ‘The Joker’ would hit #1 on the U.S. Billboard pop charts.  This entry isn’t much about Steve Miller, albeit the song is pretty famous as it was noted in an early Simpsons episode and has been a Classic Rock staple for decades; further, it would mark the beginning of Miller’s comeback in the later 1970s with the chock-full-o-hits record albums Fly Like an Eagle and Book of Dreams.  Really, I want to talk about the song as it fits within my own personal universe.  I am an only child, and can be very self-obsessed, especially when it comes to time when I’ve been alive and time when I was not… someday I won’t be alive so this distinction won’t matter as much then, but it matters now, to me at least.  Anyway, back in the early 1990s I got the Billboard Top 40 book of all charted songs going back to 1955, compiled by the godfather of this shit Joel Whitburn… I think I’ve gotten either one or two more editions since then… Whitburn passed away in 2022, so there hasn’t been a new printing since 2012.  The book, which has listings for every Billboard Top 40 hit, also has some cool appendices, one of which tracks the #1 song every week, throughout the decades.  So sometime in the early ‘90s I discovered that ‘The Joker’, which I of course had known from CR radio, was the #1 song during the week when I was born.  Somehow that triggered a lot of personal interest in reading about, listening to, collecting, comparing, defining, and grading, modern Pop/Rock music since the mid-1950s.  Also, I used to karaoke this song, when I did that kind of thing, but those days of falling down drunk are probably over for me now that I’m 50… FIFTY!!  Gawd that sounds old… I can start getting senior discounts at chain restaurants in like five years, get an AARP subscription, and take out IRA money in 9 ½ years, penalty-free… noooooo!!!  It’s fine really, I don’t feel old… I try to exercise several times per week… YouTube and Spotify are great for that.  I’ve got three awesome children, an awesome girlfriend, great friendships, along with access to endless music, something I could not have dreamed of when I first picked up that Billboard book (along with Rolling Stone and AllMusic record guides… flawed but early good reads).  Some people call me Maurice… whoooo-whooooooo!!

[matthigle]

Matt Higle - A Seasoned Spiritual Guide | Allmusic

30+ years in ministry define Matt Higle. As an Elvis Tribute Artist, he adds a musical touch to his spiritual journey.

[jedivoodoochile]

(46 YEARS AGO) August 29, 1977 - Iggy Pop: Lust for Life is released.

# All Things Music Plus+ 5/5

# Allmusic 5/5

# Rolling Stone (see original review below)

Lust for Life is the second solo album by Iggy Pop, released on August 29, 1977. It reached #120 on the Billboard Top 200 LP's chart and #28 on the UK Albums chart.

Iggy and Bowie at the height of their respective powers presented a formidable artistic engine, and Lust For Life sees them working up a full head of steam. Two songs will need little introduction - 'Lust For Life' and 'The Passenger' are as intrinsic to the tapestry of 70s rock music as sundry Beatles efforts were to the previous decade (their influence on 90s film soundtracks is a testament to their durability). Those monolithic jukebox favorites aside, listeners may also find space in their hearts for the swaggering 'Neighbourhood Threat' (shades of the Stooges, without the musical clatter) and the disquieting 'Turn Blue', written from the viewpoint of an overdosing junkie.

The Lust for Life sessions took place soon after the completion of a concert tour in support of The Idiot album, the tour ending on 16 April 1977. Pop has stated, "David and I had determined that we would record that album very quickly, which we wrote, recorded, and mixed in eight days, and because we had done it so quickly, we had a lot of money left over from the advance, which we split."

The singer slept little during its making, commenting "See, Bowie's a hell of a fast guy... I realized I had to be quicker than him, otherwise whose album was it gonna be?" Pop's spontaneous lyrical method inspired Bowie to improvise his own words on his next project, "Heroes".

Bowie, Pop, and engineer Colin Thurston produced Lust for Life under the pseudonym "Bewlay Bros." (name via the final track on Bowie’s Hunky Dory). The recording was made at Hansa Studio by the Wall in Berlin and featured Ricky Gardiner and Carlos Alomar on guitars with Hunt and Tony Sales on drums and bass, respectively. With Bowie on keyboards and backing vocals, the team included three-quarters of the future Tin Machine line-up; the Sales brothers’ "gale-force" contribution to this album led Bowie to invite them to join his new band twelve years later ("Check out Lust For Life," he told guitarist Reeves Gabrels, "I’ve found the rhythm section!").

__________

ORIGINAL ROLLING STONE REVIEW

Iggy Pop's second comeback album leaves one with ambivalent feelings: glad that Iggy is alive, apparently well, writing, singing and performing again, but upset because his new stance is so utterly unchallenging and cautious. Taken purely on its own terms, Lust for Life is a successful album. Side one is quite good, starting with the title cut, which rocks with a Sandy Nelson-like drum style while Iggy delivers his survivor message to the masses, and continuing to the closing track, "Tonight," easily the most straightforward pop song Iggy has written. Side two is considerably weaker, with a pair of overdrawn ballads, an infectious throwaway and one bona fide winner, the ominous "Neighborhood Threat."

Were this just another album by just another artist, that might be the end of it, but Iggy Pop has never been just another entertainer. As rock's truest bad boy, Iggy led the Stooges with a vision of frustrated, depressed and angry young adult life that will probably never be seen (or dared) again. That he has come back from the edge relatively intact is almost a miracle. With David Bowie as producer and guide, he is actually realizing a career for the first time. Like Lou Reed, Iggy is most likely headed on a course just left of center, bizarre enough to attract those inclined toward something different but safe enough not to scare them away.

It is questionable, though, whether Iggy has anything important left to say. To make any art in the future, he would probably have to start self-destructing, and neither he nor any of us really want to see him crawling through the broken glass again. Here comes success, Iggy, and you deserve it more than just about any perform I've ever seen or heard. I just wish there were some way that your music could be important and your life happy at the same time.

~ Billy Altman (January 12, 1978)

TRACKS:

All lyrics written by Iggy Pop except "Turn Blue" by Pop and Walter Lacey.

Side one

"Lust for Life" – 5:13 (David Bowie)

"Sixteen" – 2:26 (Pop)

"Some Weird Sin" – 3:42 (Bowie)

"The Passenger" – 4:44 (Ricky Gardiner)

"Tonight" – 3:39 (Bowie)

Side two

"Success" – 4:25 (Bowie, Gardiner)

"Turn Blue" – 6:56 (Bowie, Warren Peace)

"Neighborhood Threat" – 3:25 (Bowie, Gardiner)

"Fall in Love with Me" – 6:30 (Bowie, Hunt Sales, Tony Sales)

[allmusic]

AllMusic Staff Pick: The Byrds There Is a Season

If the Byrds weren't the best American rock group of the 1960s, they were at least in the Top Five, and if you want to chart their progress from folkies dipping their toes into rock & roll to seasoned survivors of pre-Americana country rock, There Is A Season is an excellent beginner's guide. All the hits, rare demos and outtakes, fine live material, and even a DVD of vintage television appearances – this has it all.

- Mark Deming

[bitter69uk]

“Rockabilly bombshell Sparkle Moore was born Barbara Morgan in Omaha in 1939. The quintessential bad girl, she dressed in leather (and often in men's clothes), with her short blonde hair greased back in an Elvis Presley-styled pompadour. Dubbed "Sparkle" in honour of a supporting character in the Dick Tracy comic strip, she signed to the Cincinnati-based Fraternity label to issue her debut single, the hiccupping "Rock-a-Bop," in late 1956, and though still just 17 years old she toured the US in support of the record, even opening for Gene Vincent at the peak of his fame. (A planned appearance on radio's Grand Ol' Opry was cancelled due to a bout with laryngitis, however.) The sultry yet sinister "Killer" followed in 1957, but soon after Moore learned she was pregnant and abruptly quit performing to focus on raising a family. No subsequent recordings are known to exist, although an unreleased Fraternity ballad called "Flower of My Heart" subsequently appeared on several compilations, most notable among them 2004's Good Girls Gone Bad: Weird, Wild & Wanted, the first to assemble her complete recorded output in one disc (including a handful of alternate takes).”

/ From Allmusic Guide /

Happy 84th birthday to enigmatic platinum blonde rockabilly icon - and perennial Lobotomy Room favourite - Sparkle Moore (born 6 November 1939)! Now sing along with me: “You should be labelled with a skull and a-crossbones / You're a jinx to my soul, oh yeah …”

[cyarskj1899]

Black Music Sunday: Soul music doesn't always need a singer. Enjoy these hit R&B instrumentals

I was listening to a rhythm and blues playlist the other day and talking with a friend while doing so. We got into a discussion of our favorite “soul” artists. While bickering about it, an instrumental popped up—and it hit me that both of us were talking about singers only. We had ignored some great tunes where there was nary a vocalist to be found.

This would not have happened had we been talking about jazz; when we listen to John Coltrane or Miles Davis, we don’t automatically think of lyrics and vocals no matter how lyrical the instrumentation is.

Black Music Sunday is a weekly series highlighting all things Black music. With over 140 stories (and counting) covering performers, genres, history, and more, each featuring its own vibrant soundtrack, I hope you’ll find some familiar tunes and perhaps an introduction to something new.

I decided to jump into my audio time machine and go back and listen to some R&B instrumentals that made it onto the Billboard charts in the late ‘50s and through the ‘60s. As always, this story is not going to cover all of them, nor is it going to go back to whatever was the first one. The definition of what is actually R&B is oft-debated—a discussion covering early race records, some blues, and some jazz. So here’s a disclaimer: I’m just going to serve up instrumental hits I remember. 

The first tune that popped into my head was one that I heard my older cousins in Philly play and dance to. It was number one on the Billboard R&B charts in November 1958.  “Topsy Part Two” by Cozy Cole, who, if you remember him, had roots embedded firmly in jazz—roots that DJ and music historian arwulf arwulf details in his biography of Cole at AllMusic. 

Give a listen to his chart-topping drum solo.

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/dBotlTI4BUk?start=110

Take a look at “Topsy” being celebrated and danced to on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand(the cameras always manage to not focus on the few Black kids who were dancing there, but that’s a story for another day).

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/wSSM-1JTVbU?start=110

The next group and tune on my list is Booker T. and the MG’s’ “Green Onions.” Timothy Kevin Perry wrote the group’s bio at Musician Guide.

As YouTuber SmurfStools Oldies Music Time Machine notes beneath this live performance of “Green Onions”:

This performance is from April 1967, as part of the Stax/Volt Revue in Norway.

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/dO0KLDxh7RA

Related:  Black Music Sunday: Remembering when there were 'Stax' of soul musicians in Memphis

Saxophonist “King” Curtis was born Curtis Ousley in February 1934, in Fort Worth. He was an essential backup musician for many years and finally made a breakthrough and found commercial success in the ‘60s before being tragically stabbed to death in front of his New York City brownstone in August 1971. As Ed Decker at Musician’s Guide wrote:

Here’s “Soul Serenade.” 

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/DyGqOJUc-UI

That was so nice, I gotta play it twice!  Here’s Curtis blowing “Soul Serenade,” from his 1971 album “Live at Filmore West.’ 

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/oQlq6BqIP-o

Here’s a live performance of King Curtis & The Kingpins performing “Memphis Soul Stew.” If you can sit still watching it, you got a “hole in yo’ soul.”  

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/0Loy55z4GpA

The next 1960s piece was featured here in September 2022, in “Black Music Sunday: Ramsey Lewis made all of us part of 'the in crowd,'” on the occasion of Ramsey Lewis joining the ancestors last year.  

As I wrote then, about the Ramsey Lewis Trio’s big hit:

Here’s a live version from 1965:

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/sB-DndAgbuE

The next instrumentalist, Jimmy Castor had a birthday this week; Jan. 23, 1940; he passed just a week before his 72nd birthday, on Jan. 16, 2012.

Douglas Martin wrote Castor’s obituary for The New York Times:

Castor sang, played saxophone, bongos, and other percussion instruments, in addition to composing and writing—however other than the “shout-out” to Leroy that his momma is calling him, the hit “Hey Leroy, Your Mama’s Calling’ You” is an instrumental.

Here he is live on American Bandstand in 1967, moving from instrument to instrument.

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/TdbN2rgBORA

The last tune for our story today is “Soulful Strut,” by Young-Holt Unlimited, which started out as a song called “Am I the Same Girl?” Elder Young and Isaac Holt began as the other two parts of The Ramsey Lewis Trio, as detailed in Steve Krakow’s feature for the Chicago Readeron Young and Holt, which notes that “Young-Holt Unlimited were more than Ramsey Lewis’s rhythm section.”  

In 1968, Young-Holt Unlimited released the album Soulful Strut. The title tune, which had started out as “Am I the Same Girl?” with Barbara Acklin singing vocals, saw her vocals wiped off and was renamed “Soulful Strut.”

As Reader’s Krakow notes, “The grooving single went gold in less than three months, selling more than 1 million copies, and climbed to number three on the Hot 100.”

applewebdata://www.youtube.com/embed/Ygv4RMGwqMs

Strut on with me into the comments for even more soulful instrumentals—and please post your favorites.

Sent from my iPhone

[projazznet]

Michel Petrucciani -100 Hearts

100 Hearts is a solo piano album by Michel Petrucciani. It was recorded in 1983 and released by George Wein Collection before being reissued by Blue Note Records. The AllMusic reviewer concluded that it was “A very impressive outing.” The Penguin Guide to Jazz commented that the album “established Petrucciani as one of the great romantic virtuosos in the jazz of his time”.