Goshdarnit! Myrtle, it's them All Pearls No Swines down here on our farm!

Kudos, if you recognized that it's a redneck farmer introducing our newest edition of All Pearls, No Swine. Why would a redneck farmer do such a thing you ask? Well, because he welcomes you to the very first themed edition of All Pearls, No Swine. Quick pop quiz: Do you like a.) country music b.) country rock c.) AOR with country influences .) all of the above or e.) none of the above? 

If your answer is anything but e.), you're in luck, as this edition of All Pearls, No Swine might be for you! (If, however, you voted e.), sorry buddy, better luck next time, see ya in a bit!). And that is because All Pearls No Swine Vol. 19 is an all-country and adjacent genre edition of our series. This came about out of necessity. I had a couple of country tracks that I tried to place on previous editions of APNS, but they never seemed to quite fit. A trad country song like Herb Pedersen's "Easy Ride" is a very fine piece of work, but it never jelled with the other tracks of previous 80s-themed editions of the series, so consequently it got kicked out of the line-up several times. 

"Myrtle, some of them there country songs are quite cromulent..."

So I realized that the problem was the environment, but in a backwards way. Instead of trying to fit in this real country stuff with the rock, pop and folk sound of the other tracks, maybe I should create a more friendly environment for tracks like this by surrounding them with all like-minded tracks? So I did. It just so happened that at the very same time I stumbled upon a batch of rarities and forgotten songs that fit the bill. Some tweaking here, some tweaking there, and voilà - the "howdy y'all" very first all-country edition of All Pearls, No Swine. 

Sideman deluxe Pedersen is probably one of the bigger names around here, though the biggest is probably John Denver. "Dance Little Jean" is of course known as a hit for the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, but at the time he wrote it, Jimmy Ibbotson wasn't part of what was then known as the Dirt Band. When he had written "Dance Little Jean" he proudly presented it to his estranged wife, hoping it might move her to take him back. Her reaction? She assured him it would be a hit, which means he could finally make his child support payments! Ouch! So, Ibbotson's old and new band got the hit, but it could have been Denver, whose attractive version is augmented by Irish tin whistle.

"We want YOU...to be the main ingredient of our country stew. Nope, we're not freaky-lookin' at all, no sir." 

The previously featured Burrito Brothers put in an appearance, and so does Dan Fogelberg with the blink-and-you'll-miss-it opener. And then it's off to the usual group of unknown or little-remembered folks. Some would be more known for other things than their musical accomplihments. Lloyd Maines, of The Maines Brothers, whose sped-up version of Terry Allen's immortal "Amarillo Highway" is my favorite version of that song, is the father of future Dixie Chick Natalie. The group is better than the above image would suggest...

If nothing else, All Pearls No Swine Vol. 19 shows the elasticity of the genre. Canuck Wray Ellis with "Where's That Woman" is pure mainstream, country verging on country pop whereas Whitewater with "Daughter of the Devil" is essentially harder edged Southern rock with a dash of country in it. Jack Alves' "Indian Friend" is only slide guitar, whereas Jim Robertson's "Whitehorse" has some slight psych elements to it. Cimarron Creek's "Ridin' For Revenge" is country rock, whereas Dakota's "The Captain And The Outlaw" is about as traditional as it gets. Lonestar Cattle Company's "Easy Driver" is country-influenced AOR rock that sounds for all the world like something Randy Meisner could have recorded in the early 80s. Speaking of Mr. Meisner: He is present here as part of the miniature supergroup Black Tie with Jimmy Griffin and Billy Swan. 

Sometimes a white horse is...just a white horse

But enough with the chit chat. If you have any love for the genre, I'm sure you'll find a thing or two to like here. And if you don't, One Buck Records will be back with some good old-fashioned rock'n'roll...probably...

Old Folks' Boogie? Everyone boogies to Lowell George & Little Feat

If you've been around here for a little while you'll know that the One Buck Guy loves nothing more than launching new series, so here we go again! Almost all of the tribute albums I posted so far have been either slimmed down editions of longer sets or ones where I simply changed the sequencing for a better listening experience. The Fleetwood Mac one was arguably the first entry in my homebrewed tribute albums, but hey, here's the official premiere of We've Got You Covered, a series of cover albums paying tribute to an artist or band. 

When I say homebrewed I'll be honest and say that some work has been done for this one, the first volume of what looks like it'll be three volumes dedicated to Lowell George and his merry men. The bulk of the tracks come from a playlist Farq shared over on his island (with a Farq-approved bit rate), but it came off as exactly that: More like a playlist on a computer than a music album, with several tracks having artists follow themselves in rapid succession, something I tend to avoid, and having the same songs repeated right after each other, another big no-no for me. So, there was a bunch of material there, but I felt it could be put into better shape. (Sorry, Jonder, just tagging the tracks right before publication and it looks like this is an old comp of yours!) Over the course of these discs I also added a bunch of additional tracks from various sources, including one or to you might not know or have. And I hope you're charmed by rather than ashamed for the admittedly DIY-looking album cover...

Impeccable look, impeccable song choices...

It's probably not necessary for you, dear experienced music blog reader, to talk about the greatness of George or peak Feat, so let's have a quick look at the line-up of this first volume, shall we? One part of contributors are Lowell George's friends and running mates like Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Nicolette Larson or Linda Ronstadt. There is of course also George's old compadre Robert Palmer, who not only had the good taste but also the skills to cover Little Feat several times and always come up with winners. Or label mate Claudia Lennear who launched her solo career (after years of background singing, both in The Ikettes and on a ton of classic songs, with a cover of "Two Trains", only to see it stall out completely after that single and one album. 

Country fans will find Kathy Boguss and The Golden Palominos and their lovely take on the eternally underrated "Brides Of Jesus". Americana fans will no doubt cherish the dream duo of Kelly Willis and Jay Farrar. Speaking of dream duos: How 'bout Susannah Hoffs and Matthew Sweet covering "Willin'". Yup, very good. 

And then there's the group of, well, miscellaneous artists like Cher, Whishbone Ash, dutch actress and singer Ricky Koole , John Sebastian, Dan McCafferty and Sandy Denny. Really, we got a bit of everything for everyone on this. Plus, obviously, some really awesome tunes courtesy of Mr. George. What's there not to like? 

Bruce goes further on...with or without you

So, here's the reworked Rising, part two, with all the non-9/11 songs making up Further On. With no particular theme binding these songs together, this is really nothing more (nor nothing less) than a good old fashioned rock album. Considering that, Human Touch apart, almost all albums of Bruce had some sort of concept or conceptual idea behind them, Further On would have come off as a little lightweight, a bit of a distraction. Which, after the heavy work of the thematic and emotional songs on The Rising might have been just what people would have needed, had he put out this record a couple of weeks after a single-album The Rising. 

I already talked a bunch about the songs yesterday, so I'll keep it short today: The fab "Mary's Place" is the perfect album opener to get you in the spirit of things, while "Further On (Up The Road)" with its promise of things to come seems like the perfect album closer. On the original Rising, a track like "Further On (Up The Road)" just came off as an ordinary rock song, with more space around it here, it feels like more. "Lonesome Day", which quickly became a concert favorite, is the prefect kick-ass opener for what would be side two, while the moody "The Fuse" seemed to be the perfect closer of side one. 

Any which way, in Bruce's discography the songs that make up Further On, are minor works, but there is some fun to be had with them, and hopefully more so in this newly assembled version. And if Bruce isn't your jam, in my or any other versions, some other fun stuff will soon come your way, further on (up the road)...

 

When there's too much of a good thing... (...out of a very bad thing)

I liked Bruce's The Rising when it came out in 2002. It was also the first new Springsteen album I bought, after having built my collection of his catalogue. But that's not necessarily why I liked it. I thought the songs that were inspired by the terror attacks of September 2001 were strong, and even the ones that only vaguely alluded to it (or maybe didn't) like "Nothing Man" were strong. There was just one problem with the album, a rather big one, or maybe I should say a rather long one: The album is just too damn long! At almost 73 minutes it is by far the longest album the Boss ever cut, essentially the length of a vinyl double album. It was difficult to get through the album in one sitting, especially because I feel (and this is a very personal impression) that the album sags a bit in the middle, right after "Empty Sky". 

I am not a huge fan of Bruce's dabbling in world music, but it seemed unwise that the two tracks that do are sequenced one right after the other. "The Fuse" is an underrated tune that was at the time used well in Spike Lee's The 25th Hour, itself an underrated, almost forgotten movie. But here, in the middle of this very long album, I'd still skip it from time to time. One track I'd never skip is "Mary's Place", a fantastic throwback number that sounds like the E-Streeters had transported themselves back in time to the late Seventies. It's a calculated move for sure, a 'let's do one like in the old days', but it works like gangbusters. Still, right next to the sad, emotional 9/11 stuff, something wasn't quite right with it. 

Drunken, rambling hobo filmed for Youtube? Oh, no, it's just Bruce in a music video. Difficult to tell the difference sometimes...

In a way, it's understandable that Bruce mashed all this stuff together. He had all these songs written under the impression of the terror attacks, but he also wanted some upbeat stuff on the album, and these world music experiments, have something for the re-united E-Streeters to do etc. etc. So, for the Boss it made sense to to this album in a 'a bit of everything for everyone' style. But really, The Rising is truly two albums in one, and so my inofficial mission is to split them into two albums, which maybe would have been the best way to release this music. 

Let's start with the new The Rising (yes, I kept the title, don't mess with a good thing). This is Bruce's 9/11 album, so I gathered all the songs more or less openly about it from the original album. I mean, yes, "My City Of Ruins" was originally written about Springsteen's old hometown Freehold, but no one would associate that song after its The Rising appearance with that. So those were seven tracks, one short of an album. But there was of course High Hopes, Springsteen's odds-and-sods collection in 2014 which had one unreleased song from The Rising sessions, the ghostly "Down In The Hole" (with all his children in a choir appearance!). So that's eight tracks, for an album length of a little more than 39 minutes. Perfect length for a vinyl album. 

I programmed both 'sides' of the album in a mirror way: moody opener, up tempo anthem, slow song, uptempo-ish closing number. This assures, I think, enough variety in what is obviously thematically samey material. So, what can I tell ya? If you are one of the 'Bruce is a hack, egads' type, there is probably nothing I can say to get you to check out The Rising, either version, but if you aren't, it's probably been a good long while since you listened to this particular Springsteen album. So, maybe my version here gives you a good excuse to listen again...

So, be back tomorrow then for part two of this project, Further On. 

Fake It 'Till You Make It: Generation X and the eternal punk sellout question

When William Broad and his brood showed up as second generation punks in 1977, they immediately had a hard time justifying their bonafides. It didn't matter that frontman Broad a.k.a. Billy Idol had been part of the Bromley Contingent, the notorious group of Sex Pistols fans that also counted Siouxsie Sioux among them. The band was too photogenic, their punk rock was too mainstream-ish etc. etc. Of course, the naysayers saw all their prejudices confirmed when, after the end of the band, Billy Idol became an MTV idol, while partner in crime Tony James formed Sigue Sigue Sputnik. So, according to common wisdom, Idol, James and the rest of Generation X where fakers, who just used punk's moment to go ahead, then shamelessly pillaged the mainstream via garish make-up and music videos and the help of MTV when the opportunity presented itself. 

Now that the trench wars over who and what was or wasn't punk are long over, nevermind the bollocks, eh? Maybe we can just agree that Generation X was a pretty kick-ass rock band, punk or no punk. They had a bunch of cool songs and the attitude to sell them. That you can't take away from them. "Ready Steady Go" - perfect, energetic opener. "Your Generation" - lots of fun. "Dancing With Myself" - no wonder Idol reused this one to kickstart his solo career. "One Hundred Punks" - pop punk, the origins. And so on. True, songs like "Stars Look Down" and "Triumph" have more than a little pop in them and expansive comp closer "Paradise West" has nothing whatsoever to do with punk. But why the hell not. I ain't fighting no trench wars. "Andy Warhol" reveals another influence on the Gen X crew you wouldn't have bet. But hey, everybody likes Bowie, right?! 

My little Generation X compilation also makes room for things that don't usually end up on these types of comps. For example their attempt at an epic, "The Prime Of Kenny Silvers". Punk bands don't do seven minute epics, something not lost on Idol & company. So they basically cut the track in half, dutifully calling the two bits "Part 1" and "Part 2", not realizing maybe how silly that is and that multi-part tracks are also the domain of prog and art rockers. I deleted the useless break, so their not bad attempt at an epic (though whether it really needed to be seven minutes long I'll let you decide) is the single seven-minute track it was always meant to be. 

So, 20 kick-ass tracks from Generation X, nothing more, nothing less. And that is a promise you can count on. 

Let's go on a trip that you might not have been on before...

Also: Let's go on a trip that I normally don't go on. I am not some kind of expert on 60s garage rock which is what most of the music on today's One Buck Record is comprised of. Yeah, I tricked you a bit witth the artwork which screams psychedelia, didn't I? But I like to surprise my readership from time to time, hell, even surprise myself a little. I stumbled upon these tracks on this ol' French rock box set I had bought for little money, then never particularly listened to, because it wasn't that good. But with some careful editing...The first two discs were garage rock, which I boiled down to twenty highlights that make up The Trip. 

There is of course the 'title song' by gadfly/socialite/svengali/sham/record producer/about a thousand other things Kim Fowley. It's little,more than some of the hip jargon of the time thrown together in a talk sing-song, but it gives a pretty good idea of the pleasues you can find on this Trip. Not professionalism at every step, but a lot of enthusiasm, some musical chops and quite a bit of chutzpah to try to make their musical mark even without the money or skills that other, more famous acts would or could. 

The genre is mostly garage rock, but since that is a bit of a catch all term, there's quite a bit of variety here: some surf rock, some psych rock, some folk rock, some sunshine pop, some r&b-inspired mod rock. As said earlier, I'm no expert on the genre or any of the groups and artists here, so I let the insights - if there are any - come from you folks. Of the fine folks here, I am especially taken with Mouse'n'The Traps and their "Public Execution", the most shameless Bob Dylan/"Like A Rolling Stone" imitation I've ever heard. But also: one of the best! It's amazing how close they come to mimic The Zim. Mouse a.k.a. Ronny Weiss later showed up to lead country rock outfit Rio Grande. And "Like A Rolling Stone" also shows up, courtesy of The Creation. 

One other great thing about 60s garage bands are of course the names: The Primitives, The Hairy Ones, The Creeps, The Bad Roads, The Mourning Reign. I'm pretty sure that The Primitives were, uh, kind of primitive and The Hairy Ones were hairy. Speaking of: The Hairy Ones were kind of a fake garage band, a British studio project that imported their EP to France and Australia, and is mostly remembered for their guitar players: Jimmy Page and John McLaughlin! 

Anyhoo, to quote Mr. Fowley: "Summer time is here, kiddies, and it's time to take a trip...". Hope you enjoy the ride...

And then there were two...

There was an interesting vibe to the ex-Byrds' reaction to the failure of their reunion endeavors, whether it was the Byrds Reunion Album or the McGuinn-Clark-Hillman era. Roger McGuinn was ultra-defensive and constantly complained how it was all everyone else's fault. Chris Hillman quickly went to auto-derision, mocking and sometimes poo-poohing his own contributions (and sometimes, the others). And Gene Clark was always the one to take a measured point of view, admitting that things could have been done better, but that there were good things on those albums. 

I was thinking of also doing something with the McGuinn-Hillman album to finish off the era, but there are few alternatives to choose from and if stuff like McGuinn's b-side "Making Movies" are any indication, there isn't much better quality music to be had. Plus, the album isn't that bad, if slick, R&B-flavored L.A. rock is something that you like. The album has of course another 'McGuinn's master plan that didn't turn out as planned' legend attached, relegated to the dust pile of history like his century of American-music spanning concept album or his hippie musical Gene Tryp. According to him, he and Hillman had written twelve themed songs centered around the idea of entertainment, but Chris' brother-in-law and co-producer Jerry Wexler "said we had to go for hits and threw out most of the material." In a slightly later interview, McGuinn exagerrated for framatic, albeit unintended humorous effect when he talked about him and Hillman having written "hundreds of songs" but Wexler "didn't let us get any of them on there. He was trying for quote, unquote, 'hits', and we didn't get any".  

Oh boy, do we look natural and comfortable here. You can't even see the gun just outside the frame...

Which brings me back to the observations I made in the opening paragraph. McGuinn complained about not getting his idea of a concept album about entertainment, but if the three surviving songs of that concept are any indication, there isn't really much room for improvement. "Entertainment" is merely okay, "Making Movies" with McGuinn as a fey folkie is terrible to my mind and only "Turn Your Radio On" is pretty good. The hit rate isn't great, and considering that no other songs from McGuinn's famed song-cycle ever slipped out, as live tracks, outtakes or re-recordings, it's highy doubtful that all these songs were there in the first place, or that they were worth much of anything. 

Hillman might have ridiculed the sound and track selection of the album retrospectively ("You couldn't get any whiter guys than me or McGuinn to sing this r&b material"), but he actually acquits himself quite well on McGuinn-Hillman. Here's the secret to Hillman's status as both one of the best second bananas in rock'n'roll history and his various stylistic excursions: He has kind of a bland, if lovely, singing voice, which means it is not super memorable, but that also means it is quite malleable. Hillman can pretty much sing anything with that voice. Which means that him being recast as a rhythm'n'blues singer on McGuinn-Hillman isn't as akward as it sounds. As a matter of fact, he does a good job. And it's easy to forget, but he already dabbled in r&b material quite a bit on The Flying Burrito Brothers' live swan song Last Of The Red Hot Burritos. McGuinn is clearly less comfortable with this material, even though "Angel" and "Love Me Tonight" are pretty neat. 

This time it's Rog who's in pyjamas...

Looking back at the McGuinn-Clark-Hillman era, it seems pretty obvious that Hillman best understood the assignment. Even though he would more or less disavow the entire era and its music, the idea of writing commercial pop and rock songs suited him best, while McGuinn the ex-folkie and Clark, the still-and-ever folk singer songwriter struggled with the idea, sometimes mightily. 

As a bonus to the untouched McGuinn-Hillman album I have added "Making Movies" and a really nice radio appearance for CBS studios in New York in 1981, in which they perform as an acoustic duo, which means McGuinn is much more comfortable. Though ostensibly still supporting McGuinn-Hillman, they don't play a single song from the album, instead bringing out nice versions of a bunch of Byrds classics, City's fabulous "Let Me Down Easy" and two numbers from the first MCH album, as well as a poem adaptation, "America For Me" which is quite lovely. As ill-begotten as some of the MCH misadventures were, this concert is a nice way of saying goodbye to the era, with the two remaining ex-Byrds comfortably bringing up their old and recent past. 

Goin' Downtown: McGuinn, Clark and Hillman leave for the city

It's McGuinn-Clark Hillman week here at One Buck Records! Might as well get the whole shebang out of the way in the next days. And since I did a monstrous write-up for the first album, the next two will be way shorter, promised!

The McGuinn-Clark-Hillman (and then, briefly McGuinn-Hillman) era was of course considered a failure, but such blanket criticism and received wisdom doesn't tell the whole story. It is for example rarely acknowledged that the trio's second album City was actually a good album. Not a work of genius, not something to rival the Byrds' legacy, but a good mainstream/AOR rock album, with a number of discernible Byrds-ian features. For one thing, cGuinn's Rickenbacher was back! Bit since the first album was so royally botched artistically, something that we rectified here at One Buck Records, folks weren't necessarily willing to give the group a fair shake for the rest of their tenure, especially considering the controversy concerning Clark's limited participation, then sudden exit from the group. 

City is actually so good, that only some very mior surgey is needed. The one big issue of the album wasn't what was on the album, but rather what wasn't on it: While Gene Clark had co-dominated (with Hillman) the first album, he was now relegated to 'featuring'-status and a mere two songs, one of which, "Painted Fire", sounded terribly out of place with its odd Fats Domino-piano style and confused and thus confusing lyrics. "Painted Fire" still sticks out, but considering that the idea was to get more Gene Clark on here, not less, it had to stay. And I added "Little Mama", which eagle-eyed viewers have seen I left of my alternate version of the trio's first album. With its elaborate production it fits right in with the rest of City, even if the song's orchestration maybe doesn't a hundred percent. And of course, Geno's other song, "Won't Let You Down", is one of the finest of the era and a definite highlight of the album. 

But what really makes City a quality album is that everyone steps up their game: Hillman's rock songs have more bite and are more memorable than their sometimes feeble predecessors, and as a bonus he goes back to the country ballad well mined during his Flying Burrito Brothers tenure and delivers the lovely "Let Me Down Easy". And Roger McGuinn, so uneasy on the first album, delivers some of his better songs from the era in the title song, "One More Chance" and "Givin' Herself Away". Only the ridiculous novelty" Skate Date" has been dropped to make way for "Little Mama". Plus new sequencing and new artwork courtesy of the "Don't You Write Her Off" single. But hey, it's our three heroes. In...wait for it...the city. Easy pickings, folk, sometimes you gotta take 'em. 

City deserved to rival the first album's success, as it's a much stronger album than the released version (not of my re-imagining, he says without a dash of humility) of their debut. But the album did nothing and with Clark gone, thing weren't looking bright for the remaining duo of McGuinn and Hillman... 

Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before: Three ex-Byrds walk into a recording studio...

 

The whole McGuinn-Clark-Hillman adventure (or: misadventure, as it largely turned out to be),was pretty much doomed from the start, and then the protagonists proceeded to bravely walk towards the inevitable. Coming out of McGuinn and Clark being booked as an acoustic duo in 1977 due to them both having nothing going on after their respective solo careers had petered out with the disappointing Thunderbyrd and Two Sides To Every Story, respectively. A well-received impromptu on-stage reunion with David Crosby and Chris Hillman on December 7 in San Francisco’s Boarding House (which isn’t the same concert that is heavily bootlegged, that one would come about three months later) reset the course for the modest adventure that two men and their acoustic guitars were on. McGuinn’s manager Ron Rainey was looking for labels to shop the McGuinn-Clark duo to, then after the first Boarding House concert reunion approached Hillman. With three ex-Byrds seemingly on board, Capitol struck. Hillman was reticent to work with his ex-colleagues again , but a 25,000 dollar signing bonus quickly convinced him. Which, really, pretty much sums up the entire MCH adventure. They were in it for the money, and it showed. Really badly. Personal or emotional ties were secondary, if even that. 

McGuinn and Hillman didn’t get along at that stage, everyone was suspicious of Clark and his unpredictable behavior and Hillman’s short fuse at this time meant backstage confrontations, sometimes devolving into fist fights, were frequent. Most of the time, the three ex-Byrds wouldn’t talk to each other, doing their own parts in the studio when the others weren’t there. And then, of course, the drugs. Cocaine was everywhere during the whole MCH adventure, with all of them – including the side men and tour band – indulging in the white powder. As usual, Gene Clark got it worst on his never-ending road of self-sabotage. The drugs and alcohol-abuse worsened his by then well-documented fear of traveling and bouts of stage fright. After having weathered reasonably well the first tours before and after the release of their debut album, Clark started to miss tour dates, then studio dates, then simply stopped showing up whatsoever, relegated to ancillary member in the title and packaging of the second album. McGuinn and Hillman limped on for another year and another album before the plug on the whole misadventure was pulled.

It's okay, Geno, I know the guy, he's not a cop...

But what about the music? Well, considering the circumstances it’s amazing that any worthwhile music came out of this at all. But if ever there was a band where you have to be really picky, it’s this one. Their first album was by far the most succesful, making the Top 50 and even giving them a Top 30 hit with "Don't You Write Her Off". But musically, the whole thing was a disaster. As a matter of fact, it was a disaster on all levels, including the packaging. Having a glossy picture of the three men in a competition of who could open his shirt wider open, coupled with the worst, most hyperbolic sleeve notes I've ever read. That might've and should've turned some people off, but not as much as when they actually put the record on. 

Weak to so-so songwriting mixed with atrocious production choices almost killed the MCH adventure right off the bat artistically (if not commercially). Fans who had been privy to the genuinely well-done McGuinn & Clark solo shows probably couldn’t believe their ears when they heard that self-titled first record. Slicker than a greased up bowling lane, the album carried the contemporaneous production by Ron and Howard Albert, riding high on the success of their Criteria studio in the success of the Bee Gees during their saturday night fever heydays. Disco strings handicapped Gene Clark’s “Backstage Pass” and a relentless and incongruous disco beat all but destroyed “Release Me Girl”, a melancholy ballad when heard at McGuinn & Clark shows back in 1977. 

Strong compositions were few and far between. Hillman contributed mediocre AOR material, while McGuinn’s stuff was extremely lightweight. Clark had the best songs of the bunch, but the aforementioned production choices were disastrous. Even the UFO-sighting inspired “Feeling Higher” sounded better in a robust live performance, whereas the ultra-slick studio cut started to bukle under  under the weight of all the bells and whistles and turns Clark's philosophical musings into cocktail music. Even a reasonably impressive percussive coda was too little, too late - dragging a repetitive number out even longer. When played straight in concert, some of these songs do posess their modest charms that almost completely disappeared behind the Albert brothers’ ill-fitting production. Sure, McGuinn, Clark & Hillman, but especially the Alberts, wanted to avoid the classic Byrds sound, but why sound like second-rate Gibb brothers?

Hey you guys, I think we got the whole hip disco look down...

Production aside, the disappointment of fans, who had seen McGuinn, Clark & Hillman on the road in the run up to that first album would be understandable in terms of song choices. Where in the hell was the fabulous "Crazy Ladies", a Gene-co-write with Thomas Jefferson Kaye?  And why wasn't "Here She Comes Again", an extremely fun 60s-throwback composed and sung by McGuinn and Hillman in a rare moment of collaboration included? So, the One Buck Guy tries to make an album, that is much better and truer to the sound of its three members. What if, instead of protesting and complaining about the Alberts' production choices afterwards, the three protagonists had voiced opposition during the recording and forced Capitol to rethink their high-gloss product? What if they had insisted not only on including a couple of numbers from their live repertoire, but include them in less glammed up versions that were closer to the Byrds sound? What if Capitol insisted on keeping a bunch of the commercial material, but conceded an album side to the group's songs in a more down home style? 

This is the idea behind Two Worlds. Each album side presents a different world. Side a, the 'rural side' includes the band's more classic sound, built around McGuinn's Rickenbacker guitar and the group's harmony singing. Side b, the 'urban side' keeps the Alberts' high-gloss production. Having set up this dichotomy it was time to replace the worst production excesses of the Alberts' by different, better versions. Considering that Clark's songs came out worst out of the Albert disco machine, we'd start there. The insufferable disco version of "Release Me Girl" and the glammed-up version of "Feelin' Higher" were replaced by live versions from a Clark & McGuinn concert from March 1978 at The Bottom Line, though to keep enough Clark on the b-side, I created a short reprise of the album version of "Feelin' Higher" with its percussive coda. To set up that second part of the song, I added a couple of seconds of that calypso beat to the song on the a-side. Considering that "Backstage Pass" - disco string arrangement apart - suffered the least from the Albert's production, I kept that one intact for the 'urban' side of the album.

Yo Chris, this isn't a pyjama party...

With Chris Hillman's tracks I had the exact opposite problem compared to Clark. While Clark's songs actively suffered from the overproduction, Hillman took to writing shallow, but catchy AOR-rock numbers like a fish to water and the Alberts' choices feel much more logical for his songs. But I still needed some Hillman on side one, so the demo version of "Surrender To Me" would do quite nicely. Plus he's front and center on his co-lead vocals on the reinstated "Here She Comes Again". And of course the first course of action was to reinstate "Crazy Ladies", one of the great lost Clark tunes. I love the version of the song from the heavily bootlegged 1978 Boarding House concert and especially its interplay of McGuinn's "Eight Miles High"-like raga guitar work juxtaposed with Hillman's mandolin playing. But that version had a lot of audience noise in the beginning and some feedback on one of Clark's lines in the first stanza. So I created a hybrid version in which the first 45 seconds are from The Bottom Line and then give way to the great version from The Boarding House.  

These changes all help to establish a more distinctively Byrds-ian sound, especially on the 'rural' side, helped also by a heavily augmented presence of Roger McGuinn's presence on this improved version of the album. While he still only has the two lead vocals on the two numbers from the finished album, the new versions of "Release Me Girl", "Feelin' Higher", "Surrender To Me", "Crazy Ladies" and "Here She Comes Again" have him essentially sing co-lead vocals on five additional songs, giving him a much higher profile. 

This is the kind of album the reunion of McGuinn, Clark & Hillman always should have been. It might've sold, but people didn't want a Bee Gees-lite out of this group. They did good work on the road, playing these songs, and now on Two Worlds these songs have a better, more fitting home. So, enter into the two worlds of McGuinn, Clark & Hillman...

All Pearls, No Swine boldly march on...

...into the new millenium. The first decade of the Twenty-First Century was the decade I was the most implicated in music. When I started studying in the late 90s, I found this record store that was essentially only dealing in midprice and budget Cds, while maintaining a rigid quality selections. That's where I truly started to build my classic rock collection. But I also started to pay way more attention to the new music that was coming out, buying Rolling Stone every month and a bunch of other music magazines. For once, I was aware of all the trends that happened outside of the mainstream, from the rise of the 'The'-bands to trends like the Freak Folk revival. I heavily got into Americana and actually awaited new record releases from my favorites. I widened the spectrum of music I was listening to manyfold.

So it might have been a long time coming for the All Pearls, No Swine series, but I had little to no trouble compiling a series of favorites that not everyone knows, but most assuredly should. Some of my favorite songs of the decade had to go on here: Jackie Leven's fantastic “The Sexual Loneliness of Jesus Christ” (that I already mentioned in my write-up for a different Leven post), Nicolai Dunger's "Hunger", which in my book he never bettered, Midlake's mysterious "Van Occupanther, the almost title song from their fantastic sophomore effort. 

I mentioned getting into Americana in a big way, so you'll find quite a bit of that here, from traditionalists like Slaid Cleaves visiting the "Horseshoe Lounge" and Alison Krauss & The Union Station's moody, spellbinding "New Favorite" to...something weirder. The Handsome Family's "In The Air" was my introduction to weird Americana and its unforgettable narrator or story set to a Johnny Cash-chicka-boom beat impressed me mightily and is still great. The Handsome Family can get a little repetitive at times, but their highlights are awesome. So is The Gourds' "Dying Of The Pines" and the Drive-By-Trucker's "Danko/Manuel", not only a fantastic tribute to the fallen Band members, but also a somewhat autobiographical reflection on life on the road and its dangers, something Jason Isbell knew a thing or two about. This was my introduction to the finest lyricist of this century. 

Some are on the farthest edges of Americana and might equally be classified as folk pop or art pop, such as The Czars' dreamy album closer "Lullaby 6000", or Jolene's "Break", which sounds like Michael Stipe fronting a more openly countryfied band. I never got into The National as much when they broke wide open, and while most would champion their slower, moody work, I'll go to bat for "Mr. November", one of the more rockin' tracks they ever cut... "I used to be carried in the arms of cheerleaders..."

Some here are one-hit or no hit wonders. Jude Christodal got a lot of hype, signing with Madonna's Maverick Records for his major label debut, but while the follow-up King Of Yesterday is a worse album, the title song is great. Gary Jules is a one-hit wonder from the 2000s, doing the slow, moody re-imagining of "Mad World" for the Donnie Darko soundtrack that spawned a decade and a half of slowed down, atmospheric covers of formerly mid- or uptempo songs, but the short, lovely "Pills" shows that maybe he deserved a little more. And there's a veteran onehit wonder, Michael Penn, older brother of Sean, who is mostly remembered for his 1989 surprise hit (well, upper chart entry) "No Myth". But he continued making good to great music, as you will hopefully agree once you've listened to "High Times".  

I could go on and on, about Lucky Jim for example, an unjustly forgotten favorite from the period, but enough with the chit chat. Time to - sorry, Aerosmith - let the mudic do the talking...

   

Radio of Spirit or Spirit of Radio (no, not that one...)

When I opened the Spirit section with an abbreviated, single LP version of Spirit Of 76 I promised a further three alternate albums concerning Randy California and his ever-changing (save for stepdad Ed Cassidy) line-up of Spirit, Mark II to...oh...maybe XII or so?! So, after our look at the work throughout the 70s of the ever more fluid types of Spirit it's time to make good of that promise and pick up where the last tracks of that comp left us: with a Spirit that was, for all intents and purposes, kaputt. Future Games, the disastrous excuse of a concept album had left the band without a record contract once again. Which of course didn't stop California & Co. from gigging or from writing and recording new music. California was a lot like his idol Jimi Hendrix, basically recording everything, whether a live show, a sudio demo or a simple tape of him noodling on his guitar. Which, if you listen to it all, or even most of it, can be tiresome and unproductive, since there is so much chaff to go through. Fortunately, you won't have to, as once again the One Buck Guy volunteers to present the best of the rest. 

This version of the newly reconfigured band was once dubbed "a power trio with class" by California, including besides him and Cassidy bassist and backing vocalist Larry "Fuzzy" Knight. Their live shows as a power trio were highly charged, but their studio work, as highlighted on Radio Aqua Blue, was more melodic and relatively diverse. The name of this album that never existed is actually a play on the band name Aqua Blue, that California gave to a very short-lived four-piece version of the band including his friend Tom Hall from Maui. "So Happy Now", "There Are Words" and "(I See You) In The Morning Light" are from the Aqua Blue version of the group. 

By the way, you might ask, that explains parts of the name, but why Radio? Well, considering the extremely different nature of the tracks, in fidelity, source and style, I was looking for a way to try to unify the tracks a bit, so I settled on the concept of the album being a radio station - Radio Aqua Blue! - that plays these different tracks. Thus the little bits of radio dial in between tracks. And really, Radio Aqua Blue - the imaginary station as well as the existing album - plays a bunch of different stuff, ranging from pure rock'n'roll to an unexpected excursion into country rock ("Midnight Train") to a couple of slower guitar ballads. As said, the album highlights the melodic side of Spirit rather than their turbocharged rock'n'roll, though tracks like "Rock'n'Roll Planet", "Zandu" and especially "These Are Words" are exactly that. 

One major choosing point for the tracks that make up Radio Aqua Blue was sound quality - some songs from the period with merit were excluded because the sound quality was so much inferior to the others. In order to stretch out the material to album length I took a solo California guitar demo from '77 ("Livin' In This World") and used it as part of the closing medley. Spirit specialists will also recognize the Potatoland '81 track "We've Got A Lot To Learn" present here in an alternate version, as Spirit was starting to rework the old Potatoland material in 1978. 

So, overall Radio Aqua Blue is the album that Spirit could've brought out in 1979, if record companies had been interested. It isn't any kind of classic by any means, but a diverse and good listen either way. So, turn on your radio, switch it to Radio Aqua Blue and let the spirit of radio take over...

Lookin' for a Pot of Gold: The Sunshine Pop of Chris Rainbow

Some artist's music is made to be listened to in their proper context, preferably within the albums they issued. And some artist's music...is not. You can probably guess on which side I fall in my appreciation of Chris Rainbow. Rainbow, né Christopher James Harley, ostensibly chose his moniker to avoid confusion with Steve Harley, but his stage name also served as a statement of purpose. Sunshine pop is probably what best describes a good part of Rainbow's output, a sun-kissed tribute to the music of Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys. So much so, that some of his songs - and not just the cheekily titled "Dear Brian" sound like Beach Boys outtakes from the 70s. See "Ring Ring" for example, which sounds like it could and should come from a late 70s Beach Boys album. Not bad for a guy born and raised in a city that couldn't be more different from the West Coast and Southern California - he's from ugly-ass Glasgow. After his solo career sumarized here Rainbow kept busy joining a number of prog and prog-minded artists during the first half of the Eighties (The Alan Parsons Project, Camel, Jon Anderson), then concentrated on a career as a producer under his real surname, mainly for pompous Scot rockers Runrig. 

However, on the three albums he brought out between 1975 and 1979 there is also a ton of filler, listless soft rock that disappears into background music, unless it starts to actively annoy the listener. So, Pot of Gold is essentially my attempt to make one real good listen out of three very checkered albums. Because if the compilations I propose here at One Buck Records have one goal, its that: Like many of you, dear readers, I have way too much music laying around, in CD cases and on hard drives. So I'd rather listen to one compilation of good material than wading through the chaff on two or three (or more) original albums. 

The main focus of Pot of Gold is, as you may have gathered, on Rainbow's pop confections rather than the bland soft rock, though a couple of selections on this 18-track compilation walk the rather thin line between both. For a better listening experience, some of the songs (namely tracks 1,4,7,10, 14 and 15) that were running long have also been edited. As is, you get 70 minutes of goodness that, taken together, do feel like a long-lost double album from the Beach Boys circa 1976 or so, minus the terrible oldie covers/remakes. It certainly beats the stuffing out of something like the Boys' 15 Big Ones or M.I.U. album or - careful, them's fighting words for some - Love You.  

So, folks, these songs breathe summer, and wouldn't you know it, it is summer (and really hot around these parts lately). So, get a cool drink and enjoy some cool summer music with Mr. Rainbow...