The French Connection: Ear Candy A La Française, S'il Vous Plaît...

Oh bon dieu, mais qu'est-ce qui s'est passé avec cette séries? I knew it had been a while since I posted something from my adopted home country but it seems that the last time The French Connection connected you with Gallic music of some sorts was *checks notes* October 2025?!? Time to change that, though admittedly, if it hadn't been for a bit of a chance encounter, the return to music from the frog- and snail-eating part o the world would've been even longer. 

But a couple of days ago I caught Phoenix's "Lisztomania" on the radio, and I thought to myself, "why, that was a cool tune", and then thought that the accompanying album Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix was also really neat, and that the kind of fluffy ear candy pop on it is the perfect music for the spring with summer temperature that we have around here this week (today, it thankfully cooled down a bit, after a week of temperature saround 35°C, which really is too much. It's also too much historically speaking for a month of May, but that's probably the new normal with global warming continuing unabated. But I digress.

Hipsters et fières d'y être

So, Phoenix. If you vaguely remember having heard something about these guys or this album, that's because with this album especially they made some waves in the States, even winning a Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album of the year. How you feel about that will say a lot about what the Grammies do with their voting categories, or how the term 'alternative music' has changed since its inception in the early 90s. Because nothing about this album screams 'alternative' in a way that you and me and other older folks remember that term. This is lush, extremely produced, intelligent pop music, which i only alternative, if the mainstream choices are hip hop, EDM or a mix of both. In no sane world would this run as 'alternative music', but the Grammies have always been insane (not in a good way), and category fraud has been as rampant as at their cousins, the Oscars, if not more so. 

Honestly, I remembered that Phoenix basically did all the TV late night shows back when that still meant something, but the whole Grammy and platinum (for single "1901" ) and gold certifications (for "Lisztomania") thing passed me by. But yeah, for a couple of weeks in 2009 Phoenix looked like the next big thing in alternative pop music. And, you know, deservedly so. If you remember these two singles, you sould remember them fondly: big catchy songs with big catchy choruses, even though some of the idiosyncratic lyrics are probably best blamed on these guys not writing in their mother tongue. Or, you know, being French arty hipsters. I mean, c'mon, these guys hail from fuckin' Versailles! 

Le hipster chic, mode ironique, eh...

Oh, but Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix deserves whatever prices they want to give out, and whatever chart success it can get! It's such a confident, impeccably played and produced record. If you want you can hear hints of, say, Antmusic-era Adam And The Ants in "Listzomania", and there's some clear New Wave influences, while lush instrumental "Love Like A Sunset Pt. 2" reminds you of Avalon-era Roxy Music. Opulent pop aren't dirty words, you know, so there's no need to couch this in 'alternative' clothes. 

Seing how a straight up post of the original album would be lame-ish, you'll even get an extra special, One Buck Records only bonus track edition, with a handful of live unplugged tracks from a small live for radio concert in Germany in october 2009. It's interesting to hear these songs in a more stripped-down form, plus they (and thus I) throw in a cover of Dylan's "Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands", because why not. 

Check out Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix for the sound of the spring...

P.S.: If you like polished pop made in France, I invite you to check out Geyster right here. 

Hotdang, Boys And Girls, It's Them Incredible Bluegrass Chartbusters Once More...

Yes, that other flagship series is back with another volume, and I'm not overselling anything when I say this one's a killer. Having spent a good bit of stolen moments here and there on this series, I did a ton of revisions on it, including this volume, making place for more and more cool beans discoveries. It also means that the line up of recurring favorites and favorites-to-be is now almost complete. All the stalwarts of previous volumes are back, including relatively recent addition Love Canon with a cover of ZZ Top's "Legs" as the kick-ass opener. But we also have the debuts of two great combos that will bring enjoyment to this series and your homes for weeks and months to come.

So, give a big, hearty 'howdy y'all' to Bourbon Revival and The Infamous Stringdusters. The former are my latest discovery, and boy am I glad I found them. They don't have a lot of covers (or published songs fullstop) to their names, but the ones that they brought out are all really good. They debut with "I Want You To Want Me", 'cuz you can never have enough Cheap Trick in Bluegrass, folks. The Infamous Stringdusters, also a band I stumbled on recently, have been way more active, which makes sense since they recently celebrated their 20th anniversary. Thye are mainly doing original songs, but from time to time record the odd pop or rock cover.  For their first appearance we got a stone-cold classic, Tom Petty's "American Girl". 

Other folks debuting: Interstate Express with the Eagles' "Take It Easy" and The HillBenders, a group specializing in WhoGrass, including covers of the entire Tommy album, from which the claasic "Pinball Wizard" comes. And two other tracks have blink-and-you'll-miss-'em artists: Wheatstone Bridge clock in with a great cover of "Smells Like Teen Spirit", but as of today, we won't see them again. And the fine bluegrass cover of Bryan Adams' "Heaven" by Chad Darou and Cia Cherryholmes seems to have been a one-off. 

So, crank this up, get some overalls or straw hats (or not), and get the hootennany goin' once more...

Is This A Mixtape? Yes! Is It Weird? Yes! Is It Yes? Yes!

If you've been around a while, you know two things about the One Buck Guy and prog rock: I'm not a huge fan of the genre, but I like Yes. But I like a lot of the bits and pieces from Yes that a - shall we say more classic - fan would probably frown upon. Hell, the One Buck Record of the day even proudly contains what is unofficially the worst Yes song of all time. Classic Rock ranked all (the) released tracks from Yes, and Tormato-era b-side "Abilene" came in 207 ot of 207! And yet here it is! Suck it, Classic Rock, I like what I like. and once you don't have to worry about the admittedly ridiculous opening (a synth made to sound like a horse neighing, predating Neil Young's synth horse experiments on Trans by a couple of years), the song is pretty neat. Sue me! 

This is just one example of what to expect - and not to - here. This albums is called a Mixtape, but isn't tagged as such, because it isn't one long megamix like the ones that are, even though that was the original idea. No, Mixtape here is meant to show you that this is someone's mix, a personal selection of songs. Oh, also: You have to take the word Mix really seriously. This was made during the 'OBG goes wild on Audacity'-era (some might say the 'OBG, WTF?'-era, but let's not dwell on that...), so it really is a mixtape in the literal sens, mixing and matching moments from Yes that I like. Often it's complete songs, but sometimes it might just be an extract  from a longer piece, or I edited out something I felt was superfluous, like the false ending to "Into The Lens (I Am A Camera)", the aforementioned fake-horse-bullshit on "Abilene" or even the occasional gratuitous keyboard solo. 

Before you recoil in horror, know that a lot of the music is intact, including my two favorite long-form pieces from Yes, "Homeorld (The Ladder)" and "Roundabout". But there is also a track called "A Moment - Alternate View", which is a remnant of the original idea, before plans changed. When I still wanted to do a one-hour megamix of my favorite Yes moments, I had prepared little bits from longer pieces that were supposed to serve as bridges in between the songs. But then, halfway through I realized that my original plan was counter-productive to my 'personal best' approach. If I want to hear one of my faves right away, it has to be indexed, so out went the continuous megamix idea, but I already had a couple of these 'linking bits' ready, so I decided to throw them on anyway. 

Seeing that this is a truly personal mix, in every word of the sense, you get - for better or worse - some exclusive edits. I've always liked Yes' take on Simon & Garfunkel's "America" for example, but the album version took forever to get to the vocals/song section, while the single edit threw out one of my favorite parts: the little country licks Steve Howe played - and for a classically trained Brit he sure loved to play a country lick or two - so I edited a third version that splits the difference between the two mentioned. 

The so-called 'Chop Shop Mix' of "White Car" is a whole 'nother story. I had always liked the original one-and-a-half minute doodle off Drama, but it really was just a doodle, an intro and a short verse. So I tried to make it into more of a song, using the original song, the tracking sessions version and a live version from the Drama tour to create this version. I always felt that that song deserved more than to be an excuse for Geoff Downes to doodle on his keyboards, for Horn to mess around with a vocoder and for both to tease the audience with a couple of notes from "Video Killed The Radio Star". Whether this new mix makes this more of an epic song or whether it works for you remains to be seen, but hey, lemme know, eh. 

So yeah, this is what YESterdays is, and I hope you enjoy it. The whole adventure spread into a two-disc thing at the time, but I'll just send out this as a test balloon, and can bring out the sequel if anyone is actually interested. and despite being essentially a Part 1 or Volume 1, this album is - as all of my alts and other albums are - sequenced to tell a story, so it has a short prelude in the classical-sounding "Vevey's Theme" and ends with an epilogue of sorts, Chris Squire's amazing solo bass version of "Amazing Grace". 

So, time go back in time and enjoy some YESterdays...yes?  

All Pearls, No Swine - Same As It Ever Was...

 

All Pearls, No Swine is back, and for the first time with live compiling, or almost! I compiled this a couple of weeks ago and, uh, that's it. No particular organizing principle, no nothing – which means, it's the same as it ever was. Only one principle, same as it ever was: quality control. Good stuff from mostly unknown, or little-known properties, same as it ever was. A mix of some rock, some folk, some country-leaning stuff, same as it ever was.

Thirty nine volumes in we still have time and opportunity to discover some folks here, but by this stage the number of alumni starts to rise. Veterans Podito, Doug Firebaugh and big brother Alex Taylor have already shown up several times, all coming up with quality contributions once more. We've met Toad once before, and they're back with a real corker: Almost twelve minutes of "Life Goes On" - which, with a title and song length like that, is obviously the compilation closer. Loose Boots are back with another little country rock gem, "Only Lonely Roads", while German folk outsider Sibylle Baier comes up with another narcoleptic folk beauty, “Colour Green”.

We also say hello to a couple of newcomers like Sum Pear, Amigo, Blaze Foley, Mac Davis, Gold and the intreaguingly titled Don Speer And The Hudson Profit Expedition. We also get some prog with the likes of Chetarca and then-Yugoslavian combo Smak,while Tom Eslick and Victoria bring different types of folk, the latter by covering Warren Zevon's little-known early pearl “Tule's Blues”. And finally, as possibly the best-known name in the bunch, there's Tommy Bolin, upping the rock factor with an punchy demo of “Wild Dogs”.

So, twenty fine tracks of music worthy of being (re)discovered music of the 1970s. Same as it ever was! So, have a good start into the weekend with this, a lovely soundtrack to your saturday morning or afternoon...

Two Halves Of Seven Equal ? - Or Poco's Weird Math Problem

Uh-oh. That's no doubt what the remaining members of Poco must've thought when band leader and main songwriter Richie Furay handed in his resignation just before the release of Crazy Eyes. Gone was Furay's recognizable voice, his stage presence, and most importantly, the songs. To be fair, the band had come a long way since Furay had utterly dominated the songwriting on the band's first two bands. Paul Cotton brought a strong songwriting presence immediately, and had three songs apiece on From The Inside and A Good Feelin' To Know and two - the same as Furay - (not counting a coer each) on Crazy Eyes. But Schmit had been content to contribute the occasional ballad, and now had to step up his production, while Rusty Young's real coming out as a songwriter would have to wait for another album.

So while the odds for a quality album seemed slim, the now quartet acquits itself pretty nicely. While Young contributes only one song, his "Rocky Mountain Breakdown" is the best of his country reels, and has a cameo of founder Jim Messina on mandolin. The biggest surprise are Tim Schmit's songs, especially "Skatin'"  and "Just Call My Name", which see Poco experimenting - for the first and only time, really - with a harder edged guitar rock sound. While Paul Cotton had been drafted into the band specifically to beef up the rock guitar in Poco's country rock, Schmit had mainly been known for delicate ballads, but does a pretty good job on these, while Cotton's opener "Driving Wheel" is another of his storytelling epics and quite impressive, while expansive closer "You've Got Your Reasons" also does quite nicely. "Faith In The Families" was a stage favorite and maybe thus chosen to represent the album on their Greatest Hits collection. 

So most of the album's songs were fine, and yet there was something off about Seven, something that made me rarely put the album on and often pull it out of the CD player before the album was done. And yet it took me only a cool 20+ years to figure it out. Sure, having it on CD with no side breaks, and having listened to it about three times in that time span didn't help, but still: For a dude who - since this lil' blog adventure started - spends a lot of time thinking about sequencing, it's kind of tough to realize that Poco did the old 'one rock/quick side, one ballad/slow side' and that's caused such a weird, and not entirely satisfactory, listening experience. It's kind of a chicken-and-egg thing: Did I not listen a lot to the album because it's running so weirdly, or did I not realize why it's running so weirdly because I barely listened to it. It's the latter, of course, but still: consider the One Buck Guy miffed that he missed this little detail. Then again, since the start of this blog adventure I'm much more sensitive to these things than before, so beforehand I jad just shrugged it off, and the album with it. 

To be fair, this two different sides deal is a weird gambit for a band like Poco, whose music lives between these poles, but is never that rocking, nor that slow, comfortably living in a midtempo world that carries hallmarks of both sides. So it was always a weird idea that Poco would try to attach two identities to two album sides. It's just not a good fit. What happened with the original configuration of the album left me baffled, on numerous levels. On one hand, possibly to fulfill the 'rock side' part of the concept, there were Schmit's heavy rock numbers, So it was not only strange to have two heavy rock tunes from Schmit, but it was even weirder that they ,  each other back to back. But the conception also explains why - after the reasonably promising first half - the album sort of drifts away together with the listener's attention when ballads and midtempo numbers are all cluttered together in the second half. 

This can of course be corrected in a rather simple manner: Resequence the album so that the ill-fitting two side concept is dissolved. Alternate the rock and slower songs, as well as the Cotton and Schmit vocals, and you have a version of Seven that is a much better listen. Which is - you might've guessed - exactly what our One Buck Record of the day is. A sronger version of a pretty good, if not quite top-tier, Poco album. there's a lot of worse ways to spend half an hour. 

Hey, You Wanna Take a Ride In Kris Delmhorst's Cars?

 

Aaaaaand here's the last part of our impromptu Cars appreciation week here at One Buck Records, appropriately titled Cars. That is of course because it's a tribute from former-Brooklynite-adopted-Bostonian Kris Delmhorst to one of the city's premier bands. To do the songs of Ocasek & Co. justice, modern-day folkie Delmhorst has invited a ton nof musical friends to pump new life into these songs, folks like fellow Bostonian (and then-labelmate) Mark Erelli on Lap Steel and backing vocals or classically trained bass player and producer Zack Hickman, mainly known for collaborating with Josh Ritter. As a special bonus, she also gets original Car Greg Hawkes to play some Ukulele on the album! 

As a matter of fact, it's the musical coloring that Delmhorst and her assembled crew do, that makes the difference. The songs are great, obviously, but Delmhorst and collaborators add all the bells and whisteles – sometimes literally – that make Cars thoroughly enjoyable: From Penny Whistle to Clarinet to Banjo to Mandolin to Laura Cortese's very present fiddle, there's a ton of interesting stuff going on here musically, that saves this from being a nicely meant but underwhelming tribute. “You Might Think“ is paced by a fiddlepart that I love, while “Shake It Up” gets a New Orleans Brass Band—style arrangement and “Magic” transforms from a giddy pop song into a delicate ballad. 

On “Why Can't I Have You” Delmhorst brings the speed way down and the moodiness way up. “Tonight She Comes” with accordion and fiddle sounds like a folk song, though the lively group vocals betray its original perfect pop side, while “You Wear Those Eyes” gets a slightly jazzy makeover. Drive is probably the most conventional covr here, and while the song stays beautiful, Delmhorst doesn't do much of note with it. But sometimes a faithful cover is a-okay also, I guess.

Cars is a very fine album that gives a new spin and shine to these Cars warhorses, and Delmhorst's love for the band and the originals celearly shines through. The band gets a 'thank you for the summer of '84' credit, when Heartbreak City blew up and presumably led young Kris to the Cars. Consequently, she covers all five of that album's singles. Anyhow, full speed ahead for some nice reimaginings of some of the band's biggest and best...

...The Time That Two Future Cars Took A Turn Down Folk Rock Avenue...

Welcome back to Cars appreciation week! Oh, you didn't know it was Cars appreciation week around here? Neither did I, until just about now. But mentioning the long and winding path to the seeming overnight success of the Cars made me think that Ric Ocasek's and Benjamin Orr's  unexpected detour into folk/soft rock is worth a detour. So we jump in the car, next destination: Milkwood. 

So how exactly did Ocasek and Orr end up singing three-harmony soft folk songs? Blame Jim "Jas" Goodkind, who searched for band members to form a blues rock group (well, it was the early 70s...) and ended up with one Richard Otcasek, armed with an acoustic guitar and a couple of songs. So the two forgot about the whole blues rock deal and played as an acoustic duo, before Otcasek proposed bringing in his old friedn from high school, Benjamin Orzechowski. Milkwood built a bit of a following in Boston and the area, then signed with Paramount Records to record 1973's How's The Weather?, our One Buck Record of the day. 

Hey, what is Waylon Jennings doing there on the right? Oh, hold on, it's Benjamin Ortchowski, soon to lose the beard and then a ton of letters of his name...

And of course there is more to Milkwood than that, because Ocasek and Orr met Greg Hawkes while working on How's The Weather?, adding sax and taking care of the horn arrangements. So while Milkwood doesn't sound anything like The Cars, it's interesting that three fifths of the band were assembled here to work on an album that Milkwood had high hopes in, but sank like a stone. When How's The Weather? flopped, the band was done within weeks of that failure, with Orr and Ocasek moving on to other short-lived bands, until...well, you know. 

But enough about the band, what about the music? Well, it'spretty neat. Nothing earth-shaking, very much in the vein of America, with Ocasek's decidedly odd humour and slightly askew point of view only shining through in very brief moments. Ocasek is at least very well cosplaying the part of the sensitive folkie, with song titles including "Dream Trader", "Winter Song" and - don't laugh - "Timetrain Wonderwheel". This is all very pleasant, if not exactly what you'd expect three future Cars to come up with. But it's definitely more than just youthful ephemera. It will probably not climb up your personal best albums ever list, but it's a really nice early 70s folk-rock (with soft rock touches) album, if you are in for that kind of thing. 

Aah, the letters are still there, but the future Mr. Orr is much more recognizable like that...and check out the snazzy 'stache on Slick Ric...

Today's offering is a whole package, including artwork, photos and a Boston Globe article with enlightenig comments by Jim Goodkind that functions as virtual liner notes for this album. So, enjoy your trip into Milkwood, then we will be back with a last little Cars-related surprise in the next few days...

Gentlemen, Please Start Your Engines...

Now that a hitcher has passed by on these pages a couple of days ago, the next step seems obvious. Quick question: What does a hitcher nned to do what he does? Why, cars of course! And so Cars is what we're going to deliver! The Cars' self-titled album is of course an unassailable classic, one of the best, most-fully formed debut albums of all time. Oh, and it has posible the best three song run to open a record. Quickly, name me an opening trio that rivals "Good Times Roll", "My Best Friend's Gir" and "Just What I Needed" - it might exists, but it sure isn't easy to find. But the crazy thing is that the album has't just shot all its powder on that opening salvo, but keeps the energy and hooks coming. It's an album that runs essentially like a greatest hits album. 

As a matter of fact, the music of that debut was so confident and refined in its own inimitable style - which would of coure be almost instantly imitated - that one could wonder how that band could bring out such an album without a false note without...you know...working towards it. But of course nothing is ever developed right out of thin air. The funniest thing when thinking about the Cars is of course that the nucleus of the band - vocalists Raic Ocasek and Ben Orr, nés Richard Otcasek and Benjamin Orzechowski - was doing a folk-ish country rock-ish music before, something that has left absolutely no traces in The Cars' oeuvre. But the weird sidestory of Milkwood is a story for another day. When Ocasek and Orr hooked up first with Greg Hawkes in Richard and the Rabbits, then with Elliot Easton in Capt'n Swing and finally with all of the above and drummer David Robinson as the Cars.

Uuuuh. Let The Good Geek Times Roll...

On today's One Buck Record you can hear how fully formed the band is so early in the game, mainly because they spent a lot of time on developing and putting these songs in shape, while also throwing off a ton of promising contenders that didn't make the cut. This album gathers demos for eight of the nine album tracks - late addition and kickass opener "Good Times Roll" seemingly wasn't demoed, but developed on the spot in the studio. And then there's eight tracks, some of them demoed really early, in spring 1977, that got put aside. Two of these, "Ta Ta Wayo Wayo" and "Leave Or Stay" were rescued and finally recorded for the band's lackluster swan song in a 'back to the roots' move that often precede a band's imminent break up. Reconnecting through the shared past and all that. But I digress. 

Listening to Test Drive should be interesting for a number of reasons: First of all, and again: the songs are really good. Even the outtakes are all of really high quality. There's also the chance to listen to a couple of these songs, such as "Moving In Stereo" and "All Mixed Up", in their original version with Ric Ocasek's vocals, before he gave almost half of them to Ben Orr to sing. 

Aaaaah. Let the good times roll...

Test Drive is both comforting and a discovery - you know most of these songs, but maybe not quite like this. So, strap yourself into the front seat, let the engine roar, and, uh, the good times roll...

Don't Give This Guy A Ride! (...This Album, However...)

As a kid I liked all kinds of movies. My dad installed a love for Westerns, and like most kids I liked action films and comedies, everything that moved and entertained. But the first genre I discovered for myself, because no other family member would have a taste for it, was horror movies. For a long time, with a single TV in the house, occasions were rare, and had to be seized. Several factors had to combine: I would have to watch a movie with my dad, while my mom would go to bed and read if the film didn't interest her. Then I would wait until my dad would inevitable fall asleep and snore happily away at one point, at which I could either wait for the late night horror film or quietly switch channels to get to my bounty. I distinctly remember watching The Thing on low volume, with my dad's snoring the background noise to Kurt Russell squaring off with the shapeshifting beastie - still the best horror movie of all times, folks. 

Another horror classic from my younger days is, obviously, The Hitcher. Man, that movie was a shock to the system. A variation on the slasher films of the time, the film's seeming realism that slowly gives way to something else - not quite supernatural, then definitely something leaving all senses of reality behind, which made this probably more disturbing than the clearly fantastic Nightmare On Elm Street series. The Hitcher, more than a slasher, is truly a nightmare movie. When Jim Halsey's nightmare (ha!) starts as he stops to let the mysterious John Ryder in his car, he says "my mother told me never to do this" with a geeky smile that will soon disappear, you understand that The Hitcher is essentially a scary but instructive story that the brothers Grimm couldn't have imagined better. And even though there is no Freddy Krueger here, the film has more of a nightmare feel to it than the increasingly operatic grand guignol spectacles involving the burnt-to-a-crisp undead child murderer.

Some critics didn't get it, obviously, and not only those that have prejudices against horror-themed films. It's true that at some point people will inevitably go 'eh...but Ryder can't possibly be here at this moment in time', because as Halsey's nightmare continues, it truly takes on the hallmarks of a drzam...or a nightmare, where space and time are not functioning as in the real world, getting bent out of shape, making sudden jumps in location or illogical chronology ,ot a bug, but a feature. If you're wondering why things are not adding up, you're watching this film wrong. As director Robert Harmon, who weirdly disappeared fropm the face of the earth after this film - said "You either get it, or you don't". As a film that shows how something that looks realistic, if admittedly improbable, slowly morphs into something entirely impossible, with the viewer losing all sense of real-life logic. The film logic, that The Hitcher and John Ryder impose on people trump the suspension of disbelief. 

You know what's really helping a film that emulates a dream and its logic? Why, a score that gives you tghe feeling that the real world and its restrictions are slowly melting away for example. And it so happens that Mark Isj=ham's score is exactly that kind of music. Entirely synthetic, the score was Isham's attempt to use and master then new cutting edge technology to his bag of tricks, adding the Prophet 2000 keyboard to his arsenal of old school synths like the ARP 2600 he had worked with for years. The brought in two drummers, but then proceeded to only use sampled drum sounds. And while all this sounds like the score to The Hitcher would sound awfully of its time, that's not really true. If anything the music sounds out of time, seemingly existing just on that fine line between reality and dream. 

The score to The Hitcher is one of the finest examples of a synth soundtrack from the high time of that particular type of soundtrack. Action-driven, incidental numbers like "Cars And Helicopters" are rare, most cuts here are incredibly atmospheric and just there to set a mood. And frankly, if you're coming for moodsetting - and you definitely shoud - you will not be disappointed here. I kept the soundtrack as is, as a bonus tracks there is an 'ambient suite' version of The Hitcher theme, which was of course more impressive before I knew that a simple push of the Paulstretch function in Audacity could create the ambient soundscapes of extremely slowed down tracks. Still, if you got nothing better to do, or listen to, it will give you atmospheric background music in spades. 

So, The Hitcher. If you can catch it somewhere, go and (re)watch the movie. And, of course, listen to this fantastic piece of business by Mark Isham. 

Let's Look At Those Crazy Eyes Once More...Yup, It's Still Poco's Masterpiece

Often great art can come out of great uncertainty. Sometimes een out of great distress. And while these terms would be overselling the quagmire that Poco found itself in in 1973, it's still amazing that a group that had several major defections over the years that the group did their hands down best album while their founder and leader with an iron fist was quietly quitting on the band he had held in his grip for so long. When A Good Feelin' To Know the album did way worse than everyone thought and the title song - that everyone, and Furay first - thought would be a hit didn't even chart, Furay was done with Poco, at least in his mind. David Geffen oer at Asylum had bothered him for months now, telling him that Poco was never going to happen, and to come over to his label to team up with Chris Hillman and JD Souther and "do another Crosby, Stills and Nash". (Narrator: They did not). 

There was only one problem: Good old fashioned paperwork. When Furay was sent to Epic Records in the first sports-team style 'trade' in music biz history for Graham Nash going to Atlantic to form the just mentioned Crosby, Stills & Nash, he had signed for a certain number of albums, which was not yet fulfilled. So while Furay was gone spiritually, he still had obligations to fulfill and decided to stick with Poco for one last album before doing the supergroup thing Geffen had sold him on. During recording he didn't tell anyone in the group, only announcing that he was leaving while Crazy Eyes was prepped for release. By the time the record hit stores, Furay was gone. But in his wake he left Poco's masterpiece.

He was of course ably helped by the other members of the group, who no doubt felt Furay slipping away, or at least loosening his grip on the band's songwriting and decision-making that had already sent co-founder Jim Messina on his way. The first thing one realizes when listening to Crazy Eyes is how diminshed Furay's contributions are. He has three lead vocals, but only two credited songs. Common logic would dictate that that's because he was doing minimum service and keeping all his good songs for the future Asylum Records project. But unlike his future group mate Hillman - who admitted to doing all that for the Byrds reunion that brought him to Geffen in the first place - that is not true. For one thing, original closing number "Let's Dance Tonight" is one of his best Poco songs ever. The title song is an astonoshing accomplishment, a mini-symphony whose gradual construction is a joy to behold. And that song, a eulogy for Gram Parsons before the spiralling country rock star actually died probably led him to want to cover Parsons' "Brass Buttons". 

But yeah, the other guys really stepped up. Timothy Schmit had already upped his efforts on the previous album, but his "Here We Go Again" was a new high, and rightfully chosen as the album's lead single, even if once more success inexplicably eluded them. Paul Cotton has strong showings with pure country opener "Blue Water" and "A Right Along", plus a wonderful version of J.J. Cale's "Magnolia" that would become a band standard for the rest of its existence with Cotton in the band. Another thing that is marvelous is Jack Richardson's production work - from the echo on Furay's forlorn vocal on "Brass Buttons" to the way it highlights George Grantham's drum fills to the way "Crazy Eyes" builds from just some distant drums, revealing layer of layer of instruments during its gradual build up. Just marvelous stuff, after the arguably underproduced From The Inside and the overproduced A Good Feelin' To Know. Here Richardson and the band - with a huge assist by Bob Ezrin on the title cut - find just the right balance. 

But back to Furay for a second. While he did hold back a song like "Fallin' In Love" for the debut of the Souther-Hillman-Furay Band, he did contribute a new song, "Believe Me" that would finally show up on that album, but could've been on Crazy Eyes. The released SHF Band version is fine, but the looser, more expansive Poco version is fantastic. And he finally went on to record "Nothing's Still The Same", written in late 1969, yet somehow it didn't make either Poco or DeLIVErin', despite being one of his best compositions. One Buck Records vets will remember that Crazy Eyes has been featured here before, and no history will not be erased. I think the original write-up has its moments, but the little chronological Poco alt album series I am currently doing allowed me to take a deeper dive into some aspects of the album I didn't at the time, and both together give you a ton of insight into the original album and its One Buck Record incarnation.

You might have guessed, or, you remember, that the Crazy Eyes on these pages is a reworked alt album that adds four songs that were cut for it but not used, including the above mentioned Furay-tracks, Cotton's superior remake of an Illinois Speed Press song ("Get In The Wind") and a sprightly Rusty Young instrumental. There's lots of nerdy sequencing discussion in the old write-up, if that's your thing, so I'm not going to repeat all of this stuff here. Let me just say it once more. This is the way to listen to that album, as each reinstated number brings something to the table and the album is much more varied and runs way better in this imagined double vinyl album version. Seriously, this is the version of Crazy Eyes to have and hold, and treasure, and listen to repeatedly. It's a really good album in its original form, but I dare say without false modesty that my work pushes it into great album territory. 

It might've been Furay's last dance with the band he founded, and his untimely exit always has overshadowed its musical merits somewhat. But what could have been a lame duck uninspired contract filler album - at least as far as Furay was concerned - turned into something else entirely, especially in this expanded version: a new country rock masterpiece - nothing more, nothing less. 

Breaking News: One Buck Guy Gets Feisty, Listens To Modern Music, For Once...

 

...and I don't really plan to make a habit of it. But stranger things have happened I guess. Still, this obviously isn't music that would bother the charts or the, uh, airwaves (streamwaves?). If you are following this blog for a while, you must've surely heard me mention les soldes, the twice-a-year stock-clearing sales promotion that inevitably has the few stores who still have music sections throw out their unwanted stock. Most of it is crap (well, probably), but the fact that they throw out albums for a couple of bucks gives me the opportunity to take a flyer on something that looks interesting enough. If I were a younger, hipper guy I could of course whip out my smart phone in the store and pull up the artist whose album I have in hand. But that would be spoiling the fun, wouldn't it? Instead I try from scanning the covert art and song titles whether this could be something interesting. And that is how I fell on our One Buck Record of the day, SYML's The Day My Father Died. 

The cover art looked like it might be a folk record of some kind, and I recognized a couple of guest artists mentioned on the back cover (Elbow's Guy Garvey and Nickelcreek's Sara Watkins, whose solo debut I had picked up during the soldes a decade or so ago), so I figured this might be my jam. And it kind of sort of is, otherwise it wouldn't be up here, natch! SYML is Brian Fennell, an indie musician from the Pacific Northwest. 2023's The Day My Father Died is his second album, inspired by the death of his adoptive father. It has grief , heritage and loss as topics, but it never gets too maudlin. Which, given the fact that Fennell sometimes slips into a falsetto, was a real risk, bringing to mind the memory of Bon Iver. 

You guys remember Bon Iver? Justin Iver, one of the most overrated and overpraised projects of the early 2010s? I have excessively used the term young men's earnest sad sack music in the last months and plan to retire that term soon, but if it fits for something, it's Bon Iver's incredibly overhyped For Emma, Forever Ago, that came with its own picture perfect origin story of Vernon, after a romantic breakup, locking himself in an isolated cabin in the woods and coming up with a quote-unquote masterpiece of romantic despair. Except it sucked. No melodies, no memorable songs, and the awful strained falsetto made for an unpleasant listening experience, completely diametral to what the critics and their reviews promised. But I digress.

 So, SYML - Fennel's nom de plume recalls his Welsh heritage, 'siml' being the local varaint of 'simple' - is no Bon Iver, thank god. These songs have melodies, some of them quite memorable, too. They have structure and they are generally well sung, with the falsetto used sparingly. Not awful caterwauling here, no sir. What we do have here is a sort of modern folk-rock, possible close to what someone like Hozier is doing (I'm no expert in the matter, mind). It also turns out he had a bonafide hit somewhat similar to what he is up to on this album. "Where's My Love?" was featured in Teen Wolf, and then numerous teen-oriented TV series from 2018 onwards and is now certified Platinum, whatever that means in the streaming age. Of course, I was cmpletely oblivious to this man and any successes he might've had when I picked this up. 

So, how do we know this truly is modern music, even with its folk-rock twist? Because my then seven year old loved it, demanding I play the song she liked to sing a long all the 'oweo--o-o-o-o-o' of the title song, the lyrics of which she happily doesn't understand, though she's phonetically singing along "...the day my father died" (gulp!). It's a big song with a big hook, yet was never released as a single. It's also not alone on the album as The Day My Father Died has enough 'oweo's' and other stadium-ready singalong elements, and some light electronics. You know, for the young'uns. On the other hand, his music clearly has its origins in DIY folk - thus the Bon Iver comparison - so people who like classic, guitar-based acoustic music should also give a listen. A song like "Sweet Home" reminds recalls the era of Crosby, Stills & Nash, even if one-man band SYML harmonizes with himself. 

If you noticed the little One Buck Records logo on the cover or the tags, you'll see that this is my personal version of the album. I thought the original never really got out of the starting gates, only picking up steamm occasionally, so I resequenced the album from the ground up. I also thought it was a little long and repetitive, so I deleted two tracks, incidentally two of the features (bye bye Lucius, bye bye Sara!). At a now vinyl era-compatible 47 minutes and with a much improved flow, I think SYML's The Day My Father Died is an album well worth listening to, even if - like me - you have given up on modern music trends a hile ago. The Day My Father Died combines modern and retro elements in what I find is a very attractive manner. Check this out to see if you feel the same way...