Wednesday, November 24, 2010

78. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)

1. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
2. With A Little Help From My Friends
3. Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
4. Getting Better
5. Fixing A Hole
6. She's Leaving Home
7. Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite
8. Within You Without You
9. When I'm Sixty Four
10. Lovely Rita
11. Good Morning Good Morning
12. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)
13. A Day In The Life

Well, shit. You complain about this book starting a year off badly and then you get one of the most famous albums of all time dropped on you. I don't know who put these albums in order, but they sure as hell did a fantastic job of confusing everybody!
So, here we are, Sgt. Pepper. Unlike some of the more obscure albums I've reviewed so far, you're more or less bound to know this one. Seriously, if you haven't heard this by now, you must be under several layers of rock and halfway through the process of turning into fossil fuels. This album is one of those very special albums that gets a massive cult built up around it, one that renders it nearly impossible to badmouth it in any way, no matter how much I wanted to. Not that I would really need to, since I'm so biased towards the Beatles that you'd think Apple was giving me a stipend.

Listening to this album years and years after the event can make one wonder how on earth this came to be known as the greatest album of all time. A very good collection of songs, to be  sure, but the greatest album ever? Well, not quite. I've always had a bit of an axe to grind where this album is concerned, but that's only because I'm a snob who thinks Revolver is better anyway. When an album is acclaimed to the hyperunrealistic degree that this is, it's inevitable for a bit of backlash to occur.

The only real thing that bugs me about the constant barrage of praise for this album is the constant parroting that this is the first concept album ever. This is blatantly untrue. For one, the phrase 'concept album' can be applied loosely enough that Frank Sinatra's 'In The Wee Small Hours', the very first album reviewed here, could be called one. If you want to get into semantics and argue about 'intellectual' concepts greater than 'sad songs' or 'songs about cars', then I direct you to 'Freak Out', which has a much more solid and significant concept than this one.

Which brings me to complaint #2: This album isn't a concept album. It started as a concept album, sure, but it isn't one. The original idea came after their decision to quit touring in '66, an extraordinarily stressful time for the group that found them wanting to escape their public personalities and perform under the guise of another (fictional) band. And so Sgt. Pepper was born.


...But the Beatles, being human beings, got lazy. So we have two songs and a reprise, and that is all that remains of the album's grand concept. Like almost every other achievement the Beatles made, they were not first, but through the virtues of their immense fame they codified the idea of concept albums for years to come. And all this without even making a proper concept album!

Much of the album's reputation stems from the reception it received at the time. This album plowed into the music world with the force of an atomic bomb. The reception was so huge that even the mainstream press had to take notice. A review in the London Times called it "a decisive moment in the history of Western civilisation", which, while it seems a bit much, perfectly encapsulates the reaction many people had to this album. Before Pepper (BP?), rock music was frequently derided as meaningless music for teenagers that could never aspire for greatness or to be labeled by that lofty term, "art", not like jazz music. This album changed all that. From here on we enter fully into the Age of the Album. It is perhaps symbolic that this would be the Beatles' first American LP that would be left untouched by Capital Records, which had a rather nasty habit of cutting up the track lists of their earlier albums, making a bunch of weird patchwork albums. Needless to say, the Beatles didn't like that very much at all. No more of that nonsense, though. From here on, the album would be fully acknowledged as a genuine artistic statement. And even if this album does suffer from being overrated, any album that has that on their claim to fame is alright by me.

So, I've written all these big lofty paragraphs about how this album was an Event, but I haven't even mentioned any of the songs yet. Christ, Pitchfork oughta hire me.
Despite my whinging earlier, this really is an exceptional album. You've got the iconic intro, replete with sound effects, followed by Ringo getting a song that, for once, isn't way worse than the other members' songs. It's nice that they finally threw Ringo a bone for once. Sure, Ringo may never be an amazing singer, and Joe Cocker's well known cover knocks this song out of the park, but forget all that. Give Ringo some credit for once!

'Lucy' has always amused me on some level. John Lennon's famously denied the LSD allegations over and over, but with lyrics like that, not to mention the sweet acid-fried haze that the song's trapped in, who does he think he's fooling?

Following this, we get 'Getting Better', 'Fixing A Hole', 'She's Leaving Home'...a veritable Paul blitzkrieg. Come to think of it, Paul seems to be doing the heavy lifting on this album, taking up half the record while John gets a paltry 3 and a half songs. The first two tracks' boundless optimism and cheery feeling are perfectly deflated by the depressing 'She's Leaving Home'. With that harp intro and those oh-so-melodramatic strings, it's merely inches away from sliding into unbearably sentimentality. However, one of McCartney's greatest gifts in the Beatles was his ability to fall just short of that line, making cheesy sentimental pop music (famously derided as 'Paul's granny music' by Lennon during that period where he couldn't let a day pass without bitching about Paul and the Beatles), music that is undeniably syrupy, but somehow without leaving a bad taste in your mouth. And as if that wasn't enough, he does the exact same thing in 'When I'm 64', whose music hall atmosphere sounded dated even then.

George is no slouch either, even if it may feel that way on first listen, since he only gets one song, and his role as lead guitarist was rather diminished in the wave of their studio craziness. He still finds time to throw down bitchin' solos here and there, and he's definitely brought the Indian influence up a notch. 'Within You Without You' seems to be the most disliked track here, being a five minute raga-influenced piece with rather preachy lyrics, but forget the haters, this track is fire. Seriously, listen to it again.

I've always felt that 'Mr. Kite' is the underrated gem on this record, for some reason. Although the lyrics reveal Lennon's sheer songwriting laziness that plagued him throughout their later period, taken almost completely from a 19th century circus poster, the song's instrumentation is nothing short of magical. It seems hard to believe that the instrumental breaks were written by humans.

And finally, we can't really go too far without mentioning 'A Day In The Life', can we? This song represents one of the last true songwriting collaborations between John and Paul, mashing their two individual songs together to make a combination that would melt faces for all time. The way the orchestra just keeps building and building...it still sounds jarring today, I can only imagine how it must've sounded back then. While A Hard Day's Night, released a mere 3 years before this (can you believe that?) has one of the most iconic opening chords of all time, Pepper has the most iconic closing chord-a dramatic,climactic finish that closes the curtain on an era in rock history, but not without showing a glimpse of the exciting turns yet to come. 10/10

Sunday, November 21, 2010

77. Nico - Chelsea Girl (1967)


1. Fairest Of The Seasons
2. These Days
3. Little Sister
4. Winter Song
5. It Was A Pleasure Then
6. Chelsea Girl
7. I'll Keep It With Mine
8. Somewhere There's A Feather
9. Wrap Your Troubles In Dreams (And Dream Your Troubles Away)
10. Eulogy To Lenny Bruce

EEEEEEEEEY NICO MY CAAAHSIN! WANNA GO SHOOT SOME POOL?!

Actually, never mind. This album would sound terrible if it were in Grand Theft Auto 4. I'd be way too moody to kill anybody. It'd be the most miserable thing in the world. This album is the sort of thing you'd play in a coffee club to chase out the bourgeois. It's "chamber folk" which as far as I can tell means they forgot to tell the string section to leave the recording studio.

Despite my snarkiness, this is a highly compelling album. It's beautiful, cold, forlorn, and if you listen to it like I did, lying on the Squiggle staring into the stars, it can even be spellbinding. You might remember Nico from the super-acclaimed Velvet Underground debut, and most of the members of that group were involved with writing and recording the album in some way. Save for one song , though, you wouldn't really know it. This is music far removed from the famed discordance of the Velvet Underground. While their music is perfectly suited for interpreting the throes of heroin addiction, the music here is tailored towards its subjects. Take 'Chelsea Girls', the toe-tapping (well, if you haven't got a pulse...) title track. It's already a sad song as it is, but when you factor in the oh-so Baroque strings and Nico's strange emotionally detached German voice, it becomes nearly heartbreaking. Listen to the flute, man. According to an interview given years later, Nico didn't like this album because she had very little creative control over how it would sound, and she hated it, particularly the flute: "But the flute! The first time I heard the album, I cried and it was all because of the flute." Well, so did I, but that's because it's a sad fuckin' flute, man! Take that away and the song loses so much of its tragic melancholy air!


Basically what I'm saying is that I am better than Nico at music. What's she gonna do, haunt me?


Oh yeah, there are other songs here too. Including, much to my surprise, two rather good songs written by a 19 year old Jackson Browne! Speaking as a fellow 19 year old, fuck you. Pretty much all the songs on this album follow the same formula, except for the sore thumb 'It Was A Pleasure Then' which is where the Velvet Underground sound comes out of nowhere. Psychedelic, discordant strings, eh? I'm not quite sure how I feel about this song. There were aspects of it that I liked, particularly some moments at the beginning that were downright Sigur Ros-y 30 years too early, but I don't really like how completely different it is from every other song on the album. If it had been placed elsewhere, perhaps it would be recognized for the beautiful (if slightly misshapen) snowflake that it is.


This album didn't necessarily seem like an album that I would enjoy, but maybe it's just the overcast skies, the autumn air, and my general moodiness as of late that  made this album speak to me so much. Whatever it is, it's certainly nice to find an album that soundtracks my setting so well, even if it is on a pre-ordered list. I guess sometimes things just work that way. 9/10

Monday, November 8, 2010

76. Astrud Gilberto - Beach Samba (1967)


1. Stay
2. Misty Roses
3. Face I Love
4. Banda (Parade)
5. Oba, Oba
6. Canoeiro
7. I Had the Craziest Dream
8. Bossa Na Praia (Beach Samba)
9. My Foolish Heart
10. Dia das Rosas (I Think of You)
11. You Didn't Have to Be So Nice
12. Não Bate O Coração

I'm sorry, but I was under the impression that I had to hear these albums before I died. I mean, that's what the book is called, isn't it? In some imagined scenario, this crazy bastard's got a gun to my head and if I don't educate myself about the most important and influential albums of the past 50 years, I'm fuckin' DEAD, right?

It is albums like these that makes this imaginary death threat seem that much more hollow. I'm pretty damn sure that if I had died without listening to this album, I'd be just fine. In fact, I'd have had an extra half hour of my time.


It's not as though this album is bad. Considering some of the albums  I've heard/forced myself to listen to over the years, this was at least listenable. But that's just it: that's  all it is. There's nothing at all groundbreaking about this album. In fact, considering it's the first album from 1967 which I can already tell you is one hell of an exciting year, this shit sounds downright anachronistic. It's the sort of music I'd expect one of the characters from Mad Men to have playing in the background in 1962, not touted as one of the greatest/most influential albums of 1967. It's bossa nova at its most cliche and pedestrian. Essentially, it's entirely made up of songs that sound like 'Girl from Ipanema' but aren't as good.


I suppose this would be the part of the review where I mention the individual songs, but what good what that do? The only individual comment I could make is to wonder why the hell she thought having a duet with her kid was a good idea.  Children just shouldn't be allowed to sing, just look at Justin Bieber. Yeah, I know, he's actually 16 or something, but as far as I'm concerned, he's been caught in a temporal causality loop and is forever stuck as a high voiced android.


But I digress. Welcome to the year 1967. You thought '66 was some hot shit? This is even better. Although most of the sounds associated with '67 started in earnest the year before, this was the year that they entered the public conscience in a big way. In this year, rock began to be taken seriously as a viable artistic medium, rather than just a bunch of catchy pop tunes. This shift in thinking would result in some of the greatest and most influential albums of all time. This is not one of them. 3/10

Sunday, November 7, 2010

75. Nina Simone - Wild is the Wind (1966)


1. I Love Your Lovin' Ways
2. Four Women
3. What More Can I Say
4. Lilac Wine
5. That's All I Ask
6. Break Down And Let It All Out
7. Why Keep On Breaking My Heart
8. Wild Is The Wind
9. Black Is The Colour Of My True Love's Hair
10. If I Should Lose You
11. Either Way I Lose

My very first thought upon starting this album was 'Since when did Nina Simone become a man?' Which is always a nice first impression to have.

Nina Simon is gifted with one of the more unique voices in R&B music. It has a tremendous range of expression, able to evoke any number of emotions. The album too displays a very wide range, but unfortunately it doesn't quite manage to hold itself up as successfully. Like a lot of R&B albums from this period, this thing was haphazardly flung together from a variety of sessions taking place over a few years, with the result that this record flip flops faster than John Kerry under pressure.


While in other cases this would be seen as showing the artist's true diversity, here it comes across as some douchebags not knowing how to structure an album properly. The songs are a jarring split between more 'pop' sounding soul records like 'I Love Your Lovin' Ways' that sound like they're meant for radio play, and introspective darker songs like 'Four Women' and the title track. You can imagine that they don't mix together very well. 


The conventional tracks are listenable, but mostly rather slight. The only ones that stick out are the first one (go figure) and the rather interesting 'Break Down and Let It All Out', which if you sent it forward in time 10 years and gave it to a disco diva, would've been a massive hit. It's uncanny.


The more ambitious tracks almost save the record from mediocrity, and they're by far the most memorable. 'Four Women' tells the story of four black women and their tragic position in life. Here Simone's civil rights advocating background really shines through, especially in the oh-so dramatic ending ("MY NAME....IS PEACHEEEEEEEEEEEEES!").


'Wild Is The Wind' has been overshadowed a bit by the David Bowie cover, but her version is haunting and near theatrical in its phrasing. It's 7 minutes long, which is quite a feat, since most soul artists didn't dare go past the 3 minute mark back then. Props to Nina for straight not giving a shit.


This album's got some really good songs on it, but the filler clashes with it so bad that the listening experience is not as satisfying as it should be. It's sort of fitting that the last album I review for 1966 is thrown together like this, like so many albums were in this period. 6/10