40 Year Itch : Those We Missed July 1973

 [Purchase]10cc's playful debut spawned four singles in the UK ( the #1 "Rubber Bullets" and #2 "Donna" among them). One of the weirdest art pop bands of its day, 10cc's entire catalogue from here to Bloody Tourists is worth owning.[Purchase]Although it's home to "Knockin' On Heavens's Door" ( US #12), this soundtrack of mostly instrumentals makes for nice background listening and that's it. And why would you by a Dylan album that you didn't...

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40 Year Itch: Calling All Cars ! Calling All Cars!

\[Purchase]It's one of the great musical debates of our time: What was the first disco song? There are sections of Eddie Kendricks's 1972 hit "Girl You Need A Change of Mind" that have that propulsive dance floor beat. 1972 also saw  disco progenitors like Jerry Butler's "One Night Affair" and Manu Dibango's "Soul Makossa" that compel you to get up and boogie.But a strong case can be made that all of the disco elements...

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40 Year Itch: The Rock n Roll Raceway

On July 28th 1973 600,000 fans packed Watkins Glen Raceway in upstate New York to see The Allman Brothers, The Grateful Dead and The Band. It was the biggest rock concert ever staged in the U-S,  surpassing Woodstock by 200,000. Promoters expected 150,000 fans ( paying $10 each) but there were already people camping out two days before the concert. A full day before showtime, hours earlier than planned,  promoters opened the gates. The...

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40 Year Itch: Wigglin' My Fanny ( Ha Ha Man Get Down)

[Purchase]Funk was once a word used to describe the smell of a bedroom after a session of sweaty sex.In that case, Betty Davis's debut album just might be the funkiest funk album ever released.   After her marriage with jazz legend Miles Davis came to an end, Betty took off for San Francisco where she hooked up with the Family Stone's rhythm section , bassist Larry Graham and drummer Greg Errico. Neil Schon of Santana and Doug Rodrigues...

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40 Year Itch : Future Days

[Purchase]Future Days is the fifth album from Krautrock luminaries Can and the final album to feature Damo Suzuki on vocals. Returning from a sunny vacation, the five members of Can entered Inner Space Studio to record another blissed-out album of mostly instrumental electronic boogie. All but the three-minute single "Moonshake" ( my favorite all-time Can tune) are lengthy, 8-minute plus trance-inducing numbers with the twenty minute "Bel Air" taking...

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40 Year Itch : Have Mercy!

[Purchase Original Mix Recording]With their third album, Tres Hombres, released in July of 1973, ZZ Top, that little ole band from Texas, delivered a high powered, tequila-soaked rock 'n' blues best seller. The album hit the Top 10 while the first single, the John Lee Hooker-esque "La Grange", just missed the Top 40 singles chart--peaking at #41. Not bad for a song about a whorehouse!  Dusty Hill admits he visited the Chicken Ranch, a well known...

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40 Year Itch : I Am No Waterboy

[Purchase]When Lou Reed followed up his commercially successful 1972 album Transformer with Berlin, some critics thought he was committing some kind of commercial seppuku. Writing for Rolling Stone, Stephen Davis called the album a disaster:There are certain records that are so patently offensive that one wishes to take some kind of physical vengeance on the artists that perpetrate them. Reed's only excuse for this kind of performance (which isn't...

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40 Year Itch: Van the Man Plays the Rainbow

For two nights in July of 1973 Van Morrison and his ultra tight 11 piece Caledonia Soul Orchestra played the Rainbow Theatre in London. This is the same band that would record the classic 1974 double live album It's Too Late to Start Now. The string and horn section --and Van's fiery delivery--give even Morrison's Them era tunes an epic quality. The 1973 tour was put together to promote Morrison's first disappointing album Hard Nose the Highway....

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1973 In Salsa

[Purchase]New York salsa was fusion music; you could hear urbane Havana son and country Puerto Rican jibaro styles, jazzy horn and flute solos, Santana-style rock guitar, wah wah keyboards, long percussion jams that drew on funk and African music while mixing in various Caribbean and South American rhythms. It was integrated, like the city it came from.  Will Hermes, Love Goes to Buildings On Fire: Five Years in New York That Changes Music Forever. ...

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40 Year Itch: California Tumbles Into the Sea

[Purchase for $4.99]"There is a substantial body of opinion which holds that Countdown was the best Steely Dan album, bar none. Generally speaking, the type of person who typically holds this position is not the sort of individual you want sitting across the table from you at a dinner party, especially one where alcoholic beverages are being served. Nor would you be well advised to give one of these guys your email address or (gasp) your phone number....

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Meaner Than a Junkyard Dog

[Purchase]Billboard Hit Singles July 21, 19731. Jim Croce : Bad Bad Leroy Brown2. Billy Preston : Will It Go Round in Circles3. The Carpenters : Yesterday Once More4. Three Dog Night : Shambala5. Paul Simon : KodachromeJim Croce finally convinced himself he made it the day he slung a guitar strap over his shoulder and stood up to perform in concert.  Those days of getting assaulted by a drunk in a Pennsylvania bar were behind him."When the fights...

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40 Year Itch : Rock and Roll's A Loser's Game

[Purchase]Mott the Hoople's follow-up to the David Bowie aided and abetted All the Young Dudes, Mott is a masterpiece and one of the great rock and roll albums of the 70's. It plays like a concept album about the trials and tribulations of a road-weary, instrument-misplacing, infighting and ultimately disillusioned rock band and proved Mott the Hoople could make a great music all by themselves.The band rocks hard on "Whizz Kid", "Drivin' Sister"...

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40 Year Itch : Wake Up & Turn I Loose

[Purchase]   Following shortly on the heels of the 1973 Island Records release Catch A Fire, Trojan Records put out African Herbsman, a collection of  recordings by Bob Marley and the Wailers most of which were produced as far back as the 1960s by Lee Perry. In Jamaica they were released in 1971 as Soul Revolution.Among the tunes that would be re recorded for future Island releases: "Lively Up Yourself" ( Natty Dread). "Duppy Conqueror"...

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The Style Council's Mick Talbot : My Top Ten

[Purchase]In June of 1983 Mick Talbot provided Smash Hits with a  soul heavy Top Ten List of his favorite tunes. At the time Talbot and Former Jam leader Paul Weller were promoting their mini LP Introducing the Style Council and the UK#4 single "Speak Like A Child". The list comes courtesy of Brian at Like Punk Never Happe...

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40 Year Itch : Tengo Tiempo

[Purchase]Can you spare a minute for the greatest rock album to ever come out of Argentina?When the Argentine version of Rolling Stone Magazine compiled that nation's top rock albums of all time it was hardly a surprise that Artaud by Pescado Rabioso ( Rabid Fish) topped the list. In truth, this was a solo album by the band's  Luis Alberto Spinetta...known in his country as El Flaco or "Skinny".Spinetta had a poet's sensibility and...

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40 Year Itch: "My name is Ray Davies...and I am dying"

[Purchase]On July 15 1973 Ray Davies told fans at London's White City Stadium he was quitting the Kinks. To quote Davies:"I'm fucking sick of the whole thing. I'm sick up to here with it."Looking "haggard and ill" according to Sounds Magazine, Davies was a pill popping freak who describes the theatrical, rock operatic years between 1973 and 1975 as a time "in my life, in my career, when I should not have been allowed to put any records out." In the...

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40 Year Itch: Faithful Till Death

 [Purchase]In the early morning hours of July 15, 1973 a drunk driver hit Clarence White as he was loading equipment into his van following a gig in Palmdale, California. He died the next day at the age of 29.Though best known for his stint with The Byrds ( beginning as a session musician on Younger Than Yesterday and then as a full fledged member from 1968 -1973), White also played with country rock pioneers Nashville West, the bluegrass super...

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Blown Away !

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40 Year Itch: Slow Jamming With Stevie Wonder

On July 13 1973, weeks before the release of Innervisions,  Stevie Wonder finished his show at New York City's Rainbow room with an impromptu  six and a half minute thank you to his audience.Wonder had given the New York crowd a preview of four songs that would appear on next month's release Innervisions.1. Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing2. Higher Ground3. Superwoman4. To Know You is To Love You\5. Signed Sealed Delivered I'm Yours6. Visions7....

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40 Year Itch : If I Crossed A Million Rivers

[Purchase]Thundering right out of the gates with its lead off track "Keep Yourself Alive", Queen released its debut album on July 13th 1973 and immediately drew comparisons to Led Zeppelin."With its first album Queen has produced a driving, high energy set which in time may be looked upon with the same reverence Led Zep I now receives" said the Chicago Tribune. Rolling Stone's Gordon Fletcher added "There's no doubt that this funky, energetic...

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40 Year Itch : Adventures in Soul

[Purchase]Two Great Artists Challenge Themselves and Their FansWith his dazzling live album in 1972 and his partnership with Roberta Flack on the Grammy winning "Where Is the Love", the multi-talented Donny Hathaway had finally struck Gold. Now, to show his new fans what he was really capable of, Hathaway recorded his most ambitious set yet.I decided to call it Extension of a Man because I am in the process of expanding and developing styles. I would...

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40 Year Itch: Don and Phil Call It Quits

[Purchase]By July of 1973, Don and his younger brother Phil Everly were barely talking. They would stay at different hotels, take separate cars to the gigs and even use separate dressing rooms. They'd fight like cats and dogs until the curtains were pulled apart and the show started. They were making good money as the Everly Brothers and, like Siamese Brothers,  seemed to be stuck with each other for life.Then on July 13, 1973 at Knott's Berry...

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40 Year Itch: This and That...

 [Purchase]Bits of Music news from the early Summer of 1973:Richie Havens begins an 8 city tour to promote Portfolio, an album containing eight lithographs Havens himself drew.Why is John Dean's picture in a music blog? Because the Time Magazine cover story was promised to Paul Simon.  Buck Owens was spotted in San Diego for farewell ceremonies to two US Navy Destroyers sold to Brazil: The USS Buck and the USS Owens.Gemini announced...

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