40 Year Itch : Stones Record "Angie" Demo

Following their exhausting, drug-fueled North American "STP" Tour, The Rolling Stones gathered in Jamaica in late November to begin sessions for their follow up to Exile On Main St. Although the Stones would never admit it, something was missing. Sure,  the single "Angie" would hit #1 in the US in 1973 and so would  the album Goats Head Soup.  But this hit and miss record marks the end of the classic Rolling Stones album era which began with Beggars Banquet in 1968 and included Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers and Exile.

Writing for Creem, Lester Bangs said 

"There is a sadness about the Stones now, because they amount to such an enormous 'So what?' The sadness comes when you measure not just one album, but the whole sense they're putting across now against what they once meant..."  

Who's Angie about? David Bowie's wife? Richards has said Angie is heroin : ("Heroin, you're beautiful/  But ain't it time we said goodbye"). 

40 Year Itch: Those We Missed from Nov '72

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I'm reading Neil Young's Waging Heavy Peace ( skip the first 50 pages and Neil starts to settle down and tell his story). I think it's fair to say Neil's the kind of guy who likes to have a lot of plates spinning at the same time. Journey Through the Past is the soundtrack to an experimental, critically panned concert film that wouldn't be seen for two more years. Unreleased on CD, among the best stuff is this seven minute Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young version of "Southern Man"

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With her debut, The Divine Miss M, Bette Midler introduces audience to the brassy, self-mocking "Bathhouse Betty" who first stole hearts in cabaret shows performed in NYC gay clubs. The album went Top 10 and remains a fan favorite.

 

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With the help of "Brand New Key" ( I got a brand new pair of roller skates/ You got a brand new key) , Melanie became Billboard's #1 Female Vocalist of 1972. Her follow-up, Stoneground Words, is the work of a mature, intelligent artist. Naturally nobody bought it. Yet , today it is often referred to as a great under-heard classic.



 

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Basically, Cream's Jack Bruce replaced a heroin addicted Felix Pappalardi on bass to form a new version of Mountain. But by changing their name, Leslie West, Jack Bruce and Corky Laing could renegotiate their record contract. The result was a whopping $1 Million/ Three Album deal. The label didn't care for the debut album enough to promote it but Why Doncha is worth a listen for those who like their riffs heavy and bass lines plodding.


 

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After years of recording albums on his own Takoma label, the inventive guitarist John Fahey released his first Reprise album in November of 1972. Of Rivers And Religion would be selected as one of top ten albums of the year by Time Magazine and Robert Christgau says it's Fahey's best but most critics weren't so kind.
I haven't found the time or desire to get to know all of Fahey's work. To me it sounds as good as anything else I've heard him do.

 

40 Year Itch: Focus III

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The greatest things Dutch guitar god Jan Akkerman ever did wasn't with Focus. It was refusing to play with Sting "because I didn't like his music".

Anyway, Focus followed up their international prog metal yodeling classic "Hocus Pocus" with this double album, Focus III, released in November of 1972. The yodeling is kept to a minimum tho I think you can hear some hints of operatic singing about two minutes into  "Sylvia", a major hit everywhere but in the US. To my ears this sounds like a really bad TV theme. An adventure show starring a lifeguard and his pet chimp. "Surf Chimp" I think we'll call it. Starring Jan Michael Vincent.

 

40 Year Itch: On Butterflies and Lilac Sprays

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In Kicking And Dreaming, Nancy Wilson tells the story of searching for Joni Mitchell on Sechelt Island off the British Columbia coast. This is years before she became famous herself. Nancy had read that Joni owned an 80 acre farm on the 15 square mile island. The journey proved fruitless. Islanders who could have pointed the way usually sent Nancy in the opposite direction.

Though I can't prove it, I always felt I recognized the backdrop of Joni Mitchell's For The Roses. It couldn't be anything but an island on the Sunshine Coast, a slightly sunnier cousin of Washington's San Juan Islands. And the nude gatefold pretty much seals the deal.

But enough about the cover. Released in November of 1972, For the Roses offers a transition between the stark instrumentation of 1971's classic Blue and the Tom Scott/ soft jazz explorations of 1974's Court And Spark. While it may be some people's favorite Joni Mitchell album, For the Roses doesn't work for me anywhere near as well as the two albums surrounding it. Naturally there are songs that sounds like Blue ( "Banquet", "For The Roses") and those that sound like Court and Spark ("Barangrill" and the US#25 hit "You Turn Me On ( I'm A Radio)" which even gives us a glimpse into the forthcoming boho hit "Help Me").



Two of the more interesting cuts, at least to me, are "Blonde in the Bleachers" and "Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire". The first one may very well be a message to Graham Nash about those "sweet mysteries" groupies offer but about my half way in it becomes a message to groupies about Graham Nash and all of the other rock n roll men:
 You can't hold the hand Of a Rock'n'Roll man
 Very long
 Or count on your plans With a Rock'n'Roll man 
 Very long 
 Compete with the fans For your Rock'n'Roll man 
 For very long
 

 And the astonishing lyrics of "Cold Blue Steel" relate an urban nightmare from the perspective of a junkie:
 A wristwatch, a ring, a downstairs screamer 
Edgy-black cracks of the sky "Pin-cushion-prick- Fix this poor bad dreamer!"

 

  For The Roses isn't the first Joni Mitchell album you should buy, but you're missing out if you ignore it altogether.

40 Year Itch: Slayed?

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Yob-Rock at its finest. Though their impact on US charts was minimal. Slade owned the UK Charts between 1971 and 1976. They placed 17 consecutive singles into the UK Top 20 including 6 Number Ones. The ultimate Slade album is their UK#1  Slayed?, released in November of 1972. It features the chronically poor-spelling band's huge hits (UK#1) "Mama We're All Crazee Now" and (UK#2) "Gudbuy T'Jane" as well as "Look At Last Night", perhaps the band's most introspective song:

You'll be right here today/Gone Tomorrow

Maybe they'll care today/But not Tomorrow

Fate can be fickle with the famous. Three days after playing a sold out show in London, drummer Don Powell crashed his Bentley into a wall killing his girlfriend and nearly himself. As Noddy Holder said of that moment: "We were riding the crest of a wave, then a week later Don hjad his crash. He was given 24 hours to live. It all came crumbling down in one day".

40 Year Itch: Grey Lagoons

On November 25, 1972 Roxy Music performed a three song set on the BBC arts program Full House. You'll hear a bit of "Re-Make/Re-Model", "Ladytron" and a new song, "Grey Lagoons", which would appear on the band's second album For Your Pleasure.

 


The sound is tinny and the picture is low-res but it's worth your time if you're a big fan of Roxy Music. Phil Manzanera takes quite the solo on "Ladytron". Andrew Mackay and Bryan Ferry trade off solos ( sax and harmonica) on "Grey Lagoons". Despite his eye-catching appearance, Brian Eno doesn't get many isolated shots at all. There's one near the end.

This week Bryan Ferry releases The Jazz Age, a collection of 1920's style takes on Roxy Music/solo Ferry  classics.

40 Year Itch: Space Chuggin

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Space rock pioneers Hawkwind followed up their #3 UK charting single "Silver Machine" with their third album  Doremi Fasol Latido, a record that would appeal to the same "fanboys" of the early 70's who liked sci fi novels, prog rock and dropping acid in their basement apartments. This is the first album to feature bassist Lemmy from Motorhead and drummer Simon King. Doremi Fasol Latido was recorded at  Rockfield Studios in Wales which Lemmy described as a barn surrounded by mattresses. To appeal to the fanboys, the back cover includes the legend: 

 The Saga of Doremi Fasol Latido is a collection of ritualistic space chants, battle hymns and stellar songs of praise as used by the family clan of Hawkwind on their epic journey to the fabled land of Thorasin.

In his review for Sounds, Martin Hayman described gets to the sessence of space rock's appeal:

The bass and drums batter on with unflagging pace, synthesisers swirl and whistle around the thunderous block riffs whose endless repetition generates that numbed hypnosis, tuneless and menacing voices incant largely incomprehensible lyrics. This is not to knock Hawkwind: the sound they are getting is thicker, fuller, more convincing than ever before. Its total effect is pretty devastating, but the means by which the effect is achieved is no revolution in sound."

The subsequent tour included dancer Stacia who was the subject of an earlier post. This clip includes some NSFW shots of Stacia and Lemmy's explanation of how he joined Hawkwind.