Galactic At Amoeba Tonight

I've been enjoying the new Galactic album, From The Corner To The Block, and I'll do pretty much anything to promote Amoeba Records, so check out the webcast of Galactic's performance at Amoeba Hollywood today at 6pm (PST).

Jon Pareles On Kanye West

Jon Pareles of the New York Times has a sensational piece on the new album by the ego formerly known as Kanye West. Not only did he write was I had been sort of thinking, but had not fully articulated in my own mind, he goes way beyond anything I could ever say in this matter. This is one of the best pieces of music criticism I've read in ages.

Read: NY Times On Kanye West
Kanye West MP3's at Turn The Page

Snippets Of Springsteen's Magic

Here is an mp3 comprised of 30 second samples of Bruce Springsteen's upcoming album with the E Street Band, Magic. I have no comment to make, as I am loathe to judge an album based on 30 second samples that are at sub-fidelity levels. But I now know what Springsteen's manager, Jon Landau, meant when he said that the album is "light on its feet."

Download: Bruce Springsteen - 30 second snippets of Magic

On Rick Rubin And Saving The Record Business

There is a long cover piece on Rick Rubin in Sunday’s NY Times Magazine. Unfortunately, the headline, “Can Rick Rubin Save The Music Business,” is symptomatic of the article missing the point. The music business does not need to be saved – the music business, comprised of everything from records, downloads, publishing, live performance, merchandising, performance rights organizations, internet portals and much more, is thriving (depending on who you’re with). It is the record business, with severely declining sales, layoffs and a perception of diminished possibilities that is in a fight for survial. What the article should be titled instead is: “Can Rick Rubin Save The Record Business As We Know It?”

Rubin is an excellent music man, and I’d confidently bet that he improves the quality of Columbia’s artist roster and releases. Beyond that, I really don’t know. His American Recordings imprint has broken only one act in the past decade – System Of A Down, and with Rubin continuing to take on outside production projects and not coming into an office daily (the devil is in the details, especially at a label as big as Columbia), it is difficult to really gauge what his impact will be outside of the artist roster.

In the article David Geffen is quoted, "The music business, as a whole, has lost its faith in content. Only 10 years ago, companies wanted to make records, presumably good records, and see if they sold. But panic has set in, and now it's no longer about making music, it's all about how to sell music. And there's no clear answer about how to fix that problem. But I still believe that the top priority at any record company has to be coming up with great music. And for that reason, Sony was very smart to hire Rick." Geffen is correct in the importance of great music to a music company, but he (and most of the business) misses what I believe to be the biggest challenge in the new landscape of the record business: the absolutely broken relationship between the business and the (now super-empowered) consumer.

When the record business was an oligarchy, controlling production, promotion and distribution of mainstream music, the relationship between the business and the consumer didn’t matter – the industry had the consumer over a barrel. But with the rise of the Internet and the ability to acquire music for free, the consumer now holds the cards. In response, the industry has tried to sue and innovate its way out of the problem. It hasn’t worked and in my opinion, it will never work. The lawsuits have not deterred the huge number of people from getting their music for free and the suing of its own customers have only served to cement the industry's already awful reputation while its innovations have consistently been at least one step behind technology. It has made the issue of downloading a moral one, subsequently calling the huge majority of its customers thieves, and placing the responsibility of the business faltering on them, conveniently ignoring their own responsibilities in the matter and ignoring the fact that no one is interested in lessons in morality from the record business. Such tactics continually violate the fundamental rule of successful business: The Customer Is Always Right (even when they’re not). And whether the industry’s assertions are right or not does not matter. It has not gotten and will not get the record industry results the results it is looking for.

In my opinion, the record industry must do the following to even have the possibility of moving forward successfully in the Internet era:

1. Publicly acknowledge and take responsibility for the fact that what they’ve done has not worked – and admit that their strategy has come from trying to protect their control over distribution, promotion and sales rather than serve the music buying public.
2. Recommit to providing consumers with music from a context of quality - quality music with quality of convenience, quality of choice and a quality price point (having the only place online to buy major label music being iTunes, which only sells only 128k AAC files at 99 cents per song, is none of the above.)
3. Quit making music consumers your adversaries. That means drop every single lawsuit against individual filesharers. Yes, consumers need to be made aware of the impact that downloading music illegally has on music, artists and the industry, but take the morality out of it, and leave consumers empowered to make a choice, whatever it is. Because the reality is already that consumers already are making a choice everyday, except they aren't really aware of the impact that their choice has. Dropping the lawsuits provides the space for consumers to actually listen to what the industry's valid points are, rather than dismissing them out of hand.

Doing the following does not guarantee anything. But what it does do is dramatically transform the relationship between the industry and the consumer - in perception and reality, and creates the possibility of, for the first time, creating a relationship between the consumer and the music business, one where each can listen and positively respond to what the other has to say, without making one an out of touch industry of greed and the other an ungrateful thief that needs to be punished.

Bootleg Friday: Elvis Presley, 1970

Since I was away on vacation on August 16, I missed the commemoration of the 30th Anniversary of Elvis' death. So to atone for my absence, today's installment of Bootleg Friday is from an Elvis tour rehearsal taped at RCA Studios on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, on July 24, 1970. It's a fascinating tape - it's Elvis being relaxed and deadly serious, often within the same song (similar to how he sang much of his material live). Elvis will take up a song lightly, playing around with it, but each time as the song progresses, he gathers his momentum and loses himself within the song. And he is hyper-conscious of his phrasing - you'll hear him stop the band on "Bridge Over Troubled Water" to re-sing a line to his own satisfaction.

The rehearsal is a refreshingly stripped down version of Elvis' band, sans orchestra and background singers, so James Burton's guitar and Ronnie Tutt's drums really get the full spotlight. Tutt's drumming on "Suspicious Minds" is especially breathtaking. But what you get most of all, of course, is Elvis himself, a supreme singer and presence, who at this point in his career, still cared very much about his music, even if the rot had already began to set in.

Download: "Stranger In The Crowd" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "Something" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "Polk Salad Annie" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "Bridge Over Troubled Water" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "Sweet Caroline" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA
Download: "Suspicious Minds" 7/24/70, Hollywood, CA

Summer Goodness: Superbad, Easy Street Records & The Gossip

Some more vacation tidbits...

Seeing “Superbad” was an unexpected treat. The movie - a vulgar, smartly filthy and warmly hilarious high school comedy is simply one of the funniest movies I’ve seen in a long time. Not only does it work as a “high school sex comedy,” its wonderful portrayal of adolescent male friendship is very affecting without getting too sentimental. Jonah Hill and Michael Cera are both great in their roles, and the juxtaposition of the badass soul music of the soundtrack with the futility of the the high school boys is brilliantly done. Go see it, if you haven’t already.

I was in Seattle for a couple of days and my hotel was around the corner from Easy Street Records, a superb record store that inspired me to buy a compact disc (Charlie Rich’s Behind Closed Doors) simply because it didn’t feel right to me to walk out of the store without buying something (which is something I can’t say about Virgin Megastore or the former Tower Records, never mind horrible chain stores with no selection). Easy Street, like Amoeba Records, is a store creates such a music rich environment that it is impossible, if you’re a real music fan, not to want to immerse yourself in tons of new music that you’ve never heard before. It is more than a store – it’s a shrine to the love of music, and they honor that love. Being there, you can’t help but rekindle your romance with music just a little bit more.

I did a lot of driving during the trip, and since I was in the Pacific Northwest, I figured I’d listen to some music from that area that I hadn’t gotten around to yet, which led me to the Gossip’s Standing In The Way Of Control a luminous dance/punk/soul album released last year. Lead singer Beth Ditto, a very full figured lesbian provocateur originally from Arkansas, sings with a full-throated passion that occurs as inspired by equal parts Iggy Pop and a myriad of soul greats. It may plays as indie rock, but it’s really indie/soul music – created by an eternal outsider who holds herself with power and dignity in a world that would nullify her.

I’m swamped with catching up on stuff. Bootleg Friday will happen tomorrow – and then expect fresh content starting next week. I'm excited for the fall.

Download: Lyle Workman (Superbad OST) - "Flashback Party Weekend"
Download: Charlie Rich - "Behind Closed Doors"
Download: The Gossip - "Standing In The Way Of Control"

Back From Vacation

Got home late last night from vacation in the Pacific Northwest. The last time I had traveled extensively out there was 1987 and I almost forgot how beautiful it is out there. It's good to be home, even if I'm a bit jet lagged. I'll give a vacation recap later in regards to some sounds I got into out there, but to be honest, I listened to a lot of Grateful Dead. Scenes like this one, from a hike I took up to Mirror Lake at Mount Hood in Oregon, just kind of called for it.


This vacation reminded me how much I love the wilderness. But it's great to be back home; I'm looking forward to getting a little corruption in my lungs.

Springsteen's "Radio Nowhere"

I’m still on vacation until next week, but the release of “Radio Nowhere,” the first single from Bruce Springsteen’s upcoming album, Magic, merits a posting. Or on second thought, maybe not.

A guitar driven, mid-to-up-tempo rocker, “Radio Nowhere” is a major disappointment to these ears. Generic in sound and lyric, the song occurs as a somewhat lifeless affair, with little in the way of joy, wonder or soul. The guitars growl, but they growl like an old, mangy dog might – with little spark or bite. And when Bruce sings the line “I was driving thru the misty rain/Looking for a mystery train,” it’s all I can do not to groan. This is one of those songs that sounds like it was constructed by using a “Springsteen-paint-by-numbers-kit,” and the blandness that producer Brendan O’Brien was wrongfully accused of for his production on The Rising comes to pass on this track.

No one wants to fall in love with new Bruce Springsteen music more than I do. But I have to call ‘em like I see ‘em – this song is a stiff. I’m still very hopeful about the album – and perhaps in context with the rest of the album, “Radio Nowhere” will resonate more. And live, I’m sure it will gain some power. But for now, I have to say that this is the worst Springsteen lead single ever, a song that feels like it should be an outtake, and coming off of the looseness and joy of The Seeger Sessions, it feels like a major stumble.

Springsteen sings on this track, “Been in some kind of dark cove/Searchin’ for a world with some soul.” Usually, Bruce Springsteen music is something that can be counted on to provide the soul – but if his new music is indeed soulful, it’s going to be on the Magic’s other tracks, because this one just flat out misses the mark.

On Vacation

Hey all -

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. I'm out of town on vacation and without Internet service. I'll be trying to post some next week - hopefully I'll get some Internet access. I'll be back on full time starting 8/28.

Bootleg Friday: Elvis Costello, 1978

For today's installment of Bootleg Friday, you're getting Elvis Costello at one of his peaks, performing at the legendary Winterland in San Francisco, CA on June 7, 1978. The show was broadcast live on KSAN radio, and featrues Costello and the Attractions motoring through songs from his first two albums, My Aim Is True and This Year's Model, both of which are my favorite Costello albums. (I know there are a lot of fans of Imperial Bedroom, but despite many listens, it's never hooked me.)

Highlights include "Mystery Dance," "Less Than Zero," and titanic versions of "Blame It On Cain" and "Party Girl." I hear a lot of soul influence in both the playing and singing - the sound like a bunch English guys trying to be Booker T. and the MG's with a bad attitude, even though at the time, they probably wouldn't have admitted it. From the Rolling Stone interview in 1982:

"When I went to live in Liverpool I discovered everyone was into acid rock - and I used to hide my Otis Redding records when friends came around. I didn't want to be out of step. I tried to find somebody of that sort that I could like and his group would be it: someone weird like Captain Beefheart. It's no different now - people trying to outdo each other in extremes. I "saw the light" when I was already playing, coming back to London, seeing the pub-rock groups. I discovered that all the music that I liked secretly, that I'd been hiding from my friends - that was what was great fun in a bar: Lee Dorsey songs!

Costello's relationship with soul would take an incredibly complicated turn on the Armed Forces tour in 1979, when drunk in a bar after a show in Columbus, Ohio, arguing viciously with Bonnie Bramlett and members of the Stephen Stills Band and looking for the most outrageous possible thing he could say to offend his antagonists, Costello called Ray Charles a "blind, ignorant nigger," said something similar about James Brown and attacked the stupidity of America in general. This from a man who had produced the first album by the Specials, a pioneering interracial U.K. band, who had taken on the racist National Front in England with "Night Rally" and had appeared at Rock Against Racism concerts. At the time, he became far better known for that statement than he ever did for his music, and it effectively ended any possibility of Costello becoming a mainstream artist - it would take years for the incident to be complete.

Download: "Mystery Dance" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "Lip Service" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "Less Than Zero" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "Blame It On Cain" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "This Year's Girl" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "I Don't Want To Go Down To Chelsea" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "Watching The Detectives" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "Party Girl" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Download: "I'm Not Angry" 6/7/78, San Francisco, CA

I Was A Teenage Werewolf

Twenty nine years ago tonight, Bruce Springsteen played the greatest version of "Growin' Up" ever. I could write a whole spiel about it, but it would just delay you from hearing it. It's pretty goofy and corny, and yet, even after hearing it about 1000 times, I still get choked up listening to it. And it makes me want to take on the world.

Download: "Growin' Up" 8/9/78, Cleveland, OH

A Lighter Shade Of Pop

Yesterday I read Rob Sheffield’s very moving book, “Love Is A Mix Tape,” chronicling his relationship with his first wife Renee, who died suddenly of a pulmonary embolism at the age of 31 after they had been married for only five years. It’s an excellent book that is part ode to the role music plays in our lives (at least those of us who are total music fanatics) and how we process grief and loss. It struck me as a combination of High Fidelity and Joan Didion’s The Year Of Magical Thinking.

Of the many things that affected me about the book was the love Rob and Renee had for pop. I’ve never been a big fan of pop – listening to top 40 stations has never been my thing, and I’ve always been pretty snarky and dismissive about it. If there are songs on top 40 that I like, they’re usually ones that started somewhere else (rock, r&b, rap or soul) and then crossed over to pop, but my immediate reaction is usually to dismiss anything purely pop as light and insignificant. What I’ve missed with that attitude is that being light and insignificant is absolutely wonderful sometimes, and would be an ideal balance to my very serious and significant self (even when I’m having lots of fun, I’m pretty serious about it). As a listener, that means I don’t get a lot of great pop until after the fact, the way I didn’t get Justin Timberlake’s first album until about a year after it came out. (Hell, I even like “Sexyback” now.)

I’ve always looked for meaning, depth and substance in music – and I always will. But I am declaring that I am now ready to some more frivolity in my listening picks. I’m open to suggestions.

The Police At MSG

Today we are lucky to have a guest entry on last Friday night's Police show at MSG by our good friend Artie Fufkin. I have to say that Artie is a far better writer than I thought he'd be - and certainly a better writer than he is a promo man.

If I were a betting man, I would venture to say that nothing Sting does these days happens by accident. With that being said, if one was to believe that his intention was to “shock the world” by announcing a Police reunion, mission kind-of accomplished. But if you dig a little deeper, you’d see that it wasn’t so shocking.

Digging back into the set-lists from Sting’s last back-to-basics concert tour (during which he played colleges for the first time in decades), his set leaned heavily on classic Police material. And so when the band appeared together at a Sundance cocktail party following the screening of Stewart Copeland’s DVD Why Does Everyone Stare, it seemed like something was definitely brewing.

Since the time the trio imploded at the height of its popularity, Stewart Copeland has kept busy as an avid film composer (scoring a staggering 60 movies) and Andy Summers returned to his first love, jazz, releasing niche records with little commercial success. Which suited him just fine. Or so it seemed.

Of course, everyone knows what happened to Sting. But for better or for worse, you gotta give the guy credit-- a lot of credit. He works really hard at it. (And he has the body to prove it - Ed.) Releasing a consistent stream of solo albums (Nothing Like The Sun, The Soul Cages and Ten Sumner’s Tales have all aged well in their own way) some not so good (the over-produced Mercury Falling or the forgettable Sacred Love) all the while dropping unexpected later-day career gems like “Desert Rose” and mounting extensive concert tours featuring some of the most seasoned studio musicians money could buy.

And even though The Police never really formally announced their break-up, you couldn’t help but admire Sting for the time and effort he put into his Dream Of The Blues Turtles band which featured the truly outstanding Omar Hakim/Branford Marsalis/Daryl Jones/Kenny Kirkland line-up which helped not just re-invent, but truly re-construct some of Sting’s darker material like “Shadows In The Rain,” “Bring On The Night,” “When The World Is Running Down…” into swinging jazz fusion monsters, with some versions actually eclipsing the originals. Many other line-ups would follow, but none would match the sheer splendor and wow factor of the original Turtle’s band. The line-ups that followed, while often equally talented in the sum of their parts, became more and more sanitized as the years wore on. The adjective I found myself using after seeing Sting shows was “polite.” Having seen most of them live, I tip-toed around The Police reunion cautiously.

With the advance buzz on the first few shows being very mixed, my intention was to approach the band’s return to Madison Square Garden with an open mind. Walking into the arena, a couple of things perked my immediate interest. The first one being that The Police themselves hadn’t played together on-stage at MSG in over 25 years-- I can’t recall another band (other than maybe Cream) that had been away this long. The second thing on my mind was more of a curiosity factor to see how the mostly older crowd would react to the band’s return.

That latter question was immediately answered the second I sat down in my in my $254 + tax, handling fees and UPS shipping charges seat. People were excited. Big time. So by the time the band’s intro song cranked through the P.A. (the well-fitting “Get Up, Stand Up”), most of the crowd was on its feet waiting for the band to kick into “Message In A Bottle” which has kicked off every reunion show on this tour thus far.

They started strong and quickly followed up with “Synchronicity II.” To the band’s credit, they kept the staging simple and the light show efficient, never over-powering the band or the songs. And thankfully, the band’s expanded line-up of their later tours, featuring back-up singers, horn sections etc., were nowhere to be found, leaving the original band bare of clutter, able to focus inward.

“Walking On the Moon” followed, eventually leading into a very tentative sounding “Voices Inside My Head,” which evolved brilliantly into the evening’s first real highlight; a full-on-blow-out explosion of “When The World Is Running Down…” It absolutely killed. It was obvious that they had taken the time to work on it. At this point in the show, I was ready to dismiss the negative reviews I’d read online, but unfortunately, the momentum the band had built got brought to a near stand-still by re-arranged versions of the punk rave-up “Truth Hits Everybody” (rearranged with an underwhelming 4/4 tempo that didn’t work), “Bed’s Too Big Without You,” (great on Regatta De Blanc in all its reggae nuanced glory, not so great live) “Dee Doo Doo, Dee Da Da,” which sounded aged (and not for the better) and culminating with an anemic version of “Invisible Sun,” (one of the band’s great singles) which sounded neutered and tired.

The band did bounce back near the conclusion of the show with an absolutely pulverizing version of “Can’t Stand Losing You” which morphed into “Regatta De Blanc” then back into “Can’t Stand Losing You” with the band truly coming together in a way that I’d never heard before, never over-shadowing each other but rather playing off each other and allowing for spaces between the notes to breathe in a new inviting way.

Without question, there is greatness left in this band. Sting’s voice has never sounded better and despite some strength that’s gone from Copeland’s playing, he’s still one of the most adventurous drummers ever and the best possible platform for Sting’s melodies and arrangements—when they work. He sang with strength and clarity in a way I’d rarely seen before and he seemed dare I say, HAPPY singing these songs again. But then again, if you grossed over 6 million bucks for one night’s work at Dodger Stadium, you’d be pretty fucking happy too. But without digressing into the obvious money making opportunity that this tour clearly is, if the band stopped playing it safe and followed the abandon that they’re hinting at, this could truly be a reunion tour to remember. Until that happens, the show will remain pretty ordinary with flashes of greatness.

Thoughts On Lee Hazlewood

Our dear friend Greg Beshers in San Francisco writes about Lee Hazlewood, who died this past weekend.

Lee Hazlewood had soul, a lot of it in fact. Since he passed away this weekend at the age of 78 there have been quite a few news articles on his career mostly focusing on his biggest hit, “These Boots Are Made For Walkin,’” sung by Nancy Sinatra. While that song is about as ubiquitous as the air we breathe, it’s his solo material that personally gets to me. His song craft, his late 60’s slick West Coast production techniques - utilizing horns, guitars, multiple keyboards and a super tight rhythm section - as well as his deadpan delivery, drenched in reverb, with tales of cowboys and life on the wrong side of the tracks, stand out for their quality in any age of recorded music. He rivals many producers, even to this day, for the sounds he got.

To me though, Lee was the real L.A. Cowboy who epitomized the word “maverick.” He did what he wanted, with who he wanted, when he wanted and never looked back. It's probably because when you get down to it, he never gave a damn what people thought. That's a tough road to go down and it’s even tougher to do it in style, which he did, much to my eternal admiration. We talk a good game in this country about our respect for such men, but I think it's mostly just talk. I guess it makes sense that even though he died over the weekend, I didn't hear a word about it until Monday morning.

Buy Lee Hazelwood at Amazon

Download: "You Look Like A Lady"
Download: "She Comes Running"
Download: "If It's Monday Morning"

The Real Thing

It's very unusual for me to dis a part of my own posts, but that Bowie version of "Knock On Wood" I put up this morning has been bugging me slightly all day long. So I'm putting up a far better live version of it. It's Eddie Floyd, the original creator of the song, doing it with Bruce and the E Streeters in Memphis in the Spring of 1976.

Enjoy the real thing.

Download: Bruce Springsteen w/Eddie Floyd "Knock On Wood/Yum Yum Yum (I Want Some)" 4/29/76, Memphis, TN

PS: It was after this show that Springsteen drove out to Graceland and tried to meet Elvis - by climbing over the wall and running up the driveway. He was gently escorted from the premises.

Accessing The Bowie Files

Sorry for the mishap with the files. They should be working fine now.

Bootleg Friday: David Bowie, 1974

Today’s episode of Bootleg Friday is a very great and interesting David Bowie show from the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles from September 5, 1974. It’s from the Diamond Dogs tour and what you hear is a Bowie in transition from the glam of the Ziggy Stardust era to the soul and funk explorations of that would result in the release of Young Americans the following year. (And you can hear his fascination with soul in the cover of Eddie Floyd’s “Knock On Wood,” which isn’t anything particularly good, but I’m including it for historical purposes.) His band for this tour is a pretty amazing one, consisting of studio vets like Earl Slick, Carlos Alomar, Michael Kamen, David Sanborn as well as Luther Vandross on backing vocals. Toni Basil (of “Mickey” fame) handled the elaborate stage show and choreography.

I’m a Bowie fan, but I’ve never worshipped at his altar. There are albums of his that I love (Ziggy, Station To Station, about half of Hunky Dory), but to me, he’s always been a fascinating fraud – an artist who has neither a ton of emotional depth or soul, yet one who’s done an incredible job of taking on different styles and personas to create something utterly modern and glossy in the most appealing (and sexy) of ways, which I believe is why his appeal endures so strongly. But he did write "All The Young Dudes," and for that alone, he's a legend in my book.

Download: “1984” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Rebel Rebel” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Moonage Daydream” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Suffragette City” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “All The Young Dudes” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Rock N’ Roll With Me” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Knock On Wood” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “The Jean Genie” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA
Download: “Rock N’ Roll Suicide” 9/5/74, Los Angeles, CA

Tom Snyder

There are lots of tributes to Tom Snyder going around the net today, and a lot of great clips from his shows. I always enjoyed watching him; his was an immensely curious man, and he refused to dumb himself, his guests or his audience down to fit some conventional stereotype of what television should be or what the audience would appreciate. His latitude with his guests allowed them to relax and to really be themselves.

Here’s a great interview with Kiss from 1979. Ace Frehley really steals the show here, much to Gene Simmons obvious annoyance.



Here’s an interview with Jerry Garcia and Ken Kesey from 1981, talking about the Acid Tests.



And what would a post about Tom Snyder be without a clip of his infamous interview with John Lydon of P.I.L.? It's difficult to listen past Lydon's obnoxiousness or Keith Levine's pretentiousness, but what you get a sense of is John Lydon's utter dismay, of how in his eyes, punk absolutely failed.

Miss Lavelle White

Thanks to our friend Sarah in Texas, today I can write about an a great soul and blues artist I just discovered instead of writing about how I think Flight of the Conchords is mediocre and symptomatic of how most beloved things in indie culture are overrated.

Sarah sent me a link to Lavelle White’s website and listening to her sing is like a breath of fresh air. Lavelle is an 78-year-old soul singer out of Texas, who recorded for the Duke and Peacock labels in the 50’s and 60’s, and toured with Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, Bobby “Blue” Bland and many others, but never released a full length album until 1994. From what I’m told, Lavelle is a pretty fierce woman – she wears tight gold lame pants onstage and lets her audience know that she is not to be messed with – or else. She is in possession of one of those voices that immediately emerges as singular and you can hear the accrued experience – both as an artist and a woman - in her voice. She sings with immense power, but has none of the melisma and oversouling that has afflicted so many singers who continue on in music inspired by soul.

Download: "Soul Deep"

Bootleg Friday: Leon Russell, 1970

You didn’t think I’d leave you hanging on Bootleg Friday, did you?

Yeah, I didn’t post much this week at all. I got stuck. It happens sometimes – either there’s no inspiration, or everything I begin to write seems, well, stupid to me. When that happens, what I should do is just press on, but this week, I didn’t. I apologize. Next week I promise to be far more active on the blog.

Ok – so on to Bootleg Friday. It’s from a transcendent Leon Russell show, taped at the Fillmore East in New York on November 21, 1970 on a double bill with Elton John (!). Elton opened, and Leon blew the doors out with a tremendous set of his 50’s tinged dixie rock n’ roll.

Leon Russell is one of those figures who is far less well known than he should be. Prodigiously talented, he’s played with legends – Dylan, Lennon, Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis (who he toured with when he was in his teens), Clapton, Willie Nelson and literally hundreds of others, made great albums, had his own record company and produced for countless artists. He’s also written songs that became hits for others: “Delta Lady” for Joe Cocker, “Hummingbird” for B.B. King and “Superstar” for the Carpenters are just a few among many.

Here he is leading the all star band at George Harrison’s Concert for Bangladesh:



The songs I'm putting up are just a small taste of his talent and soul. I can't recommend his music highly enough.

Buy Leon Russell at Amazon

Download: "Girl From The North Country" 11/21/70, New York, NY
Download: "A Song For You" 11/21/70, New York, NY
Download: "Dixie Lullaby" 11/21/70, New York, NY
Download: "It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry" 11/21/70, New York, NY
Download: "Prince Of Peace" 11/21/70, New York, NY
Download: "Delta Lady" 11/21/70, New York, NY

Oh, How Ironic

There's a lengthy piece in today's L.A. Times (site reg required) about rock artists participating in advertisements. Reading it, I can't help but be struck by a certain irony: Once upon a time, most rock artists (even the left of center ones) made commercial music designed to sell records and be played on the radio (i.e., be popular) - and then avoided advertising like the plague. Now, many rock artists make music that is deliberately noncommercial or obtuse (under the guise of being "uncompromised") and then place their music in advertisements because they find that their music isn't reaching as big an audience as they thought they would (or should).

Now I know the arguments contrary to that: Record sales are down, radio doesn't play doesn't do much for rock artists anymore, it's harder to get an artist exposed these days, etc., etc. All of which has truth to it. But there's another part of the equation that rarely gets discussed - for over fifteen years, the vanguard of rock artists have looked down their nose at making music that is obviously melodic or accessible, and the genre has suffered an enormous loss of popularity because of it, resulting in the erosion of popularity of modern rock on the radio, and the winnowing of outlets that expose left-of-center-but-accessible rock to a broad audience. Yes, obviously the internet revolution has had an enormous hand in this. But I ask the question: If modern rock radio (and artists) had really been delivering the goods, would everyone have run away so fast?

Bootleg Friday: Van Morrison, 1971

If there's someone who embodies the term "blue-eyed soul," it's Van Morrison. So it's fitting that today's edition of "Bootleg Friday" is from a very fine Van Morrison show from September 5, 1971 that was recorded at Pacific High Studios in San Francisco and broadcast on K-SAN.

I got this show about two years ago, and it rekindled my interest in Morrison, who frankly, I was sort of sick of, mainly from overdosing on Moondance in my teens. What really got me excited about the show is the tremendous cover of "Hound Dog," which is both swinging and hilarious, as if it's a combination of Big Mama Thornton's original crossed with Jerry Lee Lewis. Also of note is the version of "I've Been Working"; it's colossal. Once I really started listening to the whole thing, I really got how amazing he is - and I revisited most of his catalog.

Buy Van Morrison at Amazon.

Download: "Into The Mystic" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)
Download: "I've Been Working" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)
Download: "Hound Dog" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)
Download: "Tupelo Honey" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)
Download: "Just Like A Woman" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)
Download: "Domino" (9/5/71, San Francisco, CA)

An Unexpected Classic Rock Day

Yesterday was one of those days where the long shadow of classic rock enveloped me in all of it's familiarity. And it was good.

The day didn't start like that - I woke up with Mingus on the brain. But when I had the iPod on shuffle while riding the subway, Joe Walsh's "Walk Away" came on, and damn, it really sounded good, so I listened to his Greatest Hits album in full and enjoyed the hell out of it. I don't think I had listened to a Joe Walsh album of any sort since the 80's, but I was really struck by how much fun the songs were - and how well they were embedded in the grey matter of my brain. "All Night Long," "Funk 49," "Life's Been Good," and "Rocky Mountain Way..." it was like I was experiencing Freedom Rock on the F train.



Joe Walsh doing "Funk 49" in 1972:



After hearing Blood On The Tracks played in it's entirety while I killed time at a coffee shop before a business meeting and running some errands, it was time for dinner and karaoke with some of my peeps. We went to Sing Sing Karaoke on Ave A and 5th Street. Now this was not the kind of karaoke where you do one or two songs over the course of the night while getting bombed. We got a private room for just three of us, so this was like doing a full on set. And for whatever reason, I didn't/couldn't perform any soul songs. It just seemed ridiculous to me. So we hit the classic rock - and it was good. Tracks performed included:

"You're In My Heart" - Rod Stewart
"Hotel California" - The Eagles
"Paradise By The Dashboard Light" - Meatloaf (Yes, I know the entire Phil Rizzuto part by heart)
"Tenth Avenue Freeze Out" (I pop my Bruce karaoke cherry on this one.)
"Suspicious Minds" - Elvis (done as a duet with L - possible highlight of the night)
"You Don't Bring Me Flowers" - Neil Diamond/Barbra Streisand (oooof)
"Roadhouse Blues" - The Doors
"The Joker" - Steve Miller
"Maggie's Farm" - Bob Dylan
"I Want It That Way" - Backstreet Boys (I did not take part in this)
"Wild Horses" - The Rolling Stones (I nailed the Keith background part!)
"You Can't Always Get What You Want" - The Rolling Stones
"Levon" - Elton John
"Rocket Man" Elton John (We sang it so well that there was nothing left to do except go home)

It was more fun than should be allowed legally. And there's nothing better than the classic rock for karaoke.

I think I need to listen to I Never Loved A Man The Way I Love You all day long to get back in the groove.

Download: Joe Walsh - "Funk 49"
Download: Joe Walsh - "Walk Away"
Download: Joe Walsh - "Rocky Mountain Way"
Download: Joe Walsh - "Life's Been Good"

Mingus At Cornell

Over the past few years, my love of jazz has been expanding. I've come to love the beauty of the playing - both for it's virtuosity and for it's willingness to subsume that virtuosity for the sake l of the song. I am not an expert on the music in the slightest - I am like someone who is getting into fine wine, who knows what he likes (and seems to like the good stuff) and is hungry to learn more.

I've been listening a lot lately to Charles Mingus. I've been floored by the soul of his playing and the soul of his bands. It's tempestuous music, with obvious roots in blues and gospel, which is most likely why I've been so drawn to it. The soloists are great, but Mingus seems to always keep it focused on the band, and there's nothing I love more than a great band leader. The music is completely uncompromising - but there's nothing self-righteous about it. It is simply the sound of genius creating. Here is a clip of the Mingus Sextet featuring saxophonist Eric Dolphy in Belgium in 1964:



Blue Note just announced the release of Cornell 1964, a great show with the same sextet. It's worth taking the time to check out the digital player that they've created, as well as an additional video that they have in the player. It's awesome stuff - this is music worth delving into.

Buy Charles Mingus At Amazon

Soul Is Country and Country Is Soul

On my podcast I spoke of a great performance by Ray Charles on the Johnny Cash show doing "Ring Of Fire." Here it is:



The little bit about the difference between "city love" and "country love" before the performance is pretty priceless. Check out the very knowing look on both Johnny and Ray's faces.

A Deeper Podcast Vol. 1 - A Soul Summer

So without further delay, it is my pleasure to announce the creation of my podcast series, A Deeper Podcast. Volume 1 is a two part series called "A Soul Summer," featuring some great soul tracks that for me, have always created the perfect summertime vibe. I know that "summertime mixes" are so last month, but hey, I just learned how to make a podcast.

In this two part episode you will find music from:

The Meters
Aretha Franklin
Tony Joe White
Otis Redding
Candi Staton
King Curtis
...and many more

I have to acknowledge that the sound quality on my spoken intros is not top notch - I bought a bum microphone and ended up using the mic embedded in the computer. It'll be better next time. But hey, you're not downloading these to hear me talk, are you?

Comments, suggestions for future podcasts, and love letters are all welcome. Enjoy it...and revel in the summer!

A Soul Summer Part 1
A Soul Summer Part 2

Bootleg Friday: Prince, 1983

It’s been a quiet but busy past few days at A Deeper Shade of Soul, as I’ve been learning how to use Garageband so I can do some basic home recording and do some podcasts for you all, which will be coming within the next ten days or so.


Certain artists just remind me of summer. One of them is Prince. Perhaps the association of summertime around Prince is due to the summers of 1983 and 1984, when I was at Camp Na-Sho-Pa in the Catskills. Yours truly wasn’t exactly the most popular of campers, but they had a radio station where I DJ’d for the first time and there were some very cool counselors who turned me on to some great music, including Prince, who I heard for the first time in the summer of 1983. It seemed like 1999 was on an endless loop in my bunk – not because the kids my age liked it (Billy Joel and Journey were the most popular artists amongst my peers, which partly explains why I had such an occasionally hellish time), but because the counselors insisted. Thank the good Lord that they did.

A year later it was a different story. By this time, Purple Rain had just been released and “When Doves Cry” had a firm grip on the #1 single position on the Hot 100 (keeping “Dancing In The Dark” at #2, much to my annoyance). Prince was popular, and wherever I went, I could hear the album. (I won’t even go into the first time I heard “Darling Nikki,” amidst a crowd of increasingly horny 13 and 14 year old boys who thought it was the most incredible thing in the world that someone said “masturbate” in a song.)

So in that spirit, today’s installment of Bootleg Friday is a tremendous Prince show from Providence, Rhode Island in 1983. It’s a snapshot of an artist who is in full command of his vast talent – soul singer, guitar God, bandleader supreme and last, but certainly not least, sex symbol. Not even James Brown asked, “Is he (your boyfriend) fine/Does he have an ass like mine?” Listening to it, it makes the explosion of Purple Rain seem pre-ordained.

Download: “Dirty Mind” 2/10/83, Providence, RI
Download: “How Come You Don’t Call Me Anymore” 2/10/83, Providence, RI
Download: “Lady Cab Driver” 2/10/83, Providence, RI
Download: “International Lover” 2/10/83, Providence, RI
Download: “1999” 2/10/83, Providence, RI

A Friend Writes In...

ok so i know "rock is dead" and all, but when is the irony going to get cut out of it? I mean there's no sense of sex or danger or anything in indie rock or for that matter any other kind of rock. i get it, rock as a (popular) art form is long since dead, but still, do we have to have a bunch of sniveling hipsters being ironic all the time? It was the same thing 10 fucking years ago and nothing has changed since except the names of the newly crowned ironically challenged bands..

and i don't buy the "oh we're getting old" shtick. It's still the same thing as when we were in our 20's. nothing has really changed in 10 years except that the music has become even more sexless which i didn't think was possible.....

sorry needed to vent. was looking at some pics from recent McCarran pool shows. ugh

Does anyone have something to respond to this? Because I'm at a loss. Especially after watching Live Earth. And yes, I have heard the new Spoon record, and that's not helping matters either.

Bootleg Friday On A Monday: Wilson Pickett

As promised on Friday, here is the "makeup" session of Bootleg Friday. It's a great Wilson Pickett show from Stockholm, Sweden in February of 1969. It's a very good way to start the week.

Download: "Introduction"
Download: "634-5789"
Download: "Hey Jude"
Download: "I'm In Love"
Download: "Funky Broadway"
Download: "Sweet Soul Music"

Louis Armstrong: The Founding Father

On this day thirty six years ago, Louis Armstrong, one of the fathers of American music and the absolute Founding Father of jazz, died at his home in Queens. The following is the obituary from the New York Times. It's a fascinating read, and it captures some of the dimension of his enormous impact and influence on American music. It's impossible to imagine any strain of American music without him.

(Thanks to Scott for emailing this.)

July 7, 1971
OBITUARY
Louis Armstrong, Jazz Trumpeter and Singer, Dies
By ALBIN KREBS
Louis Armstrong, the celebrated jazz trumpeter and singer, died in his sleep yesterday morning at his home in the Corona section of Queens. He had observed his 71st birthday Sunday.

Death was attributed to a heart attack. Mr. Armstrong had been at home since mid-June when he was discharged from Beth Israel Medical Center after 10 weeks of treatment for heart, liver and kidney disorders. He seemed in good health during an interview June 23, in which he played his trumpet and announced his intention to return to public performances.

President Nixon released this statement:
"Mrs. Nixon and I share the sorrow of millions of Americans at the death of Louis Armstrong. One of the architects of an American art form, a free and individual spirit, and an artist of worldwide fame, his great talents and magnificent spirit added richness and pleasure to all our lives."

Tributes to Mr. Armstrong also came from a number of leading musicians, including Duke Ellington, Gene Krupa, Benny Goodman, Al Hirt, Earl (Fatha) Hines, Tyree Glenn and Eddie Condon.

Mr. Ellington commented: "If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what I call an American standard, an American original."

"He could play a trumpet like nobody else," Mr. Condon said, "then put it down and sing a song like no one else could."

Mr. Hines, who frequently said he had taken his piano style from Mr. Armstrong's trumpet style, remarked: "We were almost like brothers. I'm so heartbroken over this. The world has lost a champion."

In Washington, the State Department, noting that Mr. Armstrong had toured Africa, the Middle East and Latin America on its behalf, said:

"His memory will be enshrined in the archives of effective international communications. The Department of State, for which he traveled on tours to almost every corner of the globe, mourns the passing of this great American."

The entertainer's final appearance was last February, when he played a two-week engagement at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

Last month, noting that his legs were weak from his hospitalization, he said, "I'm going back to work when my treaders get in as good shape as my chops."

A master showman known to millions as Satchmo, Mr. Armstrong lived by a simple credo. Putting it into words a couple of years ago, he said:

"I never tried to prove nothing, just always wanted to give a good show. My life has been my music, it's always come first, but the music ain't worth nothing if you can't lay it on the public. The main thing is to live for that audience, 'cause what you're there for is to please the people."

Mr. Armstrong was first and most importantly a jazz trumpet player without peer, a virtuoso soloist who was one of the most vivid and influential forces in the development of American music.

But he was also known to delighted millions around the world for his ebulliently sandpapery singing voice, his merry mangling of the English language and his great wide grand-piano keyboard of a smile.

Jazz music, probably the only art form ever wholly originated in America, and Louis Armstrong grew up together in New Orleans. It was in a seamy slum there that Mr. Armstrong learned to love and play jazz in the company of gamblers, pimps and prostitutes.

But in time he was to play his trumpet and sing in command performances before royalty and, through his numerous worldwide tours, to become known unofficially as "America's ambassador of goodwill."

Recognized for Role
Jazz experts, even the purists who criticized Mr. Armstrong for his mugging and showmanship, more often than not agreed that it was he, more than any other individual, who took the raw, gutsy Negro folk music of the New Orleans funeral parades and honky-tonks and built it into a unique art form.

Over the years, his life and his artistry changed radically. He left New Orleans for Chicago in the early nineteen-twenties, when he was still playing the cornet, and before 1930 made some of his most memorable recordings--with his Hot Five or Hot Seven groups.

Mr. Armstrong won his initial fame playing an endless grind of one-night stands. Under constant pressure to put on a show that made the customers tap their feet and cry for more, he did not hesitate to exploit a remarkable flair for showmanship. His mugging, his wisecracking and most of all his willingness to constantly repeat programs that had gone over well in the past won him the cheers of his audiences, along with the disapproving clucks of some of his fellow musicians and jazz specialists.

The criticism that he no longer improvised enough, innovated enough, mattered little to Mr. Armstrong. He dismissed the more "progressive" jazz approved of by some leading critics as "jujitsu music."

He did not mind being called "commercial" because he followed popular music trends, and he deliberately introduced into his repertory crowd-pleasers such as "Mack the Knife" and "Hello, Dolly!," which put his recordings on the bestseller charts when he was in his 60's.

Like 'Sandpaper Calling'
As his ability to play his horn exceptionally well waned with the years, Mr. Armstrong supplanted his trumpet solos with his singing voice. An almost phenomenal instrument in its own right, it has been compared to iron filings and to "a piece of sandpaper calling to its mate."

Just watching an Armstrong performance could be an exhilarating experience. The man radiated a jollity that was infectious. Onstage he would bend back his stocky frame, point his trumpet to the heavens joyfully blast out high C's. When he sang he fairly bubbled with pleasure. And as he swabbed away at the perspiration stirred up by his performing exertions, Satchmo grinned his famous toothy smile so incandescently that it seemed to light up the auditorium.

"I never did want to be no big star," Mr. Armstrong said in 1969, in an interview for this article. "It's been hard goddam work, man. Feel like I spent 20,000 years on the planes and railroads, like I blowed my chops off. Sure, pops, I like the ovation, but when I'm low, beat down, wonder if maybe I hadn't of been better off staying home in New Orleans."

Mr. Armstrong's early years spent in New Orleans, were marked by extreme poverty and squalor, but he emerged able to recall them without self-pity and even with good humor.

"I was a Southern Doodle Dandy born on the Fourth of July, 1900," said Daniel Louis Armstrong.1 "My mother Mary Ann--we called her Mayann--was living in a two-room shack in James Alley, in the Back O' Town colored section of New Orleans. It was in a tough block, all them hustlers and their pimps and gamblers with their knives, between Gravier and Perdido Streets."

Mr. Armstrong's father, Willie Armstrong, who stoked furnaces in a turpentine factory, left Mrs. Armstrong when the boy was an infant. Leaving the child with his paternal grandmother, Mrs. Armstrong went to live in the Perdido-Liberty Street area, which was lined with prostitutes' cribs.

"Whether my mother did any hustling I can't say," Mr. Armstrong said. "If she did, she kept it out of my sight."
However, Louis, who rejoined his mother when he was 6 years old, recalled that for many years afterward there was always a "stepfather" on the premises and that before his mother "got religion and gave up men" around 1915, "I couldn't keep track of the stepdaddies, there must have been a dozen or so, 'cause all I had to do was turn my back and a new pappy would appear." Some of them, he added, "liked to beat on little Louis."

However, Mr. Armstrong was always intensely fond of his mother, and he cared for her until her death in the early nineteen-forties.

Dippermouth, as he was called as a child, and his friends often sang for pennies on the streets. To help support his mother and a sister, Barbara, Louis delivered coal to prostitutes' cribs and sold food plucked from hotel garbage cans.

The night of Dec. 31, 1913, Louis celebrated the New Year by running out on the street and firing a .38-caliber pistol that belonged to one of his "stepfathers." He was arrested and sent to the Colored Waifs Home for Boys.

"Pops, it sure was the greatest thing that ever happened to me," Mr. Armstrong said. "Me and music got married at the home."

Played in Home's Band
Peter Davis, an instructor at the home, taught Louis to play the bugle and the cornet. Soon the boy became a member of the home's brass band, which played at socials, picnics and funerals for a small fee. Louis was in the fifth grade when he was released from the home after spending 18 months there. He had no other formal education.

The youth worked as a junkman and sold coal, while grabbing every chance he could to play cornet in honky-tonk bands. The great jazz cornetist Joe (King) Oliver befriended him, gave him a cornet and tutored him.

"I was foolin' around with some tough ones," Mr. Armstrong recalled in 1969. "Get paid a little money, and a beeline for one of them gambling houses. Two hours, man, and I was a broke cat, broker than the Ten Commandments. Needed money so bad I even tried pimping, but my first client got jealous of me and we got to fussing about it and she stabbed me in the shoulder. Them was wild times."

In 1918, Mr. Armstrong married a 21-year-old prostitute named Daisy Parker. Since Daisy "wouldn't give up her line of work," Mr. Armstrong said, the marriage was both stormy and short-lived.

The same year he was married, Mr. Armstrong joined the Kid Ory band, replacing King Oliver, who had moved to Chicago. In the next three years he marched with Papa Celestin's brass band and worked on the riverboat Sidney with Fate Marable's band. Dave Jones, a mellophone player with the Marable band, gave him his first lessons in reading music.

By then Mr. Armstrong's fame was spreading among New Orleans musicians, many of whom were moving to Chicago. In 1922 King Oliver sent for his protege. Mr. Armstrong became second cornetist in Mr. Oliver's by then famous Creole Jazz Band. The two-cornet team had one of the most formidably brilliant attacks ever heard in a jazz group. Mr. Armstrong's first recordings were made with the Oliver band in 1923.

The pianist in the band was Lilian Hardin, whom Mr. Armstrong married in 1924. Miss Hardin had had training as a classical musician, and she gave him some formal musical education.

Mrs. Armstrong, convinced that as long as her husband stayed in the Oliver band he would remain in the shadow of his popular mentor, persuaded him to leave the band in 1924 to play first cornet at the Dreamland Cafe. The same year he joined Fletcher Henderson's orchestra at the Roseland Ballroom in New York.

For the first time, Mr. Armstrong found himself in the company of musicians of an entirely different stripe from those he had known in New Orleans and Chicago who, like himself, had fought their way up out of the back alleys and were largely unschooled in music. From these men, many of whom had conservatory educations, he learned considerable musical discipline.

Moving back to Chicago in 1925, Mr. Armstrong again played at the Dreamland Cafe, where his wife, Lil, had her own band, and with Erskine Tate's "symphonic jazz" orchestra at the Vendome Theater. It was at that point that he gave up the cornet for the trumpet.

"I was hired to play them hot choruses when the curtain went up," Mr. Armstrong recalled. "They put a spotlight on me. Used to hit 40 or 50 high C's--go wild, screamin' on my horn. I was crazy, Pops, plain nuts."

Billed as 'World's Greatest'
During his second Chicago period, Mr. Armstrong doubled in Carroll Dickerson's Sunset Cabaret orchestra, with billing as the "World's Greatest Trumpeter." The proprietor of the Sunset was Joe Glaser, who became Mr. Armstrong's personal manager and acted in that capacity for the rest of his life. Mr. Glaser died on June 6, 1969.

In that Chicago period, Mr. Armstrong began to make records under his own name, the first being "My Heart," recorded Nov. 12, 1925. Louis Armstrong's Hot Five (and later Hot Seven) recorded, over a three-year span, a series of jazz classics, with Earl (Fatha) Hines on the piano. These records earned Mr. Armstrong a worldwide reputation, and by 1929, when he returned to New York, he had become an idol in the jazz world.

While playing at Connie's Inn in Harlem, Mr. Armstrong also appeared on Broadway in the all- Negro review "Hot Chocolates," in which he introduced Fats Waller's "Ain't Misbehavin,'" his first popular-song hit. (He later appeared as Bottom in "Swingin' the Dream," a short-lived travesty on "A Midsummer Night's Dream." Over the years he appeared in many movies, including "Pennies From Heaven," "A Song Is Born," "The Glenn Miller Story" and "High Society.")

For several years, Mr. Armstrong "fronted" big bands assembled for him by others. By 1932, the year he was divorced from Lil Hardin Armstrong, he had become so popular in Europe, via recordings, that he finally agreed to tour the Continent.

It was while he was starring at the London Palladium that Mr. Armstrong acquired the nickname Satchmo. A London music magazine editor inadvertently invented the name by garbling an earlier nickname, Satchelmouth.

One for the King
While he was in London, Mr. Armstrong demonstrated memorably that he had little use for the niceties of diplomatic protocol.

During a command performance for King George V, Mr. Armstrong ignored the rule that performers are not supposed to refer to members of the Royal Family while playing before them and announced on the brink of a hot trumpet break, "This one's for you, Rex."

(Many years later in 1956, Satchmo played before King George's granddaughter, Princess Margaret. "We're really gonna lay this one on for the Princess," he grinned, and launched into "Mahogany Hall Stomp," a sort of jazz elegy to a New Orleans bordello. The Princess loved it.)

One of Mr. Armstrong's pre-World War II European tours lasted 18 months. Over the years his tours took him, to the Middle East and the Far East, to Africa and to South America. In Accra, Ghana, 100,000 natives went into a frenzied demonstration when he started to blow his horn, and in Leopoldville, tribesmen painted themselves ochre and violet and carried him into the city stadium on a canvas throne.

His 1960 African tour was denounced by the Moscow radio as a "capitalist distraction," which made Mr. Armstrong laugh.
"I feel at home in Africa," he said during the tour. "I'm African-descended down to the bone, and I dig the friendly ways these people go about things. I got quite a bit of African blood in me from my grandmammy on my mammy's side and from my grandpappy on my pappy's side."

Played With Big Bands
Before the war, Mr. Armstrong worked with several big bands, including the Guy Lombardo orchestra, concentrating on New Orleans standards such as "Muskrat Ramble" and "When the Saints Go Marchin' In" and on novelties such as "I'll Be Glad When You're Dead, You Rascal You." He did duets with Ella Fitzgerald and he accompanied Bessie Smith.

After 1947 he usually performed as leader of a sextet, working with such musicians as Jack Teagarden, Earl Hines, Joe Bushkin and Cozy Cole. He was a favorite at all the jazz festivals, in this country and abroad.

Mr. Armstrong lost track of the number of recordings he made, but it has been estimated there as many as 1,500. Dozens have become collectors' items.

The jolly Mr. Armstrong was quite inured to his fame as a jazz immortal. Not too many years ago, he was interviewed backstage by a disk jockey who began with the announcement, "And now we bring you a man who came all the way from New Orleans, the Crescent City, to become a Living American Legend." The Living American Legend, who was changing his clothes, dropped his trousers and began the interviews with the observation, "Tee hee!"

"Tee hee" was part of a uniquely Armstrong vocabulary, which included Satchmo-coined words such as "commercified" and "humanitarily." In his speech he arbitrarily inserted hyphens in the middle of words ("ar-tis-try" and "en-ta-TAIN-uh") and, unable to remember names too well, peppered his conversations with friends and interviews with salutations such as "Daddy" and "Pops."

Despite the hard life he led--traveling most of the time, sleeping too little, living out of suitcases, eating and drinking too much or not enough--Mr. Armstrong, even into his 60's, was still going strong. His chest was broad and powerful, and his 5-foot-8-inch frame carried a weight that varied between 170 and 230 pounds.

He was, however, keenly aware of his health. "I'm one of them hy-po-CHON-dree-acs," he would say with a delighted laugh. He was afraid of germs and always carried his trumpet mouthpiece in a carefully folded handkerchief in his back pocket. He liked to talk at length about his physic, a herbal mixture called Swiss Kriss, while at the same time he recounted how unwisely he sometimes ate, especially when his favorite food, New Orleans-style red beans and rice, was set before him.

Although in latter years he suffered from a kidney ailment, Mr. Armstrong's greatest worry was chronic leukoplakia of the lips, what amounted to a tough corn that resulted form blowing his horn. He used a special, imported salve to soothe his lips.

"If you don't look out for your chops and pipes," he said, "you can't blow the horn and sing. Anything that'll get in my way doin' that, out it goes. That trumpet comes first, before everything, even my wife. Got to be that way. I love Lucille, man, but she understands about me and my music."

He was referring to the former Lucille Wilson, whom he married in 1942.
He loved all forms of music. When asked what he thought of the country-and-Western and folk music so favored by the young, he replied, "Pops, music is music. All music is folk music. I ain't never heard no horse sing a song."

Some Negro militants criticized Mr. Armstrong for his earthy speech and his habit of rolling his eyes and flashing his toothy grin while performing. They said he was using stereotyped characteristics of the happy-go-lucky Negro and playing the Uncle Tom. Mr. Armstrong ignored the charges.

Comment on Selma
Nevertheless, Mr. Armstrong, on learning in 1965 that the police in Selma, Ala., had taken violent action against freedom-marching Negroes in that city, told an interviewer:

"They would beat Jesus if he was black and marched. Maybe I'm not in the front line, but I support them with my donations. My life is in my music. They would beat me on the mouth if I marched, and without my mouth I wouldn't be able to blow my horn."

For many years, Mr. Armstrong refused to perform in New Orleans, his hometown, because of segregation there. He did not return until 1965, after passage of the Civil Rights Act. On that occasion he triumphantly played with an integrated band in the city's Jazz Museum.

Reflecting on his more than 50 years as a musician, Mr. Armstrong said, "There ain't going to be no more cats in this music game that long."

There was no doubt that he was the most durable of the great jazzmen, nor that millions of people held him in great affection. His fellow musicians, many of whom were influenced by his artistry, looked upon him with awe.

Miles Davis, a contemporary jazz star, has asserted that "you can't play anything on a horn that Louis hasn't played." Teddy Wilson, who played piano with Mr. Armstrong in 1933, has called him "the greatest jazz musician that's ever been."

And Leonard Feather, the eminent jazz critic and author of "The Encyclopedia of Jazz," wrote of Mr. Armstrong:
"It is difficult. . .to see in correct perspective Armstrong's contribution as the first vital jazz soloist to attain worldwide influence as trumpeter, singer, entertainer, dynamic show business personality and strong force in stimulating interest in jazz.

"His style, melodically and harmonically simple by the standards of later jazz trends, achieved in his early records an unprecedented warmth and beauty. His singing, lacking most of the traditional vocal qualities accepted outside the jazz world, had a rhythmic intensity and guttural charm that induced literally thousands of other vocalists to imitate him, just at countless trumpeters through the years reflected the impact of his style.

"By 1960, Armstrong, set in his ways, improvised comparatively little; but he retained vocally and instrumentally many of the qualities that had established him, even though entertainment values, but his own admission, meant more to him than the reaction of a minority of musicians and specialists."

As for Mr. Armstrong, it was pleasing his listeners that really mattered.
"There's three generations Satchmo has witnessed," he said, "the old cats, their children and their children's children, and they still all walk up and say, 'Ol' Satch, how do you do!' I love my audience and they love me and we just have one good time whenever I get up on the stage. It's such a lovely pleasure."

Mr. Armstrong is survived by his widow, the former Lucille Wilson, and by an adopted son, Clarence Hatfield of New York. He also leaves a sister, Mrs. Beatrice Collins of New Orleans and two half-brothers, Henry and William Armstrong, both of New Orleans. The Armstrongs' home in Corona was at 34-56 107th Street.

A funeral service will be held Friday at 1 P.M. at the Corona Congregational Church, 34th Avenue and 103d Street. Burial will be in the Flushing Cemetery.

The honorary pallbearers will include Governor Rockefeller, Mayor Lindsay, Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, Guy Lombardo, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Pearl Bailey, Count Basie, Harry James, Frank Sinatra, Ed Sullivan, Earl Wilson, Alan King, Johnny Carson, David Frost, Merv Griffin, Dick Cavett and Bobby Hackett.

Mrs. Armstrong requested that flowers and cards be omitted and said those wishing to do so could send contributions in her husband's memory to the Kidney Research Foundation and to the Sickle Cell Anemia Foundation, which promotes research on a disease that mainly afflicts blacks.

1 According to Gary Giddins, the author of "Satchmo," Armstrong's birth certificate shows that he was in fact born on Aug. 4, 1901.

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Bootleg Friday: Postponed

Due to bandwidth issues and a lack of time to remedy them, I unfortunately have to postpone today's entry of Bootleg Friday until next week. However, it does mean that we will have two episodes next week to look forward to.

And to try to make it up to you, I'm going to give you some choice in what bootleg selections I put up next. Send me a comment and let me know what you want.

Here are the nominees:

Wilson Pickett - 2/10/69, Stockholm, Sweden
Tom Waits - 12/12/75, Minneapolis, MN
Leon Russell - 11/21/70, New York, NY
Prince - 2/10/83, Providence, RI
Elvis Costello - 7/7/78, San Francisco, CA
Van Morrison - 9/5/71, San Francisco, CA

Let your voice be heard!

Smashing The Pumpkins

There were three instances where I lost any interest I might have ever had in the Smashing Pumpkins. The first instance was at Roseland Ballroom in the fall of 1991, when I saw them on a triple bill, sandwiched between openers Pearl Jam and headliners the Red Hot Chili Peppers. The Pumpkins were not memorable at all, and because I had been hearing a lot of buzz on them, I walked out thinking, "What's so great about them?"

The second instance was at Lollapalooza in 1994, when they headlined and followed the Beastie Boys (dumb move to follow the Beasties). By this time, I had become a semi-fan, liking some of both Gish and Siamese Dream. But their set was so meandering, boring and self-indulgent that my friends and I left about five songs into it. And then finally, there was the moment I heard "Zero," the song that probably inspired emo's worst self-pitying indulgences, with lyrics like, "Emptiness is loneliness/and loneliness is cleanliness/And cleanliness is godliness/and god is empty just like me." After that, I was done with them - I became an official hater.

Now they're back. I got an advance copy of their latest, Tarantula, out next week, and it only confirms for me what I thought back in the day: Billy Corgan has far more ego than talent. I have very little idea of what he's now singing about, but all I get from listening is the sense that he's a somewhat frustrated man with little outlet for his empty and outsized gestures. There's no heart or spirit in his music, let alone soul, and watching and listening to him, I am relieved to say that I believe that history will eradicate any importance they may have once had. Hearing them now, they only seem silly.