Friday, August 27, 2004
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glisten: Blue CD 9
17. Elvis Presley - "Blue Moon"
Juan - The King. He's beyond evaluation.
Brian - There’s this song I used to really like by, of all bands, the KLF called “Elvis on the Radio, Steel Guitar in My Soul”. It features snippets of train sounds, steel guitar and, yes, Elvis floating in and out of the mix singing “In the Ghetto”. I’m not, admittedly, a big Elvis fan. But this version of Blue Moon… I’m back in the same car I was riding in for the Four Vagabonds. Untypical Elvis... low key, under produced in all the best ways. I dare to say tender. Maybe this time it’s a transistor radio.
Rob - Continues in the vein of the last track. Doesn't do anything for me.
Pastor - I've got this image of Elvis in an electric blue cowboy outfit riding a horse at dusk with one of those 'Hee-Haw type' red, white, and blue guitars and singing after a long day of cow poking. It does frighten me when he sings those high bits however.
Early Elvis is pretty much untouchable in my eyes. Sure, he continued to make (occasionally) interesting music for most of the rest of his life but nothing quite as exciting and honest as those first two dozen or so cuts.
The King is sweet and endearing here; you sorta wanna give him a hug and the yodelling makes me wanna give him my hankie.
Definitely among my top ten for th' big fella.
Buy "The Sun Sessions", Elvis' overwhelmingly good early singles, from Amazon.
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Visit the official Elvis page.
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Tour (virtually) Sun Studios.
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Explore this fansite for "Mystery Train", Jim Jarmusch's spectacular film about Memphis and Elvis and Carlu Perkin-san.
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Learn what causes a real blue moon.
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Be amazed by the glory that is ELVIS' SHOPPING LIST!!!1!!1!ONE!!
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18. Bob Dylan - "It's All over Now, Baby Blue (Live)"
Juan - I was actually expecting this one. Not this version, though, which is actually very good. The voice is a little bit more nasal than usual, but it doesn't annoy at all. On the contrary.
Brian - Is it just me, or does that beginning guitar bit sound like Nick Drake’s Pink Moon? Ok. The song. Well, Bob’s Bob…what can I say? Bob’s always a bit blue. Seems that when Zim goes live he’s either terrible or brilliant, you get no in-between. Obviously this is the Bob when he’s on. One of his more direct songs from a time when he was discovering the joys of directness. Does anyone discuss what a brilliant harmonica player Bob is? He uses the harmonica like Neil Young uses the guitar…a complement to a voice. Seems we’ve come back around to the voice again…the oral rhythm.
Rob - Sounds like a typical Bob Dylan song. I like Bob Dylan, and I enjoy this song, although it doesn't really stand out as one of his best. Still the lyrics are always great.
Pastor - I'll say it - I have never liked it when Bob plays the harmonica. I know I'm supposed to get into the storytelling and poetry aspects of the performance, but at this point in time I just can't do it.
Dylan has been a real uphill battle for me and it's only been in the past few years that I've really wholeheartedly embraced him (unsurprisingly, twas 'Blonde on Blonde' and 'Bringing It All Back Home' that did the trick). "Baby Blue" isn't even close to one of my favorite tracks but it is innocuous and mellow, the sort of thing that you can listen to two or three hundred times in a row without it ever becoming grating, intrusive or annoying and that's hard to come by.
Buy "The Bootleg Series, Volume Four", Dylan's legendary 'Royal Albert Hall' concert backed by The Band, from Amazon.
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Visit Bob Dylan's website for TONS of audio fun.
Would you believe the nutty sumbitch has clips of his ENTIRE CATALOG online? It's like a Dylan library.
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Explore this massive collection of Dylan links and essays.
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Save up now for the soon-to-be-released Dylan autobio.
My sister had a hardcover first edition of "Tarantula" back in the day. Wish I'd have read it...
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spiffy
Much love and well wishes go out to the Dooce. Think good thoughts and keep her close to heart, ya'll.
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NYC Tofu readers are advised to make it out to see Go Robot Go a new Fringe Festival play by my good friend (and "major talent") Julie Shavers. The dialogue is sharp as a needle and funny as hell and th' music rocks the casbah. If you see it and don't like it, I'll give you your money back. How's that?
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More reasons to love Bjork:
“You know, its ironic that just at the point the lawyers and the businessmen had calculated how to control music, the internet comes along and fucks everything up.” Björk gives the finger again, this time waving it into the air. “God bless the internet.” She adds, “I'll still be there, waving a pirate flag.”
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I feel like I've brought this up a dozen times, but since they're asking me directly:
What's the ethical grounds for me allowing Google AdSense on this page? Is it cool, do you think? Seeing as they pay me only if you click? Or am I being disingenuous?
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You wanna know what cool is? Cool is having a photographer from the muthafuckin' Rolling Stone call you to find out when would be a good time to come over to take your photo.
More info soon but the long and the short of it is that there's likely to be a nice piece on musicbloggers in th' Stone fairly shortly with some typical malapropisms from yours truly thrown in.
Could this be the beginning of mainstream recognition? Or just the spark that the big boys need to start litigation? Or just a lot of little people flipping out at their tempestuous teapot? Don't touch that dial!
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Lest I forget, my good good buddy Kimdog is finally blogging with some regularity. It's still embryonic but she's fun to read and turns a good story.
You should drop by and leave her messages. It would totally fuck with her head if she got two hundred hits and twenty notes today.
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I have a crush on bunny mcintosh and it's not pretty. I mean, it's not like some kind of bullshit SUICIDE GIRLS crush or anything but I still am dropping by her page more often than is healthy. Which is to say, often.
Bunny, ya want a CD? And speaking of which..
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One more blue yet to go! Monday will cap us off and then we're off to play with the drunks.
Ending one CD means it's time for another, so let's try again to hook you up with a:
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NEW CD UP FOR GRABS!
This time the mix is A FAMILY AFFAIR.
Want to be a guest reviewer? Here's how we play:
If you want a copy of the next mix CD, email me at the address listed at the top of this page with "CAN I HAVE A CD?" in the subject line and a friendly request in the actual mail. The first FOUR requests I receive will get a response from me detailing the rules of review. Everybody else gets a nice pat on the head.
As soon as I receive the first four requests, I will update this post or leave a note in the next post to let you know that we're full up; however, professional music writers (anybody who publishes in a glossy mag or regularly in a daily paper) as well as other musicbloggers are STRONGLY DESIRED. I may toss an extra disc out if you show up late, so drop me a line, yes?
Please note that there is no charge whatsoever for this CD, _except_ you are going to be expected to write a track by track review... quickly. By quickly, I mean within a week after I mail the thing or more or less two or three days after you receive it in the mail.
United States players only please, unless you're willing to fedex me a check for shipping and handling (or buy me something off of my gift list, in which case you're in. Sorry to be American elitist; I'd love to be able to go global but it's just too damn expensive. Again, if you wanna pay for it then I'm happy to include and indulge my beloved overseas readers as well.
UPDATE: Thank you; we're full up!
Professionals, celebrities and friends of the family can still drop a line tho'.
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