Digging a Little Deeper..Again
Having grown up on Fm radio in New York we had a few choices: WPLF-FM which had some great DJ’s but really had a select playlist and after a while it just sounded the same: WNEW-FM. A founding member of the FM Rock and Roll sound with legendary DJ’s and a little wider playlist that would expand after midnight to something akin to a Pirate radio station: And on Long Island we had WLIR-FM which originally played deep cuts but could not compete with the bigger stations in NYCity so they ended up playing New Music, a combination of alternative and punk and they broke artists in the US. U2 and The Smiths are two examples. That was it though. Occasionally you would hear something interesting or something that got infrequent airplay and that sort of made it worthwhile to listen. This piece is about those rare songs you would rarely hear or would discover as you went through a new album to see what else was on there.
Forgive me if I have mentioned any of these songs before but I think it really is worth it to find them on Apple Music or Spotify and give a listen.
Now Fleetwood Mac was never really a big favorite of mine but there are at least two songs from the Danny Kirwan era that are worth a shot. From Kiln House, “Station Man and the title track from Bare Trees. Kirwan plays lead on both and while Lyndsey Buckingham may be an overall better guitar player, Kirwan was no slouch. Both albums have some excellent songs and you can see in Bare Trees, the band becomes a Bob Welch group for a short period of time. I always find the history of this band fascinating and to follow it through it’s different incarnations is fun.
A group I did like very much but I am not sure if they ever reached their full potential was Jethro Tull. From Benefit, I think you should give a listen to “With You There to Help Me”. It’s a six minute journey that shows the promise of this band. Little bit more guitar than later songs but you get the sense of what they could accomplish. Intensity ebbs and flows throughout the song.
Speaking of guitars and guitarists, Joe Walsh has to be up there as one of my favorites of all time. Maybe we misunderstood him over the years but if you listen to any of the following songs maybe you will agree with me. Forget the Eagles( although he brought them the Rock to their Roll) his solo stuff and James Gang material is excellent. I will give you three songs and let you decide for yourselves. First is “Welcome to the Club” from So What. Typical Joe Walsh, Funny and tight. The best five minutes you will spend today. Next “The Bomber:Closet Queen Bolero” Actually from when he was with The James Gang. Not so sure about what the hell the title means but listen to it and part of the fun with Walsh is figuring out what he is talking about. Lastly, and I think any version you hear is excellent, is “Turn to Stone” from Barnstorm. Moody but his guitarwork is exceptional and one thing about Joe Walsh, His guitar playing is crisp and clean.
Speaking of exceptional guitar playing, Mark Knopfler from Dire Straits has the cleanest , crispest quitar playing on the planet and one song that really brings that playing centerstage is “Down to the Waterline” from Dire Straits debut album. It is the shortest song on my list and I wish it would have went on for another ten minutes, the guitar playing is so good.
Beat me up on this one if you want but from Band of Gypsys by Jimi Hendrix,”Who Knows” is a bluesy, Hendrix extravaganza. With Hendrix and bass player Billy Cox rapping against each other leading into some incredible guitar work, it might be my all time favorite Hendrix song. I am not sure that this song would ever sound as good in a studio as it does live so for over nine minutes you can listen to one of the greatest guitar players rip it up and that crowd really had no clue.
I might have mentioned this song in another post and I apologize but it really is worth downloading. Joe Cocker’s version of “Hitchcock Railway” is one of Cocker’s best cover versions. With Leon Russel on piano this song just jumps off and there is something about the cowbell throughout the whole song. Granted, you can barely understand any of the lyrics but who cares?
For a fun story by an American legend try listening to “Trudy” by The Charlie Daniels Band. Good time rock and roll from any Southern Band still is worth a listen and “Trudy” is a funny story that probably actually happened to someone in the band. It was a minor hit somewhere but I still love this song.
Keeping it below the Mason Dixon line I think Molly Hatchet’s “Dreams I Will Never See” is another great example of Southern Rock that can be stretched out. granted it is not “Free Bird” but the point of this article is to move past the “Free Birds” of this World and find something thats almost as good. Never a fan of the band but when I heard this song at some club done by a cover band that was doing Marshal Tucker, Charlie Daniels and the like, I was obsessed with finding out more about it. A friend gave me the album “Molly Hatchet” to listen to and there it was. I went out and bought the album (thats what you did back in the day). I never bought anything else by the band but was happy to have this one album.
I will keep looking in the archives for some interesting music and hope to hear from you soon about songs and albums that have fallen by the wayside. I live to learn as they say.