Category Accents & Anglophiles
WHO’S NEXT? NOBODY COMES CLOSE: Reflections On Listening To Who At 50, And Their Rock Masterpiece (No, It’s Not Tommy)
Just a quick one — pun intended — to honor one of my all-time favorite artists, The Who, to mark their “Who Hits 50!” world tour that lead singer Roger Daltrey has summed up as “one long goodbye.” Of course, we’ve all heard that promise/threat from the ‘Orrible ‘Oo” a few times and decades before, […]
A MASTER OF MASKS: David Bowie’s Pre-Ziggy Breakthrough Blitz Comes Up Hunky Dory
What better fit for a Flashback Friday Halloween than to examine a pivotal point in the singular career of David Bowie, a man of many masks, guises, and gazes: the doomed astronaut of Space Oddity, messianic rock god alien of Ziggy Stardust, paisley dandy, diamond dog, the cracked actor of Aladdin Sane, The Lodger, Thin White […]
FIVE LEAVES AND A LEGEND LEFT: Nick Drake’s Sacred, Secret History On Imagined Airwaves
Forty-five years ago, in September 1969, Nick Drake’s debut album, “Five Leaves Left,” was released. Nick only made three records in his all-too-short 26 years. It was a third of a lifetime, really; a brief flicker of a brilliant, glowing candle snuffed out far too soon, before the daylight had a chance to break. Each of […]
The Luckiest Man Alive: Happy Birthday Ringo Starr, The Man Who Brought The Beat To The Beatles
“I consider him one of the greatest innovators of rock drumming and believe that he has been one of the greatest influences on rock drumming today … Ringo has influenced drummers more than they will ever realize or admit. Ringo laid down the fundamental rock beat that drummers are playing today and they probably don’t […]
NEW WAVES, OLD TRICKS, AND GETTING LUBED: A Rolling Stone Convo With GBV’s Bob Pollard
Happy 20th Anniversary to one of my best-loved albums of, well, the past twenty years: “Bee Thousand,” by the Dayton, Ohio indie-rock band Guided By Voices. Like my first mad crush, I remember hearing this 1994 cracked masterpiece soon after it was released on June 21, 1994, as if it were only yesterday. I had […]
VIOLET HOURS AND VANISHING DAYS: A Saturnine Stroll with the Clientele
As promised, here’s the second installment of my Clientele Memorial Day Weekend Special Edition of “RPM.” Wherein I catch up with Alasdair MacLean a few years after our first interview — this time to talk about his band’s sophomore album, “The Violet Hour,” as well as discuss the growing pains of learning how to play the […]
SEASONS IN THE (SORT OF) SUN: The Clientele Return To Rainy Days & Suburban Light
Some records stay with you. Aside from the memorable music that usually accompanies, well, a memorable album, chances are that you were probably either doing or feeling something special the first time you heard those sounds — falling in love, finishing your finals, strolling down the memory lane of your old childhood haunts, or road-tripping with your […]
AMERICAN EXILES ON TOUR ’72: The Stones Roll On That Dusty Road In Wax Boots (And Digital Ones Too!)
LADIES & GENTLEMEN, A PREFACE TO THE INTRODUCTION: Call it kismet or the hand of fate or the rock gods grinning with glee at the chemical convergence of impulse, intent, and circumstance. But I just noticed that this review essay, which I intended to serve as a kind of Part II piggybacking follow-up to […]
STICKY STONES AT THE MARQUEE: Tax Exiles Bid Fond, Loud Farewell To England
Today marks the anniversary of one of the best (and more importantly, audio and visually documented) “in-between” Stones shows and tours during their prime: a March 26, 1971 concert at the small Marquee Club in London, the same venue where they got their start as a band some nine years earlier, when singer Mick Jagger and guitarist […]
10,000 Hits Of Anything Has GOT To Be Good For You! (A Special Thank You Message To Subscribers)
Hello all of you lucky and loyal subscribers, My favorite words today are “ten thousand.” As in, 10,000 spins of a favorite record on the turntable. As in, Land of 10,000 Dances. If you do anything 10,000 times, it’s gotta be good, right? With that number and what it means in mind, today I’ve got 10,000 reasons […]
RPM: Jonathan Perry's Life in Analog 