Category Accents & Anglophiles
A SHALLOW SALUTE: Why The Beatles Were So Much Better Than This (And Dave Grohl)
It’s not that I was surprised, exactly. Disappointed and annoyed is more like it. I knew that a big, gaudy CBS/Grammy salute to the Beatles celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Fab Four’s triumphant U.S. debut on “The Ed Sullivan Show” (on CBS, of course) was bound to be a bit self-serving and showbiz-y. Still, I expected […]
TAYLOR MADE STONES: Happy Birthday To The Other Mick
January 17 is always a special day for us here in the surround-sound music den at “RPM: Life In Analog.” It allows us to officially celebrate what we pretty much celebrate every other day by marking the birthday of one of rock’s greatest, and yet most underrated guitarists, whose playing you’ve surely heard for a little group […]
WHOLE LOTTA LED: All-Female Lez Zeppelin Bring All Their Love … And Some Serious Chops Too
As a way to mark legendary Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page’s 70th birthday today, and offer testimony (as if that’s even needed) to Zep’s towering impact and enduring influence on generations of bands, guitarists, singers, and state-of-the-art rock theater, here’s a piece I wrote for The Boston Globe back in August 2007 on one of the […]
CHRIS BELL’S PURE POP COSMOS: Big Star’s Other Bright Light
Speaking (as I so often do here) about great musicians and music, I’d like to take a moment to remember and honor Christopher Bell, the co-founding singer-songwriter of the seminal 1970s outfit Big Star. Although in the years since the band’s initial demise and subsequent discovery by new generations of listeners, much of the credit and attention […]
REVOLUTION AND STREET FIGHTING MEN: The Beatles, Stones, and The (Myth) Making Of Rock’s Greatest Rivalry
Happy accidents of timing and circumstance can produce exquisite results. Just like a sleep walking Keith Richards waking up one night in 1965, picking up his guitar, and tape recording a half-dreamt nocturnal idea – a little riff that would turn into “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” – my plan to interview John McMillian, historian and author of […]
BEFORE TOMMY WAS BORN: The Who’s Sell Out From A Band That Never Did
Right up front, I would concede, in point of fact, that my headline for this post may be debatable given “The Who”‘s activities of the past decade or so. Following the substance-and-alcohol-related deaths of drummer Keith Moon in 1978, and more recently, bassist John Entwistle in 2002, the surviving twosome of guitarist and principal songwriter […]
The Faces From Mod To Rod To Nod: As Good As A Wink To A Blind-Drunk Horse
It’s hard to believe that four decades — 42 years ago this weekend to be exact — have passed since the boozy British blooze-rock band The Faces released what many (including me) consider to be the finest album of their relatively brief (1969-1975) career. “A Nod Is As Good As A Wink … To A Blind […]
GUIDED BY BOB: A Salty Salute to GBV’s Robert Pollard Who Turns 56 (which is less birthday candles than he’s made records)
A very Happy 56th Birthday to Robert Pollard of the long-running Dayton, Ohio rock band, Guided By Voices. Pollard is, at this point, one of the few indie-rock artists who’s always made me feel young. Not because he’s even that old, or his music or sensibility is old, mind you. Naw, it’s just that, when you’re […]
NOT TO BE TAKEN AWAY: Moon The Loon, Gone Too Soon
Happy Birthday to The Who’s late Keith Moon, rock’s greatest gonzo drummer, horse tranquilizer taker, practical joker (usually involving explosives, toilets, television sets, and brandy), and one man Wall of Sound. Moon was only 18 when he auditioned for The Who by striding onto the stage wearing dyed ginger hair to match his ginger-colored clothes, […]
Paul Weller’s Ever-Changing Moods: The Modfather Talks
Paul Weller’s music has always been as stylish and sharply tailored as his suits. Whether as the singer-songwriter for The Jam, a seminal outfit that helped define the British Punk movement of the mid-1970s, or his subsequent group, neo-soul romantics The Style Council, or his substantial solo career, Weller has always followed his own muse and blazed […]
RPM: Jonathan Perry's Life in Analog 