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Lucky Man Album: Emerson, Lake & Palmer (1970) C'est La Vie Album: Works, Volume 1 (1977) by Emerson Lake & Palmer Greg Lake started writing "Lucky Man" when he was just 12 years old. "I was round my friend's house and he had a broken down old guitar," Lake explained on his Songs of a Lifetime tour. "In fact, it only had one string on it. Luckily, it was the bottom string. With a matchstick, I picked out this tune. It made me think, you know, perhaps I could play guitar. So it came to Christmas and I said to my mom, 'Do you think there's any chance of me having a guitar for Christmas?' And she said, 'No.' You know, we were pretty poor. So that was it. I just accepted it. But anyway, Christmas came, and there it was, the guitar. And of course I was thrilled. The first four chords I learned were D, A minor, E minor, and G. With these chords I wrote this little song. It's a kids' song, really. And it was a medieval fantasy, really. And I never wrote it on a piece of paper. I just remembered the words." Arguably Emerson, Lake & Palmer's best known song, this almost did not happen. On the last day of recording their first album, ELP did not have enough material to fulfill their contract requirements of 21 minutes per album side. Greg Lake explained: "Everybody looked round the studio, you know, 'Has anybody got any more material?' And there was deadly silence. So I said, 'Well, look, you know, I've got this little thing I wrote when I was a kid. And if there's nothing else, maybe that would do.' You know. So Keith said, 'Well, you play it, then, let's have a listen.' So I played it, and nobody liked it. So I said, 'Yeah, but you know, the thing is we've got nothing else.' Keith said, 'Well, you record it on your own and I'm going to go down the pub.' So off he went down the pub. So Carl Palmer and I, we recorded the first part together, just drums and acoustic guitar. And it sounded pretty dreadful. But then I put a bass on it and it sounded a bit better. And then I went and put some more guitars on it, and an electric guitar solo. Then I put these harmonies on, these block harmonies. And in the end it sounded pretty good, it sounded like a record." The guitar chords on the chorus: A minor, E minor, D, then Dsus - just play a regular D chord and add a G played on the first string, according to Greg. The end of this song contains one of the most famous Moog synthesizer solos in rock history. Keith Emerson had just recently gotten the device, and only decided to play on this song after hearing the track Lake and Palmer came up with and realizing it was a legitimate song. "Keith came back from the pub and he heard it and was shocked," said Lake. You know, it had gone from this silly little folk song to this quite big production. And so he said, 'Wow, I suppose I'd better play on that.' And so I said, 'The thing is, I've already put the guitar solo on.' He said, 'Look, I could play something at the end.' He said, 'I've just had this gadget delivered next door. It's called a Moog synthesizer. I haven't tried it before, but maybe there's a sound on there that would work on this.' So I said, 'Okay. Why don't we give it a try.' And so Keith went out into the next room. And he said, 'Run the track, then, for an experiment.' So I flipped it in record and pressed play. And because he was experimenting, we didn't really listen. In fact, we put the speakers on dim. The track went through and Keith experimented, and when it got to the end I turned to the engineer, Eddie Offord. I said, 'Was that me or did that sound good?' And Eddie said, 'I think it did sound good.' And we played it back. And that is the solo that's on the record." This song does not have a happy ending. The "lucky man" has riches and acclaim, but he decides to fight for his country, gets shot, and dies. Greg Lake says that even though he wrote the song when he was very young, the story was always the same. "The lyrics never changed," he said. "But strangely enough, over time the way that people perceived the song changed. Perhaps it was vaguely something to do with the Vietnam War, that period, just at the end of the Vietnam War. Some people associated it with the John F. Kennedy assassination. It had those sort of overtones. So it was connected in a way to an era when there was a lot of war and drama like that. But the lyrics really got interpreted in a way in which I'd never intended them to be, of course, when I wrote it as a young kid." (Here's our full Greg Lake interview.) By Emerson, Lake & Palmer standards, this is a very simple song; they got far more complex on their next albums. "Most tracks recorded by ELP, we would say that the backing track would have to be a killer instrumental before we added any voice, so the music had to stand up on its own without the lyrics," Carl Palmer said in his Songfacts interview. "A very simple lyric like 'Lucky Man' is fine - you can take that, too. But the lyrics did mature as time went by, and I think Sinfield and Lake did a great job." Lake was part of the Mandoki Soulmates, a supergroup assembled by the drummer Leslie Mandoki. Of the many famous songs they played, Leslie says this one was the most challenging to interpret. Works, Volume 1 was a double album with Keith Emerson the focus of the first side, Greg Lake the second, Carl Palmer the third, and the entire band sharing equally on Side 4. "C'est La Vie" was one of the songs Lake wrote for his side with help from lyricist Pete Sinfield, who was his bandmate in King Crimson. Telling the story of the song, Lake said: "I used to live in Paris for a while. A very beautiful city. I sometimes would go out walking in the streets there, and you'd often hear this instrument playing. I don't know what they call it, really, but it's one of these barrel organ things you wind up. It's the sort of sound, it's a bit like a Las Vegas casino. It kind of lives with you. Anyway, I'd heard this barrel organ playing. And I walked on back home towards my apartment. I went past this cafe and I heard the voice of Edith Piaf, the famous French lady singer. And when I got back to the apartment I thought, I really would like to write a sort of French song with some French feeling. I don't really speak French, but I knew this phrase, 'c'est la vie,' that's life. And so I thought, That would make a good idea for a song. So I wrote this song, "C'est la Vie," and we recorded it and put it onto Works Volume I. However, a couple of years later it was covered by a French singer called Johnny Hallyday. And he's a sort of French Elvis Presley. Anyway, he had a #1 hit with it in France, which as an Englishman, of course, gave me a great deal of pleasure."

Boned

Care of Cell 44 Album: Odessey And Oracle (1968) Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914) Album: Odessey And Oracle (1968) by The Zombies Paul Ashley Warren Atkinson (19 March 1946 – 1 April 2004) was a British guitarist and record company executive, best known as a founding member of the pop/rock band The Zombies. Atkinson was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2019. At St Albans, Atkinson met Rod Argent and Hugh Grundy, and the three formed a band initially called the Mustangs, later changed to The Zombies. Colin Blunstone and Paul Arnold joined the new band in mid 1958, but Arnold soon left and was replaced by Chris White. After the group won a local contest, they recorded a demo as their prize. Argent's song "She's Not There" got them a deal with Decca Records and was a hit in the UK and US. An album, Begin Here (renamed to The Zombies when released in the US) would follow. They would appear on American television for the first time on January 12 1965, when they appeared on the first episode of Hullabaloo. The Zombies would have another chart-topper in 1964 with Tell Her No. The group continued to record successfully through the 1960s, but disbanded in December 1967, reportedly over management disagreements. Care of Cell 44 is an uptempo pop symphony about a guy writing to his girlfriend, who is in prison. The group's main songwriter Rod Argent recalled in Mojo Magazine February 2008: "It just appealed to me. That twist on a common scenario, I just can't wait for you to come home to me again." This was released as the first single from the Odessey And Oracle album in the UK, but it didn't make the charts, which surprised vocalist Colin Blunstone. He said in his Songfacts interview, "It's a wonderfully crafted song. I think it's got an incredible lyric, wonderful chord sequences and a great melody - it's just got everything." Blunstone was shocked by the song's lack of popular appeal, as he thought it was a very commercial track. Soon after it stiffed, the band split up and Blunstone took a job in the Burglary Department of a London insurance office. Bassist Chris White admitted: "We tried to promote 'Care Of Cell 44,' but there was no positive reaction. It was downhill from then on." However the band did have a surprise hit in America a year after their breakup when "Time Of The Season" peaked at #3. Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914) is written by Zombies bassist Chris White, who recalled in Mojo magazine February 2008 how this dark and chilling war protest number came about: "I'd been reading AJP Taylor on the First World War and my uncle had died at Passchendaele. I was driving to St. Albans and working out that in the first morning there were 60,000 casualties in the Battle of The Somme. The enormity hit me and I had to pull over to the side of the road because I was shaking. That's where that (lyric) came from. 'I just can't stop shaking.' In the flat I had an old American pedal organ with the knee swells. I wrote it on that, but Rod played it so much better in the studio." Despite being the album's least commercial track, this was released as its first US single. White admitted in the same interview: "I was surprised. I think it was the resonance of the Vietnam War." Unsurprisingly the single flopped. There was a printer's error with the title. It was actually called "Butcher's Tale Somme 1916" but they printed it as "Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)." This was on top of another error on the album as the designer of the LP cover misspelt the word "Odyssey" as '"Odessey." In our interview with Zombies lead singer Colin Blunstone, he explained why he didn't sing on this track. "I don't know if you've ever listened to the lyric, but it's pretty dark stuff," he said. "People thought it was about Vietnam but really it's about the First World War, and I just couldn't see how it could fit on the album. But I was wrong. Everybody plays the album through, and I've never heard the running order questioned ever. So, originally I was going to sing that, but I thought it was too dark for me, especially at 19. I could handle it now, but at 19 I just thought it was a bit dark."

Black Water Album: What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits (1974) China Grove Album: The Captain And Me (1973) by The Doobie Brothers Patrick Simmons, who is the group's guitarist, wrote Black Water and sang lead. It has the Louisiana swamp rock feel of earlier Doobie Brothers songs like "Toulouse Street" and "Black Eyed Cajun Woman." "Black Water" wasn't seen as having hit potential, so it was relegated to the B-side of "Another Park, Another Sunday" in March 1974. "Black Water" wasn't issued as an A-side until November, and it didn't reach #1 until March 15, 1975. In a Songfacts interview with Tom Johnston, the Doobie Brothers frontman explained how the song became an unlikely hit. Said Johnston: "That's a story that could have happened back then, but never would ever ever happen now: Roanoke, Virginia picked that tune up and started playing it in heavy rotation, and somebody in Minneapolis who I guess knew somebody in Roanoke heard the song and decided to follow suit, and it ended up becoming our first #1 single. That was Pat's first single. And oddly enough, it was never looked at as a single by the record company. I remember when I first heard it was #1, we were in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and we were just getting ready to go on stage, and then I guess Bruce [their manager Bruce Cohn] must have told us. I think we were already aware of the fact that it was getting airplay, but nobody was really paying a lot of attention. And then all of a sudden it became #1 and we were paying attention. I remember I went in and congratulated Pat backstage, and we've been playing it ever since." The band lost lead singer Tom Johnston to illness in 1975, but found a capable replacement in Michael McDonald, who was with them until their split in 1982. When they re-grouped in 1988, Johnston took over as frontman. The Doobie Brothers are one of the few bands with hits sung by three different singers: Johnston, McDonald, and thanks to "Black Water," Patrick Simmons. The Doobie Brothers performed this in a 1978 episode of the TV show What's Happening!! where they teach the characters on the show about the dark side of bootlegging. The United States private security firm Blackwater was named for the dark water swamps of North Carolina, where the company is based. After criticism of the company's conduct during the Iraq War, they changed their name to "Xe" (pronounced "Z") in 2009. China Grove is a small town in Texas, about 10 miles from San Antonio in Bexar county. Did Doobie Brothers singer/guitarist Tom Johnston know this when he wrote the song? Sort of. Here's what he told Songfacts: "The words were written last, and they were made up around this whole idea of this wacky little town with a sheriff that had a Samurai Sword and all that sort of thing. The funny thing was that I found out in 1975 in a cab in Houston that there really was a China Grove, although what happened was in 1972 we were touring in Winnebagos, and we were driving into San Antonio. And there is a China Grove, Texas, right outside of San Antonio. I must have seen the sign and forgotten about it. And when I came up with the term 'China Grove,' I thought I was just making it up because of the words being about this crazy sheriff with a Samurai Sword." Tom Johnston's lyrics were influenced by the oriental piano sound that Billy Payne came up with when they were working on the track. Payne was the pianist for Little Feat, and recorded with many other artists, including Elton John and James Taylor. In his Songfacts interview, Johnston said: "The piano lick went, 'Dadadadun, dadadadadundun.' It was an Oriental sounding lick. And so from there I took off and went to the place I ended up with lyrically. I must have seen that sign and forgotten it. And when the cab driver told me this in Houston, I said, 'You gotta be kiddin' me.' He said, 'There really is a China Grove.' I said, 'No, there isn't.' He says, 'Yeah, there really is. And it is right outside of San Antonio.' I said, 'That's weird.' And it turns out there's one in North Carolina, too." This song has been used in a number of TV shows, including The Simpsons, Entourage and House. It has a very distinctive guitar riff, which makes it perfect for certain scenes. According to Johnston, however, he didn't think one way or another about the riff when he came up with it. Johnston claims that the only time he know a guitar lick was going to become a hit was the one he came up with for "Listen To The Music." The late Keith Knudsen, drummer for The Doobie Brothers, had quite a culture shock when traveling with Al Kooper (of Blood Sweat & Tears fame) in Japan. As related in Kooper's memoir Backstage Passes and Backstabbing Bastards, Knudsen was dry and asked the bass player to score him marijuana - and was taken aback when informed that Japan was both a police state and very drug-free. The naive bass player tried anyway and brought back a tiny amount, wrapped in a paper packet as if it were a much higher-caliber substance. Knudsen casually lit up in the hotel room, and the bass player freaked out, stuffing towels under the door and carrying on like he thought they were going to be shot.

Barracuda Album: Little Queen (1977) Magic Man Album: Dreamboat Annie (1975) by Heart Barracuda was written by Ann and Nancy Wilson together with guitarist Roger Fisher and drummer Michael DeRosier. According to the band, the song is a statement about the record industry in general. It was written at a time when there was friction between the band and their label. Little Queen was the first album Heart released for the CBS-Portrait label. Their old label, Mushroom Records, sued the band and in 1978 released Magazine, an album made up of previously recorded material that Heart did not want released. (Thanks to Sovereign Records for this information.) The Wilson sisters revealed in various interviews that the song was about Heart's anger towards an ad Mushroom Records placed in trade publications implying that Ann and Nancy were lesbians having an affair. The song focuses on Ann's rage towards a promoter who came up to her after a concert in Detroit asking how her "lover" was. She initially thought he was talking about her then-boyfriend - band member Michael Fisher. After the promoter revealed he was talking about her sister Nancy Wilson, Ann became angry and went back to her hotel room to write the song. Nancy put suitably angry music to the words to complete the song comparing the sleazy side of music to a dangerous fish. This song can be heard in the movies Wag the Dog (1997), Charlie's Angles (2000), Roll Bounce (2005), You Again (2010), The Campaign (2012) and Identity Thief (2013). TV series to feature the song include The Sopranos, Chuck and My Name Is Earl. It was also used in a 2009 episode of Glee where it was performed by Lea Michele and Adam Lambert. Fergie performed this with Heart at the 2008 Idol Gives Back charity special on American Idol. During the 2008 presidential campaign, this song was used as the as the unofficial theme song for Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin. The Alaska governor originally earned the nickname "Sarah Barracuda" when she played basketball in high school, because of her fierce competitiveness. The name was revived after Palin became mayor of her hometown, Wasilla, in 1996 and it was played at the 2008 National Republican Convention, after she gave a speech. The next day, Ann and Nancy Wilson issued a statement that said: "The Republican campaign did not ask for permission to use the song, nor would they have been granted that permission. We have asked the Republican campaign publicly not to use our music. We hope our wishes will be honored." Their wishes were not honored, and the song was played at the convention that night after their presidential nominee John McCain spoke and Palin joined him on stage. As the Republican campaign pointed out, they had obtained the proper performance rights to the song and were under no obligation to get further permission to use it (they would have if they wanted to use it in a commercial or video). With no legal recourse, the Wilson sisters retaliated in the media, telling Entertainment Weekly: "Sarah Palin's views and values in NO WAY represent us as American women. We ask that our song 'Barracuda' no longer be used to promote her image. The song 'Barracuda' was written in the late 70s as a scathing rant against the soulless, corporate nature of the music business, particularly for women. While Heart did not and would not authorize the use of their song at the RNC, there's irony in Republican strategists' choice to make use of it there." The song's co-writer Roger Fisher was also anti-Palin, but he saw things differently, telling Reuters he was "thrilled" that the song was being used as it was a win-win situation. He explained that while Heart gets publicity and royalties, the Republicans benefit from "the ingenious placement of a kick-ass song." He added that he would use some of the proceeds in a donation to the Obama campaign, and thus, "the Republicans are now supporting Obama." When Heart entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013, they played "Barracuda" last in a 3-song set. By this time, the Wilson sisters were the only original members still with the band, but it was the Little Queen lineup that got inducted: Roger Fisher, Howard Leese, Michael DeRosier and Steve Fossen. There was some bad blood between the Wilsons and their former bandmates, and at first, Ann and Nancy ruled out a reunion. In the end, they appeased fans by performing "Crazy On You" with the classic lineup, but did "Barracuda" with their current band along with some of their Seattle-based friends: Chris Cornell (who inducted them), Mike McCready (Pearl Jam) and Jerry Cantrell (Alice in Chains). While contributing guest vocals to Alice in Chains' 1992 Sap EP, Ann Wilson refused the bands' request to sing the "Barracuda" chorus on the song "Right Turn." She told them they wouldn't find it funny when people were still hounding them to play "Man In The Box" 10 years later. "Barracuda" soundtracks the 2024 Hyundai "Conquer the Weekend" Vikings Commercial for their Santa Fe SUV. The "Magic Man" is Mike Fisher, Heart's original guitarist. He was Ann Wilson's boyfriend, and she followed him to Canada during the Vietnam War years so he wouldn't get drafted. In 1974, Nancy Wilson (Ann's sister) joined the band and Fisher became their manager and sound engineer. The song is about being madly in love to the point where you are not thinking clearly. The line, "Come on home girl..." relates to Ann Wilson's mother. The line, "Try to understand, Mama, he's a magic man" is Ann's response. Wilson says her mother helped keep her grounded when she was being rather irrational and acting under the spell of her "magic man." According to Ann and Nancy Wilson's autobiography Kicking and Dreaming, this hit climbed the charts thanks to a radio publicist who offered DJs drugs and prostitutes in return for airplay. "When we were out of the way he'd pass the DJ a gram of cocaine," recalled Nancy, "or the number of a hooker and say, 'She's yours, on Heart.'" Heart built their following in Canada, where they were waiting out the Vietnam War. When their debut album, Dreamboat Annie, was released there in 1975, some radio stations picked up the song as the band toured the country. When they returned to America in 1976, they had to start the promotional cycle again, but it worked: "Crazy On You" got airplay around the country and generated a buzz for the band. When "Magic Man" was released, more radio stations were familiar with Heart and added it to their playlists, helping send the song to #9 and push Dreamboat Annie Platinum. They were off and running in a career that landed them in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013. In a 2022 interview with Ann Wilson, she talked about what "Magic Man" means to her when she sings it. "Now, it's like looking back on a love affair of the past from this great distance," she said. "It's pretty interesting to look back on all that naiveté and just what it's like when you fall in love for the first time. It's so powerful, it becomes a lifestyle. That song is a 'leaving home' song. So, I sing it as my 21-year-old self, just taking off into the world." Dolly Parton covered "Magic Man" for her 2023 rock album Rockstar. Her version is a duet with Ann Wilson and is dedicated to Parton's husband, Carl. "Nobody can out-sing Ann, but I gave it my darndest, and we added a few lines that were not in the original," said Parton. "We wanted to have a few things that made it seem like ours."

American Dream Album: American Dream (1988) by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young Time Travel and 88s In 1970, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young released the incendiary single "Ohio," written by Neil Young in the aftermath of the Kent State shootings. The quartet didn't release another single until 1988, when they put out "American Dream," the title track to their first album together since Déjà Vu, also in 1970 (Crosby, Stills & Nash released three albums without Young in the interim). Like "Ohio," it's written by Neil Young and deals with the political climate of the day, which in 1988 was a lot less urgent than in 1970 when American soldiers were killing students on a college campus. "American Dream" is a satire on the Iran-Contra Scandal and, to a lesser degree, the downfall of presidential candidate Gary Hart, who was caught with his mistress. The video, which includes news footage of the satired events, got some airplay on VH1, but the single didn't chart in America and the album was widely panned and remains remembered as one of the group's less noble efforts. They started in 1968 as Crosby, Stills & Nash, formed from former members of three prominent 1960s groups: The Byrds (David Crosby), Buffalo Springfield (Stephen Stills) and The Hollies (Graham Nash). After releasing their first album in 1969, another Buffalo Springfield alum, Neil Young, joined the band. Joni Mitchell is a huge part of CSN&Y history. She was romantically involved with Crosby before taking up with Graham Nash. She also wrote their song "Woodstock" and did the artwork for their first greatest hits album, So Far, released in 1974. Mitchell's first album was produced by Crosby. The Crosby, Stills & Nash performance at Woodstock is well documented, but many don't know that with Young, they played the ill-fated Altamont concert headlined by The Rolling Stones. The band left right after their set - before it got violent - because they had another gig that night. Crosby and Nash have released albums together, and Stills and Young teamed up for one called Long May You Run in 1976. The two who really didn't get along were Stills and Nash, both of whom battled for the affections of Rita Coolidge. Stills got together with Jimi Hendrix in March 1970, six months before Hendrix' death. They jammed together at a London club called The Speakeasy, and Hendrix added guitar to Stills' song "Old Times, Good Times," which appears on his debut album. Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young are the only group to top the US albums chart with three consecutive LPs where one was a studio album (Deja Vu), one was a live album (4 Way Street), and one was a greatest hits album (So Far). They espoused peace and love but made lots of money, which put them at odds with some in the hippie community. This came to a head on September 15, 1969, when Stills got into a fistfight with an audience member at a festival in Big Sur, California that was being filmed as a showcase for good vibes. Each band member has been inducted twice into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: Crosby with The Byrds, Stills with Buffalo Springfield, Nash with The Hollies, and Young as a solo artist. From 1972-1981 they released just one studio album - CSN in 1977 (without Young) - but each member was active outside the group with solo albums and other collectives. The group was somewhat unique in that each of the members were recording solo albums at the height of their success as a group. Other configurations included Crosby-Nash (they made eight albums together) and the Stills-Young Band, which made one album in 1976. They were successful from the start, beginning with their first album in 1969 and continuing through the early 1970s. CSN&Y was one of the few groups selling as many albums as the Beatles. Young left the group in 1976, returning long enough to record an album in 1988 after Crosby finished a jail term on drug and weapons charges, fulfilling a promise Young had made to record with CSN if Crosby could beat his drug addiction. Graham Nash told The Guardian in a 2015 interview that it was a very difficult decision to leave his former group the Hollies. He said: "They were my friends for many, many years, but when I heard myself singing with David and Stephen that first time in Joni's [Mitchell] living room, my life changed dramatically. I needed to sing those songs." Nash is both a keen photographer and collector of photographs. When he sold his 2,000-print collection through Sotheby's in 1990, it set an auction record for the highest-grossing sale of a single private collection of photography. Stephen Stills underwent successful surgery for prostate cancer on January 3, 2008, which was his 63rd birthday. In a 2022 interview with Crosby, he talked about his relationships with his former bandmates. "I still really love Stephen Stills," he said. "I just can't help it. There's something about his music, something about the way he plays that just thrills me. It always has. But I don't get along well with Neil or Graham, either one." 1969-2015 David Crosby (Van Cortland) Vocals, guitar 1968-2015 Stephen Stills Vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass 1968-2015 Graham Nash Vocals, guitar, keyboards 1968-2015 Neil Young Vocals, guitar 1970-2015 I used to see you on every T.V Your smiling face looked back at me I used to see you on every T.V Your smiling face looked back at me Then they caught you with the girl next door People's money piled on the floor Accusations that you try to deny Revelations and rumors begin to fly Now you think about reaching out Try to get some help from above Now you think about reaching out Try to get some help from above Reporters crowd around your house Going through your garbage like a pack of hounds Speculating what they may find out It don't matter now, you're all washed up You wake up in the middle of the night Your sheets are wet and your face is white You tried to make a good thing last How could something so good, go bad, so fast? American dream, American dream American dream, American dream Don't know when things went wrong Might have been when you were young and strong Don't know when things went wrong Might have been when you were young and strong Reporters crowd around your house Going through your garbage like a pack of hounds Speculating what they may find out It don't matter now, you're all washed up Don't know when things went wrong Might have been when you were young and strong American dream, American dream Don't know when things went wrong Might have been when you were young and strong American dream, American dream

Voodoo Child (Slight Return) Album: Electric Ladyland (1968) by Jimi Hendrix This was recorded after Jimi Hendrix finished the long, slow blues of "Voodoo Chile," a 15-minute jam that appears earlier on the Electric Ladyland album. An ABC film crew came into the studio to do a piece on The Experience and told them to "make like you're playing, boys." Jimi said, "Okay, let's do this in E." The TV footage was lost, but their impromptu jam gave them the song "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)." Stevie Ray Vaughan covered "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" on his Couldn't Stand the Weather album, and numerous guitar virtuosos carry out extended versions at their own concerts. Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, and John Petrucci played a version on their G3 2001 tour. This was one of several standout wah-wah popularized songs, alongside Cream's "White Room" and Isaac Hayes' "Theme from 'Shaft'." Hendrix was considered a master of the wah-wah pedal, and this track earned him the #1 spot on Guitar World's greatest wah solos of all time list in 2015. In 1970, this was released as a single in the UK a week after Hendrix died. It became his only #1 hit. "Voodoo Child" was the last song Hendrix performed live. On September 6, 1970, which was 12 days before his death, he played it at a concert in Germany. Hendrix dedicated the album to his groupies, who he called "Electric Ladies." Steve Winwood played organ on this. He was a member of the band Traffic, and often played on the same bill with Hendrix. When Jimi was recording this in New York, he had Winwood come by and play. The legendary jazz artist Miles Davis admits being influenced by this song when he made his album Bitches Brew in 1969. One of the songs on that album is called "Miles Runs His Voodoo Down." On the Live at Fillmore East version, Jimi says: "This is the Black Panthers' national anthem." In 2012, "Voodoo Child" was voted the best guitar riff in rock and roll history by readers of MusicRadar. The website wrote: "From its wah-wah into the rhythm parts and the astonishing solo, this is still regarded by many as the high watermark of electric guitar expression." Guns N' Roses' "Sweet Child o' Mine" came second in the poll and Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love" third. The original album cover was adorned with naked women, but the ensuing controversy prompted the label (Reprise Records) to swap it out for a photo of Hendrix. The musician wasn't pleased with either version; he wanted to bring in photographer Linda Eastman, who would be more famously known as Linda McCartney, to shoot the cover, but the label nixed the idea. Thanks to a studio engineer's error on the master tape's label, the album was nearly called "Electric Landlady." This was used in a 2023 commercial for Acura's electric vehicles. There's no voiceover in the spot, just the song and some driving sounds. Well, I stand up next to a mountain And I chop it down with the edge of my hand Well, I stand up next to a mountain Chop it down with the edge of my hand Well, I pick up all the pieces and make an island Might even raise a little sand, yeah 'Cause I'm a voodoo child Lord knows I'm a voodoo child, baby Want to say one more last thing I didn't mean to take you up all your sweet time I'll give it right back to you one of these days I said, I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time I'll give it right back one of these days, yeah And if I don't meet you no more in this world Then I'll, I'll meet you in the next one Now don't be late, don't be late 'Cause I'm a voodoo child, voodoo child Lord knows I'm a voodoo child, hey, hey, hey I'm a voodoo child, baby I don't take no for an answer Just want you to know

Happy Together Album: Happy Together (1967) It Ain't Me Babe Album: It Ain't Me Babe (1965) by The Turtles Happy Together is not a song about a couple in love. According to Gary Bonner, who wrote the song with Alan Gordon, the song is about unrequited love. Our desperate singer wants the girl to "imagine how the world could be so very fine," proposing what would happen "if I should call you up." The line in the fadeout, "How is the weather?" is when he realizes they will never be more than passing acquaintances, as he resorts to small talk to keep from bursting into tears. The song's composers Gary Bonner and Alan Gordon were the bass player and drummer of the Boston area group The Magicians. Bonner became a regular member of Kenny Vance and the Planotones. Gordon, who died in 2008 at the age of 64, had songs recorded by Alice Cooper, Frank Zappa and The Lovin' Spoonful. Talking about how the song came together, Alan Gordon said: "I had nearly half a song already written, mostly lyric ideas, but couldn't find the right melodic concept. The Magicians were in the middle of a week-long engagement at the Unicorn Club in Boston, and one early morning I was visiting my divorced father in nearby Ayer, Massachusetts after being up all night. I had stopped to have breakfast at the Park Street Diner in the town and was miserable with no sleep, the endless dumb gigs we were playing and having a songwriter's block. About the only melody that was throbbing in my tired, fried brain at that hour was the time-immemorial repeated open string pattern that Allen (Jake) Jacobs, the Magician's lead guitarist, would use as he incessantly tuned and retuned after, before, and frequently during each piece we played. Suddenly, some words began to fit and literally minutes later music and lyrics started to take shape. I excitedly and in fairness asked Jake to complete the song with me as co-writer, but he refused, saying it was all 'too simple' for him to be involved, so my regular partner Gary then helped me with the finishing touches. When Gary Klein at the Koppleman/Rubin office heard the result, he immediately knew the song would be perfect for the new and upbeat image being created for The Turtles, and it was his continued enthusiasm that convinced the group to record it." After the song was turned down by a number of groups, Bonner and Gordon recorded a demo at Regent Sound Studio with some session musicians, including guitarist Ralph Casale and bassist Dick Romoff. It was Casale who came up with the main figure which set the groove for the song. He told us: "A chord sheet was placed in front of the musicians and we immediately proceeded to put this song together. I came up with what I considered and called a Lovin' Spoonful feel. I created the figure and all the other musicians including Bonner and Gordon immediately understood the direction. The vocal arrangements fell into place very nicely. Regent Sound was an excellent studio so the demo sounded like a finished product. I later told everybody, 'I just heard a hit record.' As Aunt Flo put it, the original demo was phenomenal. In fact the Turtles' recording sounds as though they used the basic demo track and overdubbed horns. The Bonner/Gordon vocal arrangement sounded a lot like the hit record also." The Turtles were formed by Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan. They were saxophone players who did whatever was trendy in order to make a living as musicians. They played surf-rock, acoustic folk, whatever was big at the time, and in addition to their own bands, played backup for The Coasters, Sonny And Cher and The Righteous Brothers. After a while, they gave up sax and became singers, signing a deal with White Whale Records as The Crosswind Singers. When British groups like The Beatles took over America, they tried to pass themselves off as British singers and renamed themselves The Tyrtles. The record company made them change the name to The Turtles, and tried to make them sound like The Byrds, who were leaders of the folk-rock trend. Like The Byrds had done before, The Turtles recorded a Bob Dylan song for their first single - "It Ain't Me Babe." They had a few more minor hits, and recorded the original version of "Eve Of Destruction," which became a #1 hit for Barry McGuire. They recorded some gloomy songs that completely flopped, so they decided to try some happier songs. After many other artists passed on "Happy Together," The Turtles decided to record it in an effort to change their image once again. Bonner and Gordon also wrote other Turtles hits like "She'd Rather Be With Me" as well as "Celebrate" by Three Dog Night. In the three years after The Turtles recorded this, they had several other hits, but disbanded in 1970. Volman and Kaylan joined Frank Zappa And The Mothers Of Invention as "Phlorescent Leech and Eddie." After a few years with Zappa, they started recording as Flo And Eddie. They wrote music for the animated movies Dirty Duck, Strawberry Shortcake and The Care Bears, and hosted their own nationally syndicated radio show. They also played on many famous songs by John Lennon, Roger McGuinn, Hoyt Axton, Alice Cooper, Blondie, Bruce Springsteen, The Psychedelic Furs, Sammy Hagar, Duran Duran, and The Ramones. In 1984, they went on their "Happy Together Tour" as The Turtles Featuring Flo And Eddie. The line "If I should call you up, invest a dime" harkens back to a time when telephone calls were often made at pay phones that cost a dime. These days, he would probably just call from his cell phone, which is much more convenient, but far less romantic. Besides The Turtles, three other acts took this song to the US Hot 100: Dawn featuring Tony Orlando [medley] (#79, 1972) Captain & Tennille (#53, 1980) The Nylons (#75, 1987) In the UK, the Australian singer Jason Donovan made #10 in 1991 with his version, and in 1979, T.G. Sheppard made it to #8 on the country chart with his rendition. Other artists to cover "Happy Together" include Mel Torme, The Ventures, Hugo Montenegro, The Vogues, Buck Wild, Vikki Carr, Petula Clark, Melba Moore, Donny Osmond, David Cook, Percy Faith, Frank Zappa and Weezer. This has appeared on the soundtracks to the movies Adaptation, Ernest Goes To Camp, Life Or Something Like It, and Freaky Friday. This has been used in lot of commercials for clients like Burger King, The NFL, Nintendo, Red Lobster, Sony Playstation, Florida Orange Juice, Heineken, Clinique and Nickelodeon. (Thanks, Carlin America publishing for all above.) In 1989, this was used in a movie of the same name starring Helen Slater, Patrick Dempsey and Brad Pitt. This song was used in an episode of That '70s Show. The scene of the song's usage involved the character Fez imagining what his life would be like if his friends were his family. The sequence later transitions into the characters performing the song. This opens the 12 Monkeys episode "45 RPM" (2018) as Cassie prepares to time travel to the '70s to assassinate a villain. "It Ain't Me Babe" was written and originally recorded by Bob Dylan, who released the song on his 1964 album Another Side Of Bob Dylan. The lyrics find the singer telling a girl that he is not her true love, and that she should forget about him as he is just a temporary fix for her loneliness. Dylan is rarely forthcoming about his songs, but this may have been inspired by Joan Baez. This was the first hit for The Turtles, who had several more hits in the '60s, including the #1 "Happy Together." Howard Kaylan of The Turtles explained how they came to record this in the Forgotten Hits newsletter: "When the Turtles first signed our original recording agreements with the tiny label that would become White Whale, we were all under the legal age of 18. Needless to say, the contracts required our parents' approval. This was all done before a judge in the county of Los Angeles who reviewed the paperwork about to be executed and told our parents that, "If you let your sons sign these papers, the court won't be responsible for the outcome. These are the worst contracts that I have ever seen." We didn't care. We wanted to make records and damn the consequences. So we signed. And our parents co-signed. And the judge had been right. It took many years and many thousands of dollars to win back our money and our self-respect. But, in the meantime, we had a record deal. We had originally intended to break up our band, the Crossfires, on one particular evening in 1965, while playing our usual Friday night gig at the a teen club in Redondo Beach, California called the Revelaire. On my way upstairs with our resignation, two shady-looking entrepreneurs stopped me and asked if we were interested in making a record. They loved the way we sounded doing a cover of the new Byrds single (our guitarist had gone out and bought a 12-string guitar earlier that week) and thought that doing folk-rock was the key to our future. It fell upon me to find the tunes to record. The Crossfires had been a surf band in high school, but together with a friend of ours, Betty McCarty, we had also done some folk singing as The Crosswind Singers. In fact, we opened a concert at Westchester High that starred the folk duo Joe and Eddie (a foreshadowing of things to come, many years before the names Flo and Eddie were to become our nom de plumes). I found Dylan's 'It Ain't Me Babe' on an album and, being blissfully unaware that anyone else had ever recorded it, thought that it would make a great rock song. So I literally 'lifted' the Zombies' approach to pop - a soft Colin Blunstone-like minor verse bursting into a four-four major chorus a-la 'She's Not There.' Both of the B-sides to 'It Ain't Me Babe' and 'Let Me Be' were songs that I had originally written for the Crosswind Singers and that we had performed with Joe and Eddie on that most auspicious of occasions. 'The Wanderin' Kind' sounded like a total Byrds cop. I wasn't ashamed then and I'm not ashamed now. It was all jangly guitars and travelin' boot-heels. But, in my defense, it was written well in advance of the Byrds records and, in fact, was a Dylan cop. Hey, we were all doing it. We never said that we were trend setters. Sometimes, the smart follower is perceived as a leader too. 'Almost There,' on the other hand, had nothing to do with the world of folk rock. In fact, if stolen from anyone, it would have to be called a Kinks-style rocker. The guitar lick intro and the incomprehensible "you gettum, boys" mumbled at the start of the solo were stone giveaways. The Turtles' career was always, somehow, intertwined with the that of the Kinks lasting all the way to our final album in 1970, Turtle Soup, which Ray Davies, himself, produced." (Thanks to Kent at the Forgotten Hits newsletter.) Also in 1965, Johnny Cash recorded this with his wife June Carter. The song appears in the 2005 movie Walk The Line, which is about Cash. Other artists to record the song include Joan Baez, Nancy Sinatra and New Found Glory. Dylan's use of the word "Babe" gave Sonny Bono the idea to use the word in his 1965 Sonny & Cher hit "I Got You Babe." Jim Pons (born March 14, 1943) is an American bassist, author, singer, and video director who most notably played for the Leaves (1964–1967), the Turtles (1967–1970), and the Mothers of Invention (1970–1971) and Flo and Eddie (1971-1973). After leaving the music scene in 1973, he worked as a video director for the New York Jets, and briefly the Jacksonville Jaguars. Jim designed the team logo for the New York Jets, which lasted from 1978 to 1997. In 1964, he formed the garage rock band The Leaves. The band was founded by Pons and guitarist Robert Lee Reiner, who were Fraternity students at Cal State Northridge (then known as San Fernando Valley State College). They were originally called The Rockwells, prior to changing their names to The Leaves. They got the name Leaves when one of the members greeted another by saying “What’s happening?”, and the other responding with “The Leaves are happening”. The Leaves eventually secured a regular gig replacing the Byrds as the house band at the popular nightclub Ciro's on the Sunset Strip. They signed with Mira Records after being heard by Pat Boone, who got them the position. The Leaves are noted for recording an early version of the song Hey Joe, which they recorded along with their debut album in 1966. Their version of Hey Joe was #1 on the Los Angeles stations and peaked at #31 on the Billboard pop charts in May 1966. Hey Joe would achieve greater popularity in 1967 when it was covered by Jimi Hendrix. Pons stayed in the Leaves until 1967. Pons joined The Turtles shortly after the Leaves. He played bass on their hit songs She'd Rather Be With Me, Elenore, She's My Girl, and You Showed Me. As a member of the Turtles, he appeared on television on both of their appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, and American Bandstand, among many others. Jim continued to tour with the Turtles until they split in 1970. He played on their albums, Happy Together, The Turtles Present the Battle of the Bands, Turtle Soup and The Turtles Greatest Hits Vols, 1 and 2. Since the 2010s, he has occasionally guest-starred with The Turtles alongside Flo & Eddie. Pons will usually join them on stage if they are performing in Florida, where he lives. Pons was a member of Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention (1970-1971). He played bass on their albums "Live at the Fillmore East", "Just Another Band From L.A.", and "Playground Psychotics". Pons portrayed himself in Zappa's 1971 surrealist film 200 Motels, starring the members of the Mothers Of Invention. In 1973 Pons left the music industry to become the film and video director for the New York Jets football team; he designed the team's 1978–97 team logo. He held this position until around the year 2000. Pons and his family moved to Jacksonville, Florida in 2005, where he did game day video for the Jacksonville Jaguars, until he retired. In 2017, Pons wrote an autobiography titled Hard Core Love: Sex, Football and Rock and Roll in the Kingdom of God which won the 2017 Florida Writers Association BOOK OF THE YEAR award. The book describes his spiritual journey during his careers in the music and sports industries.

Mysterious Ways Album: Achtung Baby (1991) Gloria Album: October (1981) by U2 In this song, the main character, Johnny, has an epiphany through an encounter with a mysterious feminine being. To explain, we turn to Into The Heart by Niall Stokes. "It's a song about a man living on little or no romance," Bono says. "It's a song about women - or a woman - but it's addressed to him." Bono talks a bit about theology and about El Shaddai - the third and least used name for God in the Bible, which translates as "the breasted one." "I've always believed that the spirit is a feminine thing," he says. "Mysterious Ways" is not about a particular woman. It is about women in general, and the way they entrance, and often dominate men. Says Bono, "At times I do tend to idealize women. It's easy to fall into the trap of separating them into angels and devils for the sake of the drama. But there's no way that there's ever anything anti-women involved. Our songs are not politically correct. They are written from a man's point of view. He's wrestling with different things, there's a flash of anger and hurt here and there. But I don't think women come out badly." Bono got the idea for this song from a conversation he had with Rev. Jack Heaslip, whom the band met when they were students at Mount Temple Secondary School and he was a guidance counselor. Heaslip became a trusted advisor to the band and a sounding board for questions about spirituality and religion. "He mused on the idea that the gender of God is not clear in the original biblical Hebrew," Bono wrote in his memoir Surrender. "In fact one of the names of God, El Shaddai, means 'the breasted one.' If the greatest creative force in the world is a woman giving birth, then of course the greatest creative force in the universe is likely to be a feminine spirit." While recording this in Berlin, U2 came up with the basis for their song "One." In a rush of creativity, they put together "One" and finished "Mysterious Ways" later. This was very refreshing for the band - they were having a hard time coming up with anything and even considered breaking up. The line, "If you want to kiss the sky, better learn how to kneel - on your knees boy!" is probably a reference to oral sex, although it can have a more innocent religious meaning, like kneeling on a pew. Bono performed this on the Zoo TV tour in character as The Fly, a parody of an egomaniacal rock star, wearing huge sunglasses and leather. This was the second single from the Achtung Baby album. The first single was "The Fly," which did well globally but stiffed in America, reaching just #61. "Mysterious Ways" went to #9 in the US and got lots of airplay on a variety of formats. "One" was the next single, and it was also a big hit in America and around the world. Recording the album was challenging, but ultimately very rewarding. So much so that Daniel Lanois, who produced it with Brian Eno, cites it as his favorite collaboration. "I do appreciate the collaborative feeling that we had on Achtung Baby, which is a U2 record we made in Germany," he told Songfacts. "What was great about that was there were a lot of very talented, smart people in a room wanting the very best for everybody. That is the true meaning of collaboration." Lanois, who has also worked on albums with Neil Young, Emmylou Harris, Bob Dylan and many others, has a long association with U2. He first worked with them on their The Unforgettable Fire album in 1984. Directed by Stephane Sednaoui, the video was shot in Morocco with a belly dancer portraying the woman who "moves in mysterious ways." When U2 embarked on their Zoo TV tour in 1992, they returned to this motif, with a belly dancer appearing on stage when they performed the song. After the first leg of the tour, Morleigh Steinberg, who did some choreography for the band, became the dancer. She ended up taking up with The Edge, whose marriage collapsed while the band was recording the Achtung Baby album. Steinberg and The Edge had two children together and got married in 2002. A dance remix by Paul Oakenfold became popular in clubs. Speaking to American Songwriter, the Edge explained how Daniel Lanois transformed the song. "At the time we were working on it in Berlin, it had no chorus," he said. "It was a groove, a great verse idea, and that was all we had. Bono went into the other room to work on chorus ideas for 'Mysterious Ways.' I came back in and I was showing Adam (Clayton, bass) what the chord changes were, and Danny goes 'Let's play those back to back,' so I played the two chord progressions back to back and we all just went, 'Oh, that's a great combination of sequences. Let's try that out in the room." Gloria is my mother's name. Gloria is Latin for "Glory," and the Latin refrain of "In Te Domine" means "In You Lord." (Did you know: Bono's stage name was originally Bono Vox, which is Latin for "Good Voice"). Like all but the most scholarly among us, Bono is not fluent in Latin. He did know some Latin words - mostly because of church - and with tape rolling, he sang what came to him. The challenge then was to translate what he had sung, so he left the studio to find a Latin dictionary but found something better: a friend who had studied the language and could translate for him. Released on U2's second album, October, "Gloria" is a spiritual song reflecting the Christian beliefs of Bono, The Edge, and Larry Mullen (bass player Adam Clayton was not as devout). Early on, U2 infused worship messages in their songs, and almost broke up the band when they feared it conflicted with their faith. With lyrics like, "I try to stand up, but I can't find my feet," Bono is supplicating to a higher power. He explained to Musician magazine in 1983: "I had this feeling of everything waiting on me, and I was just naked, nothing to offer. So I went through this process of wrenching what was inside myself outside of myself." Some of Bono's lyrics and vocals were inspired by an album of Gregorian chants that their manager, Paul McGuinness, had given him. The music video was the second from U2 (following "I Will Follow") and their first in the MTV era. Directed by Meiert Avis, it shows the band performing the song in Dublin in the same place the October album cover was shot. It was the first U2 video shot outdoors, something they did on many others over the next few years because they liked the lighting. Adam Clayton played a bass solo on this track, something he rarely did. Bono (from the book Race Of Angels): "I actually really like that lyric. It was written really quickly. I think it expresses the thing of language again, this thing of speaking in tongues, looking for a way out of language. 'I try to sing this song... I try to stand up but I can't find my feet.' And taking this Latin thing, this hymn thing. It's so outrageous at the end going to the full Latin whack. That still makes me smile. It's so wonderfully mad and epic and operatic. And of course Gloria is about a woman in the Van Morrison sense. Being an Irish band, you're conscious of that. And I think that what happened at that moment was very interesting: people saw that you could actually write about a woman in the spiritual sense and that you could write about God in the sexual sense. And that was a moment. Because before that there had been a line. That you can actually sing to God, but it might be a woman? Now, you can pretend it's about God, but not a woman! "Gloria" was modestly successful throughout Europe but in America was mostly constrained to college radio stations and didn't chart. Most listeners heard it for the first time on the Under A Blood Red Sky live album, which was released in 1983 after U2's third album, War, took off. "Gloria" was the only track from October included on the album, and along with "Party Girl," one of two songs on the tracklist recorded June 5, 1983 at the Red Rocks amphitheater in Colorado. U2 played this at concerts throughout the '80s, then brought it back in 2005 for their Vertigo tour. Van Morrison released an unrelated song of the same name in 1964. A fellow Irishman who U2 admired, Morrison's "Gloria" is considered a classic. Steve Lillywhite produced this song along with the first three U2 albums. He had form for getting the most out of young bands with audacious lead singers: He also produced the first two Psychedelic Furs albums around this time.

Play On Album: Starting Over (1974) Rock and Roll Mama (1972) by The Raspberries Eric Carmen, the frontman of the powerpop band Raspberries and singer of solo hits including All By Myself, Never Gonna Fall in Love Again and Hungry Eyes, has died aged 74. Carmen’s wife, Amy, announced his death on his official website. No cause of death was given. “It is with tremendous sadness that we share the heartbreaking news of the passing of Eric Carmen,” she wrote. “Our sweet, loving and talented Eric passed away in his sleep, over the weekend. It brought him great joy to know that, for decades, his music touched so many and will be his lasting legacy. After discussions between Carmen and Bonfanti about forming a new group, the first lineup for the Raspberries was Eric Carmen (rhythm guitar, vocals, piano), Jim Bonfanti (drums), Wally Bryson (lead guitar, vocals) and John Aleksic (bass). Aleksic left the group at the end of 1970. In 1971, Dave Smalley (rhythm guitar, vocals), just back from Vietnam, became the fourth member of the original recording lineup with Carmen moving to bass. The Raspberries' demo tape went to the desk of producer Jimmy Ienner, for whom Carmen had previously done session work. After a major-label bidding war the band signed to Capitol Records. This 1st album featured a strong scratch and sniff raspberry scented sticker on the front cover. The Raspberries wore matching ensembles on stage. The group was known for making its stage entrance in tuxedos and large bouffant hairdos which, according to Carmen, "complemented the style of our music". Raspberries bass player Scott McCarl wrote "Play On" with their frontman, Eric Carmen. Most Raspberries songs have Carmen on lead vocals, but McCarl sings on this one. McCarl joined the band for their fourth album, Starting Over, which ended up being their last. He told Songfacts the story behind "Play On." "I'll be honest and tell you that Starting Over is not my favorite of the Raspberries albums," he said. "That would be Fresh, the second one. It kicked off with 'I Wanna Be With You,' a thrilling Raspberries/ Beatles concoction that left me breathless upon my first hearing, in an Arby's as I recall it! So, when I got to join the band a little later, I yearned to bring that same electricity to my own song for us, if I possibly could. I had that opening guitar riff, with the first verse all in place... and then nothing. Eric and I went to McDonalds, grabbed two extra-large Cokes, and went back to his place. I can still see it like yesterday, me playing him ideas on acoustic, and him on piano, back and forth, both of us nudging it further along. The lyrics came rather easily. Not really important stuff perhaps, just the rock 'n roll life we were living. We got to what we thought was a pretty good chorus - though not quite good enough perhaps? - and split up for the day. I lived 10 floors below him in the same building, the Watergate Apartments, of all names. Early the next morning I got a call from him, this wild voice on the other end saying 'you've got to come up - you've got to come up!' And he had tweaked our chorus, re-done as you know it now, the perfect complement to my original verse, with its Beatlesque chorus harmonies reaching higher and higher. Oh man, it was magical. A song like that, you need to have that chorus, you just have to have it. And now we did. From there we went nonstop until we'd finished it. It was fun going from the key of E to the key of C for the bridge - beware, sharp turn ahead! And I dearly like a part I wrote that you may not have ever noticed: the turnaround near the end, A flat minor to A - I 'borrowed' it from 'Nowhere Man.' It's our favorite song that we wrote together." After The Raspberries split, Scott McCarl left the music industry but returned in 1998 with a solo album he titled Play On, after this song. In 2022, the album was re-released with additional material. Taken from the record RASPBERRIES recorded at record plant, new york. Dave Smalley about the song: At that time (1972) the band was gigging around locally and we had a house where we all lived. For a period of time Wally and I and Eric occasionally would drag a bunch of girls home. A gig didn't go by where it wasn't crawling with women. "Rock and Roll Mama" was written about girls who'd come to gigs and party with the band in hopes of a possible romantic scenario. It was a different time back then, we were all single and we all loved women.

C.I.A Album Restless Breed (1982) Run For Your Life Album Fire Down Under (1981) Restless Breed is the fourth studio album by American Band, Riot, released on May 21, 1982. It was the band's first record with vocalist Rhett Forrester. Fire Down Under is the third studio album by Riot, released in 1981, it's the last album to feature original vocalist Guy Speranza. In the late 70s, Riot were the Great White Hopes of American rock. But that was before the public ignored them, their label disowned them, and their singer quit. And then things got really bad… Riot, a bunch of New Yorkers whose determination to succeed was exceeded only by their repeated failure to do so. Between 1977 and 1981, they released a string of albums that should have turned them into superstars, one of which – 1981’s Fire Down Under – remains one of the great hard rock records of the era. What they didn’t have was the breaks. The Riot story has all the ingredients of a true heavy metal epic: the youthful dreams, the missed opportunities, the dogged perseverance, the repeated failures, the frustration, the farce, the bickering, the violence, the drugs… and the deaths of not one but three key members. It’s Spinal Tap without the jokes; The Story Of Anvil without the happy ending. It’s a cautionary tale to anyone dreaming of rock’n’roll fame, and a reminder that for every band who make it, there are thousands who don’t. “It’s just amazing that anything ever happened,” says drummer Sandy Slavin, who was a member of the band during their early-80s heyday. “When I played with Ace Frehley we’d be sitting on the bus and everybody would be telling you their music business horror stories. Mine was always just that little bit more horrifying." “To be successful, you have to be a great performer, play the game and work with the press,” says Billy Arnell, who co-managed the band in the late 70s and early 80s. “Riot wasn’t that great at that stuff. They didn’t understand that being in the music business, a multi billion-dollar industry, took more than thinking like a Brooklyn kid.” Former guitarist Rick Ventura – a man who lived through the worst parts of the story – puts it more bluntly: “Talk about a band with bad luck.” After two false starts, Riot had at last made their masterpiece – the album that would book their place at rock’s top table. At least that’s what should have happened. Instead, Capitol refused to release it. The official line was that the label deemed it ‘commercially unacceptable’ – too heavy for the climate of 1981. But Slavin suggests that the real reason was down to a failed power-play by Billy Arnell and Steve Loeb. “There was a song by Rick called You’re All I Needed Tonight that our A&R guy liked,” says Slavin. “He said it was a big hit, and he took a tape to the executives in LA and played to them. Then Billy and Steve don’t put the song on the album – it was their way to put the A&R guy in his place. Of course, the A&R looks like an idiot. That’s when the label decided that it was ‘commercially unacceptable’.” Whatever the reason, the knockback was disastrous for Riot. Arnell decided to go toe-to-toe with the label and get the fanbase involved. He sent out a postcard to all the fans on their mailing list, invoking their axe-wielding, seal-headed mascot: “Tior is held captive in the ivory tower by the maniacal company executives.” He worked up a petition to get the album released, signed by fans and such high-profile supporters as Iron Maiden. The cause was picked up by the British music press, if not their American counterparts. Rather than having the desired effect, the campaign only made things worse. Not only did Capitol refuse to release the album, they weren’t inclined to let Riot go. While things hung in limbo, Riot’s funds dried up. Cracks were growing between the co-managers and the members of the band who weren’t Mark Reale and Guy Speranza. “The band’s money was cut off,” says Slavin, still fuming at the memory. ”I had to give up my apartment in New York, move back to New Jersey. It was fucked. Billy and Steve had kept the money [from the deal with Capitol], so they could have kept us going. Then they sold it to Elektra. They sold the fucking record [Fire Down Under] twice.” It was Elektra Records, fired up by the enthusiasm of hotshot A&R man Tom Zutaut, who proved to be Riot’s saviours. The new label helped extricate Riot from their Capitol deal, and finally released Fire Down Under. To the relief of the band, it was a success, selling more than its two predecessors combined (it would eventually sell more than 500,000 copies in the US). Yet Riot’s capacity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory was unmatched, and once again their world was about to come crashing down around them. In November 1981, while supporting Grand Funk Railroad, Guy Speranza – whose nickname was Buddy – dropped a bombshell. “Guy turns to me and Mark and starts talking in the third person,” recalls Slavin. “He says, ‘Hey you guys, Buddy’s packing it in.’ We thought he was joking, so we didn’t say anything. Then we get back to the hotel and he says, ‘I’m really quitting.’ He announces that he’s getting married and his wife-to-be doesn’t like rock’n’roll.” In a career defined by terrible timing, this was the worst timing of all. The band had finally made their breakthrough, and now their frontman was walking away from it for love. It soon became apparent that Forrester was a volatile and insecure character. He became prone to picking fights. Worse, he was unreliable, as the band found out on their first tour with him. “We got to Nashville, and we hear that Rhett’s going to make a later plane, which is always a bad sign,” recalls Slavin. “Suddenly, there’s a call for our tour manager. He comes back and says, ‘Fellas, the tour is over – Rhett’s in the hospital.’” It transpired that Forrester had attended a Queen show at Madison Square Garden, and ingested something at the aftershow that saw him hospitalised for four days. Riot’s run of bad luck didn’t stop with their initial split. On January 2, 1994, Rhett Forrester was shot and killed during a car-jacking in Atlanta. “The police guess he was reaching for something in the glovebox and whoever was standing outside the car, probably selling him something, thought he was going for a gun and shot him in the back,” says Sandy Slavin. “Rhett then drives the car away and crashes it into a police car. That’s Rhett!” On November 8, 2003, Guy Speranza passed away after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. In an interview, Mark Reale revealed that his wife believed this was related to the chemicals he handled every day for 20 years in his job as a pest controller. Then, on January 25, 2012, Mark Reale died of complications from Crohn’s Disease, the crippling stomach ailment that he had been battling for most of his life. He was still flying the Riot flag, until his illness got too bad for him to continue. A week before Reale died, Rick Ventura turned up to jam with the current Riot line-up in New York. “I planned on going down and surprising Mark,” he says, “but he was too sick to play. I miss Mark, and I miss Guy too.”

Baby Blue Album: Straight Up (1971) by Badfinger The "Dixie" addressed in the song's lyrics was a real person, a singer named Dixie Armstrong, who was a former girlfriend of singer/songwriter Pete Ham. The song is about a guy who keeps his girl (his "baby blue") waiting too long and loses her. It seems to be based on his long-distance relationship with Dixie, which he couldn't maintain. Todd Rundgren produced this track. A year later, Rundgren released his breakthrough album Something/Anything?, where he wrote, produced and performed all the songs, including the hits "I Saw The Light" and "Hello It's Me." George Harrison started producing the Straight Up album but turned it over to Rundgren when he decided to organize the benefit Concert for Bangladesh, which Badfinger played as part of Harrison's backing band. Harrison produced the album's other hit, "Day After Day." The last US Top 40 hit for Badfinger, this song marked the beginning of a devastating decline for the band. They were signed to The Beatles' Apple Records - Straight Up was their third album on the label and featured contributions from George Harrison. With "Baby Blue" and "Day After Day" getting a steady stream of airplay and Beatles comparisons, they toured twice in 1972 to packed houses. All was not well behind the scenes, however, as Apple Records was on shaky ground. Badfinger recorded their fourth album, but their negotiations with Apple got snarled and a lawsuit prevented its release. These legal entanglements kept Badfinger from touring or recording while they were at the peak of their powers, and also drained them financially. In 1973, they signed to Warner Brothers and recorded their fifth album. Nearly two years after Straight Up hit the racks, Apple finally issued Badfinger's fourth album, titled Ass, in the US in November of that year. Their self-titled Warners album came out in February 1974. By this time, the band's sound had fallen out of favor, and both albums underperformed. With their legal and financial problems becoming even more burdensome, Pete Ham hanged himself in 1975. His suicide note made it clear that the business dealings were his undoing; he expressed hopes that his death would serve as a cautionary tale for aspiring musicians. He was 27. "Baby Blue" plays in the last minutes of the final episode of the TV drama Breaking Bad in a scene where the lead character, Walter White, dies in a meth lab. At the start of the series, White is a high school chemistry teacher, but he develops a signature strain of blue meth and finds the drug trade far more profitable and exciting. Throughout the series, he refuses to compromise his work, so his blue meth is his "baby" in that regard. The finale aired September 29, 2013, attracting over 10 million views. Downloads and streams of "Baby Blue" spiked right after the episode. By this time, there was only one living member of Badfinger: guitarist Joey Molland. They were one of the first bands to sign with The Beatles' label, Apple Records. The group was known as The Iveys, but The Beatles renamed them "Badfinger" after their road manager, Neil Aspinall, came up with the name. He got the idea from John Lennon, who used to talk about his "Bad Finger Boogie." After Apple Records folded, they signed with Warner Brothers. The group was doing very well when Warner Brothers discovered money missing from their accounts. They pulled their albums and sued the band, effectively ending their career. Despondent over their business problems, Ham hanged himself in 1975. In 1983, Evans also hanged himself. All 4 members wrote some songs, but Ham wrote most of their hits, including "Day After Day," "No Matter What," and "Baby Blue." Ham also wrote the Harry Nillson hit "Without You." The group played on George Harrison's first solo album All Things Must Pass. The Warner Brothers lawsuit was finally settled in 1985, with the 2 remaining members and the families of the 2 deceased receiving a settlement for royalties. Evans and Molland got together and released the last 2 Badfinger albums in 1979 and 1981. 1969-1981 Peter Ham Guitar Tom Evans Bass Joey Molland Guitar Mike Gibbins Drums

Radar Love Album: Moontan (1973) Twightlight Zone Album: Cut (1983) by Golden Earring Before you could send a text message or call someone in their car, there was no way to communicate to a driver - unless you had a certain telepathic love that could convey from a distance your desire to be with that person, something you might call - Radar Love. In this song, the guy has been driving all night, but keeps pushing the pedal because he just knows that his baby wants him home. Golden Earring was founded 1961 and into the '00s was still playing with the same lineup since 1970, doing 100+ shows a year in The Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. The group is from The Netherlands, where this was a #1 hit. They had only one other hit. It didn't come until 1982, with "Twilight Zone." Like many of Golden Earring's songs, this began with the title and grew from there. Originally intended only as an album track, it turned out to be the only cut on their US debut album Moontan that they could whittle down to a single for radio. It became their showstopper at concerts, and provided a striking moment for their drummer Cesar Zuiderwijk, who would take a few steps back and leap at the drum kit near the end of the song. The song is all in 4/4 time, and the original tempo is around 100 BPM. It's a very clever arrangement: the intro is on the beat of each bar at the start. The shuffle on the snare is semi triplets which give the illusion of the song speeding up. You have to quantize drum machines to a 6th beat. Consequently the chorus is doubled up to give the impression that the tempo has speeded up to 200 BPM. You have to transpose the 4/4 bar so it can be played with in 1 beat of the bar. It does take a bit of lateral thinking to get your head around the math, but the song is all 4/4 at 100 BPM. This song is featured in the movie Detroit Rock City, about four teenage boys and their struggle to finally see the band KISS play live. The website radar-love.net details lots of info on the use and abuse of this song. It has been covered over 250 times: Notable versions include Bryan Adams, U2, Crowded House, Def Leppard, R.E.M. and Carlos Santana. It has also been used in TV shows The Simpsons, The X-Files, Beverly Hills, 90210 and My Name Is Earl. Movie usages include The Break-Up, Pushing Tin and Wayne's World 2. White Lion covered "Radar Love" in 1989 when they were still an imposing presence in the jungle of hair metal. The band had big hits with "When The Children Cry" and "Wait" from their 1987 album Pride, but had to make their next album, Big Game, under duress, writing it in just two weeks. "We needed half a year off, we needed hair treatments for our abused hair, we needed just to breathe," lead singer Mike Tramp said. "We needed the vocal cords to relax, stuff like that. We didn't get that." Their version of "Radar Love" was the second single from the album, and it stalled at #59 in the US. The band released just one more album before splitting up in 1992. UK radio station Planet Rock carried out a survey of their listeners in 2011 regarding their favourite tracks for in-car listening. This song came out top with Deep Purple's "Highway Star" the runner-up and AC/DC's "Highway To Hell" in third place. The line, "The radio's playing some forgotten song, Brenda Lee's coming on strong" is a reference to the 1966 Brenda Lee song "Coming On Strong," which made #11 in the US. Right out front, note that this song named "Twilight Zone" has nothing to do with Manhattan Transfer's "Twilight Zone." One is not a cover of the other. This is the "Twilight Zone" written by Golden Earring's lead guitarist George Kooymans. He was inspired not by the famous TV series of the same name, but by the Robert Ludlum novel The Bourne Identity, which would later be turned into a popular movie. The song and especially the video tell the story of an espionage agent, on the run from enemy spies before being cornered. The cover of the album Cut (from which this was the only single) shows a scene repeated in the video, of a bullet slicing through the Jack of Diamonds playing card. The card is supposed to represent the rogue agent. Interestingly, there was at least one episode of the original Twilight Zone TV series which was also a spy drama. Namely, episode #149 from season five, "The Jeopardy Room," is about a Soviet KGB agent who wants to defect, but he ends up pinned in a hotel room under surveillance from a hit man and his accomplice, who sadistically make him play a game for his life. And it's one of the few episodes where a gun is fired - "When the bullet hits the bone," indeed! Get ready for a nostalgia blast: This song was also used as the theme to the Twilight Zone pinball machine. This was part of Bally Midway's series of "Superpin" arcade pinball games that were based on TV shows - other pinball games in the series were based on Star Trek and The Addams Family. Fittingly, this song is also sometimes used as bumper music for the radio show Coast to Coast AM, the all-night paranormal talk show which also more frequently uses "A Hazy Shade of Winter." The video is yet another whose early airplay on MTV paid off. In MTV Ruled the World - The Early Years of Music Video, Rick Springfield talks about the MTV Effect: "The difference that I saw was, before MTV, you'd have to be on like your third successful album before people started recognizing you at the airport. But once MTV hit, you had that one hit single, and you were as recognizable as if you were around for three or four years. It was so instant. That was the power of television. George Jan Kooymans (born 11 March 1948, The Hague, Netherlands) is a Dutch guitarist and vocalist. He is best known for his work with the Dutch group Golden Earring. Kooymans wrote "Twilight Zone", the group's only Top 10 Pop Single on the US Billboard Hot 100, which hit No. 1 on the Billboard Top Album Tracks chart. Kooymans also wrote and produced for other artists. In 2017 and 2018 he released two albums as a member of Vreemde Kostgangers (Strange Boarders), a Dutch-language supergroup he formed with Henny Vrienten (bass player of the band Doe Maar) and singer-songwriter Boudewijn de Groot. Kooymans is married to Melanie Gerritsen, the younger sister of Golden Earring bassist Rinus Gerritsen. Kooymans primarily played a Gibson Les Paul, a Gretsch 6119, a Fender Stratocaster, a Gibson Marauder, a Gibson SG, a Yamaha SG2000, several BC Rich guitars, a double cutaway Gibson Melody Maker and a Gibson Firebird, with his primary amps being a Roland Jazz Chorus, a Vox AC30 amp, and a Fender Twin Reverb. In February, 2021, Kooymans announced that he was suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and would retire. Shortly afterward, Golden Earring announced they would disband. the bit I did at the beginning made the video 11:11:11

The Diary Of Jane Album: Phobia (2006) I Will Not Bow Album: Dear Agony (2009) by Breaking Benjamin The band did three versions of The Diary Of Jane. The first version is pretty much the song as you probably know it. The second version is exactly the same, only the ending note is lower than the first version. And the third version is much softer, acoustic rendition of the song featuring Sebastian Davin on backing vocals. The single moved rapidly up the charts in its first week of official release, debuting on the Billboard Hot 100 at #55, making it the fastest added single ever in the history of Hollywood Records. At the time it was released, Breaking Benjamin's 2006 single "The Diary Of Jane" became the fastest added single ever in Hollywood Records history. The song is said to be written about '30s and '40s film star Jane Bryan, who starred in a movie called We Are Not Alone (which the band also chose as an album title.) The video for "The Diary of Jane" featured Sarah Mather from American Idol season 4 in the role of Jane. Season 4 American Idol contestant Sarah Mather plays Jane in the song's music video. The clip ends with Ben Burnley closing a diary on Jane's tombstone. The name was revealed to be Jane Bryan during the second episode of the band's podcast. Jane Bryan was an American actress whose screen career lasted only four years, but she appeared in prominent roles in a number of memorable films before she married a drugstore magnate in 1940 and retired. Whether or not the band meant for her name to be of significance is unknown, and unconfirmed, however it may be relevant that one of her movies, We Are Not Alone, shares its title with that of Breaking Benjamin's sophomore album. I Will Not Bow is the first single from American alternative metal band Breaking Benjamin's 4th studio album Dear Agony. The song was premiered on the radio station 97.9X in Breaking Benjamin's hometown of Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania on the afternoon of August 11, 2009. The song features in the 2009 Bruce Willis sci-fi movie Surrogates. The song was not written specifically for the film, but according to drummer Chad Szeliga, "Ben (Burnley, vocalist) sent a few songs to our record label, Hollywood Records," which is owned by Disney, who then decided they "wanted a Breaking Benjamin song for this movie." The music video was filmed at the World Trade Center building 7. The director Rich Lee (Evanescence) chose the location as he felt it was an eerie location to film. Burnley described the shoot to Weekender magazine as "a great time," before admitting that it wasn't without its difficulties. He explained: "I have issues with heights and stuff, and when I first got up there I started to have a little bit of a panic attack," he says. "And I got over it really, really quick because I put it in my mind that the city was fake, because you're up so high it literally looks like a scale model, so I just kept thinking that, and I got through it. The windows go all the way down to the floor. In the very first shot of the video, where I'm standing looking over, I actually had my eyes shut, because you're so close, and if you're that close to the window, for me, then it kind of gets dizzying I guess? Nauseating? So I had to keep my eyes shut, and I opened them up when I turned around and started singing." The song was written by Benjamin Burnley and Jasen Rauch, the guitar player and primary songwriter of the Christian alternative metal band Red. (check out "Death of Me"). Breaking Benjamin use a studio in Benjamin Burnley's hometown of Ocean City, New Jersey, which used to be a law office. The frontman told Billboard magazine: "People still come to the door looking for legal assistance. I'm like, 'Sorry, can't help you out.'" In 2010, Breaking Benjamin went on an indefinite hiatus due to frontman Benjamin Burnley's inability to record and tour due to an unspecified illness. Several reports indicated that Burnley had suffered permanent liver damage after bouts of alcoholism at a young age. Burnley told The Pulse of Radio in 2015. "I used to drink a lot, and I think it must have something to do with that because back in 2007, I stayed up drinking for three days straight — this is after already months and months of drinking heavily — and I woke up and I just felt really sick, like alcohol poisoned, and I was like, I should've probably gone to the hospital but I didn't, and I went onstage and when I went onstage I almost collapsed from being just so sick. And basically that was 2007 and it hasn't gone away." 1998- Benjamin Burnley Vocals, rhythm guitar 1998- Aaron Fink Lead guitar 1998, 2001–2011 Nick Hoover Bass 1998–1999 Jonathan "Bug" Price Bass, vocals 1999–2001 Chris Lightcap Drums 1998–1999 Jeremy Hummel Drums 2001–2004 Mark Klepaski Bass 2001–2011 Chad Szeliga Drums 2005–2013 Keith Wallen Guitar 2014- Jasen Rauch Guitar 2014- Aaron Bruch Bass 2014- Shaun Foist Drums 2014-

Amber Beautiful Disaster Album: Transistor (1997) 311 Every other year, 311 celebrate "311 day" – March 11 – with a massive concert where they play an extra long set for their fans. For instance, in 2010, 311 played 60 songs from their catalogue at the Mandalay Bay Event Centre in Las Vegas, Nevada. 311 singer Nick Hexum used to own a private island off the coast of Florida. After he purchased the island, Hexum changed its name from "Money Key" to "Melody Key." Eventually, Hexum decided to sell the property, stating that his priorities had changed and he had not been to the island as much as he had hoped he would. Hexum listed the property in 2011 for sale for 4.9 million dollars. Hexum was engaged to Pussycat Dolls vocalist Nicole Scherzinger. The couple met backstage at a Days of the New concert in 2001 but later broke up in 2004. He will not confirm or deny that the song "Amber" is about her. Bassist Aaron "P-Nut" Wills' father was a chaplain for the Air Force. Prior to joining the band, Wills worked at Shoney's as a dishwasher for one week. He also played violin before picking up the bass. 311 got their name from their high school. Classes ended at 3:10pm, and according to some members of the band, everyone in the group was getting high by 3:11. In an interview with Premier Guitar, 311 guitarist Tim Mahoney said his two main influences were "Dimebag" Darrell Abott from Pantera and Jerry Garcia from The Grateful Dead. Although neither of those two legends played PRS guitars, Mahoney explained that he played them because "there isn't anything they can't tackle." A huge influence on the band is the hardcore group Bad Brains, known for adding a touch of melody to their heavy sounds. "It was unique and on the verge of chaos most of time, spilling over into chaos and disarray," Nick Hexum told Songfacts. "We've had many opportunities to meet those guys and just thank them." 311 (three hundred [and] eleven) is the natural number following 310 and preceding 312. 311 is the 64th prime; a twin prime with 313, and a permutable prime with 113 and 131. DO YOU SEE THE LIGHT? It can be expressed as a sum of consecutive primes in four different ways: as a sum of three consecutive primes (101 + 103 + 107), as a sum of five consecutive primes (53 + 59 + 61 + 67 + 71), as a sum of seven consecutive primes (31 + 37 + 41 + 43 + 47 + 53 + 59), and as a sum of eleven consecutive primes (11 + 13 + 17 + 19 + 23 + 29 + 31 + 37 + 41 + 43 + 47). שיא CCCXI 311 (DSM-IV), DSM-IV code for "Depressive Disorder Not Otherwise Specified" 3-1-1, the telephone number of local information service operated by some local governments in the United States and Canada 311 earthquake, the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami off Japan 311, the area code of a common fictitious telephone number (311-555-2368) used in early Bell System ads and in fiction

Waymore Blues The Highwayman Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way Ive Always Been Crazy by Waylon Jennings My Uncle, Col. R.M. Jones Jr 82nd Airborne Ret. favorite back in the 1980's He was in this Division in Vietnam. My father a Marine Aviator. The Americal Division was an infantry division of the United States Army during World War II and the Vietnam War. The division was activated 27 May 1942 on the island of New Caledonia. In the immediate emergency following Pearl Harbor, the United States had hurriedly sent a task force to defend New Caledonia against a feared Japanese attack. This division was the only division formed outside of United States territory during World War II (a distinction it would repeat when reformed during the Vietnam War).[3] At the suggestion of a subordinate, the division's commander, Major General Alexander Patch, requested that the new unit be known as the Americal Division—the name being a contraction of "American, New Caledonian Division". This was unusual, as with the exception of the Philippine Division, all other U.S. divisions were known by a number. After World War II the Americal Division was officially re-designated as the 23rd Infantry Division. However, it was rarely referred to as such, even on official orders. The division was reactivated 25 September 1967 at Chu Lai in Vietnam from a combination of units already in Vietnam and newly arrived units. Its precursor, a division-sized task force known as Task Force Oregon was created in Quảng Ngãi and Quảng Tín provinces from the 3rd Brigade of the 25th Infantry Division, the 1st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division, and the 196th Light Infantry Brigade (all brigades that deployed separately to Vietnam in 1966). Task Force Oregon operated in close cooperation with the 1st Marine Division in the I Corps Military Region. As more US Army units arrived in Vietnam the two divisional brigades were released back to their parent organizations and two arriving separate brigades were assigned to Task Force Oregon, which was in turn re-designated the 23rd Infantry Division (Americal). The division was composed of the 11th, 196th, and 198th Light Infantry Brigades and divisional support units. Both the 11th and 198th brigades were newly formed units. The division became notorious after its 1st Platoon, Company C, 1st Battalion, 20th Infantry (11th Infantry Brigade) led by Lieutenant William Calley slaughtered hundreds of South Vietnamese civilians in the My Lai Massacre in March 1968. A helicopter crew from the division's 123rd Aviation Battalion, led by Hugh Thompson, Jr., attempted to intervene in the massacre and were later awarded the Soldier's Medal. Seymour Hersh broke the story of the massacre in November 1969, and a year later 14 officers – including Samuel W. Koster, the division's commanding officer – were charged with covering the massacre up. Most of the charges were later dropped, but Koster was subsequently demoted and stripped of his Distinguished Service Medal. Calley was charged, convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment and hard labor on 31 March 1971 for the murder of 22 Vietnamese civilians. President Richard Nixon soon intervened and on 1 April 1971 ordered Calley transferred from Fort Leavenworth to house arrest at Fort Benning, pending his appeal. Calley, the only person convicted, eventually served only three and half years of house arrest and was released in September 1974. Brigadier General John W. Donaldson was later tried for shooting civilians from helicopters on 13 separate incidents. Donaldson was the highest-ranking officer to undergo court-martial during the war, but charges were eventually dropped due to lack of evidence. MG Frederick J. Kroesen, Jr., holds the unit colors as they are cased, Chu Lai, 11 November 1971 On 28 March 1971, Vietcong sappers attacked Firebase Mary Ann, which was being transferred by the 1st Battalion, 46th Infantry Regiment to the ARVN, resulting in 33 US/ARVN killed. The shoulder sleeve insignia's four white stars on a blue field are symbolic of the Southern Cross under which the organization has served. The blue color stands for infantry.

Seven Bridges Road Album: Eagles Live (1980) by Eagles The "Seven Bridges Road" is Woodley Road in Montgomery, Alabama. This song describes the emotions the singer feels as he travels the road, which does have seven bridges and moss covered trees. This was written and originally recorded by the Country singer Steve Young in 1969 on his debut album Rock Salt & Nails. It is Young's most famous song. According to issue 338 of Goldmine magazine, the Eagles didn't want to do a live album, but Joe Smith, who worked for their label, kept trying to convince them to do one. The band finally agreed to record some shows in 1980, but at the last minute threatened to cancel unless Smith could answer a trivia question, which he did: "Who were the four 20-game winners on the Baltimore Orioles pitching staff in 1971?" Answer: Mike Cuellar, Pat Dobson, Dave McNally and Jim Palmer. Writer Stephen T. Young There are stars in the southern sky Southward as you go There is moonlight and moss in the trees Down the Seven Bridges Road Now I have loved you like a baby Like some lonesome child And I have loved you in a tame way And I have loved you wild Sometimes there's a part of me Has to turn from here and go Running like a child from these warm stars Down the Seven Bridges Road There are stars in the southern sky And if ever you decide you should go There is a taste of time sweetened honey Down the Seven Bridges Road

"Never Been to Spain" is a song written by Hoyt Axton, originally released on his 1971 LP Joy to the World and later that year performed by Three Dog Night, with Cory Wells on lead vocal. It was featured on their 1971 album Harmony. The recording was produced by Richard Podolor. The lyrics consist of the narrator ruminating about overseas locales that he has never visited, but about which he feels he has some proxy experience, primarily via the music but also due to other presumed highlights found there. He loosely compares his own actual travels to these more worldly spots. In the final verse, he observes that while he has "never been to heaven", he has "been to Oklahoma", where he was told he was born, thus implying a kinship between the two places. Hoyt Axton, who was born in Oklahoma, explained that he originally wrote, "...in Oklahoma, born in a coma...." However, it was considered inappropriate; thus, the lyrics were changed to "not Arizona". In the US, "Never Been to Spain" peaked at number 5 on the Billboard chart, and number 18 on the U.S. adult contemporary chart in 1972. Outside of the US, "Never Been to Spain" reached number 3 in Canada and number 34 in Australia. Other versions Elvis Presley, on his 1972 album As Recorded at Madison Square Garden. Ronnie Sessions, as a single in 1972 that reached number 36 on the Billboard Country chart. Cher, on her 1972 album Foxy Lady. Waylon Jennings, on his 1972 album Ladies Love Outlaws and in the 2007 concert film Never Say Die: The Final Concert and its soundtrack. Ike & Tina Turner, on their 1977 album Delilah's Power. Cravin' Melon, on their 1998 EP Squeeze Me. ApologetiX did a parody of the song entitled "Never Been to Spain (Yet)" that was featured on their 2007 live album Chosen Ones. The No Refund Band recorded a cover for their self-titled 2012 album. The Oklahoma State University Cowboy Marching Band plays a version at football games (during the first time-out of the fourth quarter), where fans yell "State" in unison following the line "I've never been to heaven, but I've been to Oklahoma" that has been recorded on several of their performance albums as well. Never Been to Spain Three Dog Night Written by: Hoyt Wayne Axton Well, I've never been to Spain But I kinda like the music Say the ladies are insane there And they sure know how to use it They don't abuse it Never gonna lose it I can't refuse it, hmm Well, I've never been to England But I kinda like the Beatles Well, I headed for Las Vegas Only made it out to Needles Can you feel it? Must be real, it Feels so good Oh, it feels so good Well, I've never been to Heaven But I've been to Oklahoma Well, they tell me I was born there But I really don't remember In Oklahoma, not Arizona What does it matter? What does it matter? Oh, I've never been to Spain But I kinda like the music Say the ladies are insane there And they sure know how to use it They don't abuse it Never gonna lose it I can't refuse it, oh, oh Well, I've never been to Heaven But I've been to Oklahoma Well, they tell me I was born there But I really don't remember In Oklahoma, not Arizona What does it matter? What does it matter?

The Andy Griffith Show is an American sitcom television series that was aired on CBS from October 3, 1960, to April 1, 1968, with a total of 249 half-hour episodes spanning eight seasons—159 in black and white and 90 in color. The series originated from an episode of The Danny Thomas Show. It stars Andy Griffith as Andy Taylor, the widowed sheriff of Mayberry, North Carolina, a fictional community of roughly 2,000–5,000 people. Other major characters include Andy's lifelong friend, the well-meaning and enthusiastic but bumbling deputy, Barney Fife (Don Knotts), Andy's aunt and housekeeper, Bee Taylor (Frances Bavier) and Andy's young son, Opie (Ron Howard). The townspeople round out the regular cast. Regarding the tone of the show, Griffith said that despite a contemporary setting, the show evoked nostalgia, saying in a Today interview, "Well, though we never said it, and though it was shot in the '60s, it had a feeling of the '30s. It was, when we were doing it, of a time gone by." The series revolves around Andy Taylor (Andy Griffith), the sheriff of the sleepy, slow-paced fictional community of Mayberry, North Carolina. His laid-back, level-headed approach to law enforcement makes him the scourge of local moonshiners and out-of-town criminals, while his abilities to settle community problems with common-sense advice, mediation, and conciliation make him popular with his fellow citizens. FBI is an American crime drama television series created by Dick Wolf and Craig Turk that airs on CBS, where it premiered on September 25, 2018. FBI: Most Wanted is a spin off because creativity... FBI: International spin-off was in development. On March 24, 2021, CBS announced that the spin-off had been ordered to series. On July 8, 2021, it was reported that Luke Kleintank, Heida Reed and Vinessa Vidotto were set to casts in the spin-off. BECAUSE CREATIVITY!!! And how does any of the FBI series on Columbia Broadcasting System treat the population of their host country? The people enslaved to pay their wages just like they paid for fictional Andy? LIKE SH!T. Eat it up! They love you fat dumb and dumber.

Time Of The Season is built around the bassline heard in the intro, this song has some very effective and unusual structural components that helped it endure. The bass riff is punctuated with a hand clap and the breathy "ahhhh" vocal. These elements add sonic texture during the verses, and also show up in the two interludes. And while most hit songs pound you with the chorus, this one doesn't. The full chorus - "It's the time of the season for loving..." takes just eight seconds and is repeated three times. That's just 24 seconds of chorus, but this minimalist approach gave the line tremendous impact, resonating with listeners at a time of social and political turmoil in America. The band broke up in late 1967, shortly after recording the album. When the album was released in April 1968, it sold poorly, stalling on the US charts at #95 and making no impact in their native UK. The "Time Of The Season" single, however, became a huge hit in America even though the group had disbanded and couldn't support it. It sold over a million copies, peaking at #3 on March 29, 1969. With their newfound American success, band members Rod Argent, Paul Atkinson and Hugh Grundy got the band back together, minus lead singer Colin Blunstone. This reunion was short lived, and by the end of 1969 The Zombies were once again dead. Blunstone went on to have a successful solo career, including a #15 UK hit in 1972 "Say You Don't Mind," and was the guest vocalist on Dave Stewart's (not the Eurythmics Dave Stewart) 1981 UK #13 cover of "What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted." Rod Argent formed the band Argent, which had a hit with "Hold Your Head Up" in 1972. The Zombies keyboard player Rod Argent wrote this song. He said in The Guardian February 22, 2008: "'Time of the Season' was the last thing to be written (for the album). I remember thinking it sounded very commercial. One of my favorite records was George Gershwin's 'Summertime;' we used to do a version of it when we started out. The words in the verse - 'What's your name? Who's your daddy? Is he rich like me?' - were an affectionate nod in that direction." Argent added: "The album title's slightly high-flown, isn't it? As is the quote from The Tempest on the back. It was a very flowery time in all sorts of ways. Me and Chris (Chris White bassist and co-songwriter) shared a flat with a guy called Terry Quirk who was a very talented artist and he came up with this beautiful, florid cover that we adored. We didn't notice that the word odyssey was spelt wrongly, to our eternal embarrassment. For years I used to say, 'Oh that was intentional. It was a play on the word ode.' But I'm afraid it wasn't." The famous lyrics, "What's your name, who's your daddy, is he rich like me?" are a nod to the Gershwin standard "Summertime," which The Zombies released on their first album. That song contains the lyrics, "Your daddy's rich and your mama's good looking." The theme of "Seasons" was a concept on the album Odessey And Oracle. Albums were very popular in the late '60s, so artists could put songs together that meant something when played in a certain order. In Word magazine January 2008, the vocalist Colin Blunstone was asked whether the word 'Odessey' in the album title was deliberately spelled wrong. Blunstone replied: "Rod (Argent) told this story for nearly 40 years of how it was deliberate and a play on the word 'ode,' hence 'odessey' when it should be spelled 'odyssey.' So I was astounded as anyone when he finally admitted about a year ago that it had been a simple spelling mistake. Too late to change by the time anyone noticed it. A bit embarrassing, but it's history now." The recording of this song bought about a minor spat between keyboardist Rod Argent, who wrote the song, and the vocalist Colin Blunstone. The argument was over the phrase, "When love runs high." Blunstone struggled with the high note at the end of the line, and snapped at Argent, "If you're so good you come and sing it." Argent admitted in Mojo magazine February 2008: "It was written really quickly and we didn't rehearse it an awful lot. I was trying to change the phrasing." Blunstone told his side in our 2015 interview. "It was written in the morning before we went into the studio in the afternoon, and I kind of struggled on the melody," he said. "Rod and I had quite a heated discussion – he being in the control room and me singing the song - and we were just doing it through my headphones. Because it had only just been written, I was struggling with the melody." Blunstone added: "It makes me laugh, because at the same time I'm singing, 'It's the time of the season for loving,' we're really going at one another." Rod Argent's organ sections take up about 90 seconds of this song's 3:22 running time. Most songs of the era that devoted so much of their time to organ riffs were much longer compositions like "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly and "A Whiter Shade Of Pale" by Procol Harum. This song has been sampled or interpolated on tracks by a number of artists, who sometimes use vast swaths of the song as the basis for their tracks - it's the base for the 2009 Melanie Fiona hit "Give It To Me Right" and for Eminem's 2013 track "Rhyme or Reason." Other tracks to use it include "Rolling Stone" by ScHoolboy Q and "Don't Look Back" by Miguel. Surprisingly, this song never charted in the UK, although it is widely known there. In our 2015 interview with Rod Argent, he said: "'Time of the Season' was the #1 in most countries in the world, but it wasn't in the UK. It's been released three times in the UK, and it's never been a hit. But the extraordinary thing is that everybody knows it in the UK. We played Glastonbury this year, and we had a big audience of the young kids who went completely mad when we played 'Time of the Season.' So, it has become, strangely enough, a classic in the UK, but it's never been a hit." "Time of the Season" was the first song picked by Al Kooper (just after leaving Blood Sweat & Tears) in his new position as staff producer in the A&R department at Columbia Records. As told in Kooper's Backstage Passes and Backstabbing Bastards, producer Clive Davis was about to sign off Columbia's options to release Odessey And Oracle. Kooper persuaded him to keep the option, and the Zombies' later success was the first feather in his cap. Speaking of Columbia Records, their Manhattan offices (located at the CBS Building on Sixth Avenue between West 52nd and 53rd Streets) are known as the "Black Rock" after the appearance of the building. File that next to "Brill Building" in influential buildings in rock 'n' roll history. According to Argent, he was told by Paul Weller that Odessey and Oracle is his favorite album of all time. Bassist Chris White added in the February 2008 Mojo interview: "The Foo Fighters said in a recent Rolling Stone they listen to it most mornings. Tom Petty's keyboard said to me, 'You guys don't realize how important that record's been. As far as we're concerned there's Sgt. Pepper and Odessey and Oracle." In the UK, this was used in a commercial for Magners cider. In the US, Fidelity Investments used it. After this song became a surprise hit in America after the band had broken up, an opportunistic promoter in Michigan put together an ersatz version of the group and sent them on tour. Since no singer could convincingly imitate Colin Blunstone, the promoter announced that Blunstone had died, but the band decided to soldier on without him. The real Blunstone was surprised to learn of his demise, and kept the clipping explaining his death as a keepsake. This was used in the movie Awakenings with Robert DeNiro in a scene when they are driving in the car. The Cantopop artist Samuel Hui released a cover in 1971 (in English) that proved very popular in Hong Kong. It came at a time when Western music was being introduced to the area. This was used at the end of the 1996 Friends episode "The One With The Flashback" in a scene where Rachel fantasizes about Chandler. It was also featured in the 1994 episode "The One Where Monica Gets A Roommate." More TV shows to use the song: DC Legends Of Tomorrow ("Daddy Darhkest" – 2018) Good Girls Revolt ("Pilot" - 2015) NCIS ("So It Goes" - 2014) Cold Case ("Revolution" - 2005) South Park ("The Mexican Staring Frog Of Southern Sri Lanka" - 1998, "201" - 2010) The Simpsons ("D'oh-in' in the Wind" - 1998) Movies include: All The Money In The World (2017) The Conjuring (2013) Riding The Bullet (2004) Shanghai Knights (2003) The Zombies, from Hertfordshire, England, recorded "She's Not There" after they won a talent contest that led to a recording session. They were all teenagers at the time. The group signed to Decca Records, and their keyboard player, Rod Argent, wrote the song for the session. It tells the story of an alluring woman who won't be tied down to one man - the singer wants to let us know all about her, but he can only use words, since she's not there. This song has a lot of distinct elements that made it a rock classic and landed The Zombies in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 2019. For starters, the lead instrument is Rod Argent's electric piano, which was very unusual at the time - in the UK it was the first hit song with that lead instrument. And then there's the breathy vocals of lead singer Colin Blunstone. The vocal has loads of dynamic range, as Blunstone starts softly to open the story: Well, no one told me about her The way she lied And then gets increasingly agitated, punctuating the chorus: Please don't bother trying to find her She's not there! The Zombies got a big break when the recording engineer for the session passed out on the floor. That's because the assistant, who took over, was Gus Dudgeon, who went on to produce Elton John's seminal albums. Before he passed out, the original engineer was surly to the group and keen to get it over with - not a great environment for a band's first recording session! With Dudgeon at the controls, The Zombies were able to relax and do a great take of the song. It was a big moment for Dudgeon as well because it was his first session as the main recording engineer. The session started at 7 p.m. because recording at night was very rock and roll, but the engineer went to a wedding that day showed up drunk. "We are just going through some songs and I put some headphones on, and this engineer is screaming down in these headphones with the worst language you can possibly think of - very, very aggressive," Colin Blunstone said on the Songfacts Podcast in 2023. "It makes me laugh because having been in the business for over 60 years, in that first half an hour with this guy screaming at me, I was thinking, I don't think this music business is for me. Then we had a bit of luck and he passed out. He passed out cold on the floor. We had to carry him out of the studio, one on each arm and one on each leg. We took him up two flights of stairs and we put him in a London black taxi and waved him goodbye. We never saw him again, ever." "She's Not There" was The Zombies' first single. Released in the UK in July 1964, it peaked at #12 in August. It fared better in America, where it was championed on the New York City powerhouse radio station WINS and climbed to #2 in December. America ended up being their stronghold. Their UK follow-up single was "Leave Me Be," rush released to capitalize on their momentum. It stiffed, but the next single, "Tell Her No," was released in the US and went to #6. A series of subsequent singles had little impact, and in 1968 they released an album of fresh material called Odessey And Oracle. It wasn't issued in America, but it flopped hard in the UK and other countries, so the group broke up. The Zombies got newe life in 1969 when Al Kooper of Blood Sweat & Tears fame discovered the album on a trip to England and convinced CBS Records to issue it in America. They did, and the song "Time Of The Season" became a big hit. The Zombies, though, were already scattered to the winds, with Rod Argent and bass player Chris White in the band Argent and Colin Blunstone recording solo. Argent and Blunstone re-formed the group in 2004 and started releasing new material. This song was born in bassist/vocalist Chris White's bedroom and only had one verse until Zombies producer Ken Jones heard it," said White. "We were playing in Hatfield, and Ken Jones came up to hear us. And after the gig, Rod said, 'I've got this song that we've been rehearsing' and he played it to Ken on the piano. He did the verse, and then the solo, and there was no second verse, and Ken said, 'Can't we go back to the beginning again?' So Rod had to write another verse, because it only had one originally." On "She's Not There" Ken Jones also instigated a recurring trait of many Zombies' recordings: additional overdubs added in the mixdown to mono stage from 4-track. In this case, there were a couple of extra beats superimposed to create a distinctive drum pattern, thereby rendering the original mono single mix of "She's Not There" the only "correct" version of the song. The song got a big boost when it was judged on the UK TV show Juke Box Jury, where a panel of musical authorities would pass judgment on a song. "She's Not There" got the thumbs up from panelist George Harrison, who declared it a hit. This song was inspired by John Lee Hooker's "No One Told Me" from his 1964 LP The Big Soul Of John Lee Hooker. Rod Argent explained: "If you play that John Lee Hooker song you'll hear 'no one told me, it was just a feeling I had inside' but there's nothing in the melody or the chords that's the same. It was just the way that little phrase just tripped off the tongue. I'd always thought of the verse of 'She's Not There' to be mainly Am to D. But what I'd done, quite unconsciously, was write this little modal sequence incorporating those chord changes. There was an additional harmonic influence in that song. In the second section it goes from D to D minor and the bass is on the thirds, F# and F, a little device I'd first heard in 'Sealed With A Kiss' and it really attracted me, that chord change with bass notes not on the roots. And I'm sure I was showing off in the solo as much as I could!" When the song reached its US chart peak of #2 on the second week of December 1964, it earned the group an invite to the Murray the K Christmas show on December 29 at the Fox Theater in New York City on a bill with Ben E. King, The Shangri-Las, The Shirelles, and several other popular acts. It was the first time the band came to the city, and it was a seminal moment for them, as they got to meet many of their idols and soak up some American culture. They spent a lot of time with Patti LaBelle & the Bluebells, who introduced them to the music of Aretha Franklin. On their 2015 album Still Got That Hunger, The Zombies recorded a song about this experience called "New York." Colin Blunstone's breathy vocals on this track became a signature sound for the group, but their producer, Ken Jones, had him use the technique throughout their first album, which blunted the effect. That album was released in 1965, and was their last until 1968, when they issued Odessey And Oracle, which the band produced themselves. The Zombies also recorded a cover of Gershwin's "Summertime" at the sessions, which was considered for their first single, but "She's Not There" got the nod. Some of the chord changes Rod Argent used were inspired by Brian Hyland's 1962 song "Sealed With A Kiss." Rod Argent on the marriage of lyrics and melodies: "Words have to sit, they have to sort of combine seamlessly with the way the melody is being sung. I know I was very concerned with the lyrics on 'She's Not There' but in the sense that they had to really complement the melody. They had to stand on their own, and had to have their own rhythm and, in that last section I was using the words with different stresses at different times to propel it along towards the final chord. So lyrics have always been very important to me in that way, but not necessarily in a sense of having to explain something concrete. They're an important part of the jigsaw, because I think bad lyrics can screw up a song." Lead singer Colin Blunstone released a new version of "She's Not There" in 1969 under the name Neil MacArthur. His version went to #34 in the UK. Santana covered "She's Not There" on their 1977 album Moonflower. Their version hit #27 in the US and #11 in the UK; it was the only non-live song from the otherwise live album. It was also the last Santana cover song to chart. From then on, the band experimented with more jazz-sounding material. Moonflower was also the last Santana album before Supernatural (1999) to sell more than a million copies in America. "She's Not There" has been used in a number of movies, including: Titane (2021) Wolves at the Door (2016) The Debt (2010) The Life Before Her Eyes (2007) The Shaft (2001) Backdoor (2000) The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) Boys (1996) The Crossing (1990) The Krays (1990) It also appears in these TV shows: The Crown ("Cri de Coeur" - 2019) True Blood ("She's Not There" - 2011) Glee ("The Sue Sylvester Shuffle" - 2011) Crossing Jordan ("Strangled" - 2003) This song provides the soundtrack for a 2016 Kohler commercial that follows a faucet thief known as "The Jackal" who changes her appearance to evade the police. In 2004, Malcolm McLaren mashed up "She's Not There" with the Bessie Smith version of "St. Louis Blues" to create "About Her" for the Quentin Tarantino movie Kill Bill Vol. 2. It plays near the end of the film. "That's a great female blues singer who he has duetting with me," Colin Blunstone said. "I thought that was really impressive that track, I really liked it."

Can't Find Love Snowy White http://snowywhite.com/ Terence Charles White was born on 3 March 1948 in Devon, England. He grew up on the Isle of Wight and was self-taught as a guitarist, having received his first guitar from his parents at the age of ten. He moved to Stockholm in 1965 at the age of seventeen, spending more than a year there playing in a trio called the Train. In 1968 he purchased his signature guitar, a Gibson Les Paul Goldtop. Snowy White is one of a handful of classic blues-orientated British electric guitar players - musicians whose sound, technique and style has echoed the originality of the blues with the excitement of contemporary rock. At the age of eleven he first heard the urban blues sound that had been emanating from the United States, people such as BB King, Buddy Guy, Otis Rush and Albert King, and was immediately aware that this was the music that he wanted to incorporate in his playing. He has developed his own style of ‘English ‘ blues, a combination of clear, clean blues phrases and harder-edged riffs that are a recognisable feature of his very personal songs. Arriving in London in the early seventies with the classic ‘few pennies in his pocket’ he gradually made a name for himself among the local musicians and became respected as a tasteful player and an easy guy to get along with. In 1974 he toured the east coast of America, getting as far south as New Orleans and discovering that he thoroughly enjoyed being ‘on the road’. He had by then become friendly with the now legendary English blues guitarist Peter Green and they spent a lot of time jamming together. During the mid-seventies Snowy played on various sessions, developed his skills in the studio environment, and started writing his own material. In the Autumn of 1976 he was invited to tour America and Europe with the Pink Floyd as their first augmenting musician, a gig which took up most of his time throughout 1977. In 1978 the band’s keyboard player Rick Wright asked him to play guitar on his solo album, entitled 'Wet Dream,' which he recorded in the South of France. In 1979 Peter Green decided to head for the studio once more and invited Snowy along to jam. The result was the album entitled ‘In the Skies’, now something of a collectors item. He was then asked by the Pink Floyd to go to America to rehearse their new show entitled ‘The Wall’, and, at the same time, the rock band Thin Lizzy invited him to become a full-time member. So after the completion of the Floyds’ US dates he returned to England and went straight into the studio to record his first Thin Lizzy album 'Chinatown'. This album includes some songs co-written by Snowy, notably the title track. Two and a half years of world tours and recording with the band followed, including the making of Snowy’s second album with them, entitled ‘Renegade’. Snowy again co-wrote some of the songs and the title track. After this long period of work he decided that it was time to do his own thing and quit the band in 1982. In the following twelve months he got together with musicians that he had known and admired for a long time - drummer/percussionist Richard Bailey, keyboard player Godfrey Wang, and his good friend for many years, bassist and producer Kuma Harada. Together they came up with Snowy’s first solo album, ‘White Flames.’ A single, the timeless ‘Bird of Paradise', written by Snowy, which was taken from the album, became an international hit. However, the idea of becoming a ‘singles’ artiste, with the consequent concern about where the next hit record was coming from, did not appeal to him, and he took a break to rethink his musical direction. During that time he put together a gigging blues band, 'The Blues Agency', with drummer Jeff Allen, his old friend Kuma on bass, and, as he wanted to concentrate only on playing the guitar, singer and harp player Graham Bell. Between 1986 and 1989 the band played in the UK and Europe, and recorded two albums, ‘Change my Life’, followed by ‘Open for Business’ (which was released in Europe as ‘Blues on Me’.) In June 1990 Roger Waters, having split from the Pink Floyd, asked Snowy to perform with him on the spectacular ‘The Wall’ show in Berlin. In 1991 Waters again called upon Snowy, this time to play at the ‘Guitar Legends’ concert in Seville as part of Expo. After this concert Snowy decided that it was time that he returned to the mainstream of things so he set about putting down songs that he had been writing during the previous few years. The result was the album entitled ‘Highway to the Sun’. Recorded in the Summer of 1993 it contained ten original songs plus a version of Peter Green’s ‘I loved another Woman’, a long-time favourite of Snowy’s. The album also has guest appearances by Chris Rea ( slide guitar on the title track), David Gilmour and Gary Moore. It also introduced two new brilliant Dutch-Indonesian musicians, Juan van Emmerloot (drums/percussion) and Walter Latupeirissa (bass and rhythm guitar). Kuma Harada also played bass and rhythm. John ‘Rabbit’ Bundrick featured on keyboards. The video of the title track has Chris Rea guesting on slide. ‘Bird of Paradise’ then came back into the picture when KLM airlines decided to use it on their new TV advertising campaign, resulting in the single reentering the charts in Europe and the compilation album ‘Birds of Paradise’ doing extremely good business for most of 1994. Snowy’s next album project was released on the UK record label RPM. Entitled ‘Gold Top’, after his well-known Gibson Les Paul ‘Goldtop Standard’ guitar, it features material in which Snowy has been involved from as far back as 1974 right up to 1996. This album includes two tracks from Thin Lizzy, jams from the Peter Green ‘In the Skies’ session (with Peter on 2nd guitar), Al Stewart live in Philadelphia (1974), and the only complete version of the Pink Floyd song ‘Pigs on the Wing’, featuring Snowy’s original guitar solo (never before released), as well as some live Snowy White blues and some previously unreleased material. Dave Gilmour and Chris Rea also appear on tracks taken from his recent ‘Highway to the Sun’ CD. The album closes with the hit single ‘Bird of Paradise’ Snowy then recorded three albums with his White Flames band, “No Faith Required' in 1996, ‘Little Wing’ in 1998 and 'Keep Out:We Are Toxic’ in 1999. Another compilation, entitled ‘Pure Gold - The Solo Years’ was also released in 1999. Also in this year Snowy joined Roger Waters for his bands' ‘In The Flesh’ US tour, which was so successful that, in the Summer of 2000, Roger again toured the States, this time recording a live album and making a film of the show.

You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth (Hot Summer Night) Album: Bat Out Of Hell (1977) by Meat Loaf It's a song of pure passion, which is classic Steinman. Other songs he wrote include "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" by Bonnie Tyler and "It's All Coming Back to Me Now" by Celine Dion. The album version of this song contains a spoken intro ("On a hot summer night, would you offer your throat to the wolf with the red roses..."). That's not Meat Loaf - the male voice is Jim Steinman and the woman is Marcia McClain, an actress who played Dee Stewart on the Soap Opera As the World Turns. Steinman wrote the dialogue for his stage production Neverland, which was performed five months before the Bat Out Of Hell album was released. Three songs he wrote for the play were used on the album: the title track, "Heaven Can Wait" and "All Revved Up with No Place to Go." This was the first single released from Bat Out Of Hell, Meat Loaf's third solo album. His first two albums made little impact, but Bat had wings, selling millions of copies not just upon its release, but also for many years later, mostly though catalog sales. The album took a while to catch on, however. In the UK, this song was released as a single in March 1978 and charted at #33 in May. In America, the single was released in January 1978, and went nowhere. The album gained momentum throughout 1978 as radio stations added the songs to their playlists, especially those running the Album Oriented Rock format that was popular at the time. "Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad" was the next single, and this one caught on in the US, reaching #11 in July. After "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" made #39 in September, "You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth" was re-released, this time going to #39 in January 1979 - 15 months after the album came out. The album version of this song runs 5:04, but the single release excised the dialog and comes in at 3:48. Jim Steinman put lots of intimate details into this song's lyric: "fog crawling over the sand," "your lipstick shining." Bruce Springsteen also stamps his songwriting in this manner, and the similarities go beyond the words: two of Springsteen E Street Band members, pianist Roy Bittan and drummer Max Weinberg, played on this track. The album was produced by Todd Rundgren, who later said that the songs were really outsized versions of what Bruce would do. This over-the-top bombast was noted by the musicians working on the album. Kasim Sulton, who played bass on the tracks (he was also in Rundgren's band Utopia), said in a 2013 Songfacts interview: "Through the whole process I remember distinctly saying to myself, 'This is just the biggest joke that I've ever been involved in.' It was ridiculous, but it was good. Everybody certainly took it seriously, even though I'm sure that Roy and Max felt the same that I did: 'Okay, I'm just getting paid, it's a record. What am I going to have for dinner tonight?'" Meat Loaf's real name is Marvin Aday. He often made up stories about how he got the moniker. The likely answer is that it was given to him by his high school football coach, although he's also claimed that it came from his father, who said he looked like meat when he was an infant. A study at Sussex University in England found that his music is an excellent stimulant for plant growth. He has appeared in several movies, including The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Fight Club. He also played Jack Black's father in Tenacious D In The Pick Of Destiny. He comes from a rather large family. While he weighed over 200 pounds in seventh grade, his dad weighed 350 and his uncle (standing six feet seven inches) weighed nearly 700 pounds. He was in the original production of Hair, but declined to be in the nude scene. Said Loaf: "You got an extra $12.50 to be in the nude scene and I didn't need an extra $12.50." At one time, Meat Loaf went to church Sunday morning, Sunday night and Wednesday night. He told Q magazine that he maintained a faith: "My grandfather was a minister and I was born into a very religious family. There's a Bible in my hotel room, I picked it up and read some of the other night. It's still a big part of my life. People don't expect it because I get on stage and I swear - I'm a rocker. But that's not me, that's a character. If I'm cast in a film I always refuse for my character to say, 'GD,' I tell them I'm not going to say it. I'll say 'damn,' but not the other thing. That's where I draw the line, everything else is open."

Take It On The Run Album: Hi Infidelity (1981) Time for Me to Fly Album: You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can't Tuna Fish (1978) by REO Speedwagon Take It On The Run was Gary Richrath's answer to fellow band co-leader Kevin Cronin's "Keep On Loving You" (#1 in 1981) - both were going through difficulties in their relationships, Cronin with his wife Denise and Richrath with his girlfriend Debbie. Said Richrath: "When I wrote that, I woke up one night, half asleep, and sat down in front of the TV. There was a soap opera on it. I was just sitting there, strumming a guitar, thinking, 'God, these guys' relationships are worse than mine.' I just sat there and sang vocals about the effects of gossip and relationships breaking up, which was what was on the tube and all that was similar to what was going on in my life." Originally, this was called "Don't Let Me Down," with lyrics geared more toward men than the final result. This song peaked on the Hot 100 on May 30, 1981, a little over a month before MTV went on the air. The band shot a concert video for the song with director Jay Dubin, which was the ninth video MTV aired when the network launched on August 1, 1981. Shortly after the video started, the tape got glitchy and cut out, a bad omen for the band, which was soon replaced on the network by more charismatic bands that made concept videos. The Hi Infidelity track "In Your Letter" also deals with a cheating woman. Kevin Cronin's wife Denise offered a retort in a 1981 People magazine story. "They should have called the album Wives on the Run. The band gets all this sympathy and is excused for all that goes on when they’re on the road. No one even mentions the problems of the wives who are home alone." Pitbull and Enrique Iglesias poached the vocal melody and the "Heard it from a friend" lyric on their 2016 collaboration, "Messin' Around." In season 1 of the Netflix series Cobra Kai, Daniel (who now owns an auto dealership), takes Johnny on a test drive when this song comes on the radio. "Do you like Speedwagon?" Johnny asks. "What kind of man doesn't," Johnny replies. Lead singer Kevin Cronin wrote Time for Me to Fly, which finds him ready to move on from a relationship, even though it's going to hurt. In an interview, he told the story behind the song: "I had been in love with my first love - a girl that I met in high school. But there was a point where I knew that I had to move on, but didn't want to, because I was attached to her. I knew that it wasn't working, so I went to Colorado to put some distance between me and her, even though that wasn't what I consciously did. When I got there, a friend of mine had a guitar sitting on his porch. I went to play it, and it sounded horrible. I realized that it was in some kind of different tuning, so I just messed around with it. I remembered Richie Havens at Woodstock. When he played, he wrapped his thumb around the top of the neck, and I thought, 'I'll try that.' I did, and sure enough, it sounded good. A lot of times, that's what happens: you find something on the guitar that you like, and then the things that you're feeling become attached to that music, and that's what the songs are hatched from." A track from the seventh REO Speedwagon album, "Time for Me to Fly" was their biggest hit at the time, and helped the album, You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can't Tuna Fish, sell over 2 million copies. Two albums later, they broke through to a new level with Hi Infidelity, released in 1980. That one made them stadium-fillers, thanks to the huge hits "Keep On Loving You" and "Take It On The Run." When MTV went on the air August 1, 1981, REO Speedwagon was one of the biggest acts in America. Most music videos came from European acts at the time, so the network was desperate for American rockers. Even though the song was three years old, MTV put a live video (directed by Jay Dubin) of REO performing this song at McNichols Arena in Denver on April 25, 1981 in rotation. When American bands realized the power of MTV, many began making concept videos. The song was re-released in 1980 to promote the band's compilation album A Decade of Rock and Roll: 1970 to 1980. This time, it went to #77 US. Apparently, the girl this song was written about has been missing for decades. "I literally just got a call from this mystery TV show - kind of a reality TV show - that the girl that I wrote 'Time for Me to Fly' about went missing," Cronin said in 2017. "Literally, went missing like, 30 years ago. And they were calling me. I declined to be filmed for the show." Titled "Kevin Cronin Was Here," season 3 episode 3 of Netflix's crime drama Ozark premiered March 27, 2020. The episode featured the band performing "Time for Me to Fly" live, along with lead character Wendy (played by Laura Linney) singing along to the song in her car.

Moonchild Album: Calling Card (1976) Rory Gallagher “Moonchild” is a Rory Gallagher success taken from the album “Calling Card”, the eighth album by the Irish singer/guitarist. From 1976, it was his second of four albums released on Chrysalis Records in the 1970s. Deep Purple/Rainbow bass guitarist Roger Glover co-produced with Gallagher: it was the first time that Gallagher worked with a “name” producer and the only successful such collaboration. It was also the last album Gallagher would do with Rod de’Ath (drums) and Lou Martin (keyboards). After Calling Card, Gallagher retained only his long-time bass guitarist Gerry McAvoy and hired Ted McKenna on drums. This revised power trio was Gallagher’s line up for the next five years, when Brendan O’Neil took the sticks. The sessions for the album began at Musicland Studios in Munich, Germany, in the summer of 1976. Glover came on board as co-producer after having met Gallagher when the latter opened for Deep Purple on an American tour. The choice of Glover signified a conscious attempt by Gallagher to try new directions from the hard rock he was best known for. Calling Card is one of his most diverse albums. It also reflects the synergy that the band had developed after years of playing together. As producer Roger Glover commented “they all seemed very dedicated to Rory, there was an allegiance, born of years of smoky clubs and endless journeys”. This was the fifth and last release featuring this line-up. March 2, 1948 - June 14, 1995 Gallagher was born in Ballyshannon, Ireland to musical parents. His father played accordion, whilst his mother sang and acted in local theatre. He received his first guitar age nine and won a talent contest aged 12. He used the prize money to buy his first electric guitar. His early influences included Muddy Waters, Woody Gutherie and Lead Belly. Whilst at school, he also learned to play mandolin, banjo, and alto saxophone. In 1966, Gallagher formed the band Taste. They released three albums, supported super group Cream at their Royal Albert Hall farewell concert, and supported blues rock super group Blind Faith on their North American tour. They disbanded shortly after an appearance at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival. Touring under his own name, Gallagher hired drummer Wilgar Campbell and bass player Gerry McAvoy. McAvoy and Gallagher would play together for 21 years before McAvoy decided to join English blues band Nine Below Zero. Before deciding on these two Belfast musicians, Rory had auditioned many musicians, including bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell, famously the rhythm section of the Jimi Hendrix Experience. He released his self-titled debut album in 1971. He produced and wrote all the songs himself. Only two of his twelve studio albums featured a co-production credit (his 1976 album Calling Card, which was co-produced with British rock band Deep Purple's bassist Roger Glover, and 1978's Photo-Finish, which was co-produced with Alan O'Duffy, who produced some of The Rolling Stone's 1969 album Let It Bleed). In 1971, following the release of his second solo album Deuce, he was voted Melody Maker's International Top Musician of the Year, beating Eric Clapton. In later life, Gallagher was prescribed a powerful sedative to overcome his fear of flying. Combined with his alcohol intake, this caused severe liver damage. In 1995, his final tour was canceled and he was admitted to King's College Hospital in London, where he received a liver transplant. Whilst in intensive care he contracted MRSA and died. He has sold over 30 million records worldwide. He was ranked #42 on Gibson's 2010 list of the Top 50 guitarists of all time, and 57th on Rolling Stone's 2012 list of the 100 greatest guitarists. He toured at least once a year in his native Ireland. You are a moonchild and Pretty soon child, I've Got that feeling that I'm gonna make you smile forever If I can Just give me a sign And I'll show you my plan You are a blue child for Ever true child, you Know that I'll try to Paint the skies blue forever If I can Just give me a sign And I'll show you my plan Tell me why You look so sad Time slips by Like grains of sand Just put your future In my hands Tell me why Tell me why you look so sad Time slips by Like grains of sand Just put your future In my hands You are a moonchild and Pretty soon child, I've Got the feelin that I'm gonna make you smile forever If I can Just give me a sign And I'll show you my plan Just show me a smile And I'll show you my plan Just give me a sign And I'll show you my plan Written by: Rory Gallagher