At Home in Hespeler

John Paul Jones.

The Led Zeppelin bassist spent his 68th year playing and touring with the obscure improvisational avant-garde band Supersilent, writing an opera based on August Strindberg’s Ghost Sonata, and in November, touring the Southern US with Country/Bluegrass singer/songwriter/producer Dave Rawlings Machine.

And if  your thinking avant-garde? Opera? Must be a very serious fellow, the last week has seen this photobomb going around.

Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones photobombs unsuspecting Led Zeppelin fan.

I, for one, can’t wait to see what next year brings.

Happy 68th Birthday Led Zeppelin’s  John Paul Jones. Take the day off and enjoy some rest, you probably need it.

Here’s Jones (left, playing mandolin) performing Going to California with Dave Rawlings Machine – likely on November 26th.

Birthday Wishes John Paul Jones, Led Zepp

One likes to believe in the freedom of music.

Rush – Spirit of Radio.

Opera gets a bad name in modern western culture. It’s where guys have to go to appease their wives, the penitence demanded before they can go “to the big game.” It is Carmen’s Habanera that is playing when a sitcom camera enters a gay characters living room. Last year there was a Juicy Fruit gum commercial in which a bathing suit clad doofus was at an opera. On stage was a great cow of a woman with a Viking hat on her head caterwauling painfully.It’s a bad, and unfair, rap. Opera is, at it’s finest, some of the most sublime music ever crafted, pieced together into a story and presented in dramatic form.

Last week the Royal Opera in London premiered a new opera: Anna Nicole: The Party Always Ends is a presentation of the life, and death, of Anna Nicole Smith in song. Starring soprano Eva-Marie Westbrook as Anna Nicole, the opera features Westbrook in oversized prosthetic breasts – back to the great cow theme – and simulating oral sex in a strip club. It all seems really quite sordid, and out of tune with the seriousness that opera is supposed to have.

Except opera never was meant to be deadly serious. It is music, entertainment, and was always treated as such before the 20th century. In the Italian tradition, rich patrons would take a picnic and entertain their friends at a box at the opera rather than feed them at home because it was cheaper. They would yell at the stage, boo missed notes and sing along. None of the hushed solemnity that people demand at performances now.

Opera’s themes have always been a bit sordid. The first operas recreated the Greek tragedies that were considered important cultural touchstones, but were being lost. Themes of lust and love, sex and money, life and death run through the opera repertoire. Considered from a greater distance than we are able to master, a Anna Nicole Smith is a classic operatic heroine

The reviews of Anna Nicole seem to miss this point. They have been generally positive about the music, in some cases raving. They have universally been very positive about Eva-Marie Westbrook, calling her a tour de force (Reuters), excellent (Sky News), first rate (theguardian) and splendid (ABC).

Then there’s that jazz trio during the strip club scene. The bass player looks familiar somehow… it’s… um… wait a minute that’s John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin.

But what’s a jazz trio doing in an opera? some critics seriously sniff. It’s opera, stuffy, fussy and boisterous, not some laid back, breathless singer purring Summertime at the Iradium Jazz Club.

What people don’t realize is, Gershwin himself once wrote an opera. Wanting to be taken more seriously, and wanting to try his hand at a musical format he admired, he tried his hand at opera. He wrote a pretty good one too, Porgy and Bess, which is recognized by opera buffs as one of the 20th centuries, and Americas best operas.

Based in the south, and calling for a cast of African Americans, Porgy and Bess has been performed at the Metropolitan Opera, broadcast on their famous Saturday Afternoon at the Opera broadcasts and is “regularly performed internationally.” The most well-known piece from Porgy and Bess? Summertime.

That’s right, the breathless singer at The Iradium is singing an opera standard, as she also is when she breaks into Mack the Knife, by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht from The Threepenny Opera – for that matter, when the Doors broke into The Alabama Song (“show me the way to the next whisky bar…”), they were singing a Weill and Brecht song, from the opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahogany.

And opera is not, never has been, one type of music. The aforementioned Habanera from Carmen is a Cuban style piece (Habanera is a Cuban dance), in a French opera, sung in Italian with a setting in Spain. Really I think there’s enough flexibility in the genre to handle one scene in which a Jazz trio – featuring one of rocks best bassists – performs a piece.

No what galls the reviewers is that the creators of this opera dare take on a modern tragedy, instead of a classic one. Something like Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto, a story of a hunchbacked court jester (Rigoletto), who hires a killer to kill his master, the promiscuous Duke. Rigoletto’s daughter, unknown to him, is in love with The Duke. The killer unwittingly kills Rigoletto’s daughter, instead of the Duke. The first song in Rigoletto, Questa o quella per me pari sono (this one or that one, it’s all the same to me), is a tribute to women and promiscuity.

So no, Anna Nicole is not unsuitable material, even if it is a bit tame by operas standards.

The Freedom of Music Anna Nicole, Bertolt Brecht, Carmen, Eva-Marie Westbrook, Gershwin, Giuseppe Verdi, Habanera, Iradium Jazz Club, John Paul Jones, Kurt Weill, Led Zeppelin, Mack the Knife, Porgy and Bess, Rigoletto, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahogany, Summertime, The Alabama Song, The Party Always Ends\, The Threepenny Opera

All the fluffy news about those nutty celebrities

It’s open warfare on the Two and a Half Men set.
Sheen went on a flat out rant against executive producer Chuck Lorre Thursday, causing producers to shut down production of the show, and put it‘s future in doubt. Calling Lorre a “contaminated little maggot,” Sheen proved once again that his recent negative drug tests are tainted:

Clearly I have defeated this earthworm with my words – imagine what I could have done with my fire breathing fists.

His fists breath? Fire??

Review in Brief: Anna Nicole, the Opera: John Paul Jones on bass and a big blowsy blond singing, what could possibly be wrong with that?

(ed’s note: the above opera was not actually seen by the reviewer)

Speaking of Charlie Sheen and floozy blonds, one of Sheen’s hooker friends from his infamous, briefcase full of blow party is back in the news. After the party, and the fame, Kacey Jordan discovered she was pregnant.

The pregnancy is no more, as Jordan told TMZ.com “I don’t have a baby anymore.”

And was Charlie Sheen the father?

“I really don’t know.”

Singing’s a nice gig. Ask Mariah Carey, Usher or Beyonce. On New Years Eve 2009 Carey was jetted to the Caribbean island of St. Barts and paid $1M to sing 4 songs, four – $250,000/song. Nice! Usher and Beyonce both had similar gigs in the year that followed, although actual money amounts have not been disclosed.

Nice gig! Nice people, not so much.

The host of Carey’s million dollar new years eve “shityesapalooza” was the sons of Libyan protest-straffer Mu’amar Gaddafi (or Kaddafi Duck, as I recall it in a famous 80’s era cartoon).

The big billed Bedouin has recently declared war on Libya. This is bad because

a)war is bad and

b) he’s Libyan.

A leader at war with, and murdering his own people is bad company. Now, some music industry types are asking, why were the stars performing for this nutcase and his family. Case in point, Grammy winning band Arcade Fire’s manager David T. Viecelli:

People put a big paycheck on the table, and people don’t consider where the money is coming from, or what they’re at least passively endorsing. I don’t want to specifically say Beyonce or Mariah Carey behaved unethically, because I don’t know all the details. But if it’s true that Mu’amar Gaddafi’s son says, “I’ve got $50 million, come and play for my buddies,” I really think you have to say no to that.

Added former president of Reprise Records Howie Klein:

When I saw Beyonce and Usher and whoever else out there partying with these Libyan criminals… these are people who have stolen tens of millions of dollars from their nation…

Actually what they have in common is they are shooting at their own people, but lets not split hairs.

I can’t speak for Beyonce or Usher, but in fairness to Mariah Carey, she’s really not that smart.

Friday Charlie Sheen Update:

About his bosses at CBS, including Jewish creator and producer of his *ahem* sit-“com” Two and a Half Men:

These people are a bunch of AA Nazis.

As one observer put it, Sheen has an awful expensive lifestyle to afford on residuals.

Catherine Zeta-Jones was awarded the Commander of the Order of the British Empire this week, at a ceremony at Buckingham Palace. The British actress, along with husband Michael Douglas and their children, Dylan and Carys to the ceremony. Zeta-Jones (CBE), was honoured for her charity work and services to the film industry.

Also honoured was American actor Henry (The Fonz) Winkler, who received an Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his work with children’s charities.

Fluffernutter Anna Nicole, Arcade Fire, Beyonce, Catherine Zeta Jones, Charlie Sheen, Chuck Lorre, David T. Viecelli, Henry Winkler, Howie Klein, John Paul Jones, Kacey Jordan, Kaddafi Duck, Mariah Carey, Michael Douglas, Mu’amar Gaddafi, Opera, St. Barts, The Fonz, Two and a Half Men, Usher

John Paul Jones

Retirement age comes but once a lifetime, and John Paul Jones has hit the official age of retirement. Music fans worldwide can only hope he doesn’t take the hint of age, and continues working.

Whether with Led Zeppelin, as a solo artist or with Them Crooked Vultures, Jones has proven to be a rhythm section tour de force. May he continue to be so.

The last couple of birthdays, I have wished Jones a year traveling with old friends. Last year, it was modified to friends, old and new. This year, let me modify it again, and wish John Paul Jones a year of music, of friends, health and happiness.

Happy 65th Birthday John Paul Jones.

Birthday Wishes Birthday, John Paul Jones, Led Zeppelin, Them Crooked Vultures

LZ-’75: The Lost Chronicles of Led Zeppelin’s 1975 American Tour

I’m a portion of the way through LZ-’75: The Lost Chronicles of Led Zeppelin’s 1975 American Tour, Stephen Davis’ new autobiographical read on Led Zeppelin’s 1975 tour of America and, more broadly speaking, Led Zeppelin’s 1975, and something is bothering me. In 1969 Davis saw Led Zeppelin at Boston’s famed Tea Party, and was impressed by the young, early rockers.

Between then and 1975 he worked as an editor at Rolling Stone (not the whole time), America’s premiere music magazine. So what does Davis do before heading out with Led Zeppelin? Familiarize himself with the Led Zeppelin catalogue. Familiarize himself, because working for the #1 music magazine means not being familiar with the top selling band, the top concert draw of the last five years?

Taking my assignment seriously, I had to familiarize myself with Led Zeppelin’s music… I had never even listened to 1973’s Houses of the Holy…

My brother Chris is eight years younger than I. In 1975 he was still in the clutches of ardent Zeppelin fandom. He told me I had to hear the Led Zeppelin bootleg records because the mystical connection between the band and “the kids“ was a bout a communion forged by their intense love shows.

Yes kids, in 1975 you could be one year out of a Rolling Stone editorship and never listened to a Led Zeppelin album that had been #1 on Billboard, Cashbox and the UK album charts. You never need to wonder again why Led Zeppelin so mistrusted the “rock” press.

That Led Zeppelin mistrusted, even hated, the press is an important part of the story of LZ-’75. Stephen Davis was invited to travel with Led Zeppelin, courtesy of Led Zeppelin, in a proactive attempt to get better press for the band. Stephen Davis, in short, didn’t do his job for five years, and was rewarded with the gig of a lifetime. His superior attitude that the stoned kids who liked Led Zeppelin were, “in the clutches of ardent… fandom,” runs throughout the narrative.

Yet for that, LZ-’75 is an enjoyable read. Once Davis has familiarized himself, and given Led Zeppelin’s history up until 1975, the book settles into a nice memoir of the band and it’s extended family.

Because he knew he would be covering Led Zeppelin during part of their 1975 tour, Davis kept newspaper reports of the early days of the tour. Whether it’s the fans in Boston in near riot during the lead up to the tickets going on sale, or the early shows and the various problems they encountered, Davis covers the history of the 1975 tour. But it is when Davis joins up with Led Zeppelin in New York that LZ-’75: The Lost Chronicles of Led Zeppelin’s 1975 American Tour comes to life. The book shifts from historical record to personal, first person behind the scenes account of the tour.

It is, however, the Los Angeles portion of the tour that makes LZ-’75 worth the money. Whether it is chance encounters with Jimmy Page’s ex-girlfriend Lori Maddox, (“Lori is a legend along Sunset Strip,”) or Ron Wood’s wife Chrissie, “who ran off with Jimmy before the tour started,” (Wood is reported to have asked Jimmy at an after concert party in New York, “how’s our bird?”): The Hyatt House, known as the Riot House; the groupies; the kindergarten teacher who wants to be a groupie, for one night at least; Iggy Pop selling heroin; John Bonham jamming, at full volume, to Alphonse Mouzon’s 1975 album Mind Transplant at 3AM; or Robert Plant on Davis’ hotel balcony, yelling “I am a Golden God!”

Add in an interview with Robert Plant (during which the aforementioned balcony scene occurs), and a meeting in Jimmy Page’s hotel room where the exhausted(?) Page lies around in darkness, the room barely lit with “a dozen white candles.” Davis has a meeting with the kindergarten teacher, The Prairie Princess, and two roadies at the bar.

Outside the Continental Hyatt House, Davis travels with the band on The Starship – including a harrowing trip through a storm, hangs out backstage, examines John Bonham’s drum-kit with Bonham’s faithful roadie Mick Hinton, to the concerts themselves.

LZ-’75: The Lost Chronicles of Led Zeppelin’s 1975 American Tour is overall, an easy, comfortable read. Many of the stories herein will be familiar to a Led Zeppelin fan, but weaved together they tell an interesting tale of a top flight band at the apex of their career. Their Achilles Heel, drugs, was just beginning to show itself and the band would change irrevocably in the aftermath of 1975.

Dotted throughout with fabulous black and white pictures by Peter Simon, many of them never before seen, LZ-’75 makes a perfect winter’s afternoon read in the big comfortable chair.

*****************

I previously reviewed LZ-’75 from an e-book version here.

Crossposted from RambleOn

Books, Review Jimmy Page, John Bonham, John Paul Jones, Led Zeppelin, LZ-'75, Mick Hinton, Peter Simon, Robert Plant, Stephen Davis

One likes to believe in the freedom of music.

Rush – Spirit of Radio.

Yesterday was Independent Record Store Day. Did you miss it? Are you, at this moment, slapping your forehead because you forgot all about it? Not likely. More like your saying to yourself, “there’s an independent record store day?” Why, yes there is, it’s a promotional event by some players in the music industry, and is significant because a number of artists supported the idea, and got behind it.

Of course, if you go the right websites, are on the right mailing lists, you knew about it. And quite a few people go to those websites, subscribe to those mailing lists. At Other Music in New York City, they lined up around the block to get in. Easy for them, you might think. They still have record stores in New York. While it’s true New York has everything, including a street with two chess shops across the road from each other and a peanut butter restaurant, you didn’t have to be in Manhattan to enjoy Record Store Day. Chances were there was someplace within a short enough drive. Out here in Cambridge, I had four or five options nearby, more than ten if I was willing to put in an hours driving.

Why, on the other hand, would you want to attend Independent Record Store Day? Why stand in line on Saturday to shop at a store that was there Friday, and still will be, presumably, Monday. The reason is that, as I mentioned earlier, a number of artists got behind the idea. Real, artists, significant artists, with long histories in the music world, released new material specifically for this event. We aren’t talking a new Lady Gaga video here, although she may have done so. How about a new Rolling Stones single, only on vinyl? The song, Plundered My Soul, is a find from the vaults. A lost song from the Exile on Main St. sessions, Plundered My Soul is a great rocker. Proof that The Rolling Stones were once a great band, especially considering Plunder My Soul didn’t make the final cut.

Plunder My Soul singles, which sadly were gone by the time I got off my lazy ass and wandered over to Encore Records, are already selling on eBay in the $30 to $60 range . As an aside, the Kitchener Record claims there was also a line-up at Encore Records at opening time. They did have a number of the items specially released for Record Store Day. A number of vinyl albums, Jeff Beck’s new one, and John Hiatt’s newest for example. Myself, I picked up two 10” singles, a new, Bruce Springsteen and a Them Crooked Vultures picture disk.

The Springsteen features two previously released tracks, but tracks that have never been out in a physical format before. Both have gotten the iTunes treatment, but the limited edition 10” is just for Record Store Day. The A side, Wrecking Ball, was recorded and written specifically for his 2009 Giant’s Stadium concerts. Giant’s Stadium will go under the wrecking ball itself. The song itself, according to Pitchfork upon it’s iTunes release,  is:

dedicated to the big building, New Jersey, living, dying, turning 60, and trying to hold onto memories in the age of parking lots.

B side is a live version of Ghost of Tom Joad from 2008.

The real treat of my day, the real keeper, is the Them Crooked Vultures 10” picture disc. In case you haven’t been keeping track, Them Crooked Vultures is a new “super group,” with Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones, Foo Fighters frontman, and ex-Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl back on the drums, and Queens of the Stone Age front man Josh Homme on guitar and vocals. They are loud, brash, ballsy and real, real good. Their imagery, various drawings of a humanoid with a vulture head, is always excellent. Displayed in a Crooked Vultures red see through envelope, the picture disc is an excellent piece. The disc contains an album cut Mind Eraser, No Chaser, and a new live song, Hwy 1 on side one, and an interview on side two.

Over all Independent Record Store Day seems to have been a success, both for the stores that took part, and for me personally. It is simply great to be buying a new song, on vinyl, by some favourite artists, at a favourite record store. What more could a music fan ask for?

The Freedom of Music, This Week on my I-Pod, Uncategorized Bruce Springsteen, Dave Grohl, Encore Records, Exile on Main St, Foo Fighters, Ghost of Tom Joad, Giant's Stadium, Hwy 1, Independent Record Store Day, Jeff Beck, John Hiatt, John Paul Jones, Josh Homme, Lady Gaga, Led Zeppelin, Mind Eraser No Chaser, New York City, Other Music, Plundered My Soul, Queens of a Stone Age, Record Store Day, Rolling Stones, Them Crooked Vultures, Wrecking Ball

John Paul Jones.

For the first time in what must be twenty years, I got a new record for Christmas. Pristine, in the package, never before played, the music was also new. What is old is new again.

Last year at this time, I wished for John Paul Jones “may your year be filled, and thus ours, with music.” It was, but not in the way I was expecting. Them Crooked Vultures took the rock world heavily in 2009, combining front line talent from three different areas of hard rock. The result was fantastic, receiving best release of the year in some year end reviews. John Paul Jones had done it again, and my Them Crooked Vultures LP was the highlight of Christmas morning.

Happy Birthday John Paul Jones, and may your year be spent making music with friends, old or new.

Birthday Wishes John Paul Jones, Led Zeppelin, Them Crooked Vultures

Saturday Fluffernutter – all the fluffy news about those nutty celebrities.

Oh, oh! Jon and Kate’s separation has turned to the ugly side. Kate arrived at their Wernersville, Pa. home Friday when Jon was supposed to be having his quality time with the Plus Eight. Turns out Jon called in a babysitter; turns out Jon has been tutoring the babysitter, or so says a) the tabs b) Kate. Which is odd, because Kate keeps using her couch time on their TV show, “Jon and Kate Plus Eight,” to talk about how the tabloids make all this stuff up. So suddenly she believes them that Jon is boffing  23-year-old Stephanie Santoro, the “babysitter” in question? Well if it’s good enough for her, well I guess it’s good enough for me, Kate is the torrential bitch the tabs have been saying all along.

Led Zeppelin rumour of the week, courtesy of Ramble On:

John Paul Jones new band, Them Crooked Vultures, premiered last weekend at a post-Lollapalooza show at The Metro in Chicago. The Vultures (TCV in the appropriate newsgroups) feature Jones, Foo Fighters singer/guitarist/ Nirvana Drummer Dave Grohl on Drums and Queens of a Stone Age guitarist singer Josh Homme on, well, guitar and vocals. Reviews are suggesting that TCV are the greatest band since, um, Led Zeppelin.

Them Crooked Vultures are said to be releasing an album on October 23rd titled  “Never Deserved the Future.”

Les Paul (1915 – 2009): Three summers ago the family and I were in New York. After dinner, we decided to stroll to the Borders in Chelsea. For the first time in two days, I didn’t have a 5 pound camera slung over my shoulder. We walked in the store and this little old man was wrapping up a book signing. “Hey, that’s Les Paul,” I said.

“Who?” the family asked.

“You know my guitar at home, the Les Paul guitar?”

“Yea.”

“Les Paul,” I said, waving my hand in his direction.

As I said, he was wrapping up, talking to his rep and, well, he looked 100, so I didn’t want to bother him. But there I am without my camera. The family established a new New York rule after that, never go out without a camera.

Last fall I was back in NYC, and passed a club with 20 or so people lined up outside. “Who’s playing?” I asked.

“Les Paul.”

Ninety-three years old, and still playing. That’s what they call a working musician. But it’s not for his playing that Les Paul will ultimately be remembered – even now he’s barely remembered for that.

Les Paul was an innovator. In the Buddy Holly Story, a studio tech asks Buddy (played by Gary Busey), where he learnt to overdub? “Same place as you,” Holly says. “From Les Paul.” The whole idea of using two or more tape heads to layer sound one upon the other. In the early 50’s, Paul had specially made an 8-track tape recorder. By the late 1960’s, the Beatles where busy making Sergeant Pepper on a four track player, half the player Les Paul innovated out of thin air more than ten years earlier. A remarkable improvement in the way recorded music was produced. But really, who will remember him for a technical innovation, no matter how significant.

Les Paul invented the solid body electric guitar.

As Paul McCartney sang, “Who’s that movin’ cross the stage, it looks a lot like the one used by Jimmy Page.”

There can be no mistaking the visualization: Jimmy Page moved across the stage with a Les Paul Guitar. In rock and roll circles, it is the guitar. A stunning visual and audio instrument, the Les Paul is a perfectly balanced hunk of Mahogany that drove rock and roll from the mid-60’s to the present day. Jimmy Page, Slash, Cream era-Eric Clapton, Early Jeff Beck, Comes Alive era Peter Frampton to name just a few. The Les Paul guitar is the face of rock and roll.

Les Paul passed this week at the age of 94. He is being remembered for his music, especially his work with his wife Mary Ford. He is being remembered for his technical innovations that have altered how music is made. It will be, however, his namesake  guitar for which Les Paul will achieve immortality.

More importantly, Les Paul was a true musician, working to the end and  man who lived a full life worth living. May the same be said of all of us.

Fluffernutter Buddy Holly, Buddy Holly Story, Dave Grohl, Eric Clapton, Foo Fighters, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, Jon and Kate Plus Eight, Jon Gosselin, Josh Homme, Kate Gosselin, Led Zeppelin, Les Paul, Mary Ford, Nirvana, Paul McCartney, Peter Frampton, Queens of a Stone Age, Ramble On, Stephanie Santoro, Them Crooked Vultures

… Geoffrey Arnold Beck

Jeff Beck is the middle of the three great Yardbird guitarists, his time with the legendary band squeezed between Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page. Never a great improviser, songwriter or singer he is often underestimated. His renderings of other people music is, however, often brilliant and his guitar playing is as good as any in the rock genre. It is no exaggeration to call him a great guitarist, far more so than the more highly celebrated Clapton, in my opinion.

Beck’s first post-Yardbirds group would feature a young Rod Stewart on vocals and future Rolling Stone Ron Wood on bass. It was considered the template for friend and Yardbird band-mate Jimmy Page’s future band,  Led Zeppelin (the name Led Zeppelin incidentally, emerged from a recording session called Beck’s Bolero, with Beck Who drummer Kieth Moon, Pianist Nicky Hopkins and future Zeppeliners Page and John Paul Jones).

Beck was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year, many years too late (he was, of course, previously inducted as a Yardbird).

Jeff Beck, one of the true greats of rock ‘n’ roll guitar, happy 65th birthday:  enjoy your seniors discount years.

Beck’s Bolero

Beck Bogart and Appice – Superstition

Birthday Wishes, Rockin' and Rollin' and Never Forgettin' Beck Bogart Appice, Beck's Bolero, Carmine Appice, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jeff Beck Group, Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, Kieth Moon, Led Zeppelin, Nicky Hopkins, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Rod Stewart, Rolling Stones, Ron Wood, Tim Bogart, Yardbirds