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Posts from the ‘music’ category

Reprise » My Only and One: Help!

Hoping lightning would strike twice, emulating A Hard Day’s Night, Help! (released on 6th August, 1965) contained the songs from the ’65 film on side one of the album, with the other side devoted to other new material. Moreover, prodded by others’ success, The Beatles began to push at fans’ and critics’ expectations.

Reprise » My Only and One: Beatles For Sale

The group’s more somber Beatles For Sale album, coming off their hectic touring/filming/appearance schedule, set a more cynical tone for its 4 December 1964 release. Still, it represented a maturing work, and another highly successful LP in the UK (eleven weeks at #1).

Reprise » My Only and One: A Hard Day’s Night

The Beatles A Hard Day’s Night album was the third album in eighteen months to be released by 10 July 1964. Timed to coincide with the release of their first movie. One that completed the catapult to worldwide superstardom. The album reached #1 in the UK charts and was cemented there for 21 of the 38 weeks spent in the Top Twenty. The U.S. soundtrack LP spent 14 weeks at the top of our album register.

Reprise » My Only and One: With The Beatles

The With The Beatles album was going to make an impression no matter what. The important sophomore release for the newly in-demand group would gather attention from fans and critics eager to catch more of the British Invasion. Witnessing the expansion of Pop music, in the bargain. That it was released on November 22, 1963, the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, would be its counterpoint.

A Song For This Day (and year): Wake Up Everybody

In honor of the New Year now upon us, I selected another song from the Ye ‘Ol Decade of the 1970s to christen 2014. Wake Up Everybody (1975) was Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes’ last Top 40 hit. The smooth and soulful lead vocal was performed by none other than Teddy Pendergrass, in one of last numbers with the group.

Versus AARP’s 10 Essential Boomer Albums

If I do anything on this blog, it is to examine the arts of books, music, and movies. Along with my history (or angst), with them. I confess it’s a tad self-absorbed, and so typical of my generation. With that said, I’ll add my set to the well-known contributors AARP selected for each of their Essential Boomer picks. Next up, Nelson George takes on the music albums with his potent list.

Best Album Covers: Revolver

This is the next entry in Best Album Covers, a series begun right here. The first successful long-playing microgroove record for the phonograph was introduced by Columbia Records back in June of…

Reprise » “It Is Believing”

Back to the vital things in life. Besides movie-watching and reading, it’s music for me. A shared facet that my colleague Kevin highlighted last week. Though I’ve put a turntable back into my life (thereby forcing me to re-collect those LPs I thoughtlessly let go more than two decades ago, to my wife’s consternation), listening to my Compact Disc collection has taken up much of my non-work-movie-book listening time.

Guest Post » Story Telling in Music

Being a child of the 1960s and The Cold War offered a unique opportunity to be on the periphery of being in the right place and the right time for music. A bit too young to catch the allure of The Beatles. Though something of a prodigy to follow the raw, early, up and coming, cover days of The Rolling Stones. I quickly developed an appreciation for lyrics.

Same Song, Different Movie: (Don’t Fear) The Reaper by Buck Dharma

Built almost entirely around Roeser’s stellar guitar riff — it being the one song I taught my children how to air guitar as toddlers (much to their mother’s chagrin) — the track has gathered fans from each subsequent decade thereafter. Certainly, enough to collect movie acclaim over the years. If you listened to the lyrics carefully, that is. Two of which utilized the driving barre chords and the poetry of the lyrics to great effect from two distinct and contrary decades. The tune reverberated best in a pair of films from the 70s and 90s in striking backdrops by two wholly different directors dealing with death in their films.