Top Ten Of The Week: My Demise Your Gain

Tuesday marked the anniversary of the death of Howlin Wolf, one of the best bluesmen out there, who died on Jan 10, 1976.  And all he got to show for it is a song touting Viagra.

Robbing the cradle again is Bryan Ferry who married a 30 year old who once had a fling with his son Isaac.  He's 66. But he's always been a classy gentlemen and always looks his best (and just like dad his sons are so well groomed too) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2084738/Bryan-Ferry-66-marries-toygirl-Amanda-Sheppard-romantic-island-ceremony.html

Some people may care but I don't but it's music related anyway.  At The Drive In is reuniting.  They made a few noisy Nu prog stuff back in the late 90s and got heaps of praise for it. Some people get them, some people love them, the rest have other important things to worry about.  Like 4 dollar gallon gas this summer.  And by the way Fuck Iran.

The old farts are returning.  The Yardbirds with Jim McCarthy will embark on a tour while Chris Dreja recovers from illness but should return.  And no, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page or Eric Clapton will be any of the guitarists on that tour but if they did, that would be the biggest concert until the Rolling Stones get it together for the 50th year of existence tour.  And even Charlie Watts has said that would take a lot to get going.

Interesting report from Forbes saying that Best Buy is doomed to fail and I could probably see why.  The help up there are robots, they either bug the hell out of you or they ignore you.  With the downloading in full force and perhaps more music stores going out of business (bye bye Webster Records) Best Buy seems to be going further away from the things that make me go up there in the first place.  And besides nobody is going to sell CDs after 2014 anyway so sez Bob Lefsetz, the halfwit crank that has the latest gadget long before you do. But still worth a read if you like comedy from somebody who thinks he's on top of things but you soon realize that he's basically left out in the cold most of the time anyway.

And today's weather it is a balmy 50 degrees and sunshine.  Winter might be making a bit of a comeback later in the week with snow showers and a return to seasonal wintertime weather, which means back to 20s for highs and single digits for lows but we haven't had this late of no snow cover in just about 25 years.  Hey, gotta go enjoy this before it gets cold again.

And now, this week's collection of songs from varying degree.  The cycle is never ending.

1.  When The Saints Go Marching In-The Ink Spots 1961?  In my father's record collection lies many things I listened to growing up when we were in Lincoln Illinois years ago. Jim Reeves comes to mind, Fats Domino, Bobby Bare, Bobby Rydell as well but he seemed to buy a lotta 1.99 junk too, mostly Cameo Parkway stuff under the Wycode banner (that's probably misspelled but too lazy to look it up) and this album from the seminal jazz vocalists whose time had come and gone and they recorded a cheapo cheapo for Coronet to which you can find anywhere for a dollar at Goodwill or Salvation Army.  The album is hodgepodge but they do a wonderful cover of this New Orleans staple with a bit of rapping in the middle of the song.

2.  Fight-The Rolling Stones 1986  Nobody follows the Ink Spot with The Stones unless you're me and you're not me folks.  The Stones in the 80s were lost in the wilderness and made their most crappy albums to date (Undercover anyone? Oops I think Rastro liked this album, side 2 of Tattoo You).  However I did like Dirty Work although I didn't think it was the A album that Robert Christgau gave it.  Tom Waits appears on this album and perhaps this song to which he's letting out a banshee scream on the break.  You go Tom!

3.  On A Plain-Nirvana 1991  Target had the 20th year version on sale for 6 bucks to which I couldn't pass up such a deal and got to revisit the album that killed off hair metal.  You'll be happy to know that Endless, Nameless is on the reissue abit as the untitled track after Something In The Way and a bunch of B sides and BBC sessions to boot.

4.  If It Takes You Home-Idlewild 2007   Hard luck band  leaves EMI for Sanctuary in their death thrones and made perhaps what I think is their best album to date Make Another World.

5.  Those Were The Days-Cream 1969
6.  Tilt A Whirl-Masters Of Reality 1992

Two selections featuring the powerhouse drumming of Ginger Baker.  The Cream song was the B side to White Room and I liked the B side better than the goofy lyrics Pete Brown gave us for White Room.  The second track comes from the Masters of Reality album Sunrise On The Sufferbus.  Got some airplay on Rock 108 back in 92.  Baker left soon afterward complaining that the best of the band played too loud and he couldn't hear his drums.

7.  Frayed-Junk Monkeys 1991  They got lost in the Metal Blade shuffle and even I didn't know much about them till I found Bliss, their cd at the pawnshop for a dollar but it seems to me that they were more Replacements rock and roll at that time than the Replacements were at that time.   But nobody ever talks about the Junk Monkeys anymore.  Such a shame really, they did rock.

8.  Peggy Sue-Bobby Vee 1961  From Bobby Vee meets The Crickets and amazingly Vee sounds much like Buddy Holly did although Vee does try a bit too hard on the rrrrrroaring that Buddy did so easily.

9.  The Heat Of The Matter-Bush 2011  Never cared much for Bush, they always seemed to bug me. 16th Stone broke them big with Everything Zen but my second fave song was the less than a minute X Girlfriend. Gavin Rossdale continue to slag on with albums of varying degree, fans loved them, critics didn't and basically I didn't care much either but their new album The Sea Of Memories is actually very good although I'm sure it doesn't vary much from Everything Zen.  Either I'm softening my opinion on them or I'm getting desperate to listen to something good nowadays.  Really I dig the new album.  Really.

10.  Misty-Erroll Garner 1954  Sometimes when you need to mellow out, a nice mellow piano jazz number last night with cigar in hand is the perfect way to call it a day.  And makes you look forward to the next top ten.  Whenever that will be.