The R.E.M. song "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" sounds like it'd be difficult to record, fast with a lot of words! They didn't really know what they were doing with it, they just did it.It was on the album Document in 1987 written by Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Michael Stipe Guitarist Peter Buck addresses how difficult it was for Michael Stipe and the band to record.
“His part was hard, but it wasn’t that hard to do. Getting it right was hard, because we didn’t know what we wanted to do arrangement-wise. It’s kind of an odd little song constructed in a kind of weird way. I mean, it changes keys and there’s passing chords that are kind of weird, but it rocks. The subtlety’s a little easier dealing with with slower things. We had no idea what we were doing, we just did it and it was done.”
55 years ago today The Rolling Stones album: Out of Our Heads containing the song "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" became the first Stones album to hit # 1 It stayed and # 1 for 4 weeks. According to Bill Wyman, the guys who wrote "Satisfaction," Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, weren't sold on it being hit single material at the time. If that's so, Richards has certainly changed his tune after playing it live for decades. here is Keith Richards:
“I can play ‘Satisfaction’ today, or tomorrow, and still find new stuff in there and little nuances. And the way to play it with these guys is important because we never play it the same twice. In a way, it’s kind of jazz, but it’s a very – I hate to put labels on any kind of music, you know, to me it’s all music – but there’s a lot of improvisation going on because it leads you to that.”
Ronnie Wood says he's doing his best to be optimistic during the pandemic, but admits he's getting anxious to get back on the road, which is what The Rolling Stones were supposed to be doing this summer. Here is Ronnie Wood on life during the pandemic.
"We are sort of happily carrying on day by day chores and enjoying our families. But the thing is, there's got to be a time when somebody sorts out some direction of what we're gonna do. Somebody's got to lead this thing."
The pandemic has also forced the Stones to delay the recording of their next album. Ronnie Wood on the status of the new Rolling Stones album.
"There's some lovely music on the hob, you know, it's on the back burner. We're bringing it towards the front of the hob now, but gradually. The thing is we can't all get together at the moment to do it. I've been working on music. I've got a couple of albums ready to go as well. But life is on hold."
The Band released Stage Fright, their third album, 50 years today (Monday) -- August 17th, 1970.
Containing 10 songs, including the title track, "The Shape I'm In," "The W.S. Walcott Medicine Show" and "Daniel and the Sacred Harp," it was recorded at the Woodstock Playhouse in Woodstock, New York where the group was based.
The Band's guitarist and songwriter Robbie Robertson says the album was a "reaction to a level of adulation that The Band members were unprepared for. It was conceived as a lighter, less serious, more rock and roll type of album.
"The album explored themes such as peace, escape and frivolity that revealed darker shades of melancholy, anxiety and fatigue."
Robbie Robertson talks about the song "Stage Fright"
“If you’re in a situation where your job is to stand up in front of everybody and do something, it’s just kind of an interesting study of human nature. People can be so sure of themselves and confident and everything and all of a sudden you put the spotlight on them and they just kind of melt on the floor. There was something that I was personally expressing in this, but I wasn’t talking about me, me, me, me, I was talking about that experience.”
If you're a guitar player in a band imagine the opportunity to play with Jimmy page. it happened to the Black Crowes. the got an album out of it too; [Jimmy Page with The Black Crowes Live at the Greek. Although Led Zeppelin never released "Ten Years Gone" as a single, it was one of the featured cuts on Jimmy Page and The Black Crowes' 1999 Live at the Greek album. Black Crowes guitarist Rich Robinson credits drummer Steve Gorman with helping to get it into their repertoire for that tour.
"Jimmy was like, 'You guys choose which songs you want.' It wasn't like, 'We're gonna go for "Stairway to Heaven."' Y'know, it wasn't any of that. He was like, 'What songs do you want to do?' and, like, 'We want to do some stuff that maybe wasn't played that often -- "Ten Years Gone," "Sick Again," "Custard Pie,"' 'cause Physical Graffiti was one of my favorites. Just to learn those songs and pick them apart and when that band kicks in on [sings riff]. And [drummer] Steve [Gorman] was killing it. That was something that he wanted to do and I think he really accomplished it."
Former Yes singer Jon Anderson started his self-quarantining at his central California home on crutches. He tells us how it happened:
"I was gonna make barbecue, and, what I do, I give my wife a massage as I barbecue -- it's very, very tricky -- and I slipped and broke my foot. And for a month Janey had to cook, do the dishes, she had to go and do the laundry and then she had to take out all the thrash. But she was my fairy princess and now she's my goddess.
Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits turns 71 today his song "Money for Nothing" was inspired by something he saw at an appliance store. Add a cool guitar and Sting and you had a number 1 hit...3 weeks at the top. Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits talks about how the idea for "Money for Nothing" fell into his lap.
"Sometimes, some songs have like a situation. You walk into a situation and you see it. 'Money for Nothing,' I was out with my wife and we were buying some kitchen stuff in New York. And it had all these microwave ovens and cookers and kitchen display unit in the front window and it had a wall of TV sets at the back of the store -- it was a big appliance store. They were all tuned to MTV and the guy, the protagonist in 'Money for Nothing', he was there and he was just talking about all these videos that were on. I just started spying on him and...bang, there's the situation."
Roger Daltrey took a break from fixing a bulldozer on Friday to answer questions from Who fans ahead of Saturday's launch of Join Together @ Home -- a six-week series on the band's YouTube channel featuring some of their most memorable performances, including previously unseen footage.
Among the topics discussed was Pete Townshend allegedly working on songs for a new Who album.
"We did have a conversation about something -- I don't want to talk about it because it might never happen. But it sounded very promising and the only person who could do it will be Pete and if he writes it let's see where we are. But I mean I don't know what the point of a new Who album would be. But equally, with what we talked about, that would have a purpose. But I can't talk about it at the moment. The last Who album cost me money to make, and I can't go on paying to make music. That's a fool's game, you know. What's happened to the music business is one of the biggest robberies in history. It really is."
Their last album was 2019’s WHO.
Daltrey also talked about whether or not he would ever consider touring with his good friend Robert Plant, which he says he”d love to. He adds that they even discussed a one-off show, joking that hey could call it No Solos.
He also said his favorite guitars players outside of Townshend are Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck and Jimi Hendrix.
His long-awaited movie on Keith Moon is finally in the script-writing phase and he is looking for a director.
And, when asked about why The Who don't perform any of the late John Entwistle songs in concert, Daltrey was brutally honest.
"I don't think he was a great craftsman. We used to put them on there to try and keep the taxman away from him -- to give him some publishing money. I know a lot of fans like them. I think 'Trick of the Light' kind of had his humor, and 'Boris the Spider' indeed. But, the others, I don't like."
Heart's first single, "Magic Man," is 45 years old. Singer Ann Wilson asks, "Can you believe it's been 45 years since our first 45 record was released?!
"It seems like only yesterday I was writing 'Magic Man' in Vancouver BC. It was the third song written for Dreamboat Annie. (‘Here Song' and ‘How Deep it Goes’ were the first two.)
"The first time I heard 'Magic Man' on the radio I was coming back from the grocery store with my dog, Moffa, and I had to pull over and listen ... it was so surreal. I remember Moffa growled a little because she recognized my voice and couldn’t figure out where it was coming from.
"The way Heart performed 'Magic Man' in 2019 on the Love Alive tour was the most out of the box to date. It’s my favorite version so far."
With that, Ann is asking you to send her "YOUR renditions of 'Magic Man,' even if it is just a verse or two. The submission does not even need to be in English -- feel free to submit all languages and interpretations of the song. Simply visit AnnWilson.com/MagicMan to enter!
"Thank you each for 45 truly magical years."
Ann Wilson of Heart on who the “Magic Man” is:
“There are so many magic men all over the country, it’s really amazing. Like, onstage, whenever we do that song, this line of guys pushes up to the very front and points at themselves like, ‘Me, me, I’m the magic man! Me!’ So there probably are about 30,000 of them across the country. But the original magic man was the man I was with at the time the song was written, who was indeed a magical person.”
Peter Frampton's song: "Do You Feel Like We Do" is his most famous. As a solo artist, Peter Frampton had released four studio albums before his career blew up with Frampton Comes Alive in 1976. He says that "Do You Feel Like We Do," one of three hits from the double-live album, came into being three years earlier. Peter Frampton on when and how “Do You Feel Like We Do” came about:
“It was, in fact, written in between Wind of Change and recording Frampton’s Camel. I had just the chorus and went to rehearsal and so we needed a stage number and that was how that came about, as a jam from a rehearsal, really. We all wrote that together.”
