TRACK 1: "PET SOUNDS" BY THE BEACH BOYS
On May 16, 1966, this landmark album by The Beach Boys was released and I am happy to celebrate its 47th anniversary.
My introduction to The Beach Boys was an auspicious one as my Dad presented me with a copy of the compilation album "Endless Summer" (released June 24, 1974) when I was a child for no apparent reason other than when he explained to me, "I guess I thought that you liked them." While there were some songs of their's that I had heard and liked very much ("Don't Worry Baby," "In My Room," and "California Girls" spoke the loudest to me) I really had no opinion of them one way or another but I knew that I had never expressed a desire to my Dad, especially as I had no connection to surfing and the beach themed fun in the sun landscape as I was growing up in Chicago. Perhaps he just knew something that I didn't...yet.
I first heard "Pet Sounds" in its entirety during my college years and I think on first listen, or even perhaps by the second, I found myself completely enraptured, captivated, soothed and warmed by its bitter-sweetness, its melancholy, its wide eyed and open-hearted artistry and humane vision that deeply penetrated my own senses and sensibilities. And furthermore, I finally began to understand what all of the exalted praise over the genius of Brian Wilson was all about.
"Pet Sounds" was composed, produced and recorded under the leadership of Brian Wilson who quit touring with the remainder of the band so that he could fully focus his mind upon his creativity within the studio.
Utilizing a barrage of orchestrated musicianship, odd and unconventional instrumentation (theremins, harpsichords, Hawaiian instruments), soul searching lyrics and his trademark majestic vocal harmonics (which Wilson and his band mates then added to the completed backing tracks), "Pet Sounds" was the album that served as a quantum leap from all prior Beach Boys music. No longer solely about cars, girls, and surfing, "Pet Sounds" was the sound of the individualistic spirit attempting to find a place in the vast universe through a song cycle that included "Wouldn't It Be Nice,""You Still Believe In Me," "Sloop John B." "God Only Knows," "I Know There's An Answer," the amazing "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times" and others. It is an album that transcended rock music itself to become a piece of art that exists in its own artistic galaxy and yet it is accessible to everyone who chooses to listen, something that I urge all of you to do if you have never heard it or wish to revisit it. "Pet Sounds" has richly earned and fully deserves its reputation as I really believe it to be a true masterpiece of timeless quality and humanity.
TRACK 2: "LET IT BE" BY THE BEATLES
On May 18, 1970, "Let It Be," the final album by The Beatles was released to the world.
For me, as The Beatles are above and beyond my favorite band of all time, their story, from its beginnings to its conclusion, feels almost like a classic fairy tale to me as it is so well known, often told and definitive. In the case of this album, which was recorded before their true swan song, my favorite album of all time, "Abbey Road" (released September 26, 1969), my feelings towards it have been conflicted. not because of the songs themselves but because the experience of listening to it sometimes feels so sad to me, knowing that we are hearing the process of a band coming apart. The end is nigh on this album and we can hear is approaching rapidly.
Even so, I think there is so much to be gained from endings as well as beginnings. Originally titled "Get Back," as Paul McCartney desired for The Beatles to return to their musical roots of live performance after years of earth shaking studio wizardry. McCartney hoped to capture the results of raw, real performances on tape, vinyl and even film as documented in Director Michael Lindsay-Hogg's long unseen, long out of circulation documentary "Let It Be" (1970). Yet, what ended up being recorded and filmed was four men, who had been in and out of each other's pockets in an intense experience unmatched by those outside of it, growing up and growing apart from each other, leaving the fate of The Beatles to inevitable destruction. The recording was so stressfully grueling, uncomfortable, and acrimonious that George Harrison brought keyboardist Billy Preston into the sessions to help assuage the proceedings. While Preston's presence did help to a degree, it as ultimately to no avail as Harrison not only quit the sessions for a period, The Beatles, unhappy with the results, shelved the project.
And even so, the songs did emerge, as if by force of will or through the magical musical alchemy that existed between these four men, an alchemy that countless subsequent musicians have long desired to duplicate. The beauty that is present inside tracks like "Two Of Us," the hymnal "Let It Be," the swirling cosmic ocean of "Across The Universe," the bluesy shuffle of "For You Blue,"and of course, the rag-tag glory of "I've Got A Feeling" and the rooftop triumph of "Get Back."
What the "Let It Be" album taught me over the years is that this album (as well as the film), is a document about the process rather than existing as the finished product. Whether The Beatles wanted to do so or not, we were all given a peek behind the curtain, warts and all, an act that demystified the mysticism that surrounded the Fab Four, and revealed them to be just four men working and creating together to either success or failure. To this day, I have long had somewhat mixed feelings about the album itself as the tapes were eventually poured over by Producer Phil Spector instead of The Beatles' treasured Producer, and essentially their fifth member, George Martin. Like McCartney, I truly HATED the horrifically goopy strings Spector lathered all over the otherwise gorgeous "The Long And Winding Road" and I do prefer the version, and other sonic touches, as contained on the McCartney sanctioned re-mixed/re-mastered do-over "Let It Be...Naked" (released November 17, 2003). Regardless, the original "Let It Be" album is a crucial piece of The Beatles' musical puzzle and my celebration of it is paramount.
On May 23, 1969, the classic rock opera by The Who was released.
I hope that I am able to fully convey to all of you how much this album means to me and the impact it has made upon my life. Yes, as a devotee of what has long been referred to as "classic rock," I was already familiar with songs like "I'm free" and "Pinball Wizard," but I never knew of their full context. I was first introduced to "Tommy" through Director Ken Russell's orgiastic and incredible 1975 film version when I was a Freshman in high school. My intense devotion to the film led me backwards to the original work which I have long embraced as one of my most favorite albums.
The post World War 1 England storyline of a boy, traumatized into an aural/visual/spoken silence by some unknown event caused by his parents, and his eventual rise into becoming the pinball wizard and ultimately a new messiah is a fable of such spiritual deliverance and presented with tremendous pastoral and hypnotic rock and roll power that "Tommy" is indeed one of those albums that continues to reveal itself no matter how many times it has been heard. It is a harrowing tale of child abuse and a cautionary satire of exploitative religious fundamentalism. It is a song cycle of suffering and enlightenment, terror and grace, and quite possibly a musical journey into the soul of a child who is essentially autistic, opening up a window into a world that is incomprehensible to most of us. It is naive yet profound. Simply presented but deeply analytical and impressionistic. And as performed by Roger Daltrey, the late John Entwistle, the late Keith Moon and the peerless Pete Townshend, via an assortment of angelic vocals, guitars, bass guitars, drums, percussion, keyboards and French Horns entirely by the band and no outside members, "Tommy" is a timeless work of art that makes you want to play it all over again immediately upon completion.
TRACK 4: "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PETE TOWNSHEND"
And where would "Tommy" be without its creator, Mr. Pete Townshend? Lost in the ether, I suppose. Thankfully, Pete Townshend captured Tommy's spirit and unleashed it as well as mountains of music, alongside The Who and as a solo artist for nearly 50 years and on May 19th, I was implored to take the time to celebrate his 68th birthday.
The talents and artistic vision of Pete Townshend are seemingly boundless to me as the creation, writing and performing of music seems to exist as an act of nothing less than spiritual devotion and release for him, a feeling that is palpable through everything he has envisioned from rock operas like The Who's "Quadrophenia" (released October 19, 1973), his own "Psychoderelict" (released June 15, 1993), his piercing self explorations of "Empty Glass" (released April 21, 1980), his peaceful journeys into the spiritual realm with "Who Came First" (released October 1972) and of course, his roaring stabs at rock and roll, most notably on The Who's "Who's Next" (released August 25, 1971).
His skills as a songwriter, composer, producer, guitarist, singer, multi-instrumentalist, electronic music pioneer, as well as an author has placed him at the forefront of his peers and subsequent generations of musicians to this very day as he has shown time and again such euphoric joy, an ocean's worth of empathy and brutal, unflinching honesty, especially when examining himself as you can witness in his stunning and beautifully written memoir Who I Am (published October 2012).
The life's work of Pete Townshend, which is akin to an ongoing musical diary, is of such intense meaning to me that I truly feel blessed that I am able to share a lifetime with him as he creates and remains within the world with all of us. His work has soothed me, consoled me, understood me, counseled me, taught me, and heroically rocked and rolled me over and over and over again (his song "Slit Skirts" has got to be one of the finest songs I have ever heard about the aging process) and my life would not be what it is without his massive influence within it.
Happy birthday, Pete!!
And for the month of May, it is time to bring our double album's worth of Liner Notes to a close...until next time...
No comments:
Post a Comment