Y2KT10
(Y2K Top Ten)
Greetings
class, and welcome to this month’s dissertation on Millennium Musicology. We are honored to have as guest lecturer
singer /songwriter/guitarist /poet and all-around good guy, Frank Saunders of
Digital Cricket. (Warning! Unabashed
plug follows: Digital Cricket’s CD Perilous
Times can be found in Columbus at Riff’s, The Loft, Toad’s Books and the
Columbus Museum and is available in Auburn at Wildman Steve’s, Passaround
Sound, and Bigshot Records. Catch ‘em
live at Rae’s Pub 7/23, Rock A Moly Cafe 7/30 and 8/28.) Let’s go over the ground rules first: A previously unknown Y2K computer “bug” will
erase nearly all recorded forms of music at the stroke of midnight, December
31, 1999. Fortunately, the crack staff
of scientists at Playgrounds Magazine have discovered a method of saving
exactly ten pieces of music. You are charged with the duty of preserving our
musical legacy for the 21st Century...and I promise, if you send me a list with
KC & the Sunshine Band, Milli Vanilli, or the Spice Girls on it, I will
trash every shred of music that has a BPM
faster than my resting heart rate! Regardless, send your lists to the
address below...
And
now, please welcome Frank Saunders to the Millennium podium...
Terry
Schaeffer, perhaps my closest childhood friend
and a programming wiz kid at TSYS, compiled this list as a purist, using
no box sets or greatest hits compilations.
Terry was my best man and he has great taste in music. Here’s his list in alphabetical order:
1.
Allman Brothers-At Fillmore East
2.
Beatles-Abbey Road
3.
Cake-Fashion Nugget
4. Gin
Blossoms- New Miserable Experience
5.
Grateful Dead-Workingman's Dead
6.
Iron Maiden- Killers
7.
Judas Priest- Unleashed In The East
8. Led
Zeppelin- I
9.
Ozzy Osbourne- Blizzard Of Ozz
10.
Rush -Moving Pictures
(Here’s
a guy who starts out with the Beatles, slides into the Allmans and The Dead,
and Led Zep, then slams through Maiden, Priest and Ozzy, before coming up on
Cake and the Gin Blossoms. The most
eclectic list yet. Thanks, Terry. --Curtis.)
I met Vince Roses at the first Lollapalooza
and we have been friends ever since.
Vince has around 900 CDs, but he knocked off this list in about ten
minutes.
Vince has a wide range of tastes, and he has
really expanded my musical horizons.
Vince added brief notes for each selection
and in the order they came to him:
1. Ray Charles - Ray Charles It converted
white people.
2. Rufus Thomas- with the MG's makes classic rock songs his own-Mustang Sally, Midnight Hour, Land of 1000
Dances, etc...
3. The Rolling Stones- Exile On Main Street- Legend says they pirated electricity from
Paris Metro to make this while in Tax Exile.
4. Beatles- White Album Why Don’t We Do
It In The Road?
5. Replacements- Hootenanny Take Me Down To
the Hospital Vince bumped the Tom Waits album Sword Fish Trombones for this seminal Replacements album. (The
comment for the Waits album: "The crack of dawn has to be careful around
this man.")
6. Johnny Thunders-Hurt Me The last great rock-n-roller- So Alone.
7. Alex Chilton-19 Years: A Collection The High White Priest-Lost My Job (“guess I'm gonna have to steal and rob")
8. Roky Erickson- You’re Gonna Miss Me: The Best of Roky Erickson "The best
stuff is on the Pink Dust label."
9. Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band -Safe as Milk She's a Hothead.
10. The Velvet Underground & Nico-Banana album "Lou Reed and John
Cale can't decide on how much time between songs-great tension, great
songs."
(Another
very cool list...Ry Cooder played on the Safe
as Milk album...Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top cites Roky Erickson & the 13th
Floor Elevators as an early influence...while Alex Chilton’s band Big Star
found it’s way into the sound of 80s bands like REM and the
Replacements...(trivia bonus question: Alex named the band after the
supermarket chain...) Vince has made excellent choices that bring modern music
into focus --Curtis)
Jim
Steers is another friend I found at the first Lollapalooza- a great chef,
artist and a budding songwriter. Jim is
an excellent graphic design artist and he designed the Digital Cricket album Perilous Times. Here is Jim's outstanding list presented in no particular order
1.
REM-Lifes Rich Pageant “Great REM records preceded and followed it,
but this is the one that did it for me."
2.
Uncle Tupelo- Anodyne "A
perfect blend of rock, country, great writing, and a band in dissolution."
3.
Replacements-All Shook Down "You could call it a last ditch effort
or a solo album, but if great songwriting were a crime, Paul Westerberg would
be doing life."
4.
Rolling Stones-Let it Bleed
"When the Rolling Stones could truly call themselves 'The world's greatest
rock-n-roll band.'"
5.
The Beatles- Revolver "Under
the influence of Bob Dylan, among other things, the Beatles still wrote great
3-minute pop songs."
6.
Bob Dylan-Desire "Bob Dylan
could easily occupy all ten spots on my list, but since I can only pick
one..."
7.
Miles Davis- Bitches Brew "Equally
beautiful and frightening-the only jazz
fusion anyone really needs"
8.
The Velvet Underground- The Velvet
Underground “Not as groundbreaking as The
Velvet Underground & Nico, but for some reason, I still listen to this
at least once a month.”
9.
Neil Young-Zuma "Neil Young and
Crazy Horse, you can't ask for more than that."
10.
Janes Addiction- Nothing's Shocking
"Quiet, loud, and creepy."
(The
Replacements comment is killer, but Jim, who says you can only pick one Dylan
CD? --Curtis)
And finally...the list we all waited for...
Well here is my list, damn it! Creating a top ten list to preserve musical
history as I see fit is not a duty I took lightly. I have struggled and struggled, dude. At first, I just picked bands that I listened
to a great deal in my formative years, but, as Zack put it, “They don’t all
hold up now.” So here it is, my list
sans Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Rush, the Stones, even the
Beatles (sacrilege?). I decided to go
with the music that I both love and have a deep, spiritual reverence. I tried to be considerate of others,
especially my wife. I picked some great
albums that some people would not normally listen to voluntarily...(hey, I will
have a captive audience so I could conduct some teaching/indoctrination!) I picked a few albums that I consider
essential to everyone’s collection and these picks happen to hold up like an
adolescent boy would at one of Hugh Hefner’s parties (see track 3 of Chuck
Berry’s set).
The Most Essential CDs For the Preservation of Music
According to Frank Saunders:
1.Neil Young-Live Rust- Neil Young is the greatest guitarist/songwriter ever,
ever.
2.Frank Zappa- Apostrophe/Overnight Sensation-Jazz Fusion Rock with nasty
sometimes sexy satire. Frank was a
genius and he would have been President in my vision of Utopia. “Is that a real
poncho or a Sears poncho?”
3.Captain Beefheart (a.k.a. Don VanVliet)- Shiny Beast- “Tropical Hot Dog Night
like two flamingo’s in a fruit fight.
Everything’s wrong at the same time it’s right.”
4.Uncle Tupelo-Still Feel Gone-Bob Dylan, Hank Williams, Neil Young, Johnny Cash,
and D.Boone(TheMinutemen) beam down from The Starship Enterprise to earth and
their electrons get all irretrievably mixed up and that is Uncle Tupelo. This, to me, is their breakthrough
album. It is also a great break up
record. If you ever need to get through
a breakup, I highly recommend this album.
Uncle Tupelo inspired this alternative country thing we have now.
5.Roky Erickson-You’re Gonna Miss Me-Roky is like an absolutely insane Buddy Holly
with a really hot guitar player filtered through a Black Sabbath
sensibility. ‘If you have ghosts, you
have everything…if you call it, surprise there it is…” Roky reminds me that it is all in ones
perception.
6.Allman Brothers Band-Eat A Peach- Me and Terry Schaeffer were camping out with Lance and
Sam beside a north Georgia river waiting for Panic to play when someone popped
this magical CD in their player. I wish
I could go back and forth to that time as I felt like it. Great soulful rock and slide guitar...how
does a white man sing like that?
7.Hank Williams-40 Greatest Hits- Hank was the first great songwriter in
America. He has influenced me and that
is enough. Haunting ballads and gleeful
waltzes; Hank still is the man. “I love
you baby, but you gotta understand, when the Lord made me, he made a ramblin’ man.”
“Praise the Lord! I saw the light”
8.Chuck Berry- The Best of Chuck Berry-How can you leave out the man that created
rock-n-roll guitar? I can’t. Chuck’s licks and lyrics must be
archived! “My ding a ling, everybody
sing…”
9.Bob Dylan- The Bootleg Series (1961-1991)- I could not decide on one Dylan
album. “Dylan changed everything.” I think Springsteen said that.
10.Steve Earle- I Ain’t Ever Satisfied: The Steve Earle Collection-Country with
brass ones.
(Frank obviously leans toward great songwriters
and creative guitarists, and who could fault any selection here? This also
marks the first time the words “Black Sabbath” and “sensibility” were used in
the same sentence!--Curtis)
Well
class, this has been a highly educational and informative session, especially
since I had to do little but enjoy it...the most interesting thing I’ve found
about this exercise of choosing only ten CDs is that choosing only ten CDs is
virtually impossible...people really perk up when discussing what they would
include...if nothing else, I’ve stimulated some lively conversations! Mucho nachos to Frank Saunders for his
contributions this month, and those of Terry, Vince and Steve.
Ahem...everyone
please rise...at this time, It gives me great pleasure to bestow upon Frank the
title of Associate Professor of Millennium Musicology, Performing Artist
Category. Good luck in the 21st Century!
Next
month, Bill Clinton’s Top Ten, and maybe yours, if you’ll get off your butt and
send your lists to:
Playgrounds Magazine
P.O.Box 8154
Columbus, GA 31908
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