Enjoy and have a great summer!
LamanRichardsMH2Blog
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Phil Spector; The man and his music
After his mother moved the family from New York to Los Angeles in the 1950’s to get
a fresh start on life after Phil’s father committed suicide Phil found his love
for music, and while in high school he found two friends with whom to make his
dreams come true, The group called themselves The Teddy Bears. They recorded a
song called "Don't You Worry My Little Pet" that landed a four song
contract with a small label and the B-side "To Know Him Is To Love
Him," hit #1 on the charts. After the break up of The Teddy Bears and some
solo failures Phil made a name for himself as a successful producer after a
string of hit records.
He
built his reputation on his Wall of Sound at Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles by
recording guitars, bass, strings and brass and feeding them through an echo
chamber and then recording that entire echo back to tape. From 1961 through
1965 he was the producer of choice in the Rock scene. He produced Tina Turner’s
"River Deep - Mountain High," but it was another failure that sent
him into seclusion until his work with John Lennon and George Harrison on
several hits he got his mojo back.
Phil
had a love for guns from an early age after being accosted in a men’s room by
some street thugs who urinated on him he started carrying a gun to defend
himself against further attacks. He was known to be violent towards women and
had a nasty temper and found himself on the wrong side of the law in 2003 with
the murder of Lana Clarkson. Phil Spector created some amazing hits,
which go down in the annals of Rock music. His achievements in the studio made
him a pioneer
of the girl group sound of the 1960’s that garnered him with over 25 top 40
hits with girl groups The Ronetts and The Crystals.
As a music professional his studio techniques are to be
marveled and emulated, his music brought joy to many and sadness to some. I
will always remember the songs by The Crystals and The Ronettes
that I grew up listening to as a young boy and to this day still find the
melodies in my memory banks.
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Brian Eno
Brian Eno who has a very long name, Brian
Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno, known professionally as
Brian Eno and sometimes as just plain Eno, is a composer, record producer,
singer, musician, and a visual artist better known as the Godfather of ambient
music was born on the 15 of May, 1948 in Woodbridge, England. He’s produced
some of the most famous music artist on this planet, and used every piece of
technology available.
His music and the
technology he used had a major impact on the electronic music and the many
legends that he produced, he said “once upon a time a violin was
technology, once upon a time an organ was technology” and the people who built
and created them were “working at the cutting edge of the technologies of their
time”. For Brian he had a building block approach to making music and this made
for great dance music.
Brian was greatly
influenced by African music and saw his music as “unlock music” meaning a lot of things
drift separately and we listen to the results. Brian coined the phase ambient
music after a near fatal accident while recovering. He had what is called a
minimalist sensibility and his sound processing technique created an amazing
album that he collaborated on with guitarist Robert Fripp called “No
Pussyfooting”, according to David N. Howard’s book Sonic Alchemy his pioneering
utilization of studio-facilitated tape-looping and sampling techniques became
widely used in hip-hop and electronica, this helped him to see the studio as a
place to change music instead of reproducing it.
For me as a professional learning from his innovations and studio tricks
I have found more ammunition for my musical toolbox, ideas that I can find
useful in creating my musical productions and as a listener I have learned to
appreciate this genre of music.
Kraftwerk
It was during the German krautrock music scene of the late '60s
that two young men, Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider who had met while studying classical music
at the Dusseldorf Conservatory, started
their collaboration as the group known as
Organisation and so began their quest to change the
music scene and create a different type of music that was unlike anything at
the time. They released their
first and only album in August 1970 titled “Tone Float”, after
that they took the name Kraftwerk meaning
“Power Plant” and released their self-titled album that same year with its
pop-art imagery in the straight-faced manner of a Duchamp or Warhol. Their sound was pretty revolutionary for its time, and
their imagery was shrouded in mystery, they made a big impact across the many
genres of modern popular music. They had many changes in band members until they added
After the release of Ralf and Florian
in1973
Klaus Roeder and Wolfgang Flür joined the band, between
1974-1981 Kraftwerk released five albums recorded at their studio Kling Klang
name after a song from Kraftwerk 2 album. The first of which found immediate
success and reached #5 on the charts in the US was Autobahn about
a journey on the German–Austrian superhighway, this was followed by Radio-Activity in 1975 about radioactivity and the other half about activity on
the radio and Trans Europe Express about celebrating Europe in mid 1976 which
became a big “Disco” hit. In 1981 they released The Man-Machine
with it chart topping single “The Model” that builds on Trans Europe Express. Computer world released in May 1981 with it
themes of the rise of computers in modern society and its release of the track
“Computer Love and “The Model” as double A side 12” single made the #1 on the
UK charts.
The band use various electronic
instruments to create their signature sound, and their use of the vocoder helped make great
strides in popular Rock music, and inspired such musicians as David Bowie and
Brian Eno. The band had a visual appeal with its pop-art imagery added to their
instrumental music; they would dress up in mannequin outfits that gave them that
robotic look to match their compositions, Kraftwerk’s albums had that
Conceptualistic image and their multi-lingual lyrical themes made them
a hit on both sides of the Atlantic.
As a listener Kraftwerk’s works have always inspired me I am big on
the disco movement and their production inspired many funk group of the
70’s with their use of the
vocoder, and as a professional their production is very useful to me for use in
my production toolbox.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Marvin Gaye Podcast
In this post is a podcast of Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" Album.
I hope you enjoy it....
Friday, June 8, 2012
Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On
It was a time of upheavals
and unrest, the war in Vietnam Race Riots, and the Anti war movement in the US
and the music was changing from love songs to protest songs. In the mist of all
this chaos came Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going
On” a concept album that Marvin produced with the help of some great
songwriters and arrangers.
Before recording “What’s Going
On” Marvin fashioned himself as a “Sinatra-styled balladeer” determined
not to conform, and his work with various producers in the early 60’s made him
a solo star in the Motown machine. The many jewels in the Motown crown were his
hit songs with Smokey Robinson’s production of ”Ain’t That Peculiar,”
and “I’ll Be Doggone”,
Holland-Dozier-Holland’s ”How Sweet It Is,” and “Can I Get A Witness” pushed
him to the top of the charts, he also had great success as a duet partner with
Tami Terrell. He greatest success as a solo artist came when he teamed up with
Norman Whitfield with songs like “I Heard It Through The Grapevine”, “That’s the Way Love Is” and “Too Busy Thinking About My
Baby” Marvin’s star climbed the charts.
There was a song “What’s Going
On” written by Renaldo "Obie" Benson of the Four Tops and lyricist
Al Cleveland that addressed the issues of the day. This song was first offered
to The Four Tops who turned it down, and with Marvin’s rebellious nature and
being a spiritual guy they had a match for the song. Marvin
broadened his vision after Benson and Cleveland dropped the song on him and
decided what his next project would be. After hearing the horrors that his
younger brother faced in the war and how his reward for sacrificing for his
country was no jobs, and being hated for fighting the war, and his sorrow for
the loss of Tami Terrell and his artistic frustrations and the social climate
would help his project.
As far as
Motown was concerned this album would ruin Marvin’s career and put a blight on
Motown because of its protest nature and Barry Gordy was having none of it
after all Marvin was their “hottest artist,
the sex symbol of the '60s and '70s” and Marvin changing his appearance by
growing a beard and the wearing of jeans would do more harm to Motown’s clean
cut image. Barry Gordy said of the song "the worst thing I've
ever heard in my life". Because of Gordy’s reaction to the song Marvin
issued his ultimatum that when Gordy released “What’s
Going On” Marvin would not record anything
for Motown. Finally in January 1971 without Gordy’s knowledge “What’s Going On” was
released, Barry Gordy hit the roof when he found out because he hated the song,
after the first days sales of 100,000 Barry’s attitude changed. “What’s Going On” made it to the #2 spot on the Pop
charts and #3 on the R&B charts.
The album “What’s Going On”
impressed me, it was a anthem back in the
day and in the community we played it all the time. I am moved by the
production and the vocal arrangements on this album.
The Velvet Underground & Nico
In the history of Rock Music The Velvet
Underground & Nico are considered to be one of the most influential bands
ever, their first album The Velvet Underground & Nico was recorded in 1966 and released in
1967. The album was produced by Andy Warhol whose his banana art design was
used for the cover, and even though Andy Warhol had no musical background his
pop-art attitude would propel the group to the top of Rock ‘n’ roll world.
It was Andy Warhol who introduced Nico to
the group that consisted of Lou Reed, Sterling Morrison on guitars, John Cale,
Maclise on drums who was later replaced by Maureen Tucker their music became a
sonic confrontation, and Cale proclaimed that the group wanted to annoy people.
The music of The Velvet Underground & Nico had plenty guitar feedback,
unyielding percussions, and Cale’s contribution on the Viola, Bass, and Piano
gave the band their signature sound. Combined with music and art they became the first-ever 'alternative' band.
According to Anthony Carew’s About.com article on Alternative music The
Velvet Underground & Nico were a group with lots of moving parts from the
tuneless moans of Nico and John Cale’s piano riffs to the sound of Indian Raga,
and the guitars weaving in and out of the songs they weaved together their experimental music.
They considered their sound to be much different than that of the West Coast
with its “drugged-up suburban kids” thinking they will be saved by using
hallucinogenic and psychedelics drugs.
After their first album’s disappointing sales
their relationship with Andy Warhol fell apart and the band fired Warhol and
said goodbye to Nico and recorded their second album with Tom Wilson as their
producer. The band was plagued by personal upheaval and financial struggle and
soon would disband.
I found this album very hard to listen to
with the music going in all directions it was hard for me to stay focus on the
beat, and made me feel like I was tripping. Some of the songs on this album
were tolerable, but mostly I had a hard time focusing while listening.
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