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Older And Weller: Happy Birthday Paul Weller

Happy Belated to the handsome, talented modfather Paul Weller, who turned 51 on May 25.

Weller has had quite a storied career, hitting it big in the UK with The Jam at the age of 19, unleashing a barrage of stunning singles from "In the City" to "The Bitterest Pill" in only five or six years. As with The Kinks, the Jam's Britishness didn't catch fire in the US, but they are justly revered in England as one of their best-ever bands.


After breaking up the band at the height of their popularity in 1983 or so, Weller formed the Style Council, a poppier band that allowed Weller room to stretch his songwriting gifts beyond The Jam's power-trio limitations.


Since the demise of the Style Council, Mr. Weller has delivered a steady stream of strong solo records. One of the best in recent years was 2005's As Is Now, which featured songs that were as strong as any in his career, including the hard-rocking, Jam-like "From the Floorboards Up" and the wistful, Randy Newmanesque "Here's the Good News."


As befits someone of his stature, Weller has also acted as an elder statesman of sorts to younger Britpop artists, collaborating often with Oasis's quarrelsome Gallagher brothers. It was Weller who played the memorable lead guitar on their epic "Champagne Supernova." And here he is dueting with Noel on a wonderful version of Oasis's underrated tune "Talk Tonight."

Cheers, Paul.

Jay Bennett: The Engines Are Idle

Jay Bennett's final album Whatever Happened I Apologize is available as a free download at the music site Rock Proper.

As one might imagine, the record, which sounds like a completely solo affair, is a very poignant listen. While I am unfamiliar with Bennett's solo work, listening to Whatever Happened I Apologize makes clear the sturdy songwriting and musicality he brought to the Wilco table for five albums.

Particularly affecting is "The Engines are Idle." Ostensibly about the end of a relationship it, like these types of songs often do, takes on new meaning in light of Bennett's passing.

In the end I suppose
You sink or you swim
But your chance would be better
If you weren't chained to him
'Cause it's ageless and timeless
But beauty must fade
And it looked so much better
When the picture was made

With its "when all is said and done" vibe, "The Engines are Idle" recalls "Keep Me in Your Heart for Awhile", Warren Zevon's heartbreaking finale from his 2003 farewell record The Wind.

mp3: Jay Bennett, "The Engines are Idle"
Download Whatever Happened I Aplogize here at Rock Proper

Jeff Tweedy & Jay Bennett, "James Alley Blues" 1999

Jay Bennett, R.I.P.

Jay Bennett, formerly of Wilco, was the alt-rock equivalent of Brian Jones: a temperamental cat who could pick up any instrument and play something brilliant on it.

Like Jones, Bennett was fired from the band he loved for personality and power struggle issues and replaced with a hotshot lead guitarist. Tragically, the parallels to Jones continued over the weekend as Bennett was found dead in his Illinois apartment at the age of 45. (The cause of death is currently unknown.)

Bennett, who shared songwriting and production duties with Wilco leader Jeff Tweedy from 1994-2001, played a major role in the band's evolution from their so-called "alt-country" sound towards something more experimental, chaotic and harder to classify.

As this clip from I Am Trying to Break Your Heart, the documentary about the making of Wilco's 2001 masterpiece Yankee Hotel Foxtrot shows, Bennett also bore an uncanny likeness to Phillip Seymour Hoffman.



Bennett was also on board for the creation of two of the greatest slices of Americana ever recorded: Mermaid Avenue, volumes 1 and 2, wherein Wilco and Billy Bragg took unfinished Woody Guthire lyrics and spun them into pure magic, like "California Stars." (That's Bennett on the Telecaster)


Sadly, Bennett, who was in need of hip replacement surgery and did not have adequate health coverage, recently sued Wilco for royalties he believed he was owed for the documentary and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. The case was unsettled, but I guess it's settled now.

But rather than get mired in grief, let us remember the talent and exuberance that Bennett brought to some of the best music made in the last decade or so. R.I.P., Jay.

Happy Birthday Bob Dylan: Time Out of Klein

Last week's Time magazine had a nice column by Joe Klein about birthday boy Bob Dylan. (You can read it here.)

Klein is one of the best political writers out there, but is knowledgable about American music as well. In addition to penning the "anonymous" Bill Clinton expose Primary Colors, Klein also wrote the celebrated biography Woody Guthrie: A Life.

In his column, Klein calls Dylan "the great American artist of the past 50 years, I believe." With the possible exception of Rip Taylor, he's dead on.

Reading such high praise in Time magazine was most unusual, as they have kept their Dylan coverage to a minimum over the years. Unlike Molly Ringwald for example, Dylan has never had a cover story in Time. Newsweek, on the other hand, has had Bob on the cover regularly over the years and has always treated him as a serious artist.

My guess is that Time has never forgiven Dylan for his brutally accurate deconstruction of the magazine in this famous scene with a clueless, pretentious, British-toothed Time journalist from the 1965 documentary Dont Look Back.

When asked "Do you care about what you write?" His Bobness responds, "How can I answer that question when you have the nerve to ask me?":


In his film I'm Not There, Todd Haynes took real quotes from the Time interview and other famous Dylan-press confrontations and brilliantly spun them into this kaleidoscopic scene, with the journalist as "Ballad of a Thin Man"'s Mr. Jones, who knows something's happening but doesn't know what it is.



Perhaps Time has finally let go of their Dylan grudge because Dylan, in the September of his years (he's 68 today), has grown more wistful. As Klein notes, "There is no mistaking that the essential landscape of the old master's life has changed. Police officers, who used to be the objects of rage and ridicule, are now necessary public servants: 'Mr. Policeman, can you help me find my gal?/ Last time I saw her was at the Magnolia Hotel.' Which raises the question: Did she wander off in an Alzheimic haze, or did Bob?"

Happy Birthday, Bob! Hope you keep doing what you're doing for another 68 years.

Let's wrap things up with Bob sticking it to the man in song form. As this amazing clip of "Ballad of a Thin Man" will attest, Cate Blanchett really had her '66 tour Dylan down.

Country Blues Pickin' with Derek & the Dominoes and Johnny Cash

"If you think you hear some country blues pickin' in the song you're about to hear, you're right. Played by one of the finest musical groups in the world, welcome Bobby Whitlock, Jim Gordon, Carl Radle, and Eric Clapton: Derek and the Dominoes."

Derek & the Dominoes: "It's Too Late," "Matchbox" (w/Johnny Cash & Carl Perkins) The Johnny Cash Show, 1969

Who's Old: Happy Birthday Pete Townshend

Happy 64th Birthday (one day late) to Pete Townshend, big-schnozzed genius bandleader, singer, songwriter, guitarist, arranger, librettist, philosopher, pill-popper, drunk, loudmouth and erstwhile guitar smasher with a dubious collection of "research" on his hard drive.

While I am a big fan of The Who's early work, I have always felt that Roger Daltrey was an average singer at best and simply not in the same league talent-wise as Townshend, Entwhistle and Moon. (Who is?) In fact, many of my favorite Who moments are when Townshend, a much more expressive singer than Roger, sings (as in the first two tracks on Tommy) or when Roger's singing is kept to a minimum and the band does their thing, as in this explosive version of "Young Man Blues" from the 1970 Isle of Wight festival.


Had Townshend not been lucky enough to hook up with his amazing rhythm section, he would have made a dandy singer-songwriter type, as the following clips from 1979's Secret Policeman's Ball attest. The Ball was a benefit for Amnesty International, and while the benefit may or may not have freed any prisioners of conscience, Pete's music has freed millions of misfit teens from the torment of adolescent angst.

First up is a solo acoustic Pete-formance of the Quadrophenia track "Drowned." His rhythm guitar playing here is nothing short of astounding. I don't think I've ever heard anyone else play quite like this.


Next, from the same show, is a duet with classical guitarist John Williams on the uber-anthem "Won't Get Fooled Again." Cheers, Pete.

David Bowie: Queen Bitch

"This is the face the public wants... An ex-art student from Brixton whose dad worked from Dr. Vaddardo's Homes, has turned himself into a bizzare, self-constructed freak."

David Bowie: "Queen Bitch" The Old Grey Whistle Test, 1972

Wilco (the Stream)

As has become de rigeur for America's greatest working band, Wilco has made their forthcoming record available for your listening pleasure well ahead of its release date.

You can hear a stream of the cheekily titled Wilco (the Album), due out June 30, here.

In addition to being among the most talented, hardworking and inventive groups on the planet, Wilco is also among the most sensible. The band released the following email to fans today, complete with a plug for their favorite charity and a free screening of their new film:

Well, we made it nearly a month with copies of Wilco (the album) floating around out there before it leaked. Pretty impressive restraint in this day and age. But the inevitable happened last night. Since we know you're curious and probably have better things to do than scour the internet for a download (though we do understand the attraction of the illicit), we've posted a stream of the full album at http://wilcoworld.net/records/thealbum/. Feel free to refer to it as "wilco (the stream)" if you must.

We also have our usual guilt abatement plan for downloaders. If you have downloaded the record, we suggest you make a donation to one of the band's favorite charities, the Inspiration Corporation -- an organization we've supported in the past & who are doing great work in the city of Chicago. Information and donation button here: http://inspirationcorp.org/.

That's all. Enjoy the stream. Tickets for summer shows, etc. http://wilcoworld.net/tours/ Note that we'll be holding a free online midnight screening of the Ashes of American Flags film this Friday night (at both midnight US Central time and again at midnight Pacific). So get the popcorn or whatever together and be sure to log on and tune in on Friday.

Thanks Wilco, for having faith in your fan base. Me, I'm still clinging to the notion of actual "albums" with "release dates" so I may just torture myself and wait it out until June 30. Anyway, here's a dandy performance from The Colbert Report of Wilco (the Album)'s power-poppy lead track: "Wilco (the Song)."

"Wilco (the Song)" The Colbert Report, October 30, 2008

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Exclusive Wilco Song
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Rip Off This Joint

Hard-core Rock Turtleneck fan Dan Cassidy pitched a hot story idea to the RT editorial board: songs that are total rip-offs of the Rolling Stones. We greenlighted it without reading word one. Thanks, DC. Here's Part I. Have an idea for a post? Send an email to rockturtleneck@gmail.com

If “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”, it’s a wonder The Rolling Stones can sit down with all the “flattery” that’s been paid to their rocking, wrinkly posteriors.

Like the Stones themselves, who started out by ripping off Chicago/Delta blues and Chuck Berry, a long list of artists have bellied up to the Stones’ bar and overindulged. But while the Stones also dabbled in country, English folk, disco and funk, the blues riff is their sweet spot.

Keith Richards' crunchy, twisted, open-tuned offerings are the riffs by which all others are measured. In fact, the sheer volume of rhythmic, plate-shifting riffs and hooks is enough to choke a Wild Horse: Satisfaction, Jumping Jack Flash, Street Fighting Man, Happy, Rip This Joint, Rocks Off, Start Me Up, Can’t You Hear Me Knocking, Tumbling Dice, Bitch, Midnight Rambler, All Down The Line, Honky Tonk Women… OK, my wrist is cramping. He can flat out rock, is funky, and knows that not hitting the strings is sometimes as important as hitting them.

Well, it took some luck, more than a little…uh, chemistry, a one-of-a-kind frontman, a solid anchor banging the skins—and Keef, the riff savant, in the stormy center.

So let’s celebrate all that is derivative: great songs done in the style of the mighty Stones, in this case the Black & Blue nugget "Crazy Mama." No crime there. OK, maybe not outright theft, but there were definitely some fingerprints found at the scene.

The Black Crowes: “Jealous Again” (Shake Your Money-Maker, 1990)


"Crazy Mama" meets… "Crazy Mama." This is the first Stonesy riff we heard when the world met The Black Crowes — and it wouldn’t be the last. This, unfortunately, would be the Crowes’ high point. Soon after, they lost what little creative direction they had, and the Brothers Robinson's relationship devolved into a reality show worthy of the Brothers Davies.

"Jealous Again" is where their Keef fixation crossed paths with their affinity for another 60’s great, Rod Stewart, whose 1978 smash "Hot Legs" also borrowed liberally from "Crazy Mama."


OK boys, show 'em how it's done:

Happy Birthday Bono Vox: The Devil You Know

Happy 49th birthday to Paul Hewson, aka Bono aka MacPhisto, born in Dublin on May 10, 1960.

After getting into U2's new No Line on the Horizon for a while, I've found myself going back to 1993's Zooropa, the band's most underrated record. Unlike almost all of their other records, which are assembled with painstaking care, Zooropa was more or less done on the fly, so to speak, written and recorded on days off during their massive two-year Zoo TV tour in support of Achtung Baby. Sometimes the band would fly back to Dublin after a European show, and head straight into the studio to work on it overnight and fly off in the morning to do another gig. That's a sturdy Irish work ethic for you.


Zooropa and the Zoo TV tour embraced the ideas of media overload, irony, rock star excess, religion, worship of technology, salesmanship and hucksterism in their many unsavory forms. These so-called values were embodied by a character Bono created for the tour known as MacPhisto, a modern-day devil-as-lounge lizard. A curious amalgam of Lucifer, Pagliacci, 70s Elvis, Norma Desmond, Peter O' Toole, Salman Rushdie and Jack Nicholson's Joker.

As Wikipedia notes, "he spoke with an exaggerated upper-class English accent, not unlike that of a down-on-his-luck character actor." Said Bono: "We came up with a sort of old English Devil, a pop star long past his prime returning regularly from sessions on The Strip in Vegas and regaling anyone who would listen to him at cocktail hour with stories from the good old, bad old days."

The MacPhisto character was used to great effect in their Bowiesque live spectacles, as seen in the clips below of two of Zooropa's best tunes "Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car" and "Lemon." The show can be seen in its entirety on the excellent DVD Zoo TV Live from Sydney.





Happy Birthday, you ol' devil you.

Jenny Lewis: Pretty Bird

Jenny Lewis’ Acid Tongue was Rock Turtleneck’s favorite album of 2008 and it’s still delivering the goods well into 2009.

Ms. Lewis, who also fronts the L.A. band Rilo Kiley and made a much-heralded record with the Watson Twins, is a major talent with a soaring voice and irresistible energy. Acid Tongue is a tour de force of classic-country barnstormers, Bible Belt shouters, Laurel Canyon-style ballads and good old fashioned pop singing and songwriting you would be forgiven for thinking didn’t exist anymore. That it is not a million-seller is a major mystery and a minor travesty.

On Cinco de Mayo, the jumpsuit-loving redhead performed a muy caliente version of “See Fernando” on The Craig Ferguson Show.


Jenny also recently made a memorable appearance on Elvis Costello’s Spectacle show on the Sundance Channel. Elvis has been a Jenny Lewis champion for several years now and duets with her on Acid Tongue’s “Carpetbaggers.” Here they are, along with fellow sweet-voiced hottie Zooey Deschanel.


Spectacle viewers were also treated to a haunting version of the Acid Tongue ballad “Pretty Bird” which, she explains to EC, was inspired by a story she read about a rape on an Indian Reservation. To think, all this time, I thought it was about a pretty bird.

Bob Dylan's "Isis" on the Fifth Day of May in the Drizzlin' Rain

I married Isis on the fifth day of May,
But I could not hold on to her very long.
So I cut off my hair and I rode straight away
For the wild unknown country where I could not go wrong.

I came to a high place of darkness and light.
The dividing line ran through the center of town.
I hitched up my pony to a post on the right,
Went in to a laundry to wash my clothes down.

A man in the corner approached me for a match.
I knew right away he was not ordinary.
He said, "Are you lookin' for somethin' easy to catch?"
I said, "I got no money." He said, "That ain't necessary."


I was thinkin' about turquoise, I was thinkin' about gold,
I was thinkin' about diamonds and the world's biggest necklace.
As we rode through the canyons, through the devilish cold,
I was thinkin' about Isis, how she thought I was so reckless.

How she told me that one day we would meet up again,
And things would be different the next time we wed,
If I only could hang on and just be her friend.
I still can't remember all the best things she said.


The wind it was howlin' and the snow was outrageous.
We chopped through the night and we chopped through the dawn.
When he died I was hopin' that it wasn't contagious,
But I made up my mind that I had to go on.

I picked up his body and I dragged him inside,
Threw him down in the hole and I put back the cover.
I said a quick prayer and I felt satisfied.
Then I rode back to find Isis just to tell her I love her.


She said, "Where ya been?" I said, "No place special."
She said, "You look different." I said, "Well, I guess."
She said, "You been gone." I said, "That's only natural."
She said, "You gonna stay?" I said, "If you want me too, yes."

Isis, oh, Isis, you mystical child.
What drives me to you is what drives me insane.
I still can remember the way that you smiled
On the fifth day of May in the drizzlin' rain.



© 1975 Bob Dylan & Jacques Levy
This one's for Leonard, if he's still here

H-A-P-P-Y B-D-A-Y T-A-M-M-Y

Happy Birthday a day early to the late Miss Tammy Wynette, born May 5 in the year... well, a lady never reveals her age.

Tammy is most famous for her 1968 hits "Stand by Your Man" and "D-I-V-O-R-C-E," one of the cleverest, most poignant country songs of all time. "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" never goes into the causes of the breakup in question (the smart money would guess it has somethin' to do with drinkin' or cheatin'), only the couple's efforts to sheild it from their four year-old son, who is quite a little man:

Our little boy is four years old and quite a little man
So we spell out the words we don't want him to understand
Like T-O-Y or maybe S-U-R-P-R-I-S-E
But the words we're hiding from him now
Tear the heart right out of me-

Our D-I-V-O-R-C-E becomes final today
Me and little J-O-E will be goin' away
I love you both and it will be pure H-E double L for me
Oh, I wish that we could stop this D-I-V-O-R-C-E

Watch him smile, he thinks it Christmas
Or his 5th Birthay
And he thinks C-U-S-O-T-D-Y spells fun or play
I spell out all the hurtin' words
And turn my head when I speak
'Cause I can't spell a way this hurt
That's drippin' down my cheek-

Our D-I-V-O-R-C-E becomes final today
Me and little J-O-E will be goin' away
I love you both and it will be pure H-E double-L for me
Oh, I wish that we could stop this D-I-V-O-R-C-E

Here's Tammy doing "D-I-V-O-R-C-E," something she would experience in the 1970s with the dissolution of her marriage to fellow country legend George Jones.


But rather than focus on divorce, let us end on wedding, namely "The Wedding," a rather campy George-Tammy duet from '68.


And here's "Stand by Your Man"

The Serge is Working

Today I am missing the Mrs. in a big way as she is on a long-planned trip to Paris with her mother, sister and sister-in-law. But self-pity isn’t part of the Rock Turtleneck lexicon. Here we’re all about the music.

And when I think of French pop music, two words spring immediately to mind: Serge Gainsbourg.

Gainbourg was a real-life French Austin Powers. With ears the size of a baby elephant, a lazy eye and horrible teeth, he nonetheless had an awe-inspiring power to bed some of the world’s most beautiful women, including Brigitte Bardot and Jane Birkin (seen, and I mean seen, below).

Much of his chick-magnet abilities lay in his talent as a genuine pop visionary. He invented a super-sexy, sensuous, erotic brand of lounge bistro disco, that has held up surprisingly well and has influenced U2, R.E.M., Beck and fellow French pop stars Air. He's like Burt Bacharach with a baguette.

My favorite Gainsbourg track is 1968s “Bonnie and Clyde” an inexplicable, irresistable duet with Bardot that's an ode to the famous lovers/bankrobbers and, more significantly, the sheer fabulousness of Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, who played Bonnie & Clyde in the briliant film from the same time. You can find the track, and many other musical bon-bons on the fine Serge compilation Comic Strip.


The most notorious shot in Serge's canon is is "Je T'aime... Moi Non Plus" (also on Comic Strip), a slice of erotica that was so scandalous due to Birkin's cooing sighs of pleasure that the Vatican weighed in, calling it immoral. What more recommendation do you need?