March 2024 Rock/Pop Record Reviews

John Prine: John Prine
APA/Atlantic 004-45 (2 180gm, 45rpm LPs). 1971/2023. Arif Mardin, prod.; Stan Kesler, eng.; Dale Smith, asst. eng.
Performance *****
Sonics ****½

Judged by none apart from Bob Dylan to be "Pure Proustian existentialism, Midwestern mindtrips to the nth diploma," the late, nice Prine’s enduring debut stays a landmark of musical Americana and one of many most interesting collections of authentic people songs in widespread music. Fresh from the Chicago people scene, the place he befriended Steve Goodman, who performs on two of the tracks, Prine’s tales are stuffed with unforgettable characters: the damaged junkie in "Sam Stone"; the philosophical "topless woman" of "Spanish Pipedream"; the growing older couple in "Hello in There" and their touching want for kindness. Prine was professional at mixing humor and unhappiness. This marvelous album will without end be his masterpiece.

While the standard of the fabric is remarkably constant, two tracks stand out. "Paradise," with Goodman on concord vocals, is a finely etched portrait of Prine’s childhood. "Angel from Montgomery," informed from a lady’s viewpoint, has a fascinating melody and evocative lyrics that Prine by no means bested: "If desires had been lightning/And thunder had been need/This outdated home would’ve burned down/A very long time in the past." "Paradise" was recorded in New York City, however the remainder was recorded, at Atlantic’s insistence, at Chips Moman’s American Sound Studio in Memphis. Thrown off at first by the simplicity of Prine’s preparations, American’s funky studio gamers like guitarist Reggie Young, pianist Bobby Wood, and drummer Gene Chrismanall of whom performed on the studio simply two years earlier than on Elvis Presley’s career-changing Memphis periodsfinally locked on to Prine’s religious universe.

While his voice might be an acquired style, this hotter, fuller 45rpm reduce provides it a contact of additional resonance. Instrumental particulars, just like the pedal metal in "Illegal Smile," have by no means been extra distinguished. This is a 45rpm audiophile reduce that is a transparent audible enchancment over the unique.Robert Baird

Bob Dylan: The Complete Budokan 1978
Sony Music SCIP 6540-3 (4 CDs). 2023. Heckel Sugano, Tetsuya Shiroki, prods.; Tom Suzuki, remix eng.; Akihito Yoshikawa, remaster eng.; Yuta Yoneyama, asst. eng.
Performance ****
Sonics ****

Over the years, rearranging and reorchestrating his songs has develop into the sport Bob Dylan likes to play. When his two-LP set Bob Dylan at Budokan, his third reside album in 5 years, was launched in 1978, two years after his Rolling Thunder Revue tour had concluded, the response was very blended, because of the radically totally different association decisions. Originally a mixture of tracks from two nights, February 28 and March 1, 1978, this new reissue accommodates each reveals of their entirety. Remixed and remastered from the unique 24-track tapes, The Complete Budokan 1978 now accommodates 36 beforehand unreleased performances.

The sound is way improved; there is not any doubt that the recent combine brings a brand new, interesting power to a few of these songs.

Bob is in reimagining mode all through. Some of the adjustments, as within the February 28 model of "Simple Twist of Fate," do really feel arbitrary and with out a musical justificationsimply Bob being mischievous and doing it as a result of he can. Most jarring of all are the all-instrumental variations of "A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall," which have been E Street Bandized with electrical guitar, a number of organ, fiddle solos, and passages the place the high-hat cymbals go into disco mode.

On the opposite hand, a clean, fantastically paced model of "Just Like a Woman," from the March 1 set, with Dylan including a harmonica solo, is highly effective.

When they work, these adjustments add a bounciness and accessibility that he and his music are sometimes justifiably accused of missing.

The saving grace of your complete bundle is his voice, which has by no means been higher. And a lot to his credit score, he avoids the entice, inherent in lots of reside albums, of replicating the better-known studio variations. Eternally controversial, however now much more important for Dylan followers.Robert Baird

Jimi Hendrix Experience: Jimi Hendrix Experience: Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967
Legacy Recordings (auditioned as LP). 2023. Janie Hendrix, Eddie Kramer, John McDermott (Experience Hendrix, L.L.C.), prods.
Performance *****
Sonics ****

It took solely 9 dates as The Monkees’ opening act for the Jimi Hendrix Experience to understand that the teenage audiences coming to these reveals weren’t going to assist them leverage the success they’d simply earned taking part in all through Great Britain. They dropped off the tour and shortly scrambled to search out new dates. John Phillips of The Mamas & The Papas stepped up and saved the day by inviting The Experience to open for his group on the Hollywood Bowl. Now an album documenting that occasion has been launched, Jimi Hendrix Experience: Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967.

It’s the primary official launch of a present that followers and collectors have been ready a very long time to personal. The two-track tape was restored by long-time Hendrix producer Eddie Kramer, and it sounds excellent.

The live performance opens with an explosive rendition of The Beatles’ "Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band," a music and album launched only some months earlier. It was a daring method for the band to introduce itselfan act so not too long ago added to the invoice that it did not even seem on most ticketsto an American viewers.

The nine-song, 45-minute set consists of fiery renditions of songs like "Foxy Lady" and "Fire" that might assist outline their signature sound. There are additionally covers of "Like A Rolling Stone" and "Wild Thing" that current preparations that always rival the originals. There’s just one outright jam, the band’s blistering eight-minute cowl of Muddy Waters’s "Catfish Blues."

Mastery of the guitar sits on the heart of those songs, as you’d anticipate, and on Howlin’ Wolf ‘s "Killing Floor," the set’s second monitor, Hendrix reimagines the blues by means of a psychedelic lens and units in movement an American guitar renaissance that has by no means been matched.Ray Chelstowski

The Johnny Winter Story (The GRT/Janus Recordings)
Omnivore Records (auditioned as CD). 2023. Cheryl Pawelski, prod.; Michael Graves, eng.
Performance *****
Sonics *****

In 1969, when Columbia Records launched Johnny Winter to the world as "the subsequent Jimi Hendrix," they gave him probably the most important advance anybody had ever acquired and supported the funding with a superb quantity of promotion. GRT after which Janus Records responded by releasing compilations of fabric he recorded over a number of periods in Houston when he was a studio participant. Now Omnivore Recordings has packaged them as an entire set: The Johnny Winter Story (The GRT/Janus Recordings). It’s the first-ever assortment with all the tracks, 33 whole, from compilation albums The Johnny Winter Story (1969), About Blues (1969), and Early Times (1970).

Recorded in a number of periods all through Houston, these songs current a unique performer than the one who arrived at Woodstock. This artist is extra refined, with songs absolutely orchestrated, usually with nightclub-slick preparations and a voice centered extra on nuance and delivering an genuine sense of soul than the full-throated blues belting he’d develop into identified for.

At instances, it is unattainable to fathom how these vocals and the exceptional pace and precision he delivered to his guitar taking part in may have been so absolutely developed at such a younger age. The songs have been remastered, and there is a sound readability to be discovered right here that balances the classic footing of the writing with a crispness and separation that makes this one in every of Winter’s most compelling releases ever. Pay shut consideration to songs like "Gangster of Love" and "Kind Hearted Woman," the place the essence of who he would develop into as an artist begins to be revealed. But then dig in deep to instrumentals like "Harlem Nocturne" and "Take a Chance on My Love." There the jazz chops he hardly ever revealed current an artist whose vary was by no means fairly absolutely explored.Ray Chelstowski

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March 7, 2024 at 05:00PM