Petra Haden versus The Who

1967 was the large yr of psychedelia. It wasn’t nearly LSD, the summer season of affection, colourful fantasy outfits, sitar sounds and barely rapturous melodies. Psychedelia additionally meant: sound collage and Gesamtkunstwerk.

1967 was the large yr for early idea albums. It noticed the discharge of Sgt. Peppers by the Beatles and Frank Zappa’s Absolutely Free – albums that integrated sound snippets, noise experiments, snippets of dialog, ironic distortions, musical montages and music-historical quotations – a combination that was supposed to recommend one thing like an “aesthetic context”. Because that was the thought behind the idea album: the entire is greater than its components. And the idea album doesn’t have to inform a narrative, it doesn’t should be stringent – extra like a form of occurring. Psychedelic, in different phrases.

The British band The Who additionally deliberate an idea album in 1967. It was their administration who got here up with the thought of suggesting a radio program as an “aesthetic context”, i.e. placing station jingles and commercials between the music tracks. This wasn’t a nasty match, as The Who had been already incomes some cash on the aspect by producing commercials. In addition, the British pirate radio stations to which rock music owed a lot had simply been banned in the summertime of 1967 (the BBC hardly performed any present songs on the time). So the brand new Who album grew to become a declaration of affection to “Wonderful London Radio”, the legendary pirate radio station that had been pressured to stop operations on August 14, 1967. Between the songs on the album (probably the most well-known: “I Can See For Miles”), you possibly can hear genuine WLR station jingles (with horns and strings and many others.) in addition to some (largely pretend) commercials, which the band had lots of enjoyable making: “What’s for tea? Heinz’ baked beans!”

But there’s extra: on The Who Sell Out, the boundaries between the music and the fictional commercials grow to be blurred – as a result of a few of the songs themselves comprise model promoting. “Odorono”, for instance, is a few singer who doesn’t fairly hit it off along with her supervisor: “Her deodorant had let her down / She ought to have used Odorono”. And “Medac” is a few younger man for whom no zits treatment appears to assist: “Then, when nearly to crack / He discovered one other cream, Medac”. Other merchandise marketed on the album embrace Premier Drums, Rotosound Strings and Charles Atlas (the primary bodybuilding course). The digitally remastered 1995 model of the album additionally options Coca-Cola, Top Gear, Bag O’Nails and John Mason’s Cars – in addition to a music concerning the Jaguar automobile model. Of course, that is all finished with lots of irony and is supposed as a humorous criticism of consumerism. However, the businesses involved didn’t discover it humorous in any respect and took the band to court docket a number of instances.

In any case, the theme for The Who’s album cowl was clear: promoting out. We see Pete Townshend with an outsized deodorant and Roger Daltrey in a complete bathtub filled with baked beans. (On the again cowl, Keith Moon smears himself with the zits treatment, and John Entwistle poses as “Charles Atlas” in a leopard pores and skin along with a blonde in a leopard bikini). The format, the photographs and the witty texts beneath are commercial parodies. Incidentally, the photographer was David Montgomery, one of the well-known American superstar photographers. Roger Daltrey is alleged to have complained, nonetheless, as a result of he needed to sit within the bathtub for ages for the picture and caught a nasty chilly within the course of. Heinz’s beans apparently got here from the fridge and had been “ice chilly”.

The radio and promoting concept and the band’s humor made The Who Sell Out probably the greatest idea albums in rock historical past. Mike Watt, the chief of the Californian punk band Minutemen, was additionally an enormous fan of the album as a young person. “It was a report that advised us: a band can do no matter they need and nonetheless sound like themselves.” When Watt met the singer Petra Haden, he had the loopy concept of desirous to expertise the Who album in a brand new approach. He had an eight-track cassette recorder on the time and recorded the unique album on a single tape observe. He then requested Petra to easily sing alongside on the second observe – after which add extra voices on tracks 3 to eight. The outcome was one of the unimaginable a cappella albums in music historical past: Petra Haden sings all the Who album – together with the harmonies, rhythms and commercials. Petra Haden is the daughter of jazz bassist Charlie Haden – who was additionally a fearless artist.

The album cowl of Petra Haden Sings: The Who Sell Out is an ingenious homage to the album cowl of The Who.

The photographs had been taken by Alicia J. Rose, who additionally works with Haden as a musician and video artist. The texts below the photographs are additionally nice enjoyable: “Petra faces the music under-armed with Odorono, the all-day deodorant that turns perspiration into inspiration.” Pete Townshend, the boss of The Who, expressed his enthusiasm for Haden’s album: “I used to be a bit of ashamed that I favored my very own music a lot right here – in a approach, it was like listening to it for the primary time.” Incidentally, Petra Haden was additionally capable of carry out her a cappella model stay in 2005 – with a ladies’s choir.

The Who Sell Out (Decca, 1967)
Petra Haden Sings: The Who Sell Out (Bar None, 2005)

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March 27, 2024 at 11:11AM