Category: 2010’s

Ray Davies and Alex Chilton – Till The End of the Day

I didn’t know they ever did anything together and to find this was special. Two of my favorite performers coming together. Ray of course from one of my favorite bands of all time and Alex Chilton from another band I admire, Big Star.

Ray had an album in 2010 called See My Friends, a 2010 album featuring versions of classic Kinks’ songs recorded with Alex Chilton, Black Francis, Lucinda Williams, Bruce Springsteen, Metallica and many others.

This song was recorded a year before Alex died. They were neighbors in New Orleans and Alex would bring beer over to Ray’s house although Alex didn’t drink. Alex and Big Star were huge fans of The Kinks.

Ray Davies:

“Way back in 2004 I was in New Orleans, recovering from an injury, and I was befriended by a neighbor called Alex Chilton. Alex had been in a band called Big Star, and had sung on a record called ‘The Letter’ by The Box Tops. We didn’t talk about music much, but he did say to me before I came back to England, ‘You know, I’ve recorded one of your songs, ‘Till the End of the Day’, with Big Star, and I’d love to do another song with you. And he asked me to write some songs for him – I felt really flattered, because by then I had found out about his history. A very unassuming guy.”

“In 2009, on July 4th, Independence Day, he came up to Konk Studios. He was a real character – he was wearing a New Orleans beret, he had a cigarette holder – he was a chain smoker, and I think a recovering drinker – and he said, ‘Let’s do it!’ I said, ‘What would you like to do?’ He said, ‘‘Til The End Of The Day’ and ‘Set Me Free’. So I just had an acoustic guitar and a rhythm box, because I hadn’t organized anything. I played guitar and Alex sang. We did five or six takes and comped it together. “

I cannot find Set Me Free but here is a short clip of Ray talking about Alex.

…

My love of GODZILLA

No this is not a review of the new movie…just memories from a Godzilla fan. I will say though that I did enjoy the movie…The fight scenes are the best I’ve scene through this monster universe reboot…I felt like I was 10 again.

When I was a kid I loved monster movies. Huge monsters stomping through cities. My monster was and still is Godzilla. I watched all of those Japanese movies of the sixties and seventies and loved them. I will still watch one every once in a while. When I was around 11 I bought a monster book while on vacation in Florida. I took it to school and some jerk stole it. I would love to have that book back…so if you are out there…come on…give me the book back!

Godzilla Has A Bunch Of Ridiculous Movies That Actually Make King Of The Monsters Look Sane - CINEMABLEND

My best friend growing up was named Ronald…he was and still is a huge Elvis fan and I am a huge Beatles fan (we both liked older music) and we would have good natured arguments over who was better. I still think I’m right!

Ok back to Monsters he was a Kong fan and Godzilla was my guy…another argument we would gladly have. After he sees the new movie we will probably have it again.

Godzilla Vs Kong Review | Movie - Empire

In 1998 a new Godzilla was in the theaters. I was so excited… normally I’m not a big fan of CGI BUT… with monster movies…oh yes! I could not believe what they did to my Godzilla…they made him a large sidewalk lizard. They changed his looks and sound. I didn’t think they would ever come out with anything again. At the time I did get some of the recent Japanese Godzilla movies and they were good.

1998

why is zilla 1998 so bad? - Godzilla Forum

In 2014 the movie Godzilla came out and I felt like a kid again. This was the Godzilla (minus the man in the suit) that I loved as a child…

We all know Kong connects with people and that is a great thing but Godzilla is just so cool with his atomic breath and dorsal plates. Godzilla looks at people like ants but as long as we don’t attack him…he is cool with us…except if you own tall buildings on the coast! If you do you better get a lot of insurance.

┐(◕﹏◕)┌

Here is Godzilla through the years.

The Cure with James McCartney – Hello, Goodbye

I was surfing youtube and found this odd combination of The Cure and Paul’s son James McCartney doing Hello, Goodbye. This song was on the album The Art of McCartney released in 2014. A tribute to Paul… I included the tracklist at the bottom and a couple of other songs. There were some interesting combinations. 

James McCartney Celebrates His Dad…With The Cure

Hello, Goodbye

You say yes, I say no
You say stop and I say go go go, oh no
You say goodbye and I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello

I say high, you say low
You say why and I say I don’t know, oh no
You say goodbye and I say hello
(Hello goodbye hello goodbye) Hello hello
(Hello goodbye) I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello
(Hello goodbye hello goodbye) Hello hello
(Hello goodbye) I don’t know why you say goodbye
(Hello goodbye) I say hello/goodbye

Why why why why why why do you say goodbye goodbye, oh no?

You say goodbye and I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello

You say yes (I say yes) I say no (But I may mean no)
You say stop (I can stay) and I say go go go (Till it’s time to go), oh
Oh no
You say goodbye and I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello
Hello hello
I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello hello

Hela heba helloa
Hela heba helloa, cha cha cha
Hela heba helloa, wooo
Hela heba helloa, hela
Hela heba helloa, cha cha cha
Hela heba helloa, wooo
Hela heba helloa, cha cah cah [fade out]

 

The Tracklist

01 Billy Joel – “Maybe I’m Amazed”
02 Bob Dylan – “Things We Said Today”
03 Heart – “Band On The Run”
04 Steve Miller – “Junior’s Farm”
05 Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens) – “The Long and Winding Road”
06 Harry Connick, Jr. – “My Love”
07 Brian Wilson – “Wanderlust”
08 Corrine Bailey Rae – “Bluebird”
09 Willie Nelson – “Yesterday”
10 Jeff Lynne – “Junk”
11 Barry Gibb – “When I’m 64″
12 Jamie Cullum – “Every Night”
13 KISS – “Venus And Mars / Rock Show”
14 Paul Rodgers – “Let Me Roll It”
15 Roger Daltrey – “Helter Skelter”
16 Def Leppard – “Helen Wheels”
17 The Cure – “Hello Goodbye” (Feat. James McCartney)
18 Billy Joel – “Live And Let Die”
19 Chrissie Hynde – “Let It Be”
20 Robin Zander & Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick – “Jet”
21 Joe Elliott – “Hi Hi Hi”
22 Heart – “Letting Go”
23 Steve Miller – “Hey Jude”
24 Owl City – “Listen To What The Man Said”
25 Perry Farrell – “Got To Get You Into My Life”
26 Dion – “Drive My Car”
27 Allen Toussaint – “Lady Madonna”
28 Dr. John – “Let ‘Em In”
29 Smokey Robinson – “So Bad”
30 Airborne Toxic Event – “No More Lonely Nights”
31 Alice Cooper – “Eleanor Rigby”
32 Toots Hibbert with Sly & Robbie – “Come And Get It”
33 B.B. King – “On The Way”
34 Sammy Hagar – “Birthday”

Famous Rock Guitars Part 3

Now we continue our quest of famous guitars and the artists cherish them… Here was Part 1  and Part 2.

Bruce Springsteen and  Neil Young’s guitars

Bruce Springsteen’s Guitar

Bruce has stuck with this guitar from the first album until now. You see this guitar on his Born to Run album. When I saw him in 2000 he was playing it. Bruce bought this in 1972 in Phil Petillo’s Neptune New Jersey guitar shop for $185. Now the guitar  is said to be worth between $1 million and $5 million…pretty good investment Bruce!

The guitar is a composite assembled from parts from at least two other Fender guitars. The bolt-on neck dates from a 1950s Fender Esquire guitar. The Esquire decal on the headstock indicates that the neck came from the single-pickup variant of Fender’s more-popular two-pickup Telecaster. The body is a 1950’s Telecaster

The guitar had been originally owned by a record company and was part of the payola scams of the 1960s. It was rigged with four pickups wired into extra jacks that would each plug into a separate channel on the recording console.

Petillo removed the extra pickups and returned the guitar to original Telecaster shape before he sold it Springsteen, but a huge side effect of the routing was that the Tele was now really light, giving it a sound a feel unlike any other.

Bruce had Peillo modify it over the years. He added his  triangular Precision Frets, a six saddle titanium bridge, and custom hot-wound waterproofed pickups and electronics so they could better survive a sweat-soaked 4 hour show.

Bruce has now retired the Esquire from road duty, so these days Springsteen plays clones on stage, but still records with the original.

Neil Young’s “Old Black”

Neil Young is known mostly as a singer songwriter but he is a hell of a guitar player. He is one of my favorite rock guitarists. He doesn’t play lightning quick and that is a good thing…it’s playing with feel that many guitar players forget about.

Neil Young acquired Old Black in 1968 through a trade with Buffalo Springfield member Jim Messina, who traded Old Black for one of Young’s orange Gretsch guitars (Gretsch 6120 Chet Atkins).

The guitar made a humming sound so he dropped it off at a guitar shop in LA. When he came back, the shop had closed for good and lost one of the pickups. To replace the lost pickup, Neil added a Gretsh pickup that didn’t quite sound the way he wanted, but it stayed that way until Larry Cragg found an old Firebird pickup and installed it. Then Old Black was restored to its former glory and that Firebird pickup is still installed on the guitar today. It was roughly resprayed to jet black, and received a new Tune-o-matic bridge (not available when the guitar was produced) and a B-7 model Bigsby vibrato tailpiece.

The neck pickup has always been the original P-90 pickup, but it is covered by a metal P-90 cover. Neil is still playing Old Black to this day and he said he will until he dies.

…

“The Perfect Pop Song”

I found this article about The Max Planck Institute in Germany conducting a study on the perfect pop song… the winner was Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

As everyone here knows I’m a huge Beatles fan…but this one? I couldn’t disagree more with their conclusion but it is interesting on how they made the choice… I posted a couple of links.

‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’ is the most perfect pop song ever, science proves

The Beatles ‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’ is “the perfect pop song”, according to science

Great Drummers Salute Ringo Starr

I found the short video while looking around and thought I would post it. The drummers include Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Stewart Copeland, Questlove, Tre Cool, Max Weinberg, and Chad Smith.

In the span of just three minutes, we get a sense of exactly why the most famous drummers in rock and roll admire Ringo.

Another video I found is of a drummer explaining how Ringo played for the song and not to be recognized in the song.

Here is a drummer demonstrating how Ringo played for the song. He starts talking about Ringo around 50 seconds in.

Avatar: The Last Airbender

If I would not have had a son growing up when he did I probably would have never watched this series. In 2007 my son was 7 and we started to watch this and I have to admit I got hooked. It is extremely well animated and an entertaining series. The stories are such that an adult can easily watch it. The scripts are intelligent and you get drama, comedy, and action. The show was critically praised and won many awards (listed at the bottom of the post from wiki).

I would recommend this to anyone of any age. It does contain violence and fighting. The show starts off light-hearted for the most part and then grows darker.

It starts and finishes the ongoing story in 3 seasons. The episodes are around 24 minutes long and very easy to watch. You see these characters grow while watching it. Netflix has announced that they are coming out with a live action version of it.

There was a terrible live action movie that was released…avoid at all costs. Some have regarded it as one of the worst movies ever made…

I looked for a short synopsis of the series…I found this and altered it a little on IMDB.

In a lost age the world is divided into four equal powers: Water Tribe, Earth Kingdom, Fire Nation, and Air Nomads. In each nation, there’s a group of gifted people known as Benders who have the ability to manipulate their native element using martial arts and elemental magic. For thousands of years, the nations lived together peacefully. But then disaster struck. The young ruler of the Fire Nation, Fire Lord Sozin, began a war of world conquest. The only one who could have prevented it was the Avatar. The Avatar is the human incarnation of the Spirit of Light, he alone can master bending all four elements. But, just when he was needed most, he disappeared.

Now, 100 years later, a young Waterbender named Katara and her older brother Sokka stumble upon the long lost Avatar, Aang (he was around 12), who was encased in an iceberg for 100 years. They must help Aang master all four elements before summer when Sozin’s grandson Fire Lord Ozai will use a comet to deal one last deadly strike against the other nations and claim a Fire Nation victory. But, all that is easier said than done with the Fire Lord’s determined and hot-tempered son, Prince Zuko, hot on their trail.

Below is the intro to the series.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar:_The_Last_Airbender

Awards and nominations

Year Award Category Nominee Status
2005 Pulcinella Awards Best Action Adventure TV Series Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[78]
Best TV Series Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[78]
2006 33rd Annie Awards Best Animated Television Production Avatar: The Last Airbender Nominated[79]
Storyboarding in an Animated Television Production Lauren MacMullan for “The Deserter” Won[79]
Writing for an Animated Television Production Aaron Ehasz and John O’Bryan for “The Fortuneteller” Nominated[79]
2007 Nickelodeon Australian Kids’ Choice Awards 2007 Fave Toon Avatar: The Last Airbender Nominated[80]
34th Annie Awards Character Animation in a Television Production Yu Jae Myung for “The Blind Bandit” Won[81]
Directing in an Animated Television Production Giancarlo Volpe for “The Drill” Won[81]
Genesis Awards Outstanding Children’s Programming “Appa’s Lost Days” Won[82]
59th Primetime Emmy Awards Outstanding Animated Program “City of Walls and Secrets” Nominated[83]
Outstanding Individual Achievement in Animation Sang-Jin Kim for “Lake Laogai” Won[84]
2008 2008 Kids’ Choice Awards Favorite Cartoon Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[85]
Annecy International Animated Film Festival TV series Joaquim Dos Santos for “The Day of Black Sun, Part 2: The Eclipse“ Nominated[86]
Peabody Awards N/A Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[87]
13th Satellite Awards Best Youth DVD Book 3: Fire, Volume 4 Nominated[88]
2009 36th Annie Awards Best Animated Television Production for Children Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[89]
Directing in an Animated Television Production Joaquim Dos Santos for “Sozin’s Comet, Part 3: Into the Inferno“ Won[89]
Golden Reel Awards Best Sound Editing: Television Animation “Sozin’s Comet, Part 4: Avatar Aang” Nominated[90]
Nickelodeon Australian Kids’ Choice Awards 2009 Fave Toon Avatar: The Last Airbender Won[91]
2010 Nickelodeon Australian Kids’ Choice Awards 2010 Top Toon Avatar: The Last Airbender Nominated[92]