Revolver At 50: A Musical Revolution Enters Middle Age

Writing about The Beatles for me (especially on a blog that isn’t essentially rock focused) proved to be grounds for a lot of reflection. Also,how much more writing and analysis can really be done about the Fab Four by anyone? In the end,The Beatles remain a band who always seem to engender new impressions of them. Only half of the band that defined a generation are alive today-namely Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. Yet no matter what the two of them are doing today,whether doing albums of standards or performing in Maine with Todd Rundgren,its The Beatles that tend to always define them.

There’s one Beatle album I tend to view more as their definitive statement. And its not Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band-now itself an adjective describing any artist/band’s album masterpiece. The album I’m talking about is Revolver. It came out on August 5th,1966 in the UK. It represented for the Beatles a change in their performance ethic. The band members wished to concentrate more on their musicality as opposed to simply rocking hard for a sea of screaming fans in Beatlemania. So they stopped touring after this album. Which dovetails into the major revolution this Beatle album brought about.

Over the years,many rock musicians have tended to view their art in a rather more conservative way. Namely the idea of “rock is being able to pick up a guitar in a garage and just play 3 chords”. Rock ‘n roll is basically a very simplified variation of the 12 bar blues anyway. From the get go,The Beatles always had other things in mind. Songs such as “And I Love Her”,”If I Fell” and “In My Life” showcased the Lennon/McCartney talent for modulation-featuring unexpected chord progressions that were often very jazz and Brazilian in nature. Revolver took all of this to the next level.

McCartney for his part used his fascination with musique concrete by integrating backwards tape loops into many of the songs on this album-which came into play on Lennon’s Tibetan based psychedelic blowout album closer of “Tomorrow Never Knows”. These were fashioned in very melodic ways,not for showiness. Songs such as “Elenore Rigby” showcased producer George Martin’s symphonic strings as opposed to the Beatles rhythm section. John Lennon’s usually simple,almost punk style attitude about music began to change on the jazzy chord progressions of “I’m Only Sleeping”.

George Harrison even incorporated his newfound love of East Indian classical music into the song “Love You Too”. He combines Tabla drums and sitar with a melody that showcases that he is not writing a three chord pop song with Indian instruments. That he has come to understand the basics of the Indian classical forms fairly well. McCartney really shines strong on this album overall. One of my favorites is his melding of English marching band horns with a contemporary American soul shuffle in “Got To Get You Into My Life”,which inspired a hit cover version by Earth Wind & Fire twelve years later.

There’s little denying that all 14 songs on this album are amazing. But the ones I discussed merely reflect the level on which the Beatles were innovating rock. And at a time when the genre was entering its preteen years. This album contains a series of catchy pop songs,yet ones with unexpected chord changes. It also contains melodically strong music based in non Western forms such as Indian and middle eastern modalities. Above all,it does so with the keen understanding that what a rock band “rock” over is potentially the most enduring aspect of the music. And that’s what I feel as Revolver  turns 50.

 

 

 

 

Chaos & Disorder At 20: Prince Righting The Wrong

Chaos And Disorder is a Prince album born out of frustration. Feeling stifled despite the creative freedoms the Warner Bros label had given him over the year,the transition from Prince to his O(+> identity has him controversially writing ‘slave” across his right cheek in black makeup pen.  He also released a series of albums on his own and leading the New Power Generation whose lyrics functioned as angry tirades at his own label-including this one. Of course since the mid 1990’s was a very angry period in popular music anyhow,it all mirrored the times too. Yet on a strictly musical level,O(+> was having other ideas.

It’s hard to believe it was 20 years ago today that Chaos And Disorder hit the record stores. Personally,I remember it being a bit of an afterthought in record stores. Not prioritized in terms of promotion,and getting mixed reviews. Upon first listening to it upon picking up a cassette of it a few years later,I kind of liked it. The first five songs are very catchy and instrumentally dense rockers with a pop twist,while the last half of the album were hyperactive funk/rock fusions mixed with psychedelic style ballads. Several years ago,I got a hold of a the CD pre-owned. And started listening to it a bit more often.

Looking at it more recently,it could be described at representing for Prince in the mid 90’s what Around The World In A Day represented for him in the mid 80’s. Prince & The NPG’s first albums of the 90’s were generally hip-hop and techno house based. So on Chaos And Disorder,Prince returned under his then new name with an album that got back strong into his hard funk and catchy pop/rock roots. Only again,the thematic mood was on the dark side. I wrote an Amazon.com review almost a decade about the album. This goes into this album song by song a bit more. So enjoy this part of my breakdown of Chaos And Disorder:

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It wasn’t long after Prince exited Warner Bros,changed his name to O(-> and released     The Gold Experience did he begin to collect some of his “private music vault” for this album in 1996.Considering how well the same idea worked 15 years earlier with Dirty Mind he didn’t see how it wouldn’t work on ‘Chaos And Disorder’, and musically it did. Both albums have the one similarity of being Prince’s more rock oriented music. Prince’s style on the rock guitar is showcased throughout the uptempo songs on this album.The title track,”I Like It There”,”Into The Light” and “I Will” are extraordinary rockers.

For those who enjoy more pop/rock the easy going “Dinner With Delores”,with it’s 70’s soft rock feel will fit the bill nicely and it is actually one of his best songs of the period. The loud blues rock of “Zannalee” is not exactly typical of Prince but it challenges him as a musician.Don’t think that just because this is often hyped as Prince “rock” album (which in many ways it is) Prince is his always eclectic self on the zesty funk-rock hybrids of “Right The Wrong”,”I Rock Therefore I Am” and “Dig You Better Dead”-all three of which are also some of his strongest songs.

‘Chaos And Disorder’ is Prince’s final “official” Warner Bros. album and presents some his most direct songs;most of these tunes are less then 3 and 4 minutes and have a very refreshing directness.One thing that anyone considering purchasing this should know is this was released during a very trying time for Prince-he was fighting with Warners,had the “SLAVE” tattoo on his face and the lyrics here are filled with a lot of bitterness and edginess.As with many of Prince’s mid 1990’s music it will certainly get your attention.But even I found myself revisiting it after all these years of thinking of this as one of Prince’s weakest albums and maybe more people should do that.

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Unsure if Prince ever conceptualized it,but the music on Chaos And Disorder  is of a sort that could function very well as a live performance setup-with different costumes and sets. Despite the music’s theatrical potential,Prince never toured for this album. Maybe that was a good thing in hindsight because Prince’s studio albums always created their own type of theatrical (and mostly extremely funkified) musical world. As controversial as Prince’s stance on his rights as an artist during the 1990’s was,Chaos And Disorder might very well be the best examples of how that era translated onto an album for him.

 

Anatomy of THE Groove: “Black Satin” by Miles Davis

Miles Davis seemed to record a lot of his electric music of the early 70’s with his noted sense of spontaneity. He had his producer Teo Macero just record whatever he and his players were doing-all of it. And than have individual songs cut for albums later on. He did this on his fusion breakthrough Bitches Brew. And it’s a strong possibility he approached his 1972 album On The Corner in much the same way. That accounts for why there have been so many “complete sessions” box sets during the CD era for Miles. And it also points to the general approach Miles came at the whole idea of grooves and rhythm.

Miles said of On The Corner that he recorded the album as a way to “reach the kids” as he put it. Henrique and myself had a very meaningful discussion on this recently. And he bought out an excellent point. Miles was a member of America’s silent generation. Musically,this was a generation who championed melody. His own mother had advised him to “always play something you can hum”. As an innovator of modal jazz in the late 1950’s, Miles tended to view funk’s rhythmic base as solely for a dancing mindset. However ,he was able to fuse rhythm and melody here on the song “Black Satin”.

Badal Roy’s tabla drums and Khalil Balakrishna’s electric sitar washes introduce the album. After that Mtume’s percussion and Michael Henderson’s up-scaling three note bass line kick in to fatten up the groove. Miles plays a high medium pitched,processed trumpet fanfare. He punctuates with single note,percussive hits throughout the song. All between bursts of wah wah guitar,Herbie Hancock’s tweeting synthesizer and manic hand claps. On the last section of the song,Miles’ solo fives way to the cinematic organ of Harold I. Williams before the tabla/sitar intro that opened the song fades it out.

Miles’s On The Corner album is almost like one 54 minute jam sliced into four pieces. “Black Satin” would function as the second segment of that jam. But it has the most melodic content of the entire album. And it comes from Miles’ solo too-that aspect of the song you can hum. In terms of harmonic atonality, Miles was inspired by the experimental composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. Henderson’s bass line and the fast,percussive tempo tell another story. It’s based very much on the chase scene music of the blacksploitation films of the day. And this song was used as such in Don Cheadle’s film Miles Ahead.

The very first time I heard On The Corner,it was like being transported into a funky utopia. Part of the appeal was that the melodies were so minor or absent. It was like music where every aspect of it was doing it’s own dance. As time as passed,this song with it’s budding melody epidermises Miles’ extending on James Brown’s concept of turning his whole band into a drum. Also with the poly rhythms of this groove and the psychedelic sitar soloing, “Black Satin” also blends Afro-Caribbean and Indian flavors for pan ethnic funk delight. It brings Miles’ sound into the early forefront of the world fusion jazz/funk sound.

 

 

 

Miles Davis 1968: ‘Miles In The Sky’-The Road To Funk From Andre’s Amazon Archive

Miles found himself in 1968 in a very new world of music. Psychedelic sounds were everywhere and different sorts of music were bleeding together into all kinds of combinations and ending up becoming a whole new form.Sly & The Family Stone and Hendrix were popularizing it and on one of his later album with his classic quintet Miles very obviously had his ears all the way open. On the majority of this album Miles,a musician who had been edging towards a kind of avant garde sound on his previous few albums such as Miles Smiles and now a new kind of rhythm was coming into the equation.

From “Paraphernalia” to “Black Comedy” onto “Country Son”,even with the presence of George Benson,Miles was putting everything happening musically here into the context of rhythm. Believe it or not this was part of the beginning of the jazz-funk movement of the 70’s. Recently a discussion I had with my good friend from Oakland (who I realize I name drop a lot in these reviews) bought up the point that much of jazz even at this point was not as on the stop as it seemed;that there was a deeper understanding among jazz musicians who were able to translate their musical traditions from a basic theme into something very original.

The themes here do seem to be buried somewhat if your not listening close enough.But the truth is it’s because their all based in some form of communal rhythm: Wayne’s sax,Ron’s bass and Tony?Well let’s just say that his drumming on everything here is far heavier-not necessarily loud but full of a weighty bottom that stands as more then steady support for Miles’ playing,itself usually associated with “tugging at you a little softer” by his own description. The tune that pulls everything together here is the opener “Stuff”. It opens it all up-EVERYTHING Miles would do on his breakthrough electric albums such as Bitches Brew and even to some extent On the Corner begins here.

Herbie’s newly found electric piano soloing,the bass leading the whole way from the bottom up and…….a rhythm that comes in and around the psychedelic stew to what is possibly Miles’ first released tune in the funk genre,then a fairly new genre to most people. Even though not psychedelic music in the traditional sense of the word,everything from the trippy album cover all the way down to the rhythms and instrumentation all bleeding together find the influence firmly in place. This is the kind of jazz and funk I can imagine having a lot of appeal to people who usually listened to things like Country Joe & The Fish or even the Grateful Dead. And even for them Miles and the kind of rooted,complex funky music his quintet were making on albums like this will hopefully bring them into a good place to begin grooving to rhythms that were at once communal,improvisations AND jamming!

Originally posted July 6th,2009

LINK TO ORIGINAL REVIEW HERE!

*Listen to “Stuff”,Miles’ second quintet presenting prototype jazz/funk fusion.

Andre’s Amazon Archive: ‘Parade (Music From Under The Motion Picture Cherry Moon)’ by Prince & The Revolution (1986)

During the years following the big commercial success of “Purple Rain” Prince never elected to just rest on his laurels and become a face for the jet set life or press fodder. He spent a good deal of the time almost obsessively recording in the studio and one of the projects he was working on was this soundtrack album to his second motion picture Under the Cherry Moon. This album couldn’t be any more different from his first soundtrack project which was for the most part very pop focused.

This album still finds Prince in an accessible frame of mind but still very musically daring and willing to integrate as many musical ideas into his generally funk oriented sound as he could. The fantastic thing about this album is how well the music bleeds together in terms of arrangement and not only does it feel more like a formal soundtrack with it’s heavy cinematic touches but is one of the albums of the mid 1980’s that has really aged very well for something so contemporary for it’s time in a lot of ways.

The album has a lot of artsy touches to the music such as the pretense of steel drums, accordions and other cross continental flavors that enhance the mood it was trying to achieve. Also as with any Prince album of the 80’s his use of drum machines are among some of the most adept and creative one could imagine from such an often maligned instrument. “Christopher Tracy’s Parade”,”New Position”,”I Wonder You” and the title ballad all kind of form an introductory suite of songs to introduce the album.

It starts with a fanfare of horns,strings and rhythms and working around some slippery,keyboard loop driven types of what I’d describe as neo psychedelic funk. It’s alternately dreamy,poetic and sexy and accomplishes it’s cinematic flavor well. “Life Can Be So Nice” is a very carnivalesque slice of dance-funk with a very busy top and a very tight bottom rhythmically. This album also features some of the tightest funk Prince ever recorded such as “Girls & Boys”,”Anotherloverholenyohead”.

And of course the big hit “Kiss”,all strong indications of the rhythmic influences Prince was bringing to the surface from his long standing love of James Brown during this era. This album is also home to one of those great lost Prince classic eclectic pop songs in “Mountains”;neither pop or rock,funk or psychedelia it’s one of my favorite Prince songs here and in his entire catalog. The album also contains two very French pop-jazz sounding ballads in the instrumental “Venus De Milo” and “Do U Lie”.

The album concludes with the darkly chorded jazz-folk ballad “Sometimes It Snows In April” which,driven by acoustic guitar and the somewhat bittersweet lyrical focus is at least one music nod to another of Prince’s musical influences: Joni Mitchell. This album and movie were not as well received commercially as his previous soundtrack but,than again that’s exactly what Prince was going for-to be known as a respected musician as opposed to some flavor-of-the-month hit maker. In a lot of ways he got to have both on this album because there were some successful singles here as well. But all in all this speaks a lot to Prince’s rhythmic and general creative progress.

Originally posted on May 29th,2010

LINK TO ORIGINAL REVIEW HERE*

Anatomy of THE Groove: “Mountains” by Prince & The Revolution

Prince & The Revolution were a band that truly evolved into their own name. With the announcement. With the announcement that surviving members Lisa Coleman,Brown Mark,Wendy Melvoin,Bobby Z and Matt Fink are planning on a reunion tour in tribute to their fallen bandleader,it reminded me of just how much these musicians expanded Prince’s grooves as it progressed. That progression went from the stripped down new wave of the Dirty Mind/Controversy  era to the brittle electronic Minneapolis sound of 1999 and Purple Rain. Shortly thereafter,their sound made an even broader change.

During the summer of 1985,Prince and his band mates expanded. He added saxophonist,brother of his manager Alan Leeds and trumpeter Matt “Atlanta Bliss” Bliston along with guitarist Miko Weaver. The band also eschewed their flamboyantly dandy style clothing in favor of dressy,tailored clothing and slicker haircuts. This also effected their sound as they recorded for Prince’s next film project Under The Cherry Moon and it’s accompanying soundtrack album Parade. The song from the album that might best project Prince & The Revolutions evolved sound is “Mountains”.

The song starts with two by two snare drum heavy beat with right on the rhythm hand claps. A pounding drum machine introduces the up-scaling piano melody that carries the musical refrain of the entire song. It’s that same rhythm filled out with chiming guitar,percussion and high pitched,otherworldly synthesizer. On the choruses of the song,Prince plays call and response with his new horn section. The bass line of the song is equally fluid. It moves throughout under the drum as both a thoroughly percussive element while basically playing the melody of the piano.

The instrumental bridge of the song strips the music down to the rhythm that opens it. This time the rhythm guitar is playing a bluesy chicken scratch riff that Prince segues by shouting out “MOMMY I’M CLEVER!”. The following vocal shriek leads directly into the final repeat of the chorus. The harmonic horns scale down at the end of that chorus when Prince’s falsetto shouts find those horns playing a swelling evolving fanfare. An electric sitar inaugurates the refrain-a somewhat East Indian classical melody with the sitar wash holding up the James Brown style horn charts as the song fades out.

“Mountains” is a Prince song that really fascinated me from the moment I heard it. It mixed in the spiritually ethereal quality of gospel with a psychedelic airiness to the production. As my friend Henrique points out,on the other hand, the rhythmic nucleus of this song is strong galloping funk. The drums,the hand claps,the bass,the horns and rhythm guitar clop along like instrumentals hooves working their way down a heavily funky road. It’s mixture of cinematic drama with a strong ear for a phat groove showcase just how vital Prince’s musical progression was to the 1980’s.

 

Prince Rogers Nelson 1958-2016: The Musical Legacy Of The Purple One

Now that a day had passed since Prince’s rather sudden death,there’s been some time to absorb everything a bit better. Henrique Hopkins and myself have been discussing Prince’s music in a funk context for years now. Everything from the strong influence of Curtis Mayfield on his falsetto voice and high on the neck guitar playing,down to his bass playing being influenced by his guitar style. Earlier I ran down some of Prince’s most influential albums throughout the years. As the man himself said last year,,albums matter.

Also on that last article,mention was made about a good deal of Prince’s most creatively satisfying works having not been mentioned in favor of the highlights. So in this article I plan to remedy some of this. As my friend Calvin Lincoln had implied,Prince’s music has been overdressed by some. And in all truth,his album’s after the early 90’s could be extremely uneven in quality. But the key element of his musical ethic was the element of surprise. When one thought he was out of steam,couldn’t rock and had lost the funk,he came back with vigor. So here are some albums that reflected this for me anyway.

Prince’s sophomore album provided him with his first major pop hit in “I Wanna Be Your Lover”. Songs such as “I Feel For You”,later done by the Pointer Sisters and most famously by Chaka Khan as well as the churning funk of “Sexy Dancer” are stand out funky grooves on an album that leans heavily towards west coast style pop/rock and mildly country influenced ballads. As Prince himself said it,the album was for the radio more than for him. But in the end it balanced his musical approach and sense of pop craft very well.

I’m listing these albums together because Prince’s third album Dirty Mind  from 1980 and and fourth Controversy from 1981 could almost be part one and part two. The former album has a rougher demo like musical quality-with “Partyup”,”Head” and “Uptown” having an anti authoritarian punk funk vibe about them. The latter album was a bit sleeker musically. And an interesting attempt for Prince to address socio political concerns as they were developing. “Sexuality” and “Annie Christian” address everything from censorship to gun violence while the title song deals with his sexually and musical free outlook. He also pulls out some heavy funk on “Let’s Work” as well. These are two albums that really lend themselves well to be heard together.

Prince knew this 1984 album was going to be his commercial breakthrough album. In hindsight it’s also the album that still has a lot of radio oriented music lovers convinced (incorrectly,really) that Prince was primarily a rock based artist. And probably on purpose. That’s because this album doesn’t have much funk/soul content on it. At the same time,it could best be described as progressive new wave/synth rock at the cutting edge instrumentally-with the bass-less classic “When Does Cry”,the brittle “I Would Die 4 U” and “Computer Blue” leading the way. That plus the fierce gospel hard rocker “Let’s Go Crazy” and the arena anthem title cut really gave Prince the huge audience he has today. And it served to musically illustrate the semi autobiographical feature film of the same name.

Parade was Prince’s second soundtrack for his second film in 1986 called Under The Cherry Moon marked the ethos of a massive change in musical priorities for Prince. The electronic orchestrations of the Minneapolis sound are replaced by the sweeping strings of Claire Fischer and the sax of newcomer Eric Leeds. These shows up on the cinematic “Christopher Tracy’s Parade”,”Life Can Be So Nice” and “Mountains”. Still Prince throws down some of his most powerful funk with “Girls & Boys”,”Anotherloverholeinyohead” and the iconic hit “Kiss”-with it’s Curtis Mayfield style falsetto and that high up on the neck guitar.

Perhaps this is Prince’s most personally defining album in his career. The history of this 1987 album is enough for at least one whole article. Started as a whole other type of project during a massive period of recording the year before,it eventually became a double album. It has the uneven quality of a greatest hits album,with songs sounding as if they come from totally different sessions. But the strength of all the material make it all work.

It has it all-from soul ballads like “Slow Love”,pop/rockers such as “Play In The Sunshine” and “I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man” to the proto alternative/grunge sound of “The Cross”. The funk comes in many varieties from the full on JB groove of “Housequake”,the slow grinding “If I Was Your Girlfriend” to the danceable hit “U Got The Look”. There’s also two more distinctive numbers in the jazzy funk of “The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker” and the dreamy melodic piano pop of “Starfish And Coffee”.

Prince apparently recorded this album in 1987 to be played at a birthday party for drummer Sheila E,who was playing in his band Madhouse at the time. From “Le Grind” to “Rockhard In A Funky Place” at the end,this album is almost a non stop hard funk stomp. Save for the sweet ballad “When 2 R In Love”. Prince is basically playing up one big sexual orgy on all these lyrics-allegedly to showcase he hadn’t sold out. He abruptly shelved this album and didn’t put it out until 1994. But it’s a great party funk album if one is in a particularly rascally mood.

Prince’s third soundtrack to his final and least successful motion picture isn’t a full Prince album per se. It features many productions of his from Paisley Park signed artists such as George Clinton,Mavis Staples and the revived lineup of The Time. As for Prince’s contributions,he has some mutant funk/rockers here such as “Elephants & Flowers”,”Tick Tack Bang” and the epic,jazzy arena rocker “Thieves In The Temple”,his first hit of the 1990’s.

This very elusive concept album from 1992 actually focuses a great deal on the funk side of things with another JB sendup with “Sexy MF” leading the way. “The Sacrifice Of Victor” keeps the funk stripped down in classic Prince style as he waxes nostalgic on the Civil Rights movement. With the psychedelic soul/gospel of “7” leading the way,this largely hip-hop inflected album finds Prince as a bandleader for the NPG “taking it back to Church” as they say in fully rediscovering his black American musical roots.

This 1996 triple CD set was the newest Prince album to come out when I was first getting into exploring his albums. From “We Gets Up”,”Get Your Groove On”,”Sex In The Summer” and the big band sounding “Sleep Around” represent some of his most massive funk of the 90’s decade-along with the synth heavy Minneapolis groove of “New World” and the jazzy opener “Jam Of The Year” and the witty hip-hop of “Style”. Some of the music on this album,as with much of Prince’s output at the time,hasn’t musically aged well. But when the grooves cooks,it cooks up a storm!

Prince made a huge statement towards his music being based in funk with the title track of this 2004 album-another James Brown influenced number in the vein of “Housequake” and “Sexy MF”. This is an album of mostly pop/rockers and 60’s style soul ballads generally. Of the rockers Prince does provide a powerful message song in “Cinnamon Girl”,in which he discusses how the post 9/11 events are leading to discrimination of Muslim Americans.

Prince packaged this 2009 album with another of his entitled Lotusflow3r and female protege Bria Valente’s debut Elixer-exclusively at Target stores at the time. With songs such as “Chocolate Box” and “Dance 4 Me”,Prince began the reboots the 80’s Minneapolis sound this album is named for with it’s use of the Linn drum machine and synth brass. While the album itself represent Prince making his music harder to find by seeking new distribution methods,it paved the way for it’s harder to find follow up 20Ten and represents him re-embracing a sound he was in on the ground floor with.

This 2014 albums turned out to be one of Prince’s final studio albums. Released after a five year hiatus from releasing any new material publicly,it also found him back on Warner Bros. after years of fighting them over artists rights. It’s something of a ground zero for Prince-donning an Afro as he did at the very start of his career and working with a younger producer Joshua Welton. The album is home to two major funk blowouts in “The Gold Standard” and the jazzy “Breakfast Can Wait”-along with some sincere efforts to embrace modern pop and rock production techniques.

I am sure there are many people who’d have very different content in such a list. As much as Prince effected me in terms of his championing of creative freedom for artists? It’s hard to get away from the fact that he died having not effectively been able to embrace online streaming and video (such as YouTube and Vimeo),and became a hostile litigant against anyone who shared his music online in lieu of him doing it. The history of the physical music media he embraced is unknown. But as long as his music exists in some form,it’s important for young people (especially aspiring musicians) to listen to and learn from his grooves.

Andre’s Amazon Archive Special Presentation: ‘Around The World In A Day’ by Prince & The Revolution (1985)

Prince is no longer alive for the first full day of my personal life. My Facebook friend Brandon Ousley posted up today that Prince & The Revolution’s 1985 album ‘Around The World In A Day’ turned 31 today. To quote Ousley,it truly does allow reality to set in about the loss of Prince Rogers Nelson. At the suggestion of Henrique Hopkins,among my oldest online friends, here is my Amazon.com review of Prince’s seventh studio album:

Prince was,as apparently expected catapulted into musical and theatrical super-stardom with his 1984 album and motion picture  “Purple Rain”. All of a sudden,the music charts were not only filled with his proteges such as The Time and Sheila E but also many imitation records such as Ready For The World’s “Oh Sheila”. Not to mention songs he’d penned for others such as Sheena Easton’s “Sugar Walls”. Having become the massive force in the music scene that he was hoping? It would seem that this had the effect of dividing Prince’s own creative ego.

While satisfied with his success,he was of course likely being pressured by the record company and the public to continue producing music of the same sort. Prince has always been a very exploratory artist. And the only way one could possibly pin him down is the fact he seems to delight in finding every different way he can be instrumentally funkified-with funk being a very broad and flexible genre in itself. According to my knowledge recording during the Purple Rain tour,this follow up album with the Revolution showcased Prince doing something that likely neither his admirers or record company would ever have expected him to do.

Starting out with an Arabic flute-type synthesizer effect,the title song begins the album with what starts out like a psychedelic East Indian type number but veers on into straight up bass/guitar oriented funk by songs end. “Paisley Park” is a carnivalesque LINN drum/guitar based romp through a lyrical tag that has the dreamy wonder of 1967 period Beatles all over it for sure. “Condition Of The Heart” is a truly wonderful song-starting out as a jazzy piano ballad and building up to a chordally complex number reflecting on the point of falling in love itself.

“Raspberry Berry” is actually similar in instrumental and melodic content to “Take Me With U” from the previous album-yet filled with cheeky and playful double entandre’s where Prince just seems to be having a little fun. “Tamborine” is a musically hard grooving number built mainly around thick percussion and a funky bass synthesizer with Prince metaphorically eluding to masturbation-so it seems. “America” is musically a potent song-starting off very much as a guitar heavy LINN based gospel rocker before getting into some seriously fast funk. But its red scare neo con lyrical content about “not saying the pledge of allegiance on a mushroom cloud” makes one wonder how arch conservative Prince’s politics really were at that time.

“Pop Life” is a dreamy slow funk number,musically one of my favorites on this album,reflecting again on whether fame is preferable to the journey of life itself. “The Ladder” is very much an epic arena rock type ballad-whose spiritually needy lyrics are presented by Prince in an echoplexed spoken narration. The closer “Temptation” is a dragging,amplified 12-bar blues which ends with Prince apologizing Scrooge style to a deep voiced figure for forsaking love for lust. And that in a word typifies the spirit of this entire album. Musically speaking? These songs are very much in the spirit of its predecessor with somewhat more of a psychedelic twist about them.

Lyrically they are totally different. Having discovered redemption on his previous album,Prince spends the majority of this album questioning his motivations and relationship with the spiritual and secular. His political and cultural views stand out in very stark contrast on this album. His melodic and lyrical concepts are reflected with clarity,but lack a resolution. In retrospect,I really enjoy this album. It showcases Prince moving away from his own Minneapolis sound and onto a much broader musical approach. On the other hand? It also showcased the uncertainty and restlessness Prince has exhibited in more recent years. Its a complicated record-akin to its predecessor as Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark would be to it’s follow up The Hissing of Summer Lawns-interestingly enough an artist Prince deeply admires. And therefore its a record that takes time to fully get into.

Originally Posted On June 6th,2014

* My review on Amazon.com can be found by opening this link

 

Anatomy of THE Groove: “On The Case” by Alphonso Johnson

Alphonso Johnson seems to me as a bassist whose contributions to the iconic fusion band Weather Report are rather under heralded. That could be because he was sandwiched in between their original bass player Miroslav Vitous and of course Jaco Pastorious. As a session man,he joined up with Billy Cobham on and off for many years. He also had stints back up Genesis/Phil Collins on multiple occasions as well playing on former LTD lead singer Jeffrey Osborne’s 1982 solo debut. The reason I personally tend to view Johnson as a rather obscure artist is because I only found out that he even had a solo career at all just under a decade ago. And have the feeling I may not be the only one.

One of the greatest things to happen in the post millennium internet age is the advent of two things: reissue record labels and YouTube. If it weren’t for those two things, this blog would be a lot different than it is. In 1976-1977 during his years with Cobham,Alphonso Johnson recorded three solo albums on the Epic label. These featured the backing of some of the major fusion instrumentalists of the time-all touched by the music of Alphonso in some kind of way. I have two on vinyl,since the CD versions were difficult to locate upon going out of print. Only his second album Moonshadows was something I was able to locate on CD. And one song that stood out on it for me was “On The Case”.

Alphonso starts off with a shuffling bass solo that has a bluesy,up-scaling melody that is very similar in tone to the electric piano solo on Steely Dan’s ” Black Friday”. Drummer Narada Michael Walden keeps that shuffle going while Dawilli Conga adds a counter melody on electric piano. Separated by progressive fusion bursts of intense drums, Alphonso’s solos expand along with the electric piano into fuzz toned psychedelia. On the second refrain,Lee Ritenour plays a mid toned rhythm guitar solo. This grows to a heavier intensity with the solo Lee takes on the third and final refrain of the song. Conga’s electric piano leads the shuffling rhythm to the songs fade out.

This particular song always stuck out to me with how much it finds the funk in the blues and the blues when it rocks. The rhythmic base of the song is in a strong groove-with Narada staying on the one primarily through the use of hi hat. And all of the musicians understanding of the jazz/rock fusion style comes out here as well. Alphonso’s funkiness on the bass gives it all a phat center that keeps the focus consistent.  I’ve started to realize that rock ‘n’ roll is often a far simpler musical form than it might like itself to be. Yet with the combination of jazz harmonies and electric funk within the fusion genre,songs like this found a great middle ground in which to rock up the funk.

 

 

Anatomy of THE Groove 4/4/14-First Month Anniversary Edition! Andre’s Pick: “Boy Racers” by Metronomy

                            I’d like to begin this by personally thanking everyone who has supported Henrique and myself by reading Anatomy of THE Groove during its initial month. This weekly segment was born of Henrique’s concept and inspiration. And at least on my end, it really helped this new collaborative blog from being all dressed up with nowhere to go. He has bought his wealth of musical experiences from Oakland,the second city of the funk to his song reviews in this particular column. And I have added the outsider-looking-in perspective that hopefully makes for a broad perspective. Please enjoy this weeks edition of this. And I strongly encourage you recruit friends and members of your family to read these. Or anyone else in your district. Support Andresmusictalk and its Anatomy of THE Groove column. Not with your money, but with your eyes and ears. Thank you!

It was my cousin Pip Hall,a fairly recent addition to my extended family, who introduced me to the musical joys of Metronomy. Hailing from Tontes,Devon,England this band has continued to pioneer a stripped down approach to new wave style electronica that,while maintaining a strong dance and pop music ethic has also proven expansive enough to incorporate elements of psychedelia and European classic music as well. Being able to maintain such eclecticism within the confines of such a stripped down sound is no simple task,and is a testement to the talents within this band that they pull it off so well. Operating under the genre of electronica with multi instrumentals Joseph Mount,Oscar Cash,Anna Prior and the Nigerian born bassist/vocalist Olugbenga Adelekan,their most recent album Love Letters contains a short instrumental that caught my ear in particular entitled “Boy Racers”.

Starting off with Anna Prior’s high hat heavy funky drumming,the main instrumental theme of the songs starts up in earnest-a bass synthesizer line playing a deceptively simple melodic line throughout the song with Adelekan’s electric bass popping right along with it in perfect unison so it sounds. This melody manages has a strong groove to the nature of the playing,yet at the same time has a classical flavor about it at the same time. There is a refrain to the song that repeats itself once. Its the same bass synthesizer riff scaling upward with a strong popping sound effect and a bouncing ball high synthesizer line that is somewhat of a cross between David Bowie’s “Ashes To Ashes” and Hot Butter’s “Popcorn”. All of this fades out as the song draws to a close-not ubruptly but in an extended instrumental cool down where Prior’s drumming which started the song concludes it in the same manner.

One of the things that came to mind instantly about this song was how strongly it was connected to the fact that,in the UK disco-dance culture received little to no backlash in the early 1980’s and evolved into new wave,house and the electronica genre. And it is that last mentioned one which acts as something of a banner genre to a lot of music that is actually new wave,house and synthesized boogie funk. That comes out in this song because,rhythmically it comes directly from the post disco dance music genre. Yet at the same time the musical sound of it and the melody itself intersect the lines that many have drawn between minimalist EDM,low fi indie pop and rhythmic funk/soul music. And that mixture also brings out it’s new wave aspect-of course a genre heavily based in disco/funk itself. So this song grooves down to the bare bones by its near endless variations on musical hybridizing.