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News on music and the people who make it, and the stories about them. “Are we not formed, as notes of music are, For one another, though dissimilar?” ~Percy Bysshe Shelley
It ain’t over until the bald man sings! Oh, and that other stuff from Thievery Corp. is from their Radio Retaliation album.
It’s July and we’re all anxious to get away for some time before the end of summer is upon us. So the eternal question came up again at dinner last night with some friends…if you could only take 10 albums with you to a desert island with no other access to music (sorry no cloud service is available on this particular island), what would they be?
This is my personal list and these are not necessarily the 10 best albums of all time. Simply my 10 favorites. These would be coming with me in the lifeboat (after my wife and kids of course). Only caveat, castaways are not permitted to bring greatest hits albums…have to be as originally recorded, blips and all.
Blood on the Tracks (Bob Dylan) – My single favorite album of all time so had to put this one first. Makes you glad you are alive to be able to hear this astonishing record. Song after song leaves you wondering how any one person could write so many great songs in one sitting. “Tangled up in Blue”, “Simple Twist of Fate”, “Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts”, “Shelter From the Storm” with lyrics so good, they leave you breathless.
Photo Credit: Xavier BadosaArthur or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire (The Kinks) – The Kinks, led by Ray Davies, are quite simply one of the best bands of all time and always seem to be overlooked. They have written at least 100 great songs and wrote with an unsurpassed irony and satire. This record, which focuses on England’s rocky transition from a world power after WW2 was one of the first rock operas. “Victoria”, “Mr. Churchill Says”, “Drivin”…it’s a gem throughout.
Who’s Next (The Who) – I could easily have put three other Who albums here, but this one, even with it being overplayed over the years, has an amazing resilience. This may be the best rock album ever made. Not only is the music unparalleled, but the lyrics of songs like “Behind Blue Eyes”, “Won’t Get Fooled Again” and Baba O”Riley never lose their resonance. And if you don’t know “The Song is Over”, what a treasure you have ahead of you.
Photo Credit: Jason HickeyGraceland (Paul Simon) – “These Are Days of Miracle and Wonder”…when you hear this astounding record for the first time with “The Boy in the Bubble” you know you’re hearing true greatness. This should be required listening for any aspiring songwriter. The title track and “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” are so sublime you might forget you’re stranded.
Forever Changes (Love) – A magnificent record from one of the great, forgotten bands of the 60’s. Arthur Lee’s amazing band recorded their third and final album with this lineup (including Bryan MacLean). “Alone Again or” kicks off a seamless and beautifully arranged album with strings, horns and some fine guitar playing. “You Set the Scene”, which closes the record was a breakthrough in originality and arrangement. If you don’t know this album, get it immediately.
American Idiot (Green Day) – Love this record….all the way through. It’s a classic and will be listened to years from now. Amidst all the passive media response to the Iraq war, one of the only consistent voices against our involvement was Green Day’s American Idiot. The title track, “Holiday”, “Boulevard of Broken Dreams”, “Wake Me Up When September Ends” are all great. One of the finest albums released in the last 10 years.
Photo Credit: Daniel D’AuriaSgt. Pepper (The Beatles) – I know…it’s so obvious but this record would be hard to live without on a desert isle. Not much explanation is needed here. I rarely listen to it at home anymore but that’s because we all know every line on the record. Still think “She’s Leaving Home” is one of McCartney’s best songs ever.
The Rising (Bruce Springsteen) – I’m aware that a lot of Springsteen fans prefer his earlier work, but this remarkable album of America’s unshakeable spirit in the dark days following 9/11 is my favorite. “Lonesome Day”, “The Rising”, “You’re Missing”, “My City of Ruins”…every song is an inspiration. The Rising was the miracle we were all looking for.
Photo Credit: Cable27Turn Turn Turn (The Byrds) – Aren’t we lucky to still have this record to listen to. The Byrds were great interpreters of Dylan and there are two songs of his on this album, but they also wrote some great songs themselves. The arrangement of Pete Seeger’s “Turn Turn Turn” will never get old. Two great Gene Clark songs The World Turns All Around Her” and “Set Her Free This Time”. A classic recording.
Achtung Baby (U2) – Released 20 years ago, this pivotal album included so many great songs that you forget this was somewhat of a comeback after ‘Rattle and Hum’. Recorded against the backdrop of a turbulent Berlin, this record includes “One”, “Mysterious Ways”, “Who’s Gonna Ride your Wild Horses”, “Until the End of the World” etc. A truly great album.
Photo Credit: Matt McGeeI’m sure I forgot some favorites, but that’s my list for now. Which albums would you take? Write your lists in the comments below.
Great story of this rock anthem: how it came about, the impact its had over the years, and its continued legacy.
Journey on CBS’ “Sunday Morning,” July 24, 2011. (CBS)
(CBS News)Thirty years after releasing their hit song, “Don’t Stop Believin'” to the world, the rock band Journey is still believing in the uplifting power of what it says – and that includes band’s newest member. Sunday Morning’s Jim Axelrod presents A Summer Song:
It’s been on Journey’s set list every night for three decades running.
“Do you guys ever do a show without ‘Don’t Stop Believin’?” asks Jim Axelrod.
“We haven’t,” laughs Journey’s Jonathan Cain. “Not since it’s been written, no.”
“You’d have a revolt from the audience, wouldn’t you?” asks Axelrod.
“Yeah, I think they would be throwing stuff at us,” says Neal Schon, the band’s guitarist.
It may have started as solely Journey’s song – but it belongs to all of us now. The most covered, karaoked, and parodied song in modern music history.
From baseball to Broadway, Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin'” has become a national anthem of sorts – and with digital sales at almost four and a half million, it is officially the most downloaded song ever recorded in the 20th century.
“You know, we did something right in the studio,” says Cain. “We did something right when we wrote the song. You know, we hit a chord.”
It began as the brainchild of keyboard player Jonathan Cain, who had been laboring in obscurity in 1980 with a band called the Babys, when he got the chance to join Journey. It was a dream shot nobody could have predicted. Well, almost nobody.
“I was starving before I hit Journey,” Cain remembers. “Very, very rough times…I didn’t know where the next pay check was gonna come. I sold stereos. I quit the business. I was so lost, you know? And I was borrowing money from my father, who wouldn’t let me come back to Chicago. He said, ‘You stay there. Something good is gonna happen. Don’t stop believing.’ And he would always say that to me. ‘Don’t stop believing, Jon.'”
Armed with his father’s advice and the seeds of a song, Cain sat down with guitarist Neal Schon and then-lead-singer Steve Perry. Within an afternoon, Cain’s catchy chorus was transformed into a rock’n’roll classic.
“When you came in with the chorus–that’s all you had, right?” asks Axelrod.
“Yeah,” says Cain. “We worked backwards. So the way we put it together was…you do the rolling piano thing you do.”
“And I picked up the bass, and I [start singing],” continues Schon. “And with the little breakdown guitar– it’s not a guitar solo but a train.”
“I heard his guitar, and I said ‘that sounds like a train to me,'” Cain laughs. “And I go ‘don’t you love that song, Midnight train to Georgia?’ And Steve goes, ‘yeah.’ I go, ‘it’s the midnight train going anywhere.'”
While it barely broke the billboard top ten in 1981 as a single, “Don’t Stop Believin'” anchored Journey’s monster album “Escape” – which went straight to No. 1 that year. Still, when the band broke up six years later, it looked like “DSB” would slide off into the realm of rock’n’roll nostalgia, rarely to be heard from again.
Until 1998, when a string quartet provided the soundtrack for Adam Sandler being left at the altar in “The Wedding Singer,” dusting off the song for the first time in more than a decade. While seven other movies and more than a dozen television shows would borrow it, including the cliffhanging series finale of the Sopranos, no one sent the song into the stratosphere quite like the harmonic and hormonal misfits of “Glee.”
Adam Anders is Glee’s executive music producer, who says the show’s creators originally wanted Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida” to be the pilot episode’s killer closer, but were denied permission to use it. The rest, Anders says, is Gleek history.
“Why would Journey take such a chance on something that nobody had any idea if it would succeed?” asks Axelrod.
“Maybe it was the premise,” says Anders. “You know, the underdog… But obviously something struck a chord with them, and they let us have the song. And I’m so glad they did because I don’t think any other song could have done for Glee was ‘Don’t Stop Believin’ did.”
That boulevard is a two-way street. After Glee’s premiere, Journey saw an 87 percent spike in sales. And the Glee cast version of “Don’t Stop” has sold over one million downloads – making it their best-selling song.
But perhaps no one can relate more than the man who’s singing it for Journey now. Just four years ago, Arnel Pineda was a singer in a smoky room – fronting a Filipino cover band – when Neal Schon, searching for a replacement for the retired lead singer Steve Perry, found Arnel on YouTube.
“I heard his voice and I went, whoa. I go, ‘who is that?'” remembers Schon. “And I was just completely taken back by his voice. I just went, this guy’s incredible. We gotta find him.”
But what the band didn’t know was that Arnel was singing to survive. His mother died when he was just 13, after a long illness that left the family bankrupt. He ended up homeless, sleeping in a park in Manila, collecting scrap metal to scrape up enough money to eat.
“I’m not sure I know a life story to whom this concept applies any more than yours,” says Axelrod.
“Even before I discovered ‘Don’t Stop Believin’, it has been my motto, you know, to never stop believing in myself,” Pineda says, choking back tears. “The life that I’ve gone through. You know, all those hardships– that I– you see, I never– I never stopped believing that someday there is something magical that will happen in my life.”
“Never in my, like, entire life here on earth, that I would ever, ever stumble upon this kind of magic,” Pineda continues. “Playing to all of these people around the world… What a ride. You know?”
Arnel’s 2008 Journey debut album, Revelation, went platinum and spawned a successful world tour – including a triumphant homecoming concert in Manila for 30,000 of Arnel’s countrymen.
The most meaningful part of the trip took place away from the roar of the crowd – when Arnel took his band mates back to the park he’d once called home. The visit was captured for a soon-to-be released documentary called “Every Man’s Journey.”
“That must have been a moment of great cohesion for this new incarnation of Journey,” says Axelrod.
“Absolutely,” says Cain. “He’s made our camp a better camp. You know? His spirituality. His faith. His belief. You know, it’s strong.”
And it was the start of Journey’s next chapter. Their new album, Eclipse, features a song called “City of Hope,” inspired by the work Arnel is doing as the head of his own foundation, providing underprivileged Filipino children education and healthcare.
“I just want to give back,” Pineda says. “So every time I’m free, I get to reach out and look out for these kids and help for them anyway I can. And I think this will be my advocacy. You know, to put them back to school.”
“Advocacy and legacy,” Axelrod suggests.
“Hopefully yes,” says Pineda.
But Journey’s lasting legacy is without a doubt that one signature song – which, whether they like it or not, they’ll be playing tonight. And tomorrow night. And the night after that.
Terribly sad news that Amy Winehouse joined this group of hugely talented and extremely self-destructive and selfish individuals. Click on the picture above to go to the LIFE Magazine gallery of pictures.
