Month: February 2012

Record #53: Bob Dylan – Bringing It All Back Home (1965)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

On Bob Dylan’s first four releases, the production was incredibly simple–a man with an acoustic guitar (or piano, occasionally) and harmonica sang songs at a single microphone with no overdubs.

And then, Dylan lashed out.

Subterranean Homesick Blues starts with a single harmonica that is immediately joined by a drum set, bass guitar, piano, and no fewer than two electric guitars. And instead of the socially conscious lyrics that made him the Spokesman of a Generation, here he spits nonsensical couplets (Don’t follow leaders/watch the parking meters), and when he is being coherent, he’s railing against that Spokesman position.

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Record #52: Bob Dylan – The Times They Are a-Changin’, 1964

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

If the film I’m Not There says anything at all, it’s that Bob Dylan is a man who is constantly wrestling with his identity. Freewheelin’ showed a Dylan who, despite his numerous social concerns and accusations, wasn’t jaded by them, and faced the terrors of life with a wry smirk and a girl on his arm. But three of the thirteen songs in particular were lifted from the lucid post-apocalyptic improvisations and ballads to badge Dylan as the spokesman of the anti-war/civil rights/anti-establishment movement. And as reluctantly as history tells Bob Dylan accepting that role, it’s often neglected that he wrote an entire album that fully embraced the role of Protest Singer Laureate.

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Record #51: Bob Dylan – The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

There’s very, very little I can say about this record that hasn’t already been said. As a twenty-five year old, I can speak very little to the importance of when Bob Dylan emerged from the New York’s Greenwich Village and hit the national (worldwide?) stage, bringing folk music into the popular music sphere. This album in particular is iconic in every sense, from the oft-imitated album cover to the legends that occupy the tracklist–A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall, Masters of War, Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright, and Blowin’ In The Wind, arguably Dylan’s most famous song (but you don’t need me to tell you that). It was a landmark both musically and politically, rocketing Dylan into his reluctant role of Spokesman of a Generation.

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Record #50: Blind Pilot – We Are The Tide, 2011

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

3 Rounds and a Sound found success in its straightforward simplicity and personally nostalgic lyrics. Its follow up, We Are The Tide, starts with an organ and drumbeat, with an anthem of universal hope sung over it. Banjos, guitars, marimbas, and background singers join in slowly, ending in a heavily produced a cappella segment. Not even a single track in, and Blind Pilot has already alienated most of the elements that made their debut so appealing (thankfully, Israel Nebeker’s commanding voice and melody craft remains untouched).

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Record #48: Black Sabbath – Paranoid (1970)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

Black Sabbath is often cited as one of the founders of the popular rock subgenre “metal,” but you’d never guess if you compared it to the drop-D tuned, breakdown plagued, double-kick-drum fury of today’s metal.
This is too melodic, lacking the palm muted chunks of contemporary metal, instead favoring dark (for the time) lyrics put over heavily distorted (again, for the time) blues rock.
But don’t take that as a criticism of the music, only of modern semantics.
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Record #46: Billy Joel – The Stranger (1977)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

There are two albums and three years between this album and Piano Man. I know nothing about those records, but if the contents of The Stranger are taken in consideration, they must have shown the transition between Billy Joel the Barroom Pianist and Billy Joel the Pop Star. The latter made The Stranger, a record that showcases more simply played, more thoughtfully produced, and more listenable and toe-tappable songs. Joel’s maturation as a songwriter, as well as his growing distance from the lounge scene, helps to create an album much more listenable than his first commercial breakthrough.

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Record #45: Billy Joel – Piano Man (1973)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

For an album called “Piano Man” by an artist famed for his piano playing, it starts off strangely enough–Travelin’ Prayer starts off with a fast piano figure, but it’s soon drowned out by banjo, bluegrass percussion, juice harp, and other Appalachian standbys. Joel belts out a frantic country western tune, pausing once in the chaos for a well executed–but brief–piano solo. It’s an interesting choice for an album that most every listener would buy on the merit of its legendary title track, and arguably, not a good one.

In fact, the first several bars of Piano Man are sadly obscured by this WTF moment that opens the album. But once the bluegrass fog fades away, the lead single is just as timeless and wonderful as you always remember. And when he belts out “the piano sounds like a carnival”–the picture he paints is just as potent and superbly crafted as it was the first time you heard it.

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Record #44: The Beach Boys – Surf’s Up (1971)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

After the demise of the Smile sessions and the varying levels of commercial and critical success of the albums that followed, Brian Wilson shrank behind the rest of the band members, letting De Facto Front Man Mike Love lead the group in a less ambitious, more commercially viable direction. Then in the wake of their most poorly received album ever, they hired a new manager who encouraged Brian to take back his role as band leader. He was reluctant, but his brother, Carl, who shared his artistic leanings, took the role. The result was Surf’s Up, considered by many to be a return to greatness.

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