When seventeen-year old Carole King found herself pregnant, she wrote ‘Will You Love Me Tomorrow’ for The Shirelles. Girls (and now also guys) have been singing it ever since.
Continue reading...Beatles
128: The Isley Brothers, ‘Twist and Shout’
Before the Jerk, the Pony, the Watusi, the Mashed Potato, the Monkey and the Funky Chicken, there was the big mamma pelvic rotator of them all, The Twist. And before there was The Beatles, there were The Isley Brothers. They’re the guys who really Twisted and Shouted.
Continue reading...122: George Harrison (The Beatles), ‘You Know What to Do’ b/w Buddy Holly, ‘You’re the One’
So you thought (as I did) that you know every George Harrison/Beatles recording and every post-puberty Buddy Holly recording? Here are two you don’t know. And you just may have a hard time telling them apart.
Continue reading...The New A Cappella
I’ve just returned from the inspiring The Real Group Festival in Stockholm, four days of workshops, lectures, concerts and hugging, a celebration of a music shared passionately by a small but growing number of adherent fanatics worldwide — The New A Cappella. Many of the participants expressed frustration at the difficulty in explaining just what this genre is. Here’s my attempt to provide an overview.
Continue reading...118: Brian Wilson, ‘Surf’s Up’ (“SMiLE”)
The Beach Boy’s unreleased 1966 “SMiLE” was rumored to be Brian Wilson’s unfinished masterpiece. Its legend grew larger than the Loch Ness monster, more beautiful than Shangri-La, more elusive than the Yeti, richer than El Dorado, more profound than the Shroud of Turin, more holy than the Grail. Now it’s been reassembled and issued, 37 years later. Was it worth the wait?
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