Colossal Reviews

Only Unbiased Product Reviews

Colossal Reviews > rock > Page 36

Exile on Main St. by the Rolling Stones (Vinyl record album review)

By 1 Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Exile on Main St.
  • Group name: Rolling Stones
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: two
  • Label: Rolling Stones Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Distinguishing characteristics:
    • Sticker: “Promotional Copy / NOT FOR SALE”
    • Handwritten track list taped to inside of album
  • Buy it on Amazon: $32.43

Exile on Main St. by the Rolling Stones

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I know Exile on Main St. to have been a very significant and influential Rolling Stones record, but I don’t think I’ve ever listened to it all the way through, and if I did, it would have been one time, around 15 years ago.

In the past few months I’ve listened to Some Girls, which I did not like, and Beggars Banquet and Made in the Shade, both of which I thought were good.

What I expected

I don’t really have a clear idea of what the 1972 Stones sounded like, but I expect Exile on Main St. to be more like Beggars Banquet than the other two.

What it was actually like

This was an excellent blues and blues rock record and I enjoyed almost every part of it. The most unusual thing for me is that I barely recognized any of the songs, and none of them sounded particularly like hits to me, but evidently, sometimes an LP (or in this case, a double LP) can just have a wonderful sound throughout and not necessarily need its songs to be catchy for me to love it.

Highlights included Shake Your Hips, Tumbling Dice, Turd on the Run and Shine a Light. I especially liked that the Stones used gospel-style backing vocals on Shine a Light in a far more subtle and successful way than Paul Simon did on Live Rhymin’.

There were some low points, particularly I Just Want to See His Face and Let It Loose, but they didn’t detract substantially from the overall quality, which was very consistently high.

I’ve previously declared that the Rolling Stones ought to have retired by December 1969, but I might need to take that back, because Exile on Main St. is now my favorite Rolling Stones record.

Grade

5/5: love it

Paul Simon in Concert: Live Rhymin’ by Paul Simon (Vinyl record album review)

By 1 Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Paul Simon in Concert: Live Rhymin’
  • Artist name: Paul Simon with Urubamba and the Jessy Dixon Singers
  • Year: 1974
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Columbia Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Distinguishing characteristics: sticker on front of album with track list and “Columbia Records Radio Station Service / Not For Resale”
  • Buy it on Amazon: $4.99

Paul Simon in Concert: Live Rhymin'

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never listened to this Paul Simon concert, but in the past few months I’ve listened to three Simon & Garfunkel records, including one that was recorded live:

What I expected

Based on the picture on the album, Paul Simon doing folk music with an acoustic guitar, sans Art Garfunkel.

What it was actually like

I absolutely loved El Cóndor Pasa (If I Could) and completely forgot that this song existed (and probably haven’t heard it in… I don’t know how many decades). But it was great and there was a flute accompaniment that didn’t ruin it.

The flute, however, did not help The Boxer at all. It and whatever was being plucked in the background – maybe some kind of Peruvian style banjo? – sounded like they were in direct competition for prominence with Paul Simon and his guitar, and it was highly distracting. Someone should have told him that when you’ve got a song like that with such a distinctive chorus, you don’t add anything that would interfere.

I was also delighted with the record’s opening track, Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard, as I’ve had the Me First And The Gimme Gimmes cover in semi-regular rotation for probably 20 years, and every time I hear it I’m reminded of Paul Simon, but have seldom heard him singing it since I mostly listen to the much earlier Simon & Garfunkel music. His Homeward Bound was also excellent.

About Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M., I wrote a few days ago: “Not surprisingly, The Sound of Silence steals the show on this record, as it’s such a riveting song.” It wasn’t that way on Live Rhymin’, however. I think I get what Paul Simon was trying to accomplish with his choral arrangement and gospel choir backing him up, and it makes sense because the song more than just hints at a religious message, but it didn’t even remotely work, and this was probably the worst version of The Sound of Silence imaginable.

It wasn’t the worst song on the record, though. That has to have been J*sus Is the Answer, a gospel song that just didn’t sound like it belonged with the rest of the music at all. And I get that Paul Simon was into gospel – I think there’s a ton of great gospel music too – but there’s a reason you won’t see me ordering peanut butter as a pizza topping.

From there the gospel experiment continued, with very mixed results. Bridge Over Troubled Water was pretty bad, though I’ve previously described it as the worst Simon & Garfunkel song, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that it wasn’t improved by gospelizing it. Loves Me Like a Rock was much better, though.

He went back to a folk style for America, and I was glad that he did, and that he chose to end the record that way.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

Feats Don’t Fail Me Now by Little Feat (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Feats Don’t Fail Me Now
  • Group name: Little Feat
  • Year: 1974
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Warner Bros.
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $57.95

Feats Don't Fail Me Now by Little Feat

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I listened to Sailin’ Shoes by Little Feat back in May, but I had never heard of Little Feat before that point, and wasn’t really impressed by their music.

What I expected

I guess more blues rock?

What it was actually like

This was such a weird record that sounded almost as if it had been made by two bands, one a funk / jazz band and the other a blues rock / southern rock band.

Jazz and funk:

  • Rock & Roll Doctor
  • Skin it Back
  • Spanish Moon

Blues rock and southern rock:

  • Oh Atlanta
  • Down the Road
  • Medley: Cold Cold Cold/Tripe Face Boogie

Hybrid of both styles:

  • Feats Don’t Fail Me Now
  • The Fan was a sort of jazz-rock jam

I didn’t really like any of it, though.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. by Simon & Garfunkel (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M.
  • Group name: Simon & Garfunkel
  • Year: 1964
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Columbia Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $22.98

Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. by Simon & Garfunkel

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I don’t think I’ve ever listened to Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. before, but I reviewed Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme last week, and The Concert in Central Park in May.

What I expected

More folk and folk rock with extensive use of vocal harmonies.

What it was actually like

There was a lot of good material on this record that I hadn’t heard before, such as the title track Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M.. I also thought that You Can Tell the World was pretty good, and I loved the extensive use of banjo in Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream.

Benedictus, on the other hand, sounds roughly like its name would suggest. When I listened to Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme recently, I wondered why these two Ashkenazi boys from Queens were so fixated on Christian imagery in their music, and that clearly is happening on this record as well. Go Tell It on the Mountain wasn’t that bad, though. At least it was an actual folk song.

I was pretty interested to hear the Simon & Garfunkel version of Bob Dylan’s The Times They Are a-Changin’ and thought they did a pretty good job with a sort of high-low vocal harmony, and some slight changes to the guitar part from Dylan’s, though of course they don’t have Dylan’s… unusual voice… so while it’s the folkiest thing in the world for them to take Dylan’s song and reinterpret it, I do wonder whether it sounds as authentic coming from them as it did from him.

Not surprisingly, Sound of Silence steals the show on this record, as it’s such a riveting song.

Also, “Thirty dollars pays your rent on Bleecker Street…” Really? It definitely wouldn’t have paid my rent on Bleecker Street when I lived there twenty years ago, and now I think it wouldn’t even pay eight hours of rent in that neighborhood. But yeah, the 1960s was a wild time.

Grade

5/5: love it

The Bitter End Years by Various Artists (Vinyl record album review)

By 1 Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: The Bitter End Years
  • Group name: Various Artists
  • Year: 1974
  • Number of discs: three
  • Label: Roxbury Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $9.99

The Bitter End Years

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’m familiar with the Bitter End and have even been there, but didn’t know that this compilation existed.

What I expected

It looks like The Bitter End Years, a three LP set, is divided into three sub-compilations, one on each LP: “early years” of folk music, such as Judy Collins, the Everly Brothers, Phil Ochs and Pete Seeger; “comedy years” including Woody Allen, George Carlin and Joan Rivers; and “rock years” including John Denver, Arlo Guthrie, Curtis Mayfield, Melanie, Bette Midler, Van Morrison and James Taylor. So folk, standup comedy and late 1960s / early 1970s pop music.

What it was actually like

Early years

I really liked the Limelighters’ version of If I Had A Hammer. Tom Rush’s Who Do You Love was also pretty good, though definitely more electric and more of a rock song than folk. Hearing Dodi Li was pretty surprising and it was faithful to the original[1], though with the addition of some Spanish-style guitar.

I think the worst song from the “early years” has to have been Pete Seeger’s version of Where Have All The Flowers Gone, which has always been one of my least favorites.

Comedy years

There was nothing particularly funny about any of this “comedy.” Low points included the joke that Richard Nixon’s face looked like a foot, as well as the extended Godfather parody that would be right at home on “Saturday Night Live” of the early 2000s. I guess the William F. Buckley, Jr. impression was the funniest part.

Rock years

This collection of songs was so weird. There were twelve songs on this LP and, with one glaring exception, I was unfamiliar with all of them. Why would they have chosen second-rate and somewhat unknown songs for this compilation? Some kind of licensing issue?

The exception, of course, was Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl, a childhood favorite of mine and the best song on the record by far.

Curtis Mayfield’s Gypsy Woman and the Isley Brothers’ Pop That Thang were the worst and didn’t qualify as rock at all… though I guess it only says “rock years” and doesn’t explicitly say anywhere that there wouldn’t have been funk songs from the rock years. But yeah, that was strange.

Another thing that was odd, and this is true of both the “early years” and the “rock years” LPs, is that none of the songs were live recordings, let alone live recordings from the Bitter End. Instead, they were all studio versions. I kind of assumed that, this being a celebration of a specific club, the songs on it would have had something specific to do with that club.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

References

References
↑1 Well, maybe not to the original original, but to the XX century original.