Great Album

December 10: Wings over America was released in 1976

Posted on by Hallgeir Olsen

Wings over America 2 cover

A three album set from Wings!

Wings over America is one of the reasons I miss vinyl, it was big in every sense of the word. A triple album, with a poster and a cover designed by Hipgnosis.

Originally, Wings over America was to be a two-record set, but this was rethought due to the success of a bootleg called Wings from the Wings, released on a bicentennial red, white and blue triple record set, recorded on 23 June 1976 at The Forum (Inglewood, California).

Wings over America 1

This caused McCartney to redo the official release as a three-record set covering the entire concert, including Denny Laine’s “Go Now”, a song from his time as a member of The Moody Blues. This song was only performed 21–23 June 1976 at the Forum.

paul_mccartney 1976_02

Compiled from all recorded shows of the band’s Wings Over America Tour that spring, Wings over America was another success for Paul McCartney and Wings, reaching number 1 in the US in early 1977 (the last in a 5-album stretch of consecutive number 1 albums for Wings) and number 8 in the UK, and selling several million copies.

Wings Over America was reissued as a double-CD in 1984 on Columbia Records and later on Capitol Records.

Maybe I’m Amazed:

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December 1: The Jimi Hendrix Experience Axis: Bold as love was released in 1967

Posted on by Hallgeir Olsen


Axis: Bold as Love is the second studio album by the Jimi Hendrix Experience. It was recorded to fulfill the Experience’s contract, which stated that they must produce two records in 1967.

Axis: Bold as Love was first released in the United Kingdom by Track Records in December 1967, as the follow-up to the band’s successful debut Are You Experienced, which had been released months earlier in May. It was not sold in the United States until 1968 because of the record company’s fears that it might disturb the sales of the first album. Axis: Bold as Love charted at number five in the UK and number three in the US.

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November 27: George Harrison All Things Must Pass was released in 1970

Posted on by Hallgeir Olsen

“That was the great thing about [the Beatles] splitting up: to be able to go off and make my own record … And also to be able to record with all these new people, which was like a breath of fresh air.”
– George Harrison, December 2000

All Things Must Pass is a triple album by George Harrison, released in November 1970. His third solo album, it includes the hit singles “My Sweet Lord” and “What Is Life”, as well as songs such as “Isn’t It a Pity” and the title track that were turned down by Harrison’s former band, the Beatles. The album reflects the influence of his musical activities outside the Beatles during 1968–70, with Bob Dylan, the Band, Delaney & Bonnie, Billy Preston and others, and Harrison’s growth as an artist beyond his supporting role to former bandmates John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
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November 16: The Louvin Brothers released Satan is Real in 1959

Posted on by Hallgeir Olsen

satan-is-real

The Louvin Brothers – Satan is Real

What is it about this album?
Why is it so important in the americana /country/gospel music canon?

Satan Is Real is a gospel album by American country music duo The Louvin Brothers.

Released November 16, 1959
Recorded August 8–10, 1958
Genre Country, Gospel
Length 31:54
Label Capitol
Producer Ken Nelson, John Johnson (Reissue)

The gospel/country duo Charlie and Ira Louvin was born and grew up in the Sand Mountain region of Alabama, they lived on a cotton farm south of the Appalachian Mountains, that’s where they developed their distinct harmony style in the deep Sacred Harp tradition of the Baptist church.

Ira Louvin died in a car wreck in 1965. Charlie Louvin died two years ago at 83 just a few months after publishing his story about The Louvin brothers.

In The recently published book, Satan is Real, the ballad of the Louvin Brothers, Charlie talks about their singing style.This is not a straight quote, but it goes something  like this:

…people who saw the Louvin Brothers perform were mystified by the experience. Ira was a full head taller than me, he played the mandolin like Bill Monroe and sang in an impossibly high, tense, quivering tenor. I(Charlie) strummed a guitar, grinned like a vaudevillian and handled the bottom register. But every so often, in the middle of a song, some hidden signal flashed and we switched places — with Ira swooping down from the heights, and me angling upward — and even the most careful listeners would lose track of which man was carrying the lead. This was more than close-harmony singing; each instance was an act of transubstantiation.

I could not find any live footage from Satan is real, but this clip of them singing, I don’t belive you’ve met my baby is a fine showcase for their intricate singing style:

“It baffled a lot of people,” Charlie Louvin explains in his fantastic memoir. “We could change in the middle of a word. Part of the reason we could do that was that we’d learned to have a good ear for other people’s voices when we sang Sacred Harp. But the other part is that we were brothers.”

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November 10: The Clash released Give ‘Em Enough Rope in 1978

Posted on by Hallgeir Olsen
The Clash Give Em Enough Rope

It’s rock and roll all over
In every street and every station
Kids fight like different nations
And it’s brawn against brain
And it’s knife against chain
But it’s all young blood
Flowing down the drain

One of those albums that was played so much on vinyl that it got worn out and bought again (twice!), Fantastic album!

Give ‘Em Enough Rope is one of the greatest transition albums of all time. The Clash was a purely punk album, and the best pure punk album “evvah!” London Calling is an eclectic and unique era-spanning masterpiece. Give ‘Em Enough Rope retain their punk roots, but start to draw in more influence from a more diverse pool.  The album turns out to be one of the band’s best, what am I saying?! All their albums are must-haves! (except for the Cut The crap album of course). In true Clash fashion there’s not one bad track to spare.

Give ‘Em Enough Rope is the second studio album by the English punk rock band The Clash. It was released on 10 November 1978 through CBS Records. It was their first album released in the United States, preceding the US version of The Clash. The album was well received by critics and fans, peaking at number two in the United Kingdom Albums Chart.

Tommy Gun (live on Something Else in 1978):

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November 10: Bruce Springsteen released Live/1975–85 in 1986

Posted on by Egil Mosbron

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It’s not enough. By anyone else’s standards, of course, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band Live/1975-85 is an embarrassment of riches — five albums and ten years’ worth of barroom, hockey-arena and baseball-stadium dynamite; greatest hits, ace covers, love songs, work songs, out-of-work songs — the ultimate rock-concert experience of the past decade finally packaged for living-room consumption, a special gift of thanks to the fans who shared those 1001 nights of stomp & sweat and the best possible consolation prize for the poor bastards who could never get tickets.

~David Fricke – rollingstone.com

 

Thunder Road – October 18, 1975 at The Roxy Theatre:

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