August 19: Happy 78th Birthday Ginger Baker

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]“They credited us with the birth of that sort of heavy metal thing. Well, if that’s the case, there should be an immediate abortion.”
~Ginger Baker

If I am playing any music at all it is jazz music.
~Ginger Baker

There are a lot of great drummers. But Ginger Baker is an inspiration because of a certain almost relaxing quality that he brings to the drums. While a lot of drummers are putting speed and power first, Baker put rhythm first.
~bgamall.hubpages.com[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Ginger Baker Biography – youtube video:

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August 18: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds released Kicking Against The Pricks in 1986

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]“And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks” 
– Acts 9:5[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Kicking Against the Pricks is the third album released by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. First released in 1986, the album is a collection of cover versions. Like many of our favorite artists (Dylan, Springsteen), Nick Cave dove into “the great songbook from the past” and gave us an album that really stood out in 1986. It wasn’t country, and it most certainly did not fit that new-wave look of Nick Cave and The Bad Seed. They play the songs in a straightforward way, not trying to modernize or make them more rock’n roll. This album was very important in my journey back to traditional folk music and blues standards.

It still stands up very well, and is one of my favorite Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds albums.

The Singer (made famous by Johnny Cash):

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August 16: The Late Jazz Legend Bill Evans was Born in 1929

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]”My creed for art in general is that it should enrich the soul; it should teach spirituality by showing a person a portion of himself that he would not discover otherwise…a part of yourself you never knew existed.”
~Bill Evans

“To the person who uses music as a medium for the expression of ideas, feelings, images, or what have you; anything which facilitates this expression is properly his instrument.”
~Bill Evans[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Bill Evans – Complete Last Performance’79:

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August 14: The Who released “Who’s Next” in 1971

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]With its acoustic guitars and drumless bits, this triumph of hard rock is no more a pure hard rock album than Tommy. … And… it uses the synthesizer to vary the power trio format, not to art things up.
~Robert Christgau

On Who’s Next, the band crossed that line with power and grace. The album spawned the concert classics “Baba O’Riley” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again”; the great Daltrey vocal vehicles “Bargain” and “Song Is Over”; Entwistle’s scorching, anxiety-ridden “My Wife”; and Townshend’s most delicate song on record, “Behind Blue Eyes.” On Who’s Next, Townshend unleashed the power of the synthesizer as a rock & roll instrument, to be used like guitar or bass rather than as a special-effects novelty.
~The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (rollingstone.com)[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

#9 – Won’t Get Fooled Again:

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August 4: Late Jazz Legend Louis Daniel Armstrong Birthday

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]“If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know.”
― Louis Armstrong

“Seems to me it ain’t the world that’s so bad but what we’re doing to it, and all I’m saying is: see what a wonderful world it would be if only we’d give it a chance. Love, baby – love. That’s the secret.”
― Louis Armstrong

“Louis Armstrong was the first important soloist to emerge in jazz, and he became the most influential musician in the music’s history.”
~William Ruhlmann (allmusic.com)[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

When The Saints Go Marching In:

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August 3: Stevie Wonder Released His Wonderful Album “Innervisions” in 1973

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Innervisions is the sixteenth album by American musician Stevie Wonder , released August 3, 1973 on Motown Records; a landmark recording of his “classic period”. The nine tracks of Innervisions encompass a wide range of themes and issues: from drug abuse in “Too High,” through social anger in “Living for the City,” to love in the ballads “All in Love is Fair” and “Golden Lady.”

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As with many of Stevie Wonder’s albums the lyrics, composition and production are almost entirely his own work, with the ARP synthesizer used prominently throughout the album. This instrument was a common motif among musicians of the time because of its ability to construct a complete sound environment. Wonder was the first black artist to experiment with this technology on a mass scale, and Innervisions was hugely influential on the subsequent future of commercial black music. He also played all or virtually all instruments on six of the album’s nine tracks, making most of Innervisions a representative one-man band.

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