Rock and roll has probably given more than it’s taken.
~Charlie Watts
Usually I can hear the pianos, the saxophone, and usually I can hear Ronnie. But I really need to listen to Keith and Mick. The rest of the band is sort of an embellishment to that.
~Charlie Watts
People say I play real loud. I don’t, actually. I’m recorded loud and a lot of that is because we have good engineers. Mick knows what a good drum sound is as well, so that’s part of the illusion really. I can’t play loud.
~Charlie Watts
Crimson flames tied through my ears
Rollin’ high and mighty traps
Pounced with fire on flaming roads
Using ideas as my maps
“We’ll meet on edges, soon,” said I
Proud ’neath heated brow Ah, but I was so much older then I’m younger than that now
Our other blog – alldylan.com – is an “only Dylan” blog, that´s why we don´t post Dylan-stuff over here @ bortolisten.com.
But today we make an exception.
Here are a collection of links to interesting Bob Dylan posts @ alldylan.com.
Ever since I was a young boy I’ve played the silver ball. From Soho down to Brighton, I must have played them all. But I ain’t seen nothing like him in any amusement hall. That deaf, dumb and blind kid, Sure plays a mean pinball!
It is 46 years ago that the rock opera, Tommy was released, one of the first attempts at treating rock as an art form. The artists were The Who.
It’s a double album telling a loose story about a “deaf, dumb and blind kid”, Tommy was the first musical work to be billed overtly as a rock opera. Released in 1969, the album was mostly composed by Pete Townshend. In 1998, it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame for historical, artistic and significant value.
Do you know, it’s funny, but I never thought of being blind as a disadvantage, and I never thought of being black as a disadvantage.
~Stevie Wonder
“If anybody can be called a genius, he can be. I think it has something to do with his ear, not being able to see or whatever. I go back with him to about the early ‘60s, when he was playing at the Apollo with all that Motown stuff. If nothing else, he played the harmonica incredible, I mean truly incredible. Never knew what to think of him really until he cut Blowin’ In The Wind. That really blew my mind, and I figured I’d better pay attention. I was glad when he did that Rolling Stones tour, cuz it opened up his scene to a whole new crowd of people, which I’m sure has stuck with him over the years. I love everything he does. It’s hard not to. He can do gut-bucket funky stuff really country and then turn around and do modern-progressive whatever you call it. In fact, he might have invented that. he is a great mimic, can imitate everybody, doesn’t take himself seriously and is a true roadhouse musician all the way, with classical overtones, and he does it all with drama and style. I’d like to hear him play with an orchestra. He should probably have his own orchestra.”
~Bob Dylan (Feb 1989, Rolling Stone Mag. – featurette on Stevie Wonder)
Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit at The Øyafestival 2016
From time to time we collect some of our new favourite videos to publish in here, for your convenience. Enjoy!
Sam Outlaw – Everyone’s Looking For Home
New album Tenderheart out April 14 on Six Shooter Records / Thirty Tigers:
The official video for ‘It Don’t Suit Me (Like Before)’ by John Moreland, directed by Sterlin Harjo.
From the new album ‘Big Bad Luv’, released May 5th on 4AD:
Spread your wings
Come on fly awhile
Straight to my arms
Little angel child
You know you only
Lonely twenty-two story block
–
I was in San Francisco one time in 1966 and I was attracted to the city. It was the first time I had been there, and I was sitting in this hotel and all these things were going through my head, and I had a flash about an actress in an opera house appearing in a ballet, and I think that’s where the song came from.
-Van Morrison (to Ritchie Yorke)
–
If anyone ever argues that Morrison cannot sing – an unlikely scenario anyway – then simply play them this. All human emotion is crystallised here, and subtly vocalised: desire, joy, hope, world weariness, consolidation, awe & anticipation. The “angel child” here is also a fully mature woman. What sounds like a penny whistle comes in just at the end, almost subliminally. Van´s Celtic phase starts here.
-Brian Hinton (Celtic Crossroads)
Ballerina was recorded during the last Astral Weeks session on October 15, 1968 at Century Sound Studios in New York City. Lewis Merenstein was the producer.
He has performed it live 180 times according to the brilliant website ivan.vanomatic.de.
