Category: Record reviews
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Roll over, Beethoven, and take Chuck Berry with you
From approximately 1976 until 1979, disco was the law of the land. Many people were unhappy under disco’s thumpa-thumpa-thumpa rule, and a rebellion broke out on July 12, 1979 in Comiskey Park, Chicago. The White Sox, who were not enjoying a victorious season, had tried to lure paying customers into…
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Soul Sister No. 1
Here’s what I wrote about Aretha Franklin when I started this project. (If you’ve forgotten, if you weren’t paying attention, or if you have actual significant other things to do, I’m listening to all the black music of the 1970s.) So anyway: “With Aretha Franklin, it’s always 1967, I Never…
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It’s raining men
There were three men in the beginning of the 1970s who had the firepower to compete with Marvin Gaye: Al Green, Donny Hathaway, and Bill Withers. (At the end of the decade there was also Teddy Pendergrass, but I’m still trying to finish the beginning of the decade.) These gentlemen…
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The road leads back to you
I edited a couple of trade magazines in the 1990s. When you edit any kind of specialty magazine, you find that boredom seeps in like water in an old rowboat. There are only so many ways you can present the same subject, to keep it readable, informative, and interesting to…
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No wonder I can’t keep my mind on nothing else!
Today we say farewell to Percy Sledge, who sang “When a Man Loves a Woman” and went to the top of every chart in 1966. 1966 was the year my parents had finally had enough of me and my music and for my birthday bought me a transistor radio with an…
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