May 2023 Overview

May 2023 Overview

Writer's Check-in

Hello everyone! Sorry for disappearing for a whole month without a single word. I can't say I was exactly busy, but I didn't have a lot of energy left in the tank for reviewing. As I said last month, the end of April was pretty grueling in terms of workload, and by the end, I didn't feel pushing through the whole month on a regular reviewing schedule was realistically possible. I did end up still writing quite a bit, but it falls into a) reviews I don't think anyone really wants to read and b) rambling to friends over messages. So, instead of reviewing, I decided it was worthwhile to just take some time to just take in and thoroughly enjoy music without analyzing it formally. It was a lot of fun to do that (especially since my music listening sharply decreased during last semester), and I got to check out a lot of new music and revisit old favorites I hadn't heard in quite a while.

However, I don't think I am capable of just listening to music without writing my thoughts forever, so I'll try to get this going again. The plan is to start out doing a song of the day review once again, but I might throw in a mini-essay or an album review if in the mood. I think having a set schedule doesn't seem to really work for me, and I have more motivation to continue the blog if I am writing about stuff I am currently listening to. So, don't expect a cohesive direction to it, but if this works, you can expect much more regular writing on here in the future. I'm looking forward to the future of the blog, and I hope you guys are too!

Music Stats for the Month

Total Listening Time: 193 hours. I wasn't kidding about listening to a lot of stuff this month!

Top Artist: Charley Patton. The vocals are obviously unbeatable (even by people like Howlin' Wolf, who took it in a more extreme, brutal direction but also lost some of the underlying humaneness of Patton's style), but even more than that, there are few artists who had such a powerful understanding of rhythm to make those recordings come alive. At his best, he could make you want to dance with all of those clever rhythmic structures and memorable, hooky phrasings, but when catching him in a somber mood, he could easily churn your guts with those raw, vigorous grooves to make you physically feel whatever he was singing about. Definitely not the easiest artist to get into (partially since the recording quality isn't that great), but once you do, it's totally worth the while.

Top Album: The Best Of Charlie Patton - Charley Patton. Like most artists in their 20s and 30s, the sound quality sounds like shit, but Yazoo always does an excellent job cleaning them up. I highly recommend using this comp to get into him, it has practically all the essentials. Though, I do wish that "Prayer of Death" made it here.

Top Song: "Down The Dirt Road Blues" - Charley Patton. One of his toughest, hardest-rocking songs ever, it's one of those songs that has a perfectly sharp, straight-edged direction to it, kicking and plowing through a rough dirt road into the horizon. The rough directness of the vocals absolutely tears here, but it is also rich with tasty guitar rhythms and tones as well. Just hear those awesome stinging tones around the one-minute mark and how perfectly he blends them into the chopping rhythmic sound. Just one of the many masterpieces he crafted at the very beginning of his career.

Video of the Month

"Earth Angel/Johnny B. Goode" - Tim May/Michael J. Fox/Mark Campbell

I watched Back To The Future for the first time when I was in elementary school and didn't really like it too much. I'm not sure what exactly didn't appeal to me about it back then (since it's a pretty entertaining movie), but I crossed paths with the movie once again when I started working through the famous Doo-Wop Box and stumbled upon the Penguins' "Earth Angel", a magnificent doo-wop single that quickly became one of my favorites of the genre (who can resist such a beautiful chorus?). The song was also featured in the movie, so I went ahead and watched the whole clip again. Now, the "Earth Angel" part is solid and important in the movie, but the real reason I picked this particular clip was the awesome "Johnny B. Goode" rendition. Of course, anybody who covers Chuck Berry will be on my good side, but I was absolutely blown away by how perfectly they were all able to nail the essence of rock 'n' roll in that one scene. 

Everybody notes the wide range of styles and rock references they cover, from the classic Berry duckwalk to the windmills and amp kicking of Pete Townshend to the melodic speedy metal tapping and soloing of Eddie Van Halen, yet the truly awesome part is how the flow of rock history in the performance feels so organic within Chuck's self-aggrandizing anthem. It makes you feel that all of these different offshoots of rock 'n' roll, as much as they kick ass in their own special ways, all have a deep spiritual bond that unifies them: the feeling of freedom, optimism, and excitement in the original and the best of 50s rock 'n' roll creeps into all of these future styles so well that they all feel at home here. It's a rare and beautiful moment where you can see the universalist vision of rock music unfold before your very eyes, and even if this movie itself isn't a huge favorite of mine, this one moment was absolutely priceless. Check this great scene out if you haven't already.

Articles & Reviews

As I said above, I spent most of this month listening rather than writing about music, so no new reviews for now, but I'll get this kicking back up again very soon!

Monthly Playlist

Here is the link to this month's playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3pqqXdYkoRsnneBXOCBjQY?si=d72493a1a58f4137

Yes, you guys know the drill, the playlist is nearly 66% made up of blues and soul tracks (they're GREAT blues and soul tracks though, so check them out!). Though, there has been a little more variety of music this month: little bits of Britpop, post-punk, Krautrock, hard-rock, and alt-rock should make the playlist a little easier to digest for people whose lives don't revolve around bluesy grooves. So, dig in to get a nutritious dose of great music :)

Here is the tracklist:

1. "Funky Broadway" - Wilson Pickett
2. "When A Man Loves A Woman" - Percy Sledge
3. "I Want To Do (Everything For You)" - Joe Tex
4. "I Wouldn't Treat A Dog" - Bobby "Blue" Bland
5. "Cry, Cry, Cry" - Bobby "Blue" Bland
6. "Baby, I Love You" - Aretha Franklin
7. "Hot Time In The Old Town Tonight" - Mississippi John Hurt
8. "Made To Love" - The Everly Brothers
9. "Won't You Give Him (One More Chance)" - Solomon Burke
10. "I'm In Love" - Wilson Pickett
11. "A Sweet Woman Like You" - Joe Tex
12. "Cloud Nine" - The Temptations
13. "Oh Me Oh My" - Aretha Franklin
14. "Disco 2000" - Pulp
15. "Hobo Blues" (1949) - John Lee Hooker
16. "I'll Be Around" - The Spinners
17. "Red Hill Mining Town" - U2
18. "Standing In The Shadows of Love" - Four Tops
19. "Mississippi Bo Weavil Blues" - Charley Patton
20. "One Tree Hill" - U2
21. "New Year's Day" - U2
22. "Teeth Like God's Shoeshine" - Modest Mouse
23. "A Spoonful Blues" - Charley Patton
24. "One More Night" - Can
25. "Sunday Bloody Sunday" - U2
26. "Chartered Trips" - Husker Du
27. "Jealous Hearted Blues" - Ma Rainey
28. "Without The One You Love" - Four Tops
29. "Baba O'Riley" - The Who
30. "Patches" - Clarence Carter
31. "Cowboy Dan" - Modest Mouse

Well, that's all I have for now. I sincerely hope I can keep this blog going because writing about music that I love means a great deal to me, but hopefully loosening things up will help out in that regard. Hope you see you all soon!