The Rewind Button: Seven Album Wrap-up

Posted on 2013/01/122013/01/12 by Jason Hensel

The Rewind Button is a group blogging project that I’m participating in. We’re taking on Rolling Stone‘s Top 40 albums of all time and writing our own reviews of them.

I tried for many months to avoid writing a multi-album post. I wanted to focus each entry on an individual artist or band. However, I’ve learned a lot about myself and music during this project. Primarily, I don’t enjoy writing about music that much. I mentioned that in a previous Rewind Button entry, and here at the end, upon reflection, my feeling still holds true. That means for a lot of these albums, I struggled to write about them. Perhaps I tried to make the reviews harder than they needed to be. The reviews I enjoyed writing the most were the ones that I let the words tumble out of my head, unconscious of where my thoughts were going.

Maybe I do, then, enjoy writing about music if I can do it the same way I listen to albums. That is, totally immersed in feeling. In the end, I’m happy that I took part in this project, and I’m grateful for the invitation to do so. I’ve discovered other blogs and writers that are now saved in my bookmarks, and I’ve listened to some albums that I had never heard before that I now love (Stevie Wonder) and ones that I can’t stand (Joni Mitchell). It’s been a fun project, and I’m finishing it with these final seven albums.

The Band — Music From Big Pink

The song “The Weight” is a staple at karaoke spots in these parts. It’s an okay song, and it’s the only original song on this album that I liked. The other song, “Long Black Veil” is a cover song, and The Band does a good version of it. Overall, though, I found this album uninspiring. It’s not one that I will listen to again.

David Bowie — The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars

Bowie rarely fails me. I appreciate that he pushes himself and the art of music, and Ziggy Stardust is a winner for me. In our current age of singles and quick hits, it’s refreshing to go back in time and listen to an album that told a story, that provided a narrative to the music, that tried to show there was more you could do with rock music. This a top 20 album for me.

Carole King — Tapestry

Carole King is one of the world’s greatest songwriters. Tapestry, though, was just an okay album for me. I had never heard it before, and I kept seeing it on best-albums-of-all-time lists, so I was curious about what made it so great. And as with several albums on this list, I found it not that great. Perhaps at the time it was groundbreaking or inspiring or something. Now, however, I find it pedestrian.

The Eagles — Hotel California

The Eagles are my dad’s favorite band, so I grew up listening to their albums. Hearing this one again took me back to the late 1970s, sitting in my dad’s apartment patiently waiting for this album to finish so I could listen to KISS. Today, I notice The Eagles’ influence in my music, and that’s a good thing, because the band were solid songwriters in both lyrics and hooks. That’s something I work on emulating in my writing.

Muddy Waters — The Anthology

Muddy Waters is a great blues artist, and I found myself liking this album more than I imagined I would. For those who write or edit for a living, The Anthology is great background music for working. The blues’ rhythm and repeating of lines lulls one into a calm state where focus and imagination reside side by side.

The Beatles — Please Please Me

It’s no secret that I love The Beatles. Please Please Me, while not my favorite, still stands far and above many of the other albums on this list. Please please let me listen to it over anything that Van Morrison or Joni Mitchell ever puts out. How this album arrived at No. 39 and not higher is a mystery to me. It deserves higher, and in my personal list, it is.

Love — Forever Changes

This is a great, strong finish for the top 40 list. I had forgotten how much I enjoy this album. You can definitely hear the late 1960s vibe, but I also detect elements of punk, post-punk, and balls-out rock. I’ll have to remember to listen to this album more often, because it’s inspiring and a good-time experience, which is exactly what music should be.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Musicqwest

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The Rewind Button: Abbey Road

Posted on 2012/06/182012/06/18 by Jason Hensel

The Rewind Button is a group blogging project that I’m participating in. We’re taking on Rolling Stone‘s Top 40 albums of all time and writing our own reviews of them. There will be a new album and review each Thursday (or there about).

Listen, I love The Beatles. It makes me happy to see so many of their albums in the top 20 of Rolling Stone’s Top 40 albums of all time list. But being a fan of a band has its consequences. When I start to write about them, I struggle with what to say.

Because I’ve listened to their music for so long, I’ve become numb to it. No, this isn’t saying their songs don’t affect me. What I’m saying is that they’ve become so much a part of my life that I rarely give a second thought as to why I like them. It would be like me trying to go into detail why I like my right arm. I just do. It’s always been there for me. It helps me through life. Sure, I could survive without it, but having it is so much better. The end.

Stopping to consider why you like or dislike something can contribute to personal growth. But I wish you’d had asked me 20 years ago why I like Abbey Road. Then, it was more fresh on my mind. I could have told you that “You Never Give Me Your Money” is perfect until it speeds up, that by doing so it becomes a cluttered mess. I would also tell you that George Harrison pretty much owns this album with his two tracks, “Here Comes The Sun” and “Something.” I agree with Frank Sinatra’s assessment of it as “the greatest love song ever written.”

Twenty years ago I’d have more solid opinions about the rest of the album. But it’s ingrained in me now. It’s so clumped together with my being that it would be impossible to run it through a criticism sieve without destroying myself in the process.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

Sara Bynoe

Musicqwest
Zachary Stevenson
1throne: King of the Internets
Be a River With Me

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The Rewind Button: The Beatles

Posted on 2012/05/172012/05/22 by Jason Hensel

The Rewind Button is a group blogging project that I’m participating in. We’re taking on Rolling Stone‘s Top 40 albums of all time and writing our own reviews of them. There will be a new album and review each Thursday.

Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House explores the notion of individuality, namely the process of figuring out who you are so that you can become that person completely. Considered controversial at the time of its premier and publication, today the play is a dramatic classic.

The Beatles (a.k.a. “The White Album”) was slated to be named A Doll’s House after the Ibsen play. It’s a fitting title, because it too is representative of a group trying to figure out who they are and who they will become. (I wish they would have stayed with that title, because I love seeing works tethered to each other across genres and ages.)

Based on previous Rewind Button reviews, it’s no secret that I love The Beatles. To paraphrase the character Bob Slydell from the movie Office Space: I’ll be honest with you, I love their music. I do. I’m a Beatles fan. For my money, I don’t know if it gets any better than when they sing “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”

Because of its eclecticism, it’s the perfect primer for someone who has never heard The Beatles’ music. Put this album on at a party, and you’ll have at least one song that will appeal to individual listeners.

We’re back at that word: individual. This is the album that starts the group’s third act, the one that leads to their denouement. They’ve figured out that they don’t need each other to write great songs, they have the strength to be on their own without carrying the weight of a group name so entrenched in the collective mind of society, which can appear quite rigid and unforgiving.

Maybe not naming the album was for the best. A lack of artwork and proper name lends to the notion of new beginnings, a clean slate, a slam of the door on the past and the white light at the end of a tunnel.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

Sara Bynoe

Musicqwest
Zachary Stevenson
1throne: King of the Internets
Be a River With Me

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The Rewind Button: Rubber Soul

Posted on 2012/04/122012/04/19 by Jason Hensel

Now we come to my favorite Beatles’ album, and I have to figure out a way to explain why it’s my favorite. Won’t you let me get away with just saying it’s great, go listen, then end? I didn’t think so.

Here’s where I start: This is the first Beatles’ album that included no covers and included all four members as composers. When I listen to Rubber Soul, I feel like I’m listening to an album and not a compilation of singles. I feel like there was a real purpose to the overall production.

Another aspect that appeals to me is that it’s a turning point in The Beatles’ career. It’s their turn-the-corner moment. The recordings look to the past and future, sometimes within a single song. For example, take out the sitar in “Norwegian Wood” and you still have a good song, but one that could have fit on previous Beatles’ albums or featured on another artist’s album in that time period. But The Beatles added the sitar, an instrument that is usually classified as a world music instrument.

In 1965, attitudes about the world were changing, people were openly embracing other cultures and experimenting with ways of how to better inhabit this planet. For the world’s most popular band at the time to contribute to that attitude, well, that’s a pretty big deal. They didn’t need to sing political songs; they expressed their views with instrument choices, recording practices, and art direction.

Just look at the album cover and name, for example. The group photo is in focus, but slightly stretched. This aligns with the name Rubber Soul, in that the world and humans are getting pulled. The world is warped, there’s something new afoot.

And consider this new direction for the band: the song “Run for Your Life.” Sure, The Beatles had written sad songs in the past, but never one which expresses outright anger and wishful hurting. This is Rubber Soul‘s last song, and it’s a prescient one knowing what we do now of how the summercruxe of love ended in Altamont.

Because I’m fascinated and drawn to the cruxes in life, that is why Rubber Soul is my favorite Beatles album. It’s a perfectly balanced affair that, in my list, ranks far above Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Grad Student By Day

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

1throne: King of the Internets

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The Rewind Button: Highway 61 Revisited

Posted on 2012/04/052012/04/12 by Jason Hensel

Jonah Lehrer shares a great story in his latest book, Imagine: How Creativity Works, about Bob Dylan. Lehrer tells us that after months of grueling touring, Dylan vows to give up making and playing music. He leaves for upstate New York to relax and write a book. However, once he’s away from all life’s pressures, a sense of urgency comes over him to write. He immediately dictates what comes to mind, later claiming it was like word vomiting. After writing for hours, he had “Like a Rolling Stone” completed. A few days later, he’s back in New York, recording the song quickly and cementing his status as America’s premier troubadour.

Listening to Highway 61 Revisited is like attending a fun party. I feel like I’ve stepped sober into a room full of people dancing, smoking, drinking and fondling. It’s how I image the late 1960s were for free-spirited individuals. The energy is attractive, and even if I don’t quite understand the party’s whys or whats, I’m willing to stay until the end.

Listening to this album is also like taking a road trip. Yes, maybe the title is playing a bit into that feeling, but it’s the rolling aspect of the music that lends itself to this feeling. Most of the songs are bluesy stomps touching on America’s current collective psych in 1965. It’s interesting that the top five albums on Rolling Stone‘s list were all released between 1965 and 1969. Does that mean the late 1960s were rock and pop music’s golden age? Highway 61 Revisited makes a compelling argument that yes it was.

You have Dylan releasing this album, followed later in the year by The Beatles’ Rubber Soul, then Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys in response to Rubber Soul, followed by Dylan’s Blonde on Blonde, then the one-two punch of Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s. If the 1960s weren’t the golden age, it was at least a time of great conversation among artists, framed in musical responses. This is something sorely lacking in today’s musical landscape (well, actually, hip-hop is carrying on this tradition).

Dylan’s genius was instigating this one-upmanship, and he achieved this by not settling for the status quo. Sure, he could have carried on the folk path, playing sold-out shows night after night. But he realized that his art (and his physical and mental health) was suffering because of this. He had to break free, get away, and just chill out for a bit. And by doing so, he gifted so many other artists.

Maybe I’m giving Dylan too much credit. Perhaps he just wanted to relax and not try so hard. Maybe he just wanted to rock out for once. Either way, purposeful or by accident, Highway 61 Revisited started a musical movement we have yet to witness on the same depth and intellect again.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Grad Student By Day

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

1throne: King of the Internets

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The Rewind Button: Revolver

Posted on 2012/03/292012/04/05 by Jason Hensel

The Beatles’ Revolver album is like a middle child, in that it’s often overshadowed by its siblings immediately older and younger than it. I admit that I keep forgetting about the album. When reaching for some Beatles to listen to, I’m more apt to grab Rubber Soul (the older sibling) or Sgt. Pepper’s (the younger). Shame on me, because Revolver holds its own quite well.

This album should appeal more to me, because it features three tracks by George Harrison (my favorite Beatle), but I prefer Paul McCartney’s songs the best. “Here, There and Everywhere” is the perfect definition of a song that will melt me every time. The ohs and ahs and harmony and that little guitar run at 1:05 in the track make me want to close my eyes and forget every bad thing in the world. Then you have “Eleanor Rigby,” “Good Day Sunshine,” “For No One,” and “Got to Get You Into My Life.” McCartney was at the top of is craft on Revolver.

My biggest criticism–and it’s a subjective one–with Revolver is the actual cover. The line drawings and collage look amateurish, and perhaps that’s why I keep forgetting about this album. I’ve blocked the ugliness from my mind. I realize that we’re primarily reviewing the songs. However, “greatest albums” should include packaging. An album is a piece of art work (or they used to be). All elements should point to greatness.

Revolver is No. 3 on Rolling Stone‘s “Top 40 Albums of All-Time” list. It should definitely be higher than Pet Sounds, because of the variety of voice and styles it offers. But dammit, a picture of goats is preferable to line drawings. Remember that, kids. Animals trump humans.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Grad Student By Day

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

1throne: King of the Internets

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The Rewind Button: Pet Sounds

Posted on 2012/03/222012/03/29 by Jason Hensel

I know a bit about Pet Sounds‘ history, but not a lot. And for this edition of the Rewind Button, I decided to forgo any research about it and give it a pure listen. I wanted to hear the songs as someone would for the first time in 1966, without Internet access.

Okay, so if I picked up this album at my local record retailer in 1966, I’d probably be all like, “Whoa, the Beach Boys are trippin’, man!” I’d turn to my friend and say, “Harold, put down that Simon & Garfunkel album. This one has sound effects.” And Harold would cock his ear toward it–he can tell I’m serious, because I’m speaking in italics–and chime in with a “it’s groovy man. The Beatles better watch their back.”

Alas, it’s 2012 and we know how this story ends. The Beatles counter with Sgt. Pepper’s and Brian Wilson goes mad.

For its time, though, it was good (maybe great on certain days). However, it doesn’t hold up for me. For this review, I listened to Pet Sounds about 10 times over the last two days. I often found myself looking at the track list to see how many more songs were left before it ended. Several times I found the music flourishes frustrating and unnecessary.

“After listening to it twice in a row one day, I couldn’t help but notice that I was feeling annoyed and sad,” wrote Dave Lefebvre, another Rewind Button reviewer, on Musicqwest. “It’s funny how something so light sounding can make you want to slit your wrists.”

Lefebvre raises the point that the lyrics are to blame for the annoyance. It’s true, Wilson’s lyrics trend toward the unhappy side of life. And just like with Sgt. Pepper’s music/lyric dichotomy, I appreciate this element on Pet Sounds. I also appreciate the use of call backs on the album. The most predominant one is “I Know There’s an Answer” and “Hang On To Your Ego.” Another one is “You Still Believe In Me” and “I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times.” While not as overt as “Answer”/”Ego”, there is the same melodic movement in both.

It’s as if Wilson wanted to write an opera, reusing music and lyrics throughout for an overall theme. I’m not an opera fan. I often find it tedious, melodramatic and too ornate. Maybe that’s why Pet Sounds doesn’t sit well with me.

In an attempt to one-up The Beatles, Wilson goes over the top. He tries to pull listeners over to his side of the world. However, I prefer a little restraint with my madness, a little balance to my world. Pet Sounds is too much for me. It overwhelms in its effort to prove its genius.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Grad Student By Day

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

1throne: King of the Internets

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The Rewind Button: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

Posted on 2012/03/152012/03/29 by Jason Hensel

Sgt. Pepper broke Brian Wilson’s heart. He had a nervous breakdown after hearing the seminal album in 1967. Because of this, he didn’t complete the Beach Boys’ album Smile until 2004.

The specific song that affected Wilson so much was “A Day in the Life,” the last song on Sgt. Pepper. Perhaps it was that song’s final E-major chord that suffocated his creativity. That chord is a heavy door shutting on one of the Beatles’ most lyrically depressing albums.

Below the uplifting music, lyrics address loneliness, leaving, emptiness, and holes (fixing and filling them). And it’s this music/lyric dichotomy that is Sgt. Pepper‘s greatest strength. The album has character. It has emotions. It has good and bad days.

My dad framed his first pressing of Sgt. Pepper and hung it on the wall in his study. It’s one of the many albums he played around the house when I was growing up. As a child who preferred the make-up and theatrics of KISS and the Village People, I never appreciated the Beatles as I should have. I liked them, but at that time they were dad’s music.

Then came my teenage years and my flirtation with country music (old school, please, none of that Nashville pop) and hair metal bands. I remember shopping at Wal-Mart with my grandmother. This was when The Beatles’ albums were first released on CDs. I browsed the selections and almost bought Sgt. Pepper. I chose Guns and Roses instead.

It wasn’t until I got to college that I started to fully appreciate them and just how much they influenced all the other types of music I had been listening to. And when I was finally clued in, I wasted no time in catching up.

I admit that Sgt. Pepper is not my favorite Beatles album (that would be Rubber Soul). Still, as someone who appreciates darker lyrics, I find listening to it a satisfying experience. But it’s rare that I listen to it completely and in song order. I most often start with “A Day in the Life.”

Unlike Wilson, the song doesn’t choke my creativity. When I hear that final E-major chord and its slow ringing out, I start to think of how I can add to the song, what music I can write that could contribute to the art.

The greatest works of art are ones that inspire others to create more art, either through reflection or impersonation. That is why Sgt. Pepper sits atop Rolling Stone‘s Top 100 albums list. Listeners have found, and will continue to find, new things with every play. And they’ll want to immediately add their own views about it. Conversation rolls into conversation. Music into more music.

Unless, of course, you’re Brian Wilson.

Please visit these other blogs participating in The Rewind Button project:

Betty Livin

Love As A Verb

Life Doesn’t Have to Suck

Grad Student By Day

Renée Sylvestre-Williams

Sara Bynoe

La Belle Vie

MusicQwest
Zachary Stevenson

1throne: King of the Internets

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