Friends, I have a new podcast based on a book I’ve recently completed. Don’t Call It Nothing: The Lost History of ‘90s Roots, Rap & Rock ‘n’ Roll is as yet unpublished, so I’m using the pod to cover the bands, albums, and songs in the book. Win-win! Please join me over there as The […]
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In doing early research for my next Nicky Hopkins post, I landed on the Jefferson Airplane’s 1969 album, Volunteers, because Hopkins plays on five tracks. Unfortunately, his prodigious talents couldn’t pull the record out of a nose dive. I get that the group has many adherents who appreciate their wild, shirtless sensibility, but I don’t […]
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The day after Nicky died (September 6, 1994), Ian McLagan and his wife Kim were shopping in Austin and stopped to have a drink in Nicky’s honor. They chose a weirdly appropriate bar, with church pews as benches and coffins for tables, and ordered a round of beers. They were amazed when, without them lifting […]
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Like Ray (Charles), Aretha was a hands-on performer, a two-fisted pianist plugged into the main circuit of Holy Ghost power. Even though we produced Aretha in a way that we never produced Ray, she remained the central orchestrator of her own sound, the essential contributor and final arbiter of what fit or did not fit […]
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