Saturday, July 15, 2006

Even More Cowbell...

...because I put my pants on, just like the rest of you, one leg at a time.

I'll get out of this music mode soon, but it just came to my attention that a cd was released this past April entitled.... 'Maximum Cowbell'

The track Listings:

01 Blue Öyster Cult - (Don't Fear) The Reaper
02 Mountain - Mississippi Queen
03 Loverboy - Working For The Weekend
04 Twisted Sister - We're Not Gonna Take It
05 War - Low Rider
06 Wild Cherry - Play That Funky Music
07 Santana - Evil Ways
08 Nilsson - Coconut
09 Electric Light Orchestra - Evil Woman
10 The Chambers Brothers - Time Has Come Today
11 Elvis Presley - Burning Love
12 Blood, Sweat & Tears - Spinning Wheel
13 Ted Nugent - Free-For-All
14 Argent - Hold Your Head Up
15 The Alan Parsons Project - Games People Play
16 The Edgar Winter Group - Frankenstein


Not bad, but for me there were several glaring omissions (Foghat's 'Slow Ride' and the aforementioned Nazareth' 'Hair Of The Dog' for starters)...plus just about any early hit from Canadian rocknroll vets April Wine - 'Drop Your Guns', 'Could've Been A Lady' - and most especially their cowbell classics 'Oowatanite' and 'Tonite Is A Wonderful Night To Fall In Love'...both from the very first record album I ever bought - April Wine's 'Stand Back'.

Album number one....wow...sort of like your first time, 'cept it was with music and probably a lot less traumatic.

So why 'Stand Back'?

April Wine and BTO (Bachman Turner Overdrive) were the two biggest Canuck bands at the time (and 'BTO's Greatest Hits' ended up being my second ever purchase). I knew one of the two bands would be the victor when I ventured into the Hudson Bay Company's department store music dept. ... found the lp's, hummed and hawed, turning the record jackets over and over again....weighing, considering, evaluating, debating...and eventually 'Stand Back' won out.

Still not sure exactly...maybe just because it seemed like the cooler purchase at the time.

For the record, no pun intended, purchases numbers 3, 4, 5, and 6 were respectively - Paul McCartney's 'Wings Over America', Led Zep's 'Song Remains The Same', 'Kiss Alive', and the Rolling Stones 'Made In The Shade'.

Also in there somewhere were two 45's - Steve Miller's 'Rockin' Me Baby' and Queen's 'Bohemian Rapsody'.

These were all just the beginning of a beautiful friendship... pop/rock music threw out a line and sinker and boy, was I hooked.

By now I'm sure you've figured out the year was 1975. Over thirty years ago. Yeesh. And yet I remember buying these lp's still so clearly...racing home and up to my room to listen to them on my little portable mono record player...sitting on top of my little brothers and forcing them to listen also (even though Kiss frightened them) - remember it like it was yesterday...

But now, with the internet and downloading, the days of 'High Fidelity' seem behind us forever --- browsing record shops and the different music sections, comparing likes and dislikes with the vinyl junkie behind the till, deciding on a purchase based purely on whether it had a cool album cover or not...sadly, it's all ancient history.

Alex Epstein raises the question whether the 'internet killed the record store' over on Complications Ensue, and then dovetailed neatly into Are We All Out On The Street In Five Years? and what's next for the future of tv and movies...

Somewhere I read..."Past experience, if not forgotten, is a guide to the future."

So where the hell does that mean I'm going? Rockland Wonderland?


Well, for the time being, I'm going to be away with the kids for a few days and also have a writing deadline looming. So things will be quiet here at Uninflected Images for a bit.

Enjoy the sun....

SONG & ARTIST#1? - "I have waited a lifetime
Spent my time so foolishly
But now that I've found you
Together we'll make history
I know I can't help myself, baby
You're all in the world to me"

SONG & ARTIST#2? - "Now come on people, live with me, where the light has never shone
And the harlots flock like hummingbirds, speakin' in a foreign tongue
This is my life, this is my life, this is my life, my life...
This is my life, this is my life, this is my life, my life."

5 comments:

Crashdummie said...

"Music expresses that which cannot be put into words, yet cannot remail silent" /Victor Hugo

So rock on :)

And hey, have a fab time with you kiddies!

Cheers!

Brandon Laraby said...

Have you ever seen Dazed And Confused?

Yes, it's American and yes, I'm a child of the 80's but I still think - hands down - it has one of the best soundtracks I've ever heard... AND it has your Foghat song on it too ;)

DD

Dave said...

wow - you can remember your first album purchases?

I have no idea. Admittedly, I have a lot - probably too many.

I think I just whited out a large chunk of my youth. I'm deliberately avoiding therapy on the odd chance I remember what trauatized me to forget it all.

Dizzie said...

I'm completely snowed in on Train's Cab. One of my exes told me Train's the weirdest band he ever heard (yeah, he was the weird one, I know), but I can't help but to love them... now, it's Cab. It's just SO DAMN GOOD!

wcdixon said...

no guesses at the songs...

Foreigner "Feels Like The First Time"
and
April WIne/Elton John "Bad Side of the Moon"