A BIT OF JONI MAGIC

The following two clips of Joni Mitchell singing her iconic song 'Woodstock' come from the excellent OPEN CULTURE website.

The two versions sung 31 years apart each have loveliness and show why she has been celebrated as one of the greatest folk/pop performers.



JONI MITCHELL - 'WOODSTOCK' 1969






JONI MITCHELL - 'WOODSTOCK' 1998

JUG JUG TO DIRTY EARS*

I see that The Rolling Stones tour in USA has been cancelled/postponed due to old Mick's health problem.


MICK JAGGER - HEART SURGERY




Well, they are getting on a bit. Mick Jagger is about 10 years older than me and there's no way that I could cavort around on stage the way he's been doing for years.

I was watching the British comedy programme 8 Out Of 10 Cats where Sean Locke compared the Rolling stones to a line up of Toby Jugs.  Funny.

Sean Locke

The Rolling Stones

Toby Jugs

The funny thing is that Toby Jugs have been made of The Beatles:

The Beatles in Toby form

And old Mick has been immortalised the same way:

Mick Jagger

* "Jug Jug to dirty ears" - from T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land



The change of Philomel, by the barbarous king

So rudely forced; yet there the nightingale

Filled all the desert with inviolable voice

And still she cried, and still the world pursues,

“Jug Jug” to dirty ears

ORTHOGRAPHY

ANNIE LENNOX - I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

I watched an Annie Lennox version of that great song I put a Spell On You  today and thought it was pretty good but not the best version I've heard.

You'd have to go far to beat Screaming Jay Hawkins'  original:

SCREAMING JAY HAWKINS - I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

But I have always liked Nina Simone's quiet and intense version:

NINA SIMONE - I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bette Midler, Joe Cocker and others have done passable versions that are worth checking out but for me, the one that did it for me years ago was Arthur Brown's screaming version. His magnificent voice was just made for this song which has a lot of Hawkins' elements as well as some of the hamming up that Hawkins did in this version that got a lot of flack from the black community:

SCREAMING JAY HAWKINS (2) - I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

Here's Arthur Brown's version:

ARTHUR BROWN - I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

ARE YOU SICK OF CHRISTMAS MUSIC YET?

If not you might find this of interest:




WHAT MAKES MUSIC SOUND LIKE CHRISTMAS?

PREPARING FOR CHRISTMAS 2 - CANDYMAN

There have been a few different Candyman songs but the one that I've always preferred is this:

GRATEFUL DEAD - CANDYMAN

I was searching for this on Youtube tonight and was looking in the wrong place.

I thought it was a Hot Tuna song but Hot Tuna performed Rev. Davis's version. Grateful Dead's song was written by The Dead band members Garcia and Hunter and Hot Tuna was formed as a side project by Kaukonen and Casady who were Jefferson Airplane band members. I used to get them mixed up a bit as they all probably did themselves what with living in the same times and places back in the '60s and '70s.

"Look out, look out the Candyman
Here he comes and he's gone again
Pretty lady ain't got no friend
Till the Candyman comes around again"

1970 on the excellent American Beauty album.

This will be a Christmas Day choice although I haven't told The Old Girl yet. It can go with dessert.

PREPARING FOR CHRISTMAS

I've been looking forward to what music we will play on Christmas morning this year.
While we have no plans for a big Christmas bash and will not have a house full of guests this year - being just the two of us we plan to have a nice Christmas as, who knows, it might just be my last one.

No doubt The Food Curmudgeon, The Wine Guy, The Religious Curmudgeon and The Cultured Curmudgeon will all be making plans also but the responsibility for music will fall to me.

In the past we have had a tradition of putting on a mixture of classical, jazz and old popular classics  in the morning before a christmas lunch.

CHRISTMAS MUSIC

This year should be no different but I think that we'll pre-select (or at last I will and surprise The Old Girl) some 'tunes' that will set the mood.

One of them that I listened to this evening will be Enigma's Sadeness from the album Enigma MCMXC a D.

SADENESS

This provides the right amount of irreverence combined with voluptuous indulgence to start the day off.

I hope that Robert approves.

MOVE OVER ORANGE FUCKHEAD

I went to see David Byrne's American Utopia show on Saturday.


This was stupendous! The best show that I've seen for some time. It wasn't just a rock concert but was more like an opera that Kurt Weill or Benjamin Britten could have put together. The constant movement and rhythm used Brazilian samba beats and USA high school marching band motifs.
The musicians and singers  - 12 of them including Byrne - carried their instruments including percussion on body harnesses so were able to move in a choreographed two hour performance - vibrant and alive.

I ZIMBRA

David Byrne is no imitator and once again sets a new standard for on-stage performance - not that his Stop Making Sense has ever been eclipsed.

I normally hate it at concerts when people stand up in front of you to dance but at this show everyone, from the second piece of music in stood up and moved and it was infectious. Byrne certainly knows how to motivate an audience unlike that fat foolish fuck Donald Trump who thinks he does. American Utopia is political of course and alludes to the fact that The United States of America had its beginnings as a utopian experiment that has largely failed. If David Byrne had been born in the USA then I have no doubt the man could be President.