album reviews
Joni Mitchell
Ladies of the Canyon Reprise
Along with the other established ladies of folkdom, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Judy Collins, both Mrs. Harris and Miss Mitchell have been around a while, Some brilliant chick folksingers have vanished — Judy Henske, Alice Stuart and Rosalie Sorrels whither art thou? — but these two have endured. This is Joan's eleventh album and Joni's third and in their own gentle ways they come to grips with the teeth of the times in their curiously lyrical, frankly autobiographical fashio... | More »
The Beatles
Let It Be Apple
To those who found their work since the white album as emotionally vapid as it was technically breathtaking, the news that the Beatles were about to bestow on us an album full of gems they'd never gotten around to polishing beyond recognition was most encouraging. Who among us, after all, wouldn't have preferred a good old slipshod "Save The Last Dance For Me" to the self-conscious and lifeless "Oh! Darlin'" they'd been dealing in? Well, it was too good to be true —... | More »
Mott the Hoople
Mott The Hoople
Not so very long ago, some friends of mine circled a block for about five minutes while I tried to figure out which unreleased Dylan side we were listening to. I could have spared us the trouble if I'd been listening to the lyrics, which were those of Sonny Bono's immortal protest classic "Laugh At Me." And it wasn't a Highway 61 outtake at all; it was Mott the Hoople. Mott the Hoople is a synthetic rock band. By that I certainly do not mean that they're phony. Rather, th... | More »
Dr. John
Remedies
Break out the hash pipe and heat up the gumbo — Dr. John is back again with music from that steamy, swampy place in your mind that only Dr. John can reach. Remedies is not get-it-on rock music; it's too loose and languid for that. The rhythms — by far the best part of Dr. John's music — are lyrical and liquid; they flow and throb, like blood, like fucking. Dr. John's music is not mind-music, not body-music — at its best, it is emotional — beyond wo... | More »
Bob Dylan
Self Portrait Columbia
"Self Portrait No. 25" Written and Arranged by Greil Marcus Chorus: Charles Perry, Penny Marcus, Pann Wenner, Erik Bennstein, Ed Ward, John Burks, Ralph Gleason, Langdon Winner, Bruce Miroff, Richard Vaughn and Mike Goodwin (1)What is this shit? (1) "All the Tired Horses" is a gorgeous piece of music, perhaps the most memorable song on this album. In an older form it was "All the Pretty Ponies in the Yard"; now it could serve as the theme song to any classic western. Can you hear ... | More »
Jimi Hendrix
Band of Gypsys Classic Collection
This is the album that Hendrix "owed" Capitol for releasing him over to Reprise Records and significantly, it isn't a studio effort, as his Reprise albums have been. Which is not to imply that it is any better than those Experience albums. The context of the album is vital — Band of Gypsys was one of Hendrix' 1969 amalgamations consisting of Buddy Miles on drums and Billy Cox on bass, among others. They hadn't been together very long when this session was recorded live at... | More »
Marvin Gaye
That's the Way Love Is
I start out with a prejudice against any Motown album containing songs like "Yesterday," "Groovin'," and "Abraham, Martin and John" but Marvin Gaye's superlative vocal stylings almost bring this one off. Though any song gains distinction when sung by Marvin Gaye, and any album of his is a pleasure to listen to, his latest would be better if its more memorable songs were livelier and its livelier songs more memorable. Produced by Norman Whitfield who has given us "Grapevine" and gui... | More »
Miles Davis
Bitches Brew Columbia/Legacy
Miles' music continues to grow in its beauty, subtlety and sheer magnificence. Bitches' Brew is a further extension of the basic idea he investigated in his two previous albums, Filles De Kilimanjaro and In A Silent Way. In a larger sense, however, the record is yet another step in the unceasing process of evolution Miles has undergone since the Forties. The man never stops to rest on his accomplishments. Driven forward by a creative elan unequaled in the history of American music, ... | More »
Paul McCartney
McCartney Apple, EMI
McCartney is an album that wants desperately to convince. Its explicit and uniform message is that Paul McCartney, his wife Linda and family have found peace and happiness in a quiet home away from the city and away from the hassle of the music business. This is a beautiful vision and, like most listeners, I wanted very much to believe it was true. On the basis of the music alone I was entirely persuaded. The 14 cuts on McCartney are masterful examples of happiness, relaxation and contentment... | More »
MC5
Back In The U.S.A.
Wop-bop-a-lu-bop-a-lop-bam-boom. Thud. "Tutti Frutti," which opens the partly excellent MC5 album, is easily the worst cut on it, and in a way a clue to the rest of the record, which ends, stiffly enough, with "Back in the USA." The MC5 have roots; or their producer Jon Landau does, or somebody does. Over four minutes of totally pointless music is expended in "proving" that fact — and regardless of the possible coy significance of this one-time "Killer Band" singing "Back in the USA" as... | More »
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