The Pink Floyd’s debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn was released on August 5, 1967.
It was the only Pink Floyd album released while Syd Barrett was the lead singer, guitarist, and songwriter of the band. Between the release of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and 1968’s A Saucerful of Secrets, Barrett’s mental condition quickly declined and he was kicked out of the band.
The Piper at the Gates of Dawn included 11 tracks all of which were composed by Barrett except for “Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk” which was written by Roger Waters.
Oh yes, you can listen to this entire psychedelic masterpiece on the YouTubes. Check it out:
Prince’s 6th album Purple Rain hit #1 on the US album charts on August 4, 1984. It remained at #1 for 24 weeks before being knocked off the top spot by Madonna’s Like a Virgin on January 18, 1985.
Besides it’s huge commercial success, Purple Rain has also received it’s share of critical acclaim. It was ranked as the 72nd greatest album of all time by Rolling Stone magazine. VH1 (18th), Time magazine (15th), and Zounds magazine (18th) ranked it among the top 20 albums of all time.
Entertainment Weekly’s recent 1000th issue (dated July 4, 2008) ranked it as the #1 album of the past 25 years.
The 9 track album includes some of Prince’s most well known songs, including “Let’s Go Crazy,” “When Doves Cry,” and the title track “Purple Rain.”
I’d include some of these songs from YouTube here but apparently Prince is having all of his songs removed from YouTube. Guess he doesn’t like free advertising?
Metallica lead singer, songwriter, and rhythm guitarist James Hetfield turned 45 years old today. He was born on August 3, 1963 in California.
Metallica’s studio albums to date:
Kill ‘Em All (1983) Ride the Lightning (1984) Master of Puppets (1986) …And Justice for All (1988) Metallica (1991) Load (1996) ReLoad (1997) St. Anger (2003)
Metallica’s next album Death Magnetic is set for release on September 10th of this year. It’s 75 minutes long, spread over 10 tracks. The first single is “The Day That Never Comes” which has been described as the most “downbeat” song on the album.
I was going to do a feature on the top 5 songs by Oasis at Last.FM but I decided to change it to a feature of the top ranked song from each Oasis album as 4 of the top 5 are from (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? This is a bit more representative of their career to date although it’s a bit heavy on the ballads.
I think it’s a bit unfortunate that album (Morning Glory) gets so much more play than their other albums as for one I don’t think it’s even their best album (Definitely Maybe is better) and for another all of their albums, except Heathen Chemistry, are quite good.
Each song will include the music video made for it and it’s overall Last.FM rank (among Oasis’ “top tracks”)
Definitely Maybe (1994) - “Live Forever” - #4
(What’s The Story) Morning Glory? (1995) - “Wonderwall” - #1
Be Here Now (1997) - “Stand By Me” - #10
Standing On The Shoulder Of Giants (2000) - “Go Let It Out” - #22
This is a troubling series of events; a documentary on a lost cult musician found in San Diego working the midnight shift at a porn shop and playing keyboard on the side in a cocktail jazz band. So, what to make of this exactly? It is known that Beck mentions the great Gary by first and last name on his epic Pop Dance number “Where It’s At”. Well, that’s nice; and good old Gary has had his bizarre 1977 epic “You Think You Really Know Me?” spun on college radio for lo these many years now. How super is that? Anyhow, to explain Gary’s sound; one need look at a sort of progressive Funk approach…maybe something like The Ohio Players? It’s really hard to say for certain, since Mr. Wilson’s approach is so individualistic. Surely, there’s a rampant Disco beat in nearly all of his tunes; and let it be said that Gary is a wonderful multi-instrumentalist…perhaps keyboard in particular.
In this documentary; the hipster folks at the now defunct Motel Records locate Gary from one of his old band mates, to be precise; Gary is written a letter. Motel Records puts out a re-release of the classic “You Think You Really Know Me?” and a nice little rarities collection as well called “Forgotten Lovers”. Since then, some chap named Peanut Butter Wolf put out an album of new material by Mr. Wilson in 2004 called “Mary Had Brown Hair”, in which Gary is re-united with some of his former band mates from his original mind-boggling lineups from the ‘70’s heyday; referred to as Gary Wilson and The Blind Dates. Lyrically, Gary tackles the topic of love in an intense yet innocent manner. He has limited range as a vocalist, but makes the most of it; it could be argued that he is almost a Soul vocalist of some sort, albeit one with a bizarre fetish for covering his body in flour and wrapping tape around his face and being photographed with mannequins. Read the rest »
MTV Europe was launched 21 years ago today on August 1, 1987. The very first video was the Dire Straights song “Money For Nothing” which of course includes the line “I Want My MTV.” It also features Sting on backing vocals. The video was very “high tech” - you’ve probably seen it before but if you’ve missed it you can check it out below.
“Hey Jude” was one of The Beatles biggest hits (#1 on the US charts for 9 consecutive weeks and #1 in many countries around the world.) The song was written and sung by Paul McCartney.
It was one of the few Beatles songs not to be recorded entirely in Abbey Road. The master rhythm take was recorded on July 31, 1968 at Trident Studios in London. At the time Abbey Road was still using a 4 track machine and The Beatles wanted to take advantage of the 8 track recording machine at Trident Studios for this song.
At just over 7 minutes long it was uncommonly long for it’s time. At the time it was the longest running #1 single in UK & US history.
Kate Bush was born on July 30, 1958 in England. Bush was initially signed by EMI at age 16 after having been recommended by Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour.
In 1978 (at only age 19) she had a #1 UK hit with her debut single “Wuthering Heights” which she wrote herself. This was the first #1 self-written single by a woman in UK history.
Paul McCartney has released two albums under the name The Fireman with the producer Youth (of The Super Furry Animals.) These are experimental ambient music albums. I’ve only heard the second of those two: 1998’s Rushes. The first is from 1993 and is titled Strawberries Oceans Ships Forest. I’d like to hear that one as well but it’s out of print and hard to locate (as is Rushes.)
I read recently that McCartney is working with Youth now on a new album by The Fireman that should be out later this year. And I’m hopeful it’s going to be crazy weird. Yes, crazy weird would be delicious.
To get an idea of the kind of music The Fireman makes - listen to “Appletree Cinnabar Amber” off of Rushes:
***edit***
I just found this track “Lifelong Passion” which may be on the new album.
