Pophistory: music, movies, history, and life.
In 1969, Jim Morrison of The Doors discussed how he gained weight when he started college in this interview with Howard Smith of the Village Voice. Check out where Morrison explains why “fat is beautiful.”
The PBS web series Blank on Blank made the above section of the Smith interview available recently. Patrick Smith did the cool animation.
Did you have a similar experience in college? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
I do not quite get the album art on Worried Man (2012), the debut full-length CD by Andrew Combs. Is he cold? Is it supposed to be a picture of a “Worried Man”? I do not think the album cover adequately prepared me for what to expect when I heard the music. One thing I do know, though, is that it is the best album by a new artist I have heard in a long time.
Because Worried Man came out in October 2012, I realize I am a little slow in discovering Andrew Combs. But seeing a video of Andrew Combs performing on the Twang Nation website recently led me to check out his album. Listening to Worried Man starting with the first track of “Devil’s Got My Woman” has been one of those periodic experiences that restores my faith in new music.
Combs, who is originally from Texas and now resides in Nashville, wrote all of the songs on the album, and he sings with an ache in his voice in the best country and Americana tradition. The album includes heartbreak, whiskey, and pedal steel, and the title track reminds one of an old murder ballad (even if the violence stops short of killing). You can hear the influences of Combs’s heroes who include Harlan Howard, Willie Nelson, Mickey Newbury, Guy Clark, Jackson Browne, and Tom T. Hall. Combs pulls off connecting to these past influences while also sounding modern at the same time, as he does in this performance of “Please, Please, Please.”
Every artist is different, of course, but for comparison purposes, a lot of the songs remind me of another artist I like a lot, Slaid Cleaves. “Please, Please, Please” sounds like it could be a great Heartbreaker-era Ryan Adams track. The song “Worried Man” sounds like it is off of the album of another Texan, Ray Wylie Hubbard . For now, Andrew Combs has made a stream of the album available so you can listen for yourself below Check it out.
Combs, who released the album on his own Coin Records, also co-produced the album with Mike Odmark. Singer-songwriter Caitlin Rose adds her voice to several of the tracks. I look forward to more music from Andrew Combs, whatever the cover looks like.
What is your favorite track off of Worried Man? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
In an upcoming LIfetime biopic, Ring of Fire, Jewel plays Johnny Cash’s wife June Carter. This clip gives an idea of Jewel’s performance. While it is not surprising that Jewel has the singing chops on such songs as “Wildwood Flower,” it is interesting to see her capturing Carter’s humor. It will be hard to top Reese Witherspoon’s fine performance in Walk the Line (2005), but Carter deserves her own film and this clip shows the film has potential. Check it out.
The movie is based on the book, Anchored In Love
For a bonus video, check out the Carter family singing the same “Wildwood Flower” song in 1990 in this video, featuring June, Helen, and Anita Carter.
Will you watch Jewel as June Carter? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
Berry Gordy, the founder of the Motown record label, recently appeared on CBS Sunday Morning to discuss his amazing career and a new Broadway musical about the early days of the label called, appropriately, Motown: The Musical. In the interview, Gordy told interviewer Anthony Mason how he started out writing songs for Jackie Wilson, his opening of Hitsville, USA, his affair with Diana Ross, and why he initially did not want to work with Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson.
[October 2013 Update: The CBS Sunday Morning video is no longer available for embedding, although you may watch the segment on YouTube. Below is another interview featuring Barry Gordy.]
What is your favorite Motown song? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
In 2004, I discovered the debut self-titled album from country singer Julie Roberts. It’s traditional sound stood apart from much of the mediocre music that comes out of Nashville. I particularly liked her version of “Break Down Here,” and it is one of my favorite country songs of the last decade.
I liked the album so much that when her next album, Men and Mascara (2006) came out two years later, I picked it up when I saw it at a Tower Records going out of business. While it never grabbed me as much as her debut album, it was a solid sophomore effort, and I particularly liked the title track.
While Roberts generally recorded songs from other artists on her first two albums, she showed a good taste for music and a talent for interpretation, choosing songs by people such as the talented Julie Miller. The first album, Julie Roberts, had good sales and reviews, leading to national TV show appearances and nominations from the Academy of Country Music and a CMT Awards breakthrough artist nomination.
Her follow-up CD, Men and Mascara, did moderately well but was not as successful. It was a rough time for the music industry overall, and a few years later her record company Mercury Records dropped her. While I had wondered what had happened to Roberts, I did not know until being surprised while watching an episode of The Voice this week.
The years since her breakthrough debut album have not been kind to Julie Roberts. She has failed to surpass or even reclaim the success of her first album, even though she self-released another try in 2010. A 2010 flood in Nashville ruined her home and belongings. And then she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis while she was making her second album.
Which brings us to this week on The Voice, where Roberts hoped for a second chance in her career, much like the winner of season three, Cassadee Pope, did when she auditioned. While it was great to see Roberts again, she appeared not as a guest performer but as a contestant, singing for the four judges who face away from contestants and only opt to turn around if they choose to keep the singer on the show as part of their team.
Roberts selected a song by one of the judges she knew during better times, Blake Shelton’s “God Gave Me You.” As she sang, she hoped Shelton or at least one of the judges would hit the button on their chair to give her and her career a new chance. [2016 Update: Unfortunately, The Voice video segment with Julie Roberts is no longer available.]
Ultimately, none of the judges turned their chair around for Roberts, and Blake Shelton felt especially bad after he recognized the singer he had just rejected. Roberts probably made a mistake singing a song recorded by one of the judges because the judges can be more picky when they think a contestant is trying to win them over with the song selection, especially when it is a song with personal meaning to the judge.
Roberts does much better on other songs. And she probably would have been selected had she sang a song like “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain,” which is available along with other stripped down “Naked” recordings on her website.
This week, Julie Roberts released a statement on her website about her experience on The Voice. In it, she notes that the rejection “was heartbreaking for me on many levels but I believe with all my heart that God has other plans for my life that He is working on behind the scenes for me right now.” The good news is that she plans to record new music and head back out on the road. We wish her well with her life, her health, and her career.
[July 2013 Update: After her TV appearance, Julie Roberts signed a record contract with Sun Records and will release an album in October 2013.]
What is your favorite Julie Roberts song? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)