New Canadian

Pretty much like the stories from the turn of the century, on March 15,  1970 I arrived in Toronto with $200 Canadian and a steamer trunk full of my worldly possessions; which included far too many thick sweaters to protect me from the harsh Canadian winters. I guess my brain had not processed the fact that North America had central heating pretty much everywhere.
I emigrated with two friends who had come ahead of me and had an apartment already.

One of the friends was from my college days and shared my love of music. Especially American girl groups and girl singers and R&B artists. It was the first Sunday after I had arrived, he and I headed to Sam’s record shop on Yonge Street while my other friend, his girlfriend at the time, later his wife, cooked dinner for us. (They are still together and we are still friends.)
We were overwhelmed by the fact that shops were open on Sunday and a record store had so many of our favourite artists with material that we had not seen before. We were also interested in so many new artists for us to pick over.  My friend bought Roberta Flack‘s debut album called First Take. 
I bought an Ella Washington album which included a minor hit named, He Called Me Baby. I love that song and I had the 45 RPM disc back in London.

Roberta Flack’s album contained a soulful rendition of English rebellious folk singer Ewan McCol's  The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face. A beautiful song he wrote for his girlfriend back in the early 1950's named Peggy Seeger. (They later married and she is still performing.)

I remember seeing Roberta Flack performing music from the album on the Johnny Carson show.  However, Roberta was not well known until Clint Eastwood used her version of The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face as a background music for a romantic interlude in his 1972 movie Play Misty for Me.  The track was released as a single that year and  eventually topped  the Billboard charts.

In 1972, I bought a Mini 1000 and commuted to work in it; braving 16 lanes of Highway 401 and its daily chaos. I also often gave a ride to anyone who asked for one. Soon I had accumulated three regular companions and we packed into that little car, turned on the radio, usually to 1050 CHUM, and sang along to all the hits. Johnny Nash, I can see  clearly now, You're so vain Carly Simon and of course Roberta Flack among many more.

It was a wonderful year. My friends had returned temporarily to the UK for many months and I found crazy new companions in Toronto. Many born and raised there who exposed me to so many great new experiences.  It was the year I felt I had found myself as a genuine new Canadian; and Roberta Flack's song is forever associated with that initiation.

Conway Twitty

I was a teenage school boy in Northwest London when I first heard Conway Twitty sing It's Only Make Believe. I loved it. Linked to those great memories of sharing music tastes with other school friends. For awhile, when Conway went Country he lost favour with me, but in adulthood, I came to appreciate him once more.  
I was lucky enough to see him perform at the first country and western exposition in London in  early March 1970. It was just shortly before I emigrated to Canada. A friends mother worked at the old Wembley Stadium and adjoining showplace. The exposition had sold too few tickets, they gave every employee a couple of tickets; hence we got in for free.

So when I was in Nashville in the early 80's I couldn’t miss up the opportunity to go to Conway's home and as it turned out it was a museum about his rise to fame.  It was called Twitty city I love that name.

The site is now owned by Trinity Broadcasting Corporation and no longer functions as an homage to Conway Twitty. 
Another piece of Americana lost to the mists of time.

1973

This blog is about the music from 1973 because that’s the year I believe "the Sixties", as a socio-cultural phenomenon  ended. All those English invasion bands were fading, The influence of Electric Organs and synthesizes were having an impact on pop music. What's more,  radio clearly diverged into AM pop and FM-friendly music. 1973 saw Alice Cooper, Led Zeppelin and the Who all touring North America. It was an amazing time and the managers of these bands had realized that the big money was made touring; it was not from hits on AM radio.

Alice Cooper had a big hit with I'm 18 in 1972. And following up on this hit and a big hit album called Billion Dollar Babies,  "Alice"  hit the road for a monumental tour in 1973.
The Who were also touring to promote an album, Quadrophenia. It was Pete Townsend‘s second rock opera.  Long Train Running from the Doobie Brothers  another hit from 1973. The beginning of many for them in that decade.

Another hit from 1973 is Will It Go Round in Circles from Billy Preston.  When Get back by the Beatles was released as a single in 1968, it featured Billy Preston. Billy was very popular in London at that time and hung around Apple studios a lot. Photograph from Ringo is his no.1 from 1973.

Many great albums now considered "Classic Rock" and are still being played on the radio today were released in 1973. Possibly the most prominent is Pink Floyd's Dark side of the moon, but also there was  Stevie Wonder's  Innervisions. A great track from that LP is Higher Ground. It was released as a single and made the top 10 in 1973.

Fleetwood Mac were on tour in that year, what a great year to have been young and a music lover. I feel lucky to have been there and experience these great moments. 

post script

42 years ago July 26, 1977, Zeppelin were touring North America once again when they got a message that Robert Plant's five-year-old son was very ill. They cancelled the rest of the tour,  Robert flew back to England.  Sadly, his son passed away. Robert Plant was shattered by the loss and did not do much for the next 18 months. After that date in 1977,  Led Zeppelin never toured America again; Because in 1980  their drummer, John Bonham died from alcohol poisoning and the band effectively dissolved.

PLAYLIST for 1973

18 from Alice Cooper.

the real me (from Quadrophenia)

Long train running from the Doobie Brothers

Will it go round in circles from Billy Preston.

Photograph from Ringo,

Higher Ground from Stevie Wonder

Ecology and Police Profiling

Both of these topics remain in the forefront of 21st Century activists' attempts to increase  awakening in Society. As it should be.
However, what comes to my mind is how long this fight for better practices has been going on, and while big gains have been made, so much remains to be done. It is wonderful to see someone as young as Greta Thunberg getting centre stage at International Events and calling out us adults to do much more for the next generations.

Pop music from the sixties Protest Movement echoed the sentiments of the population. As the sixties became the seventies, music continued to echo the worries of the population passed the Anti-war rhetoric. 

Throughout the sixties, Motown was staunchly grinding out memorable pop hits; However, they did in fact become aware of the changing sentiments in society and even Stevie wonder covered Bob Dylan‘s Blowing in the Wind. It made the top 20. As mentioned earlier MOTOWN was a purveyor of great pop songs,  however, long before the 21st century & the growing awareness of racial profiling, this was the theme for one of Stevie wonders massive hits in 1973 recorded on the album Innervisions. The album version of Living For The City which includes a spoken section in the middle where Stevie indicates how he is railroaded into jail simply for being with other Black youth; His innocence was irrelevant to the case.  The album track was edited and released as a single without the dialogue in the middle piece and it made the top 10. 

 In the early seventies, Marvin Gaye was moved by the state of society and the environment and wrote a whole album about ecology. Berry Gordy was loathe to release it, but Marin had clout after 2 number 1's and a decade of popularity, Berry gave in and the album was a huge hit and remains a classic with What's  Going On being covered by many others. 

SONGS

blowing in the wind. - Stevie wonder

Living for the City - Stevie wonder

What's Going On - Marvin Gaye

Eric and the Beatles. A Playlist

As the Beatles came to prominence in the early sixties, British music was moving from folk based tunes to Blues based songs. However, as Britain did not have a history of  home-grown Blues Music it was all borrowed from America and especially music from the South.
There were many great blues artists who came over to Britain and the rest of Europe for tours. My friends and I managed to see just about all of them; the Legends.

In the fall of last year we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the release of the Beatles White album. One of the stand-out tracks on that album was George Harrison's composition, While My Guitar Gently Weeps. On the anniversary of the original release, Apple reissued a re-mastered version of the double album with extras.

One of the features of that track was Eric Clapton‘s uncredited solo guitar break. Of course we all know that George and Eric were good friends, this was the period that Eric had fallen in love with George’s wife Patti,  who Eric did eventually marry. But George and Eric remained good friends all their lives.

Back in those days record labels controlled their contracted artists were very stringently. Especially  about guest appearances on other major artists tracks; hence, the lack of accreditation for Eric‘s solo. Of course this was ridiculous because everybody knew that it was Eric Clapton. The rumours  and gossip columns in the tabloids revealed everything. The special interest in Eric Clapton was because back then, and still now 50+ years later, is considered one of the greatest rock guitarist.

Here is a track by George Harrison When We Was Fab, it too is a collaboration with Eric Clapton.

Clapton came to prominence with the group the Yardbirds. As they moved from their original blues based styling  to more progressive rock, Clapton left them and joined John Mayall's  Bluesbreakers. He recorded one album with them.  On the cover is a photo of the band with Eric being extra cool and reading a famous British comic called the Beano.
Ever since then the album is known as the Beano album. Rambling on my mind from that album is a track where Eric not only plays guitar but also does the vocals with Mayall's band backing him.

The irony of Clapton leaving the Yardbirds because he felt they were getting too progressive is that Eric left  John Mayall's band pretty soon to form the supergroup Cream. Cream were at the forefront of progressive rock. One of their first singles was a hit I feel free.

Cream only lasted about 30 months, Clapton was disillusioned with the music business and was heavily into drugs. However, he still wished  form a group where all the players  had similar sensibilities. That group was Derek and the dominoes. They’re really only famous for one track Layla. Once Eric got himself together and started performing again in the early 70's he released 461 Ocean Blvd. and re-started his career and never looked back. On the 30th anniversary of that album's release it was re-issued with a second disc of a live recording where Eric does Layla. Unlike the Derek and the Dominoes' version it doesn’t have a long Piano coda.

Layla  was about his love for Patti Boyd, as is Wonderful Tonight.
On August 1, 1971, George Harrison got some friends together and put on the first Rock for Charity concert. Two shows at Madison Square Garden’s which were released as the Concert for Bangladesh. From that album,  is the track called Bangladesh. George does the lead vocals, along with his pal Eric Clapton on guitar, and many other famous performers.

In 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono were promoting their efforts to stop the Vietnam war and foster peace. They were in Toronto when John got the idea for a peace concert which occurred in Toronto in that august. Of course it was recorded an album released later. Be truthful it’s not a very good album, it was very disorganized and it comes through on the recording quality. However one of the best tracks is John Lennon doing Money (that’s what I want), The old Barrett strong number that they did all those years ago in the Cavern and Hamburg. John is backed up by Eric Clapton and Keith Richards on this track.
In the Beatles early days, they played many Carl Perkins tunes, one track that Ringo sang on was called Matchbox. This is a live concert of  Carl's where he does Matchbox with  Ringo and Eric Clapton on it.

After George Harrison passed away Ringo wrote and recorded a wonderful track called Never Without You. An homage to his friend. Of course, Ringo invited George’s friend Eric Clapton to sing and play on the track as well.

Repeating the same  theme  Without You, is John Lennon's drinking Buddy,  Harry Nilsson’s hit from 1972. It topped the charts that year. The tune is a cover of Badfinger's song Without You from their first album.

In early 1992, Columbia records put on a show at Madison Square Garden‘s to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of Bob Dylan‘s first album. Anybody who is anybody is in that concert. There’s a CD released and a DVD with a boat full of great music. At the concert  Eric does a  version of Bob Dylan’s Don’t Think Twice (it’s all right). It’s an amazing rendition of the song that’s been covered by hundreds of other artists.

Playlist
While my guitar gently weeps
When we was Fab
Rambling on my mind
I Feel free
Layla
Wonderful tonight
Bangladesh
Money (that’s what I want)
Matchbox
Never without You
Without You
Don't think twice (it's alright)

Teddy Bears

When we arrived in England in 1953 we did what many new immigrants did, we moved in with family friends who had emigrated from India before us. Then, after 6 months, we bought our first home. My parents also bought a TV and radiogram within the first few months of settling into our home. Pretty forward thinking for those days.  There was only one TV channel and just three BBC radio channels. Back in those days a lot of the programming concerned people talking or maybe dramatic plays but very little pop.
One of the most popular radio shows was on Saturday morning for a couple hours of children’s favorites. Requests came in from children to hear tunes that they liked. I was recently watching a documentary on Eric Clapton and he mentioned being a child and listening to the same show. His early introduction to music. A favourite song that was constantly requested was one called The Teddy Bears Picnic it was done by Henry Hall. I remember it well from those Saturday mornings.   It also was a song we sang as a family in Calcutta. 

Even before Disney turned Winnie the Pooh into a worldwide money making machine, the simple but sweet philosophy of Winnie the Pooh was a big hit with the hippies and the love generation. I remember having a small paperback called the hums of pooh. In wide circulation again in the mid-sixties.  (I am pretty sure a friend showed it to me first. We shared its insights over many coffees.)
One of the original members of  Buffalo Springfield was singer-songwriter and later producer,  Jim Messina. When Springfield broke up Jim hooked up with Kenny Loggins  and as a duo, Loggins and Messina they had quite a few hits. They had a lovely one where they’re singing about Winnie the Pooh. It’s called the house at Pooh corner.

I loved reading when we were 6 by A.A.Milne to my daughter and my mother would sing "They're Changing Guards at Bucking Palace"...

(Christopher Robin Went Down with Alice,) to them also.

Teddy Bears Picnic - Henry Hall

House at Pooh Corner - Loggins & Messina

They're Changing Guards at Bucking Palace - Vera Lynn

        

OTIS REDDING

December 10, 1967 I was working my first serious full-time adult job in Oxford, England. I was an editor at the Clarendon Press, a part of  the OUP (Oxford University Press). The office was on Saint Giles, then an old road from the Woodstock & Banbury Road junction and the shopping district and at the edge of various colleges. I had a short two stop bus ride or about a half an hour walk from the office in order to get “home”.  I finished at five pm and walked to my bed sit on Chalfont Road, made a simple meal on my one-ring burner and put on the BBC News on the transistor radio.  I was shocked to hear of the death of the great Otis Redding in a plane crash in the US. Along with members of the Bar-Kays who were backing him on the tour. I actually cried. 
He was a great artist that all my friends and I admired. My friends and I went as a large group to see him, (and the whole revue,) in the great Stax-Volt Revue when it came to London. As I discovered later, The Beatles & Stones were in attendance too, as they were huge fans.

51 years later he is still admired around the world and his great posthumous number one hit, recorded  just days before he died (Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay remains a staple of radio in the 21st-century.