Ratings: **** Excellent, *** Good, ** Average, * Don't Bother Little Criminals - Randy Newman (Warner Brothers); rating: **** Foreign Affairs - Tom Waits (Asylum); rating: *** The Stranger - Billy Joel (Columbia); rating: *** So many self-professed "rock-poets" are no more than competent songwriters. Some are true visionaries, others jazz-age stylists and imitators of form. While some wallow in self-pity, defeat, and bored fatalism, a select few view their surroundings with all the passions and simplicity of an artist. Randy Newman does not operate under false pretenses: he is of the latter breed. His writing is colorful while at the same time neutral, loaded with sardonic wit, cynical yet ironic, and, propelled by a detached emotionalism. Varied, some times dissonant orchestrations provide a perfect backdrop for his expressive vocals and piano arrangements. Little Criminals contains twelve slices of life, each one different, each like a distorted Rockwell-esque Americana print. Found here are a grotesquely humorous look at why short people have "no reason to live," a look at a cop through a child's eyes, life on a midwestern farm, and a sensitive portrait of a young girl at her father's funeral, among others. Tom Waits is a stylist with a formula as vehicle to his expressions. Waits, assuming a type of persona, takes the lower-class drifter-and-drunk perspective and absorbs him self into his creation, as the object of his own searching commentary. Waits is the fifties Greenwich Village coffeehouse poet removed from his smokey cavern, the beat poet, the bum-and-barfly, chain-smoker, and street prophet. He writes and improvises on lonliness, the tragedy of life, and the human comedy. A sparse acoustic jazz trio backing a rusty voice that can't carry a tune conjures scenes of urban blues, the decay and the drama of corner bars, and main street estab lishments. Songs carried by scat-singing, cool improvisa tions, and dark images make Fore4gn Affairs-the recorded testimony of a madman and a poet. On the other hand, Billy Joel sings of middle-class dreams, ambitions, fantasies ARTS and CULTURE and pitfalls in conventional rock idiom. Suburban comforts and discomforts, youthful restless ness, and loneliness are key subjects to Joel's limited insight. Each of his albums, least of all The Stranger, is handicapped by thematic sameness. It is the dynamic performance of his material that saves the album, although a clinical and calculated production by Phil Ramone almost manages to capsize this effort. Moonflower (Columbia); rating: *** Moonflower maps Santana's coming full circle from their start in 1968, through experimentation in jazz fusion, MOR, and finally back to their original roots, as heard on their last two albums. The new two-record set is guitarist Carlos Santana's rebirth; one that had been emerging slowly and was in fact long overdue. Since band members changed constantly after the third album by the original band, Carlos' biggest challenge was in putting together a new band approximating the energy levels of the original. Missing from the transitional albums, but not quite as obvious in the last two, was what I call the "Latin Fire," seemingly sacri ficed for a more laid back, sometimes more stylish ap proach. Thanks to the guidance of new manager Bill "Filmore" Graham, the band has redis- Doc Watson By Bob Buckingham Guest Columnist In this column I'll attempt to deal with aspects other than the pure commercial qualities of American music. The emphasis will be on the roots or antecedents of the music and how they have been incorpor ated into our contemporary framework. Doc Watson, a native of North Carolina, is a fine example of living music. Watson draws his material from all forms of country and folk music. He carries a strong sense of value for his music and the people he learned it from. Topic 1p 12t5336, The Watson Family Tradition, is an English album produced by Al Lloyd and Ralph Rinzler from tapes made of the Watson family in 1964 and 1965. Herein are the antecedents of much of these songs in the past fifteen years. When proforming or record ing these songs he gives credit to the sourse. Aunt Dooly Greer's "Roving on a Winters covered elements and regained power missing since 1971. Moon!lower offers an aural wash of charged sexual Latin rock, with a modest portion of soul, samba, and inspired celebration. Carlos is among the best electric guitarists going, and those transitional years of experimentation have done nothing but add strength to his skill. However, the most credit should go to Tom Coster, keyboard player for Santana since the early seventies. On Moonflower, Coster finally is able to fill the gap left by the departure of original organist Greg Rolle. Coster comes of age with deep, earthy organ playing that formed the powerful backbone of the original. Santana Moonflower does have its problem, which is most often common among multiple record sets. That problem is too much material. Each of the sides stands on its own, with alternation between the studio cuts and live selections. The album is carefully balanced between the studio and live material; yet when the four sides are played consecutively, it smacks of excessiveness and over-indulgence. The problem, ironically, is that Carlos is inspired - he wants his audience to know that, but he chooses constant guitar soloing, repeti tion, and overstatement as proof and means. A little careful editing and more varied choice of material would have made this flaw less noticeable. Night" or gaither Carltion's fine fiddle and banjo tunes "Georgie" or "Pretty Saro" are here, as well as lullabyes, fiddle tunes and ballads not usually associated with Doc. Doc Watson first came north as part of Clarence "Tom" Alshey's band which also includes Fred Price and Clint Howard. By 1967, Doc had at least four Ip's on the vanguard fable, and had played on about four more for Folkways. Two such albums were made with the Ashley band. Old Tinley Concert Vanguard VDSIO 7 / 1 08 finds the Alshey band minus Ashley(then near 80) in concert for the Seattle Folk Society. Watson is featured on guitar, banjo, mandlin, and harmonica, while Price and Howard play fiddle and guitar respectively. Price and Howard are not professional musicans and its is apperent. Never the less, they produce some robust and hardly music which transcends any lack of proficiency. Watson turns in some fine guitar. M ."4 . ~.... :. • %.: ,.,,,r, , .. 1. • . . ...,,,kr.;:•:.,.,K,' .." ) 4 -••••••,,..,.. • . .:-." :. • ~•. :.•1 . 4 , :; *:, •'e ) i; . :.• .-", ,•.;. 7 .:$OZ: ' ' R 1 , w .. .• : .:::.`"(:::/...--:.• • • ./.. :79 • ~.r: . - •••••:,..,;,. . •,•!.. y, ~ . 1 .„,..5.,-- :..:f s , i4l2 - • ... ,/..-'''', - 4 ,..!/:: :Pt ..::: ~14...1:::::;:e..";;;:,.. 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On the 1p there are some of Ashley's tunes present ("Girl From Sunny Tennessee,") as well as tunes associated with Price and Howard ("East Bound Train") and Watson ("Sittin' on Top of the World"). This 1p draws upon early commercial county music, and less upon the ballad and tunes of the topic Ip. It wasn't until until Watson started to record for United Artist records that he began to draw from more contemporary sources with any great regulary. Of this, Watson says, "When I got back into the old time music in the sixties...l think I did too much to become a purist again, instead of being myself. Further along...actually added a few tunes that weren't really old Limey along to the gets...in - order to be fair to my • 1.,.,. EEC .nusical taste...but I think its Doe's spoken introduction to the Topic 1p that sums up his music: To me, the old time fiddle tunes and the old time ballads, there's never been anything prettier nor ever will be. All of Doc Watson's albums are availble from: County Sales, Box 191 Floyd, Va. 24091. Contributions Welcome The scope of the arts is unlimited in its potential. You can help us realize this potential. Have you been to a movie, play, art exhibit, or concert that was so good [or bad] that you'd be inspired to write about it? Well, then write about it, and submit it to the Arts and Culture page of the Reader. !.. • 01 v 4 . ;1' : ': ....:4 . . ' • : • ;.. ::: • #1
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers