themusic

Kelly Joe Phelps - Lead Me On

I grew up in a meta-folkie home: Peter, Paul, and Mary LPs piled on top of Flat & Scruggs, Seeger/Guthrie concerts (Arlo, by the time I was going)…there was a lot of other music around, but American folk was the core.

While I never entirely renounced those roots, there was a period in my life when what had become “my parents’ music” seemed to lack power and (literal) electricity. Even though I “borrowed” a lot of those albums when I left for college, they didn’t get much play for years.

Then, while living in Portland, OR in the mid-1990s, a friend told me about Kelly Joe Phelps. As I recall, I may have beeen just a hair condescending: “oh, some young white guy playing acoustic blues. Ah, a slide player, you say? Yeah, that sounds great.” Nevertheless, I agreed to go see him play, probably because his regular gig at that point was playing on Sunday mornings at a cafe that I liked.

Holy. Motherfucking. Crap. The energy and power that came from that one guy, playing a guitar and a wooden “thump box” immediately brought back to me everything that I loved about American roots music, without seeming anachronistic or forced in the slightest.

None of Phelps’ records have ever measured up to hearing him live, but Lead Me On, his first album, comes closest to capturing the sound that I heard on that Sunday morning.

Bob Dylan - Worried Blues

Dylan was just a musician that I knew was great, but never made a connection with until I heard this track.  I was in my neighbor’s basement with just candlelight, and I think the stereo was playing a bunch of CDs on random.  When this track came on my love for Dylan was ignited full on.  I never looked back.

Iggy and The Stooges, Search and Destroy (original mix).

When I heard this and I Wanna Be Your Dog what I previously thought was music was no more.

“Friends, this is what madness looks like, and this is how “a streetwalkin’ cheetah with a heart full of napalm” is supposed to sound” — boogiewoogieflu

Nirvana - Where Did You Sleep Last Night (Unplugged)

Maybe THE music moment of my life.  My sister and I watched Nirvana on MTV Unplugged in 1993.  I was a sophomore in high school, and as I’ve mentioned here before, I was running a Nirvana fever.

Unplugged was great. I was smitten. The Bowie cover was amazing, the Meat Puppets were a great new discovery, and I thought Lake of Fire would be the highlight. Then they launched into a cover of an old folk tune known as Where Did You Sleep Last Night, or sometimes, In The Pines. Bets and I were stopped in our tracks. The death cry that Kurt unleashed at the end of this tune will never be topped. I can only hope for another music moment like this in my lifetime.

Adam And The Ants, Dog Eat Dog

It’s hard to imagine how much my mind was blown in 1981 when Adam and his Ants starting popping up all over MTV.  Then we saw them at the Ritz or Danceateria or someplace like that, new wave at its very best.  And then, just like that, it was all over.

David + David - Ain’t So Easy

Everybody’s got one, and this is mine: summer of 1986, teenage bittersweet.

Rufus Wainwright, Somewhere Over The Rainbow

From Rufus Does Judy, where he recreated a complete 1961 concert by Judy Garland at Carnegie Hall, an amazingly memorable move, Stephen Holden from the NY Times said it best:

“For those who came to worship, Mr. Wainwright could do no wrong. His courage to stand as a surrogate for every audience member who ever gazed into the mirror and fantasized slipping into Dorothy’s ruby slippers spoke for itself.”