LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 21, 2019… ON THIS DATE IN 1972 LED ZEPPELIN RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘ROCK AND ROLL’ FROM THE ALBUM LED ZEPPELIN 4. I WAS SHOCKED TO LEARN THAT THE SONG PEAKED AT #47 ON THE BILLBOARD SINGLES CHART. THE SONG WAS WRITTEN AS A SPONTANEOUS JAM, WHICH BROKE OUT WHEN THE BAND WAS TRYING TO FINISH ‘FOUR STICKS’. JOHN BONHAM PLAYED THE INTRODUCTION TO LITTLE RICHARD’S ‘YOU KEEP A-KNOCKIN’ AND PAGE ADDED A GUITAR RIFF. BECAUSE IT HAPPENED DURING THE STUDIO SESSION FOR ‘FOUR STICKS’ A TAPE WAS ROLLING AND THE SONG WAS FINISHED 15 MINUTES LATER.
HERE’S ZEP, WITH A LIVE VERSION OF ‘ROCK AND ROLL’ FROM 1973’S SHOW AT MADISON SQUARE GARDEN.
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 20, 2020…ON THIS DATE IN 2003, THE UNTHINKABLE HAPPENED AT A GREAT WHITE NIGHTCLUB APPEARANCE IN WEST WARWICK, RHODE ISLAND. ONE HUNDRED PEOPLE DIED WHEN PYROTECHNICS FROM THE BAND STARTED A FIRE AND IGNITED THE CLUB. GREAT WHITE GUITARIST TY LONGLEY WAS ALSO KILLED IN THE ACCIDENT. THE TWO BROTHERS WHO OWNED THE CLUB WERE CHARGED WITH INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER, ALONG WITH THE GROUP’S FORMER TOUR MANAGER. THE FOAM SOUNDPROOFING AT THE EDGE OF THE STAGE CAUGHT FIRE, AND THE BLAZE SPREAD QUICKLY IN THE ONE STORY WOODEN BUILDING AS ALL THE FANS TRIED TO ESCAPE THROUGH THE SAME EXIT. APPROXIMATELY 200 SURVIVORS WERE BADLY BURNED, MAIMED OR PERMANENTLY DISFIGURED. GREAT WHITE STARTED A TOUR IN JULY 2003 TO RAISE MONEY FOR THE SURVIVORS AND FAMILIES OF THE VICTIMS THAT LASTED UNTIL 2005, WHEN THE GROUP EVENTUALLY BROKE UP. THE GROUP IS NOW BACK TOGETHER AND TOURING.
HERE’S A GREAT ROCK SONG, GREAT WHITE AND ‘ROCK ME’
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 20, 2020…BORN FEB 20, 1967 TODAY KURT COBAIN WOULD HAVE BEEN 53. COBAIN SKYROCKETED TO FAME WITH NIRVANA IN 1991. NIRVANA’S SELF-TITLED DEBUT SPENT OVER 2 YEARS ON THE CHARTS. DURING THE LAST 2 YEARS OF HIS LIFE, COBAIN STRUGGLED WITH HEROIN ADDICTION, ILLNESS, AND DEPRESSION. COBAIN COMMITTED SUICIDE ON APRIL 5, 1994. COBAIN IS REMEMBERED AS ONE OF THE MOST ROCK MUSICIANS IN THE HISTORY OF ALTERNATIVE ROCK.
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 20, 2020…ON THIS DATE IN 1970, JOHN LENNON RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘INSTANT KARMA’ IN AMERICA. LENNON WROTE, RECORDED, AND MIXED THE TRACK ALL IN ONE DAY. HERE’S THE OFFICIAL VIDEO FOR THE SONG. MY FAVORITE PART OF THE VIDEO IS TWO-FOLD. FIRST OFF I MARVEL AT HOW FREAKIN’ GREAT JOHN LENNON IS AS A SONGWRITER AND PERFORMER. SECONDLY, I SPENT THE ENTIRE VIDEO TRYING TO FIGURE OUT WHY YOKO ONO IS BLINDFOLDED AND KNITTING IN THE VIDEO !! CLASSIC.
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 19, 2020…FORTY YEARS AGO BOB SEGER RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘FIRE LAKE.’ IT WAS THE FIRST SINGLE ISSUED FROM THE ‘AGAINST THE WIND’ AND IT CONTINUED SEGER’S STREAK OF HIT SINGLES GOING TO # 6 ON THE CHARTS AND IS ONE OF 7 TOP TEN SINGLES FOR SEGER IN THE 1970’S-1980’S. ACCORDING TO SEGER HE DECIDED TO MAKE ‘FIRE LAKE’ THE FIRST SINGLE BECAUSE IT WAS “totally and unequivocally unlike anything I’d ever done before.The lyric is very different and very kind of unique. It’s about taking risks. About risking love, chucking it all and just heading off with a bunch of wild people, whatever. It is one of my favorite lyrics down through the years, and the track is very unusual. It’s sort of an R&B meets country kind of thing.I really wanted it to be the first single but I never thought Capitol would agree to it, and I believe it was Punch (Andrews, Seger’s manager and often co-producer) who talked them into it. What I liked about it was that it broke new ground for us. It really showed that we were unafraid to push the envelope of what we were doing before, which was basically pretty hot rock and roll, you know, with a few ballads thrown in.”
IT’S KIND OF INTERESTING TO NOTE THAT HIS GOOD BUDDIES DON HENLEY, GLENN FREY AND TIMOTHY B. SCHMIDT OF THE EAGLES ADDED BACKUP VOCALS ON THIS SONG. SEGER LATER REPAID THE FAVOR BY COMING UP WITH THE CHORUS FOR THE EAGLES HIT ‘HEARTACHE TONIGHT.’ HERE’S SEGER WITH ‘FIRE LAKE’
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 19, 2020…HAPPY BIRTHDAY WISHES GO OUT TODAY TO BLACK SABBATH GUITARIST TONY IOMMI. IN MY OPINION, TONY IOMMI IS BLACK SABBATH. IOMMI IS THE LEAD GUITARIST AND IS ONE OF THE FOUR FOUNDING MEMBERS OF THE GROUP. HE IS ALSO THE MAIN COMPOSER FOR THE BAND, AND THE ONLY MEMBER OF THE SABBATH THAT HAS BEEN A CONTINUAL MEMBER FOR OVER 5 DECADES. IOMMI HAS BEEN RANKED IN THE TOP 25 GUITARISTS OF ALL TIME BY ‘ROLLING STONE MAGAZINE’. MIRACULOUSLY, HE’S ABLE TO PLAY, DESPITE HAVING LOST THE TIPS OF HIS MIDDLE AND RING FINGERS ON HIS RIGHT HAND DUE TO AN INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENT AS A TEENAGER.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TONY IOMMI…TO CELEBRATE HERE’S SOME VINTAGE SABBATH FROM 1970
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 19, 2020…ON THIS DAY 40 YEARS AGO, BON SCOTT PASSED AWAY AT THE AGE OF 33. BON JOINED AC/DC IN 1974 AND WAS THE LEAD SINGER FOR THE GROUP FOR ONLY 6 YEARS, UNTIL HIS DEATH IN 1980. THEIR 1979 ALBUM ‘HIGHWAY TO HELL’ WAS THE BAND’S BIGGEST ALBUM COMMERCIALLY TO DATE, BREAKING THE TOP TWENTY ON BILLBOARD’S ALBUM CHART, AND IT LOOKED LIKE AC/DC WAS ON ITS WAY TO MEGA SUCCESS. HOWEVER, AFTER A NIGHT OF PARTYING IN LONDON, IT’S REPORTED THAT SCOTT WAS DEAD, FOUND IN A CAR PARKED ON THE STREET IN FRONT OF HIS HOUSE. THE OFFICIAL CAUSE OF DEATH LISTED ON THE CORONER’S REPORT IS “ACUTE ALCOHOL POISONING” AND HIS DEATH WAS OFFICIALLY CLASSIFIED AS “DEATH BY MISADVENTURE.”
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 18, 2020…FORTY SIX YEARS AGO PAUL MCCARTNEY AND WINGS RE-RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘JET’ WITH ‘LET ME ROLL IT’ AS THE B-SIDE IN AMERICA. NOW I SAY RE-RELEASED BECAUSE IT WAS FIRST ISSUED ON JANUARY 28, 1974, AND THE SINGLE’S B-SIDE WAS ‘MAMUNIA,’ ANOTHER TRACK FROM THE ALBUM ‘BAND ON THE RUN.’ ‘JET’ WAS HUGE FOR MCCARTNEY, GOING TOP TEN WITHIN’ 6 WEEKS. INTERESTINGLY ENOUGH, WHEREAS MOST OF THE ALBUM ‘BAND ON THE RUN’ WAS RECORDED IN LAGOS NIGERIA, ‘JET’ WAS ACTUALLY RECORDED IN LONDON AFTER THE GROUP RETURNED FROM THE DISASTROUS TRIP. INSTRUMENTATION IN THE SONG INCLUDED A MOOG SYNTHESIZER. IT WAS USED FOR THE BASS LINE IN THE VERSE AND IS SIMPLY LINDA MCCARTNEY HOLDING DOWN THE ROOT NOTE.
ACCORDING TO MCCARTNEY, THE SONG’S TITLE WAS INSPIRED BY HIS LABRADOR RETRIEVER NAMED ‘JET.’
“We’ve got a Labrador puppy who is a runt, the runt of a litter. We bought her along a roadside in a little pet shop, out in the country one day. She was a bit of a wild dog, a wild girl who wouldn’t stay in. We have a big wall around our house in London, and she wouldn’t stay in, she always used to jump the wall. She’d go out on the town for the evening, like Lady and the Tramp. She must have met up with some big black Labrador or something. She came back one day pregnant. She proceeded to walk into the garage and have this litter… Seven little black puppies, perfect little black Labradors, and she’s not black, she’s tan. So we worked out it must have been a black Labrador. What we do is if either of the dogs we have has a litter, we try to keep them for the puppy stage, so we get the best bit of them, and then when they get a bit unmanageable we ask people if they want to have a puppy. So Jet was one of the puppies. We give them all names. We’ve had some great names, there was one puppy called Golden Molasses. I rather like that. Then there was one called Brown Megs, named after a Capitol executive. They’ve all gone now. The people change the names if they don’t like them.” — Paul McCartney, Paul McCartney: In His Own Words
THIS IS FANTASTIC….PAUL MCCARTNEY AND WINGS REHEARSING THE TRACK IN THE STUDIO
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 18, 2020…THE YEAR WAS 1974 AND KISS RELEASED THEIR SELF TITLED DEBUT ALBUM. WE ALL KNOW KISS NOW, BUT IN 1974, THE BAND WAS UNKNOWN, HAD THE MOST AWESOME STAGE SHOW, AND THE GROUP WORE OUTRAGEOUS COSTUMES AND FACE MAKE UP. EACH MEMBER HAD A PERSONA. THERE WAS THE STARCHILD(PAUL STANLEY), THE SPACE ACE (ACE FREHLEY), THE CAT MAN (PETER CRISS), AND THE DEMON (GENE SIMMONS). THE BAND HAS SINCE SOLD OVER 100 MILLION RECORDS AND THIS YEAR ARE TOURING IN WHAT THEY ANNOUNCED AS THEIR FINAL TOUR, THE “ONE LAST KISS:END OF THE ROAD TOUR.”
LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES- FEB 18, 2020… TODAY KEITH KNUDSEN WOULD HAVE BEEN SIXTY EIGHT YEARS OF AGE. KNUDSEN IS BEST KNOWN AS A DRUMMER, VOCALIST AND SONGWRITER. HE IS ALSO THE FATHER OF DAYNA KEYES, ONE OF OUR FAVORITE PEOPLE ON THE BONE AIRSTAFF. KEITH JOINED THE DOOBIE BROTHERS IN 1974 DURING THE RECORDING OF THE ALBUM ‘WHAT WERE ONCE VICES ARE NOW HABITS.’ HE WAS A DRUMMER WITH THE DOOBIES FROM 1974 UNTIL THEY DISBANDED IN 1982. KNUDSEN IS ALSO CREDITED WITH ORGANIZING THE ONE OFF DOOBIES REUNION IN 1987 TO RAISE FUNDS FOR THE “NATIONAL VETERANS FOUNDATION.” HE LATER REJOINED THE DOOBIE BROTHERS ON A FULL TIME BASIS IN 1993. KEITH KNUDSEN DIED OF PNEUMONIA ON FEBRUARY 8, 2005 AT THE AGE OF 56. RIP KEITH KNUDSEN.
HERE’S A GREAT LIVE PERFORMANCE OF BLACK WATER FROM 1974
AND ANOTHER VIDEO TO SHOWCASE KNUDSEN’S VERSATILITY, THIS TIME SHOWING A PERFORMANCE WITH THE DOOBIES CIRCA 1981 FROM A CONCERT IN SANTA BARBARA
