Throughout our musical journeys there have been points where an artist or a band changes the way we think about music. I call those moments game changers. We’ve all heard the story of journalist/producer Jon Landau seeing Bruce Springsteen for the first time and realizing how Bruce would be the game changer for rock music in the seventies and eighties. There is also a scene in the Eagles documentary, “History of the Eagles”, where producer Glyn Johns is producing the band’s first album in London. He isn’t seeing anything special about them until one day in the studio the band is warming up for the session by singing an a cappella version of “Seven Bridges Road” around one microphone. Hearing their soaring, locked in harmonies Johns has his game changer moment. The Beatles on Ed Sullivan in 1964 was a game changing moment for an entire generation. For some people it was the songwriting of Bob Dylan. A few years ago I wrote an essay on musical crushes. All the game changers were crushes but not all crushes were game changers. What follows are the artists and bands that were my game changers.
Jackson Browne, “Late For The Sky”. It is hard even today forty plus years later to really describe the impact this album had on me in the summer of 1975. This was an example of a piece of music coming along at exactly the right time in your life to create the maximum impression. His voice and those songs were something I had never experienced before. I loved the sound of the album with its dense, even murky, production with only Browne’s voice and David Lindley’s guitars (and violin) rising out of the mix. This record, along with its predecessor “For Everyman”, are in my opinion the peak of Browne’s songwriting. That someone could write songs like this changed my outlook on music forever.
Little Feat, “Waiting For Columbus”. A few years later in 1978 when I was in college a guy I worked with in the library was touting this band’s new live album. I picked it up never having heard a note of their music. I can still remember dropping the needle on side one in the sitting room of my college dorm. What unfolded over the four sides of this album was something I had never heard before. Rock/funk/R&B all mixed up into the crazy gumbo that was Little Feat in the seventies. Lowell George’s soulful singing and piercing slide guitar laid on top of the polyrhythmic sound coming from the rest of the band. The game changer for me was the eclectic, almost sideways, songwriting of Lowell George[1]. From the hilarious last verse of “Dixie Chicken” to the geographic wordplay of “Willin’” or surrealism of “Sailing Shoes”. When was the last time you heard the word onomatopoetry used in a song (“Down Below The Borderline”)? Alas George died in June of 1979 and we lost one of the great songwriters of the modern rock era.
REM, “Reckoning”. In the summer of 1984, having recently picked up their first album “Murmur, I went to see REM at the Beacon Theatre in New York City. My first impression was that the band rocked much harder live than on “Murmur”, which was almost an acoustic album. The set showcased songs from their new album, “Reckoning”, with older songs as well as a number of really cool covers (e.g., Velvet Underground’s “Femme Fatale” and the Mamas and the Papas’ “California Dreaming”). Seeing them live was a completely different experience. I quickly picked up the new album the next week. I couldn’t get enough of this Athens, Georgia band. This album stayed on my turntable for months. I just kept flipping it over whenever I got home. REM really changed the way I thought about how a guitar band could sound, how harmonies were constructed and also about how to cover songs as interpretations not just copies of the original.
Yes, “Close To The Edge”. In the early seventies I owned this record for a while before listening to it. It was actually on an 8-track tape (that doomed seventies format). I got it as part of a get ten records for a penny teaser offer from the Columbia House Record Club (“Buy just four more in the next two years at regular club prices!”). Anyway one day I got around to listening to “Close To The Edge”. I think I was listening to it on headphones. As the title song unfolded over 18 minutes I was transfixed. Most long songs I had heard usually involved long guitar solos. This was something else altogether. It was like a symphonic piece with recurring themes over multiple movements. The lyrics were impenetrable but it didn’t matter. The melodies were soaring and each member of the band was a virtuoso on their instrument. “Close To The Edge” changed the way I thought about how you could construct longer pieces of music. I still listen to this album regularly today – on vinyl.
In looking back at this essay I see that these artists were from early in my life. Perhaps game changers come earlier when they can have maximum impact, when we are more impressionable, or open, to them. Maybe later after years of listening to all kinds of music it’s harder to get turned around by an artist.
ARTS ROUNDUP
Books – “The Circuit: A Tennis Odyssey”, Rowan Ricardo Phillips. Phillips chronicles the 2017 tennis season and the amazing resurgence of Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. When I say season I mean the entire season. Phillips touches on just about every tournament. The extended vignettes on players like David Goffin (#7 in the world) and bad boy Nick Kyrgios are especially insightful. It’s the best tennis book I’ve read since David Foster Wallace’s “String Theory”.
Film – “Bohemian Rhapsody”. By now most of you have probably seen this movie and know that Rami Malek is sensational as Freddie Mercury. You forget how many great songs Queen had. I wasn’t aware that everyone in the band contributed to the writing of those songs. Their Live Aid set is still one of the most amazing performances in rock history.
Music – Phoebe Bridgers, “Stranger In The Alps”. The second album from Bridgers is worth checking out if just for the song “Scott Street” (see the YouTube live version here).
[1]Lowell George and Jackson Browne were close friends.