Sandy Saturdays #10:
Blues Run the Game
When I was a kid there were two required initial steps to take if you wanted to one day rock: first, you had to learn how to play Stairway to Heaven. Then it was time to learn Blackbird.
I did neither; rather I borrowed my buddy Eric's spare acoustic and taught myself how to stumble through Knocking on Heaven's Door (G-D-C; G-D-C).
My approach is not recommended: my famous brother and my other, almost-as-famous, brother are both surely shredding on their six strings as we speak, their families gathered about them, rapt with awe, as they sing about the lady who's sure that all that glitters is gold and the poor blackbird's sunken eyes. Meanwhile, I'm sitting here, writing this.
(But I did recently witness a big deal version of Blackbird: the eighth grade at my school sang it with horrific, tuneless assembly requirement while their music teacher showed off his seventh grade level guitar licks, but at their center stood a committed, fearless/oblivious young woman who, I kid you not, busted out a whistled, note-perfect and full, blackbird warble at the song's end; surely that warble on The White Album is a field recording, not Paul whistling, right? But this was no field recording: the kid was on tweeting fire. I read this morning that some 14 year American boy just got a professional soccer contract for millions of dollars in England; Paul McCartney ought to offer the young woman at my school a similar contract, pronto.)
Well, anyway, neither Plant/Page's overblown, but still kinda killer (the drums!), epic or McCartney lovely yet paternalistic race anthem existed in 1965 when Sandy Denny, Nick Drake and Paul Simon were teaching themselves to be, well, Sandy Denny, Nick Drake and Paul Simon.
It's really too bad. Imagine Sandy singing Stairway to Heaven. Someway, somehow, she'd make it not sound cliche. While we're at it, imagine Sandy's perfect phrasing, volume, tempo and sense of self taking over altogether for Plant's shirtless, hollering ego.
(Don't panic, I enjoy a little Zeppelin now and again as much as the next white guy who writes a blog about his record collection, and we'll get to Plant and Denny's famous, dense and soaring, shared track on some upcoming Sandy Sunday).
And Nick Drake's version of Stairway to Heaven would be a joyful romp, no? In his hands we'd worry about the Piper rather than be warned against him.
Paul Simon, meanwhile, would revamp the entire chord structure, have 16 tracks on the demo and make Artie stand around, waiting for his turn to do something, anything, only on the last, trembling and drawn out phrase over cymbals, kettle drums and fifes: "and she's buying a stairway.... to heav......en."
But, since that song was yet to be written (Plant must have been about 7 in 65/66) there was a clear stand-in apprentice track for aspiring mid-60's Brits to work at: Blues Run the Game, Jackson C. Frank's lick heavy paean to room service gin. Simon, Denny and Drake all put their stamp on the song, Denny and Drake through home recordings and Simon through an early studio track.
We'll start with the original on this fine Saturday. Simon was there for the song's birthing; he's the producer here, which mostly seems to mean that he said "roll 'em" then looked away while the terrified Frank laid the song down live.
Frank's biography is ready for the Sophocles treatment; he and Oedipus could compare mournful notes, competing to see who had it worse from the gods.
Frank: "Look, Oedipus, I hear you about your mom and all, but did you survive a childhood fire that killed bunches of your peers? No? And was your precocious initial development followed by failed relationships, failed marriages, a terminally ill newborn son and decades of homelessness? No again? Quit trying to interrupt Oedipus; no one cares about your dad. Finally, were you blinded in one eye by errant, random fire from a teenager wielding a pellet gun? No? Well then, quit moping, and shrug it off dude!"
Poor Frank spent a lot of the seventies charging around Woodstock, NY, in his birthday suit, occasionally complimented by a sword and/or cape, his schizophrenic delusions overcoming him. All kidding aside, you gotta feel for the dude.
His tragic life makes his sad song, and his raw performance of it, all that much sadder. The full success of his leisurely, mournful pace also explains why Simon wisely shelved his own comparatively cheerful effort with Garfunkel:
Drake's performance, in turn, is studious and personal; he is trying to prove to himself that he's worthy to join the ranks of not just the quickly lost American, Frank, but also the full gamut of British performers who had the jump start on him, from the boy band ranks (Donovan, Cat Stevens, The Zombies) to the hersute bohemian ne'er do wells (John Renbourn, Richard Thompson, John Martyn) to the guys already living solidly on the astral plane (Heron/Williamson).
Clearly, the elegant Drake belonged in their club; indeed, once he took a deep breath and stuck out his comely head, he was everyone's better.
I don't know that Denny's take competes with Drake's or the original. But it's still damn good and it solidly serves its purpose: Denny sings this boy song boldly as a woman, and she presents it with her soon to be signature balance of power and grace.
Sandy dated Frank at the same point she privately laid down this track and Frank's other stone cold classic, Milk and Honey (a song that is worthy of its own future post). It seems as though Denny's dating decisions were not equal to her musical chops: she soon took a pass on the soon to be naked all the time Frank and shacked up with the world's tallest, most red-headed, dullard, Trevor Lucas.
Lucas, so far as we know, never donned a cape and charged around naked, so score one for Trevor. But he never wrote Sandy a good song, and Frank gave Denny two of them. What's more, Frank helped convince Sandy, during their time together, to quit nursing school and focus full time on music.
Good shot Jackson.
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Peach Pearl - 6- Meeting (on Wattpad) https://www.wattpad.com/1240452154-peach-pearl-6-meeting?utm_source=web&utm_medium=tumblr&utm_content=share_reading&wp_uname=MikiMakoya&wp_originator=fKyyOg48W3LrMHMOzXN3APeh7I5pBNo3rqqZGoDDqQjn78rmm1Netlgkn3l79PyK9XBtEaxKq3fTWs86x5knw%2FSXINt03sdHlfKRYsMp%2BNmt45DyMGch%2BjB6UbhZHCk9 Nigdy nie byłam dobra w opisach. Wielki Mędrzec Równy Niebu, Przystojny Małpi Król, Sun Wukong, był, a raczej JEST zaręczony. Bogom nie spodobało się że pewna bogini zgodziła się zostać jego żoną. Nałożono na nią klątwę, a samemu Wukongowi wmówiono że cierpi katusze. Co jednak się stanie gdy część klątwy zostanie złamana? I am so bad at descriptions... Great Sage Equal To Heaven, Handsome Monkey King, Sun Wukong, was, or IS engaged. Gods didn't like the idea, that one of goddeses agreed to marry him. Cursing her, and telling him she's tortured. What will happen tho, when part of the curse will be broke?
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