Fairport Convention 4: Liege & Lief

For their third album in the space of a calendar year, Fairport Convention had to regroup. First, they needed a drummer to replace the deceased Martin Lamble, and did so with Dave Mattacks, who would go on to have an incredible career behind the kit. Dave Swarbrick, who’d fiddled on the last album, was brought in as a full member, and would be a key part of the sound of Liege & Lief.

It’s been called the first true British folk-rock album, and for good reason. It was woodshed and developed in a communal house, just like Traffic and The Band, with a focus on traditional folk melodies transferred to modern electric instruments. Even the new songs developed by the songwriters in the band sounded like they were centuries old already.

Case in point: “Come All Ye” sets the scene wonderfully, a call to join in the happy stomp, complete with lines about each of the players. “Reynardine” was one of those old songs, here delivered very slowly to prolong the tale of seduction, the instruments droning as best they can. “Matty Groves” is even older, a tale of cuckoldry, revenge, and murder set cheekily to the American melody of “Shady Grove”, building tension until the clever twist ending is revealed, and the pace picks up to a stomp and another showcase for Richard Thompson. The much more soothing “Farewell, Farewell” is a Thompson lyric set to a traditional tune, sung sweetly (like everything else here) by Sandy Denny.

“The Deserter” is a subtle antiwar statement, its ultimate futility answered by an instrumental medley of four reels, electrified and precisely delivered, and seamlessly blended. Sandy comes back to sing the spooky story of “Tam Lin”, its accented execution working well with the Halloween setting. Finally, “Crazy Man Michael” was written by Thompson and Swarbrick, and by most accounts seems to address the survivor’s guilt in the aftermath of the accident that killed Martin Lamble; it’s rather haunting.

Liege & Lief follows on so well from Unhalfbricking, making them a nearly perfect pair. Such was the album’s import overseas that it’s been expanded twice: first with two outtakes added, and five years later in a Deluxe Edition that bolstered those outtakes with a few more, including “The Lady Is A Tramp” and “Fly Me To The Moon”, and several BBC sessions. But the original two-sider is still just fine.

Fairport Convention Liege & Lief (1969)—4

Nilsson 10: A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night

As a further thumbed nose to mega-stardom, Harry Nilsson decided his next album would consist solely of pop standards from what we now know as the Great American Songbook. The legendary Gordon Jenkins would provide the arrangements, and buddy Derek Taylor would produce, after Richard Perry refused to be involved.

A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night was a labor of love from start to finish. The sessions went very quickly by anyone’s standards (sorry), with Harry singing live in the studio with the orchestra. The gatefold LP packaging included photos of just about everyone in the orchestra, with notes for each song accompanied by old-timey sheet music art. (The album was also dedicated to Frank Wills, the security guard who called the cops during the Watergate break-in.) He even promoted it with a TV special.

Clearly, Harry did his homework, as these are very straight renditions, some complete with usually cast-off introductory sections, and none of his customary multi-tracked vocals. One exception is “It Had To Be You”, which includes a parody verse misleadingly attributed to lyricist Gus Kahn. (False; it was all Harry.) The newest composition was “This Is All I Ask”, written only fifteen years earlier by Jenkins himself. The album opens with a quote from “As Time Goes By”; other quotes crop up here and there as interludes throughout the seamless listen, and a full version of the song closes the program.

Richard Perry was correct in thinking the album would be out of step with the times, as it didn’t burn up the charts. But it’s still a lovely album, and would go on to influence Linda Ronstadt during her Nelson Riddle partnership, as well as Rod Stewart and any other rockers looking to mine the same vault. It’s also the last time his voice would sound so smooth.

Fifteen years later, A Touch More Schmilsson In The Night was released in Germany, consisting of four alternate takes, a couple songs pulled in from a later album, and six outtakes, with blatantly Sinatra-inspired cover art already co-opted by Tom Waits. Those six outtakes were included on the eventual expansion of the original album, rightfully restoring “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows”, “Make Believe”, “Trust In Me”, “It’s Only A Paper Moon”, “Thanks For The Memory”, and the full take of “Over The Rainbow” (after which he requests scotch, water, matches, and heroin) to the canon.

Nilsson A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night (1973)—3½
2006 CD reissue: same as 1973, plus 6 extra tracks

Tom Verlaine 3: Words From The Front

Always a literary guy, it’s easy to try to read some kind of significance into the songs on Tom Verlaine’s third solo album. Words From The Front is firmly in the template he established once Television was over, and there are enough elements that still recall their work. We’re still not sure if we’re missing anything.

That doesn’t necessarily apply to “Present Arrived”, which holds onto one riff no matter how hard he tries to shake it, under lyrics best described as minimalist. “Postcard From Waterloo” could be about the aftermath of a battle or a romance, and it does have a sweet chorus, with his typically strangulated vocal. That voice is pretty much buried in “True Story” to the point where the lyrics come off more onomatopoetic, and “Clear It Away” is very sparse with staccato parts, but striking imagery.

The title track is clearly a soldier’s plaint, somber but not too dirgey, particularly when it spirals up into one hell of a guitar solo. “Coming Apart” is another relentless riff saved by the solo, but the structure of the song is too similar to “Ain’t That Nothin’”, which he should have noticed. Or maybe he did and just didn’t care. The final nine minutes on the album are devoted to “Days On The Mountain”, which has a consistent, almost Euro-trash rhythm, faraway vocals, guitars that start out noodling but eventually coalesce, and Lene Lovich on saxophone.

Words From The Front is more a collection of jammed ideas than developed songs. Being 1982, there’s a lot of reverb in the production, making it sound like it was recorded in a small yet shiny room. It shimmers and doesn’t grate, which is just fine. But it’s not essential.

Tom Verlaine Words From The Front (1982)—3

Izzy Stradlin: Ju Ju Hounds

After fourteen or so years of putting up with Axl Rose, Izzy Stradlin had had it, and left Guns N’ Roses shortly after the Use Your Illusion albums came out. While the band stumbled around the world promoting the albums, Izzy quietly put together a band of his own, tapping Rick Richards of the Georgia Satellites on lead guitar, journeyman bass player Jimmy Ashhurst, and respected drummer Charlie Quintana. MTV News aired the first preview of the band, playing a song highlighting his raspy voice that strangely would not be included on the full-length Izzy Stradlin and the Ju Ju Hounds album.

While there are some nods to punk and reggae, the Stones and the Faces are the clear influence here, and not just because Ian McLagan plays organ on half the album. “Somebody Knockin’” and “Cuttin’ The Rug” aren’t that far removed from the new Keith Richards album, whereas “Train Tracks” is dominated by heavy slide. “Time Gone By” and “How Will It Go” lean on acoustics and mandolins for a more rootsy sound, but the clear highlight of the album is the single “Shuffle It All”, opening with a cool bass line that runs through much of six minutes. Too bad we can’t make out most of the lyrics. “Bucket O’ Trouble” is near speed metal that Axl might have enjoyed if he bothered to listen to it, while “Pressure Drop” is given a revved-up treatment faster than even the Clash, with a half-time coda that’s slower than the Specials. The cover of Ron Wood’s “Take A Look At The Guy”, with the auteur himself yelling along, serves only to make Izzy’s own voice sound that much more melodic, but it does extend the moody ending, which was faded on the original. Nicky Hopkins and the Waters Sisters are brought in for the sleepy ballad “Come On Now Inside” that closes the album. (Stuck at the end is a hidden track called “Morning Tea”, which is mostly two minutes of tribal drums with some melodic feedback low in the mix.)

Despite good reviews and whatever momentum GN’R had, the album got somewhat lost in an industry being dominated by grunge and in between Black Crowes albums. While the band did tour behind it, Izzy cancelled a bunch of dates because, well, he just didn’t like touring anymore. Six years would go by before he released a follow-up and was dropped from the label, and since the turn of the century he’s released further albums, usually via iTunes, and joined up with the evolving Guns N’ Roses on fleeting occasions, always leaving as abruptly as he’d emerged. Wherever he is now, he’s probably enjoying the peace and quiet.

Izzy Stradlin and the Ju Ju Hounds Izzy Stradlin and the Ju Ju Hounds (1992)—3

Rush 28: Rush 50

Once Rush retired from touring, they continued to preserve their legacy on the shelves. Roughly each year, another album got repackaged in a 40th anniversary edition with snazzy artwork and ephemera, and expanded with timely live recordings, beginning with 2112 through to Moving Pictures. (The program seemingly ground to a thud with the Signals upgrade, which had no musical extras.) Neil Peart’s death in 2020 put an end to the band for good, but surely they would do something for their 50th anniversary, having already celebrated their 30th and 40th in grand style?

Rush 50 is a career-spanning 50-track box, available in four CDs or seven LPs, each with a hardcover book. (A limited Super Deluxe Edition added a second hardcover book and exclusive lithographs.) Considering how many times their songs have been anthologized over the years, they had to do something to make it special for anyone buying the music again, and they did. The set begins with both sides of their first single making their digital debut: a tepid cover of “Not Fade Away” and the extremely average “You Can’t Fight It”. These songs had long been disowned by the band, and now you can hear why. An alternate “Working Man” precedes two songs from the first album performed at a high school gig, then there is a big difference once Neil’s on the kit with live versions of “Anthem”, the oft-performed-in-those-days “Garden Road”, and a funky interpretation of Larry Williams’ “Bad Boy” with some ridiculous stereo panning during the guitar solo.

From there it’s a pretty orderly stroll through the catalog, basically a song from each studio album and one or two each from the live ones, both the eleven original releases and the 40th anniversary editions. This fills up the second disc and part of the third pretty well, but the next two discs race through three decades. “The Trees” is an alternate version with a different guitar solo, and “One Little Victory” is the remixed version, but everything else is standard. Neil has two indexed drum solos in the set, as well as the extended break in “YYZ” from Exit… Stage Left, but of all the songs to choose from Presto, why “Superconductor”? The journey ends with the “What You're Doing/Working Man/Garden Road” medley, the last eleven minutes from the last-ever Rush concert.

It may not be the best place to start, but Rush 50 does deliver over four hours of solid, representative music—“Superconductor” aside. Fans have to have it, even if they won’t listen to it as much as they would other compilations.

Rush Rush 50 (2025)—4

Aerosmith 1: Aerosmith

Easily the ugliest band in rock ‘n roll for many years, Aerosmith started out as a ragtag gang of Stones and Yardbirds disciples. They weren’t immediately anything special, as it would be a long time before their actual musical pedigrees would become apparent. Meanwhile, Joe Perry and Brad Whitford’s guitars interwove and complemented each other, Tom Hamilton and Joey Kramer locked in as a solid rhythm section to deliver the “stank” singer Steve Tyler—already an accomplished drummer and pianist—insisted on.

Tyler’s voice isn’t quite in place on their eponymous debut, when you can hear it. “Make It” is something of a thesis for the band, with lots of chordal riffs and stock cymbal hits, and the guitars echoing the vocals. “Somebody” is more of a boogie, but not an obvious one. “Dream On” was the insistent single that eventually gave them a hit years after the album was first released. Not quite a power ballad, the combination of guitars playing in unison with an electric harpsichord over Mellotron strings laid something of a mystical framework, and eventually Tyler stops trying to croon and just screams. “One Way Street” has a lot of jazzy chords that make it much more than a “Midnight Rambler” cop, even if it does run long at seven minutes, over which the poor guys had to clap.

“Mama Kin” is the sleeper here, beginning with a few killer riffs for a full minute before the vocal comes in, rhyming “see it” with “shee-it”, and a chorus that extols “sleeping late and smoking tea”. The saxophone is mixed low, and doesn’t spoil it. “Write Me A Letter” keeps the party choogling, and Tyler allows himself to loosen up and explore his upper range. However, “Movin’ Out” proves that he’s no blues man; the drums are all over the place, but the song does improve as it proceeds. And they certainly bring the dirt to “Walkin’ The Dog”, which they probably got off the first Stones album. At least he doesn’t bark.

The production is muddy throughout Aerosmith, and not just in the buried vocals. But while they weren’t quite there, it does give the band a place to build on what they started. “Dream On” and “Mama Kin” were enough to get kids to buy the album, after which it was firmly lodged in countless cars’ 8-track players.

Aerosmith Aerosmith (1973)—3

Jimmy Page 4: Live At The Greek

Clearly, without Robert Plant, Jimmy Page was at loose ends. Following their most recent short-lived collaboration, he took Puff Daddy’s money so the “rap genius” could write new words to the “Kashmir” backing track for a movie soundtrack. Then he hooked up with the Black Crowes for a brief and eventually truncated tour wherein they played mostly Zeppelin songs with a few blues standards and some Crowes songs as well. The matchup, while promising, was doomed; Chris Robinson’s ego got in the way of his gratitude, but even stupider, Rich Robinson snubbed Jimmy’s offer of riffs and ideas to collaborate on new songs. (Drummer Steve Gorman left the band soon afterwards, and his account of the Page experience is as astonishing as it is maddening.)

Nonetheless, selections from two of the LA shows were released rather quickly as one of the first “on-demand” Internet offerings, then given wider distribution as a double-CD via the TVT label. Subtitled Excess All Areas in its first incarnation, Live At The Greek is notable in that it focuses more on the deep cuts than greatest hits. There’s no “Stairway” or “Kashmir”, but healthy dollops from Physical Graffiti and unexpected choices like “Hey Hey What Can I Do” and “Your Time Is Gonna Come”. Blues covers include tunes by B.B. King, Jimmy Rogers, Elmore James, the Jeff Beck Group arrangement of “Shapes Of Things”, and most surprisingly, Fleetwood Mac’s “Oh Well”. For a guy who says he was never really into Robert Plant’s vocals or lyrics, Chris Robinson certainly did his homework. Jimmy was definitely having fun, and with two extra guitarists and a keyboard player onstage, the sound is certainly filled in. (25 years later, the album was expanded to three discs to encompass a complete show or at least its equivalent, now including the Crowes staples that were left off the original album for licensing reasons, three further LZ songs, and five songs from a soundcheck—one of which is mostly them working out the harmonized guitar parts in “Ten Years Gone”, followed by a ten-minute jam.)

We want Jimmy to be happy, of course, so it’s a shame that his talents hadn’t resulted in more than a handful of albums with new music since Zeppelin disbanded. Being stuck playing in his own cover band may have brought in some cash, but what did it do for his creativity?

Jimmy Page & The Black Crowes Live At The Greek (2000)—3
2025 expanded reissue: same as 2000, plus 16 extra tracks