40 Years Ago: The Mac Gets Bare

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At first, many of the songs on Bare Trees leave about as much of an impression as the nearly colorless album cover. But there are some great tunes here and, along with Kiln House, 1972's Bare Trees is one of the best albums from The Mac's Post Peter Green/ Pre Buckingham Nicks period. 

     22-year old Danny Kirwan dominates the album with five songs including the galloping title track which features the timeless lyrics "Ba do dah, do dah da do da do". Christine McVie offers two tracks including "Spare Me A Little of Your Love" which sounds like something from the Mac's most popular soft rock era. The song would be a concert staple even on the tour supporting 1977's Rumours. And speaking of 1977,  Bob Welch wrote the sappy "Sentimental Lady" which would become a Top Ten hit when he re-recorded it for his 1977 solo album French Kiss. 

     But back to Bare Trees. It's an album of no set identity --even when the songs come from the same person. Danny Kirwan offered both a gorgeous instrumental, "Sunny Side of Heaven", and perhaps 1972's most scorching guitar sounds at the top of "Danny's Chant". The heavy drinker would be fired from the band on the follow-up US tour after smashing his guitar and refusing to go onstage. Fleetwood Mac would stumble through three more albums before Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks joined the band. 

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Funky Friday : Outa-Space

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    By running the sound of a clavinet through a wah wah pedal, Billy Preston created the funky sounds of "Outa-Space", originally a B-Side to the title cut from his 1971 album I Wrote A Simple Song.

    Of course any DJ that actually liked music flipped the disc over to play four minutes of pure funk. Re-released in April of 1972,  "Outa-Space" climbed all the way to #2 on the pop charts, went gold and won the Grammy for Best Pop Instrumental Performance of 1972.( "I Wrote A Simple Song" stalled at #77.)

 The "Fifth Beatle", Billy played on "Get Back" and on Abbey Road's "I Want You (She's So Heavy)". Among his other major hits were the #1 hits "Will It Go Round in Circles" (1973) and "Nothing From Nothing" (1974). He also recorded with The Rolling Stones and co-wrote Joe Cocker's big hit "You Are So Beautiful" with Beach Boy Dennis Wilson and Bruce Fisher.

Billy died in 2006 of an illness related to kidney disease, He was 59.

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Terry Hall ( Specials, Fun Boy 3) Picks His Top 10

Terry Hall made this list the March 18, 1982 issue of Smash Hits which I've discovered courtesy of Like Punk Never Happened. At the time the former Specials frontman was promoting the first Fun Boy Three album.

 1. Question Mark and the Mysterians: 96 Tears - my favourite record of all time
 2. Echo And The Bunnymen: A Promise - sing with feeling
 3. Charles Aznavour : She - sung with a french accent
 4. The Buzzcocks : What Do I Get - what do i get?
 5. The Doors : Take It As It Comes - the second best thing to come out of America
 6. The Roches: Hammond Song - i like this for it harmonies
 7. Dave Brubeck : Take Five - my favourite piece of music
 8. Talking Heads : Heaven - it helps me sleep
 9. The Higsons : I Don't Want To Live With Monkeys - it makes me laugh
 10. Ediath Piaf : No Regrets - it sums up my musical career

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40 Year Ago Today: ZZ Top Gets Muddy

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For their second album, released April 4, 1972, ZZ Top stuck to the blueprint that would make them rich and famous: hell-raising, blues-based, beer-soaked boogie. All that's missing is the two-foot Rutherford B Hayes beards, mirrored shades and whatever that twirling gesture was we saw in the MTV videos.

In a 2005 interview with a New Yorker reporter, Billy Gibbons revealed that because of that beard, he has to drink beer through a straw. He also prefers to sleep on the floor of his hotel room. Not sure what his wife, the lovely Gilligan Stillwater, thinks about that.

While Rio Grande Mud's best known cuts are the single "Francine" and the perennial radio fave "Just Got Paid" ( see below), at 1001Songs we like deep cuts... and we like Bar-B-Q.

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40 Years Ago This Month : Lou Lays An Egg

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Largely made up of Velvets leftovers (including "I Can't Stand It" and "Ocean", "Lisa Says") Lou Reed was recorded in the same legendary Morgan Sound Studios where Cat Stevens, Jethro Tull and Paul McCartney had laid down tracks. Surrounded by English musicians ( including Steve Howe and Rick Wakeman of Yes and the same drummer who played on Donovan's "Hurdy Gurdy Man"), Lou sounds tentative.

The standout track is "Wild Child", a preview of the art crowd reportage he'd be doing on Transformer's "Walk On The Wild Side" later in the year. 

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40 Years Ago: "Oh Babe, What Would You Say"

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As Norman Smith, he engineered all the Beatles albums though Rubber Soul. Unflappable, unhurried and always wearing a shirt and tie, he earned the nickname "Norman Normal" from a word-playing John Lennon. Smith also worked with Pink Floyd, producing Piper At The Gates of Dawn, A Saucerful of Secrets and Ummagumma. His job, apparently, was to keep them thinking more songcraft, less spaced-out atmosphere. With Pretty Things, he produced the rock opera S.F. Sorrow.

But Smith was more than a technician. He could also write songs and, arguably, even sing. At the age of 49, he gave up his "Normal" nickname and went with "Hurricane". In April of 1972, coming off a UK#2 hit called "Don't Let It Die",  Smith scored a Top 5  hit on both sides of the pond with his dance hall throwback "Oh Babe, What Would You Say". The follow-ups failed to make much of an impact and Smith went back to producing and engineering. He passed away in 2008.

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40 Years Ago Today: The Faces on BBC2

On April 1st, 1972, BBC2's "Sounds for Saturdays" aired a 43-minute performance by The Faces, then at the peak of their powers and popularity.

The Line-up:

Ronnie Wood (gtr, bvoc)
Rod Stewart (voc)
Ronnie Lane (bass, voc)
Ian McLagan (keyb, bvoc)
Kenny Jones (dr)


Here now is the concert in its entirety.

  .
- Three Button Hand Me Down (Rod Stewart/Ian McLagan)
- Maybe I’m Amazed (Paul McCartney)
- Too Much Woman-Street Fighting Man-Too Much Woman (Ike
Turner-Mick Jagger/Keith Richards-Ike Turner)
- Miss Judy’s Farm (Ron Wood/Rod Stewart)
- Love In Vain (Robert Johnson)
- Stay With Me (Ron Wood/Rod Stewart)
- I’m Losing You (Norman Whitfield/Eddie Holland/Cornelius Grant)

After the BBC2 show and four gigs around the UK, The Faces went on a short US tour. They spent much of 1972 on the road playing both Faces and solo Stewart tunes. "Maggie May" would usually invoke some kind of a stage rush. Stewart tried not to overshadow the rest of the band. As he told a reporter from Rolling Stone : "We're a band, and I want people to realize it's a band up there.The other guys in the band are strong, too, in what they do. I wouldn't be in this band if I didn't think they were equally strong."

Dave Marsh of Creem describes The Faces on stage:

Stewart bounds across the stage with his Groucho walk, leaning into the mike and crooning like some obscene parody of Bing Crosby; Wood has all the perfectly timed and intuitively choreographed moves of the best British guitarists; Lane tromps about like a drunken sailor. McLagan and Jones don't do much, but they provide the backbeat that's a necessity as backdrop for the theater.

   "Stay With Me" began climbing the charts that summer reaching  #6 in the UK and #17 in the US. But when Stewart's Never A Dull Moment came out in July, and hit #1 in the UK and #2 in the US, tensions in the band grew. Ronnie Lane left in May of 1973. After some time off and one more album, Ooh La La,  The Faces officially broke up in late 1975.

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