Day 0768 - Definitely Maybe

Oasis "Definitely Maybe" (1994)

I had a bit of a fail.  Got mixed up and listened to "(What's the Story) Morning Glory" instead (I had thought it was odd that this album would be omitted from the list).  I'll put my write up of that one aside for when it does turn up here.

Onwards and upwards though, and the things you learn.  For a band synonymous with the Gallagher brothers, neither of them was in Oasis when it first started (originally under the name the Rain).   Liam was invited to sing for the group and, after watching a show, Noel managed to convinced them to not only let him join, but to let him become sole songwriter.

The band set about recording their first album, but the first attempt was deemed a failure even after attempts to tweak the results in post-production.  The band tried again, recording in the same room as each other to give everything an 'as live' feel and then overdubbing the heck out of things.   The record company still weren't happy and eventually the recordings were handed to engineer/producer Owen Morris.  Morris was given more or less free reign and managed to shape the album into the brash piece of rawk-n-roll it is.

The album is a lot less poppy than the band's later offerings, though "Live Forever" and slightly out-of-place acoustic closer "Married With Children" provide a bit of melody.   There's a lot of the standard rock recipe of excesses here with the band even going so far as to title one track "Alcohol and Cigarettes".   Liam kind of goes overboard with nasally stretching out of his sung vowels.  Luckily he seemed to rope that in a bit in subsequent albums.

Day 0625 - …and Justice For All

Metallica “…and Justice For All” (1988) – got it

This is another album that I could expound on without listening to it.  But I will listen to it for completism, and because…. METALLICA!  Accordingly, I'll warn you that this is lengthy...

Metallica had started out playing their punky thrash on “Kill em All” and had slowly been adding layers of melodic and harmonic sophistication to their speedy thrash, reaching their peak with the album "Master of Puppets".  On the tour for that album, the band’s tour bus crashed, tragically killing bass-player Cliff Burton and leaving a fissure in the band that would take years to properly heal.  Rather than take time off to process this tragedy, the band quickly recruited a new bassist Jason Newsted, recorded an EP and hit the road again, before eventually decamping to record "...and Justice".

The band ended up taking out a lot of their unresolved issues on Newsted, with the bassist being mercilessly hazed for a long time, being given nicknames such as ‘Jason Newkid’ and ‘Carole’ (due to his supposed likeness to Carole King).  Another result of Cliff's death was a shift in the power-balance of the band.  Metallica had been becoming increasingly democratic, with all members contributing songs and arrangement ideas.  “…and Justice” saw the power swing back largely to singer/guitarist James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich.  Newsted only contributed to the writing of one song on the album, "Blackened" and his bass was famously almost non-existent in the final mix of the album.  It was suggested that this was further hazing from the band, who felt that Newsted’s playing was not up to scratch compared to their fallen comrade.

The album is an odd duck, but it really is its own thing.  With speedy thrash riffs mixing with occasionally dramatic vocals (and in the case of "Frayed Ends of Sanity" with a chant nicked from the Wizard of Oz).  The lack of bass is partially compensated by some low-chugging guitars and the resulting sound is odd but distinctive.  Hetfield was moving away from his throat scraping, trebly screams and into his now trademark, deep gravelly growl.  Lead guitarist Kirk Hammett is a star here, funnelling melodic themes, spitfire runs of notes and various scrapes, squeals and other sounds through his own virtuoso style to elevate each of the songs.

The songs could be seen as overblown in places, but I view them as being akin to a weird 'metal' take on classical music, particularly on instrumental track "To live is to die" which lays out its themes and then builds on them beautifully and brutally over its nearly 10 minute duration.

I do love this album, as it is one of those formative (high school) musical discoveries for me.  But, having heard one or two versions of this album where Jason Newsted’s basslines are added back into the mix (thanks to their inclusion on the Guitar Hero video game), the album certainly would not have suffered from having that extra bit of bottom-end.

Ultimately, the band tired of the complexity and length of the songs and started dropping them from live sets when they noticed some of their fans likewise losing interest.  The band ended up moving to a more commercial and compositionally compact approach for their follow-up (1991’s “Metallica” AKA “the Black Album”).

Day 0482 - No Sleep 'til Hammersmith

Motörhead "No Sleep 'til Hammersmith" (1981)

A pretty solid live album.  I've said it before, I'm not the biggest fan of live albums.  This one works though, given that their albums are pretty down and dirty and lacking studio 'sheen' so this is just a raw representation of what they do, with the extra sweat and intensity of it being laid out live, and maybe a little faster.

The Motörhead ethos is clearly spelt out with the liner notes which include the dedication

"Thanks to Smirnoff and Carlsberg without whom lots of this would have been coherent."

Day 0446 - At Budokan

Cheap Trick "At Budokan" (1979)

 
Cheap Trick had been working away in the US with 3 albums under their belts, but only moderate success. The band had however, scored success fairly early on in Japan so cashed in on that by recording this live album there to the adoring screams of hundreds of fans.

Whether it was those screams, the culmination of lots of hard work, or just sheer dumb luck, this album stayed in the US charts for around a year, selling over 3 millions copies and well and truly launching the band and their particular brand of power pop.   The success was no doubt aided by upbeat pop hit "I want you to want me".

Day 0444 - Rust Never Sleeps

Neil Young "Rust Never Sleeps" (1979)

Neil survived the 70s, was even nominated as "artist of the decade" by the Village Voice. He finished out the 70s with a film and an album both titled "Rust never sleeps" (the title a phrase that Young coined to urge himself to keep pushing in new creative directions to avoid stagnation).

The album itself was recorded live with overdubs added later and audience sound removed as much possible. The songs are half solo acoustic, and half 'rawk', recorded with Young's band Crazy Horse.

With the album being bookended by two stylistically different versions of the song "hey hey my my", it really shows off what Young could do back then.

Day 0368 - Frampton Comes Alive

Peter Frampton "Frampton Comes Alive" (1976)

Frampton's live set that (much like Kiss Alive!) elevated him from a relatively successful artist to a huge worldwide success.  I'm not sure that there's been a live album in recent times that has really changed the fortunes of an artist like the aforementioned did.

It's a good clean set of accessible sunny pop and rock with some longer instrumental jam sections thrown in.  The obvious hits are "Baby, I love your ways" "Show me the way" and the epic "Do you feel like we do".

Day 0018 - Sarah Vaughan at Mister Kelly's

Sarah Vaughan "Sarah Vaughan at Mister Kelly's" (1958) - got it

I LOVE Sarah Vaughan, she just has the most amazing vocal control and range of any jazz/popular singer I can think of.

I'm not usually a fan of live albums but Vaughan sounds note perfect, the recording quality is great, and you get the added charm of Vaughan's extra vocal gymnastics, her sassy banter with the crowd, and her quick-thinking ad-libs any time she happens to forget a lyric.

It's hard to tell, given that it's a sound recording, but at one point it sounds like she knocked over her lyric sheets.  Certainly at one point she ad-libs and scats the lyrics for an entire song ("how high the moon")

Day 0006 - Ellington at Newport

Duke Ellington "Ellington at Newport"

The Duke had suffered the fate of most big jazz bandleaders in the second half of the 20th century a major drop in popularity despite the fact that he continued to tour solidly.

Despite swing's fall from grace, Duke's band's set at Newport ending up being a raging success.  The record company (as record companies are wont to do) rushed to capitalise on it and release this album... only to find that recordings of the show were pretty damaged.  Columbia dealt with this by getting Ellington into the studio to re-record the set.  The album was then patched together using the studio recordings, surviving pieces of the live recordings, and assorted canned applause.

Apparently there has since been a recording pieced together of the original show and it is something special... to be fair though, this version is great too; just a tight band playing some hot music!