Tag Archives: rock

Africa: Toto

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Monday morning after sifting through literally dozens of versions, band configurations, and covers, we settle on this 2013 version of the 1981 Toto song.

Dave Paich: lead vocals, keyboards and writer

Simon Phillips: drums

Nathan East: bass

Steve Lukather: lead guitar

And because here at Shalblog Industries® we use every part of the buffalo, expect more versions of it posted this week.

Thanks to YouTuber MADIM67

Pretty Little Angel Eyes

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It’s Monday morning, summer of 1961, Evergreen Avenue in Bradley Beach, New Jersey to be exact, and the kid across the street has hauled out his record player to the front porch and is playing Curtis Lee’s “Pretty Little Angel Eyes,” over and over, far into the night, the fireflies flashing in syncopated time, stopped only by the sound of the approaching ice cream truck …

Thanks to YouTuber brianfromLI

Stuck In The Middle With You

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Josh Turner with friends Carson McKee, Reina del Cid on lead vocals, and Toni Lindgren. They just did a great gig at Rockwood Hall in NYC last night and  closed with this.

More at Josh Turner Guitar

Yesterday’s Gone

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The MonaLisa Twins with another summer British invasion hit of the 60s, Chad and Jeremy’s “Yesterday’s Gone.” Ever-Reliable Wikipedia tells us it was Chad’s first published song.

More MonaLisa Twins at MonaLisa Twins

Good Vibrations

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Monday morning, the theremin calls, and you’re swept into one of the most innovative and influential popular rock songs of the 60s.

Carl Wilson on lead vocals. The song was produced by the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson from countless short pieces of tape, and many session musicians were used as well.

There’s an excellent description of the song’s history, as well as a musical deconstruction, and how the song changed the history of the pop single, at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Vibrations

Thanks to YouTuber tabouriefilms

Hang on Sloopy

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Monday morning The McCoys urge Sloopy to hang on.

The woman in the video is Liz Brewer who was once married to the lead singer of the McCoys, Rick Derringer.

Who was Sloopy? So far I’ve tracked down four stories:

  1. One of the credited co-writers claims that he wrote the song while in Cuba, and any attractive woman there would be called a Sloopy.
  2. Sloopy was the nickname of jazz singer Dorothy Sloop who was a girlfriend of one of the writers.
  3. Jean Sloop was the name of an Ohio waitress who claims to be the inspiration.
  4. A businessman in St. Louis claimed that when he was just a kid in high school he wrote the song and sold it on the cheap to the credited writers. Rick Derringer seems to most believe this story—but he still doesn’t know why the high school kid used the name Sloopy.

Thanks to YouTuber TransatlanticMoments

She’s Come Undone

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Burton Cummings of the Guess Who does a great vocal on his bandmate Randy Bachman’s quirky and evocative song. Some may recall the story of Diane Linkletter…

Rock On Little Jane: Mike and Ruthy

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Mike Meranda and Ruthy Ungar are two incredible Hudson Valley musicians who I had the pleasure of meeting this week. Here they are singing at the Clearwater Festival 2015. The song was written for their little daughter Opal, but as Mike says, it was hard to rhyme with Opal, so they used Jane. The song is my new morning waker-upper.

Thanks to YouTuber Jim Motavalli