CoronaVinyl Day 180 (N): Songs for Beginners by Graham Nash

For an explanation of CoronaVinyl, click here.

Today's CoronaVinyl category is "N," and we might as well keep it on a solo album kick.  In the fourteen months after Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young released Déjà Vu in March 1970, all four members released solo albums, and all four did pretty well (and I just realized that I have all four of them on vinyl).  Neil Young released After the Gold Rush in September 1970, and it reached #8 on the Billboard album chart.  Stephen Stills released his self-titled debut solo album in November 1970, and it reached #3 on the Billboard album chart.  David Crosby released If I Could Only Remember My Name in February 1971, and it reached #12 on the Billboard album chart.  Finally, in May 1971, Graham Nash released his debut solo album, Songs for Beginners, which reached #15 on the Billboard album chart and is what I'm listening to today.

Unsurprisingly, Songs for Beginners is a mixture of folk rock, singer-songwriter pop, and country rock.  Many of the songs were written about Nash relationship with Joni Mitchell, which had recently ended.  An insane array of great musicians also played on the album, including Neil Young, David Crosby, Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, Dave Mason, Rita Coolidge (who left Stills for Nash in 1970, which contributed to CSNY's breakup), and Bobby Keys, among others.

The most famous song from the album is "Chicago," Nash's protest song about the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago and the subsequent trial of the Chicago Eight, which was a complete circus and miscarriage of justice.  By the way, if you haven't seen Aaron Sorkin's The Trial of the Chicago 7, which was released in October on Netflix, I highly recommend it.

Anyway, Songs for Beginners was Nash's highest-charting album in the U.S. and the UK (where it went to #13), and "Chicago" was his only solo Top 40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching #35.

Like his fellow CSNY members, Nash is one of 23 two-time inductees to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, both as a member of CSN and The Hollies.  (Crosby was inducted as a member of the Byrds and CSN, Stills as a member of Buffalo Springfield and CSN, and Young as a member of Buffalo Springfield and a solo artist.)  He was also made an OBE in 2010, which is always a big deal for Brits.

Favorite song from Side 1:  "Military Madness"

The first track on the album is a little more rocking than some of the others.  Nash has a nice wah-pedal guitar going on.

Favorite song from Side 2:  "Chicago"
As a Chicagoan and a history major, I couldn't go with another song.  On top of its poignant message, it's just a great rock and roll song.

Hair Band Friday - 12/11/20

1.  "Wind of Change" by Scorpions

2.  "Time to Rock" by Roxx Gang

3.  "There's Only One Way to Rock" by Sammy Hagar

4.  "Bottoms Up!" by Van Halen

5.  "Unchain the Night" by Dokken

6.  "That's The Stuff" by Autograph

7.  "Gods of War" by Def Leppard

8.  "White Din" by Krokus

9.  "Looks That Kill" by Mötley Crüe

10.  "Feels Good" by XYZ

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Beer: Saint Errant Chroniques / Vic Secret

My reprieve from hops was fleeting.  Beer #10 in the beer advent calendar is yet another IPA.  Double dry hopped at that, so yay.  It's a hazy IPA, so that means it at least has a little more sweetness to it to offset some of the hoppiness.  But it's still way too hoppy for my tastes.  Saint Errant is a local small-batch nanobrewery that actually uses Temperance in Evanston to brew and can their beers.  I've only had a couple of their beers, and from their website, it looks like most of their beers are IPAs.  I can highly recommend Gorilla Cookies, which is a Russian imperial stout that they recently put out.  I wish that had been in slot number ten instead of this DDHIPA, but such is life when you're a malty guy living in a hoppy world.

-Name:  Chroniques / Vic Secret

-Brewery:  Saint Errant Brewing

-Location:  Chicago, IL

-ABV:  7.5%

-IBU:  N/A

-Good for drinking if:  You're about to find out if Jonathan Fraser actually killed Elena Alves.

-Rating (out of five stars, by quarter star increments):  3.25

CoronaVinyl Day 179 (M): McCartney II by Paul McCartney

For an explanation of CoronaVinyl, click here.

Today's CoronaVinyl category is "M," and since I featured a John Lennon album from 1980 yesterday, I might as well feature an album from 1980 from the other half of the greatest songwriting duo of all-time.  Plus, while I've featured a Wings album during CoronaVinyl, I realized that I haven't yet featured a solo Paul album.

1980's McCartney II was, as the title implies, technically Paul's second truly solo album.  He had released McCartney as his first post-Beatles solo album in 1970, and then Ram in 1971, but that was technically both Paul and his wife Linda.  Then, there were seven Wings albums between 1972 and 1979.  And that brings us to McCartney II, on which Paul wrote all the songs, played all the instruments, produced, and engineered.

McCartney II is a weird album, as Paul was experimenting with synthesizers and kind of embracing new wave.  It's an interesting mix of songs from pop to to electronica to blues to synth instrumentals.  As I listen to it now, it seems a little ahead of its time, as many of the songs seemed like they would better fit in 1983 or 1984.  But Paul was (and is) a musical revolutionary, so that's no surprise.

Though it wasn't necessarily critically lauded upon its release, it did well commercially, topping the UK album chart and reaching #3 on the Billboard album chart.  The first song on the album, "Coming Up," also hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, giving him his seventh post-Beatles #1.

I'm about two months overdue for a haircut, but I realized today that the unwitting reason I haven't gone to a barber is because I am just trying to emulate early '80s Paul.  I guess I'm going to need to go another month or so before I can fill out the side fluff a little more.

Favorite song from Side 1:  "I'm Coming Up"

With "I'm Coming Up," Paul showed the world that he could adapt to the changing music landscape.  It's kind of a funky disco-ish, new wavish pop song.  And, of course, because it's Paul, it's infectiously catchy.

Favorite song from Side 2:  "Bogey Music"
This has a rockabilly/swamp rock quality to it, with reverebed vocals.  The song would have fit just as well on the White Album twelve years earlier as it does here.  Which is to say that it's weird but good.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Beer: Off Color Apex Predator

Well it's not exactly dark and malty, but at least beer #9 in the beer advent calendar isn't hoppy.  Today's selection was Off Color's Apex Predator, which is a farmhouse ale.  Off Color is a local brewery that makes a lot of good, interesting beers, often in unusual styles.  Apex Predator isn't terribly unusual, but it's a good farmhouse ale.  To the extent Off Color has a "flagship" beer, I think this is probably it.  It's refreshing, hazy, a little yeasty, but not too dank.  At 6.5%, it's pleasantly strong, especially considering how easy drinking it is.

-Name:  Apex Predator

-Brewery:  Off Color Brewing

-Location:  Chicago, IL

-ABV:  6.5%

-IBU:  46

-Good for drinking if:  You're watching your alma mater go to overtime with a ranked team on the road, but pissing away a chance at a big win.

-Rating (out of five stars, by quarter star increments):  4

Retro Video of the Week: "A Merry Jingle" by The Greedies

As we journey further into December, this week's holiday-themed Retro Video of the Week technically falls outside the parameters of Retro Videos of the Week because it was released before MTV started.  But there are only so many holiday-themed music videos out there, and I need to bend the rules every now and then.  After all, today is all about bending the rules, with the Big Ten completely changing the rules that everyone agreed to at the beginning of this football season, solely to allow Ohio State to play in the Big Ten championship game, despite the fact that the Buckeyes have only played five games.  Now imagine if Rutgers had been 5-0 and Ohio State would have been in second place in the East division at 6-1.  It would have been "Sorry, Scarlet Knights, we all agreed to the rules."  What bullshit.

But hey, it's the fucking holidays, so let's get festive.  In 1979, Phil Lynott, Scott Gorham, and Brian Downey from Thin Lizzy and Steve Jones and Paul Cook from the Sex Pistols collaborated under the name The Greedies, releasing one single song, a combination of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" and "Jingle Bells" that they called "A Merry Jingle."  It was released as a 45, and the B-side was called "A Merry Jangle," which was just "A Merry Jingle" played backwards.

Forty-one years later, it may not strike you as significant, but the fact that members a popular hard rock band and members of a punk band (albeit disbanded by that point) collaborated is pretty unusual.  Hard rock and punk were generally mutually exclusive and had an acrimonious relationship.  But Phil Lynott wasn't someone who let societal norms get in his way -- hell, he was a black Irishman who led a hard rock band as their lead singer and bassist (and primary songwriter) -- and while many hard rockers steered clear of punk, Lynott enjoyed and appreciated punk rock and its musicians.  He was one of the few hard rockers to cross the aisle in the late '70s.  And thanks to that, we have The Greedies' "A Merry Jingle," which appropriately sounds part like Thin Lizzy (with duel lead guitars and harmonies) and part like the Sex Pistols (with descending chords and the "hey" shouts).  It sounds great.  The video is from the band's appearance on what I think is Top of the Pops on the BBC.  They also did a New Year's version of the song on The Kenny Everett Video Show on the UK's ITV for New Year's Eve 1979.  But other than those, they only played a couple gigs together and then went back to their respective careers.

CoronaVinyl Day 178 (L): Double Fantasy by John Lennon and Yoko Ono

For an explanation of CoronaVinyl, click here.

Today's CoronaVinyl category is "L," and with yesterday being the 40th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon, I can't think of a more appropriate choice than John and Yoko's Double Fantasy album, released in November 1980, about three weeks before Lennon's death.  It was also the album that John autographed for Mark David Chapman outside the Dakota at about 5 p.m. on December 8, 1980.  Less than six hours later, as John and Yoko returned to the Dakota after a recording session, Chapman would shoot John five times in the back from less than ten feet away.

I was barely three when John was killed, so it's not like I remember it.  However, as I have grown into a Beatles fan, the two Beatles-related dates each year that I remember are October 9 (John's birthday) and December 8 (John's death).  I couldn't tell you any other Beatle's birthday, and I know that George died in November 2001, but couldn't give you the exact date without looking it up.

Over the years and as I have engulfed myself in music history, I have come to appreciate the cultural and social significance of John's murder, essentially dealing a final death blow to whatever optimism and hope remained from the '60s, at the beginning of a decade that would celebrate materiality and superficiality -- two things John Lennon certainly would not have celebrated.  If you are a Beatles or Lennon fan, I highly recommend checking out a livestream that now-retired IU Jacobs School of Music professor Glenn Gass -- who was my favorite teacher at any level, and who taught a Beatles class at IU, among other history of rock and roll classes, and is one of the foremost Beatles scholars -- presented last night, called Remembering John Lennon 40 Years Later.  Click on the link.  It's free.  Professor Gass goes through Lennon's life and his various tragedies, as well as his Beatles and post-Beatles career and his impact and influence.  It made me wish I could take another class with Professor Gass.

As for Double Fantasy, it was John's first album in five years, as he had taken a break from music to raise his son Sean, keeping a relatively low profile during that time.  The album is a collaboration with Yoko.  Both got an equal number of songs on the album (7 each), and the album is definitely a mutual discussion about marriage, parenthood, and relationships.  There are even kind of direct rebuttal songs, like Yoko's "I'm Moving On," which directly follows John's "I'm Losing You."  When I listen to the album, I can't help but get a little emotional because I know that this was supposed to be John's reinjection into the music world and the public consciousness, for that matter.  Hell, the first track on the album is called "(Just Like) Starting Over."  The songs are heartfelt.  Some are ballads, some are pop, some are rock.  My only real issue with the album is that the track listing on the back of the album is not the order of the tracks on the album itself.

Buoyed by John's untimely death, Double Fantasy unsurprisingly became a huge hit.  The album hit #1 on the album charts in the U.S. (where it topped the Billboard album chart for eight weeks), the UK, and at least eight other countries.  It was the #2 album on the Billboard Year End album chart for 1981.  The album would go on to win Album of the Year at the 1982 Grammy Awards, and it has gone triple platinum in the U.S.

Double Fantasy yielded three Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including John's second solo #1:  "(Just Like) Starting Over" (#1), "Woman" (#2), and "Watching the Wheels" (#10).  Those songs also charted on the UK pop charts, with the former two reaching #1 and "Watching the Wheels" reaching #30.

As you can see, I have two copies of the album -- a double Double Fantasy, if you will -- and the one on the right is unopened, still fully shrinkwrapped.  I have no idea where I got that, as I didn't intentionally purchase it because it was unopened.  Obviously, I have no intention of opening that one up, but thankfully my other copy is still playable.

Favorite song from Side 1:  "I'm Losing You"

This is a crunchy rock song with an infectious repeating guitar riff.  Cheap Trick's Rick Nielsen and Bun E. Carlos played guitar and drums, respectively, on the original version of the song, but then it was re-recorded for the album with session musicians.  The song is all about John's worries about losing Yoko, prompted by John trying to call Yoko several times at home when he was in Bermuda in the summer of 1980 and being unable to get through.

Favorite song from Side 2:  "Watching the Wheels"
"Watching the Wheels" is one of my favorite Lennon solo songs.  It's a piano-driven pop song that kind of pokes at all the people who poked at Lennon when he took those five years off to raise Sean.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Beer: Surly Xtra

Well, beer #8 in the beer advent calendar is another citra-hopped pale ale.  It's Surly's Xtra, and at only 4.5% ABV, it's sessionable, or at least it would be if it wasn't so hoppy.  While Surly is one of the Midwest's many great craft breweries, clearly I'm not a fan of their hoppy beers (or any other brewery, for that matter).  I do very much appreciate some of their darker, heavier beers, particularly the aptly named Russian imperial stout, Darkness, as well as their Belgian-style quad, Eleven.  Hopefully, things turn malty tomorrow.

-Name:  Xtra Cirta Pale Ale

-Brewery:  Surly Brewing Co.

-Location:  Minneapolis, MN

-ABV:  4.5%

-IBU:  N/A

-Good for drinking if:  You're trying to figure out if John Demjanjuk was, in fact, Ivan the Terrible.

-Rating (out of five stars, by quarter star increments):  3

CoronaVinyl Day 177 (K): Emergency by Kool & The Gang

For an explanation of CoronaVinyl, click here.

Today's CoronaVinyl category is "K," and all but a few of my remaining albums by K artists are KISS albums.  But before we get to those after a couple more trips through the alphabet, we're starting with Kool & The Gang's 1984 album Emergency.

Kool & The Gang was formed in 1964 and rose to prominence in the early to mid '70s as a funk band.  They had a string of funk and disco hits in the '70s -- like "Jungle Boogie" and "Hollywood Swinging" -- before hiring J.T. Taylor as their lead singer in 1979 and working with Brazilian musician Eumir Deodato as their producer.  The band didn't entirely shift its sound away from funk and dance music, but definitely went a little more mainstream, with huge hits like "Ladies Night," "Celebration," "Too Hot," and "Joanna."

Emergency was the band's 16th studio album, and it reached #13 on the Billboard album chart and eventually went double platinum in the U.S.  All four songs on the first side of the album cracked the Top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100 and were Top 10 on the Billboard R&B singles chart:  "Cherish" (#2; #1); "Fresh" (#9; #1); "Misled" (#10; #3); and "Emergency" (#18; #7).

Favorite song from Side 1:  "Emergency"

The title track is the kind of funk rock pop song that could only have been made in the '80s.  But it's catchy as hell, while maintaining a funky edge.

Favorite song from Side 2:  "Surrender"
"Surrender" is another song that trends more towards funk, so I like it.  That's about all I need or have to say.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Beer: Half Acre GoneAway

Beer #7 in the beer advent calendar is yet another hoppy one, Half Acre's GoneAway.  It's an IPA.  I'm not a fan.  Just give me some damn malt, beer calendar!

-Name:  GoneAway

-Brewery:  Half Acre Beer Company

-Location:  Chicago, IL

-ABV:  7.0%

-IBU:  60

-Good for drinking if:  Your family went shopping and locked you in the attic, so all you can do is put on a woman's head scarf and watch old family movies.

-Rating (out of five stars, by quarter star increments):  3