1232. Black Sabbath / Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. 1973. 5/5

When a band comes around to writing and recording their fourth and fifth albums, its about the time that you expect true greatness from them – if they have it in them. Because by this stage the band will have been touring and writing almost non-stop for five years from the time their debut album comes out, to that period arriving. Thinking back on the great bands who have had a good degree of longevity, and thinking of their fourth and fifth albums, and in the main, it is those albums that are still beloved today. Black Sabbath is no different here.
Having been out promoting the band’s fourth studio album, “Volume 4”, through 1972 and 1973, the tour had come to a rapid conclusion with Tony Iommi’s collapse after one gig towards the end of the run, resulting in the remaining dates of the tour having to be scrubbed, and the band actually going on a hiatus for the first time since their formation four years prior, with each member going their own way to spend some down time away from the spotlight. No doubt it seemed like a good idea at the time, but whether it played out that way or not is open to conjecture.
To read all four autobiographies of the four members of the band, 1973 appeared to be a tipping point of sorts. All four admit to a rampant drug and alcohol usage, and especially cocaine which had become the drug of choice. When the band reconvened at a rented home in Bel Air, Los Angeles, in order to write for the new album, they found that nothing was forthcoming. Perhaps the break had severed the momentum that the band had gained, or just relaxed them enough that they were unable to get back into that writing groove again. Tony feared writers block, either from the drug use or the pressure he felt upon him to get the band started and find the riffs that he had in the past to create the basis of their amazing songs. Geezer found his irritation with Ozzy growing, as he felt that Ozzy was leaning too much on him to provide the lyrics to the songs, rather than contributing more of his own. After a month of almost zero output, the band returned to the UK and rented Clearwater Castle to work in. Whether or not it was mood and surroundings of the dank castle that brought back the right creative environment for the masters of doom, whatever the reason the band found inspiration returning. While rehearsing in a dungeon in the castle, Tony came across the riff that became the basis of the title track of the album, and suddenly the band was back in business, and with it the album that became “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath”.

The opening salvo of the title track, that opening riff into the joining of bass and drums, and then Ozzy’s vocal, is a moment in time, one of those things that you still remember the first time you experienced it each and every time you start this album. Because it is unique, in such a way that any guitarist who first plays it at home must feel magic coursing through their fingers. From the distorted to the clear, from Ozzy starting off at a high octave and then going through the roof in the middle of the song, so much so that it became impossible for him to sing it in the years since, is iconic and amazing.
This is followed by the spine shuddering “A National Acrobat”, that opening riff which is such a changeup for the band with Ozzy crooning over the top. In many ways it is very un-Black Sabbath like, until you reach the middle passage, where the crunch comes back into the riff, and suddenly the true heaviness of the track is revealed. Tony directs the song throughout with riff and wah pedal, then plays it out with another un-Sabbath type riff. The whole song on first impressions is so much different from what you would expect the band to produce if you only knew those most played tracks, but by the end, it is amorphic. Some may call it underrated, while I just call it genius.
“Fluff” is an instrumental composed by Tony, in the spirit of other musical pieces the band has placed on previous albums between songs. As I’m sure I have said before, to me the albums would be better served not to have them there, breaking that flow, but they are. “Fluff” to me has always been like the music you hear when you are on call waiting, because in essence that’s how I feel when I hear it on this album, I’m on hold, waiting for the next song to start. At least when I come off call waiting here, I am not disappointed.
How good a song is “Sabbra Cadabra”? Brilliantly upbeat, both lyrically and musically, the piano and synth perfectly utilised even in a Black Sabbath song that does nothing to restrict the heaviness of the track in the slightest. Every time I hear this song, it lifts my spirits, whether they needed lifting or not. This is one of Sabbath’s greatest even songs, and a supreme accomplishment by making what is technically by the lyrics a love song into a song that a partner could never ever be disappointed in hearing you sing it to them. It is a brilliant way to conclude the first side of the album.

Side 2 then opens up with the equally brilliant “Killing Yourself to Live”, composed by Geezer as he was laid up in hospital recovering from the effects that his wild lifestyle was causing him. Well, both he and his bandmates. Here is another song that some would call underrated but I have always considered one of their best. The bass heavy under riff is what immediately makes this a noticeably Geezer influenced track, and hearing his fingers up and down that fretboard and being the solid basis of the song is what makes it for me. Ozzy’s vocal here is also perfect, not extending beyond what the song needs, and sung at a level that us mere mortals can actually get close to as we sing along. One of Sabbath’s best.
“Who Are You?” came about from an Ozzy composition, which he relates in his autobiography. He had gone out and bought himself a synthesiser, and while indisposed one evening he came up with this tune which he also happened to record. Tony expressed surprise at this in his book, as he claimed that Ozzy had no idea how to play the synth. Perhaps he didn’t, but the basic structure of the song he came up with made this song, and again, while it may not be in the absolute wheelhouse of what most consider to be the Black Sabbath heavy guitar and drum song, it incorporates the experimental side that the band had always had a knack of incorporating into their music along the way.
More of that can be heard on “Looking for Today”, though it is a much more basic song in format and layout. Overall, the vocals tend to hold the song together, though in a somewhat repetitive fashion that can get a little monotonous.
The continued movement of Black Sabbath from the founders of heavy metal and doom music to another plane continues with the amazing “Spiral Architect” which concludes the album. The way that this song rises and falls in platitudes, with heavy passages and beautiful vocals, the riffing guitars then complemented and even overridden in places by the strings that are a part of the track, is just amazing. It has been written in places and occasionally said in interviews that the band didn’t want to be held by the constraints of the music they wrote early in their careers, and that they always had the desire to expand their songs because of the artists they loved coming up through their childhood, such as The Beatles and even Jethro Tull, who Tony had flirted with prior to Sabbath signing their first recording contract. In some ways (and this is certainly the case on albums such as “Technical Ecstasy” and “Never Say Die”) this didn’t always work. Here on “Spiral Architect”, it is a rousing success.

How in the hell is this album 50 years old? I don’t often feel my age, but listening to this album today, and actually have it hit me that it is 50 years old, is just amazing.
Having not fallen into heavy metal until the middle of the 1980’s decade, I found all of Black Sabbath’s albums up to that time in a mixed up order, generally discovering them whenever either myself or one of my mates could afford one of their albums, at which point we would all bring in our cassette tapes and get a copy recorded for us. Apart from the Dio fronted albums, “Paranoid” and this album were the first Sabbath albums I owned, and perhaps that is why I have so much love for it. But I think there is a reaction here to what was happening in and around the band at the time. We touched on the drug and alcohol problems, which caused the tour to stop and the band members to go away for awhile, and then the difficulty that was faced in eventually coming up with ideas. All of that is perhaps a good thing, because the band’s previous album “Volume 4”, the episode of which you can find in Season 3 of this podcast, was one where the experimenting in formula arguably went too far too soon. Having the break, as short as it was, and finding the inspiration again from a gothic castle, seemed to bring back the real Sabbath. Yes, there was some additions to the music such as synth and strings in places to complement the formula, but it is the Tony Iommi guitar riffs, the Geezer Butler bass lines that boom through the speakers, the Bill Ward drumming and Ozzy Osbourne vocal brilliance that shines back through every song on this album, that creates what is one of the band’s masterpieces. Could the band have created it if they weren’t all in the midst of trying to kill themselves with drugs and alcohol? Or what may they have done with clear heads?
I don’t know how many times I have listened to this album over the past month. A lot. And having the vinyl spinning in my own Metal Cavern at home, coming at me out of the speakers, and feeling the bass thumping in my chest, and Ozzy’s vocals screaming through my eardrums, is still such a satisfying experience. It is an impossible task to try and rank Sabbath albums, through generations, or simply through the first eight albums they produced. Suffice to say that this is still a joyous experience every time I put it on. It lifts spirits, it pounds away the angst and anger, and just leaves you in a far better mood once it is done than you were in before you started. And if an album can do that, it is something to keep close and use it for that at all times.

1231. Alice Cooper Band / Muscle of Love. 1973. 2.5/5

By the time that this album came around to being released, the Alice Cooper Band was on top of the world, literally. Their previous album, “Billion Dollar Babies”, had gone to number 1 in the US and UK as well as number 4 in Australia, and had been the culmination of a long building string of success. You can hear all about that on the episode that appears in Season 4 of this podcast. It was widely and critically acclaimed, so you would think that the band would have had the world at its feet. Instead, the cracks were beginning to appear in the framework. And to be fair, it was understandable why. “Muscle of Love” was about to become the band’s 7th studio album release in just four years. Add to this the constant touring that the band did to promote those albums, and they would already have been exhausted. Add to this the ‘trappings’ of success, and you had a whole other set of problems attached.
“Muscle of Love” was to become the first Alice Cooper album without Bob Ezrin as producer since the "Easy Action”. At the time, this was explained away as Ezrin having been ill and being unable to do the duties as required by the band at the time, though in later interviews it was reported that a disagreement over the arrangement of the song that became “Woman Machine” on the album was the reason for the split. Apparently, guitarist Michael Bruce stood his ground and refused to change the arrangement as Ezrin wanted, which led to more than words being exchanged and the separation of the two parties that had had so much success together. And it had only been eight months since “Billion Dollar Babies” had been released, a very short space of time in which to tour and then come up with a slew of new songs and then record them and then release the album. Whatever else was going on behind the scenes, and it was obvious that there was, this alone would have made “Muscle of Love” a difficult birth.

It is interesting the couple of directions that this album takes, and the reasons that have come for that to occur. In interviews at the time of the album’s release, Alice is quoted as saying the band was looking to go back and make an album with a more basic rock sound. It was felt that the previous album had had a lot of time in the studio making it sound right, whereas this time around they wanted to be able to just play a song in its entirety, to be more natural in the way the songs were played rather than over produced.
Both Alice and bass guitarist Dennis Dunaway have suggested, and which is confirmed when listening to the album, that there is a loose theme of sexual habits that flows through many of the songs on the album. The title track is the main purveyor of this, as the “Muscle of Love” being sung about is both conceptually attributed to the heart and the male genitalia. “Woman Machine”, of which the basics of the song date back to the beginning of the band, is about a female robot who can do... well... the things that you want. “Never Been Sold Before” speaks of the musings of a prostitute, while the opening track “Big Apple Dreamin’ (Hippo)” is about the Hippopotamus Club in New York, which the band apparently attended frequently in the day. And then there is “Working Up a Sweat” which follows along the same lines as the song that follows it, “Muscle of Love” It is an interesting flow of these songs, ones that no doubt added to the shock value of the band at the time.
Other songs on the album of course have no such desire, and indeed have other content apart from the sexual. “Teenage Lament ‘74” relates the problems faced by every teenage boy who tries to change things about themselves just to be cool or hip or even just to fit in. Still a great song to this day. “Crazy Little Child” goes the other route and talks about teenage crime. And then there is “The Man with the Golden Gun”, a song that was written to be theme song of the James Bond movie of the same name. Apparently it arrived a day late, and the producers had already chosen another song for that theme before they heard the Alice Cooper song. It contains a lot of sound effects that fit in with that James Bond theme, along with supporting vocals from artists such as Ronnie Spector, the Pointer Sisters and Liza Minelli to fill it out. A missed opportunity to follow up the Wings theme song for “Live and Let Die”.
Once again, Glen Buxton is credited as lead guitarist on this album, but did not play on anything that made the cut for the album. Due to his addictions, it was decided he either shouldn’t or couldn’t contribute to the album, and his parts were played by session musicians including Dick Wagner, who would have more to do down the track.

It was only a couple of episodes ago that I spoke of how I went about catching the entire catalogue of Alice Cooper albums, starting with the 1980’s and then back through the popular albums to see what I may have missed along the way. “Muscle of Love” came in that second or third period of finding the band’s albums, once I had digested the big releases of both the band and then the solo act that followed. So it is fair to say that this album already had a great deal to beat by the time I got around to getting it and listening to it. And as a result, it wasn’t one that really captured my imagination at that time. It sits right between two amazing albums, the Alice Cooper Band’s “Billion Dollar Babies”, and Alice Cooper’s first solo outing with “Welcome to my Nightmare”. That’s some tough competition. And while it does still compare favourably with the rest of the original band’s work, and those who grew up with the albums from the 1970’s would still rank it highly, as a kid whose high school years were the 1980’s it is those albums that appeal to me most.
I’ve listened to this on my rotation for the past couple of weeks, and again when I just sit down with this on my stereo in the Metal Cavern and turn it up, it still sounds great and is enjoyable to listen to. The title track is such a brilliantly upbeat song, I often wonder why they couldn’t make the whole album like this song. But that wasn’t to be. It is the one main song that leaps off the vinyl or off the Spotify playlist when you listen to the album, the one excellent shining light. But if you want me to listen the ten best Alice Cooper Band slash solo albums, this doesn’t get a look in.
With a few months of this album’s release, the band split up, and this became the final album of the actual Alice Cooper Band. Vincent Furnier legally changed his name to Alice Cooper, went off and did the “Welcome to my Nightmare” solo album (with the return of Bob Ezrin as producer), and never looked back. Michael Bruce, Glen Buxton and Dennis Dunaway formed the short-lived band Billion Dollar Babies and released one album. “Muscle of Love” closes that one door and opened another, and the story of Alice Cooper continued in the hands of the frontman only.

1186. Deep Purple / Who Do We Think We Are. 1973. 3.5/5

Deep Purple the band had barely stopped to take breath over the three years leading up to this album being written and recorded. The infusion of Ian Gillan and Roger Glover to the group had brought the Mark II line up to the fore, and on the back of three triumphant albums in “In Rock”, “Fireball” and “Machine Head”, along with the euphoric live album “Made in Japan” which had been recorded on the Machine Head tour, Deep Purple was riding the crest of a wave that never looked like stalling. However, the pace that was being set for them was one that always appeared as though it would eventually be the straw that broke the camel’s back. As has been said on earlier episodes of this podcast, where the albums “Fireball” and “Machine Head” were given the 50 year treatment, the band’s management and record company were pushing the band to its limits. Forced to write and record those albums on minimal breaks from their touring schedule, and then straight back on the road to continue to bring in the dollars, you can imagine just how tired the band members must have been getting.
The album was recorded in two sessions. The first was in Rome in July 1972, and the second in Frankfurt in October of that year. From the first session, only one song made the final cut for the album, the single “Woman from Tokyo”. The band was then back on the road, including the tour of Japan where the live album was recorded and then subsequently released. The band then went to Frankfurt, but was struggling on all kinds of levels. They were struggling to come to any agreement upon which tracks should be used or even completed, and various members were not even speaking to each other through the process. Indeed, many of the tracks were only completed and recorded by having schedules arranged so that they could record their parts separately and therefore not have to be in the studio at the same time as the other members of the band. This of course all came to light after the album had been released, and is something that is often quoted by critics when they like to suggest that this isn’t up to the standard of the previous albums that this line up had released.

You couldn’t ask for a better start to this album, especially given the quality of the few albums that preceded it. “Woman From Tokyo” is a great opening track, written about touring Japan and combining the best parts of Jon Lord’s organ and keyboards, Ian Paice’s drums and Ian Gillan’s smooth as honey vocals. It was a mainstay of the setlists both prior to the sabbatical and then once again after the reformation. That Ritchie Blackmore guitar riff along with Roger Glover’s bass line throughout help to make this one of Deep Purple’s classic tracks. This then flows into the beautiful “Mary Long”, a superb track that not only is fantastic musically, but cutting edge lyrically. Ian Gillan was quoted about the meaning of the song, saying, "Mary Whitehouse and Lord Longford were particularly high-profile figures at the time. It was about the standards of the older generation, the whole moral framework, intellectual vandalism – all of the things that exist throughout the generations… Mary Whitehouse and Lord Longford became one person, fusing together to represent the hypocrisy that I saw at the time."
“Super Trouper” holds that kind of form and continues down the line of easy listening 70’s rock. “Smooth Dancer” tends to lift the tempo in the middle of the album, with a concentration of Lord’s keyboards, that go from jaunty piano bar through the verse and chorus, into an orgasmic (pun intended) solo in the middle of the song. It’s quite noticeable how this is his song to dominate and shine on. “Rat Bat Blue” pulls back that intensity again to the mid-road tempo the album hides in, lyrically moving in the Gillan/Glover styled ‘girl meets boy’ theme. “Place in Line” is very much in an old blues theme, carrying many of the same characteristics of AC/DC songs that are in the same realm. The turn has begun to come. “Our Lady” completes the seven track album in much the same way, in a slow mannered way that tinges itself in the same sort of style.
Does "Who Do We Think We Are” take on more of a blues feel, as many critics suggest? I guess in a way it does, as there are no out-and-out hard rock tracks here such that had been prevalent on earlier albums, and the back half of the album definitely in mired in this, which is perhaps the first time Deep Purple had moved in this direction for some time musically. There is little doubt that this grated with Ritchie in particular who at that time wanted to continue down the hard rock path, whereas Gillan was less inclined. This had been an issue since the “Fireball” album, and it continued to fuel the fire here, and it can be easily seen why tensions flared during the writing and recording process.

Having conducted my Deep Purple upbringing with the album “In Rock”, “Machine Head” and “Perfect Strangers”, this album has always been a bit of a mystery to me. The opening is fantastic, and over recent days having put the album on again at home and listened to it in the Metal cavern, it is still terrific to listen to, taking in every part of each band members brilliance and what they contribute to the album in that way. The songs however? Well, if I was to sit here and pick them apart, then I would certainly not rank it in the top echelon of Deep Purple albums. It was never an album I grabbed and put on, that always fell to those three I mentioned earlier, as well as a few modern albums. And for me it IS the lack of momentum in the album and the tracks, the fall back to a slower tempo and less aggressive approach throughout. And once you factor in the trouble that went into writing and recording, and how exhausted the band must have been, and how they were certainly pulling apart, then it probably isn’t hard to understand how they got to this point. It didn’t stop the album selling all over the world. For me though, despite a couple of songs that are still favourites to this day, it doesn’t stand up to the best the band has produced.
Ian Gillan left the band following this album, citing internal tensions, which was basically reaching the breaking point that had been coming for some time with Ritchie Blackmore. It is interesting though that in an interview held when they reformed once again in 1983, Ian stated that fatigue and management had a lot to do with it, that if the managers and record company had just afforded them a three month holiday in order to rest and recuperate, then perhaps the band would never have exploded. Of course, that would have changed the entire history of the band, and we may never have had the legendary album that followed this one in just a few short months time.

1002. Eagles / Desperado. 1973. 3/5

Following up their debut album, the eagles had originally come up with the idea of doing a more ‘serious’ album, a concept album, one where they would write songs about anti-heroes. While it never really eventuated the way they may have first envisioned, it does focus on the old west and the life as it was in those days. More importantly, they again put together an album of songs that showcased their amazing talents, both musically and vocally.

“Doolin-Dalton” starts the album off strongly, led by Don’s easy vocal and a non-threatening musical background which was initially to be the set up for the whole concept of the album. This is followed by “Twenty-One” which is very much a Bernie Leadon track, solidly written around his favourite banjo and with Glenn’s slide guitar thrown in, it is an upbeat bouncy song that lifts the mood of the album immediately. This segues straight into “Out of Control”, and the harder guitar riff and vocal quality making it much closer to a rock song with Glenn’s guitar and vocals dominating. The album has built up, with each of the three opening songs acting like waking up from sleep, with the quieter slower opening track into the bouncing second track and the much louder and rockier third track. It works well.
That style changes up once again for the classic “Tequila Sunrise”, a song that has become a stand out in its own right. Its gentle tones and wonderful vocal line from Glenn just seem to flow along in an unhindered way, simple tones and range that make it sound so easy but is so difficult to reproduce if you don’t have the talent to do so. This, like all of their early classic songs, stands apart from everything else on the album. The other song of this category on the album is the title track. “Desperado” is the slow piano based ballad sung by Don. It has become one of the Eagles best known songs, but was never released as a single by the band. In fact, it wasn’t until Linda Ronstadt released her version of the song that it became so huge, and was then sought after by fans everywhere. I don’t mind the song, but I don’t list it as one of my favourites.
“Certain Kind of Fool” with Randy singing lead vocals flows along nicely with his unique vocal range dominating and giving this a completely different mood from the other tracks on the album. Following the “Doolin-Dalton” instrumental segue of Bernie Leadon’s banjo playing, the album flows into “Outlaw Man” which was the second song released from the album. It has a rockier feel that the overall genre of the album, a faster energy throughout that makes it pleasant enough to listen to.
“Saturday Night” returns to the gentler side of the band, with the four way harmonies of the vocals and the acoustic guitar underneath the main focus of the song. This again segues into “Bitter Creek” another gentle country and western based song revolving around those amazing voices and the guitar and piano. It’s the crooning background harmonies that get you every time, even if it seems to stretch out for the last two minutes of the song on repeat. The album is then completed by the reprise of “Doolin-Dalton” and “Desperado”, completing the loop of the songs that bookended the first side of the album.

While Desperado is still very listenable, especially if you are in a quiet mood and you are just looking for something inoffensive to be playing in the background, this is still the Eagles in their original form. It’s the country and western side of their career, before the guitars and drums began to take a more firm outlook on the band. I still like the album, and anyone who loves the sound of those harmony vocals will like it as well. Even so, when I go looking for an Eagles album to put on and sing along with, I will go to one of the later albums rather than this.

Rating:  "It's another tequila sunrise, staring slowly 'cross the sky, said goodbye".  3/5

972. Elton John / Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. 1973. 4/5

The album that is spoken about more often than any other in the Elton John catalogue is Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. It is considered a classic, one of those albums that everyone must listen to during their lifetime. Does this necessarily make it a great album? One that can and will be listened to time and time again? Or does it just have a quirkiness about it which makes it a ‘necessary’ listen to appreciate its place in time, and then move on to the next album?

The danger with double albums, as this release was on vinyl, is that they risk being too long, too drawn out, and overstaying their welcome. Having songs that become timeless within the mix can help with that, and that is certainly the case here.
You can imagine that those that have this on double vinyl have probably worn out the first side of the first album, because that is where the gold is situated. The opening instrumental stride of “Funeral For a Friend”, which is then tagged with the brilliant “Love Lies Bleeding” as an 11 minute opening track is still one of my favourite moments from Elton John’s career. The quiet, almost haunting beginnings of the track slowly builds, with the growing musical overlay and addition of instruments along the way, to the crescendo that then halts as it moves into “Love Lies Bleeding” itself is magnificent, and one Elton starts singing as well, bringing with it the emotions of the lyrics, it is one of those songs that I will still get goosebumps from whenever it is played. For me it is a triumph.
“Candle in the Wind” is often referred to as one of Elton’s greatest tracks. Yes, I like it. I’m not sure it would rank in my first ten or so songs of his though. In many ways it was cursed for me when he re-worded it for “Candle in the Wind 1997” for the tribute to Diana Spencer and was then overplayed for months everywhere. That might be unfair, but just the way I feel. What can’t be argued is that it is a part of this album’s allure. "Bennie and the Jets" changes up the attitude of the album for the third song running, with Elton’s hammering piano and halting vocals the main styling of the song. These two songs became big selling singles which increased their influence in the world of Elton John. The opener is still my favourite.
Side two opens with another mega-hit, the title track “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”, and still has the emotive impact and the change in vocal pitch that separates it from the run of the mill songs. Bernie Taupin’s lyrics here are as far as I am concerned the star attraction. It is still a song everyone can get on board with.
“This Song Has No Title” finds itself in no man’s land after this, the first song on the album that doesn’t come with its own reputation, and as a result it feels out of place. The following song “Grey Seal” is better, played at a better tempo and with more enthusiasm vocally as well. The reggae-influenced and less ordinary “Jamaica Jerk-Off” is followed by “I’ve Seen That Movie Too”, a song that sets itself with the John/Taupin template of easy listening vocals over the placating piano and synth. And it works wonderfully well. It’s the kind of song you listen to while sitting on the lounge relaxing rather than singing along to in a louder atmosphere, but it is still a good track.
The second album starts off in a similar vein with “Sweet Painted Lady”, once again with the tempo not getting out of second gear, just idling along gently like you would hear at a piano bar. You can’t help but like "The Ballad of Danny Bailey (1909–34)". Whether you take notice of the lyrics or note, this has a harder element on the piano and drums than in recent songs, and the jaunty aspect of Elton’s playing brings back that toe-tapping quality which is usually prevalent in his best songs. “Dirty Little Girl”, I think, sounds a bit too much like what came before it in “Benny and the Jets” – not precisely, but to me it always feel like it has the same formula, just with more guitar in holes. Still, this is followed by “All the Girls Love Alice” which is a ripper of a song, utilising all of the instruments to keep the song moving along perfectly in unison, once again picking up the pace and jive of the album, and Elton’s vocals telling the story in style. The only thing that halts this for me is the two parts where he stops to brood over the lyrics, but overall this is one of the better songs on the second album.
Elton channels the fifties on the second side of this second album, starting off with "Your Sister Can't Twist (But She Can Rock 'n Roll)", infusing the synth keyboard into a song that feels as though it should have Chuck Berry playing along with it in the first half, and then the Beach Boys in the second half. Somehow he manages to combine the two into the upbeat song it is.
"Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting" is the undoubted highlight of the second album, building on the previous song by going into all out hard rock, with hard hitting drums, rock n roll piano, heavy licking guitar, thumping bass line and fantastic lyrics and vocals. This is still the song by Elton that produces the most blood-pumping moments, showcasing the fact that he can write the ballads and the pop, but he can also write these hard and rocking songs with just as much aplomb. One of the greats.
“Roy Rogers” moves back to the comfortable mid-tempo piano bar range that this band does so well, though through Elton’s crooning I often think that no matter how much I like this song despite its country and western leanings, what I wouldn’t give to have heard more of the direction of the previous song. “Social Disease” is slightly more enthusiastic while not getting too excited with itself, while “Harmony” finalises the deal in a rising expectation of a wave of emotion that may work better for others than it does for me.

For me, and probably for many people, this would have been an even better album had they done some cutting and pasting, or tried to cull some songs from the release. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, and I wonder if Elton ever thinks about that. It would have been a task, and it would have changed the feel of the album, so given it is considered a classic it probably wouldn’t have worked. For me, the good (and great) far outweighs the less good, and it gives a varied selection of the writing techniques of both Elton as musician and Bernie Taupin as lyricist. In the end, I can only agree that everyone should listen to this album and experience it, for all of those reasons mentioned here. You may not agree with its status as ‘a great’. You may be like me, someone who appreciates the excellence within the music, while understanding that not all of it reaches that pinnacle.

Rating:  “You said sorry honey if I don’t change the pace, I can’t face another day”.   4/5.

900. Billy Joel / Piano Man. 1973. 3.5/5

Billy Joel had been through some tough personal issues leading up to gaining his elusive first recording contract, and once this had occurred he would have felt that those troubles would have been over. However this was not to be, and having his first album “Cold Spring Harbour” mixed incorrectly and mastered at too high a speed meant that he was extremely unhappy with how that first album had turned out. Whether or not he would have been able to extricate himself from that contract without help is unlikely, at least not without a lot of pain. In the long run, he had a stroke of luck, and Columbia Records came knocking on his door offering him a chance after having seen a live recording he had made for a radio station become an underground hit. He was still legally bound to his first record company, but eventually (apparently under some pressure from Columbia) that contract was sold to his new label, and he was able to move forward on a major record label.
The release of “Piano Man” on Columbia thus gave Billy Joel an international profile that may well have exceeded his expectations. It certainly gave him a chance to show that apart from his song writing he was able to incorporate much more into his music than just lyrics and piano. He moved to Los Angeles on signing his contract and remained there for three years. For six months when he first arrived he played at The Executive Room piano bar on Wilshire Boulevard. It was during that time that he observed those around him, the customers he saw there on a daily basis, and slowly put together a story that he put to music all about the bar’s patrons. It was a song that was to become his signature piece, a song that would change his life and be revered around the world.

"Piano Man” immediately comes across as far more upbeat than “Cold Spring Harbour” both lyrically and musically. The opening track "Travelin' Prayer" reminds me of that old favourite "The Devil Went Down to Georgia", with the obvious reason being the violin fiddling away at a furious pace at different sections of the song. Add to this the honky tonk piano and the banjo and the similarities in style are complete. It makes for a great opening to the album. The titular track comes next, and "Piano Man" is the obvious gold nugget of the album, the song that has defined the artist and his career. Based around his own experiences of playing at a bar over those early years, the almost autobiographical song is known by people of all ages all over the world, and is the one song everyone can identify with Billy Joel. It still sounds as marvellously fresh and vital as it must have done on its release. "Ain't No Crime" is a good follow up, no doubt drawing on personal experiences to put together the lyrics, and sounding almost gospel in music and vocals. "You're My Home" was written by Billy as a gift for his wife on Valentine's Day, as he had no money at the time to buy her anything. It must be nice to be able to be talented enough to do such a thing.
"The Ballad of Billy the Kid" is lyrically, in Billy's own words, factually inaccurate, with many lines within the song having no part of the actual life of Billy the Kid. Despite this revelation, the song itself sounds great and is another sing-along hit.
"Worse Comes to Worst" opens up the second side of the album and combines variations of themes such as country, rock and gospel in a mix that strangely works, mainly through Billy's heartfelt vocals and marvellous piano playing. "Stop in Nevada", "If I Only Had the Words (To Tell You)" and "Somewhere Along the Line" all feel a bit monosyllabic in regards to the music, if not the song lyrics themselves. "If I Only Had the Words (To Tell You)" is the best of the three songs, but unlike the lively first side of the album, here it feels as though it gets bogged down a little.
"Captain Jack" was the song that is credited as the song which led to Columbia records wanting to and eventually signing Billy Joel to a record deal. On tour before this album was even thought of, Billy and his band played this at a live performance for a radio station, who then played that live version of this song for the next 12 months because of the number of requests they received to play it, not only gaining popularity from its listeners but gaining interest from record companies. It has been a favourite ever since, and one that I've always enjoyed because of the move from sublime to the raucous rendition of the chorus throughout. As a closing song, it is instrumental in wanting you to play the whole album over again because of the enjoyment you get from this finishing melody.
While the overall songs here are another step in the direction that Billy Joel eventually found as his middle ground, I would not class this as a better album overall than “Cold Spring Harbor”. The two standout songs aside, there is not much difference in the quality and enjoyment of the songs here and from his first album. they are all enjoyable and have wonderful musicianship, but there was certainly better yet to come.

Catching up to all of Billy Joel’s albums, especially those from the first half of his career, was something that I didn’t get around to doing until about 15 years ago. The singles from the radio I knew well, and then the Greatest Hits compilation that came out in the 1980’s filled a lot of other spaces. And occasionally I would be at a get together at someone’s house, and a Billy Joel album would come on. But as to actually getting those albums myself, and listening to them, it was some ways down the track.
Thus when I did get “Piano Man” and listen to it for the first time, I was still pleasantly surprised. The basis of his music is all here, written around his piano and vocals, and then expanded beyond that with other instruments and supporting vocals when needed. And listening to Billy Joel play piano and sing at you is always something worth doing. The songs here are his usual collection of lively upbeat songs and quieter more reflective songs, each with their own stories and derivatives throughout.
It is hard to believe that this album is 50 years old, perhaps because I didn’t hear it until so long after it was released, but more from the fact that the title track itself just doesn’t feel that old. Billy’s albums are all contemporary enough that they could have been written and recorded in any of the decades stretching from the 1970’s to the 1990’s, so the fact this one has reached its 50th anniversary is amazing.
I have listened to this a lot over the last 2-3 weeks, and it is still a great and easy listen. The songs that did not receive radio airplay are still solid tracks, and the album blends well together. For me it is somewhat true that it is the albums in the second half of his recording career that I enjoy the most, but that doesn’t change the fact that his albums of the early to mid-1970's are also very good. "Piano Man” is the epitome of that simile.

698. Queen / Queen. 1973. 4/5

Like most people of my generation, I came to know and love Queen from the singles that were played on the radio. For me, my first memory of Queen was "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" back when I was ten years old in 1980. The first Queen album I ever purchased was 1984's The Works. It wasn't until the 1990's, when I finally had an income of my own, that I started to go back and find all those albums from the 1970's that I had rarely heard apart from the singles and the live albums, and it was then that I first laid my ears on their eponymous debut album.
Queen is a product of its era, of a band trying to find its own sound. The songs here can be heard to be a meshing together of different types of music genres that were making themselves heard at the time leading up to the recording of this album. There is a hard rock element, driven at those times by Roger Taylor's crashing drums and Brian May's superb guitar work. Along with this can be a quieter introspective tide, while the use of longer freeform instrumental jamming that was prevalent during the late 1960's and early 1970's is also in effect. This album is different, almost unique from the albums that followed, which also moved with the times that they were recorded in.
The great danger in knowing so well what the band produced in the 1980's and coming back to listen to their earlier recordings is dismissing it because it is different, and not what you know. That would be a great shame, because this still an excellent album to this day. It has their earliest efforts in producing their layered vocals, and while the production mightn't be at its best, you can still appreciate the quartet's wonderful brilliance.

"Keep Yourself Alive" is still one of the band's most famous and great tracks, rumbling along with terrific guitaring and Freddie's vocals. It should always come under mention when you discuss the best ever "Album 1, Side 1, Track 1" songs. "Doing All Right" is one of those songs from that era which has a little bit of everything. It was quiet acoustic and piano parts, with Freddie backed by Roger and Brian's vocals, then without warning jumps into hard and heavy, almost punk guitar riffing with drumming to suit, then back to the quiet verse, and so on. It is a strangely formulated song, almost in a progressive rock kind of way. Something for everyone there. "Great King Rat" again has a somewhat hard rock progressive way about it. It is a heavier song throughout, dominated by the guitars of Brian and John Deacon and the thumping drums of Roger, with some time and tempo changes throughout the song. In fact, it can almost fool you into believing it is two songs, such is the change about halfway through, where a quiet interlude then crashes out into what is actually the second half of the song, but could easily be mistaken for the next song on the album. "My Fairy King" is full of what would become the trademark Queen vocal harmonies and overdubs. Roger Taylor can be clearly heard hitting the highest notes within the song, something that he probably doesn't receive enough credit for in his singing with the band.
"Liar" is another of the band's better known early songs, and again shows their ability to change between toying with a heavy sound and the quieter thoughtful process again in the construct of the same song. "The Night Comes Down" is a quieter song, and is followed by the Roger Taylor written and sung "Modern Times Rock 'n' Roll" which is much more up-tempo than its predecessor. This flows straight into "Son and Daughter", which perhaps best reflects the blues and heavy metal sound that was being produced by bands such as Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin at the time. Brian and John's guitars certainly reflect that sound throughout the song. "Jesus" finishes with an instrumental flurry, which itself goes into "Seven Seas of Rhye", a 75 second instrumental that concludes the album. Apparently Freddie had been writing this during the recording of this album, but hadn't finished it when it was time to publish. As a result, this is what was recorded, and the full finished version of the song with lyrics was released on Queen II.

I think this is a good album, full of good songs and plenty of initiative. Those that grew up with this album are more of the opinion that Queen was at their best in the era of the 1970's, while those who grew up with their 1980's music often feel the reverse. I don't have a solid stance either way, though if I was to rank my favourite Queen albums the majority at the top would probably be from the 1980's. Nevertheless, this is an album full of good things, and should not be dispersed without giving it a fair hearing.

461. Gary Moore / Grinding Stone. 1973. 2/5

This is close enough to the point where Gary Moore started out, and it shows. Slow and wistful, written for a different audience and different era. It’s interesting to listen to, if only because you can see the differences between this era, into his rock era, and then into his blues era.
This collection of songs is not overly bad, but they just offer so little when you are listening to them. Your immediate urge is to skip to the next track. Within a minute, you’ve reached the end of the album. Not a great recommendation.

Rating: The music probably doesn’t deserve this low a rating, but when you’ve got nothing to offer, what do you expect? 2/5.

211. Pink Floyd / The Dark Side Of The Moon. 1973. 1.5/5.

If you are not a diehard Pink Floyd fan, it may surprise you that “The Dark Side of the Moon” is Pink Floyd’s eighth studio album, and while they were successful, it was by no means a band that had outstanding success, not that you would have imagined looking back from today. Coming out of the 1960’s, their early work had a lot of the instrumentation freeform progressive exploration on stage and then on their albums that many of the same types of bands fiddled with at that point in their careers. Rather than have structured verses, choruses and instrument breaks, the songs would flow in such a way that the structure was very loose and fluid, and what was put down on vinyl was not necessarily how they were played on stage.
Most of this album was written and then performed on stage for almost 12 months before it was finally brought into the studio and committed to vinyl. Now that’s not unusual for bands in the 1970’s to play new material in concert well before they actually release it on an album. It rarely happens in the modern age, and as a concert goer I’d be ambivalent about going to see a band play the material I know, and then get hit with several songs that I didn’t know. But, certainly in the instance of this album, the band wanted to find a way to get the songs right, and the best way to do it was to playing them on stage, and finding a way to tighten them to the point that they were happy.
They then spent a period of 8 or 9 months in the studio at different times recording the album. It utilises many different concepts and recording techniques, as well as spoken word in places throughout to help connect tracks and ideas. It acts as a concept album, and according to Roger Waters, who provided all of the lyrics on the album, the five tracks on each side reflect various stages of human life, beginning and ending with a heartbeat, exploring the nature of the human experience and, according to Waters, empathy. And then, once recorded and released, it began its climb to immortality.

Is the psychedelic 1960’s and early 1970’s more your scene of music? Is it something you have to have lived through, in order to get the most out of the music? Are there forms of music that you really probably needed to be on LSD or something similar to be able to see the colours an album releases to enjoy it in its best light? Or does it simply come down to the fact that there are genres of music you will love, and others that you will be ambivalent to?
For a start, this album has a lot synths, and keyboards, and looped effects going on. “Speak to Me”, “On the Run” and “Any Colour You Like” are the instrumentals on the albums, all of them a bit ‘spacey’ for wont of a better term. They are connectors between the other songs, adding (I guess) the colour of the music to the album, but even the songs have similar effects to them. Richard Wright switches between the Hammond organ, electric piano, normal everyday piano and various synths that tend to dominate most of the album. And this is what Pink Floyd had always done well in their previous albums.
And the fact is that the effect on the album when David Gilmour’s guitar does come in, and Nick Mason’s drums, and Roger Waters bass guitar, then it booms through your speakers and makes an immediate impact on what has been produced.
And as I mentioned earlier, there are songs, or at least partial songs from this album, that just about everyone would recognise, even if you don’t know the album itself. The clocks from the start of “Time”, and that initial impact of guitar and Gilmour’s vocals in the middle of the track. The cash registers and the opening lyrics from “Money”, the vocals of Clare Torry on “The Great Gig in the Sky”, and the middle serenading of “Brain Damage”, that makes you feel you are floating in outer space while listening to it. These are iconic pieces that have infiltrated popular culture to the point that they are recognisable.
It is an album that still sells, and no doubt will again with the 50th anniversary editions being released in all formats. And it will continue to be held up as one of the greatest albums ever released, for its innovation and uniqueness in a time where these types of albums could be a dime a dozen, but missing the obvious time and energy spent in shaping the design of the album, from beginning to end, ensuring each piece flowed into the next, with lyrics discussing the topics they faced being expertly formed and drawn by the music written to highlight them.
But... despite all of this... what if you just are not attracted to it? What if despite what all the so-called experts say about this album that has sold more than 45 million copies worldwide, you just can’t hear it?

I’ll admit right here that I have never owned a copy of this album, and will only ever own a copy of this album if someone gifts it to me. And I have never been a Pink Floyd fan, even though whenever I meet people I don’t know and they discover the range of bands that I love and listen to, they say “yeah, how about Pink Floyd, hey? The Wall, Dark Side of the Moon! Awesome!!” And once I state my ambivalence towards the band and this album, I tend to be derided heavily and then they move on. Which is always for the best.
Zeppelin and Sabbath and Purple from this same era had the guitar, the iconic guitars of Page, Iommi and Blackmore. And that was what drew me to those bands. For the most part, Pink Floyd didn’t have that, though Gilmour has shown he can play when he needs to, and it is those moments on this album that really prick my ears up, when he actually plays a riff. But those are the small highlights that pop up along the way, rather than dominating the album and being the driving force. And I know full well that the acquaintances of mine who listened to this album constantly during my high school years were either tripping on acid or smoking bongs in dim basements somewhere, which is not something I spent any time doing. But, listening to the album, I can only hazard a guess that it would be a different experience listening to this while under that kind of influence.
So given that this is all the case, you can probably imagine that “The Dark Side of the Moon” is not up there with my favourite albums. And over the last month, leading up to this anniversary and this episode, I would have listened to this album more than the previous fifty years combined. And I haven’t had a problem with it being on and listening to it. It isn’t an album that I hate or loathe, or am even ambivalent to. Simply put, it just isn’t my style of music. It doesn’t hold a great deal of interest for me. I can’t think of any situation where I would want to grab this album and put it on, to salvage a bad day or enhance a good one. It just isn’t in my ballpark of music style or genre.
So – happy anniversary to an iconic album, one that millions around the world will be celebrating. An in the long run was an excuse for me to discover if my thoughts on this album had changed in any way. Spolier alert – they haven’t.

128. Alice Cooper / Billion Dollar Babies. 1973. 4/5.

The Alice Cooper Band, consisting of Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, Denis Dunaway, Neal Smith and Vincent Furnier, released their first album “Pretties for You” in late 1969, and over the next three years released another four albums at regular intervals, all of which increased in success from the previous one. By the time 1972’s “School’s Out” was released – an album reviewed on Season 3 of this podcast – the Alice Cooper Band were selling out shows around the world and had Top Ten selling singles and albums, and this success was driving the lives of the band members. Having been living in a basement together two years earlier, they now found themselves with fame and more money than they had had in their lives, and the resulting problems with drugs and alcohol probably weren’t unexpected as a result. Indeed, when recording the “Billion Dollar Babies” album, the band had to have three session guitarists on hand to help out, as Glen Buxton suffered from pancreatitis during the recording sessions which was directly related to his alcohol abuse during this time.
Recorded in three different locations along the way, the writing was again shared by all members of the band, with Alice Cooper himself composing most of the lyrics. And on the back of those last couple of albums that were building to something, “Billion Dollar Babies” became that album that showcased exactly what the Alice Cooper Band had become.

I didn’t know for years that this wasn’t even an Alice Cooper song. “Hello Hooray”, the opening track from the album, is actually written by a bloke called Rolf Kempf, and came from an album recorded by Judy Collins in 1968. This version is a beauty, and still crops up in set lists on tours.
When people see the title “Raped and Freezin’” they immediately think it is awful that a band could write a song about that subject of sexual harrassment. Of course, if they listened to the lyrics they’d realise it was a female driving, picking up a hitchhiker and then trying to do the deed with him, and him actually running off naked into the desert – thus the title. It’s a great song, in the hilarious way this band did these types of songs. Great lyrics, excellently performed. This is followed by “Elected”, one of the great Alice Cooper Band songs, politically motivated sneering perfectly orated by Alice throughout, and with a great bridge and orchestrated sound from the band as well. The title track “Billion Dollar Babies” is a statement of the time, and showcases the best this band has to offer, at a time that the harder genre of music was beginning to take hold. While the band could play in their early themed music, this song in particular showcases the attributes that they had to really bring the heaviness to their songs when they wanted to. And then you come to “Unfinished Sweet” which is about a trip to the dentist, with complementing drill sounds to make it a fabulous listen.
The second side of the album opens up with the brilliant “No More Mr Nice Guy”, with the excellently written and performed track being a standout in the years since this album was released. “Generation Landslide” changes up this second part of the album, with acoustic guitar and harmonica, which is a downplaying of the harder versions of songs on the first half of the album. “Sick Things” incorporates the piano in the same slower tempo. And then “Mary Ann” completes the trilogy of songs here that find themselves pushing the boundaries of ragtime. The album closes out with “I Love the Dead” which again has that tongue planted firmly in cheek as it talks about necrophilia, once again in the Alice Cooper style of playfulness.
There are a number of songs here that have been long-held classics not only of the band itself, but of music in general. “Elected” is a killer with its perfect takedown of the political election ideals of the US. “Billion Dollar Babies” is a perfect cut of that rise in the hard rock scene of the early 1970’s, as important as what Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple were producing at the time. “No More Mr Nice Guy” is the losers story, one that so many fans of the band at the time could have related to, as any fan of Alice Cooper was considered an outcast, a freak, just as the band was. These three songs in particular have transcended time to today, where they are still relevant, topical, and just plain brilliant.

As I know I have already mentioned here on previous episodes of this podcast, my introduction to Alice Cooper was through the mid-to late 1980’s albums such as “Constrictor” and “Raise Your Fist and Yell” and “Trash”, and then the greatest hits albums. I knew the Alice Cooper songs from the 1970’s that had made the radio, as my mother had made mixed tapes off the radio with those songs on them. So it wasn’t until the 1990’s that I first really began to delve back into the albums of the 1970’s and early 1980’s. And it is safe to say that this was one of the ones that really hit it off with me and stuck with me. Why? In the long run, it was the hit songs that drove it. Those four singles are all still the best songs on the album, and they still resonate today. They lend themselves to great cover versions as well, which both “Elected” by Bruce Dickinson and “No More Mr Nice Guy” by Megadeth have done so. And, within the framework, the whole album draws together as one. If you listen to the songs on the second half of the album out of context they don’t always work, but when you listen to the album from start to finish it comes together as a great package.
There are so many albums that share Vincent Furnier as the protagonist lead vocal, both of the band and his so-called solo albums, and this one always rises to the top if you were to list a best of poll of all of those albums. From the original band, this album is probably the best of the seven they released. Adding in the Alice Cooper albums that followed, it would be hard to argue that this isn’t in the top five of those somewhere. Of my FAVOURITE Alice Cooper albums to listen to, it would be on the borderline of those top five. And fifty years on from its release, it honestly still sounds as amazing as the first time I heard it, and how it must have sounded to all of those young freaks and geeks in 1973.