In The City

Coming into work this AM I noticed water gushing on Peachtree causing a back-up going north. Funny how the city supposedly fixed that problem the other week.

Listened to several re-issues this week. One was the newfangled double disc of the Cure’s “The Top”. I always liked a couple of songs of this one but listening to it I realized it was better than I remembered. The demo of “Give Me It” ranks with anything Robert did (I use the past tense as I don’t expect much out of new Cure releases.)

Also listened to Cheap Trick’s “Dream Police” and “All Shook Up” re-issues. At one point, Cheap Trick were probably my favorites. The show at the Fox on 4/16/79 supporting the Budokan album was as hot as it gets. But the Budokan phenomenon delayed the release of “Dream Police” and may have hurt it a bit (and it still did quite well, don’t get me wrong.) I was pondering the alternate universe where that live album wasn’t released and superstardom didn’t delay another fine studio album. Maybe that would have prevented “All Shook Up”. I figured it out back then, mind you, as I immediately didn’t much care for it. Funny, because the last new material before that, a song for the Roadie soundtrack called “Everything Works If You Let It” is absolutely one of their best. And George Martin was producing. But… No good. “Who D’King” was dreadful then and reeks now. I later found out that “Baby Loves To Rock” was pretty much a straight cop of the Yardbirds’ “Psycho Daisies”, which I’m not sure the band have ever acknowledged and they certainly don’t in the new liner notes. Still, Cheap Trick are a national treasure, what I’ve heard of their new album “Rockford” seems ok, and they really should be in the Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame (along with Kraftwerk/Roxy Music/Iggy & the Stooges/Patti Smith/ELO/The Nuge/etc…) Instead, that institution honors Jackson Browne and any recording/act tormenting the earth that features Eric Clapton.

Which at least reminds me of Dave Slusher’s great variation of Layla that honored the late great African musician Fela Kuti :

Fela, You got me on my knees

Fela, You’re in The A.N.C.

(It loses some with the passage of time but I still like it.)

Must go now, sleep beckons. Maybe it’s time to listen to one of those riveting Clapton solos to get me there faster……

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