Category: Music

This was the first bass part I ever learned — long before I ever started playing in a band.  Thank you, Hollies.

I just regret that I never got to play it live.

Just a few bars of this piece have stuck with me over the past few days, but of course I can’t actually create an excerpt of the exact passage.

So you’ll just have to listen to the entire Warsaw Concerto — this time performed by Valentina Lisitsa.  Sorry.

Hungry like a what?

Best description of Duran Duran was made by my old lead guitarist buddy Danny who said, “You know, their music sounds brilliant… but when you listen to it closely, you realize that there’s not much actually happening in there.”

I always liked the original (despite Neil Young ugh), but this cover is absolutely delightful.

And “The Brothers Comatose”?  Best band name since “The Dead Kennedys”, and they sound better than the DKs.

You all know the premise:  you’re stuck on a deserted island somewhere, and all you have for entertainment is a wind-up (or solar-powered) record- or CD player and a few records.  Which records would you choose to have?  (The most common number of records allowed is eight or ten.)

If the assumption is that you’re going to be marooned there for a lengthy period of time, e.g. ten years, then I have to say that after a year or so (maybe sooner), you’re going to be using those albums as Frisbees because no matter how much you love them, you’ll be heartily sick of their contents.

So I’m going to expand the concept because it’s still a nice way to decide your favorite albums — and I’m going to stipulate albums because forget singles:  that assumes you’d only be marooned for a couple-three weeks.

Here, then, are the parameters:

Ten composers, singers or groups.  Examples:  Beethoven, Elvis Presley, Rolling Stones.  It can be any mix of the above — all bands, all singers, whatever.  But only ten.

Specify up to five albums for each selection.  Assume 45-50 minutes of music per album.

So you’ll have a maximum of fifty albums allowed.  (For the pedantic, we can allow CDs to ensure that they’ll last however long you’re marooned.)  But no carrying over:  if you can’t think of five but only three, that’s what you get.  I will allow only ONE compilation album, in total.

To give everyone the idea, here are my choices:

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My generation of musicians seems to be dropping like flies.  Now it’s Bonnie Tyler, at age 75.  (And by the way, hers is a lovely story.)

Yeah, it’s a heartache, which has a special place in my memory because I used to sing it (complete with her breathy rasp).

Or there’s Total Eclipse, of course.

R.I.P.