Headbang - 4 April 25

We got through Friday's Headbang despite a few technical issues (which Dave and I are going to work on for the next time). On the eve of his birthday but the day of his latest Covid jab, Phil wasn't able to join us but otherwise it was a full house - Malcolm from NZ, Robs D & G and Colin from various UK locations, with me, Dave, Aidan, Gerry, Andy, Jeb and Steve (hotfoot from Edinburgh) all in attendance at Chapel House.

It was our first Headbang for 5 months but our first at Dave's for 9 months. Accordingly, we were all prepared for a blitz of Obits, Septs and Octs. For those of us attending in person it was also our first trial of curries from Saffron Garden, instead of the Derbar - and I think the response was reasonably positive.

It was also a trial of a new voting system - suggested by Dave - using WhatsApp polls - and it seemed to go reasonably well. Here's a summary of the tracks played and the votes etc:

SEPTUAGENARIANS

Annie Lennox the clear winner here. Other notables with recent big birthdays were:

SLIDE GUITAR (2)

The then 13 year old Derek Trucks was a narrow winner here.

OCTOGENARIANS (1)

There were so many who had reached 80 recently - and a number of them were big names - so I decided to split this theme into 2 sections. First of all, some of the fairly well-known but lesser lights - a medley of 6 short excerpts from:

 Then, part 1 of the slightly better known:

Maggie Bell a clear winner here.

ROYAL ALBERT HALL

To break up the 2 parts of Octogenarians I had made up a short theme of just 4 tracks, all taken from gigs at London's most iconic venue:

Modern technology in terms of film and sound helped create an "almost there" experience - particularly with the first and last tracks. Creedence Clearwater Revival's performance from half a century earlier didn't have the same tools available and this was reflected in the voting. That said, Adele's emotional performance was terrific and merited the win here.

OCTOGENARIANS (2)

Part 2 - and some big hitters here, each deserving of a career medley:

6  tracks so 2 votes per person for this theme and it was a tie between my (sur)namesakes.

A further 8 musical connections who reached the age of 80 recently but didn't quite qualify to get either an excerpt or a track played were:

and that's not all - 4 NONOGENARIANS were noted:

GENERATION GAME

Another short theme - just 3 tracks of well-known musicians segued to their offspring singing the same song:

The Marleys were the clear winners here.

OBITUARIES

As many as 36 notables with musical connections had passed recently so I had to break this down to 3 sections. First of all, 13 notables, with short excerpts from each, were combined into one 16 minute medley:

Then 7 others each got a track played:

"Most missed" was deemed to be Roberta Flack but Marianne Faithfull ran her close.

The final part of the Obits theme was merely to note the other 16:

(Some of us are getting dangerously close to their average age of passing)

JUKEBOX (20)

This theme was originally intended to feature new music, or at least acts who hadn't previously featured at a Headbang, but with many of our group finding difficulty in meeting the initial criteria, it has since evolved into anything goes (except a particular performance that we've seen before).

Only 7 nominations were received and votes cast were:

My own nomination of Annie Clark's fantastic performance on Later was a clear winner but every track got at least one vote.

We just managed to squeeze the first 8 themes in before our taxi arrived at 11 pm - exactly as I had planned. We didn't need the 2 short themes I had prepared as backup, just in case, but I'm proposing now that you listen to these at home and vote accordingly when you can - here's the details:

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS

PIONEERS OF BRITISH R & B

Malcolm had to disappear - apparently for his 2nd breakfast - before the last couple of themes were played, so we hurriedly arranged to take the team photo:

 Dave was clearly blocking out some of the virtual Headbangers so we thought we'd try again:

Just enough movement to get the 2 Robs, Malcolm and Colin in.

Look out for follow-up emails and WhatsApp messages.

Votes - Headbang 8 Nov 24

 All 9 votes in and the results are:

Quite a disparity in voting here. The opening 2-track theme getting just one third of the votes that the the 3 most popular themes got. Septuagenarians was in 3rd place with a creditable 53 points. Autumn was 2nd with 55 and was just pipped by Hammond Organ with 56.

Our broad church once again displayed disparity in voting - Septuagenarians received as many as 4 first places (8 points) but one last place (1 point). Passed Masters had 2 Headbangers voting it as best theme and 2 others as worst. Go figure.

There were 14 nominations for the Top 3 tracks:

The winning track was a bit of a break from convention as it was a made for TV video rather than the preferred live performance. It was difficult to find a suitable video where Chris Difford was prominent rather than Glenn Tilbrook.

Interesting to see that 3 of the more unusual, slightly offbeat tracks were nominated - Ketty Lester, Willie Dixon and Neil Young.

The only theme that didn't have a track nominated in anyone's Top 3 was the Jukebox. All other themes had at least one track nominated with Octogenarians + having the most - 4 in all, which is slightly surprising given that it didn't rate well in the votes for the best themes. Again, go figure.

Virtual Headbang - 8 Nov 24

Insufficient numbers available to go and disturb Dave's house meant a return to lockdown days with an all-virtual Headbang last night. Andy, Steve and Malcolm sent their apologies but 9 others logged in to Teams OK - albeit CK was either camera-shy or technically challenged:

A gentle 2-track starter theme - TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS:

Bonnie Raitt was the popular choice here.

SEPTUAGENARIANS were next. First we played brief excerpts from 5 "mentionables" but not "notables":

Then fuller tracks from the "notables" with voting in play:

The Squeeze video was the winner here.

Others who recently achieved the biblical three score years and ten - un-notable and unmentionable:

 The next theme was AUTUMN:

Led Zep's brief re-formation at the O2 in 2007 was the clear winner here.

Now for the OCTOGENARIANS +. The plus sign indicates the presence of Nonogenarians and even a Centenarian, but first, brief excerpts from the mentionable but un-notable Octogenarians:

Definitely notable were:

A narrow victory for Jimmy Cliff's performance at Glastonbury in 2003 but good to see a few votes for Ketty Lester's wonderful Love Letters.

The Centenarian was Barbara Parritt from The Toys - remember Lover's Concerto?

A brief 4 track featuring the HAMMOND ORGAN:

It was commented how vital the role of the Hammond Organ was in Bob Marley's classic.

OBITUARIES next - and there were a few. First off, brief excerpts again for:

Then the more prominent ones who recently passed:

The vote here is for the "Most Missed" so it was pretty inevitable that John Mayall would win.

Others who had left us recently were noted:

There were 8 nominations for the JUKEBOX this time and some of the tracks were pretty long so I decided to split it into 2 sections:

Rob D's nomination from Edinburgh Blues Club clearly won the first section but it was a tie between David Byrne and local loon Calum  Bowie in the second section, so all 3 played off in the final vote which was again tied - this time between Rob D's and my selection.

That led to the final theme - the second time for PASSED MASTERS. To qualify for this, the acts have to have been born over 100 years ago and now long gone. Brief excerpts again:

The legend that is Willie Dixon had a landslide victory here.

U.S. Music Road Trip 2024 - 3rd leg - CLEVELAND

Our next drive was less than 200 miles, leaving Michigan behind for the state of Ohio and the city of Cleveland - home of the ROCK AND ROLL HALL OF FAME.

It's a huge operation - 6 floors of music. We spent 5 hours there - and could have done even more:

The first (basement) floor is the biggest and best:

Lots of memorabilia, videos and interactive stuff:

This is what was on the other floors:

On level 2 - if you had any kind of musical skill, no matter how small - you could join in with a live garage band. Jo and I confined ourselves to posing with the guitars:

The soundproof rooms for the drums were fun:

Headphones on and you get a lesson in how to play along - We Will Rock You was as technically challenging as we could muster.

There was a separate section for Women in Rock:

A couple of interesting exhibits of instruments:

John Paul Jones' 8-string bass - never seen one before

Steve Winwood's piano on which he wrote his US no.1 Roll With It

There was a large display devoted to Pink Floyd's The Wall:

Well worth a visit. This was the end of our Musical Road Trip for 2024 but there was still a bit of driving and sightseeing to be done - on to Niagara then Toronto before flying back west to our daughter's in Oregon, from where this post comes. 

U.S. Music Road Trip 2024 - 2nd leg - DETROIT

We drove 300 miles east from Chicago through Illinois to the state of Michigan and what they used to promote as the Motor City, then Motown, but now they're trying to label it as the Renaissance City. Just one target here - MOTOWN, of course! We travelled over from our hotel to 2648 West Grand Boulevard - HITSVILLE USA for our 11 am tour. It was pretty busy with tours round the 2 small houses every half hour:

Our tour guide took us round various wall exhibits and we watched a short film (not available elsewhere) featuring many artistes who passed through this famous location, including one Michael Jackson whose estate had just loaned his famous fedora and jewelled glove to the Motown Museum:

Motown operated many record labels and in the very early days the album covers didn't show any of the artistes in those days of racial discrimination - plus ça change:

We were treated to a demonstration of one of the two echo chambers and then we were led next door to the original building (Hitsville USA) and the famous Studio A where most of the magic happened:

The Andantes, a group of 3 session singers who allegedly featured on 20,000 recordings (as Rob D commented in his RDR show a week or two ago), were highlighted but nobody else in our group of roughly 20 had ever heard of them. Even more obscure were the Underdogs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Underdogs_(American_band) - reportedly the first white band signed by Motown.

Naturally, the Funk Brothers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Funk_Brothers) were mentioned several times. Here's Dennis Coffey's guitar and wah-wah pedal, as featured on the Temptations' Cloud Nine (and others):

Our final "treat" of the tour was for us all to sing the first verse of My Girl while doing the Temptations' Walk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg_kmPPSMfQ).

Stepping outside, there was a gig setting up - in honour of the legendary Funk Brothers' bass, James Jamerson, whose widow was present. It was Motown's annual Bass Day and an amazing 65 bass players were present, ready to do their thing:

Next stop Cleveland.