Other Business To Discuss

Some house-cleaning items:

1) Just like my compadre Richard Nelson does on his blog, Highway 290 Revisited, I'm going to use the side column keep track of all the 2006 albums I buy. That way you can witness just how ridiculous my CD purchasing habits really are.

2) Also joining the side column is what I like to call The 3:49 Club (which is nearly half of The 700 Club). It currently has 20 members, songs that actually ARE 3 minutes and 49 seconds long. If you come across songs of this length, feel free to alert me!

3) Since it's 2006 and one of my goals is to write more, I'm going to embark on a project where I review ten albums from 10 years ago, 1996. I was a freshman/sophomore in college at this time, and that's when my CD collection began to grow exponentially. A heady time. The first review will be up tomorrow.

4) Finally, beacuase there's no search function on this site, I'm going to create a Review Index under the Offshoots heading. There you'll be able to see what has been reviewed and where to find it. That'll be helpful for me more than anyone.

Comments

REO Speedwagon: R.E.O. Speedwagon (1971)

REO Speedwagon got its start in the late 1960s on the campus of the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana. The band grew out of a friendship between a students Neal Doughty (piano/keyboard) and Alan Gratzer (drums). Joining up with a couple of other musicians, they took the name R.E.O. Speedwagon. It wasn't long before they started getting gigs at parties and bars, doing covers of the hits of the day. The band cycled through several players in its first three years, with Gratzer and Doughty as the only constants. One-by-one they added the members that would form the first "official" lineup: singer Terry Luttrell in early 1968, bassist Gregg Philbin later that summer, and guitarist Gary Richrath at the end of 1970. Richrath was a native of Peoria, 90 miles northwest of Champaign, and had essentially stalked the band until they let him join. It was a good move, as he not only an accomplished guitarist, but also a songwriter. With Richrath the band ascended to the n

The Beatles: "Now and Then" (2023)

All the way back in 2008, I wrote a series of posts covering the recorded output of an obscure 1960s band called The Beatles. Though never especially popular or commercially successful, they managed to release an impressive 13 albums and 2 compilations in a 7-year period. Once I completed those reviews, I promptly forgot all about the Beatles. I was sure that I didn't need to keep tabs on them, because all indications were that they'd never reunite or release any more music. So you can imagine my surprise a couple of weeks ago when I came across a YouTube video claiming to be about the making of a new "final" Beatles song called "Now and Then." And then imagine even more surprise when I learned that this song was not the first new Beatles song since 1970. It's the third! As it turns out, the Beatles had actually "reuinted" to record more music in the 1990s. Though band member John Lennon was killed in 1980, he left behild some unfinished songs

Twenty Twenty-Three

2023 marks not only the 20th anniversary of this blog (an occasion I'm overdue to celebrate), but also 20 years of compiling a playlist of favorite songs to summarize my year in music consumption. Though I still make an ultra-limited run of physical copies, for the most part this now lives in the streaming world. As such, if you have Amazon Music Unlimited you can listen at this link . The Tracks: 1. Mammoth WVH: "Like a Pastime" 2. blink-182: "Fell in Love" 3. Jonas Brothers: "Vacation Eyes" 4. Kylie Minogue: "Things We Do For Love" 5. Carly Rae Jepsen: "So Right" 6. Semisonic: "All the Time" 7. Caitlyn Smith: "High" 8. Wilco: "Meant to Be" 9. Jenny Lewis: "Chain of Tears" 10. The National (feat. Taylor Swift): "The Alcott" 11. Lufthaus & Robbie Williams: "Unlovable" 12. The Killers: "Your Side of Town" 13. Foo Fighters: "Show Me How" 14. The New P

3 Minutes, 49 Seconds

Search This Blog