Will classic rock last for all eternity?

Oak Lawn (IL) Reporter ^ | 4/17/03 | Michael M. Bates

[mikeb704]

Eva Narcissus Boyd was buried in North Carolina earlier this week. The name may not be familiar, but her music certainly is.

Under the name "Little Eva," she recorded "The Locomotion." The song was a giant hit in 1962.

Forty years is a very long time, even if Baby Boomers recall the era as though it were last week. I thought of Little Eva a few of months ago while driving. Her hit was playing on the radio and I wondered how many times I’d heard it over the decades. Surely hundreds of times. Maybe even thousands.

I began conjecturing if "The Locomotion" will still be listened to in yet another 40 years. Given how pervasive 60s music is today, I think there’s a possibility of that happening.

It’s not just on oldies stations. Turn on the TV and chances are you’ll hear 60s music in commercials.

Donovan, the Sunshine Superman, sings "Colours" in a Kohl’s commercial. A Gap ad uses his "Mellow Yellow." The same company features another commercial with The Troggs’ "Love Is All Around." What, you thought "Wild Thing" was their only groovy ditty?

Admittedly, some of the music in TV ads emanated from one hit wonders. Flowers.com runs a spot with "Concrete and Clay," a 1965 hit for the legendary Unit Four + Two. GMC’s Yukon included "Our Day Will Come." The first song released by Ruby and the Romantics, it was also the only one for which the group is remembered. Old Navy used "California Sun," a hit by the Rivieras. The band made the Golden State sound like heaven, which was quite an accomplishment for some Indiana boys who’d never personally been out there a’havin’ fun in that warm California sun.

It’s surprising to me that, given their sheer number and popularity, more Beatles tunes aren’t incorporated in advertising. Possibly it’s because of legal impediments. Michael Jackson has owned the rights to over 200 Beatles songs. Of course, Michael is always busy with either not getting plastic surgery or being named in multimillion-dollar lawsuits, so perhaps he just hasn’t had the time necessary to exploit his ownership.

Another consideration is that some Boomers consider Beatles music sacrosanct. These folks feel disgust with what’s perceived as tawdry commercialization of their heroes’ works. They must have not paid much attention when the group cranked out barkers like "Dig A Pony" just to fill up an album.

The mid-80s marked the first use of a Beatles song in an ad. Lincoln-Mercury had a sound-alike group singing "Help." A couple of years later, Nike featured "Revolution" performed by the Beatles and the company credited it with increased sales. Apple Records sued Nike, but until the case was settled kept employing it.

In the late 90s, Nortel Networks licensed "Come Together" for a new marketing campaign. H&R Block latched on to "Taxman" for commercials last year. Around the same time, an Allstate Insurance ad included "When I’m 64." Julian Lennon performed the tune, which added a nice touch of irony I thought.

Car companies especially look back to the golden age of rock. Steppenwolf does a heavily mixed version of "Magic Carpet Ride" for Dodge Viper. "Unchained Melody" was a 60s hit for the Righteous Brothers and Mercedes Benz incorporated it in a commercial last year. The Kinks’ "You Really Got Me" has been used in other ads for Mercedes Benz.

A song I’ve heard in several commercials is the great "Time Has Come Today" by the Chambers Brothers. It’s pitched beer, cars, and even an investment company.

One advertisement highlights "It’s A Beautiful Morning," a hit for the Young Rascals. The product being sold is Vioxx, an arthritis pill purchased by many Boomers, possibly even the not so young anymore Rascals.

When most of my generation finally leave this vale of tears – if they ever do – maybe then the 60s music will fade away. But what will take its place? The Insane Clown Posse, Eminem, Twisted Sister?

You know, The Locomotion keeps getting better with age.

[irish guard]

>>>>>>Do we really want to be listening to bands like Bad Company when we're in the retirement home?<<<<<

Something tells me that I will still like to listen to Bad to the Bone (George Thorogood), anything by AC/Dc, Pink Floyd, The Allman Brothers and others when I am 80....sorry to disapoint you, but if I make 80, I want to hear REO Speedwagon do Ridin the Storm out or Lynrd Skynrd to Freebird on my birthday!

[archy]

The recent cover version of The Smiths tune How Soon Is Now by Russian pop vocalists t.a.T.y would be a contender

No way. No. My God, what have they done?

All right, I've gotta listen to that once.

You DO know who the producer was for three of the songs on their 200 KPH in the Wrong Lane* U.S. debut album, don't you? Trevor Horn, of Pet Shop Boys and Frankie Goes to Hollywoon infamy. More cowbell!

Give a click here, and see if you hear anything interesting. I think I may have an URL for the song online at a Russian website.

[discostu]

I think it is Sweet Dream, which is a great song and done very well at that concert. All I did was buy a stereo headphone (male) to RCA (female) splitter at Radio Shack, with that in the middle I plugged the record player into the computer via the speaker jacks and the sound card. The rest is software. Sometimes I think all the problems in the world can be solved by $10 of cabling and connectors from Radio Shack.

[Tribune7]

He's a good songwriter too.

[Wednesday's Child]

Oh yeah, when anyone put out an album, almost all of it had great songs and most were given air time too. There are a few stations that really play a mix of oldies, and some just seem to play the same songs every few days or so. I'd really like to hear more 50's though.

[Revolting cat!]

Now, I'd be impressed by somebody who has quadraphonic vinyl records (and knows how to spell the damn word correctly!) and equipment to play it. All I ever got was a JVC receiver that was "quadraphonic ready" whatever that meant. A good piece of gear, by the way (as is all JVC equipment I've used.)

[archy]

Just to add, BTW, I played in a band from 1962 until 1966. The oldies we did were mostly C&W, like Hank Williams. The blues that was requested was redone versions by Chuck Berry and early rock and roll. No one ever requested, to my memory, anything earlier than the 1950s, with the exception of C&W.

That's around the time when I was playing drums, sometimes in a housecat band, other times on the road or as a fill-in at union gigs. But we worked a lot of VFW and Legion clubs where WWII and Korean War vets would ask for songs from that era, sometimes recalling a really special girl who was right alongside them- sometimes there are happy endings; not always, and not often enough.

But I can still handle the lyrics to At Sundown and a lot of old Kay Kaiser tunes. And I've worked with a couple of vocalists who could really belt out the standards.

Rock's not bad, not bad at all. But it's not all there is, either. And it borrows from the best, when it's at its best.

-archy-/-

[John Lenin]

Will Jazz ever die ?

[majordivit]

Excellent. Tnanks for the tip. I own several albums that will probably never be released on CD that I do not want to play any more on the turntable. I'd love to capture whatever decent sound remains from some of my older albums onto CDR...

[archy]

Something tells me that I will still like to listen to Bad to the Bone (George Thorogood), anything by AC/Dc, Pink Floyd, The Allman Brothers and others when I am 80....

[discostu]

Jazz isn't dead, it just smells funny.

On the serious side, since jazz is music for musicians it'll never really die, but it'll never obtain huge popularity either.

[Wednesday's Child]

JVC is very good equipment.
All I had was a "record player" and it was MONO! lol
Quadraphonic was early 70's I think. Probably way too pricey for us at the time.
When I got married we bought a Scott stereo receiver, made our own speakers and we were in heaven! lol
Needless to say, we still have, and I use every day, the Scott. Almost 35 years old!

[Gasshog]

Robert Planet came from a band named Hobblestweed

[gcruse]

In our part of the country, the older crowds were uniformly country and western. And drunk. Boy, did they drink. LOL

[Gasshog]

Robert PLANT came from a band named Hobblestweed

Sorry I cant spell plant today

[John Lenin]

If you like hard rock, jazz fusion is the next step up. The best musicians in the world are into fusion because you can't fake it, if you don't have real talent you cannot play fusion.

[activationproducts]

Jazz you can do things with (wider harmonic and rhythmic horizons). Blues is just opposite.

[majordivit]

As Ian put it his old playing style was really starting to wear on his body causing him major headaches and hand cramps so playing the flute had lost it's joy. Which is why he persued lessons when his daughter said his fingering was wrong. So a lot of RtB seems to come from it being fun to play the flute again, and (as you can tell on dot-com or even Living With the Past) doing it right allows him to do a lot of soft subtle stuff he was never able to before because he had to breath a lot harder to get a clean note. Listening to it right now, Rare and Precious Chain (which you said you've heard), he never could have done that light flute in the beginning before he didn't have the tonal control.

I was not aware of any of this. And i thought i knew everything about JT and Mr. Anderson. I guess i have to listen harder to Ian's new playing style. I just thought he was playing the flute similarly to the way he played on very early songs like 'Reason's for Waiting' or 'Witches Promise'. Come to think of it, didn't Martin Barre play some of the flute parts on 'Reasons'? Not the menacing flute riff that joins the chorus with the verses (That is definatly Ian) but the flute lines which open the song and cover the melody...

By the way, before I purchase the RTB, I've read some nice things about 'Stuck in The August Rain' and 'Another Harry's Bar'. You wouldn't mind wetting my appetite a bit by letting me know what i have to look forward to :)

[discostu]

I'd read it all in some interview Ian did about a year before RtB, didn't think much of it at the time (other than being glad it was fun again, he really sounded like he was contemplating retirement because of the pain) and it had pretty much fallen out of my head by the time RtB came out. Then I listened to it and was all "holy crap" and I remembered.

Martin played flute on Reason for Waiting AND Jeffrey Goes to Leicester Square (liner notes, my memory is only good enough to tell me he played flute on two songs on Standup).

RtB starts off with a lot of high tempo stuff (some low tempo interludes to give you a chance to breath) and climaxes with Dangerous Veils (yet another Ian Anderson song about the beautiful but probably insane women you meet when you travel for a living) which is really high tempos and extremely cool. After that the album mellows out into a more Catfish Rising/ Rock Islands cigar and a brandy in front of the fireplace mood (which is good because by the time you're through Dangerous Veils your exhausted). Stuck in the August Rain and Another Harry's Bar are the final songs on the album, very whistful and function very similarly to When Jesus Came to Play and Strange Avenues. Very soft beautific songs that are easily ignored but shouldn't be and the provide a very nice denoument to the album putting the bow on the package.

Can you guess that I wanted to be a music critic for a while? Found out you don't get to review good albums until you've been at it for a while (or the editor guesses wrong).