So much timeless music came floating through my open door around the year 1969, with one of the seminal albums being, for both its innovative sound, character and quality, the first Crosby, Stills & Nash release. Looking back at the cover, I can only wonder if I was ever so young, where if I didn’t have the pictures to prove it, I may have dismissed those years as nothing more than a long series of hallucinogenic dreams.
So ... I could talk about the groups these amazing artists sprang from, but you all know those stories. Or I could talk about the splendid harmonies, jangling guitar playing and the return to an authentic Americana musical sound, but it would be much more pleasant to listen to them than to read my words. Of course, I could always speak of the times, or the counter culture, yet all of that is now the stuff of history at this juncture. So where does that leave us at this point ... why with me, and the effect this album had on my life.
I had just landed in Vietnam when I finally got myself a copy of this album, thought I didn’t need one, as it was drifting from record players and reel to reel tape machines from every hootch ... at times the whole base was awash in the sounds of Crosby, Stills & Nash. With this release, the world was finally to came to terms with the mighty ‘Air Guitar,’ and though it was not a very feminine or a girlie thing to do, I swear, you guys have never experienced ‘Air Guitar’ until you have seen a woman in olive drab BDU’s (Battle Dress Uniform), left foot on her camouflaged helmet, wailing away, using a fully automatic M16 (with the safety in the ‘On’ position) as a guitar, with the music blasting to the max. That was the one good thing about being in Vietnam, there weren’t a lot of people to disturb, and I was the undisputed champion of the ‘Air Guitar’ for the entire 44th Medical Unit. I was lightening fast on the draw, I had the power chords down, I could reel back and bow forward with my head almost touching my knees, I had blisters on my fingers, and a smile on my face ... of course we all scrambled when we heard the feedback from the rotors, as a line of choppers were circling to touch down.
And even in the OR, some kind soul had made a tape mix of songs which always included, “Guinevere,” “Wooden Ships,” “Lady Of The Island” and of course “Helplessly Hoping.” I can still taste the tears from that song, as they inched their way down my cheeks, leaving tiny trails in the red dust that caked my face. Sometimes now, back in the real world, I’ll hear a song from this precious album ease its way through an open car window at a stoplight, turn slowly, knowing that for a brief second, that the girl in the other car will look, once upon a time, just like me.
*** The Fun Facts: The current residents don't wanna see your face on their porch, it's now a private residence at 809 Pam Avenue in West Hollywood, California. The truer side of the story goes thusly … when the to be album cover photo was developed, the boys realized they were not in Crosby, Stills and Nash order. Returning to the house a few days later to reshoot the photo, they discovered that house had been torn down and carted away, meaning the out of order photo was the last of the house at 809 Pam Avenue in Laurel Canyon.
Very nice. I was reading their wiki and this is the album that has a song on it called Death Cab For Cutie. Who knew ? The album was kind of an inspiration for Spinal Tap it seems.
Yeah, it's kind of an Elvis-like tune ("All Shook Up" inspired) with backing vocals simulating The Jordanaires. There's some cool stuff on the album.
When I listen to Oldfield going through the instruments at the end of Side 1 of TB it makes me think of The Intro and Outro. Now I'm really going to have to go and dig it up.
Very nice. I was reading their wiki and this is the album that has a song on it called Death Cab For Cutie. Who knew ? The album was kind of an inspiration for Spinal Tap it seems.
Yeah, it's kind of an Elvis-like tune ("All Shook Up" inspired) with backing vocals simulating The Jordanaires. There's some cool stuff on the album.
That is the album I am referring to. One of these days I'll stumble on it again.
I have "The Intro and the Outro" on this album - UK Import on Sunset records. It also has the great track "Big Shot" which was left off the US release.
Very nice. I was reading their wiki and this is the album that has a song on it called Death Cab For Cutie. Who knew ? The album was kind of an inspiration for Spinal Tap it seems.
That is the album I am referring to. One of these days I'll stumble on it again.
I have "The Intro and the Outro" on this album - UK Import on Sunset records. It also has the great track "Big Shot" which was left off the US release.
I remember when he was here in Cleveland making the movie and caught him noodling on the stage at the Agora at noon one day. Was driving the old coffee truck back then at stopped in the alley by the stage door right by the GE factory I stopped at everyday at noon. Just waked in the door and poked around as I would sometimes do because I could. Being the "coffee man" was like having an all access pass in those days. In offices, factories, car dealers and places like the old Cleveland Agora.
For the uneducated on pressings help me out. How does one know where an album is pressed? Especially if you happen upon it in a record store and want to buy. For instance my daughter bought me a Remastered 180g of Meddle for my birthday. I'm looking at the cover now and have no idea where it is pressed.
I'm pretty sure Kurt is gonna send you to discog.com. https://www.discogs.com/master... Finding your version from the 609 listed for meddle (I think the catalog number is the easy way),
and then knowing what's "good"... gonna need his insight on that one.
I gave up on that and went to hdtracks.com and bought the 24 / 96 wav file. I had a 1974 German pressing I sold long ago that was very nice. Still have the rip of it though. This wav file makes me not care anymore.
For the uneducated on pressings help me out. How does one know where an album is pressed? Especially if you happen upon it in a record store and want to buy. For instance my daughter bought me a Remastered 180g of Meddle for my birthday. I'm looking at the cover now and have no idea where it is pressed.
Both pressed in the same plant in The Netherlands. You will not find this information printed anywhere on the album. It is the matrix / runout numbers in the inner dead wax that will tell you were it is from, in this particular case.
You really would need to look it up at discogs to find out. It is the most reliable source available. It helps when out doing actual crate digging. I use it to cross check listings by the major on line retailers to find out which particular one a company is selling.
I've been active there for nearly 7 years now and only know what I know as I stumble on to it. It has been a very steep and frustrating learning curve. But in order to list something for sale, you must know this stuff. There are 1,200 subs for TDSOTM and Sgt Pepper comes in currently at 963. The Wall has over 800. In can take hours to narrow one of these down and sometimes what you have isn't even listed yet and then you have to create your own entry. I have a Great Britain / UK repressing of The Beatles / White Album that has yet to be listed. Haven't got time to figure that one out, so I have long since moved on to others that I can find.
Sometimes you will see where it was pressed printed on the cover or on a hype sticker. This is rare however. More often, in retail stores you will see the country it was pressed , such as The Czech Republic, Germany and most recently Italy is showing up more and more and these Italian pressings are generally very good so far although I do not yet know much about the pressing company. German pressings are almost always good or at the very least worth taking a chance on.
There is lots of detective work involved in reading these matrix numbers which may tell you where it was pressed, by who, who cut the lacquer and in some cases which lathes were used to cut the lacquers. Even the cutting date may be part of it. But there are no industry standards for this. Each company has there own coding system. And different companies used different plants belonging to other companies as well. A&M for example never had any of its own plants, they got farmed out to Columbia, RCA, Capitol, Decca and a host of other independents. Atlantic which did not own their own presses, generally has the pressing plant codes on the actual label at the end of the label number. SP for Specialty, MO for Monarch (which is the one for the best early US Zep pressings) and many others. My first choice for Columbia is the Terre Haute pressings and they pressed for everyone including the Columbia House copies which are actually very good as a rule. Capitol Records is LOS for Los Angeles and JAC for their Jacksonville, Ill. plant which served the bulk of the Midwest for major and lesser releases. I'm just scratching the surface off of the top of my head. And for more fun, most of these places have been closed for decades. We are not even dealing with the 21st Century plants in the above, let alone foreign pressings. And again, while this may sound like I know a lot about this stuff, there are plenty of people who have forgotten more about this stuff than I will ever learn.
This user has a decent list of markings and reference links for going really deep into the weeds.
Without discogs, you are back in the stone age of the 60's through the 10's just buying an album and hoping that it sounds good, never knowing about the food chain until after you open it up and buy it and even then, not knowing much about it. One the first things I did learn back in the old daze was that when a pressing had STERLING pressed in the dead wax, it was more than likely going to be good. But that is about all I learned up until recently and now I know why STERLING was meaningful.
HTH
Edit: you have a resampled copy of the most recent treatment of Meddle (10/19/2021) from HDTracks on that thumb drive. I took it down from 24 / 96 wav to 16 /48 for size purposes.
