Pop

Pop


  • Bob Dylan dead and done? The Bootleg Series Vol. 16, 1980โ€“1985

    The apocalypse was clearly at hand. Bob Dylan was dead and done. He had snapped and self-destructed. As the โ€˜80s dawned, even those who worshipped the man were having their doubts. The rebel, the doubter, the immensely skeptical, infinitely gifted oracle from Minnesota who predicted that the times they were a changinโ€™ was suddenly, unexpectedly,…

    Read More


  • Booker T. & The M.G.โ€™s: a Tribute to the Beatles

    A 12-year-old kid is at a local Woolworthโ€™s store on Ashland Avenue on the South Side of Chicago. Itโ€™s the early โ€˜70s, and heโ€™s spending his few allowance dollars on cheap โ€œcut-outโ€ vinyl albums, shelved at the front end of the checkout counter, neatly tiered, four rows high and ten albums deep. That twelve-year-old was…

    Read More


  • Diving into Disco, Part 3 โ€” The Motown years

    Blues migrated towards the urban centres, along its way electrifying guitars and gigs, as black musicians fleeing southern racial segregation strived for more economic opportunities and a better life in places like Detroit, Chicago, and New York City.

    Read More


  • A stone-cold classic: Carole Kingโ€™s Tapestry

    Barely in my teens, I listened to the very first albums I ever owned on a wide, floor-model stereo console placed prominently in the living room of my home on Chicagoโ€™s South Side. My oldest sister gave it to my mother as a birthday gift in September, 1971. It cost five hundred bucks and was…

    Read More


  • T.H.E Show 2021

    First impressions All prices listed in USD My wife is not an audiophile. But as a classically trained pianist and a professional musician, she has ears for sound quality. Itโ€™s why I sometimes seek her opinion after changing something in my audio system. This yearโ€™s T.H.E. Show, held in Long Beach, was her first audio…

    Read More


  • Jazz isnโ€™t noise. Itโ€™s special. Hereโ€™s why.

    I have a friend who listened only to classical music. One day I had him listen to the music of John Coltrane, a jazz giant. And in honor of the saxophonistโ€™s Giant status, the track I had my friend listen to was โ€œGiant Stepsโ€. As he was listening, I was trying to decide what I…

    Read More