1.
Album
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Album, is a collection of audio recordings issued as a single item on CD, record, audio tape, or another medium. Albums of recorded music were developed in the early 20th century, first as books of individual 78rpm records, vinyl LPs are still issued, though in the 21st century album sales have mostly focused on compact disc and MP3 formats. The audio cassette was a format used from the late 1970s through to the 1990s alongside vinyl, an album may be recorded in a recording studio, in a concert venue, at home, in the field, or a mix of places. Recording may take a few hours to years to complete, usually in several takes with different parts recorded separately. Recordings that are done in one take without overdubbing are termed live, the majority of studio recordings contain an abundance of editing, sound effects, voice adjustments, etc. With modern recording technology, musicians can be recorded in separate rooms or at times while listening to the other parts using headphones. Album covers and liner notes are used, and sometimes additional information is provided, such as analysis of the recording, historically, the term album was applied to a collection of various items housed in a book format. In musical usage the word was used for collections of pieces of printed music from the early nineteenth century. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, the LP record, or 33 1⁄3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, is a gramophone record format introduced by Columbia Records in 1948. It was adopted by the industry as a standard format for the album. Apart from relatively minor refinements and the important later addition of stereophonic sound capability, the term album had been carried forward from the early nineteenth century when it had been used for collections of short pieces of music. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, as part of a trend of shifting sales in the music industry, some commenters have declared that the early 21st century experienced the death of the album. Sometimes shorter albums are referred to as mini-albums or EPs, Albums such as Tubular Bells, Amarok, Hergest Ridge by Mike Oldfield, and Yess Close to the Edge, include fewer than four tracks. There are no rules against artists such as Pinhead Gunpowder referring to their own releases under thirty minutes as albums. These are known as box sets, material is stored on an album in sections termed tracks, normally 11 or 12 tracks. A music track is a song or instrumental recording. The term is associated with popular music where separate tracks are known as album tracks. When vinyl records were the medium for audio recordings a track could be identified visually from the grooves
2.
James Taylor
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James Vernon Taylor is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, he was inducted into the Rock and he is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold more than 100 million records worldwide. Taylor achieved his breakthrough in 1970 with the No.3 single Fire and Rain and had his first No.1 hit the year with Youve Got a Friend. His 1976 Greatest Hits album was certified Diamond and has sold 12 million US copies, following his 1977 album, JT, he has retained a large audience over the decades. Every album that he released from 1977 to 2007 sold over a million copies and his chart performance had a resurgence during the late 1990s and 2000s, when he recorded some of his most-awarded work. He achieved his first number one album in the US in 2015 with his recording Before This World. He is notable for his covers of other peoples songs, such as How Sweet It Is. James Vernon Taylor was born at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston on March 12,1948 and his father was from a well-off family of Southerners of Scottish ancestry. His mother, the former Gertrude Woodard, studied singing with Marie Sundelius at the New England Conservatory of Music and was an opera singer before the couples marriage in 1946. James was the second of five children, the others being Alex, Kate, Livingston and they built a house in the Morgan Creek area off the present Morgan Creek Road, which was sparsely populated. James would later say, Chapel Hill, the Piedmont, the hills, were tranquil, rural, beautiful. Thinking of the red soil, the seasons, the way things smelled down there, I feel as though my experience of coming of age there was more a matter of landscape, James attended public primary school in Chapel Hill. Isaacs career prospered, but he was away from home, on military service at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland. Isaac Taylor later rose to dean of the UNC School of Medicine from 1964 to 1971. The Taylors spent summers on Marthas Vineyard beginning in 1953, Taylor first learned to play the cello as a child in North Carolina and switched to the guitar in 1960. He began attending Milton Academy, a boarding school in Massachusetts in fall 1961. Summering before then with his family on Marthas Vineyard, he met Danny Kortchmar, the two began listening to and playing blues and folk music together, and Kortchmar quickly realized that Taylors singing had a natural sense of phrasing, every syllable beautifully in time. I knew James had that thing, Taylor wrote his first song on guitar at 14, and he continued to learn the instrument effortlessly
3.
Rock music
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It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by blues, rhythm and blues and country music. Rock music also drew strongly on a number of genres such as electric blues and folk. Musically, rock has centered on the guitar, usually as part of a rock group with electric bass guitar. Typically, rock is song-based music usually with a 4/4 time signature using a verse-chorus form, like pop music, lyrics often stress romantic love but also address a wide variety of other themes that are frequently social or political in emphasis. Punk was an influence into the 1980s on the subsequent development of subgenres, including new wave, post-punk. From the 1990s alternative rock began to rock music and break through into the mainstream in the form of grunge, Britpop. Similarly, 1970s punk culture spawned the visually distinctive goth and emo subcultures and this trio of instruments has often been complemented by the inclusion of other instruments, particularly keyboards such as the piano, Hammond organ and synthesizers. The basic rock instrumentation was adapted from the blues band instrumentation. A group of musicians performing rock music is termed a rock band or rock group, Rock music is traditionally built on a foundation of simple unsyncopated rhythms in a 4/4 meter, with a repetitive snare drum back beat on beats two and four. Melodies are often derived from older musical modes, including the Dorian and Mixolydian, harmonies range from the common triad to parallel fourths and fifths and dissonant harmonic progressions. Critics have stressed the eclecticism and stylistic diversity of rock, because of its complex history and tendency to borrow from other musical and cultural forms, it has been argued that it is impossible to bind rock music to a rigidly delineated musical definition. These themes were inherited from a variety of sources, including the Tin Pan Alley pop tradition, folk music and rhythm, as a result, it has been seen as articulating the concerns of this group in both style and lyrics. Christgau, writing in 1972, said in spite of some exceptions, rock and roll usually implies an identification of male sexuality, according to Simon Frith rock was something more than pop, something more than rock and roll. Rock musicians combined an emphasis on skill and technique with the concept of art as artistic expression, original. The foundations of music are in rock and roll, which originated in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Its immediate origins lay in a melding of various musical genres of the time, including rhythm and blues and gospel music, with country. In 1951, Cleveland, Ohio disc jockey Alan Freed began playing rhythm and blues music for a multi-racial audience, debate surrounds which record should be considered the first rock and roll record. Other artists with rock and roll hits included Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Fats Domino, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis
4.
Columbia Records
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Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, Inc. the United States division of Sony Corporation. It was founded in 1887, evolving from an enterprise named the American Graphophone Company. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in the sound business. Columbia Records went on to release records by an array of singers, instrumentalists. It is one of Sony Musics three flagship record labels alongside RCA Records and Epic Records, rather, as above, it was connected to CBS, a broadcasting media company which had purchased the company in 1938, and had been co-founded in 1927 by Columbia Records itself. Though Arista Records was sold to Bertelsmann Music Group, it would become a sister label of Columbia Records through its mutual connection to Sony Music. The Columbia Phonograph Company was founded in 1887 by stenographer, lawyer and New Jersey native Edward Easton and it derived its name from the District of Columbia, where it was headquartered. At first it had a monopoly on sales and service of Edison phonographs and phonograph cylinders in Washington. As was the custom of some of the regional companies, Columbia produced many commercial cylinder recordings of its own. Columbias ties to Edison and the North American Phonograph Company were severed in 1894 with the North American Phonograph Companys breakup, thereafter it sold only records and phonographs of its own manufacture. In 1902, Columbia introduced the XP record, a brown wax record. According to Gracyk, the molded brown waxes may have sold to Sears for distribution. Columbia began selling records and phonographs in addition to the cylinder system in 1901, preceded only by their Toy Graphophone of 1899. For a decade, Columbia competed with both the Edison Phonograph Company cylinders and the Victor Talking Machine Company disc records as one of the top three names in American recorded sound. In order to add prestige to its catalog of artists. The firm also introduced the internal-horn Grafonola to compete with the extremely popular Victrola sold by the rival Victor Talking Machine Company, during this era, Columbia used the famous Magic Notes logo—a pair of sixteenth notes in a circle—both in the United States and overseas. Columbia was split into two companies, one to make records and one to make players, Columbia Phonograph was moved to Connecticut, and Ed Easton went with it. Eventually it was renamed the Dictaphone Corporation, in late 1923, Columbia went into receivership
5.
Singer-songwriter
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Singer-songwriters are musicians who write, compose, and perform their own musical material, including lyrics and melodies. The genre began with the folk-acoustic tradition, singer-songwriters often provide the sole accompaniment to an entire composition or song, typically using a guitar or piano. Singer-songwriter is used to define popular music artists who write and perform their own material, such an artist performs the roles of composer, lyricist, vocalist, instrumentalist, and often self-manager. Most records by artists have a similarly straightforward and spare sound that placed emphasis on the song itself. The term has also used to describe songwriters in the rock, folk, and pop music genres including Henry Russell, Aristide Bruant, Hank Williams. Song topics include political protest, as in the case of the Almanac Singers, Pete Seeger, the concept of a singer-songwriter can be traced to ancient bardic oral tradition, which has existed in various forms throughout the world. Poems would be performed as chant or song, sometimes accompanied by a harp or other similar instrument, after the invention of printing, songs would be written and performed by ballad sellers. Usually these would be versions of existing tunes and lyrics, which were constantly evolving and this developed into the singer-songwriting traditions of folk culture. The term singer-songwriter in North America can be traced back to singers who developed works in the blues and folk music style. Early to mid-20th century American singer-songwriters include Lead Belly, Jimmie Rodgers, Blind Lemon Jefferson, T-Bone Walker, Blind Willie McTell, Lightnin Hopkins, Son House, the tradition of writing topical songs was established by this group of musicians. This focus on social issues has greatly influenced the singer-songwriter genre, artists who had been primarily songwriters, notably Carole King, Townes Van Zandt, and Neil Diamond, also began releasing work as performers. In contrast to the approach of most prior country and folk music. The adjectives confessional and sensitive were often used singer-songwriter style, in the rock band era, members were not technically singer-songwriters as solo acts. However, many were singer-songwriters who created songs with band members. Many others like Eric Clapton found success as singer-songwriters in their later careers, there were hints of cross-pollination, but rock and folk music had remained largely separate genres, often with different audiences. An early attempt at fusing elements of folk and rock was highlighted in the Animals House of the Rising Sun, dylan plugged an entire generation into the milieu of the singer-songwriter. In the mid- to late 1960s, bands and singer-songwriters began to proliferate the underground New York art/music scene. Lotti Golden, in her Atlantic debut album Motor-Cycle, chronicled her life in NYCs East Village in the late 60s counterculture, visiting subjects such as gender identity, kate Bush remained distinctive throughout with her idiosyncratic style
6.
Carole King
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Carole King is an American composer and singer-songwriter. She is the most successful songwriter of the latter half of the 20th century. King also wrote 61 hits that charted in the UK, making her the most successful female songwriter on the UK singles charts between 1952 and 2005. Kings career began in the 1960s when she, along with her then husband Gerry Goffin and she has continued writing for other artists since then. Kings success as a performer in her own right did not come until the 1970s, King has made 25 solo albums, the most successful being Tapestry, which held the record for most weeks at No.1 by a female artist for more than 20 years. Her most recent non-compilation album was Live at the Troubadour in 2010 and her records sales were estimated at more than 75 million copies worldwide. She has won four Grammy Awards and was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame and she is the recipient of the 2013 Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, the first woman to be so honored. She is also a 2015 Kennedy Center Honoree, King was born Carol Joan Klein in February 1942 in Manhattan, to a Jewish family. Her mother, Eugenia, was a teacher, and her father and they met in an elevator when they were students at Brooklyn College in 1936. He was majoring in chemistry while her mothers major was English and they married in 1937, during the heights of the Great Depression. Her mother dropped out to run the household while her father also quit college, with the economy struggling, he then took a more secure job as a firefighter in New York. After King was born, they remained in Brooklyn, eventually able to buy a small two-story duplex where they could rent the upstairs for income and her mother had learned how to play piano as a child and, after buying a piano, would sometimes practice. When Carol was four years old, her parents discovered she had developed a sense of relative pitch whereby she could name a note by just hearing it. Her father enjoyed showing off his daughters skill to visiting friends, I enjoyed making my father happy and getting the notes right. Carols mother then began giving her real music lessons when she was four years old and she would climb up on the stool and be raised as yet higher by sitting on a phone book. With her mother sitting alongside, Carol was taught music theory and elementary piano technique, including how to read notation, King wanted to learn as much as possible, My mother never forced me to practice. I wanted so much to master the popular songs that poured out of the radio, Carol began kindergarten when she was four years old, but after her first year she was promoted directly to second grade because she had an exceptional facility with words and numbers. In the 1950s she went to James Madison High School and she formed a band called the Co-Sines, changed her name to Carole King, and made demo records with her friend Paul Simon for $25 a session
7.
Record producer
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A record producer or music producer oversees and manages the sound recording and production of a band or performers music, which may range from recording one song to recording a lengthy concept album. A producer has many roles during the recording process, the roles of a producer vary. The producer may perform these roles himself, or help select the engineer, the producer may also pay session musicians and engineers and ensure that the entire project is completed within the record companies budget. A record producer or music producer has a broad role in overseeing and managing the recording. Producers also often take on an entrepreneurial role, with responsibility for the budget, schedules, contracts. In the 2010s, the industry has two kinds of producers with different roles, executive producer and music producer. Executive producers oversee project finances while music producers oversee the process of recording songs or albums. In most cases the producer is also a competent arranger, composer. The producer will also liaise with the engineer who concentrates on the technical aspects of recording. Noted producer Phil Ek described his role as the person who creatively guides or directs the process of making a record, indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation actually is music director. The music producers job is to create, shape, and mold a piece of music, at the beginning of record industry, producer role was technically limited to record, in one shot, artists performing live. The role of producers changed progressively over the 1950s and 1960s due to technological developments, the development of multitrack recording caused a major change in the recording process. Before multitracking, all the elements of a song had to be performed simultaneously, all of these singers and musicians had to be assembled in a large studio and the performance had to be recorded. As well, for a song that used 20 instruments, it was no longer necessary to get all the players in the studio at the same time. Examples include the rock sound effects of the 1960s, e. g. playing back the sound of recorded instruments backwards or clanging the tape to produce unique sound effects. These new instruments were electric or electronic, and thus they used instrument amplifiers, new technologies like multitracking changed the goal of recording, A producer could blend together multiple takes and edit together different sections to create the desired sound. For example, in jazz fusion Bandleader-composer Miles Davis album Bitches Brew, producers like Phil Spector and George Martin were soon creating recordings that were, in practical terms, almost impossible to realise in live performance. Producers became creative figures in the studio, other examples of such engineers includes Joe Meek, Teo Macero, Brian Wilson, and Biddu
8.
Spotify
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Spotify is a music, podcast, and video streaming service, officially launched on 7 October 2008. It is developed by startup Spotify AB in Stockholm, Sweden and it provides digital rights management-protected content from record labels and media companies. Spotify is available in most of Europe, most of the Americas, Australia, New Zealand and it is available for most modern devices, including Windows, macOS, and Linux computers, as well as iOS and Android smartphones and tablets. Music can be browsed or searched for via various parameters, such as artist, album, genre, playlist, users can create, edit and share playlists, share tracks on social media, and make playlists with other users. Spotify provides access to over 30 million songs, as of June 2016, it has 100 million monthly active users, and as of March 2017, it has 50 million paying subscribers. They distribute approximately 70% of total revenue to rights holders, who then pay based on their individual agreements. Spotify operates under a freemium model, Spotify makes its revenues by selling premium streaming subscriptions to users and advertising placements to third parties. In December 2013, the company launched a new website, Spotify for Artists, Spotify gets its content from major record labels as well as independent artists, and pays copyright holders royalties for streamed music. The company pays 70% of its revenue to rights holders. Spotify for Artists states that the company does not have a fixed rate, instead considers factors such as the users home country. Rights holders received an average per-play payout between $.006 and $.0084, Spotify offers an unlimited subscription package, close to the Open Music Model —estimated economic equilibrium—for the recording industry. However, the incorporation of digital rights management protection diverges from the OMM and competitors such as iTunes Store, Spotify encourages people to pay for music, with subscriptions as its main revenue source. The subscription removes advertisements and limits, and increases song bitrates to 320 kbit/s, the website also claims that a Spotify customer is 1. 6x more financially valuable than the average adult non-Spotify U. S. music consumer. Additionally, the website includes a section entitled Spotifys impact on piracy as a response to the criticisms against the company regarding the exploitation of musicians. For example, in Norway, the figure of 1.2 billion unauthorized song downloads in 2008 is compared to a figure of 210 million from 2012, BBC Music Week editor Tim Ingham wrote, Unlike buying a CD or download, streaming is not a one-off payment. Hundreds of millions of streams of tracks are happening each and every day, which quickly multiplies the potential revenues on offer – and is a constant long-term source of income for artists. As of June 2016, the three Spotify subscription types, all offering unlimited listening time, are, In 2008, just after launch, in October 2010, Wired reported that Spotify was making more money for labels in Sweden than any other retailer online or off. Years after growth and expansion, a November 2012 report suggested strong momentum for the company
9.
Carolina in My Mind
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Carolina in My Mind is a song written and performed by singer-songwriter James Taylor, which first appeared on his 1968 self-titled debut album. Taylor wrote it while recording for the Beatles label Apple Records. Released as a single, the song earned critical praise but not commercial success and it was re-recorded for Taylors 1976 Greatest Hits album in the version that is most familiar to listeners. It has been a staple of Taylors concert performances over the decades of his career, the song was a modest hit on the country charts in 1969 for North Carolinian singer George Hamilton IV. Strongly tied to a sense of place, Carolina in My Mind has been called an unofficial state anthem for North Carolina. It is also a song of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, being played at athletic events and pep rallies. The association of the song with the state is made in written works of both fiction and non-fiction. It has become one of Taylors most critically praised songs and one that has great popularity, the song references Taylors years growing up in North Carolina. Taylor wrote it while recording for the Beatles label Apple Records. The song reflects Taylors homesickness at the time, as he was missing his family, his dog, the original recording of the song was done at Londons Trident Studios during the July to October 1968 period, and was produced by Asher. The songs lyric holy host of others standing around me makes reference to the Beatles, indeed, the recording of Carolina in My Mind featured a credited appearance by Paul McCartney on bass guitar and an uncredited one by George Harrison on backing vocals. The other players were Freddie Redd on organ, Joel Bishop OBrien on drums, Taylor and Asher also did backing vocals and Asher added a tambourine. Richard Hewson arranged and conducted a string part, a more ambitious 30-piece orchestra part was recorded. Taylor biographer Timothy White calls the song the albums quiet masterpiece, the song was first released on Taylors eponymous debut album in December 1968, and was later released as a single in the UK in February 1969 and in the United States in March 1969. However, owing to the problems which plagued the release of the album. The new recordings were done in October 1976 at The Sound Factory in Los Angeles, backing vocals were handled by Gold and Taylor. Greatest Hits became a record, selling more than 11 million copies in the United States by 2001. The remake earned even more praise than the original
10.
You've Got a Friend
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Youve Got a Friend is a 1971 song written by Carole King. It was first recorded by King, and included in her album Tapestry, another well-known version is by James Taylor from his album Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon. His was released as a single in 1971 reaching number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, the two versions were recorded simultaneously in 1971 with shared musicians. Youve Got a Friend won Grammy Awards both for Taylor and King, dozens of other artists have recorded the song over the years, including Dusty Springfield, Michael Jackson, Anne Murray and Donny Hathaway. Youve Got a Friend was written by Carole King during the January 1971 recording sessions for her own album Tapestry, and James Taylors album Mud Slide Slim, King has stated that the song was as close to pure inspiration as Ive ever experienced. It was written by something outside myself, through me, according to Taylor, King told him that the song was a response to a line in Taylors earlier song Fire and Rain that I’ve seen lonely times when I could not find a friend. Kings album was recorded in an overlap with Taylors, and King, Danny Kortchmar, the song is included on both albums, King said in a 1972 interview that she didnt write it with James or anybody really specifically in mind. But when James heard it he really liked it and wanted to record it, Taylors version was released as a single, and reached number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and number 4 on the UK Singles Chart. The James Taylor version also spent one week at the top of the Easy Listening charts, Billboard ranked it as the No.17 song for 1971. During the recording process, Taylor also offered to his Apple Records labelmate Mary Hopkin a chance to record the song, which she turned down, James Taylor and Carole King performed Youve Got a Friend together in 2010 during their Troubadour Reunion Tour. According to author James D. Perone, the themes include an expression of a universal, sisterly/brotherly, agape-type love of one human being for another. The reassuring lyrics have made the song popular with lonely people needing a boost of self-confidence. The songs messages of friendship having no boundaries and a friend being there when you are in need has universal appeal, for Taylor the lyrics had particular resonance due to the depression he had recovered from shortly before hearing King play the song. The music moves between a major and minor key, which according to music critic Maury Dean gives the song a sympathetic mood, in his review of Tapestry, Rolling Stone critic Jon Landau called Youve Got a Friend Carole Kings most perfect new song. He particularly praised how the melody and lyrics support each other, mojo considered the song to probably be the core of Tapestry. Allmusic critic Stewart Mason commented on the intimacy of Kings performance. Mason finds that the shyness of Kings voice gives her recording of the song a sincerity that he finds Taylors to lack, Mason also praises the depth and shading provided by the string instruments on Kings recording. Music critic Maury Dean describes Taylors performance style for the song as minimalist and folkish, Dusty Springfield recorded the song in early 1971 during the sessions for her third Atlantic Records album Faithful
11.
The Rolling Stone Album Guide
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The Rolling Stone Album Guide, previously known as The Rolling Stone Record Guide, is a book that contains professional music reviews written and edited by staff members from Rolling Stone magazine. Its first edition was published in 1979 and its last in 2004, the guide can be seen at Rate Your Music, while a list of albums given a five star rating by the guide can be seen at Rocklist. net. The Rolling Stone Record Guide was the first edition of what would later become The Rolling Stone Album Guide and it was edited by Dave Marsh and John Swenson, and included contributions from 34 other music critics. It is divided into sections by musical genre and then lists artists alphabetically within their respective genres, Albums are also listed alphabetically by artist although some of the artists have their careers divided into chronological periods. Dave Marsh, in his Introduction, cites as precedents Leonard Maltins book TV Movies and he gives Phonolog and Schwanns Records & Tape Guide as raw sources of information. The first edition included black and white photographs of many of the covers of albums which received five star reviews and these titles are listed together in the Five-Star Records section, which is coincidentally five pages in length. The edition also included reviews for many artists including Lenny Bruce, Lord Buckley, Bill Cosby, The Firesign Theatre, Spike Jones. Comedy artists were listed in the catch-all section Rock, Soul, Country and Pop, which included the genres of folk, bluegrass, funk, traditional pop performers were not included, with the notable exceptions of Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole. Included too were some artists who might now be considered as world music. Big band jazz was handled selectively, with certain band leaders omitted, many other styles of jazz did appear in the Jazz section. The book was notable for the time in the provocative, in your style of many of its reviews. For example, writing about Neil Youngs song, Down by the River and his colleague, Dave Marsh, in reviewing the three albums of the jazz fusion group Chase, gave a one-word review, Flee. Good, a record of average worth, but one that might possess considerable appeal for fans of a particular style, mediocre, a record that is artistically insubstantial, though not truly wretched. Poor, a record where even technical competence is at question or it was remarkably ill-conceived, worthless, a record that need never have been created. Reserved for the most bathetic bathwater, Dave Marsh John Swenson Billy Altman Bob Blumenthal Georgia Christgau Jean-Charles Costa Chet Flippo Russell Gersten Mikal Gilmore Alan E. Like the first edition, it was edited by Dave Marsh and it included contributions from 52 music critics and featured chronological album listings under the name of each artist. In many cases, updates from the first edition consist of short, the only difference is that in addition to a rating, the second edition employs the pilcrow mark to indicate a title that was out of print at the time the guide was published. Many records had their ratings lowered as the book now offered a revisionist slant to rocks history and it included contributions from 16 music critics and featured alphabetical album listings under the name of each artist
12.
Sweet Baby James (song)
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Sweet Baby James is a song written and recorded by James Taylor that serves as the opening and title track from his 1970 breakthrough album Sweet Baby James. It was released as the first single from the album but did not chart, nonetheless, it is one of his best-known and most popular tunes, considered a classic. Taylor considers it his best song, the song was written by Taylor for the son of his older brother Alex, who was also named James. Deliberately a cross between a cowboy song and a lullaby, it was first thought up by Taylor as he was driving through Carolina to meet his infant nephew for the first time. Taylor spent considerable effort on the lyrics, whose verses he said used the most intricate rhyming pattern of his career. The chorus echoes the sentiment, with a reference to Rock-a-bye Baby. According to Allmusic critic Bill Janovitz, the two verses contrast the new baby James, as a cowboy, in the first verse with the lonely grown-up James singing in the second verse. Sweet Baby James was included on Taylors diamond-selling Greatest Hits 1976 compilation, Sweet Baby James has been played at virtually every Taylor concert since its release. And if the concert is in Tanglewood or Great Woods, the commotion is enough to pause the song, Taylor was born in Boston, and although he moved to North Carolina when very young, spent summers in Massachusetts and went to boarding school there. This association has made Taylor a regional favorite in New England, including sell-outs at Tanglewood, I have a real connection to this place. He performed the song as part of his set on episode 1 of Saturday Night Lives second season, in the Four Together benefit concert arranged by Harry Chapin in 1977, John Denver sang the harmony part of the chorus on this song. A concert performance from 1992 was included on his 1993 album Live, jay Leno requested Taylors live performance of the song on his final The Tonight Show on May 29,2009. He said he had listened to it on the car radio as he left Boston for Los Angeles in the early 1970s and that the ten miles behind, ten thousand more to go line resonated deeply with him. Tom Rush, who made a practice of recording material from the best new singer songwriters of the era, the Seldom Scene added harmony on their bluegrass version, released on their debut album Act 1 in 1972. Highway 101 closed their 1989 album Paint the Town with it, daniel Greaves of The Watchmen often performs it a cappella during concerts. On ABCs Good Morning America on September 15,2008, Taylor acknowledged there was that element about the song and this appellation has been used in other contexts as well. Celebrity chef James Martin has a BBC2 show about desserts called Sweet Baby James
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