So this week has been a busy week with two ten plus hour work days at Lippincott and a full day at Lippincott and a night at Target on Tuesday and again tonight. Way back on Monday I told you I’d write about the soundtrack of my run on Tuesday morning, well, that didn’t happen. So I’ll tell you now and couple it with an album that I listened to yesterday. The reason that they can be coupled is that they are two of my favorite “live” albums. The soundtrack for Tuesday’s run was a live Phil Ochs album There and Now – Live in Vancover 1968. Recorded in 1968 the tapes were lost in A&M’s tape vaults for 21 years and the album was not released until after that. The album features poet Allen Ginsberg playing the bells on “The Bells,” and includes many of my Phil Ochs favorites including “The Highwayman”, “Outside of a Small Circle of Friends” “Changes” and “There But For Fortune”. The album was recorded shortly after the Democratic National Convention and includes “William Butler Yeats Visits Lincoln Park and Escapes Unscathed” The concert is not perfect and the warts are what makes it fun as Ochs at tims forgets lyrics and at another point goes into a Bob Dylan impersonation in mid-song! Anyway the album is great so give it a listen if you get a chance!
The second “live” album of the week was listened to yesterday on the way to Newark, which I guess is not as good as “On the Way to Cape May”, was Ray Wylie Hubbard’s Live at Cibolo Creek. I like this album as much for Ray’s between song banter on songs like “Without Love”, “When She Sang Amazing Grace” where Ray had the great idea of writing a “Honky Tonk” Gospel song and “The Last Train to Amsterdam” love the story about lightning and the goats. Then of course there’s the story surrounding “The Obligatory Encore” (Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother”). Several years ago I saw him her in Jersey he did the same show told most of the same stories (even though I knew them it was great to hear them live) with the exception of the encore which he didn’t do because it was a family show!
So it was good to hear both of these live albums this week! I did listen to some new music this week most notably Welding Burns the great new album by Rod Picott. A review will be coming shortly!
Here’s Phil with “I Ain’t Marching Anymore” still relevant today!
Related articles
- The Phil Ochs Movie: There But For Fortune (mrmovietimes.com)
- Phil Ochs (December 19, 1940 – April 9, 1976) (merlinsnewrags.wordpress.com)
