Category: Music

The little TEAC that could

I’ve been struggling with a project at home for some time, ripping a bunch of CD-R’s to MP3. Some of the discs simply could not be read by any of the combi-DVD/CD drives I have. The only player that worked at all is a dedicated CD reader that came with the Compaq computer I bought on October 25, 2001 — the day that Windows XP was released. But some songs wouldn’t finish ripping, and even if they did finish it could take hours, and even with error correction enabled on the drive the results were awful, as heard on the audio player’s first track. The song, by Bonnie Guitar, was #27 on the Billboard music charts the week of June 24, 1957. The second track on the player has a clean rip of the song from the CD-R.

[audio:https://s3.amazonaws.com/dogratcom/Audio/2013/12/1st+rip.mp3,https://s3.amazonaws.com/dogratcom/Audio/2013/12/2nd+rip.mp3|titles=Bonnie Guitar: Dark Moon – bad rip,Bonnie Guitar: Dark Moon – good rip]

You would think the first recording was taken from a badly scratched record, and the second from a CD, but they both came from the same CD-R. What made the difference? An amazingly nimble 10-year-old TEAC CD210-PU USB CD-ROM reader I got hold of that sails through the same discs that gave five other units a fit.

That same week in 1957, another recording of the song, done by Gale Storm, was #7 on the Billboard chart, and it makes for an interesting comparison to Bonnie’s version. I hear a definite Elvis influence here.

[audio:https://s3.amazonaws.com/dogratcom/Audio/2013/12/GStorm.mp3|titles=Gale Storm: Dark Moon]

The Differences in Different Drum

Ronstadt

I have indelibly strong memories of hearing the Stone Poneys’ Different Drum on 77 WABC when I was a kid. It was one of those records that I was always especially excited to hear, even before I knew what Linda Ronstadt looked like. The way the single was put together was, like its singer, perfect, and it made me keenly aware of how the sound of a record can be as important as the song itself. My favorite singer was Petula, but even to my pre-adolescent ears I knew that Linda had a wider vocal range.

The Wall Street Journal steps out of character with this blog-like item telling how Mike Nesmith’s song Different Drum became Linda Ronstadt’s first hit single. The comparison between the recording of the song by the Greenbriar Boys that interested Linda, and her own version, illustrates my point about record production. Nick Venet, who helped Brian Wilson develop the Beach Boys sound, produced Different Drum.

A video that’s missing from the WSJ post is Mike Nesmith’s intentionally botched attempt at singing Different Drum on the Monkees TV show.

Google Calling

Google has produced a documentary about — huh? — the Clash. Okay, sure, what the heck. Denro saw them live in their prime. I saw the Ramones, but never the Clash. These guys were a full musical generation behind the Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Cream, etc., and now they’re old men too. The three surviving band mates, anyway. Strummer’s been gone for over ten years.

The Clash biography that I have is Return of the Last Gang in Town, by Prue Bury’s friend Marcus Gray. To see the Clash as the angry young men they were, there’s the semi-documentary Rude Boy.

Covering the boys before Bieber

Ann Moses was the right girl at the right time in the right place, as an editor for the popular teen magazine Tiger Beat.

DavyJones Ann Moses

Denro says this about Ann.

Her writing was friendly and enthusiastic, fact-based and not sensational, so the readers saw her as a pal who was “on the inside” and gave them access to cool things without playing up her own personality, thereby not generating any hate or envy.

I’ve added I used to be… Ann Moses to my Links list. Her posts confirm what Dennis says about Ann’s writing. I would love to see a complete collection of reprinted Tiger Beat articles by Ann.

TheWho AnnMoses