Jump to content

Jim Colyer

Members
  • Posts

    777
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    4

Everything posted by Jim Colyer

  1. Bound By Nature And natural law Got me wondering Is this all 3 score and 10 Ain't guaranteed Some die in the womb Weren't meant to be Prisoners of fate Original sin The human condition Got us penned in The Grim Reaper He's on the prowl I caught his shadow He's here now No way in No way out What the hell Is life about Bound By Nature And natural law Got me wondering Is this all I feel guilty Outliving my dad He'd be jealous He'd be mad Jim Colyer ascap
  2. LITTLE BIG TOWN: Nashville ABBA (Jim Colyer) http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=430;fa=2 Little Big Town consists of Karen Fairchild, Kimberly Schlapman, Jimi Westbrook and Phillip Sweet. They have been together as a group since 1998. Karen and Kimberly met in college in Alabama. Jimi and Karen are man and wife. Kimberly and Phillip are married but to other people. Each person in the group has one child. Karen and Kimberly met at Samford University in Alabama in 1987. Their friendship forms the core of the group. They ended up in Nashville, where they were joined by Jimi and Phillip. The LBT girls are awesome! Karen inspired me to write hundreds of new lyrics! She became my Muse! Kimberly is famous for her curly hair and dimples. She had a cooking show called Simply Southern and wrote a cook book called "Oh Gussie! Birthdays: Karen Fairchild - September 28, 1969 Kimberly Schlapman - October 15, 1969 Jimi Westbrook - October 20, 1971 Phillip Sweet - March 18, 1974 I stumbled onto Little Big Town in 2013. I had been hearing "Good As Gone" & "Little White Church" in karaoke bars but had no knowledge of the group or how good they were. "Pontoon" hitting number one had a major impact! Suddenly, they were superstars headlining the Tornado tour. When I found out they were appearing at the Ryman, I got my ticket before it sold out. I see ABBA in Little Big Town! Two guys, two girls! A blonde and a brunette. Blonde Kimberly Schlapman sings high. Dark-haired Karen Fairchild sings low. Jimi Westbrook and Phillip Sweet complete the 4-part harmony that makes the group special. They have 6 albums dating back to 2002. They write much of their own material, and every song is good! Jimi plays mandolin. Phillip plays rhythm guitar. Little Big Town went from Mercury Records to Monument, where they released a self-titled album. They ended up on Capitol. Albums: Little Big Town 2002 The Road To Here 2005 A Place To Land 2007 The Reason Why 2010 Tornado 2012 Painkiller 2014 Wayne Kirkpatrick produced 3 albums. Jay Joyce produced Tornado and Pain Killer. Tornado was number one for 5 weeks and certified gold by the RIAA. "Pontoon" won a Grammy for Best Country Duo/Group Performance. Little Big Town's album cuts are as good as their singles. They impress with their relentless harmony! Not many groups have four lead singers! They use an assortment of instruments: guitars, bass, drums, fiddle, mandolin, banjo, dobro and steel. LBT incorporates every genre: country, rock, pop, bluegrass, folk and gospel, and they put their own stamp on it. Theirs is the first music I liked since Shania, and I listed their songs in order from my favorite to my least favorite. 1 PONTOON - This is a great song and a well-produced record, very charming. The lyrics consist of a set of commands. "Pontoon" is my second favorite song after "Dancing Queen." I do not mind getting on Nashville's karaoke stages and giving them my best Karen Fairchild impersonation! I did not know what a pontoon was and had to google it. Same with a coozie. Now I know! I was informed that "motorboatin" means putting your face between a woman's boobs and moving your head from side to side while making the sound of a motor boat. The song's bridge is a short rap, and Fairchild inhales at the end of it. "Pontoon" was penned by Luke Laird, Natalie Hemby and Barry Dean. The intro features Jimi's mandolin. 2 GIRL CRUSH - This is my favorite from Pain Killer! Fairchild has a crush on this girl because she has what it takes to get this man. Fairchild wants to be like her. It is not what you think even though it can be viewed as borderline. "Girl Crush" got Song of the Year. 3 GOOD AS GONE has a video. Fairchild comes up the sidewalk to a hotel. She bursts into the room and tosses her cheater on the bed. The four convene on the rooftop to finish the song. The lyrics emphasize negative words: "cold, bad, lost, and cheap." Other LBT songs end with the word "gone." "Take the next splitsville exit ramp" is cool. The outro adds intensity. 4 TORNADO - Fairchild really changes the weather with "Tornado." She had to become the alpha female if Little Big Town was going to hit the top. This is the title track of their 5th album. 5 LONELY ENOUGH - I do not pray. If I did, it would go something like this. She believes in God but is angry with him for taking her love. This song grabbed me quick! 6 VAPOR is about our lust for life in the context of mortality. We are a vapor, a transient mist here for a moment and gone forever. I recall kissing my dad. Perhaps we have all done something like that. Photos show that our parents were as young and younger than we are now. And even "now" will slide into eternity. "Sitting by the bed side, held his hand and kissed his face Then he closed his eyes, and I watched him slip away Seems like only yesterday, he was young as I am now But soon now will be the past, yeah, time is turning fast" I am reminded of Shakespeare's "The Tempest." Prospero says "We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep." Little Big Town compares our brief lives to "fire and paper." "Never too much and never enough!" 7 THAT'S WHERE I'LL BE has geography. We visit the Arizona Plains, the Mississippi River, the land of hurricanes, the hills of Tennessee and Cisco Beach. Cisco Beach is on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. More importantly, this song is about a man's need for a woman and the extent to which he will go to be with her. Jimi does the lead, and he must be thinking of Karen. If I had a woman like her, I would do what it takes to bridge the great divide! Jimi has seen the lonely side, and he knows Karen's worth cannot be measured. She is salvation! This makes me think of my own song called "A Man Needs A Woman." Without a woman, a man is only drifting, a heart without a home. This is the kind of devotion a woman wants and the kind that will keep her. Little Big Town wrote this with Wayne Kirkpatrick. 8 GOOD PEOPLE - My second favorite from Pain Killer! Kimberly got a strong one here, and she delivers it in a spunky, sexy style. It is the law of attraction. Good people attract good people. Jimi joked that Kimberly likes handcuffs. 9 NOVOCAINE- This was the first to rope me in at youtube. They performed it at the Grand Ole Opry. "Make you numb to the pain." 10 SOBER - A song called "Sober" would normally be about sobering up. Not this one! Kimberly wants to die drunk on love! What a chorus! 11 SHUT UP TRAIN - It made me think of my mother after she left Aiken Road. She hated trains, and so do I. Fairchild sings the lead in an exceptional black & white video. 12 LITTLE WHITE CHURCH - In the video, Fairchild struts out of the house, her dominatrix side showing itself! The others are waiting on the bridge. Karen has an intensity about her that makes her the leader. Does she cock her eyebrow when she sings "free?" Suddenly, the four are on the bandstand. "No more chicken and gravy!" The groom fails to show. 13 DAY DRINKING - Country music hit a period when almost every song on the charts had drinking in it. LBT fell in line, and their song has a catchy melody while showcasing Fairchild's "tough" voice. The whistling sets it apart. I quit drinking but sing this song karaoke. Fairchild is ready to drink and unwilling to wait for a happy hour or a fireworks show. She does not want to wait for Friday or til the sun is sinking. "Sinking, thinking and drinking" are strong rhymes. There might be guilt associated with day drinking because Karen blames it on the workday, the heat wave and the "tick-tock" moving too slow. This is a summer song as the sunshine, heat wave and fireworks remind us. 14 QUIT BREAKING UP WITH ME - "You say it's over with middle finger" and "shit shit shit" would never have popped up in an old country song or even on an earlier LBT album. Pain Killer is aggressive! It has to be if LBT is going to compete at its present level. The song starts and ends with 7 "forevers," and he is sorry for the 400th time! 15 STAY ALL NIGHT - A duet between Jimi and Phillip. Phillip sets it up, and Jimi explodes! It is a thing of wanting the good times to last! They are singing about themselves. "We're burnin' rubber late for the load-in Rollin' through the radio, passin' the time Just enough gas to get there Say a prayer. Lord, let this old Ford fly It ain't the fame, the money game Gettin' your name on the big marquee It's all about the song Makin' your heart thump, feet stomp The way it's supposed to be It's good to finally be feelin' right" 16 TURN THE LIGHTS ON - Sucker punched and paralyzed! Turn the lights on, Jim! Lift your hands up! This song has healing qualities! The long intro builds anticipation, then LBT cuts loose. Guitarist Johnny Duke brings a lot to the music. 17 FASTER GUN - Captivating harmony! Her love is a wild west movie, and he hopes she finds a faster gun. She will get hers! Gun imagery: "another bullet in the chamber, "trigger," "the hammer drops, "draw quickly," "aim is deadly," "cold steel," "gunpowder kiss," "shoot you down." Jesse James gets into it. 18 A PLACE TO LAND is catchy with the tempo I love. Kimberly does the vocal. There is something tempting about being in over our heads, getting burned, drawing lines and crossing them, speeding up when we should slow down, stepping in it and always thinking it's gonna be forever. It comes with being a songwriter. 19 NIGHT OWL is track #11 on the Tornado album. It is a duet but features all 4 singers. The man wanders back home to his woman, and we journey with him past skyways and steeples, county lines and water towers, rolling fields and pastures, through lonely and deserted streets. It turns darker, and stars begin to fall. His night owl is waiting, praying for his bright headlights. "Night Owl" is a pretty song, and Kimberly has a beautiful voice. The background vocals are a hooting owl. 20 WOUNDED - LBT is a hard working group! It seems every day I find something new from them on youtube. Dominant Karen and submissive Kimberly are music's most dynamic one-two punch since Swedish Agnetha and Norwegian Frida. "Battered and broken and bruised," "tore up inside over you." Kimberly has the traditional country voice. Karen's is tougher. The women complement each other. 21 MEAN STREAK - Although Fairchild gets the hits, Schlapman has her share of great songs. Little Big Town albums run deep, and "Mean Streak" is an interesting cut from The Road to Here. I wonder why the woman stays with this man. Maybe it is because women love guys who abuse them as long as it does not get out of hand. Women can enjoy playing the victim! Kimberly looks and sounds like Dolly Parton and names her as an influence. "Mean Streak" has haunting harmony. The dude is cold as concrete, tough as a back street, rough as a dry creek, sharp as a hawk's beak, fast as a stampede, hard as an oak tree, mad as a queen bee, hot as Mojave, tight as a kite string, bad as a black sheep. How can she put up with him? Kimberly is adorable! I love those shapely calves! 22 SELF MADE is about survival. Karen and Jimi take the lead. Karen said their harmony is the real lead singer. "Who you are is who you trust" makes this a song I can identify with. We think of ourselves as survivors although, ultimately, none of us are. Nothing comes easy in Nashville, and I had better come through even when I am down. Yes, it is hard to believe the life I created! 23 BOONDOCKS - Country themes pervade. They really did grow up in the sticks. They sing of gravel roads, tin roofs, creeks, muddy water, trucks, tractors, pastures, bulls, cows, deer, possums, hawks, queen bees, crickets, copperheads, the moon and stars. 24 BONES - It starts with "What goes around, comes around," and I hear uncle James. There is some finger pointing. A technique they use at the end of certain songs is to return to the opening lines. "Bones" is different from what Little Big Town normally does. There is a gothic flavor, something like we might find in New Orleans, voodoo and all that. There are ghosts and demons! There are sins and a wicked moon. Someone is going to get what he deserves. Night brings retribution, the time when reason gives way to superstition. 25 TUMBLE AND FALL - Written by Karen, Kimberly and Lori McKenna, this formulaic lyric tells "what it is:" a long talk, a reach out, a white flag, a forfeit of the game, a staying in the ring. 26 LEAVING IN YOUR EYES - The lyrics are a bit abstract and mysterious, but there is a good beat and a nice atmosphere, especially when Jimi sings, "No sign of life or anything." 27 LOOKING FOR A REASON has Karen in the lead. She is Little Big Town's power singer, and the one who had to step up if the group was going to experience the meteoric rise following the Tornado album. Karen divorced her first husband to marry Jimi. "Looking For A Reason" says it all. The lady takes no crap! Country music is in its dominatrix era, and Fairchild fits the bill. She can be willful and demanding. "You better do it now!" 28 SOMEWHERE FAR AWAY is a "leaving song." She is leaving Abilene on her way to New Orleans, too tired to get a job. The musical interlude is otherworldly. 29 THINGS YOU DON'T THINK ABOUT - Am intense track, and Fairchild is up for it! She built his fantasy. Natalie Hemby is one of their favorite co-writers. 30 PAIN KILLER - The title track from the 6th album and second with producer Jay Joyce. The two album with Joyce made LBT superstars. They became members of the Grand Ole Opry. Fairchild tells us what she does not need: whiskey, prescription, pills, smokin', therapy, doctor, nurse. Her man is her pain killer. He is the hair of the dog, her midnight thriller. 31 YOU CAN'T HAVE EVERYTHING sets a perfect country scene: wildflowers, a willow tree and a driveway leading to a dream house. The only thing missing is love. Kimberly sings this traditional country tear jerker. We know a marriage is in trouble when lonely halls "weep." 32 YOUR SIDE OF THE BED is a duet. There are 3 things on Jimi's side of the bed: a picture of their wedding day, a clock that don't work and the Bible that his daddy gave. The picture and the clock tell us this relationship has stalled. It is stuck in the past. The Bible is history on a grand scale! There are 2 things on Karen's side: a burned down candle flame (symbolizing their burned out love) and a letter Jimi started and couldn't finish. Someone's marriage is in trouble, no surprise since country music is often about divorce. The song is full of questions. "How'd you get so far away? Aren't you even gonna make a sound? Are you lonely like I'm lonely? Are you still awake?" The couple no longer communicate, and he lies down quietly without reaching. When she prays, she prays for herself and him separately. 33 STILL - The perfect love song. 34 THE REASON WHY is the title track off the 4th album. It is an upbeat love song, and Jimi and Karen sang it to each other on The Late Late Show. 35 LIVE WITH LONESOME is wistful. Karen is a goddess! Jimi is a lucky guy! 36 FRONT PORCH THING - Front porches are still important to country people. "Strumming on my old six string!" 37 A THOUSAND YEARS has the most eerie harmony I ever heard. "Whatever the future holds, forever in your eyes." 38 SILVER AND GOLD - "On the other side of being used" makes me think of on the other side of 10/11. I do not have to stay down! Not sure what the scarecrow is doing here. 39 ON FIRE TONIGHT is a party song, a history makin' party! 40 A LITTLE MORE YOU - Come on, baby! Love is water. Dive on in! She has given a little bit. He wants a more. He will never get enough! 41 FINE LINE has lots of Cs at the beginning: "Completely complacent," "You consume," "I get crumbs," "Comfortably normal." The opening track from A Place To Land. 42 RUNAWAY TRAIN is about a guy who runs off to Las Vegas with the preacher's daughter. After gambling his money away, he and his "runaway baby" return home. The preacher cusses his soul in the name of the Lord. 43 WELCOME TO THE FAMILY introduces nightmare in-laws. Grandpa's the local sheriff. Uncle Bill's the undertaker. Cousin Jesse's just crazy. Momma's got a real bad temper, and daddy's got a shotgun. The nephew is a hunter! 44 LIVE FOREVER - A song about lasting love. Opposites are used. He is a thunderstorm. She is a roaring fire. 45 WHY OH WHY - Kimberly uses similes and metaphors to describe this troublemaker. "Stop drop and roll right in the flame!" The bridge is outstanding. 46 EVERYTHING CHANGES - "Everything Changes" is a single from their first CD in 2002. I never heard of them back them. The song is self-explanatory. Time flies, and love slips away. It is sad how pictures of people outlast people. In the video, they frolic on a beach. The sand and waves symbolize constant change. The girls are young and pretty. 47 PAVEMENT ENDS is the first track on the Tornado album. Jimi wanted it that way. They opened their concert at the Ryman with it. 48 BRING IT ON HOME went to number 4 on the country singles charts. Phillip does the lead. It has The Eagles written all over it. 49 FIREBIRD FLY - A waitress takes off in a guy's car while he goes in to pay for gas. Male-bashing has been a theme in modern country music, and the LBT ladies get their licks in. 50 SAVE YOUR SIN - Kimberly morphs into a power singer while chastising someone trying to confess his wrongs. She does not want to hear it. She is not his mamma or his priest. She is not whiskey or a shot of novacaine. She is not holy water or cleansing rain. Kimbo is seductive when she moves those legs! 51 ALL THE WAY DOWN is obviously about making love. Hard to be any more explicit! 52 I'M WITH THE BAND - They go to Memphis and New Orleans. 53 CAN'T GO BACK - This song is special to them. It is about living in the moment and the difficulty of doing so. 54 GOOD LORD WILLING - From making mischief on Chigger Hill and cuddling up with Audra Mae, he runs from flashing blue lights and a red-faced boy friend. 55 ONLY WHAT YOU MAKE OF IT is a life lesson. LBT's songs are different from Shania's. They are different in substance and tone. They are deeper. 56 DON'T WASTE MY TIME is an early video. Kimberly has long hair. Phillip looks like a kid. These people are tight. Playing for keeps. Falling in deep. Nashville's ABBA! 57 PONTIAC - "Another long, lonely night." "Lies as big as a Pontiac, no more hanging on to what will never be." 58 RAIN ON A TIN ROOF - A water song! Not only is her love like rain on a tin roof, but her eyes are like the ocean and her heart is a river. He is thankful for every drop from this summertime storm. 59 LEAN INTO IT - When the wind blows in our faces, we must lean into it. This is not where we are going to fall. 60 NEVER FELT LOVE - It is not that he never felt love but that he never felt love that feels so right. 61 TRYIN - People come to Nashville from all over the country with the dream of "making it." 62 FURY - This is the lady in "Tornado." Sounds like The Eagles. 63 ALL OVER AGAIN - Let's play that old song and fall in love again! 64 LOST - This is about Kimberly's first husband, who died of a heart attack. "Canyon of loneliness," "waterfall of tears." 65 LIFE IN A NORTHERN TOWN - The words do not make sense, but "hey, ah, ma, ma, ma, hey, ah Life in a northern town" sounds good. 66 LOVE PROFOUND - It is a question: "Isn't love profound?" No bounds, confounds, profound. The production brings it to life. 67 LIFE ROLLS ON is an affirmation of life. Sun, moon, tide and summer breeze. 68 STAY - There are two versions of "Stay." One is on the self-titled album. The other is on The Road To Here. 69 TO KNOW LOVE - Simple love song. There is moonlight and a star parade. 70 YOU'RE GONNA LOVE ME - She will both love and hate him. 71 FROM THIS DREAM - Must me nice to have a dream you do not want to wake up from. 72 FINE WITH ME - He wants to be with his girl, not the crowd. 73 EVANGELINE - Still another abused woman. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote an epic poem called Evangeline. 74 KISS GOODBYE is about losing something or someone. Little Big Town has done a number of covers and put them on youtube. They call it "Scattered, Smothered & Covered." Among the covered songs are "Rolling In The Deep," "Grenade" & "Moves Like Jagger." They turned "The Chain" into a monster at the 2013 CMA Awards. Fleetwood Mac's rendition is timid by comparison. Jimi raged from the depths of his soul when he screamed, "If you don't love me now, you will never love me again!" Chills ran through me, something that has not happened since early rock n' roll. I like Little Big Town. I saw them at the Ryman and wanted to see them again. They exploded with the Tornado album! Part of the problem before was in the packaging. Titles on the CD cases were hard to read. People compare them to The Eagles and Fleetwood Mac. In fact, LBT is better than both those groups. Every song on the 6 CDs is a gem. Great harmony and gorgeous women! If ABBA were reincarnated as a country group, they would be Little Big Town. The blonde and the brunette! Phillip could pass for Benny Andersson's twin, and sultry Karen Fairchild is a super trouper, nailing blue notes at the end of every line. They are a reservoir of talent. Their songs are melodic while having a beat. There is emotion and enthusiasm! Relationships are at the heart of Little Big Town's catalog, both married and unmarried. Their songs are thoughtful and reflective. I saw LBT at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, April 30, 2013. They were sensational! The 4 lined up: Jimi, Kimberly, Karen and Phillip. They filled the room with harmony, all singing at once. They used 3 musicians: lead guitar, bass and drums. The drums provided a big beat as the 4 prowled the stage. Kimberly was devastating in her skin tight pants and high heels. I made note of the way Karen's hair crossed above her right eye. She is fascinating! Jimi and Karen sang together on "Your Side Of The Bed." The crowd stood on its feet and went wild during "Pontoon," "Tornado" and "Boondocks." Karen wore her hat for "Pontoon." Kimberly wore her shades. SONG LIST Pavement Ends Little White Church On Fire Tonight Sober Front Porch Thing Bones Your Side Of The Bed Leaving In Your Eyes The Chain Can't Go Back Shut Up Train I'm With The Band Good As Gone Self-Made Pontoon Tornado Boondocks Night Owl At the concert's end, they bowed in ABBA fashion. This was my first show at the Ryman since coming down from Louisville with my parents in 1961. I saw Little Big Town again on February 1, 2014. They opened for Keith Urban at the Bridgestone Arena with a 12-song set. It was basically the Tornado album, although they started with "Little White Church" and ended with "Boondocks." Fairchild talked about how they used to play at 3rd & Lindsley. Kimberly teased the crowd about "motorboatin." I almost teared up when she sang "Sober." The third time I saw Little Big Town was in Louisville at the Palace Theater on 4th Street. It was, March 13, 2015, and the place had changed since I saw movies there as a teenager. Anyway, this was the best concert I ever saw! I had a good seat, and there was not a boring moment! Chills and goose bumps! LBT's confidence has been high on the heels of Painkiller, and they performed music from their new CD. Day Drinking Girl Crush Good People Quit Breaking Up With Me Turn The Lights On Faster Gun Painkiller Tumble And Fall Save Your Sin Stay All Night "Little White Church" and "Boondocks" took on new energy! Revised 2016 Jim Colyer http://www.jimcolyer.com
  3. I Just Want Money You can quote me on that Lean and mean ain't cool I wanna be fat I wanna be rich Have billions like Trump Have a wife like Melania Bump bump bump I'll get her pregnant Have another kid And if it's healthy Be glad I did But if it's a dummy I'll head down the road I'm not the type To carry the load I Just Want Money You can quote me on that Lean and mean ain't cool I wanna be fat I wanna be rich Have billions like Trump Have a wife like Melania Bump bump bump James Ronald Colyer That's my name Named after Reagan My claim to fame I'll run for Senator Represent my State Live in a mansion It's not too late Make lots of speeches Kiss lots of babies Folks here in Nashville Already know me Jim Colyer Music ascap
  4. It's been coming For such a long time So put your lips Up next to mine Let the music Hypnotize you Let the feeling Overwhelm you Let It Happen It comes so natural Once you get started Let's do it all Your skin tastes good Kissed by the sun Let me in Let It Happen It's so easy I'll show you how So put your arms Around me now We'll make our way Back to the room Climb in bed Let love bloom Let It Happen It comes so natural Once you get started Let's do it all Your skin tastes good Kissed by the sun Let me in Let It Happen Let's make the most Of our time together Let's make this A night to remember Let It Happen It comes so natural Once you get started Let's do it all Your skin tastes good Kissed by the sun Let me in Let It Happen Jim Colyer ascap
  5. Love them legs When they start moving I sure dig What they're doing Kicking left Kicking right Come on, girl Spend the night Bring On The Dancing Girls I'm Vegas bound Bring 'em on One more round Bring On The Dancing Girls Let's shake it now Legs and hips They know how Can-can girls In seamed nylons Drive me wild Turn me on High heel shoes Sexy as hell Come on now Kiss and tell Bring On The Dancing Girls I'm Vegas bound Bring 'em on One more round Bring On The Dancing Girls Let's shake it now Legs and hips They know how When the music starts They turn it loose Make me feel like A long neck goose Bring On The Dancing Girls I'm Vegas bound Bring 'em on One more round Bring On The Dancing Girls Let's shake it now Legs and hips They know how Jim Colyer ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  6. http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=46 I thought ABBA was the last music to influence me. It was Elvis Presley, The Beatles and ABBA summing up everything. From nowhere, Shania Twain appeared on the Nashville scene. She was country with a difference. Her music had its roots in rock n' roll. Shania's real name is Eilleen Edwards. She was born on August 28, 1965, and grew up in Timmins, Ontario, Canada, 500 miles north of Toronto. Shania's parents divorced when she was two, and she never knew her father. Her mother married an Indian named Jerry Twain. The family struggled for necessities, and Shania remembers growing up hungry. She hunted rabbits and cut trees in the wilderness. From the age of 8, she played guitar and wrote songs. Her mother encouraged her! She woke Shania from her sleep to perform in bars around Timmins once alcohol stopped being served. Shania felt comfortable in front of audiences. Mary Bailey, a Canadian singer, took her under her wing and became her manager. For a while, Shania honed her skills at an Ontario resort called Deerhurst. It was there that she was dubbed "Shania," meaning "on my way." A tragedy occurred when Shania was 21. Her mother and stepfather were hit head on and killed by a logging truck. It was hard work and sacrifice as Shania's "family" became her responsibility. Mary and a Nashville attorney engineered a deal with Mercury Records, but Shania's first CD was run-of-the-mill, produced by Music Row veteran Norro Wilson. Norro was old school, and it showed. The Nashville method was for a producer and his artist to collect songs from publishers and to record them in one of a handful of studios using the same musicians who played for everybody. It was a stale system and the reason country music all sounded alike. There was nothing about Shania's first album to recommend it, and Mercury was going to drop her. Enter Robert John "Mutt" Lange!, a producer from South Africa with money and connections. By chance, Mutt saw one of Shania's videos on television. He saw and heard something no one else did. It was Shania's body, her movements, her grace! He heard the sensuality in her voice. He attempted to reach her by phone and finally connected. Conversations began. Mutt wanted to produce Shania and wanted her to do her own songs. That did it! A romance bloomed, and the couple married in December, 1993. Work began on The Woman In Me. Mutt spent a million dollars, and they recorded in Nashville. There had never been a country album like it. It was country with a pop and rock spirit. Shania and Mutt co-wrote. Their songs were instant classics. "Any Man Of Mine" became Shania's signature. "(If You're Not In It For Love) I'm Outta Here!" rocked! Country radio played "Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?" reluctantly. This was risque stuff for Nashville. So was Shania's belly button! She was sexy and not afraid to flaunt it. She was the female Elvis! Shania held off touring, declining to open for established country acts, which was the accepted way. Mutt Lange knew what he had. He wanted to build a catalog of songs that would fill a two-hour concert. Shania had superstar potential. Mutt was 16 years older than Shania and remembered the golden era of Elvis, The Beatles and ABBA. He and Shania penned 16 gems for Come On Over, their second album. It was released in November, 1997, and went on to become the biggest selling record ever by a female artist, selling 40 million. It dominated the airwaves 1998-2000. Single after single went number one: "Love Gets Me Every Time," "Don't Be Stupid," "Honey I'm Home", "Man! I Feel Like A Woman!" Girls around the country sang Shania nightly in karaoke bars. 1998 was to her what 1956 was to Elvis. When Shania did tour, she was ready. The concerts consisted of wall-to-wall hits. Her band showed cultural diversity, musicians deferring to her stardom. They played the Nashville Arena in September, 1998, and I was there with my son Michael. It was an orgy of music and energy. In her prime, Shania was carried aloft through the crowd as if she were Cleopatra. Fans reached, hoping to touch! It was Bill Clinton's presidency at its hedonistic zenith! Nashville was jealous of Shania's success. Ultimately, common sense prevailed, and the Country Music Association voted her Entertainer of the Year for 1999. It is their most prestigious award. It was all there: books, magazines, endorsements. The girl who ate rabbits was wealthy beyond her wildest dreams, but her anonymity and privacy were gone. She and Mutt sold their property in upstate New York and moved to Switzerland. When the economy sagged in 2000, Shania disappeared. New songs had to be written. Motherhood came next! Mutt and Shania took time out from their fairytale careers to become parents. Their son was born, August 12, 2001. Mutt had been married but had no kids. He vowed never to marry again. Shania gave him a reason to. The Chicago concert in July, 2003, kicked off a second world tour. Up Close & Personal, taped in Nashville, simulated Elvis' 1968 Comeback Special. Shania was making an effort to be part of country music even though the establishment resisted. Radio did not want to play Up!, and there were no number ones. "Forever And For Always" peaked at number 4. The video put Shania on a beach. She was still beautiful! The Up! CD did something that Come On Over did not. It reached #1 on Billboard's pop album chart. Up! was a progression. The couple had evolved musically. There were good songs on Up! even if Nashville considered it artsy. "C'est La Vie" proved conclusively that Shania and Mutt evolved from ABBA. Notes in the chorus are identical to notes in "Dancing Queen." The CD had a disco feel with classical riffs. Politics had changed drastically from Bill Clinton to George W. Bush as 9/11 put America on a conservative course. Still, Shania partied into the 21st century, becoming the only woman with three consecutive albums topping the 10 million mark. On the strength of three records, she stood with Elvis, The Beatles and ABBA. Shania's catalog is thematic. Her lyrics are female. She is the consummate libber, dealing with feminine concerns: looks, clothes, men, fun, money, work, hair, food and weight. Shania is Everywoman! In one respect, she differed. She broke loose from men in her age group and married a father figure, a man who could elevate her career to the level she deserved. It came out in 2008 that Shania caught Mutt in an affair with the housekeeper. They divorced! Once again, Shania followed in the footsteps of Elvis, The Beatles and ABBA. Shania did a two-year residency at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas beginning in December, 2012. After Vegas, she went back on the road for what she called her final tour. Revised 2016 Jim Colyer
  7. I'm traveling the world It's my back yard I don't do anything Unless it's hard Seen 4 continents Gimme one more Next stop, Asia All aboard! The Cutting Edge I'm the blade The stuff from which Our future is made Got my suitcase Credit card Moving forward Avant-guarde Exoplanets They're everywhere Extraterrestrials Room to share Shostak, Marcy Berman, Kaku Hey Jill Tarter! It's me and you The Cutting Edge I'm the blade The stuff from which Our future is made Got my suitcase Credit card Moving forward Avant-guarde Voting for Trump You can bet I'll campaign On the Internet Writing songs On Music Row Hanging out With 20-year-olds Singing Luke Bryan Jason Aldean Eric Church LBT The Cutting Edge I'm the blade The stuff from which Our future is made Got my suitcase Credit card Moving forward Avant-guarde Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap
  8. http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=49 Mamma Mia! was billed as the world's number one show! Catherine Johnson took 21 ABBA songs and wrote a mother/daughter story around them. Her story is appropriate as women's issues are a major theme of songwriters Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus. Detractors called Mamma Mia! a jukebox musical. If nothing else, it is a means of perpetuating the ABBA catalog, a body of 110 songs that surpasses The Beatles in quality. Indeed, ABBA was the Swedish Fab Four! Mamma Mia! stayed on tour and found a home at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. It was refreshing to see a musical whose every song is a hit. "Dancing Queen," "Take A Chance On Me" and "Waterloo" transport us back to the late 1970s, that halcyon interlude between Vietnam and 9/11. We will never relive that period, but Mamma Mia! offers an over-the-shoulder glance. Answering critics, ABBA music being 30 years old is not a legitimate complaint. Mozart is older, and Shakespeare holds up when modern playwrights falter. ABBA produced the brightest, most positive pop music ever! Their songs carry two hours even if the plot around them is thin. The songs are three and four minute dramas! They are character-based. Benny and Bjorn went into theater after ABBA and wrote the CHESS musical with Tim Rice. They staged Kristina fran Duvemala in Sweden. They tended in this direction from the beginning. That songs appear randomly placed in Mamma Mia! is a matter of perspective. If each of us had written a book around ABBA songs, the show would have come out different every time. Catherine Johnson had the idea first, and her sequence stands. A critic called Mamma Mia! a party, and he was right! Benny and Bjorn wanted to do one more musical. They did not realize they had already done it. Bjorn said that after CHESS bombed on Broadway, he never wanted to go back to New York. Mamma Mia! eased his pain! It is set on a Greek Island. There are the mother, the daughter and three possible fathers. I saw the show at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center in Nashville in 2002. It is true that the plot of Mamma Mia! is thin and contrived in such a way as to tie ABBA songs together. The jukebox musical had its day! Mamma Mia! works where the others fail because of the nature of ABBA's catalog. The songs are mini-dramas in themselves! There is a feminist attitude, and mother/daughter themes permeate. Agnetha and Frida were mothers in the ABBA years, and Benny and Bjorn wrote the songs around their wives. CHESS bombed on Broadway, although its soundtrack was brilliant. The story remained in flux and changed with each production as it moved around the globe. Benny and Bjorn wanted a concrete story and adapted four novels by Swedish author Vilhelm Moberg for their second musical. Kristina fran Duvemala is about the Swedish emigrants who came to America. It was a hit in Sweden but was four hours long and in Swedish. Benny and Bjorn's goal was to get an English version to Broadway. Mamma Mia! helped. It gave them a worldwide hit and a success on Broadway. Mamma Mia! looks back at our youth and has possibly paved the way for Kristina. MAMMA MIA! THE MOVIE July 19, 2008. I just returned from seeing Mamma Mia! I laughed and cried for two hours. The audience loved it, and as I exited the theater, some girls were singing "Dancing Queen." Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan were amazing, and I understand why Streep is called a great actress. She told Benny and Bjorn she wants a part in Kristina if it becomes a movie. Three women carried the musical to the screen. Judy Craymer conceived the idea for Mamma Mia! while she was working with Benny and Bjorn on CHESS. They were skeptical but gave her the go ahead. Catherine Johnson wrote the book, and Phyllida Lloyd directed. Mamma Mia! is set on a mythical Greek Island. There is water and a blue sky. Ex-hippie Donna Sheridan, played by Streep, owns a villa on the island. Her daughter Sophie (Amanda Sigfried) is about to be married. Sophie has never known her father but wants him to give her away at her wedding. She gets into her mother's diary and finds the names of three men who could be her dad. She invites all three to the island. They arrive wearing shades! We suspect that Pierce Brosnan is Sophie's dad because he is the biggest name. Brosnan is Sam, Colin Firth is Harry and Stellan Skarsgard is Bill. As it turns out, the real dad is not revealed. Each guy gets one-third credit. It is the songs that make this project viable. Sophie sings "I Have A Dream" as she takes the boat to mail the letters to her potential fathers. Streep offers a stirring rendition of "The Winner Takes It All," and Brosnan does "When All Is Said And Done," an underrated song and one I was glad to see included. It was slowed down, and although Brosnan took some heat for his singing, he was not bad. "Money Money Money" works its way in, and Streep sings it as she shows us her run down villa. A shutter falls from the window. Using binoculars, she looks out to sea at a boat owned by a wealthy man. She fantasizes the Titanic scene. The music is an orgy! Sophie and Sky sing "Lay All Your Love On Me" on a beach as Sky brandishes a cigar. Sophie swoons at the end of a frantic "Voulez-Vous." Sophie and her friends typify today's airheads. Sophie is 20 and looks younger. The movie opens with the girls in an attempt to appeal to a young audience. The music was 30 years old and had to work to bring in the kids. Donna was a swinger in her day and fronted a trio called Donna and the Dynamos. The Dynamos are Tanya and Rosie, and they show up for Sophie's wedding. Sky is the groom-to-be. I wanted the Dynamos to not be so plain. Maybe they were cast so as to not upstage Streep, whose career was built on talent, not looks. Mamma Mia! has its share of zany dialog and wild dancing! There is one scene I considered tacky. Tanya sings "Does Your Mother Know" to an African-looking kid after having flirted with him the night before. Ironically, it is not Sophie and Sky who get married, but Donna and Sam. The youngsters go off to explore the world! The whole piece comes off as Shakespearean comedy with ABBA songs. Mamma Mia! was lucky to get Meryl Streep. She is respected worldwide. Tom Hanks is credited as the Executive Producer, having bought the movie rights. Benny is shown once. Bjorn is shown twice. Look quickly or you will miss them! Benny is at the upright piano for "Dancing Queen" as women run through the streets to a pier and jump in the water. Bjorn is a Greek god at the film's end. Benny recorded the backing tracks for Mamma Mia! with the same musicians who worked with ABBA: Lasse Wellander, Rutger Gunnarsson and Per Lindvall. The songs in Mamma Mia! drew from seven albums. Certain lyrics were modified to suit characters and plot. For the most part, the lyrics remained intact. -from Waterloo 1 Waterloo 2 Honey Honey -from ABBA 3 Mamma Mia! 4 SOS 5 I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do -from Arrival 6 Dancing Queen 7 Money Money Money -from ABBA The Album 8 Take a Chance On Me 9 The Name Of The Game 10 Thank You For The Music -from Voulez-Vous 11 Voulez-Vous 12 I Have A Dream 13 Chiquitita 14 Does Your Mother Know 15 Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! -from Super Trouper 16 Super Trouper 17 The Winner Takes It All 18 Our Last Summer 19 Lay All Your Love On Me -from The Visitors 20 When All Is Said And Done 21 Slipping Through My Fingers Revised 2015 Jim Colyer
  9. CHESS Musical http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=30 Opening As the 1980s dawned, ABBA showed signs of becoming political. Politics seeped into their consciousness in "The Day Before You Came" and into the conversation in "Our Last Summer." "The Piper" hinted at the way the masses may blindly follow a leader. In "The Visitors," the police are coming to arrest a woman whose home has been a meeting place for dissidents. ABBA was vocal about injustice in Poland, and their records were banned in the USSR. There is nuclear war in "Soldiers:" "that dreadful rumble, all that thunder and the blinding light." Their interest in politics came to a head in the CHESS musical. Benny and Bjorn teamed up with Tim Rice. They composed the music, and Rice penned the lyrics with Bjorn's help. Tim acquired his political savvy while doing the lyrics for Evita. CHESS is like Evita in that all the dialog is contained within musical numbers. The entire show is sung. Tim Rice helped Benny and Bjorn with the larger framework. They were accustomed to 3 and 4 minute songs. It is different to think in terms of two hours of music centered around a plot and a cast of characters. A production of CHESS presents a very different soundscape from an ABBA concert. Songs are lyrically linked to the ones before and after them. Tim Rice is a master of irony. Evita dies at her zenith, and both romantic and married love fail in CHESS. CHESS is a love story in that the Russian and Florence have a year-long affair. Ultimately, the authors are saying that love suffers at the expense of political interest and competitiveness in games. Selfhood is paramount in the pursuit of fame. CHESS is a story of ambition, although not in the Macbethian sense. It is based on the Fischer/Spassky chess matches of 1972. Two warriors vie for the chess crown. That a serious drama can be enacted without bloodshed is an anomaly attributable to the Swedes. CHESS divides into three parts. There is the competition between the chess players, the struggle between east and west and the conflict between lovers and would-be lovers. Four characters are important: the American and his assistant, Florence, and the Russian and his wife, Svetlana. Two couples! Like ABBA! The Russian falls in love with Florence and defects to be with her. The American gets revenge by flying Svetlana to Bangkok. She spoils her husband's fling. CHESS is introspective, brooding. The characters are forever second guessing themselves. Suspicion is cast upon the American's sexuality, and Florence's history is tainted by her misconception that her father was a hero during the Hungarian uprising. CHESS was a hit in London's west end between 1986 and 1989. It came to Broadway in 1988, and got terrible reviews. It closed after two months. CHESS got a second chance on the road, touring 21 American cities, and I saw it at the Kentucky Performing Arts Center in Louisville, March 7, 1990. Audience response was excellent! Background With the collapse of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, the American-led Allies poured into Germany from the west, while the Russians poured in from the east. The armies met, victorious and exuberant! It did not last long! Human nature being what it is, we tend to manufacture enemies when there are none. Winston Churchill envisioned an "iron curtain" splitting the continent. The United States and the Soviet Union squared off, democracy versus communism in a so-called Cold War. Russia put up the Berlin Wall, and John Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev went eyeball to eyeball over Cuba. The space race took Americans to the moon, and Bobby Fischer beat the Russians at their own game. The 1980s saw a resurgence of Cold War policy under Ronald Reagan. This was the context in which the CHESS musical was conceived. The Soviet Union eventually overspent and broke up. The Russian army pulled out of eastern Europe, and the two Germanys became one. Cooperation between Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin made the rivalries of CHESS hard to understand. Summary The World Chess Championship is being held in Merano, Italy. We get the picture: Alps, clean air and water, the perfect setting! Money is the city fathers' interest. Hotels will be full and the economy bolstered. The American champion appears. He is both happy and cynical about the media attention. He knows they care about the east/west angle, not chess. The Russian challenger watches the American on TV, and he and his assistant, Molokov, debate whether the champion is competent. The Russian wants to be his own man. Alone, he admits to himself that the dream and the reality are two different things. The matches get underway! The arbiter is determined that past infractions will not reoccur. He knows that lurking beneath the veneer of diplomacy is the hostility of Soviet/U.S. relations. The inevitable commercialism is here. The event becomes a marketplace for toothpaste, vests and chess sets. Florence's loyalty wavers when the American walks out. He brings up her childhood and the Hungarian uprising. He is obsessed with politics. The game resumes with the American outmatched. There will be a new champion! Florence meets with the Russian and changes sides. Call it love at first sight! She and the Russian leave Merano together, and he defects. He hated communism anyway and how the party thwarts ambition. Time passes, and the Russian must defend his title in Bangkok. The American is vindictive and has gone to Moscow to plot with the Russian's wife. Drawn to Bangkok, he prowls the streets, unaffected by this city of sin. Florence raises hell when she sees the Russian's wife on television. The American confronts his foe. He will spare Florence the truth about her father for a price. The Russian despises the American for going to Svetlana. Rejected by Florence, the American regresses to childhood. He sees himself as a victim. Kings, queens, knights, rooks and bishops kept him sane! As the new combatants hover over their chessboard, Molokov has confidence in his boss. The American assures him the expatriate will lose one way or another. The Russian retains his title but in doing so, loses both wife and lover. Svetlana accuses him of being abnormal. He feels she never understood him. Only when it is too late, does he regret losing Florence. A history of chess follows. It is a game of mistakes, originating from a brother murdering a brother. Can its exponents be anything but losers? Song sequence on the London album: ..1 MERANO - Sets the scene and introduces the American. Rodgers and Hammerstein composed the music for The King And I, also set in Bangkok. SRO is standing room only. ..2 THE RUSSIAN AND MOLOKOV/WHERE I WANT TO BE - The Russian is ready for a change. He is not satisfied with his backers. ..3 OPENING CEREMONY (THE ARBITER) - The referee asserts his authority! There are 64 squares on a chessboard. 8x8. ..4 QUARTET (A MODEL OF DECORUM AND TRANQUILLITY) - When the American walks out, the others decry the current state of affairs. The Russian, Molokov, Florence and the arbiter make up the quartet. ..5 THE AMERICAN AND FLORENCE/NOBODY'S SIDE - Florence no longer believes in the American. Florence is Elaine Paige. ..6 CHESS - The game breaks up! ..7 MOUNTAIN DUET - Florence and the Russian have something in common. Romance blooms! ..8 FLORENCE QUITS - Florence and the American accuse one another. ..9 EMBASSY LAMENT - The Russian defects! The sarcasm of the civil servants is understandable in light of their anonymity and meager salaries. This is comic relief! With the downfall of communism, passage from east to west is not so sensational. 10 ANTHEM - The Russian proclaims his freedom. He feels contempt for his wife and his countrymen. There is no patriotism in him. His pledge of allegiance is to himself. 11 BANGKOK/ONE NIGHT IN BANGKOK - The American resists the temptations of Asian night life, preferring his intellectual sport. The chess board doubles as a dance floor, while the stray square represents the defecting Russian. Siam was the old name for Thailand, and Yul Brenner was famous for his role as the king of Siam in The King And I. Merano is the Tirolean spa, South Tyrol being a province in the Alps. Hastings is in southern England. Somerset Maugham traveled in Asia. Buddha lived in the sixth century, B.C., and his statues can be standing, seated or reclining. 12 HEAVEN HELP MY HEART - Florence knows the Russian will tire of her. 13 ARGUMENT - Florence and the Russian argue when Svetlana shows up. 14 I KNOW HIM SO WELL - Duet between Florence and Svetlana about the man they love. Svetlana is Barbara Dickson. The wife fears he needs freedom. The mistress fears he needs security. 15 THE DEAL (NO DEAL) - The American threatens to expose Florence's father as a traitor unless the Russian throws the match. The Russian rejects his offer. 16 PITY THE CHILD - The American recalls his childhood in a burst of self-pity. He is remorseful about the lost relationship with his mother. Harold Schonberg's book, "Grandmasters Of Chess," contains biography of Bobby Fischer and a description of his erratic temperament at the Reykjavik matches. Tim Rice made the Russian a composite character, but his American is a copy of Fischer down to the broken home, propensity for living in hotel rooms and his obsession with the Russians. Of 16 chess champions, Fischer is the only American to hold the title. When Murray Head sings, "I took the road of least resistance," we feel the passion of a man scrambling for his life, desperate to survive! The guitar has ABBA written all over it. Lasse Wellander has a tension in his lead that is very distinctive. 17 ENDGAME - The Russian beats his challenger. His goal is attained even if his private life is in shambles. A game of chess consists of three parts: opening, middlegame and endgame. 18 EPILOGUE: YOU AND I/THE STORY OF CHESS - The Russian and Florence are done. The choir recounts the history of the game. Chess works as a metaphor because romantically and politically, life is a chess game. Rice was the one with the enthusiasm for the game, not Benny and Bjorn. We sense in him a need to downplay his subject, half apologizing for imposing a musical about chess on a public that associates it with an ivory tower intellectualism. Endgame CHESS Moves is a video show accompanying the album. Tim explains the significance of the clips. We see smoky lighting and detached characters. Included are "One Night In Bangkok," "Nobody's Side," "The Arbiter," "I Know Him So Well" & "Pity The Child." At the end of CHESS Moves, the American raises the white king above his head as the black player resigns. Black and white are the traditional colors of both squares and chessmen. Players are also known as black and white. White has the advantage because he moves first. In a series of games, players alternately play each color. Games last between 40 and 50 moves. Any blockbuster show spawns an effort telling how it was made, and CHESS has its documentary called The Making of CHESS. It traces the recording of the album in 1984, and we achieve an intimacy with its participants, a sense of running back and forth between London and Stockholm. We share Anders Eljas' (yah) pride in working with the London Symphony Orchestra, and when Tommy Korberg as the Russian hits the final note of "Anthem," we feel his satisfaction! I researched the game. Chess reduces society to its fundamentals. The pieces are a cross section of medieval life. Kings and queens rule! Rooks are the castle. Bishops are the Church. Knights are armies. Pawns are peasants. The musical does the same thing on a personal level, isolating elements of human nature. Ambition and emotion are compressed. Success becomes everything, and we are shown its rewards and its price. The players were given names on Broadway. The American was Freddie Trumper. The Russian was Anatoly Sergievsky. Broadway let the American win, mirroring Reagan's victory over the Soviets in the Cold War. As the show moved around the world, it took on the nature of a chess match, yielding to any number of variations. Productions shuffled the song sequence and altered plot and characters. One critic called it the worst musical ever. It is certainly in a class by itself. CHESS reflects the thinking of the 1970s even though it was written and performed in the '80s. It was an unpatriotic show trying to succeed in a patriotic decade. In those terms, we understand its limited success. CHESS questioned authority at a time when people raised flags, not questions. Tim Rice said he finally got his favorite show right with CHESS In Concert. This production originated from the Royal Albert Hall in London and aired in the States on public television. Adam Pascal played the American. Josh Groban played the Russian. Tim agonized over CHESS and said he may someday write a book about it. That the show will not die is a tribute to the songs of Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus. Revised 2015 Jim Colyer
  10. I Stand On Pluto Looking back at Earth That speck in the sky Land of my birth What's it all mean I don't know Probably nothing Reap what you sow I Stand On Pluto This ice and rock sphere It's where I'll die I have no fear I'm just a piece Of chemistry No one on Earth Will miss me It's cold out here Moons in the sky I know their names I counted five I Stand On Pluto Looking back at Earth That speck in the sky Land of my birth What's it all mean I can't say Three billion miles No use to pray Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap
  11. BRIGHT LIGHTS, DARK SHADOWS by CARL MAGNUS PALM: A summary http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=171 Swedish author Carl Magnus Palm wrote an in-depth biography of ABBA. It goes beyond the superficial, sketchy books that appeared earlier. It took a Swede to penetrate ABBA this way. British and American authors could not do it. I talked to Palm on the phone when I was in Stockholm. Carl Magnus Palm lets us know right away that behind the glitter of ABBA there were four troubled individuals. He attributes much of it to Sweden's geography. Nordic latitudes and prolonged darkness create a natural pessimism in Sweden. Even ABBA succumbed to it! Their photos show smiles. Their lyrics reveal anxiety behind the images. Palm calls Bjorn the backbone of ABBA. Bjorn was studious from the outset. He was sharp and good with languages. His music helped him get girls. We learn that Bjorn lost his virginity in his early teens. Stig Anderson, ABBA's future manager, guided Bjorn and The Hootenanny Singers through a string of albums in the 1960s. Bjorn differed from his band mates in that he wanted to write songs like The Beatles. Palm goes into detail about the relationship between Frida's mother and Alfred Hasse, the German soldier who got her pregnant. "They threw off their clothes and went swimming. Afterwards, they made love for the first time on the beach." Frida was one of thousands of children born to German soldiers and Norwegian girls. Young Frida lived for music. Her first husband was a trombonist. Frida was reunited with her father in 1977, and kept in touch with him for five years. She finally came to believe that he knew of her mother's pregnancy when he left Norway. I wondered Benny came to write such music as that in Kristina fran Duvemala. He got it from his grandfather. His grandfather taught him the accordion and to play Swedish folk music. The pop music of ABBA was almost a diversion. After Benny became a father at 16, his girl friend got custody of their two kids. Benny joined the Hep Stars, a band known for its wild stage act. Like Bjorn, Benny felt the tug of The Beatles and began writing songs. He admitted that his lyrics were bad. This book creates a broad context in which to understand ABBA. We get a sense of the four moving toward each other in space and time. Palm holds Agnetha's story back as if to save the best for last. She arrives in chapter 8 on page 112. Agnetha was shy, and there was a daddy to contend with! The songs she wrote for Bernt Enghardt were about self-pity. Agnetha was so self-conscious and innocent as to be almost helpless. Bjorn and Agnetha became a couple in 1969. Palm informs us that it was not meant to be a smooth relationship. Benny and Frida became engaged, "engaged" being a euphemism for having sex without marriage. Frida was jealous from the start, never believing that Benny could love her. Her low self-esteem was a problem! Benny and Frida took refuge in each other partially because both had abandoned their families. As the collaboration between Benny and Bjorn continued, Stig began to think that the duo could write an international hit. Benny, Bjorn, Agnetha and Frida began toying with the idea of singing as a group in 1970. By then, they were close friends. The did a cabaret act as Festfolk, a show so embarrassing that Bjorn was relieved it was not taped. The couples had doubts about living together and working together too. According to Palm, Agnetha went on the pill at 16. She and Bjorn married in July, 1971. By 1972, Michael Tretow and Gorel Hanser were on board. The group recorded "People Need Love," the first real ABBA song. The decision was made to do only what they wanted, and 1973 saw them enter the Eurovision Song Contest with "Ring Ring." Frida's depression began to lighten, and Agnetha was pregnant. They were going international. The Eurovision stood between ABBA and their breakthrough. They won it in Brighton, England, in April, 1974, with "Waterloo." Winning the Eurovision changed everything. Offers poured in! It was double-edged. As Eurovision winners, they would never be taken seriously in certain circles. It did not matter. The contest was their only chance of breaking out. Stig cut a deal with Atlantic Records, and "Waterloo" was released in America. Reluctant to tour, they began making promo clips, stressing the group's image. ABBA continued to make videos. From the self-titled album, videos were made for "SOS," "Mamma Mia!," "Bang-A-Boomerang" and "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do." Director Lasse Hallstrom made the most of what he had, zooming in on the girls' faces and showing two members with one face in profile. He encouraged eye-to-eye contact with viewers. The clips had an enormous impact in Australia where Mamma Mia! was number one for 10 weeks. The demand for ABBA in Australia was so great that the four flew down in March, 1976, for a TV special. There was a kind of ABBAmania with teenagers congregating in airports. Palm observes that ABBA occupied a parallel universe to the rest of the pop/rock world. Meanwhile, "Fernando" became a massive hit with "Dancing Queen" waiting in the wings. Bjorn talked about "Knowing Me, Knowing You." He envisioned a man walking through an empty house. He had never been through a divorce, but given the differences between him and Agnetha and their tendency to quarrel, the song was a premonition. The Arrival album was their first peak! ABBA used television as a key to the world. They taped ABBA-DABBA-DOO! They flew to Poland. With this broad popularity, Bjorn and Agnetha began drifting apart. They had a second child, thinking it might keep them together. Europe was the first leg of the 1977 tour. ABBA had major fame by this time. In cities like Berlin and Copenhagen, adoring fans were a nuisance. The four were confined to hotel rooms. Palm points to growing tension between the couples while the press exaggerated differences between Agnetha and Frida. There was a natural competition between the women for the best songs and for attention on stage but apart from that, there was no antipathy. The women knew their success was the result of combined efforts. For the tour, Benny and Bjorn conceived a mini-musical called The Girl With The Golden Hair. It consisted of "Thank You For The Music," "I Wonder (Departure)" and "I'm A Marionette." This was a clue to the path Benny and Bjorn would ultimately take with their CHESS and Kristina musicals. ABBA flew to Australia with the idea of making a movie around the concerts. The two weeks in Australia were pandemonium! Palm's frenzied account makes good reading. Hallstrom directed the movie, much of which was improvised while filming. Back in Stockholm, ABBA-The Album was completed. Palm singles out "One Man, One Woman" and sees it as Bjorn's confession of what it was like living with Agnetha. Agnetha is anything but likable in this book. She is sensitive and scared to the point of paranoia. She is self-centered and often sick. She whines and complains. She is fine as long as she gets her way but unbearable when called upon to make concessions. There is a feeling of never being satisfied, disappointed by a lack of success and frustrated by the conditions success generates. ABBA wanted to be famous and have their privacy too. The lights are too bright, and the shadows are too dark. They built their own studio, and "SummerNight City" was the first song recorded there. Despite Benny and Bjorn not being happy with it, "SummerNight City" is a pounding disco number reflecting its era. Bjorn and Agnetha's incompatibility came to a head! She took the kids and moved out, Christmas day, 1978. The marriage was over, but at least there would be peace in the studio. It took Bjorn one week to meet his second wife. Palm regards Voulez-Vous as ABBA's best album. It is disco! The picture on the cover was taken at the Alexandra discotheque. Palm used a photo from this shoot as the cover for his earlier book: ABBA: The Complete Recording Sessions. ABBA toured America in September, 1979. It was a moderate success thanks to meticulous planning. Agnetha was isolated and homesick, although she and Bjorn got along and worked well together. Lena joined Bjorn in Los Angeles, an inspiration for the lyrics of Super Trouper. ABBA took their show to Japan in March, 1980, for eleven performances, six of which were in Tokyo. It was the final tour. The Super Trouper album comprises 10 masterpieces. "Lay All Your Love On Me," "Our Last Summer," "The Piper" & "The Way Old Friends Do" are superb! Palm calls "The Winner Takes It All" Agnetha's "best ever performance on record." She assumed the "abandoned woman" role. Frida did the vocal for "When All Is Said And Done," a song suggesting the end of her and Benny's marriage. ABBA lyrics had become blatantly personal. The concert with Dick Cavett is my favorite despite a lack of enthusiasm among fans. Palm notes the cold desolation of The Visitors. The end was near! They recorded "The Day Before You Came," the last song, in August, 1982. As Agnetha began work on her solo album, Benny and Bjorn teamed up with Tim Rice to write the musical they long dreamed about. CHESS was based on the Bobby Fischer/Boris Spassky matches in Reykjavik, Iceland, and "One Night In Bangkok" became a big hit. I recall Karen and I seeing the video on TV. I thought it was stupid, and Karen facetiously asked me if I were going to buy it. I did not know that Benny and Bjorn were involved or even what it was. I had discarded my ABBA records and was trying to live the same kind of life as my parents. Despite faults, CHESS refuses to die. Benny and Bjorn's complaint was that the story is weak. For their second musical, they adapted the classic novels of Swedish author Vilhelm Moberg. This is the story of the Swedish emigrants who came to the United States in the 1850s. Benny and Bjorn tried to get an English version to Broadway and finally got the music to Carnegie Hall. The ABBA catalog resurfaced in the 1990s. Tribute bands sprang up. ABBA Gold and More ABBA Gold sold millions. ABBA shows poured into the U.S. on video cassettes. Mamma Mia! rose from the revival, and the stage musical written around ABBA songs became the world's biggest show and a major motion picture. Judy Craymer, who worked on CHESS, conceived the idea of building a show around ABBA's catalog. Catherine Johnson wrote the story, and Phyllida Lloyd was chosen to direct. Three women for a story about a mother and daughter! Bright Lights, Dark Shadows fleshes out the ABBA story. We anticipate a lot of Palm's revelations, but he is the one who took the trouble to put them on paper. His book reads like a novel. It is not fiction. It really happened!
  12. Beatles http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=61 John Lennon was the heart and soul of The Beatles! He was the one who wanted to be Elvis Presley. When it was over, he said the only good thing about The Beatles was being bigger than Elvis. John Lennon met Paul McCartney in their hometown of Liverpool, England, in 1957. They had something in common. They were taken with American rock n' roll. John covered Chuck Berry. Paul did Little Richard. A bond formed, and they wrote songs together. George Harrison joined them on lead guitar. Harrison was a student of Carl Perkins and rockabilly. Ringo Starr came last on the drums. The Beatles' personalities were such that they fit together to make a whole. John was the brooding intellectual, always questioning himself and others. His wit was razorlike. Paul was politically correct, the cute one who wanted to please. George was introverted and spiritual. Ringo was the comedian who got along with everybody. In the beginning, The Beatles looked alike and dressed alike. It was hard to tell them apart. They were regulars at a Liverpool club called The Cavern. It was there that they met Brian Epstein, who became their manager. He took them to London and to George Martin, who became their producer. If there was a fifth Beatle, it was Martin. The Beatles released "Love Me Do" in October, 1962. Beatlemania ensued! Songs like "From Me To You," "I Wanna Hold Your Hand," "I Saw Her Standing There" & "She Loves You" drove girls wild at concerts! The Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show as Elvis had done. It was pandemonium! The Beatles were chased by fans and the press everywhere they went. Records were released on 5 labels. Albums were solid. Every song was good. The Beatles made a movie called A Hard Day's Night, which portrayed something of what Beatlemania was. Teenage girls screamed in theaters to the point that the dialog was inaudible. It was The Beatles' sound! It was their look. It was the long hair! The Beatles annihilated everyone in music except Elvis, and even he reeled! After 1964, things cooled. The one constant was the music. The Beatles continued to make good records. They recorded "Ticket To Ride," which John Lennon called the first heavy metal song. There was a second movie: Help! It was silly with its James Bond parody, and being in color took away. A Hard Day's Night was in black and white. The Beatles introduced the "concept album" with Rubber Soul, making rock music an art form. Revolver was released the following year. These were tough times in America. The Vietnam War and race riots were out of control. When The Beatles were threatened by the Ku Klux Klan, tours ended, and they retired to the studio. Lennon's songs remained the best on the albums, although they became morbid in a way that is hard to understand. The idea of death pervaded song after song, even the image of being murdered by a gun. No Reply - I nearly died In My Life - Some are dead and some are living Run For Your Life - I'd rather see you dead Girl - Will she still believe it when he's dead We Can Work It Out - Life is very short Rain - They might as well be dead Tomorrow Never Knows - Ignorance and hate mourn the dead, It is not dying She Said She Said - I know what it's like to be dead Lennon's morbidness continued through Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Magical Mystery Tour, White Album, Abbey Road and Let It Be. Good Morning Good Morning - Nothing to do to save his life A Day In The Life - He blew his mind out in a car I Am The Walrus - Dripping from a dead dog's eye, See how they run like pigs from a gun, Bloody Tuesday Yer Blues - Wanna die, If I ain't dead already, Feel so suicidal Happiness Is A Warm Gun - Bang bang shoot shoot, My finger on your trigger, Mother Superior jumped the gun The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill - What did you kill, Bullet-headed, If to kill was not a sin, If looks could kill, His elephant and gun Glass Onion - See how the other half live Revolution #9 - Turn me on, dead man The Ballad of John & Yoko - They're gonna crucify me; Oh boy, when you're dead Come Together - Shoot me In his Rolling Stone interview following the breakup, Lennon was incoherent. He rejected The Beatles, never to embrace them again. When he did Double Fantasy, he said he did not want to be thought of as a Beatle, but as John Lennon whose life was changed by American rock n' roll. His preoccupation with death extended into his solo work. Instant Karma - Pretty soon you're gonna be dead Cold Turkey - I wish I was dead, Can't see no future My Mummy's Dead - Title Working Class Hero - Smile as you kill Imagine - Nothing to kill or die for How Do You Sleep? - When they said you was dead I Don't Want To Be A Soldier - I don't wanna die John Sinclair - Shooting gooks in Vietnam Angela - They shot down your man The Luck of the Irish - Wish you were dead, Death and the glory We're All Water - If we check their coffins Sunday Bloody Sunday - When they shot the people, When they nailed the coffin lids Born In Prison - Die in prison Attica State - The prisoners did not kill (Ironically, Lennon's killer was given a life sentence in Attica Prison.) Woman Is The Nigger Of The World - We kill her will Intuition - It seemed like suicide Scared - I just wanna stay alive, Gonna be the death of me, The straws slip away Old Dirt Road - Breezing thru the deadwood Whatever Gets You Through The Night - A gun to blow your mind. It was as if Lennon had a premonition of his death! He was shot and killed in New York City by a deranged fan named Mark David Chapman on December 8, 1980. Lennon had turned 40 on October 9. He once remarked that he did not want to work in a factory because he would be dead by 40. There is irony, too, in the hoax about McCartney being dead. The hoax was never explained. Nor did anyone claim responsibility for the "clues" that popped up on the album covers and in the music. John Lennon admitted that he wanted out of The Beatles as early as 1966, but was afraid to leave the group. Instead, he used his disenchantment to craft classic tunes like "Revolution" and "The Ballad of John & Yoko." He was the edge! He broke down the English language and reworked it, using nonsense lyrics like those in "I Am The Walrus" and "Come Together." Lennon's songs are superior to McCartney's even if McCartney fans claim otherwise. "In My Life" is better than "Yesterday." Someone called Lennon a diarist and McCartney a dramatist. This is true! Ego was at the center of Lennon's work. Even during the peace movement, he acted as if he had invented peace. McCartney created characters such as Eleanor Rigby. When Lennon brought Yoko into the studio, it drove a wedge between him and McCartney. Yoko had no talent. Nor did McCartney's wife, Linda, who accompanied her husband on stage with Wings. It was up to ABBA from Sweden, a country known for sexual equality, to produce a group in which men and women could co-exist. As The Beatles were winding down, they left a niche for the band that would take rock n' roll to its next level. Elvis Presley may have never heard of ABBA, but The Beatles evolved into them! A DAY IN THE LIFE: THE MUSIC AND ARTISTRY OF THE BEATLES by MARK HERTSGAARD This is an excellent book about The Beatles' music. Mark Hertsgaard gained access to The Beatles archives at Abbey Road Studios in London, listening to 50 hours of Beatle tapes in 6 days. He devotes his first chapter to "A Day In The Life" from Sergeant Pepper. He regards this song as one of the masterpieces of the 20th century. A great thing about Hertsgaard's book is that he provides insight into the meaning of certain Beatle songs. For example, the 4000 holes in Blackburn, Lancashire, were potholes in the streets, something John Lennon picked from a newspaper article. Hertsgaard notes that the orchestra crescendo at the song's end simulates a nuclear blast and subsequent mushroom cloud. Indeed, Beatle music had become quite serious! Hertsgaard recognizes "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and "I Saw Her Standing There" as rock n' roll classics. They were the two cuts that broke The Beatles into the American market. What stands out for me is how early Beatle songs used the AABA-extended structure. Elvis had used it with "One Night" and "Stuck On You." These songs went back and repeated the bridge. "You Can't Do That" and "I Feel Fine" used the AABA format. Chapter 7 deals with A Hard Days Night, and Hertsgaard stresses the importance of this movie. He is fascinated with John Lennon and writes lavishly about the mysterious opening chord of the title song. He praises Paul McCartney for "And I Love Her." Rubber Soul was the first album to be more than a collection of singles. It was marked by a growing social consciousness and an expanded definition of love. As The Beatles mastered the studio, producer George Martin and his classical training were having an influence. The "5th Beatle" composed the classical run for "In My Life." "Norwegian Wood" was interesting. McCartney explained "I lit the fire" as the suitor setting fire to the girl's apartment. It could as easily have meant he lit a joint or a fire in the fireplace. Revolver saw increased experimentation as McCartney's opening cough at the beginning of "Taxman" concluded with Lennon's LSD inspired "Tomorrow Never Knows." Mr. Wilson was the British prime minister, while Mr. Heath was the leader of the opposition. The weirdest rendition of a Beatles song I ever witnessed was at Abbey Road on the River in Louisville when a band fronted by a singer dressed as Colonel Sanders sang "Tomorrow Never Knows" through a foghorn while playing a banjo. McCartney's "Paperback Writer" was from the Revolver era. Characteristically, Paul sang about what other people were doing while John sang about himself or tried to proselytize. By 1967, Beatle music was immersed in politics and religion. They were at the front of the "peace and love" movement, and their fans followed. The Beatles spoke against the Vietnam War. Lennon wrote "Revolution" and claimed that the group was more popular than Jesus, a boast rather than an indictment of hypocrisy. Hertsgaard explains that Strawberry Field was an orphanage in Liverpool and that Penny Lane was a bus roundabout. "Strawberry Fields Forever" ended with an enigmatic comment by Lennon. Was it "cranberry sauce," "I am very bored" or "I buried Paul?" Psychedelia alienated many fans from the Beatlemania era. The Beatles presented themselves as fictional characters for the Sergeant Pepper album. They were tired of being Beatles. They wore colorful costumes, and lyrics were printed on the back of the album jacket. Rock n' roll had become art! Visual images pervaded the lyrics. Hertsgaard calls "Hey Bulldog" a "great, growling rocker." It was a track I could not get enough of. George Martin opposed the White Album being double. He felt there was too much inferior material. Ringo later said they could have broken it down into the White Album and the Whiter Album. It was Ringo, who screamed, "I've got blisters on my fingers," at the end of "Helter Skelter." "Sexy Sadie" was a code name for the Maharishi, the guru who conned the group. "Julia" was Lennon's tribute to his mother. George Harrison was composing the best songs toward the end. "Something" and "Here Comes The Sun" are favorites. Lennon wrote "One After 909" when he was 15. It uses the AABA-extended format. It is rockabilly and my favorite piece on Let It Be. I saw a group perform it at Legends Corner in Nashville. Abbey Road was released in September, 1969, and I lay in bed with my girl friend listening to it while home on Christmas leave from Fort Knox. I was headed for Germany in April, 1970, when The Beatles announced their split. Revised 2015 Jim Colyer
  13. http://jimcolyer.com/papers/entry?id=58 Elvis Presley was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, January 8, 1935. His parents were Vernon and Gladys Presley. There was a twin brother, who died at birth. Elvis grew up in the two-room house, which Vernon built. He was close to his mother, a relationship that defined his personality. The family moved to Memphis, Tennessee, when Elvis was 13. He was a misfit in school. He wore flashy clothes and spent time on Beale Street. He had rhythm! He listened to black musicians play the blues. After high school, Elvis took a job driving a truck for an electric company. He wanted to record a song as a gift for his mother and went to Sun Records, a label owned by Sam Phillips. Marion Keisker, who worked for Phillips, saw something in Elvis and encouraged her boss to work with him. Phillips put Elvis with guitar player Scotty Moore, bassist Bill Black and drummer D.J. Fontana. The result was "That's Alright Mama." Memphis radio stations played it. Other recordings for Sun followed as Elvis caught on across the south. Girls loved him. They screamed and swooned! Parents detested his gyrations and called him vulgar. This new music was rock n' roll. The older generation called it everything from "nigger music" to the "devil's music." RCA purchased Elvis' contract for $35,000 and got a bargain. Elvis had his first number one in January, 1956, with "Heartbreak Hotel." "Hound Dog," "Don't Be Cruel" & "All Shook Up" followed. Elvis appeared on television: the Steve Allen and Ed Sullivan shows. When Sullivan insisted he be shown only from the waist up, it added fuel to the fire. Hollywood beckoned, and Elvis made his first movie: Love Me Tender. In two years, he laid the foundation for the music that would dominate into the 21st century. Elvis was drafted into the U.S. Army in March, 1958. He got a deferment to finish King Creole, considered by critics to be his best movie. The draft was real in the 1950s. Young men were expected to serve their country and relished the opportunity. Elvis did his basic training at Fort Hood in Texas. His mother died while he was in basic, and he never quite recovered from her death. Elvis was in armor and worked with tanks. He got orders for Germany, where he met 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu. She became his wife and the mother of his daughter. Elvis' two years in the Army were something he and his fans were proud of. Despite fame, he pulled K.P. and was not given special treatment. Music had changed by the time Elvis was discharged in March, 1960. It was calmer. Elvis' first record as a civilian was "Stuck On You." Its sexy lyrics took it to number one. "It's Now Or Never" was released that summer. It was operatic and proved that Elvis could sing. Having served in the Army and mellowed, he appealed to older people. He starred with Juliet Prowse in G.I. Blues. Part two of Elvis' career began: the movie years. Viva Las Vegas did well partially because of Ann-Margret. Elvis' manager, Tom Parker, controlled things and saw "his boy" as a money-maker. As long as the movies made money, they ground them out. Each was worse than the one before it. Elvis looked like a cardboard cut-out as The Beatles redefined rock n' roll. Elvis and Priscilla married in 1967. Their daughter, Lisa Marie, was born 9 months later. The Renaissance came at the end of 1968. Elvis did a Comeback Special for TV, sitting with friends in the round and performing his early hits. At the show's end, he appeared in a white suit and sang "If I Can Dream." It was his first relevant song in a while. It fit the late 1960s with its Counter Culture, Civil Rights & Vietnam War. Elvis came off as a prophet with a message in this third and final incarnation. "Suspicious Minds" provided his first number one in seven years. He gave up movies, played the International Hotel in Vegas and went back on the road. He donned jump suits and bell bottoms. Legendary guitarist James Burton joined his band. After "Burning Love" peaked at number two, things began to slide. Elvis was fooling around, and Priscilla left with her karate instructor. Aloha from Hawaii in 1973 was the last big hurrah. Elvis had a special relationship with Hawaii, and his passion was evident. "American Trilogy" reeked with pathos! Elvis died suddenly on August 16, 1977, at 42. It was hard to believe! For baby boomers, there had always been Elvis Presley. Everyone remembers where they were when they heard the news. I was sitting on a bed watching television in a hotel in Springfield, Virginia, near Washington, D.C. Thousands gathered at Graceland Mansion in Memphis to show grief and pay their last respects. As time went on, a darker image of Elvis emerged. Former bodyguards published an exposé. Prescription drugs, weight gain, divorce and sad songs had taken their toll. Elvis was miserable in his last days. He had everything a 21-year-old wanted, nothing a 42-year-old needed. Nevertheless, he changed music! He was the one who paved the way for The Beatles. The Elvis legacy survives in the Broadway musical, All Shook Up, a light-hearted story written around 25 songs. A roustabout rides into town on a motorcycle and teaches people to be hip. ELVIS PRESLEY: THE MAN, THE LIFE, THE LEGEND by PAMELA CLARKE KEOGH I made a study of Elvis' life around the 10th anniversary of his death. I read books, watched movies and bought his albums. I took a knowledge of the Elvis story into Keogh's book. It is fun to read about Elvis. It is almost supernatural, the way he comes off in biographies. Pamela Clarke Keogh speaks of Elvis Presley in mythological terms, and we share her wonder as she documents the lure of Beale Street. Young Elvis was like everyone, and yet different. He wanted to be noticed! He wore flashy clothes and sideburns. Keogh came up with 100 pictures from the Graceland archives. She is conscious of clothes and fashion. It is obvious that a woman wrote this book. Her book reads like a romance novel. She is sentimental, and Elvis becomes a fictional character. Keogh dwells on his wardrobe. She tells what he wore for this or that show. It was Sam Phillips at Sun Records in Memphis, who discovered Elvis. Phillips was a southern gentleman with a high opinion of himself. He was a little crazy. His death in 2003, went virtually unreported. I learned of it from a small piece in a magazine I thumbed through in a Veterans Hospital. The Sun Records label is interesting. It is yellow and round, a likeness of the sun. There are rays with a rooster crowing at dawn. Phillips put Elvis with guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black in the summer of 1954. Elvis was doing ballads, obviously the wrong material. Things happened when they stumbled onto an old blues song. It was rhythmic and showcased Elvis' voice in such a way that it came across. Elvis and his combo began touring the south. Drummer D.J. Fontana had played in strip clubs and applied stripper licks to what Elvis was doing. Girls ate it up! Keogh calls it the "dawn of the modern era." She conveys a feeling of destiny about Elvis, the shy Memphis kid who became the biggest star of all-time. There are no surprises in her book. Reading it is like listening to a favorite song that we have not heard in a while. Elvis is contagious! When I do his karaoke songs, his spirit comes into me. I start talking like him and cannot stop. We are all Elvises! Elvis played Las Vegas in May, 1956, promoted as "The Atomic Powered Singer." Fascination with the atomic bomb was at its peak. The audience at the New Frontier was too old, and Elvis bombed! Elvis appealed to teens, those with no memory of World War II. He carved the generation gap. "Hound Dog" changed everything! There were 31 takes, and Elvis crouched on the floor listening to number 31. "That's the one," he said. I recall hearing "Hound Dog" on the radio on the truck with my dad. Chills ran up my spine! I asked my dad who Elvis Presley was. He said, "Some guy in a leather jacket." Elvis could turn a mediocre song into a classic. Truly awesome! No matter what you say about him, it is never enough. Someone will come along and say more. Some of his hits were written in the Brill Building in New York. Leiber & Stoller wrote "Hound Dog," "Jailhouse Rock" and "Love Me." Doc Pomus & Mort Shuman wrote "Little Sister," and "Viva Las Vegas." Elvis remarked that he went through a hundred songs before finding one that suited him. Elvis was drafted at the peak of his popularity. Keogh writes that he was "strac," a term for a soldier who looks good in his uniform. I was called "strac" by the guys in my platoon in Germany as a joke. My fatigues were wrinkled, and my boots unpolished. Elvis and his future wife Priscilla met in Germany. Keogh calls them "opposite-sex versions of each other." Priscilla was Elvis' doll, and he dressed her. I tried to compare Elvis' stint in the army to my own. I ended up seeing more differences than similarities. Elvis was drafted in March, 1958, during peace time and took his basic training and at Fort Hood, Texas. His AIT Advanced Instructional Training was in tanks. I was drafted in October, 1969, during the Vietnam War. I took my basic training at Fort Knox, Kentucky. My AIT was radio school. Morse Code drove me nuts! Elvis got orders for Germany and was assigned to the 3rd Armored Division in Bad Nauheim. They made him a jeep driver. I also received orders for Germany, becoming an Atomic Demolitions Munitions clerk in Bamberg. Elvis sailed to Germany on a ship. I flew. Elvis made Specialist 4, then Sergeant. I peaked at Spec. 4. Elvis saw Bill Haley play in Frankfurt and Stuttgart. I passed through these cities on my way to Bamberg. Elvis hung out with showgirls in Paris, while I became more and more paranoid, ending up in the hospital in Nuremberg. But even Elvis admitted to having good times and bad times in the army. Viva Las Vegas is the last movie we can justify. Keogh calls Elvis and Ann-Margret soul mates. Keogh adds dialog to her scenarios. It may be real or made-up. She dramatizes the meeting between Elvis and The Beatles. No one recorded their 30 minute jam, and no pictures were taken. I sense Keogh's fantasies. She is aware of the King's southern charm. He was a magnet for women! In 1969, Elvis again recorded in Memphis, sessions that produced "Suspicious Minds." Both Elvis and America had changed, and Las Vegas was ready. He became a fixture at the International Hotel in an era of jumpsuits and high collars. Keogh calls him a lone gladiator! She cannot resist describing what the band wore, even women in the audiences. They looked like stewardesses, flight attendants as they are now called. Elvis went back on the road for the remainder of his life. His concerts ended with "Can't Help Falling In Love," and he never did encores. 42 is young unless you are an athlete or a rock star. Elvis Presley was not meant for middle-age. He died at 42, overweight and hooked on prescription drugs. His girl friend was 20. The lesson here is that each stage of life demands a transition, an adjustment to a new level of maturity. It is the only way to survive. Suddenly, we are senior citizens, and our roles are deeper. Some believe that if Elvis had fired his manager, he may have become the serious actor he wanted to be. I became aware of Elvis' health problems in 1976. I saw on TV that he was hospitalized. Things went sour! Linda Thompson left, and Ginger Alden took her place. Elvis' bodyguards published a tell-all book after being fired. Shows were canceled. I arrived at Graceland on June, 18, 1977. The Indianapolis concert of June 26, was his last. I was sitting on the bed in a Springfield, Virginia, motel when it came on TV that Elvis had died. Revised 2015 Jim Colyer
  14. This is Veda, but I will put Sarah Wortham's vocal on "Up & Running!" She likes Shania, and I think this is a Shania-type song. Sarah is 22 and new to Nashville. This should make a decent work tape. Play https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClVp4NxwUX0 I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the hurt And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way I was so jealous I couldn't see straight You might say I was filled with hate The green-eyed lady Filled with animosity I couldn't believe she could take my place That you could tell me you need your space It took a long time I'm finally getting over you I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the hurt And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way solo She was a looker, I had a complex I thought she was better than me But I looked in the mirror this morning And she can't hold a handle to me You turned your back on a love so true You're headed for a fall Like Humpty Dumpty You're coming down off your wall I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the pain And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way Yeah, I'm over the pain I'm on my way Oh, yeah! Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  15. This is Veda, but I will put Sarah Wortham's vocal on "Up & Running!" She likes Shania, and I think this is a Shania-type song. Sarah is 22 and new to Nashville. This should make a decent work tape. Play https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClVp4NxwUX0 I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the hurt And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way I was so jealous I couldn't see straight You might say I was filled with hate The green-eyed lady Filled with animosity I couldn't believe she could take my place That you could tell me you need your space It took a long time I'm finally getting over you I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the hurt And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way solo She was a looker, I had a complex I thought she was better than me But I looked in the mirror this morning And she can't hold a handle to me You turned your back on a love so true You're headed for a fall Like Humpty Dumpty You're coming down off your wall I'm Up & I'm Running! I'm finally getting over you I'm getting over the pain And the heartache you put me through I'm Up & I'm Running! It's getting better everyday I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way I'm getting over the pain I'm on my way Yeah, I'm over the pain I'm on my way Oh, yeah! Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  16. I like your voice I like how you sing I like your smile I like everything I like your movements They're so smooth I like your grace Got a Crush On You Crush On You A great big crush I hope you Feel that way too Crush On You I must confess If you want me My answer's "Yes" I like your eyes I like your hair Where you're concerned It's easy to care I like your lips They're soft and sweet I like your kiss Each time we meet Crush On You A great big crush I hope you Feel that way too Crush On You I must confess If you want me My answer's "Yes" Just seeing your face Turns everything around You pick me up When I feel down Crush On You A great big crush I hope you Feel that way too Crush On You I must confess If you want me My answer's "Yes" Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  17. THIS PLACE Sitting in McDonald's West End Avenue Dust In The Wind The Kansas tune This Place is terrible This Place is horrible This Place is abominable This Place is unbearable This Place changes Yet never changes People die off I hate this place This Place is terrible This Place is horrible This Place is abominable This Place is unbearable Could be the summer of 75 Could be the fall of 85 Could be the winter of 95 Could be the spring of 05 Nashville, Tennessee How you've tortured me Put me on the rack Crucified me This Place is terrible This Place is horrible This Place is abominable This Place is unbearable Jim Colyer ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  18. Outside The Lines Outside the box Yes, I'm a rebel I know how to rock I wanna bash Everyone I see You oughta be More like me Outside The Lines Take off the gloves Let's duke it out To hell with love To hell with Rubio To hell with Bush To hell with Cruz I'm with Trump I kick ass I play to win I come back Again and again Outside The Lines Way out of bounds I'll be fighting Fifteen rounds I'm gonna bash Everyone I see It's my manifest Destiny Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  19. She was the cutest in our class A cheerleader With a real nice ass Every boy wanted What she's got She Was Hot Now, Probably Not A taste of her And you wanted more She looked like Roberta Shore A real looker A real sexpot She Was Hot Now, Probably Not I bet today She's fat as a hog Time makes fools Of us all I loved to watch When she went struttin' She looked like Gunilla Hutton A real eye-catcher She hit the spot She Was Hot Now, Probably Not Jim Colyer ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  20. I strut and fret My hour on the stage Filled with pride Filled with rage I know I'm a fake I know I'm a fool I go through life Breaking the rules I'm Not God I just wanna be But I can't match The Deity I'm Not God And I'll never be Some people think I'm half crazy Living my life Outside the law Breaking every heart I come across Women love me Until they find That I'm half Outta my mind I'm Not God I just wanna be But I can't match The Deity I'm Not God And I'll never be Some people think I'm half crazy Under the influence Of old King Lear I curse God I have no fear I'm Not God I just wanna be But I can't match The Deity I'm Not God And I'll never be Some people think I'm half crazy Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  21. Driving down the road 60 miles an hour It's the speed limit Don't wanna do more Cars on my bumper Pushing me along I'll keep my cool Just sing a song Bring On The Posse I ain't gonna budge I don't need police I don't need a judge Bring On The Posse Blow me off the road I'm standing my ground I'm carrying my load Walking down the street Minding my business People behind me Breathing down my neck Gimme a break Cut me some slack Get off my ass Please drop back Bring On The Posse I ain't gonna budge I don't need police I don't need a judge Bring On The Posse Blow me off the road I'm standing my ground I'm carrying my load Ain't this road long enough Long enough for us all Ain't there room enough On this sidewalk Bring On The Posse I ain't gonna budge I don't need police I don't need a judge Bring On The Posse Blow me off the road I'm standing my ground I'm carrying my load Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  22. I was never handsome I was never cool Never a wise man More of a fool Now here lately It's coming together With every year I'm Looking Better Looking Better On every page I'm gonna make it In old age Looking Better Never too late To find my destiny Beat my fate I was always heavy One step behind Hanging out with losers Out of my mind There's been a change I'm light as a feather With every step I'm Looking Better Looking Better On every page I'm gonna make it In old age Looking Better Never too late To find my destiny Beat my fate I look in the mirror And see someone Just starting out Who's just begun Looking Better On every page I'm gonna make it In old age Looking Better Never too late To find my destiny Beat my fate Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  23. Money Is Of The Essense -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I've been broke I've been down But I'm never Gonna be again Cos now I know The value of a dollar It won't matter How poor I've been Money is God Money is everything Money is all Money Is Of The Essence I've got accounts I've got annuities Stocks and bonds I've got securities I've got a good Interest rate I'll be rich It's not too late Money is God Money is everything Money is all Money Is Of The Essence Like Scarlett O'Hara In Gone With The Wind All I wanna do Is win win win Money is God Money is everything Money is all Money Is Of The Essence Money is God Money is everything Money is all Money Is Of The Essence Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  24. BuckWild Saloon A rainy night Purple rain The band's alright Posters on the wall Jones and Cash You realize Nothing can last You get old quick In This Town It's hard to get up Once you get down It's hard to succeed You just hang around You get old quick In This Town A Foreigner song Cold As Ice Seventy-six Jonelle White She died young Jonelle's gone Gone and forgot I moved on You get old quick In This Town It's hard to get up Once you get down It's hard to succeed You just hang around You get old quick In This Town I'm speaking of Nashville If you haven't guessed If you think I'm mean The answer is "Yes" You get old quick In This Town It's hard to get up Once you get down It's hard to succeed You just hang around You get old quick In This Town Jim Colyer ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
  25. Daughter of Zeus And Hippolyta Her mother is queen Of the Amazons A princess by birth From Paradise Island Brought to us By William Marston Wonder Woman Five foot ten A rare beauty Stronger than men Wonder Woman Back in fashion A heart of gold Full of compassion Using the name Diana Prince She's making America Great again Bullets and bracelets And a woman's wisdom Her lasso of truth Is doling out justice Wonder Woman Five foot ten A rare beauty Stronger than men Wonder Woman Back in fashion A heart of gold Full of compassion She's Gal Gadot Cathy Lee Crosby Lynda Carter Adrianne Palicki Wonder Woman Five foot ten A rare beauty Stronger than men Wonder Woman Back in fashion A heart of gold Full of compassion Colyer Bushmeyer Music ascap http://www.jimcolyer.com
×
×
  • Create New...