What ever happened to...Jeff Lynne?

Jeff Lynne, ELO-founder and member of the Traveling Wilburys, has recorded "Long Wave", a project of songs he used to hear on the radio in his formative years.

According to Lynne, "Long Wave attempts to recreate the feeling of an old-fashioned radio, the sound of it – the soft bottom on it and the lack of top – it's just so old fashioned and evocative."

Included are such pre-rock favorites as "Smile" and "Love Is a Many Splendored Thing," as well as the 1964 tune recorded by Don Covay & the Goodtimers, "Mercy, Mercy" – seen here in an innovative video directed by Martyn Atkins.

Springsteen's 1st U.S. Performance Of "Jungleland" Since...

Bruce Springsteen's recent concert at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts featured the first U.S. performance of "Jungleland" without "The Big Man". Jake Clemens absolutely nails the sax solo.

Beach Boys' California Saga Continues

The Beach Boys family legacy is continuing in a new group. The inspiration came from the Beach Boys’ 50th anniversary tour, as the sons and daughters wanted to create a fitting tribute to the band,

playing the band’s back catalog and straying from the material played by the Beach Boys themselves.
California Saga features Brian Wilson's daughters, Carnie and Wendy Wilson (of Wilson Phillips fame); Mike Love's son and daughter, Christian and Ambha Love; Carl Wilson's son, Justyn Wilson; Dennis Wilson's son, Carl B. Wilson; and Al Jardine's sons, Matt and Adam Jardine. The lineup will also include keyboard help from Billy Hinsche, Carl Wilson's brother-in-law, who toured with the Beach Boys for decades.

The group made their live debut with the Beach Boys on June 2nd, performing "Friends" backed by the Beach Boys touring band.

California Saga performed a longer set on July 10th at the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles. You can here an audience taping of the show here.

A Brief History of Rock

Chicago guitar salesman Alex Chadwick strums out 100 R&R riffs in twelve minutes. Did he miss anything?  Click here to view.

Where Dreams Began

In Gregg Allman's biography "My Cross to Bear", we came across some things we hadn't heard about before.  One of the stories involved Mike Finnigan (who has played with Jimi Hendrix, Joe Cocker, Etta James, Crosby Stills & Nash, Dave Mason, Buddy Guy, Manhattan Transfer, Tower of Power, Bonnie Raitt and many more). There's a great story in the book about the career-changing kindness of Mike Finnigan, and here it is:

In 1965, we (Allman Joys) played at Pepe's a Go Go, which was next store to the Whiskey a Go Go, and I was talking to this guy named Mike Finnigan who played in a band called Mike Finnigan and the Serfs.  I asked him what that big piece of wood was on the stage.  He said, "Come on up here and I'll show you."

Now, as a rule, nobody lets you play their Hammond. "Don't ride my Harley, don't mess with my wife, and no, you can't play my Hammond!" That's just it, man.  But Mike Finnigan let me sit behind his, which was very cool of him.  And man, when I heard that B3, it just melted me.  In the next day or two, he turned me on to Jimmy Smith and Groove Holmes.  That Hammond just struck me.  It was nice, round, kind of dull-ended instead of sharp, and I thought it blended with a guitar just perfect. The next time I sat down at a Hammond I would write "Dreams."

Surf's Up!

Here is a video featuring Jeff Beck, recorded at the Musicares tribute to Brian Wilson a few years back.  Jeff is backed up by Brian Wilson’s band (minus Brian), doing a mostly instrumental interpretation of Brian Wilson’s “Surfs Up”.  The video also has a version of  “Surfin' USA.” featuring Jeff Foskett's lead vocal. "Surf's Up" is amazing, and worth watching/listening to.

March 26, 1969

If you're a fan of the original line-up of the Allman Brothers Band, you may have heard the story of how the band started.

After several Sunday jam sessions in a park in Jacksonville, Duane set up a private jam session. As Butch Trucks recalls it, "We set up at Berry Oakley's house. Duane was there, so was Dicky and Jaimo and Berry and myself. We played three or four hours without stopping."

As recounted in Randy Poe's Duane Allman biography "Skydog", Duane kicked off the proceedings with a shuffle - a shuffle that lasted for hours. "We got into this jam and it went here and here and here", said Butch Trucks. "Dicky and Duane were really having a good time with each other."

Duane later recalled it this way: "We set up the equipment and whipped into a little jam. It lasted two-and-a-half hours. When we finally quit, nobody ever said a word, man. Everybody was speechless. Nobody'd ever done anything like that before - it really frightened the shit out of everybody. Right then I knew. I said, 'Man, here it is - here it is!"

Duane Allman then walked to the open doorway, stood in front of it, and said, "Anybody in this room not gonna play in my band, you're gonna have to fight your way outta here!" And then he added, "The only thing is, we need a singer - and my baby brother's the only one who can do it."

Gregg Allman recalls (as do the other surviving members who were there that day) that he arrived in town three days later, on March 26th. According to Gregg, "We all got together in the same room for the first time...and I was the last one to get there. And there were all these guys I didn't know looking at me. It was heavy."

Gregg stood and listened to the musicians tear through Muddy Waters "Trouble No More". According to Dickey Betts, "Gregg put his hands against the wall and said 'I can't play in this fucking band!'"

That set Duane off. Using the same tactics he always used with his brother, he "coerced" Gregg into reluctantly singing the song.

Gregg explained, "I never heard or sung the song before, but by God, I did it. I shut my eyes and sang, and at the end of that there was just a long silence. At that moment, we knew what we had."

Just as the other members of the band had realized three days earlier, Gregg knew he was now in perilously unexplored musical territory. He also realized that he had to write new songs that would fit within the context of the band. He already had "Dreams" and "It's Just Not My Cross To Bear". Within the next five days Gregg recalls he wrote "Whipping Post", "Black Hearted Woman" and a couple of others. "I got on a real roll there", said Gregg.