David Bowie - Aylesbury Friars Club, Aylesbury, Britain, 9-25-1971

Note that this David Bowie concert recording has been officially released, as part of the "Divine Symmetry" box set in 2022. However, I have done a lot of audio editing and added in some missing bits to make this a clear improvement over the released version, so I feel I'm justified in posting this. It is far and away the best live recording of Bowie prior to him becoming a big star with the "Ziggy Stardust" album in 1972. As such, I think it's a must have for any serious Bowie fan.

Bowie very rarely performed concerts prior to 1972, a fact he actually mentions in his banter between songs in this recording. So we're lucky to have this at all. The released version is a big sonic upgrade over the bootleg versions that had been circulating between. However, even that has issues. Most of it has soundboard-level quality. But there are issues, especially the song "Changes." That sounds only okay at the beginning of the song, then suddenly gets a lot better midway through. I couldn't make any improvements to that, and related issues.

However, there were some things I could improve. The main one was the parts that were left out. I checked the bootleg versions with the official version. The official version entirely excluded the song "Queen Bitch." I don't know why, but I'm guessing this was on a CD with some other songs, and there simply wasn't enough room to squeeze in the whole thing. That probably also explains why some of the banter between songs was removed as well. That's especially the case with the banter before "The Supermen," where two entire minutes were removed. There were other removals as well, for instance in front of "Oh, You Pretty Things." 

The first thing I did was restore the missing song and banter in their proper places. But that created a problem, because the sound quality difference between the official version and the bootleg version was stark. For the banter, luckily, I was able to close most of that gap. I ran it through the MVSEP program's de-reverb filter, and that helped. Then I took just the vocal parts of the banter tracks (which was most of them, aside from a little applause), and ran those through Adobe's vocal enhancer. That did wonders. Now, in my opinion, one can hardly tell the difference on the sourcing for the banter. I also did the same for the banter before "Changes," which sounded pretty bad on the official version.

It was harder to fix "Queen Bitch," since the bootleg version of the song was muddy. I did manage to use similar tricks to improve the clarity of the vocals somewhat. But still, at the end of the day, that one sounds worse than most of the rest of the songs. But it's still listenable, about on par with the problematic parts of "Changes" on the official version.

Bowie does a surprising number of cover versions here, by his usual standards ("Fill Your Heart," "Buzz the Fuzz," "Amsterdam," "Round and Round," and "I'm Waiting for the Man.") Maybe he was still uncertain how his own songs would go over with a concert audience. He needn't have worried, because the crowd loved him. You can especially hear that at the end, where he has to apologize because the audience didn't want him to stop but his band simply didn't have any other songs they'd practiced and were ready to play.

This album is 60 minutes long.

01 talk (David Bowie)
02 Fill Your Heart (David Bowie)
03 talk (David Bowie)
04 Buzz the Fuzz (David Bowie)
05 Space Oddity (David Bowie)
06 talk (David Bowie)
07 Amsterdam (David Bowie)
08 talk (David Bowie)
09 The Supermen (David Bowie)
10 talk (David Bowie)
11 Oh, You Pretty Things (David Bowie)
12 Eight Line Poem (David Bowie)
13 talk (David Bowie)
14 Changes (David Bowie)
15 talk (David Bowie)
16 Song for Bob Dylan (David Bowie)
17 talk (David Bowie)
18 Andy Warhol (David Bowie)
19 talk (David Bowie)
20 Queen Bitch (David Bowie)
21 Looking for a Friend (David Bowie)
22 talk (David Bowie)
23 Round and Round (David Bowie)
24 talk by emcee (David Bowie)
25 talk (David Bowie)
26 I'm Waiting for the Man (David Bowie)
27 talk (David Bowie)
28 talk by emcee (David Bowie)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/TD1x3zsQ

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/kPGLJZKfsIP9WOa/file

The cover image is from a concert poster for this exact concert. I cropped it to get it to fit into a square space. I also added in the number "1971," since I always want to include the date, month, and year for all the concerts I post. 

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison & Ringo Starr - Solo Ballads, Volume 3 (1969-2026) (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Here's the third and last of three albums collecting ballads from the solo careers of the ex-Beatles John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. I've also finished posting a similar series of three albums of rockers from them. All of these were put together by guest poster Mike Solof. But we're not quite done. Because McCartney has been so prolific, he gets an extra album of rockers and another extra album of ballads.

Once again, pretty much everything here comes from studio albums. "Mama You've Been on My Mind" is an exception, since it's a demo version that came out as a bonus track. But Mike made new mixes of four songs. A couple of them were at my request. The thinking is some of these songs were a bit too rocking to fully qualify as ballads. So the mixes strip the songs down some more.

This album is one hour long.

31 [I Want To] Come Home (Paul McCartney)
32 King of Broken Hearts [Mike's Mix 2026] (Ringo Starr)
33 Jealous Guy [Ultimate Mix] (John Lennon)
34 Warm and Beautiful (Paul McCartney)
35 Life Itself (George Harrison)
36 Love Is (Ringo Starr)
37 Happy with You (Paul McCartney)
38 Out the Blue (John Lennon)
39 Sat Singing [Mike's Mix 2026] (George Harrison)
40 Early Days (Paul McCartney)
41 Photograph [Mike's Mix 2026] (Ringo Starr)
42 Only Love Remains (Paul McCartney)
43 Imagine [Mike's Mix 2022] (John Lennon & Julian Lennon)
44 Mama You've Been on My Mind [Demo] (George Harrison)
45 As Far as We Can Go (Ringo Starr)
46 Tragedy (Paul McCartney)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/tCJixTR6

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/88IHsZeczEOLSre/file

Mike Solof sure does love imagining what the Beatles would have looked like if they all were still alive. Here's another cover image Mike made using an AI program. It's in the same style as the two previous albums in the ballads series.

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison & Ringo Starr - Solo Ballads, Volume 2 (1969-2026) (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Here is the second out of three albums where guest poster Mike Solof gathered together ballads from the solo careers of the Beatles. 

Since this is a collection of released songs, I don't have much to say. You can find more sourcing details in the mp3 tags. Also, Mike has included a list of the source albums in his PDF file added to the download zip. 

All of the songs are the official studio album versions, with the exception of "Run of the Mill," which is an unreleased demo version. However, when it comes to putting a ballads album like this Mike noticed a lot of the Beatles solo career songs tended to be more of the rocking variety. So, for five of the songs here, Mike made mixes to make these, well, more ballad-esque. Those are the ones with "[Mike's Mix 2026]" in their titles.

This album is 48 minutes long.

15 Somedays (Paul McCartney)
16 Give Me Love [Give Me Peace on Earth] (George Harrison)
17 Bless You (John Lennon)
18 Heal the Pain (Paul McCartney & George Michael)
19 Grow Old with Me [Mike's Mix 2026] (Ringo Starr)
20 Run of the Mill [Demo] (George Harrison)
21 Tomorrow (Paul McCartney)
22 Beautiful Boy [Darling Boy] (John Lennon)
23 Only You [Mike's Mix 2026] (Ringo Starr)
24 Footprints (Paul McCartney)
25 Woman [Mike's Mix 2023] (John Lennon)
26 Golden Blunders (Ringo Starr)
27 Days We Left Behind (Paul McCartney)
28 Grow Old with Me [Mike's Mix 2023] (John Lennon)
29 Just for Today [Mike's Mix] (George Harrison)
30 Jenny Wren (Paul McCartney)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/1CCu6UDj

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/9EfenBAkeihKu2n/file

The cover is more AI art Mike found on the Internet. He likes those more than I do. All the ones in this ballads series have the same style.

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison & Ringo Starr - Solo Rockers, Volume 2 (1969-2026) (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Here is the second out of three albums where guest poster Mike Solof gathered together rockers from the solo careers of the Beatles. I've already explained pretty much everything you need to know in the write-up to "Volume 1," so I'll keep this write-up short.

All the songs here have been officially released, except for "Dispute and Violence." This was a collaboration between George Harrison and Ravi Shankar that was performed during Harrison's 1974 concert tour. 

This album is an hour and one minute long. 

Note that, for this album and the others in this series and the ballads series, Mike wanted the track numbering to continue from album to album. That way, you can put them in one folder and listen to them as a single album if you want. 

15 So Glad to See You Here (Paul McCartney)
16 What You Got (John Lennon)
17 Wake Up My Love (George Harrison)
18 One (Ringo Starr)
19 Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five (Paul McCartney)
20 Devil's Radio (George Harrison)
21 Instant Karma [We All Shine On] (John Lennon)
22 Have You Seen My Baby (Ringo Starr)
23 Girls School (Paul McCartney)
24 Tight A$ (John Lennon)
25 Cloud 9 (George Harrison)
26 Oh My My (Ringo Starr)
27 Monkberry Moon Delight (Paul McCartney)
28 I Don't Wanna Face It [Mike's Mix 2025] (John Lennon)
29 Dispute and Violence (George Harrison & Ravi Shankar)
30 Only Mama Knows (Paul McCartney)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/jjye47MU

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/L7Adyk612Rd8gDn/file

The cover image is another one Mike made using AI, imagining Beatles reunions that never happened. In my opinion, this one has a late 1970s vibe.

Billy Joel - WLIR Ultrasonic Concert Series, Ultrasonic Recording Studios, Hempstead, NY, 11-9-1971

Here's WLIR Ultrasonic Concert radio broadcast. This one features Billy Joel at the very start of his solo music career.

Joel struggled for a few years in various bands, including a stint in a heavy metal duo called Attila that he would prefer to forget. In 1971, he changed direction and released his first album, "Cold Spring Harbor," in singer-songwriter mode. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure this is the first live bootleg of him, from just after that album came out. The album didn't make much of a mark, being released on a small record label, so we're lucky to have this recording at all.

However, there's a big downside in that we only 19 minutes of that radio broadcast. That's probably all there is, since it's likely he had to share the program with one or more other musical acts, due to him not having a well known name at the time.

Nineteen minutes isn't very long for an album. So I asked musical friend Mike Solof for advice, since he's a big Billy Joel fan. He pointed me to another radio show Joel did about two months later, on January 29, 1972. It's a broadcast of a few songs from a club in San Francisco (going from tracks 10 to 15). A couple of songs were the same, so I didn't include them. But the other four were different, so this other song fills out this album to a reasonable length very nicely.

The last song, "Josephine," has "[Edit]" in its title. That's because a small chunk of the middle of the song was missing. Luckily, I was able to find another version and fill it in. And also, it was a pretty small missing piece. So hopefully you won't notice the problem.

The sound quality is very good. The music remains unreleased. 

This album is 37 minutes long.

01 talk (Billy Joel)
02 Everybody Loves You Now (Billy Joel)
03 talk (Billy Joel)
04 She's Got a Way (Billy Joel)
05 All American Blues (Billy Joel)
06 talk (Billy Joel)
07 Got to Begin Again (Billy Joel)
08 talk (Billy Joel)
09 Captain Jack (Billy Joel)
10 Travelin' Prayer (Billy Joel)
11 Long, Long Time (Billy Joel)
12 talk (Billy Joel)
13 Ballad of Billy the Kid (Billy Joel)
14 Josephine [Edit] (Billy Joel)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/QpWuSsxK

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/iLD5mPGM8GbAYAT/file

The cover photo shows Billy Joel at a piano with his band behind him. I don't know the details, but I would guess it's from around 1973. In all the photos I've seen of Joel in 1971 he has a mustache, so I added a mustache to his face here.

Dana Gillespie - Hold on to Your Fire - Non-Album Tracks (1971-1976)

Recently, a commenter asked me if I still plan on posting more non-album tracks collections. Actually, I have lots of them that are already made. I just don't get around to posting them much because they're part of my music collection and I usually prioritize posting things I've recently discovered. But I'll try to get back to posting more of those. Back in 2020, I posted a non-album tracks collection by British singer-songwriter Dana Gillespie. It consisted of rare songs she did in the late 1960s. Finally, I'm back with a second such collection, from the early 1970s.

First, here's the link to the earlier collection:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2020/11/dana-gillespie-light-up-various-songs.html

At the time of the start of the music here, she had released two albums in the late 1960s, mostly consisting of her own songs. Both were well received, but neither of them were hits. Around 1970, she started musically collaborating with David Bowie, whom she had known since about 1965. She was signed to his record company and management team. Bowie even wrote a song for her, "Andy Warhol," and they performed it together on the BBC in 1971. 

The first five songs here are demos she recorded in 1971. This was half of an album with her songs on one side and Bowie's songs on the other. About 500 copies were made and circulated in the music industry to help both of them get record deals. Bowie's songs were redone for his album "Hunky Dory." These versions come from a later archival compilation called "What Memories We Make."

However, Gillespie didn't release another album out until 1973, because she got involved playing a major role (Mary Magdelene) in the first London production of the play "Jesus Christ Superstar." That kept her busy through 1972, and a soundtrack was released in 1973. Tracks 6 and 7 here are from that. 

When she finally released her next album, "Weren't Born a Man," it was a very good one. I recommend it if you haven't heard it yet. Bowie and his guitarist Mick Ronson technically produced it. But in fact, they were too busy with their careers, having turned into big stars since Bowie started collaborating with Gillespie in 1971. But Bowie did have some involvement, for instance, playing on and producing that album's version of "Andy Warhol." 

In 1974, she released another album, "Ain't Gonna Play No Second Fiddle." This was also was good, but didn't get much traction. It showed her moving more in a blues direction. Unfortunately, she began having trouble with her record company. She got stuck in a dispute, and was unable to release any more records. Her next album wouldn't come out until 1982. From that point on, she went all in on the blues, and put out many more albums in the blues style. Tracks 8 through 14 are from 1973 and 1974, and mostly consist of songs she wanted to put out on her next album. Those didn't come out until the "What Memories We Make" compilation mentioned above.

While having a music career, Gillespie also was pursuing a movie career. She certainly had the looks to be a big star. When she was blocked from making more records, she spent most of the rest of the 1970s as an actress. She landed some prominent roles, but never became a big star in that field either. The last song here is from a 1976 movie. 

One final thing. Here's an article from the Guardian about Gillespie's very interesting life. It's worth a read:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/aug/12/bowie-bed-hopping-and-the-blues-the-wild-times-of-dana-gillespie

This album is 58 minutes long.

01 Mother, Don't Be Frightened (Dana Gillespie)
02 Andy Warhol (Dana Gillespie)
03 Never Knew (Dana Gillespie)
04 All Cut Up on You (Dana Gillespie)
05 Lavender Hill (Dana Gillespie)
06 Everything's Alright (Dana Gillespie with Stephen Tate & Paul Nicholas)
07 I Don't Know How to Love Him (Dana Gillespie)
08 Hold on to Your Fire (Dana Gillespie)
09 Man Size Job (Dana Gillespie)
10 Stoke the Engine (Dana Gillespie)
11 Goin' Crazy with the Blues (Dana Gillespie)
12 Say Goodnight to the Night (Dana Gillespie)
13 Do the Spin (Dana Gillespie)
14 Gone at the Game (Dana Gillespie)
15 Celandine's Blues (Dana Gillespie)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/LAAK3hDd 

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/I0tgLutyB6aSxSK/file

The cover image is from a 1968 movie called "The Lost Continent." The original picture I found was in black and white, but I colorized it. She also had some dirty smudges on her skin, which I removed in Photoshop. 

Blue Mink - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1970-1974

Here is the second and last of BBC sessions albums for the British band Blue Mink.

As mentioned in the write-up for "Volume 1," Blue Mink was fairly popular in Britain in the early 1970s, having six Top Ten hits there. However, they never had any commercial success in the U.S. During the time period of this album, they had three big British hits: "The Banner Man," "Stay with Me," and "Randy." This has versions of the first two, but not "Randy."

Everything here is officially unreleased. Like "Volume 1," nearly all of it comes from BBC studio sessions, thanks to an anonymous friend who send the music to me. There are only two exceptions. "The Banner Man" comes from the "Whittaker's World of Music" BBC TV show, and "By the Devil (I Was Tempted)" comes from the "Cilla" BBC TV Show. 

The great thing about all the BBC sessions sources is the sound quality is excellent. The downside is BBC DJs were still in the habit of talking over the starts and ends of songs. So I had to fix that in the usual way, using the MVSEP audio editing program. That's why many of the songs have "[Edit]" in their titles.

Blue Mink's commercial success petered out after 1973. They had no songs that made the charts in 1974, and they broke up at the end of that year. But actually, except for the last song, which is from 1974, all the others here are from 1971 and 1972, when they were more popular. They may well have had more BBC sessions after 1972. However, around that time, the BBC began switching to just playing the record versions of songs. I'm not interested in posting that. So that's probably why their BBC appearances stopped after that, other than the occasional BBC TV show appearance.

This album is 48 minutes long. 

01 Mind Your Business [Edit] (Blue Mink)
02 Our World (Blue Mink)
03 Cat House [Edit] (Blue Mink)
04 Everybody's Singing like Now [Edit] (Blue Mink)
05 Live with Life [Edit] (Blue Mink)
06 Something [Edit] (Blue Mink)
07 We Have All Been Saved [Edit] (Blue Mink)
08 The Banner Man (Blue Mink)
09 Sunday (Blue Mink)
10 Count Me In [Edit] (Blue Mink)
11 Mayday [Edit] (Blue Mink)
12 Wacky, Wacky, Wacky (Blue Mink)
13 Just Goes to Show (Blue Mink)
14 Stay with Me (Blue Mink)
15 By the Devil [I Was Tempted] (Blue Mink)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/sYPYVgLE

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/EFQfVAaI75iIVz4/file

The cover image shows the band performing on an unknown TV show in April 1971. The image focuses on the band's two lead singers, Roger Cook and Madeline Bell.

Covered: Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff, Volume 2: 1970-1973

I haven't posted much at this blog in recent days, but for a very good reason: I've been fully focused on finishing the "Maximum Wall" version of Pink Floyd's "The Wall." It's still some days away from completion, but the end is very much in sight. Fabio from Rio has helped greatly in adding a visual aspect to an accompanying booklet that has now grown to over 150 pages! I'm hoping the final product will blow your socks off.

Luckily, I had a bunch of albums mostly ready to be posted in preparation for my vacation, and I still have some of those to post. So here's another one. Let's continue with the "Covered" albums by Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, usually just called "Gamble and Huff." Here's the second volume out of four.

By 1970, Gamble and Huff had enough of a track record of writing and producing soul music hits that they were ready to start their own record company. So they created Philadelphia International. It was backed by CBS Records, and distributed by them. This new company was up and running by 1971. Soon, they were having even more hits, and bigger hits too.

At the same time Gamble and Huff and Philadelphia International were on the rise, Motown Records was self destructing. I've described this in other write-ups. But, in short, it seems label owner Berry Gordy grew tired of the music business and wanted to become a multimedia company, with much more focus on T.V. and movies. So he moved the company from Detroit to Los Angeles, and lost most of the musical talent along the way. (And yet, for all that, Motown only had a couple of movie successes.) Thus, Philadelphia was able to largely replace Detroit as the place to be for soul music in the early 1970s.

Furthermore, as time went on, Gamble and Huff began to develop an increasingly distinctive style.  Here's how it is described in their Wikipedia entry: "Gamble and Huff's Philadelphia soul sound evolved from the simpler arrangements of the late-1960s into a style featuring lush strings, thumping basslines, and sliding hi-hat rhythms - elements that soon became the distinguishing characteristics of a new style of music called disco."

Some hits here were massive. For instance, "Me and Mrs. Jones," "Love Train," and "TSOP [The Sound of Philadelphia]" weren't just Number Ones on the U.S. soul singles charts, they were Number Ones on the U.S pop charts as well! Furthermore, they had many more hits than this. I just selected the cream of the crop, so these albums would have wider appeal.

All through this time period, the Gamble and Huff songwriting partnership was going strong. The vast majority of the songs here were written by the two of them, and with nobody else. However, occasionally there were additional songwriters. For instance, "Drowning in the Sea of Love" was also written by Joe Simon, and a songwriter named Cary Gilbert helped write "Me and Mrs. Jones." 

This album is 54 minutes long.

01 Get Me Back on Time, Engine Number 9, Part 1 (Wilson Pickett)
02 Drowning in the Sea of Love (Joe Simon)
03 I'll Do Anything [He Wants Me To] (Doris Troy)
04 Back Stabbers (O'Jays)
05 Me and Mrs. Jones (Billy Paul)
06 One Night Affair (Jerry Butler)
07 When the World's at Peace (O'Jays)
08 If You Don't Know Me by Now (Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes)
09 Power of Love (Joe Simon)
10 Love Train (O'Jays)
11 Am I Black Enough for You (Billy Paul)
12 I'll Always Love My Mama (Intruders)
13 Break Up to Make Up (Stylistics)
14 The Love I Lost, Part 1 (Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes)
15 Put Your Hands Together (O'Jays)
16 TSOP [The Sound of Philadelphia] (MFSB with the Three Degrees)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/EjhUcS2T

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/qf93VFHAlUX1weE/file

The cover image is from 1973. I moved the two people closer using Photoshop. Also, the original picture was in black and white. But I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program. That's Huff on the left and Gamble on the right.

The Carpenters - Singles Uncovered, Volume 1: 1969-1972 (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Hi Everybody,

This is Mike Solof, a frequent guest poster at this blog, and temporary introduction writer. Paul just texted me and asked if I would write a brief intro to my latest project for him, since he is gallavanting around Spain on vacation right now. I told him I would be happy to give it a whirl. So here, just like Paul would, is my whirl (written as if in Paul's voice):

Over the years, I have featured a lot of variations on Carpenters songs for this blog. Today, we continue that tradition once again. In the past, I have featured full acapella, and near acappella versions, piano recitals, and BBC sessions (some done by another guest poster, Fabio from Rio). Obviously there is just something about Karen’s voice and her harmonies with her brother Richard that we just can’t seem to get enough of around here. So when Mike approached me to do yet another take on their music, it was a no brainer. His versions follow the same path he takes with his Uncovered Beatles series. In those, he created new versions of songs you know and love by ripping apart the the commercial versions using modern audio editing technology, and eliminating the excessive and unneeded additions which in this case was all the orchestral backings, as well as the overuse of choral singers in their later years. This leaves the basic tracks, which usually include Karen’s and Richard’s vocals, accompanied by bass, drums, piano,  and guitar. Mike occasionally left in other instruments as well to fill out the extra quiet spots. He calls this "Pure Carpenters," and I tend to agree.

So here is Volume One, which covers the years 1969-1972. two more volumes will follow.

I did convince him he would have to change his picture for the cover though. What you see, presented here, is a shot he found online of Karen and Richard mixing their first album. His original version, had a beautiful picture of just two random carpenters working on a house. That’s his sense of humor, so ask him for that version if you’d like a copy. He’s strange in that way, but he hopes you enjoy this new project as much as he enjoyed putting it together.

---

Thanks, Mike. This is the real Paul writing again. Everything up above is true except for the part about the  original cover art featuring to actual carpenters working on a house instead of the two members of the Carpenters. Mike really wanted to use that, but I fought him tooth and nail on it. However, you can see it below if you're curious. You can also see it in the PDF file that he included in the download zip.

This album is 56 minutes long.

01 Ticket to Ride (Carpenters)
02 Your Wonderful Parade (Carpenters)
03 Don't Be Afraid (Carpenters)
04 All of My Life (Carpenters)
05 [They Long to Be] Close to You (Carpenters)
06 I Kept on Loving You (Carpenters)
07 We've Only Just Begun (Carpenters)
08 Mr. Guder (Carpenters)
09 Maybe It's You [Piano Version] (Carpenters)
10 Merry Christmas Darling (Carpenters)
11 For All We Know (Carpenters)
12 Rainy Days and Mondays (Carpenters)
13 Saturday (Carpenters)
14 Superstar [Groupie] (Carpenters)
15 Let Me Be the One (Carpenters)
16 Drucilla Penny (Carpenters)
17 One Love (Carpenters)
18 Bless the Beasts and the Children (Carpenters)
19 Hurting Each Other (Carpenters)

Maybe It's You [Orchestra Version] (Carpenters) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/aiKnKZiF

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/p7xLQDFG3Cz009H/file 

The cover image was chosen by Mike. I don't know the details. But they look pretty young. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program.

Also, just for fun, Mike asked me to make this alternate cover, which is a, uh, much more literal take on the word "Carpenters."

Covered: Brian Wilson, Volume 1: 1963-1978 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

June 11th marks the first anniversary of the passing of musical genius Brian Wilson (1942–2025), who would have turned 84 on June 20th had he still been with us. This seems like the perfect moment to post "Covered" albums devoted to this extraordinary songwriter. Since Brian is, of course, closely associated with the Beach Boys, the "Covered: Brian Wilson" collection also serves as an indirect tribute to the legendary vocal group, highlighting the enormous influence they have had on generations of musicians since the 1960s.

This collection is another collaboration with Fabio from Rio. He is a devoted Beach Boys fan and, in fact, his first guest post here was a tribute to Brian Wilson, written and published just days after Brian’s death one year ago. You can find it here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2025/06/various-artists-songs-in-key-of-brian.html

It is therefore no surprise that he embraced this project wholeheartedly and came up with hundreds of potential covers, which were eventually trimmed down to exactly 100 tracks spread across five volumes. These 100 recordings represent 98 different compositions, since we made minor exceptions to my usual policy of avoiding duplicate songs by including two versions each of "God Only Knows" and "Good Vibrations", which will appear in later volumes.

Most of the songs here were not hits in their cover versions or at least were not big hits. But there is one important exception: “Surf City” was a Number One hit in the US in 1963 for Jan and Dean. The song was written by Wilson and Jan Berry of Jan and Dean fame. However, even though a lot of these were not the big hits, they were intended to be, it shows that Wilson’s songs were being widely covered practically from the very beginning of his career with The Beach Boys in 1962.

Note that during The time period of this album, 1963 to 1978, Wilson wrote or cowrote dozens of hit songs for the Beach Boys. Fabio and I were careful to never use the Beach Boys versions or solo Brian Wilson versions, but only covers by other musical acts. It just so happens that many of the best covers of those hits from this time come later. So if you don’t see some of your favorite songs, just wait to see what we come up with for the later volumes.

Out of these 23 tracks here, only 12 were recorded by the Beach Boys around the time of their first release. The remaining 11 tracks were originally recorded by other artists, demonstrating that Brian's talent was not limited to his own group.

These are the non-Beach Boys tracks: 

01 Drag City (Jan & Dean)

02 He's a Doll (Honeys)

03 Surf City (Jan & Dean)

04 The One You Can't Have (Honeys)

06 The New Girl in School (Jan & Dean)

08 Guess I'm Dumb (Glen Campbell)

13 Time to Get Alone (Redwood)

17 Good Time (American Spring)

19 Sweet Mountain (American Spring)

20 Had to Phone Ya (American Spring)

23 Almost Summer (Celebration)

A few of those songs - tracks 13, 17, and 20 - were later done by the Beach Boys. And Celebration was a side project for Beach Boys singer Mike Love.

Particularly noteworthy are the Honeys / American Spring (a.k.a. Spring), which together are represented here by five songs. The Honeys were a pop group formed by sisters Marilyn Rovell (later Marilyn Wilson), Diane Rovell, and Barbara Rovell (the latter eventually replaced by their cousin, Ginger Blake). In many ways, they were a female counterpart to the Beach Boys. They were discovered by Gary Usher at a talent show in 1961. Usher eventually introduced them to Brian, who renamed the group and began dating Marilyn. The couple married in December 1964.

The Honeys dissolved in 1970 when Ginger left the group to pursue a solo career. Marilyn and Diane then formed Spring, and later added "American" to the band's name after encountering trademark issues with a British group of the same name that threatened legal action. American Spring released a single album in 1972, produced by Brian Wilson, and recorded several additional tracks in 1977–1978 for a second album that was never released. Some of these recordings would later appear on compilations and anthologies. "Had to Phone Ya," recorded before the Beach Boys' own version, is one such example. 

This album is one hour long.

01 Drag City (Jan & Dean)
02 He's a Doll (Honeys)
03 Surf City (Jan & Dean)
04 The One You Can't Have (Honeys)
05 You're So Good to Me (Fireballs)
06 The New Girl in School (Jan & Dean)
07 Don't Worry Baby (Ivy League)
08 Guess I'm Dumb (Glen Campbell)
09 Here Today (Bobby Vee)
10 I'm Waiting for the Day (Peanut)
11 Don't Talk [Put Your Head on My Shoulder] (Carmen McRae)
12 The Little Girl I Once Knew (Bystanders)
13 Time to Get Alone (Redwood)
14 Aren't You Glad (Peggy March)
15 Darlin' (Paper Dolls)
16 Friends (Chicks)
17 Good Time (American Spring)
18 Vegetables (Jan & Dean)
19 Sweet Mountain (American Spring)
20 Had to Phone Ya (American Spring)
21 Sail On Sailor (KGB)
22 Breakaway (Wildfire)
23 Almost Summer (Celebration)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ypFoz44W

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/DdA0Xae8n72zlKI/file

The cover image is from 1964.

Covered: George Harrison, Volume 1: 1964-1971

It's time that I tackle a truly great songwriter for the "Covered" series: George Harrison. I hope and assume that anyone reading the blog already knows that he was a member of the Beatles. This series includes songs he wrote while in the Beatles with songs from his long solo career afterwards. I found enough for six volumes.

Harrison is such a famous musician that I'm not going to try to sum up his life or even just his music career. But I do want to write some about the early evolution of his songwriting.

When it came to writing songs, he was a late bloomer. In the Beatles, John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote about 100 songs separately or together before the Beatles released their first album in 1963. (A lot of them were discarded.) Harrison was watching and learning from one of the greatest songwriting teams of all time. But apparently it wasn't until 1963 when he wrote his first complete song, or at least one he considered good enough to show to the other Beatles. His "Don't Bother Me" would appear on the band's second album, "With The Beatles." He wrote it while sick in bed during the summer of 1963. He later said that it was as an exercise to see if he could write a song, and "at least it showed me that all I needed to do was keep on writing, and then maybe eventually I would write something good."

But despite this early success (which, in fact, was a good song), the next two Beatles albums went by without any original Harrison songs on them. (He occasionally sang cover versions on Beatles recordings instead.) He later said that he lacked confidence and found it hard to compete with what he called the many "wondrous hits" written by the Lennon-McCartney team. But then the 1965 Beatles album "Help!" contained two of his songs. From that point on, every Beatles album contained at least one of his songs, usually two, and once three. (There were four on 1968's "The White Album," but that can be seen as two albums with two of his songs each.) He also had the occasional song come out on a B-side or archival release. Ultimately, 22 of his songs were released while the Beatles were together, out of 188 original songs by the band in total. But a few more of his songs trickled out in archival releases, such as "You Know What to Do," "Not Guilty," and "All Things Must Pass." There are still more of his songs the Beatles tried in the studio but remain unreleased. Most of those eventually appeared on his solo albums.

Unfortunately, for many years, Lennon and McCartney underestimated Harrison's songwriting, and didn't do much to encourage him. The two of them were writing so many excellent songs that they weren't keen to find room for many of Harrison's songs as well. But by 1969, that changed. Harrison's two songs for the "Abbey Road" album that year, "Something" and "Here Comes the Sun," aren't just great Beatles songs, they're some of the best and most acclaimed songs of all time. "Something" is one of the most frequently covered songs ever, and as I write this in 2026, "Here Comes the Sun" is the most listened Beatles song on Spotify. 

As a result, Lennon and McCartney could no longer downplay Harrison's songwriting talent. Lennon called "Something" the best song on "Abbey Road." And, in 1969, McCartney said, "I think that until now, until this year, our songs have been better than George's. Now this year his songs are at least as good as ours." Also, decades later, McCartney had this to say: "It was easy to underestimate George because me and John... had always written most of the stuff... and George was a late bloomer as far as writing was concerned. He wasn't that interested in the beginning but then he started to get interested and, boy, did he bloom, you know? He wrote some of the greatest songs ever."

On September 8, 1969, the Beatles had an important meeting about their future plans. Ringo Starr couldn't attend, so the other Beatles made a tape recording of the meeting. That means a recording of exactly what was said has survived. In the meeting, due to the undeniable success of Harrison's songs on "Abbey Road," Harrison was treated as a songwriting equal to Lennon and McCartney, perhaps for the first time within the band. 

Lennon had been drifting away from the Beatles for some time, distracted by his relationship with Yoko Ono and hobbled by a heroin addiction. But in the meeting, he suggested the Beatles record a new album and a new single before the end of 1969, which would have been an ambitious schedule. He also suggested that he, McCartney, and Harrison get four songs each on every Beatles album moving forward, with Starr getting one or two if he wanted. (At this point, Starr had only written two songs on Beatles albums credited solely to him.)

Here's an entire article about that meeting. It's fascinating reading if you're a Beatles fan, with a lot of discussion about Harrison's songwriting and his role in the band: 

https://www.guitarplayer.com/guitarists/john-lennon-plan-to-keep-the-beatles-together

Unfortunately though, later that month, Lennon took part in a rock festival in Toronto, Canada, as a solo artist. That experience went so well for him that it gave him the confidence to want to leave the Beatles and have a solo career instead. About a month after that, he told the other Beatles he was leaving the band, although they kept that a secret for another six months due to wanting to present a united front in a legal dispute they were having with their record company.

However, even after Lennon's announcement he was leaving, there was still a chance the Beatles would continue, releasing more solo albums mixed with Beatles albums where Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison would get four albums each. Here's the audio of a radio interview Harrison did in March 1970 where he talked about the Beatles getting back together later in 1970 to record another album after all four of them did solo albums:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-fNA3Ee5eM 

Unfortunately, growing problems prevented that from happening, most especially due to financial conflicts between the band members as they fought over management and ended up suing each other. But that meant that by 1970, Harrison had a big backlog of excellent songs he'd been writing. Many of them came out on his classic and very successful solo album "All Things Must Pass" later in 1970. (Technically, it was a triple album, but it's basically a double album of songs because the third album just contains some long jam sessions.) A lot of those were written much earlier, but had been ignored by the other Beatles. For instance, "Isn't It a Pity" was written back in 1966, and had been rejected by the others for both the "Revolver" and "Sgt. Pepper's" albums!

Anyway, let me steer this more to discussing the songs on this volume. Across the six volumes in this series, I have included ALL the songs Harrison wrote for the Beatles, but most of them don't show up until later volumes, just because what I considered the best cover versions didn't happen until years later. Instead, this volume has many songs that Harrison was writing with and/or for other musical acts at the time, since usually the best (and often the only) versions were the first ones. So, for instance, "Sour Milk Sea" was a song he wrote for Jackie Lomax, though Lomax's 1968 single of it didn't make the charts. He co-wrote "Badge" with Eric Clapton, and it was released by the band Clapton was in at the time, Cream. 

"Hurdy Gurdy Man" is an interesting case. Donovan wrote it when he was vacationing in India with the Beatles and others in 1968. It was a big hit, making the Top Five in both the U.S. and Britain that year. But it turns out Harrison helped him out, writing a verse of the song by himself. But when the song came out as a single, the Harrison verse was missing. It was cut by the producer, due to the pressure of keeping a single under three minutes. Donovan later regretted this, saying it was the best verse in the song. He has often performed the Harrison verse in concert ever since. Apparently, Harrison was also very disappointed the verse wasn't included. I've used a live solo acoustic version from 1973 that includes that verse. But I put it in 1968 chronologically, since that's when Donovan's version of the song first came out (and when the Harrison verse should have come out as well).

"Octopus's Garden" is another tricky case. Technically, and legally, that song was written solely by Ringo Starr, and was included on the Beatles' "Abbey Road" album. But, in fact, it's pretty obvious to me that while the original idea was Starr's, Harrison played a key role finishing the song. At the time, Starr had barely done any songwriting, and he needed help. Harrison did Starr a favor by not asking for a songwriting credit. In both the "Let It Be" and "The Beatles: Get Back" films, one can actually see footage of Harrison helping him write the song while also teaching songwriting techniques.

Basically, the exact same thing happened with "It Don't Come Easy." The song was released as a solo single by Starr in 1971, and it made the Top Five in both the U.S. and Britain. Here's an except from the Wikipedia entry about the song: "Although Starr received sole writing credit for 'It Don't Come Easy,' Beatles historian Bruce Spizer writes that he had 'substantial, but uncredited, assistance' from his bandmate George Harrison. In author Robert Rodriguez's description, the official songwriting credit was long thought to be 'bogus' and, notwithstanding Starr's involvement, a sign of Harrison's 'great generosity' in wanting to help the drummer establish himself independently of the Beatles." Starr started writing it in 1968 by himself, but he had trouble finishing songs. I would guess Harrison wrote half or more of it.

A couple of songs here you might not recognize, even if you're a big fan of Harrison's music, because he never released his own versions of them: "Ain't That Cute" by Doris Troy, "Sing One for the Lord" by Billy Preston, and "I'm Your Spiritual Breadman" by Ashton, Gardner and Dyke. In each case, he was involved in the production and/or recording of albums by those artists, and got involved enough to write or co-write some songs. "Try Some, Buy Some" by Ronnie Spector was another case of that, but he eventually did release his own version of that one.

This album is 59 minutes long.

01 Don't Bother Me (Gregory Phillips)
02 If I Needed Someone (Hollies)
03 Sour Milk Sea (Jackie Lomax)
04 Hurdy Gurdy Man (Donovan)
05 Badge (Cream)
06 Octopus's Garden (Ringo Starr)
07 My Sweet Lord (Billy Preston)
08 Something (Shirley Bassey)
09 Ain't That Cute (Doris Troy)
10 Sing One for the Lord (Billy Preston)
11 Here Comes the Sun (Richie Havens)
12 Taxman (Junior Parker)
13 It Don't Come Easy (Ringo Starr)
14 I'm Your Spiritual Breadman (Ashton, Gardner & Dyke)
15 Try Some, Buy Some (Ronnie Spector)
16 Let It Down (Stone the Crows)
17 The Inner Light (Jimmy McGriff & Junior Parker)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/MtrvVGxu

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/IIi6h8Vu3ZIF8Yh/file

The cover image is from 1965.

Covered: Neil Young: Alternates, Volume 1: 1966-2001 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

Back in March 2026, I posted no less than ten volumes of the "Covered" series for Neil Young. Surely, you'd think, that's enough. Ten volumes is more than any of the other dozens of artists in the "Covered" series. But no, there's more! In making those ten albums, guest posted Fabio from Rio did most of the hard work, collecting hundreds of different cover versions, and presenting them to me in an organized fashion. But I did most of the selecting of which songs made the final cut. This, by contrast, represents Fabio's choices for the best of the rest. I had a little say, but just a song or two here and there where I suggested a different version or something like that. 

Fabio found enough for four volumes of "Covered" alternates. Here's the first one. Across these four volumes, about half the songs are different versions of songs that were included on the previously posted ten Neil Young "Covered" volumes. But the other half are songs that didn't feature on those volumes at all.

Fabio has written some liner notes, which are included in the download zip. But since these volumes are more like an addendum to those earlier ten volumes, he wrote just one essay for all four volumes, without song-by-song explanations.

For some musical acts in the "Covered" series, they had a lot of hits, and the choices of which covers to pick is pretty straight forward - the hit versions. But with Neil Young, it was much more subjective, since there have been tons of covers, but very few hits. So one person's trash is another person's treasure. You may well like some of these better. 

This album is an hour and two minutes long.

01 Flying on the Ground Is Wrong (Guess Who)
02 Down to the Wire (Yellow Hand)
03 Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing (Carpenters)
04 Down by the River (Buddy Miles)
05 Til the Morning Comes (Francoise Hardy)
06 I Believe in You (Linda Ronstadt)
07 Hold Back the Tears (Jessi Colter)
08 Revolution Blues (Band of Blacky Ranchette)
09 Already One (Aaron Springfield)
10 Human Highway (Jim Witter & Cassandra Vasik)
11 Borrowed Tune (Marc Jordan)
12 Pushed It Over the End (Rich Hand)
13 Big Time (Black Crowes)
14 The Old Laughing Lady (Stereophonics)
15 Motion Pictures (Mercury Rev)
16 Mellow My Mind (Hederos & Hellberg)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/kra1ih4k

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/yfTyPoRmZ7KvcBd/file

The cover image is from 1969 or 1970. It was taken from a black and white photo of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program.

Frank Zappa - 1971-1988 Strictly Commercial Live (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Guest poster Mike Solof has been busily slaving away in the salt mines, coming up with more albums to post at this blog. In particular, he's got a big Beatles project coming that hopefully will knock your socks off. Unfortunately, I've fallen behind getting some things ready to post, but hopefully I'll catch up soon. For this album, he came up with the idea of collecting live versions of all the songs on the Frank Zappa best of collection "Strictly Commercial."

I'll leave most of the explaining to Mike, in his PDF notes included in the download zip. But Zappa was well known for his lead guitar playing, and he's able to stretch some songs out here. For instance, the official album is about an hour and 17 minutes long, whereas this is almost two hours long. A lot of the difference there is with "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow." The official album has the three minute long single version, but this is a 20-minute-long live version of the entire suite. 

As is Mike's style, he's included a gapless single file of the album in the download zip, for those who prefer to hear it that way.

By the way, all the songs here feature Frank Zappa, except for one. His only Top Forty hit in the U.S. was "Valley Girl," in 1982. But that featured his daughter Moon Unit Zappa on lead vocals instead of him, and she was only 14 years old at the time. So it turns out he never performed the song before dying in 1993. But, much later, in 2010, his children Dweezil and Moon Unit performed the song in concert just once. So that's the version included here. But note the sound quality is a bit rough on that compared to everything else. It's one of only two unreleased versions (along with "Sexual Harassment in the Workplace)." All the others were chosen from the many dozens of official live albums.

This album is an hour and 56 minutes long. 

01 Peaches en Regalia (Frank Zappa)
02 Don't Eat the Yellow Snow (Frank Zappa)
03 Dancin' Fool (Frank Zappa)
04 San Ber'dino (Frank Zappa)
05 Let's Make the Water Turn Black (Frank Zappa)
06 Dirty Love (Frank Zappa)
07 My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama (Frank Zappa)
08 Cosmik Debris (Frank Zappa)
09 Trouble Every Day (Frank Zappa)
10 Disco Boy (Frank Zappa)
11 Bobby Brown Goes Down (Frank Zappa)
12 I'm the Slime (Frank Zappa)
13 Joe's Garage (Frank Zappa)
14 Fine Girl (Frank Zappa)
15 Planet of the Baritone Women (Frank Zappa)
16 Sexual Harassment in the Workplace [Instrumental] (Frank Zappa)
17 Tell Me You Love Me (Frank Zappa)
18 Montana (Frank Zappa)
19 Be in My Video (Frank Zappa)
20 Valley Girl (Dweezil Zappa & Moon Unit Zappa)
21 Who Are the Brain Police (Frank Zappa)
22 Muffin Man [Extra Guitar Mix] (Frank Zappa) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/424ohU9v 

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/WWM2Cx8sAJ0funq/file

The cover art is by Greg Joens. The original version was in black and white. I colorized it (because I hate black and white covers) with the use of the Kolorize program.

Various Artists - Covered: Dennis Lambert & Brian Potter: 1965-1985

A week or two ago (as I write this in mid-May 2026), a commenter named Rich had the excellent suggestion that I should make a "Covered" album for the songwriting team of Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter. So thank you, Rich. They fit the format of the "Covered" series perfectly, because they had no careers as performers, but they wrote a lot of hits for others.

Lambert and Potter are a rare case of a successful trans-Atlantic songwriting partnership. Lambert was born in 1947 and raised in New York City. Potter was born in 1939 and raised in the Essex countryside of England. Lambert joined a record company in 1965, working in A&R, production, and songwriting. I'm not sure what Potter did at first (with him being almost ten years older than Lambert), but in 1965 he already had a big songwriting success, helping to write "What'cha Gonna Do about It," the first British hit for the Small Faces. Meanwhile, Lambert had a decent success in 1965 as well, co-writing "Do the Freddie," a hit for Freddie and the Dreamers.

Lambert and Potter met when Lambert was in London in 1969. The two of them decided to write songs together. They both moved to Los Angeles and began working with a record company there. One of their first songs they wrote together was "One Tin Solder." It made the Top Forty in the U.S. for the band the Original Caste. Then it would get higher on the charts in 1971 for the band Coven. Their first really big success together though was "Don't Pull Your Love," which was a Top Five U.S. hit in 1971 for Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds.

From that point on, they had many more hits all through the 1970s. I've only included the ones I like best here. There were others that were Top Forty hits. Their songwriting continued until about 1980. I don't know much about Potter's career, but it seemed he stopped writing songs around that time, because I don't find any more songwriting credits for him after 1980. 

However, Lambert kept going well into the 1980s, writing with others. He didn't have that many hits, but he had a couple of really big ones. He co-wrote "Nightshift" with a member of the Commodores, and the Commodores had a Top Five hit with it in both the U.S. and Britain in 1985. 

He also helped write "We Built This City." That song was originally written by Martin Page and Bernie Taupin (the latter being the main co-writer for Elton John). But their version was lacking something. So Lambert and a producer named Peter Wolf drastically changed it. (That's a different Peter Wolf than the one in the J. Geils Band, by the way.) The result was a smash, going all the way to Number One in the U.S. for Starship in 1985. Personally, I don't think it's a bad song, but it's hated by a lot of people, making several worst songs of all time lists by critics.

Since then, Lambert and Potter presumably both eventually retired. But both of them are still alive as I write this in 2026. 

Here's the Wikipedia page for Lambert:

Dennis Lambert - Wikipedia

And here's the one for Potter:

Brian Potter (musician) - Wikipedia  

This album is 57 minutes long. 

01 What'cha Gonna Do about It (Small Faces)
02 Do the Freddie (Freddie & the Dreamers)
03 Delighted to See You (Honeybus)
04 One Tin Soldier (Original Caste)
05 Don't Pull Your Love (Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds)
06 Keeper of the Castle (Four Tops)
07 The Runway (Grass Roots)
08 Ain’t No Woman [Like the One I’ve Got] (Four Tops)
09 Love Music (Sergio Mendes)
10 Are You Man Enough (Four Tops)
11 Country Boy [You Got Your Feet in L.A.] (Glen Campbell)
12 One Chain [Don’t Make No Prison] (Four Tops)
13 It Only Takes a Minute (Tavares)
14 Open Invitation (Santana)
15 Don't Look Any Further (Dennis Edwards & Siedah Garrett)
16 We Built This City (Starship)
17 Nightshift (Commodores)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rrnJPb9s

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/oLZomJN7xtUUHiG/file

The cover image was the cover photo for an issue of Songwriter Magazine in 1977. That's Dennis Lambert on the left and Brian Potter (with the blue shirt) on the right.

The Carpenters - Imaginary Piano Recital, Volume 1: 1970-1975 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

Here's another Fabio from Rio guest post. It's the first of two volumes featuring the Carpenters. Basically, Fabio and I love Karen Carpenter's voice, but the production of Carpenters records usually left a lot to be desired. Too often, the songs were drenched with syrupy strings and other overproduction that detracted from the beauty of her voice, and the song, instead of adding to them. So we've tried to counter that in various ways. First, I posted a "Near Acappella" album that stripped the music just down to vocals, bass, and drums. Then, we posted two completely "Acappella" albums. Now, there's this. The idea is, an imaginary piano recital, with nothing but Karen Carpenter singing, and usually her brother Richard playing piano.

Fabio found all the songs for this. First, he found some other people on the Internet who already had used audio editing technology to strip official studio versions of songs down to just lead vocals and piano. But many songs he liked hadn't been given that treatment, or hadn't been stripped enough, so he did his own audio editing. So all the songs have been edited, heavily, but the ones with "[Edit]" in them specifically indicate the ones with Fabio's editing.

Fabio has a lot more to say on this. So check out his liner notes that are included in the download zip. 

This album is 52 minutes long, not including the bonus track.

01 [They Long to Be] Close to You [Edit] (Carpenters)
02 Maybe It's You [Edit] (Carpenters)
03 For All We Know (Carpenters)
04 One Love [Edit] (Carpenters)
05 Rainy Days and Mondays [BBC Version] [Edit] (Carpenters)
06 Superstar [Groupie] [Edit] (Carpenters)
07 A Song for You [Edit] (Carpenters)
08 I Won't Last a Day without You [Edit] (Carpenters)
09 I Can't Make Music [Edit] (Carpenters)
10 Sing [Edit] (Carpenters)
11 The End of the World [Edit] (Carpenters)
12 Top of the World [Edit] (Carpenters)
13 Yesterday Once More [Edit] (Carpenters)
14 Love Me for What I Am [Edit] (Carpenters)
15 Solitaire [Edit] (Carpenters)

Top of the World [Country Singalong Version] [Edit] (Carpenters) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/m4XXvPoN

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/mvMqUYAmX1OEhxY/file

For the cover image, we wanted to show Karen singing and Richard playing piano. Luckily, we found two, just enough for our two volumes. I don't know the details of where or when this image was taken though, except that it's "circa 1971."

Aretha Franklin - Montreux Jazz Festival, Casino de Montreux, Montreux, Switzerland, 6-12-1971

Guest poster Fabio from Rio is in the process of making an interesting Aretha Franklin compilation. While I was helping him gather songs for that, I came across this concert. It was broadcast on T.V. in 1971, so the sound quality is excellent. However, it seems to have languished in obscurity as an audio bootleg. I'm hoping to help fix that with this post.

Franklin's peak years were 1967 to 1974. In terms of the song list, this was pretty standard for the time, and there's a lot of similarity with her 1971 live album, "Aretha Live at Fillmore West." But there are very few live recordings from that era with great sound quality, so I figure this is worth posting.

As a nice bonus, the leader of her band in this concert was saxophonist King Curtis, a star in his own right. He features prominently on the first two songs before Franklin even came to the stage, especially "Soul Serenade," which was a hit for him in 1964. Sadly, he died just two months later when he was stabbed by a stranger in New York City. 

This album is 54 minutes long. 

01 Soul Serenade [Instrumental] (Aretha Franklin)
02 Aretha Introduction [Instrumental] (Aretha Franklin)
03 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
04 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin)
05 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
06 Call Me (Aretha Franklin)
07 Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
08 Share Your Love with Me (Aretha Franklin)
09 Don't Play That Song [You Lied] (Aretha Franklin)
10 Bridge Over Troubled Water (Aretha Franklin)
11 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)
12 Spirit in the Dark (Aretha Franklin) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/FtxvfkAE

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/8YFwGQVz8UY0sPs/file

The cover image is a screenshot from this exact concert. 

Various Artists - Covered: Randy Newman, Volume 1: 1963-1973

Whenever I think about the "Covered" series of albums I've made, I get frustrated, because I've got dozens that I've never gotten around to posting. I guess I enjoy the making of the albums more than the steps needed to post them. It feels like unfinished homework. But I'm going to make more of an effort to fix that, starting with a triple-header of Randy Newman.

Here's some highlights from his Wikipedia entry:  

"[Newman] is an American singer-songwriter, pianist, composer, and arranger. Born in Los Angeles to an extended family of Hollywood film composers, he is known for his Americana-inspired songs, non-rhotic Southern-accented singing style, and typically mordant or satirical lyrics. Since the 1990s, he has worked mainly in film scoring, most popularly for Disney and Pixar. ... Newman has received numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards (out of 22 nominations), three Emmys, seven Grammy Awards, as well as nominations for a BAFTA Award and seven Golden Globe Awards. His award-winning film work includes 'Ragtime' (1981), 'The Natural' (1984), 'Toy Story' (1995), 'A Bug's Life' (1998), 'Pleasantville' (1998), 'Monsters, Inc.' (2001), 'Cars' (2006), 'The Princess and the Frog' (2009), 'Toy Story 3' (2010), and 'Marriage Story' (2019). He was honored with the Recording Academy's Governors Award in 2003, a Disney Legend award in 2007, and inductions into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002 and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013."

As mentioned above, he was born in Los Angeles. But he also spent many of his childhood summers in New Orleans. That would prove to be important, because his songwriting would be heavily influenced by New Orleans styles. And also as mentioned above, he was part of an extended family of Hollywood film composers. His mother and father had regular jobs (as secretary and internist, respectively), but three of his uncles were film composers, and so were three cousins. 

He began writing songs professionally by the age of 17. He put out a single under his own name in 1962, but it flopped. So he decided to try writing songs for others for a while. He began having successes almost immediately. The first song here, "Hold Your Head High" by Jackie DeShannon, is from 1963. 

Also very early on, he began writing instrumental music for TV shows, starting with an episode of "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis" in 1962. That talent would continue to grow, leading to him to eventually doing full movie soundtracks starting in 1971. More on that in a later volume though.

Alan Price helped boost Newman's songwriting career in 1967. For one thing, he had a hit with Newman's "Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear." But also, he was so taken by Newman's songwriting that his 1967 album "A Price on His Head" had no less than seven songs by Newman. Harry Nilsson paid him an even bigger compliment by covering an entire album of his songs in 1970, "Nilsson Sings Newman."

Newman finally released his first album under his own name in 1968, "Randy Newman (Creates Something New Under the Sun)." It was a critical success, and it led to even more musical acts covering his songs, but it didn't sell well. It didn't even reach the top 200 U.S. albums chart. For the next ten years or so, he would continue to be a cult artist, meaning he was critically praised and beloved by a small group of fans, but didn't have much wider commercial success. 

Meanwhile, his songwriting continued to get better and better. It arguably peaked with his 1972 album "Sail Away," though he has maintained remarkably high consistency for his entire career. Rolling Stone Magazine has put that album on their list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. His 1974 album "Good Old Boys" would also make that list, though lower down it.

Newman's songwriting is extraordinary, but it's also idiosyncratic, with frequent heavy sarcasm. Some songs have general romantic themes that lend themselves to being covered a lot, for instance "I Think It's Going to Rain Today." There are over a 100 different cover versions of that one. But then consider a song like "God's Song (That's Why I Love Mankind)." It's a sarcastic song about how God seemingly could care less about the human race, and even laughs at the calamities it throws at humanity. I think it's a great song, with deep meaning, but it's not exactly typical Top Forty subject material! So there are a lot of songs I would have wanted to include but didn't, because either there's no cover versions at all, or at least no worthy covers. And I've followed my usual rule for the "Covered" series of generally not including versions by Newman himself (although he'll show up with one song in a later volume, and in a duet in the other volume).

Note that some of the best songs written by Newman during this time period only show up in one of the later two volumes. So if you don't see a favorite, wait to see what's on those first. 

This album is 52 minutes long. 

01 Hold Your Head High (Jackie DeShannon)
02 Baby, Don't Look Down (Billy Storm)
03 I've Been Wrong Before (Cilla Black)
04 Nobody Needs Your Love (Gene Pitney)
05 Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear (Alan Price Set)
06 Snow (Claudine Longet)
07 Illinois (Everly Brothers)
08 I Think It's Going to Rain Today (Dusty Springfield)
09 Just One Smile (Blood Sweat & Tears)
10 Bet No One Ever Hurt This Bad (Linda Ronstadt)
11 Love Story (Peggy Lee)
12 Dayton, Ohio, 1903 (Wayne Fontana)
13 Mama Told Me [Not to Come] (Three Dog Night)
14 Cowboy (Nilsson)
15 The Beehive State (Doobie Brothers)
16 Living without You (Manfred Mann's Earth Band)
17 God's Song [That's Why I Love Mankind] (Etta James)
18 Guilty (Bonnie Raitt)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/V6aqPKqW

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/qo8CJZ7pNQ5aBBM/file

The cover photo is from 1968.

Jackson Browne - Jabberwocky, Syracuse, NY, 3-27-1971

Here is a really great concert bootleg from Jackson Browne. It may well be the most interesting concert recording out of his long career, because it's from very early, about a year prior to the release of his debut album. The most interesting aspect is that there's no less than nine songs here that weren't officially released at the time (and only a couple of have come out in different versions much later). So it's basically like there's an entire album of songs prior to his debut included here.

I've known about this concert for a long time, but I hadn't posted it yet because it had a number of sound quality issues, and I'd never gotten around to fixing them. But yesterday, I saw a person named "twrona" posted a version on a popular bootleg sharing site that fixed most of those issues. (I left that person's notes so you can read what they fixed.) So I grabbed that and made some fixes of my own. Mostly, that had to do with volume adjustments. I also ran all the talking tracks through the Adobe vocal enhancer to help get rid of hiss and other background noise, which were much more noticeable during those bits.

This is a solo acoustic concert. (There's some talk at the beginning about Browne having a backing musician, referred to as "the Famous Flame" or "Tom Jones," but that's just jokey references to his guitar.) This very possibly is the earliest concert recording available for him. Note that it took place the same night as a Bonnie Raitt concert in the same venue. You can find that one here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/04/bonnie-raitt-jabberwocky-club-syracuse.html

(I just updated the cover art for that one. Taking a look at it again after a long time, I didn't like it. So I changed the font colors and style to match this Browne one.) 

This appears to be a combination of early and late shows. (I'm not sure where the break is, but "Jamaica Say You Will" is probably the last song of the early show.) Perhaps Raitt also did early and late shows, and her recording is a combination of those as well. At one point, Browne noted that Raitt was backstage during his set, and he also noted a written set list she'd left on stage. It's a shame the two of them didn't perform any songs together, but they probably were just starting to get to know each other. They would go on to become good friends, and perform together on stage many, many times.

I cut out some dead air and guitar tuning between songs. I also cut out about three minutes of crowd interaction in the middle of the show. Basically, someone in the audience was very aggressive, and all but demanded to be allowed to sing a song. Browne obliged, and the person sang... and was absolutely terrible. Trust me, you don't want to hear it. By the way, this same person asked for Raitt at one point. I think it's the same person who basically was an annoying heckler during Raitt's concert that same evening.

Here are all the songs performed in this concert that remain unreleased by Browne: 

Together Again (performed twice, the first version being much shorter)
Mae Jean Goes to Hollywood
Last Time I Was Home
Jesus in 3-4 Time (a J.D. Souther cover)
Take It Underground
When You Lose Your Money
Someday Morning
World to Gain
Shadow Dream Song

Most of the rest of the songs would appear on Browne's 1972 debut album "Jackson Browne," also known as "Saturate Before Using." But two, "Our Lady of the Well" and "These Days," would appear on his 1973 album "For Everyman."

Everything here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. That's because it was broadcast live on the WNEW radio station, as was Raitt's performance. 

This album is an hour and 24 minutes long.

01 talk (Jackson Browne)
02 Under the Falling Sky (Jackson Browne)
03 World to Gain (Jackson Browne)
04 talk (Jackson Browne)
05 Together Again [Short Version] (Jackson Browne)
06 talk (Jackson Browne)
07 Mae Jean Goes to Hollywood (Jackson Browne)
08 Last Time I Was Home (Jackson Browne)
09 talk (Jackson Browne)
10 Jesus in 3-4 Time (Jackson Browne)
11 talk (Jackson Browne)
12 My Opening Farewell (Jackson Browne)
13 talk (Jackson Browne)
14 From Silver Lake (Jackson Browne)
15 talk (Jackson Browne)
16 Rock Me on the Water (Jackson Browne)
17 talk (Jackson Browne)
18 Jamaica Say You Will (Jackson Browne)
19 Together Again (Jackson Browne)
20 talk (Jackson Browne)
21 Take It Underground (Jackson Browne)
22 talk (Jackson Browne)
23 When You Lose Your Money (Jackson Browne)
24 talk (Jackson Browne)
25 Our Lady of the Well (Jackson Browne)
26 talk (Jackson Browne)
27 These Days (Jackson Browne)
28 Someday Morning (Jackson Browne)
29 Shadow Dream Song (Jackson Browne)
30 talk (Jackson Browne)
31 Song for Adam (Jackson Browne)
32 talk (Jackson Browne)
33 Looking into You (Jackson Browne)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/Hh5vD1WT 

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/xBaMAUmjTlwnzgL/file

The cover image is supposed to be "circa 1971" at the Troubadour club in Los Angeles. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it with the help of the Kolorize program. 

Joan Baez - Baez Sings Baez, Volume 1: 1967-1971 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

Here's an album that was entirely made by guest poster Fabio from Rio. I just helped it along here and there, for instance making the cover art. Recently, Fabio really got into the music of Joan Baez, and devoured all 40 or so of her albums. He thought she was almost entirely about singing cover songs. But as he listened to those albums, he discovered many good songs that were written by her. So he came up with the idea of compiling all of her original songs, to show that she's had a lot of songwriting talent, as well as singing talent. He found about 70 songs, enough for five albums. This is the first one.

A well known Joan Baez compilation album has the title "Baez Sings Dylan," and consists just of her covers of Bob Dylan songs. Fabio came up with the idea of riffing on that, and calling this series "Baez Sings Baez." So that's what we're calling it. And the font type, color, size, and so on is a close match to the "Baez Sings Dylan" cover.

Fabio has a lot more to say about this. But, like guest poster Mike Solof does, he prefers to put his comments in a file that's included in the download zip. So please give that a read to learn a lot more. 

Everything here comes from officially released studio albums, so the sound quality is excellent. 

This album is 57 minutes long. 

01 North (Joan Baez)
02 Saigon Bride (Joan Baez)
03 A Song for David [David's Song] (Joan Baez)
04 Sweet Sir Galahad (Joan Baez)
05 Here's to You (Joan Baez)
06 Blessed Are... (Joan Baez)
07 Three Horses (Joan Baez)
08 Last, Lonely and Wretched (Joan Baez)
09 Outside the Nashville City Limits (Joan Baez)
10 When Time Is Stolen (Joan Baez)
11 Gabriel and Me (Joan Baez)
12 Milanese Waltz - Marie Flore (Joan Baez)
13 The Hitchhiker's Song (Joan Baez)
14 Fifteen Months (Joan Baez)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/PMuEKXwc

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/gZhw4tt48XqFdZv/file

I mentioned above how I made the cover art as an homage to the cover of the official album "Baez Sings Dylan." Fabio selected the photograph. All I know about it is that it dates to 1965.

Various Artists - Covered: Van McCoy, Best Of: 1962-1985

Here's another artist for my "Covered" series. To remind you, this highlights the talents of songwriters by collecting cover versions of their songs. This time, the focus is on Van McCoy.

These days, McCoy is probably seen by many as a one-hit wonder, because he had one huge hit under his own name: "The Hustle." This instrumental was a huge hit in 1975. It went to Number One on the main U.S. singles chart, as well as on the soul chart. It reached at least the Top Ten in most other countries as well, including hitting Number Three in Britain. 

That was his only Top 40 hit in the U.S., so technically that makes him a "one-hit wonder" in that country. But he did have other hits in other countries. For instance, he had three more Top 40 hits in Britain. But more important, he had a very long and successful career as a songwriter and producer. The focus here will be just on the songwriting part though.

 

McCoy was born in Washington, D.C., in 1940. He started playing piano and singing in a church choir at a young age. He began writing songs at the age of 12. Eventually, he would have 700 of his songs recorded and released by himself or other musical artists. He started to study psychology at Howard University, but dropped out in 1960 to pursue a music career. 

 

He formed his own record company from the very start. He had a little success with his own recordings. His first single, "Mr. D.J.," was a minor hit in 1960. But he soon found more success writing and producing songs for others. He mostly concentrated on that, though he continued to release singles under his own name. His first really big hit as a songwriter was "Baby, I'm Yours." Singer Barbara Lewis took it to the Top Ten in 1965. He continued to write many more hits in the 1960s and 1970s. I've included the ones I liked the best here. Note these aren't necessarily all the biggest hits on the charts.

 

In the 1970s, he began focusing more on his own career. In the 1960s, he only released one album under his own name. But in the 1970s, he released ten. His solo career really took over after his 1975 hit "The Hustle." But he continued writing and producing songs for others as well. Unfortunately, his career was cut short, because he died of a heart attack on June 29, 1979, at the age of 39.

 

Here's his Wikipedia entry if you want to know more. It's surprisingly detailed compared to other similar entries:

 

Van McCoy - Wikipedia 

This album is an hour and nine minutes long. 

01 Stop the Music (Shirelles)
02 Getting Mighty Crowded (Betty Everett)
03 Giving Up (Gladys Knight & the Pips)
04 Baby, I'm Yours (Barbara Lewis)
05 It’s Starting to Get to Me Now (Irma Thomas)
06 Where Does That Leave Me Now (Nancy Wilson)
07 Before and After (Chad & Jeremy)
08 Let It All Out (O'Jays)
09 Stop and Get a Hold on Myself (Gladys Knight & the Pips)
10 When You're Young and in Love (Marvelettes)
11 You're Gonna Make Me Love You (Sandi Sheldon)
12 The Way to a Woman’s Heart (Billy T. Soul)
13 I Get the Sweetest Feeling (Jackie Wilson)
14 So Soon (Aretha Franklin)
15 Lost and Found (Kenny Carlton)
16 Nothing Worse than Being Alone (Ad Libs)
17 Right on the Tip of My Tongue (Brenda & the Tabulations)
18 Let Me Down Easy (Derrick Harriott)
19 The Hustle (Van McCoy)
20 This Is It (Melba Moore)
21 Heavy Love (David Ruffin)
22 Baby Don't Change Your Mind (Gladys Knight & the Pips)
23 Sweet Bitter Love (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/HhVWn2Gr

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/kTvbsbNvI6VKdyA/file

The cover photo dates to 1975. I assume it's from an awards ceremony, but I don't know the details. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it with the help of the Kolorize program.