Category: Episodes

654. Bill Withers

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Episode 654 is BILL WITHERS. Even if he recorded only “Ain’t No Sunshine,” “Lean on Me,” “Lovely Day” and “Just the Two of Us,” that would be sufficient to secure Bill Withers’ fame. But these came on several quality albums in the 1970s that applied his smooth yet textured baritone voice to a relaxed style of soul that contrasts to the chrome and flash of contemporaries. Also a great songwriter. He got a late start to his recording career, and (thankfully) declined to allow himself to be fully dragged into 80s synth R&B, so his nine albums (all but one in the 70s) stand as a consistent solid career set.

Favorite album: Still Bill

Favorite song: Ain’t No Sunshine

Compared to expectations: ↑

Recommendation: The first two albums (Just As I Am, Still Bill) are the best, but all are decent.

652. The Grass Roots

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Episode 652 is THE GRASS ROOTS. You will recognize the songs “Let’s Live for Today,” “Midnight Confessions” and “Sooner or Later” as AM radio staples, but you probably didn’t know the band behind them. That’s the Grass Roots. Music fans will know that songwriter P.F. Sloan got his start here. And fans of The Office may know it as the band Creed Bratton was in in the 1960s. They offered some decent LA-style late 60s pop, but with changing lineups and sounds, they come down to us in some obscurity.

Favorite album: Let’s Live for Today

Favorite song: Let’s Live for Today

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: A greatest hits record is more than you’ll need.

650. Carcass

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(May 2025) Episode 650 is CARCASS. An extreme metal band from Liverpool that influenced grindcore and melodic death metal. Their early (late 80s/early 90s) albums are punishing affairs (the best in my opinion), cultivating a certain image with song titles like “Vomited Anal Tract,” “Mucopurulence Excretor,” “Crepitating Bowel Erosion” and “Embryonic Necropsy and Devourment.” They reunited in the 2000s for a couple decent but not distinguished albums.

Favourite album: Symphonies of Sickness

Favourite song: Corporal Jigsore Quandry

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: The first three albums: Reek of Putrefaction, Symphonies of Sickness and Necroticism: Descanting the Insalubrious.

649. Tim Buckley and Jeff Buckley

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Episode 649 is TIM BUCKLEY and JEFF BUCKLEY. Tim is an acquired taste, and he hasn’t acquired mine. His five-octave voice is impressive, but I’ve never warmed to the crooning way he employed it. It often feels discordant to the music underneath, even as he varies his style from folk to avant-garde to pop. I appreciate the experimentalism of Starsailor, which has become a cult classic. It may seem odd to append Jeff here, as he was never part of his father’s life, but it’s the only way I could review him as he had only one studio album, Grace, but what a fine album that is. His “Hallelujah” is among the best covers that surpasses the original. Jeff inherited his father’s many-octave voice, but uses it more pleasantly.

Favorite Tim album: Tim Buckley

Favorite Tim song: Pleasant Street

Favorite Jeff song: Hallelujah

Compared to expectations: Tim ↓, Jeff same

Recommendation: You should know Jeff’s Grace. Try Tim’s more conventional eponymous album or Goodbye and Hello, or the weird Starsailor, to see if it fits your taste.

648. Buck Owens

~ ernopepper ~ 2 Comments

(May 2025) Episode 648 is BUCK OWENS. His music is perfect. I don’t mean it’s my favorite or meets some objective universal measure of excellence (like J.S. Bach). But to my untrained ear, this is what quality country music sounds like. It’s straightforward, unadorned and rhythmic. That’s the Bakersfield sound he’s famous for. He rolled through the 60s with album after quality album. But his career and reputation changed after he started hosting Hee Haw; that’s the only way I knew him from my youth – as a corn-pone TV presenter rather than a productive musical artist.

Favorite album: I’ve Got a Tiger by the Tail

Favorite song: Under Your Spell Again

Compared to expectations: ↑

Recommendation: Buck ’Em! The Music Of Buck Owens (1955-1967) is a good anthology for the casual fan.

647. Captain Beyond

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Episode 647 is CAPTAIN BEYOND, a B-list supergroup from the mid-70s (with former Deep Purple, Iron Butterfly and Johnny Winter members). It’s a weird mix of heavy, prog rock, space and yacht rock, and thus a lesser-known archetype of the period. Their first of three albums has the heaviest sound, and thus the best.

Favorite album: Captain Beyond

Favorite song Mesmerization Eclipse

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: Probably only relevant for 1970s rock completists

646. Violet Mindfield

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(April 2025) Episode 646 is the VIOLET MINDFIELD, a contemporary Southern California-based retro-psychedelic band. While their stated intention is to recreate 60s psychedelic and garage band sounds, what I hear is a call back to acts of previous retro generations, such as Olivia Tremor Control and Oh Sees. There’s a fine line between reverent homage and derivative mimicry, which they straddle. Their most recent album, California Burning, appears to be original songs based on classic 60s riffs (not unlike what the Rutles did).

Favorite album: The Forgotten Streetlamps of Time

Favorite song: Autonomous Overdrive

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: It’s an interesting listen if you like 60s psychedelic and garage music.

644. Lightnin’ Hopkins

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(April 2025) Episode 644 is LIGHTNIN’ HOPKINS, Texas bluesman with a career that spanned from the 1920s to 1980s. Despite all the changes in the blues genre over that time, Hopkins remained consistent and loyal to his sound: just his guitar (acoustic or electric) and his earthy voice. I enjoy this style of stripped-down blues, but after dozens of albums, it can get repetitive.

Favorite album: Strums the Blues

Favorite song: Devil Is Watching You

Favorite instrumental song: Hopkins’ Sky Hop (inspiration for Stevie Ray Vaughn’s ‘Rude Mood’)

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: I prefer the early recording compilations from the 1940s-50s, but the consistency in his output means you can jump in most anywhere.

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643. Ruth Crawford Seeger

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(April 2025) Episode 643 is RUTH CRAWFORD SEEGER, following the recent episode on her stepson, Pete Seeger. Composing in the 1920s-30s, she and her colleagues became known as “ultramodernist,” heavy on dissonance. When the Seeger family moved to Washinton DC to work with the Library of Congress on folk collections, she published her “American Folk Songs for Children” which became widely used. Her oeuvre is not large, but it is rather interesting.

Favorite piece: Suite for Wind Quintet

Favorite vocal piece: Three Chants

Compared to expectations: same

Recommendation: Start with her String Quartet (1931), her most famous work.

642. Sepultura

~ ernopepper ~ 1 Comment

(April 2025) Episode 642 is SEPULTURA, vaulting to the top tier of my favorite metal bands. In a genre that demands a high level of orthodoxy to the metal formula, Sepultura separates themselves: they create music within the metal idiom. Beyond their skillful navigation within subgenres (speed/thrash, death, groove, prog), they bring in novel elements like drumming rhythms from their native Brazil, notably on the albums Chaos A.D. and Roots when they reached their creative peak. But it’s not a mere meld, it makes part of a whole. Each album has its own personality; they’ll try something new and then circle back to hit you in the face with power thrash.

Favorite album: Roots

Favorite song: Lookaway

Compared to expectations: ↑

Recommendation: Highly recommend. Chaos A.D. and Roots are their most inventive, but there’s really not a bad album in the lot.