I couldn’t believe it when I learned that Michael Jackson, the King of Pop himself, passed away today of an apparent heart attack.  One of the most iconic pop stars from our generation, Micheal Jackson will be remembered for the significant mark he made on popular culture.  He will also be remembered for his increasingly bizarre behavior as the years passed, however I prefer to remember him from his Thriller days:

Many happy returns to Iggy Pop, who turned 62 on April 21.  I have to admit that Lust for Life is still one of my all-time favorite songs (despite its embarrassingly prolific use in T.V. cruise ship advertisements).

April 21 also happens to be the birthday of my son, who turned 13 yesterday.  Happy Birthday RollerBoy!

I am in the middle of reading the book Johnny Cash: The Autobiography and I’ve been inspired to look up some of his old television show recordings. Johnny Cash has always been one of my favorite artists, but I’ve never really explored the music from the Johnny Cash Show which ran from 1969 to 1971. Capitalizing on Cash’s success after his 1968 Live at Folsom Prison album, the weekly program was essentially a variety show including members of his own band, as well as guests such as Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Merle Haggard and Joni Mitchell.

The following segment features Louis Armstrong in one of his last performances:

It’s Music Monday here at the RollerBlog and today’s featured artist is Led Zeppelin.  I discovered Led Zeppelin in high school and I’ve been a fan ever since.  These days I like to exercise to Led Zeppelin, or as I like to call it, Zeppercise.

The following is one of my favorite Led Zeppelin songs, Black Dog, performed live in 1973:

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. One simple rule, leave ONLY the actual post link here. You can grab this code at LJL Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted without prejudice.

I just found a new record to add to our collection.  Spaced Out Disco, released in 1978 by The Galactic Force Band, includes danceable versions of movie themes from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Trek, 2001, and Star Wars.

I seriously need to own this.  Too bad my birthday is 11 months away….

Here is the Theme From Star Trek from the B side of the record:

It’s Music Monday here at the RollerBlog and it is a Yes kind of a day.  As loyal readers of this blog already know, I am a big fan of Yes.  RollerReggie and I bought tickets to see Yes in concert last year and we were extremely disappointed when the tour was canceled.  The good news is that Yes is on tour again, and they’ll be here in Seattle this month.  This time the band will be without lead singer Jon Anderson, so we are still debating whether or not we are going to buy tickets.

What do you think - should we go?

While you mull it over, feel free to rock out to this live footage of “Roundabout”:

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. One simple rule, leave ONLY the actual post link here. You can grab this code at LJL Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted without prejudice.

Many happy returns to David Bowie, one of my favorite artists.

David Bowie on the April 23, 1987 cover of Rolling Stone

**News Flash**

I was contacted by the folks at Bloomberg (yes - you read that right…they actually sent me a press release) with the news that that John Oates will be interviewed tonight on the show “Night Talk” on Bloomberg TV. Apparently the interview will be available on their web site after the show.

- - - - -

It’s no secret that I am a fan of mustaches. And there is perhaps no finer mustache than the one adorning the upper lip of John Oates. Ever since discovering John Oates’ mustache on the Herb Urban blog, I have been on the lookout to purchase a Hall & Oates album of my very own.

Well I am happy to report that day has finally come! Just this past weekend, I stumbled across the 1982 record H20 by Daryl Hall and John Oates at Rubato Records.

The first song on the album, “Maneater”, is actually kind of catchy. A little too catchy. I’ve actually caught myself singing it a few too many times over the past few days.  “Oh here she comes, watch out boy she’ll chew you up, oh here she comes, she’s a maneater!”

But the album quickly devolves from there. As we listened to the next song, “Crime Pays,” RollerReggie simply shook his head. “I feel like I am in synth hell,” he moaned. “This song embodies everything I hated about eighties music!”

And so it continued.  We couldn’t even make it to the B side of the record.  RollerReggie and I were overcome with the sheer eighties force of H20.  And the saxophone solos.

But, I didn’t really spend $3.99 to actually listen to this record.  I bought it because John Oates has the best mustache ever.  Therefore, I am one satisfied customer.

NPR aired a story today on Mark Hammill, founder of the progressive rock band Van der Graaf Generator in the early 1970s.  After my mini-obsession with Yes a year ago, I’ve become intrigued with the prog rock genre and found the story quite interesting.

The story traced the history of Van der Graaf Generator and of the band’s musical influence.  According to the All Things Considered web site, “as a founding member of the British progressive rock scene in the early ’70s, Hammill reached beyond the pretension of prog rock and into the fury of punk.”

If you are interested in hearing the story, you can listen to it here.

I was recently introduced to the music of Betty Davis, and I have to say that I was blown away.  Although she was perhaps most well known for her one-year marriage to Miles Davis in the late 1960s, she holds her own as a ground-breaking seventies funk musician.

Raw and powerful, her music was imbued with an unprecedented passion.  As a vocalist she had a very unique style, whispering and purring one moment and screeching and growling the next.  She has been widely compared to Madonna; Santana stated that “she was the first Madonna, but Madonna is more like Marie Osmond compared to Betty Davis.  Betty Davis was a real ferocious Black Panther woman.  I could see why Miles was very attracted to her. You couldn’t tame Betty Davis.”

One of my favorite Betty Davis songs is the “Anti Love Song,” which was included in her 1973 debut album Betty Davis.  The song begins with the following lyrics:

Anti Love Song

No I don’t want to love you
Cause I know how you are
That’s why I have been staying away from you
That’s why I haven’t called ya
Cause I know you could possess my body
I know you can make me scrawl
I know you can have me shaking
I know you could have me climbing the walls
That’s why I don’t want to love you
Cause I know how you are
Sure you say you’re right on and you’re righteous
But with me I know you’d be right off
Cause you know I could possess your body too, don’t cha?
You know I could make you crawl
And just as hard as I’d fall for you, boy
Well you know you’d fall for me harder
That’s why I don’t want to love you…

Right on, sister.