Liquid Skin (Gomez, 1999)

Gomez is one of those bands I've picked up piecemeal throughout my adult life. The earliest hearing was back in college radio when their debut album, Bring It On, hit and did well. It was pleasant enough. A little strange, but not too weird. Three distinct singers, one a little John Mayer-before-Mayer-happened (and better anyway). I didn't give the band much thought after that, but while many/most of the bands of 1998 spiraled down into the "lost bands" file, Gomez was a surprisingly tenacious group, and I discovered them about five years later when they were giving out freebies of a later studio and live album (In Our Gun and Out West, respectively).

Liquid Skin falls in the middle of all of this, during the time when I wasn't thinking about the band. Therefore, it is very much a "fill in the gap" retrospective acquisition. It's their second album and it hit very quickly after the debut, creating almost a "staggered double-album" effect to the casual fan. I honestly don't pick up on many huge differences between them, particularly if the third album is considered, which does feature a number of departures from these albums.

This album also does a weird thing where the previous album's title track shows up here instead. Just for fun, I checked to see if there was a "Liquid Skin" on In Our Gun, but there wasn't, so it's not a running joke or anything. It's just a fluke, kind of like having multiple self-titled albums, or (even worse?) making your second album the self-titled album.

Nowadays, Gomez is up to seven studio albums, with the last one released in 2011. According to everything I've seen the band is still around (with the same rock-solid, no drama lineup), but quite some time has elapsed since their last release. The official website has been quiet for nearly a year, but if the most "recent" news is any indication, this unofficial hiatus is probably likely due to the budding solo careers of Ian Ball and Ben "not Mayer" Ottewell, both of which upon light inspection cut fairly close to the Gomez sound.

The Crisis of Church and State, 1050-1300 (Brian Tierney, 1964)

Since finishing grad school, the notion of "required reading" has been slightly alien, and it kind of awkward has found a way to insert itself in the mechanisms I use to measure the reading of my own choosing. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the class, and who knows, maybe one day I would have found Tierney's book on my own.

Very much like the other "required" book featured here, this is a combination of primary sources and commentary by Tierney. With no disrespect to Hillgarth, Tierney provides exceptionally good introductions, effectively half the price of admission here. He really puts the documents in their context and not a single one left me scratching my head, wondering why it was included.

One thing it was easy to get hung up on was the episodic nature of the chapters, usually featuring a pope and emperor having the world's biggest yo mama fight complete with scripture citations. There was a lot of other things going on during this period, so I think it is important to not stop here but examine other aspects, such as the work of the great thinkers of the period (the 13th century was especially rich in this area).

However, if that was the intention, of either the book or the class, then both have succeeded wildly.

Beggar's Banquet (The Rolling Stones, 1968)

Way back in November of 2014 I coyly mentioned that the album cover art for Zephyr's self-titled debut was the second most famous album cover to feature a toilet. Now, fourteen months later, let me introduce the most famous cover of them all, the Rolling Stones' Beggars Banquet. Nowadays you put a toilet on the cover of your album and nobody blinks (unless you are Metallica and you wanted to call your first album Metal Up Your @$$). However, for 1968, just a year off of the iconic covers of Sgt. Pepper's and dreamy ornate color explosions from San Francisco, the image is downright jarring. In fact, if it was too much for the viewer, the alternative "calling card" cover (see above) used instead for the original release. Normally I don't fixate on album covers, but here the stark, dirty image reveals what the Rolling Stones had become, and, when compared to their previous albums, what they rejected.

When one analyzes the trajectory of popular music in the 1960's, a trend emerges that shows increasingly elaborate (and often weird) styles and the years wore on, up until about early 1968. Some bands transformed into it (notably all the "big six" British Invasion bands), resulting in a very "poppy" name (Beatles, Yardbirds, Animals) getting applied to something new. Since these were like brand names, changing the band name would be even sillier. Meanwhile, a whole host of new bands were jumping into the mix (The Nice, Pink Floyd) and continuing to drive the new sound. Particularly in the case of the former group, there was a growing sense that they were on the wrong path musically. For some bands, the solution was to disband; they have reached (maybe exceeded) their "shelf life". Meanwhile, other bands jettisoned the beads, incense, and so forth and (to paraphrase the Beatles) "got back to where they once belonged". While the Beatles (and later on the Who) did this in dramatic fashion, probably the most stark and conscious musical back-shift was done by the Rolling Stones.

The Rolling Stones had been on the magical mystery tour very briefly. They were one of the last to board, with only one album (Their Satanic Majesties Request) being fully immersed in the psych sound. Amidst the chaos and drug busts, it wasn't the best of times for the band, and, on top of everything, Brian Jones was becoming estranged from the rest of the band. As he had been the most enthusiastic band member in promoting an "expanded sound", getting beyond R&B covers and tributes, it left the rest of the band starting to wonder exactly where the heck they were going. As Jones's presence waned, Keith Richards by necessity had to fill the void. Richards was no fan of the band's mid-1960's direction. The result of this new Richards-led configuration was the vastly stripped down Beggars Banquet.

Probably the best-known track of the lot is "Sympathy for the Devil", a song that spoke of stark realities and leaving the dreamworld of the previous album behind. Musically it was different as well, driven by a multi-piece percussion section that threw listeners into the jungle. Most of the rest of the album has a "throwback" flavor to it, but like many of the bands seeking to get back to their roots, it is not a perfect-180. Nobody would mistake these songs for outtakes from, say, December's Children. The lyrics, for one thing, convey a more aggressive and worldly stance. Also, the Jagger/Richards writing collaboration is still in full effect here, with only a single cover among the ten tracks. Even though at points it sounds like the band is going full country/western (a sound they would flirt with for the next decade) on tracks like "Dear Doctor" there is enough adventure in the music mix, be it the wandering drums and slide guitar of "Jigsaw Puzzle" or the sitar on "Street Fighting Man", to indicate there was still forward progress.

Again, it bears mentioning that Jones was sidelined for a good chunk of this album. His increasing mental instability was viewed mostly as a nuisance by the others and they rewarded him by walling him off from a number of the recording sessions. Nevertheless, he sneaks out here and there, playing mellotron on "Jigsaw Puzzle" and the aforementioned sitar on "Street Fighting Man". Although he played (very little) on Let It Bleed, this is effectively the final album of the Brian Jones era of the Stones. Notably, as he moved to fill the void, this is the first album to feature a lead vocal by Richards, in the opening to "Salt of the Earth".

My interest in the Rolling Stones has been jumpy at best over time, so this was actually a later acquisition for me. I had heard the tracks that were picked for singles long ago, but was pleasantly surprised by some of the tracks that didn't get as much exposure. "Jigsaw Puzzle" is a real gem on the album, and, lyrical content aside, "Stray Cat Blues" is another outstanding track. Some parts get a little too "hayseed" for me in places, but overall the band "got back" at the right place and right time in the musical continuum and that decision is still paying dividends to this very day.

Copperhead (1973)

I received a copy of this album many years ago from a friend (five years gone, RIP) not knowing a whole lot about any band named "Copperhead" or their guitarist, one John Cipollina. Then again, other than the name, Quicksilver Messenger Service didn't register with me either. So this particular acquisition sort of fell out of the sky. The first track ("Roller Derby Star") clicked with me right away but the others took some time. And, as it turns out, this was largely a musical rejection of Cipollina's old band (QMS), so any particular knowledge of his past work wouldn't necessarily help here.

It turns out there was a huge amount of controversy behind this album. Copperhead had been around as an informal side project to QMS since around 1970, but sound and personnel issues were making Cipollina increasingly itchy and he completely broke with the band in 1972 and brought along a number of early QMS members and friends of the band, in essence forming a hard-charging "Anti QMS" band. They proved to be a strong live act and a major label deal with Columbia was soon inked. Unfortunately, their biggest fan, Clive Davis, was soon ousted from the label and they (along with just about every new band on the label) were jettisoned. The band quickly disintegrated following this development. A good chunk of the group including Cipollina landed in other Bay Area groups like Terry & the Pirates. Bassist Pete Sears, who left the band just before the recording of this album, a sort of "everyman" of Bay Area rock, probably enjoyed the most success, falling in with Jefferson Starship for the duration of its initial existence. Some reports indicate he dabbled with Journey, but that has been hard to verify.

Anyway, Copperhead's sole album goes in and out of circulation, though these days its pretty easy to find in convenient mp3 format. It looks like a live album, which goes under at least two different names, has also come to light and is readily available as well.

Awakenings (Oliver Sacks, 1973)

This was an interesting book.* Rest in peace, Dr. Sacks.

* Perhaps I should explain in this very long footnote why I found this book to be interesting. I had seen a documentary on PBS about the cognitive relationship with music featuring the author. While it actually tied into a much later work of his called Musicophilia, I realized it might be best to begin with the work he is best know for, primarily to get a sense of his style. I don't normally read medical stories, but this really opened my eyes to Parkinson's disease and how we treat disease in Western medicine. In many ways, L-DOPA presented as serious a problem as the disease itself. Although the initial transformations were miraculous, it was like the drug didn't know when to stop and pushed the patients too far the other direction. Therefore, it was necessary to either scale back or stop L-DOPA, which all too often resulted in patients ending up right back where they started, or worse, due to "personality fragmentation" caused by L-DOPA that was not fully reversible. If I could relate this to anything I've read before, the most obvious candidate would be Flowers For Algernon. Although I love that book dearly, this one is all the more startling in that this really happened. I made a point of seeing the movie afterward. My wife watched over my shoulder and was fairly critical of the entire production, calling the ending "depressing" and accusing Robert De Niro of overacting. However, if you've read the book, you will know that De Niro caught the spirit of these patients extremely well and I don't think he was overacting at all. These patients lived in a completely different world from what we "normal" people experience in our daily lives. As for "depressing", well, I'd say more that it's "real". I think in movies we get so hung up on "magic bullets" and hero stories that to experience a story where medicine does NOT score an unqualified triumph can feel like a failure. Finally, if you've read this far you are probably wondering about this footnote. I am paying tribute to Dr. Sacks's affinity to using footnotes in the text. They are essential to read to fully enjoy the book, although some are so long that I feel he might have been better off integrating them into the text. Some in this edition were in fact moved into the appendices section.

Acid Daze (Various Artists, 2003)

1960's comps tend to lean either garage/punk or psychedelic in flavor. Obviously this one makes no secret that it favors the latter. Also, the selections are entirely British, where the best psych was being made. In terms of obscurity, it is fairly mass market, so while it won't blow any minds, it's a decent place to begin exploring the music.

The most important thing to keep in mind with Acid Daze is that unlike Nuggets, Pebbles, Garage Beat '66, Rubble, Back From the Grave, Teenage Shutdown, and the million other comp series out there is that this one was a freebie attached to a British music magazine, Uncut, so the tracklist is more driven by what they can sell rather than just a general passion for the genre. Therefore, while the compilation is quite good, it sometimes veers into areas that a "regular" series would probably shun. Instant Garage, a freebie attached to Mojo, has some of the same issues, however from the garage end of the spectrum. Probably three tracks are included here that are a bit of a stretch for the genre: "Octopus" (Syd Barrett), "Clarence in Wonderland" (Kevin Ayers), and "Never Never Land" (The Pink Fairies). The latter two are more post-psych 1970's recordings, and "Octopus" is a stripped-down psych-rock rejection by one of its founders. I think they placed more emphasis on the man than the music here. I should point out, though, that in all three cases these are great songs, just a little out of their element here.

On the other hand, there are a number of essential tracks for those listeners trying to get beyond Sgt. Pepper's without having to invest in all of Nuggets II. On the shortlist would be: Tomorrow, The Move, Nirvana (the British one, obviously), The Smoke, The Nice, Arthur Brown, and Dantalion's Chariot. On top of this they've included the psychedelic phases of bands that either already had British Invasion cred or would be bigger in the 1970's: T(yrannosaurus) Rex, Spencer Davis, The Hollies, the Small Faces, Status Quo, and Donovan. The tracks from these bands don't capture them at their height, but are great songs nonetheless.

Finally, special mention should go to two songs. First, "Granny Takes a Trip" by the Purple Gang. This is probably the one song here that really had no psych aspirations whatsoever but when you call your band "The Purple Gang" and your song "Granny Takes a Trip", you can probably expect the drug-reference interpreters to jump all over you. But it's far more innocuous: The Purple Gang was named after a reference in the psych classic "Jailhouse Rock" and the song is just about an old woman who likes to travel, all played in old-timely jug-band style. Apparently the compilers missed the point. The second is "Ginza Strip" by the Executives, the one truly "obscure" song on the entire disc. However, with a little strategic digging, interested listeners will discover that this little blop of pop whismy is an early recording by a band featuring Glenn Cornick, who would soon join a band of freaks named after an enterprising agriculturalist and play on their first three albums. It's quite a find, considering that pre-Tull recordings are notoriously rare.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (Jerry Goldsmith, 1989)

Meet anyone who has seen all of the Star Trek movies (or at least the first six) and they probably have a pecking order as to their preference. For me, it's 4, 2, 6, 3, 1, and 5. So, it's a little uncomfortable to have here the soundtrack to my least favorite of the movies. However, as fate would have it, the two weakest films sport the scoring talents of the late Jerry Goldsmith. For many, Goldsmith created the iconic Star Trek fanfare, so popular that Star Trek: The Next Generation threw out their plans to create their own theme and just used his instead. Although I'm a sucker for Leonard Rosenman's score of the fourth movie, and a lot of folks prefer James Horner's "beefed up" return performance on the third, it's hard to say in the long run than any of these come closer to capturing the Star Trek spirit musically as Goldsmith's work.

I abandoned any plans to build a complete soundtrack collection ages ago, so I never heard any of the other soundtracks until recently. This soundtrack cuts pretty darn close to The Motion Picture (1979) as Goldsmith is probably following the "why mess with success" model. The "Klingon" theme reappears cleverly as before, which is a nice touch. It almost makes me forget how dumb much of this movie was. Also, as is fairly typical for these soundtracks, included on the disc is a pop track by Hiroshima called "The Moon Is a Window to Heaven". Not exactly my listening preferences, but oh well.

As far the other soundtracks of the "classic" movie era, the only one I've neglected to mention here is the sixth one, The Undiscovered Country. While it is one of the stronger movies of the bunch, the soundtrack is the total antithesis of the theme-heavy franchise. The composer, Cliff Eidelman, I think is/was best known for composed the music for Free Willy and is mostly ethereal and background-grade stuff. While I can whistle just about any of the other movies' themes, this one has nothing. So that answers that.

When the "Next Gen" movies came about, they initially went with Dennis McCarthy, who did most of the TV show music for The Next Generation and its spinoffs, Voyager and Deep Space Nine (for which is did the theme). However, the lure of Jerry Goldsmith (who wrote the original theme for Voyager) was too much, and all three of the other films feature his scores. Goldsmith died a couple years after the last movie, Nemesis, which is another bad movie sporting a far nicer soundtrack than it probably deserved. Of the composers of the original six movies, only considerably youngest Eidelman is still living (Rosenman died of old age in 2008 and Horner is a plane crash in 2015).

Christianity and Paganism, 350-750: The Conversion of Western Europe (J. N. Hillgarth, 1985)

This one is a bit different than the others since I read it for a class, but since I read the whole thing, by gum, I'm counting it!

This is a collection of various documents (laws, histories, letters, etc.) with ample annotation from Dr. Hillgarth. I probably would not have picked it out on my own, but with guidance it provides excellent insight into the spread of Christianity in the late Roman and early Medieval periods. This is a later edition of the original book, which used this edition's subtitle as its main title.

For the course, I focused on some of the excerpts from the Theodosian Code. I re-arranged Hillgarth's presentation chronologically and analyzed the changing areas of interest and increasing intolerance of non-Christians in the post-Constantine Roman Empire. Of the three papers I wrote for the course, this one probably came to me the easiest, channeling both majors for the first time in a good long while.

Taking a course in church history? Check this out!

The Division Bell (Pink Floyd, 1994)

Program note: I am acknowledging that I fell seriously behind on just about everything over the last few months, so until further notice, what follows is catch-up work. It would be irresponsible to create new content opportunity at this point. Of course I will continue reading, but the weekly album thing needs a mandatory rest. Besides, I'll run out of albums before too long.

In 2014, with the release of The Endless River, the world finally had to accept what they knew but didn't want to admit for the past 20 years: Pink Floyd was no more. Aside from a few freak reunions, they band was pretty much defunct since the end of the 1990's, but, even after the death of keyboardist Richard Wright, there were those who weren't prepared to close the books on Pink Floyd. Maybe they were trying to balance out those who gave up on the band in 1968 ("no Barrett, no band!"), or 1984 ("no Waters, no Floyd!"). Even though I don't consider either The Division Bell or A Momentary Lapse of Reason to be my primary go-to albums, I don't draw a hard line against either one. As long as Dave Gilmour stuck around (plus Nick Mason for continuity's sake), I didn't see any wrong with calling these Pink Floyd albums.

In some ways The Division Bell enjoys more legitimacy than its 1987 predecessor. The band photos, for one thing, were a marked improvement, with Wright fully reinstated (he was listed as an "additional musician" previously) and Gilmour sporting a smart haircut. The earlier photos seems so awkward with just Gilmour and Mason sporting age-inappropriate hairstyles. Also, The Division Bell marks a return to the concept album format. It's not a obvious structured format like The Wall, nor does it sport marathon-length songs like Animals. The listener needs to apply a little imagination, but a theme does emerge. The sudden rise of The Publius Enigma didn't hurt matters any. Click the link because I'm not going down that rabbit hole again! Although the album got pretty tepid reviews, it couldn't have arrived at a better time in my life and Pink Floyd was the first major rock show I went to. It was in a stadium and the band looked like a bunch of ants, but boy was it fun.

The last song, "High Hopes", from which the title of The Endless River comes, is probably the best final song a band can ask for. Many bands have no idea when their end is coming - even the Beatles got burned with the release of Let It Be making "The End" from Abbey Road in fact not the end. Other times the band just isn't ready to call it a day, so what may seem like finality is not. In true Pink Floyd form, the last notes are not the end of the song. Instead it's an awkwardly abrupt and almost inaudible phone conversation. It's an amusing coda, but I think at that point the band was already packing it in.