I saw Little Feat at the Troubadour.<\/p>\n
When I was a junior in college, all the music magazines testified about this new album by Little Feat, entitled "Dixie Chicken". So, of course, I bought it.\u00c2\u00a0 And played it.\u00c2\u00a0 And if you’d taken a picture of my face upon that first time through you would describe my expression as quizzical.\u00c2\u00a0 As in HUH?\u00c2\u00a0 This is what they were raving about?\u00c2\u00a0 It didn’t sound quite like anything else, kind of like white boys from L.A. got sidetracked on their way to New Orleans.\u00c2\u00a0 There was no hit single, and if this were the modern era, I probably wouldn’t have given the album another spin, but it being 1973, I played "Dixie Chicken" again and again and AGAIN, because I’D PAID FOR IT!<\/p>\n
That’s how it worked.\u00c2\u00a0 We could only afford a small amount of music.\u00c2\u00a0 Every record was picked with TLC, no purchase was casual, to buy a bummer was to indict oneself as a lame, uneducated music fan.\u00c2\u00a0 No one else might have known, but you would, so you gave these records a chance, and more often than not they exposed themselves to you.<\/p>\n
But "Dixie Chicken" was a bit beyond that.\u00c2\u00a0 First I loved "Juliette".\u00c2\u00a0 Then other tracks started to reveal themselves to me, and then not only did I like "Dixie Chicken", I LOVED IT!\u00c2\u00a0 I had to go back and buy "Sailin’ Shoes", I was a fan of a band almost no one had ever heard of, never mind had an opinion on.<\/p>\n
Moving to L.A. is like arriving in a musical cornucopia.\u00c2\u00a0 Not only do the street signs and locations make sense, from their placement in your favorite songs, suddenly all your favorite musical acts are AVAILABLE!\u00c2\u00a0 You can SEE THEM!<\/p>\n
I dragged Danny to the gig.\u00c2\u00a0 He was the only guy at Star Sporting Goods who’d heard of Little Feat.<\/p>\n
And this was back when there were tables in the venue, before it was necessary to stand to hear rock and roll, when the music touched not only your body, but your soul.\u00c2\u00a0 You’d sit tucked into your seat grooving, with your mind bouncing like a pinball through the stratosphere.<\/p>\n
I saw Little Feat again.\u00c2\u00a0 At the Santa Monica Civic a few years later.\u00c2\u00a0 But that Troubadour gig was the shit.\u00c2\u00a0 Because it was solely about the music.\u00c2\u00a0 They didn’t have a new album, it wasn’t like this one gig was going to ignite their career, this was a band of players locking into a groove for their fans.<\/p>\n
And Little Feat ultimately had a radio hit.\u00c2\u00a0 But not only did they not live up to their potential, they never broke through to mainstream consciousness.\u00c2\u00a0 Everybody knows who Vanilla Ice is, even if they don’t want to listen to Rob Van Winkle’s music…but stop people on the street and ask them their opinion on Lowell George and they’ll say HUH?<\/p>\n
RAMBLE ON<\/span><\/p>\n Last week I went to lunch with Jerry Greenberg.\u00c2\u00a0 The oldsters are too rich to survive in today’s work for almost nothing music business, but they’ve still got their stories, a treasure trove.<\/p>\n Jerry was there.\u00c2\u00a0 When Atlantic signed Zeppelin.\u00c2\u00a0 He told me the story.\u00c2\u00a0 About Ahmet getting a phone call from Dusty Springfield telling him that Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones were starting a new band and he should sign them, this was even before Robert and Bonzo were involved.<\/p>\n And I’m telling Jerry about when I was in high school and in one week, everybody knew "Whole Lotta Love".\u00c2\u00a0 It was October ’69.\u00c2\u00a0 The track hit the airwaves, everybody bought "Led Zeppelin II" and Taylor Swift doesn’t have an iota of the impact.\u00c2\u00a0 There wasn’t a soul who didn’t know "Whole Lotta Love".\u00c2\u00a0 That album is all that anybody listened to for a week straight, maybe a month.\u00c2\u00a0 Zeppelin was instantly the biggest band in the world.<\/p>\n And sure, "Whole Lotta Love" was the breakthrough, a single edit made by Jerry which Peter Grant finally acceded to, but the thing about "II" was you could play it through and through.<\/p>\n My personal favorite was always "Living Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman)", it tore through my speakers, but even I know the track that followed it was more magical…RAMBLE ON!<\/p>\n It was like you were on a thoroughbred, riding through the English countryside in the early morning mist.\u00c2\u00a0 Loping along without a thought in your brain other than this song.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s the magic of great music, its magnetism, it draws you in and won’t let go.<\/p>\n You see every Halloween Phish plays an entire classic album.\u00c2\u00a0 And rumor was it was gonna be Zeppelin, so the Phearless Phoursome dropped some classic Zep into their set the night before, the 30th.\u00c2\u00a0 But on the holiday, the album they covered was WAITING FOR COLUMBUS!<\/p>\n HUH?<\/span><\/p>\n I bet most of you have never heard of this double live album, when two vinyl discs didn’t even add up to the length of one CD.<\/p>\n What do you do when you don’t break through?\u00c2\u00a0 RECORD YOUR GREATEST HITS!<\/p>\n Well, Little Feat only had one.\u00c2\u00a0 But they had all that great music in their catalog that so many people had never heard.\u00c2\u00a0 And they were big in England.\u00c2\u00a0 And if you think "Waiting For Columbus" took hold in America, you’re rewriting history.\u00c2\u00a0 Sure, dedicated music fans now knew who the band was, but still most people knew no tracks.\u00c2\u00a0 Although as years passed, "Dixie Chicken" became a standard.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what perseverance will do for you.\u00c2\u00a0 Concentrate on cutting something great, not what people want, and you might end up with a cut that lasts, one that truly strikes a chord.<\/p>\n Still, it’s not like Little Feat is the Doors, there’s been no mass renaissance.\u00c2\u00a0 So it’s utterly AMAZING that Phish played this live album in its entirety Sunday night.<\/p>\n But it’s even better than that.\u00c2\u00a0 They even employed a horn section, just like the original band, featuring Michael Leonhart of Steely Dan’s band.\u00c2\u00a0 This was no casual effort, this was a tribute to their forgotten heroes, this was musicians who had to get it RIGHT!<\/p>\n And you’d feel more comfortable if Phish Phucked up.\u00c2\u00a0 But they nailed "Waiting For Columbus" so well it makes you TINGLE! Not only do they get the notes right, they duplicate the ENERGY!\u00c2\u00a0 Actually, having to cover up for the lack of soul, no one can duplicate Lowell George’s soul, they play with such intensity, such drive, that it’s an aural tsunami that gathers you up and pulls you into the flow.<\/p>\n That’s the audience.\u00c2\u00a0 Not fat cat bankers who buy up all the good seats, talk and leave early.\u00c2\u00a0 But fans, who need to be there, even if there’s no mainstream buzz, even if no one other than those in attendance care.\u00c2\u00a0 The music isn’t made for those who don’t care, but those WHO DO!<\/p>\n Forget everybody who doesn’t care.\u00c2\u00a0 Did you read endless reams of hype on these Phish shows?\u00c2\u00a0 No, YOU HAD TO KNOW! That’s the modern music business.\u00c2\u00a0 If you think it’s about hype, you’re probably selling your album below cost on Amazon in order to get a good SoundScan number.\u00c2\u00a0 Huh?\u00c2\u00a0 WHO PAYS ATTENTION TO SOUNDSCAN!<\/p>\n Anybody can be famous for a day on YouTube.\u00c2\u00a0 But can you live in the hearts and minds of your FANS?\u00c2\u00a0 That’s all you should care about.<\/p>\n I don’t care whether you download the original or Phish’s rendition of "Waiting For Columbus", but just know that when you’re ready there’s a treasure trove of juicy greatness ready to satiate your aural taste buds.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s the modern music world.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s not about hits, it’s about LAND MINES!\u00c2\u00a0 Just ready to explode and change your life when you least expect it!<\/p>\n Great music is supposed to infect you, make you unable to walk away, never mind turn it off.\u00c2\u00a0 It doesn’t compete with movies or television.\u00c2\u00a0 The only thing that can equate with great tunes is sex.<\/p>\n So, put on your best look and go down to the show.\u00c2\u00a0 There you’ll find like-minded people who may not look like the stars on TMZ, who might not have a six-pack, but they know the power of music.\u00c2\u00a0 Join the band! <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I saw Little Feat at the Troubadour. When I was a junior in college, all the music magazines testified about this new album by Little Feat, entitled "Dixie Chicken". So, of course, I bought it.\u00c2\u00a0 And played it.\u00c2\u00a0 And if you’d taken a picture of my face upon that first time through you would describe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-shows","category-the-music"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-U6","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3478"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3479,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478\/revisions\/3479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
EXPLANATION<\/span><\/p>\n
SPANISH MOON<\/span>
There was hookers and hustlers, filled up the room<\/span><\/p>\n
Hey lordy, join the band, be a good rascal and join the band<\/span><\/p>\n\n
Zeppelin<\/a><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n