"The Circle Game," by Tom Rush (May, 1968)

Dad's Take:

You could call 1968 the year of the concept album, and this is another. This time, folk-rock singer Tom Rush follows a relationship from beginning to end.

Most of the songs on the album were written by others. Rush wrote two himself, but others come from such big names as Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, and Charlie Rich. He might not have written most of the songs, but he combined them into a story and delivered them in his own style. Using so many cover songs was an interesting choice, considering Tom Rush's own songwriting talent. His two songs are among the best on the record, especially "No Regrets," which has become a standard, covered by several big-name artists.

This is one of those records that you have to put on and then sit back and listen. The poetic lyrics demand attention. And it's easy to give it. Like a lot of folk and folk-rock, the voice isn't the draw. Rush's voice is kind of a combination of Dylan and Lou Reed, with a little Gordon Lightfoot and a touch of Leonard Cohen mixed in, but it usually fits the songs fine. The draw is the songs and the messages behind them.

Some songs are a little jarring. For example, if you know James Taylor's version of  "Something in the way she moves," Rush's almost hyperactive musical arrangement feels more than a little odd. But for the most part, the album takes a mellow, enjoyable, and emotionally satisfying folk-rock approach.

I like the record best in its mellower moments, such as "Tin Angel" and "Urge for Going," both written by Joni Mitchell. The somewhat countrified old-school rocker "The Glory Of Love," written by Billy Hill and performed by people like Benny Goodman in the distant past, is fun, but sounds slightly overdone compared to most of the tracks.

Jackson Browne's "Shadow Dream Song" holds up well to the Tom Rush treatment. It's one of Browne's earliest songs and shows that he'll one day be a songwriting force to be reckoned with. It's one of the best songs on the record. I also really like Joni Mitchell's title song, "The Circle Game."

This record isn't a personal favorite, but when it's good, it's really good. I've gone to it a couple times in the last few months, when the mood has hit me. Usually I'll listen to a few songs, then move on to something else. But like most concept albums, it is best when listened to whole, despite a few weaker songs. Where it's weak, it's usually due to some production decisions that aren't to my taste, rather than the songs themselves, as in "Something In The Way She Moves." Overall, though, it's a solid album, a classic in its genre.

One additional note: the cover photo of Tom Rush and his girlfriend Jill Lumpkin was shot by photographer Linda Eastman, who later became Mrs. Paul McCartney.

Brad's Take:

The 60s were all about folk music that (to me) was very hit and miss. My tastes sway more to "miss" but I actually really liked this album by Tom Rush. I'd never heard of this guy before, but it's classic singer-songwriter/folky music, but the production and other instrumentation going on sets this apart a little bit from the rest of that era. It's not just an acoustic guitar and vocals. I always prefer multiple guitar tracks and other instruments in this kind of music.

Most of the songs kind of stay in a certain style, but "The Glory of Love" is a fun little early 60s pop-inspired tune. It's full of melody and even features background vocals by a female group. Not sure who it is though. This was one of my favorite songs from the album though. I'm a sucker for that kind of stuff.

Generally, I've found that most of folky stuff from the 60s all sounds kind of similar. This album was refreshing though. It has the classic popular folk style, but there's also a lot of other non-traditional parts throughout each song that makes it not as bland to me. Some might argue that a lot of these kinds of records were so stripped down is so you could focus on the story that the songwriter was telling through their lyrics. But I think that Tom Rush has the perfect balance of interesting music and interesting lyrics. I don't feel like the music takes away focus from the stories at all.

This is definitely a folky album that I don't have a hard time backing at all. Consider me a fan!

On a side note: Tom Rush's voice reminds me a lot of a singer-songwriter I like named Mark Kozelek (who is also the frontman of the bands Sun Kil Moon and The Red House Painters.) If you haven't checked him out, or his other bands, do it.

"The Velvet Underground & Nico" by The Velvet Underground (March, 1967)

Dad's Take:

I find the Velvet Underground very hard to relate to personally, with its urban junkie themes, but it's impossible not to hear how this band that barely scratched the awareness of the general public during most of their career influenced much of what came later, especially in the punk and post-punk alternative scenes.

The opening track, "Sunday Morning," is like late-sixties sparkly pop on heroin. Maybe because of Lou Reed's pop sensibility and his substance issues. It belies the darkness of most of the rest of the album.

This is one of those records that's hard not to judge in retrospect. Even in the anything-goes musical world of 1967, this album is odd. For one thing, nobody can actually sing, although they almost sound like people who can. It's not just that their voices are unusual, but that they really sound like they are in the wrong business. It's like they're saying, "If Dylan can do it, we can too," only they can't. And yet, the thing works extremely well. Like so many successful artists who make it in spite of their voices, VU took their sub-par voices and made them right for their music. If they had better voices, their schtick would break. And when you look back at it from those punk and alternative days, you see how much influence they had.

The catchy pop songs like "Femme Fatale" with their sixties feel have a dark edge that is almost a parody of the pop forms they imitate. And that's the whole point. VU is like the underside of pop, and its way is more honest than the music it undercuts. Whether they are attacking the exotic sound of the Beatles Indian-influenced songs on cuts like "Venus In Furs" or flat-out junkie songs like "Heroin," there's a truth in the music that is often missing from the shiny corporate pop. Maybe this is Any Warhol's influence on the album. His art often looks like simple commercial pop art, but with a sharp underbelly. That same thing is all over this record.

I admit that I often find VU difficult to listen to, and at times feel like it's one of those "art" things that I'm not hip enough to get. Only, I do get it, I think. That it's hard to listen to doesn't mean I don't see why it is so highly rated. It's not hard to believe that Lou Reed started out by playing cover versions of popular songs for budget labels like Pickwick. You hear the pop sensibilities and the jadedness of mail-order budget commercial cynicism. This attitude became the predominant one in popular music two and three decades later. That those bands that popped up in the late eighties and nineties looked back at the VU is obvious and maybe inevitable.

And, here's the thing. There's a lot of interesting stuff happening in these songs, especially in the cynical dissonance. The almost-too-relaxed underground style of the arrangements and the garage band production values hide some smart instrumentation and an artistic sensibility. Like much worthwhile art, it's not always pretty, but it tells a truth we don't like to see.

Do I like it? What is "like"? Does the band even want me to like it? I don't know. But it's better than I sometimes like to admit, fits in with both 1967 and 1997, and rewards repeated listenings more than you might expect the first time you hear it. Yeah, that junkie New York club scene is probably as much a myth as the Beach Boys' version of California (which it also lampoons in places), and it's a mythical world that makes me uncomfortable, but that doesn't make the art any less valid.

So this is one I can pull out once in a while and get into, although I'm exhausted by the end. For its influence alone it belongs on our list, and maybe mainly for that influence. But it also takes rock and roll to artistic places where it hadn't gone before. And, even if it's hard to listen to, it is good, much better than it seems like it should be, given the elements of the band.

Brad's Take:

This is yet another good example of a band that I have heard of for many years, but never got around to listening to on my own. Because of that, I was pretty excited to bust this out and give it a whirl.

The album's first 3 songs are great. They've got that 60's folk rock kind of thing going on, mixed with some of the psychedelic sounds. It reminds me a little bit of the last Bob Dylan album we reviewed. Lou Reed and Dylan even have a similar vocal style in some songs, like "Venus In Furs."

"Femme Fatale" was a song that I was already very familiar. Not their version though. The solo project of Mike Kinsella, called Owen, recorded an almost unrecognizable version of the song for his amazing album At Home With Owen a few years ago. Until just a few months ago though, I thought he wrote it. It was cool hearing the original version of the song, but I do enjoy Owen's rendition of it most.

In the song "Run Run Run," you realize that these guys weren't the most skilled musicians... The "guitar solo" in that song is just terrible. I can't figure out what Sterling Morrison was thinking when he recorded that thing, but it's no bueno.

Overall, this album reminds me of a sloppy band of teenagers trying to write in the style of Bob Dylan and The Beatles, but doing it very sloppily and not very well. For what it is though, it's pretty good. There's definitely potential. It's like watching a local band of junior high kids that are trying hard to be awesome, but they're coming up short, but you still give them a few bucks for a CD and say, "Good job, but keep trying. You'll be great in a couple years." I could listen to this again, I think.

"The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" by Bob Dylan (May, 1963)

Dad's Take:

I've been looking forward to this one probably about as much as Brad hasn't been, but I'm hoping Brad might see the light.

Bob Dylan's first album didn't get much attention, but this second disc introduced him as the major new force in folk music. Innovative lyrics, social relevancy, solid playing, revolution, and that voice that some people have trouble getting used to but that delivers the songs so perfectly--all of this helped define the music of the sixties. Dylan is to folk music what the Beatles are to rock and roll: a redefining iconoclast that changed everything that came after.

Of course, there was no way to know that when this album first surfaced. There was no way to predict how much Dylan would affect all genres of popular music. There was just a collection of great songs. "Blowin' in the Wind," "Masters of War," "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right," "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall." There's anger, frustration, acidic wit, and beauty in these songs and in most of this album.

Sure, Dylan is not always easy to listen to, but that's true of so many great artists. He challenges you to listen and to think, to look below the surface and see the world. Not since Woody Guthrie had the folk music scene been forced to really see like this. Not since Woody Guthrie had folk music sounded this fresh and bitter at the same time.

We'll hear more Dylan in our list, but few of those albums will have exciting vibe of Dylan's breakout effort. I can't listen to this record enough.

Brad's Take:

My dad was right. I was not looking forward to this album. I've never been a real fan of Bob Dylan. Off the top of my head, the only Bob Dylan song I could name is "Blowin' In The Wind" but I have listened to a punk rock cover of it hundreds of times more than I have listened to the original. I won't ever disagree that he's a classic musician, but I just personally haven't been able to get into his music at all before so I went into this very pessimistically. Since that isn't very fair though, I will try to give this an unbiased review...

Bob Dylan's known mainly for his voice and his lyrics. Robert's voice is hard to get used to at first, but I got used to it on this album. Whether you get used to his unique voice or not, there's no denying that his lyrics are great. His lyrics are very politically charged, like every folk album that came out in the 60s.

As a guitar player myself, I was slightly annoyed that Ol' Bobby's guitar was noticeably out of tune on "Down The Highway" and a couple of others. Also, some of the really high harmonica notes he plays almost killed me, like the final drawn out note in "Girl From North Country." I've never been a real fan of the harmonica...

To me, this album sounds like a guy sitting on his front porch, imperfectly playing his slightly out of tune guitar but singing songs from his heart. But Freewheelin' launched Bob Dylan's career instantly, and it was well earned.

Although I was not excited to listen to an entire Bob Dylan album, I found myself to accept it about halfway through. There weren't any songs I loved, or any that I like-liked, but there weren't any songs I hated either. It's not my typical cup of tea, but for what it is, it's great. It's a perfect snapshot of the 60s folk music scene.