When PJ Harvey first showed up it was kind of just flat-out exciting. She was a lot of things (sexy, forceful, punk, English), and none of them put her in any particular genre. She was alternative when that still seemed to mean something. Come to think of it, she's still sort of a genre of her own. "Dress" was her first single, and it'll always sound hot.
Here's some soulful blues for you, in rhythm. It isn't quite right to say that Barbara Lynn was great, because the Texas native is still at it, touring around from her home in Beaumont, Texas. The killer reissue label Water just brought out her 1968 album, Here Is Barbara Lynn, which you can read more about here. But for now, just watch this talented singer and songwriter on the 1966 TV show The!!!! Beat, as she dances around the guitar neck, offers a convincing word of romantic caution and generally is just the coolest thing ever on two legs.
When someone asks if you like Fleetwood Mac, the best response is, "Which one?" (Although truthfully, the answer is "yes," regardless.) This Playboy After Dark clip from 1970 with the early, Peter Green–led blues-rock version of the band is remarkable for a number of things: the haircuts; the thankfully brief dialogue between Barbi Benton and Hef (who already looks 60 or so); and the instinctive way the late-era hippie-bunnies take to this superdope slice of greasy rawk goodness.
Oh man, you know how hard it was to decide between SOAD and Linkin Park for this Video Thrwbck? The band with the superior braided beardage won.
Amazingly, most of us managed to escape the swing revival of the late nineties unscathed. I used that year as an opportunity to ask my piano teacher to finally teach me some music that was on the radio. By the end of it, I'd nailed most of the Brian Setzer Orchestra LP, but this proved insurmountable. The piano arrangement is insane. If nothing else, these swing band dudes could play. And still do (holler obviously early-bought URLs).
Watching this clip you almost get the feeling that Roger Daltrey was kind of weighing the band down. You definitely get the feeling that no one in the history of the world has ever looked happier to be playing the drums than Keith Moon does at about 1:40.
I went to look up "Prison Sex," the video which was banned on MTV and Much Music after much controversy, but even though it was still cool and scary and amazing it was also kind of too dark to be posting in the AM, so here we are at the equally awesome (and almost as disturbing) "Sober" which didn't get any complaints and actually won a Billboard or something. Undertow makes me think the 90s weren't so bad after all.
Some songs just get around. "Blue Flower" is best known as a Mazzy Star tune, but it was originally done by the insanely great art-pop group Slapp Happy in 1972. Today, however — right now, at this particular moment — we (you and me) are just going to agree to prefer the version by OG shoegazers Pale Saints, which followed Mazzy Star's by two years. Singer-guitarist Meriel Barham deserves a Grammy and an Oscar for this performance. And maybe a Nobel Prize for androgyny.
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