The Sunday Six

Hard to believe it’s Sunday again, and we’ve reached the second weekend in spring. In typical tri-state (New Jersey, New York, Connecticut) fashion, we’ve had some wild temperature swings, and for tomorrow, the weatherman has forecast a whooping daytime high of 35 F – keeping fingers crossed they’re wrong like most of the time! Meanwhile, let’s keep the weather behind us and embark on another journey celebrating the music of the past and the present with six tunes.

Carlos Santana/Bella

I’d like to start today’s trip with a beautiful instrumental by Carlos Santana, one of the first guitarists I admired after I had started to pick up the guitar as a 12 or 13-year-old. Santana’s first compilation Santana’s Greatest Hits from July 1971, which spans the band’s first three albums, was one of the vinyl records my six-year-older sister had at the time. While I’m most familiar with the band’s classic period and it remains my favorite Santana music, I’ve also come to like some of their other work. Bella, co-written by Sterling Crew (keyboards, synthesizer), Carlos Santana (guitar) and Chester D. Thompson (keyboards), is from a solo album by Carlos, titled Blues for Salvador. Released in October 1987, the record is dedicated to his son Salvador Santana, who was born in May 1983 and is one of three children he had with his first wife Deborah King. Salvador Santana is a music artist as well, who has been active since 1999 when he collaborated with his father on composing El Farol, a Grammy-winning track from Santana’s hugely successful Supernatural album that came out in June that year.

Steely Dan/Home at Last

Last night, I saw an outstanding tribute band to Steely Dan, Sting, Stevie Wonder and Gino Vannelli. I’ve covered Good Stuff on previous occasions, for example here. After having felt skittish about going to concerts for the longest time, I’ve recently resumed some activities. It felt so good to enjoy some top-notch live music! As such, I guess it’s not a surprise that Messrs. Walter Becker and Donald Fagen are on my mind. While they have written many great songs, the one album I keep coming back to is Aja, a true masterpiece released in September 1977. Here’s Home at Last. That’s kind of how I felt last night!

The Chambers Brothers/Time Has Come Today

All righty, boys and girls, the time has come to go back to the ’60s and step on the gas a little with some psychedelic soul – coz, why not? The inspiration for this next pick came from a playlist titled 60s Rock Anthems, which I saw on Spotify. Regardless of whether you consider Time Has Come Today by American psychedelic soul group The Chambers Brothers a “rock anthem,” I think it’s a pretty cool tune. The title track of their debut album from November 1967 became the group’s biggest hit single, climbing to no. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100. The trippy song was co-written by brothers Willie Chambers (vocals, guitar) and Joseph Chambers (guitar), who made up the band together with their brothers Lester Chambers (harmonica) and George Chambers (bass), along with Brian Keenan (drums). Since the studio cut came in at 11 minutes, they edited it down to 2:37 minutes for the original single. Subsequently, there were also 3:05 and 4:45-minute single versions. Since we don’t do things half-ass here, of course, I present you with the full dose – sounds like a tasty stew of early Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix!

The Style Council/Shout to the Top

After the previous 11-minute psychedelic soul tour de force, I thought something more upbeat would be in order. The other day, I remembered and earmarked British outfit The Style Council. Formed in late 1982 by singer, songwriter and guitarist Paul Weller (formerly with punk rock band The Jam) and keyboarder Mick Talbot (formerly of Dexys Midnight Runners, among others), The Style Council became part of a wave of British pop outfits that embraced blue-eyed soul and jazz. Others that come to mind are Simply Red, Matt Bianco and Everything But The Girl. Shout to the Top, written by Weller, was the group’s seventh single that came out in October 1984. It was included on the band’s sophomore album Our Favourite Shop from June 1985 and part of the soundtrack of the American romantic drama picture Vision Quest released in February of the same year. Warning, the catchy tune might get stuck in your brain!

Blue Rodeo/5 Days in May

Our next stop takes us to the ’90s and some beautiful Neil Young-style Americana rock. Blue Rodeo are a relatively recent “discovery.” The first time I featured the Canadian country rock band, who has been around since 1984, was in early December 2021. Borrowing from this post, they were formed by high school friends Jim Cuddy (vocals, guitar) and Greg Keelor (vocals, guitar), who had played together in various bands before, and Bob Wiseman (keyboards). Cleave Anderson (drums) and Bazil Donovan (bass) completed the band’s initial lineup. After gaining a local following in Toronto and signing with Canadian independent record label Risque Disque, the group released their debut album Outskirts in March 1987. Co-written by Keelor and Cuddy, 5 Days in May is from Blue Rodeo’s fifth studio album Five Days in July, first released in Canada in October 1993. It only appeared in the U.S. in September of the following year. The band has since released 16 additional studio albums. I reviewed their most recent one, Many a Mile, here.

Foo Fighters/Medicine At Midnight

Once again, we’ve reached the final stop of our musical mini-excursion. Late on Friday sad news broke that Taylor Hawkins, who had been the drummer of Foo Fighters since 1997, passed away at the age of 50. The tragic event happened just before the band was scheduled to play a gig in Bogota, Colombia as part of their South America tour. The cause of death is still under investigation but may have been heart-related. I generally don’t follow the Foos and as such know next to nothing about their music. But I think Dave Grohl is a pretty cool dude, and I sympathize with what must be a difficult loss to him and his bandmates, the Hawkins family and Foo fans. An AP story quoted Grohl from his 2021 book The Storyteller: “Upon first meeting, our bond was immediate, and we grew closer with every day, every song, every note that we ever played together…We are absolutely meant to be, and I am grateful that we found each other in this lifetime.” Here’s the title track from Foo Fighters’ tenth studio album Medicine at Midnight released in February 2021. Like all other tracks on the record, it’s credited to the entire band.

Here’s a Spotify playlist featuring all of the above tunes.

Sources: Wikipedia; Associated Press; YouTube; Spotify