Perfect Pop Songs

I'm going add this one just because it's so sing-along-ish...Just flows, and rolls off the tongue, tells a story, and is a feel-good song.

And here's another soft-rock classic, from Styx, for those of my younger years, when groups like Fleetwood Mac, Styx, Journey and REO Speedwagon ruled our world. This was practically a daily lunch-time anthem in my high school cafeteria.

And a Neil Diamond classic made for swaying and swinging:

 

This thread really is a trip (down memory lane), and oh, what a trip! Having the time of my life looking at and listening to all this stuff.

I'm sure everyone knows this one, and can get into it:

 

So fucking bad ass. Muddy, a killer band and Johnny Winter wailing in the background.

 

This song has a groove you could get lost in for a week

 

Always sounded like it should have been included in a James Bond-knock off, didn't it? Massive intro before turning into a regular pop song.

Another one like that was "Black is Black" by Los Bravos.

 

Or this one in 5/4.

 

Pretenders were perfection.

 

The first song is really fucking tightly done.

The second song was one of John Lennon's favorites.

Oh to be a boy in the '70s.

 

Speaking of John, this is the best perfect song by The Beatles.

 

There are no words to describe how much I love Little River Band. Saw them in concert at Pacific Coliseum in 1978 ... their harmonies were as tight live as in the studio.

 

Classic Canadian rocker from Max Webster, contemporaries of Rush

 

Buckle up, he's putting his teaching hat back on.

Stax Records, or more properly Stax/Volt, in Memphis, was a primary source of Southern Soul and R&B during the 60's and early 70's. This was another case of a group of players acting as a house recording band who played on damn near everything. Back in the payola days, radio DJ's were reluctant to play too many new songs from the same label in order to avoid the appearance of having been paid off. The record companies got around this be establishing subsidiary labels, in this case Stax and Volt. Stax came from "Stax of Wax". Stax also had a recording and distributing agreement with Jerry Wexler at Atlantic Records, which brought about the involvement of legendary engineer/producer Tom Dowd. Dowd was hugely influential and was involved in an absolute encyclopedia of hits over the years. He'll eventually get an entry of his own, and I urge you to find and watch the movie "Tom Dowd and the Language of Music". To high point him (unfairly, he was huge), he produced "Layla" and "The Allman Brothers at the Fillmore East".

There was some flux when the label was first getting started but the core line-up of players was Booker T. Jones on keyboards, Donald "Duck" Dunn on bass, Steve Cropper on guitar, and Al Jackson on drums. Jones was away from the label for a while in the mid-60 as he got a music degree, and during that period he was replaced by Isaac Hayes. Later they both contributed. This band was a bit unusual in that they actually released songs as a band, typically instrumentals as songs with vocals would be credited to the singer. If the song featured horns it was typically credited to the Mar-Kays, and if it didn't to Booker T. and the MG's. Stax's studio was in what had been an old movie theater, and the room had a spacious open sound that a trademark of the label.

You know this band, whether you realize it or not, not just because of the Stax songs you know or for their best known song (which you also know) but also because they became the heart of the Blues Brothers Band.

They backed Rufus Thomas and Carla Thomas, Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Wilson Pickett, Johnny Taylor, Isaac Hayes himself, the Bar-Keys, and more. Since they had a production agreement with Atlantic they also were involved with recordings by many Atlantic artists. They were Otis Redding's touring band.

Anyhow, enough blather.

This clip is from a mid-60's Stax/Volt concert tour and features Booker T and the MG's as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVjnBo96Ug