a blog for those who never gave up their turntables or records
MY FIRST PUBLISHED PIECE was with the Wyoming Valley West High School newspaper, where I was the nerd who got the gig of reviewing records. That was 1969 and, like most nerds with super cool record collections, I wrote condescending reviews of records that all my non-nerd classmates bought. [Continue reading]
ROLLING STONE REJECTED MY COMMENT! I received today’s copy of the Rolling Stone Daily newsletter (February 26, 2021) and there was an article titled “Hear the Beach Boys Reunite on Charity Re-Recording of ‘Add Some Music to Your Day’.” [Continue reading]
DOES JACKIE DeSHANNON belong in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame? Making an argument for her or any artist is not easy for two reasons. First, the Hall does not have any set of criteria by which fans can assess potential candidates. [Continue reading]
BOOK REVIEWS ARE NOT MY THING here on Rather Rare records, but exceptions to unwritten rules are often good things. So here is a review of “Stacks Of Wax – The Complete History Of The Record Labels Of Cincinnati, Ohio,” a self-published effort by David Bottoms. [Continue reading]
JACKIE DeSHANNON entered 1963 as a 21-year-old singer with fifteen singles under her belt, not one of them a hit! Hundreds of artists who had been more successful—they’d heard thunder boom with at least one hit record!—had come and gone during that time, yet Liberty Records showed great faith in her and kept with her through the rest of the decade. [Continue reading]
WAY BACK IN 1984, way back when people actually believed in “trickle-down economics,” I was living in Scottsdale, Arizona, but I wasn’t getting out much. I had succumbed to the ubiquitous peer pressure question of “Why do you live in the past when it comes to music?” [Continue reading]
IF I EVER GET AROUND to writing a book about the how’s, why’s, and wherefore’s of collecting records, I will include a chapter on “On How Not To Handle Your Records.” However the book is laid out, I would hope to use a photo like the one below for this chapter. [Continue reading]
My apologies but I accidentally pushed the PUBLISH button instead of the SAVE DRAFT button and sent my Sound Of Silence/Sounds Of Silence article out onto the internet that was still in draft form.
I will have the piece completed and properly published by tomorrow (October 24, 2020). [Continue reading]
I WAS NOT A FAN OF PUNK ROCK in the 1970s and ’80s. I admired the political aspect of the punk movement in the UK and the anybody-can-be-in-a-band spirit, but I didn’t connect with most of the music. (I still don’t care for most of it but have loosened up a bit with age.) [Continue reading]
