The Missing Years
by Pete
Whether you’re familiar with John Prine or not, you should at least make yourself familiar with The Missing Years. Produced by the late Howie Epstein of the Heartbreakers, and including such special guests as Tom Petty, Bonnie Raitt, and the Boss himself, the album is full of warm melodies, and funny & insightful lyrics. You can end the weekend just right by listening to this tune…
John Prine: The Sins of Memphisto (mp3)
Buy The Missing Years on eMusic or Amazon.
Bonus: Todd Snider: That’s the Way That the World Goes ‘Round (mp3)
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Hope for Haiti Now
January 23, 2010 - 10:54 am
Tags: bruce springsteen, Hope for Haiti, Justin Timberlake, Matt Morris, Shakira, Sting, The Roots, Wyclef
Posted in Video | No comments
Like many of you, I sat down and took in the two hours of Hope for Haiti Now last night – a music-based benefit organized by overall good guy George Clooney. It was broadcast on most TV and cable networks. This will shock you, but Fox News did not – I repeat, DID NOT – [...]
Growin’ Up
January 1, 2010 - 12:19 pm
Tags: bruce springsteen, The Boss
Posted in Video | 1 comment
A fellow Boss fan sent me a link to this video earlier today. It’s a 23 year old Bruce Springsteen performing “Growin’ Up” at Max’s Kansas City in New York City. The year was 1972 – Bruce’s first album wasn’t released until the following year.
Somehow, this seems appropriate as the first post of this [...]
Pete’s Favorite Albums of the 00’s
December 31, 2009 - 7:56 am
Tags: Arcade Fire, band of horses, bruce springsteen, Grandaddy, M.I.A., Marah, Prince, Steve Earle, The Boss, Wilco
Posted in Ickmusic Faves | 6 comments
Quick Note: I didn’t want to bombard my Top 10 with Springsteen and Prince albums, so I chose my favorites of theirs from the 00’s. Did I spend more time with M.I.A.’s Arular than with Bruce’s Magic or Prince’s Musicology? No way. Just so you know, I limited my picks to one album per artist.
And [...]
Open All Night as Bruce takes a rest
December 9, 2009 - 10:21 pm
Tags: bruce springsteen, Seeger Sessions, The Boss
Posted in Rock n' Folk | 2 comments
After the whirlwind schedule that Bruce and the Band have put themselves through the last couple of years, they’ve definitely earned some much needed R&R. And with some sort of hiatus underway (1 year? 2-3 years?), Boss Geeks like me start to speculate on what his next move might be. We know he can’t stay [...]
Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ (the Buffalo Tour Finale)
November 25, 2009 - 8:23 am
Tags: bruce springsteen, The Boss
Posted in Rock | 4 comments
For those interested in downloading Sunday’s tour finale in Buffalo (where Bruce and the band performed Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ), head on over to super top-notch blog Addicted to Vinyl, where Matt’s got a zip file of goodness for you…
Greetings from Buffalo, NY (Addicted to Vinyl)
If you’re looking for other full album shows, don’t [...]
Darkness in Philly
November 19, 2009 - 1:18 pm
Tags: bruce springsteen, The Boss
Posted in Rock | 6 comments
As bootlegs go, the tour that supported Bruce’s Darkness on the Edge of Town has to be my favorite (followed closely by The River). My favorite show? Without question, it’s July 7th, 1978 at the Roxy – a small club show in L.A. The quality is perfect, the intensity unmatched. In fact, let me play [...]
Bruce Takes NYC Down To The River
November 14, 2009 - 12:59 pm
Tags: bruce springsteen, The Boss, The River
Posted in Rock | 16 comments
With only four shows left on the Working On A Dream tour (wrapping up in Buffalo on November 22nd), and with much buzz about how the band will be taking some sort of extended hiatus, now’s the time to savor and cherish what Bruce and the Band have been bringing all year – and that’s [...]
Happy Birthday Boss (The 6-0)!
September 23, 2009 - 3:00 am
Tags: bruce springsteen, The Boss
Posted in Rock | 5 comments
Bruce Springsteen, one of my heroes in this life, turns 60 years old today. Not sure where the time goes, all I know is it goes a tad too fast for my liking. This is a simple & short post to send a hearty Happy Birthday out to the Boss.
“Brilliant Disguise” is probably my favorite [...]
More Buried Treasure with the Seeds
September 21, 2009 - 8:09 pm
Tags: The Seeds, Tom Petty
Posted in Rock | 4 comments
Another fine tune courtesy of Tom Petty’s Buried Treasure. The Seeds were a Los Angeles-based garage-psych-rock band in the 60’s and early 70’s. They were fronted by one Sky Saxon, who parted with the band in the early 70’s to join up with Yahowha religious family (aka the Source Family), led by Father Yod. They [...]
Let There Be Drums
September 14, 2009 - 10:38 pm
Tags: Sandy Nelson, Tom Petty
Posted in Oldies | 1 comment
Thanks to Tom Petty’s Buried Treasure, his radio show on Sirius-XM’s Deep Tracks, I heard a gem this morning. An instrumental that reached #7 on the Billboard charts in 1961, featuring the drum work of Sandy Nelson. I’m not sure how today’s modern drummers would judge the technical prowess of Nelson’s drumming on [...]
November 20, 2006 - 8:46 am
Ok, I was giving The Sins of Memphisto a try and I was liking guitar picking intro but I had no idea what the song was about because of the ‘interesting’ lyrics. I googled the lyrics and apparently John Prine also felt an explanation of this song was necessary, lol. Here’s what he had to say:
The Sins Of Memphisto notes
“I never do my homework until after I’m done writing. And at the time, I thought that Memphisto was the city in ancient Egypt that Memphis, Tennessee, was named after. But the city in Egypt is Memphis. I also got it confused with Mephisto, Mephistopheles, the devil. But I thought, that’s okay, it’s kind of like the devil going to Memphis, Tennessee. I wrote this one under pressure from my producer, Howie Epstein. We were 12 cuts into The Missing Years, and Howie says, “We need one or two more cuts.” And I went, “You’re kidding. From where? We’ve been working for nine months. I don’t have anything hiding on the shelf. You could take a autopsy, and you won’t find a song inside of me.” So I went and locked myself in a hotel room and went, “If he wants a song, he’ll get a song.” I tried to write one from as far in left field as I could and came up with “Memphisto.” I’m convinced I was just working the whole song to get around the punch line “exactly Odo, Quasimodo.” It’s just hip lingo, kind of like “No shit, Sherlock.” I’d had it for about four years, trying to work it into song.” ~John Prine
November 20, 2006 - 3:31 pm
That’s good stuff.
Thanks Bo-Bella. Will you be my Ickmusic Research Assistant?