Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#995 in the Series) is The Small Faces, First Step Being married to, or even dating a super model may give you a lot of bragging rights with the boys down at the local watering hole, and it certainly gives you a “checkmate” in the game of one-upmanship when you and your buddies are on your fifth pint and trading war stories about the hottest girlfriend you ever dated.  But if you are a rock star, and history tells us anything, it’s that that Super Models are responsible for ruining more careers than drugs, alcohol and Yoko combined, and that maintaining a relationship with one or more of these long legged vixens may be...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#994 in the Series) is Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Uncle Charlie & His Dog Teddy Most music fans will know the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (if they know them at all) as the makers of “Will The Circle Be Unbroken”, a superb album which has become semi-legendary in certain circles, with good cause. It was an essential purchase when it came out in 1972, a wondrous 3 LP set within which tribute was paid by a younger generation to some of the most revered performers of traditional Country music. The likes of Mother Maybelle Carter, Earl Scruggs and Roy Acuff were on board for a seminal release on which both sides of...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#992 in the Series) is The Waterboys, This is the Sea. Hands up all those who remember “The Big Music?” Don’t worry, you could easily be forgiven if you don’t! You’ll know the bands associated with it though. The Big Music was a description thrown about in the early 80’s (here in the UK at least) and it was applied, mostly, to a small grouping of bands who were just starting to make an impression on the music buying public and who were all deemed to be making a similar grandiose, epic, “reaching for the sky” type music. You or I would probably just have settled for the term Stadium Rock to be...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#990 in the Series) is Boo Hewerdine and Darden Smith, Evidence It was 65 degrees here in Chicago a couple of short days ago. Within 10 hours it was down to 32. Yes, it was freezing.  I tell you that weather tale as I lead into a piece on this great album by Boo Hewerdine and Darden Smith titled Evidence.  Why you might have asked? I mention that because I’ve always had certain albums that I associate with the different seasons or even sometime more specifically a certain time of that season. I could never listen to Frank Zappa’s Apostrophe in the dead of summer because no one “trudges across the tundra” in...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#989 in the Series) is George Winston, December.  There’s really not a ton more that you can say about this album that hasn’t been said previously?  It’s an all-time Hall of Fame Christmas season album, how’s that. I read a few reviews on this album while looking for information on it. They all basically said the same thing, how this album set the tone for a whole new genre, and how for years and years others would try and recreate what George Winston created in 1983.  It’s just a man and his piano and that’s it. One of the most difficult things in all of music has been to record a new...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#984 in the Series) Big Star, Third/Sister Lovers This one goes down as one of the great enigma’s of rock music, an album by a band which had pretty much split up by the time it was recorded, which had no title and which didn’t even have a finalized track listing. For years it was, just like The Beach Boys “SMiLE”, more of a rumour, a myth, than an actual record. Thankfully it was eventually released, in an albeit limited capacity, and fans were finally able to hear what all the fuss was about. Was it worth it? Hell yeah. Big time. Big Star were founded in Memphis by  three friends who were deeply...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#983 in the Series) is Missing Persons,Spring Session M. (Capitol) I don’t know many bands that would 100% fill the term “Cool” better than Missing Persons.  Not only did they have the “look” but they definitely also had the “chops” to go with it. They were one of the original bands that received a huge boost by MTV. The hot look of lead singer Dale Bozzio had a ton to do with that, especially when the ex-bunny dressed in only bubble wrap. Hot looks only take you so far without musicianship however, and as good as they looked, they played even better. Dale Bozzio’s “other half” was drummer Terry Bozzio.  This man...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#982 in the Series) is My Morning Jacket, Circuital A Review of Circuital ….With a Slight History and Very Public Secret Crush Thrown in. When I first heard of My Morning Jacket, their genre was described as “Southern Rock”, which instantly made me turn my head and say bleh. Then, shortly thereafter,  WXRT in Chicago played a song from their 2001 Release, At Dawn. (Bermuda Highway). I remember being in the car, pausing, thinking, then saying to myself. “Who the hell was that?” You see, that was long before I could look anything up in the car, , and I certainly didn’t have the internet at my fingertips, otherwise known as the Pre-...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#981 in the series) is the debut self-titled album by Mudcrutch. I’ll be the first to admit, I’ve never been the biggest Tom Petty fan.  Don’t get me wrong, I think he’s OK, I do like him. I’ve seen him and really enjoyed the show. (Althought I liked the opening band the del Fuegos better)  I’ve liked some of this work but I think the best thing he ever did was his original single “American Girl” and that was 1976. But…. however, I really liked his Mudcrutch album! Here’s what Mudcrutch was all about. They were Petty’s first band formed in 1970.  The band did include a number of future Heartbreakers. They...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#980 in the Series) is Cheap Trick, In Color The mid to late 70s were really a fun time to be a music fan for me. Seeing bands in clubs around Chicago, and then seeing some of them release albums and becoming even more successful, some of those success stories would even reach world-wide. Cheap Trick was one of those bands. They would make the 90 minute or so trip from their Rockford, Illinois home to Chicago every so often. Once or twice they’d even play tiny “Luigi’s” in Chicago Heights.  We were underage but we’d get in. The first Cheap Trick album was released in early ’77.  To me it’s never been...