Friday, April 30, 1976

Bob Marley & The Wailers released Rastaman Vibration

Rastaman Vibration

Bob Marley & the Wailers


Released: April 30, 1976


Peak: 8 US, 11 RB, 15 UK, 68 AU


Sales (in millions): 0.5 US, 0.1 UK, 2.0 world (includes US and UK)


Genre: reggae


Tracks:

Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts.

  1. Positive Vibration
  2. Roots, Rock, Reggae (6/19/76, 51 US, 37 RB)
  3. Johnny Was (4/76, --)
  4. Cry to Me
  5. Want More (Want More)
  6. Crazy Baldhead
  7. Who the Cap Fit (11/76, --)
  8. Nightshift
  9. War
  10. Rat Race


Total Running Time: 35:21


The Players:

  • Bob Marley (vocals, rhythm guitar)
  • Aston “Family Man” Barrett (bass)
  • Carlton “Carlie” Barrett (drums, percussion)
  • Jean Alain Roussel (Hammond organ)
  • Tyrone Downie (keyboards)
  • Al Anderson (guitar)
  • Earl “Chinna” Smith (guitar, percussion)
  • Rita Marley, Judy Mowatt, Griffiths (backing vocals)

Rating:

3.666 out of 5.00 (average of 23 ratings)

About the Album:

“For Bob Marley, 1975 was a triumphant year. The singer’s Natty Dread album featured one of his strongest batches of original material (the first compiled after the departure of Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer) and delivered Top 40 hit ‘No Woman No Cry.’ The follow-up Live set, a document of Marley's appearance at London's Lyceum, found the singer conquering England as well. Upon completing the tour, Marley and his band returned to Jamaica, laying down the tracks for Rastaman Vibration (1976) at legendary studios run by Harry Johnson and Joe Gibbs. At the mixing board for the sessions were Sylvan Morris and Errol Thompson, Jamaican engineers of the highest caliber.” AMG

War…remains one of the most stunning statements of the singer's career. Though it is essentially a straight reading of one of Haile Selassie’s speeches, Marley phrases the text exquisitely to fit a musical setting, a quiet intensity lying just below the surface.” AMG

“Equally strong are the likes of Rat Race, Crazy Baldhead, and Want More. These songs are tempered by buoyant, lighthearted material like Cry to Me, Night Shift, and Positive Vibration. Not quite as strong as some of the love songs Marley would score hits with on subsequent albums, ‘Cry to Me’ still seems like an obvious choice for a single and remains underrated.” AMG


Notes: “Cry to Me” was first recorded at Studio One in the ‘60s. “Jah Live” was added to the 2001 Japanese release. The 2002 Deluxe Edition also added “Smile Jamaica,” six alternate mixes of songs from the album, and a second disc of live material from 5/26/76.

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First posted 3/26/2008; last updated 5/10/2021.

Friday, April 23, 1976

The Ramones released their debut album

Ramones

Ramones


Released: April 23, 1976


Peak: 111 US, -- UK, -- CN, -- AU


Sales (in millions): 0.5 US, -- UK, 0.5 world (includes US and UK)


Genre: punk


Tracks:

Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts.

  1. Blitzkrieg Bop (2/76, --)
  2. Beat on the Brat
  3. Judy Is a Punk
  4. I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend (9/76, --)
  5. Chainsaw
  6. Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue
  7. I Don’t Wanna Go Down to the Basement
  8. Loudmouth
  9. Havana Affair
  10. Listen to My Heart
  11. 53rd & 3rd
  12. Let’s Dance
  13. I Don’t Wanna Walk Around with You
  14. Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World


Total Running Time: 29:04


The Players:

  • Joey Ramone (vocals)
  • Johnny Ramone (guitar)
  • Dee Dee Ramone (bass, backing vocals)
  • Tommy Ramone (drums, backing vocals)

Rating:

4.449 out of 5.00 (average of 15 ratings)


Quotable:

The Ramones “defined punk music and gave rise to an entire music movement.” – Clarke Speicher, The Review

Awards:

(Click on award to learn more).

About the Album:

“Prog rock, prepare to die.” BL “Like the Pistols and the Velvet Underground, it’s hard to overstate the importance of the Ramones in the development of post-punk and alternative music.” PK “Music historians long ago decided that Ramones is punk rock’s Rosetta Stone.” TL This “29-minute explosion of bratty speedy unschooled punk knocked the wind out of art-rock.” UT As Joey Ramone said, “Rock & roll had got bloated and lost its spirit.” BL

“Legend has it that Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy spent a total of $6,400 recording this debut.” TL The question is, “Where’d all the money go? These…tracks sound like they were mixed on a runway at LaGuardia, but the playing is impressively clean…and Joey’s singing proves you don’t need range to sound exuberant.” TL

“The Ramones highlight the difference between American and British punk in the mid-1970’s – unlike the Pistols and other British punk bands, who had a frequently political message (if an occasionally garbled one) behind their aggressive and stripped down music, the Ramones opted for a raw, regressive sound without the political sloganeering. I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend has nothing in common with ‘Anarchy in the UK,’ save a DIY aesthetic that had no need for the pretentious artistry which had seized control of mid-70’s rock music.” PK

By way of “ripped denim, dumb lyrics and fuzz-toned guitars,” BL the Ramones delivered a collection of “imaginative reductions of early rock & roll, girl group pop, and surf rock.” AMG “Classic rock fans ambivalent about ‘punk’ should recognize that the Ramones were really just the Beach Boys on speed: a ‘1-2-3-4’ intro, simple 4/4 beat, and 3 surf guitar chords played at rapid-fire pace…Of course, instead of singing about surfing and riding in hot rods, the Ramones sang about glue-sniffing misfits.” PK The Ramones “reminded their fans that music is supposed to be fun, loud and fast, like The Beatles and The Beach Boys before they strove to be ‘artists.’” RV

Songs like Judy is a Punk, 53rd & 3rd and Blitzkrieg Bop “succeed mostly because of the pop influences at their core.” TL The latter, with its “three-chord assault,” AMG includes the “famous ‘Hey! Ho!/ Let’s go!’…[as] an homage to the Bay City Rollers,” TL a decidedly pop group.

The Ramones begins at a blinding speed and never once over the course of its 14 songs does it let up.” AMG “None of the songs clock in at any longer than two and half minutes, and most are considerably shorter.” AMGThe Ramones is all about speed, hooks, stupidity, and simplicity.” AMG “It’s easy to consider Ramones a dumb album, considering the quirky lyrics, a nuance-free lead singer, simple three chord progressions and band members who haven’t quite learned to play their instruments. But the album is a carefully disguised act of rock criticism, knocking down rock ‘n’ roll’s idols.” RV

“Not only is the music boiled down to its essentials, but the Ramones offer a twisted, comical take on pop culture with their lyrics.” AMG “Songs about sniffing glue and headbanging would never again prove so incredibly revolutionary.” RV They also offer “the horror schlock of I Don’t Wanna Go Down to the Basement, the drug deals of ‘53rd and 3rd’, the gleeful violence of Beat on the Brat, or the maniacal stupidity of Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue.” AMG

“And the cover of Chris Montez’s Let’s Dance isn’t a throwaway – with its single-minded beat and lyrics, it encapsulates everything the group loves about pre-Beatles rock & roll. They don’t alter the structure, or the intent, of the song, they simply make it louder and faster.” AMG

“In comparison to some of the music the album inspired, The Ramones sounds a little tame – it’s a little too clean, and compared to their insanely fast live albums, it even sounds a little slow – but there’s no denying that it still sounds brilliantly fresh and intoxicatingly fun.” AMG “Only The Beatles can claim to have influenced more bands than Joey Ramone, whose group somehow defined punk music and gave rise to an entire music movement.” RV “Within 12 months [of the album’s release], thousands picked up guitars, and punk rock grabbed headlines.” BL

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First posted 3/23/2008; last updated 2/28/2024.

Monday, April 12, 1976

Bob Seger “Turn the Page” live version released

Turn the Page

Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band

Writer(s): Bob Seger (see lyrics here)


Released (studio version): January 1973 (album cut)


Released (live version): April 12, 1976 (album cut)


Released (live version): November 1977 (single)


First Charted: --


Peak: 1 CL, 1 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.)


Sales (in millions): --


Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 148.0 video, -- streaming

Turn the Page

Metallica


Released: November 16, 1998


First Charted: November 21, 1998


Peak: 111 AR, 39 MR, 15 CN, 11 AU, 11 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.)


Sales (in millions): --


Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 99.5 video, -- streaming

Awards (Bob Seger):

Click on award for more details.


Awards (Metallica):

Click on award for more details.

About the Song:

Bob Seger released his first single with the Decibals in 1961, but didn’t put out an album until 1969’s Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man. That album’s title cut reached #17 on the Billboard Hot 100 and it looked like his career might finally be underway. Over the next six years, he charted seven more hits, but none reached the top 40.

As he struggled to find success during the early ‘70s “he was all too familiar with the trials and tribulations of being a musician on tour.” UCR He poured those experiences into “Turn the Page,” a track from his 1973 album Back in ‘72. “Few other ‘life on the road’ songs can rival…[its] intensity and passion.” UCR The song “does a remarkable job summing up the grueling and lonely realities of the day-to-day life of a musician on the road in the early ‘70s.” UCR He references personal experiences such as suffering from tinnitus and having truck drivers mock him and his bandmates for their long hair. BC

“The song starts with a saxophone which set a somewhat ominous tone for the remainder of the proceedings. Seger’s vocals come across as rather hushed: You can almost picture the rock and roll legend quietly singing to himself as to not disturb the other members of his band as they try to get some sleep on the bus.” UCR

The song didn’t really find an audience until a live version from 1976’s Live Bullet hit the radio and became an album rock classic. That album became his highest charting to date (#34) and went five times platinum. Even bigger things were to come for Seger: his next seven albums were top-10, multi-platinum hits.

“It should be little surprise that Seger’s words would resonate…well with his peers.” UCR Waylon Jennings, Staind, and Kid Rock have all performed the song live and Bon Jovi has acknowledged the song as an inspiration behind their hit “Wanted Dead or Alive.” UCR Garth Brooks wrote “The Thunder Rolls” as a tribute to the song. BC Metallica recorded the song in 1998 for their Garage Inc. cover album. It spent 11 weeks atop the Billboard album rock chart.


Resources:


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First posted 8/1/2022.

Saturday, April 10, 1976

Frampton Comes Alive! hit #1 for first of 10 weeks

Frampton Comes Alive!

Peter Frampton


Recorded: live: March 24, 1975 to November 22, 1975


Released: January 6, 1976


Charted: January 31, 1976


Peak: 110 US, 6 UK, 117 CN, 8 AU, 11 DF


Sales (in millions): 8.0 US, 0.1 UK, 17.0 world (includes US and UK)


Genre: classic rock


Tracks:

Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts.

  1. Something’s Happening
  2. Doobie Wah
  3. Show Me the Way (2/21/76, 6 US, 10 UK)
  4. It’s a Plain Shame
  5. All I Want to Be Is by Your Side
  6. Wind of Change
  7. Baby, I Love Your Way (6/26/76, 12 US, 28 AC, 43 UK)
  8. I Wanna Go to the Sun
  9. Penny for Your Thoughts
  10. I’ll Give You Money
  11. Shine On
  12. Jumpin’ Jack Flash
  13. Lines on My Face
  14. Do You Feel Like We Do (9/18/76, 10 US, 39 UK)


Total Running Time: 78:06

Rating:

4.295 out of 5.00 (average of 19 ratings)


Awards:

(Click on award to learn more).

About the Album:

“If you were challenged to name five rock albums that epitomized the ‘70s, Frampton Comes Alive! should probably top the list.” AZ After stints with Herd and Humble Pie, Frampton had ventured out on his own. He made “four solo albums with little commercial success.” WK It wasn’t until a collection of some of those tracks were recorded live “and released as Frampton Comes Alive! that he became a household name.” AZ In fact, there’s a joke in the movie Wayne’s World 2 that if you lived in the suburbs at the time, you were automatically issue the album. WK

It was recorded during the summer and fall of 1975, primarily at San Francisco’s Winterland venue and New York’s Long Island Arena. Recordings from four different shows went into the making of the album. WK Consequently, “one must take this all with a grain of salt as a concert document.” AMG Not only did work have to be done to splice the songs together into seemingly one show, but “there was considerable studio doctoring of the raw live tapes, a phenomenon that set the stage for such unofficial hybrid works as Bruce Springsteen’s Live/1975-85 and countless others.” AMG

When initially released, the album “was an anomaly, a multi-million-selling (mid-priced) double LP by an artist who had previously never burned up the charts with his long-players in any spectacular way. The biggest-selling live album of all time” AMG offered “buoyant pop, sentimental ballads, arena rock – this album has it all.” AZ

It’s easy to see why the album did so well. Frampton “packed one hell of a punch on-stage – where he was obviously the most comfortable – and, in fact, the live versions of Show Me the Way, Do You Feel Like I Do, Something’s Happening, Shine On, and other album rock staples are much more inspired, confident, and hard-hitting than the studio versions.” AMG

The 1999 reissue offered “a considerable improvement over the original double CD or double LP in terms of sound – the highs are significantly more lustrous, the guitars crunch and soar, and the bottom end really thunders, and so you get a genuine sense of the power of Frampton’s live set, at least the heavier parts of his set, rather than the compressed and flat sonic profile of the old double-disc version.” AMG “Frampton and the band sound significantly closer as well, even on the softer songs such as Wind of Change, and the disc is impressive listening even a quarter century later.” AMG

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First posted 1/6/2012; last updated 11/30/2022.