http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ry2td7q5ZMcWell as you might have gathered from earlier posts, Dave is one of my musical Gods. In college we sought out his shows like pilgrimages. One of those journeys took some buddys and me to Dave's room at the Holiday in Oneonta NY. A shocked Edmunds happily signed our picture sleeves, as he professed astonishment that anyone in the small upstate town had ever heard of him. Speaking of picture sleeves, someone has a real nice slide show of I'll bet damn near all of Dave's picture sleeves, which provide the visual for his version of "Baby I Love You" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVRWktdnODg&feature=related . If you're an Edmunds fan you should have a look. I am happy to say I have many of the picture sleeves featured in the slide show, although I don't have one for Dave's version of NRBQ's "Me and The Boys," which is one I really would like. His rendition of the song is pretty sweet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RA7BKHDWQdk .
Neil. Not sure what to say here. I often feel that there are some musicians that make more than music. There is something, dare I say, spiritual, when I listen to his records. His voice, the words, his expressive guitar playing, they all seem to reach a different spot in me.
Neil is a great thing to have on the jukebox, but usually it's "Heart of Gold." To have a stomper like "Homegrown" is awesome. (The video link above takes you to a recent solo performance with Neil playing the banjo). And then to get "Hey Babe" on the flip side, is way cool. Both from the great American Stars and Bars album. I am pulling that out tonight.
I have seen a couple of Neil's incarnations. Solo at the NY State Fair. The Shocking Pinks at the fair as well. And the Blue Notes at the Weedsport County Fair grounds. Never saw Crazy Horse though. I won't even try to put together a list of favourite Neil songs, but here's a couple of Neil related stuff I dig.
- Neil's Bridge School Concerts, especially the early ones. From one of the early discs of the concerts they put out there is David Bowie with an acoustic "Heroes" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KIyLSI7yKm8 ), Patti Smith's "People Have the Power," and Elvis Costello doing "Allison" with Neil singing backing vocals. Here is a link to Costello doing Neil's "Tell Me Why" from a more recent Bridge School concert http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qWc3VUivDc .
- From the My Better Self album, Dar Williams' cover of "Everybody Knows This is Nowhere" with Marshall Crenshaw playing and singing.
- The Bridge record, which is a tribute album that features modern rockers interpreting Neil (Flaming Lips, Nick Cave, Victoria Williams http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib98a5wW-6s , Sonic Youth, Soul Asylum, and many more).

Randomly selected. Randomly Selected!
So here is how it goes. You go to the rummage sale and there in the box of 25 forty-fives is "Personality Crisis" by the NY Dolls. Of course you have to get it. you offer the guy a buck. He says "Nope, five bucks for the whole box." So now you have "United We Stand" by The Brotherhood of Man. But look at this video. We have to show it for the children's sake. We can't let them make the same cultural and fashion mistakes.
This is one of my favourite 45s. The Alpha band is T-Bone Burnett's late 70s band. I found this at Yesterday and Today Records in Rockville MD. Another one of those "Oh My God, they put this out on 45." It's a Dylan cover.
I have the reputation as a Dylan hater. But that's not the case. I just prefer his songs sung by others.
Can you believe You Tube doesn't have this song by the Alpha Band. They do have Dylan's version. I looked elsewhere on the net, and couldn't find any place to hear the Alpha Band song except a sample on Amazon. So my choice was the Dylan original, or 29 seconds of the song from an online store. So maybe you can do some shopping after the 29 seconds are up.