In Which Doctor Casino Listens to Classic Rock Classics for the First Time

That was Steve Miller's first (small) hit, and the only one with Boz Scaggs in the lineup. It's also the main outlier on the soundtrack, dating from 1968.

"never been any reason" is u+k and you should listen to it asap

this one was on the original list for this thread, so let's get to it. written by boudleaux bryant, originally recorded by the everly brothers, known by many as a gram parsons/emmylou harris song, but known by many more as a 1975 smash for these guys, the only scottish act scheduled to appear in this thread:

SONG #37: NAZARETH "LOVE HURTS"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soDZBW-1P04

WAIT DON'T LISTEN TO THAT!!!

that version cuts the intro. listen to this:

THE REAL SONG #37: NAZARETH "LOVE HURTS"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRJaZdodEgI

This was one of the songs that most surprised me when Dr. Casino said he didn't know it.

It's gotta be one of those, know the song, don't know the title type deals

I don't think I've ever actively tried to listen to this song (the Nazareth version at least) but I've heard it dozens of times probably

I like Nazareth and this is one of my least favorite Nazareth songs. I think it was left off of the UK version of Hair of the Dog and that makes perfect sense to me.

Love Hurts: Cool intro, nice...ooh! Nice big bang. I like this kinda post-"Lucy" watery guitar banging into this big meaty one. The singing... y'know, maybe I HAVE heard this one, once again. It's kinda falling in and out of familiarity. It's the main WAHH WAHHH of the title during the verses (kinda proto-Journey there) that's familiar, but everything else about the mix isn't really clicking.

As this goes along, I'm liking it less. The most interesting thing about it is that watery guitar, but since the pace is so steady, that starts to make it feel like an uninspired grunge deep cut, like Silverchair trying to get at "Black Hole Sun." The rest - the ooh-oohs and the wails - is adequate but just kinda generic. I like the big drum fill (In The Air Tonight on worrisome downers) going into the solo but it'd be nice if the drummer didn't immediately then fall back into a listless slump. I guess for a self-pitying song about love hurting it'd be inappropriate to rock super hard, and I admit I'm glad that the crashing chorus chords don't take this full on into the Journey power ballad territory they're sketching out. This is a reasonable song for a band to have in their repertory...people can catch their breath, switch to swaying from dancing, go get a beer, chin up and contemplate how true it is that love does, indeed, hurt. Just not much else to it.

It's an oldie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFE2SnliiV0

This may out me as a cornball but i love this song sooooooo much

Everlys, Nazareth, Gram & Emmylou...it slays me all the time

But the Nazareth version kills me because they just fucking GO for it, balls out power ballad & you wanna drink alone in a shitty wood panelled hotel room <3

Everlys' one is lovely (as always). Possibly have heard that one as I love them and have been through various compilations and things. Don't think that's my way into the song though.

i'm pretty sure gram and emmylou was the first version i heard, or at least the first version that registered with me. i was confused by friends who knew it as a nazareth song, though i've come to appreciate their take on it over the years -- though, yeah, as dr. c suggests, it's a bit plodding for what it is.

there's something about a male and female commiserating on this sentiment that makes the gram/emmylou version feel so much warmer AND sadder for me.

Gram & Emmylou version definitely my favorite. The Nazareth version pisses me off because of how they changed the lyrics. "Love is like a flame, burns you when it's hot" -- unlike a stove, a flame is never not hot.

These other classic rock stalwarts did a pretty decent version, too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMzPHPzmc74

Parsons Harris version just a warmup (or slow burning we'll-sweep-out-the-ashes fire up) for "Hearts on Fire" (naturally)

Checking out the Gram/Emmylou version now. Kinda just this side of treacley, but in a way that my AM gold "weenie music" self can't really deny. It's pleasant. Can see why Gram would be drawn to the song, not even knowing very much about him - it's got "Hickory Wind" all over it. Something really interesting happens with the guitar just after 3:00, suddenly sounds much more like period R&B (reaching for "Drift Away" here). Might be a good fit for the song generally, find a way to bring up the tempo without losing the hurting.

wiki trivia: this song was used to open each newscast aired on los angeles radio station KFI until late 2013.

bonus non-wiki trivia: this video was directed by don letts.

SONG #38: RATT "ROUND AND ROUND"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u8teXR8VE4

showcasing the lyrical genius of stephen pearcy

Round and Round: Off to a surprisingly solid start. Clean, punch rock, of its period but not so "processed" sounding. Shit, I think I know where this is heading, the Round and Round bit just popped into my head. Hrm. "We'll put you on your shelf" is such a great, lame put-down... wonder how many songs have struggled to make good use of "shelf" since "Misty Mountain Hop." I like the guitar sound just after "arrow through my heart."

Hmmmm....now this isn't quite the round and round I thought it would be! How odd. The one in my head was faster, more in-your-face. This is ... why am I basically liking a Ratt song? Maybe it's the video. Stick it to those snobs, Ratt! Dude's high kicks are definitely not David Lee Roth's. Dude soloing on the dining table is also definitely not Eddie Van Halen but it's kind of a cool solo for this kind of thing. Goes some different places, has a few ideas in not too long of a running time. Ha ha, the butler is in cahoots with Ratt!

Yeah, not bad! There's something a little bit more nimble and energetic about this performance than what I associate with this whole genre. Like it's just more rhythmically interesting - not at the level I was struck by with AC/DC a few songs back, but this could be so leaden and forced-fun, and it just manages to feel like actual fun. OK, the butler actually getting all "hard rocked" out is kinda lame. I'm pretty into the, er, love interest, though.

Second listen: still pretty enjoyable. I wish the rich people were more evidently 80s yuppie rich assholes, rather than these old money aristocrats who amuse themselves renting the garret out to Ratt before discovering it wasn't worth it.

An unexpected thumbs up.

This is also a song I really love while hating nearly every other song in the world like it. It's 3 things, I think: 1. at least on this recording, the entire band are playing together and really, really well and you can hear them. 2. The only dumb producer tricks are the pre-echoing back-up vocals, which are really cool; and 3. The major/minor tonality of the main riff is really surprising and exciting in a good way, and I like when weird chords are used to sound awesome instead of "hey, I went to music school, dig my chords".

but not so "processed" sounding.

this and TWU otmfm. I don't like this song a ton, but at the time, hearing it on MTV, you noticed something different about them immediately; the production set them apart. It sounds like I wished all hair-metal sounded (and non-hair metal, for that matter), dry and punchy, rather than drowning in gated digital reverb.

Just realized what that pre-chorus guitar bit reminds me of: duh, "Panama"! Their whole thing really feels like Van Halen with less chops and an obviously less compelling frontman. That's not such a horrible thing to be, though.

I mean, even the way they say "Round and Round!" is kinda like "Pan-a-ma!" I'm sure I'm not the first to observe this, and it doesn't ruin the song or anything, but...man.

in 1984 p much every "hard rock" act felt like Van Halen with less chops and an obviously less compelling frontman. imo "round and round" gets away with it a lot better than most.

that said, a direct panama crib is unlikely -- Out of the Cellar was released only a couple of months after 1984

As probably the only person in this thread who read Stephen Pearcy's book, let me clear some stuff up. Ratt was an evolution of Pearcy's late '70s hard rock party band Mickey Ratt, who were direct rivals to Van Halen on the Sunset Strip/Southern California party/bar scene at the time. VH got the major label deal, MR didn't, so by the time Ratt got signed in the early '80s, Pearcy was already a grizzled and somewhat embittered veteran.

i really like this song but now I find the words so distractingly terrible that I have a hard time listening to it

I mean, lyrically honestly it's no worse than Kiss but some reason it really, really bugs me

Just read them, yeah, basically word salad but somehow less bothersome to me than Judas Priest's gibberish a while back, although a lot of lines could slot into that song without raising an eyebrow ("I've got a way, we're gonna prove it tonight," "Like Romeo to Juliet, time and time," and of course "Tightened our belts abuse ourselves / Get in our way, we'll put you on your shelf"). Who knew it was so tough to write hard rock lyrics?

post just give it time

goddamn autocorrect XPOST

i'll take priest's gibberish any day of the week

while we're on the subject of not very good lyrics by grizzled veterans:

SONG #38: SCORPIONS "NO ONE LIKE YOU"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huCBgj_aZns

Alterna-kids loved Ratt when they came out, glam pop metal but they had 60's style choruses. I still listen to Out of the Cellar.

My favourite Scorpions is the 70s stuff but I love this song.

scorps rule

No One Like You: Strong opening. Kinda familiar. I associate these guys with big 80s anthems, specifically "Rock You Like a Hurricane," but this sounds more like 70s rock - could be tumbling into "No More Mister Nice Guy," "Crazy On You," or even "Slow Ride" at any time. And huh...with this dreamier guitar and dreamy singing it's sounding REALLY familiar.

Yeah, I've heard this chorus - knew the sequence of notes his voice was going to hit even if I didn't have the words to hang on it. So I've heard it, but not paid attention to it. D'oh.

What's most striking about it are the verses, with the sparer guitar and the earnest, almost croony, Freddie Mercury type singing. There's a "cooler," more atmospheric song in there. The guitar stuff is cool, kinda neat on the soloing, but nothing I couldn't get elsewhere, and they haven't quite got the knack for doing the pummeling Boston chorus without it getting wearisome after a couple of go-rounds. Maybe I'm not in the mood, or maybe the theme is just too generic for it to feel like the song really needs to exist. An indifferent sideways thumb, tipping downward.

(I may also just be disappointed because at first glance I thought it was "No One Likes You," which is a much more promising title.)

boooooooo *throws rotten fruit at u*

it's the Scorps man, sideways thumb does not compute

;_;

"cooler more atmospheric song in there" - melodically, always gets me thinking of the "what do you do when everybody's insane?" section of Heart's "Crazy on You" - the part I will still sit through the song to hear.

the cooler more atmospheric song you're thinking of is "bringing on the heartbreak" (1981) but yeah there is no meh in scorpions

Love this song and never turn it off if it comes on the radio. Shows how arrangement, variation and conviction can take you a long, long way when you only are working with three chords.Klaus Meine's Teutonic mangling of English vowels cracks me up, though -- when I was first hearing this song in the 80s, I always thought, in the chorus, he was saying "I am mention the things we'd do" and was like, "?????"

Guitar mags of the era were in LOVE with Rudolf Schenker. Couldn't interview him often enough.

Huh, maybe I should give this one another chance!

If it's any consolation, I'm almost done revising that paper about Brutalist telephone architecture!

We need to celebrate the paper's completion with a Styx twofer.

i forgot about how great this thread is, please do resume.

sorry about my absence. i, um, have NOT had too much time on my hands lately. but styx twofer coming up shortly...

yessssssssss

I kinda wanna hear this infamous song about the pissed off trees tbh

well, the playlist in front of me says "styx twofer," and rush's "the trees" technically isn't anywhere in the queue for this thread, but if that's what you need after writing about brutalist telephone architecture, who am i to deny you?

(also, correcting my numbering system which seems to have gone slightly awry upthread.)

SONG #40: RUSH "THE TREES"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnC88xBPkk

dammit. trying again:

SONG #40: RUSH "THE TREES"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnC88xBPkkc

The Trees is really quite a bad song. If I didn't know it was Rush I'd think it was some random b-level prog band.