SMOKESTACK LIGHTNING

HOWLIN' WOLF

SONGWRITER: CHESTER BURNETT

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: SMOKESTACK LIGHTNING

LABEL: CHESS

GENRE: BLUES

YEAR: 1956

"Smokestack Lightning" (also "Smoke Stack Lightning" or "Smokestack Lightnin'") is a blues song recorded by Howlin' Wolf in 1956. It became one of his most popular and influential songs. It is based on earlier blues songs, and numerous artists later interpreted it.

Wolf had performed "Smokestack Lightning" in one form or another at least by the early 1930s, when he was performing with Charley Patton in small Delta communities. The song, called "a hypnotic one-chord drone piece", draws on earlier blues, such as Tommy Johnson's "Big Road Blues" (1928, Victor 21279), the Mississippi Sheiks' "Stop and Listen Blues" (1930, OKeh 8807), and Charley Patton's "Moon Going Down" (1930, Paramount 13014). Wolf said the song was inspired by watching trains in the night: "We used to sit out in the country and see the trains go by, watch the sparks come out of the smokestack. That was smokestack lightning." In 1951, he recorded the song as "Crying at Daybreak". It contains the line "O-oh smokestack lightnin', shinin', just like gold, oh don't you hear me cryin'", similar to the Mississippi Sheiks' lyric "A-ah, smokestack lightnin', that bell shine just like gold, now don't you hear me talkin'".

Chester Arthur Burnett(June 10, 1910 – January 10, 1976), known as Howlin' Wolf, was a Chicago blues singer, guitarist, and harmonica player. Originally from Mississippi, he moved to Chicago in adulthood and became successful, forming a rivalry with fellow bluesman Muddy Waters. With a booming voice and imposing physical presence, he is one of the best-known Chicago blues artists.

The musician and critic Cub Koda noted, "no one could match Howlin' Wolf for the singular ability to rock the house down to the foundation while simultaneously scaring its patrons out of its wits." Producer Sam Phillips recalled, "When I heard Howlin' Wolf, I said, 'This is for me. This is where the soul of man never dies.'" Several of his songs, including "Smokestack Lightnin'", "Killing Floor" and "Spoonful", have become blues and blues rock standards. In 2011, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 54 on its list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time".

Whoa, smokestack lightning

Shinin', just like gold

Ah, don't ya hear me cryin'?

A-whoo-hoo, ooh

Whooo...

Whoa-oh, tell me, baby

What's the, matter here?

Ah, don't ya hear me cryin'?

Whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo

Whooo...

Whoa-oh, tell me, baby

Where did ya, stay last night?

Ah, don't ya hear me cryin'?

Whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo

Whooo...

Whoa-oh, stop your train

Let a, poor boy ride

Why don't ya hear me cryin'?

Whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo

Whooo....

Whoa-oh, fare ya well

Never see, a you no more

Ah, don't ya hear me cryin'?

Ooh, whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo

Whooo...

Whoa-oh, who been here baby since

I-I been gone, a little, bitty boy?

Girl, be on

A-whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo

Whooo...

DEVIL'S RADIO

GEORGE HARRISON

SONGWRITER: GEORGE HARRISON

COUNTRY: U. K.

ALBUM: DEVIL’S RADIO

LABEL: DARK HORSE

GENRE: ROCK

YEAR: 1987

"Devil's Radio" is a song written by George Harrison that was first released on Harrison's 1987 album Cloud Nine. It was not released commercially as a single, but a promotional single was released and the song reached #4 on the Billboard Album Rock Tracks chart.

"Devil's Radio" was inspired by a church billboard Harrison had seen stating "Gossip: The Devil's Radio...Don't Be a Broadcaster." The song's theme is an attack on gossip, trivia and cynical talk radio which spreads inaccuracies and falsehoods. The song uses metaphors such as "vultures," "weeds," "pollution" and "industrial waste" to drive home the point of gossip's effects. The theme was a personal one to Harrison, as he had felt victimized by gossip and by the media attention he received as an ex-Beatle, which inhibited his ability to live a normal life. This point is driven home by the line "You wonder why I don't hang out much/I wonder how you can't see."

"Devil's Radio" begins with a repeated recitation of the word "Gossip" before launching in the verses describing the evils of gossip. Chip Madinger and Mark Easter wrote that the music was inspired by the Eurythmics, making it one of the few songs in which Harrison was influenced by contemporary musical trends. Harrison biographer Simon Leng described the music accompaniment as Harrison's most aggressive since "Wah-Wah" in 1971 and described the style of the music as rockabilly. Leng compared the opening of "Devil's Radio" to songs of Chuck Berry and particularly praised Harrison's vocal and the counterpoint provided by Eric Clapton, who played guitar on the song along with Harrison. The other musicians who performed on the song were Elton John on piano, Jeff Lynne on bass guitar and keyboards, Ringo Starr on drums and Ray Cooper on percussion.

Several commentators have noted resemblances between "Devil's Radio" and songs written by others. Beatles' author Andrew Grant Jackson points out a similarity in theme and tone with Don Henley's 1982 hit "Dirty Laundry." Music lecturer Ian Inglis suggests a resemblance between the line ""You wonder why I don't hang out much" and the rhetorical devices Bob Dylan uses in "Desolation Row" where Dylan asks "You asked how I was doing/Was that some kind of joke?" Leng notes a similarity with the theme of a different Bob Dylan song, "Restless Farewell," in which Dylan complains of the damage caused by gossip and rumors. However, Leng also states that Harrison's approach differs from Dylan's by being more direct, whereas Dylan's approach is more allegorical.

George Harrison MBE (25 February 1943–29 November 2001) was an English musician, singer, songwriter, and music and film producer who achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of the Beatles. Sometimes called "the quiet Beatle", Harrison embraced Indian culture and helped broaden the scope of popular music through his incorporation of Indian instrumentation and Hindu-aligned spirituality in the Beatles' work. Although the majority of the band's songs were written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, most Beatles albums from 1965 onwards contained at least two Harrison compositions. His songs for the group include "Taxman", "Within You Without You", "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", "Here Comes the Sun" and "Something".

Harrison's earliest musical influences included George Formby and Django Reinhardt; Carl Perkins, Chet Atkins and Chuck Berry were subsequent influences. By 1965, he had begun to lead the Beatles into folk rock through his interest in Bob Dylan and the Byrds, and towards Indian classical music through his use of the sitar on "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)". Having initiated the band's embracing of Transcendental Meditation in 1967, he subsequently developed an association with the Hare Krishna movement. After the band's break-up in 1970, Harrison released the triple album All Things Must Pass, a critically acclaimed work that produced his most successful hit single, "My Sweet Lord", and introduced his signature sound as a solo artist, the slide guitar. He also organised the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh with Indian musician Ravi Shankar, a precursor to later benefit concerts such as Live Aid. In his role as a music and film producer, Harrison produced acts signed to the Beatles Apple record label before founding Dark Horse Records in 1974 and co-founding HandMade Films in 1978.

Harrison released several best-selling singles and albums as a solo performer. In 1988, he co-founded the platinum-selling supergroup the Traveling Wilburys. A prolific recording artist, he was featured as a guest guitarist on tracks by Badfinger, Ronnie Wood and Billy Preston, and collaborated on songs and music with Dylan, Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and Tom Petty, among others. Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 11 in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time". He is a two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee – as a member of the Beatles in 1988, and posthumously for his solo career in 2004. 

Gossip, gossip

Gossip, gossip

I heard it in the night

Words that thoughtless speak

Like vultures swooping down below

On the devil's radio

I hear it through the day

Airwaves gettin' filled

With gossip broadcast to and fro
On the devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip

Gossip, oh yeah

He's in the clubs and bars

And never turns it down

Talking about what he don't know

On the devil's radio

He's in your TV set

Won't give it a rest

That soul betraying so and so

The devil's radio

Gossip, gossip

Gossip, gossip

(Oh yeah) gossip, (gossip) oh yeah

(Gossip) oh yeah, (oh yeah) gossip

It's white and black like industrial waste

Pollution of the highest degree

You wonder why I don't hang out much

I wonder how you can't see

He's in the films and songs

And on all your magazines

It's everywhere that you may go

The devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip

Gossip, oh yeah

Runs thick and fast, no one really sees

Quite what bad it can do

As it shapes you into something cold

Like an Eskimo igloo

It's all across our lives

Like a weed it's spread

'till nothing else has space to grow

The devil's radio

Can creep up in the dark

Make us hide behind shades

And buzzing like a dynamo

The devil's radio

(Gossip) oh yeah, (gossip) oh yeah

(Gossip) gossip, (gossip) gossip

Oh yeah, gossip I heard you on the secret wireless

Gossip, oh yeah You know the devil's radio, child

Gossip, gossip

Gossip, gossip.

       WE HAVE NO SECRETS

CARLY SIMON

SONGWRITER: CARLY SIMON

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: NO SECRETS

LABEL: ELEKTRA

GENRE: POP ROCK

YEAR: 1972

Carly Elisabeth Simon (born June 25, 1945) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and children's author. She first rose to fame in the 1970s with a string of hit records; her 13 Top 40 U.S. hits include "Anticipation", "You Belong To Me", "Coming Around Again", and her four Gold certified singles "Jesse", "Mockingbird" (a duet with James Taylor), "You're So Vain", and "Nobody Does It Better" from the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me.

After a brief stint with her sister Lucy Simon as duo group the Simon Sisters, she found great success as a solo artist with her 1971 self-titled debut album Carly Simon, which won her the Grammy Award for Best New Artist, and spawned her first Top 10 single, "That's the Way I've Always Heard It Should Be". Her second album, Anticipation, followed later that year and became an even greater success, earning Simon another Grammy nomination and later being certified Gold by the RIAA. She achieved international fame the following year with the release of her third album, No Secrets, which sat firmly at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 for five weeks, was certified Platinum, and spawned the worldwide hit "You're So Vain", for which she received three Grammy nominations, including Record of the Year and Song of the Year. With her 1988 hit "Let the River Run", from the film Working Girl, she became the first artist to win a Grammy Award, an Academy Award, and a Golden Globe Award for a song composed and written, as well as performed, entirely by a single artist.

Over the course of her career, Simon has amassed 24 Billboard Hot 100 charting singles, 28 Billboard Adult Contemporary charting singles, and won 2 Grammy Awards, from 14 nominations. AllMusic called her "one of the quintessential singer-songwriters of the '70s". She has a contralto vocal range, and has cited Odetta as a significant influence. She was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1994. In 1995 and 1998, respectively, she received the Boston Music Awards Lifetime Achievement and a Berklee College of Music Honorary Doctor of Music Degree. She was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame for "You're So Vain" in 2004 and awarded the ASCAP Founders Award in 2012.

No Secrets is the third studio album by American singer and songwriter Carly Simon, released on November 28, 1972 by Elektra Records.

The album was Simon's commercial breakthrough. It spent five weeks at number one on the US Billboard 200 chart and quickly went Gold, as did its lead single, "You're So Vain", which remained at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for three weeks, and topping on the Adult Contemporary chart for two weeks. 25 years after its initial release, the album was officially certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on December 12, 1997. The album is ranked number 997 in All-Time Top 1000 Albums(3rd. edition, 2000). 

We have no secrets

We tell each other everything

About the lovers in our past

And why they didn't last

We share a cast of characters from A to Z

We know each other's fantasies

And though we know each other better when we explore

Sometimes I wish

Often I wish

That I never knew some of those secrets of yours

The water was cold

The beach was empty but for one

Now you were lying in the sun

Wanting and needing no one

Then some child came, you never asked for her to come

She drank a pint of your rum

And later when you told me

You said she was a bore

Sometimes I wish

Oft' times I wish

That I never, never knew

Some of those secrets of yours

In the name of honesty in the name of what is fair

You always answer my questions they don't always answer my prayers

And though I know you say that it's me that you adore

Sometimes I wish

Often I wish

That I never, never, never knew

Some of those secrets of yours

Some of those secrets of yours

Some of those secrets of yours

We have no secrets

Telling each other most everything now.

SO MANY ROADS

JHON MAYALL & THE BLUESBREAKERS

SONGWRITER: JOHN MAYALL

COUNTRY: U. K.

ALBUM: A HARD ROAD

LABEL: LONDON RECORDS

GENRE: BLUES ROCK

YEAR: 1967

A Hard Road is the third album (and second studio album) recorded by John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, released in 1967. It features Peter Green on lead guitar, John McVie on bass, Aynsley Dunbar on drums and John Almond on saxophone. Tracks 5, 7 and 13 feature the horn section of Alan Skidmore and Ray Warleigh. Peter Green sings lead vocals on "You Don't Love Me" and "The Same Way".

The album reached #8 on the UK album charts which is Mayall's third biggest chart next to Bare Wires and Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton which reached #3 and #6, respectively.

The cover art and the original LP sleeve design are by Mayall. In 2003 and 2006 two different expanded versions of the album were released.

John Mayall, OBE(born 29 November 1933) is an English blues singer, guitarist, organist and songwriter, whose musical career spans over sixty years. In the 1960s, he was the founder of John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, a band which has counted among its members some of the most famous blues and blues rock musicians.

n 2013, Mayall signed with producer Eric Corne's label, Forty Below Records. The two have produced 4 studio albums together, A Special Life featuring accordionist C.J. Chenier, Find a Way to Care, Talk About That featuring Joe Walsh and Nobody Told Me. Corne also re-mastered some live recordings from 1967 featuring Peter Green, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood released as Live in 1967 Volumes I and II. In 2016, Mayall was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed John Mayall among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.

       Mayall's autobiography, Blues From Laurel Canyon: My Life As A Bluesman, co-written with author Joel McIver, was published by Omnibus Press  in August 2019.

So many roads, yeah

So many trains to ride

So many roads, yeah

So many, so many trains to ride

Whoa, I've got to find my baby

Whoa, before I'll be satisfied

I was standin' at my window

When I heard that whistle blow

I was standin' at my window

When I heard that whistle blow

I thought it was a streamline

Whoa, it was a B and O

It was a mean old fireman, yeah

It was a cruel, cruel old engineer

It was a mean, mean old fireman, yeah

It was a cruel, cruel old engineer

Yes, it took away my baby

Whoa, and it left me standin' here.