The Music Didn't Die

It was fifty years ago today that Buddy Holly accepted a ride on the small plane that would crash and take his life. Don McLean's 1971 "American Pie" raised Holly and the accident to iconic status, and people have wondered ever since just what the immensely talented 22-year old might have accomplished had he not taken that plane. Dave Tianen writess that Holly was floundering at the time and that the British Invasion would have swamped him. Myself, I believe that Holly was simply too gifted for that, that he would have responded to the challenges of the British Invasion (and Motown, that matter). As one of the first performers to write and produce his own material, Holly had the ability and luxury to choose his future direction. His innovations as a producer -- at the age of 22, no less -- indicate that he could well have become as influential behind the soundboard as he was in front of a microphone...

One thing we know for certain is that the music did not die that day. For example:

One Kind Favor, B. B. King. At first listen, this CD sounds like nothing B. B. King didn't do at ages 23, 33, 43, 53, 63, and/or 73. What makes One Kind Favor so special is that not only is he still doing it at 83, his vocals are better than ever. The album's elegiac quality comes from the songs, all covers originally performed by peers who have passed on. You can just about see their ghosts listening, smiling, and tapping their feet while the rest of us anticipate how great the immortal grand master of the blues will sound when he's 93...

She Ain't Me, Carrie Rodriguez. It starts so unassumingly that you nearly miss the penetrating lyrics ("You took me to the water then you told me not to look straight down/But I did"). The Rodriguez slows down the tempo for "Rag Doll," ups the emotional ante, and pretty soon she's reconnoitering the country first explored by Jackson Browne in Late For The Sky. Rodriguez, though, brings the perspective of a modern woman who's had it with men except for the one she can't live without. And therein lies the universality of She Ain't Me because, man or woman, we've all been there.

Wayback Machine: In 1969, Led Zeppelin released its debut album, Sly and the Family Stone sang for "Everyday People," and the Woodstock Nation converged on upstate New York for three days of peace, love, and music. Almost unnoticed, Elvis Presley walked into a Memphis studio to began a 10-day recording session that would stand as one of the most creative of his regal career. The sessions produced two gold albums -- From Elvis In Memphis and From Memphis To Vegas/From Vegas To Memphis. 

You can hear the fruits of the entire session on the 1999 RCA release Suspicious Minds: The Memphis 1969 Anthology. On these two brilliant CDs, Elvis displays his mastery of R&B, soul, country, gospel, and pop. Hits from session included "Suspicious Minds" (#1), "Kentucky Rain," (#16) and "In The Ghetto" (#3). If you ever wondered how a country boy could sing about life in the ghetto, listen to the way Elvis vocalized the simple phrase "and his mama cried." Hear this coming from someone who loved his mother deeply, and you realize that can be no greater expression of sorrow and loss, whether from the poorest shack in the Mississippi delta or the most desperate tenement in Harlem...

Support the troops with an Overseas Mardi Gras package...

In 1971, B.B. King asked the inmates of Sing Sing Prison, "How Blue Can You Get"? That's Joan Baez looking on...