Monthly Archives: December 2017

So, that was 2017…

Gone Gone Gone, music, , , , ,

It seemed like my blog from 2016 basically became and endless obituary column. Of course, this year has had its share of famous and influential musicians shuffle away, as well. I ended up making less posts this year simply because I didn’t want to keep things on a low note (as it were).

So, I’ll now just wrap up the year acknowledging many faces that have disappeared from the music scene in the past twelve months.

At the start of the year, the drummers from two of my favourite bands passed away – Can’s Jaki Liebezeit and the Allman Brothers’ Butch Trucks. But, later in the year, we lost Can’s Holger Czukay (pictured above) as well as the Allman Brothers’ Gregg Allman.

AC/DC took a hit with the passing of Malcom Young and Soundgarden lost Chris Cornell. The death of Tom Petty also seemed to come out of the blue. One of the musicians who I saw several times back in the late ’70 and early ’80s also passed – guitarist J. Geils.

A couple of the original rock and rollers also left us – Chuck Berry and Fats Domino. The world of jazz also lost a trio of fabulous guitarists – John Abercrombie, Larry Coryell and Allan Holdsworth.

Here is a list of just some of the musicians and composers who we lost this past year…

John Abercrombie

Gregg Allman

David Axelrod

Walter Becker

Chuck Berry

Charles Bradley

Paul Buckmaster

Glen Campbell

Ralph Carney

David Cassidy

Chris Cornell

Larry Coryell

James Cotton

Holger Czukay

Fats Domino

Gord Downie

J. Geils

Johnny Hallyday

Grant Hart

Pierre Henry

Allan Holdsworth

Al Jarreau

Aloys Kontarsky

Jaki Liebezeit

Phil Miller

Sunny Murray

Maggie Roche

Roswell Rudd

Keely Smith

Mel Tillis

Butch Trucks

Peter “Overend” Watts

John Wetton

Of course, this list just scratches the surface. For a much more detailed (and depressing) list, check out:

Musicians Who Died in 2017

 

 

 

 

Hawkwind: Sonic Assassins by Ian Abrahams

books, experimental music, progessive rock, vinyl, , , , ,

I recently posted the following brief review of this book on Goodreads:

Quite a well researched book that would be enjoyed by any hardcore Hawkwind fan. I’m sort of glad that I waited to buy this one as the 2017 updated version brings the story up to date.

There are a couple of things that would have made the book a bit better. There are a number of black and white photos scattered throughout the book. They seem to be out of place. It may have been better to include them in their own section in the middle of the book. It’s also strange that Stacia who was an integral part of the band’s performance visuals is not pictured at all!

Although album releases are detailed during the normal course of the story, it would have been nice to have a thoroughly annotated discography at the end of the book. Sure, people can look up that stuff online. But, why not have it right there in your hands while you are reading the book?

After posting the review, author Ian Abrahams dropped me a message with a useful link:

Thanks for the review, really appreciate it! For an annotated discography, have a look at the blog that’s associated with the book: http://sonicassassins-book.blogspot.c… as I’ll be continuing to post bits and pieces there that didn’t make it into the book itself.