Tom Petty…Wildflowers (Box Set)

This article has information about the Tom Petty Wildflowers & All The Rest box set.  Also on this site is a full review of the music.  You can click this link when you want to check it out:

https://ontherecords.net/2020/10/wildflowers-all-the-rest-review

That review also has a bonus story about how a one-word change made “You Don’t Know How It Feels” a hit.

Wildflowers & All The Rest completes Tom Petty’s desire to release his original vision of Wildflowers as a 25 song double album.  His plan to release it was stopped by his untimely death (at the age of 66) on October 2nd, 2017.  Now, Tom Petty’s daughters, Adria & Annakim, his wife Dana, and Heartbreakers Mike Campbell & Benmont Tench, have put together various sets of the 1994 recordings.

Tom Petty considered Wildflowers a personal peak.  It was a solo project that he undertook with producer Rick Rubin.

Tom said working on the album as a solo effort gave him more freedom to write whatever he wanted, without thinking about how the songs would work for the band.  Of course, when he started recording the album, he included Heartbreakers Mike Campbell, Benmont Tench, and Steve Ferrone among the numerous musicians.  Drummer Ferrone was actually invited to become a Heartbreaker, after his work on this album.

The basic 2 CD set includes the songs Tom originally planned for the album.  Had it been released as a double album in 1994, it probably would have had a different running order, with the songs more evenly divided between the two discs. The Deluxe version has 4 discs, and the Super Deluxe version has 5.  Here are the songs:

Wildflowers (Disc 1)

  1. Wildflowers
  2. You Don’t Know How It Feels
  3. Time To Move On
  4. You Wreck Me
  5. It’s Good To Be King
  6. Only A Broken Heart
  7. Honey Bee
  8. Don’t Fade On Me
  9. Hard On Me
  10. Cabin Down Below
  11. To Find A Friend
  12. A Higher Place
  13. House In the Woods
  14. Crawling Back To You
  15. Wake Up Time

All The Rest (Disc 2)

  1. Something Could Happen
  2. Leave Virginia Alone
  3. Climb That Hill Blues
  4. Confusion Wheel
  5. California (released on She’s The One soundtrack)
  6. Harry Green
  7. Hope You Never (on She’s The One soundtrack)
  8. Somewhere Under Heaven
  9. Climb That Hill (on She’s The One soundtrack)
  10. Hung Up And Overdue (on She’s The One soundtrack)

Home Recordings (Disc 3)

  1. There Goes Angela (Dream Away)
  2. You Don’t Know How It Feels
  3. California
  4. A Feeling Of Peace
  5. Leave Virginia Alone
  6. Crawling Back To You
  7. Don’t Fade On Me
  8. Confusion Wheel
  9. A Higher Place
  10. There’s A Break In The Rain (Have Love Will Travel)
  11. To Find A Friend
  12. Only A Broken Heart
  13. Wake Up Time
  14. Hung Up And Overdue
  15. Wildflowers

Wildflowers Live (Disc 4) [From 1995-2017]

  1. You Don’t Know How It Feels
  2. Honey Bee
  3. To Find A Friend
  4. Walls
  5. Crawling Back To You
  6. Cabin Down Below
  7. Driving Down To Georgia
  8. House In The Woods
  9. Girl On LSD
  10. Time To Move On
  11. Wake Up Time
  12. It’s Good To Be King
  13. You Wreck Me
  14. Wildflowers

 Finding Wildflowers (Disc 5) [Alternate Versions]

  1. A Higher Place
  2. Hard On Me
  3. Cabin Down Below
  4. Crawling Back To You
  5. Only A Broken Heart
  6. Drivin’ Down To Georgia
  7. You Wreck Me
  8. It’s Good To Be King
  9. House In The Woods
  10. Honey Bee
  11. Girl On LSD
  12. Cabin Down Below (Acoustic)
  13. Wildflowers
  14. Don’t Fade On Me
  15. Wake Up Time
  16. You Saw Me Comin’

For Tom Petty fans, the main parts of this project are the unreleased songs on Disc 2 (plus alternate versions of the She’s The One songs), and all 15 of Tom’s Home Recordings on Disc 3.  Tom was an excellent musician.  He played all of the instruments on these demos, using an 8-track studio recorder in his music room.  You can find three of those home recordings on YouTube…”You Don’t Know How It Feels”, “Wildflowers”, and “There Goes Angela”.  They’re all nicely-realized high-quality recordings.

Fans of vinyl will be happy that all of these are available in multi-record sets.  If you have an extra half-a-grand lying around, you could get the limited “Ultra Deluxe Edition”.  The actual price is $499.98.  (Seriously, some marketing genius said “Let’s take all the package prices down 2-cents to make the prices seem lower.”)  Here are the various versions as shown on the Tom Petty website.  These two images can be enlarged.

The 2 CD set is $10 per disc.  The extra two discs in the Deluxe version cost $15 extra per disc, but It turns out the extra cost is for a nice 48-page booklet built into the CD holder.  If you want the 5th disc, it will cost an extra $100, and you get an 80-page book.  I ordered the 4 disc set for $50.  Updates:  Discs 2 & 3 make this set very worthwhile for Tom Petty fans, with the Home Recordings being a terrific addition to any Tom Petty  collection.  Also, Disc 5 Finding Wildflowers was released as a single disc on April 16th, 2021.  It lists for $14.98, and is a worthwhile purchase.

My wife and I have an extensive music collection, but Tom Petty earns an “unfair share” of our listening time.  We miss him, and are enjoying his previously unreleased recordings.

Taylor Swift..Folklore & Evermore

It’s been an amazing journey for singer-songwriter Taylor Swift.  She was just 16 when her first album was released in 2006.  That self-titled album was Country, and a huge success.  Two years later, her Fearless album was an even bigger breakthrough and won the Grammy for Album of the Year.  Her impressive string of successes and awards continued into 2019.  By then she had seven multi-platinum albums, with six-in-a-row debuting at #1 on Billboard’s album chart.  (Update October, 2023):  Swift has had 13 albums in-a-row debut at #1)

Over her career, Taylor Swift became the most consistently successful Pop Star in the world, and had some of the highest-grossing tours.  Then in early 2020 the pandemic hit.  Swift and other artists were forced to cancel major tours, costing them millions of dollars.  What was Taylor Swift to do?

On July 23rd, 2020 Taylor surprised the world by announcing she had completed a new album in less than three months, and was releasing it the next day!

As surprising as the announcement was, the album itself, Folklore, was even more surprising.  It’s not a highly produced Pop album, rather it’s a much more minimalistic recording with an Indie vibe.  Critics are calling it Taylor Swift’s best album.

You might wonder why an old Classic Rock guy like me is even paying attention to music by Taylor Swift.  My wife and I decided to watch a Taylor Swift concert from her  Reputation tour that was available on Netflix, and also her Miss Americana documentary.  It was obvious she is very talented, so we bought Folklore.

Most artists deliver their best work in the first few years of their popularity, and then trail off from there.  Taylor Swift has given fans her best album after 14 years of staggering success.  Folklore, in just one week, became the most popular album of 2020 with the biggest first week since her own Lover album came out less than a year earlier.

Billboard’s album ranking combines actual sales with streaming, but if you look at sales alone, Folklore sold more that week than the other top 50 albums combined!

Update:  Folklore spent 6 consecutive weeks at #1 on Billboard’s Top 200 album chart, and then came back for two more (8 total) non-consecutive weeks at the top.  That’s the longest at #1 for an album in four years.  Folklore is also the only album to actually sell over a million copies in 2020.  The next closest sold less than half as much.  Both Billboard and Rolling Stone named Folklore the #1 album of 2020 based on actual sales and streaming.  Taylor Swift is the only artist to have the top-selling album of the year five times.

Update:  On March 14th, 2021…Taylor Swift’s Folklore was named “Album Of The Year” at the Grammy Awards.

Swift’s first single “Cardigan” debuted at #1 on the Hot 100.  All 16 of her album tracks also made the Hot 100.

Credit for the album’s success also goes to Aaron Dessner of the Indie Rock band The National.  Dessner co-wrote eleven of the songs, and assisted with production.  He started working with Taylor Swift at the end of April.  That’s when he sent her several instrumental tracks as song starters for Swift to write melodies and lyrics.  He says a few hours later, about 3 A.M., Swift sent back the completed song…”Cardigan”.  They spent almost three months working remotely back-and-forth to finish the project.

On Folklore, Taylor Swift sings many of the songs in third-person as a storyteller, rather than the autobiographical style she has often used.  For example, three songs introduce characters that form a love triangle.  “Betty” tells the story from the perspective of 17-year-old James.  He lost Betty by impulsively cheating on her with another girl.  “Cardigan” tells the same story from the perspective of a grown up Betty looking back on her early lost love.  Usually the “other woman” is ignored, but here she gets her own song, “August”.  The album is filled with quality songs like these with good melodies and very clever and insightful lyrics.

Maybe the pandemic was a great excuse for Swift to do an album with much less production.  By getting away from the pressure of putting out another album with big arena-ready Pop songs, she has freed herself to do Indie/Alternative or whatever style works for the “adult” portion of her career.  It may or may not have been a calculated move, but it was brilliant.

Update:

Taylor Swift has released a video of her entire album.  She performs the songs live in a small studio.  The film is called The Long Pond Studio Sessions.  It’s available to view on Disney+, and the audio is on streaming services.

And now…Another album!  Taylor Swift announced today (12/10/20) a “sister” album to Folklore called Evermore.

The full album (minus bonus tracks) was released 12/11/20, two days before her 31st birthday.  It’s not an album of leftovers from Folklore.  It’s another collection of high quality songs in a similar style, and with expanded instrumentation.

Sales and streaming of Evermore made it her 8th album in a row to debut at #1 on Billboard’s Top 200 albums.  The single “Willow” went to #1 on the Hot 100 singles chart, while the song “No Body, No Crime” debuted at #2 on the Hot Country chart. 

The popularity of Evermore actually pulled Folklore back up to the #2 position on the Album Sales chart.  It’s an extreme rarity for an artist to hold the top two positions.  Evermore returned to #1 in June, 2021 when the Vinyl album was released.

Tom Petty & George Harrison

Conversations With Tom Petty…what a great read!


Author Paul Zollo did extensive interviews with Tom Petty, including discussing almost all of his songs, and the results are fascinating.  I strongly recommend the recently updated book to all Tom Petty fans.  There is so much revealed, and it was particularly interesting to hear about Tom’s relationship with George Harrison.

Tom said he originally saw George Harrison and Ringo Starr in 1974, when they visited Leon Russell’s studio.  It was right after Tom and his band began practicing there for their first album.  It wasn’t until the next decade, when Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers were in England with Bob Dylan in 1987, that Tom actually met George Harrison.

This was a really big deal for Tom.  He said seeing The Beatles during their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 was when he wanted to form a band.  But by the time he actually met George Harrison, his own experience with fans informed him to not act like one with George.

Here’s an excerpt from the book, with Tom describing how it was to meet George Harrison:

“The Hindus think that when you meet someone and you feel really close to them immediately, that maybe you knew them in a past life.  And that was how it was with George.  We instantly became very close.  And I remember him saying to me, ‘You know I’m not going to let you out of my life now’.  We really got along well.  And shared a sense of humor.  And we became very close friends.”

Petty said The Heartbreakers and Bob Dylan played several more nights in London.  After one of the shows, they hung out with George, Ringo, former Beatles publicist Derek Taylor, and their wives.  It was a day later, on Tom Petty’s birthday (October 20th), that George gave Tom a cassette with his just completed album, Cloud Nine, and asked him to “Let me know if you like it.”

The album was produced by The Electric Light Orchestra’s Jeff Lynne, and of course Tom loved it.  When it was released later in 1987 (November), it went Platinum and had two hit singles, “Got My Mind Set On You” (#1 on the Hot 100) and “When We Was Fab” (#2 on the Rock chart).

Tom Petty’s meeting with George Harrison also led him to a friendship with Jeff Lynne.  In fact, Tom happened to  spot Jeff while they were both driving in L.A. traffic one day.  As it turns out, Jeff Lynne had moved into a house not far from where Tom lived.  The two got together and eventually (1989) Jeff Lynne produced Tom’s most successful album, Full Moon Fever.  Jeff even co-wrote “Free Fallin’”, “I Won’t Back Down”, and “Runnin’ Down A Dream”.

Shortly after Tom & Jeff first got together in 1987, there was another chance meeting.  Tom and his daughter (Adria) we’re out Christmas shopping and decided to stop at a restaurant.  After they we’re seated, the waiter told Tom that someone in the restaurant had asked to see him.  Tom and Adria were escorted to a room and found George Harrison and Jeff Lynne.  George had just been asking Jeff for Tom’s number, because he wanted to visit with him.  George followed Tom to his house.  They hung out all afternoon, laughing and playing guitars.

The next day was Christmas Eve, and George returned with his wife Olivia and son Dhani.  After that, the two families made it a tradition to spend Christmas together whenever possible.

All of these friendships…Tom Petty, George Harrison, Bob Dylan, and Jeff Lynne led to The Traveling Wilburys in 1988.

Of course Roy Orbison was added because Jeff Lynne was producing an album for him at that time, and also because all of them were Roy Orbison fans.  Tom and Jeff even wrote two songs with Roy…”You Got It” and “California Blue”…the two best songs on Roy’s album.

Tom Petty says George Harrison’s reputation as “The Quiet Beatle” wasn’t how he really was.  Petty said…”He was so funny.  It’s hard to explain.  He was the funniest guy I ever met.”

“Such a keen sense of humor, a lot of fun!  He was a wise person, and really wanted to know the meaning of it all, but he was light-hearted.”

That’s just an extremely small sample of Paul Zollo’s book.  It’s filled with Tom’s very forthcoming comments.  The above picture of Tom was taken by the author as Tom exited the stage at his last concert, September 25th, 2017…exactly one week before he died.

We miss both Tom Petty and George Harrison, two great friends who enriched our lives with timeless music.

Paul McCartney…Flaming Pie (Remaster)

Flaming Pie was originally released in 1997, and is now remastered with extra tracks in 2020.

Here’s the original 1997 CD along side the new Remaster, which has a cardboard cover like the vinyl album I also bought in 1997.  Over the years, I’ve purchased nearly all of McCartney’s albums, and Flaming Pie is my second favorite after Band On The Run.  There are two main reasons I like Flaming Pie so much…”Calico Skies” and “Somedays”.

McCartney says in the liner notes that this album was recorded after he, George, and Ringo had worked on The Beatles Anthology albums and videos.  He allowed himself to incorporate some of The Beatles’ style into Flaming Pie.  “Calico Skies” & “Somedays” would have sounded good on Beatles albums.  “Beautiful Night” (with Ringo), “The World Tonight”, and a few other cuts, would probably have fit in too.


Although a more extensive box set is available, I bought the two-disc version.  The second disc contains 21 cuts that are mostly home demos and early run-throughs.  As interesting as it is to hear Paul’s early efforts, the home recordings seem like Paul was just trying to get the basic songs on tape, and he wasn’t singing like he expected anyone to ever hear them.  They sound like they were recorded with a portable tape recorder, and one of the songs even has a phone ringing loudly in the background.

The bottom line is:  The album itself is worth buying if you don’t have it, but the 1997 CD sounds just as good as the remastered album, and the extra disc has no cuts that are major additions.  I also didn’t find any “must have” tracks when I listened to the box set on Apple Music.

Let’s look at the quality of the original album itself.

Paul recruited some talented people to help him.  George Martin did some production and orchestral arranging.  Jeff Lynne helped produce some tracks and added vocals, guitar and more.  Steve Miller added some lead guitar & vocals, and co-wrote a song.  Ringo Starr provided some drumming and backing vocals.  Linda McCartney added harmony vocals, and their son James has a featured guitar part.

Album buyers know there are extremely few albums that are all good.  For many decades I’ve put onto tape, and then playlists, the good songs from each album.  Here’s my playlist for Flaming Pie:

  1.  Somedays
  2. Calico Skies
  3. The World Tonight
  4. Heaven On A Sunday
  5. Used To Be Bad (with Steve Miller)
  6. Little Willow
  7. Young Boy
  8. If You Wanna
  9. Beautiful Night (with Ringo Starr)
  10. Great Day

It’s rare that we ever get ten songs to enjoy from one album.  “Somedays” and “Beautiful Night” feature orchestrations by George Martin, and are very Beatle-sounding.  Upon release of the album, Paul McCartney mentioned in an interview that “Calico Skies” ranks with his best songs.  It’s mostly about his love for Linda, who was dying of cancer at the time.  “Little Willow” is a beautifully gentle song that Paul wrote in tribute to his friend (and Ringo’s ex-wife) Maureen, who was also a cancer victim.  “Used To Be Bad” is a solid blues duet with Steve Miller, who’s also on “If You Wanna”.  “Heaven On A Sunday” features Linda and James.  The two singles are “The World Tonight” and “Young Boy”.  The album and this playlist conclude with a slight but fun little tune, “Great Day”.

The original album was hurt by not starting with one of the better tracks.  “The Song We Were Singing” is a song about John & Paul, and we want to like it, but it doesn’t quite work.  Unfortunately, it’s a weak first impression for an album with a lot of good songs.

Flaming Pie
came out 23 years ago, and 27 years after The Beatles split.  The album is one of the highlights of Paul McCartney’s 50+ years of solo work.

Laurel Canyon (Review)

This will be the definitive documentary about the music that came from the artists living in L.A.’s Laurel Canyon from 1965 to 1975.

The two-part documentary is available to stream on Epix (it later became available as a low-cost digital purchase).  It includes all the artists listed on the above poster and more.  We see an amazing collection of old film and photos, plus we hear old and new interviews.  The key decision in the making of this film is that the artists are only seen as they were back in the sixties and seventies.  That’s because only the audio is used from the newer interviews.  This allows viewers to be taken back in time without thinking about how the stars have aged.

The director of the film is Alison Ellwood, shown above with the Eagles in 2013 when she did the acclaimed “History Of The Eagles” documentary.  Ellwood and her Laurel Canyon staff deserve  praise for finding all of the film and photos from about half-a-century ago, and then determining how to assemble them into a cohesive narrative.  The documentary is only semi-chronological, with artists interwoven throughout.  That way we don’t just get one artist followed by another.  In fact, it’s similar to the way these artists were interacting musically as they visited each other‘s houses in Laurel Canyon.

Here we see a group of musicians, including Jackson Browne, Joni Mitchell and Cass Elliot (who was often the hostess for such gatherings).


Photographer Henry Diltz says (visitor from England) Eric Clapton was fascinated by the guitar tunings and style of chord playing by Joni Mitchell.

Diltz provided most of the historic photos, and was friends with nearly all of the artists.   He narrated portions of the film, and was shown at his current age.  Henry Diltz, who was at one time a folk musician, did the album cover photography for a lot of the Laurel Canyon artists, including The Doors, Crosby Stills & Nash, James Taylor, Jackson Browne, the Eagles, and many more.  Here’s a photo he took of Joni Mitchell.

Joni was leaning out the window of her home in the canyon, and the photo was taken as Diltz and a friend approached the house.

Diltz also took this shot of Joni with Graham Nash.  Nash told the story of how he wrote “Our House” when the two lived together.  It was the same time Mitchell was writing her albums Ladies Of The Canyon and Blue.


Additional historic photos were by Nurit Wilde, who is shown here on the 1960s set of The Monkees TV show.  Like Henry Diltz, she narrated parts of the film and was shown at her current age.  She mentioned that she ran the lights and sound for Buffalo Springfield at the Whisky A Go Go club.

At one time Stephen Stills and Peter Tork were roommates.  Stills had been considered for The Monkees, but when he was told his crooked teeth disqualified him, he suggested Peter audition.

Included in the film were the stories of Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth” about demonstrations in the 1960s, and CSN&Y’s “Ohio” about how four Kent State students were shot while protesting the Vietnam War in 1970.  The film doesn’t shy away from other bad news of the time, such as the Manson murders, but mostly the documentary concentrates on the artists.

Besides the more expected artists, Laurel Canyon provided significant coverage of other artists like The Doors (shown above), Love, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Little Feat, Alice Cooper, The Turtles, The Monkees, Bonnie Raitt, and Frank Zappa.  It didn’t matter what type of music you made, you were accepted by the Laurel Canyon family of musicians.


The documentary had some excellent rare film footage of Linda Ronstadt.  She told the story of how boyfriend J.D. Souther wrote “Faithless Love”.  Linda quipped that she and J.D. would have a fight, he’d go write a song about it, and she’d record it.

Most people know that the Eagles formed after Don Henley and Glenn Frey had backed Ronstadt on tour.  They added former Flying Burrito guitarist Bernie Leadon, shown on the left in the above photo, and Poco bassist Randy Meisner, who is next to Bernie.  Both had played in Ronstadt’s band earlier, and she recommended them to complete the original Eagles.


(Couldn’t leave out this shot of Glenn Frey & old Chevy.)

Last year’s enjoyable documentary Echo In The Canyon covered 1965 through 1968.  The even better Laurel Canyon: A Place In Time covers an extra seven years.  Director Alison Ellwood says she had wanted to make the film for twenty years, and the project was started before Echo.  She made it a point not to see that film, so it wouldn’t affect her work on Laurel Canyon.

The documentary starts in 1965 with the music of The Byrds and The Turtles, and goes through 1975 when the Eagles really take off prior to their peak of Hotel California.  It’s impressive how much information is included about all the artists, and yet the just over two-and-a-half-hour film never lags or seems too long.

Laurel Canyon  is not just a cool film for Baby Boomers.  It’s a great historic record of an almost mythical place and time.

Singer-Songwriters of the ‘70s

Everyone knows the 1970s were great years for singer-songwriters, but until I put together some playlists from that decade, I didn’t realize how large and impressive the group of artists actually is.  The below names take us back to that golden time of singer-songwriters.  For each one, there are a couple of their 70’s song titles for reference.  You’ll probably remember most of these songs, and be reminded of more great songs by many of these artists.  The singer-songwriters are in no particular order, with legendary ones found throughout.

James Taylor…Fire And Rain, Shower The People

Jackson Browne…Doctor My Eyes, Running On Empty

Bob Dylan…Tangled Up In Blue, If Not For You

Joni Mitchell…Big Yellow Taxi, Help Me

Billy Joel…Piano Man, Just The Way You Are

Neil Young…Heart Of Gold, Like A Hurricane

Cat Stevens…Wild World, Father And Son

Neil Diamond…I Am I Said, Song Sung Blue

John Denver…Rocky Mountain High, Take Me Home Country Roads

George Harrison…My Sweet Lord, Isn’t It A Pity

Paul Simon…Kodachrome, 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover

Elton John…Your Song, Rocket Man

Jim Croce…You Don’t Mess Around With Jim, Time In A Bottle

Kris Kristofferson…Me & Bobby McGee, Loving Her Was Easier

Carly Simon…You’re So Vain, Anticipation

Carole King…It’s Too Late, You’ve Got A Friend



John Lennon…Imagine, Instant Karma

Stephen Stills…Love The One You’re With, Change Partners

Dan Fogelberg…Longer, Leader Of The Band

Bill Withers…Lean On Me, Ain’t No Sunshine

Harry Nilsson…Coconut, I Guess The Lord Must Be In New York City

Stevie Wonder…Superstition, You Are The Sunshine Of My Life

Leon Russell…Tightrope, This Masquerade

John Sebastian…Welcome Back, Stories We Could Tell

J.D. Souther…You’re Only Lonely, Faithless Love

Harry Chapin…Taxi, Cats In The Cradle

Karla Bonoff…Someone To Lay Down Beside Me, Lose Again

Rod Stewart…Maggie May, You Wear It Well

Paul McCartney…Maybe I’m Amazed, Band On The Run

Don McLean…American Pie, Vincent 

Dave Mason…We Just Disagree, Feelin’ Alright?

Gordon Lightfoot…Sundown, Wreck Of the Edmond Fitzgerald

Gerry Rafferty…Baker Street, Right Down The Line

Joan Baez…Diamonds & Rust, Winds Of The Old Days

Jimmy Buffett…Margaritaville, Come Monday

Van Morrison…Domino, Moondance

Jonathan Edwards…Sunshine (Go Away Today), It’s A Beautiful Day

J.J. Cale…Call Me The Breeze, Cocaine

Eric Clapton…Wonderful Tonight, Layla

John Fogerty…Who’ll Stop The Rain, Almost Saturday Night

Graham Nash…Chicago (We Can Change The World), Simple Man

John Prine…Angel From Montgomery, Hello In There

Randy Newman…Sail Away, Mama Told Me Not To Come

Three of the best singer-songwriters had their own backing bands.

Bob Seger…Night Moves, Turn The Page

Tom Petty…Breakdown, Refugee

Bruce Springsteen…Born To Run, Thunder Road

What an amazing decade for singer-songwriters!  You can find individual articles on many of these artists on this site.

Bonus:  To round out the information on the decade…great singer-songwriters could be found in ‘70s Rock bands.

Led Zeppelin, Eagles, The Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac, Queen, Van Halen, Pink Floyd, The Who, Lynyrd Skynyrd, AC/DC, The Allman Brothers Band, Emerson Lake & Palmer, The Doobie Brothers, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Chicago, Aerosmith, Black Sabbath, Crosby Stills Nash & Young, America, Loggins & Messina, Supertramp, Bad Company, Steely Dan, Boston, Steve Miller Band, Foreigner, The Moody Blues, The Band, Heart, The Guess Who, Badfinger, Kiss, Deep Purple, Dire Straits, The Cars, Yes, and more.

Those were the days my friend.  We thought they’d never end.

The Fifth Beatle

There are really only four serious candidates for the title of “Fifth Beatle”.  It’s a term that has been used to describe who was the next most important person in the career of the four Beatles.

The first candidate is Stuart Sutcliffe.  He was literally the fifth Beatle when he played bass with the original four Beatles, including during their time in Hamburg, Germany.  He mainly joined the group because of his friendship with John Lennon after they met in Art School.  Stuart left The Beatles in July of 1961 to remain in Germany to study art.  Tragically, he died of a brain aneurysm in 1962.

The second candidate is Pete Best.  He was the original drummer for the band, but was replaced by Ringo Starr just before The Beatles began their rise to fame in late 1962.  He may seem like the unluckiest guy ever, but he did eventually become a millionaire from royalties after The Beatles included some of their earliest recordings on their Anthology series in the 1990’s.

Here’s the full line-up in Germany:


L-to-R:  Pete Best,  George,  John,  Paul,  Stuart Sutcliffe

Next is Brian Epstein.  He’s the record store owner who came to manage The Beatles after seeing them perform at The Cavern Club in Liverpool.  Brian was monumental in helping The Beatles get a recording contract and guiding their career through touring and appearances throughout the world.  He died of an accidental drug overdose in 1967.  The Beatles sorely missed his guidance in the following years.

The final candidate is George Martin.  He very wisely signed The Beatles to a recording contract at EMI when they had been turned down by other labels.  He then guided them through the most astonishing recording career in history.

We can eliminate Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best as candidates.  Even though they were significant in Beatles’ history, their impact on the group was nowhere near the importance of Brian Epstein and George Martin.

Without Brian Epstein, The Beatles might not have even stayed together or had a recording career.  But, once they started recording, the most important person in their career was George Martin.

The real legacy of The Beatles can be found in all the studio recordings the four of them did from 1962 through 1969.  (The only session in 1970 was just Paul, George and Ringo working on “I Me Mine” in January of that year.)  Almost their entire catalogue was produced by George Martin.

George helped critique and encourage the early songwriting of Lennon and McCartney.  He was a musician himself and performed on many Beatles recordings…most often on keyboards.   Of course he also wrote beautiful orchestral arrangements and smaller string and horn accompaniments that were so important to Beatles songs.

No one else worked as closely and as long with The Beatles, and no one helped them realize their musical visions like George Martin.

He earned his place in their history, and is the person most qualified to be called The Fifth Beatle.

The Beatles…A Hard Day’s Night & Help

In America, we didn’t know the high quality of The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night and Help! albums.  The soundtrack albums in the U.S. only had 8 and 7 Beatle songs respectively, compared with 13 and 14 songs each in England.  Instead, the American albums had instrumental “filler” from the movies.


If you listen to the British versions, you realize the quality of these albums is a lot closer to Rubber Soul than we would have originally thought.  A Hard Day’s Night (July 10th, 1964) was the first Beatles album to feature all original songs…all written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

The first seven songs (side one of the record) are all from the movie, and the quality is extremely high.  There are two #1 hits, “Can’t Buy Me Love” and “A Hard Day’s Night”…two of The Beatle’s best ballads, “And I Love Her” and “If I Fell”…two more good rockers, “I Should Have Known Better” and “Tell Me Why”…plus a song written for George, “I’m Happy Just To Dance With You”.  No filler at all.

Side two also contains some high-quality songs, especially “Things We Said Today”, “You Can’t Do That” and “I’ll Be Back”.  All the songs on side two ended up scattered onto other American albums.

A defense for Capitol Records is that United Artists had a contract for the A Hard Day’s Night movie soundtrack, but that doesn’t explain why Capitol did the same thing with Help! in August of 1965.

I bought the American versions of these albums as they came out, as well as all  the other Beatles albums, so I’ve heard these songs thousands of times.  When I listened to the British version of Help! recently, it struck me how many really good songs are on that album.

On side one, John Lennon provided four quality songs… two #1 hits, “Help” and “Ticket To Ride”, plus the Dylan-like “You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away” and “You’re Going To Lose That Girl”.  Paul’s songs are the melodic “The Night Before” and “Another Girl”…and George contributed “I Need You”.  That’s a strong side.

None of the songs on side two were on the American version.  Capitol again scattered the songs across other albums.  That includes a third #1 hit, the most-recorded song of all time, “Yesterday” by Paul McCartney, and another fan favorite of his  “I’ve Just Seen A Face”, which opened the American version of Rubber Soul.  The opening of side two of that album also used a song from Help!, “It’s Only Love”.  The George Harrison song “You Like Me Too Much”, and Lennon & McCartney’s “Tell Me What You See” finish off the 12 songs written by The Beatles.

Ringo’s version of “Act Naturally” by Buck Owens, and John’s take on the old-fashioned rocker, “Dizzy Miss Lizzy”, finalize the album’s songs.  If Capitol had simply left off those two non-originals (making it 12 songs like most American albums), they would have had a Beatles album approaching the quality of Rubber Soul.  Help! would also be thought of more highly by American fans.  It’s the first Beatles album with three #1 hits.  Let It Be also has three.  They could have had more big hits on their albums, but many of their #1 singles were not included on their regular albums.

The Beatles spent 1964 and 1965 touring the world, writing songs whenever they could, and recording four albums…A Hard Days Night, Beatles For Sale, Help!, and Rubber Soul.  Oh, and they starred in two movies.  Those years were hectic for John, Paul, George & Ringo.

Odd fact:  On the original vinyl stereo album of A Hard Day’s Night, The Beatles songs were all in mono.  Only the instrumental tracks were stereo.  I took my album back to the store and just bought the cheaper mono version.

The Beatles had three other “Movie Albums”.  The Yellow Submarine animated film has a newer Songtrack that is far better than the original soundtrack.  The Magical Mystery Tour TV special has a really good album, because Capitol added some previously released hit singles.  The Let It Be film was released in a new form, a 3-part documentary on Disney + in November, 2021, and it’s titled The Beatles: Get Back.  There’s a remixed Let It Be box set, and the music in the new documentary was also remixed.

The films The Beatles made were always because of, and secondary to, their music.  United Artists admitted they were less interested in the movie A Hard Day’s Night than in getting the soundtrack.  Of course they had no way of knowing the movie would become a classic.

And, for nearly two decades, Americans had no way of knowing how good A Hard Day’s Night and Help! were, because we’d formed our opinions by only hearing half of the albums.

Extra:  To find out which albums all the Beatles’ singles landed on, you can click this link:  https://ontherecords.net/2017/11/the-beatles-singles-left-off-albums/

The Buckinghams…They’re Playing Our Songs

Although songs by The Buckinghams have been popular for decades, all their hits are from just one amazing year!

The world was introduced to The Buckinghams with their #1 single “Kind Of A Drag”.  It was on the U.S.A. Records label from Chicago, just like the band.  The single became #1 on February 18th, 1967, and stayed there for two weeks.  How did this big hit come about?

The band had been called The Pulsations, but when they were regularly appearing on a local Chicago TV show, the band was asked to change their name to something that fit in better with the British Invasion.  From a list of possibilities, the band chose The Buckinghams.  The group felt there was still a connection with Chicago, because of the city’s Buckingham Fountain.

“Kind Of A Drag” was written by Jim Holvay, who was in another Chicago band, The Mob.  He didn’t think the song was right for his group, so he gave it to The Buckinghams.  Although the band didn’t include any horn players, arranger Frank Tesinsky used horns to help give the song a fresh sound.

And then the story gets weird.  After the U.S.A. label released the single, and before the song broke big time, the label dropped The Buckinghams!  It may be the only time in history when a band with a #1 hit was unsigned to a label, and had also been dropped by their manager.  What next?

Drummer John Poulos had a friend, who had a cousin, who was working for Chad & Jeremy…James William Guercio.  The Buckinghams met with Guercio (who was also from Chicago), and signed a management agreement with him.  Guercio then had the pleasure of pitching a band with a #1 hit, and Columbia signed them.

The new manager/producer selected another song by Jim Holvay (and co-writer Gary Beisbier)… “Don’t You Care”.  The song was their second hit, going to #6 in April of ‘67.

The Buckinghams’ first Columbia album is Time And Charges.  It includes their third big hit of the year, “Mercy Mercy Mercy” (#5).  I had purchased the single “Kind Of A Drag”, and then bought all of their albums as they were released.  My band also learned their hits as they came out.  I love the horn arrangements and the voice of lead singer Dennis Tufano.

Time And Charges has a very original arrangement of The Beatles song “I’ll Be Back”, and Tufano’s singing really makes it work.  It’s worth checking out.

Left to right…lead singer Dennis Tufano, drummer John Poulo, keyboardist Marty Grebb, and guitarists Carl Giammarese & Nick Fortuna.

By September of 1967, it was time for two more hits and another album.

“Hey Baby (They’re Playing Our Song)” made it to #12, and “Susan” went to #11.  Both songs were written by the same team of Jim Holvay and Gary Beisbier.

Billboard Magazine said The Buckinghams were the most listened to band in America in 1967.

The year ended, and so did the hits.  What happened?

The Buckinghams and James William Guercio had a falling out.  Part of the problem was a disagreement over the song “Susan”.  Guercio added a psychedelic section to “Susan”, and the band didn’t want it included.  Guercio released it his way, but radio stations agreed with the band, and took the highly unusual action of editing out that section.

Guercio and The Buckinghams split.  Guercio went on to produce the bands Chicago and Blood, Sweat & Tears.  The Buckinghams released In One Ear And Gone Tomorrow.

Unfortunately, the title pretty well told how the album performed, and where The Buckinghams’ recording career was headed.  It was their last album, and contained no Top 40 hits.  A friend at college, Roger Annin, often stopped in my dorm room and requested “Song Of The Breeze”.  I liked “Back In Love Again”, and even bought their single “Where Did You Come From” (that had the piccolo trumpet like “Penny Lane”), but alas, there were no more hits.  That was 1968, and by 1970 The Buckinghams had called it quits.

In the early 1980’s there were some special appearances by members of the group, and there have been various versions of The Buckinghams touring since then.  However, fans missed out on Lead singer Dennis Tufano, because he was not with any of the touring versions.

As sad as it is that The Buckinghams’ hit-making only lasted one year, think how many groups would have loved a year like that!  And The Buckinghams know…Hey Baby, They’re (Still) Playing Our Songs!

Karla Bonoff…Deserved More Success

She deserved to be more popular.

In late 1977, we bought tickets to Jackson Browne’s “Running On Empty” concert in Omaha, which was set for January, 1978.  Opening for him was Karla Bonoff.  She had just released her self-titled album (above).  We had heard of Bonoff, because she had been a backup singer for Linda Ronstadt, and had written three songs that appeared on Ronstadt’s Hasten Down The Wind album…”Someone To Lay Down Beside Me”, “Lose Again” and “If He’s Ever Near”.

We always liked to get to know the opening acts, so we bought Karla Bonoff’s album.

Besides the songs she wrote for Ronstadt, the album has a couple of songs that should have been hits… “I Can’t Hold On”, and “Isn’t It Always Love”, plus the beautiful “Falling Star”, and really, the whole album is good.

So she opens the concert, and the crowd is extremely responsive to her performance.  In fact, she gets what few opening acts get, an encore.  We knew what her encore song would be, because she hadn’t performed “Falling Star” during her set.

Here’s a photo of Karla taken less than a month after we first saw her.  It’s amazing that Karla Bonoff never really broke through to Radio, or on the charts.  She had just one Top 20 hit, “Personally”, which was an old cover song.  It might have been a mixed blessing when Linda Ronstadt recorded her songs.  With Ronstadt’s following, Bonoff’s songs became much better known (and the royalties would be large), but Karla was never able to come close to Linda’s level of popularity.  That doesn’t mean Karla Bonoff didn’t sing beautifully, write great songs, and release solid albums.

Karla’s second album, Restless Nights (1979), is also a record you could just drop the needle on and enjoy…so many good songs.

There’s one song on it that’s extremely well-crafted and catchy.  I still have trouble believing it wasn’t a hit.  “Baby Don’t Go” featured Andrew Gold and Kenny Edwards (who co-wrote it with Karla) on guitars and harmony vocals.  Here’s the song, see if you think it would have sounded great on the radio:

Karla Bonoff’s third album is Wild Heart Of The Young.  It was released in 1982, and although it contains the hit “Personally”, it was her weakest album.  It wasn’t until 1988 that Bonoff released her next (excellent) album New World.


This one includes some her best songwriting and recordings.  The title track, “New World”, is one of our favorites.  Interestingly, with this return to form, Linda Ronstadt again chose three of Bonoff’s songs for her multi-platinum album, Cry Like A Rainstorm, Howl Like The Wind.  The songs chosen were “All My Life”, “Goodbye My Friend”, and “All Walk Alone”.  Her recording of “All My Life” with Aaron Neville won a Grammy Award for “Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group” in 1989.

We’ve seen Karla Bonoff in concert three times.  The latest one was in January of 2017, 39-years to the month after the first time.

This was at The Shedd Institute, a nice smaller venue here in Eugene, Oregon.  She accompanied herself on guitar and piano, and was supported by an additional guitarist (Nina Gerber).  It was an excellent concert for an enthusiastic crowd.

As she told some stories about her songs, she mentioned “All My Life”.  She admitted she was a little envious of Linda Ronstadt and Aaron Neville winning the Grammy for her song while she had to watch from home.

After the show, Karla Bonoff graciously talked with fans and posed for photos.  Here she is with my wife, Jeannette, who like Karla, was born in 1951.

In 2019, Karla Bonoff released the album Carry Me Home.  Unfortunately, it’s mostly re-recordings of her already released songs.  It’s still a very good listen, because amazingly her voice sounds the same.  The better recommendation is to stream or buy the collection of some of her best recordings, All My Life.

Once you get to know her songs, you can join the fans who believe she deserved to be much more popular.

Extra:  Our main Karla Bonoff playlist:

  1. I Can’t Hold On
  2. Someone To Lay Down Beside Me
  3. Lose Again
  4. Isn’t It Always Love
  5. Home
  6. If He’s Ever Near
  7. Falling Star
  8. Baby Don’t Go
  9. Never Stop Her Heart
  10. Loving You
  11. The Water Is Wide (with James Taylor)
  12. Trouble Again
  13. When You Walk In The Room
  14. Only A Fool
  15. Personally
  16. New World
  17. All My Life
  18. Way Of The Heart
  19. Goodbye My Friend
  20. All Walk Alone