Monday, April 18, 2022

Fifty Years of Music • April, 1972

 
Now I’m just an old nothin’ with memories of fifty years
I started with The Blues Project
Spent some time with Blood Sweat & Tears
My life was filled with music
My heart was drenched in sound
And if you go see an old movie
You might hear me in the background
–Al Kooper, A Possible Projection of the Future

In my monthly routine of going through albums released in the current month from fifty years ago, Al Kooper's A Possible Projection of the Future / Childhood's End just jumped out at me. The album cover is a 28 year old Al in full makeup made to be 80 years old. I looked up Al Kooper in Wikipedia and he is indeed alive and kicking 50 years later at 78 and it states, "He is currently retired."

Now for fun, I did a Google image search and tried to find the oldest looking picture of Mr. Kooper and put him up against his 80 (or 78) year old makeup-self from 1972. Here's the side by side with a photo I found from an article review of him in 2015, at 72 years old.



I got to say Al, "You look great my man" as you still got your rock 'n' roll hair and shades, and are not nearly as wrinkled as you thought you'd be. I love your futuristic projection of yourself in a white (Pete Townsend) jumpsuit, being a ward of the state. Here's wishing you the best and being one of the best in your distinguished career as a musican's musician, not to mention a wonderful wry sense of humor.

Several of the songs this month from April, 1972 clearly have a 'time' theme not to mention the strong folk vibe that dominates this month. 

I remember going to the Santa Maria Library as maybe a freshman or sophomore and checked out this folk album from Woody Guthrie, the guy who wrote This Land, the song that we all sang together in grade school. I wanted to know a little bit more about him, brought the record home, played it in my bedroom as usual, and just got obsessed with the song, Hobo's Lullaby. I couldn't sing a lick, but with Woody it was easy to sing along with him and wondered to myself, could I ever write a song? I thought this was a great song that I ironically just discovered this month he didn't write, it was a Goebel Reeves song. 

Then in 1972,  Arlo releases the album titled, Hobo's Lullaby and figured he must have been impressed by dad too! I loved listening to it this past week and have always loved Arlo's cover and big hit of the classic Steve Goodman song, City of New Orleans. 

Songs are like a smell that triggers your memory, like corn dogs at the Santa Barbara County Fair. That would be happening soon that summer of '72, but first I had to wrap up my junior year in high school.

Enjoy the playlist my friends.

and now, A Possible Projection of a Present Blog Reader -
Did you notice, he didn't say a word about Crosby and Nash, or Stephen Stills?... And why was Chris Hillman wasting his time as a lowly underling to Stills in Manassas? I still miss the original Byrds so much.... Really Manassas with 21 songs with Stills just kind of meandering through a double-album no less... Didn't any of these guys realize that doing their own thing (after doing the initial solo albums) was such a watered-down experience for their fans?... The separate duo of Nash & Crosby, and a Manassas Stills had some good songs here, but not a whole album's worth like they did just a few years before... And releasing two separate albums in the same month?... was that a competition thing?... When does the ego come back to earth to realize that the greatest thing about themselves is the magical band they created together, not the individual... self... Remember Mick Jagger's solo career... for about 5 minutes... The band is the thing, man...
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