77 / 97
15
NEWS
MUSIC
T
he dude is plugged into
something. He sees the
universe through the little
hole in the middle of the black
plastic disc he's holding up to the
lava lamp. In his head, the whole
thing makes sense, like an epic
family tree coded in countless
microscopic concentric circles.
He lands the needle with a
reassuring thump into the groove
of Ground Zero. "Well since my
baby left me…" ching-ching!
Heartbreak Hotel
. "'Before Elvis
there was nothing', man," the
dude says. "John Lennon," he adds
in parentheses. Vinyl junkies are
always quoting somebody.
Sure enough, side one of
30 #1
HITS
is rock'n'roll's big bang from
eight angles, from the swooning
croon of
Love Me Tender
to the
rude holler of
Jailhouse Rock
.
From there to side four – cue
the gospel hum of
Crying in The
Chapel
, the tumbleweed soul
of
In the Ghetto
, the reckless
melodrama of
Suspicious Minds
,
the hiccupping hip-shimmy of
Burning Love
and
Way Down
–
practically every song is a beacon
for everything to come.
The dude lurches out of his
beanbag now, spilling his Twisties,
hoisting another hefty double-
LP set:
THE ESSENTIAL BOB
DYLAN
. He throws in a few more
quotes for context: "Hearing Elvis
for the first time was like busting
out of jail," Bob once testified.
"Bob freed your mind the way
Elvis freed your body," Bruce
Springsteen added. "And so it
rolls," the dude says, dropping into
the folkie dreamtime of
Blowin' In
the Wind.
These four sides turn out to be
as complete a cross-section as
you could hope for in 23 tracks.
Side two is detonated by
Like A
Rolling Stone
and soothed with
the Nashville murmur of
Lay Lady
Lay
.
Knocking On Heaven's Door
,
Forever Young
and
Tangled Up In
Blue
usher in the '70s.
The last side seals any argument
about the master's currency:
between the curled lip of '99's
Things Have Changed
and the
withering divorcee's kiss-off of
2012's
Long And Wasted Years
is a
wordsmith, bandleader and singer
at the top of his game. Singer?
"One of The. Greatest. Singers.
full-body gatefold of the artist,
resplendent from solid black afro to
glowing white socks.
"Revolution, evolution, poetry
and funk…" The dude seems
like he's fully tripping as he slips
on
ENTERTHEWU-TANG (36
CHAMBERS)
, still following those
family tree lines that maybe only
he can see. "Even the Wu-Tang
worshipped Jacko," he reminds
himself. Nearly 25 years on, it still
feels like an initiation. Old Kung
Fu movies and boxy beats, street
hassle vignettes and agitated spits
and snarls scare up a lo-fi urban
landscape woven with a (still)
disturbing thread of homoerotic
ultra-violence. It's the cornerstone
of '90s hip-hop, no less; the sound
of some hardcore underground a
million miles from compromise and
just one more shove from flames.
"Too much, man?" the dude
cackles. "It should be."
But it’s getting late. The last
sleeve surrenders its treasure like a
prayer book retrieved from a church
pew. "Tragic, of course," the dude
mutters, sucking orange
Twistie fingers as he cues
up Jeff Buckley's
GRACE
.
But to vinyl mystics like
this guy, there will always
be something impossibly
perfect about a talent
that lives and dies on two
sides of a long-player.
They're not even
flawless. The wilful
clamour of
Eternal Life
is the bum note that
brings the human frailty
to a debut/swansong of
otherwise uninterrupted
genius. Harmonically
outrageous in
Mojo Pin
,
rhythmically alarming
in
So Real
, classically
gorgeous in
Hallelujah
and
Corpus Christi Carol
.
After
Dream Brother
,
the click of the retiring
tone-arm jerks the dude
from slumber. "To be
continued," he says to no
one in particular.
THE VINYL COUNTDOWN
promotion is held across all vinyl-stocking JB Hi-Fi stores,
and features over 200 LPs you can grab for under $30! Turn the page for more examples
of the awesome titles available, and head to your nearest JB to see the range.
THE VINYL SOLUTION
Ever," the dude intones
as he slides the next
record from its sleeve in
a sweet crackle of static.
"They called Elvis the
King, why not me?" He
actually does a pretty
good Michael Jackson
impersonation. But never
mind the jokes. In the
racially segregated year
of '79,
OFFTHEWALL
made history by stealing
pop back to the black
side without frightening
the children of the
dawning
MTV
revolution.
Don't Stop 'Til You Get
Enough
,
Rock With You
and
Off The Wall
will fill
any dancefloor anywhere
to this day.
She's Out
of My Life
? "Schmaltzy
AF!" the dude can’t help
noting, though he does
seem to have something
in his eye as he hides
behind the iconic
This month The Vinyl Countdown is back; Michael Dwyer contemplates five of the
Sony releases available in this enormous vinyl sale: ELvis Presley's
30 #1 Hits
, Bob
Dylan's
The Essential Bob Dylan
, Michael Jackson's
Off The Wall
, The Wu-Tang Clan's
Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
, and Jeff Buckley's
Grace.
Words
Michael Dwyer