This is a startlingly original kidnapping film, which bucks film conventions of the day – of any day, really. I suspect it might have been a little shocking, both in its form and its somewhat taboo inclusion of heroin addiction as a subplot. MILD SPOILERS
Tag: 1963
The Charles Mingus Quartet + Max Roach (1955, 1963)
Even though it was the dominant form of how we listened to music for decades, it’s interesting to think about how much LPs affected the way people enjoyed music. Limited to 44 ish minutes, artists had to either curate their recordings and performances, or released more than one LP, the latter of which was just …
Surfer Girl (1963) by The Beach Boys
Like every early Beach Boys album, this is a short collection of an incredibly inconsistent set of songs which, on the one hand, show off Brian Wilson’s increasingly elaborate vocal arrangements and increasing compositional sophistication and, on the other, pad things out with songs so inane or derivative you want to burn the record. The …
Night Beat (1963) by Sam Cooke
The Sam Cooke I’m familiar with is a slick, polished soul singer, backed by lush, professional arrangements, singing catchy songs that blur the line between soul and pop. Not on this record. The story with this record seems to be that Cooke and his band recorded these songs over a few nights. I doubt they …
Fantasias for Guitar and Banjo (1963)
Given how much I like path-breaking music, and how interested I am in reading about it, it’s surprising to me I wasn’t at least aware of Bull before listening to Fantasias for Guitar and Banjo. Bull combines what is called “American Primitivism” – i.e. solo acoustic guitar performances using folk techniques but often incorporating more …
In Dreams (1963) by Roy Orbison
If there was one artist I grew up with from the ’50s and early ’60s, it was Johnny Rivers. But if there were two artists I grew up from the ’50s and early ’60s it was Roy Orbison. You see, we listened to oldies radio. But when we didn’t listen to oldies stations, we either …
Ingredients in a Recipe for Soul (1963) by Ray Charles
This record was a big success but, despite some positive reviews, doesn’t have the greatest reputation. (Example: the Allmusic review is 4 stars but really feels like a 3 star review.) The idea is that its source material is [i]too[/i] diverse. I call bullshit.
Surfin’ USA (1963) by The Beach Boys
I know this record is supposed to be the Beach Boys’ best album of their early years – hell, at least one writer is on record claiming it as the best record by an American rock band released before the British invasion, which is one tall order – but I prefer their debut album. I’m …
Two Classic Albums from Gordon Jenkins (2000)
In my quest to hear the sources of nearly everything, sometimes I stumble upon stuff that I really shouldn’t have, music that is just not for me. This twofer is one of those things; it’s a compilation that pairs a compilation (seriously) with what appears to be a release for orchestra.
The Twilight Zone (1999) by Bernard Herrmann, performed by Royal Scottish National Orchestra conducted by Joel McNeely
Though not the composer of The Twilight Zone‘s most iconic theme, Herrmann composed music for both the overall show and individual episodes. This album collects the scores for seven of those episodes and includes a couple other pieces Herrmann did for the show.
America, America (1963, Elia Kazan)
This film – which is about the journey of Kazan’s uncle from Anatolia to the US – is the kind of film which is quite common now but which was quite rare back then, even in the early ‘60s, pre-Renaissance. I honestly don’t know how many other (American) films like this existed at the time. …
String Quartet; So You Want to Write a Fugue; Shostakovitch; Poulenc (1997 Compilation)
I really like Gould’s quartet. I know it’s not the most forward-thinking piece for the time, but I think it’s among the second tier of its era and I really don’t mind listening to it. The fugue-song thing is a different story: I like it but it’s almost too clever. I like that it seems …