Saturday, June 25, 2016

Music Brexit

To celebrate the Brexit, this music break will consist of songs by British artists.  To start, here's something from Fleetwood Mac, back when they were all British.  To my knowledge, Down At The Crown does not appear on their studio albums, but is included in the compilation Madison Blues.  The lead vocal is mostly from guitarist Danny Kirwan, who wrote the song, but one section is sung by keyboardist Christine McVie.  Jerry Spencer plays slide guitar.

The first George Harrison song I remember hearing, after he went solo, was What Is Live, released in 1971, and included on his triple album All Things Must Pass.

The first single released by Humble Pie was Natural Born Bugie, a.k.a. Natural Born Woman.  The band consisted of guitarist Steve Marriott (left), bassist Greg Ridley (bottom center), guitarist Peter Frampton (right) and drummer Jerry Shirley (top).  The first three verses are sung by Ridley, Frampton and Marriott, in that order, with all three singing the fourth verse.

The Who recorded and released Magic Bus in 1968, three years after guitarist Pete Townsend wrote it.  Townsend plays mostly acoustic guitar, with drummer Keith Moon playing claves, adding drums only toward the end.  In the thumbnail, Moon and Townsend sit behind bassist John Entwistle and singer Roger Daltrey.

Arguably the most famous song by Queen without Freddie Mercury on lead vocals would be '39, from their 1975 album A Night At The Opera, written and sung by guitarist Brian May, who later earned a PhD in astronomy.  It would also have be one of the few songs ever to invoke the time dilation effect in Einstein's theory of relativity.  Mercury and drummer Roger Taylor provide backing vocals, while bassist John Deacon, in response to a joking suggestion by May, plays the double bass.  In concert, Mercury would sing the lead vocal.

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