How About a Little Traffic

I have lately been listening to a band from the late 60's that I have really been enjoying. I think that probably the most famous name in the band is Steve Winwood. But the Steve Winwood that I was familiar with is not the Steve Winwood that I am listening to when I hear Traffic or Blind Faith. Some would argue that Eric Clapton is the more famous one and they may be right but for this exercise I am going to address the change in sound and musical stylings of Steve Winwood. So lets get it started with a little Blind Faith. He formed this band in 1969 with Ginger Baker and Eric Clapton along with Ric Grech. Though Clapton did not stay in the band very long.

Blind Faith - Can't Find My Way Home

Blind Faith - Well Alright

There was some upheaval after Clapton left and Winwood decided to reform the band Traffic with  Jim Capaldi, Chris Wood and Dave Mason. There is some overlap and things are kind of muddled up so I may have things reversed as far as the timing goes. But, I don't really care. Just shut it and enjoy the music.

Traffic - John Barleycorn Must Die

Traffic - Light Up or Leave Me Alone

I do not know if I can even adequately explain to you how much I love the sound of Traffic. I would go so far as to say that I like and enjoy both Blind Faith and Traffic more then I enjoy Cream and I probably enjoy Traffic most of all. There is just something about their sound that works for me.

But now that we have listened to what kind of music that Steve Winwood was putting out in the late 60's and early 70's I think you will really enjoy what he was putting out in the 80's.

Steve Winwood - Back In The High Life

Steve Winwood - Higher Love

Now, I have to be totally honest with you. I can barely stand Higher Love or Back In The High Life. I think they are horrible. They are very nearly unlistenable for me and I can listen to anything by Blind Faith and Traffic over and over again. So what do you think the problem is? Did my taste change in 5 minutes? Did Steve Winwood change? Did his talent go away? Or did he make a calculated effort to write and play songs that he knew would sell the most albums and garner him the most radio play? I do not know. The only thing I know is that I do not like his solo work at all. Those are my thoughts.

I hope you enjoyed Fridays musical musings and I hope that I helped you discover some music that was new to you. Now "light up or leave me alone"

Ke$ha 'Warrior"

Well here goes nothing, I am giving the latest Ke$ha album a listen and I am not sure what to say. I need to be upfront and tell you that this is not my typical style of music at all. That isn't to say that I am against pop music, because I am not but I generally speaking do not choose to listen to this style of music if I am left to my own choices. That being said I sat down to listen to her latest album with an open mind. I honestly wanted to give it a fair listen and I believe I did just that.

The bottom line for me as far as this album goes is that I didn't hate it. I don't think it was great or amazing or earth shattering and I didn't think it was the worst album I had ever listened to either. But it just didn't do anything special for me. Their were two songs that actually made me really sit up and listen. One was 'Dirty Love' and it featured Iggy Pop. I will pretty much listen too anything with Iggy Pop in it at least once and I think that Iggy and The Stooges "Raw Power" is an amazing early punk album. So that being said I was a little surprised that he showed up on her album. Now both of these songs are NSFW unless you have some headphones on or work in a place that doesn't care like I used too.

Now if you got through it and are still with me. What did you think of that drum line? Or the guitar riff after that? Does it remind you of anything? It does me but I am unable to pin it down. It isn't that everything has to be totally original but it is nice if there is some originality. I give her points for getting Iggy to join her. But honestly is he even being used in a good way? I don't think so. It wouldn't surprise me if he just called that in using skype and then cashed his paycheck. Not that I would blame him. She probably paid good money.

The other song that got my attention was 'Gold Trans Am' all I can say is that it is the dirtiest Steve Miller song I have ever heard. Just nasty.

I will give some time to recover from that audio onslaught. I have some friends who I know like and listen to Steve Miller so I just hope that they listened and will take the time to let me know what they thought about this little gem. I can't say that I disliked it. It was kind of fun but it isn't something that I would listen to other then for the novelty of it.

So bottom as far as this album goes...if you like this kind of music and you like Ke$ha then this is just more of the same and you are going enjoy it. But as far as anything new or different it isn't and it is very much derivative of Lady Gaga or Katy Perry or any of the hot new lady singers that are heavily auto tuned. Though to be fair. Ke$ha is not as good as Lady Gaga or Katy Perry. I am not putting her down. I think that is just the reality of her as a performer.

Also on a side note, Rolling Stone gave her 3 and 1/2 stars and I can't tell from the review if that is being satirical or what? So for whatever it is worth. I believe that I liked this album less then the Rolling Stone reviewer whose name is Rob Sheffield.