Dylan Thomas – Reading His Complete Recorded Poetry

For 364 days, I have been writing about albums that have moved me in my life. And today, finally, it comes to an end. Day 365.

I have been thinking for a long time about how I should end this series.

Ultimately, I realized that this whole effort has been one long celebration of beauty; the beauty of artistic creation, and the sharing of it with others who will hopefully be moved, as I have been moved.

I am still stunned by how many have followed along as this series has progressed—literally thousands of you. Thank you to each and every one of you.

I can think of no better way to distill down the essence of what this effort has been all about, than to present as a final recommendation, an album that is in itself a distillation, down to the bare essentials of artistic creation.

Here, we have just a poet, and his words. No adornment of any kind.

And yet, the album is mysterious, ambitious, and so, so beautiful.

In less than 24 hours from now, in California, where I live, it will be 2018. Someone else will perhaps take up the challenge in the new year, and recommend 365 more wonderful albums. As for me, I am now done.

And so, with that, this series goes gentle into that good night.

Elvis Costello – My Aim Is True

It’s honestly really hard to just pick ONE early LP from Costello to recommend. A greatest hits culled from his first 9 albums would give you one of the greatest collections of modern, literate, angular rock n’ roll songs the world has ever known.

But on an album-by-album basis, ol’ Declan does manage to throw a few duds onto just about everything. But that’s fine. It just makes it harder to pick an as-released release.

So his debut is the obvious choice. Alison is obviously just a staggering accomplishment for a young songwriter, and with the now-canonized inclusion of Watching the Detectives, you can double that compliment. (The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes is no slouch either.

I’m Not Angry is perhaps the album’s legit sleeper, and not only are the performance and arrangement stellar, but the lyric is rock n’ roll perfection for being both so poetic, and so dumbly macho, simultaneously:

You’re upstairs with the boyfriend while I’m left here to listen
I hear you calling his name, I hear the stutter of ignition

Townes Van Zandt – For The Sake Of The Song

I got to spend an afternoon in Nashville with Jack Clement once. It was overwhelming. I couldn’t believe it was him. Among other things, we talked about this album, and all the arguments over whether it was over-produced. As he has often done publicly, he reiterated his concession that he may have overdone it a bit. I disagreed. I like it just as it is.

As far as I’m concerned, with songs this good, there IS no right production touch. They contain so much, and every setting highlights different facets. When Townes played ’em solo, certain things moved to the fore, other things receded. As they are here, they show other sides of their personalities.

In his book A Grief Observed, written after his wife passed, C.S. Lewis talks about his anger at himself for not being able to hold a single image of his wife in his mind, convinced his love for her must be flawed. He ultimately comes to console himself through realizing that his knowledge of her was so nuanced, that how could a single image possibly even exist, that could show her in her full measure? Of course he couldn’t hold a single image. There wasn’t one.

That’s how I feel about these songs. How could one performance, one recording, one arrangement, possibly hold all they contain? When I hear these songs, I experience the production the way I might a dress on my missus; she looks lovely, I am reminded of something special about her, but it’s just the dress, it’s not the totality of HER.

Townes explains this all in the title song:

Maybe she just has to sing, for the sake of the song
And who do I think that I am to decide that she’s wrong?

Mance Lipscomb – You Got To Reap What You Sow, Texas Songster, Vol. 2

I love every single thing Mance Lipscomb ever recorded. I’ve already recommended Volumes 1 & 5, and his oral autobiography, I Say Me For A Parable.

Now, I’ll happily recommend Volume 2!

Some GREAT songs and performances on here. Personal favorites? All of them, but especially:

• Come back baby (been tryin’ to play this in me own sets for, what, 20 years?)
• Cocaine done killed my baby (love these happy-go-lucky dyin’ songs!)
• Silver city (such a killer vocal)
• You rascal you (best version of this ever, even better than Armstrong’s!)

Navasota’s finest. You can’t go wrong!