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Motown: The Musical
Motown: The Musical
2013 | Musical
10
9.0 (2 Ratings)
Show Rating
I loved this musical. My auntie who I went with said she didn't like the actor who played Berry Gordy (on our night, the main actor was sick so they used the understudy) she said he didn't sing the songs right. But as someone who is too young to have known Motown in its golden years, this was the best I could get. And it really was the best. All the songs are covers so i knew a lot of them and could sing along. And the actors who played the singers were so fantastic! Stevie Wonder was the spitting double of the real deal and it honestly could have been the real Diana Ross singing.... so believable! They even did this cute little bit were they let the audience sing. They picked some lady who was a bit shy but turned out to be amazing! And some over confident young fellow who is lucky we were too polite to laugh at his futile attempt at Stop In The Name Of Love...

Overall, fantastic play! Up there in my top 5 for sure!
  
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Anand Wilder recommended Muswell Hillbillies by The Kinks in Music (curated)

 
Muswell Hillbillies by The Kinks
Muswell Hillbillies by The Kinks
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"Well that was a big influence for their take on Americana, and I just like the juxtaposition of their extreme Britishness and singing about Oklahoma. And it's funny, Ian Svenonius has this whole thing about how Americans only accepted black music once it was taught to us by our British overlords. The Beatles and The Stones lacked the context to realise that maybe it's inappropriate to take on this Southern accent. I feel like Ray Davies has a little more tact, like, "No, I'm not going to sing like that!" A lot of the time I will sing in a kind of an English accent - not total English, but definitely more English than country, because my context is growing up and listening to The Beatles and thinking I like the way John Lennon sings it. It's easier not to sing a hard "r", it always sounds country when you sing an "arr". I would never do a Jamaican accent. I'll leave that to Sting. Once again, see we forgive Sting, 'cause he doesn't have the context."

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Explosions in the Glass Palace by Rain Parade
Explosions in the Glass Palace by Rain Parade
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"Again, a similar time in my life; I was listening to a few American psychedelic bands. There was a band called Long Ryders who did a track called ‘Looking for Lewis and Clark’ that I played, learned, used to sit and sing although I had no idea what the lyrics were. I was pretty much singing nonsense, although the song did get me into Tim Hardin! Anyway, they were one of a few bands [that were important to me], like Opal, Screaming Trees and Rain Parade, but Rain Parade was the one that changed me. This album was like an explosion in my mind. I don’t know what program it was, but I saw them perform ‘No Easy Way Down’ on TV, a filmed concert, and it was like, ‘Here is something I can fully get behind.’ It’s a slow, sludgy, drone rock anthem; the guitarist is doing the Kevin Shields tremolo thing with the guitar, but in 1985. It’s just incredible, and I have to say would have been pretty influential on the early Ride sound for sure."

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Making Movies by Dire Straits
Making Movies by Dire Straits
1980 | Rock
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"In more recent years, I decided if I was going to play acoustic punk music I wasn’t going to be the guy that just bangs on a guitar. I wanted to learn how to play guitar and use it to dictate what I needed to say, as well as my lyrics. So I took online lessons to learn about finger picking and I learnt Romeo and Juliet by Dire Straits, note for note. I think it’s one of the most beautiful love songs in the world, and I love the fact that he doesn’t even sing it. He just talks it. I adore Mark Knopfler for that. He seems so unaffected in this song. He didn’t care about Wham! or Oingo Boingo or whatever was popular at the time. He just said, ‘I’m singing like this and I’m finger picking because that’s what I love.’ That goes right back to Bob Dylan for me: from Just Like a Woman to Romeo and Juliet. And when I finally learn how to play that song note for note I’m going to play it for people."

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Butch Vig recommended Marquee Moon by Television in Music (curated)

 
Marquee Moon by Television
Marquee Moon by Television
1977 | Rock
9.0 (4 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"To me this record sounds like electricity. It's sorta arty-punk. Tom Verlaine sounds on the verge of a nervous breakdown and his singing and lyrics are so dreamy and elliptical. It's brutally stark and spare. The guitar playing is so amazing, so different - there's this tension, this raw clean air playing in the guitars - it's just so well arranged and yet unlike any record I've ever heard. The album never really had any commercial success but it's such a seminal record. I think it influenced a lot of bands along the way. It opened everyone’s ears to what you can do with an electric guitar. Both Duke and Steve (of Garbage) are huge fans of Marquee Moon and every now and then this record will pop up on our references. Sometimes we'll say, “You should do a guitar that sounds like a Television riff, that real tall angular sound."" One of the songs off our new album, Man On A Wire, has a little bit of a Television influence to it."

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Chino Moreno recommended You'd Prefer an Astronaut by Hum in Music (curated)

 
You'd Prefer an Astronaut by Hum
You'd Prefer an Astronaut by Hum
1995 | Rock
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"They're a band from near Chicago. This is a heavy record, and it's where Deftones get a big part of our influence from, tone-wise. There are these huge chords going on, a huge backbeat, rolling basslines going on underneath, a lot of that has directly inspired certain songs. There's a wall of sound guitar, it's heavy and even bombastic in a way, but it's produced very well. We approached the producer about doing something for us, I think around our first or second record. I think the vocals are an acquired taste, he didn't have the best singing voice and he talk-sings, but the lyrics are very scientific, he sings about the stars and astrophysics, really odd topics, but the songs are really warm, there's a romantic vibe there as well. I knew I had to pick some records that inspired us that were older records, and this is one - I listen to this now and it's stood the test of time, and Deftones were definitely influenced by it."

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