INDIANAPOLIS, IN | Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis was bejeweled, sequined, and sparkling to the rafters on the evening of November 1st as the one and only Taylor Swift played the first of three shows in final US city stop of her Eras tour. An enormous crowd of over 69,000 fans turned out for the show, shattering the attendance record for the venue and shaking the walls of the stadium with energy and excitement.

Many in attendance were also fans of Gracie Abrams, who warmed up the crowd with her 30-minute set. Abrams has opened for Swift over 35 times so far during the Eras tour and it’s clear that she knows how to properly warm the crowd, sharing anecdotes of her friendship and experiences with Swift—and the love and respect the two have for each other—in between songs. Abrams demonstrated that she is a talent all her own, too, as she showcased her songwriting and performance skills, sharing six songs with the excited crowd.

It wasn’t long after Gracie wrapped up her performance that a countdown clock appeared on the stage’s gigantic video screen, letting everyone know there was one minute left until Taylor would begin the show. The energy and roar of the crowd increased exponentially as the seconds ticked down, whipping all into a frenzy by the time the clock finished.

And then we were off to the races. Swift opened with an abbreviated version of “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince” before moving into “Cruel Summer,” a song from her 2019 album Lover that enjoyed recent, newfound success after being highlighted as the opener for the Eras show.

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Few pop music artists to emerge in the 1960s were more controversial, intelligent, funny, prescient, and just plain far out as Frank Zappa. As a guitar God who never took that pose seriously, who introduced jazz, classical, avant-garde, and cabaret on acid theatrics into his indescribable live act and recordings, nearly everything Zappa did in the ’60s and 1970s still sounds light years ahead of anything made today. At that time, Zappa skewered not only the fake post-’50s fat cats and plastic people, but himself and the so-called hippies who loved his music.

Zappa’s early records with the Mothers of Invention are unhinged freak-outs of sound and (bongo) fury. While serving up blistering critiques of the phoniness of both middle America and the power elite, the humor which with Zappa infused his bizarre music made it all the more lovable and just plain fun.

Along with The Fugs, The Holy Modal Rounders, The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, and a handful of others, Zappa, solo and with the Mothers, sought to poke twisted barbs of ridicule at all that was fake, mean, and phony. Unlike the others, Zappa was not a member of the underground drug culture and didn’t even drink. While his appearance was counterculture, his approach was counterintuitive.

Zappa recorded for Verve and his music was later distributed by Warner Brothers during the ’60s into the ’70s. While no major record label in the world would touch Zappa today, those days of rage allowed iconoclasts like Zappa to have a sandbox in which to blow up cultural bombs. By the time we get to Apostrophe, Zappa’s sixth solo album (not to mention 12 further albums he made with the Mothers), he had built up a rabid following and the counterculture of young people had become a demographic behemoth, propelling the album to gold sales status.

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As one of the greatest of tenor saxophonists, Ben Webster amassed a sizable discography across a long career. His live performances were also extensive and on occasion, those nights were recorded. Released posthumously in 1985, At the Renaissance is a fine introduction to Webster’s full-bodied, mature style as he stretches out with a sharp band. On November 8, Craft Recordings reissues an expanded edition of the original LP on 180 gram vinyl as part of the label’s Contemporary Records Acoustic Sounds series. There are certainly more important albums in Ben Webster’s body of work, but he rarely sounded better than he does right here.

Ben Webster is most renowned for his work with Duke Ellington, who he joined for an extended period in 1940 after playing in numerous bands, including those of Bennie Moten, Fletcher Henderson, Benny Carter, and Cab Calloway. Considered one of the “big three” tenor saxophonists of the swing era (the others are Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young), Webster was the first major player on the instrument to have a significant role in Ellington’s band, though by 1943 he’d made his exit for the clubs of 52nd Street.

Webster briefly rejoined Ellington later in the decade (he’d first played with Duke in the mid-’30s), but from the mid-’40s onward his career path is noted for an association with promoter Norman Granz’s Jazz at the Philharmonic initiative, co-led sessions with Hawkins, pianists Art Tatum and Oscar Pederson and saxophonist Gerry Mulligan, plus plenty of records and club dates as a leader.

At the Renaissance is just one of numerous albums capturing those club dates. Prior to departing for Europe in 1964, Webster gigged frequently at the Los Angeles club the Renaissance, often with Mulligan, but on October 14, 1960 he was leading the band heard here, with Jimmy Rowles on piano, Jim Hall on guitar, Red Mitchell on bass, and Frank Butler on drums.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | How did Dexter make a TV audience sympathize with a serial killer? No question, it took an ingenious premise, great writing, great direction—and a stellar ensemble cast headed by lead actor Michael C. Hall. But long-time viewers of the show know there was another “character” that played a huge role in the series: the soundtrack.

From Rolfe Kent’s unforgettable title theme to the well-chosen Latin-tinged tunes that fit the Miami setting to composer Daniel Licht’s brilliant themes, the score of Dexter commented on the action even as it amplified its emotional power. Special mention must be made of the late Licht’s work, which employed Latin and electronic elements to portray Dexter’s warm and cold sides; among the favorites here are “Astor’s Birthday Party” and the haunting “Blood Theme” that played over the credits in every episode.

In 2007, the Milan label put out a CD and a truncated single-LP soundtrack album containing music from the first season; now, for the first time, we at Real Gone Music are offering all of the music that appeared on the CD in an expanded double-LP edition, pressed on blood with white swirl vinyl and housed inside an appropriately gory gatefold. Don’t miss Michael C. Hall’s spoken word pieces either—perversely pleasurable listening, limited to 1,500 copies!

Remembering Gram Parsons, born on this date in 1946. —Ed.

You’ve got to hand it to Gram Parsons; the boy had chutzpah. No sooner had the relatively unknown 21-year-old joined The Byrds in February 1968 in the wake of the departure of David “I Am the Walrus” Crosby and Michael Clarke, he managed to talk the band, including leader Roger McGuinn, into scuttling McGuinn’s plans for an ambitious double album of the history of American popular music in favor of an album of straight-up country music, or country-rock if you insist, or “Cosmic American Music” as Parsons poetically termed it.

It must have been an audacious piece of salesmanship, for no rock band—much less a pop supergroup with the psychedelic bona fides of The Byrds—had ever attempted anything so potentially suicidal from a commercial standpoint. From “Eight Miles High” to “The Christian Life”? Longhairs playing pure country honk? Why, the idea was unthinkable, risible even, although The Byrds themselves had dabbled in country before and Bob Dylan himself would make the transition soon enough.

To add authenticity, The Byrds (McGuinn on acoustic guitar, banjo, and vocals; Chris Hillman on bass, mandolin, acoustic guitar, and vocals; Parsons on acoustic guitar, piano and organ, and vocals; and Kevin Kelley on drums) wrangled up a crew of mostly Nashville ringers, including legendary electric guitarist Clarence White (who would die tragically in 1973, hit by a drunken driver); John “Tear Down the Grand Ole Opry” Hartford on banjo, fiddle, and acoustic guitar; Lloyd Green and JayDee Maness on pedal steel guitar; Roy Husky on double bass; and Earl Poole Ball and Barry “Electric Flag” Goldberg on piano.

Parsons’ tenure as a Byrd turned out to be short-lived—he soon went on to form The Flying Burrito Brothers with Chris Hillman—and the Sweetheart sessions ended in controversy and chaos, with McGuinn (the original Lou Reed!) erasing Parsons’ vocals on three songs during post-production and rerecording them himself, leaving Parsons as lead vocalist on just three cuts. The ostensible reason for this varies from unresolved contractual questions about Parsons to McGuinn’s refusal to be upstaged by the unknown rich boy in his spiffy psychedelic-drug-and-pill-themed Nudie suit (which, in the interests of historical authenticity, he probably didn’t purchase until later.)

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The Ladybug Transistor’s The Albemarle Sound, an ambitious but tightly focused serving of baroque and at times lightly psychedelic pop, was released by Merge Records as the 1990s wound to a close. Having achieved classic status, it’s now receiving a 25th anniversary reissue on vinyl and compact disc from Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records in a deluxe limited edition that includes a mobile, a button set, a silkscreen print, and bonus tracks on the CD and accompanying the LP on a digital download. Bold and assured, it’s an essential addition to any comprehensive ’90s indie shelf.

It’s a common generalization that the music of indie rock’s heyday (let’s demark the late 1980s through the ’90s), if not as unembellished as the din that dominated the punk explosion of yore, is still modestly scaled, stripped down, and structurally straightforward, at least in comparison to the mainstream pop and rock sounds of the same era.

As is often the case, there’s a kernel of reality in that simplification, although plenty of exceptions did emerge to illuminate ambitiousness from across the indie scene’s wide stylistic spectrum. Arriving late in the timeframe established above, The Albemarle Sound remains a standout example, if maybe a bit undersung as part of the Elephant 6 Collective (Brooklyn wing).

The formative debut Marlborough Farms (Park ‘N Ride, 1995) and stronger, more focused follow-up Beverley Atonale (Merge, ’97) precede it, but the third time really was the charm from the group of Gary Olson (vocals, trumpet), Jeff Baron (guitar), Jennifer Baron (bass), Sasha Bell (keyboards, flute), San Fadyl (drums), and Julia Rydholm (violin).

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | To celebrate Frank Black’s landmark solo album, Teenager Of The Year turning 30, 4AD release a one-time vinyl pressing on 17th January, to accompany a tour of North America plus Paris and London, where Frank Black and the original band will be performing the album in its entirety.

This special vinyl tour edition of Teenager Of The Year, has been remastered for the first time from its original analogue studio tapes. Sounding as essential as the day it was released, the limited 30th Anniversary Tour Edition is cut at 45 rpm for optimum playback and is being pressed on double gold vinyl. The album also comes in a gatefold sleeve with liner notes by both Frank Black and producer Eric Drew Feldman. A 24-bit digital version is being released on the same day.

Originally recorded amid a rich songwriting vein, just as the Pixies had been placed on hold, Frank Black’s ambitious double album Teenager Of The Year came out in May 1994, just one year after his fantastic self-titled solo debut. Recorded with scene legend Eric Drew Feldman (Captain Beefheart’s Magic Band, Pere Ubu, The Residents), Teenager Of The Year, is now widely regarded as the defining statement of his solo career and the best album the Pixies never made.

“Sometime in the early 80s, I’d have to look up the date, I matriculated high school. This school held an awards banquet for some of the departing students at the school. I received an award called the Teenager Of The Year award; my brother received the same award the following year. Our award was a 50 dollar credit for textbooks, a Teenager Of The Year medallion (my mother still has this), and also the banquet hall dinner, soup to nuts. My brother and I had no complaint about the award (it was given for being all-around-good-guy as best as we could determine). But for such a grand title to be given as Teenager Of The Year, I felt the glory had not been amplified enough.

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