Lord, I can't go back there (R Dean Taylor) (LP 292)

R. Dean Taylor The Essential Collection (CD - Spectrum Music, 2001) ***

Genre: American soul/pop  

Places I remember: HMV at Bluewater Mall - £3.99 

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Indiana Wants Me




Gear costume:  Two Of Us, Gotta See Jane, Taos New Mexico, Fire And Rain

Active compensatory factors: I'm breaking my self imposed 'rule' (more of a guideline really) not to include compilations in these posts, but, really - this is mostly about Indiana Wants Me anyhow.

Somehow, R. Dean Taylor ended up parlaying this prison escape drama into a number one single in 1970 and as a nearly teenager in Auckland/ New Zealand, I was hooked!

It's all there - the high drama and the voice, but something else hooked me and I think it's the connection to an exotic America. Indiana. My febrile brain, age 12, just fell in love with a quirky idealised version of America.

In other news: R Dean was not a one trick pony/ one hit wonder. His original songs are collected here, along with some stunning covers. The Beatles and James Taylor (no relation) songs don't veer much from the original arrangements but R Dean's vocals make them special.

Where do they all belong? Found in the soul section at HMV, but R. Dean, a Canadian, is a Motown recording artist so who knows. BTW the R stands for Richard -  I know, I was expecting something else too.

I said, "Don't mind, but what do you mean I am the one?" (Michael Jackson) #175

Michael Jackson Billie Jean (long version)/ Billie Jean (instrumental version) (Epic 12", ES12053, 1982)

This song takes the 'let's build up the instrumentals until we get into a great groove' approach. There must be a technical name for this, surely.

I'm a sucker for it, whether it's Deep Purple's Smoke On The Water, The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band's  The Intro And The Outro (Adolf Hitler on Vibes) or Billie Jean.

The song opens with a standard drum beat along with a standard hi-hat, and it contains hardly any reverberation. After two bars, another standard open hi-hat enters. After two more bars, a repetitive bassline enters. Each time it passes through the tonic, the note is doubled by a distorted synth bass. This accompaniment is followed by a repetitive three-note synth, playedstaccato with a deep reverb. The defining chord progression is then established. Jackson's quiet vocals enter, accompanied by a finger-snap, which comes and goes during the verses, as the rhythm and chord progression repeats.

That was according to wikipedia and I'm not about to argue. Written like that it doesn't sound like much does it? But there is a definite sense of energy and power when you hear it building these layers of sound. There's a reason for this.

The song was mixed by Bruce Swedien ninety-one times — unusual for Swedien, who usually mixed a song just once. Quincy Jones had told Swedien to create a drum sound that no one had ever heard before. The audio engineer was also told to add a different element: "sonic personality". "What I ended up doing was building a drum platform and designing some special little things, like a bass drum cover and a flat piece of wood that goes between the snare and the hi-hat" Swedien later wrote. "The bottom line is that there aren't many pieces of music where you can hear the first three or four notes of the drums, and immediately tell what the piece of music is." He concluded, "But I think that is the case with 'Billie Jean' — and that I attribute to sonic personality

Have a listen:



Hidden gem: The B side is labelled an 'instrumental version' but there are a few of MJ's vocals, the Billie Jean bits, on it. I guess this was made for a DJ kinda thing. For the rest of the world we'll take MJ's peerless vocals as well as those amazing instrumental passages thanks very much.

As a sidebar: I came across this version of the song a few years ago on a CD compilation of Eighties Anthems by some outfit called Clubhouse. It's a mash up between Steely Dan's Do It Again and Billie Jean and it works really well!



Outside of this the most widely celebrated 'live' version of this song is MJ's famous Motown 25th anniversary performance and it would be against some sort of musical law of the universe not to include it here.

Lord, we don't need another mountain (Bacharach/David) #117

Tom Clay 1 What The World Needs Now Is Love 2 Abraham Martin And John /The Four Tops Reach Out I'll Be there (Motown, Gold 51, ?) 

I think this piece of cynical Motown product came out in the late eighties, after The Four Tops had returned to Motown. Someone in the marketing department at EMI had a thought and here we are.

It's a weird combo - DJ Tom Clay's 1971 creation is paired with the sublime Levi Stubbs lead vocal from 1966. Go figure.

I remembered hearing the Clay song in the early seventies on the radio - must have been - there was no music TV, interweb, social media aside my friends at Mt Albert Grammar lending me stuff, so - must have been the radio.

As you know I'm a sentimental old fluff and growing up I was obsessed with American culture. I loved the Kennedys and Martin Luther King so this 'song' left a deep impression.

Of course MLK's dream speech creates goosebumps still and I love Edward Kennedy's eulogy that's included here along with the real time sounds of the assassinations.

The use of the Bacharach/David song is inspired. For years growing up I thought it was about the events. I interpreted the mountain in the title metaphorically for many years.

There is a really wistful melancholy aspect to the music that seemed perfect - still does.

Hidden gem: The official B side is the Four Tops song but I have the single filed in the F's because how can this song be side 2?? Impossible. Levi Stubbs is immortal and this Holland Dozier Holland song is a classic. 

The Four Tops are easily my favourite Motowners - as big as Hendrix, Sonny Terry/Brownie McGhee, Miles, Coltrane and Chuck Berry as far as I'm concerned.