Andrew Hickey’s History of Rock Music in 500 Songs podcast (& books) — discuss!

I’ve fallen deep into the rabbit hole of this podcast, & since it looks like there are a number of other ILXors on board, I thought maybe it deserves its own thread.

A few random thoughts:

- I like the approach: no guests, no co-host, just a guy drawing connections and building a portrait of a music.

- He speaks so slowly that I have to listen on accelerated speed, even though this causes the music clips to go breakneck. (With some of the songs, I quite like the effect — especially with the rockabilly stuff! — but it generally doesn’t make for the most seamless experience.)

- The Patreon bonus episodes, I’ve discovered, are essential, & I highly recommend signing up if you like the main show.

- As the show moves into the 60s, I find myself missing the vibe of the early blues & jump stuff, & I’d love to see a similarly well researched podcast devoted to pre-R&R music (you could call it “Before Elvis There Was Everything”)

- Hickey does, I think, a really good job of acknowledging the problematic aspects of a lot of the figures involved without getting bogged down in analysis of those same aspects.

- Now I’m gonna end up searching for and probably buying a lot of 78s :(

I was very interested by the way he talked about category in the Q&A episode since it was something I had come across in a George Lakoff book Women, Fire & Dangerous things while Lakoff was talking about i think Lotfi Zadeh a thinker who I think was a Palestinian academic.
The way he was talking about the subject as pertained to birds where a sparrow is close to the central birdy bird idea and an ostrich is way out of centre to something much fuzzier seemed to come without introduction so I wondered if it was a subject that other people were familiar with since it is a model that I think does apply to a lot of categories. A central archetypal grouping and a gradual fade within the category to things that didn't seem to exemplify that category to people who weren't familiar with the contents of the category.
So did wonder if other people did hear that and get what he was talking about and if it is a more widespread understanding particularly since he didn't seem to need to explain it. May have been something he had talked about elsewhere to introduce it better.

- He speaks so slowly that I have to listen on accelerated speed, even though this causes the music clips to go breakneck. (With some of the songs, I quite like the effect — especially with the rockabilly stuff! — but it generally doesn’t make for the most seamless experience.)

I personally don't feel like he speaks too slowly. I do recall a very early episode or two that sounded self-consciously slow, like a friend had told him, "Hey, maybe slow down a bit?" But none of the episodes since have sounded like that to me. I can't listen at anything other than 1x, partly because of the music, but mainly because of his dramatic pauses (e.g., "Lieber and Stoller were reluctant to take on this young musician...but we'll talk about Phil Spector in later episodes"), asides, and occasional jokes. And also, even listening at 1x I find myself rewinding -- "Hey, wait, who was that? Gaynel Hodge? Hm, I should look him up" -- because of how much information he packs into each episode.

- Hickey does, I think, a really good job of acknowledging the problematic aspects of a lot of the figures involved without getting bogged down in analysis of those same aspects.

Agreed. I very much appreciate his content and trigger warnings.

- Now I’m gonna end up searching for and probably buying a lot of 78s :(

I mentioned this on the podcasts thread, but his recommendations on the best CD compilations of some of the earlier artists -- I picked up ones by Ruth Brown, Johnny Otis, Johnny Ace, Roy Orbison, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe -- are stellar. But his recommendations sometimes lean toward compilations more comprehensive than a casual listener might want -- I like the Everly Brothers, but do I need a boxed set of five of their albums?

The discussion of approach to category seemed to proceed quite naturally from whatever the question was, I didn't feel there was a need for background on it as a school of thought or anything.

I was briefly hung up on the example of a robin as central to the category of birds cos red breasts are atypical and they're pretty darn mousey as birds go. But I get the principle and I'm down with it ;-)

In the category of things that should get a thread on ILM this podcast is dead centre though. Thanks for starting the thread in time for its return.

I _like_ the Everly Brothers, but do I need a boxed set of five of their albums?

I think the big thing with that description of category he was using is the fuzzier less archetypal part. Like there is a rippling edge of things tat fuzzily fit into the category that are not so immediately close to the middle which at closer inspection does have a connection that is just not as immediate. & has caused people on chatlists to try to make out the only things that fit into a category are those things that are more interchangeable with the archetype to the point of things needing to be almost clones of that archetype, Whereas I would think the more interesting things would be those that had some originality meaning they were absolutely not clone but still had a connection in influence/evolution/whatever.
Like all categories are artificial to start with but I do think that idea of a category with a semi obvious core radiating outwards with more fuzzy outliers included is more interesting. Fuzzy outliers may have venn overlap with other radiated categories too. & that overlap is a point of interest too.

I've known Andrew on a number of internet music places for the best part of two decades now*, including FT, so am surprised that he isn't on here too. Maybe he checked it out in the late 2000s when everyone was apparently doing their best to be as unpleasant as possible. Anyway, this is a fantastic project and he has been very supportive to my own much less successful project, so I'm happy to see he has his own thread, even though he isn't here.

*originally on Livejournal over a shared love of The Beiderbecke Affair, iirc.

Well great show and one that I hope continues. Going to take me a while to get through everything up to date. Have listened to several over last few weeks. So will continue to listen through them but am listening through a load of podcasts all the time. Eventually I will catch up witth everything, but i still think I will have caught up with the books i have as a backlog too.
& all the tv shows I've been finding out about.

That Q&A edition was quite interesting anyway. How he works through things, works out what does need to be covered in depth and what as a transient thing inside another discussion.
I'm surprised that Fontella Bass doesn't have more written about her though. Does she need to be rescued like?

Are you guys listening to these in order? I have just started randomly listening here and there, seems like it’s an embarrassment of riches.

I’ve been listening in order. Learned tons about 40s and 50s music. Up to #58 on the Bobettes. My 17 year old son got a kick out of the Billy Lee Riley ep with “Flying Saucers RnR” and has asked to hear more !? I’d call that success.

I think it was in one of these that I heard that Booker T & The MGs recorded Green Onions in what was scheduled as a Billy Riley recording session.
Heard that his band became the Sun house band in the late 50s a few years ago too.
Picked up a Charly cd of his r'n'r years about a decade ago that is pretty great. & had me wondering if it was his version of Baby Please Don't Go that a few bands in the 60s were starting from when covering the song. Pretty primal anyway.

Oh, perfectly timed thread - I started bingeing about a week ago after someone on an Eggpod Twitter Space mentioned it in connection with the Beatles.

I listened to the one for She Loves You then went back to the beginning. I love that it’s opened up new horizons for me in listening - I knew I was ignorant about the early history and prehistory of rock but after this it feels like a world I want to live in for a while.

He’s very impressive, though I can see that his delivery might put a few people off. And he could probably lighten up a bit on all the disclaimers.

even listening at 1x I find myself rewinding -- "Hey, wait, who was that? Gaynel Hodge? Hm, I should look him up" -- because of how much information he packs into each episode.

I'm completely addicted to this podcast. Currently on episode #36 (forced myself to start at the beginning after binging the Beatles episodes).

Favorites episodes:

Rosetta Tharpe - "This Train"
Les Paul and Mary Ford - "How High The Moon"
Johnny Otis, Little Esther - "Double Crossing' Blues"
Lloyd Price - "Lady Miss Clawdy"
Ruth Brown - "Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean"
The Chords - "Sh-Boom"
Johnny Ace - "Pledging My Love"
All of the Chess Record Episodes (Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry and The Moonglows)
Little Richard - "Tutti Frutti"

In case anyone isn't familiar with Ruth Brown (I wasn't) should watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqmGZRGvKC8

For those that cannot handle his voice (I can’t) and don’t want to read the transcripts in browser (I don’t) he does offer full transcripts arranged in ebook format for his Patreon subscribers and god they’re good. I’m not sure if he’s published the second yet as I’ve been checked out for a while but that first ebook made for an amazing companion piece to bob Stanley’s new pre-rock’n’roll one this summer

It’s a pretty extraordinary thing he’s doing here and I very much appreciate the lengths he goes to to mitigate against the shittiness of his subject matter . It doesn’t slow things down so much when you’re reading rather than listening, perhaps

Also <3 to you CaAL, I discovered your project and Andrew’s at roughly similar times and have followed them in tandem, and between the two of you you’ve completely blown away my previous conceptions about when 20th century popular music got “interesting” and I’ve found it extremely rewarding

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pW-lWQBjnFg

Doing this on phone so apologies if the tags fuck up. But that’s my fav entry. When the chorus kicks in and we go from old timey to rock’n’roll. It’s good stuff

I love this podcast.

I also found about it from ILM, specifically from a thread about Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, where someone linked to a transcript of an episode where Hickey discusses Jones's abuse of women. That episode contains his one effort to avoid causing offense that I found completely ridiculous:

You see, Brian Jones was a sadist, and not in a good way. There are people who engage in consensual BDSM, in which everyone involved is having a good time, and those people include some of my closest friends. This will never be a podcast that engages in kink-shaming of consensual kinks, and I want to make clear that what I have to say about Jones has nothing to do with that.

Because Jones was not into consent. He was into physically injuring non-consenting young women, and he got his sexual kicks from things like beating them with chains. Again, if everyone is involved is consenting, this is perfectly fine, but Jones didn’t care about anyone other than himself.

I can't imagine someone weird enough to be offended by this, but reasonable enough to be assuaged by the disclaimer.

In general, his efforts with this kind of thing strike me as both well-intentioned and pretentious. I think he sincerely wants to avoid causing pointless suffering, and to tell a version of rock history that sheds light on how various people have been unfairly sidelined. And I also think he's very invested in presenting himself as enlightened on these topics (which, of course, requires him to solemnly deny that he sees himself this way).

But that's a minor gripe, considering how good the show is. I've learned so much from it, and I'm beyond curious to see where it goes.

As another listener pointed out in the recent Q&A episode, he's rapidly approaching the point at which a lot of the most critically acclaimed rock music becomes stuff that was less commercially successful and therefore less immediately influential. I'm very interested to see how he'll handle that. I can imagine a version of this show that covers, say, the Eagles but not Minor Threat, and is justified on its own terms in doing so.

What is Camaraderie at Arms Length's project?

XP I don’t read his disclaimers as him being invested in seeming like anything at all … I read them more like “I’ve seen a thousand internet shitstorms and I want to be VERY VERY CLEAR about what I mean by what I’m about to say.”

JRN at 11:24 10 Aug 22

What is Camaraderie at Arms Length's project?

my attitude to the disclaimers is: I am fortunate enough not to have any form of PTSD and therefore these are not for me, but other people aren't so lucky.

I can imagine a version of this show that covers, say, the Eagles but not Minor Threat, and is justified on its own terms in doing so.

He's done Patreon bonus episodes (usually around 10-20 minutes) on a couple of songs that I was sure would be part of the regular 500, particularly Link Wray's "Rumble," and Tommy James And The Shondells' "Hanky Panky." And in his bonus episodes on the Walker Brothers' "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore" and Jackie Shane's "Any Other Way" he says that he tried to find a way to make them part of the 500, but wasn't able to. I'm still not 100% clear on the criteria for inclusion -- and he has stressed that it's not about personal preference, the aesthetic merits of the song itself, or establishing a canon -- but it could be because I wasn't listening closely enough to the episodes that may have laid out the criteria.

All that said, there hasn't been a single "main" episode where I thought, "Why is this here? What does this have to do with anything?" I have thought that before listening -- the one on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" especially -- but not after.

Listening to the Q&A episodes he’s done, a big criterion is songs that give him a way to continue strands of the overall narrative. Sometimes several strands at once.

I've only listened to the James Brown episode, and it was really good even though he seems to be way more of a harmony person than a rhythm person. I probably would have picked a different tune to talk about the invention of funk, but he defended his thesis and I learned a lot of trivia despite being a JB nerd.

There's been a few episodes where he points out the differences between certain rhythms, and how certain rhythmic approaches evolved over the years. iirc, these were mostly in the earlier episodes.

Alba, yes, I do now remember how he's talked about the strands and connections and such.

Chiming in with a few thoughts. The podcast is one of my favorites of the past few years and there are so many similar shows that absolutely get this format wrong compared to Hickey... most "great record survey" type podcasts just gush over an album like a perfect 10 retrospective review and maybe offer a bit of "what was the band doing in the few months leading up to it" information. The approach here is light on the praise, and much more about putting the career of the artist into the context of the evolution of popular music. Excellent research and some great connections drawn between artists and songs I hadn't thought about.

I actually like his relaxed, bemused reading tone, and the writing isn't too cringe apart from the wallowing overmuch in salacious events wherever they crop up and the accompanying endless trigger warnings, and I can definitely quibble with Hickey's curious curatorial choices. He explains why he feels Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters don't belong in his survey but I think it doesn't make sense, really, since one of the big themes of his show appears to be the excellent point that "rock music and (black) soul music are basically contiguous and the musicians themselves listen to and operate across those boundaries, and it's only racist marketing / categorization that kept these two segregated on the radio and in record stores and in people's minds". So instead of some great electric blues episodes featuring what I think most critics would feel are far superior to yet sound right at home next to most 50s "rock and roll" songs, you get 2 Wanda Jackson and Eddie Cochran and Everly Brothers episodes, and full episodes on Tommy Steele, Manfred Mann and that LSD gimmicky surf song, and way too many episodes on Elvis, the Beatles and Beach Boys that betrays an overly "white oldies music fan" focus at odds with the aforementioned "segregation of soul music" theme. But this is quibbling; it's ok to have a point of view and go with it and the extremely high quality of the show speaks for itself.

My head canon I suppose would also have leaned a bit more international and focused less on telling just the story of the US and UK single and album charts. If you're going to say soul music and rock music are basically the same, you might as well include new york cuban-soul fusion bugalu (Joe Cuba) and maybe its precursor the conjunto sound of Arsenio Rodriguez; Jorge Ben and the Jovem Garda which was basically samba-rock fusion; Serge Gainsbourg evolving from chanson to latin jazz to full on 60s rock to writing a ye-ye anthem that wins the Eurovision; and I think the "Lion Sleeps Tonight" episode was fine but soul/latin/highlife hybrids happening in 60s west africa seems like a pretty big oversight to a history of rock music, it's basically some of the best electric guitar music ever made. And same goes for ska, I can see why Hickey went with "My Boy Lollipop" but geez that is just not the 60s ska track I would have picked. Just because it made the hit parade in the UK doesn't mean it's as important as the actual innovations that preceded it. There might be upcoming episodes on Hugh Masekela and Bob Marley and maybe a bonus episode on Mutantes or Veloso/Gil in exile.

Overall I like what Hickey's doing so much I've seriously considered basically copying the format and doing some seasons focusing on some of my sweet spots, like say doing 25 episodes on female 70s/80s post-punk, followed by a season on african musicians... but I think about the head start Hickey must have had owning hundreds of biographies and memoirs and the music I would want to cover, much of it doesn't even have a single biography, so the focus would have to be more on the music than on the biographical details of the artist... sounds like a ton of work.

25 episodes on female 70s/80s post-punk

Oooh, that is rich territory to mine. Au Pairs, Ari Up, Lora Logic, Danielle Dax, AC Marias, just to name a few...

He explains why he feels Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters don't belong in his survey but I think it doesn't make sense

That definitely raised an eyebrow for me, but I do think it makes sense. The early rock 'n' rollers came from Louis Jordan, the Moonglows, the Ink Spots, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Wynonie Harris...Hickey points out that the overt influence of Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf didn't happen until Bo Diddley, and then not again until the Rolling Stones. He does point out that Waters influenced Chuck Berry, but has stressed that Waters was one among many of Berry's influences alongside Louis Jordan, Nat "King" Cole, and Charlie Christian.

I initially questioned some of his choices, but not after understanding that a) he's not out to create nor establish a canon; b) he's not choosing songs because they're good (or not); and c) each episode is more about the story than the song. An obvious example of the latter is his most recent episode on "All You Need Is Love." In the nearly 4-hour episode he doesn't get to that actual song until maybe 3 hours in. And when I saw that he'd chosen Peter, Paul & Mary's version of "Blowin' In The Wind" I thought, "What?! Not Dylan's version?!" But the story about PP&M's version is also the story about Dylan's version, and also broadens the scope to encompass the changes happening in the established popular music industry at the time (among other things). As counterintuitive as this sounds, an episode on Dylan's version would've been more narrowly focused, to its detriment.

In his recent Q&A episode, he says that he has done (and will do) episodes on songs that he absolutely despises. This isn't about "Hey, this is a great record! I'll do an episode on that!" And to his credit, the two episodes he's done so far on artists I intensely dislike were surprisingly -- shockingly, even -- engaging and informative.

And what I probably love most about this podcast is who unexpectedly turns up, and where. Sun Ra, Iannis Xenakis, Dexter Gordon, Coleman Hawkins, and Antonio Carlos Jobim are all mentioned, but not in the episodes you think they might be.

In the nearly 4-hour episode he doesn't get to that actual song until maybe 3 hours in

Re: rhythm. He spends a lot of time in the 40s/50s episodes pointing out rhythmic innovations and trying to explain their origins and influence. Also makes an interesting point that rhythmic innovations could not be copyrighted - so everyone could copy Bo Diddley without him getting paid.

Yeah, I found the Peter Paul and Mary episode interesting and all, but pretty tangential to the history of rock music per se, and again, I'm not sure we need quite as much Dylan in this series as we are going to wind up with. But like I say this is just a quibble. Personally I think the podcast would be better if it focused on the greatest and most innovative performances while maybe not having as much repeated focus on the very biggest names like Elvis, Beatles, Beach Boys, Dylan - and I think Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf absolutely recorded some of the best electrified stomping sing-along popular music that is basically rock and roll, although it gets pigeonholed or dismissed as just being blues music.

I have to imagine that by the time he gets to the 70s there will be less repeat artists, with glam, prog, metal, punk, funk, disco, new wave, etc. all in the mix.

In his recent Q&A episode, he says that he has done (and will do) episodes on songs that he absolutely despises

I've been trying to figure out which ones these are, think Louie, Louie is one, though his description of it just made me love it even more.

I'm still not 100% clear on the criteria for inclusion -- and he has stressed that it's not about personal preference, the aesthetic merits of the song itself, or establishing a canon -- but it could be because I wasn't listening closely enough to the episodes that may have laid out the criteria.

one of the big themes of his show appears to be the excellent point that "rock music and (black) soul music are basically contiguous and the musicians themselves listen to and operate across those boundaries, and it's only racist marketing / categorization that kept these two segregated on the radio and in record stores and in people's minds".

I might be wrong about this but I think I do remember him saying that at some point he would stop covering Soul music on the podcast as the genre becomes established as a separate thing from Rock - curious to see where he places this cut off, as I'd have probably placed it at the emergence of Motown and Stax.

The problem with just continuing to cover Soul and R&B imo is that while musicians listen to all sorts of music sure, as the story advances "Rock and Roll" becomes a term that is very much coded white and carries with it a whole lot of cultural baggage that simply wasn't there in the 50's. So while including Soul or, as per mig's post, MPB and Gainsbourg could be viewed as breaking down dumb marketing barriers, it's also doing so within the context of making it all a sub-genre of Rock & Roll, which I think ends up reinforcing some fucked up hierarchies, it's the same thing as Hip-Hop artists getting inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame. The way to sidestep that would be for it to be A History Of Pop Music, but of course that widens the scope to an absurd degree.

He's done eight Motown episodes, but only one (or two, if you count "In The Midnight Hour") on Stax so far. One of the more recent episodes was on Aretha's "Respect," which obviously talked about Otis Redding a fair amount (and he's said there'll be at least one Otis episode coming up). My guess is that if he stops covering soul, it'll be in the mid-'70s. He did say in an early episode -- one which led me to one of the most stunning recordings I've discovered in the last 15 years or so -- that he will be covering hip-hop to some degree in the future.

Ah, ok, this is what I was looking for (from episode 32 on Ray Charles's "I Got A Woman"):

...it’s worth talking about the musical boundaries we’re going to be using in this series, because while it’s called “A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs”, I am not planning on using a narrow definition of “rock music”, because what counts as rock tends to be retroactively redefined to exclude branches of music where black people predominate. So for example, there’s footage of Mohammed [sic] Ali calling Sam Cooke “the greatest rock and roll singer in the world”, and at the time absolutely nobody would have questioned Cooke being called “rock and roll”, but these days he would only be talked about as a soul singer.

And much of the music that we would now call “soul” was so influential on the music that we now call rock music that it’s completely ridiculous to even consider them separately until the late seventies at the earliest. So while we’re going to mostly look at music that has been labelled rock or rock and roll, don’t be surprised to find soul, funk, hip-hop, country, or any other genre that has influenced rock turning up. And especially don’t be surprised to see that happening if it was music that was thought of as rock and roll at the time, but has been retroactively relabelled.

Overall I like what Hickey's doing so much I've seriously considered basically copying the format and doing some seasons focusing on some of my sweet spots, like say doing 25 episodes on female 70s/80s post-punk, followed by a season on african musicians... but I think about the head start Hickey must have had owning hundreds of biographies and memoirs and the music I would want to cover, much of it doesn't even have a single biography, so the focus would have to be more on the music than on the biographical details of the artist... sounds like a ton of work.

― mig (guess that dreams always end), Thursday, August 11, 2022 6:32 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I put together this list of what the first 18 episodes of "A History of Jazz in 500 songs" would be, there is absolutely no way I'm ever making it, but if anyone wants to have a go then I would be very happy to help out.

Unique Quartette - Mama's Black Baby Boy
Vess L Ossman - A Bunch of Rags
Scott Joplin - Maple Leaf Rag
Arthur Pryor with Sousa's Band - The Patriot
Bert Williams - Nobody
Buddy Bolden Band - Funky Butt
Europe's Society Orchestra - Down Home Rag
Sophie Tucker - Some of These Days
Prince's Band - St Louis Blues
Collins & Harlan - That Funny Jas Band From Dixieland
Original Dixieland 'Jass' Band - Livery Stable Blues
Earl Fuller’s Rector Novelty Orchestra - Russian Rag
Wilbur Sweatman's Original Jazz Band - Dallas Blues
Marrion Harris - I Ain't Got Nobody
Art Hickman's Orchestra - Rose Room
Lieut. Jim Europe's 369th U. S. Infantry “Hell Fighters” Band - Memphis Blues
Joseph C Smith's Orchestra - Yellow Dog Blues
Mamie Smith and Her Jazz Hounds - Crazy Blues

David Wondrich is great on Europe’s “down home rag” in ‘stomp and swerve’, that was a real opener for me for with the super early stuff

New episode! And I strongly suspect this is less about the song itself -- unless Scott McKenzie really is somehow fascinating enough to warrant a 2 1/2 hour episode -- and more about the story: https://500songs.com/podcast/episode-151-san-francisco-by-scott-mckenzie/

wasn’t there some stuff with John Stewart as well?

just finished listening, the song itself is covered for only a few minutes- majority of the episode is the career of The Mamas & the Papas and The Monterey Pop Festival 1967.

I'm a bit baffled at how much Hickey shoehorned into this one. Enjoyable to listen to as always but not sure I needed 2.5 hours on the Mamas & the Papas w/ Scott McKenzie and Monterey Pop detours. I feel like I don't have a strong sense of who this John Phillips character really was, or why I should want to know him given what I know of how he turned out. I think the problem was me; I have always held California Dreamin' at arms' length, it's great of course, and moreover I'm intrigued by the hyper capitalist American go-getter make friends and influence your uncle attitude of putting easy listening ba-ba-da-da-da peanut butter in my chocolate rock but beyond Pet Sounds and the more marginal hipster crate digs like Free Design and Millenium, the whole field is kind of a blur to me and the big hits like Eloise and Windy kind of bore me. If I'm in the mood for interesting 60s easy listening I'll usually reach for something like Morricone or Esquivel, Swingle Singers, Peggy Lee, Scott Walker, Francoise Hardy. I think there's more for me to explore in the world of the big sunshine pop hits, "The Archies plus Bacharach" sounds appealing to me, but it's currently lost on me, even after this episode.

It seems there could be a way to use the moment of the summer of love to tie together sunshine pop of the Turtles/Association/5th Dimension and sophisticated adult-themed records of Bacharach and Webb, lounge precursors and the Beatles/Beach Boys/folk rock stuff he's already covered, and talk about California Dreamin' as a sort of happy-sad, beautiful-summation of this cultural moment, and how the band's Fleetwood Mac style internal drama is a presage of the sexual chaos of the dawning era.

I think he's big into that kinda stuff, possibly through being a huge Beach Boys fan. The comment on the LA/SF feud was interesting to me as I was totally unaware this had even been a thing.

Ditto. That strain of '60s California music -- Mamas & Papas, Association, much of the non-Spector/non-Beach Boys Wrecking Crew things like Gary Lewis & The Playboys -- isn't really my bag. And I can't stand the McKenzie song, but I thought it was the perfect fulcrum for this episode. What really struck me was learning that Monterey was set up to be a kind of battle of the bands between LA and San Francisco. As Hickey pointed out, most most of the LA bands either declined, didn't show, backed out, were missing key members, or (as with the Association) were seen as squaresville next to the Dead, Airplane, Moby Grape, Quicksilver, and Big Brother (and forget about comparing the Association to Hendrix or the Who...though Steve Miller is on record saying he despised the Who's set and loved the Association). So it's about how the slick LA scene came up with the McKenzie song -- representative of cynical showbiz appropriations of the new hippie culture -- that those on the SF scene not only laughed at, but made irrelevant overnight.

Latest episode is also California-centered, but is much more focused on the song itself ("For What It's Worth" -- and I had no idea about the somewhat hilarious origin story of the song's title). Not sure how much in this episode will be news to Neil fans (of which I am one, but I never got around to reading Shakey or his autobios), but a few things -- like Neil's love for Bobby Darin, which explains a fuck of a lot about how Neil went about his career -- were genuinely surprising to learn.

Thoroughly enjoying this podcast thanks to this thread. Thanks!

Neil briefly being a Motown artist was news to me!

also lol @ Stills description of Mike Love as "spooky"

I started listening to this only yesterday and I'm very interested in this Beach Boys / Manson thing. I love a diagonal throughline

Not to say Leadbelly's true story isn't worth telling, but I'm a bit taken aback that Hickey previously looked at the official story of a black man incarcerated for murder in the first half of the 20th century and didn't automatically at least consider that this might have been a frame job.

he is a middle class white male, they can be insensitiue.
Hopefully somebody will have pointed that out to him and he can be better in future. Though would be more convenient if he arrived at a similarr conclusion as he read the book.

Yes but he is also, as this thread illustrates, very invested in being sensitive and aware of these issues, so this felt out of character.

It sounds like no one had really done any primary research on Ledbetter’s pre-folk revival life in a very long time to fully disassemble the context of his incarcerations. Hickey is plenty skeptical of romantic narratives around musicians and good at synthesizing multiple sources but this is a case where there hadn’t been thorough scholarship in a long time.

Yeah, sure, I'm not saying he should have been certain Leadbelly was innocent. Just that he shouldn't have been certain of his guilt either, because any judgement made against a black person during that period in that area is automatically suspect imo.

Man, different kind of nightmare, but the stuff about Dennis in part 3 is also a nightmare. I didn't realize that he was (probably) as close to Manson as this suggests. I wonder what we have in store in part four. I expect we'll have to wait a bit!

There's a couple of decent books on The Family. Does the Ed Sanders one still stand up?

Some very dark stuff in this episode. Much more interested in the Ledbetter story though than the more mundane who wrote what on The Beach Boys 1968 album.

Yes, it's all great but I don't really need to know about Ricki Fataar and stuff - a lot of the BBs stuff he covers doesn't feel ancillary to the topic at all.
Still, for all my BBs knowledge, I'm nevertheless learning new stuff about them so I can't complain

Alex Chilton/Box Tops/Chris Bell/Big Star episode up as a Patreon bonus. About an hour and a half long.

Final episode of this 5-month, 4-episode saga finally dropped. I guess I’ll be spending the next week on it.

Started in on this ep on a long run this morning. My mind was wandering so I totally missed the connection between the Leadbelly story and Manson. ?? But the story leading up to the Sharon Tate murders was mind boggling, not to mention the “Charlie don’t surf” stuff. A lot going on there and I was glad he went deep into it.

The way Hickey tied the song “Shortnin’ Bread” to the Manson murders in one terse line was pretty startling

It's quite the odyssey. Great episode.

Things I only just realised: James Jamerson plays bass on *Pacific Ocean Blue*.

I loved the latest episode, but I was surprised about two things. One, Hickey never makes an explicit connection between the Ledbetter/Lomax, Manson, and Beach Boys threads of the story, in a way that explains why the Ledbetter story is included in this particular series. The closest we get is the nexus of Brian Wilson's obsession with "Shortnin' Bread", the folk tradition of hog-killing songs, and the Manson family's use of the words pig/piggy. I was expecting something relating Lomax's racism to Manson's, but even that was just left implicit.

Two, Hickey says that he takes no pleasure in relating the Manson story, but has to do it because of its profound effect on the culture. But these episodes--as I remember them, at least--don't actually speak to that much. That theme could emerge in later episodes, but I was struck by the fact that, just as far as this specific series is concerned, we don't get anything that makes Manson out to be more than a lurid and mysterious footnote in the history of rock.

An episode or two ago the connection was made between Ledbetter and beach boys doing Cotton Fields.

I did find the connections more tenuous but still an interesting way to cover a few stories.

An episode or two ago the connection was made between Ledbetter and beach boys doing Cotton Fields.

Right, but if that's the only sort of connection there is, then the story might've just as well waited for a Nirvana episode, via "Where Did You Sleep Last Night". I'm still wondering why exactly it's incorporated here, at this point in the series. My guess: he just really wanted to cover it and this seemed as good a place as any.

Re: the Manson aspect--Now that I think about it, one of the striking things in this story is how LITTLE the Manson association affected the Beach Boys and Terry Melcher. If it had wrecked their careers, that would justify including the story. If the point was to highlight that a major rock star and big-name producer could be mixed up in a racist spree-killing sex cult--really deeply, in Dennis Wilson's case--and have the public largely not care, that would be interesting. But the former didn't happen, and the latter wasn't Hickey's angle. So what was the point? Is it supposed to be so obvious as to go without saying?

Nirvana episodes aren't happening until 2050 tho...

Sure, and that's if they happen at all. But supposing that the series was going to completed, does it make more sense to cover the Ledbetter/Lomax stuff in the early '70s portion, in the context of the Beach Boys and Charles Manson, than in the early '90s portion with Nirvana?

I could imagine interesting connections being drawn between Ledbetter, '50s/'60s folkies, the association of folk and acoustic instruments with intimacy and authenticity, and the MTV Unplugged series. Plus the contrast between Ledbetter and Kurt Cobain as two tragic figures, one who burned out and one who faded away. And "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" wasn't just a song Nirvana did at some point, like with the Beach Boys and "Cotton Fields". It was one of the last things Cobain recorded in his life (maybe THE last?), was the final track on an album that went octuple platinum, and is a legendarily haunting and poignant performance

I know this is ridiculous armchair quarterbacking. It's just interesting to think about

Not at all ridiculous! I feel pretty much the same way —- like, the minstrelsy to Manson thread gets drawn through Leadbelly & Shortenin’ Bread and tugged taut with the line about how you get shortening: by killing pigs. But that line isn’t going to land very hard if you haven’t read Vincent Bugliosi or been steeped in Manson/Family lore — I don’t think he set it up properly. And it’s also a case of the pareidolia he talks about at the beginning of the series; if there’s a *real* connection between the beach boys’ Shortenin’ Bread and the “pig” murders on Cielo Dr, I don’t think he made the case.

Which would be fine, but he’s spent 5 months telling this story, weaving at least 3 big strands together over 4 episodes, and it didn’t seem to add up to much. There might be a bigger payoff planned (as JRN noted a few xposts above, the *impact* of Manson was stated but not explored) — there’s certainly enough material to come (“Revolution Blues”) that’ll no doubt pick that thread up again.

I do hope, now that he’s gotten his beloved beach boys out of the way, it kind of unblocks him a bit & he can do more one-ep songs and progress the story a bit more efficiently. I hate that I keep playing that note, but at this pace I don’t expect him to get to song 250, much less 500.

I beef, but I beef because I love. And I should step up & say I think he’s still doing a masterful job, in the main, and that I eagerly await each episode (each completed song, that is) and the bonus songs too.

I’m likely to go back & re-listen to this one in the near future.

I agree with all that, and like I said when he got deep in the weeds with Sweetheart of the Rodeo, I look forward to him getting into some actual rock music. The kind that rocks.

I couldn't wait for all of these to come out, which is what I usually do for the multi-part episodes. The wait was so long and the episodes were so long that I gave up. I agree that connections weren't strongly made, but I'm okay with that. When he got to the killing pigs bit I almost got goosebumps. While the epic Dark Star was woven tighter and probably better, I really enjoyed this.

He could use some editing, sometimes he really does go on. But just as often those digressions interesting. Andrew has his own character that he brings to the podcast and at this point I find his trivial wormholes charming.

The Letter is a great bonus episode.

Yeah, Sweetheart of the Rodeo was the big one that dragged for me.

It's tough to wait for new ones to come out, but that's only because he's so good at what he does. And he's spoiled his listeners by being so insanely prolific. Look at what he did in 2023, the volume and quality of work is extraordinary. He may never reach those heights again, but I can't wait to find out.

As a child in the 70s I remember everyone had the Endless Summer comp. Wild to think that their pre Pet Sounds material was out of print until that comp came out.

I agree with HD’s post above … I enjoyed most of The Beach Boys story but I’m glad it’s done. I thought the bonus on Alex Chilton / The Letter was much more interesting.

I loved the bonus ep on "The Letter"/Big Star too. He said on Bluesky earlier today that episode 179 (the most recent was 177) will either be on the MC5 or the Bee Gees (and if the latter, MC5 will be a bonus). Not sure if he's revealed what 178 will be. In any case, I can't wait

The overarching connections I got from the final episode: Leadbelly's story was parallel to Brian Wilson, as they both had a special line into the soul of America, but their vision was always at the mercy of those around them, who both thwarted and enabled them; Dennis was the soul of the actual band, the chemical reaction that made it work, and he was forever damaged by the Mason association. Manson and Ledbetter sat the extreme ends of America dysfunction, tugging those California boys in all the crazy directions.

Beach Boys are a big blind spot in my listening - sweet harmonized singing isn't my thing. Really have never explored the 70s albums and now I'm curious as the rougher texture in the voices and WTF themes have more appeal to me that the 60s hits.

i just started this recently and it was crazy to hear on his first question and answer show that it will take 10 years to finish this project.

Personally I could have done without the excerpts of Manson's music - I know he needs music to break up the monologue but the hipster fetischism for Manson's album was always gross.

I'm still wondering why exactly it's incorporated here, at this point in the series. My guess: he just really wanted to cover it and this seemed as good a place as any.

Think he was pretty upfront in the first episode that he had decided to cover it because he wanted the parallel to be about two murderers, but then it turned out Leadbelly didn't actually kill anyone and at that point he was prob too deep into the ep to start afresh.

Dennis . . . was forever damaged by the Manson association

Was he? It doesn't seem to have hurt his career, and while Dennis was clearly a very troubled guy, that was already true long before he met Manson (and maybe explains in part how he got mixed up with him)

Think he was pretty upfront in the first episode that he had decided to cover it because he wanted the parallel to be about two murderers

We'll never know, of course, but I don't see how that parallel would have been any more illuminating than any of the ones we actually got

i just started this recently and it was crazy to hear on his first question and answer show that it will take 10 years to finish this project.

I was curious how the pace has changed over time, so I checked the history of episodes.

Here's the number of songs he's covered each year
2018: 52 episodes (episodes 1 - 13 in 3 months, which is a pace of 52 annually)
2019: 50 episodes (14 - 63)
2020: 46 episodes (64 - 109)
2021: 31 episodes (110 - 140)
2022: 20 episodes (141 - 160)
2023: 11 episodes (161 - 171)
2024: 5.5 episodes (172 - 177.5)

Obviously, this doesn't measure the number of hours of content he's producing each year, which is probably almost the same as it's always been (it's just that each song takes at least 10x longer to cover).

But if he continues at the 2024 pace, he wouldn't actually reach song 500 until 2079.

My sense is he's gotten a bit bogged down because there is so much more info about the artists he's now covering; people know much more about these stories and have opinions; and Hickey himself has gotten increasing recognition as folks realize how fantastic this project truly is - leading to all the inherent distractions when one achieves a certain level of "fame"

next step - going back to his roots lol

He’s written a couple of books about the beach boys, and blogs about seeing them live on cruises &c, so he obviously got a special interest in them. Since he followed their career to the end in this episode, he’s done with their story. With luck, that means he won’t feel as deeply obligated to explore every nook & cranburger of future artists. (We still have the Beatles’ breakup & aftermath to cover though, and a whole lotta Stones)

I do think the sheer volume of stuff that’s been written about particularly the late 60s poses issues for him (he’s mentioned this as a barrier to productivity).

I thought I was a Beach Boys lore nerd till I listened to these. I know nothing

This was a great episode. I never listened Love You until today. Wonderfully strange album. Johnny Carson is truly bizarre.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNlwR8bzY1I

On Bluesky Andrew mentioned his two least favorite songs: “Universal Coward,” which has come up before, and a Mike Love abomination called “Rockin’ The Man In The Boat” about a woman masturbating. If Clarence Carter did the song it would be kinda funny, from Mike Love it’s cringe city.

xp oh Love You is classsssssic

And so is this podcast. Just listened to the Eight Miles High one and very much enjoyed the music theory side of it

This was a great episode. I never listened Love You until today. Wonderfully strange album. Johnny Carson is truly bizarre.

It's the strangest record I have ever heard. It's one thing for non-strange people to make music that deliberately sounds strange. But this is a record made by strange people, desperately trying to sound normal.

The Patreon comments for the latest episode are insane. People are criticizing the episode for being too long, too many tangents etc. and AH keeps getting angrier and angrier. He keeps cancelling people's subscriptions and refunding their money.

I'm not sure why people feel the need to criticize his work on that particular forum, but it makes for entertaining reading.

I think the nature of this project and the types it will attract might result in a particular kind of unstoppable force vs immovable object kind of deal

Also I followed him on bsky & like 75% of my feed are his posts & reposts, I’m amazed he ever manages to release an ep tbh

Shocking that people on the interwebs don't understand the difference between "A" history and "The" history...

Gillian Welch had it figured out 20 years ago with the Napster-era Everything is Free

but what's actually scary about the most recent episode is the charlie manson race riot/world re-born craziness and some of the white nationalist insanity we are seeing

When he got to the killing pigs bit I almost got goosebumps

I knew little enough about the murders that it's only reading this thread that I got the significance!

I think that's fine though. I got near goosebumps at the audio excerpt payoff partway through the "Tomorrow Never Knows" episode, and there are presumably people unfamiliar enough with the song for that not to have worked. It would be a shame to have to spell everything out completely.

After the Fairport episodes, he's doing "Kick Out the Jams."

Feels like a mad time jump to go from the Beach Boys to Fiarport to MC5, but it does make sense - they were all happening within close enough time to each other

They're all 69 though MC5 is actually a late 68 recording.
Loads happening at the time. Some very interesting developments in guitar rock which merit much further personal investigation. Richard Thompson came out with some pretty great rock riffs in Liege & Lief that would not be out of place in heavier material. Do wish there had been a lot of live material captured of the band in 68 and 69 cos he was an endlessly inventive improvisor. & that era of the band or those eras with the 2 different female singers are so good. There are a couple pf part sets with Judy Dyble and the so far not fully salvaged live debut of the Liege and Lief set which I'm dreaming technology might find a way of making listenable at some point.

Nick Drake though :'-(