Margo Guryan

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I've just listened to 25 Demos and I think "California Shake" is the best song Neil Young never recorded.

What do people think about this person?

― Tracer Hand, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Take a Picture is my favorite so far of all lost pop classics of the 60s. I like her harmonic shifts, which seem so perfectly in tune with shades of mood. I like how that psych freakout song, "Love", finishes it off (before the bonus trax).

― Curt, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

wow, somebody just told me about her last night. sounds really great.

I've heard she's something like francoise hardy or astrud giberto. Does that seem right?

― fritz, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Beautiful stuff - we recorded Love & Sun (the demo version is magnificent!) for Songs For the Jetset 2000, at Mike Alway's request - I'm hooked. Are you familiar with Wendy & Bonnie? They were 13 & 17 when they recorded their Genesis album in 1968...& it's just been re-released.

― Jez, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Wendy & Bonnie were amazing, too, but it's more like, considering their age and that it's from 1968. Margo Guryan is some kind of miracle of human creativity no matter where or when she came from.

Any more Songs for the Jetset in the works, Jez?

― Curt, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I've heard she's something like francoise hardy or astrud giberto. Does that seem right?

She has a smokiness to her voice that is maybe a little more rock n roll than those other two. Yet her voice is still very good - she hits the notes, and more. And she looks great (= dishevelled) on the cover! And Curt I'm with you on the "miracle of human creativity" thing. The liner notes say that she brought sheet music for all the studio musicians the day they were to record the demos, and the session players (unfortunately unnamed) thought the music was crazy. Then they heard it back with the vocals on.

― Tracer Hand, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

both 25 Demos and Take a Picture are great. Go get them. And yes, it's in the same general neighborhood as Astrud Gilberto, Francoise Hardy, even Claudine Longet, but her voice is less gimmicky than Gilberto and Longet, and her music is a bit more pop than Hardy.

― g, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I did have 25 Demos on my best of 2001 list...

― g, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Still waiting for my copy of 25 demos to arrive in the post. I do have Take a Picture - those 70's funkadelic tracks on there really surpised me when I put the album on. Not exactly what I was expecting.

― marianna, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Curt: We've got a Tomorrow's World album in the pipeline & a few ongoing projects. If you're interested, check the music page at Boum.co.uk

Cheers

Jez

― Jez, Thursday, 17 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I really love the songs on _25 Demos_ about Watergate, especially "The Hum." "And the tapes go mmmm-mmm-mmm-mmm..."

― Douglas, Friday, 18 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What about Free Design?

For a start, that's a band name to die for. Marina have just released the comeback album - their voices are still like cut crystal glass.

I do love most of the recordings I've heard, but there is something slighty eerie going on, eg Kites Are Fun is such an odd lyric.

― Jez, Friday, 18 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

jez: do you do all the music on those siesta albums? very cool. Hey, just out of curiosity, do you have any idea about how well they have been selling?
As for Free Design they are great but occasionally the new age hippy dippiness wears on me a little.

― g, Friday, 18 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

We've produced the Mike Alway stuff since 2000. As four sales, I haven't a clue.

― Jez, Friday, 18 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I thought it was a little disappointing, actually. I think it was the lyrics that bothered me - they were sort of girlish.

― Kerry, Friday, 18 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

three years pass...

Jesus, "Take A Picture" is so good... She should get a Vashti Bunyan or Free Design-kind of revival, this record is simply fantastic.

― zeus (zeus), Saturday, 7 January 2006 16:30 (twenty years ago)

She kind of 'had' one, no, about 4 or 5 years ago? The main difference being Vashti resurfaced, alongside the young and the hip, and began recording again and Margo did not. I am not sure she did much press at all

Question: Can anyone shed light on the differences between "25 Demos", "Changes" and "Thoughts"? - all 3 are available on CD and at least 2 out of the 3 have the same cover. Are they all the same?

― GALKIN (GALKIN), Saturday, 7 January 2006 17:19 (twenty years ago)

three months pass...

Re: `the differences between "25 Demos", "Changes" and "Thoughts"', "25 Demos", a U.S. release, is what the title says. "Thoughts" is a U.K. release containing the twenty-five demos, all Margo-written, plus two songs written by others featuring Margo's vocals. "Changes" doesn't exist; it was a discarded title, somehow publicly known, for the album that was released as "Thoughts".

― David Rosner, Sunday, 30 April 2006 06:14 (nineteen years ago)

one year passes...

"...god it feels like 8.4 or 5..." California Shake would have been a perfect song to play between talks on those Coast2CoastAM shows when the host and the guests talked about earthquakes, over the summer.

― gigabytepicnic, Wednesday, 7 November 2007 06:01 (eighteen years ago)

My band wrote a song in response to Margo's "Timothy Leaves." It's called "Margo Left in Bed." We sent her the song and have become friends with her ever since. She even gave us mixing advice on our new EP! I am crossing my fingers that we might get her to guest on something coming up.

You can hear that song if you'd like: www.myspace.com/brownreclusesings

― htshell, Wednesday, 7 November 2007 06:07 (eighteen years ago)

is that "16 words" deal on her myspace really her? - she sounds the same after all these years!

― gershy, Wednesday, 7 November 2007 06:19 (eighteen years ago)

yeah it totally is. it took me a while to get into it, but now i really dig it!

― htshell, Wednesday, 7 November 2007 06:25 (eighteen years ago)

one year passes...

"Sunday Morning" is all sorts of wonderful.

― Turangalila, Sunday, 7 December 2008 15:28 (seventeen years ago)

I had the pleasure of interviewing Margo for my blog earlier this year.

P.S.: Margo's husband posted on this thread six posts above this one, so I assume Margo is also reading this thread. Hi Margo! :)

― simplecarnival, Monday, 8 December 2008 23:22 (seventeen years ago)

ten months pass...

Take A Picture is some amazing stuff. Love just completely blew my mind. Occasionally a bit delicate/cutesy for my tastes, but the moments of sheer bliss are utterly transcendant.

― satsuma laroux (Masonic Boom), Monday, 19 October 2009 12:30 (sixteen years ago)

The Chopsticks Variations?

― Mark G, Monday, 19 October 2009 13:02 (sixteen years ago)

Lovely album, Sunday Morning and Love Songs are just perfect.

― zeus, Monday, 19 October 2009 15:56 (sixteen years ago)

i was listening to "love songs" the other day <3

― velko, Monday, 19 October 2009 16:03 (sixteen years ago)

five years pass...

"love" is exquisite

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib6L9-jeSDE

― reggie (qualmsley), Saturday, 7 March 2015 01:36 (eleven years ago)

six years pass...

RIP Margo, you were great.

https://buzzbands.la/2021/11/10/songwriter-margo-guryan-whose-1968-album-was-discovered-three-decades-later-dies-at-age-84/

― Alba, Wednesday, 10 November 2021 21:20 (four years ago)

So sad. Have been listening to this on repeat this evening

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbY-ACeXWhE

― Piedie Gimbel, Wednesday, 10 November 2021 21:56 (four years ago)

RIP. The spotify algorithm introduced me to her last week through this very pretty song and now's passed away. How odd!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjV_N5k6X6A

― ceci n'est pas une messi (cajunsunday), Wednesday, 10 November 2021 22:23 (four years ago)

oh no, this is awful. i am going to play my copy of "take a picture" tonight.

― treeship., Thursday, 11 November 2021 00:14 (four years ago)

Ahhh huge RIP. Take A Picture is perfection, and her demos are a goldmine

― J. Sam, Thursday, 11 November 2021 00:15 (four years ago)

RIP :(

― Exploding Plastic Bertrand (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 11 November 2021 16:46 (four years ago)

https://www.psychedelicbabymag.com/2018/03/margo-guryan-interview.html

― Exploding Plastic Bertrand (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 11 November 2021 16:58 (four years ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4h4l7w4xVkc

― Exploding Plastic Bertrand (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 11 November 2021 17:09 (four years ago)

Oh no...RIP Margo. "16 Words" goes through my head all the time (the catchiest song ever that mentions Saddam Hussein?). I just noticed on YouTube that there was an official video made for "California Shake" in 2014:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnOYseiijR8
Here's Saint Etienne's cover of "I Don't Intend to Spend Christmas Without You" (faithful to the arrangement from Claudine Longet's version):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDq5dPVhx_Y

― ernestp, Thursday, 11 November 2021 18:09 (four years ago)

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