A.A. RockBlog

There have been many rock artists over the years that have solidified themselves as being important stars - be that the Beatles' energetic, experimental sounds, the heavy metal style of Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, or Black Sabbath, or the folky and progressive blend of Jethro Tull. But of all the most popular bands, NONE have come even CLOSE to achieving worldwide fame and success than Pink Floyd. The band's sound combining electronics, tape loops, sound effects, and generally complex rhythms. After rather slow start to their career, the band literally broke out with their 1973 record The Dark Side of The Moon . It was this record that established them as highly prolific musicians. Pink Floyd first performed the album live during their 1972 world tour with the working title of Dark Side of the Moon: A Piece for Lunatics . Despite the band's numerous spacial references (think Astronomy , Two Suns in Sunset , Set the Controls for the Heart of The Sun , and did I mention P

It's been exactly fifty years since we landed on the moon (thanks to the late, great Neil Armstrong). The iconic anniversary, coupled with my recent visit to the Museaum of Flight to learn more, got me wanting to listen to David Bowie's Space Oddity  (1969) yet again. You can listen to the song here. Now here's the catch. While many think that the song was written in honor of the moon landing, that is NOT the case. The BBC played the song in time with the moon landing and the song was released about the SAME TIME  as the landing event. HOWEVER, and this is a BIG however, Bowie stated in a 2003 interview that the inspiration behind this classic hit came as a result of him watching the 1968 movie 2001: A Space Odessy . If you can't recall, that's the movie with the icon doo-doo-doo TA TAHHHH! music. Bowie stated that he was stoned while watching it and loved watching reruns of it calling it, in his own words, "such a revelation." A word about the movi

It's been a while since we've discussed a portion of the history of the music of my homeland (former Yugoslavia), so in this blog post, I will go over the history of perhaps one of the greatest, if not THE GREATEST record labels that has a rich 45-year history. The Beginnings: The record label emerged shortly after World War II. In just its first year of existense, they managed to sell 33,000 copies - mainly from Dalmation (Croatian) artists. By 1957 they released their first EPs and by the early 60s, they had competition from another popular ex-Yugoslav record label, PGP-RTB, based in the nation's capital city Belgrade (which now is the capital city of Serbia). Over the years, they've also had competitors with Belgrade's Jugodisk, the minor Zagreb area Suzy Records (notable for signing Priljavo Kazalishte - Dirty Theatre), and Sarajevo's Diskoton records, which most noteably released Bijelo Dugme records since Zeljko Bebek's departure in 1983. In the

Today is Independence Day (happy 4th to all), and for those that may (or may not) know, there are a number of classic hits that get HEAVY rotation on the radio for Independece Day. There are, in particular, two artists that have created hits honoring this great country, John Cougar Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen. Let's take a look at some John Mellencamp songs shall we? Mellencamp's hits such as Small Town and Pink Houses really encourage listeners to take pride in what one has and to be appreciative. Small Town in particular was one that he told Rolling Stone that he wrote with the acknowledgement that one doesn't have to be from New York or Los Angeles to enjoy the good life. I don't know if many of you know, but Mellencamp was born in Seymour Ind, and grew up in Bloomington, which by the time of the Scarecrow album (1985), was larger. In 1984, his hit Pink Houses also became a staple of American pop culture and was used countless times in political campaigns and