[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.” The acro-nym MTV also appeared for the fi rst time in a similar Parks memo to Ostin.As Parks tells it, “I was directly under Mo Ostin at WB Records (both architecturally, and on the Corporate Organization Chart.I answered to only one man.That was Mo).I had memos printed: ‘From the Director of Audio-Visual Services— re:———,’ and‘Yes___’ or ‘No___.’ It got things done, that memo.”Early in the course of Parks’ new duties was an interesting encounter with fi lm producer Fred Weintraub.“[Weintraub] was in a dilemma.He needed 10,000 feet• 123 •S O N G C Y C L Eof raw-stock to shoot a documentary at the upcoming Woodstock Festival.He couldn’t reach Mo Ostin.I did, and in no time fl at John Calley [then president of Warner Bros.Pictures] delivered the fi lm stock.Mo believed me.No question, I was point man on that move to bottle the counter-culture.Warner Brothers was in a key position for the soundtrack rights.A few days later, some kid worth a million bucks walked into the offi ce to discuss a music video.He was having a fabulous hair day and played loud guitar music.As he parted, he quipped ‘.and don’t get caught up in the machinery, man.’” Parks concluded his reminiscence of the run-up to Woodstock by stating, “I had other priorities than queuing at a rock concert’s mud fl at latrine.And, I didn’t get caught up in the machinery.”• 124 •What Is Up The Canyon Will Eventually Come DownAs the ’70s bore on, a growing sense of estrangement seeped under the door of Parks’ offi ce at Warners.He had completed a second album for the label, 1972’s calypso-infl ected Discover America, a catalog sweep on Trinidadian classics with sonic treatments and signature arrangements that made the record every bit a Parks vehicle.He had availed himself of the opportunity to visit Trinidad at the turn of the decade, witnessing the bandsmen in competition during Carnival and reacquainting himself with the culture that he had come to know fi rst while playing with his brother in Seal Beach in the early ’60s, where Andrew de la Bastide and his steel drum orchestra often shared bills with the Steeltown Two.Unfortunately, Warner/Reprise was fi nding that, in spite of the quality of fi lms generated by Parks’ offi ce, there were few venues at that time to screen them.It became more diffi cult to rationalize the expense involved.These promotional fi lms, despite the acceptable example set by the Zappa and Joni Mitchell fi lms, were deemed• 125 •S O N G C Y C L Ecost-ineffi cient on the whole.The offi ce was dissolved, with Parks orphaned by the company whose image he had helped to shape in the late ’60s.He continued to record for the label, and Warners took interest in and released some of Parks’ subsequent productions but, in a manner of speaking, he had been disinvited from the golf foursome.In this new decade, Van Dyke Parks would revisit his affi nity for the sounds of Trinidad.The Esso Trinidad Steel Band became production clients for an album of covers (“Apeman” by the Kinks’ Ray Davies, the Jackson Five’s “I Want You Back”) whose 1971 release on Warner Bros.Records was arranged by Parks.Another lightning-strike session (both fi guratively and literally, as it was done in a day while a hurricane passed over Miami) was Hot & Sweet, from 1974, a collection of calypso anthems sung by the venerated singer The Mighty Sparrow.Parks worked on these productions in conjunction with Andrew Wickham, an expatriate Englishman who had been hired at the Monterey Festival to serve as a “house hippie,” a liaison to street culture for Warners.Parks performed songs on Discover America by two songwriters whom he had come to admire: the brilliant New Orleans keyboard player and producer Allen Toussaint and Lowell George, best known as a founding member of Little Feat, whose Warners albums showcased both George’s idiosyncratic approach to slide guitar and his bottomless passion for swampy funk-infused melodies.Parks would in time produce both artists.Having brought Toussaint to Warner Bros.attention via his own recordings, Parks travelled to Louisiana to work on Toussaint’s• 126 •R I C H A R D H E N D E R S O N1975 solo LP Southern Nights.Though Parks was sharped out of his production credit by Toussaint’s management, the shape and sound of Parks’ earlier work informs the beguiling Southern Nights.Brief shards of songs function as bridging devices, sequenced as reprises throughout the album’s running order, and a pervasive sense of drama threads throughout the set, distinct from Toussaint’s other solo discs for Warners.Parks’ fingerprints, recognizable from Song Cycle, are all over Southern Nights.While credited as “tail gunner” on Little Feat albums such as Feets Don’t Fail Me Now, his friendship and songwriting partnership with Lowell George was the main bond between Parks and the band.George died prematurely in 1977, on the heels of fi nishing his fi rst solo LP, Thanks, I’ll Eat It Here.Noteworthy also from this mid-’70s period are the sessions conducted in partnership with Harry Nilsson.Once a golden-voiced, handsome pop troubadour with a string of successful albums in the ’60s, the following decade had seen Nilsson turn dissolute in the wake of his platinum success with 1971’s Nilsson Schmilsson.His later records for the RCA label became, more or less, documented parties with scores of the well-heeled and wasted dropping by the studio to contribute.Nilsson found a helpful workmate in the person of Van Dyke Parks, whose Caribbean affi nities agreed with Nilsson’s own buoyant wit.Parks could organize a coherent session when liquor and cocaine-inspired chaos threatened to void productiv-ity.Duit On Mon Dei was a high point for the melding of Nilsson’s and Parks’ minds; the keyboard playing and arrangements for steel drums and strings plays like an• 127 •S O N G C Y C L Eequally impish extension of Discover America’s spirited adaptations.(Having noted as much, one can’t ignore the fi rst response of Nilsson’s mother to the album: “Harry, I can hear the ice cubes clinking.”) Later the two would travel to the island of Malta to collaborate on the score for Robert Altman’s imaginatively dark, Brechtian fi lm adaptation of Popeye [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.” The acro-nym MTV also appeared for the fi rst time in a similar Parks memo to Ostin.As Parks tells it, “I was directly under Mo Ostin at WB Records (both architecturally, and on the Corporate Organization Chart.I answered to only one man.That was Mo).I had memos printed: ‘From the Director of Audio-Visual Services— re:———,’ and‘Yes___’ or ‘No___.’ It got things done, that memo.”Early in the course of Parks’ new duties was an interesting encounter with fi lm producer Fred Weintraub.“[Weintraub] was in a dilemma.He needed 10,000 feet• 123 •S O N G C Y C L Eof raw-stock to shoot a documentary at the upcoming Woodstock Festival.He couldn’t reach Mo Ostin.I did, and in no time fl at John Calley [then president of Warner Bros.Pictures] delivered the fi lm stock.Mo believed me.No question, I was point man on that move to bottle the counter-culture.Warner Brothers was in a key position for the soundtrack rights.A few days later, some kid worth a million bucks walked into the offi ce to discuss a music video.He was having a fabulous hair day and played loud guitar music.As he parted, he quipped ‘.and don’t get caught up in the machinery, man.’” Parks concluded his reminiscence of the run-up to Woodstock by stating, “I had other priorities than queuing at a rock concert’s mud fl at latrine.And, I didn’t get caught up in the machinery.”• 124 •What Is Up The Canyon Will Eventually Come DownAs the ’70s bore on, a growing sense of estrangement seeped under the door of Parks’ offi ce at Warners.He had completed a second album for the label, 1972’s calypso-infl ected Discover America, a catalog sweep on Trinidadian classics with sonic treatments and signature arrangements that made the record every bit a Parks vehicle.He had availed himself of the opportunity to visit Trinidad at the turn of the decade, witnessing the bandsmen in competition during Carnival and reacquainting himself with the culture that he had come to know fi rst while playing with his brother in Seal Beach in the early ’60s, where Andrew de la Bastide and his steel drum orchestra often shared bills with the Steeltown Two.Unfortunately, Warner/Reprise was fi nding that, in spite of the quality of fi lms generated by Parks’ offi ce, there were few venues at that time to screen them.It became more diffi cult to rationalize the expense involved.These promotional fi lms, despite the acceptable example set by the Zappa and Joni Mitchell fi lms, were deemed• 125 •S O N G C Y C L Ecost-ineffi cient on the whole.The offi ce was dissolved, with Parks orphaned by the company whose image he had helped to shape in the late ’60s.He continued to record for the label, and Warners took interest in and released some of Parks’ subsequent productions but, in a manner of speaking, he had been disinvited from the golf foursome.In this new decade, Van Dyke Parks would revisit his affi nity for the sounds of Trinidad.The Esso Trinidad Steel Band became production clients for an album of covers (“Apeman” by the Kinks’ Ray Davies, the Jackson Five’s “I Want You Back”) whose 1971 release on Warner Bros.Records was arranged by Parks.Another lightning-strike session (both fi guratively and literally, as it was done in a day while a hurricane passed over Miami) was Hot & Sweet, from 1974, a collection of calypso anthems sung by the venerated singer The Mighty Sparrow.Parks worked on these productions in conjunction with Andrew Wickham, an expatriate Englishman who had been hired at the Monterey Festival to serve as a “house hippie,” a liaison to street culture for Warners.Parks performed songs on Discover America by two songwriters whom he had come to admire: the brilliant New Orleans keyboard player and producer Allen Toussaint and Lowell George, best known as a founding member of Little Feat, whose Warners albums showcased both George’s idiosyncratic approach to slide guitar and his bottomless passion for swampy funk-infused melodies.Parks would in time produce both artists.Having brought Toussaint to Warner Bros.attention via his own recordings, Parks travelled to Louisiana to work on Toussaint’s• 126 •R I C H A R D H E N D E R S O N1975 solo LP Southern Nights.Though Parks was sharped out of his production credit by Toussaint’s management, the shape and sound of Parks’ earlier work informs the beguiling Southern Nights.Brief shards of songs function as bridging devices, sequenced as reprises throughout the album’s running order, and a pervasive sense of drama threads throughout the set, distinct from Toussaint’s other solo discs for Warners.Parks’ fingerprints, recognizable from Song Cycle, are all over Southern Nights.While credited as “tail gunner” on Little Feat albums such as Feets Don’t Fail Me Now, his friendship and songwriting partnership with Lowell George was the main bond between Parks and the band.George died prematurely in 1977, on the heels of fi nishing his fi rst solo LP, Thanks, I’ll Eat It Here.Noteworthy also from this mid-’70s period are the sessions conducted in partnership with Harry Nilsson.Once a golden-voiced, handsome pop troubadour with a string of successful albums in the ’60s, the following decade had seen Nilsson turn dissolute in the wake of his platinum success with 1971’s Nilsson Schmilsson.His later records for the RCA label became, more or less, documented parties with scores of the well-heeled and wasted dropping by the studio to contribute.Nilsson found a helpful workmate in the person of Van Dyke Parks, whose Caribbean affi nities agreed with Nilsson’s own buoyant wit.Parks could organize a coherent session when liquor and cocaine-inspired chaos threatened to void productiv-ity.Duit On Mon Dei was a high point for the melding of Nilsson’s and Parks’ minds; the keyboard playing and arrangements for steel drums and strings plays like an• 127 •S O N G C Y C L Eequally impish extension of Discover America’s spirited adaptations.(Having noted as much, one can’t ignore the fi rst response of Nilsson’s mother to the album: “Harry, I can hear the ice cubes clinking.”) Later the two would travel to the island of Malta to collaborate on the score for Robert Altman’s imaginatively dark, Brechtian fi lm adaptation of Popeye [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]