Share a Tune With the Class

[The Picnic Wasp]

This song stirs many emotions for me. I would be in my thirties when I began a gradual drifting migration from my local's lounge bar to the public bar where an older crowd spent their weekend evenings. As a result I met a group of about half a dozen really great folk of greatly varying personalities. They were all about ten years older than me or slightly more. I introduced a couple of them to Rush and two of them accompanied me to Rush concerts at different times.

One who didn't tune in to Rush was Jim. He was a really quiet person with a background in science, but he really came into his own when he'd had a few pints to loosen his tongue. I did a fairly good impression of his voice which had definite James Stewart type drawl characteristics. I got away with that mainly because I was the young whippersnapper in the group which was a great feeling and one which I miss very badly these days.

Sometimes, if there was nothing on after the pub, three or four of us would buy a few tins at exorbitant pub prices and go back to Jim's house. His mum lived with him as she wasn't very well which was great because if she hadn't yet gone to bed she would always appear with toast or sandwiches which were very welcome after several lagers and the inevitable appearance of a bottle of whisky from the cocktail cabinet.

Jim was a big Steely Dan, Donald Fagen fan so a lot of his vinyl got played. Jim was a decent guitar player but would give me his acoustic to mess about on while he played some chords and runs on a tiny battery keyboard. We'd sometimes make an accidental melody over some DF track despite the drink and my very poor playing. The song above was a particular favourite of Jim's and it's distinctive atmosphere transports me immediately back to those contented evenings. Jim died a few years ago. He had been fighting a form of that dreadful disease we hear about so much.

The last time I met him in the village he was in remission and looked as well as he ever did. A few months later he was gone, but not forgotten and today was a welcome reminder. Great guy.

[Slim]

This nearly brought a tear to my eye. I reckon Larry Carlton would have been happy with that guitar solo (except Larry would have made it last about two minutes)

[Slim]

Didn't know this one, from 1971. Lovely jazzy funk tune. Came on the PA before the band at a gig in Shrewsbury last week.

Supposedly Spiro Agnew wanted to have the album it's from withdrawn due to certain political content.

 

[Slim]

I suspect most people are aware of this perfect pop tune from 1975. I was reminded of it this morning because a Rick Wakeman performance at a festival in 1988 came up in my YouTube suggestions, and I noticed the singer / bass player (David Paton) in his band.

I've just read that he plays on the first two Kate Bush albums. He also played with Camel, Elton John and Fish. And he was in the Bay City Rollers in 1968. Didn't know they started in the '60s.

[David L]

I suspect most people are aware of this perfect pop tune from 1975. I was reminded of it this morning because a Rick Wakeman performance at a festival in 1988 came up in my YouTube suggestions, and I noticed the singer / bass player (David Paton) in his band.

I've just read that he plays on the first two Kate Bush albums. He also played with Camel, Elton John and Fish. And he was in the Bay City Rollers in 1968. Didn't know they started in the '60s.

I think he popped up on my fb feed recently, his birthday is 29th October.
January was a great song that was on K-Tel's 40 Supergreats. What a compilation that was! Possibly, the first LP I had featuring original artists after only ever owning a few of the 'Top of the Pops' and 'Hot Hits' compilations (studio bands performing cover versions)