DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL

DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL

An Acute Attack of the Anglophilliacs

David Marsh

by

In place of the usual grousing, just a few quick notes, this month.

• Has anyone noticed that the backing to Joni Mitchell’s “Help Me” has all the qualities that make Jethro Tull what they are? That flute, for instance, is right out of Aqualung. Has she gone Anglophilic on us, or merely suffered a lapse of taste? I love you madly, Joni, but please, more like “Radio” and “Robbery,” and less like this, OK?

• Robert Christgau recently wrote an excellent Newsday piece in which he labels Elton John rock’s most consistent presence. I like the idea, but as usual, beg to differ; my vote is in for Stevie Wonder. I love “Don’t You Worry

About A Thing as much as anything he has done. It encompasses all of pop from Sinatra to Sly. If Motown could clone Stevie, their treasury would be even more mint-like than it' already is.

• Last Friday, three Boston radio stations simultaneously broadcast Maria Muldaur’s dismal “Midnight At the Oasis.” This is like turning on the radio and finding nothing but “Kick Otit the Jams,” or “Walk on the Wild Side.” Even in Detroit, or New York, you’d be depressed.

• Those unfortunate enough not to live in New York — whence my next column will emanate, hurrah! — have the blessing of a syndicated (taped) Wolfman Jack show, if a local station buys it. Why don’t you tell them to do so? (Still, I wish he was playing current records as he does in N.Y. instead of his only-oldies show.)

• I think the most depressing thing that has happened to me recently was finding out that “Rock and Roll Heaven” was by The Righteous Brothers. I was ready to accept this as a joke, or" a muddle-minded sequel to “American Pie,” until I found out my formerly favorite blue-eyed soulsters (pace Mitch Ryder) had sunk so low. Funky, this ain’t.

• Speaking of soul, and of Elton John, “Bennie and the Jets” R&B success has kept it on the charts, and in your hearts, for 17 weeks. Why doesn’t this happen to something like “My Mistake” by Marvin and Diana? >

• This summer’s great single looks like it’ll be The Hughes Corporation’s “Rock The Boat.” Can’t wait to get to the beach for that One. (So you’re reading this in August — can’t be helped.) If we can-come up with a couple more like it, I won’t miss last year’s “Soul Makossa”

and That Lady, not to mention “Let’s Get It On,” so terribly.

• Great time for standard R&B too. Gladys Knight, the Spinners, the O’Jays, the Four Tops are all looking like hits.

• Robert Christgau was also dead on the mark about Steely Dan in the July Consumer Guide. “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number” is slated for success, and if you need proof not only that something new is happening,, but that it is successful both commercially and artistically, this is it.

• But A1 Green’s “Let’s Get Married,” one of his greatest ever, got mired in the middle of the Hot 100, and never dug its way out. Shame.

• Bryan Ferry’s “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” didn’t even get on the Hot 100. I don’t usually like to talk about singles that don’t hit the charts, because I’m afraid no one but me has ever heard of them, but there are a few this month. Besides Ferry: Jr. Walker’s “Dancing Like They Do On Soul Train,” Ferry’s British-release “The In Crowd,” and Kitty Walls’ version of Dylan’s “Forever Young.” (Kitty Wells?)

• The oldies sweepstakes continues apace. This year’s contenders for “Monster Mash” are “Livin’ in the U.S.A.” produced and directed by Steve Miller, and “Rock Around the Clock,” from a movie called Blackboard Jungle, by Bill Haley and the Comets. Looks like chlorinol by a neck.

• Fanny looks like they may finally have a winner, in “I’ve Had It.” Don’t suppose they’ll actually pan out as the feminist rock band of dream and legend, do ya?

• As long as no one else in this rag seems to be paying attention to rock TV (I understand why), I may as well chip fin my 2 cents worth here. (After all, it’s a lot like radio, isn’t it?) I watched the Bonnie Raitt - Jackson Browne - Steve Miller episode of Chip Monck’s Speakeasy, and decided things were getting better. After all, conceptually speaking, talk shows are less boring than variety shows (In Concert, Midnight Special). Of course, talk shows are more boring than everything else on the tube, but so what? Take your improvements as you can get them.,

TURN TO PAGE 79.

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• Another thing about TV: has anyone out there seen It Pays to Be Ignorant, hosted by Jim Backus? It’s the intellectual’s Hollywood Squares, even though it makes a half hour of Let’s Make A Deal hysteria seem as mentally rigorous as an hour of calculus. You’ll love it, and why Lester Bangs hasn’t written 3,000 words on it yet is beyond me.