Utopia (1974)
 

 
Beethoven fans: There is a musical work of staggering genius hidden in this album, from the collaboration between Todd Rundgren and Moogy Klingman (Jimi Hendrix, Lou Reed, Allman Bros., Warren Hayes etc.).
 
It's called The Ikon, and it starts at 28:52 (it was the B side of the album.) The form is based on Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (note the similarity between the opening riff and the famous four-note intro to the Fifth). It also references Rhapsody In Blue, West Side Story and according to Todd Rundgren; Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass.
 
Each movement has a separate theme featuring a particular instrument - everything from balls-to-the-wall blistering guitar (Todd plays the same Gibson SG that Clapton used on Cream's Disraeli Gears) to pastoral piano interludes, to happy Mariachi craziness - and as with Beethoven, each theme/instrument is layered one-by-one in the spectacular finale (in my opinion, the true genius of the piece is in how well those themes go together in a completely unexpected way, leading up to the best ending in rock music history).
 
Bear in mind that the track features three wildly disparate keyboardists: Moogy, Ralph Schuckett and M. Frog LaBat, on early monophonic synths and keys (Moogy alone played; Fender Rhodes, Minimoog, Univox Mini-Korg, a Hammond L-100 organ, Sound City Piano, an RMI Keyboard Computer and Rock-Si-Chord, a Clavinet, and a Yamaha Grand.  
 
The track was recorded live in the studio, with no overdubs.
 
Enjoy.

That album was my introduction to Rundgren. It's killer. Thanks for posting and bringing it back to my ears this morning!
 
John

The Ikon was epic; my shallow Rundgren history included his radio hits, Onomatapoiea, and the fact that when I had long hair someone told me I looked like him . . .  :-/
 
Didn't pick up on any Herb Alpert passages.  Heard bits that Made me think of Peaches En Regalia and Welcome Back My Friends

Was suddenly reminded of these folks this morning... (you may have heard them on Prairie Home Companion sometime)  
 
Robin and Linda Williams - Down in Buena Vista
 
 
 
Robin and Linda Williams are kinda' homefolks around here, and this tune is set in a little, nearly forgotten town about an hour North of Roanoke, Virginia. The town is nestled in an odd canyon-like bowl in the Blue Ridge Mountains, with the small Glen Maury river running through it. It's incredibly scenic from every direction, and there's a music festival that happens there every June I always look forward to.

Rainy day in Southern California.  A little Average White Band with School Boy Crush to funk up my morning before students start rolling in....

Blue Man Group, I Feel Love
 

 
Gotta see them live - especially at the Luxor in Las Vegas. There's no way to describe it, except to say that I was picking pieces of my brains out of my cereal for weeks afterward.
 
That pile of plumbing is an instrument they invented called a tubulum. (Note the grand piano as a percussion instrument.)

A piano is by definition a percussion instrument, with the hammers hitting the strings.

I meant the lid-less grand piano lying on its side on stage left with the strings exposed, which the blue man whacks with a hammer the size of a tympani, that looks like something out of a Tom 'n Jerry cartoon.  
 
In fact, since it lacks piano hammers and he's hitting the strings, he is the hammer! (I wonder if the piano is difficult to keep it in tune?)
 
I'm not sure it's clear in the video, because we've seen BMG so many times, but here's the DVD of that concert. Everybody should see it at least once, because it's actually a hilarious parody of rock concerts.

Rock Concert movement number 4: The behind the head leg lift. Ready, GO!
 
LOVE BMG!!

In fact, since it lacks piano hammers and he's hitting the strings, he is the hammer! (I wonder if the piano is difficult to keep it in tune?)
 
Kind of like Copley playing, eh?
 
Peter

What else for today?  
 
8th of January, as played by Tony Rice, as heard by Clarence White, and played on (what's left of) his old Martin D-28 no less.  
 

 
Poor old Tony's in rough shape these days, but man what an influential guy he's been.

The track was recorded live in the studio, with no overdubs.
 
I'm listening now, and I'm wondering if the vocals are all one take as well.  I suppose he could be using a harmonizer to get some of the vocal harmonies, and perhaps some of the other vocal sounds could be vocal patches on the keyboards.
 
I did hear the Herb Alpert reference, or what I think was it.  And I felt a very strong Return to Forever influence; and as well, Emerson Lake & Palmer.  Interestingly, Welcome Back My Friends was released around two months before Utopia; so it seems at least somewhat less than likely that Todd would have heard it prior to the recording date of this piece.
 
the best ending in rock music history
 
Such things are of course quite subjective, and depend significantly on one's own personal history.  Personally, I don't think this one comes close to, for instance, just off the top of my head, ; but that's just me.  

Carl Perkins doing a Mathew Mcconaughey impression?!
That's Alright Mama

quote:I'm wondering if the vocals are all one take as well. I suppose he could be using a harmonizer to get some of the vocal harmonies, and perhaps some of the other vocal sounds could be vocal patches on the keyboards.
 
I listened to it again, and I see (actually, hear) what you mean. Considering the album came out forty years ago (whoosh! what was that? Your life, son! Holy cow, that was quick!) details are sketchy.  
 
The liner notes say the album was recorded live at the Fox Theater in Atlanta, Georgia April 25th, 1974, but I remember an Interview with Todd at the time (Creem magazine, I think) where he said something about doing it live in the studio, in one take. Might have been one of the other songs (or the drugs  )
 
There were no harmonizers in 1974 (that I know of, anyway). Synths could only play one note at a time. The Polymoog and E-mu polyphonic synths were still years off (especially the legendary Prophet 5), so my guess is Todd used a Mellotron  
 
Mellotrons used tape loops (kinda like an Echoplex, with separate loops for each keyboard key) and could be set up with three voices, usually strings, horns and woodwinds (Strawberry Fields Forever, Nights In White Satin, Stairway To Heaven, etc.), but Rick Wakeman and the Moody Blues also opted for a vocal set, for that Mormon Tabernacle Choir vibe.
 
I turned up this interesting paragraph in a Rolling Stone bio of Todd
 
quote:By 1972 Rundgren had taken over production of Badfinger's Straight Up LP from George Harrison (who was involved with his Bangladesh concerts) and had engineered the Band's Stage Fright and Jesse Winchester's self-titled 1971 LP, as well as produced records by the Hello People, bluesman James Cotton, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, and Half-nelson (who later became Sparks). In 1973 he would produce the New York Dolls' debut LP, Grand Funk Railroad's We're an American Band, and Fanny's Mother's Pride.
 
Busy boy, huh? It was three years before he produced Meat Loaf's Bat Out Of Hell, a fact that I didn't know until just now, while looking up this stuff. (The things I do for you people.)
 
Note this interesting tidbit:
 
quote:Recording started in late 1975 in Bearsville Studios, Woodstock, New York. Roy Bittan and Max Weinberg, the pianist and drummer from Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band played on the album, in addition to members of Rundgren's group Utopia: Kasim Sulton, Roger Powell and John Willie Wilcox. Edgar Winter played the saxophone on All Revved Up. Rundgren himself played guitar, including the motorcycle solo on Bat Out of Hell.
 
So I wouldn't be shocked if Todd sweetened things a little.

Pentangle's .  just because it had been too long.
 
And a new one for me;  
 
Peter (Who's thinking Fairpot Convention or Steeleye Span for tomorrow)