This week musician Ed Sheeran won a copyright case brought against him claiming he stole his hit Shape of You. Back in 1976 George Harrison was not so lucky when he was ordered to pay compensation for 'stealing' aspects of The Chiffons He's So Fine when writing his 1970 hit My Sweet Lord. Generally it seems the law has resisted supporting claims of musical plagiarism and you can't help feeling Harrison might have got a better verdict today.
Progressive (Prog) Rock takes a lot of flack. No surprise given its love of overly complex songs you can't hum, performed in elaborate settings and costumes (Peter Gabriel performed this song while dressed as a flower). However, occasionally they stopped trying to be JS Bach and knuckled down and wrote great songs (not many admitttedly). This is one of them.
Hard to believe this recording of the blues classic 'Nobody Knows' is almost 100 years old. Here is Bessie Smith, the 'Empress of the Blues', nailing it in 1929 on the verge of the Great Depression which was about to strike the US and the world (and Bessie).
You may not think Motörhead your thing, but you might just find the riff head-banging its way in to your weekend. And the sentiment applies everywhere.
Duke Ellington wrote this song in the 1930s, but this recording is from his 1962 collaboration with John Coltrane when he was 63 and Coltrane was 36. Duke is the pianist, 'Trane' the saxophonist. Two innovators from different eras of Jazz (or "American Music" as Duke liked to call it).
Music for Airports is the first of four ambient albums from musician (Roxy Music and solo), producer (U2, Bowie) and artist, Brian Eno. The idea came to him as he sat in the drab atmosphere of 1970s Cologne Bonn Airport. The creative process consisted, in typical Eno style, of splicing together various loops of recordings. It was designed to be played continously and to induce a sense of calm - Eno was a nervous flyer.
In 1968 British singer Dusty Sprngfield left for Memphis to revive her career and expand her range from the pop style of her earlier years (good though it is). The result was the Dusty in Memphis album. Still pop, but no little Soul.