Posts by Alby

"Trust," released in 1981, is one of Elvis Costello's under-appreciated efforts, mostly remembered only for "Clubland." I always liked this track, with its understated air of menace, Costello's vague but…

Back in the day, the Top 40 included all sorts of music, even gospel, as evidenced by this song hitting No. 4 in the country in 1969. Edwin Hawkins, director…

Another one-hit wonder from the '90s, "Phone Booth" traveled a long road to No. 1 on the modern rock chart in 1996. It started several years earlier, when songwriter Chris…

Fastball is a band out of Austin, Texas, that formed in 1995 and scored a massive modern-rock hit in 1998 with this rockabilly-flavored tale of a road trip with no…

The title song and the conceptual genesis of the album that made Willie Nelson's career. "The Tale of the Red Headed Stranger" was a nearly forgotten country tune that Willie…

I drove the other day past the Boxwood Road plant, still under demolition, and didn't realize I should have rolled up the windows. Most of the buildings are now piles…

It's beach music, it's blue-eyed soul, and while it only reached No. 39 on the Hot 100, it made a national act out of a band that had been playing…

Actor Peter Fonda died yesterday at age 79, 50 years after the release of his most famous film project, "Easy Rider." Fonda asked Dylan to write the film's theme song.…

Director Quentin Tarantino's latest "let's wish away the bad parts of history" film is tangentially related to the Manson Family murders in 1969 Los Angeles. Some critics have complained that…

A standout track from Patti Smith's 1996 comeback album "Gone Again," the song was started by her husband, Fred "Sonic" Smith (of MC5 fame), who wrote the music and had…