 | Blinded by the LightBruce Springsteen (later covered by Manfred Mann's Earth Band) |
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DavesMusicDatabase.com is devoted to ranking, rating, and reviewing music of all genres and eras. The DMDB blog serves up album and song reviews, best-of lists, music history snapshots, and music-related essays.
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Friday, February 23, 1973
Bruce Springsteen “Blinded by the Light” released
Saturday, February 17, 1973
Lou Reed charted with “Walk on the Wild Side”
:format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-6442595-1521491645-4997.jpeg.jpg) | Walk on the Wild SideLou Reed |
Writer(s): Lou Reed (see lyrics here) Released: November 8, 1972 First Charted: February 17, 1973 Peak: 16 US, 17 CB, 18 GR, 17 HR, 1 CL, 1 CO, 10 UK, 18 CN, 100 AU, 1 DF (Click for codes to charts.) Sales (in millions): -- US, 0.2 UK, 0.2 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 73.87 video, 414.28 streaming |
Awards:Click on award for more details. 
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About the Song:Lou Reed, “who never ceased to offend somebody,” UCR references valium, oral sex, hustlers, and whores in what is likely the “the first transvestite rock song that middle America heard.” UCR The song title came from A Walk on the Wild Side by Nelson Algren. Reed was tapped to write songs for a musical based on the novel, but it never came about. RS500 On the resulting song, Reed served as the “narrator brilliantly delivering his cool rap-like observations” UCR about real people including Holly Woodlawn, Candy Darling, Joe Dallesandro, Joe Campbell, and Jackie Curtis. They were all actors and/or transsexuals Reed knew through artist Andy Warhol. WK As Reed said, “I always thought it would be kinda fun to introduce people you see at parties but don’t dare approach.” RS500 He “paints such as vivid picture of deliberate decadence that it can still be shocking…years later.” RY It also serves as “a chillingly stark portrait” RY about the underbelly of New York City, “America’s largest and darkest city.” RY When Reed “invokes the ‘colored girls’ to sing ‘do do-do do-do, do-do-do’ and their voices fade into the lush atmospheric sound of a lazy baritone sax solo, the music suggests the atmosphere of a New York City subway station at three in the morning.” RY Reed hadn’t found commercial success with his band Velvet Underground or his first solo outing. However, David Bowie idolized Reed and he’d achieved enough clout as “the rising star of British glam-rock” TB to “freely bestow his Midas touch upon other artists who interested him.” RY “The sweet touches in the vocal harmonies, and the quick and deceptively simple arrangements are in large part due to Bowie” TC and his production on the song and Transformer album. It gave Reed his “greatest solo success.” TB Resources:
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First posted 4/28/2020; last updated 9/15/2023. |
Wednesday, February 14, 1973
Patsy Cline 12 Greatest Hits released
12 Greatest Hits |
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Released: February 14, 1973 Recorded: 1957 to 1963 Peak: -- US, 17 CW Sales (in millions): 10.0 US, -- UK, 10.9 world (includes US and UK) Genre: country |
Tracks:Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts.
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Rating: 4.608 out of 5.00 (average of 21 ratings)
Quotable:“The perfect introduction to one of the greatest singers in country music history” – Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music GuideAwards:(Click on award to learn more).
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About the Album:Patsy Cline was born Virginia Patterson Hensley in 1932 in Virginia. After she got married in 1957 and gave birth the next year, she moved to Nashville. She became a member of the Grand Ole Opry and signed with Decca Records in 1960. With producer Owen Bradley, she found major success on the country charts with hits like I Fall to Pieces, Crazy, and She’s Got You. In March 1963, she was on a flight from Kansas City, Kansas, back to Nashville. It crashed and she was killed. She was only 30 years old. Despite her short career, she has been celebrated as one of country music’s most important performers. Ten years after her death, she became the first female performer inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. In 1967, Decca released a greatest hits collection with twelve songs. In addition to the nine featured chart hits, there are “lesser-known gems like Why Can’t He Be You, which are as good as the big hits.” AMG Overall, the set “may be brief, but it contains abosolutely no filler and leaves no gaps, making it the perfect introduction to one of the greatest singers in country music history.” AMG It reached #17 on the country charts. MCA Records reissued the album after Cline was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. It was reissued again in the CD era in 1988 and became the first album by a female country artist to go double platinum. By 2005, the album was certified for diamond, or ten-times platinum. Despite the massive sales, the album has never charted on the Billboard album chart. |
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First posted 5/30/2008; last updated 3/20/2024. |
Wednesday, February 7, 1973
The Stooges Raw Power released
Raw Power |
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Released: February 7, 1973 Peak: 182 US, -- UK, -- CN, -- AU Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Genre: proto-punk |
Tracks:Song Title [time] (date of single release, chart peaks)
All songs written by Iggy Pop and James Williamson. Total Running Time: 33:57 The Players:
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Rating:4.268 out of 5.00 (average of 28 ratings)
Quotable:“One of the most influential works in rock history. Without Raw Power, there is no Clash, no Ramones, no Sex Pistols.” – Consequence of SoundAwards:(Click on award to learn more).
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The Album’s Influence“Under the leadership of Iggy Pop, the Stooges brought theatricality to rock ‘n’ roll that wasn’t avant-garde or esoteric.” PM Iggy assembled the band, originally known as the Psychedelic Stooges, for a Halloween party in 1967 at the University of Michigan. “Over the next two years, they toured relentlessly through the Midwest, achieving notoriety for their wild performances, which often featured such antics as a shirtless Iggy smeared in peanut butter or his own blood and crawling or diving into the audience.” CS “They were, in most reflective accounts, the first true punk band.” CSThey signed to Elektra Records in 1968 and recorded two albums which, “though largely panned or ignored, vastly increased their status as cult figures,” CS establishing them as “minor underground gods.” CS “A little too predictably, however, the unruliness and drug abuse that contributed to their wild performances dragged the band’s career down to the point where they could barely function.” CS They “lapsed into an extended limbo” TM after Fun House flopped. “After an unhappy relationship with their label Elektra, who had mismarketed the band’s first two albums and ditched them before their third took shape, Pop had disbanded the Stooges.” RD David BowieLuckily for the Stooges, David Bowie was a fan. “Iggy Pop was part of the inspiration for the character Ziggy Stardust and Bowie returned the favor.” CM by encouraging his management team, MainMan, to take a chance on the Stooges. He helped the band land a deal with Columbia Records.At Bowie’s suggestion, The Stooges went to London to record Raw Power. “The genteel surroundings…in no way tempered the raucous machismo of Raw Power; indeed the record could not be further from the sexual ambiguity of the glam rock that Bowie and others were touting at the time.” RD Even after the album was recorded, the record company didn’t want to release it. “Columbia hated the album, viewing it as even less accessible than the band’s material for Elektra, and charged Bowie with salvaging what he could from the mess.” RD Bowie remixed the album the next day. CM “Thankfully, Bowie paid heed to Iggy’s vision and delivered eight tracks that influenced the proto-punks of New York and London and secured Pop’s legacy as the movement’s godfather.” RD Iggy said, “David was interested in the primitive aspects of the Stooges…I think to him we were a bunch of Neanderthals. I see his point.’” CM The Album’s InfluenceCM Their third album, Raw Power, “saw the group continuing the proto-punk garage vibe of its first two albums.” CQ “Like a cauldron of blood, sex and anger, Raw Power is the antithesis of delicate. A monolith of brash.” PM “Nihilism doesn’t get any better” EW’12 than on this “ferocious blast of proto-punk energy.” EW’12 It is “among the most aptly named albums ever recorded.” TB“Raw Power is considered the apex of the Stooges’ work and a major force in the development of the early, amateurish, white-suburban garage sound that became punk.” CS It “would prove to be one of the most influential works in rock history. Without Raw Power, there is no Clash, no Ramones, no Sex Pistols.” CQ “Famously, Steve Jones admitted that he learned to play by taking speed and listening to the LP.” CQ Red Hot Chili Peppers’ guitarist John Frusciante said, “When you think about all the ways bands these days try and expand rock and roll, most of them look pretty silly next to Raw Power. That is a definitive statement.” TM Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain went so far as to rank the album his favorite of all time. TM A New Lineup“In many ways, almost all Raw Power has in common with the two Stooges albums that preceded it is its primal sound, but while the Stooges once sounded like the wildest (and weirdest) gang in town, Raw Power found them heavily armed and ready to destroy the world — that is, if they didn’t destroy themselves first.” AM“Guitarist Ron Asheton and bassist Dave Alexander had been edged out of the picture, and James Williamson had signed on as Iggy’s new guitar mangler.” AM “His power chords established a massive wall of sound.” CM His “torrents of distorted buzzsaw guitar…proved the perfect counterpoint to Pop’s howling, proudly lewd declarations.” TM Their collaboration “brought about a tighter focus, and Iggy’s efforts to kick his heroin habit (or perhaps a recognition that this might be his last chance to make his band work) seemed to give him a new lease on his music as his vocals reached an unprecedented level of passion.” CS Ron Asheton returned to the fold as a bassist. “From a technical standpoint, Williamson was a more gifted guitar player than Asheton (not that that was ever the point), but his sheets of metallic fuzz were still more basic (and punishing) than what anyone was used to in 1973, while Ron Asheton played his bass like a weapon of revenge, and his brother Scott Asheton remained a powerhouse behind the drums.” AM The Godfather of Punk“Tensions were high during the recording of Raw Power, and the album sounds like the work of a band on its last legs – though rather than grinding to a halt, Iggy & the Stooges appeared ready to explode like an ammunition dump.” AM“Of course, they were still fronted by one of the greatest live performers of all time: Iggy Pop, the godfather of punk himself.” CQ “Raw Power revealed Iggy as a howling, smirking, lunatic genius.” AM Over 34 minutes, the Detroit rock ‘n’ roll statesman goes straight for the jugular.” CQ Smiths’ guitarist Johnny Marr describes Iggy as ‘both demonic and intellectual, almost how you would imagine Darth Vader to sound if he was in a band.’” CM The SongsCreem’s Lester Bangs praised the album for “the ferocious assertiveness of the lyrics” that were “at once slightly absurd and indicative of a confused, violently defensive stance that’s been a rock tradition from the beginning.” PM “You can tell from the titles…that these are not campfire songs, they’re Molotov cocktails.” CMThe album offers “up a more glam feel on songs like Search and Destroy and the title track, thanks in part to David Bowie’s final mix of the album. Both Bowie’s management and the label had no idea what to do with Raw Power, which was likely the darkest thing they’d ever heard; Bowie exercised his star powers and mixed the record, ultimately saving it.” CQ Whether quietly brooding (Gimme Danger) or inviting the apocalypse (‘Search and Destroy’), Iggy had never sounded quite so focused as he did here, and his lyrics displayed an intensity that was more than a bit disquieting.” AM The former “featured some nice acoustic guitar but the mood was malevolent and alienated.” CM “Shake Appeal has some nice riffing but it is delivered at breakneck speed and Iggy’s vocal sounds more than half crazed.” CM “It sounds like it’s blowing rock conventions to bits.” TM “Penetration utilized that rock ‘n’ roll staple, the celeste (a keyboard of orchestral bells) – but the driving guitar of Williamson and the raw stomp of the Ashetons keep the album simple and centered firmly in the belly and the balls.” RD Notes:A 2010 deluxe edition of the album added a live concert from Atlanta in October 1973 and a disc’s worth of outtakes and alternate takes. |
Reviews:
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First posted 3/28/2011; last updated 8/29/2026. |
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