Joe Jackson

[so lacklustre]

Bought Rain today, but not had chance to listen yet.

[DrSpooky]

Mine arrived Friday and I have listened to it while doing math and updating Pinewood Derby software. It sounds good but it deserves a better listen than I have given it so far. Spooky made sure I got the autographed edition from his website.

I will post more after taking it to work.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Ludovic Hunter-Tilney

He has to be kidding, right?

[colrow26]

Got my copy of Rain last week - gotta be the best thing he has done since Laughter and Lust. really strong selection of songs and the stripped back piano bass drum arrangements really work.
Always found the Costello/Jackson comparisons a bit lazy - both deserve credit for plowing their own furrow over the years and trying different stuff.
Anyone who owns an early JJ album will not be disappointed by this new one.
while on the JJ topic i was visiting London a couple of years ago (to see Paul weler at the Roundhouse) and was walking through Soho when i spotted Joe crossing the round - i grabbed my wifes arm and just said look look.. - must have scared JJ half to death as he legged it sharpish!
Now thats what i call being cool

[johnfoyle]

"Joe's Rain goes down a storm"

Review by *Freddie Windsor
The Mail on Sunday
4-stars
Sunday February 3, 2008

In a lengthy career that spanned everything from covering Pulp's
Common People as a duet with William Shatner to campaigning against
the smoking ban, Joe Jackson has never stood still. In some ways,
therefore, Rain comes as a surprise. A relentless innovator since the late
Seventies, here Jackson reunites with two-thirds of his original
backing band.

Using no more than piano, bass and drums, Rain conjures up memories
of Jackson's 1978 debut Look Sharp!. Always a fan of pre-rock'n'roll
musicians such as Cole Porter and Cab Calloway, Jackson here delivers
ten ballads and torch songs strong enough to hold their own in such
hallowed company.

Like his contemporary, Elvis Costello, Jackson moves forward by
delving deep into the past. In particular, the yearning Wasted Time
and A Place In The Rain capture the understated elegance of a bygone
age. Combining instant familiarity with a rare knack for melodic
twists and turns, Rain is a quiet triumph.


*Note to readers - Lord Freddie Windsor is an English financial
analyst who is the only son of Prince and Princess Michael of Kent.
He is currently 32nd in the line of succession to the British Throne.

Freddie reviews pop albums for the Mail on Sunday newspaper on a part-
time basis. The 27-year old royal lives at Kensington Palace in
London and is a self-confessed Joe Jackson fan.


Freddie on Wikipedia -
http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ Lord_Frederick_ Windsor

More about Freddie -
http://www.nettyroy al.nl/frederick. html

Freddie is also a model for the British modeling agency 'Storm' -
http://www.stormmod els.com/mendetai ls.html?id= 1049

[Otis Westinghouse]

Musical chameleons arouse a degree of public distrust.

So do music critics with names like Ludovic Hunter-Tilney!

[so lacklustre]

Now had a few listens and am liking it a lot. Prefer it to Volume 4, and think that it has a similar feel to Night and Day. Already preferring it to the last 3 EC albums. Love the fact that it has just 10 tracks and is about 45 minutes long (EC take note). Imo Joe Jackson is a rich man's Lloyd Cole.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Where did that come from? Very different kettles of fish and not really comparable at all, but I would, of course, counter it with saying that Ron S is a rich man's musical holy grail.

[johnfoyle]

Cracking show from Joe in Dublin last night . To a packed Olympia ( older crowd, lots of leather jackets
and bad hair dyes/shaved heads - and as for the men..) Joe started with a solo turn on Home Town before being
joined by Graham Maby (bass) Dave Houghton (drums) and continuing with Stepping Out. With a mix of songs from Rain and his back catalogue ( including a very welcome two from 'Laughter and Lust', Obvious Song and Stranger Than
Fiction) two covers were featured , ABBA's Knowing Me Knowing You and Frank Zappa's Dirty Love ( the last
especially for birthday boy Dave , '14' today due to being born on this day peculiar to 'Leap' years).

Joe sounded a bit croaky at the start and mentioned it with a 'here's hoping..' aside . However he got better as the evening went on. He joked about the setlist being only a guide and how they were planning to discard it entirely as the tour developed. Someone shouted up something like 'Well will you come back when you get it right ?!?!' to a big smile from Joe and co.

I preferred last year's show at the same venue because all the 'Rain' songs were so knew to me then
and it was so thrilling to see Joe continuing to be so inventive. Joe was also quite assertive that night in
denying ( to their mild displeasure) the crowds demands for oldies. Tonight he was more acquiescent , trotting out a lame 'Is she really...'etc. , letting lines be sung by the crowd etc. Maybe it was the voice etc.

Support act Susie Wilkins delivered a confident set , featuring songs with unfussy lyrics and some interesting harmonies with guitarist Antonio Fortin. I look forward to hearing her disc , a five song collection bought for 8 euro after the show.

The setlist ( from a JJ list)

home town
steppin out
invisible man
too tough
real man
obvious
stranger then fiction
on youre radio
so low
rush across the road
king pleasure time
diff for girls
knowing me knowing you(abba cover)
dirty martini
good bad boy
blaze of glory

dirty love (zappa)
is she really
slow song

A review of tour opener in Cardiff on Wednes.-

http://tinyurl.com/28fqlv

[wardo68]

A fellow EC obsessive who's been more of a Joe Jackson man than myself gave me a copy of Joe's new "Rain" CD. I heartily recommend it to any Joe fan, especially if you like piano. It's a solid 4-star album.

[migdd]

Joe is coming to the Neighborhood Theatre in Charlotte, North Carolina on November 10, just 4 days after the Graham Parker show here in town, for which I have tickets.

I've never seen Joe live and I'm not even sure (although I'm assuming it is) that this is a band show. Should I stay or should I go? Tickets are $50 general admission (the priciest I've ever seen at this venue), $75 for Gold Circle (first 8 rows) or $85 for VIP(boxed with table, bar service and appetizers). Neighboorhood Theatre seats about 500 guests.

I'm very tempted.

[blooch]

If you are buying a Joe jackson album for the first time you wont go wrong with Look Sharp! or Night And Day. That album is where Breaking Us in Two comes from. I once saw him do an accapella version of Is She Really Going Out With Him on a BBC programme in the early eighties dont know if he still does this in his live shows or not?

Anyway im off to play the song title game again.

[migdd]

I have the first three albums but lost my way after Jumpin' Jive but of course I'm aware of his early/mid-eighties hits. I think I'll give the new album (Rain) a try. Joe has been touring extensively this year. See johnfoyle's account of one of those shows on this thread.

[spooky girlfriend]

Seen him twice with Doc, once with his original band on the Volume IV tour in a small venue in Atlanta about 4 years ago, then a couple of years ago at the Ryman where we met us with cosmos. That was a really interesting show, because it was with Todd Rundgren and an instrumental group called Ethel. Doc and I really wanted to catch him this past April in Atlanta but I had some health issues and we totally missed the ticket sales (pretty much did the same with Elvis in Nashville, sadly).

Some people like him, some don't. His music is all over the place, in genres. He's like Elvis in that he does whatever he wants, whether he thinks people will like it or not. I think you would enjoy it. Sounds wonderful.

[always dancing]

I am a Joe Jackson and Graham Parker fan and saw both within the last year. I saw GP at a coffee house that had about 50 seats. I sat on a bar stool right in front of him. Great personal show. I saw Joe Jackson at the Keswick in Philadelphia (1300 seats). It was excellant. JJ is a little like EC in that he has reinvented himself and has tried different things. He still has his additude while Elvis has softened a bit (not that that is bad). Have you ever read JJ blog on smoking? It is a little out there.

[Otis Westinghouse]

I look forward to his blog on lung cancer.

[bambooneedle]

Not a Joe fan but he plays pretty good piano on Suzanne Vega's Left Of Centre http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZNCnfS5SeY

[johnfoyle]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Live-At-BBC-Joe ... 910&sr=1-1

Live At The BBC
~ Joe Jackson

January 26, 2009

Disc: 1
1. One More Time
2. Got The Time
3. Fools In Love
4. I'm The Man
5. Look Sharp!
6. Cancer
7. Real Men
8. Breaking Us In Two
9. Fools In Love
10. Chinatown
11. Target
12. T.V. Age
13. It's Different For Girls
14. Tuxedo Junction
15. Steppin' Out
Disc: 2
1. Sunday Papers
2. One More Time
3. Friday
4. It's Different For Girls
5. Don't Wanna Be Like That
6. Happy Loving Couples
7. I'm The Man
8. Got The Time
9. Is She Really Going Out With Him?
10. Come On
11. On Your Radio
12. Another World
13. Sunday Papers
14. Look Sharp!
15. Is She Really Going Out With Him?
16. Steppin' Out
17. A Slow Song

Bjoern notes on a J.J. fan list-


I just compared the amazon tracklist with my JJ radio shows and BBC stuff. It seems like the sources might be as follows:

CD 1 - Track 1-4 John Peel Session (early 1979?)
- Track 5-15 Hammersmith Odeon, London (15. Aug. 1982)
CD 2 - Track 1-10 Hatfield Polytechnic (29. Nov. 1979)
- Track 11-17 Regal Theatre, Hitchin (Sight & Sound In Concert, 22. Jan. 1983)

[Mikeh]

I know there are a lot of similarities between JJ and EC - they emerged at the same time from the UK new wave scene; they both went off tangents with JJ's Jumping Jive and EC's Almost Blue around the same time; they have both recorded classical albums and by and large done their own things.

But does anyone know if they have ever met? I think it would make a great Spectacle show!

[migdd]

Don't know if they've ever met.

My Spectacle dream show is a guitar/piano pull with EC, JJ and Graham Parker. Dream on!