Mick Jones turns 66 today....Mick Jones of the Clash.  One tends to think of the Clash as Joe Strummer's band, and one would tend to be right. Joe was the band's lead singer and primary spokesman and singer, but he wrote most of the songs with Mick or the rest of the band.  Mick, however, sang lead on 2 of the band's 3 mainstream hits (or maybe 3 of 4). In fact, for the casual listener, Mick may well be the voice of the Clash. When the band got experimental on Sandinista , he sang on the more straight forward pieces: power pop and rock. What we have hear is a collection of those songs on which he sings the lead - "Hitsville U.K.", with his girlfriend, Ellen Foley. It's great stuff. As I listen to this playlist, I realize that some of my favorite  Sandinista   tracks are those wherein Mick took the lead vocals.  Happy Birthday, Mick. The other Mick Jones, from Foreigner, is older. His birthday is in December.

Fifty years ago this week, Grand Funk Railroad sold out Shea Stadium in 72 hours, a feat that, 6 years earlier, took the Beatles about two weeks. To be fair, no band had ever played Shea before the Beatles. It may even be possible that the Mets were never able to sell it out in their early years. They were huge at the time, yet nobody could figure out why. Their first two albums, if you read up on them, are often compared unfavorably to Black Sabbath, or Spinal Tap around the time of  Brainhammer .  More "hard rock" than "heavy metal", the first two albums feature a lot of heavy boogie and hard funk riffing without the hooks of Zeppelin or Deep Purple. Production values are pretty lo-fi, they almost seem live. " Got This Thing on the Move " sounds like Blue Cheer or maybe early MC5 while " Paranoid " - not the Sabbath tune - could fit on the Stooges' Funhouse . They were all about the live show. In 1969, as yet unknown, the were well received...