Discovering Bob Seger was cool once
was a lot like discovering
Steve Winwood had played with Hendrix
when the only thing I had heard was
“Higher Love”
and then discovering Traffic and Blind Faith.
On the 60′s channel on the satellite radio at work
they would occasionally play this song,
“Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man.”
I loved it, and finally was able
to stop whatever candy related work I was doing
in time to get over there and see who it was by -
The Bob Seger System.
The Bob Seger System?
Started hunting for it – Kurt and Kevin at Soundex
couldn’t help – some guy at Sig’s told me that it
was outta print and I could find copies on amazon
for 30 bucks or so… yikes!
then a couple of weeks ago I find a torrent -
“Bob Seger – 1966-1975.”
it included 3 albums by the system,
it included 3 albums by the system,
a collection of early singles, and a lot more…
YAY!
So I’ve been listening to The Bob Seger System
and wondering how you get from this
to this
Sure, I liked “Old Time Rock’n'Roll” back in the risky business days, and “Katmandu” made me think maybe he was o.k…
but discovering the old stuff makes “Turn the Page” make sense…
Some of the stuff in this collection wouldn’t be out of place on a 60′s psych comp with the likes of The 13th Floor Elevators,
other songs just plain rock… Too often there is bad psych panning (guitar solos move back and forth a LOT) but overall the records sound great – fat bass and drums that sound like drums and killer organ!
I wish somebody would remix/remaster and rerelease these records.
The early stuff really gives you the sense that these people were FREAKS.
Listening to the early stuff I no longer wonder why they got hassled in coffee shops
all over detroit and where ever else they traveled in rural and industrial america.
but how do you get from there to Beverly Hills Cop II?
is it just age? hunger for a hit? what?
I could talk about Bob Seger all day…
but I’ll stop now as I have to get ready to go be an extra in a student film!
whoohoo!
Oh dear god there it is.
Glad to have you on board Mike – welcome.
Btw, I listed you as Kid Ornery in the right margin. Let me know if you want to go by something else.
“how you get from this to this?”
ZZ Top knows. Neil Young tried not to think about it. Keith Moon and John Bonham might have seen it all too clearly in their bands future. Queen embraced it.
Neil Young made crappy records off and on throughout his career so he didn’t have to pile them on all at the end…
Good thing too, or there’s be nothing but Trans and Shocking Pinks in Neil’s future…
I have never been able to tolerate Seger throughout my entire musical life and his entire musical career. That includes the System stuff too. Sure, Ramblin’ was more organic, but I have more fun with the BHC2 song to be perfectly honest. Either way, I think they are both better left in the margins of my brain. However, regardless of my opinion of Detroit’s native son, I really enjoyed your laying it out there with much the same curious enthusiasm that Marshall uses in his posts. So there you go. Nice post. Keep ‘em coming!
Is it going to be that BS will dominate the next podcast? I am glad you are drinking the water that you were led to Kid, but what about the economy? Oh well. And here’s a question too, while there is still time for BS to be the dopamine that will urge J.C. to pull his freak flag outta his pants and salute, can he veer again? Will Bob Seger take that career leap that will make somebody like Genesis P-Orridge seem like a 1950′s housewife (inside, not outside) when compared to him? Just take a look at Leonard Cohen these days. I’ve heard he is dancing around like a stripper on meth and making dollars for the temple too.