I would say that “This Morning” Bud is in for more than he bargained for. We’ll be seeing a LOT more of Lorraine’s Polaroids as the Road Trip winds to a close here in the next week or so. Damn, this thing has grown a tad since I first wrote it! Captain’s prerogative I suppose.
🙂
In 1975, the Moody Blues had officially gone on “hiatus” after producing seven of the best “cosmic-rock” albums of the 60s and 70s. So, guitarist Justin Hayward and bassist John Lodge went into the studio to record an album of tracks that essentially WAS the Moody Blues’ eighth album. They used the Moody Blues producer, Tony Clarke, and even hired the same artist, Philip Travers, to do the gatefold album cover. Then to really stick it to the other members of the Moody Blues, they called themselves Blue Jays, after the first initials of their names. They only produced one album and then they each went solo.
The song “This Morning” has always been one of my favorite tunes from Justin Hayward, and he has a TON of them. He has a distinctive, thick, rich guitar sound that is really hard to imitate. And yes, I named my first son after him. I’m that way. There is a song on the album called “When You Wake Up” that I really wanted to use as today’s title, but it’s for the more hard-core Moody Blues fans. The album was re-released in 2004 on CD with some bonus tracks (and what album has NOT been re-released without bonus tracks, hmmm?).
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Discussion (51) ¬
Aaahhhh…this is gonna be good, lol.
Yes, the collection of Polaroids Lorraine is collecting will make a nice desktop here soon!
🙂
(Also, there’s a point to her taking a picture of Bud while he’s transformed… you’ll find out soon!)
Sounds good man. Can’t wait!
Ohh, Bud is sooo gonna take her Kodachrome away…
From all the crap he learned in high school…
(for you not in the know, we’re quoting Paul Simon’s “Kodachrome”)
Hurrah for you getting the reference!
Also, you keep rocking the facial expressions harder all the time. Especially, in this strip, Robyn’s in panel 3!
Shake it! Shake it like a polaroid picture……..
Shake, shake, shake… shake your booty!
Shake, shake, shake Senora, shake your body line
Haha nice.
My worst hangover wake up I had was the day after my 18th B’day (fyi, 18 is the majority and legal age for drinking in Quebec :P).
So I’m sleeping, totally drunk. I woke up with the close up face of my roommate (1 inch from my face). He’s looking at me with serious eyes. He points at my face and says (in a Darth Vader type of voice): “You ARE an ADULT!
That was creepy….
Ah, too many hang-over stories to fit into this tiny space, but trust me, I have some real winners. Never woke up with my roommate’s face staring at me… that would be creepy. I occasionally woke up in the back of my car at a bar somewhere. Nothing like the sunlight of the rising sun to jar you out of a drunk induced sleep. And, oh the looks you get from the stink of a good drunk on a Saturday night the following Sunday morning as the church folks are walking by you. That was so fun to do…
🙂
~raises hand~” Sir…what’s a hangover?”
Go ahead, hate me 😛
The best thing to do at Christmas – or even better, at Easter – is to drive past churches with a megaphone, shouting ‘HE’S NOT THE MESSIAH, HE’S A VERY NAUGHTY BOY!’
/Life of Brian moment
“Just how do you want us to ‘fuck-off’ my lord?” Best line in the movie…
Heheh that’s become a traditional romantic goodbye tradition every morning when I pack my DB off to the office 😀
…because traditions are always traditional. Hnuh, hnuh, hnuh.
haha, nice…
oops, that’s what I get for not reading the comments above *smacks forehead*
funny strip though!
Thanks, James!
We saw the Moody Blues in concert earlier this year, and they were still awesome!
I never saw them in the “classic” days when Mike Pinder was with the group, but I did see them MANY times in the 80s/90s and they did not fail to entertain each and every time.
I took my oldest son to see them back in like 2001 or so (so he could see his namesake perform live) and the kid fell asleep! At a rock concert? Anyway, he was not impressed, but at least I got to see them before Ray left the group to retire.
Met Mike Pinder in the 90s when he was pushing a solo release via Best Buy stores. He was quite the gentleman and would talk to each and every person at length if necessary. Very cool guy to say the least. I brought along his first solo album and he was tickled I had it and it looked worn out (I enjoy his music).
🙂
hmmmm.. blackmail?
Oh, Lorraine isn’t that devious… she’s just that bent… 🙂
Thanks for putting the music on the site! Today’s was an eye-opener. I’d never bothered to think of the Moodies as being the same post-Pinder, but like you say this was a Moodies track.
I loved the stuff up through Seventh Sojourn, but I pretty much ignored Octave and beyond. Part was that Steppin in a Slide Zone didn’t seem too hot, the other was that I’d always preferred Wakeman over Moraz in Yes, and replacing Pinder with Yes’s cast-off keyboardist seemed like a slap in the face.
But this is good stuff. Thanks.
Yeah, this track was done long before Moraz showed up. “Octave” was okay, but the band had splintered by that point and you could tell it by the sound.
Rick Wakeman is a killer keyboardist! I have a couple of his solo efforts and they are really good stuff. Gone are the days of good instrumentals too, so I miss all that stuff.
Hah! Wakeman was a boring old fart. Wakeman was *born* a bopring old fart. What you want from that era is the mighty Thijs van Leer and his band Focus. Trust me on this 😀
I have TWO Focus albums… 🙂
I may not be “hip” but I get around… 🙂
Bwahahaha that you do – thanks to the internet 😀
euuuuggghhhh…
*twitches uncontrollably*
the moody blues…
*twitches again*
–dee!
Yes, many people have the same feeling toward the Moody Blues. They came at me at the right age (13 in 1970) and I got hooked with “Question” and their really cool album covers (I am an artist of sorts…). I know that groups like the Moody Blues, ABBA, Neil Diamond and the Carpenters can bring about huge gags at the mere mention of their names.
But, I am into many types of music and can appreciate the fact that those folks were successful, whether people agree they should have been or not.
Hey, I just bought a Guitar Wolf album, that adds some points back…
🙂
Ohhh-kayyy…yet more proof that we were separated at birth…
~sings a few bars of Tights That I’ve Shat In and retires to a corner to discreetly regurgitate~
Yadda, yadda… come on, man… give a guy a break! 🙂
I’ll say again, I bought a Guitar Wolf album today.. actually TWO! Come on, that’s gotta be worth something…
😉
~grins~ Look, as far as I’m concerned it’s not a matter of talent; the Moodies had plenty of that. But they were so…damned…WET. And also, a university roommate played their stuff 24/7. Scarred me for life, it did, and not even his letting me occasionally drive his funky Lotus Europa made up for it!
b: man … i’ve spent years trying to erase the trauma that that band caused me…mk ultra ain’t got nothin’ on the moody blues in my world…*shudder* …
only through many, many years have i been able to therapeutically rid myself of the sheer terror that the moody blues caused me.
and by purchasing a guitar wolf record, you have taken a step toward the light.
welcome, brother. 😀
t: !!!!!!!!
yep. definitely more proof.
out of all the times i’ve rewritten the lyrics to that band’s songs in my head (to try and escape the torture, ie “i’m just about to stick my head in a fan”), that one never crossed my mind.
bless you. 😀
–dee!
Deedledum — you didn’t think of that title because you don’t wear tights, presumably. As a woman, I found it crashingly obvious 😛
My ancillary career as a parodist began some 40-odd years ago on one of my first-ever gigs, when the PA broke down and I launched into an instant improvisation – ‘I’ve thrown a custard at your face…and watched it dripping down your chin…’ These days, there are endless 21st birthday parties in Munster where my Bonnie Tyler send-up Totally Pissed at the Bar is sung (for some value of ‘sung’), and I’ve also morphed into ‘Weird Alice’ Lancrevic, the song-parody darling of kazillions of Terry Pratchett fans. What a strange world.
Ah-ha! See, it’s not the Moody Blues that got you, it’s being exposed to their music 24/7. Let me tell you, there is hardly a song out there that if played to death that you will not come to loath the song and the group due to the pain it connects with you.
I, on the other hand, connect the Moodies with gettin’ high, gettin’ laid and other nice things in life. To each his own, I say… and that’s exactly why I pick a variety of songs for you readers to reminisce about… good or bad!
🙂
Well, another 24/7-playing neighbour in Hollyweird subjected me to its only two albums in constant rotation: Iron Butterfly’s In-a-Gadda-da-Vida, and Van’s Moondance. Took me almost 30 years to be able to listen to the latter one again. As for Iron Butterfly, they were probably never worth listening to in the first place. Oh my, did they ever suck as a live band, too…
But no, my distaste for the Moodies harks to the very first time I heard their stuff. Same for ~shudders convulsively~ ELO 😛
i too was subjected to 24/7 moody schmooze playing, only i was unfortunate enough to get subjected to the entire gamut of their catalog, for several years. the catalog, shows, having to listen to one-sided overseas phone calls to their fanclub (whom the person who was torturing me with the music knew all the people who ran it by first name), etc. unfortunately, all the kraftwerk, devo, the pistols, etc and all the other stuff i was listening to at the time while not at home didn’t offset the waterboarding-via-ear i got while at home.
i didn’t really like it much the first time round with their music, but by the 2000th time with each record…
auuuuuuuuugggggggggghhhhhhhh.
don’t get me wrong, i like space rock (especially the newer bands, like spiritualized). but man, after hearing all the moody blues arrangements over and over and over and over and over again, and not really liking it upon first listen … “seventh sojourn”, “octave”, “to our children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children’s children” were all like aural cheese graters…
and yet another similarity…ELO … euuuugghhhh… *shudders*
you know, thee artiste, i feel lucky in the respect that my car’s cd player doesn’t gradually turn every cd i listen to into queen’s greatest hits. 😉
i do a lot of rewriting of songs in my head (and sometimes out loud if i have an audience, but only when its completely inappropriate, as that’s the only time it gets the most laughs). if i were to pull a parody record outta my hat, it wouldn’t sell well because it’d simply be too vulgar for mass consumption. 🙂
i had a neighbor recently that LOVED to listen to the same 10 songs over and over again…”unchained melody”, sabbath’s “changes” (of all the songs offa volume 4, why THAT one?) and the commodores’ “easy” were their three favourites. altho on david coverdale’s birthday, i heard the same 6 whitesnake songs all day long. apparently, variety isn’t the spice of drunk…
–deedle-dee-dee
Ddddddddee – a quick reply here to your reply-button-less answer further down the thread…
1) Are you sure you’ve left them in the car for the full two weeks? Or maybe it only works on audiocassettes 😛
2) Arrgh noooo arrgh arrgh nonononononooooarrggggghhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why oh why oh why did you have to remind me of the existence of the Commodes’ (not a mistype) Queasy?! Noooooo! Do you have any idea how long it took me to convince myself that that was only an extended bad dream I had once during cocaine psychosis? Aieeee! ~weeps, wails and gnashes teeth~
The only antidote I know is to retreat into my fond memories of the times when, having been induced by obscene amounts of black market cash to play weddings, we used to pull out my version of the Carpenters’ Close to You, as covered by a combination of Quo, the Toy Dolls, and Grand Funk Railroad, with backing vocals approached as an approximation of Spurs fans roaring on the terraces. Now *that’s* what I call music 😀
Buggrit, we didn’t get that room after all…sorry, Byron…
ta-fk-an:
0) i imagine that more than three tiers would get annoying if you like to keep yer browsers tidy.
1) yep. and the cd deck is well-cursed, having lost the face (stolen at the laundrodome) but yet it still remains on at very high volume, and the same cd has been stuck in there for the last year (luckily its an mp3 cd). drive-thru’s (when i can afford them) and cel phone conversations are lots of fun in my car since you can barely hear me over whatever’s blasting out of it at the time. warming up the car at 3am to go to the grocery store is hell. my neighbours love it.
2) sorry. that’s all i can say there. i’ve been trying to scrub that song straight outta my memory for years but i just keep getting reminded that it exists. once i forget, someone moves into my building and plays it over and over again. or i hear the damned thing blasting out in a car when i’m on my way home from somewhere at 2am. other commodores songs i’m totally ok with, but that one? nope. it just doesn’t go away. and if i have to suffer… 😉
so basically yer brain-floss for that tune is a song called “close to the pictures of nellie the elephant’s high falootin’ woman”?
that’d be more insane than ‘queasy’. 😀
i haven’t kept up with the toy dolls but man, that’s another band that is just fantastic. and another band whose records were always hard to get, stupidly expensive, and quickly worn out because they were so good. “bare faced cheek”, “idle gossip”, “a far out disc” and “dig that groove baby” are the best ones imho, altho you just can’t go wrong with them.
heh. we took over the thread again. d’oh! … told byron to toss ya my info, so the blame is squarely on him. 😉
–dee-funk’d.
Here we go again with an out-of-thread reply, and I ABSOLUTELY PROMIS it’s a short one… ~winks~
Delighted and unsurprised that you grok the Toy Dolls (Olga FTW!). And now that we’ve mentioned yet another band Byron undoubtedly doesn’t know about, I am sooo sending him a load of their finest, along with his copy of GW:WZ 😀 I first saw them somewhere around Reading in, let’s see, ’81, and have had a soft spot for them ever since. Damn’ fine players in every incarnation. And don’t forget to add Fisticuffs in Frederick Street and Dougie’s Giro to your list…
…and with that, it’s over and out for this discussion. See you on the next instalment of 1977. Hmm, I wonder if Byron should start a separate discussion board – Mister Wilkins’ Pandemonium Shadow Show and Rock and Roll Carnival, perhaps?
/transmission
I have forum software available… didn’t need until NOW…
🙂
I’m going to over-haul the 1977 site again here very soon and was going to add a Forum section… I’m not big on Forums, but they are good for conversations like these…
Also, you’re not the first person to mention the Toy Dolls to me, and I’m aware of them now, yes. Being that I’m not from England and never really heavy into the Punk scene, I am not aware of these types of bands… I guess I was too busy listening to the Moody Blues… *zing*
😉
d’oh! byron zinged! 😉
“dougy giro” is on “dig that groove baby” and “fisticuffs” is on “bare faced cheek”… 😀 both albums are classic and both tunes are classic too… olga is one HELL of a guitar player. he makes eddie van halen look like he’s standing still sometimes.
my gateway drug with that band was “nellie the elephant”. friend had the 12″ and forced me to listen to it.
awaiting the next installment of…
*zing!*
–dee!
Hahaha! That’s the reason I went and bought a camera, f’r the wake-up factor! 🙂
Cameras always got me slapped back in the day… I only WISH we had the digital stuff today back then… oh the images you’d have… But then I wouldn’t have a comic to draw then as you’d SEE all the goofy stuff I did!
🙂
Oh my,this could be a real Kodak moment.I like the Moody Blues as well as Led Zeppelin.Getting trapped by genre is silly as far as liking music goes.
I know, my hard rock friends always looked at me funny when I’d put on a Moody Blues album. Now, all you stoners out there should know that after a few good tokes, the Moody Blues are EXCELLENT… I mean all those talking voices, sliding Mellotrons… Come on, man!
(Not saying hotclaws is a stoner… just in genreral…) 🙂
My first Moodies experience was when an older relative played his brand-spanking-new Threshold of a Dream on our record player. As an impressionable 11-year-old already into 60’s psychedelic music (to this day I can never get enough of flanger effects), it was clear this was in the same category no matter how “normal” some people thought it might be. It always seemed to me that to appreciate the Moodies, you kind of had to know in advance it was stoner music — then you could really listen deeply and appreciate the twists and nuances in that context, rather than listen to them as straight ballads.
As for ELO… they did half a good album, then Roy Wood left to form Wizzard. And that was it, it was like ELO went from Jefferson Airplane straight to Starship thanks to Jeff Lynne. 10538 Overture was brilliant. After that, well…