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You learn something new every day

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Today i learned that Jackson Browne was once a member of The Nitty Gritty Dirt band. I never knew that.

What have you learned recently that took you by surprise

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  1. A few days ago i watched a video on one of the recent threads, namely Afternoon Delight by the Starlight Vocal Band. Great record mate! Nod ‘arf!! A bit of googling and Wiki reading revealed that the band was made up of 2 married couples. They were signed to a label co-founded by John Denver, and were opening for him on tour when this song was a big US hit. One of the chaps in the band, Bill Danoff, wrote this song. But prior to that he had written most of Take Me Home, Country Roads with a view to offering it to Johnny Cash. But then they met John Denver and played it to him. John, Bill and his wife Taffy Nivert finished the song off and are all credited co-writers. A few years later Bill co-wrote Boulder to Birmingham with Emmylou Harris

    So that’s a lot of stuff I learned in one day. I guess like most people I assumed John Denver had written Country Roads. Let’s be honest, any percentage of writing credit on that song would do you very nicely. I often watch Celia Woodsmith (singer with Della Mae) doing her Pretty Songs for a Sunday live stream. She played Country Roads this week and said that Della Mae have toured widely over the years in non-English speaking countries as part of a US cultural outreach programme and that when so doing, without fail they get asked to play this song at Concerts or Workshops. She reckons the song was commonly used in a Teaching English as a Foreign Language syllabus

    I remember our man in Thailand telling us a while back that every Thai bar band were guaranteed to know 2 songs; Hotel California and Country Roads

    • Sutter’s Mill was (bizarrely) another bar band/solo favourite, more popular than Hotel California. But that was a decade ago, and I have no idea what they’re playing now. Country Roads was given a meaning John Denver never intended by the Thai difficulty with the “r” and “l” sounds.

      • I saw a very good local singer guitarist play a solo set in a bar near me a couple of years ago. His name is Richard and he normally plays in Irish folk session bands. He dedicated one song to a departed pal who had been his biggest fan and had booked him to play at his 50th party. He loved the Irish material and asked Richard to play as much as possible, which he proceeded to do. During the half time break Richard was introduced to the birthday boy’s mother, and he asked her what she had thought of the set. She said “Do you play any Irish songs?”. He quickly took note of her advanced age and replied “Well, I played a few earlier, but if there’s any particular one you’d like, tell me now and if I know it I’ll happily play it for you”. She said “ooh, let me think. Ummmmm. I know, do you do Take Me Home, Country Roads”

        We all laughed but Richard said “The daft thing is, if you walked into any bar in Ireland which had either a jukebox or a live act, it wouldn’t be long before you heard that song”

  2. Coincidentally, yesterday I learned, from an ex prison officer mate of mine, that the phrase nitty gritty is thought to have originated in a term used by slave traders to refer either to the women or to the remains at the bottom of the transport ships that were covered in lice and grit.

  3. I discovered, a few days ago that jazz composer/bandleader/pianist Mike Gibbs was the musical director/arranger for Bill Fays first, eponymous album and that John Marshall, soon to replace Robert Wyatt in Soft Machine, played drums on it.

  5. Amazingly, I also learned today that Jackson Browne was a member of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. I think that it could be related to reading your post, but it could also be one of those amazing examples of synchronisation.

    However it did not take me by surprise – having read the post title, I was mentally prepared for the possibility of new knowledge.

    • I like that sort of Pete Frame musical family tree information and The Cars are one of the bands I like (but not love), so this grabbed my attention. “Really?”
      Well, seems to be partly true. The drummer from the Modern Lovers joined The Cars. Not quite Joy Division to New Order.
      Sorry to rain on your parade*, fentonsteve.

      * Rain Parade have family connections with The Bangles, Mazzy Star and Crazy Horse

  7. In 1940, my mother, a nursery school teacher in Willesden, was evacuated with her entire class to Highclere Castle (aka Downton Abbey). She always fondly remembered having her bottom pinched by Lord Porchester.

    Today I learned that one of her tiny charges was one David Sutch, later ennobled as Screaming Lord of That Ilk.

  8. Well a couple of days ago. The Avro Lancaster bomber was the upgraded and re-designed Avro Manchester, that had been nicknamed ‘Merlin’ due to its Rolls Royce engines.

  10. It’s not long ago that I found out that Jessica Hynes, who I always watch out for on TV shows as she is amazing, is the same actress who played Cheryl in The Royle Family under her pre-married name of Jessica Stevenson. I had no idea. ‘Duh’

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