katefans@chinet.chi.il.us (Chris Williams) (04/26/91)
Vickie here. Don't know when I'll have a chance to post again so I'm taking advantage of it to comment on some Happy posts. Sorry I'm so out-of date. Charles from Athens (Hetch Hetchy's home town-Yay!) writes: > Since it'll be a little while till we can get there (did I mention I hate > having classes all the time?) I wonder if anyone has noticed any of Happy's > music for sale there. I've seen a lot of posts about mail-ordering her > things, but is it possible to buy from Tower? Please e-mail me any > information. I WISH!! Believe me, when Happy's music is carried in Tower it will be cause for all Happyfans to celebrate non-stop for at least a month! One of the main things I want to stress to people is that Happy is now working at a "kitchen-table" level. Aural Gratification is a home operation. We're the ones who can make a difference in getting Happy's name out to people. Any gains made at a national/international level will be exciting and wonderful. We have the chance here to follow her career as it develops and to help her and cheer her on. Happy released _Rhodes Vol. I_ in 1986. I "found" her mid-1988. Most of you are just now discovering her and the time will come when other fans will be envious of us for having come in so early. I'm serious. Hell, I'm envious of those in Albany who've been fans since 1986 and got to hear _Vol. II_, _Rearmament_ and _Ecto_ when they were first released! It's so great to "be there" when albums are brand new. The problem from now on will be the excruciating wait between albums in the future. The nice thing is that we already have 5 wonderful albums from Happy to keep us satisfied. It would be awful if Happy never got any recognition outside the Albany area. As I said in my other post, I'd love to see her get a hit just so she can quit struggling to pay the bills and concentrate all her energy on her music. If that didn't happen, I'd still like to see her get past obscurity and be at least as well known as say, Jane Siberry is in America. Jane is very well known in Canada but is considered a "cult" artist here. Still, most people who are knowledgable about good music have at least heard of her. That's a decent goal for Happy fans to strive for. Buy the music, get familiar with it and then tell eveyone you know about it. Spread the word. ----------------------------- Kirstin writes: > A big Woof thanks to Chris and Vickie....i do have a > vocabulary that extends beyond "great" "fantastic" > "excellent" and "brilliant." I think I was Kateatonic, > losing all rational thought at Kate's godliness. > Thank you thank you thank you for everything. It was so wonderful having you here! I hope in the summer you're able to come back often. We only scratched the surface! I mean, we didn't even get around to "Delia Smith's Cookery Course" ! > Also thanks for guiding me in Happy's direction > love-hounds don't miss this woman! She is awesome!!!! > Im sending out my check tomorrow for Warpaint. My Pleasure! We're days behind on news and I've heard you've written something else but we won't see it until after this is posted. Bummer. ---------------------------- Lee Hounshell writes: > My Happy-Rhodes CD "Warpaint" arrived in the mail last Saturday. > For all you doubters out there, I strongly urge you to buy it. I > haven't yet ordered her cassette tapes, but I will now. I sure > wish all her material were available on CD.. she is a very > talented artist. The following is a track list of her CD album: > 1. Waking up - 4:06 > 2. Feed the Fire - 4:33 > 3. Murder - 4:54 > 4. To Live in Your World - 3:30 (my personal favorite) > 5. Phobos - 5:13 ^^ ^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^ > 6. Wrong Century - 4:22 > 7. Lay Me Down - 3:51 > 8. Terra Incognita - 4:33 > 9. All Things - 4:48 > 10. Words Weren't Made for Cowards - 5:20 > 11. Warpaint - 6:13 > 12. In Hiding - 3:10 It will be interesting to see if your favorite changes. Mine keeps changing. First it was Lay me Down, then it was All Things, then In Hiding, then Feed the Fire, then Terra Incognita. Ask me again next week! All the songs are so good that it's easy for one song to obsess me for a while, then I move on to the next one to discover and cherish. For instance, when I finally got around to reading the lyrics to Feed the Fire, and realized (from my conversations with Happy) that it was inspired by Kate Bush (among others), I was obsessed with it for nearly a week, and kept rewinding it to play it over and over. My current favorite is Words Weren't Made for Cowards. It's a truly great song. Though the lyrics tear at my heart, it's sure to stay my all-time favorite from the album. > the master tape. I took the chance and ordered the CD sight unseen > (well, unheard if you want to be acurate) and I'm astounded by her > music. I can't believe that a major record label hasn't jumped on > this woman yet!! With her talent, she's sure to be a major artist. We can only hope so. Tell everybody you know and play the music for them. If they like it, her name may stick in their brains and they can go on to tell other people about it. We can start the ball rolling for Happy. As far as a major label deal, I don't want her to have one unless they'll leave her alone and let her make the music she wants to make. Artistic freedom is much more important to Happy than fame and fortune, though fame and fortune would certainly help let Happy make the kind of music she wants to make. > can post that. For those of you who have both the tapes and the > CD, how to they compare?? Are the tapes near as good as the disk? > Which is your favorite? Larry posted a WONDERFUL response to this that I can't top, so I'll just agree with him that ALL of the tapes are worth getting and that you're in for many, many treats! It should be telling that you're hearing different things from different people about which early album is a favorite. For me it's Ecto & Vol. I (depending upon which one I'm listening to at the time), for Larry it's Rearmament, for Michael Mendelson it's Vol. II. That should tell you that they're all "Must-Haves" and it's impossible to pick one over the other. You probably understand by now that the early tapes don't compare in sound quality with _Warpaint_ because of the limited budgets involved. Once you hear them though, you'll see that it doesn't matter one little bit! The sound quality isn't bad, just different, and the songs are so good that you'll soon (hopefully) not even notice. Larry says: > you have budget constraints. I'm kind of sentimental towards > _Rearmament_, myself. And _Rhodes Vol. 2_ is also a must-hear which > has been intimated by some as Happy's "weakest" album. Funny that one > of the most beautiful, heart-wrenching songs ever written > ("The Revelation") just so happens to be on that album. They don't mean > "weak" in the traditional music reviewer's sense, I'm certain. It's more > like _Vol. 2_ is "great," as opposed to the others being "wonderful." No, not weak. Not at all. Not with songs like "Come Here" "The Revelation", "Where Do I Go?", "Noone Here", "To the Funnyfarm", "Asylum Master" plus the other 7 great songs. Weak? Who said weak? Not me! I (at one time) would have called _Rearmament_ weak, but I've seen the light Larry, I'm sure you'll be happy to know. I came to appreciate the album more when I was listening on headphones while pouring over Jeff's lyric sheets. It's so odd. For the most part, I really liked most of the album before, but something about it really came across strong while I was looking at the lyrics. The "magic" finally hit me. I've been listening to it over and over again. I can't get enough of songs like "The Perfect Irony", "For We Believe", "Friend You'll Be", "I Have A Heart", "Because I Learn", "Rhodes Waltz", "Ally Ally Oxenfree", and MOST especially "'Till the Dawn Breaks" which has become my new favorite on that album. The other songs are all great too. I've put aside (for Happy) my distaste for the word "baby" and gained new respect and love for the song "Baby Don't Go" and also realized that the ONLY way to listen to the song "Dreams Are" is through headphones. The two characters interact via your brain and it's a wonderful feeling! I can even listen to "Box H.A.P" and "The Issue Is" without gagging now. The synth sounds she used on those particular songs used to irritate the hell out of me, but I found out that she's a huge Wendy Carlos fan so their use makes more sense to me now. To be honest, I'd still love to see those two songs re-recorded sometime. The songs really are very good and Happy's voice is utterly beautiful. Michael writes lots of nice stuff about the early tapes, plus: > If you haven't already ordered your copies, I'm not exactly sure how you > have been living with yourself on a day to day basis. Yeah! What he said! (she says as she's rolling on the floor with laughter!) > As for the possibility of producing the earlier work on CD, she said > there was a good chance Ecto would get done (eventually) but that the > other 3 might be made into a "best of" project. PLEASE NO!!!! There are > no songs, at least on I and II, that bear omission! Yeah! What he said again! (Thanks Jeff) This "Best of" business will be addressed. How can you pick a best of when all the songs are so good? If Happy were really going to do such a thing I'd want to make sure I got my opinions in. I could pick the songs I'd want to see included, but it would certainly be painful to have to leave any off. By the way, in case I've forgotten to give this information... For those interested: To get Happy's tapes and the new CD, write: Aural Gratification P.O. Box 8658 Academy Station Albany, NY 12208 Tapes are $9.95 + $1.50 p&h The CD is $13.99 + $2.00 p&h Albums: Rhodes Vol. I 1986 \ Rhodes Vol. II 1986 |- A GOOD year for Happy fans in Albany! Rearmament 1986 / Ecto 1987 Warpaint 1991 75 very excellent songs are on these 5 albums. All are well worth the price. The first three will most likely become collectors items, especially if she goes ahead with that CD project. (still far in the future though, if it happens at all) I think that's all for now. DAMN, I can't wait till we get our phone back on! The recession hit our household pretty hard but at least we have it much better than a lot of folks. Chris hasn't worked since December, but he's doing free-lance computer-graphics training and I still have my job so we're keeping the rent paid and the electricity on. There's little chance of our becoming homeless so our situation is far better than many unfortunate people. The phone bill had become too much of a burden and was a luxury we couldn't afford, so it was cut off. Once Chris has a regular job and we pay the three months we owe, we'll be back on line. Till next time we get access... Vickie (one of Vickie'n'Chris) "There's a growing force of people who care...In all the years of struggle it seems we're making way" Happy Rhodes
jburka@SILVER.UCS.INDIANA.EDU (Jeff Burka) (04/28/91)
Vickie writes: >I (at one time) >would have called _Rearmament_ weak, but I've seen the light Larry, I'm >sure you'll be happy to know. I came to appreciate the album more when I >was listening on headphones while pouring over Jeff's lyric sheets. I'm so happy to hear this! Makes all those hours of backing-and-forwarding with my walkman, hunched over the keyboard, worthwhile! I know that seeing the lyrics (or even just fragments) has increased my appreciation of so many songs. wrt "Friend You'll Be," I was listening to it last night (wasn't even paying much attention, as I'm studying for finals), and I heard the first line of the song perfectly clearly. I have no idea why the words escaped me every time I tried to transcribe it. As I recall, it's "I'm influenced by my friend," or something very close to that (I didn't write it down) >I can even listen to "Box H.A.P" and "The Issue Is" without gagging now. >The synth sounds she used on those particular songs used to irritate the >hell out of me, but I found out that she's a huge Wendy Carlos fan so >their use makes more sense to me now. To be honest, I'd still love to see >those two songs re-recorded sometime. The songs really are very good and >Happy's voice is utterly beautiful. I never found the synth sounds on these annoying at all. Maybe it's because Happy's vocals and lyrics are so beautiful. >For those interested: >To get Happy's tapes and the new CD, write: > >Aural Gratification >P.O. Box 8658 >Academy Station >Albany, NY 12208 > >Tapes are $9.95 + $1.50 p&h >The CD is $13.99 + $2.00 p&h > >Albums: >Rhodes Vol. I 1986 \ >Rhodes Vol. II 1986 |- A GOOD year for Happy fans in Albany! >Rearmament 1986 / >Ecto 1987 >Warpaint 1991 Just a point of interest: Vickie has mentioned that Happy is now 25 (actually, when will she be 26? In the letter she sent me in August, she said she was 25). If you put two and two together, you realize that Happy's first three albums came out when she was ~20. Roughly KaTe's age at the time of the release of TKI and LH. Except, of course, that Happy hadn't had the support of EMI and established musicians like Gilmour for several years. Jeff (who really should get back to sociology) "Yes they can say/She's not so great/That they could do the very same." -- |Jeffrey C. Burka |"I've lost my way through this world of | |jburka@silver.ucs.indiana.edu | profanities/I thrive on the wind and | |jburka@amber.ucs.indiana.edu | the rain and the cold." --Happy Rhodes|