THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (VOLUME 1): Work Left To Do

As 2019 nears its final curtain, I've continued to work on my book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). The book's formal proposal is in the hands of my agent, and prospective publishers should start receiving the pitch this month. Me? I am more than happy that the drudgery of crafting that proposal is behind me. I've spent the last few months getting back to the part I like a lot better: the writing itself.

The book's first draft is still incomplete. It's been a long process, perhaps made longer by my own determination to keep tweaking its parameters. At one point, I only had 15 or 16 chapters left to write; now, I have 19 chapters left to write. Math was never my strong suit.

But the book is stronger for the changes. Even as I add and delete chapters, I feel like I'm getting closer to a final design. Since my last update a week ago, I've completed first drafts of two more chapters, and--miraculously!--refrained from making any further changes to my proposed Table of Contents. This doesn't mean I won't still make more changes--let's not get crazy--but I'm growing increasingly satisfied with the plan as it stands.

This week, I completed chapters on "The Batman Theme" by Nelson Riddle and "Just Like Me" by Paul Revere & the Raiders. I'm particularly glad to have finished the Raiders entry, a chapter I meant to finish in late August or early September, but found elusive until this week. These are the chapters still awaiting a complete first draft:

NEIL DIAMOND: Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show
PINK FLOYD: Wish You Were Here
MERLE HAGGARD: Mama Tried
SHOES: Tomorrow Night
OTIS REDDING: (Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay
P. P. ARNOLD: The First Cut Is The Deepest
BOB DYLAN: Like A Rolling Stone
THE DAVE BRUBECK QUARTET: Take Five
DAVID RUFFIN: I Want You Back
DON HENLEY: The Boys Of Summer
THE RUNAWAYS: Cherry Bomb
THE COWSILLS: She Said To Me
RUFUS: Tell Me Something Good
THE SUPREMES: You Keep Me Hangin' On
LULU: To Sir, With love [museum outings montage]
MANNIX: Highway Lines
CHEAP TRICK: Surrender
THE O'JAYS: Put Your Hands Together
EDDIE & THE HOT RODS: Do Anything You Wanna Do



Of these, the Pink Floyd, Dylan, and Runaways chapters are the only ones without at least a placeholder line typed in their space; all of the others have at least a line or two, and some have several paragraphs written. 

Along the way, I've discarded a number of completed chapters. I just excised a finished chapter about The Raspberries, and I've previously removed entries written about The Castaways, The Ventures, The Buzzcocks, and Al Hirt. I also deleted finished chapters about The Monkees and The Ramones (both of whom are still represented in the book by other songs). A completed chapter about The Dandy Warhols never quite found its way into the line-up (though, oddly enough, I was able to repurpose one of its paragraphs for the Batman chapter), and I never really considered including an already-published chapter about The Beatles' "Hey Jude."

So...the work continues. And lest you think I've just been eating junk food and reading gossip magazines these past few months, let the record show that the completed draft already totals more than 99,000 words, and that's not counting anything from those 19 pending chapters. All of the foreword and afterword material is written, and all of the interludes are done, providing additional context. 

And you know what else is done?

94 of the 113 song entries have completed first drafts. 94 of 'em.

Those are for songs by The Monkees, The Ramones, Nelson Riddle, Paul Revere & the Raiders, The Beatles (twice), The Kinks (twice), Badfinger, Chuck Berry, Dusty Springfield, The Sex Pistols, Elvis Presley, Patti Smith, Little Richard, Crazy Elephant, Wilson Pickett, The Hollies, The Shirelles, Buddy Holly, Johnny Nash, Suzi Quatro, Gladys Knight & the Pips, The Rare Breed, The 13th Floor Elevators, The Rolling Stones, Prince, Lesley Gore, Translator, The Bobby Fuller Four, The Who, Todd Rundgren, The Flashcubes, Smokey Robinson & the Miracles, The New York Dolls, The Easybeats, Bruce Springsteen, Aretha Franklin, Baron Daemon & the Vampires, KISS, The Left Banke, The Bay City Rollers, The Knickerbockers, The Go-Go's, James Brown, Grand Funk, Sammy Ambrose, The First Class, The Isley Brothers, The Rubinoos, Big Star, The Flamin' Groovies, Material Issue, Marvin Gaye, The Searchers, The Flirtations, The Spinners, Alice Cooper, Sly and the Family Stone, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Led Zeppelin, The Bandwagon, The Bob Seger System, Ben E. King, The Byrds, The Everly Brothers, The Cocktail Slippers, Gene Pitney, The Velvet Underground, Freddie & the Dreamers, The Drifters, Sam & Dave, The Spongetones, The Trammps, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Grandmaster & Melle Mel, T. Rex, The Smithereens, Freda Payne, Elvis Costello & the Attractions, The Four Tops, Paul Collins, The Jive Five, The Dave Clark Five, Wham!, The Beach Boys, The Selecter, Solomon Burke, David Bowie, The Grateful Dead, Stevie Wonder, Eytan Mirsky, The Jayhawks, and The T-Bones. That's a lot of work already done. But yes, there is still much more yet to do.

And I believe it's gonna be worth it.



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Fans of pop music will want to check out Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, a new pop compilation benefiting SPARK! Syracuse, the home of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. TIR'N'RR Allstars--Steve Stoeckel, Bruce Gordon, Joel Tinnel, Stacy Carson, Eytan Mirsky, Teresa Cowles, Dan Pavelich, Irene Peña, Keith Klingensmith, and Rich Firestone--offer a fantastic new version of The Kinks' classic "Waterloo Sunset." That's supplemented by eleven more tracks (plus a hidden bonus track), including previously-unreleased gems from The Click Beetles, Eytan Mirsky, Pop Co-Op, Irene Peña, Michael Slawter (covering The Posies), and The Anderson Council (covering XTC), a new remix of "Infinite Soul" by The Grip Weeds, and familiar TIRnRR Fave Raves by Vegas With Randolph, Gretchen's Wheel, The Armoires, and Pacific Soul Ltd. Oh, and that mystery bonus track? It's exquisite. You need this. You're buying it from Futureman.

(And you can still get our 2017 compilation This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4, on CD from Kool Kat Musik and as a download from Futureman Records.)

Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 100 essays (and then some) about 100 tracks, plus two bonus instrumentals, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).