In the Golden Autumn from 1983 kicks off with “Renee”, a driving pop song anchored by a drum machine and shimmering guitar jangle that recalls a rougher version of the Police at their peppiest. Having released several cassette albums prior to this one, Newell was working as a kitchen porter at this point, depressed and broke after a book deal gone bad. If Newell was in a dark place at this point in his life, he was still writing insanely catchy earworm pop songs. From the triumphant acoustic bounce of “A Halloway Person” to the Beatles Revolver-era stomp of “Please Don’t Step on My Rainbow” to the delightfully demented dance rock of “Marilyn on a Train”, In the Golden Autumn is stacked to the brim with hit songs from an alternate universe. Newell sounds genuinely hopeful throughout this album with only “Ghosts in Doorways” and the eerie sonic experiment “The Autumn Cornfield” providing moments of darkness. Newell brings a huge amount of sonic experimentation in to the pop song templates of In the Golden Autumn resulting in some of his most interesting work. “Sandstorm in Paradise” is a maelstrom of guitar meltdowns and vocal freak-outs over an eerie synth line that never takes away from the song’s underlying groove.
A collaboration between Will Isenogle (Merryl) and David Grubba (Enea). These four tracks contain fifty minutes of pure drone and pulsing rhythms in an improvisational setting. This is Prophet-heavy synth bliss.
Western music may live forever, but in the early '60s it had already suffered a decline. The singing cowboys had all but disappeared from the silver screen, and the days when western attire and repertoire were expected of country artists would soon be over. The album format became the new domain of commercial western music, and stalwarts like the Sons of the Pioneers and Tex Ritter continued to release moderately successful albums long after their hitmaking heydays. Eddy Arnold had a number one hit in 1955 with one of his recordings of "Cattle Call," but this 1963 LP was his first all-western album and his first to make the Billboard album charts. In addition to the expected western standards on Cattle Call, Arnold "westernizes" popular songs like "The Wayward Wind," and his smooth baritone fits these songs just as well as that of Rex Allen or Johnny Western. The re-recording of the title track is a haunting beauty with a real yodel rather than the falsetto vocal treatment it often receives, and is the version that is frequently anthologized even though it wasn't a hit. Well made and well remembered, Cattle Call is perhaps the most significant western album of the '60s.
As a consummate display of Atkins' refined finger picking style, this album sets its own lofty standards. A nearly invisible rhythm section underpins Atkins' one-man guitar ensemble with very subtle rhythm support on side one, where each number shines like a finished gem. To cite two examples, "Swedish Rhapsody" has dignity and subtle swing -- the perfect expression of a country gentleman -- and the note selection on "Liza" is astonishingly right every time. On side two, Atkins goes it alone, often leaning toward short, sometimes hokey classical pieces, the exception being "Unchained Melody," which has a simply stated first chorus followed by an echo-delayed overdubbed second chorus. In general, the tunes with rhythm on side one are more ingratiating than the unaccompanied pieces on side two, yet they all display a relaxed, confident musicality at all times.
Chet Atkins Picks the Best is the title of a recording by guitarist Chet Atkins. At the Grammy Awards of 1968, Chet Atkins Picks the Best won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.
