Emotional Review

The Rolling Stones - Hackney Diamonds 2023 október 20., Geffen Records Nnna, végre itt az új “régóta várt” eposzi jelzővel már megjelenése előtt ellátott Stones album. Tizennyolc év után, szokták mondani, mintha a 2015-ös Blue and Lonesome feldolgozás album nem is számítana. Dehogynem számít, ha az első három is számított, éppenséggel szép búcsú lehetett volna az is, blues-feldolgozás keretbe foglalva a 60 éves ballisztikus pályát, Paul McCartney pedig mintha éppen ehhez alkotta volna bulvársajtóban nagyot ment megjegyzését, miszerint a Stones igazából “csak” egy jó kis blues-feldolgozás zenekar lett volna. Az, hogy régóta várt, szintén véleményes, én ugyan nem vártam. Nem akarásnak nyögés szokott lenni a vége, ez pedig szemlátomást nem nagyon akaródzott kigurulni. Mert minek is? Követelték az emberek az új dalokat? Mindenki unja már a régit, a koncerteken nincs mit játszani? Dehogy unják. Külső kényszer nem volt, és sokáig úgy tűnt, belső igény sem, bár gyakran hallottuk a “már tény...

S02 E06 I know, it's a bore, nobody listens to music any more the way I do, happy to see some covers in your feed and maybe some youtube, and that's it. But I still like the idea of spreading the faith, either it hits someone on the head, or just pops up someday to warn me that it'd hit me. This album is something that hits me each year. I bump in to it, and I just want to dip my ears into it, and then I can't help but listen the whole thing over and over for days. Then I fall in love with Margo, and then I realize I can't have her for many reasons, then I get fed up with and forget the whole Cowboy Junkies thing for another year. Now happy new year again.

This one is not an easy listen, but if you open your mind and soul, your heartbeat will soon be adjusted to the groove. My mum used this for a gym she held for people with heart disease, and it worked. Also the version of Rivers of Babylon is proof that any song can sound magical when played around a campfire, which inspired me to prove this with ill choices several times.

When talking about influences, Sir Paul may be the oddest choice from my part, but I can't avoid it. I've never been a Fab Head, my interest pointed in the opposite direction pretty early on. But this album has more than a fair share in the fact that London was the earliest and most magical mystery town, where I liked to imagine myself. And still, this fantasy can be recalled at any time whenever I step on those reverse roads or/while listening to this album. 

I first heard of Tonga at high school when a boy had a fame for having radio contact with someone from every country in the world. Do you know what’s a radio contact? It’s the pre-historic, analog version of Messenger. He reportedly had a contact with a guy from the island of Tonga, who stated he was the king of that country. Looking at the globe, the island looked distant and small enough that it sounded realistic. If you sent radio signs to that country, asking for a reply, there’s a chance that the person responding would be the King himself. Thanks for this, when years later, my friend , singer and Australian embassy worker Marie Louise Hill introduced me the music of this duo, their homeland sounded familiar to me. The girls were beautiful and exotic, and I was keen to hear some trad aboriginal music from them. But they were much more. Backed by songwriter Paul Kelly, they delivered a pleasant mix of classic rock, blues, country and reggae, with a local flavor, and simple but deep...

I was introduced to Antonio Carlos Jobim’s work in the late ’90s, thanks to Viktor Doby’s Brazilian girlfriend, whom he had met fleetingly in Greece on a volcano, but that didn’t stop her from visiting him in Budapest. Viktor was busy at that time, so as a student of architecture with plenty of free time I was honored to have been her guide. And this turned out to be an enjoyable task, because Priscillia was highly interested in our turn-of-the-century architecture and Art Nouveau. In return, she introduced Brazilian music to me. She presented this album to Viktor, who was less enthusiastic about it than I, soon developing into a bossa nova afficinado, that even made me write a tune titled “The Girl from the Volcano” (still unpublished).