The mind is an interesting thing. The other day BTO’s “Blue Collar” popped up on my Spotify Discover playlist. This is a song that I love, and I hadn’t heard it in years. The song reminded me of a similar song that my stepfather, Larry Steely, turned me onto and which came out around the same time, in the early ’70s. He had the album. The album name was eponymous, and I remembered the cover was blue, and I remembered the artist was a brother to another known musician. I remembered the song itself was jazzy, in the mode that “Blue Collar” is jazzy.
But I could not remember the damn album name, the artist’s name, or the freaking song, for the life of me!
At first, I thought it was Edgar Winter’s brother Johnny Winter. So, I looked up Johnny Winter songs and albums, and no joy – not even close. So I thought – who else? Well, Greg Allman – “Allman” – hmm, could be the one. So I looked up to see if it was Duane Allman. So, again, I looked up Duane Allman records and albums. No Joy.
It was bugging me! Who could it be? I tried Googling “albums with blue covers” and saw a whole bunch: Joni Mitchell’s “Blue,” of course, and many others. No Joy.
So, I thought, after about a half-hour of futzing around, well, maybe it’s lost forever. Larry passed away twelve years ago, so I couldn’t ask him. It looked like I hit a dead end.
So, I thought, after about a half-hour of futzing around, well, maybe it’s lost forever. Larry passed away twelve years ago, so I couldn’t ask him. It looked like I hit a dead end.
Larry once told me a trick he learned from a guru when he was in India: if you need to get an answer to a question, ask yourself the question before you go to sleep, and in the morning, you’ll get the answer. This – or something like this, anyway – is something that I have done over the years. Get the “unconscious mind” or the Universe, or whatever, working for you. Sometimes, there is something you can’t just get to that’s right under the surface, and just by asking yourself the question, somehow, the mind’s magic kicks in, and later, up pops the answer.
Today, I thought “Mark Allman.” Hmm. Now, I know there was no Allman brother named Mark, but I went to Youtube and searched anyway… And lo and behold, YouTube’s search-fu came up with it. But it wasn’t “Mark Allman.” In fact, it was not a famous brother to anyone. It wasn’t even a person’s name; it was a band name: Mark-Almond. Mark-Almond!
Mark-Almond was a jazz-rock band made up of Jon Mark and Johnny Almond. The album had a grey cover, not blue. My memory added color when there was none. The song? “The City”. Such a great song, which I hadn’t heard in decades.
The chain of memory is fantastic. Here’s one song, BTO’s “Blue Collar,” which kicked off the process of digging out from somewhere in my soul “The City” by Mark-Almond.
The chain of memory is fantastic. Here’s one song, BTO’s “Blue Collar,” which kicked off the process of digging out from somewhere in my soul “The City” by Mark-Almond.
It’s a wonderful thing.
