David Albert "Dave" Alvin (born November 11, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, music producer and poet. He is a former and founding member of the roots rock band the Blasters. Alvin has recorded and performed as a solo artist since the late 1980s, and has been involved in various side projects and collaborations as well. He has had brief stints as a member of the bands X and the Knitters.
Early life
Alvin grew up in Downey, California. As teenagers, he and his older brother Phil Alvin attended blues, rockabilly, and country venues and listened to the music of T-Bone Walker, Big Joe Turner, and Lee Allen, among others. Alvin attended Long Beach State University.
Career
In 1979, Alvin and his brother Phil formed the roots rock band the Blasters with fellow Downey residents Bill Bateman and John Bazz. Alvin served as the group's lead guitarist and chief songwriter. Despite a growing fan base in the United States and Europe, Alvin left the band in 1986 and became the lead guitarist of the Los Angeles-based alternative rock band, X. He left X in 1987 to work on a solo project after the group recorded their album See How We Are. Alvin became a member of country-folk band the Knitters and appeared on their 1985 album Poor Little Critter on the Road and their 2005 follow-up, The Modern Sounds of The Knitters.
"All by Myself" is a power ballad by American artist Eric Carmen released in 1975. The verse is based on the second movement (Adagio sostenuto) of Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Opus 18. The chorus is borrowed from the song "Let's Pretend", that Carmen had recorded with the Raspberries in 1972.
The song was the first released on Carmen's first solo LP after leaving the power pop group the Raspberries and was released as the first single in December 1975, to great acclaim. It reached number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, number 1 on Cash Box Top 100 Singles and number 3 in Canada. The single sold more than one million copies in the United States and was certified gold by the RIAA in April 1976. "All By Myself" was Carmen's first of eight U.S. Top 40 hits. In the UK, however, this was his only Top 40 success, peaking at number 12. In a 2006 poll for UK's Five programme Britain's Favourite Break-up Songs, Eric Carmen's version of this song was voted seventeenth.
Goodnight Vienna is the fourth studio album by Ringo Starr. It was recorded in the summer of 1974 in Los Angeles, and released later that year. Goodnight Vienna followed the commercially successful predecessor Ringo, and Starr used many of the same players, including Billy Preston, Klaus Voormann, Robbie Robertson, Harry Nilsson, and producer Richard Perry. The title is a Liverpool slang phrase meaning "it's all over".
Background and recording
While all three other former Beatles had contributed to Ringo (1973), only John Lennon contributed to Goodnight Vienna as Paul McCartney was busy with his band Wings promoting the album Band on the Run and George Harrison was recording Dark Horse.
On 17 June 1974, Starr called Lennon, who was about to record his Walls and Bridges album, and asked him to write a song he could include on his next album. Lennon wrote what became the title track, "Goodnight Vienna". A demo of "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" was recorded by Lennon on 28 June, with the session musicians from Walls & Bridges and sent to Starr in advance of the sessions. Besides writing and playing piano on the title track, Lennon suggested Starr cover The Platters' hit "Only You (And You Alone)" playing acoustic guitar and providing a guide vocal for Starr to follow. Starr's versions of both "Only You (And You Alone)" and "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" were recorded at a session produced by Lennon.Elton John also contributed a track, "Snookeroo", co-written with Bernie Taupin.Harry Nilsson gave Starr the track "Easy for Me", which he later recorded his own version of for his Duit on Mon Dei album.
All by Myself is a 1982 album by Shirley Bassey. Having ended her contract with United Artists around 1980 (around the time that label was sold to Bassey's former home EMI), Bassey took a break from recording, and then began releasing albums on various labels. All by Myself was the first of these, issued on the Applause label. 1982 was the dawn of the CD era, and this was her first-ever album to be issued on CD. The album was also issued on LP and cassette. In the UK and some other countries, the album was titled Love Songs, with identical cover art, and under that name it charted for five weeks on the UK albums chart, on the K-tel label, peaking at #48. The original CD has since become scarce, though the songs have appeared on many compilations.
Track listing
Podcasts:
Dave Alvin
ALBUMS
- Common Ground released: 2014
- Eleven Eleven released: 2011
- The Best Of The Hightone Years released: 2008
- Live From Austin TX released: 2007
- West of the West released: 2006
- Ashgrove released: 2004
- Public Domain: Songs From the Wild Land released: 2001
- Blackjack David released: 1998
- King of California released: 1994
- Museum of Heart released: 1993
- Blue Blvd released: 1991
- Romeo's Escape released: 1987
- Outtakes in California released:
Dave Alvin
ALBUMS
- Touch My Heart: A Tribute to Johnny Paycheck released: 2004
- In Their Own Words, Volume 1 released:
Touch My Heart: A Tribute to Johnny Paycheck
Released 2004- If I'm Gonna Sink (I Might As Well Go to the Bottom)
- Someone to Give My Love To
- I'm Barely Hangin' on to Me
- Shakin' The Blues
- I Did the Right Thing
- She's All I Got
- Touch My Heart
- I'm The Only Hell My Momma Ever Raised
- I Want You to Know
- 11 Months and 29 Days
- Apartment #9
- The Lovin' Mahine
- Motel Time Again
- A Man That's Satisfied
- Take This Job and Shove It
- Old Violin
In Their Own Words, Volume 1
- Intro
- King of the New York Streets
- Intro
- I Heard It Through the Grapevine
- Intro
- I Wanna Be Sedated
- Intro
- I Feel So Good
- Intro
- Just What I Neeeded
- Intro
- At Seventeen
- Intro
- Wichita Lineman
- Intro
- Andersonville
- Intro
- Anna
- Intro
- Let's Talk Dirty in Hawaiian
- Intro
- I Need Love
- Intro
- Positively 4th Street
- Intro
- No Woman, No Cry
- Intro
- That's the Way Love Goes
- Intro
- Will the Circle Be Unbroken
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
-
by Dave Alvin
Blue Wing
by: Dave AlvinHe had a blue wing tattooed on his shoulder
Well it might have been a blue bird I don't know
But he gets stone drunk and talks about Alaska
The salmon boats and 45 below
He said he got that blue wing up in Walla Walla
Where his cellmate there was Little Willy John
And Willy he was once a great blues singer
And winging Willy wrote him up a song
He said It's dark in here can't see the sky
But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
And I fly away beyond these walls
Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
On a poor man's dreams.
They paroled Blue Wing in August, of 1963
And he moved on picking apples to the town of Wenatchee
Then winter finally caught him in a run down trailer
park
On the South side of Seattle where the days grow gray
and dark
And he drank and he dreamt of visions when the salmon
still ran free
And his fathers, fathers crossed that wild old Bering
And the land belonged to everyone and there were old
songs yet to sing
Now it's narrowed down to a cheap hotel and a tattooed
prison wing
He said It's dark in here can't see the sky
But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
And I fly away beyond these walls
Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
On a poor man's dreams.
Well he drank his way to LA And that's where he died
But no one knew his Christian name and there was no one
there to cry
But I dreamt there was a service A preacher and a cheap
pine box
And half way through the service Blue wing began to
talk
He said It's dark in here can't see the sky
But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
And then I fly away beyond these walls
Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
On a poor man's dreams.
Yeah yeah On a poor man's dreams