As I discover music in the non-linear and non-contemporary fashion of this blog, I feel that I'm going from room to room in which each one there used to be parties. Parties that I'm not late to but of which I've missed completely and only by sifting through a mess of clues littered across the floor can I find solace in the fact that it must've been some happening party. I was eight years old when Jeff Buckley died and ten years after that I learned who he was and what he did. Like most people from my generation, this discovery came through his tallest standing legacy: his rendition of "Hallelujah". (In my excitement in trying to spread the voice of this lost artist to my friends, I falsely claimed he wrote the song. What a fool that boy, it was written by Leonard Cohen.)
A natural fascination with this lustful prayer inevitably lead to a thorough listening of his only album, 1994's Grace. Quickly claimed as a masterpiece which sales slowly caught up with, Jeff Buckley's music combined beauty and a stinging angst with deft guitar playing, ephemeral songwriting, and vocals either gritty or heavenly. As he was building his highly anticipated follow-up, Jeff sadly drowned in a slackwater channel of the Mississippi River at the age of 30. All that was left was a body washed up by Beale Street, an unfinished album, and the question of why Jeff had to leave so soon. The answer was supplied with a mythos that would surround Jeff and his music just as it had his father, Tim Buckley, who died at an even younger age of a heroin overdose.
I'm not going to say much more about Jeff Buckley because it has been covered a hundred times before and better. All I can originally provide is my own impression of Jeff and his impression on me, but I will save these for a later project for which this blog is partially a vehicle. In the meantime, ...
Here is the complete discography for Jeff Buckley:
Babylon Dungeon Sessions (1990 demo)
Live at St. Anne's Church (1991 live bootleg)
Songs to No One 1991-1992 (compilation with Gary Lucas)
Live on WFMU (1992 live bootleg)
Trash Can Demo Tape (1993 live bootleg)
Live at Sin-é (1993 live EP)
Live at Sin-é (1993 live double-album)
Live at CBGB's (1993 live bootleg)
Live on Man in the Moon (1994 live bootleg)
Live at the Mountain Stage (1994 live bootleg)
Live on Morning Becomes Eclectic (1994 live bootleg)
Peyote Radio Theatre (1994 live EP)
Grace (1994 single)
Grace
Live at the Pacific Club (1994 live bootleg)
Last Goodbye (1994 single)
Live in Fukuoka (1995 live bootleg)
The Rain Was Falling On That Day (1995 bootleg compilation)
Live at Berkeley's Sproul Plaza (1995 live bootleg)
So Real (1995 single)
Live at Meltdown Festival (1995 live bootleg)
Live à L'Olympia (1995 live bootleg)
Grace Around the World (1995 live compilation)
Eternal Life (1995 single)
Live from the Bataclan (1995 live EP)
Live at the Mercury Lounge (1995 live bootleg)
The Grace EP (1996 EP)
Mystery White Boy (1996 live compilation)
"Hallelujah" by Jeff Buckley
"Corpus Christi Carol" by Jeff Buckley
Interview with Jeff Buckley
"Back in N.Y.C." by Jeff Buckley
On the Death of Jeff Buckley
"Satisfied Mind" by Jeff Buckley
Pass the Headphones!!
No comments:
Post a Comment