Halloween Music

You're on your own for last-minute costumes, but the library can outfit you with Halloween music. If you need a score:

• The Halloween Songbook: 16 Spooky Tunes of the Season (MP1977.H3 H3 1996)
• Moans, Groans & Skeletons: A "Recycled" Sing-Along for Halloween by Cheryl Lavender (MP1977.H3 L3 1991)

If you need some CD song suggestions, Sound Opinions devoted the October 26 broadcast to monsters. Check out the episode footnotes, then hit our catalog to search by song title. For example, we have "Dracula's Wedding" by Outkast on Speakerboxxx: The Love Below (CD 22368-22369).

Hammond's Folly

Bob Dylan signed a recording contract with Columbia Records on October 26, 1961. Legendary A&R man John Hammond discovered Dylan and brought him to the label over the objections of Columbia executives, who dubbed the signing "Hammond's Folly."

Of course we have shelves of books about Dylan, but why not learn more about the career of Hammond, who also played a major role in launching the careers of Billie Holiday, Count Basie, Aretha Franklin and Bruce Springsteen? Hammond was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, and you'll find a brief biography and timeline on their website. We have several books in our collection about him:

• John Hammond on Record: An Autobiography with Irving Townsend (ML429.H253 A3)
• The Producer: John Hammond and the Soul of American Music by Dunstan Prial (ML429.H26 P75 2006)

The 40th Anniversary of James Brown's Live at the Apollo Show

On October 24, 1962, James Brown staged and recorded the concert that became the legendary album Live at the Apollo, also known as The Apollo Theater Presents, in Person, the James Brown Show (CD 3605). The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame notes that Brown did so over the objections of Syd Nathan, who felt that no one would be interested in a live album of previously released material. Brown was clearly vindicated.

To learn more about it, we have book devoted to the album, Live at the Apollo by Douglas Wolk (ML420.B818 W65 2004).

Brown returned New York's Apollo Theater for two more albums, James Brown and the Famous Flames Live at the Apollo. Volume II (CD 26788-26789), recorded June 24-25, 1967, and The Great James Brown: Live at the Apollo 1995 (CD 5106). In addition, Disc 3 of I Got the Feelin': James Brown in the '60s (DVD 3478-3480) features a 1968 performance by Brown at the Apollo.

Honoring Larry Monroe

Whether you can make it to Larry Monroe's Recuerdo on Thursday night or not, there are plenty of ways to explore and honor his 50 years at Berklee. Among the highlights of the library's collection of Monroe materials are the Berklee Oral History Project interviews with him in 2007 (DVD 2827) and 2008 (DVD 3153).

Fun and Functional Tour Riders

We have previously mentioned how Van Halen ensured that their tour rider was read and followed. Iggy & the Stooges have a different approach. The band's stage manager Jos Grain has written one that is so funny that it invites careful reading. For example, in describing the monitor mix for guitar, it says, "clear and bright, like the Sound of jackboots on wet cobblestones, on a beautiful spring morning in 1932, just before it all went sour..." The Smoking Gun provides the complete document.

Iggy Pop And The Stooges And The Seven Dwarfs

Should you need to prepare your own technical rider, you could use this as a model, but it might be better to start with something more basic. And rather than starting from scratch, make use of our Music Business Contracts collection. It is available on the computer by the reference desk. Among the contracts is Booking: Artist Technical Rider. You can print or copy the contracts then add your own creative flourishes if you desire.

Pete Townshend: Hot Off the Presses

Couldn't get tickets to Pete Townshend's sold-out appearance at the Berklee Performance Center on Friday? The library can help mitigate your woe. We have his brand spankin' new memoir Who Am I (ML418.T695 A3 2012).

Regardless of whether you're going to see him speak, the library can help you brush up on your Who history. We have plenty of CDs, DVDs, and scores by the Who as well as Townshend's solo work. We also have plenty of books about the Who. Here is a sampling that will expose you to different parts of our collection.

• In our reference collection: The Who on Record: A Critical History, 1963-1998 by John Atkins (ML421.W46 A8 2000)
• In our oversize collection: Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere: The Complete Chronicle of the Who, 1958-1978 by Andy Neill & Matt Kent (ML421.W46 N45 2002)
• From elsewhere in our biography collection: Moon: The Life and Death of a Rock Legend by Tony Fletcher (ML419.M66 F5 1999)

A Sampling of This Year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominees

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has announced the 2013 nominees for induction. Here is a starting point from our collection for each artist.

• The Paul Butterfield Blues Band: The Paul Butterfield Blues Band (CD 16094)
• Chic: The best of Chic: Dance, Dance, Dance (CD 8131)
• Deep Purple: Machine Head (CD 15706)
• Heart: Dreamboat Annie (CD 2765)
• Joan Jett and the Blackhearts: I Love Rock 'n' Roll (Annex CD (Box 72))
• Albert King: The Ultimate Collection (CD 7997-7998)
• Kraftwerk: Trans-Europe Express (CD 16442)
• The Marvelettes: Deliver: The Singles, 1961-1971 (CD 5169-5170)
• The Meters: The Meters Anthology: Funkify Your Life (CD 7479-7480)
• Randy Newman: 12 Songs (CD 14947)
• N.W.A.: Straight Outta Compton (CD 23252)
• Procol Harum: The Best of Procol Harum (CD 13177)
• Public Enemy: It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (CD 194)
• Rush: Moving Pictures (CD 1705)
• Donna Summer: Bad Girls (CD 33650)

Rolling Stone Featuring Berklee's Amy Heidemann

Berklee alumna Amy Heidmann of Karmin won the poll to be the featured cover for Rolling Stone's Women Who Rock 2012 issue. Come in to the library to see the October 11 issue with her on the flip cover (Adele is on the front cover.) It has articles on both Karmin and Psy, another former Berklee student.

We always have the most recent two months of issues of Rolling Stone in the library, but there are lots of ways of accessing it in addition to print, which you can find by checking the title in our Local Periodicals Holdings list. For Rolling Stone, we have several databases that index it and additional ones with full text. But we also have in-library access to the complete run back to 1967 on the computer by the reference desk.

The FBI Report on "Louie Louie"

For Banned Books Week, we have a display of banned music and books about music censorship. Among the songs we highlight is "Louie, Louie" by the Kingsmen, which Indiana governor Gov. Matthew Welsh deemed pornographic; he asked the state broadcasters association to ban the song.

Especially for primary source material enthusiasts, here is the FBI report on the investigation of the song's reported obscene lyrics, including the laboratory report that they "were unable to determine any of the wording in the record."

Thank you to Amanda Raab at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Library and Archives for bringing this to our attention.