RINGO STARR
A: Wrack My Brain
B; Drumming is My Madness
(RCA 1981)
So, Ringo...hmmmm. I'm not sure how to start this one. I like Ringo, I'm sure many people do, he actually seems like the most personable member of The Beatles, but he seems to be the butt of so many jokes, and the popular perception is that he's not as good (musically) as the other three. Although this is not not uncommon perception with drummers. I reckon it's a bit unfair - I know that I couldn't do what Ringo does, and I've never heard a track on which he's performing and thought it sounded wrong, or too basic. In fact if his work is complementing and supporting melody, then actual he's doing his job and doing it well. Also he's not one of these jazz or rock drummers that think they's God's gift to percussion, and exercises it with lengthy, often interminable drum solos - nope - his work work is tight, and on the beat - just what is needed. Of course then he has to and go and sing...
Ringo Starr is unlikely to grace anyone's list of top 100 pop and rock vocalists - that's fine when making those kinds of lists many perfectly adequate and acceptable singers get left off, and Ringo is a perfectly adequate singer. This sounds like damning with faint praise, but there's plenty of mediocre singers out there who are more highly rated because the slack is taken up by the skill of their band, the orchestration and arrangement of their songs.
Wrack My Brain* is bright and breezy slice of pop. Honestly not much can be said, it's light, it's actually quite catchy. The guitar solo comes slightly from left field as it's a little (but not too much) country inflected. This goes for the little snatches of honky tonk sounding piano that pepper the arrangement. I quite like it, except just at they end when it ends in some very odd synthesised backing vocals - but that's a minor quibble.
Flipping the platter over we find Drumming is My Madness - which is good to know, that Ringo has a passion for his day job! Although the drumming here is doing nothing that particularly stands out - instead it's got a quirky groove, lead by a guitar, it's quite bassy, with some fun horns filling in. There's a couple of small drum breakouts, but actual there's a flute solo that stands out more. Ringo's singing is lesser than on the a-side of this disc. He alternately sounds either bored or amused at doing this, it's like this is just a fun piece that he's knocking off for himself, without ever anticipating that it'll see the light of day.
This record is light-hearted fun - never likely to trouble either the charts or serious musos, but as a snack between heavier bits of music it cleanses the palette, without filling you up.
*OK - so research is going against the ethos of this blog, but Wrack or Rack? I have a Yardbirds single called Rack My Mind (due on this blog one day!) - so surely one of these is wrong and I can get on my high horse about it! No - turns out that either are acceptable spellings, Wrack maybe slightly more old-fashioned, but it's just as acceptable.
Next Time some proper grunge...
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