My Record Collection Trivia Quiz

Answer: Uncle Charlie and his Dog Teddy

"Uncle Charlie and his Dog Teddy" is a great album, period. Released in 1970, this is the album that really established the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band as an important band. In addition to "Bojangles", the album contains covers of Kenny Loggins "House at Pooh Corner", Randy Newman's "Living Without You" and Mike Nesmith's lovely "Propinquity". Add to that some brilliant instrumentals and a really cool album cover and you have one of the great country rock albums of all time.

Answer: Seatrain

Apparently, Martin was assigned to produce "Seatrain"; he went on to produce another album for them, "Marblehead Messenger", but it is inferior to their first effort together. After a few personnel changes, the band split up having never really achieved commercial success.

But the group's first collaboration with Martin has some great moments, especially "Thirteen Questions", which was released as a single but didn't get the airplay it deserved.

Answer: Livingston Taylor

James Taylor's younger brother Livingston is still making music. While his career has largely been overshadowed by his brother's, he has consistently turned out well crafted folk rock. "Over the Rainbow" is, for me, the highwater mark of his career. Livingston has contributed to his brother James' career; for JT's "Hourglass" in 1997, Livingston wrote "Boatman", one of the album's best tracks. Two other Taylor siblings, Kate and Alex, had brief recording careers as well.

Answer: Randy Newman

I found "Nilsson Sings Newman" in the cut-out bin at a record store in Ithaca, New York. It cost me two dollars. What a deal. This is a beautiful album, with Harry's vocals at their most supple and expressive. Particularly nice is his version of "Dayton, Ohio 1903", Newman's nostalgic ode to the simplicity of an earlier time. Newman plays piano on all of the songs and, oddly enough, seems to be cuing Harry on when to come in and feeding him lyrics.

It's all part of the album's unique charm.

Answer: Writer

James Taylor and David Crosby are two of the prominent musicians who played on "Writer." Taylor's trademark acoustic guitar shines through on a few numbers, most notably "Goin' Back", a Goffin-King song that was also a hit for the Byrds. "Child of Mine" and "No Easy Way Down" are two other highlights from this gem of an album.

Answer: James Taylor

Produced by Peter Asher of Peter and Gordon, James Taylor gives credit for this album's very existence to the Beatles. An early--and rare--non-Beatles release on Apple, the album contained some great songs. "Something in the Way She Moves" was the inspiration for George Harrison's "Something", not the other way around.

The album's best song was the classic "Carolina in my Mind" on which Paul McCartney played bass. Despite the quality of the songs, the album can get a bit tedious due to the excessive and over-produced filler that is designed to tie all the songs together in a "Side Two of Abbey Road" sort of way. James has since re-recorded three of the songs for later U.S. albums--the above two and "Rainy Day Man"--and ex-wife Carly Simon covered "Night Owl" on her insanely successful "No Secrets" album.

Answer: A Bit of Liverpool

All of the songs on this album had been written or previously performed by acts from the British Invasion. Thus, you had the girls putting their own spin on "Can't Buy Me Love", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "Bits and Pieces" and "How Do You Do It?". The Supremes also cover a couple of Motown hits that had been covered by British acts--"You've Really Got a Hold on Me" and "Do You Love Me?" They sound much more at home with the Motown numbers than they do with, say, "House of the Rising Sun".

Answer: The Magnificent Seven

"The Magnificent Seven" is a surprisingly good album, containing some spirited performances--particularly on their cover of the Tina Turner classic, "River Deep, Mountain High".

Answer: Friends

I have not seen "Friends" so I cannot comment on it. Roger Ebert saw it though; he gave it one star and used words such as "sickening" and "corrupt" and "horrible" to describe it. (Don't sugarcoat it, Roger. Give it to us straight!) Elton and Bernie's soundtrack has some nice moments though, particularly the title song.

Answer: Songs, Pictures and Stories of the Fabulous Beatles

How can there be such a thing as an "obscure" Beatles album? Well, their first album to be released in America was, of course, "Introducing the Beatles" on VeeJay Records. Why VeeJay? Because Capitol Records, EMI's American subsidiary, passed on the boys, convinced that no British rock and roll act would ever make it in the US.

They were wrong, of course, soon came to realize this and agreed to release all of the Beatles albums from here on in. So VeeJay had this one shot at making millions off of the Beatles and they were going to milk it for all it was worth. Thus, they repackaged the album in a nifty gatefold cover, added more pictures of the boys, miniature bios and, on the back, individual pictures of each Beatle; under each Beatle was the word "LOVES" and under that, the outline of a heart where you could paste your very own picture, thus becoming the envy of your friends and co-workers. One more note--VeeJay also released the same set of songs in a double album entitled "The Beatles vs The Four Seasons".

Included in the set were scorecards, more pictures, more bios and a "free bonus 8"x15" Beatles color picture suitable for framing." VeeJay billed this set as "The International Battle of the Century"--a bit of an overstatement in light of that whole World War II thing. Both of these albums are rare finds for Beatles collectors.