Just Like Jon

Book on musicians a gold mine

Reviewed by Aaron W. Hughey
Jan 22, 2017

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“The Vinyl Dialogues, Volume III: Stacks of Wax” by Mike Morsch. Columbus, Ohio: Biblio Publishing, 2016, 308 pages, $16.95.

“ ‘The Vinyl Dialogues’ series has, from the beginning, been about accurately documenting the recollections and perspectives of the artists who made the music that is the soundtrack of my generation, specifically in the 1960s and 1970s,” Mike Morsch explains in the preface to “The Vinyl Dialogues, Volume III: Stacks of Wax,” his latest addition to the series he initiated a couple of years ago. “But there seems to be a sense of urgency now. The artists who crafted the soundtrack of our lives are getting older, and some of them are ‘moving on.’ And with them go those stories about the making of the music.”

As implied by the title, this is the third volume in “The Vinyl Dialogues” series, the first being “The Vinyl Dialogues: Stories Behind Memorable Albums of the 1970s as Told by the Artists,” which was published in 2014 (and reviewed in the Daily News on Nov. 7, 2014), which was followed by “The Vinyl Dialogues, Volume II: Dropping the Needle... on More Albums of the 1970s,” which was released in 2015 (and reviewed Nov. 22, 2015). Both were instant must-reads for anyone who came of age during the 1960s and 1970s and both have been accepted for inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame archives. I suspect the third volume will find a home there as well.

“Stacks of Wax” is a virtual gold mine of insights and inside stories of how some of the most enduring music the world has ever known was created. What makes Morsch’s work stand out from many of his contemporaries who are writing about the music from this era, however, is that his narrative is based entirely on 28 personal interviews he conducted with the artists who are featured in this intimate chronicle of a bygone era in popular music. Most chapters are augmented with photographs of the individuals he interviewed, which adds to the overall appeal of the book. Among the seminal songwriters, musicians, performers and innovators interviewed were Natalie Cole, Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere and the Raiders, Fito de la Parra of Canned Heat, Walter Williams of the O’Jays, Peter Wolf of the J. Geils Band, Carl Palmer of Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Ruth Pointer of the Pointer Sisters, Rick Allen of Def Leppard, Henry Fambrough of the Spinners, Jim Messina of Loggins and Messina, Daryl Hall and John Oates of Hall and Oates and Art Garfunkel of Simon and Garfunkel. The man is definitely connected.