Distributed by Music Video Distributors
Review by Joe Viglione
#1 on the http://www.joevigtop40.com
The interesting thing about this marvelous CD package is that you see the contributing artists in a different light. Billie Joe Royal, resplendent in “Down in the Boondocks” guitar riffs here imitates Dylan’s voice in “These Are Not My People,” https://youtu.be/Xm-kjyTrosc introducing listeners to non-hit songs that they may not have heard before. Boondoicks was written by the great Joe South and has Royal sounding like Gene Pitney.
Eric Andersen’s “Honey” is here, though his rendition of Arthur Crudup’s “That’s All Right Mama,” a song Dylan also covered, might have been more obvious. Still, this compilation is teaching the audience lesser known songs from these artists. This writer has interviewed Tom Rush at least three times or more and I’ve never heard “You Can’t Tell a Book By It’s Cover” from Rush’s Take a Little Walk With Me album. He absolutely has the Dylan vibe here. Meanwhile Dion himself, from Kickin’ Child The Lost 1965 album, produced by Tom Wilson, also on Bronx Blues, a far cry from “Runaround Sue,” in fact, it sounds more Dylan than Dion. Bobby Darin’s with the highway patrol checking up on his gender with “Me and Mr. Hohner” is so far from “Mack the Knife,” and even further from “Beyond the Sea.” Who knew???
Lou Reed’s “Men of Good Fortune” is a far cry from Lou’s song of the same name on the Berlin album and artists as diverse as Bob Seger and Boz Scaggs are mixed in with the obvious P.F. Sloan with “Halloween Mary” (he wrote “Eve of Destruction”) and Barry MaGuire’s “Let Me Tell You Where It’s At” (he sang the hit version of “Eve of Destruction”) with Donovan’s “Universal Soldier” the only song here that has any semblance of a hit record from the era, this compilation, He Took Us By Storm is as daring financially as it is adventurous artistically. The publishing alone on 25 titles has got to be two and a half times what a vinyl ten-song album pays out. The cover of the album is mind-blowing too with many of the artists said to have been inspired by Zimmerman popping out of his head. A unique and progressive album in this era of tinnier speakers in your coffee shop and too much bass. Truly great stuff that is back to the future.